We all know that light is very fast: when we flip a switch, light immediately appears. In reality, this does not happen instantly, as the speed of light is finite, and a Universal constant, close to 300,000 km/s.The finiteness of the speed of light is evident on large, astronomical distances, as this beautiful video by Dr. James O'Donoghue shows. Also "information" in the Universe is carried at the speed of light. What does that mean? We will talk about the "infamous" black hole information paradox soon. ;)
"Language is the instrument by which one addresses the mind and the will. But you have to know how to use language. And so the reformers were also using language in a way that the humanists developed it, in order to address people's hearts, and bring people's hearts into alignment with God, and into alignment with the love of God." Today on "Reformation Reflection", Dr. Joseph Tipton discusses how the reformers used language to bring people closer to understanding the love of God. If you enjoy today's episode, please remember to like and share!
Because gravity makes them turn, not slow down. In a way, it’s a little like moving electrons being affected by a simple magnetic field in that it makes them turn.
The speed of light is variable. It’s only constant in a constant medium, or in a constant vacuum. I suppose someone could consider gravitational interferences as a kind of non-constant medium.
chris taylor
4 years ago
Suggestion: Bring in Greg Beale or Scott Hafemann to debate this issue of language in the Reformation and ancient Greece. I don’t see how you-ins can get over your infatuation with the Greeks and Romans without such a debate.
Malachi
4 years ago
Speed of Light: Hmmm, that’s nice and all. But it gives people fits. Christians are capable (if we don’t think TOO hard) of acknowledging the Trinity doesn’t “make sense; it’s just IS” but tell us that light from the sun takes 8-1/2 min to reach earth…well, we’re just suppose to believe the science of it. You see, if that’s true, then light from a star takes millions of years to reach us. BUT, we all know that the universe isn’t millions of years old…so, God made stars with the “appearance of age” and all that. We have our talking points.… Read more »
If all the theoretical physics stuff were made up, wouldn’t all the astronauts be dead?
The way biology works holds true regardless of how you think it got to be that way. If force, gravity, the speed of light, etc., don’t work the way the scientists say they do, the rockets don’t get where they’re going, and come back.
Jane, it is one thing to say biology works in a particular manner and quite another thing to say biology works in this way because of evolution. So, if a biologist were to observe the coccyx of a man and conclude that it must be a vestigial tail, I am bound by Scripture to laugh at him. Uproariously, even. In the same way, it is one thing for astrologists to say that orbits and sunlight work in a particular manner (and therefore we have functioning satellites)…and quite another thing for them to say it all exploded from a cosmic acorn… Read more »
Right, I get that distinction. But the problem is that in biology, the “it works that way because” is largely to irrelevant to the stuff they do with it. It works that way; we can worry about the “because” at a different time. In physics and astronomy, the things you’re questioning go beyond the “it works this way because,” to “this is how it works.” If light doesn’t take 8 1/2 minutes to reach the earth from the sun, everything else they’re reckoning is off. If the physics they’re using to posit the Big Bang doesn’t work, the spaceships don’t… Read more »
I was probably writing more obtusely than needed. Thanks for engaging and being iron to sharpen my iron. :) I think measuring space is just as irrelevant to rocket science, in the end. In other words, spaceships fly regardless of how fast we think light travels. Certainly God “could have” created photons streaming in mid-flight (day one) before He created their apparent source (day four) so that we THINK we’re seeing light emanating from distant stars and attempt to measure the actual source based on particles that have nothing to do with them. He “could have”…but is that the most… Read more »
I’ll admit I’m not very knowledgeable about this, but I don’t think the relationship between successful space travel and measurement is as distinct as you’re suggesting. Also, I simply don’t see anything problematic about assuming the speed of light is what it is posited to be. “Light year” is simply the name for the unit of distance. The idea of stars being that far away poses no problem for creation and doesn’t require “shoehorning” precisely BECAUSE we know visible light was created before stars. The problem with the assumption isn’t that the stars shouldn’t be that far away, it’s that… Read more »
Since I start with creation ex nihilo and the assumption of a young earth (both Scriptural truths), I naturally end up with a conclusion that the stars, too, are really quite young. This means that either a) God placed them a zillion-gajillion miles away AND made them extraordinarily colossal AND created streaming photons already flowing from them so they would register on our eyeballs, even though those photons couldn’t possibly have come from the actual stars themselves, given the vast enormous distances away… OR… b) they’re not really that far away or that huge, and our measurements are a bit… Read more »
But there’s an alarming trend among theologians, Christian astronomers, and laymen alike to conclude that since we did those things, those rocket science guys must really know what they’re talking about…and since they say “millions and billions” then it must be true
Indeed. Christians want, so desperately, to be respectable in the eyes of the cool kids.
Regarding starlight and time, another possibility is that certain constants and relationships of space-time were not always what we observe today.
It is a possibility, just like it’s a possibility that continental shift and erosion of the Grand Canyon happened at much faster rates during and after the Flood than is happening now.
It’s also a possibility that we haven’t measured starlight and time correctly at all, just like we haven’t measured the age of fossils correctly.
Drew, This simply won’t do. Precise measurements of the speed of light (including gravitational effects) and distances are required for the modern space program. You may be able to get a rocket to fly without a precise understanding of the behavior of light and relaivity, but you won’t be able to get it to exactly where you want it or communicate with it. Look at the enormous precision required for the New Horizons probe, for instance. It is practical validation of the theory. Of course for something as fundamental speed of light there are many validations – it would require… Read more »
Rob Steele
4 years ago
Your appetite for books is staggering. Glad to see James Dolezal made the list. Suggest you look into Michael Heiser. Blessings!
jigawatt
4 years ago
The speed of light might be the limit on information speed but it doesn’t explain the EPR paradox and “spooky action at a distance”. Quantum mechanics is just freaky.
I find it interesting that CS Lewis basically discounted the idea that secular scientists actually believed in non-deterministic QM. He assumed that they would eventually land on some hidden-variables theory that upheld strict determinism. Bell’s theory came out in 1964, one year after Lewis died, that (for the scientific community at least) disproved hidden-variables.
The notion that something like particle decay is completely non-deterministic is an argument on the limits of God’s knowledge as well. It says that not even God can ever know/determine when a particle will decay, or which slit a photon traveled through, because there would be no hidden variables for Him to even have access to (let alone control). So the theory is hopelessly incompatible with the doctrine of God’s foreknowledge (and His Sovereignty, at the quantum level). God’s foreknowledge would seem to require that He have some hidden way of simultaneously knowing both the absolute position and momentum of… Read more »
I’m certainly not saying that whatever QM really is is beyond God’s knowledge. What’s interesting to me is that secular scientists do indeed believe that it is non-deterministic. They gave up their strict determinism and in so doing, a completely mechanized universe as well. Lewis (and others I assume) who fought modernism thought that determinism was demanded by a 20th century atheistic worldview, but turns out it’s not.
jigawatt wrote: They gave up their strict determinism and in so doing, a completely mechanized universe as well. I don’t believe that determinism automatically implies an impersonal, reactionary, mechanistic universe. God can determine that His creation be full of personal and accountable choice-making agents. There’s nothing inconsistent about that kind of personal determinism. Lot’s of personal freedom can exist within God’s personal determination. The impersonal, reactionary determinism of the modern naturalistic worldview is a function of their monistic starting point. They start with the impersonal, the purposeless, the meaningless, the accidental, the intentionless, and the reactionary, and their theory can… Read more »
God does not actually have “foreknowledge”, per se.
We say that he does for the same reason that we say that the sun rises in the east: that’s how it looks from our perspective. God, however, is outside of time. Time is part of His creation.
Particle decay happens inside of time. So, its non-determinism and absolute unpredictability are not problems wrt God’s omniscience.
John Callaghan wrote: Particle decay happens inside of time. So, its non-determinism and absolute unpredictability are not problems wrt God’s omniscience. Something doesn’t add up here. When Callaghan says that “Particle decay happens inside of time”, does this mean that God cannot set out, in advance, to create a particle that will decay in precisely 47.9 seconds? If God can do so, what does Callaghan mean by “absolute unpredictability”? Does Callaghan think that the “absolute unpredictability” of particle decay means that God would have to actually create a vast multitude of independent particles, observe them each decay from His timeless… Read more »
When the discussion gets to this level, saying that God can or cannot “set out, in advance” to do something is not meaningful. There is no before and after in God: He exists in eternity.
Unfortunately, Callaghan is choosing to sidestep the question of whether God can create a particle that will decay in 47.9 seconds. If God can, then it would contradict Callaghan’s notion of the “absolute unpredictability” of particle decay. If God cannot create such a particle, then Callaghan’s notions about particle decay impose limits, not just on God’s omniscience, but on His omnipotence as well. John Callaghan wrote: When the discussion gets to this level, saying that God can or cannot “set out, in advance” to do something is not meaningful. There is no before and after in God: He exists in… Read more »
You are showing your ignorance, and querulous nature. Bell’s theorem does not hold that hidden variables do not, or cannot, exist. It simply holds that certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist.
This whole conversation is a category error. Physicists are describing the world as it is, as it can be observed from within the system. Something can be completely unpredictable from within a system and completely legible from without.
demosthenes1d wrote: You are showing your ignorance, and querulous nature. Bell’s theorem does not hold that hidden variables do not, or cannot, exist. It simply holds that certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist. I’ll grant that it was von Neumann who actually attempted a general argument against hidden variables, but if demosthenes1d wants to get technical, Bell conceded that his theorem doesn’t completely disprove the existence of local hidden variables either (see superdeterminism). If I’m showing my ignorance, then demosthenes1d must be as well, using his own logic. It’s been said that no other theorem in all of… Read more »
Katecho, You are embarrassing yourself. If you will note – I stated that Bell’s theorem holds that “certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist.” For you to then claim that my statement shows my ignorance due to the possibility of some types of local hidden variables compounds your ignorance with a failure of reading comprehension. The idea that Bell’s theorem is an attempt to limit God is laughable. Hidden variables is a term of art within physics, Bell wasn’t making a theological claim. Also, you are failing to understand the theological import of the eternity of God. Drop the… Read more »
The most concise answer to your question is found in Summa Theologica I, Q10:
Article 2. Whether God is eternal?
… Objection 4. Further, in eternity, there is no present, past or future, since it is simultaneously whole; as was said in the preceding article. But words denoting present, past and future time are applied to God in Scripture. Therefore God is not eternal.
… Reply to Objection 4. Words denoting different times are applied to God, because His eternity includes all times; not as if He Himself were altered through present, past and future.
Callaghan wrote: The most concise answer to your question is found in Summa Theologica I, Q10 This is a very concise non-answer of the questions that Callaghan is actually supposed to answer. (I have no idea why Callaghan thinks that I have any doubts that God is eternal.) I’ll summarize the two lines of questioning for Callaghan: If particle decay is “absolutely unpredictable”, can God create a particle that will decay in 47.9 seconds? Why does Callaghan think that we cannot speak meaningfully of God before creation, and God after creation? Can we speak of God the Son before His… Read more »
That scripture index is nifty. Kudos!
I read somewhere that visible light, I.e., photons, are subject to gravity. If so, how can the “speed of light” be a constant?
Because gravity makes them turn, not slow down. In a way, it’s a little like moving electrons being affected by a simple magnetic field in that it makes them turn.
The speed of light is variable. It’s only constant in a constant medium, or in a constant vacuum. I suppose someone could consider gravitational interferences as a kind of non-constant medium.
Suggestion: Bring in Greg Beale or Scott Hafemann to debate this issue of language in the Reformation and ancient Greece. I don’t see how you-ins can get over your infatuation with the Greeks and Romans without such a debate.
Speed of Light: Hmmm, that’s nice and all. But it gives people fits. Christians are capable (if we don’t think TOO hard) of acknowledging the Trinity doesn’t “make sense; it’s just IS” but tell us that light from the sun takes 8-1/2 min to reach earth…well, we’re just suppose to believe the science of it. You see, if that’s true, then light from a star takes millions of years to reach us. BUT, we all know that the universe isn’t millions of years old…so, God made stars with the “appearance of age” and all that. We have our talking points.… Read more »
Possibly a stupid question:
If all the theoretical physics stuff were made up, wouldn’t all the astronauts be dead?
The way biology works holds true regardless of how you think it got to be that way. If force, gravity, the speed of light, etc., don’t work the way the scientists say they do, the rockets don’t get where they’re going, and come back.
Jane, it is one thing to say biology works in a particular manner and quite another thing to say biology works in this way because of evolution. So, if a biologist were to observe the coccyx of a man and conclude that it must be a vestigial tail, I am bound by Scripture to laugh at him. Uproariously, even. In the same way, it is one thing for astrologists to say that orbits and sunlight work in a particular manner (and therefore we have functioning satellites)…and quite another thing for them to say it all exploded from a cosmic acorn… Read more »
Right, I get that distinction. But the problem is that in biology, the “it works that way because” is largely to irrelevant to the stuff they do with it. It works that way; we can worry about the “because” at a different time. In physics and astronomy, the things you’re questioning go beyond the “it works this way because,” to “this is how it works.” If light doesn’t take 8 1/2 minutes to reach the earth from the sun, everything else they’re reckoning is off. If the physics they’re using to posit the Big Bang doesn’t work, the spaceships don’t… Read more »
I was probably writing more obtusely than needed. Thanks for engaging and being iron to sharpen my iron. :) I think measuring space is just as irrelevant to rocket science, in the end. In other words, spaceships fly regardless of how fast we think light travels. Certainly God “could have” created photons streaming in mid-flight (day one) before He created their apparent source (day four) so that we THINK we’re seeing light emanating from distant stars and attempt to measure the actual source based on particles that have nothing to do with them. He “could have”…but is that the most… Read more »
I’ll admit I’m not very knowledgeable about this, but I don’t think the relationship between successful space travel and measurement is as distinct as you’re suggesting. Also, I simply don’t see anything problematic about assuming the speed of light is what it is posited to be. “Light year” is simply the name for the unit of distance. The idea of stars being that far away poses no problem for creation and doesn’t require “shoehorning” precisely BECAUSE we know visible light was created before stars. The problem with the assumption isn’t that the stars shouldn’t be that far away, it’s that… Read more »
Since I start with creation ex nihilo and the assumption of a young earth (both Scriptural truths), I naturally end up with a conclusion that the stars, too, are really quite young. This means that either a) God placed them a zillion-gajillion miles away AND made them extraordinarily colossal AND created streaming photons already flowing from them so they would register on our eyeballs, even though those photons couldn’t possibly have come from the actual stars themselves, given the vast enormous distances away… OR… b) they’re not really that far away or that huge, and our measurements are a bit… Read more »
drewnchick wrote:
Indeed. Christians want, so desperately, to be respectable in the eyes of the cool kids.
Regarding starlight and time, another possibility is that certain constants and relationships of space-time were not always what we observe today.
It is a possibility, just like it’s a possibility that continental shift and erosion of the Grand Canyon happened at much faster rates during and after the Flood than is happening now.
It’s also a possibility that we haven’t measured starlight and time correctly at all, just like we haven’t measured the age of fossils correctly.
Drew, This simply won’t do. Precise measurements of the speed of light (including gravitational effects) and distances are required for the modern space program. You may be able to get a rocket to fly without a precise understanding of the behavior of light and relaivity, but you won’t be able to get it to exactly where you want it or communicate with it. Look at the enormous precision required for the New Horizons probe, for instance. It is practical validation of the theory. Of course for something as fundamental speed of light there are many validations – it would require… Read more »
Your appetite for books is staggering. Glad to see James Dolezal made the list. Suggest you look into Michael Heiser. Blessings!
The speed of light might be the limit on information speed but it doesn’t explain the EPR paradox and “spooky action at a distance”. Quantum mechanics is just freaky.
I find it interesting that CS Lewis basically discounted the idea that secular scientists actually believed in non-deterministic QM. He assumed that they would eventually land on some hidden-variables theory that upheld strict determinism. Bell’s theory came out in 1964, one year after Lewis died, that (for the scientific community at least) disproved hidden-variables.
The notion that something like particle decay is completely non-deterministic is an argument on the limits of God’s knowledge as well. It says that not even God can ever know/determine when a particle will decay, or which slit a photon traveled through, because there would be no hidden variables for Him to even have access to (let alone control). So the theory is hopelessly incompatible with the doctrine of God’s foreknowledge (and His Sovereignty, at the quantum level). God’s foreknowledge would seem to require that He have some hidden way of simultaneously knowing both the absolute position and momentum of… Read more »
I’m certainly not saying that whatever QM really is is beyond God’s knowledge. What’s interesting to me is that secular scientists do indeed believe that it is non-deterministic. They gave up their strict determinism and in so doing, a completely mechanized universe as well. Lewis (and others I assume) who fought modernism thought that determinism was demanded by a 20th century atheistic worldview, but turns out it’s not.
jigawatt wrote: They gave up their strict determinism and in so doing, a completely mechanized universe as well. I don’t believe that determinism automatically implies an impersonal, reactionary, mechanistic universe. God can determine that His creation be full of personal and accountable choice-making agents. There’s nothing inconsistent about that kind of personal determinism. Lot’s of personal freedom can exist within God’s personal determination. The impersonal, reactionary determinism of the modern naturalistic worldview is a function of their monistic starting point. They start with the impersonal, the purposeless, the meaningless, the accidental, the intentionless, and the reactionary, and their theory can… Read more »
God does not actually have “foreknowledge”, per se.
We say that he does for the same reason that we say that the sun rises in the east: that’s how it looks from our perspective. God, however, is outside of time. Time is part of His creation.
Particle decay happens inside of time. So, its non-determinism and absolute unpredictability are not problems wrt God’s omniscience.
John Callaghan wrote: Particle decay happens inside of time. So, its non-determinism and absolute unpredictability are not problems wrt God’s omniscience. Something doesn’t add up here. When Callaghan says that “Particle decay happens inside of time”, does this mean that God cannot set out, in advance, to create a particle that will decay in precisely 47.9 seconds? If God can do so, what does Callaghan mean by “absolute unpredictability”? Does Callaghan think that the “absolute unpredictability” of particle decay means that God would have to actually create a vast multitude of independent particles, observe them each decay from His timeless… Read more »
When the discussion gets to this level, saying that God can or cannot “set out, in advance” to do something is not meaningful. There is no before and after in God: He exists in eternity.
Unfortunately, Callaghan is choosing to sidestep the question of whether God can create a particle that will decay in 47.9 seconds. If God can, then it would contradict Callaghan’s notion of the “absolute unpredictability” of particle decay. If God cannot create such a particle, then Callaghan’s notions about particle decay impose limits, not just on God’s omniscience, but on His omnipotence as well. John Callaghan wrote: When the discussion gets to this level, saying that God can or cannot “set out, in advance” to do something is not meaningful. There is no before and after in God: He exists in… Read more »
Katecho,
You are showing your ignorance, and querulous nature. Bell’s theorem does not hold that hidden variables do not, or cannot, exist. It simply holds that certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist.
This whole conversation is a category error. Physicists are describing the world as it is, as it can be observed from within the system. Something can be completely unpredictable from within a system and completely legible from without.
demosthenes1d wrote: You are showing your ignorance, and querulous nature. Bell’s theorem does not hold that hidden variables do not, or cannot, exist. It simply holds that certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist. I’ll grant that it was von Neumann who actually attempted a general argument against hidden variables, but if demosthenes1d wants to get technical, Bell conceded that his theorem doesn’t completely disprove the existence of local hidden variables either (see superdeterminism). If I’m showing my ignorance, then demosthenes1d must be as well, using his own logic. It’s been said that no other theorem in all of… Read more »
Katecho, You are embarrassing yourself. If you will note – I stated that Bell’s theorem holds that “certain types of local hidden variables cannot exist.” For you to then claim that my statement shows my ignorance due to the possibility of some types of local hidden variables compounds your ignorance with a failure of reading comprehension. The idea that Bell’s theorem is an attempt to limit God is laughable. Hidden variables is a term of art within physics, Bell wasn’t making a theological claim. Also, you are failing to understand the theological import of the eternity of God. Drop the… Read more »
The most concise answer to your question is found in Summa Theologica I, Q10:
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1010.htm#article2
Callaghan wrote: The most concise answer to your question is found in Summa Theologica I, Q10 This is a very concise non-answer of the questions that Callaghan is actually supposed to answer. (I have no idea why Callaghan thinks that I have any doubts that God is eternal.) I’ll summarize the two lines of questioning for Callaghan: If particle decay is “absolutely unpredictable”, can God create a particle that will decay in 47.9 seconds? Why does Callaghan think that we cannot speak meaningfully of God before creation, and God after creation? Can we speak of God the Son before His… Read more »
Thanks, John. I was going to respond, but this is much more concise.