MOON & SPENCER (PART 2)
There are two main propositions that I make with regard to Dr. Marion
Fox's citation of Moon & Spencer with respect to my more general
proposition that ALL of the relevant empirical astronomical information
that exists shows that the universe is far, far older than any 6,000
years.
Proposition 1: Dr. Fox's proposal that space is Euclidean for matter,
whereas light travels through a highly warped space (shades of Star
Trek!), is pure speculation. In 1953 it was an interesting speculative
conjecture. Today, in 1999, almost half a century later, Moon &
Spencer's speculation is, quite simply, wrong.
Proposition 2: Dr. Fox, not just any young earth advocate but also
educated in physics, should know better than to attempt to cite Moon &
Spencer as justification of the young universe/young earth position,
because their 1953 speculation turned out to be just an interesting
conjectural model that had no evidence (no empirical information) to
support it in 1953, and the relevant empirical information that exists
only contradicts the conjecture. This second proposition of mine speaks
to the attitude (and well-deserved reputation) of young earth advocates
to "play fast and loose" with the facts, all because of their persistent
and pervasive prejudice against the old universe/old earth position. I
shall discuss this second proposition in "Moon & Spencer (Part 3)."
Moon & Spencer's Idea
First, let's be clear on what it is Moon & Spencer actually did. They
were reasoning out (with mathematical language; recall Part 1 of my
discussion on Moon & Spencer) some of the implications of a theory which
had first been proposed in the first decade of the 20th century by Swiss
physicist Walther Ritz, a theory which, unlike Einstein's theory of
special relativity (and later, general relativity), assumed that the
speed of light did vary in a vacuum. (Note that since that time, all
empirical information that has been acquired is consistent with the idea
that the speed of light in a vacuum does NOT vary at all. See,
http://www.phys.virginia.edu/classes/109N/lectures/michelson.html.
Additionally, various implications of Einstein's general relativity,
based on special relativity, have been well corroborated by empirical
information.)
Moon & Spencer were basically saying that IF Ritz's theory (or something
like it) was a more-or-less accurate representation of reality (implying
that the speed of light in a vacuum did vary, and that, thus, Enstein's
special relativity and general relativity were wrong), and IF space was
thus Euclidean (non-curved) whereas light itself traveled through a
non-Euclidean, highly warped space with just such a geometry (calculated
using the math developed by Riemann and subsequent mathematicians -
hence the term "Riemannian space"), THEN light, no matter how far away,
would reach anywhere in the universe in no more than about 15.71 years.
This is all that Moon & Spencer did. They showed an interesting result
according to a particular theoretical idea about the structure of
reality, an idea that is today just a historical footnote in physics.
Moon & Spencer did not offer any corroborating empirical information.
However, one of the implications of Moon & Spencer's conjecture is that,
as observers on Earth, we would see multiple images of all observed
astronomical entities farther than about 90 trillion miles. (This is
something Dr. Fox neglected to point out.) Thus, for example, in the
case of SN1987a we would not observe just one image of the explosion of
the star - we would see it many times, over and over again, as the light
traveled around it's highly warped space on a 15.71 year cycle.
Now, multiply this implication of Moon & Spencer's conjecture for
SN1987a by EVERY OTHER OBSERVED ENTITY IN THE UNIVERSE farther from
earth than about 90 trillion miles (which is almost everything in the
universe), and you can understand why Moon & Spencer's conjecture really
is absolutely nothing more than an interesting, but obsolete,
mathematical speculation.
Moon & Spencer and SN1987a
However, space does indeed possess a curvature that can be described
using Riemannian mathematics (as I have stated repeatedly in previous
posts), just as Einstein used it (and as physicists have subsequently
developed its application). (See my previous post on this, "Moon &
Spencer (Part 1).") For example, Einstein's general relativity describes
how space is curved by the mass of the sun in the relatively immediate
vicinity of its surface enough so that the deviation of the path that
light follows from stars that are behind the sun but just below the
surface (relative to our observing them from the earth), are actually
seen on the earth as being just over the surface of the sun. This
prediction of general relativity has been well corroborated by the
empirical information that has been gathered regarding this effect of
curved space.
Additionally, I provide you with some online links showing specific
empirical examples of the fact that space does indeed have a curvature
based on matter affecting the shape of space in the manner described by
Einstein (and not Moon & Spencer!):
http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/pr/1999/18/index.html
http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/PR/95/43.html
http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/PR/95/14.html
and finally (in my opinion, the "neatest" one)
http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/PR/96/10/A.html
By looking at these observations from the Hubble space telescope, you
get to see specific examples of what happens to light from astronomical
entities that gets "gravitationally lensed" (light traveling through
space that is curved by significant mass along the line of sight between
the earth and these entities we are observing).
Again, I point out here the fact that none of this is relevant to
SN1987a (nor to the Large Magellanic Cloud which SN1987a is in), or
other astronomical entities in "near space," because the curvature of
space is not enough at this short range (only about 169,000 light-years
distant) to significantly alter the result obtained using a "flat space"
(Euclidean) model. (And there is no unusual, highly dense mass between
us and SN1987a; if there was, we would see the distortion effects of the
gravitational lensing.)
We do not observe multiple, distorted images of SN1987a nor of the Large
Magellanic Cloud, as we WOULD see if light followed an extreme curvature
as conjectured by Moon & Spencer. In other words, no empirical
information exists to indicate that the idea that Dr. Fox has advocated
(in criticism of my SN1987a example) is correct, AND all relevant
empirical information that does exist indicates otherwise.
When I initially requested citations from Dr. Fox, my request was
clearly in the context of requesting either specific empirical
information that would corroborate his position that the universe is
only 6,000 years old, or, at the least, specific empirical information
showing that all the direct empirical information that shows that the
universe has been around a lot longer than 6,000 years is, somehow,
misleading information (i.e., why should we not believe exactly what we
see?). (The geocentrism controversy that I have mentioned in earlier
posts IS a good parallel, because today we see the ancient universe very
clearly with our sophisticated array of scientific technology. The fact
that the universe has been around a lot longer than 6,000 years is just
as clear as the fact that our solar system is heliocentric.)
Dr. Fox has, to date, provided no citations of this kind. (And no one
else has either.) His best attempt has been this Moon & Spencer
conjecture, which was nothing more than than a mathematical speculation
in 1953 and is today, in 1999, nothing more than another historical
footnote about an incorrect idea.
If you will recall, beginning with a 6/18/99 post of mine, my claim has
been simply that there exists direct empirical information showing that
the universe has been around much, much longer than just 6,000 years.
All that anyone has offered so far in criticism is complete speculation.
No one has presented an iota of empirical information that shows
anything to the contrary of what such examples as SN1987a show us so
clearly.
Acknowledging The Facts
Incidentally, this conjecture by Moon & Spencer was first "resurrected"
from being a historical footnote by Harold Slusher in the mid-80s,
writing under the auspices of the Institute for Creation Research.
On this topic, Dr. Bert Thompson has written:
|
Vivien Bouds has likewise noted the ridiculous situation
resulting from a Riemannian view of light travel in which an
astronomer would be able to observe most stars in two exactly
opposite directions.... Thus there seems little point in using
the Riemannian space theory as an answer to the light problem.
(Essays in Apologetics, Volume IV, pages 9, 10)
|
(Thanks to the LURlist respondent who provided this reference to me.)
In fact, Dr. Fox has already implied that he knew Moon & Spencer's
conjecture was wrong, when he brought it up against my SN1987a example
to begin with. He has been trying to claim that even if I discussed Moon
& Spencer's idea and pointed out why it was wrong, then the fact that it
was wrong would, somehow, be irrelevant.
I acknowledge that Dr. Fox would have had a point if the relevant
astronomical information was recent, sparse, and not clear (and thus not
well understood). But this is not the case, and no one should try to
pretend that it is. The relevant astronomical observations are quite
voluminous, and entirely consistent with an incredibly gigantic universe
consisting of millions of galaxies scattered around billions of
light-years of space. There simply is NO evidence of a young universe,
and ALL of the relevant empirical information that exists shows that the
universe has been around for much, much longer than just 6,000 years. We
literally SEE the ancient universe when we peer out into space with our
modern, sophisticated telescopes, acquiring direct empirical information
that our ancestors simply did not have access to.
What Dr. Fox is claiming (along with other young universe/young earth
advocates), basically, is that we should reject and ignore ALL of this
direct empirical information simply because what we have found does not
match what we, personally, wanted to find because our acceptance of a
religious creed based on our human interpretations of parts of the Bible
makes this direct empirical information too uncomfortable for us to
accept. Therefore, pure speculation is better than everything that we
actually know (and emotional considerations are superior to factual
information).
I will state it again so there is no misunderstanding: ALL of the
relevant empirical information shows a universe that is far older than
6,000 years, because we literally observe historical events in the
universe that took place hundreds of thousands, millions, and even
billions of years ago. SN1987a is just ONE of the thousands of examples
that I could have chosen to use.
(For example, here is an online reference to a star that is about 10,430
light-years away:
http://beast.as.arizona.edu/Gallery/Hst/novacyg.html
gives the image, and
http://beast.as.arizona.edu/Gallery/Hst/novacyg_txt.html
gives some discussion. We are literally watching the gas envelope that
is moving out from an explosion on the star that took place a bit more
than ten thousand years ago. This star, by the way, is relatively quite
close to earth, being near us in our part of the Milky Way galaxy.)
When I made the comment in previous posts that no one is dealing with
SN1987a, the context of my comment has clearly been in reference to
empirical information, as opposed to sheer speculation. Pure speculation
doesn't count when compared to the clear empirical information that
exists in astronomy. I'm sorry, but fantasy just does not constitute
evidence, and those who try to pretend otherwise demonstrate a distinct
flaw in their overall perspective with regard to intellectual honesty.
(Moreover, those who acquiesce to those who make these pretensions that
speculation somehow constitutes evidence against voluminous empirical
information that contradicts it demonstrate a similar flaw.)
And that leads me into "Moon & Spencer (Part 3)"...
Sincerely,
Todd S. Greene
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. (2 Corinthians 3.17)
The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge;
the ears of the wise seek it out. (Proverbs 18.15)
For God is not a God of confusion but of peace.
(1 Corinthians 14:33)
| |
P.S.: Just as a note of clarification, I am purposely not yet
discussing the "apparent age" argument in this line of discussion.
That is for later...
|