Now, if we leave aside all relations to ourselves we should be aware of the facts that:
1. Even if we live to be 80 to 100 years old, that is only a fraction of a fraction of a second in universal time, and the entire development phase for us humans is not much longer.
2. The space each one of us occupy on Earth will be enormously large compared to some matter and some living organisms, but yet, negligible compared to matter in the Universe.
3. The capacity of our brain is superior to the brain of any other living organism on our tiny planet Earth, but in universal terms its an unknown.
4. We have to realize the fact that there are many unknowns about the Universe and our environment, as I mentioned before, and we are at the stone-age when it comes to an understanding of the Universe.
These comments are made with the hope that they might encourage interested people to search for information about our existence and challenge his/her own beliefs. Hopefully these comments can serve as "food for an inquiring mind" but they are as much a guide for myself as my writing helps me to structure my own thoughts. The aim is not to try to persuade anyone to change beliefs unless those beliefs are extremely dogmatic and counterproductive. Please continue to believe what you believe in. My hope is that the reader of these pages
may become interested to find out more about ourselves and our environment with the help of scientific exploration. Without an interest to learn and a without a willingness to question what we have learned, there will be no progress for us humans.
To begin with, our planet is one of the nine major planets presently known in our solar system. They are named (the "inner" planets) Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars and (the "outer" planets) Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. The inner planets are small and are composed primarily of rock and iron. The outer planets (except Pluto) are much larger and consist mainly of hydrogen, helium, and ice. The Sun, that mainly consists of "burning" helium (nuclear fusion), is the heart of our solar system. It is also a star. There are 100 billion stars in our galaxy, the "Milky Way". How many of these stars have planets around them, we don't know because they are difficult to detect, but we can assume that it is quite a number, so we are probably talking about many billions of planets just in our galaxy.
To continue, there are several hundred billion galaxies in the Universe, probably with billions of planets. On top of that, there is a phenomenon named "dark matter" in the Universe, but we don't know what it is, although it represents about 90% of all matter in the Universe. It is probably some form of gases and the basic building blocks of new galaxies and stars. New stars, solar systems and even galaxies are created all the time. For us this development is hard to experience since the element of time comes in here, from our narrow viewpoint this development takes a very long time (many human lifetimes, and it is continuous). There are probably no limits here.
Scientists are working to unravel many of these mysteries and find out whether all we can observe is really infinite. They are using Particle Accelerators, very large and expensive machines with the capability to "split" atoms in a vacuum into smaller components. More than 10 years ago, scientists were able to find out, with the help of these machines, that there are basically two parts of matter, called the "standard model". One is "quarks", which are the building blocks of protons, neutrons and other "heavy" components of the atomic nucleus. The other one is "leptons", exemplified by "light" particles like the electron and the neutrino.
The neutrino is a very interesting object. It is emitted by stars such as our Sun, it travels at the speed of light, and it passes through most matter as if it were not there. An estimated ten million neutrinos will pass harmessly through your body in the time it takes to read this sentence. An international "neutrino hunt" costing hundreds of millions of dollars, is now entering a crucial phase, aiming to resolve fundamental scientific questions about the utlimate roots of matter, and the past and future history of the Universe. There are many world-wide projects going on right now with names such as NESTOR (Neutrinos from Supernova and Teravolt sources, Ocean Ridge) by University of Athens and American physicists and AMANDA (Antarctic Muon and Neutrino Detector Array) by the University of Wisconsin and the University of Stockholm. A $100 million neutrino detector called "Super Kam" was completed in April 1996 in Tokyo. Scientists from Japan and the U.S. are conducting experiments there.
The "standard model" also postulates that the universe is controlled by four basic forces: gravity, the glue that holds the universe together, electromagnetism, which keeps electrons from breaking away from the rest of the atom, the strong force, which holds together the atomic nucleus; and the weak force, which controls the gradual disintegration of some nuclei, the process at work in radioactivity. It should be understood that other forces, and other particles, may yet be discovered. It is possible, for instance, that quarks are made up of particles still more fundamental. If so, this may have an impact of the number of dimensions we are aware of and those we are not.
As early as 1905,
Albert Einstein (#2) developed his mass-energy equation, E=mc2, as part of his special theory of relativity. This equation states that with a given mass (m) is associated an amount of energy (E) equal to this mass multiplied by the square of the velocity of light (c). A very small amount of mass is equivalent to a vast amount of energy (see the one cubic inch example of weight above). Einstein spent the last years of his life trying to show that the gravitational and electromagnetic forces were different aspects of the same phenomenon. Although he failed in his attempt at unification, the theoretical physicists have now begun to glimpse an underlying oneness in the four basic forces. With their customary whimsy, they call these theories GUTs (for Grand Unified Theories). Central to this framework is the existence of new particles, tiny fragments of matter (or energy, since the two are interchangeable) less than a trillionth the size of a bacterium, itself only about ten-thousandth of an inch long, that transmit these forces.
Antimatter (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5) (#6)
was discovered by the British physicist Paul Adrien in 1928 but not confirmed until 1955. According to the "Standard Model" mentioned before, each of the family of particles that make up all matter has a counterpart or mirror image called an antiparticle. The only known examples of antiparticles, or antimatter, are the particles created when subatomic particles are slammed together in an accelerator/collider and then they don't last long. Why so little antimatter is found in nature is one of the mysteries that particle physicists hope to solve with the giant supercolliders. Distant galaxies could possibly be made of antimatter, but no direct method of confirmation exist. Most of what is known about the far Universe arrives in the form of photons, the particles that carry electromagnetic energy, and photons are identical with their antiparticles. Thus, little information is provided concerning the nature of their sources. There is speculation that another mirror image of our Universe exists parallel to ours and presumably, time would go in reverse in such a Universe. But again, these are pure speculations.
Einstein's theories have been tested and retested by checking predictions based upon them, and they have never failed. Nor has any new theory of the architecture of the universe replaced them. Those tested and confirmed theories can safely be considered as FACTS.
At the other extreme, it is difficult to comprehend the enormous size of the Universe. Galaxies are formed in clusters, each with millions of galaxies in them, some clusters as large as 300 million light years in diameter. And there are billions of clusters.
Time is one of the fundamental quantities of the physical world, being similar to length and mass in this respect. But as Einstein explained in his Theory of Relativity, time is also relative. A mosquito that lives only for a day, might think that it had a long and fulfilling life. If we reach 100 years of age, we might think we had a long and fulfilling life. Well, the life of the Universe is counting in the billions of years and no one knows or has a good theory on how long the Universe will be around. It takes light, which is an extremely fast oscillating electromagnetic field at the speed of 186,282 miles per second, about 100,000 years to cross our galaxy (and our galaxy is comparably small). If time is not infinite, it must have a beginning and an end. The "Big Bang Theory" justifies a beginning and there might be theories for an end (the contracting or pulsating universe for example). What if it doesn't have a beginning or an end? It seems that matters in the Universe are revolving and "consumed" in a never-ending cycle. Strong gravity centers like "black holes" are sucking in matter continuously and we have no idea what happens to time, energy and matter in that process. Is it disappearing from this Universe ending up in another? Or maybe just reappearing somewhere else in the Universe in another form?
In our sphere of space, we have 3 geometric dimensions (depth, width and height) plus the 4th, which is time. Albert Einstein stated that none of these are absolute. Depending on how fast an object moves, the dimensions of space can stretch or shrink, and the passage of time can speed up or slow down. These effects are only measurable when objects travel at close to the speed of light. If there are more dimensions, we must be able to experience them. There could be other dimensions that have to do with our mental state, the basic building blocks of matter, anti-matter, and with the continuous processes in space, especially time, for example.
There are two theories on how and when life developed on this planet. The older of the two is Creation and the other, originated by Charles Darwin with his work "On the Origin of Species" (1859) established the theory of Evolution. The source of the former theory is Genesis in the Bible. Creation, as explained in the Bible and other comparable ancient literatures, is a theme expressed in explanatory stories to account for the world as it presently is. The notion of the world as it currently exists, of course, depended on the world views of the various cultures that produced the stories. In practically all of these cultures, the biblical included, the Universe was thought of as an original chaos into which order had been introduced by a creative hand.
The story of Noah and the flood accounted for the existence of the different human races and the animals and plants found in the familiar world. As formal science developed, however, and the thoughts of the Greeks, particularly that of Aristotle, were recovered about the year 1200, questions arose concerning the evidence of personal observation. Humanity as the center of Universe, for example, could not be accepted if the Earth revolved about the Sun (see Copernicus). And discoveries in geology, and the growing possibility that the Earth might be older than the 6000 years postulated by the Irish archbishop James Ussher in the 17th century, disturbed traditionalists. Even more disturbing was the speculation that led to the evolutionary theories of Charles Darwin. In Creation, all life on Earth including humans, was created at about the same time, and the first humans were Adam and Eve.
The theory of Evolution basically point out three main sets of observable data:
1. The enormous number of different life-forms present on Earth.
2. The clear similarities in anatomy and molecular chemistry seen within the diversity of life-forms which clearly point to common ancestry about 4 billion years ago.
3. The sequence of changes in fossils found in successive layers of rock and sediment that have formed over more than a billion years.
Central to the concept of Evolution is the process of Natural Selection by which the sequence of evolution over generation after generation favors those life-forms and subspecies best able to cope with their particular environment. All life, including humans, have slowly evolved from common ancestors reaching as far back as to the one-cell organisms that were developed about 3.5 billion years ago.
The latter is thought to have appeared about 600,000 years ago and is the taxonomic designation for modern man. Better hunters than Homo Erectus, these early humans cooked their meat, wore clothes of animal hide, constructed shelters, and made wooden tools. From what is known about their social life-style it is almost certain that they communicated verbally. Most important is a brain capacity of 1,200 to 1,600 cubic centimeters. Humanlike creatures may have evolved first into Neanderthal man, that mysteriously disappeared about 35,000 years ago to be replaced by the Cro-Magnons, famous for their cave paintings found in southern France, evolved about 40,000 years ago. Homo Sapien Sapien (or wise man) were hunters for about 25,000 years; they domesticated animals 18,000 years ago and invented agriculture about 12,000 years ago. The earliest permanent settlements appeared 9,000 years ago and the first real cities only 5,000 years ago.
An interesting article to be published today (12/13/96) in the journal Science, reports that a new finding on Java suggests that the Homo Erectus species co-existed with Homo Sapiens as late as 27,000 years ago and lived on this Indian Ocean island 1 million years after it died out in Africa, which is an astonishing find. Java was once connected with Asia by a land bridge and when the sea level rose, it became an island, trapping and isolating the primitive humans. The more advanced Sapiens could build boats and probably arrived in Java about 40,000 years ago, which means that Sapiens and Erectus Hominids shared the island for hundreds of generations. It is believed that the arrival of modern humans led to the demise of the primitive forms, out-competed by Sapiens who produced more children and learned to live more successfully, not necessarily by warfare.
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New: Panel of Scientists want to find out about life in the Universe!
Newsreport 12/11/96: Today, a panel of scientists, including astronomer Carl Sagan, paleontologist Stephen Jay Gold, NASA chief Daniel Goldin, the head of the Aeronautics and Astronautics Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Claude Canizares, and religious leaders and others, told Vice President Al Gore that U.S. space research should be directed toward answering questions about mankind's origins: How the Universe, stars, planets and life came into being and whether life may be widespread in the Universe. They proposed that grand new research programs are not needed, just incremental beefing up of projects already in the works.
In a white paper prepared for today's session, the panel wrote that "discoveries in just the past few years provide the first scientific basis for believing that life may be widespread in the Universe, in our solar system and beyond...For the first time in history, we have achieved the level of understanding and technical capability necessary to fill in the 'missing links' along the chain of origins by exploring the Earth and outward in space, in the present and backward in time...Answers to these questions are within reach."
They explained that a major new committment such as the canceled Superconducting Supercollider or the human Genome Project, is not needed. Instead, it requires pushing ahead with projects such as a new wave of robotic missions to Mars, ongoing and planned telescopic searches for planets around other stars, and continued efforts on Earth to explore the kinds of life found in the most extreme environments, such as volcanic hot springs, frozen lakes, and even rock formations deep underground. Finding out whether water exist on moons of Jupiter where life might also have arisen, and expanding the search for other planets "will yield a steady return of significant findings and,
inevitably, major surprises over the next 15 years", the panel said.
WHAT IF... Evolution and Creation in reality is the same thing?
(Both theories has its source in God - the processes of the Universe - as all life and our environment was created by God. The Scriptures describes our origin in symbolic terms, not necessarily according to a certain timeline or method/process of origin. However, what difference does it make if none of these two theories denies the existence of God and that God is the Creator? The big question is, of course, how God is defined (see below)).