Charles Darwin published his controversial views about biological evolution, a conflict between biblical literalists and geologists was brewing. Geologists such as Charles Lyell argued that the earth must be millions of years old. Defenders of Bishop Ussher’s young earth view appealed to the Noahic flood or to a supposed gap between a first creation and a second creation (or renovation of a creation ruined by a catastrophe) to explain the newly discovered fossil record and evidences of ancient upheavals in earth’s crust and canyons created by aeons of erosion.
