Cosmic Fingerprints #1

  

Recently I while reading a science blog and saw an add for a free daily "news letter" that would explain the origins of the universe.

So I bit and I signed up for it. Now in a multi part posting we can all go through it and see what we have.

Max,

100 years ago, Albert Einstein published three papers that rocked the world.  These papers proved the existence of the atom, introduced the theory of relativity, and described quantum mechanics.

Let's start here first, papers don't prove scientific concepts, papers may explain experimental results, and propose many other things, but they don't 'prove'.

Second, the theory of the atom was pretty much already accepted.

Pretty good debut for a 26 year old scientist, huh?   His equations for relativity indicated that the universe was expanding.  This bothered him, because if it was expanding, it must have had a beginning and a beginner. Since neither of these appealed to him, Einstein introduced a 'fudge factor' that ensured a 'steady state' universe,one that had no beginning or end.   But in 1929, Edwin Hubble showed that the furthest galaxies were fleeing away from each other, just as the Big Bang model predicted.  So in 1931, Einstein embraced what would later be known as the Big Bang theory, saying,"This is the most beautiful and satisfactory explanation of creation to which I have ever listened."  He referred to the 'fudge factor' to achieve a steady-state universeas the biggest blunder of his career.   As I'll explain during the next couple of days, Einstein's theories have been thoroughly proved and verified by experiments and measurements.  But there's an even more important implication of Einstein's discovery. Not only does the universe have a beginning, but time itself, our own dimension of cause and effect, beganwith the Big Bang.   That's right -- time itself does not exist before then.  The very line of time begins with that creation event.  Matter, energy, time and space were created in an instant by an intelligence outside of space and time.   

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whhooooa,  we need to stop here, and he was doing so well.  "...intelligence outside of space and time.". Just because there was a beginning does not mean there was an "intelligent beginner" the cause can be nothing more than  a process that requires only the right set of conditions to occur. But I'm sure he will explain how he knows there was an "intelligence" at the beginning. 

About this intelligence, Albert Einstein wrote in his book "The World As I See It" that the harmony of natural law "Reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection."*  

*   Pretty significant statement, wouldn't you say? 

So now we know how the author knows there was an "intelligence" behind the big bang. One of the smartest men to ever live said so. As the asterisk points out Einstein's statement is very profound and very provocative. Yet that does not make it true.  Take for example another very profound statement, "all men are created equal" a very profound statement one that, however is not true. Take for example the severely mentally ill, they are not on equal footing as someone who has full faculties. 

Just because Einstein said it, does not make it true. Take another quote from the same person, "god would not play dice with the universe". This was in response to Hissenburg's uncertainty principle, a fundamental principle of quantum mechanics. I'll blog about that latter on.  Einstein even argued against quantum theory's more esoteric concepts. Quantum Mechanics bothered Einstein on a deep and spiritual level. He did not like the fuzzy logic of the Quantum world.

Even great minds can be wrong.

He went on to write, "Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe--a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble."

And yet another quote that is wrong. There are more nontheists scientists than there are theist scientists. For example look at the "Steve" project.

Well so much for profound, if your not familiar with logical fallacies and not up to speed on many of the trickier arguments theist use. It can seam and does at first seam to be very reasonable. He slips none factual statements and make it seam like fact my tying it to an expert. Let's see what his next email will bring.