Russell Humphreys' Cosmology

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR || JOURNAL OF CREATION 27(2) 2013 Baumgardner, except as an odd relic plants and animals reside that were later Do radioisotope of the creation process. buried and fossilized on the surface of the present-day continents? methods yield Don Stenberg To me problems of having the Santa Rosa, CA granitic rock comprising the bulk trustworthy UNITED STATES of AMERICA of today’s continental crust cool relative ages and crystallize during the Flood » John Baumgardner replies: are insurmountable. It seems much more reasonable to associate the for the earth’s Mr Stenberg seems not to grasp “dry land” of Genesis 1:9 with the the staggering consequences of his granitic continents and the onset of the rocks? proposal that the earth’s granitic Flood with the explosive appearance continental crust, with its large of fossils in the sediment record. John Baumgardner’s article on inventory of radioactive elements Mr Stenberg’s primary difficulty in radioisotope methods, in J. Creation and an average thickness of some being able to accept these conclusions 26(3):68–75), seems to be (in part) a 35–40 km, formed during the Flood. seems to be his reluctance to allow response to my article in the August Stenberg seems to imagine that the for God’s supernatural activity during issue, since some of the very arguments radioactive elements so abundant in creation and the Flood, despite the plain he uses in this paper regarding zircon today’s granitic rocks were somehow meaning of 2 Peter 3:3–6. crystals he also uses in his letter of introduced into pre-existing crystals response to my article in this same via some unspecified magmatic process John Baumgardner issue of the Journal. Although I agree apart from a wholesale melting and Ramona, CA with his main premise, I am struck by recrystallization of the rock. To me, and UNITED STATES of AMERICA two major things in his article. The I suspect to most earth scientists, such a first is that, as every good creationist thing is inconceivable. Potassium, after knows, evidence is always interpreted. all, is a major element in alkali feldspars Specifically, Baumgardner seems such as orthoclase (KAlSi3O8). A Russell to take as axiomatic that the Great typical granite contains 35% or more Unconformity is the beginning of the alkali feldspar. The only imaginable Humphreys’ Flood, and interprets all of the data to fit way for such rocks, with their large with this assumption, even though not inventories of U, Th, and K, to form is cosmology all of the data fit this assumption very to crystallize from a melt. If that much well. However, the Great Unconformity molten rock were present at the earth’s Russell Humphreys’ new creationist cosmology seems to suffer from four could just as likely be the result of surface during the early portion of the major problems. His model lacks orogeny (mountain building) during the Flood, how could any life-forms have elegance; his mechanics may be last major supercontinent cycle during survived to be fossilized later? flawed; his liberties with general the Flood. Stenberg is insisting that cooling relativity are in question; and his The second is that in his figure 3, be by naturalistic means, but what conceivable naturalistic process could claims are short on empirical evidence. showing the distribution of apparent cool so much rock in the span of a few Since, from a cosmology-building ages of zircon crystals taken from weeks? If the granitic crust comprising perspective, any single one of these various places, the peaks correspond the continents today did not appear indictments is serious enough to very well with the beginning of the until during the Flood, what then was disqualify his efforts, it seems that various proposed supercontinents the “dry land” mentioned in Genesis he would have to rise above all four that seem to have formed and broken 1:9? What was it that distinguished to satisfactorily deliver a credible and up during the Flood. Specifically, the “dry land” from the “seas” on Day viable end-product to creationists. the peaks at 1.2 Ga, 1.9 Ga, and 2.7 3 in regard to topography? If there Ga correspond with the formation of were not a fairly large topographical Model not elegant supercontinents Rodinia, Columbia, difference between the sea bottom and and Vaalbara (Ur) respectively. Thus, land surface, where did the water filling Humphreys’ model is not elegant. the data cited by Baumgardner seems today’s oceans reside? If the granitic Processes move along in starts and to be explained readily in my proposed crust comprising the continents today stops and even reversals. In the model as a result of Flood processes, did not appear until during the Flood, 2nd installment of Vardiman and but it cannot be well explained by where on the earth did all the pre-Flood Humphreys’ three-part cosmology 39 JOURNAL OF CREATION 27(2) 2013 || LETTERS TO THE EDITOR series,1 the reader is confronted with no Model’s mechanical failure need to go that deep (i.e. ‘imaginary’) less than seven instances of “Imagine”, to show that the gravitational strength Humphreys’ model may suffer a “Suppose”, “If God”, and “Let’s say” of the sphere is powerful enough to serious mechanical failure. He counts as Humphreys forces through a series cause real problems for the model. on the stretching of space to impose of in-flux parameters he continually By obeying the Schwarzschild limit the predicted 1+z cosmological adjusts in order to get Creation Week cos and keeping Φ just above the critical redshift factor on incoming light to turn out ‘just right’. This awkward value of -½c2 and making the radicand storybook approach serves to diminish rays trailing his shrinking sphere of approach the limit of zero, it’s easy to 1 the scientific thrust of his endeavour. timelessness, never considering the see that zgrav can grow to a very large His regime to transfer distant starlight very real possibility that the sphere value indeed! And this would cause to a young earth is ponderous, almost of timelessness should itself act as a a blueshifted signal, not a red one, as if God is under compulsion to gravitating body—possibly a strong since we, as observers in more or less deliver a 6-day-old planet in an ancient one—and thus countermand any hope the centre of the shrinking sphere, are universe no matter the cost. This is of achieving the Hubble redshift. standing ‘downhill’ from the incoming classic ‘tail wagging the dog’. At least Though he may be correct about light rays and not ‘uphill’. Clearly, if one ad hoc fix must be introduced into its surface not being of a material this scenario is accurate, any hope 1 Humphreys’ patchwork cosmology nature, his sphere is nonetheless a of a Hubble redshift in Humphreys’ early on. He writes: mathematically defined geometry universe is dashed. Worse, the entire “Imagine that events prior to Day with potentially strong gravitational model collapses. Four have expanded space and properties and so should possess a moved the shell of ‘waters above discernable event horizon, one which the heavens’ out to a radius of, say, may exhibit pronounced effects on Unorthodox general relativity one billion light years. This would close-proximity light waves. Humphreys takes an unorthodox have left the earth and the nearly-flat Gravitational redshift is given by ‘left-hand turn’ with general relativity. fabric of space within the ring just In his Pioneer paper,2 just before he above the critical potential.” introduces eqs. (A16, 17), he first offers However, according to Hum- 1 1+=zgrav (1) a brief line of reasoning which—at least phreys’ own calculations, the actual 2 12− GM / rc to him—yields convincing evidence potential at this early phase will be that “In an empty expanding shell, the many times deeper than the critical where, for purposes of this study, metric must change with time.” He then level. Using his requirement of 8.8 x GM/r is equivalent to the gravitational 52 offers eq. (A17): grr = grr(t), an equation 10 kg for M, the mass of the waters potential Φ of Humphreys’ dynamical above, and 1 billion light-years for he later terms “unassailable”. Feeling sphere of timelessness of radius r(t). radius R, his eq. (3a), Φ = -GM/R, secure in this new but potentially self- Therefore, says that at the close of Creation Day made position, he then proceeds to hurl 3, the gravitational potential Φ will challenges at long-held GR dogma. It’s 1 easy to see where he is headed when be approximately 13.8 times deeper z = −1 2 grav (2) he says this: than critical. A rescue would be to 12+ Φ / c2 arbitrarily grant G, the gravitational “The textbooks assume that constant, a value 13.8 times less all components of the energy- where the terms and sign convention ν than today’s known value, an appeal momentum tensor Tμ must be zero he may have hinted at in an earlier used under the radicand are intention inside the cavity, even if the shell installment.3 However, with no prior ally made identical to that of Hum- is expanding. Their basis for that 4 instruction from our study of the early phreys. Here we consider Humphreys’ assumption is the lack of obvious universe—whether observationally or shrinking sphere of timelessness to sources of gravitational field in the hypothetically—as to why we should be a gravitating body of gravitational cavity.” assume an increase in the strength potential Φ, phi, on which incoming Confident that he has seen of G over time, our concession to do light rays from galaxies are falling what others have missed, Humphreys so would simply be ad hoc.

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