Posted on 10/22/2015 7:20:02 AM PDT by Salvation
I was meditating on time today, precipitated by some mysteries I’ve recently learned about the light of the Sun that reaches this earth.
I have long known that to look up into the night sky is to look far into the past. Looking up at the star Sirius, I am seeing 9 years into the past. Looking over at the star Antares, I am seeing 250 years into the past. And when I look the star Rigel, I am seeing 600 years into the past. Looking further still at the Andromeda galaxy, I am seeing one million years into the past. That is how long it takes the light of these stars and galaxies to reach us! We are not seeing them as they are now, but as they were then. The past, even the distant past, is very present to us.
The light of the sun takes 8.25 minutes to reach us. Thus we see the surface of the sun not as it is now, but as it was more than 8 minutes ago.
But I learned yesterday that the light of the sun is even older than I had thought. A little research on my part revealed this astonishing fact: the photons of light that reach the surface of the sun (and then reach us 8+ minutes later) were actually generated 100,000 years ago in the sun’s core.
Emerging from the sun’s core as the result of nuclear fusion, a photon of light enters the radiative zone (see diagram above). The plasma in that radiative zone is quite a maze for the photon to get through, such a maze that it takes the better part of 100,000 years to make the journey to the convective zone and the photosphere where it finally begins a rapid journey out into the vacuum of space.
Why does it take this long? Imagine being in a large room filled with people, trying to get to the door on the other side the room. But as you try to make your way across the room, person after person strikes up a conversation with you, delaying your progress. It won’t take you 100,000 years to get to the door, but you get the idea.
The diagram above shows the meandering, zigzag motion of a photon as it makes it way through a maze of plasma that detains the photon for up to 100,000 years!
Thus, the sunlight we currently bask in is much more than 8 minutes old; it’s 100,000 years old! The light we see today was made in the sun’s core back during the beginning of the last ice age.
The great mystery of time is on display for us at every moment. The past is present in many ways. And our past is on display and still present as well. If anyone on a planet near Rigel were looking back through a telescope at the earth right now, he would not see us as we are today, he might see Joan of Arc and her contemporaries of the 15th century. The light of our “today” will not reach Rigel for 600 years.
What is the present? That is mysterious as the sum total space of the universe and it depends on where you are. God, who is just as present at Rigel as He is here, has the same access to the images of 1415, as he does to those of 2015. Indeed, He is present at Andromeda just as much as here on earth; and a million years ago is just as accessible to Him as is now.
The future is even more mysterious, but that is just as available to God as is the past.
Do not miss the irony of the fact that the light of the sun (and the reflected light of the moon), by which we set our clocks and calendars to measure time and tell what time it is now, is 100,000 years old.
Does anybody really know what time it is? Only God, only God. Time is very mysterious and the more we think we know, it seems the less we really do.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, God How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand—when I awake, I am still with you (Psalm 139:16-18).
Monsignor Pope Ping!
I always find it fascinating when folks debate the existence of other intelligent life in the universe. This article provides a reminder about how long it might take for a signal to get to or come from the nearest star systems (if they are even systems).
We just sent signals out a few decades ago. We have at least a few hundred more years before intelligent life RIGHT NEXT DOOR might recognize it. Then it might be several hundred more years before we would receive a call back. Folks, that is a 1,000 year conversation after two exchanges. And that is to our CLOSEST POTENTIAL NEIGHBORS. Now consider the rest of our own Galaxy. Given the life of stars, planets and life on our own planet, a few million years of existence is reasonable for a species. We’ll say 10 million for the real hardy intelligent life.
Now, let’s say intelligent life started on another planet just a little older than ours. What would constitute just a little older? A few billion years? One billion? What if we started a little before them? I might take a few thousand years to find or get a signal from or to other intelligent life and that’s after we figure out where to look and when it was intelligent.
Finding other intelligent life is not a math problem. It’s a time and space problem.
It’s always fun to think about it thought.
Theologically, the question of intelligent life on other planets stands really simple: do these creatures sin?
If they do, Christ saved them too. Whether we know of it or not.
One of the myriad of evidences of the truth of Scripture is the phrase in Revelation 13:8 that describes Christ as, “The Lamb slain before the foundation of the world,” meaning, among other things, outside of time and space.
Time is created when light is created (along with the other wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum); time and space are defined by the wave-speed and the mass of light—a concept that would have made no sense to any rational thinker of the time, nor any rational thinker before the 17th century (Ole Roemer) for time, or the 20th century (Einstein) for space. But the One who created time and space knew.
One thing I like about the Catholic Church is it does not see modern science (such as astronomers studying the vastness of the universe) as a threat to God or the Bible.
Quote-Time is created when light is created
The Father’s calendar has a day every month that represents what happened before He said Let there be Light and called the Light Day.
And that pattern can answer questions like why are Jewish boys to be circumcised on the 8th day? What is the 8th Day in His Timekeeping? Or what is the significance of Passover on His 14th Day?
It sets pattern where it is commemorating His Creative and Redemptive Work- every month,every week, every day..
The Savior of the World was born on a Day that the world ignores. A Day, once a month, that tells us that something occurred before the First Work Day where He said ,Let there be Light..
And the world is ignorant of it. Not by accident- by design..
So you don’t believe God created all of this in six 24 hour days as calibrated?
Interesting. Aliens could be Gods people too.
I do not believe God created the universe as it currently exists in 6 periods. of 24 hours. I believe he used the laws of physics. It certainly happened quick. But time is not relevant when considering g eternity. Time as we know it is a human creation of measurement unique to our solar system and planet. Humans had to recall and retell the story of creation. They were pretty primative. It was simplified.
Do you discount the possibility that the Holy Spirit moved the writer of Genesis to record it as such?
This is not a mystery. It is simple.
Einstein missed the variable that explains this.
Time is not just a function of the speed of light.
Time is a function of the operational frequency of consciousness divided by the speed of light.
When consciousness (the soul) is cleansed and thus the mass is reduced it allows for an increase in frequency. when the speed of consciousness exceeds the speed of light one automatically has the gift of prophesy.
This is also why time collapses when I meditate or pray as I am tuning to the higher frequency where the time distortion is greater.
This is also why the memory of my near death experience, when I recall it is always a present experience as the experience happened at such a high level of consciousness that it is always in the present.
Another endorsement of modern scientism by the “ancient and unchanging” church.
Not at all. In fact, I fully expect the Holy Spirit did. Except that there was no writing or recording in those earliest of times in the "evolution" of the human intellect and understanding of the world God created. But the Holy Spirit simplified the message so it could be understood, recalled and passed along. Remember, back then, history was recorded in stories. Jesus still taught in parables (stories) as well to explain messages and concepts. I beleive, Genesis is largely symbolic. Humans are VERY unique in that we are aware of our existence and can create (similar to he who made us in his own image). This is the symbolic explanation provided when Adam and Eve eat of the fruit on the tree of "knowledge". They were made aware and with that comes the concept of right and wrong and evil.
I'll be sure to get some of the details on the messaging to God's first people when I meet him. For I am certainly curious.
Have to be. They may be alien to us but God is one God.
Even though the New Testament testifies to the creation as an actual event and not symbolic.
There is yet still symbolism in the New Testiment, even as it testifies. I concede, I am not the biblical scholar that I believe you to be. But I do not recall Jesus' specific reference as fact to detailed accounts of what became the book of Genesis (He might have, I'd have to check context) As mentioned previously, Jesus taught in parables (symobolism) and certainly references the prophets and teachings. Jesus, The Father and Holy Spirit all maintain a similar style.
Also, I don't discount the knowledge our species has gained since those primative days in the garden of Eden ;O). How would we account for the existence of Dinasours ahead of Adam and Eve and long after the "6th day"? Our knowledge of the age of our planet is precisely the result of our eating from the tree of knowledge (along with our own awareness, right from wrong and evil). We learn, explore, create, invent, plan and we SEEK ANSWERS through Science all because God made us unique from the animals. Science has led us to conflict with the literal interpretation of creation documented in Genesis. I won't decide between what God has given man in word and knowledge. Instead, my faith has led me to seek and understand how to interpret the truth without conflict.
In short, I don't think God wants me to believe in a grand conspiracy about the age of the earth as proven by a hundred years of human science. Instead, my faith leads me to believe that before and during creation, God did not measure time in minutes, hours, days and years. But first people people new the sun came up and went down in a pretty routine cycle. I am not sure God is finished with Creation to this day. What might believers think of creation in 100,000 years when were are considered primative portions of our species? Science tells us we have only been intelligent for about 20K years depending on what you qualify as intelligent (unique among life on earth).
Jesus also referenced Moses in John 5:45-47.
Exodus is attributed to Moses who recorded in Exodus 20:11, "“For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”
There are other examples in the NT that tell us the events of Genesis are not symbolic but literal events that did indeed occur.
I hope these examples aid in the discussion.
It really comes to do you believe God's Word?
If He cannot create the universe in six days, can He bring the dead back to life?
If He cannot create the universe in six days, can He bring the dead back to life?
It does not have to be black and white for me. I continue to evolve as does my understanding and relationship and faith. I believe God's Word and that Dinasours existed. It fits neat and tidy with me.
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