Posted on 04/20/2003 10:36:35 AM PDT by JHL
On Easter of all days, Gary Trudeau uses his Doonesbury cartoon to insult Christians in general, and George Bush's faith in particular. How quick the liberals are to condemn someone else's faith and belief system, but just let a Christian say anything negative about another's belief system and how quick they are to invoke an injunction against "judgementalism."
You can read the cartoon for yourself at the following link CLICK HERE for cartoon
Then evolution cannot be a science since scientists who hold to evolutionary beliefs claim to have most, if not all, of the "answers".
Just like Mirimax-Disney was unaware that their antiCatholic art film "Priest" was originally slated to be released on Good Friday some years back?
You give them too much good faith and credit.
This means that a know-nothing cartoonist has turned HIS back to vast human experience and knowledge...
I like this new theme in your responses to the blue posts!
If there is no center, why is it still called the big bang theory? Isn't this what astronomers have been trying to prove since I was in school, oh so many years ago? I guess the determination of the initial center point didn't pan out with the red shift calculations and our current observations, so they dropped the idea of the initial explosion creating the universe as we know it?
Do astronomers accept the notion that If stars are constantly being created on their own, living and dying over time, independent of the initial creation of the universe? if so, then shouldn't it be called the "continual bang theory"? Or do astronomers not accept the notion that new stars are being created on an ongoing basis?
As to the distribution argument, why is the observable universe not somewhat uniformly distributed as we see it now? Why wouldn't we see uniformity now if The big bang happened everywhere at once.?
The only place where I appear to differ from the current scientists is that they believe our viewable universe is all that there is. We are a one shot wonder, nothing more.
How about all the existing dead "cluster universes" are acting like black holes and trapping all the light from the further out dead/alive universes and are thus preventing us from collecting the data to prove my hypothesis? "Would you believe" it's not the bogus space dust that invalidates Olber's paradox, but all these burnt out universes acting as black holes trapping the light that we should find from our vantage point. Are the current astronomers still looking for additional mass within the universe to validate their red shift or other mathematical problems? Or to eplain why our aged (whatever the current number is) universe doesn't have more mass in it to explain the current state of our universes expansion/contraction?
btw, what do you do for a living to know so much about this?
This has already been done, and, except for some local clumping (galaxy clusters, and what not), the universe is isotropic and homogeneous on large scales.
You may or may not have heard of the phenomenon known as gamma-ray bursts, first observed by spy satellites in the 1970's searching for gamma-rays emitted by nuclear tests in the USSR and elsewhere.
Throughout the 1980's and early 1990's, we didn't know where this phenomenon originated. What could cause an intense, short emission of gamma-rays, and where did they come from? Scientists devised several statistical tests to determine the distribution of GRB's, and then applied the current observed set to those tests. As more and more bursts were observed, it was determined that they were isotropic and homogeneous in distribution, that is to say, there was no clumping in any direction in the sky. These results were deemed to be supportive of a cosmological source of the phenomenon, because anything nearby (even in the Local Group) would introduce asymmetries in the distribution.
If you need references I'd be happy to dig them up for you.
1Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. 2This is what the ancients were commended for.
3By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. 4By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead. 5By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death; he could not be found, because God had taken him away. For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
7By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
8By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
11By faith Abraham, even though he was past age--and Sarah herself was barren--was enabled to become a father because he[1] considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.
13All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16Instead, they were longing for a better country--a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. 17By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18even though God had said to him, "It is through Isaac that your offspring[2] will be reckoned."[3] 19Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.
20By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau in regard to their future.
21By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons, and worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.
22By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions about his bones.
23By faith Moses' parents hid him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary child, and they were not afraid of the king's edict.
24By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. 25He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. 26He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward. 27By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king's anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible. 28By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel.
29By faith the people passed through the Red Sea[4] as on dry land; but when the Egyptians tried to do so, they were drowned.
30By faith the walls of Jericho fell, after the people had marched around them for seven days.
31By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient.[5] 32And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets, 33who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, 34quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies. 35Women received back their dead, raised to life again. Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. 36Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. 37They were stoned[6] ; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated-- 38the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.
39These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. 40God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
If there is no center, why is it still called the big bang theory? Isn't this what astronomers have been trying to prove since I was in school, oh so many years ago? I guess the determination of the initial center point didn't pan out with the red shift calculations and our current observations, so they dropped the idea of the initial explosion creating the universe as we know it?
I'm not a cosmologist (I'm more interested in science at redshifts < 1), but basically, there is no observed center of the universe. It's kinda of a complex reasoning, but here's one way to look at it:
Remember that because light has a speed, the farther back in distance you look, the farther back in time you look. The farthest back in time that we can "see" is the infrared background, which is nearly a source of nearly constant intensity and temperature that is nearly perfectly homogeneous in the sky. It acts as a wall to us, we can't see the universe beyond it, and it is what really prevents us form seeing the BB itself, since no radiation source we know of penetrates it, and it is the biggest piece of evidence that there was indeed a BB. That is the only reference frame that exists, and it is part of the universe itself. If we had a preference to one side of the center or another, than that background would be preferentially hotter to one side, and it is not. That is one bit of evidence that the universe doesn't have a center. You are thinking of the universe as an n-dimensional space, but it is not that simple.
Highly recommended link.....
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