Cosmology Curiosity

Bill Bryson pokes at Edwin Hubble

Bill Bryson in A Short History of Nearly Everything (2003) describes Edwin Hubble (1889-1953) amusingly:

"According to his [Hubble's] own accounts, he also managed to fit into his life more or less constant acts of valour - rescuing drowning swimmers, leading frightened men to safety across the battlefields of France, embarrassing world-champion boxers with knockdown punches in exhibition bouts. It all seemed too good to be true. It was. For all his gifts [good looking, athletic, leading a comfortable middle-class life], Hubble was also an inveterate liar.

"This was more than a little odd, for Hubble's life was filled from an early age with a level of genuine distinction that was at times almost ludicrously golden. At a single high-school track meeting in 1906, he won the pole vault, shot-put, discus, hammer throw, standing high jump and running high jump, and was on the winning mile relay team - that is, seven first places in one meeting - and came third in the long jump. In the same year, he set a state record for the high jump in Illinois.

"As a scholar [Hubble] was equally proficient, and had no trouble gaining admission to study physics and astronomy at the University of Chicago .... There he was selected to be one of the first Rhodes Scholars at Oxford. Three years of English life evidently turned his head, for he returned to Wheaton [Illinois] in 1913 wearing an Inverness cape, smoking a pipe and talking with a peculiarly orotund accent - not quite British but not quite not - that would remain with him for life."

Charming.

[Image credit: Wikipedia]

Related post: More Edwin Hubble, from Bill Bryson
Related post: Bill Bryson's parting shots on Edwin Hubble

Technorati Tags: Bill Bryson, Edwin Hubble, Hubble, Short History of Nearly Everything

Objections to Humphreys' white hole cosmology

Now, for the objections to Humphreys' "white hole" cosmology.

Fellow young earth creationists Williams and Hartnett in Dismantling the Big Bang (2005) cite two difficulties:

(a) it fails to account for the hundreds of thousand of years in our own galaxy and those nearby; and

(b) it predicts large blueshifts in light from nearby galaxies but these aren't observed.

Earlier [1999], old earth creationist Hugh Ross wrote a critique against the theory.

Humphreys summarized the objections. Humphreys' reply is here and here.

Other objections and the latest rebuttals by Humphreys are also noteworthy.

[Image by Ales Tosovsky, per Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike License v. 2.5.]

Related post: Is there an edge to the cosmos?
Related post: Humphreys' cosmology: the two possibilities
Related post: Gravitational time dilation
Related post: Humphreys' 'white hole' cosmology

Technorati Tags: cosmology, Hugh Ross, old earth creation, relativity, Russell Humphreys, white hole cosmology, Young Earth Creation

Humphreys' cosmology & the distant starlight problem

D. Russell Humphreys' "white hole" cosmology proposes a solution to the so-called distant starlight problem.

The 'problem' -- If the universe is less than 10,000 years old, how come we can see starlight that must have taken billions of years to reach Earth?

The solution of Humphreys:

(a) the cosmos has an edge and a center, and the concentration of mass creates a net gravitational force that bends space [Figure 'A'];

(b) such gravity well causes time to pass slower at the lower portion of the well where the Earth happened to be located;

(c) in effect, at the outer reaches of the universe, time moves faster (including the starlight photons' movement to Earth and elsewhere);

(d) however, the current low density of the cosmos wouldn't have made 10,000 years of Earth time ran in parallel with the 15 billion years of outer space time;

(e) given on the other hand a much compact cosmos during creation week, the gravity well must have been much steeper [Figure B]; and

(f) such would make the time passage aberration more pronounced, enabling starlight billions of light years away to reach Earth in little time [Figure 'C'].

[Images above are from Starlight and Time. It is believed that the use of a limited number of web-resolution screenshots for identification and critical commentary qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law.]

Related post: Is there an edge to the cosmos?
Related post: Humphreys' cosmology: the two possibilities
Related post: Gravitational time dilation
Related post: Humphreys' 'white hole' cosmology

Humphreys' 'white hole' cosmology

These are the salient points of D. Russell Humphreys' 'white hole' cosmology:

(a) God may have used a white hole in bringing about the cosmos;

(b) this white hole, with water [the 'deep', Gen. 1:2] at its core, encompassed the entire universe;

(c) Humphreys points out that his white hole cosmology is based upon sound physics:

relativity + (bound & expanded cosmos) = white hole cosmology

(d) in comparison, the 'standard model' is similar save for one key premise:

relativity + (unbound & expanded cosmos) = Big Bang cosmology

(e) being inside the ultimate supermassive black hole running in reverse (i.e., the white hole) means that tidal forces were very benign on Earth and elsewhere;

(f) the shrinking event horizon reached Earth in the morning of the 4th day of creation, at the same day God created the stars; and

(g) all the while due to gravitational time dilation, while merely one day passed on Earth, billions of years of physical processes transpired at the far ends of the cosmos.

[Gerald Schroeder's cosmology is the opposite. His six ordinary days happened at the universe's fringe, while 15 billion years transpired on Earth simultaneously.]

A lot more detail and equations are in Humphreys' Starlight and Time book [1994] and DVD.

Young earth creationists regard Humphreys' peer-reviewed white hole cosmology as an important development in the field of scientific creationism.

[Image credit: Wikimedia Commons]

Related post: Is there an edge to the cosmos?

Related post: Humphreys' cosmology: the two possibilities

Related post: Gravitational time dilation

Technorati Tags: Big Bang, bound finite cosmos, cosmology, Gerald Schroeder, gravitational time dilation, Russell Humphreys, time dilation, white hole cosmology

Humphreys' cosmology: the two possibilities

First, the premises:

(a) we see the universe expanding uniformly all around us; and
(b) no side appears to be 'thicker' [galaxies-wise]; i.e., on a large scale, the cosmos looks the same everywhere.

Possibility No. 1: we are not really in a special place and it just so happened that the cosmos is isotropic and homogeneous.

Possibility No. 2: we are actually at or near the center of the cosmos.

If we imagine galaxies [or more accurately, galactic clusters] as points on a sphere, the two possibilities are as illustrated above by D. Russell Humphreys.

Interestingly, observationally we wouldn't be able to distinguish one from the other.

The deeper implication however is, if the mass of the universe is in just a part of it, then a gravity well is currently in place.

Gravitational time dilation would cause time to run slower at the lower portion of the well.

These in brief are the pieces that comprise Humphreys' 'white hole' cosmology.

More on Humphreys' cosmology on the next post/s.

[Images above are from Starlight and Time. It is believed that the use of a limited number of web-resolution screenshots for identification and critical commentary qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law.]

Related post: Gravitational time dilation
Related post: Humphreys on Hawking's astronaut and time dilation
Related post: Is there an edge to the cosmos?

Technorati Tags: cosmological principle, cosmology, Einstein, General Relativity, gravitational time dilation, Russell Humphreys, white hole cosmology

Is there an edge to the cosmos?

There are three possibilities as regards the universe's size and shape.

Figure 'A': It is infinite & unbounded.

The space you can roam around on (in this example, a line) is unlimited. And if you move in one direction you'll never bump into an edge (boundary).

Figure 'B': It is finite & bounded.

The space you can move on is limited. And if you move in one direction, eventually you'll meet an edge.

Figure 'C': It is finite & unbounded.

The space you can move on is limited (in the example, the rim). But you can keep on going and will never be stopped by a boundary. You'll just end up where you started.

The balloon analogy is also used. An ant crawling on the balloon's [finite] surface will never reach an edge.

Big Bang cosmology comes in flavors 'A' or 'C'.

Naturalistic thinking [without necessarily equating Big Bang to atheism or materialism] excludes 'B' because an edge would imply a 'neighbor' [God].

Furthermore, if the universe is the summation of everything, they say that to speak of something outside of the cosmos would be a logical absurdity.

Christian cosmology traditionally holds 'B'. And the Bible is replete with passages saying that God is transcendent. That is, God as the creator surpasses (and is independent of) time, space, matter, & energy.

[Image by Cosmology Curiosity]

Technorati Tags: bounded cosmos, cosmology, cosmos, edge of universe, finite cosmos, universe

D. Russell Humphreys - creationist, physicist, & author

D. Russell Humphreys (Ph.D., Physics) is a young earth creationist. He is the leading proponent of 'white hole cosmology'.

Humphreys' cosmology is described in great detail in his book, Starlight and Time: Solving the Puzzle of Distant Starlight in a Young Universe (1994). A DVD version is also available.

Humpreys worked six years for General Electric's High Voltage Laboratory where he received a US patent and one of Industrial Research Magazine's IR-100 awards. He received another US patent and two awards from Sandia, including an Award for excellence for contributions to light ion-fusion target theory.

Humphreys has retired from Sandia and now works with the Institute for Creation Research (ICR).

[Image above is from Starlight and Time. It is believed that the use of a limited number of web-resolution screenshots for identification and critical commentary qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law.]

Related post: White hole cosmology
Related post: Humphreys on Hawking's astronaut and time dilation

Technorati Tags: cosmology, relativity, Russell Humphreys, Sandia, Starlight and Time, white hole cosmology

Olbers' paradox of the dark night sky

'Why is the night sky dark?' [Olbers' paradox] is not a trivial question as it seems.

The universe for a long time was thought to be static and infinite. This was the ancient Greeks' belief and the thought prevailed even up to as recent as Einstein's time.

Now if there were such infinitely numerous stars that fill each spot of the sky, shouldn't the sky blaze with dazzling brightness?

That in brief was the paradox popularized by the German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers in 1823.

The current thinking is that the paradox has been solved.

This in view of the apparent finiteness of the universe, and the observed expansion of the cosmos. The two conspire such that only a limited number of visible light photons reach the human eye.

Other articles on Olbers' paradox can be found here, here and here.

[Image by A3m, per Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike License v. 2.5.]

Technorati Tags: astronomy, Big Bang, cosmology, Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers, Olbers' paradox, static universe, universe

The question Hawking can't answer [off topic]

Hawking can't figure it out.

His question: 'How can the human race survive the next hundred years?'

As of this writing, close to 23,000 have proposed an answer.

Hawking posted the question 6 days ago. There's still 7 days left before Yahoo! Answers closes the discussion.

[Image credit: Hawking's website]

[Thanks to Kosmiceggburst for pointing out the story.]

Technorati Tags: Hawking, Stephen Hawking, Yahoo! Answers

The Bible on the universe's expansion?

Some say the Bible talks about it while others say it does not.

Does the Bible really allude to the universe's past and present expansion?

Dr. Russell Humphreys cites 17 Bible verses as proof:

Job 9:8 - 'He alone stretches out the heavens'

Psalm 104:2 - 'He stretches out the heavens like a tent'

Isaiah 40:22 - 'He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in'

Jeremiah 10:12 - '[He] stretched out the heavens by his understanding'

Zechariah 12:1 - 'The LORD, who stretches out the heavens.'

The other twelve verses are: 2 Samuel 22:10, Job 26:7, Job 37:18, Psalm 18:9, Psalm 144:5, Isaiah 42:5, Isaiah 44:24, Isaiah 45:12, Isaiah 48:13, Isaiah 51:13, Jeremiah 51:15, and Ezekiel 1:22.

Dr. John Byl, a young earth creationist like Dr. Humphreys, has a divergent opinion: 'The more usual interpretation of the stretching out of the heavens is that this refers to their initial creation, on the second day [when the 'firmament' was added to separate the waters], rather than to their subsequent expansion. Any proposed further expansion after the second day is pure speculation.'

Given the many verses on the subject, however, Humphreys may have the prima facie evidence going for him.

[Image credit: Wikimedia Commons]

Technorati Tags: Bible, big bang, cosmology, John Byl, Russell Humphreys, universe expansion, white hole cossmology