Earth Archives

March 18, 2024March 17, 2024

The Origin of Life on Planet Earth

When I was in college in the late 1950s, our biology professor at Indiana University gave us a nicely packaged explanation of the origin of life on planet Earth. In 1952, scientists Stanley Miller and Harold Urey built a test tube environment containing water vapor, methane, ammonia, and hydrogen, the gases Alexander Oparin and J.B.S. Haldane said would be needed for life to begin.

Miller and Urey used an electrical discharge to simulate lightning in the primitive Earth and placed a trap to collect any residue produced. After a time, they found the trap contained some amino acids, the building blocks of life. The media and our textbooks wrongly suggested that science had created life.

An old adage says, “Science education is the process of taking data from the professor’s notes and transferring it to the student’s test paper with as little interference as possible in between.” As a young atheist, I loudly proclaimed that it was impossible for an educated person to believe that God created life.

Nobody thought to question the assertion that the Miller-Urey experiment explained the origin of life on planet Earth. In fact, amino acids are not life, and life contains only specific amino acids. The Miller-Urey apparatus destroyed amino acids faster than it produced them, so the trap was necessary to prevent them from all being destroyed. The apparatus contained no oxygen, but in my geology class, we learned that there was much evidence for oxygen in the Precambrian rocks of the ancient Earth.

The quest to understand the origin of life (OOL) remains a topic of intense debate and exploration. In a recent publication in the esteemed journal Nature, researchers Nick Lane and Joana Xavier candidly acknowledged the persistent challenges in OOL research:

“The origins-of-life field faces the same problems with culture and incentives that afflict all of science—overselling ideas towards publication and funding, too little common ground between competing groups, and perhaps too much pride: too strong an attachment to favored scenarios and too little willingness to be proven wrong.”

Dr. James Tour of Rice University has called this area of research “clueless,” but the media continues to make unsupported claims. Perhaps the most crucial point of this research into the origin of life on planet Earth is that if science ever does discover the OOL, all it will show is that it took intelligence for it to happen in the first place.

We need Christian young people to go into science so they can explain false claims about OOL to those of us who may not have the inclination or the training to understand it solely by ourselves. However, we still need to educate ourselves enough to fulfill the admonition of 1 Peter 3:15, “Always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear.”

References: “To unravel the origin of life, treat findings as pieces of a bigger puzzle” in the journal Nature for February 26, 2024, referenced in Evolutionnews.org February 28, 2024

March 11, 2024March 8, 2024

Mutualism Shows Life Design

We call it mutualism when various complex relationships occur between two species, producing codependency and benefits to both. There are two kinds of mutualisms. In obligate mutualism, both species depend on each other for survival. Facultative mutualism refers to relationships that benefit the species, but they could survive without it. Looking at life on Earth, we see many examples of how mutualism shows life design.

In Borneo, a carnivorous pitcher plant and wooly bats have a relationship of obligate mutualism. The plant lures bats in with an echo reflector, but the plant doesn’t eat the bat. The pitcher plant grows in soils with low nutrients and needs additional fertilizer. The droppings of the bats provide that fertilizer, enabling the plant to survive. The woolly bats are easy victims of predatory animals, but during the daytime, when the bat isn’t hunting insects, it finds refuge and protection inside the pitcher plant. The plant and the bat depend on this relationship, but no one would suggest they are related.

Legumes such as beans, peas, and clover form a mutualism with bacteria. The bacteria can fix nitrogen from the atmosphere, turning it into ammonia. The plants use the nitrogen from the ammonia to synthesize proteins needed for growth. The plants serve the bacteria by housing them in root nodules and providing them with sugars and oxygen so they can grow. Once again, mutualism shows life design.

There are a vast number of smaller organisms that depend upon obligate mutualism. An example is a green-brown spongy sludge that grows on the marshes of the Florida Everglades. It may look like a toxic algal bloom drawing oxygen from the water. But instead of being destructive, it is a mutual design of algae, fungi, microbes, and bacteria. This perfectly matched relationship is called a periphyton. It is a system of life that provides the basis for the entire food chain of the Everglades and another example of how mutualism shows life design.

Trying to explain how mutualism became part of Earth’s living systems by a chance process takes a huge imagination and a great deal of faith. It seems far more likely that mutualism is not an accident but part of God’s design for life. The more we know of the creation, the closer we get to the Creator.

References: BBC News for February 14, 2024, and Wikipedia

March 8, 2024March 7, 2024

Evidence for a Changing Climate

Those of us who live in the Great Lakes area are wondering what happened to winter. This year, we have had very little snow, virtually no frigid temperatures, and a lack of ice on our lakes and rivers. Usually, we see 53% of our Great Lakes covered with ice. We frequently travel to the lighthouses and bays to see ice piled up against the shoreline and other obstacles. The total ice coverage of the Great Lakes for 2023/2024 was 2.7%, and the chances of that number changing in March seem nonexistent. This is another evidence for a changing climate.

The United States experienced 28 weather-related disasters, causing over a billion dollars in damage. These numbers are gleaned from data on hurricanes, floods, and wildfires, but the damage goes far beyond the obvious causes of expense. A major industry in this part of the country is fruit growing. Apples, apricots, blueberries, and peaches provide a good income for growers, and we can purchase most of these crops at relatively low prices in this area. The problem is that the crop can be lost if the trees bloom too early and the buds get frosted. In the first week of March, we had temperatures in the 60s and 70s, increasing the prospect of losing the fruit crops if the temperature drops.

Some people say there is no evidence for a changing climate, so we don’t need to make serious changes in how we manage the planet. This ministry is built around the appeal to evidence. The Bible contains many examples of God calling people to look at evidence – for example, Gideon and the fleece and Thomas and the resurrection. Evidence shows that the Earth is going through a period of increasing temperature. We also know that at times in the past, Earth’s climate has been mu c h warmer than it is today.

Just as there is strong evidence for a changing climate, the evidence for God’s existence is massive. Ignoring the need to care for the Earth can be catastrophic. Ignoring the importance of changing how we use what God has given us will bring hardship to all of us. Ignoring God’s existence and the importance of living as He calls us to will be even more catastrophic, with eternal consequences. We need to deal with the evidence God has given us and change how we conduct our lives.

Reference: The Week for March 8, 2024, page 16.

March 5, 2024March 4, 2024

The Habitability of Mars Is Bogus

The media presents Mars as the next home for humanity. The main reasons include that it is our closest planet, has received massive treatment by science fiction writers, and scientists say it has an earth-like history. However, a significant amount of data from robotic spacecraft has exposed the fact that the habitability of Mars is bogus.

Mars doesn’t even begin to approach the conditions necessary for humans to exist on its surface. We are realizing that planet Earth is a very, very unusual place. Discover magazine published an excellent summary of what Mars is like and how difficult it would be for human habitation. The enormous distance to Mars is an obvious problem, but consider these facts:

1) Mars is a barren desert with temperatures regularly hitting -81 degrees Fahrenheit.
2) The air on Mars is 95% carbon dioxide, and no liquid water has been found on its surface.
3) Mars’s magnetic field and atmosphere would not provide adequate protection against cosmic radiation, known to cause massive health problems for humans.
4) The Martian soil contains perchlorates, toxic compounds of chlorine. Growing plants on Mars for food would be impossible because of this and because the amount of sunlight reaching the surface of Mars is about 60% of that on Earth.
5) Mars is smaller than Earth, and thus, its gravity is less. Experiments show that constant physical training would be required for anyone staying on Mars for any significant time.

The bottom line is that the habitability of Mars is bogus. Living there would be extremely difficult. People would have to take with them the things God has provided on Earth. Living on Mars would require synthetic buildings that duplicate Earth-like conditions. They may have to be underground for radiation protection.

Something that the media and most of the general population have not understood is that the planet God has given us is unique, and the habitability of Mars is bogus. There is no place in our solar system where humans can exist without making extreme provisions. Please don’t take what we have on planet Earth for granted. It is an incredible gift created for us, and the Creator expects all of us to take care of it.

Reference: March/April 2024 issue of Discover magazine

March 4, 2024March 3, 2024

Blaming God For Human Mismanagement

Our hearts go out to those who have lost property and maybe even loved ones to the so-called natural disasters that have increased in frequency and size. Few of these disasters are the typical product of nature. What God created has always been in balance and functioned without the massive changes we are seeing in today’s world, but skeptics are blaming God for human mismanagement.

Among the disasters that have increased in number and ferocity are wildfires. They destroyed massive numbers of trees, causing a shortage of wood and wood products, destroying homes and businesses, and even entire towns. The Nature Conservancy reported that the average wildfire size today is 23,000 acres. In the 1980’s, the average wildfire size was 7,000 acres. A currently burning wildfire in Texas has destroyed more than one million acres.

Those of us with some training in environmental management know that the “Smokey the Bear” idea of preventing any kind of fire was an ignorant practice. In the natural world, lightning and spontaneous combustion produce small fires. When you allow leaves and dead wood to accumulate for decades, a lightning strike can cause a massive fire with lots of fuel for combustion. Even the amount of smoke these huge fires generate threatens people living thousands of miles away.

God has used fires in surprising ways. There are some trees whose seeds do not germinate unless they have been exposed to fire. Some animals depend on naturally burned-over areas to produce food such as berries and nuts. Still, we have been in some areas where the fire’s massive heat sterilized the area, preventing anything from growing.

Skeptics are blaming God for human mismanagement that has caused the devastating fires we are seeing today. A major cause of today’s catastrophic fires is human prevention of naturally occurring small fires. We need to recognize that the intelligence of design has kept woodlands healthy and stable in the past. We must work with that design intelligently to avoid the tragic pictures we see on the news.

We also need to understand that there are some places where humans should not build buildings. We all know that Los Angeles and San Francisco straddle the San Andreas fault, which has produced severe earthquakes in the past and will do it again. When that happens, skeptics will be blaming God for human mismanagement, even though the warnings were there. We know what we must do, but greed and selfishness seem to rule the day instead of intelligent management of what God has given us.

References: The Nature Conservancy newsletter first issue for 2024 (page 13) and NBC News

January 25, 2024April 12, 2024

Lunar Cycles, Lunar Influence, and Lunacy

The Latin name for the Moon is “luna.” Many English words are derived from that root, including lunacy, lunatic, and even loon, as in “crazy as a loon.” Having grown up in the north, I know that hearing the cries of loons could lead to thoughts of them being crazy. Lunar cycles occur naturally, but many people believe a “lunar influence” is connected to abnormal behavior.

People have given unique names to certain full-moon appearances, such as blue moon, sturgeon moon, harvest moon, cold moon, snow moon, pink moon, flower moon, strawberry moon, hunter moon, beaver moon, worm moon, and wolf moon. You can find those names in the Old Farmer’s Almanac, so it should not be surprising that most of them have connections to agriculture or to a time when people did not have electric lights clouding their view of the sky. I have found that seeing the full moon in remote areas hundreds of miles away from city lights is a moving experience. If you were fishing, harvesting, hunting, or plowing, you would have no problem with just the Moon for illumination.

The Moon is not just an accident, nor is its influence on life. Genesis 1:14 describes God clearing Earth’s cloud cover to let the lights of the heavens (Sun and Moon) become visible “for signs and seasons and for days and years.” Some birds use the Moon for migration journeys that coincide with specific lunar phases. Many animals respond to both circadian rhythms and a lunar clock.

So, how does the Moon affect human activity? Studies show that there are more animal bites from cats, rats, and horses during full moons. That is probably because more humans are doing more things outside at night during a full moon. Also, data show there are more crimes during full moons. Apparently, criminals can use the light of a full moon for their activities just as farmers can.

The Bible refers to lunar cycles for time and mentions lunar festivals (Colossians 2:16) but otherwise makes no particular connections to the Moon. All of the claims of abnormal human behavior during various lunar cycles are in the realm of what is called “folklore.”

I hope you can take some time to admire the full moon away from city lights and imagine how ancient people depended on it for nighttime light to carry on their lives. Meanwhile, don’t worry about it affecting you psychologically or causing biological changes. The animals and insects may be altered by lunar cycles, but you are not a bug or a werewolf.

January 22, 2024January 20, 2024

What Is Gravity and How Does it Work?

Many things in the creation do not lend themselves to conventional science. Gravity is an excellent example. What is gravity, and where did it come from? Issac Newton suggested that gravity was a property of mass because the more mass something has, the more it weighs. A physics equation describes gravity, saying that if you have two masses, there will be a force of attraction between them.

In a high school physics experiment, we hung two large bags of sand near each other. Gravity would pull them toward each other, and if you increased the amount of sand, it would draw them closer. Using a group of levers, the students could measure the force between the two bags. We can measure it, but what is gravity?

Instead of bags of sand, scientists measure the gravity force between the Earth, Moon, and Sun. What keeps Earth orbiting the Sun and the Moon orbiting the Earth? Isaac Newton proposed that the distance between objects affected the amount of gravitational force between them. An equation describing the attraction between masses 1 and 2 must include the masses, the distance between them, and a number known as the gravitational constant. The equation is F = G (M-1)(M-2)/X². G is the gravitational constant, and scientists have measured it to be 6.67 x 10^-11. If the value of the constant G differed from what it is, the Earth could not exist, and neither could we.

If you don’t follow all of that, don’t worry about it. The point is that gravity is a complex quantity that holds everything together. But that leaves questions unanswered. What is gravity? Is it a wave? How can it work over huge distances? How can mass cause gravity – or does it? Why is the gravity constant precisely what it is?

As science probes deeper into the nature of matter, time, space, and energy, it becomes increasingly evident that not everything physical has a physical cause. We cannot explain the creation of time, space, energy, or gravity by conventional science. As you read modern research reports, you see that our world was shaped from dimensions beyond the four we know about. The laws that govern our world and the dimensions we live in do not fully describe the nature of gravity, time, or even space.

Ancient biblical writers guided by the Spirit of God understood that a wise Creator designed our world. The writer of Proverbs 8 personifies wisdom, giving it a feminine nature. Wisdom says, “O you simple, understand wisdom and have an understanding heart. The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way before His works of old. I was set up from eternity, from the beginning and before the earth ever was.”

Open-minded contemplation of the creation leads to the recognition that an infinite intelligence beyond that of any human brought the physical creation into existence. We learn from the Bible that God’s purpose was to allow the war between good and evil to end once and forever and that we play an essential role in that war.

January 18, 2024March 29, 2024

Extinction of Plant and Animal Species

Near the end of 2023, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed 21 species from the Endangered Species Act because they have become extinct. What causes the extinction of plant and animal species?

Many factors lead to extinctions. Dr. Hugh Ross says the fossil record indicates that half of the mammal species that existed at the time of Adam and Eve are now extinct. Human activities that can endanger species include habitat destruction, introduction of invasive species, and introduction of diseases. Of course, animals can endanger people in various ways, including introducing diseases.

Humans have endangered plant species by introducing invasive plants. Plants used for decorative purposes can become invasive. Examples are English holly and the tree of heaven. Some plants that have become invasive were introduced to serve a purpose, such as controlling erosion. An example is the kudzu plant.

At other times, humans have caused extinction by killing large numbers of a species such as the passenger pigeon. Because of hunting and habitat destruction, the dodo bird became extinct within less than a century of its discovery. Humans caused the extinction of the great auk by foolish vandalism. Today, poachers are endangering the rhinoceros by killing them for no good reason. By contrast, human efforts rescued the California condor after it became extinct in the wild.

Woolly mammoths existed alongside early humans, and some scientists say they were essential for the survival of humans in some areas. People used them for food and their skins for protection from the elements. Their bones became tools, building materials, and even musical instruments. These large animals also kept plant vegetation under control while spreading their seeds. We can not always determine the cause of the extinction of plant and animal species, and that is the case with woolly mammoths.

The extinction of the dinosaurs occurred before humans were on the scene. That is good because humans and dinosaurs could not coexist on the land or at the same atmospheric oxygen level. God used them to prepare Earth for humans, and He orchestrated their extinction before He placed Adam and Eve in the garden.

As we look at the extinction of plant and animal species, we learn some essential facts. From the beginning, God had a plan for life as He prepared this planet for us to be here. He gave the first humans the responsibility to take care of the Earth, but we have not done a very good job. Finally, God is still giving us a chance to do better, and we have had some successes. Serving God involves serving others and caring for what God has given us for human flourishing. We can only do that when we submit to His plan for our lives.

References: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and A Matter of Days by Hugh Ross, page 74.

January 16, 2024January 15, 2024

Survival in the Cold by Design

As I sit in my warm office in Michigan today, I look out at snow and ice. My outdoor thermometer registers -8 degrees, and I wonder how the ducks on the river, the squirrels on the ground, and the birds in the air handle these frigid temperatures. I enjoy watching the birds on my bird feeders and the squirrels chasing each other in the oak trees, but I wonder how they survive. Then I apply my knowledge of physics, and I understand animal survival in the cold.

I always enjoyed teaching the heat and thermodynamics section of my high school physics class. One of my lines that always got a laugh was, “Why do we need to wear clothes to survive, outside of the obvious one.” The point is that our skin is not very good insulation against the cold. In winter, we pick clothes with air spaces within the fabric because air is a very poor conductor of heat, so it insulates us from the cold. We use coats stuffed with goosedown or some facsimile to be well protected from the cold. Goosedown also insulates sleeping bags and quilts.

Chickadees visit my bird feeders regularly. They usually are relatively sleek birds that fly smoothly and efficiently. As I look at my chickadees on this day of -8 degrees, they are almost round. Their feathers are fluffed up to trap air, so the birds are well insulated for survival in the cold. They don’t fly as smoothly as they do in summer. They crowd my feeders and would sit there without moving if they could.

Squirrels have a different problem. Their coats give them some protection, but getting food is an issue when heavy snow covers everything. They need to keep warm but avoid activities that would sap their reserve of nutrition. My gaze goes to the top of the oak trees, and I see a large round ball of leaves and twigs. Many years ago, to expand our church parking lot, we had to take down a tree with a large round ball of leaves and twigs near the top. As the tree came down, a squirrel ran out of the ball. I put my hand into the nest to see what was inside. Even though the air temperature was 20 degrees, it was very warm inside the ball of leaves and squirrel hair.

God has equipped His creatures for survival in the cold, and His design enables our Michigan winter to throb with animal activity. Trial and error explanations are weak because survival errors are lethal. We can see design in the natural world that speaks of God’s wisdom and planning. The evidence allows us to “know there is a God through the things He has made” (Romans 1:20). Watching animals thrive in very cold conditions is an excellent example of that evidence.

January 11, 2024January 9, 2024

Aliens Visiting Planet Earth

The media has been full of claims that the government is hiding evidence from the general public about aliens visiting planet Earth. In this day of lying politicians and scams and fakes, it is essential to not buy into any claims too quickly.

The claims that were leaked out to the general public include the following:

1) A group of U.S. airmen found a downed alien spacecraft in Rendelsham Forest, England.

2) Sixty-two children in Zimbabwe witnessed a flying saucer near their playground.

3) A UFO knocked ICBMs offline in Montana.

(4) Various videos from the US Navy show aircraft maneuvering beyond what any earthly craft can do.

All of these and others are included in a film titled The UFO Movie They Don’t Want You to See, produced by Brian Dunning. (It is available for viewing on YouTube at the link below.) The reason we are interested in this film is that there have been those who claimed that aliens are responsible for the Bible, that Jesus Christ was an extra-terrestrial, and that the biblical narrative was given by aliens to guide gullible people into believing in God instead of knowing their true origin. This film exploring evidence about aliens visiting planet Earth has no religious interest and, in fact, is promoted by skeptic organizations.

It is important to understand that it is not our intent to say there is no life in outer space. With the massive number of galaxies, stars, and planets, other life forms may exist. God may have chosen other methods to conduct the war between good and evil. The problem is that the nearest star to our solar system is 4.3 light years away, and the closest galaxy to our Milky Way Galaxy is 750,000 light years away. Those distances are too great to allow any civilization to have an interest in us. Science fiction about aliens visiting planet Earth would have us believe that time and space can be controlled by aliens with intelligence far beyond our own. Some people choose to believe that even though it requires much more faith than to believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God.

The UFO Movie They Don’t Want You to See, produced by Brian Dunning