Thursday, September 16, 2010

Variable Constants?

Whether all the constants in science (especially physics) are truly constant is a question that sometimes comes up (often, with respect to the anthropic principle and a fine tuned universe).  Obviously, such a thing would have huge implications for the assumptions and the conclusions of science.

I wanted to draw attention to a paper that has been recently submitted for peer review, "Evidence for spatial variation of the fine structure constant" by John K. Webb (Univ. of South Wales), et. al., and which proposes that the fine structure constant is varying.  Here is a nice summary at Technology Review, along with some interesting blog comments afterward.

Keep in mind that this paper's results may be refuted or they may be further verified (whether next month or 40 years from now).  However, neither such results, nor the refutation thereof, affect the certainty of the creation account recorded in Genesis nor our God's promises to us in Christ.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Dr. James Dobson - Correction

A couple days ago I posted a blog commenting on the audio book, Bringing Up Girls by Dr. James Dobson since, in the book, there was a reference to "early hominoids."  In my blog article, I attributed the use of this term (which is similar in thought to old earth viewpoints such as Hugh Ross) to Dr. Dobson.  What I thought was a term used by Dobson was actually part of a longer extended quote from Marc Gellman's article in Newsweek (here is the link).  While it is evident in the print edition as to how far Gellman's quote extends (because of the page formatting), it is ambiguous on the audio CD.

Yesterday, I was kindly contacted by Dr. Dobson through one of his representatives.  He clarified that the term ("early hominoids") was not Dr. Dobson's but that of Marc Gellman.  In fact, Dr. Dobson said that he disagrees with it.  I was informed that Tyndale House (the publisher) will be editing this in future editions in both the book and audiobook to remove this ambiguity.

I wanted to point this out since, while I did delete the post from my blog, it still may remain on some blog readers and I don't want to misrepresent Dr. Dobson's viewpoint.

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Mostly Empty Space

I've recently finished A Matter of Days by Hugh Ross as well as the "podclass," Principles of Evolution, Ecology and Behavior (EEB122; Spring, 2009; Prof. Stephen C. Stearns) from Yale University (the podclass was obtained from iTunesU).  I'm working on several comments for each as there are some noteworthy things that I want to point out.

In the mean time, I've started another podclass on chemistry, Principles of Chemical Science (MIT, 5.111, Fall 2008).  In one of the opening lectures, the professor commented on the diameter of the atom (electrons, protons and neutrons) as well as the diameter of the atomic nucleus (only the protons and neutrons at the center of the atom).  The diameter of the atomic nucleus is on the order of 10E-12 cm while the diameter of the entire atom is on the order of 10E-8 cm.  So, the diameter of the atom is roughly four orders of magnitude larger than its nucleus.

What this means is, if we would think of an atom (i.e., the diameter of the electron cloud) as approximately the same diameter as that of a basketball then the atomic nucleus would be approximately the diameter of several human hairs.  This is somewhat simplistic since I'm ignoring the moving electron cloud and the atomic forces.  Still, I find it interesting that matter, as we currently understand it, is mostly made up of empty space.