Last Thursdayism

Defintion

Last Thursdayism, also Last Tuesdayism and Last Wednesdayism, is the unfalsifiable belief that the whole of the universe was created Last Thursday with the apparent age of an ancient universe.

Discussion

The belief, much like the belief in the Invisible Pink Unicorn, is a parody of one of the many creationist arguments that the universe is only 6000 years old despite having the appearance being of 15 billion-years-old, with the effect of age being brought about by the creation of starlight in transit, or by creating fossils of creatures which never existed to scatter through rock strata bearing witness to geological ages that never took place.

Last Thursdayism serves to parallel many creationist assertions to illustrate by analogy just how ridiculous these creationist assertions really are. For example, a common apology for the existence of ancient animal fossils is that they were placed by Satan to test the faith of the believer. The last Thursdayist may with equal logic say the same thing about last Wednesday's newspaper.