Light, stars, and creationism

[otseng]

If the stars were created on the fourth day, where did the light on the first day come from?

How can we see stars that are billions of light years away if creationism says the earth is less than 20,000 years old?

[DeoxyriboNucleicAcid]

The solution is simple. The bible is not to be taken literally.

[otseng]

That is one possible answer. But I like the theory presented by Dr Humphreys in Starlight and Time.

He theorizes that the universe did start off as a "Big Bang" but with one change, that the universe is bounded.

The typical Big Bang believers make an assumption that the universe is unbounded. That is, there is no edge to the universe. Why do they believe this? Because background radiation noise (from the Big Bang) is uniform in all directions from Earth. There are only two ways to explain this. Either we are near the center of the Big Bang or there is no center. And to have no center requires an unbounded universe with no edge.

There are huge implications in assuming that the universe is bounded. One is that we are near or even at the center of the universe. Another is that we are near the center of gravity of the universe. This in itself has other implications.

One is that time runs differently according to gravity. A clock closer to the center of gravity runs slower than a clock farther away from the center of gravity. This could account for some of the reasons why we can see starlight that are billions of light years away.

But, this does not answer the question how can light be made before the stars. I'll address that in a later post.

[DeoxyriboNucleicAcid]

[quote="otseng"]That is one possible answer. But I like the theory presented by Dr Humphreys in Starlight and Time. [quote]

I have given Dr Humphrey's background in another posting elsewhere in these pages. He simply is not a credible reference.

There is no 'centre' to the universe. The universe is expanding but it is expanding from every point. A better way to think of the universe's expansion might be to think of it as creating space between objects. It is limitless. To suggest it has boundaries is, with respect, foolish. We would have to ask what is on the other side of the boundary and then, of course, how big is that alleged area. Does that new area have a boundary too? What is beyond that? Etc, etc ad infinitum.

It is as misguided as the old 'First Cause' argument for the existence of God.

As a New Millennium Resolution, let's put superstition behind us at last. What a wonderful world this would be without the various gods and goblins and the resultant fear that superstition has inflicted upon us.

[otseng]

There is no 'centre' to the universe. The universe is expanding but it is expanding from every point. It is limitless. To suggest it has boundaries is, with respect, foolish. We would have to ask what is on the other side of the boundary and then, of course, how big is that alleged area. Does that new area have a boundary too? What is beyond that? Etc, etc ad infinitum.

To say that we don't know what is beyond our universe, therefore nothing is beyond it doesn't prove anything.

A better way to think of the universe's expansion might be to think of it as creating space between objects.

This would be true whether the universe is bounded or unbounded.

As a New Millennium Resolution, let's put superstition behind us at last. What a wonderful world this would be without the various gods and goblins and the resultant fear that superstition has inflicted upon us.

Uh, what does this have to do with anything, let alone this topic?

[otseng]

Assuming the universe is bounded also has some other interesting implications. At the moment of the Big Bang, where all matter is in one concentrated volume, it would've created a black hole. The gravitational strength would have been so strong to have created an event horizon. Nothing inside the event horizon can go outside the event horizon.

The moment of creation when God created light is when God expanded the singularity so that the matter could leave the event horizon. Without this supernatural explosion, nothing would've ever left the event horizon. So, this is why light was created before the stars were created.

As the matter expanded, the diameter of the event horizon collapsed.

There is an interesting anomoly when one approches an event horizon. Time goes at a different rate. Suppose an astronaut flies towards a black hole and has a telescope to see a clock on earth. As he approaches closer to the event horizon, he observes the clock on earth going faster. As he gets closer, he'll even see the stars moving very fast. The astronaut would experience a lot of time from the perspective of someone on earth.

As the event horizon collapsed, it would've hit earth also. And it would've experienced time differently than what happens elsewhere.

[CanadianBuddhist]

How can we see stars that are billions of light years away if creationism says the earth is less than 20,000 years old?

That's simple. Light takes along time to travel through space and astronomers know that most of the stars you see could be burnt out and new ones created. The light could have been on it's way but because it has so far to go the earth could have been created and evolved to it's current state before it reached here.

[DeoxyriboNucleicAcid]

There is no 'centre' to the universe. The universe is expanding but it is expanding from every point. It is limitless. To suggest it has boundaries is, with respect, foolish. We would have to ask what is on the other side of the boundary and then, of course, how big is that alleged area. Does that new area have a boundary too? What is beyond that? Etc, etc ad infinitum.

To say that we don't know what is beyond our universe, therefore nothing is beyond it doesn't prove anything.

I am not saying that we don't know what is beyond our Universe I am saying to suggest there is something beyond it is wrong. There cannot be a 'beyond' when you are describing everything. 'Universe' = noun: everything that exists anywhere.

A better way to think of the universe's expansion might be to think of it as creating space between objects.

This would be true whether the universe is bounded or unbounded.

I was explaining that as the Universe expands it creates the space into which it is expanding.

As a New Millennium Resolution, let's put superstition behind us at last. What a wonderful world this would be without the various gods and goblins and the resultant fear that superstition has inflicted upon us.

Uh, what does this have to do with anything, let alone this topic?

Point taken

[otseng]

I am not saying that we don't know what is beyond our Universe I am saying to suggest there is something beyond it is wrong. There cannot be a 'beyond' when you are describing everything. 'Universe' = noun: everything that exists anywhere.

I am limited by vocabulary. What I mean by "beyond" is what is outside of what we see. Since we are limited inside a universe, I cannot explain what is "outside" of it.

A better way to think of the universe's expansion might be to think of it as creating space between objects.

This would be true whether the universe is bounded or unbounded.

I was explaining that as the Universe expands it creates the space into which it is expanding.

But, even in an expanding bounded universe, space would also have to be "created".

What I find interesting about this theory is that it follows the Big Bang theory, but with only one modification, that the universe is bounded. And since it's not proven that the universe is unbounded, it is a plausible theory. And at the same time, the theory conforms to different aspects of the creation description in Genesis.

[Alan]

<The light could have been on it's way but because it has so far to go the earth could have been created and evolved to it's current state before it reached here.

>

A good point, except that lab tests put rocks and such on earth far older than that. Being well educated in the sciences, it's hard for me to dispute these tests to that degree. I'm reluctant, too, to say that the Bible is not literal, for fear that would be taken as a dismissal of its truth. Instead, can it be said that the Bible was never intended to be used to settle such questions or meant to be accurate in that way. And it is also highly subject to misinterpretation by any reader, isn't it? Therefore, such arguments are not terribly important. Well, my opinion, anyway.