Okay, please try and follow. According to most religions the universe is only a few thousand years old. Yet we are able to see light from stars and galaxies that are billions of light years away. If the world were only a few thousand years old we would not be able to see that light yet because it would still be billions of light years away from us. So either God tricked us by placing the photons of light billions of light years closer to earth than should be OR…. the universe is actually some 13 billion years old.
Which is it?
2007-10-13 08:45:22 · 15 answers · asked by xmilestogo 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
*right, correction: if the UNIVERSE were only a few thousnad years old we would not be able to see that light.
Most of you got the point though.
2007-10-13 09:03:21 · update #1
The 'omphalos' (belly-button) hypothesis says that God created everything with the appearance of age.
It's trading this problem for the "What kind of sicko tricks people who actually bother to use their God-given intellect?" problem.
2007-10-13 08:51:47 · answer #1 · answered by Doc Occam 7 · 3⤊ 0⤋
Your ASSUMPTIONS are :
1. That light has ALWAYS travelled at 300 Million meters per second .
2. An omnipotent being could NOT have created us yesterday.
3. Carl Sagan never wrote any fiction .
Foot note :
God can make light do anything HE wants , even appear both a Wave and a Particle at the same time .
In my opinion you sound like a Christian spouting Intelligent Design - you give Atheists a bad reputation .
2007-10-13 16:06:24 · answer #2 · answered by londonpeter2003 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'm still waiting for somebody to explain how this would be possible with a Young Earth. I'm an atheist, but I've heard an explanation for this. (Keep in mind, I'm not saying it's a good explanation)
It's known as "c decay." It involves the (unsupported) claim that the speed of light was once much faster than it is now and has only recently slowed to its current speed. That way, light from galaxies millions of light years away reached Earth because it moved faster than what we currently measure as the speed of light.
I don't believe this explanation (it's not based on evidence) but it's the only one I've that could conceivably answer Carl Sagan's objection.
2007-10-13 16:01:36 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 0⤋
Well I don't think religious people like thinking about stuff like this but an omnipotent sky-pixie could invent the light en route to us. I've even heard religious people argue that. Makes me wonder why anyone would want to worship such a malicious trickster. Does he only want stupid and ignorant people praising him?
If only if this were irrefutable. You're forgetting how the faith-heads think. I promise you won't be getting any to admit how silly they've been today.
Having said that I think Carl Sagan was wonderful and everybody should read 'Cosmos' and 'The Demon Haunted World'
**Does gwhiz mean Stephen Hawking? He's not that great, too tied up on classical mechanics if you ask me.**
2007-10-13 15:49:19 · answer #4 · answered by Leviathan 6 · 4⤊ 1⤋
Carl Sagan was not an expert on Christianity or the bible.
2007-10-13 16:05:35 · answer #5 · answered by ? 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋
What's even more impressive is that we've seen the light from supernovas that would have exploded before they were created. The distance can be confirmed by direct measurement, so arguments about inference of size cannot be applied.
2007-10-13 17:55:29 · answer #6 · answered by novangelis 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
I agree with you, and I love Carl Sagan. But the creationists will tell you that when God made the stars he also made their light such that it already spanned the gap between the stars and the Earth. It is nearly impossible to combat deliberate, self-imposed ignorance.
2007-10-13 15:49:59 · answer #7 · answered by Pull My Finger 7 · 5⤊ 2⤋
Carl Sagan =dirt
2007-10-13 15:58:44 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 3⤋
The Earth could be a few thousand years, while the universe is millions. Just that the Earth came later. That's just some outside perspective, I don't know too much about it.
2007-10-13 15:49:24 · answer #9 · answered by ptbc 2 · 2⤊ 3⤋
Your mistake is saying that "most religions" believe this.
Only a very few fundamentalists try to promote this idea.
The majority (a billion Christians & almost as many muslims)
do not reject scientific inquiry in favour of scripture.
2007-10-13 15:52:45 · answer #10 · answered by Robert S 7 · 2⤊ 2⤋