Posted on 10/22/2004 7:22:56 AM PDT by Publius Valerius
Universe's 6,000th birthday ...
Tim Radford Friday October 22, 2004 The Guardian
Britain's geologists are about to celebrate the fact that the universe is exactly 6,000 years old.
At 6pm tonight at the Geological Society of London, scientists will raise their glasses to James Ussher, Archbishop of Armagh (below), who in 1650 used the chronology of the Bible to calculate the precise date and moment of creation.
Working from the book of Genesis, and risking some speculation on the Hebrew calendar, he calculated that it began at 6pm on Saturday October 22, 4004 BC.
Actually, he put the date at October 23, and then pedantically realised that time must have begun the night before, because the Bible said that "the evening and the morning were the first day."
The geologists selected the anniversary for a day-long conference on some of the fakes, frauds and hoaxes that have plagued geological and palaeontological research for centuries. "It's not that we think Archbishop Ussher's date was a fraud," said Ted Nield, the society's communications officer. "It's just that it was spectacularly wrong."
Dr Nield conceded, too, that in toasting the archbishop's calculations the geologists were committing another error. More than 6,000 years have passed since 4004 BC. The symmetry is only apparent. The date is a mere numerological reflection. The real anniversary passed unnoticed, in 1997.
Heh.
Why do I get the feeling this is the start of a really long thread?
Modern day scientists are never wrong?
Excuse me..."spectacularly wrong."
WAY too much government funding.
What? You think a thread about the age of the universe is going to start off a creationism vs. evolution debate? Never! < /sarcasm>
I wonder if he included the day that Joshua asked the Lord to keep the sun from setting.
Happy Birthday Universe!
I noticed it, back then.
Debate? Naw, I showed up for the party!
Maybe, but there is an election season truce among the ususal suspects. No creation/evolution flame wars.
Is my math off or wouldn't the earth be 6008 years old?
Compared to enternity the age of unviverse is one breath from God.
Huh? 4004 + 2004 = 6007 (minus the zero year). Good grief.
However, I think the time scale may be just a wee bit off. 12 billion years old is a little closer to the mark.
Funny thing about how little science really knows, String theorists can tell you that it is equally valid that the universe is the as big as 13 billion light years in diameter, or no bigger than the size of a single proton. Yet, theology speculation is just spectacularly wrong. It is amazing however, whether you believe in God or in Science...Faith exists in either a Supreme Being or a virtual particle. For me, I'll choose the Supreme Being over the virtual particle any day and question everything else in-between.
You forgot there is no year zero.
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
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