Saturday, September 20, 2008

Owen Gingerich on Astromony, God and Jesus

The universe is easier to understand with purpose and design.

It would be silly to picture everything here, alive, and the universe without having a meaning

Its hard to prove, but it makes more sense to have ultimate purpose and reasoning


there's always a religious tension between science and the natural world. In the early part of the periodic table, there is no stable mass 5. Some say it is God's goof. If you make the elements from scratch, you will not be able to build up to higher elements.

Hydrogen links to everyone, but to build up Helium atoms (4 mass)

Carbon and Oxygen are the 2 most abundant elements after Helium, necessary for life.
If there was a mass 5, then you can zoom up to the heavier elements in the big bang.

So this goof, was necessary to creating life to have an abundance of the elements of life.


Anthropic principal -- when it was proposed as an idea, it was saying all these things are magnificent, it looks like the universe was designed to make life possible
When people got uncomfortable, people turned it around -- saying we wouldn't be here to speculate, so we have to find out the answer because we are here

there could be a master plan with a designer
2 - we are just in 1 universe, where we are in the one that happens to have this configuration
3 - the universe could be no other way, there are no alternative universes. To make a universe at all, it needs to be this way

Everyone is men of faith, even the skeptics have fallen for a belief system that ruled out the notion of God, but something you can't prove in any way.
It may make more sense for your, but it can't be proved there is no God.

Agnostic -- say you dont' know, you are open to arguments from both sides. Its hard to pin a tag of faith.

Eternity can embody all of time in it. Scientists think about eternity, you have to go outside of our measure of time. To learn before the big bang, time is only present if you have change and motion. If you have nothing, you dont have change and motion.

An eternity can be defined as something in which time is embedded, and other universes might arise that lack a dimension of time, or multiple dimensions of time. Its hard for us to fathom, because we think in term sof cause and effect, and as having a past that can be remembered, and a future that is not accessible to us.

Before the big bang, they aren't dismmissing themselves from time. What is happening is a time dependent notion.

christians talk about another universe, that we dont' have access to -- heaven

The image of God as the creater is hard to comprehend, and picture an image of God. If , he has this omnicipants and wants to relate to his creatures, then God has the power to come forward in different aspects --

whats the purpose? we hope we play a part, otherwise we can't philisophically understand our purpose. We think the purpose is to study and understand, in which God created a universe that allows us to examine and understand the universe, and use taht understanding to enhance the relationships with the creatures on the earth. (kepler said by studying the uinverse, he is glorified God)

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