Jim And Penny Caldwell's Archaeological Findings:

[Joshpantera]

BC, the speed at which you catch on to things and excel is most impressive. I honestly wondered whether or not you'd start to see through the ID / IC problem simply because you really wanted it to be true. But even so, your better judgement took the lead and I can see that you're now seeing the problem from the same general perspective that soem of the others have been trying to express. 

 

And as for the anti-BB stuff, you'll find that it's an equally questionable genre. Some of the arguments may seem logical and possibly valid. But at the end of the day there's no good reason to turn away from the standard model just yet on behalf of any alternative model that I'm aware of. But just like the Caldwell's and Behe, Lerner and other's are worth exploring just for the hell of it. If any thing you can better understand what isn't necessarily so...  

[BlackCat]

BC, the speed at which you catch on to things and excel is most impressive. I honestly wondered whether or not you'd start to see through the ID / IC problem simply because you really wanted it to be true. But even so, your better judgement took the lead and I can see that you're now seeing the problem from the same general perspective that soem of the others have been trying to express. 

 

And as for the anti-BB stuff, you'll find that it's an equally questionable genre. Some of the arguments may seem logical and possibly valid. But at the end of the day there's no good reason to turn away from the standard model just yet on behalf of any alternative model that I'm aware of. But just like the Caldwell's and Behe, Lerner and other's are worth exploring just for the hell of it. If any thing you can better understand what isn't necessarily so...  

 

You're absolutely right Josh, I really wanted it to be true, which of course must cloud your judgment.  I was able to 'see through' the ID/IC stuff, only because the religious blinkers have now gone.  Most of my life, I've  had these blinkers on, that often prevented me from pursuing uncomfortable questions that challenged my faith but would have lead me to the truth.  Many times over the last twenty years when I've decided to check out what all the fuss is about evolution or claims about the Bible not being true  and getting a whiff of something that seemed to disprove the Bible's claims, I would retreat behind those blinkers and resume the doubting but more comfortable mindset of a person who allows fairy stories to guide their life (I'd nearly convinced myself they weren't fairy stories).  Now I can see clearly, things like evolution are falling into place very quickly (which is good because I've got a lot of time to make up for.).  I agree that it is good to explore those guys you list, as it all helps to understand the overall picture.

 

I must admit that I still want there to be an 'all will be well' end result for us all, but now I don't have the religious rubbish feeding that hope, it is hopefully not impeding my ability to be skeptical and openminded.  It's quite an amazing feeling to now be 'awake'.  When I talk to Christians, I see how they are trapped by their faulty beliefs etc, and I can see how I used to be. 

 

This was me believing in all manner of ridiculous things whilst trying to make myself 'believe' these ridiculous things:

 

[bornagainathiest]

Hello again BC!

 

I hope you're fully-recovered from your flu.

 

Thanks for waiting patiently for me to explain my objections to Intelligent Design theory.   This post will attempt to outline the Cosmological reasons why I cannot accept ID. 

 

 

A sailor on a yacht in the middle of an ocean can describe his world in two ways - locally or globally.  Both descriptions are valid, but each has different applications.  Both co-exist and are interdependent.  It is not possible to properly describe one without the other.  Any locality sits within a larger, global context. (Please note BC, that this is THE salient point I wish to make in this message... so I'll repeat that last sentence.)

 

Any locality sits with a larger, global context.

 

THE   LOCAL   VIEW

His local viewpoint is bounded by the horizon, which forms a circle centered on him.  He knows that the horizon is an abstract edge of his world and not a true one.  This is his visual horizon.  The limits of how far he can see are determined by the curvature of the Earth, nothing more.  For most of the time, knowing what is within his local, visual horizon is all he needs.  A local map will tell him where various navigational hazards are, where he can find good anchorage and other important information.  Local information is all he needs to get by but local information is not all that there is.

 

THE   GLOBAL   VIEW

The sailor's local view is not however, a full and complete description of where he is.   If he gets into trouble and wants to radio his position to the Coastguard, he needs to give them global coordinates - so many degrees North or South and so many degrees East or West.  Simply telling them his local view ('I'm completely surrounded by empty ocean.') is of no help to them or to him.  They need to know where his locality sits within the larger, global context of the map coordinates.  So, while local information holds good for local matters, global information is the best and fullest and most complete description of everything.

 

Now let's take these examples of local vs. global and apply them to this page... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_inflation

The section, 'Overview' tells us that... 'For cosmology in the global point of view, the observable universe is one causal patch of a much larger unobservable universe..'    So, the portion of the universe that is visible or observable by us is not all that there is.  The local view astronomers have from Earth is just as limited as the local view our sailor has from his yacht.  Neither can see the global view of their reality.  In the sailor's case, he's limited by the curvature of the Earth.  In the astronomer's case, they are limited by the speed of light.

 

THE  SPEED  OF  LIGHT  LIMITS  US  TO  A  LOCAL  VIEW  OF  THE  UNIVERSE

 

If that sounds confusing, I'll explain.

The speed of light governs how fast anything can move within the universe.  Those of us who are old enough (like me!) can remember President Nixon speaking to Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the Moon in 1969.  He would speak a few words... there would be a pause of 1.25 seconds... and then the astronauts would hear what he said and reply to it... their words also taking 1.25 seconds to travel from Tranquillity base to Washington. 

 

Why the pauses?  The limited speed of light (or radio, in this case) that's why.

The finite speed at which light travels means that distant things, like the Moon and the Sun, appear to us, not as they are right now, but as they were when the light left them.  We see the Moon as it was one and a quarter seconds ago.  The Sun, as it was eight minutes ago.  The mission controlers for the Mars rovers receive the signals from those robots many minutes after they were transmitted - which explains why they can't be guided remotely from Earth. 

 

And the further we go from home, the greater the delay or 'look-back' time.

We see the nearest stars as they were in 2009, not as they are now.  Polaris, the Pole star appears to us as it was when Sir Francis Drake landed in California, in 1579. That's because it's distance (434 light years) is also a measure of time as well as space.  Too often people forget that a light-year is exactly that... the distance light can travel in 365 days.  Too often they forget that to the further you look into space, the further back you look in time too.

 

This rule holds good, no matter where astronomers look.

The nearest galaxy, M31 in Andromeda, appears as it was 2.5 million years ago, long before modern humans evolved.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubble_Deep_Field

Some of the galaxies imaged by the Hubble space telescope in 2004 appear to us as they were 12 billion years ago - over twice the age of the Earth! (Please do click on the colored diagram in the 'Observations' section, BC.  This will help explain what I mean.)  Now for some important facts, that need to be assimilated, before we move on to the pivotal point of this message, namely... Any locality sits within a larger, global context.

 

IMPORTANT    POINTS

 

1.

Eventually, astronomers will reach a limit to how far in distance and how far back in time they can see.  That limit is 13.7 billion light-years.  This is because the universe is 13.7 billion years old.  

 

2.

The finite speed of light creates an illusion of greater and greater age with increasing distance.  But the true age of everything we can see is exactly the same as the age of everything in the universe - 13.7 billion years.  'Look-back' time makes distant things appear older than they really are.

 

3.

1 and 2 combine to limit our view of the universe to a strictly local one.  Mixing metaphors, we are in the same boat as our sailor, limited to a local view of things.  His 'local' view is a function of the Earth's curvature.  Our 'local' view is a function of the finite speed of light and the finite age of the universe.

 

4.

In both cases, the sailor on his yacht and us on planet Earth, the limitations of our local viewpoints prevent us from seeing the whole or global picture.  In both cases, we know that our local view sits within a larger, global context... but we simply cannot see the global whole.

 

Remember the Wiki page on Cosmic Inflation?

Our local, observable universe is just one patch of a larger, but unobservable universe. 

Inflationary theory is strongly supported by several independent lines of evidence and is generally accepted to be the best explanation for the early evolution of the universe.  This brief period of Cosmic Inflation needs a little elaboration, for fuller understanding.  Almost instantaneously, the universe expanded from a quantum-sized 'seed' (many thousands of times smaller than an atom) to a volume at least a thousand times larger than everything we can see.  I'll repeat that, for effect.

 

THE UNIVERSE EXPANDED TO A VOLUME AT LEAST A THOUSAND TIMES LARGER THAN EVERYTHING WE CAN SEE.

 

It did this 13.7 billion years ago and did so exponentially.  Please note the path of the green line on the graph of this page... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponential_growth

After an incredibly tiny fraction of a second, Cosmic Inflation slowed down in our 'local' region of the greater, global whole.  Our local universe continues to expand, but at a much more leisurely pace than during the Inflationary epoch.  

.

.

.

.

If you've stayed with me so far BC, well done!

 

Now it's time to explain how and why all of this fits in with my objection to an Intelligent Designer.

Any locality sits within a larger, global context.  Our local, observable universe sits within the larger, global context of an unobservable universe that's at least a thousand times the volume of the tiny portion we can see.  At least a thousand times and probably much, much larger than that.

 

So why did the Designer need to make such a vast, greater universe, if we are His/Her/It's prime reason for creating anything in the first place?  Why not just make one star (the Sun), plus the Earth and the Moon?  That's all that's needed.  Doing anything else makes no sense.  It's incompetently, massively wasteful.  It's serves no coherent purpose.  It's ridiculous.  It's overkill to a trillion, zillion decimal places.

 

The facts of the Big Bang and Cosmic Inflation tell me that there is no Intelligent Designer, BC.

 

Please ask me anything about all of this and I'll be happy to clarify and explain.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Akheia]

That was amazing, BAA. The bit about how pointless and unnecessary such a huge universe is took my breath away. It'd be interesting to see how creationists respond to that point. Have you ever heard from any regarding the superfluity of most of the cosmos?

[Thought2Much]

That was amazing, BAA. The bit about how pointless and unnecessary such a huge universe is took my breath away. It'd be interesting to see how creationists respond to that point. Have you ever heard from any regarding the superfluity of most of the cosmos?

 

Creationists just say the expansiveness of the universe is God's way of showing off his power, and this is why he is evident in creation, and we (the non-believers and the scientists) are just too dumb to see it.

 

Yes, I've asked some. This is the answer that some have given me. There is just no getting through to them with facts.

[Ravenstar]

The utter vastness and complexity and mind-boggling enormity (on all levels) of the universe is one of the main things that fed my doubt of this 'local' and very 'human' deity in christianity. Then it fed my doubts about anything supernaturally anthropomorphic at all... now finally, any concept of an intelligent 'designer' seems rather  umm.. it just doesn't make sense. Even if there were one it would be so completely beyond anything we could comprehend that it ceases to have any meaning. Conversely 'it' would be so removed from us as to be moot. But that's philosophy, not science.

 

My awe, however, for this incredible environment we are in...and all it's mysteries and it's wonders (just the part we can observe) is extremely deep and profound - probably more so than I ever felt for 'god'. Maybe teaching astronomy to kids should be our focus... just thinking out loud.

 

Thank you BAA.. that was marvelous.. and I had no idea that the universe was vastly larger.. wow, just wow.

 

question: You stated that the universe was 13.7 billion years old. Then you said, "'Look-back' time makes distant things appear older than they really are."  Not sure I understand this.. do you mean it looks OLDER than 13.7 Billion years?

 

Now... if the universe is vastly larger (by a factor of a thousand) are you saying that is also 13.7 billion years old?   And if we can't see something does that not mean that some objects are moving faster than the speed of light? (ancient quasars?) I'm getting confused here I think. I did read somewhere that some objects that are farther away seem more 'primitive' than those closer (galaxies for example) I could be wrong or have misread that.

 

So.. does the CBM permeate the entire universe (observable) or is it at the fringes of our ability to see.

[Thought2Much]

question: You stated that the universe was 13.7 billion years old. Then you said, "'Look-back' time makes distant things appear older than they really are."  Not sure I understand this.. do you mean it looks OLDER than 13.7 Billion years?

 

No, the universe looks 13 or so billion years old. But since the light from objects that are billions of light years away is just reaching us now, we are seeing those objects as they were billions years ago. Those galaxies are now billions of years old, but the light reaching us now is the light from when they were just a few hundred million years old. This is why looking at things very far away is almost like looking backward in time.

 

There was also something called the inflationary period right after the big bang. Space itself expanded very, very quickly (as in, faster than the speed of light) for a short time. This is why we think the universe is something like 90 billion light years across (pulling from memory here), even though the universe is only 13.7 billion years old. Remember, nothing can travel faster than light within its local space, but space itself can expand faster than the speed of light. That's a tricky concept to explain, and I don't fully understand it myself, so you'll just have to trust me on that one. A physicist might be able to put it in terms the rest of us can understand.

 

Something else to consider: since things farther away from us are moving away from us faster than the things that are closer to us, it is possible that there are portions of the universe that we can't see simply because the combined speed as we move away from each other is greater than the speed of light, and so that light will never reach us.

 

So it would look something like this:

 

Distant Galaxy A (moving in one direction at x% light speed) <----------- (total speed is x + y) -----------> Us (moving in another direction at y% light speed)

 

If x + y is greater than the speed of light, the light from Distant Galaxy A will never catch up to us. Neither object is breaking the rules, because neither object is traveling faster than light in its local space.

 

Also, because of the inflationary period, there could be large chunks of the universe that are separated from us by such a great distance that the light from there hasn't even gotten here yet.

[Ravenstar]

Thank you.. and I actually do get that.

 

I think we think of space as something the universe inhabits (or expands into) - but what you have said here, and I agree, is that space itself is a quality (quantity?). It's like trying to explain to someone that there is no 'before' the BB - because time (spacetime) itself did not exist until then. I think of time as a quality of space - without motion there can be no time... no space to move through.. no time.

 

It's difficult to put into words - our language, based upon how we experience things presupposes certain things, like up/down, outside/inside, before/after. Our language is based in dualities which doesn't describe well the early universe.

 

However... what you did say does suggest that the speed of light is not necessarily a constant... only within the locality would it be. Interesting.

[Thought2Much]

Ravenstar, that's actually a lot of what relativity is all about, and I think you're sort of hitting upon some of those concepts intuitively. It was Einstein that introduced the concept of spacetime, which is pretty much what you have stated: time is an inextricable quality of space, and both are affected by the presence of matter. Or, to put it another way, time is actually another dimension of the world we live in, so we have our three observable dimensions, plus time.

 

The speed of light actually is constant. No matter what your reference frame is, that speed doesn't change. The only thing that messes with that constant is if space expands faster than that speed. And even when space expands faster than light, if you measure the speed of light locally, its speed doesn't change.

 

Oh look, now I've gone cross-eyed.

[BlackCat]

BAA- that was worth the wait.    Give me a day or two to process it. 

[bornagainathiest]

That was amazing, BAA. The bit about how pointless and unnecessary such a huge universe is took my breath away. It'd be interesting to see how creationists respond to that point. Have you ever heard from any regarding the superfluity of most of the cosmos?

 

Hi Akheia!

 

T2M's correct.  Right on the money.

 

I've read similar replies from Christians, along the lines he mentioned, in other forums.  And he's right about the Christian mindset too.  They seem to be pathologically incapable of separating their ancient Middle Eastern sky god mythology from reality.  So, anything and everything that's wonderful, beautiful and powerful MUST be evidence of His handiwork. 

But there's an important distinction to be made between the Young Earth Creationist Christians (who reject cosmological science) and the Theistic Evolutionist Christians (who accept it).

 

If you ask a YEC why God made such an ancient universe, they'll reply... "He didn't."

They hold scripture as the ultimate authority and treat any science that contradicts it as the work of Satan.  The Bible tells them that the universe is no more than 6,000 years old, give or take a few centuries.  So, even though many stars and galaxies appear to be millions and billions of light-years away, God created them with the appearance of great age. 

 

No!  I kid you not. 

That's what they really do believe.

Such a belief is commonly known as Last Thursdayism.  You can read about it here... http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Last_Thursdayism

But please disconnect your brain, before clicking on this link.  The stupid b-u-r-n-s!

 

Akheia, there's just no point in asking a YEC about an ancient universe... they just deny that it is so.

However, the Theistic Evolutionists are little better.  Some of their pat answers I've read are...

 

"Because He can." 

(Create a universe that is 99.999% unobservable and unknowable to us.)

 

"Because it reflects His glory."

(Directly followed by a quote of Psalm 19.)

 

"Because, before the Creation, He foreknew that astronomers would discover this fact."

(Directly followed by a quote of Psalm 19.)

 

"Because, before the Creation, He foreknew that non-believers would take this fact as evidence of His non-existence.  But on Judgement Day, they will have no excuse for deliberately and consciously rejecting Him and this evidence of His handiwork."

(Directly followed by a quote of Psalm 19.)

.

.

.

It's hopeless! 

 

Hopeless!!!

 

 

 

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHH!!!

.

.

 

 

BAA

[bornagainathiest]

To Ravenstar and Thought2Much...

 

Way to go, guys! 

 

First, I'm glad you like this stuff.  I groove on it too. 

 

Second, I had some boring and time-consuming (but important) stuff to do yesterday, so I couldn't stay on-line and field any questions.  Thanks for stepping into the breach there, T2M.  I appreciate your input and help a lot. 

 

Lastly, I hope your attack of Strabismus corrects itself, friend.    Driving without proper depth-perception is not recommended! 

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[bornagainathiest]

BAA- that was worth the wait.    Give me a day or two to process it. 

 

Take all the time you need, BC.

 

After all, these are BIG concepts. (Pun intended!)

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[Thought2Much]

To Ravenstar and Thought2Much...

 

Way to go, guys! 

 

First, I'm glad you like this stuff.  I groove on it too. 

 

Second, I had some boring and time-consuming (but important) stuff to do yesterday, so I couldn't stay on-line and field any questions.  Thanks for stepping into the breach there, T2M.  I appreciate your input and help a lot. 

 

Lastly, I hope your attack of Strabismus corrects itself, friend.    Driving without proper depth-perception is not recommended! 

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

No problem, BAA. I do enjoy talking about this stuff, and find too few opportunities to do so, both online and in real life (which is why I jump in and steal your thunder once in a while ). I've hung around on an astronomy/science forum for years, and I've learned a lot, but I rarely post there because with all of the really knowledgeable people on that board, I'm sort of the idiot in that particular village. Compared to the average guy on the street I know too much, but compared to those guys I know next to nothing. It can be difficult to find the right "interested laypeople" who want to talk about science this way.

 

And thanks for your concern. The strabismus is usually temporary.

[Thought2Much]

After all, these are BIG concepts. (Pun intended!)

 

I am a firm believer that one should take full ownership of one's puns, and be loud and proud with them. We all know that even when someone says, "No pun intended," the very fact they have recognized the pun means it probably was intended, so they're probably lying.

[Thought2Much]

So.. does the CBM permeate the entire universe (observable) or is it at the fringes of our ability to see.

 

I didn't address this part of your post because I don't know the answer. BAA? Bhim?

[bornagainathiest]

 

So.. does the CBM permeate the entire universe (observable) or is it at the fringes of our ability to see.

 

I didn't address this part of your post because I don't know the answer. BAA? Bhim?

 

I'll tackle this tomorrow, if that's ok?  Unless Bhim beats me to the punch.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[Thought2Much]

 

 

So.. does the CBM permeate the entire universe (observable) or is it at the fringes of our ability to see.

 

I didn't address this part of your post because I don't know the answer. BAA? Bhim?

 

I'll tackle this tomorrow, if that's ok?  Unless Bhim beats me to the punch.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

 

NO. YOU MUST REPLY NOW.

 

Just kidding. I'm looking forward to the answer, thanks.

[ExCBooster]

On the subject of space and scale, has anybody linked to that

clip yet? One of the most mind-blowing nine minutes on Youtube. Should be required watching in any science class ever. But somebody would probably have some sort of religious objection. There's also a great book, A Universe From Nothing that explains the big bang and other cosmology stuff rather well. (The nutshell version: turns out that "nothing" is really absurdly unstable.)

[Thought2Much]

On the subject of space and scale, has anybody linked to that

clip yet?

 

I don't know if anyone's linked to it here, but I can second the recommendation. The video was made in 1977, so the music is a bit dated, but if you can get past that, then it's a great short film.

[Akheia]

Been watching Dr. Hector Avalos over at Minnesota Atheists' YT channel. Anybody else catch him?

 

 

He's fast approaching the status in Biblical history that Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson holds in my mind for astronomy. I can't remember if I saw a link to him here or elsenet, but either way, wow, this talk puts PAID to the claims of apologists that the Bible is a document relaying reliable history.

[BlackCat]

I've been dwelling on what you said BAA:

 

 

So why did the Designer need to make such a vast, greater universe, if we are His/Her/It's prime reason for creating anything in the first place? Why not just make one star (the Sun), plus the Earth and the Moon? That's all that's needed. Doing anything else makes no sense. It's incompetently, massively wasteful. It's serves no coherent purpose. It's ridiculous. It's overkill to a trillion, zillion decimal places.

 

The facts of the Big Bang and Cosmic Inflation tell me that there is no Intelligent Designer, BC.

 

 

 

 

I only understand your above statement if one's understanding of a Designer is something like the God of the Bible.  As I now well and truly appreciate how man-made that God is, courtesy of you guys here and with a lot of help from this site:

http://contradictionsinthebible.com/category/genesis/    , I am considering the possibility of a Designer which is subject to 'laws' or constraints of reality.  The more I think about this (my brain is hurting  ) I can't see how there can be any kind of personal Designer of reality.  And yet...why is there anything and why are there laws and constraints and a kind of 'order'?  Why not just an eternal 'seed' that remains a 'seed'.   Or why not 'nothing'?   Sorry, I'm struggling to convey my ideas, but I hope you'll get what I'm trying to say.   But getting back to the 'facts': not one atom or sub atomic particle is unneccesary or wasteful.  Every material thing is a result of that 'seed' or Super force breaking.  I keep coming back to the 'breaking' bit, and wonder if that can be the only 'clue' to a Designer.  Why is there 'change'? Why didn't that 'seed' remain a seed?  The more I'm thinking about this, the more the idea of a 'Designer' seems not quite right.  It's the 'Cause' of everthing that is what we are wondering about.  If that 'seed' or Super Force has always been in existence (in one form or another) then you have something that wasn't caused and that is the hardest thing to comprehend.............

 

Akhei- that youtube video of Dr Hector Avalos is really interesting.  Thank you for posting it.  I've just watched the first part and am now going to watch part 2. 

[bornagainathiest]

Ravenstar wrote...

 

"So.. does the CBM permeate the entire universe (observable) or is it at the fringes of our ability to see."

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Hello Ravenstar. 

 

Yes, the CMB is at the very fringes of the observable universe. 

If it permeated the entire universe, then it would be called the Cosmic Microwave Fore-ground, because it would lie between us and everything else we can see.  We'd have to subtract it's signature radiation from any astronomical images, so that we could see the Moon, the planets, the stars and the galaxies, clearly.

 

But, since it doesn't do that and is only seen at the very limits of what we can see, it's the Back-ground to everything that lies in front of it.  Because everything else in the universe lies in front of it, all of this extraneous information has to be painstakingly subtracted to see the valuable information that's encoded in the CMB. 

 

To help you visualize things better Ravenstar, please compare this diagram...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hubble_Ultra_Deep_Field_diagram.jpg

to the Chronology outlined here...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronology_of_the_universe

 

Here's how they compare. Please read downwards

 

The Chronology ................................................................................The Diagram

Planck Epoch

Grand Unification Epoch

Electroweak Epoch

Inflationary Epoch

Baryogenesis

Supersymmetry Breaking

Electroweak Symmetry breaking / Quark Epoch

Hadron Epoch

Lepton Epoch

Photon Epoch

Nucleosynthesis

Matter Domination

Recombination...................................................................................Radiation Era (CMB signature)

Dark Ages..........................................................................................Dark Ages

Reionization

Formation of Stars.............................................................................First Stars

Formation of Galaxies........................................................................First Galaxies (Hubble Ultra Deep Field)

Formation of groups, Clusters & Superclusters.................................(Hubble Deep Field)

Formation of the Solar System

Today................................................................................................Modern Universe

 

Does that make sense? 

I've color coded the chronolgy to roughly match the colors used in the diagram.

Ok, it looks like a lot went on before the CMB got going, in the Recombination era, but please remember that everything from the Planck Epoch to Nucleosynthesis took no more than 20 minutes! 

 

That's right! 

All of that shit happened in just 1,200 seconds! 

Matter Domination takes us to 70,000 years after the 'beginning' and then we get Recombination, when the Cosmic Microwave Background is first emitted.  This happened about 377,000 years after the 'beginning'.

 

Now, the main reason why scientists want to get a good, clear look at the CMB is because they reckon a lot of information about the first 20 minutes is 'frozen' into the patterns of that light.  Think of it this way.  If you dropped several dozen pebbles into a puddle of water and then flash-froze it, just after the stones hit the water surface, you'd have a permanent, frozen record of what happened to that puddle at that instant, wouldn't you?

 

You could tell how many pebbles hit it.  What order they hit it in.  What height each pebble was dropped from.  What angle they hit the water at.  What angle they were, with respect to their neighbors. How big each pebble was.  What shape it was.  How fast it was travelling when it hit.  Which pebbles, if any, were spinning, when they hit.  You could tell how many axes (plural of axis) they were spinning around.  You could probably tell the density of each pebble, too.  You could also look for patterns, groupings, similarities and dissimilarities between the pebbles.

 

And there's more!

You could apply this kind of forensic cosmology to the puddle itself.  You could tell the density and viscosity of the water.  You could tell what it's temperature was, when the pebbles hit.  You could estimate the depth of the puddle from any energy reflected of it's bottom.  You could probably estimate the dimensions of the puddle from the height and spread of the frozen splashes. 

 

So, there's a treasure trove of information 'locked' into the signals of the CMB, Ravenstar.

Cosmologists have been building up many, many theoretical models of what happened in the first epochs of the universe's evolution.  The Planck CMB data will be the acid-test of their validity.  There's proabably a Nobel prize waiting for the scientist who gets it right!

 

I hope this all helps.

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[bornagainathiest]

Dear BC,

 

I'll have to give some serious thought to your searching questions and get back to you when I can, ok?

 

Thanks,

 

BAA.

[Joshpantera]

Been watching Dr. Hector Avalos over at Minnesota Atheists' YT channel. Anybody else catch him?

 

 

He's fast approaching the status in Biblical history that Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson holds in my mind for astronomy. I can't remember if I saw a link to him here or elsenet, but either way, wow, this talk puts PAID to the claims of apologists that the Bible is a document relaying reliable history.

I've been through it. Good stuff.