Science in The Bible

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Science in The Bible

• Lecture 3 (4/20/07)

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Review

• Homework
• A dialogue
• Questions about the literal 6 days
• That early scientists were also Christians
• That God created the earth old
• Whats your science background?
• Reading

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Just a bit more on Time

• Genealogy is not necessarily chronology

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God Created How?

• Four approaches
• Evolutionary Creationism
• Theistic Evolution
• Progressive Creationism
• Young-Age Creationism

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Evolutionary Creationist

• Believes God created the universe in such a way
  that it was inherently capable of generating its
  current structure and contained bodies, through
  natural laws and practices
• Says that power and wisdom of God are shown in
  how He created the Creation with an inherent
  ability to generate complexity

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Evolutionary Creationist

• Accept the evolutionary theories and claims of
  antiquity advocated by evolutionary naturalists.
• Advocate the Day-Age or Framework interpretations
  of Genesis 1. Some deny the historicity of
  Genesis 1 by suggesting it is a myth.

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Evolutionary Creationism

• Apparent Challenges
• The character of God (biological misfits, poor
  planning, harsh world filled with disease,
  violence, and struggle)
• Animal death before the fall of man
• Non-global flood

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Theistic Evolutionists

• Claim that God modified the universe at the level
  of molecules, genes, cells, etc. over millions
  and billions of years to produce the universe and
  its components which we have today. Unlike the
  evolutionary creationist, the theistic
  evolutionist would say that evolution could not
  happen by itself God must intervene in little
  steps and continual activity shows forth the
  glory of God.

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Theistic Evolutionists

• Most accept the evolutionary theories and claims
  of antiquity advocated by evolutionary
  naturalists. Any problems in evolutionary theory
  (for example, how life evolved from non-life, how
  mutations accomplish increased complexity,
  complex adaptations, the challenge of probability
  theory) are explained by Gods intervention

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Theistic Evolutionism

• Apparent Challenges
• The character of God (biological misfits, poor
  planning, harsh world filled with disease,
  violence, and struggle)
• Animal death before the fall of man
• Non-global flood

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Progressive Creationist

• Claims that God created the universe and its
  components in many steps spread over billions of
  years of time. Occasional bursts of creative
  activity are scattered over long periods of time.
  When large gaps are seen in the fossil record,
  the progressive creationist interprets that as a
  place where God intervened.

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Progressive Creationist

• Accepts conventional claims of antiquity and
  evolutionary explanations fro all but the largest
  transformations in the universes history. Most
  hold to the Day-Age or Framework interpretations
  of Genesis 1. Some deny the historicity of
  Genesis 1 by suggesting that it is a myth.

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Progressive Creationist

• Apparent Challenges
• The character of God (biological misfits, poor
  planning, harsh world filled with disease,
  violence, and struggle)
• Animal death before the fall of man
• Non-global flood

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Young-Age Creationist

• Believes God created all things ex nihilo (from
  nothing) some thousands of years ago. This view
  is advocated primarily because of biblical
  interpretation and chronology.

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Young-Age Creationist

• Believes the Scriptures are the foundation upon
  which to build models and theories of science,
  and that when modern interpretations of
  scientific data seem to conflict with the Bible,
  the scientist must look for different
  interpretations.
• Rejects most theories of evolution and theories
  of antiquity. Genesis 1 is understood with the
  literal day interpretation.

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Young-Age Creationist

• Apparent challenges
• Light travel times
• Radiometric dating
• Other evidences of antiquity
• Evolutionary theories and their evidences

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Thermodynamics

• First Law
• Second Law
• Entropy
• Times Arrow
• Randomness

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Thermodynamics

• The two principal laws of thermodynamics apply
  only to closed systems, that is, entities with
  which there can be no exchange of energy,
  information, or material. The universe in its
  totality might be considered a closed system of
  this type this would allow the two laws to be
  applied to it.

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Thermodynamics

• The first law of thermodynamics says that the
  total quantity of energy in the universe remains
  constant. This is the principle of the
  conservation of energy. The second law of
  thermodynamics states that the quality of this
  energy is degraded irreversibly. This is the
  principle of the degradation of energy.

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Thermodynamics

• The first principle establishes the equivalence
  of the different forms of energy (radiant,
  chemical, physical, electrical, and thermal), the
  possibility of transformation from one form to
  another, and the laws that govern these
  transformations. This first principle considers
  heat and energy as two magnitudes of the same
  physical nature

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Thermodynamics

• About 1850 the studies of Lord Kelvin, Carnot,
  and Clausius of the exchanges of energy in
  thermal machines revealed that there is a
  hierarchy among the various forms of energy and
  an imbalance in their transformations. This
  hierarchy and this imbalance are the basis of the
  formulation of the second principle.

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Thermodynamics

• In fact physical, chemical, and electrical energy
  can be completely changed into heat. But the
  reverse (heat into physical energy, for example)
  cannot be fully accomplished without outside help
  or without an inevitable loss of energy in the
  form of irretrievable heat. This does not mean
  that the energy is destroyed it means that it
  becomes unavailable for producing work. The
  irreversible increase of this nondisposable
  energy in the universe is measured by the
  abstract dimension that Clausius in 1865 called
  entropy (from the Greek entrope, change).

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Thermodynamics 2nd Law

• Today the word entropy is as much a part of the
  language of the physical sciences as it is of the
  human sciences. Unfortunately, physicists,
  engineers, and sociologists use indiscriminately
  a number of terms that they take to be synonymous
  with entropy, such as disorder, probability,
  noise, random mixture, heat or they use terms
  they consider synonymous with antientropy, such
  as information, complexity, organization, order,
  improbability.

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Thermodynamics
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Additional Thoughts

• How fast does a reaction proceed?
• Is it easily reversible?
• What are the concentrations of the reactants?

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Relativity

• Works for the physical world
• Not for the spiritual
• Unless we look at being relative to God
• Not to each other

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Genesis 11-5 One day

• In the beginning God created the heavens and the
  earth. The earth was without form, and void and
  darkness was on the face of the deep. And the
  Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the
  waters.
• Then God said, Let there be light and there
  was light. And God saw the light, that it was
  good and God divided the light from the
  darkness. God called the light Day, and the
  darkness He called Night. So the evening and the
  morning were the first day.

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Word Studies

• How much experience do you have?
• What resources do you have?

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Heaven

• 9028 ???????? (amayim) n.masc. Str 8064
  TWOT 2407a1. LN 1.5-1.16 heaven, i.e., the realm
  of God where God abides, similar to the area of
  the sky, but with a focus of where God abides,
  sometimes describes as the upper regions above
  the upper sky (Ps 1810EB 9) 2. LN 1.5-1.16
  atmosphere, i.e., the area of the stars, skies,
  air, as a region above the earth including the
  horizon (1Ki 1845) 3. LN 1.5-1.16 unit
  ???????? ???????? (amayim amayim) highest
  heaven, i.e., the very uppermost part of the sky,
  stars, and air (Dt 1014) 4. LN 1.5-1.16 unit
  ?????? ??? ???????? ??? ?????? ??? ????? (bayin
  ha- amayim w- bayin ha- ?ere?) midair,
  formally, between the heavens and between the
  earth, i.e., an area of space just above the
  earth which has no base or support to set the
  feet (2Sa 189)

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Earth

• 167     ????? (?ere?) earth, land, city (-state),
  (under) world.
• According to KB3 (p. 87), this word appears
  approximately 2400 times in the ot. More
  specifically, THAT I, p. 229, remarks that ?ere?
  is the fourth most frequently used noun in the
  ot, appearing 2504 times in the Hebrew sections
  and 22 times in the Aramaic sections.
• The first two meanings listed above are far and
  away the most crucial. That is, ?ere? designates
  either (a) the earth in a cosmological sense,
  or (b) the land in the sense of a specific
  territorial designation, primarily the land of
  Israel.

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Heavens and Earth

• Collectively refer to the universe
• All that God created

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was

• Can also be translated
• Had become
• This leads to the gap theory

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Formless -- tohu

• 9332 ?????? (tohû) n.masc. Str 8414 TWOT
  2494a1. LN 80.1-80.4 formlessness, emptiness,
  i.e., a state of empty space and so nothingness,
  so not having a shape, implied to be a state
  prior to order and form (Ge 12 Job 267 Isa
  4518 Jer 423), see also domain LN
  58.1458.18 2. LN 1.86-1.87 wasteland, i.e.,
  what is barren and void of use, as tracts of
  unpopulated land (Dt 3210 Job 618 1224 Ps
  10740) 3. LN 6.96-6.101 idol, i.e., an object
  which are worshiped, with a special focus on the
  uselessness and worthlessness of the fashioned
  object (1Sa 1221) 4. LN 20.31-20.60 ruination,
  destruction, i.e., what has been destroyed and in
  chaos and confusion (Isa 2410 3411) 5. LN
  65.1-65.16 vanity, nothingness, i.e., what is
  worthless and lacking in value, implying a very
  low status in some contexts (Isa 4017, 23
  4129 449 4519 494) 6. LN 33.251-33.255
  false testimony, i.e., speech which is empty and
  void of truth, so false in reasoning or facts
  (Isa 2921 594)

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Void -- bohu

• 983 ?????? (bohû) n.masc. Str 922 TWOT
  205a1. LN 14 emptiness, the void, i.e., an
  emptiness that shows lack of order (Ge 12 Jer
  423), note some interp this as a void from a
  prior creation, see WBC15 2. LN 14 unit ?????
  ??? ?????? (tohw w- bohû) total chaos, i.e., a
  physical state of total lack of order (Ge 12
  Jer 423), note some give the associative
  meaning of this chaos as a contest of deities,
  see WBC1 for discussion 3. LN 20.31-20.60 unit
  ????? ?????? (?e?en bohû) plumb line of
  desolation, i.e., a figurative and ironic meaning
  of destruction (Isa 3411), note the irony is,
  of course, that a plummet line is normally used
  for construction not destruction and the chaos
  that is associated with destruction

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Light

• Wave Particle Duality
• Speed is constant?

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John 11-9 (NKJV)

• 1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
  with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the
  beginning with God. 3All things were made through
  Him, and without Him nothing was made that was
  made. 4In Him was life, and the life was the
  light of men. 5And the light shines in the
  darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
  6There was a man sent from God, whose name was
  John. 7This man came for a witness, to bear
  witness of the Light, that all through him might
  believe. 8He was not that Light, but was sent to
  bear witness of that Light. 9That was the true
  Light which gives light to every man coming into
  the world.

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Transition
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Genesis 16-8 - Second Day

• 6Then God said, Let there be a firmament in the
  midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters
  from the waters. 7Thus God made the firmament,
  and divided the waters which were under the
  firmament from the waters which were above the
  firmament and it was so. 8And God called the
  firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning
  were the second day.

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Key words

• Firmament (expanse)
• Waters

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Firmament

• 8385 ??????? (raqîa?) n.masc. Str 7549 TWOT
  2217aLN 1.5-1.16 expanse, firmament, i.e., an
  area of atmospheric space, either relatively
  close to the ground or in the upper limit of the
  sky and heavens (Ge 16, 7,8, 14, 15, 17, 20 Ps
  192EB 1 1501 Eze 122, 23, 25, 26 101 Da
  123), note though to the modern mind the
  expanse of the sky is a void of empty space, it
  is perceived as a solid space (hence firmament)
  and is so a kind of base to hold up highly
  heavenly objects such as water or a throne, see
  also domain LN 7.267.53

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Firmament

• Hard dome view

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Where are the waters?

• View 1
• Waters above
• A protective canopy of water above the earths
  atmosphere
• Source of much of the water in Noahs flood

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Where are the waters?

• View 2
• Waters above
• Oceans
• Waters below
• Trapped below the earths crust until released in
  the flood

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Where are the waters?

• View 3
• Waters above
• Clouds in the atmosphere
• Waters below
• Oceans

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Where are the waters?

• View 4
• Waters above
• Beyond the edge of the edge of the observable
  universe