Did the mountains come first or the river?

Regarding Duane Richter's letter, I do not argue with or dispute anyone's religious beliefs. I do believe that religion and science are not mutually exclusive. You can believe that God created all things on His own time frame, and science mainly explains the what, where, when and how of what we can physically observe or theorize.

No one on earth knows how long a Genesis "day" is when God created everything in six days (resting the seventh). It could be 24 hours or 24 million years. It is a scientific fact that the rotation rate of earth is slowing, recently measured to be slowing at 1.7 milliseconds per century, so that the rate was much faster in the far distant past, if you believe in scientific fact.

Regarding the Wind River Canyon and the power of water, Mr. Richter assumes that the mountain range was there before the river; therefore the river had to start at the top and cut its way down to form the canyon. Everyone knows that water does not flow uphill.

The scientific explanation for the canyon's creation (by water) is simple. The Wind River was in place first, coming downhill from its namesake mountain range flowing across the Wind River erosional basin. A gradual uplift of the earth's crust from underneath the river allowed it to cut down into the rock as the Owl Creek/Bridger range uplifted to its current height, avoiding being dammed. The power of water.

This canyon-creating mechanism is evident around the globe. A nearby example is the Shoshone River Canyon west of Cody. Why didn't the river just flow south a few miles and go around Cedar Mountain? Because the river was there first, and the mountains uplifted underneath it to form the canyon as the river cut down to avoid being dammed. The power of water. Same thing happened with the Grand Canyon in Arizona.

I can believe that God created the heavens and the earth. I can also accept the science community's efforts to explain what we can see. God made the rules; it is up to us to discover them. And we are, slowly but surely. People used to believe that bathing regularly caused disease. We now know that the opposite is true, that cleanliness prevents disease. If you believe in scientific fact.