The Natural Philosophy Alliance (NPA) is devoted mainly to broad-ranging, fully open-minded criticism, at the most fundamental levels , of the often irrational and unrealistic doctrines of modern physics and cosmology; and to the ultimate replacement of these doctrines by much sounder ideas developed with full respect for evidence, logic, and objectivity. Such reforms have long been urgently needed; and yet there is no area of scholarship more stubbornly censorial, and more reluctant to reform itself.
Reigning paradigms in physics and cosmology have for many decades been protected from open challenge by extreme intolerance, excluding debate about the most crucial problems from major journals and meetings. But the founding of the NPA in 1994 provided those struggling against this irrationality and intolerance with the strength, visibility, and credibility that comes from numbers and from collaborative, purposeful effort. It has also enabled them to share, expand, and refine their individual knowledge through contact with many other critical scholars, at NPA general meetings–held at least once per year since 1994–and by phone and mail, both postal and electronic.
We call the NPA an “alliance” because our members hold a wide variety of different views, yet have joined forces in a common effort. We agree unanimously on little more than that something is drastically wrong in contemporary physics and cosmology, and that a new spirit of open-mindedness is desperately needed in order to correct this situation
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Our foremost watchword is tolerance . Physics has sunk into its current mess largely because of lack of it, while some other sciences, such as the earth sciences, have made remarkable progress since 1950 by practicing it. Beyond science, we also strongly oppose political, religious, racial, and ethnic bias: for example, our criticisms of special and general relativity do not involve any kind of criticism of Einstein as a person, or of his political and ethical views–or even, in most cases, of his other valuable scientific work.
Several NPA members believe that the main benefit of criticizing and replacing special relativity may be–beyond even the likely development of new energy sources this will facilitate–the undermining of the relativism and subjectivism that have increasingly infused many areas of thought over the past century, since the iconoclastic amorality of Nietzsche. It will then become more difficult to support ethical relativism, and to argue that truth and values are not objective, absolute, eternal, and/or rationally based.
To learn more about the Natural Philosophy Alliance–its meetings and publications, how to join, etc.–look further into this web site.
I finally met my Uncommon Descent colleague, JohnnyB! JohnnyB gave the play-by-play here:Bartlett Publishing….
Also at this morning’s session I attended talks on Lucas Force Law YEC physics with Dr. Jason Rosenhouse at pandasthumb. This was lively as physicists Dr. John Hartnett and astro physicist Dr. Danny Faulkner were in a shouting match with Dr. Boudreux and Dr. Lucas and friends over the proposed classical model of atomic structure…..
Later in the day physicist Dr. Humphreys gave a presentation related to plasma cosmology and the fact that young and “old” galaxies have identical levels of maganatism inconsistent with an Old Universe. He cited a recent letter published this year in the prestigious scientific journal nature. Humphreys appeared to be right on!!
PS
It turns out there will be another “Expelled” movie about the suppression of dissent from Einsteinian relativity and standard quantum mechanics (just kidding). Dr. Lucas made a very powerful case about the kludgey nature of Quantum theory and offered a more elegant model based on almost standard electro-dynamics combined with a ring model (versus point model) of the electron…
Einstein Wrong - The Miracle Year documents the quest of a mother and her son as they enter the underworld of physics to take on relativity and the icon of 20th century physics.
Follow the journey of “Mrs. de” as she goes into the classroom, out into the streets, attends underworld physics conferences, and finally takes things into her own hands to discover the truth about relativity and the “miracle year” of Einstein. See her enter the dark side of physics where the legend of Einstein is not the solution, but part of the problem.
Don’t miss the suburban housewife who takes on the man whose name is synonymous with “genius”. And when all appears to be lost, can a physicist who lives just around the corner save her and the world from the depths of a physics world in turmoil?
Just when you thought it was safe for physicists to walk the streets, along comes “Mrs. de” to shake things up.
And while they shake up the physics world 100 years after Einstein, the family discovers their own year where real miracles happen.
Scientist re-examined rocks from the Apollo missions of about 35 years ago. They presumed the Moon had no water, they presumed worng.
Walter Brown speculated that Noah’s flood created explosive water and steam that accelerated ice into the moon. This would cause water to melt rock on impact! Furthermore, we would expect water to boil off on the moon, but we have a peculiar circumstance of water being trapped inside rock!
These results raise many questions. Are the volatile contents of the melts that formed the green and orange glasses typical for the Moon? Can the general scarcity of most volatile elements on the Moon be reconciled with the apparent abundance of sulphur, chlorine, fluorine and especially water in the lunar glasses? What happened to all the water during the Moon’s formation? And if the Moon is not bone dry, where did the water come from?
Mark Chaussidon, “Planetary science: The early Moon was rich in water,” Nature 454, 170-172 (10 July 2008)
[Advanced Creation Science]
[Pictured from left to right: (Nobel Laureates) Michelson, Einstein, Millikan]
Decreasing speed of light models postulate some sort of exponential decay. As time moved forward, the changes became less and less, but they were noticed:
“If the velocity of light is constant, how is it that, invariably, new determinations give values which are lower than the last one obtained … There are twenty-two coincidences in favour of a decrease of the velocity of light, while there is not a single one against it.”
M. E. J. Gheury de Bray, “The Velocity of Light,” Nature, 24 March 1934, p. 464.
M. E. J. Gheury de Bray, “The Velocity of Light,” Nature, 4 April 1931, p. 522.
We notice this phenomenon even in the measurements by Nobel Laureate Albert Michelson:
This graph of Racemization rate constants defined by supposed C-14 dates suggests accelerated sedimentary deposition in the past, not long geological ages.
[Advanced Creation Science]
There are some critics of my ideas and that of Barry Setterfield that deserve special attention. The critical work was honest and correct on many points. The work was so well done it inspired me to get around to finally going to grad school in physics so I could study the issues more carefully.
The reader may find these papers sufficient to overturn various YEC hypotheses. However, the was work by Robert Fritzius that and others that may give an “out” to the very important issues which Dr. Jellison and Dr. Cheesman raise.
There are still some important empirical measurements that must be made through advanced methods such as those pioneered by the Hipparcos mission. Many issues remain open, but they can be solve by future measurements…
The interpretation of “pulsators” as eclipsing binary stars is important. If spectroscopic binaries are a better indicator of binary star population, then Dr. Cheesman’s calculations may unwittingly lend credence to CDK and von Maanen’s small universe model.
We are unfortunately arguing in a vacuum as precise distance measurements are not available beyond about 300 light years. We expect an inverse square law relation in terms of brightness of stars and distance. But what if this is violated? If it is violated, it could be a significant affirmationof Setterfield’s CDK theory.
I don’t agree with all that Barry Setterfield has written, and I think Dr. Jellison has successfully cast doubt on major sections of Barry’s work, enough for me to rejection them.
But not all of Barry’s ideas are irredeemable.
In contrast, I’m of the opinion, the Big Bang is now irredeemable as a viable physical theory. When the prestigious Sigma Xi magazine likened it to a folktale, I realized the mainstream is now coming to terms with doubts which many have held privately….
Einstein’s theories have been held in such high esteem that any deviation from them is almost heresy in the realm of physics. Though Einstein himself was an open minded individual, and he would be appalled to think his ideas could never be questioned, there is almost a reverence of him such that skepticism of his venerated thoeries should remain private.
Unlike, Darwin, Einstein is deserving of reverence, as is the creationist Maxwell, the creationist Faraday, and the creationist Newton (these three are known as “Einstein’s Heroes”).
For YEC to succeed, however, it may be necessary that our current conception of the laws of physics, the very conceptions formed by Einstein and his three creationist heroes, may have to be re-written. Ah the irony of ironies, for YEC theory to succeed, the works of the greatest creationist physicist, Maxwell, will have to be re-written, as well as the formulas of relativity which Einstein deduced from Maxwell’s equations [I gave a glimpse of the sort of derivations demonstrating the connection of Maxwell’s celebrated equations of electrodynamics and Einstein’s relativity here: Lorentz Covariance and the Creationist Maxwell’s Equations]
Work on the issue is being done in secular quarters far removed from ID and creationist circles (and if I may say, that is a good thing). Joao Maguiejo holds the professorship once held by nobel laureates like Abdul Salam. He is no one to be dismissed. It was because of profound problems with the Big Bang (and there are still many) that he was partly inspired to explore the heresy of a Variable Speed of Light (VSL).
If the speed of light is variable, Einstein’s work would not be thrown out, but merely recast as a special case of a larger principle. This would seem to echo how Einstein did not invalidate Newton, but showed Newton’s ideas to be a special case in restricted domain.
Now, an open speculation proposed by obscure YECs like Barry Setterfield and myself is this: the formation of the filamentary structures of galaxies in the universe, and the galaxies themselves was the result of Birkeland currents flowing through plasma in the backdrop of a decreasing speed of light.
What will happen to matter if the speed of light has decreased over time. Supposes a particle was travelling a thousand times the current speed of light today, but maybe only 30% the speed of light in the past. One speculation is the particle will decelerate in order to maintain its relationship to the decreasing speed of light. Suppose it is a charged particle. Will it have electromagnetic radiations as a result of the deceleration (bremsstrahlung)? I don’t think so, but who knows? But the answer to such questions may solve an open problem in physics.
We all know what it’s like when we’re running late, and if we’re on the road we’re tempted to drive faster to get to the destination. The problem with galaxy formation is the building blocks, according to what we observe, were moving too slow given the gravitation forces involved. This relates to a classic problem in cosmology.
My professor of Quantum Mechanics at GMU, Dr. James Trefil, was famous for making the following statement, one which relates to a problem of speed and time.
Five Reasons Why Galaxies Can’t Exist
The problem of explaining the existence of galaxies has proved to be one of the thorniest in cosmology. By all rights, they just shouldn’t be there, yet there they sit. It’s hard to convey the depth of frustration that this simple fact induces among scientists.
James Trefil, The Dark Side of the Universe, p. 55.
One solution that Trefil and his colleagues proposed was the notion of “Dark Matter” in order to reconcile mainstream physics with the problem of galaxies.
But then 3 other professors at GMU, including Menas Kafatos, offered their public objection to the fabrication of potentially fictitious entities like Dark Matter to kluge a flawed theory.
The basic problem is one of speed. Gravity is too weak to confer sufficient speed to form the galaxies if we suppose the universe is even 13.4 Billion years old (much less 10,000 years).
But regarding the problem of speed, consider the fact that if we observe a car crawling along at 5 mph hour, do we wonder how this slow car managed to travel 60 miles in the last hour? Not at all! A simple solution is that the car was moving faster in the past and that our observation of the car’s present motions is not necessarily an indication of its velocity an hour earlier…..this relation is formalized by one of the most classic equation in physics:
where t = time, D(t) = distance, and v(t) = instantaneous velocity at time t
One speculation Barry Setterfield and I postulate is that if galactic building blocks were moving at high velocity in the past, they could be decelerated as the Zero Point Energy (ZPE) changed and the speed of light decreased. The change in the ZPE necessitates a decrease in the speed of light as well as an isotropic deceleration of everything else. Voila, the galaxies can form in such a universe (details saved for later)…..
The problems associated with gravitational accretion and formation disappear if we invoke the forces other than gravitation as the force which assembled the galaxies. What other force could that be? God? Well, yes, but even God can express his work through forces of nature. Setterfield and I (and others) propose the force is magnetic, the result of Birkeland currents flowing through plasmas.
Let us suppose that we have all the subatomic particles we need spread throughout the cosmos, but in a plasma state. First of all what is the proportion of these particles (neutrons, protons, electrons)….Answer: The proportion we find in water! What an amazing coincidence with the book of Genesis. The waters in the heavens might be a reference to the plamsa state of matter, approximated by the proportion of sub-atomic particles in water. It is arguable that the cosmos was formed from water, if one is willing to allow a small bit of poetic license….
Now what happens when a Birkeland current drives through a plasma. Well, perhaps a picture is worth a thousand words:
Now if we have highspeed particles coming togother, we would assume an insane amout of kinetic enery, and thus heat. But the heat problem can be solved if the matter is isotropically decelerated by a change in the ZPE which isotropically slows all matter and light.
Thus the existence of the galaxies need not be a mystery. There is no need for kluges like dark matter (which won’t work anyway), since gravitational accretion was not the cause of of cosmic structure.
It would also solve the problem of the filamentary organization of the galaxies. Dr. Trefil even had a chapter in his book referring to theories of filamentary organization of galaxies through gravitational mechanisms as “snake oil” (comically poking fun at even one of his own theories with a bit of self-deprecating humor!).
This organization galaxies and filamentary structures does not agree well with a graviational accretion scenario. Gravity (the discovery of the creationist Newoton) as the creator of galaxies does not accord well with basic physics. However Electro-Dynamics (the discovery of the creationist Faraday, Maxwell and others) as the creator of galaxies does accord well with basic physics, especially if one is will to allow a VSL cosmology.
God didn’t use gravity to form the galaxies, he used electricity.
A creationist paper apparently passed peer-review in the respected journal of Proteomics. Here are some wonderful sections from the paper.
These data are presented with other novel proteomics evidence to disprove the endosymbiotic hypothesis of mitochondrial evolution that is replaced in this work by a more realistic alternative.
….
More logically, the points that show proteomics overlapping between different forms of life are more likely to be interpreted as a reflection of a single common fingerprint initiated by a mighty creator than relying on a single cell that is, in a doubtful way, surprisingly originating all other kinds of life.
Read the frothing-of-the-mouth reaction by Paul Zoophile Myers here.
I foresaw this event. See my debate with Dr. Arthur Hunt of Pandas thumb over endosymbiotic theory at Access Research Network:
[Advanced Creation Science]
We have been taught that quasars and galaxies are distant objects, on the order of billions of light years away. Is the matter closed? I once thought so. I and a few other are not so sure anymore. Let the evidence be reviewed and then let there be some closure on the matter.
Consider the following compilation by Robert Fritzius:
The author contends that cosmological redshift, as a velocity/distance indicator, has led to a universe whose size is grossly overestimated, and that the inflated “scale of the universe” has contributed to the first of the missing mass problems.
With improved space probes like Hipparcos we can settle the issue through paralax measurement rather than cicularly reasoned speculations. What if we discover the galaxies, as Fritzius and van Maanen suppose, are only thousands, not billions of light years away! Visit Fritzius’ website for compelling arguments that the galaxies are much smaller and closer than we suppose and how the Big Bang paradigm has biased measurements to explain away the obvious possiblity that our distance measurements are totally wrong.
[Advanced Creation Science]
I’d like to apologize for my delay to the Standard Deviation Blog in letting the trackback though our moderation queue. I was away for 3 weeks and am in the process of changing internet providers.
He [Salvador] does not, however, provide a mechanism by which this variable speed of light will fix the apparent problems of the young earth creationism perspective. Stellar age seems to be fairly trivial for a YEC, and it’s not even made clear how a non-constant speed of light resolves this issue. Granted, I am not a cosmologist, but neither is Mr. Cordova, and he puts forth very little of any actual reasoning behind his claims. Should any of these have come from reputable sources, I’d love to have these as references.
It is possible to preserve much of classical electro magnetic theory and Einsteinian relativity, if the speed of light is variable. It doesn’t mean Einstein’s physics is thrown out the window any more than Newtonian physics was thrown out the window by Einstein. We merely have to adjust the domain of application and see things in a larger context.
Some secular work on the speed of light has been done by Barrow, Paul Davies, John Moffat, and João Magueijo. Here are links to secular mainstream VSL theories: VSL. The secular mainstream VSL theories are at variance with YEC theories, however, they help describe a mathematical reconciliation with ideas which Einstein put forward, and thus have a bearing on YEC theory. For example, the problem of Lorentz invariance has to be recast in VSL theory. Magueijo deals with such things.
There are also developments with Stochastic Electrodynamics which may be important toward a viable VSL cosmology. I can’t possibly cover all the topics in one post, and I’m also reporting things as I learn and discover new things. That’s what a weblog is for after all!!!
Now regarding stellar-age homogeneity. If the speed of light were constant, when we observe distant stars, we are supposedly observing how they looked 13.5 billion years ago. We can then compare these distant to stars nearby — only a few thousand light years away. If the speed of light were constant, the distant stars should look 13.5 billion years younger than the ones nearby, but they don’t. THIS IS A MAJOR PROBLEM!
Thus from purely empirical considerations alone, something is afoul about prevailing theories.
One possible solution is that light from the distant stars travelled quickly in the past. The net result is that we get a snapshot of the entire universe that is approximately instantaneous (practically speaking), and we don’t have delays associated with light travelling “slowly” over long distances. Thus all the stars appear the same age because of the relatively instantaneous snapshot we get from high speed of light.
There are also falsifiable predictions that flow from a YEC-VSL theory. We would expect slow motion effects from light from distant stars. The farther they are, the more slow motion we should observe. Binary stars should appear to orbit slower the farther they are. I pointed out that spectroscopic binaires give some evidence of this in the globular clusters. See: Survey of Spectroscopic Binary Stars.
The research is still in its infancy and it would be terribly pre-mature to render judgment either way.
I’m also not convinced our distance measurements are accurate since they are not based on triangulation, but only on circularly defensible arguments assuming the speed of light is constant and an inverse square law interpretation of light intensity. This could be all wrong in a VSL cosmology. I haven’t had time to do a flux analysis, but a YEC VSL cosmology might imply that we ought to observe deviations from the inverse square law distance estimate compared to a triangulation distance estimate. There may be some empirical support to this already, but we need better instrumentation.
For several decades, the distance to the Pleiades was determined by methods relying on our knowledge of stellar physics that was assumed to be rather well advanced. In 1989, the European astrometric satellite Hipparcos was launched. Hipparcos was able to measure the astrometric parameters of more than 100 000 stars, i.e. their positions, parallaxes, and proper motions, with the best accuracy ever obtained. Distances could then be directly inferred from the parallax measurements. About 50 of the brightest stars from the Pleiades cluster were Hipparcos targets. When the results from Hipparcos were released in 1997, it soon appeared that there was a 12% difference between the new Hipparcos measurement of the Pleiades’ distance and the previous estimates. The Hipparcos team found that the distance to Pleiades was about 118 parsecs or pc (385 light-years), whereas the previous measurements gave values of about 132 pc.
This situation presents a crucial astrophysical problem. If Hipparcos is right, it would mean that the stellar physics models relied upon for years may be wrong. If Hipparcos is wrong, there may be problems in calculating distances in the Universe, as distances of remote galaxies rely upon the determination of nearby stars’ distances, such as that of the Pleiades. Therefore, fixing the discrepancy is of major importance for astronomers.
Already the Hipparcos parallax measurments are suggesting decades of assumptions could be totally amiss, and this was only with a 400 light year triangulation. And the Hipparcos mission could totally unwind decades of Big Bang hypotheses.
Any guesses what will happen when our parallax measurements can see out to 30,000 light years? There is reasonable speculation we are totally mis interpreting the distance and position of quasars and galaxies.
Dr. Lon Solomon was nearly expelled from Johns Hopkins because he was a Christian. Thankfully the Lord watched over him and several others.
Richard Dawkins and company seem to be under the impression that Christianity spreads because children are indoctrinated by their parents. But Lon’s story is a counter-example against Dawkins simplistic notions.
Lon was a Jew and then a drug dealer before giving his life to Christ. Lon became senior pastor of an Evangelical mega-church. The mega-church has various executive from high-tech companies who are generous parishioners. One of the most incredible pro-ID conferences I’ve ever witnessed was hosted on the 90-million dollar church campus in 2006. The modern-day creationists come from good schools and are part of churches attended by executives from the high-tech industry. Lon is a prototypical Evangelical pastor in the new generation of Evangelicals.
Personal biography
Lon Solomon was born and raised in a Jewish home in Portsmouth, VA.
Lon holds a B.S. degree in Chemistry (1971) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; a Th.M. degree in Hebrew and Old Testament (1975, summa cum laude) from Capital Bible Seminary; an M.A. degree (1978) in Near Eastern Studies from Johns Hopkins University; and a Doctorate of Divinity degree (2005) form Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary.
Lon and his wife, Brenda, have been married since 1974. They have four children:
Jamie (born 1977), a 1999 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and a 2003 graduate of medical school who is now practicing as a Navy doctor;
Justin (born 1981), a 2006 graduate of University of Michigan Law School who is now practicing law;
Jonathan (born 1985), a recruited baseball player at Johns Hopkins University (where he is a junior); and
Jill (born 1992), an inspiring daughter with special needs.
Lon and Brenda have two grandchildren, one grandson and one granddaughter. They live in Fairfax, Virginia.
While in college, Lon’s life became a relentless search for meaning and purpose. He sought to fill the void he felt on the inside with fraternity life, partying, and gambling and developed a serious drinking problem. When all this failed to supply the inner peace he was seeking, Lon became deeply involved in drugs, both as a user and a distributor. He turned to “spiritual” things at this point, diving into psychedelics, Eastern religions, and even attempting a return to mainstream Judaism. But all this failed to resolve his inner turmoil, and he decided that suicide was the only reasonable way out.
It was at this time that Lon met a street evangelist in Chapel Hill who began to talk to him about Jesus Christ. As a result of months of interaction with this man, Lon made the decision to accept Jesus as his personal Savior and Messiah in the spring of 1971.
Lon refers to his life as a marvelous example of God’s transforming power in action. Subsequent to his decision to accept Christ, Lon was able to quit the drug and alcohol abuse that had plagued his life for years. He went on to graduate from Capital Bible Seminary in Old Testament with highest honors. He then did his graduate work at Johns Hopkins University receiving a Master’s Degree in Near Eastern Studies in 1979. He taught Hebrew and Old Testament at Capital Bible Seminary from 1975 to 1980.
While I was in church one day, Lon related how he was nearly expelled from Johns Hopkins because of his Christian beliefs, but survived to graduate. His story inspired me to apply to JHU.
In case anyone was wondering, do I personally think atheists are immoral people or bad parents as a rule? No. Atheists in the USA, as a rule, don’t live down to the logical consequences of their world view. Many have, thankfully, a innate sense of right and wrong. Many good upstanding Christians were raised in atheist homes like Francis Collins.
Furthermore, I can’t recall that I ever argued explicitly that atheists are bad parents. For the record, I think Atheist PZ Myers is a very fine father and husband. He should also be quite proud of his kids.
Regarding the legislation of morality, I’m a libertarian at heart. I’m for self-government, personal responsibility, and self-control. I think the US Government should limit their intrusion in the lives of people even if people choose to follow a way of life that might be wrong in the eyes of God. If Darwinists want to impale themselves on their pets like Darwinist Kenneth Pinyan or chop off their private parts like Darwinist John Roughgarden, the US Government should limit its intereference (unless of course medical malpractice is indicated or cruelty to animals is involved). However, I can’t help but think, upon hearing of these Darwinist practices — “OUCH”! (more…)
I had accepted the Big Bang all of my life until a physics student at UVa in 2002 told me many in the community are now privately expressing doubts (in addition to those who openly do like Halton Arp who was Hubble’s associate). When a prestigious organization like Sigma Xi has an article in its magazine that is critical of the Big Bang, perhaps it would be good to review the current state of affairs.
The YEC model would have no reason for existing if the Big Bang were on solid ground. Thus the demise of the Big Bang might be important for YEC to succeed. We will see.
In any case, YEC aside, it’s astonishing the Big Bang could be likened to a folktale in the Sigma Xi magazine. I have a feeling it represents a growing dissatisfaction with the model.
The Sigma Xi society boast many Nobel Laureates and I was impressed with their latest anti-Big Bang article:
“Modern Cosmology: Science or Folktale?”
In its original form, an expanding Einstein model had an attractive, economic elegance. Alas, it has since run into serious difficulties, which have been cured only by sticking on some ugly bandages: inflation to cover horizon and flatness problems; overwhelming amounts of dark matter to provide internal structure; and dark energy, whatever that might be, to explain the seemingly recent acceleration. A skeptic is entitled to feel that a negative significance, after so much time, effort and trimming, is nothing more than one would expect of a folktale constantly re-edited to fit inconvenient new observations.
The suggestion that Darwin’s theory of evolution is like theories in the serious sciences – quantum electrodynamics, say – is grotesque.
David Berlinski
Perhaps the most fundamental principle in physics is quantum theory, and it is this theory that leads to an Intelligent Design inference from a direction quite independent of the arguments offered by Dembski and Behe or even Gonzalez and Richards.
This other form of ID was advocated primarily by physicists John Barrow and Frank Tipler. Their derivation suggests the existence of God, and the existence of God implies Intelligent Design.
Quantum mechanics can be symbolized by Schrodinger’s Equation:
In principle, each component of the universe (sub atomoic particles, molecules, rocks, planets, stars, galaxies, etc.) is a quantum system. Two individual quauntum systems (like two atoms) can be viewed as a single quantum system, and this composite system can be combined with other quantum systems, etc. — one can repeat this combination of quantum systems until one defines a quantum system for the entire universe. That conceptual merging of all quantum systems is represented by the quantum system of the universe, or (for lack of a better term), the Universal Wave Function. Taking the Schrodinger equation and generalizing it for the entire universe, we have the universal wave function as derived by Barrow and Tipler:
where the indexed Psi’s are the individual quantum systems, and the O’s are the “observations”.
In Hofstadter and Dennett’s book, Mind’s Eye, Hofstadter writes:
Perhaps one way to think of the universal WAVE FUNCTION is as the mind - or brain, if you prefer - of the great novelist in the sky
Various theories of Intelligent Design and Advanced Creation Science depend heavily on Schrodinger’s equation of Quantum Mechanics [as I pointed out in Fundamental Theorems of ID].
Thus it makes sense to cover a little bit about Schrodinger’s equation over several threads and hopefully after some lenghty derivations, I can connect basic physics to theories of ID and Advanced Creation Science.. To my surprise, I discovered there is a relationship of Schrodinger’s equation in physics to the Fourier Transform of math and Electrical Engineering.
So to kick-off my exploration of the Fourier Transform and Schrodinger’s equation, I’ll simply state some accepted definitions used in practice:
If we have an arbitrary function x(t) which obey the Dirichelet Conditions, the Fourier transform of that function is defined as:
[Advanced Creation Science]
There are two theorems that I consider fundamental to Intelligent Design. The first was derived by the renowned physicists John Barrow a Frank Tipler from Schrodinger’s equation of quantum mechanics:
The second fundamental theorem of ID was derived by William Dembski, it can be found on page 25 of this document: Searching Large Spaces.
The exploration of these fundamental theorems will take a year’s worth of blogging. They make feasible the theory of ID, and a theory of ID leads to the possiblity of theories of special creation, which make possible theories of a young cosmos.
But regarding the first fundamental theorem of ID, Frank Tipler writes:
A recent poll of the members of the National Academy of Sciences, published in Scientific American, indicated that more than ninety percent are atheists. These men and women have built their entire worldview on atheism. They would be exceedingly reluctant to admit that any result of science could be valid if it even suggested that God could exist.
I discovered this the hard way when I published my book The Physics of Immortality. The entire book is devoted to describing what the known laws of physics predict the far future of the universe will be like. Not once in the entire book do I use anything but the known physical laws, the laws of physics that are in all the textbooks, and which agree with all experiments conducted to date. Unfortunately, in the book I gave reasons for believing that the final state of the universe — a state outside of space and time, and not material — should be identified with the Judeo-Christian God. (It would take a book to explain why!) My scientific colleagues, atheists to a man, were outraged. Even though the theory of the final state of the universe involved only known physics, my fellow physicists refused even to discuss the theory. If the known laws of physics imply that God exists, then in their opinion, this can only mean that the laws of physics have to be wrong.
Unless Russell Humphrey’s white hole cosmology (or something like it) is true, the only way YEC can be true would be through non-constant “constants”. These developments are marginally favorable to the Young Cosmos hypothesis.
[A word of caution, the VSL cosmology suggested in the article is not the same as the YEC cosmologies promoted here at YoungCosmos. However, these are still important developments. ]
The following is the Modulation Theorem used in Electrical Engineering, it has significance to the creationists.
The Modulation theorem makes possible many of the high-tech (modern cell phones, satelite communications) and low-tech (i.e. simple intercoms) systems we use today.
Darwinism does not hold a candle to the series of equations listed below. This is real science versus mindless Darwinism. There is more science represented in these equations than Ed Brayton or Liz Craig, or for that matter Charles Darwin ever comprehended.
These equations touch upon creation science since they relate to Schrodinger’s equation and Stochastic Electrodynmaics. If Stochastic Electrodynamics holds true, it may make viable various CDK/VSL and plasma cosmologies, which in turn make a Young Universe cosmology feasible in principle.
In brief, from the above picture of the modulated wave, we can see one wave form (modulated signal) as the product of two other wave forms (the carrier signal and the modulating signal). Schrodinger’s equation allows particles (like electrons) to be modeled as modulated signals (wave packets). Stochastic Electrodynmics goes even farther with this interpretation of wave mechanics and can derive the majority of physical laws through wave mechanics, even the major theorems of relativity.
If stochastic electrodynamics is true, it leads to the possibility of a CDK/VSL and plasma cosmology which would make possible a Young Universe cosmology. Whether the hypothesis is true is a worthy scientific question. This website is committed to exploring the idea over the next several years….
Furthermore, (with some work) things like Heisenberg Uncertainty, Statistical Mechanics, Thermodynamics can be derived from the above considerations. These principles and concepts (with some work) can be shown to utterly destroy Darwin’s ideas. It was considerations like these that led the great Engineer/Physicist and Nobel Laureate Eugene Wigner to declare:
certainly it is hard to believe that our reasoning power was brought, by Darwin’s process of natural selection, to the perfection which it seems to possess.
More later….but in the meantime contrast the above considerations with Darwin’s own confession of scientific incompetence:
I attempted mathematics [at Cambridge University ], and even went during the summer of 1828 with a private tutor (a very dull man) to Barmouth, but I got on very slowly. The work was repugnant to me, chiefly from my not being able to see any meaning in the early steps of algebra. This impatience was foolish, and in after years I have deeply regretted that I did not proceed far enough at least to understand something of the great leading principles of mathematics; for men thus endowed seem to have an extra sense. But I do not believe that I should ever have succeeded beyond a very low grade.
Charles Darwin
Autobiography (p. 58 of the 1958 Norton edition)
[Advanced Creation Science]
The prestigious society Sigma Xi (which boasts many Nobel Laureates) published the following essay which David Coppedge quotes:
Creationists have long battled with geologists and biologists, but they have only lately taken on physicists and cosmologists….
I stumbled onto this thriving, wired network two years ago, after my colleague Alan H. Guth and I published a review of recent cosmological research in Science. About a week after our article appeared, Guth received an e-mail message directing him to a rebuttal of our piece, posted on a creationist Web site. That response included dozens of hyperlinks to like-minded “refutations’ of the big bang, inflationary cosmology, string theory and the rest. These sites boasted high production values and good graphics.
[Advanced Creation Science]
Dr. Danny Faulkner is a tenured professor of astronomy at a secular school. He is also a Young Earth Creationist.
Faulkner echoes my views of Young Earth when he says:
We have posed many questions here, but offered few definitive answers. The field of creation stellar astronomy is still in its infancy. The author has few answers for many of these questions at this time, and he hopes that this brief discussion can lead to further discussion and research.
Advanced Creation Science
CDK says the current speed of light was faster in the past. This becomes more believable if the speed limit is broken in the lab. A group of physicists may have succeeded in breaking the speed of light.
This morning, after much searching I may have found confirming evidence of a VERY VERY bold prediction of Barry Setterfield’s light speed decay theory. Light speed decay (CDK) theory predicts that we will see celestial objects move in slow motion (time dilation) depending on an equation calculated by Dr. Stephen Cheesman. For example, the degree of time dilation predicted when we start to look at objects at say about 30,000 light years is about 59, their physical motions will appear to be slowed down by factors of 59!
In a survey of Visual Photometric Binary stars and Visually accessible Spectroscopic Binary stars, I have found confirming evidence of this time dilation! Astronmers have acknoweldged the anomaly and tried to explain away the fact that as one looks farther out from Earth there is an increase in population of slow visual Binary Stars (Stars which orbit one another), or apparently no binary stars at all. Actually, with extreme time dilation, binary stars will look frozen, and this is actually what we are seeing in globular clusters 30,000 light years away.
I have also asserted that there are only supposed eclipsing binaries detected by micro-lensing techniques which are not binaries at all.
I would welcome review of the current work on this subject as it would confirm:
NOTWITHSTANDING THE investment made by the scientific community and the general
public in contemporary cosmology, a suspicion lingers that matters do not sum up as they should. Cosmologists write as if they are quite certain of the Big Bang, yet, within the last decade, they have found it necessary to augment the standard view by
means of various new theories. These schemes are meant to solve problems that cosmologists were never at pains to acknowledge, so that today they are somewhat in the position of a physician reporting both that his patient has not been ill and that
he has been successfully revived.
…. (more…)
Although I think YEC theory has a ways to go, there are various anomalies reported from secular quarters that continue to give hope to YEC proponents. One paper cited is a 1991 peer-reviewed paper by Tifft: Properties of the Redshift III: Temporal Variation. In this paper, Tifft argues that changes in redshifts from the same have object have been detected by historical measurements. It is like looking at an object and seeing its color change before your very eyes. This would throw some doubt on the standard interpreations of the Big Bang.
Comparisons between new 21 cm redshifts and older data, especially older 300 foot telescope data, are used to demonstrate the presence of systematic deviations, toward higher redshifts, in all the older data.
Objectivity cannot be equated with mental blankness; rather, objectivity resides in recognizing your preferences and then subjecting them to especially harsh scrutiny — and also in a willingness to revise or abandon your theories when the tests fail (as they usually do).
— Stephen Jay Gould
[Gould was the beloved mentor of creationist Kurt Wise]
I will try to put a mix of advanced creation science with topics of interest to the general reader. YoungCosmos will be set apart from other websites in its willingness to invite and discuss serious challenges with various YEC hypotheses.
However, I recognized, exclusive focus on specialty topics will discourage interest in the website. So, I’ll try to maintain about a healthy mix of interesting topics and specialty topics. This post deals with an attempt at clarification of both Setterfield’s work and Dr. Jellison and Bridgman’s work regarding wavelength behavior with respect to time at the same general location and at various locations…. (more…)
[Advanced Creation Science]
I’m opening this thread for a more detailed and mathematically rigorous discussion of the Boltzman distribution objection to CDK. This a critique of paper by Dr. Jellison introduced here. I welcome civil, academic discussion and civil treatment of the subject matter. I thank the participants in advance for their restraint in holding back their frustrations with each other. The discussion will move forward as we stick to the facts and theories.
I’d like to thank Dr. Jellison for raising important question regarding CDK which I expect many others will have and which I hope CDK supporters will consider carefully.
I would like to offer my counter-critique in defense of CDK pertaining to page 29. The traditional Boltzman distribution is:
Dr. Jellison’s interprets Boltzman under CDK to be:
[Advanced Creation Science]
I am great supporter of Barry Setterfield’s work. See www.Setterfield.org
Part of advancing the his work involves exposing it to scientific criticism. Though facing criticism may be difficult, if a theory is true, it will prevail in the end.
With that in mind, I present the hard work of two scientists (Jellison and Bridgman) who have written a critique of an idea I really like, namely CDK. I do not expect the discussion to be settled anytime soon, and the work of these two scientists is worthy of consideration. I’d like to thank them for making their work available online. The issues here could take years to settle, and I think it unfair to Barry to make any demands he respond anytime soon.
I must sadly assert, rather than condemning Old-Earth Creationists as being compromisers or finding flaws in OEC theology, it would be far more productive (for science and the cause of the gospel, if indeed CDK is true) to solve scientific problems such as the ones outlined by Dr. Jellison. For as long as these scientific problems linger, there will be those who will accept an Old Universe, and I for one can’t blame them….. (more…)
Much has been made of the Baraminology Study Group’s (BSG) activities.
In fact, the BSG’s activities have reached the very halls of the Unted States Congress and the Office of Special Council in the Richard Sternberg affair. See: www.rsternberg.net
Here are my reflections of Thursday, June 14, 2007: (more…)
In Criticism of CDK from brother Stephen J. Cheesman, I was confronted with some of the sobering difficulties of a particular YEC Cosmology known as CDK (speed of light decay). In that discussion, the topic arose as to what would constitute an empirical support or refutation of Barry Setterfield’s ideas.
It appears aerospace engineer George Sanctuary independently derived a time-dilation equation and found several anomalies that appear to support the Setterfield cosmology.
1) Quite surprisingly, the derived nominal tidal effects model duplicates general relativity precessions for all celestial bodies in the solar system. However, for two binary stars, (DI Herculis and AS Camelopardalis), GR predicts double the measured orbital precessions, while the NTE model duplicates the measured values.
Nominal Tidal Effects (NTE) combined with the Hyperbolic Creation Model (HCM) described in this paper offer a reasonable alternative to a universe cosmogony which is explained using general relativity (GR). The HCM cosmogony is heliocentric (sun-centered), as also is the well-known background Red Shift. The cause of the Red Shift frequencies could be a decaying transit super-speed of light. Finally, the possibility that the age of the universe is just a few thousand years has been demonstrated.
DI Herculis is an 8th-magnitude eclipsing binary about 2,000 light years from earth. These two young blue stars are very close — only one fifth the distance from earth to our sun. They orbit about a common center of gravity every 10.55 days. So far, no problem!
The puzzle is that, as the two stars swing around one another, the axis of their orbit rotates or precesses too slowly. General relativity predicts a precession of 4.27°/century, but for DI Herculis the rate is only 1.05°/century. This does not sound like a figure large enough to get excited about, but it deeply troubles astronomers. D. Popper, an astronomer at UCLA, says:
“The observations are pretty clear. I don’t think there’s any question there’s a discrepancy and, frankly, it is an important one and it’s unresolved.”
The solution may be a Young Cosmos and YEC CDK cosmology.
[Note: I’m on vacation till Monday, June 11, 2007. Sorry I can’t joint the fun for a few days. ]
[Ed Note: We have been following Barry Setterfield’s research on the speed of light since 1993.
It is interesting that both evolutionists and creation scientists can be blinded by their own presuppositions…]
