Taking up Rawhn Joseph's arguments (see previous post) first, in the last chapter I documented disproof of his assertion that the Big Band has failed every important test. It hasn't failed in, in fact it's the only theory that hasn't failed any. Let's look at Joseph's specific arguments.
I. BB theorizes universe is 8 Billion years old but there are stars and galaxies more than 8 billion light years away. Joseph explains:
For example, the big bang theory predicts that the universe is about 8 billion years old, which is 5 billion years younger than our own Milky Way Galaxy. Also, according to prediction, there should be no stars or galaxies more than 8 billion light years from Earth. And yet, there are stars and more stars as far as the Hubble eye can see; old and fully formed galaxies which are not newly created as predicted by theory, but over 13 billion years in age and so incredibly distant that Astronomers and NASA refused to continue looking as the very existence of these stellar objects completely refutes the big bang. Moreover, predications based on the Big Bang can account for less than 20% of the mass and density of the known, observable universe. Nor can this theory explain the discordant data on red shifts, galaxy distribution, colliding galaxies, the abundance of helium, and why the movement of galaxies appears to be speeding up, and so on.
The answer to this one is so obvious even I know it. There are two answers:
(1) The original BB estimate of the age of the Universe was wrong. That doesn't effect the BB theory it just means the age is different. That has no effect on the actual theory at all. The real age of the Universe is about 15 Billion years.
(2) Joseph is not allowing for the Lambda force. The principle that speeds up the expansion. BTW the planets and stars are not just propelled away from each other, but space itself is expanding like a loaf of bread the oven, things like stars are analogous to nuts in the bread, they move further away as space expands. Space is not expanding at a steady rate but the rate of expansion is always accelerating.
Joseph's answer to this argument is nothing short of stupid:
To bridge the fatal discrepancies between observation and theory, and to account for acceleration, the greater than predicted gravitational influences, the missing 80% of the universe, and so on, the acolytes of this religion invent multiple universes, alternate realities, and hypothetical, invisible, undetectable substances, and supernatural constructs such as "inflation," "dark energy" and "dark matter." And yet, although proposed as a patchwork fix, to paper over the increasing number of holes in this theory, these constructs actually refute the big bang and support instead the theory of the eternal, infinite universe.
So all the facts that have been discovered just excuses to cover up for the failure of the Big Bang to predict something it's not even about, and all scientist are acolytes of religion! He dismisses mulitiverse as a mere "religious excuse" to cover up the failure of the BB but that's the principle answer to the fine tuning argument and atheists use it all the time for many things. I'm sure the atheists wouldn't want to lose that answer. Be that as it may the expansion and the lambda force have proved over and over again by more than one kind of study, radio telescope, red shift and more.
Joseph's arguments are all based upon problems with the original predictions of the Big Bang as though he's not willing to allow a theory to be tweaked. Probably all theories get tweaked so that's not reasonable. He also argues that there's no physics to explain the expansion. That's true and I've seen staunch proponents of the BB say that, and yet the theories that would replace it are only half baked. There are lots of theories that are only way done, such as "string," and "GUT" and quantum gravity but science does not give them up becuase they are not yet fully fleshed out. Those theories don't have the empirical verification that the Big Bang has. Joseph continues to link the problems of the BB with the Supernatural account of religious belief and thus to insist that it's problems its origins in religious thinking. Ironically when I first started on message boards I had a long bitter argument when atheists who refused to bleieve that a priest made up the big bang becuase scinece accepts it so it must be true and therefore a stupid religious person could not have thought of it.
Of cousre this Joseph character hasn't the intelligence to see that his anti-religious hatred and bigotry are driving his irrational arguments which are fraught by such typically atheist fallacies as genetic fallacy, guilt by association, and bait and switch. Moving on to a serious commentator.
blog: the answer that saves the world. warning this site has very aggressive pop-ups
answering question what is the problem with the BB.
I'd say Redshift. Redshift has been interpreted to represent distance and velocity. Because redshift "shows" that everything is moving away from everything else, the cause is presumed to be a big explosion. This is supported by background radiation, which is presumed to be the echo of the big bang.
However, there are many examples where the standard interpretation of redshift is in doubt. For example, objects displaying very different redshifts being connected by a tunnel of gas.
The discoverer of Redshift (Hubble) warned against a misinterpretation of redshift, and his student did a lot of work attacking the standard interpretation of redshift, and was shut out for his efforts.
This is going to be important in the 3d segment because it's typical of a paradigm shift. This is an anomaly and it will be absorbed into the paradigm until there are too many to keep absorbing. The answer to this one is these same phenomena are also used to back alternatives so they can't be too vigilant about dismissing all red shifts since they need them to back the alternatives. There's also no data to show who often these kinds of problems come up. A lot of atheists take inflation as an argument against the BB but inflation includes the singularity and the Big Bang so it's not opposition. Inflation is just part of the tweaking of the BB. Now they will argue against the CA that this means BB is not creation, but they still have no evidence at all (no empirical) for anything prior. They have theories and speculation but nothing concrete.
As for actual scientists:
Eric Lerner a Plasma physicist argues in a book of this title The Big Bang Never Happened.
this is the publisher's blurb
Lerner, a plasma physicist, points out flaws in the Big Bang model and proposes an alternative theory: an eternal, self-sustaining "plasma" universe where electromagnetic fields within conducting gases provide other, simpler explanations for observed phenomena. His contention that the Big Bang is merely a repackaged creation myth is presumptuous, but well argued. To present a current scientific controversy to a general audience risks, on one hand, misleading the public and, on the other, circumventing the peer review process. This book, however, makes valid points in a convincing manner and does neither. Recommended for general science collections.
But it's not as dramatic as all that. I'm sure Lerner's book is good and I'm not saying don't read it, it is given high from reader reviews, but the first reader review I see says this:
And his objections to the Big Bang are neither new nor shocking; with the exception of the age of the "Great Wall," they comprise the same problems that cosmologists have been working indefatigably to explain since the Big Bang theory gained mass acceptance. His heresy is simply in seeking outside the parameters of the Big Bang for a solution. One reviewer, who finds Lerner's conclusions--and perhaps even his search--unjustifiable, says that this book "deserves to be burned." There are several unflattering names for this approach to debate...
Apropos of reviewers, a couple of them recommend that prospective readers seek out the works of Nobel laureates, who "know what they're talking about." The "obscure Lerner" based his book on the work of Hannes Alfven, who won the Nobel prize in 1970 for his work in plasma physics and is considered the father of that discipline. (Alfven took another heretical position when he claimed that electrical currents could pass through space. Both his idea and the proofs he offered were met with howling derision, but oddly enough he turned out to be right!)
That would bring Lerner's theory under the answer of Odenwald in part one where he deals with the 1970 theory.
all about scinece.org
Big Bang Theory - The Only Plausible Theory?
Is the standard Big Bang theory the only model consistent with these evidences? No, it's just the most popular one. Internationally renown Astrophysicist George F. R. Ellis explains: "People need to be aware that there is a range of models that could explain the observations….For instance, I can construct you a spherically symmetrical universe with Earth at its center, and you cannot disprove it based on observations….You can only exclude it on philosophical grounds. In my view there is absolutely nothing wrong in that. What I want to bring into the open is the fact that we are using philosophical criteria in choosing our models. A lot of cosmology tries to hide that."4
In 2003, Physicist Robert Gentry proposed an attractive alternative to the standard theory, an alternative which also accounts for the evidences listed above.5 Dr. Gentry claims that the standard Big Bang model is founded upon a faulty paradigm (the Friedmann-lemaitre expanding-spacetime paradigm) which he claims is inconsistent with the empirical data. He chooses instead to base his model on Einstein's static-spacetime paradigm which he claims is the "genuine cosmic Rosetta." Gentry has published several papers outlining what he considers to be serious flaws in the standard Big Bang model.6 Other high-profile dissenters include Nobel laureate Dr. Hannes Alfvén, Professor Geoffrey Burbidge, Dr. Halton Arp, and the renowned British astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle, who is accredited with first coining the term "the Big Bang" during a BBC radio broadcast in 1950.
The answers on these would seem to be spelled out above that the same materiel supports one theory as well as the other, where it says "the evidence listed above." One of the major problems associated with gentry that atheists harp on is the non conservation of energy. That violates one of Newton's laws of physics.(see Article by Gentry himself Orion foundation: exposing flaws in the Big bang). He claims the Einstein's static cosmology of 1917, as the true "Rosetta stone" that is included by Odenwald on is list of alternate theories that haven't panned out and his 16 reason for backing the big bang answer it.
When atheists find out the truth about Gentry they will drop his theory like a hot rock:
Robert V. Gentry
- Creationist
- Physicist and chemist
- D.Sc. (honorary) from Columbia Union College
- M.S. in Physics from University of Florida
- Graduate work at Georgia Institute of Technology
- Often considered the world's foremost authority on radiohalos
- Former Guest Scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratories, Atomic Energy Commission
- Published scientific papers in Nature, Science, Applied Physics Letters, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Annual Review of Nuclear Science, etc.
That's going to be a problem for them. If the Big bang exists to provide propaganda for belief in Creation as Joseph says, how does he explain the fundamentalist hatred of the Big bang? That Orion foundation site article above, if one explores that site one sees creationist papers. This must be a real problem for the kind of irrational atheist opposes the Big Bang because he wants to get away from a God argument. What it mean for real science? It means that scinece is going on, moving on, doing what it does. It also means a paradigm shift is coming because that's what scinece does ot. Major changes happen in scinece through paradigm shifts, we can see one shaping up with the Big bang. The role of and Christian apologists in the Paradigm shift is merely as part of the political battle that ensues over a Paradigm. I'll deal with that in the third installment.
