The problem with Young Earthism is that it kind of requires accepting the Matrix. Technically, we can never know if we're actually in the Matrix or not, because if we were, it would be such a good simulation that we'd have no way of knowing. I can never know if the world around me actually exists, or if I am just a disembodied mind being fed experiences by an
evil demon. Likewise, if an omnipotent deity created the universe 6,000 years ago (
or last Thursday) with the appearance of age, we would have no way of knowing, of confirming or denying it.
Those philosophical theories are all really interesting to think about, and they're certainly possible, but in order to function, we have to make certain assumptions that are, ultimately, unprovable. I have no way of actually knowing for certain that any of you actually exist physically outside of the experiences I have of you in my brain, let alone any way of knowing that you are sentient minds like I am, but I take those as postulates in order to live life. In order for science and rational thought to have meaning, we have to assume that the universe is not just a grand deception that was created five minutes ago. When Answers in Genesis argues that YEC is a possible way that the universe came about, yeah, it is, but only if literally every other conceivable arrangement of words is considered equally possible, because believing in YEC requires either rejecting the basic postulate that the world is consistent and understandable; or, at the very least, postulating the existence of a massive global conspiracy (possibly of demonic origin) among all scientists to suppress the truth of the earth's age. If either one of those is true, then how can we even study anything at all, if anything along the way can be thrown out just as easily?
Let's say I'm standing up and holding a pencil in my hand, and I ask, "If I let go of this pencil, what will happen?" You can say "It'll fall, because gravity will attract it toward the center of the earth, just as I've seen happen to many other things today." And you don't know that for certain, because I haven't let go of the pencil. It's also possible that the pencil will stay floating, because it's possible that at some point in the last few days, you were knocked unconscious and taken onto a spacecraft and now you're in a zero-g environment. But if we're going to allow that as a possibility, then we also have to admit that it's conceivably possible that the pencil will sprout wings and fly out. You've never seen a flying pencil before, but there are ways that one could conceivably exist, and it's not impossible for me to have one. In this new realm of possibilities, the only outcomes that are not possible are word salads, like "The pencil will radiate apple deaf at married bachelor." YEC is not word salad, but it is the zero-g theory -- yeah, it's a logically consistent possibility, but what reason is there to believe it?
Anyway, back on topic: Guys are cute.