Young Earthers, explain this:

Originally posted by SwissGambit
Nothing can travel faster than light. If your statement was correct then the Theory of Relativity has been refuted and we all would have heard about it.

Can you give a link for your claim?

Assuming your right again.
Kelly

Originally posted by SwissGambit
Nothing can travel faster than light. If your statement was correct then the Theory of Relativity has been refuted and we all would have heard about it.

Can you give a link for your claim?

Well I don't know what RJHinds is blathering about (and neither does he)
However while relativity says that no thing can travel faster than light, it says nothing about space itself.

Space can expand/move faster than light.

The red-shift of distant galaxies and the expansion of the universe is caused not by stars and galaxies
moving away from us but rather that the space between us and them is expanding.

The farther away you go the greater the total expansion and thus the greater the apparent speed.

At some point the speed exceeds that of light.

In a universe where rate of expansion is continually slowing then the distance from us to the radius at which things
appear to be moving away from us at the speed of light will expand.
In a universe where the rate of expansion is increasing (which appears to be the universe we are in) the radius at
which things appear to be moving away from us at the speed of light will decrease.
Given that this represents an event horizon, from beyond which light will never reach us, in the universe with the
increasing rate of expansion this event horizon beyond which we cannot see will shrink. Turning the sky dark as
first all the other galaxies disappear, then our own gets ripped apart, till eventually every extant particle is disconnected
from every other.

Of course that will take an unimaginably vast period of time, but it does appear to be the current fate of the universe.


However it should be noted that in none of this do we actually see anything travelling faster than light, as any star beyond
the event horizon and apparently moving away from us at light speed of faster is invisible.

Originally posted by KellyJay
Assuming your right again.
Kelly

The theories of special and general relativity have been tested, and I do not kid, Quadrillions of times at least.

Every time we accelerate particles up in a particle accelerator we test relativity.
Every time you use GPS you test relativity.
Every time we detect gravitational lensing, calculate orbits, measure time (with atomic clocks) we test relativity.

The 'nothing goes faster than light' law of special relativity is unbelievably well tested and backed up.

Originally posted by googlefudge
The theories of special and general relativity have been tested, and I do not kid, Quadrillions of times at least.

Every time we accelerate particles up in a particle accelerator we test relativity.
Every time you use GPS you test relativity.
Every time we detect gravitational lensing, calculate orbits, measure time (with atomic clocks) we test rela ...[text shortened]... g goes faster than light' law of special relativity is unbelievably well tested and backed up.

So as far as your concern there is nothing, and I mean nothing that is beyond
our ability to monitor or harness that cause what you believe to be, wrong?
Kelly

Originally posted by KellyJay
So as far as your concern there is nothing, and I mean nothing that is beyond
our ability to monitor or harness that cause what you believe to be, wrong?
Kelly

I am not sure what you are asking here...

You appear to be asking if there is anything beyond our ability to detect that would change
my mind. (please clarify if this is not what you are asking)


To which my response is that the point of science and rationality is to base your beliefs and
world view on evidence and observation.
If we detect or observe something that contradicts or doesn't fit in our current models of how
the world works then those models get updated to accommodate this new information and we
get very excited about it. We like discovering new things.

However you seem to be asking if there is anything that is beyond detection or is impossible to
observe that would change my mind...
Which is utterly nonsensical.
If it can't be detected or observed then it can by definition have absolutely no effect on the reality
we inhabit (or it's effects would be detectable) and thus is completely and utterly irrelevant to
anything in our reality.

Anything that is impossible to detect is identical with something that doesn't exist.
There is nothing we can say about it, no properties we can discern, no effects to see, it is indistinguishable
from it's own non-existence.


So no... I am not going to change my mind based on things that are impossible to detect, because there
is absolutely no way of telling if they are there and even if they are they can by definition have no effect or
impact upon the reality we inhabit.



Now this is not the same as things we can't detect yet, but might in the future.
If we do detect or observe something in the future that contradicts or alters our understanding of the universe
then our understanding of the universe will alter.

In the astronomically unlikely event that the apparently FTL neutrinos at CERN turn out to be a real effect
(currently the error bars for the experiment have been expanded to cover travelling slower than light so the
FTL 'result' no longer applies, and only if the error bars shrink and cease to cover slower than light do we get
interested again) then of course we will have to update our theories to account for this.
But it will be with 'relativity plus' because we have vast vast amounts of data that support relativity and any
new theory will have to account for that as well as relativity does now as well as accounting for the special case
exception we would have just discovered for very high energy neutrinos.

This new theory will still not allow FTL stars because we have a a theoretical and experimental understanding
of the stuff stars is made of and know categorically that that stuff cannot be made to go faster than light.
The fact that some super high energy (higher energy than those produced in supernova) neutrinos may or
may not be able to travel faster than light doesn't change that.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I know that the Holy Bible does not give a specific age for the universe. That
was the way it was intended so we could discuss the possibilities. I also did
not give a specific age for the Earth because the genealogical information is
not specific enough. However, the creation account along with the other
information provided us is enough for us to ru ...[text shortened]...
possibility that I might be wrong. Therefore, I declare myself and the Holy
Bible right. 😏

However, the creation account along with the other information provided us is enough for us to rule out a million year or older Earth.

By 'creation account' I assume you are referring to the first of two contradictory creation accounts in Genesis, the one where God creates the world in six 'days'. And you are insisting, I assume, on reading this account literally (i.e., six 24-hour days). For the Jews, remember, a day begins at sundown ("And there was evening, and there was morning--the first day" (Gen. 1:4)). But the sun wasn't created until the fourth 'day'. It is curious then that God is said to have engaged in the work of creation three 'days' prior to the Sun's existence. Are we still talking about literal 24-hour days? I think not.

Returning to the two contradictory creation accounts, i.e., Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. How is it that God created humans on the sixth 'day' after all other living things in Genesis 1, and yet God created humans before all other living things in Genesis 2? The two accounts are irreconcilable. So answer me this, RJ: aside from the fact that the 24-hour days in Genesis were not intended to be interpreted literally, do you realize that your preference for Genesis 1 (with its six 'day' creation timeline) over Genesis 2 (which offers a contradictory account without a timeline) is completely arbitrary?

Listen, the details of Genesis are not important. They were never meant to be taken literally. Do an extensive cultural study of the time period when Genesis was written and try to understand what the intended audience (e.g., an uneducated peasant) would have understood a 'day' to represent. It is clear that Genesis was not intended to be an accurate depiction of the formation of the vast cosmos, rather it was intended to convey much more profound truths about the cosmos: that it was created by God, that the physical world is 'good' (a profound Jewish understanding of the world), that human beings are part of God's plan, etc., etc.

And this is the extent I'm going to discuss this subject with you, RJ. I'm not interested in battling your stubbornness, if you insist on clinging to your modernist, literal understanding of ancient, metaphorical texts.

Originally posted by FMF
One would have thought a theist would have seen curiosity, powers of deduction, intellect, science, learning, etc., as capacities granted by God rather than things to be sidelined and even scorned in the process of asserting "faith", no?

I wholeheartedly agree.

Originally posted by SwissGambit
Nothing can travel faster than light. If your statement was correct then the Theory of Relativity has been refuted and we all would have heard about it.

Can you give a link for your claim?

He is referring to the fact that expansion of space leads to distance stars moving away from us faster than light. The result is that we can never see the whole universe.

http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/cosmology_faq.html#FTL

Originally posted by KellyJay
If you do not know how the universe got here, you don't know how long it has
been here, you don't know where everything was or why with respect to the
distant past due to your lack of knowledge on everythings beginning. You
assume quite a bit here, but if you want to call your assumptions facts, I'm not
surprised.
Kelly

“...If you do not know how the universe got here, ...”

but I do know how the universe got here, don't I! The big bang.

“...you don't know how long it has been here ...”

your logic has two flaws here: firstly, you have just based that assertion that “...you don't know how long it has been here ...” on a false premise that I don't know how the universe “got here”.
Secondly, EVEN if that false premise was correct, how do you deduce 'don't know how old X is' from 'don't know how X started' ? Obviously one does not imply the other.
I may observe an avalanche. I may not know how it started. But, if I am a very quick thinker, I can still make a reasonable estimate of how long ago in seconds it started from its size and speed and clues such as signs of disturbed snow higher up etc. I may be able to say it is definately more than 10 seconds old but not more that 20.

“...you don't know where everything was or why with respect to the
distant past due to your lack of knowledge on everythings beginning. ...”

not sure what you mean here but science tells us such things as the rate of expansion of the universe and about when the first stars formed and star evolution etc.

Originally posted by KellyJay
Assuming your right again.
Kelly

that was not an "assumption" in the normal sense of the word.
Relativity is proven.

Originally posted by humy
“...If you do not know how the universe got here, ...”

but I do know how the universe got here, don't I! The big bang.

“...you don't know how long it has been here ...”

your logic has two flaws here: firstly, you have just based that assertion that “...you don't know how long it has been here ...” on a false premise that I don't know how the universe “ ...[text shortened]... pansion of the universe and about when the first stars formed and star evolution etc.

The Big Bang is an event that has matter spread through space, it does not
talk about how the matter got here, there isn't anything what so ever from
the mind of man that talks about that! There is no how the matter got here
period, nothing that goes from nothing to something. Creation has a eternal
God creating who does not have a beginning or end, not so with Big Bang,
at best you can push it off a little more suggesting yet another process to get
us to the point of the Big Bang, then we can ask the same thing, where did
that come from!
Kelly

Originally posted by humy
“...If you do not know how the universe got here, ...”

but I do know how the universe got here, don't I! The big bang.

“...you don't know how long it has been here ...”

your logic has two flaws here: firstly, you have just based that assertion that “...you don't know how long it has been here ...” on a false premise that I don't know how the universe “ ...[text shortened]... pansion of the universe and about when the first stars formed and star evolution etc.

You error about the universe and comparing that to the avalanche you have
seen or could have seen an avalanche start and stop to do comparisions.
With the universe you've no idea what an old one or new one looks like, you
have guesses, but you really do not know. You look at this one and think it is
old, not knowing how it got here and what it looked like when it did so you
really could be comparing things that have nothing to do with age, you'd never
know it, but you believe you got it right.
Kelly

Originally posted by googlefudge
I am not sure what you are asking here...

You appear to be asking if there is anything beyond our ability to detect that would change
my mind. (please clarify if this is not what you are asking)


To which my response is that the point of science and rationality is to base your beliefs and
world view on evidence and observation.
If we detect o ...[text shortened]... ) neutrinos may or
may not be able to travel faster than light doesn't change that.

"Anything that is impossible to detect is identical with something that doesn't exist.
There is nothing we can say about it, no properties we can discern, no effects to see, it is indistinguishable
from it's own non-existence."

No, they are not the same! Something that doesn't exist will not cause a
reaction in the natural world while something we don't see, understand, at
the moment could be doing things we are crediting to other things.
Kelly

Originally posted by googlefudge
I am not sure what you are asking here...

You appear to be asking if there is anything beyond our ability to detect that would change
my mind. (please clarify if this is not what you are asking)


To which my response is that the point of science and rationality is to base your beliefs and
world view on evidence and observation.
If we detect o ...[text shortened]... ) neutrinos may or
may not be able to travel faster than light doesn't change that.

I like how people don't have an issue saying that time can be altered from
something that is constant and at the same time think they can claim they
know how old things are. If you believe time can be altered how do you know
it cannot be altered to move at a faster rate and a slower one, your ability to
judge events would be seriously hindered if for some reason distance and rates
are not what you think they are. One sort term measurements it isn't difficult
to monitor, but on a larger scale I think you are just assuming to much.
Kelly

Originally posted by KellyJay
No, they are not the same! Something that doesn't exist will not cause a
reaction in the natural world while something we don't see, understand, at
the moment could be doing things we are crediting to other things.
Kelly

You are changing your mind about what you are talking about.


If something can't be detected ever, then it can have no effect on the world or that effect
would be detectable and thus the existence of the thing detected.

Something that has no effect and is undetectable IS by definition indistinguishable from something
that doesn't exist.


This is not the same as something we cant currently detect but that does have an effect that
we might someday detect and thus detect the thing.

There are no doubt things we haven't detected which is one of the reasons we are still doing science and
looking for things we haven't discovered yet.

But we can't say anything about what effect those as yet undiscovered things and effects will have on our
understanding because we haven't discovered them yet.


However if you define something to have absolutely no detectable effect on the universe then that thing is
by definition indistinguishable from something that doesn't exist.

So make up your mind.

Are you asking me about something that does effect the universe but that we haven't discovered yet?
Or
Are you asking me about something that has no effect at all and is thus indistinguishable from it's own non-existence?