outer space Archives - Page 14 of 14

February 24, 2017October 8, 2018

TRAPPIST-1 Planets and Life

TRAPPIST-1 Planet Lineup - NASA — TRAPPIST-1 Planet Lineup – NASA Illustration

In May of 2016 astronomers using the Transiting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope (called TRAPPIST) announced the finding of three planets orbiting a single star which has been labeled “TRAPPIST-1.” On February 22, 2017, astronomers released to the media a report stating that they have discovered four more planets orbiting Trappist-1. The planets are small, and their location in relation to the star they orbit indicates that they could have liquid water on them. The media has picked this up and USA Today (February 23, 2017, page B1) has headlined “Newly Discovered Network of Planets Could Harbor Life.”

This is just another example of media sensationalizing and misapplying a scientific study. Let us point out before going any further that we have repeatedly said that there may be life elsewhere in the universe. We have also pointed out that chance is an unworkable explanation for the creation of life anywhere. The Bible doesn’t say this is the only place where God has seen fit to create life, so the question of life in space is moot.

The facts are that this is a remarkable scientific achievement made possible because the planets transit the star so that we can see them because we are looking at them at the proper angle. We now know that the process of star formation produces multiple planets orbiting the stars. To suggest that there will be life on one of these planets is a wild speculation. First of all, the star is very small and very dim. It is a red star just slightly bigger than Jupiter. That means it will emit the wrong wavelengths for photosynthetic life at least, and radiation levels are probably prohibitive. There are many other parameters that have to be carefully chosen for life to exist–things like shielding magnetic fields, sheltering major planets, proper spin rates, protective atmospheric layers, proper densities of the atmosphere, and many more. A discussion of some of these parameters is available in videos # 6 & 7 on our doesgodexist.tv website.
–John N. Clayton © 2017

February 23, 2017October 8, 2018

Supernova 1987A Celebrates 30th Birthday

On February 23, 1987, a historic explosion was witnessed by astronomers on Earth. A massive star known as Sanduleak -60 degrees 202 exploded. What was previously classified as a supergiant star became a supernova. For the first time since A.D.1054, there was a supernova close enough to the Earth for scientists to observe first-hand what was happening.

Students in high school physics and earth science classes study a diagram known as the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. It is simply a scattergram of the temperature of stars plotted against their luminosity. Stars begin as very hot blue giant stars. As they cool, they turn white-hot, then red, then brown. Then they may become a cinder. In the case of larger stars, the internal processes change, and they become giant stars which in some cases explode. Because these processes require a very long time, we don’t live long enough to see a single star go through all of these phases. But we can see stars in all of these stages. Seeing a star explode is a very rare event (about once a century), and Sanduleak -60 degrees 202 was thus a fantastic opportunity to see in detail what happens when a star explodes.

There is much to learn from Supernova 1987A. Exploding stars seed space with the heavier elements. We are learning how the elements that make up our world were formed. For those of us who believe God is the engineer of all of this, we can see how God made iron, copper, gold and the materials of the Earth’s crust. The incredible energy and power of the process testify to God’s power and creative wisdom. As we compare this supernova with the one that happened in A.D. 1054, which produced what is now called the Crab Nebula, we see it is different in many ways. In 1 Corinthians 15:41 the Bible tells us that “one star differs from another” and we now know that is true even of exploding stars. This supernova also gives us another tool to measure the size and age of the universe. We have several methods of measuring how far away this supernova is, but they all give us the same answer. The explosion took place 160,000 light years away from us, or 160,000 years ago. We are safe from the incredible radiation because of the huge distance.

We now have 30 years of measurements of this historic explosion. This birthday will be celebrated by scientists, but it is also significant to those who enjoy looking into space and seeing the handiwork of God.
–John N. Clayton © 2017

February 5, 2017October 8, 2018

Neptunian Influence

Neptune Photo from Voyager 2 - NASA — Neptune Photo from Voyager 2 – NASA

The planet Uranus was observed by scientists as early as 1690. For over 100 years astronomers watched this “last planet” in the solar system with wonder. The problem was that the orbit of the new planet did not follow the rules. The eccentricity of Uranus’ orbit told the astronomers that there was something very large and forceful that was having a real impact on what Uranus did and how it behaved. As time went by, better telescopes were built. Astronomers had watched Uranus long enough to know where the great influence was, so they turned their instruments to that part of the sky and were astounded to see still another planet–Neptune! The orbit of Neptune was established and studied, and it too did not quite obey the rules, so astronomers turned their most powerful instruments even further out and discovered Pluto. Most modern discoveries in astronomy are related to influence. We know where to look and what to look for because we see the influence of an object long before we see the object itself.

The same principle applies to human relationships and Christ. If people are Christians, their influence should be obvious to a stranger long before that stranger knows the source of the strength in the Christian’s life. Jesus said, “By this shall all men know that you are my disciples if you have love one for another.” Jesus also said, “By their fruits you shall know them.” Scientists would never have thought of looking for the planet Neptune until they saw its influence on Uranus. Many people will never think of looking for Christ until they see his influence in the lives of Christians. We should not have to tell others we are Christians, but they should suspect it by the way we live and how we treat one another.
–John N. Clayton © 2017

January 26, 2017October 8, 2018

Alien Claims and the Media

No Aliens Are Near
Every time some unusual signal from space is discovered, we see headlines in newspapers about aliens being the source of the signal. In August of 2016, reports came out of a radio telescope in Russia known as the RATAN-600 that had picked up a strong signal in the 11 gigahertz band. This was coming from a star known as HD 164595 and was first detected in 2013. Since that time the RATAN telescope and SETI have listened for repeat signals, but none have been detected. Headlines in the media have been things like “Baffling Alien Signal Detected.” Dr. Eric Korpela who works with SETI says, “There’s always the problem that scientific vocabulary is different from the public vocabulary. Detection, to me, means something was detected. To the public, it may translate as ‘We found aliens.’” It turns out that the signals have several possible natural explanations, none of which involve aliens.

The question remains as to why the public is so obsessed with the theme of aliens. We have pointed out repeatedly that finding life in space doesn’t have anything to do with the existence of God. If God chose to create life in other places for reasons we don’t fully understand, that is no issue. The Bible deals with humans and our existence on Earth. It is becoming obvious that there are no higher forms of life anywhere close to us, so the question is moot. This is not a question that has implications for the existence of God or the credibility of the Bible.

I have had atheists respond to me by saying that if life exists elsewhere, it proves that life can come about by chance. That assumes that God exists only on our planet, which is a misunderstanding of what God is. The fact remains that having a story about aliens sells, and video games and sci-fi movies will continue to propagate the idea. I have often told the story of doing a radio debate with an atheist on the Larry King talk show in Washington D.C. before he became famous. A listener called in and asked the atheist what he would do if a spaceship landed on the White House lawn, and a little green man jumped out with a Bible in his hand and said: “Has Jesus been here yet?” My atheist friend responded “punt,” and maybe that’s what we should all do on this issue until we have more facts. Source of Information: Astronomy magazine December 2016, page 9.
–John N. Clayton © 2017

January 19, 2017December 20, 2021

Evolution of Big Bang Theory Sounding More Like the Bible.

Big Bang-Artist's Concept — Big Bang-Artist’s Concept

In 1931 a Belgian astronomer named Georges Lemaitre proposed that the universe emerged from the decay of a single supermassive particle which he called “The Primeval Atom.” Since that time there have been a variety of similar explanations with the “Cosmic Egg” proposal being popular in the 1950s. The Big Bang was a label conceived by Fredrick Hoyle as measurements of the temperatures of various regions of space became known, and as radiation from the start of the cosmos confirmed a very hot singularity at the beginning of the cosmos. Hoyle’s label was actually making fun of some of the theories of his day, but the label stuck.

As more and more data has become available, the evolution of thought about the origin of the cosmos has changed. Quantum mechanics is now suggesting a whole new physics to describe the creation. While this has been happening, the evolution of words and their meaning has also taken place. A “singularity” is no longer understood as a point in space and time. It is not a single particle or kind of object. It is a condition of the cosmos in which space and time came into existence, containing ultra-hot and ultra-dense particles. The current theory says that a trillionth of a second after the singularity came into existence the temperature was a billion times hotter than the core of the Sun, and the energy density was more than 10 to the 36th power kilograms (that’s 10 followed by 36 zeros) in every cubic meter of space. To make it that dense, you would have to compress the Sun to the size of a marble.

Jeremiah 10:12 is typical of the descriptions the Bible gives of God’s creative acts. “He has made the earth by his power, he established the world by his wisdom, and has stretched out the heavens by his discretion.” Just as physics now turns to quantum mechanics to comprehend processes at a subatomic level beyond what we can physically see with our eyes, so too does the Bible describe God not in human terms, but in multidimensional terms. Acts 17:28 is a good example with the description of God being totally non-anthropomorphic, “In him we live and move and have our being.” Other passages such as Jeremiah 23:23-24 and 2 Chronicles 2:6 give a similar view of the nature of God as a being outside space and time.

All Big Bang cosmologies have a common problem–explaining what banged and who banged it! What the evidence supports is the fact that the creation came from an entity outside of space/time. This entity wasn’t “nothing” but an entity that had a purpose for what it did and had great wisdom in how creation was accomplished. God fits those properties, and no chance process does. For more on this topic, we encourage you to read the booklet titled “A Help in Understanding What God Is” which is on our doesgodexist.org website. (http://www.doesgodexist.org/Pamphlets/Flatland.html)
Data from Astronomy magazine, February 2016, page 34.
–John N. Clayton © 2017.

January 8, 2017January 7, 2021

Should We Go to Mars?

Chances are you have seen the movie The Martian or the National Geographic TV series on Mars, with the hypothetical first colonization of the red planet. Politicians have jumped into the popular hysteria by making proposals about establishing human occupation of the planet. Some wealthy private companies are proposing to offer trips to Mars. But should we go to Mars?

There is nothing in the Bible that would attempt to restrict humans from leaving Earth. By the same token, there is no encouragement to do so. What the general public does not seem to understand is that God incorporated an incredible number of design features into the Earth for us to be able to live here. We have discussed those features over and over in our printed publications, in our Dandy Designs series, and also on our Facebook page. When you don’t have those design features available, human life becomes very tentative.

NASA has recently discovered that astronauts who flew to the moon were four times more likely to die from heart disease than those who had even the minimal protection of the International Space Station. Astronauts are also showing signs of what has been nicknamed “Space Brain.” This involves dementia and cognitive impairment. The effect of weightlessness is still being studied, but the loss of bone and muscle mass is known to be a consequence of living without gravity.

The cost of resolving all these issues is huge. Even though we will probably be able to overcome these problems in the distant future, we need to understand that God’s design of Earth is highly complex. Should we go to Mars? We may want to make sure we use our resources to solve the hunger, homelessness, and ecological issues before we venture to other worlds.

NASA data is available in The Week, December 23, 2016, page 27.