Hunting down the God Particle

From KHouse.Org

Scientists think they’ve caught sight of the elusive Higgs boson, a theoretical subatomic particle that makes up the glue that holds the Universe together.  The announcement was made at a press conference on Tuesday.  After billions of dollars and a decade of sweat from thousands of scientists deep in the ground under the Alps, the great mysteries of physics may finally be answered.  Perhaps.  The Higgs may exist after all.

The Large Hadron Collider, a massive atom smasher hidden underground in the Alps along the border of France and Switzerland, has a price tag of $10 billion and the job of shooting atoms through its 16.8-mile circular tunnel at insanely high speeds.  The CERN scientists running this vast project have been on the hunt for the Higgs boson, which the media have warmly dubbed the “God Particle.”  The scientists cannot see the Higgs boson itself; it breaks down too quickly to be directly observed, and only its ”shadow” can be seen.  They do believe, however, that they have narrowed its mass down to the region of 124 to 126 GeV.  (Remember, mass = energy according to Einstein’s famous E=mc^2.)  That’s approximately 125 times heavier than a proton and 500,000 times heavier than an electron. The data is not conclusive, but if the Higgs actually exists, then the CERN scientists are on the way to getting a snapshot.  The Higgs boson theoretically isn’t charged, but it does have a sizeable mass.

This is a big deal to physicists.   All known matter is made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons, which are made up of quarks, leptons, and gluons and the like.  These are the building blocks of all matter.  Physicists want to know what gives these subatomic particles their mass in the first place. Why don’t particles just race around at the speed of light? What gives them inertia, and what slows them down? What makes it possible for our atoms to stick together so that we can exist?  Is there a particle that unifies all the forces we see in the physics of the Universe?

The Need For The Higgs:
The Standard Model in particle physics attempts to explain how all the fundamental particles of the Universe interact with each other.  The model, which is often compared to the Periodic Table of Elements used by chemists, consists of 16 particles that make up all matter in the Universe. The problem is that the Standard Model is not complete.

In 1964, a physicist by the name of Peter Higgs, currently professor emeritus at the University of Edinburgh, proposed that empty space is not really empty at all; it is filled with a background energy field, like a lattice through which all other particles have to move.  Wherever a particle moves through this field, the field gets distorted and hugs around the particle.  The Higgs boson is that ”hug” of the field around a particle - like a crowd of people around a starlet.  The particle is given mass, making it harder for it to change direction, speed up or slow down, like the crowd-clustered starlet trying to move across the room.  People surround her as she moves, making it harder for her to speed up or slow down.  In a similar way, it is believed that subatomic particles get their mass - their inertia, their resistance to changes in motion - through interactions with the Higgs Field.  That was Peter Higgs’ idea.

Since a field cannot be seen, scientists are looking for the hugging clusters, the uncharged particle that would interact with every other subatomic particle to give them all mass. Since then, scientists have been scrambling to find this particle, the Higgs boson.

Back in 2008, world renowned physicist Steven Hawking told British TV, ”I think it will be much more exciting if we don’t find the Higgs. That will show something is wrong, and we need to think again. I have a bet of $100 that we won’t find the Higgs.”  If the recent excitement is all based on random blips that have no statistical significance after all, then the physicists will have to embrace the renewed mystery of the Universe and be open to other possibilities.

“If we don’t see [it], that would be an incredible discovery, be cause then the Standard Model doesn’t work,” Pierluigi Catastini, a research associate with the ATLAS experiment, told Mashable Tech. “If we do find the Higgs boson, then we fill in the most important piece.”

A significant number of scientists, though, are hopeful about proving the Higgs Field and are willing for Hawking to eventually lose his bet. The project involves more than 8,000 scientists from at least 85 countries.

Dark Matter
The existence of dark matter was proposed in 1932 by astronomer Jan Oort, who measured the motions of nearby stars in our Milky Way relative to the galactic plane. He found that the mass of the plane must be more than the mass of the material that can be seen. A year later, Fritz Zwicky examined the dynamics of clusters of galaxies and found their movements similarly perplexing. Over the years, many spiral galaxies were observed and found to be swirling too fast to be held together by the gravitational pull of the visible stars. Since the speedy-moving stars have not been flung out through space, some scientists describe dark matter as “the glue that holds the Universe together.”

Astronomers cannot detect or measure dark matter directly because it emits no light or radiation – hence the name. Its existence is inferred from the gravitational effect it has on visible matter (such as stars and galaxies). There have been a number of conjectures regarding the nature of dark matter, but all of them have eluded any empirical validation.

Physicists hope CERN’s Large Hadron Collider will shed even more light on dark matter, dark energy, the existence of extra dimensions, and the fundamental nature of matter, energy, space and time.

Without Excuse:
Science, like religion, often requires us to take a leap of faith. Any honest scientist should admit that despite centuries of scientific discovery and technological advances, most of the Universe remains an enigma. There are large numbers of areas that, despite careful investigation, we do not fully understand, from the “magic” of photosynthesis to the mysterious particles that make up the fabric of space-time.

Science continues to develop and change as scientists discover new evidence, and it is one of the great joys of being human to explore and discover the marvelous brilliance and detail God used in putting this world together.  Still, even as scientists analyze the data from the LHC and hope to catch a glimpse of the Higgs boson, we’re certain that the name “God particle” is more accurate than some physicists would choose to admit.  Whether or not dark matter is busy keeping distant stars from shooting further into space, we know that Jesus Christ holds each of us, and we trust him to hold the atoms in our bodies together with as much care as he takes in sustaining the entire Universe.  Even if Science changes, we know He does not.

“Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.” - Hebrews 11:3

“For by him [Jesus] were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.” – Col 1:16-17

Related Links:

• Higgs Boson Seminar: Have Physicists Found The ‘God Particle’? – The Guardian
• Why the Higgs Boson Announcement Matters – Mashable Tech
• What Is the Higgs Boson And Why Is It Important? – CNN
• Deep below the Alps, Physicists Seek to Fill in the Blanks of Time and Space (2008) – The Globe And Mail
• Higgs Boson: One Page Explanations – Physics World Volume 6 Number 9
• Physicists Close In on a Universal Puzzle – The Wall Street Journal

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Dark Energy and the Accelerating Universe

From KHouse.Org

“Have ye not known? have ye not heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:” – Isa 40:21-22

Perlmutter on one team, and Schmidt and Riess on another, independently found some 50 distant supernovae whose light reached Earth more weakly than anticipated. The scientists were expecting the expansion of the universe to be slowing down, causing the supernovae to appear brighter. Instead, the supernovae light was fading. They concluded that the exploding stars had been carried away through space at an ever increasing velocity, along with the rest of their galaxies. In other words, the universe was accelerating.

Then, in 2001, a supernovae 10 billion light years away – the farthest ever observed – once again disrupted expectations because it was determined to be too bright.  This indicated that when that supernova exploded, the universe was still slowing down..

“Long ago, when the light left this distant supernova, the Universe appears to have been slowing down due to the mutual tug of all the mass in the Universe,” said Riess in 2001. “Billions of years later, when the light left more recent supernovae, the Universe had begun accelerating, stretching the expanse between galaxies and making objects in them appear dimmer.”

The cause of all this celestial confusion?

Newtonian physics requires that in order for a mass to increase in velocity, force has to be added to it according to the equation F=ma. Force equals mass times acceleration. What could have happened that would have suddenly forced the universe to expand more quickly? (Or make it appear as though it were expanding faster?)

Right now, the culprit is called “dark energy.” It’s not a super villain, a cosmological nemesis of the superhero Quasar Man. No. It’s just energy nobody can see. Or prove directly. Astrophysicists have no clue what dark energy might be or what causes it, but its most important characteristic is its negative pressure evenly distributed in space. Dark energy supposedly accounts for 73 percent of the total energy density of the entire universe.  “Dark matter” accounts for another 23 percent, and boring matter made of regular old atoms we can detect makes up just 4 percent of the energy density.

Of course, dark energy and dark matter are hypothetical.  They are used to try to explain the data astronomers have been collecting, but nobody has any good answers.  Saul Perlmutter writes, “The dark energy evinced by the accelerating cosmic expansion grants us almost no clues to its identity. Its tiny density and its feeble interactions presumably preclude identification in the laboratory. By construction, of course, it does affect the expansion rate of the universe, and different dark-energy models imply different expansion rates in different epochs. So we must hunt for the fingerprints of dark energy in the fine details of the history of cosmic expansion.”

Perlmutter states we cannot detect dark energy on Earth, presumably because of its “feeble” interactions, and yet it has the power to force galaxies to move at increasing rates through the cosmos.  It may be that astrophyicists need to revamp all their models.  Perhaps they’ve missed something.  Something important.

The idea that the universe is expanding it largely based on the red shift – the fact that light from deep in space shifts to the red. The same way that a motorcycle sounds deeper as it zooms away from us, the red waves – the longest waves of light -that  reach us from supernovae cause most astronomers to assume that the sources of light are moving away from us. However, William Tifft in 1976 determined that the red shift was quantized, not continuous. If it were caused by stars moving away at high speeds, it should be continuous, not bundled in little packages. In the 1980s, Guthrie and Napier at the Edinburgh Observatory spent ten years challenging this view, and confirmed that Tifft was correct.  There is also the potential that the speed of light has been slowing down, which we have touched on in previous articles  [see the links below].

At the same time, the term “stretching the heavens” appears at least 17 times in the Scriptures. According to the Scriptures, the heavens can be “torn” (Isa 64:1); “worn out” like a garent (Ps 102:25) “shaken” (Heb 12:26; Hag 2:6; Isa 13:13); “burnt up” (2 Pet 3:12); “split apart” like a scroll (Rev 6:14); “rolled up” like a mantle (Heb 1:12); or a scroll (Isa 34:4) “Rolled up?”

How can all the data best be reconciled?  The Astrophysicists are still working on it.  In the meanwhile, we congratulate the Nobel Prize in Physics winners and their dedicated hard work in trying to hammer out the mysteries of the Universe.

Related Links:

• Supernovae, Dark Energy, and the Accelerating Universe – Saul Perlmutter
• Written In The Stars – NobelPrize.com
• Type Ia Supernova Cosmology with ADEPT – John Hopkins
• Faster Than The Speed Of LIght – Koinonia House
• History Of The Light Speed Debate – Koinonia House
• A Supernova Sheds Light On Dark Energy (2001) – NASA
• Beyond Newton Briefing Pack – K-House Store

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Neutrinos may really be faster than Light

From KHouse.Org

Neutrinos may indeed travel faster than the speed of light, according to three years’ worth of data amassed at a huge underground lab in Italy. Physicists across the world are skeptical of course; Einstein’s theory of relativity hinges on the speed of light and the fact that nothing goes faster. If a particle can shoot past light speed, then crazy science fiction dreams like time travel conceivably become possible. If other labs are able to duplicate the results, this discovery will cause theoretical physicists to wrestle once again with the most fundamental concepts about the nature of the universe.

Less massive than an electron, faster than a speeding photon, able to fly through thick rock without hitting a single quark. It’s a lepton. It’s uncharged. It’s… it’s… a neutrino!

Neutrinos are tiny subatomic particles without any charge, which makes it possible for them to speed through the earth without interacting with the atoms along the way. Neutrinos are so tiny and finicky to work with, they aren’t even assigned a quantified mass. For example an electron has a mass of 9.11×10^−31 kg (which is exceedingly small), but a neutrino’s mass is described simply as “non-zero.” Just barely there.

The Opera Experiment:
Italy’s Gran Sasso National Laboratory is buried deep under the ground, out of the way of the Sun’s cosmic radiation. There a group of 160 physicists from 11 countries have been collaborating in an experiment called Oscillation Project with Emulsion-Tracking Apparatus, or “Opera” for short. The Opera experiment does not begin in Italy, though. Just over 450 miles away at the CERN Large Hadron Collider on the border of France and Switzerland, naked protons, stripped of electrons, are fired into a graphite target. There they turn into a pulse of smaller particles called mesons that decay into neutrinos and speed through the earth toward the Gran Sasso lab.

Much to their dismay, the Opera physicists found the neutrinos traveled a distance of 454 miles from the CERN particle accelerator to the underground lab in Italy about 60 nanoseconds faster than a beam of light. That’s significant, because the margin of error was only 10 nanoseconds. In 2007, scientists at Fermilab in Chicago clocked neutrinos exceeding light speed, but their margin of error was higher – high enough to render the results inconclusive – high enough to protect the conceptual order and the sanity of the world’s physicists.

The Opera scientists are not trying to prove a point, nor do they wish to upset Einstein. They were not even initially focusing on neutrino speed. Neutrinos can morph from one shape to another, and the scientists performing the Opera experiment have been trying to study the transformation of muon neutrinos to tau neutrinos. In the process, they measured the speeds of thousands of neutrinos, and came to the uncomfortable discovery that they were going too fast. After 16,000 neutrinos detected over three years, the physicists only detected one tau neutrino. While the speed of neutrinos is becoming the big issue, OPERA spokesperson, Antonio Ereditato of the University of Bern, said, “We would like to see some tau neutrinos.”

Skeptical physicists abound. Few are ready to believe that any particle, however small, surpasses the speed of light. Astrophysicist Martin Rees of the University of Cambridge reminds Scientific American readers that neutrinos and photos arrived about the same time from SN1987A, a supernova first observed in February of 1987. If neutrinos indeed travelled faster than light, then the neutrinos from the supernova should have beat the photons in their space race from the explosion by a good four years. The SN1987A neutrinos had lower energies than the particle accelerator neutrinos, but still. Theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss of Arizona State University voiced the same sentiments, also noting that the experiment appears to violate Lorentz invariance, “which is at the heart of so much known physics.”

That’s the struggle. So much known physics, tested over and over, depends on the speed of light as the max of the universe. The equations work. The numbers fit over and over again. So, if the speed of light can be surpassed, what does that really mean? Does it mean that neutrinos actually leapfrog forward in time? Or, is there something that physicists have missed?

Most theoretical physicists assume there must be a mistake somewhere. Is there a systematic error that the Gran Sasso team missed? Did they measure the underground distance with the necessary precision, accounting for the tidal bulges in the Earth’s crust due to the location of the Moon?

Dr. Dario Autiero, of the Institut de Physique Nucleaire de Lyon in France declared that his group has been trying to explain the results for six months without success.

“We cannot explain the observed effect in terms of systematic uncertainties,” Dr. Autiero told the physicists at CERN. “Therefore, the measurement indicates a neutrino velocity higher than the speed of light.”

“This result comes as a complete surprise,” confirmed Ereditato. “After many months of studies and cross checks we have not found any instrumental effect that could explain the result of the measurement. While OPERA researchers will continue their studies, we are also looking forward to independent measurements to fully assess the nature of this observation.”

Physicists in other labs are jumping to see if they can repeat the Italian lab’s results. Until others can repeat the experiment and get the same data, it’s unwise to take a stubborn position on the issue. At the same time, an editorial in The Guardian warns against rejecting discoveries just because they’re uncomfortable:

“[B]ut the history of science cautions against branding it unthinkable…Recall, too, that it was the then inexplicable Michelson-Morley experiment which encouraged the spread of Einstein’s early ideas, and the baffling perihelion precession of Mercury which lent support to his general theory. The first thing in science is to face the facts; making sense of them has to come second.”

Related Links:

• Why OPERA’s Claim For Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos Is Not Wrong – John P Costella, PhD
• Challenging Einstein Usually A Losing Venture – USA Today
• Unthinkable? Faster Than Light – The Guardian
• PERA Experiment Reports Anomaly In Flight Time Of Neutrinos From CERN To Gran Sasso – CERN
• After Report on Speed, a Rush of Scrutiny – The New York Times
• Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos? Physics Luminaries Voice Doubts – Scientific American

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The Attack of Planet X and the Death Star

From KHouse.Org

The Mayan Calendar is coming to its end, Planet X is on its way, and the Death Star is knocking killer comets toward us.  For doomsdayers, 2012 spells the end of the world in one way or another. That’s not really the bad news, though. The bad news is that the world probably will not end in 2012, and the financially strapped inhabitants of Earth will have to pay all their bills after all.

Planet X:
Planet X, the long-sought-after 10th planet of our solar system, is rumored to be swinging by Earth just in time for all the other 2012 end-of-the-world predictions. Planet X, aka Nibiru, has been the subject of much discussion for decades. During the past few years interest has been renewed as Nibiru’s return is expected to cause vast devastation to the earth, flipping its poles and killing billions of people. Fortunately – or unfortunately – for Earth dwellers, however, Nibiru has yet to show even a glimmer of his face.

“Planet X” is the name for the fantasy planet beyond the recognized members of our solar system. Pluto also bore the name “Planet X” for a time, until this 9th planet was discovered and the search for further planets continued. The “Planet X” came from Percival Lowell who built a private observatory at Flagstaff, Arizona, and devoted considerable effort to his searches before he died in 1916. Clyde Tombaugh began his searches in 1929, and found Pluto in February 18, 1930. He searched for 13 more years and examined more than 30,000 square degrees of the sky. He found one new globular cluster, five new open star clusters, one new supercluster of 1800 galaxies, and several new small galaxy clusters, one new comet, about 775 new asteroids – but no new planet except Pluto.

In his book The 12th Planet (1978), Zecharia Sitchin popularized the idea that the ancient Sumerians knew of another planet far beyond Pluto. The Akkadian seal appears to show the sun and 11 planets (if the moon is counted as a planet). While unknown to today’s astronomers, Sitchin argues that the Sumerians were familiar with the planet and its 3600 year elliptical orbit. Using questionable allusions in the Sumerian and biblical texts, Sitchin argues that that inhabitants of Nibiru – the Anunnaki – were responsible for genetically engineering the humans of today by crossing their DNA with the DNA of primitive humans.

Certain groups have taken these ideas and run with them.  They predicted that Nibiru would show up in May 2003, which (unless Nibiru is invisible and massless) it did not.  They are now offering a December 2012 date for Nibiru’s return, a convenient co-incident with the end of the Mayan ”long count” calendar. There are even detailed descriptions of Nibiru and its inhabitants. Some believers say they have received telepathic messages from these aliens living on Nibiru, who claim their planet is a star-ship. Whether these ideas are based on communications from aliens, deceptive spiritual beings, or too much late-night Star Trek, believers are convinced that Nibiru is approaching quickly.

However, the evidence is not on the side of the Planet X crowd. Even with the exceedingly fast rate of approach one would expect of the severe elliptical orbit Nibiru is supposed to have, no fantasy planet will pass by the earth in December 2012. If it were on its way, the planet would be one of the brightest objects in the night sky by now. Astronomers would have been following its approach for the past decade. Yet, Planet X is still not visible with the strongest telescopes, and no reputable astronomer has verified its existence.

Ultimately, the fantasy of Planet X flies far stronger than the science, and the planet should be considered with as much concern as any other science fiction story.

The Death Star:
It is also boringly unlikely that Nemesis, The Death Star, lurks past the edge of our solar system. In 1984, paleontologists suggested that exinctions in the fossil record occurred about every 27 million years.   It was proposed that a brown dwarf companion to our sun flew out there, periodically splashing through the Oort Cloud and knocking comets our way – giant, dinosaur-killing comets – causing devastation in cycles.

Experts shook their heads, “No.”    A study published in the Royal Astronomical Society Letters last year concluded that even if Nemesis existed, the brown dwarf wouldn’t offer us a convenient, predictable, comet-bumping orbit.  Apparently, we do not have to worry about death by meteor-ing next year.  The 27-million-year cycle of destruction claimed by the geologists is just an illusion.

“There is a tendency for people to find patterns in nature that do not exist,” said Coryn Bailer-Jones, a researcher at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Astronomy. “Unfortunately, in certain situations traditional statistics plays to that particular weakness.”

Star Parties:
Some folks are taking the end of the world scenarios as an opportunity for fun.  On Friday, Dec. 21, 2012, the Big Sky Astronomical Society in Alberta, Canada plans to host an End of the World Star Party from 8 p.m. to 11:59 p.m. at the Big Sky Observatory.

“Bring your Y2K survival gear and come join us, as the Ancient Mayan Calendar comes to an end, ” said James Durbano, president of the Big Sky Observatory Society. “We will be observing the waxing gibbous moon, Jupiter and its four large moons and the Orion Nebula. We will also be keeping an eye out for Planet X, Nibiru, comets and asteroids, since all of these objects may collide with the earth on that evening, according to doomsday theorists.”

Durbano added wryly, “In addition, we will be looking for UFOs full of aliens who plan to abduct us, enslave us, and then annihilate our planet.”

In other words, whether or not Nibiru or Nemesis have it out for us, we should get out under the stars and enjoy the vast, beautiful universe around us.

“Is not God in the height of heaven? and behold the height of the stars, how high they are!” – Job 22:12

“He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names. Great is our Lord, and of great power: his understanding is infinite.” – Psalm 147:4-5

Related Links:

• 2012: Beginning of the End or Why the World Won’t End? – NASA
• Planet X, 1841-1992 – University of Arizona
• Believing the Unbelievable – Koinonia House
• Search For Planet X – X Facts
• Nemesis No More? Comet-Hurling ‘Death Star’ Most Likely a Myth – Space.com
• Death Start Debunked – MSNBC
• Perseid Viewing Scheduled At Big Sky Observatory – The Prairie Post

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The Heavens Declare The Glory of God – Scientists find 200 sextillion more stars in the sky

From Fox News.Com

The night sky may be a lot starrier than we thought.

A study suggests the universe could have triple the number of stars scientists previously calculated. For those of you counting at home, the new estimate is 300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. That’s 300 sextillion.

The study questions a key assumption that astronomers often use: that most galaxies have the same properties as our Milky Way. And that’s creating a bit of a stink among astronomers who want a more orderly cosmos.

It’s one of two studies being published online Wednesday in the journal Nature that focus on red dwarf stars, the most common stars in the universe. The study that offers the new estimate on stars is led by a Yale University astronomer. He calculates that there are far more red dwarfs than previously thought, and that inflates the total star count.

A second study led by a Harvard University scientist focuses on a distant “super Earth” planet and sees clues to the content of its atmosphere — the first of this kind of data for this size planet. It orbits a red dwarf.

Red dwarf stars — about a fifth the size of our sun — burn slowly and last much longer than the bigger, brighter stars, such as the sun in the center of our solar system, said Yale astronomer Pieter van Dokkum. His study looks at how many red dwarfs are in elliptical-shaped galaxies.

When scientists had estimated previously how many stars there were in the universe, they assumed that all galaxies had the same ratio of dwarf stars as in our galaxy, which is spiral-shaped. Much of our understanding of the universe is based on observations inside our Milky Way and then extrapolated to other galaxies.

But about one-third of the galaxies in the universe are not spiral, but elliptical, and van Dokkum found they aren’t really made up the same way as ours.

Using the Keck telescope in Hawaii, van Dokkum and a colleague gazed into eight other distant, but elliptical, galaxies and looked at their hard-to-differentiate light signatures. The scientists calculated that elliptical galaxies have more of those dwarf stars. A lot more.

“We’re seeing 10 or 20 times more stars than we expected,” van Dokkum said. By his calculations, that triples the number of estimated stars from 100 sextillion to 300 sextillion.

For the past month, astronomers have been buzzing about van Dokkum’s findings, and many aren’t too happy about it, said astronomer Richard Ellis of the California Institute of Technology.

Van Dokkum’s paper challenges the assumption of “a more orderly universe” and gives credence to “the idea that the universe is more complicated than we think,” Ellis said. “It’s a little alarmist.”

Ellis said it is too early to tell if van Dokkum is right or wrong, but it is shaking up the field “like a cat among pigeons.”

- Prophecy News Watch

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Nasa Detects 30-year-old Baby Black Hole

From KHouse.Org

NASA DETECTS 30-YEAR-OLD BABY BLACK HOLE

Black holes aren’t born just any day. It took years for scientists to be convinced that they actually exist, and some people still aren’t sure. Yet, it appears that a baby black hole is growing just 50 million light years away, in our own back yard as far as astronomical neighbors go.

In April 1979, a teacher/amateur astronomer watched a star explode, and for the past 31 years the supernova has been watched very diligently by astronomers around the world. SN 1979C is just 50 million light years away, a single brilliant spot in one of the 1300 to 2000 galaxies in the Virgo cluster. (Yes there are 1300-2000 galaxies in the cluster in the constellation Virgo.)

On November 15, NASA announced that astronomers using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory had found evidence that SN 1979C had indeed developed into a black hole and offered scientists the opportunity to watch a black hole develop from “infancy.”

“If our interpretation is correct, this is the nearest example where the birth of a black hole has been observed,” said Daniel Patnaude of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. who led the study.

Black holes have long been portrayed by science fiction writers as the entry doors to wormholes, those tubes by which travel through deep-space and even time are possible. That would be a lot of fun, but the fantasy holds very little hope in reality. In reality, black holes are created when some of the debris left behind by a supernova dangles in space for a bit and then gets pulled by good old Newtonian physics back into itself. The mass of the densely packed particles keeps growing as more chunks of former star get sucked in, creating a powerful gravitational force that eventually pulls anything nearby into it. These spots get the distinction of being called “black holes” because even passing light can’t escape the intense pull of gravity from the core.

As gasses swirl around a black hole and eventually are sucked into it, they emit a tremendous amount of energy, which eventually reach us as infra-red, optical, ultraviolet and X-ray light. A steady stream of X-rays from the site of a supernova tells us that the black hole is sucking down a steady diet of particles. SN 1979C was once a star 20 times the size of our Sun, and it is estimated that now material 5 times the mass of the Sun is crushed into a space less than 25 miles across. Astronomers carefully recorded X-ray radiation from SN 1979C between 1995 and 2007, and determined that the supernova was emitting X-rays at a constant rate.

“This may be the first time the common way of making a black hole has been observed,” said co-author Abraham Loeb, also of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. “However, it is very difficult to detect this type of black hole birth because decades of X-ray observations are needed to make the case.”

The X-rays don’t necessarily have to come from a black hole. A young neutron star could also emit X-rays in the wind of high energy particles it sends out.

As they pull in more material, the mass and density of black holes grow. Full grown, mature black holes can generally have a mass between a million and a billion times greater than the Sun. Many galaxies swirl around black holes at their center, including the Milky Way.

The Milky Way’s black hole, known as SagA*, isn’t pulling in a great deal of material these days, though. Something is keeping material from being voraciously sucked into the center of the hole. It may be that heat is keeping material away from SagA*’s event horizon. It may be that there are so many supernovas exploding in that part of the galaxy that they are pushing material away from SagA*.

God truly demonstrated His greatness when He spread out the unfathomable space of the universe. He created countless galaxies and stars brilliant enough to be detected from millions of light years away. He’s allowed for the densely packed matter we call black holes that cause the swirling of galaxies and that emit powerful rays from all ends of the light spectrum. As our technology improves, we can appreciate with even greater reverence how truly mighty and amazing is our God.

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained;  What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.” – Psalms 8:3-5

Related Links:

• Baby Black Hole Discovered in Earth’s Backyard – Physics Central
• Black Hole Encyclopedia – Hubble Site
• NASA’s Chandra Finds Youngest Nearby Black Hole – NASA
• Probing Massive Black Hole With X-Ray Observations – U of Maryland
• 66-40 Beyond Time and Space (audio) – Koinonia House

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Alpha changes with Time and Space

From KHouse.Org

ALPHA CHANGES WITH TIME AND SPACE

The fine structure constant, α, has changed over time and space according to a study led by John Webb of Australian University of New South Wales. Webb’s team has been studying the light from distant quasars for over a decade, using the Keck telescope in Mauna Kea, Hawaii. The team had determined previously that α was the slightest bit smaller in the distant past. Now, after having analyzed new data from the Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile, Webb’s team concludes that the change in α is affected by its position in space, and therefore α is not a constant throughout the universe after all.

What does that mean?

The fine structure constant alpha is one of the physical “constants” of the universe. It describes the strength with which electrons hold onto atoms. The formation of individual molecules and the existence of life itself all depend on the attraction of electrons to the nuclei of atoms, and if α has a different strength out there in the universe, that may mean that we live in the only part of the universe that can support life.

It also adds another question mark to the issue of whether the physical constants – like speed of light in a vacuum or the gravitational constant – are truly constants, and do not vary after all. As Paul Davies from Arizona State University at Tempe notes, “If we can accept a varying fine-structure constant, then all bets are off.” In 2002 Davies published findings that suggest the speed of light has slowed over time.

Physicists use quasar spectroscopy to analyze the universe. Quasars are brilliantly luminous galaxies far away, providing a high redshift due to their great distances. The strength of the attraction of atoms to their electrons -α -makes a difference when it comes to the frequencies at which atoms absorb light, and so should show up in the way that the light from quasars is absorbed by gas clouds out in space. By taking measurements of the spectral bands of the light coming from quasars, and by carefully analyzing those bands, Webb’s team has concluded that α is not a constant at all, but varies depending on which part of the universe is being observed.

The Keck telescope in Hawaii is able to observe the sky from the northern hemisphere, while the VLT telescope in Paranal, Chile observes it from the southern hemisphere. These two huge telescopes, separated by 45 degrees in latitude therefore, for the most part, observe different parts of the sky. While taking measurements from quasars viewed in the north using the Keck telescope, Webb’s team concluded that α was a fraction smaller billions of miles away. When observing the southern sky, however, using the VLT telescope, the team got the opposite results; α appears to be larger in that direction.

The results imply that the universe is quite large and may in fact be infinite, making our tiny speck in the cosmos look that much smaller. However, if Webb’s team is correct and α has indeed changed, it may be that our tiny speck in the cosmos is the only place where life can exist. That makes our piece of real estate in space delightfully significant after all.

“When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:” – Psalms 8:3-6

Related Links:
• Evidence For Spatial Variation Of The Fine Structure Constant – Arxiv.org
• Fine Structure Constant Varies with Direction in Space, Says New Data – Technology Review
• Changing One of Nature’s Constants – US News & World Report
• Einstein’s Theory May Be Relatively Wrong (2002) – CNN
• History of the Light-Speed Debate – Koinonia House

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History of the Light – Speed Debate

From Koinonia House

HISTORY OF THE LIGHT-SPEED DEBATE

When we walk into a dark room, flip a switch and the light comes on, it seems that light has no speed but is somehow infinite – instantly there.  That was the majority opinion of scientists and philosophers until September 1676, when Danish astronomer Olaf Roemer announced to the Paris Academie des Sciences that the anomalous behavior of the eclipse times of Jupiter’s inner moon, Io, could be accounted for by a finite speed of light.   His work and his report split the scientific community in half, involving strong opinions and discussions for the next fifty years. It was Bradley’s independent confirmation of the finite speed of light, published January 1, 1729, which finally ended the opposition. The speed of light was finite-incredibly fast, but finite.

The following question was: “Is the speed of light constant?” Interestingly enough, every time it was measured over the next few hundred years, it seemed to be a little slower than before. This could be explained away, as the first measurements were unbelievably rough compared to the technical accuracy later. It was not that simple, though. When the same person did the same test using the same equipment at a later period in time, the speed was slower. Not much, but slower.

These results kicked off a series of lively debates in the scientific community during the first half of the 20th century. Raymond Birge, highly respected chairman of the physics department at the University of California, Berkeley, had, from 1929 on, established himself as an arbiter of the values of atomic constants. The speed of light is considered an atomic constant. However Birge’s recommended values for the speed of light decreased steadily until 1940, when an article written by him, entitled “The General Physical Constants, as of August 1940 with details on the velocity of light only,” appeared in Reports on Progress in Physics (Vol. 8, pp.90-100, 1941). Birge began the article saying: “This paper is being written on request – and at this time on request … a belief in any significant variability of the constants of nature is fatal to the spirit of science, as science is now understood [emphasis his].” These words, from this man, for whatever reason he wrote them, shut down the debate on the speed of light. Birge had previously recognized, as had others, that if the speed of light was changing, it was quite necessary that some of the other “constants” were also changing. This was evidently not to be allowed, whether it was true or not, and so the values for the various constants were declared and that was that. Almost. In the October 1975 issue of Scientific American (p. 120), C.L. Strong questioned whether the speed of light might change with time “as science has failed to get a consistently accurate value.” It was just a ripple, but the issue had not quite disappeared.

Partly in order to quell any further doubts about the constancy of the speed of light, in October 1983 the speed of light was declared a universal constant of nature, defined as 299,792.458 kilometers per second, which is often rounded off to the measurement we are more familiar with in the West as 186,000 miles per second.

Birge’s paper was published in 1941. Just a year later, Barry Setterfield was born in Australia. In 1979 he was 37 years old. That year he received a book from a friend, a book on astronomical anomalies. It was a large book, and near the end of it there was a section on the speed of light, questioning its constancy. Barry was stunned. Nothing he had read or learned in physics or astronomy had even hinted that there was a question regarding the speed of light. It was a constant, wasn’t it? As he read, he learned about the measurements that had been taken years before, and the arguments that had gone on in the scientific literature, and he was fascinated. He figured he could read up on it and wrap up the question in about two weeks; it didn’t quite work out that way.

Within a couple of years, one of the creationist organizations had started publishing some of Barry’s findings. They were still preliminary, but there was so much more to this than he had thought. In the following years his exploration continued, and he read all the literature he could find. His work caught the attention of a senior research physicist at Stanford Research Institute International (SRI), who then asked him to submit a paper regarding his research. It was to be a white paper, or one that was for the purposes of discussion within the Institute.

Barry teamed up with Trevor Norman of Flinders University in Adelaide, and in 1987 Flinders itself published their paper, “Atomic Constants, Light, and Time.” Their math department had checked it and approved it and it was published with the Stanford Research Institute logo as well.

Gerald Aardsma, a man at another creationist organization, got wind of the paper and got a copy of it. Having his own ax to grind on the subject of physics, he called the heads of both Flinders and SRI and asked them if they knew that Setterfield and Norman were [gasp] creationists! SRI was undergoing a massive staff change at the time and since the paper had been published by Flinders, they disavowed it and requested their logo be taken off. Flinders University threatened Trevor Norman with his job and informed Barry Setterfield that he was no longer welcome to use any resources there but the library. Aardsma then published a paper criticizing the Norman-Setterfield statistical use of the data. His paper went out under the auspices of a respected creation institution.

Under attack by both evolutionists and creationists for their work, Norman and Setterfield found themselves writing long articles of defense, which appeared in a number of issues of creation journals. In the meantime, Lambert Dolphin, the physicist at Stanford who had originally requested the paper, teamed up with professional statistician Alan Montgomery to take the proverbial fine-tooth comb through the Norman-Setterfield paper to check the statistics used. Their defense of the paper and the statistical use of the data was then published in a scientific journal [Galilean Electrodynamics , Vol. 4 No. 5, pp. 93ff., 1993]  and Montgomery went on to present a public defense at the 1994 International Creation Conference. Neither defense has ever been refuted in any journal or conference. Interestingly enough, later in 1987, after the Norman-Setterfield paper was published, another paper on light speed appeared, written by a Russian, V. S. Troitskii ["Physical Constants and the Evolution of the Universe", Astrophysics and Space Science Vol. 139, 1987, pp 389-411]. Troitskii not only postulated that the speed of light had not been constant, but that light speed had originally been about 1010 times faster than now.

[To be continued next week.  This article by Helen D. Setterfield was originally published in the July 2002 Personal Update NewsJournal]

Related Links:

• History of the Light-Speed Debate – Koinonia House
• Light Slows Down – Transcript – The World Today

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Hunting down the God Particle

From Koinonia House

HUNTING DOWN THE GOD PARTICLE

“They call it the God particle: a mysterious sub-atomic fragment that permeates the entire universe and explains how everything is the way it is. Nobody has ever seen the God particle; some say it doesn’t exist but, in the ultimate leap of faith, physicists across the world are preparing to build one of the most ambitious and expensive science experiments the world has ever seen to try to find it.” – David Adam, The Guardian, August 21, 2004

The Large Hadron Collider was started up again this weekend and is expected to reach full speed before the end of the month. This massive atom smasher hidden underground in the Alps along the border of France and Switzerland has a price tag of $10 billion and has the job of shooting atoms through its 16.8-mile circular tunnel at insanely high speeds.  Thus far, the LHC has accelerated proton beams to an astounding energy level of  2.36 teraelectronvolts (TeV).  The highest any previous atom smasher had reached was .98 TeV.  In December the CERN scientists shut down the LHC in order to ready it for even more ambitious experiments.

The massive machine was brought back to life in the wee hours of Sunday morning, and CERN scientists now want the LHC to reach 7.0 TeV in order to create what they consider to be Big Bang conditions.  For the next 18 months to two years the LHC should pound atoms against each other and analyze the results through powerful computers in order to catch a glimpse at the very stuff that makes up the universe.  Physicists hope the collider will enable them to directly observe the Higgs boson, the theoretical glue that holds the entire universe together.  The Higgs boson, often called the God particle, is perhaps the most elusive element in particle physics.

Back in 2008, world renowned physicist Steven Hawking told British TV, ”I think it will be much more exciting if we don’t find the Higgs. That will show something is wrong, and we need to think again. I have a bet of $100 that we won’t find the Higgs.”  Other physicists, though – a significant number - are hopeful about the possibilities and are willing for Hawking to eventually lose his bet. The project involves more than 8,000 scientists from at least 85 countries.

Dark Matter
The Standard Model in particle physics, which is often compared to the Periodic Table of Elements used by chemists, consists of 16 particles that make up all matter in the universe. The problem is that the Standard Model is not complete. In the late 1960′s a physicist by the name of Peter Higgs proposed the existence of a particle that would somehow interact with every other subatomic particle to give them all mass. Since then, scientists have been scrambling to find this particle.

The existence of dark matter was proposed in 1932 by astronomer Jan Oort, who measured the motions of nearby stars in our Milky Way relative to the galactic plane. He found that the mass of the plane must be more than the mass of the material that can be seen. A year later, Fritz Zwicky examined the dynamics of clusters of galaxies and found their movements similarly perplexing. Over the years, many spiral galaxies were observed and found to be swirling too fast to be held together by the gravitational pull of the visible stars. Since the speedy-moving stars have not been flung out through space, some scientists describe dark matter as “the glue that holds the universe together.”

Astronomers cannot detect or measure dark matter directly because it emits no light or radiation – hence the name. Its existence is inferred from the gravitational effect it has on visible matter (such as stars and galaxies). There have been a number of conjectures regarding the nature of dark matter, but all of them have eluded any empirical validation.

Physicists hope CERN’s Large Hadron Collider will shed even more light on dark matter, dark energy, the existence of extra dimensions, and the fundamental nature of matter, energy, space and time.

Without Excuse:
Science, like religion, often requires us to take a leap of faith. Any honest scientist should admit that despite centuries of scientific discovery and technological advances, most of our universe remains a mystery. There are large numbers of areas that, despite careful investigation, we do not fully understand, from the “magic” of photosynthesis to the mysterious particles that make up the fabric of space-time.

Science continues to develop and change as scientists discover new evidence, and it is one of the great joys of being human to explore and discover the marvelous brilliance and detail God used in putting this world together.  But even as scientists analyze the data from the LHC and hope to catch a glimpse of the Higgs boson, we’re certain that the name “God particle” is more accurate than some physicists would choose to admit.  Whether or not dark matter is busy keeping distant stars from shooting further into space, we know that Jesus Christ holds each of us, and we trust him to hold the atoms in our bodies together with as much care as he takes in sustaining the entire universe.  Even if Science changes, we know He does not.

“Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.” - Hebrews 11:3

“For by him [Jesus] were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.” – Col 1:16-17

Related Links:

• Hadron Collider Resumes, Full Speed Seen in Weeks – Reuters
• Atom Smasher Restarts, Preps for New Work – AP
• World’s Most Powerful Atom Smasher Restarts: CERN – AFP
• Deep below the Alps, Physicists Seek to Fill in the Blanks of Time and Space – The Globe And Mail
• Higgs Boson – Wikipedia Encyclopedia

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“What is Truth?” Part 2: The Ultimate Message

From Koinonia House

Technical > Space-Time > The Ultimate Message

Last month we began our inquiry of ”What Is Truth?” by examining the boundaries of our reality. We touched on some of the bizarre discoveries of quantum physics, including the nature of hyperspaces and the discovery that our physical universe appears to consist of more than the three dimensions we commonly experience.

The Cosmos as a Hyper-Hologram?

There also seems to be evidence to suggest that our world and everything in it consists only of ghostly images, projections from a level of reality so beyond our own that the real reality is literally beyond both space and time.

The main architect of this astonishing idea includes one of the world’s most eminent thinkers: University of London physicist David Bohm, a protégé of Einstein’s and one of the world’s most respected quantum physicists.

Bohm’s work in plasma physics is considered a landmark. While at the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, he noticed that in plasmas (gases composed of high density electrons and positive ions) the particles stopped behaving like individuals and started behaving as if they were part of a larger and interconnected whole.

Moving to Princeton University in 1947, there too Bohm continued his work in the behavior of oceans of particles, noting their highly organized overall effects, and their behaving as if they knew what each of the untold trillions of individual particles were doing. Bohm’s sense of the importance of inter-connectedness, as well as years of dissatisfaction with the inability of the standard theories to explain all of the phenomena encountered in quantum physics, left him searching.

While at Princeton, Bohm and Einstein developed a supportive relationship and shared their mutual restlessness regarding the strange implications of current quantum theory.

One of the implications of Bohm’s view has to do with the nature of location. Bohm’s interpretation of quantum physics indicated that at the subquantum level location ceased to exist. All points in space become equal to all other points in space, and it was meaningless to speak of anything as being separate from anything else. Physicists call this property ”nonlocality.”

A Deeper Order of Existence

One of Bohm’s most startling suggestions is that the tangible reality of our everyday lives is really a kind of illusion, like a holographic image. Underlying it is a deeper order of existence, a vast and more primary level of reality that gives birth to all the objects and appearances of our physical world in much the same way that a piece of holographic film gives birth to a hologram. Bohm calls this deeper level of reality the implicate (enfolded) order and he refers to our level of existence the explicate (unfolded) order.

This view is not inconsistent with the Biblical presentation of the physical world being subordinate to the “spiritual” world, which is the superior reality.¹

Many physicists remain skeptical of Bohm’s ideas. Among those who are sympathetic, however, are Roger Penrose of Oxford, the creator of the modern theory of black holes; Bernard d’Espagnat of the University of Paris, one of the leading authorities on the conceptual foundations of quantum theory; and, Cambridge’s Brian Josephson, winner of the 1973 Nobel Prize in physics. Josephson believes that Bohm’s implicate order may someday even lead to the inclusion of God within the framework of science, an idea Josephson supports.²

How Do Holograms Work?

A hologram is a form of lensless photography in which a laser simultaneously illuminates an object and a piece of film. The film records the interference between the light waves hitting it directly and the light waves reflected from the object. It is, in effect, a frequency record rather than a spatial image.

Fourier Transforms

The hologram is one of the most remarkable examples of a Fourier Transform. Holographic principles were first formulated in 1947 by Dennis Gabor (who later won a Nobel Prize for his efforts) as he was trying to improve the electron microscope, then a primitive and imperfect device. His approach was a mathematical one, leaning on a type of calculus invented by an 18th century Frenchman, Jean B. J. Fourier.

Fourier had developed a mathematical way of converting any pattern, no matter how complex, into a language of simple waves. He also showed that these wave forms could be converted back into the original pattern, just as a television set converts those frequencies back into the original images. Engineers frequently exploit Fourier Transforms to change a time series into a frequency series. The use of frequency response curves in the evaluation of audio equipment is a common example.

Modern holographic images are derived from the work of Emmet Leath at the University of Michigan. (I had the pleasure of exploring computer-generated holograms with him in his laboratory in the early ’60s.)

Informational Properties

The hologram exhibits some very profound properties beyond the three-dimensional image. In fact, it is one of the most profound means to distribute information throughout a given media. All of the information it contains is distributed over the entire image surface. One can remove a portion of the hologram without losing the image! Drill a hole in the hologram, and one can still view the entire object by simply moving one’s eye to a more convenient angle (some resolution, or sharpness, will be lost however). Cut the film into pieces, and each piece contains the complete image.³

An engineer who is designing a communication system in anticipation of hostile jamming, or other countermeasures, needs to employ several critical techniques to be effective. In addition to taking advantage of available error detection and correction techniques, he will also attempt to spread his message throughout the available bandwidth. He will avoid clustering his message into areas which would increase his vulnerability to jamming or interference.

It is provocative to notice that the Biblical text evidences these same techniques. Where is the chapter on baptism? Or salvation? Or any specific critical doctrine? Every major theme is spread throughout the 66 books making up the total message. There is no concentration of any critical element in any single location. One can tear out a surprising number of pages and still not lose visibility of the essential message. (Some resolution or clarity would be lost, however.) This design intent of distributing the vital elements throughout the entire message system is even highlighted by Isaiah:

Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts. For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little: – Isaiah 28:9,10

A Biblical Analogy

When one examines a hologram in natural (uncollimated, noncoherent) light, it has no apparent form nor attractiveness. However, when one examines it with the laser with which it was formulated, a three-dimensional image appears.

When one examines the Bible in unaided, natural light, it ”has no form nor comeliness that we should desire it.”⁴ But when we examine it illuminated by the Light that created it, the Spirit of God that put it all together in the first place, we see an image: the image of the One that every detail in it illuminates, the promised Messiah Himself.

From Genesis to Revelation, God’s program for the redemption of mankind is carefully distributed throughout 66 books,⁵ penned by more than 40 different individuals span-ning over a thousand years! And, indeed, this abused collection has survived the jamming and interference of its enemies over many centuries without material damage! (However, if we illuminate the hologram with a laser of a different frequency, it will yield a false or distorted image. So, too, the Scriptures!)

Religious Adversaries

And there are knowledgeable, resourceful adversaries that are very committed to preventing it from achieving its objective. And you are the target of their malicious designs. Lies and deceit are their primary weapons.⁶ And, surprisingly, religion has been the deceptive packaging to prevent man-kind from perceiving the truth of God’s grace and mercy.

Religion is man’s attempt to reconcile himself to God. It began when Adam and Eve attempted to clothe themselves to hide their nakedness.⁷

God’s response was to replace their efforts with coats of skins,⁸ teaching them that they would ultimately be covered by the shedding of innocent blood. The concept of a substitutional sacrifice, which would later be codified in the Levitical system, and climaxed at Golgotha, was introduced before they left the Garden of Eden.

You and I are also the beneficiaries of that love letter, written in blood on a wooden cross that was erected in Judea about 2,000 years ago.

The holographic paradigm thus seems to give us a glimpse not only into the nature of physical reality, but it also leaves its imprint within the Word of God itself. This would appear to be a subtle, but significant, fingerprint of the Author of it all.

It is amazing – and yet not surprising – that the Word of God presents a view of reality that is not at variance with these contemporary insights from the very boundaries of our present understanding of the physical universe, which is but a transient illusion for temporal purposes:

While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal. – 2 Corinthians 4:18

These 66 books – penned by over 40 authors over thousands of years – evidence an integrity that has been super-naturally engineered to provide not only a perspective of reality that science is only beginning to catch up to, but high-lights a future that is beyond our imagining! Next month, we’ll explore some of the ”high-tech” statements in the Bible – describing science and technology that had yet to be discovered or invented when the Bible was written.

What Is Truth?

The Ultimate Truth is a Person: the identity of Jesus Christ. And He is the most anti-religious person who has ever walked the Earth! It’s not about religion, it’s about relationship. It is the most important discovery of your life – your eternal destiny depends upon it!

What Is Truth? – DVD – Chuck MisslerJoin Chuck Missler as he examines the boundaries of our reality, explores ways to qualify sources of information, offers advice on testing hypothesis, and reveals the source of Ultimate Truth. Click for more information – DVD

1. 2 Corinthians 4:18.
2. The Reach of the Mind: Nobel Prize Conversations, Saybrook Publishing Co., Dallas TX, 1985, p.91.
3. This is only true for a hologram invisible to the naked eye. Synthetic holographic-like images used in normal light displays do not have these properties.
4. Isaiah 53:2.
5. Seventy, if one recognizes that the Book of Psalms is actually assembled from five books.
6. John 8:44, et al. This began in Eden when the adversary cynically inquired, “Yea, Hath God (really) said…” Genesis 3:1ff.
7. Their “nakedness” may be referring to their loss of their original nature: they may have been clothed with light, walking with God, etc. There may be far more involved than most theologians have ever imagined.
8. Genesis 3:21.

First in a Series: What Is Truth? – Chuck Missler

Quantum Teleporting, Part 2: Our Holographic Universe – Chuck Missler

System Design of the Scriptures?: Our Holographic Bible – Chuck Missler

What Is Truth? – The Case for Biblical Integrity

• How do we know what is really true?
• How do we know that the Bible is true?
• How sure can we be?

We live in a skeptical environment, where even the very existence of truth is questioned. Lately, the Bible – and even the Lord Jesus himself – has been under attack.

Join Chuck Missler as he examines the boundaries of our reality, explores ways to qualify sources of information, offers advice on testing hypothesis, and reveals the source of Ultimate Truth.

How We Got Our Bible – The Origin of the Word of God

• Where did our Bible come from? How good are the texts?
• Why do we believe its origin is supernatural?
• How do we know that it really is the Word of God?
• How accurate are our translations?
• Which version is the best?

Chuck Missler reviews the origin of both the Old and New Testaments in light of recent discoveries and controversies.

Beyond Perception – Particle Physics And The Boundaries of Reality

• Hebrew Cabalists theorized 800 years ago that God established the universe with 10 dimensions.
• Why do scientists now also believe we live in a 10-dimensional universe?
• Has physics finally reached the very boundaries of reality?

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