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More on the Fine Structure Constant
Bonker writes "Neat news from the Beeb. It turns out that data collected from observation of quasars indicates that the fine structure constant of the universe, aka 'Alpha', may have changed since the universe began. It may have been very slightly smaller than it is right now. The article hints that other constants we're familiar with, such as high, holy 'c', may also vary over time. Of course values can't have changed dramatically, because that would mean that low-weight atoms such as carbon would be unstable, and without carbon, there wouldn't be anyone around to measure the fine structure constant anyway." We ran a story about this last year. It looks like the team has continued to check their work for errors and hasn't found any yet.
A while back, didn't some scientists manage to slow the speed of light down to something around 60 miles an hour in their lab? That's definitely not 180,000 m/s. Kind of interesting, did Einstein think C would be constant in his calculations?
While we are at it, we should also chek whether the value of pi is changing.
After that e, sqrt(2), 1 and 0.
For those of you who do not know humour: %$#%$
c is the speed of light in a vacuum. Light has different speeds through different mediums. Its just a matter of finding a medium to achieve you speed.
From what I remember the change in the alpha value, if there is one, would only be by about a billionth of what it is today.
It's that same group saying the same thing again. Although I haven't reviewed their latest paper, I remember that I wasn't impressed with the statistical analysis of their data, as of the previous paper.
Personally, I won't find the evidence convincing untill another group takes some their own data and gets similar results. Given that many astronomers have similar sentiments, it seems that giving VLT time to the same group seems not the best use of VLT time.
Of course, if no other astronomers find the likelyhood of the discovery worth the effort of making the observations, then it may be difficult to get independant confirmation. Given that it would be a really big deal if true, I think that says a lot about how seriously the astronomical community takes these claims.
The number of dates I've had in the past year. Of course this tends to cause some division by zero errors.
--It's Pimptastic!--
The article actually doesn't really hint that 'c' is changing, which is good, because it's not clear what would be meant by that. The article says that several physicists have previously wondered if it could change. It then goes on to quote a modern physicist as saying that they were wrong.
I think c is best thought of as a man made constant. Just as I might say that there are 2.54 centimetres per inch, I can say that there are ~3*10^8 metres per second. Neither of these really contains any information about the universe outside of our perception of it. It is simply a statement of how one one system of measurement compares to another. 2.54 centimetres per second evaluates to unity (the number 1, with no units) if you actually evaluate it. Likewise, physicists commonly use unity as the speed of light, because in a very meaningful way, it is.
If I suddenly magically increased c by 10%, that would be indisinguishable from stretching the universe by 10% in every spacial direction. Consider that the speed of light it essentially unity, and that expressing it otherwise is really more a statement of our systems of measurement that we use than of physical reality. This makes it seem silly to say that I have magically increased c by 10% and makes it seem more reasonable to say that I have stretched the universe by 10% in every direction.
Arrr, it be the infamous pirate, No Beard Pete!
Be happy that there were no bad news today.
If I were guessing in the absense of any data, then I would agree with you. However, there is data which appears to preclude such large rates of change. There is a narrow range of values for the rate of change which is consistant with this data. However, if you beleive theconstraints placed by the Oklo reactor, then the changes have to be oscillatory.
Whoa, time to change those #defines to doubles.
Quoth the article:
"If this is correct, it will radically change our view of the Universe. We have to be cautious but it could be revolutionary. We have seen something in our data - but is it what we think?"
I like it when scientists talk about their theories in this manner. On one hand you have a whole body of researchers, scientists, and journals who are so afraid to rock the status quo that they refuse to research (or publish) controversial information. On the other, you have scientists and/or crackpots who are so paranoid and skittish towards working within the peer reveiw system that we'll probably never gain access to their research, some of which may be quite important and revolutionary.
(I quit my physics major a year in and switched to CS. At what point do 'paranoia' and 'ego-building' become required courses?)
I think this is a nice middle ground. These guys have announced a neat finding, with the caveat that they are still in a thourough 'error-checking' mode and are looking for problems with their own research and are implicitly inviting others to do the same.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Is anyone else irritated because the Slashdot icon in the upper right hand corner no longer sends you back to "www.slashdot.org" but instead to the topic page (Example: "science.slashdot.org" or "ask.slashdot.org)? It's bugging the shit outta me.
Can't spell
Can't conjugate
Can't proofread
and now...
Can't keep consistency.
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
NO JAM!
You can't change the speed of light (in vacuum).
Such a change would be undetectable. All you can do is distinguish the cases of c being 0, finite>0, or infinite. Real natural constants have to be dimensionless, so a change can not be compensated by rescaling measuring rods and clocks. The fine structure constant, of course, is dimensionless.
If C isn't constant, then perhapse you can shine that flashlight off the front of the ships at near light speed and achieve faster than light with light itself ^__^
I never claimed to be a physics expert, just an expert in physics
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Seastead this.
> The BBC site doesnt work for me. It couldnt be /.ed already?
;)
No... alpha changed and the article ceased to exist
I have a shitty sig!
There goes my theory about the universal constants containing a message from the Creator of the universe. Guess I'll have to start working on that old universal field theory again.
Recently Creation Scientists (even though evolution and creation as a theory for origins are philosophy and not science) proposed that the speed of light had changed over time.
Wrong (about evolution not being a science).
Evolution is a major part of biology (a science). It is studied by scientists, and pubished in scientific journals.
If your not specifically talking about evolution but rather the creation of the first lifeform, then this is strictly evolution (it isn't important to the theory of evolution, whether or not the first lifeform was placed by God, planted by aliens, or arose from chemical soups (which is a hypothesis and still science)).
Warning: Some ideologies on the Net are smaller than they appear.
Philosophical musing: all life, and varied species arose through natural selection and genetic mutations
The first is observable, and has been proven: hence, it is science.
The second is not observable, has not been proven except with philosophical arguments, hence it is philosophy.
Look up science and find out what qualifies for that title. Just because a scientific journal mentions God does that make it unscientific? What if a scientific journal mentions some observed facts and then the scientist gives his unproven thoughts on what it might mean? Is it still scientific? The scientist is simply mixing science with philosophy.
Why do they bother? If there really is an invisible man who runs the universe, any attempt at scientific reasoning or analysis is futile.
This guy could change all of the physical rules, alter all physical evidence, and even fsck with your mind at will. In fact, under this scenario, the evidence that has been left for us (strange bones carefully arranged into historical families, radioisotopes, lightwaves streaming in from the sky, etc.) is clearly meant to deliberately mislead us.
If you really buy into this outlook on life, you'd be better off just ignoring the physical world and focus on trying to interpret the meanings of the mystical texts that are supposed to hold more credibility than physical evidence.
....does that mean we all have to go back to programming in Cobol? ;-)
-marc
I can't believe I followed that link. In any event, are all creation scientists this hopelessly clueless?
I'm no bible scholar, but I seem to remember that the earliest parts of genesis don't say when the universe was created, only that it was. Perhaps the universe can be 14 billion yrs old, without screwing up their retarded little mythology? Oh wait, that's right, astrophysics also dates the earth as being 4 billion years old. Maybe they oughtta work on that problem first, before taking on the universe?
Evolution is a process. It did, and does happen. If God walks up to me, someday, just for the irony factor or something, it will not, in any way, disprove evolution. Duh. This is why religion is without doubt, full of retards. Do you argue about whether Detroit engineers created the new SUV, or whether it evolved from the pickup and station wagons of the 50's? No, because both are true.
Science isn't out to disprove God, it just wants to know how things work. As such, it can only ever disprove or confirm the process, not some supernatural intent.
See Ma! I told ya t' universe was gawn t' hell in handbasket.
alpha is the coupling constant for the electromagnetic force.
In other words, it determines the "strengh" of the electromagnetic force. It is important because
a) it has no units (it's just a number, approximately 1/137)
b) it is easy to measure to a great degree of accuracy
c) it can be measured using a variety of different experiments
d) many fundamental phyiscal constants (such as c - the speed of light in a vacuum, e - the charge of an electron, and h - the Planck constant.
So a change in alpha would mean a change in one of the fundamental constants of physics.
For more information, you can read NIST's wonderful description.
"You have the option of insanity. I do not. And that makes me crazy!" - Brian to Angela, My So-Called Life
in your favourite format.
I used my Q powers about 100 billion years ago to alter this constant to impress a lady Q -- forgot to change it back -- I will get right on it.
"You dont ask how some things are done, you simply do them." - Q
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
It is a science; evolution and development of new or changed life forms has been demonstrated many times. For example, bacteria evolved to fight penicillin; new strains of cold virus appear every year; AIDS was unheard of until recently, etc. etc.
"Of course values can't have changed dramatically, because that would mean that low-weight atoms such as carbon would be unstable, and without carbon, there wouldn't be anyone around to measure the fine structure constant anyway."
Who is to say that carbon has always been stable... maybe one of the more unstable elements today was the stable element at the time and has become unstable as a result of the change in the constant value.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Over the past two years, I've developed a decent "haha, only serious" model of the universe. It works sort of like this:
About two years ago, Slashdot ran a story talking about the theoretical upper limit of computer speed (sorry, couldn't find a link). Basically, the idea was to convert the mass of your computer to energy to allow ALL of it to work for you. This energy, in the form of light, will create intereference patterns - just like you did with the two slits in 5th grade science - and that's how the computer (which now resembles a small star) does it's computing kinda thing (gross oversimplification of what the article said, but that's the gist). Now if you compress enough energy into a singularity, you have pretty much (and the "pretty much" is important) infinite computing power (due to time dialation and so on).
Well, it just so happens that God has one of these things on his desk. Our universe is a program running inside this uber-computer that resembles a black hole.
Earlier I said the processing power of this computer would be "pretty much" infinite. Well - it isn't big enough to handle every particle in the universe simultaneously. Some of the universe is "swapped out". Ever sit down at the computer to read slashdot, and whammo, four hours have gone by? Wonder what happened to the time? You were swapped out, that's what.
There also appears to be problems with the branch prediction unit of this computer. Deja vu? branch prediction made an error, and the queue had to be recalculated. Ever reached in your pocket and pulled out a $5 bill you didn't know you had? bad branch prediction.
If a tree falls in the woods, and no one was there to witness, does it make a sound? No. It didn't even fall. Actually, it wasn't even there. Years later, when a witness comes upon the site, all the events since the last witness came by are quickly approximated and the end results are what the new witness sees. What constitutes a witness? People? squirrels? I dunno. Doesn't matter, really.
Can't remember if you left the oven on? Well, both options are possible, and both have been approximated. The appropriate one will be chosen when someone sees the end result (either your house burns down, or it doesn't).
Lots of strange events can be explained with this model of the universe:
Reincarnation/past lives/Ghosts? Bad garbage collection, or the Divine Coder forgot to unallocate memory.
ESP? Packet snooping.
Why can't objects with mass go faster than the speed of light? Think of everything like an object in C++. If you have a "mass" property, your object is too big to fit through the "bus" in one "fetch cycle", so your "position" property can't be updated as fast as say...a photon, which fits through the bus in one cycle.
Why is the rules of Quantum Mechanics so strange/Planck's Constant? In the world of computers we know, what's smaller than a bit? Looking at things on that small a scale, we're seeing the individual bits flip from 1 to 0 in God's workstation. Of course it will look odd, and it won't mean much when compared to the world as we perceive it. Combine that with the fact that most of the universe is approximated, and you end up with really strange things happening on that small a scale.
Why are some people luckier than others? Not all people call the same random number generator, or maybe some people can call it with a certain "seed value".
Bermuda triangle? think of something like a bad sector on a disk, or a faulty RAM stick - of course, the computer this runs on doesn't use disks or RAM sticks, but it's still a decent analogy.
Jesus? You play Quake/Unreal/The Sims, don't you? It just so happens that God's version of "The Sims" is a hell of a lot better than yours.
Don't think of this as something akin to the movie "The Matrix" - because these rules we live by in this universe can't be broken. There's no dodging bullets. there's no agents... We were created parts of this simulation, and are ourselves simulated and no more or less real than the world we live in - and there's no way to get out of this simulation.
However, maybe there is a way to use the rules to our advantage? But to do that, you need to know the real rules behind the physics we see. We'd need to know what's happening to those individual bits in the processor. If we can affect those often enough, maybe we could effectively beat the rules...?
More important is this question: Were we created on purpose, or is this entire universe of ours that exists inside God's Workstation meant to be something else entirely? Maybe we were supposed to model plasma dynamics, and the system taking on intelligence was a by-product of the genetic algorithm that was used? Or maybe we're something like an AI experiment?
I would just like to take this opportunity to point out that no other science has quantities in it that have names as cool as the fine structure constant or the permeability of free space.
From the article, it seems that the thing they are measuring to understand the nature of how this 'constant' changed is the light that eminated from the rest of the universe that is just reaching earth. The older light appears to show matter generally acting in one way, and the newer light appears to show matter acting in another way.
How did they isolate this one factor in sub-atomic formulae as the only feasible explanation? How did they eliminate things like universal gravity effects (gravity appears to be instant and with unlimited range), forces acting on the light over billions of years, or changing nature of the stars as that portion of the universe ages, thus changing the light coming from them?
This does qualify as one of those 'extrordinary claims' that themselves need both extrordinary proof and extrordinary qualification of what they are really stating.
:^)
Ryan Fenton
Presumable God could change reality at will. He could change it so that planetary orbits were complicated spirals, figure 8's, etc, and change our minds so that this made sense.
Of course, that scenario would make all learning useful. I believe that the bones n' stuff can be explained, I don't just say God put them there to mislead us. I don't believe that this world has been given the appearance of old age to deceive us. I think it has the appearance of a young earth. I tried not to enter a creation/evolution discussion since it's a waste of time. Just go look up radio-carbon dating failures then you might understand, but don't pester me for details.
Change of information is present, but it is not an example that leads to the evolution of a new species. I'm not interested in entering this discussion. Your interpretation (philosophy) is not the only explanation of the facts (science).
And don't make out creationists as being idiots without understanding them. Go look up some radio-carbon dating failures among other things, and you will soon discover (if you actually bother to look) that the methods used to show that the earth is millions of years old have failed numerous times in situations where the date of a sample is known.
Don't criticise when you obviously don't understand the issue.
Also, gravitational effects would shift all of the absorption lines they see uniformly, whereas what is observed is a relative shift between different sets of lines in the same atoms, which requires changes in the fine structure constant.
-------- The thought plickens....
Dating techniques are sometimes inaccurate, and some methodologies in the past have turned out to be flawed. No one denies this, only the bible thumpers claim to be infallible.
But, rather than give up after a first try, a scientist attempts to figure out what the problem was, and design a new test that may be more accurate. That is what science is about.
The earth is, by all accounts, not millions of years old. It is billions of years old. Order of magnitude. Or at least, that's the best guess we can make, knowing what we know. If someone came up with something approaching evidence that it was only 600 million years old, I would listen. It would have to be pretty damn convincing, but I like oddball theories, and everyone gets a chance with me... somtimes two of them. But even 600m, which is a slighter difference than you are suggesting, is rather big. 3.7 billion yrs difference. And it would have to offer alternate explanations for all sorts of different things. Frankly, I can't imagine anything that might allow for it to be that young.
So this is where you get to tell me, that it's even younger yet, something on the order of 10,000 yrs old. Good luck trying to explain that.
I don't think that death, famine, disease or killing are ever good things. You see, that's a leap of logic there. I said that it simply was a process that can explain alot of the things in the world that we see around us, I made no statement that I preferred these things, that they were some kind of goal to be pursued, or anything like that. But they happened. They're still happening. If they tend to induce a phenomena known as evolution, and it's obvious they've been happening a very long time (though we might debate home long), is it so unbelievable that evolution might have been happening a very long time?
I'm sorry that I called creationists idiots. It is very frustrating for me. They are simply emotionally vulnerable people (and at one time or another, we are all vulnerable) that turned to the only people who claimed to want to help them. This is sad. Even their own bible warns against such, I believe. Something about the shepherd leading the sheep astray.
The universe is strange, without a doubt. And it's unimaginably large... there's plenty of room left for a supreme being to being hiding somewhere. But if such does exist, what will he have to say about you acting so silly and letting your emotions blind you to what you see around you?
Oh, and BTW, much of what we call suffering is the result of sin. People hurting one another, for malice's sake, hurting themselves. The bible thumpers don't have a monopoly on morality.
Everyone seems to love carbon. It is highly overrated if you ask me. Hydrogen, now there's an element...
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
You look at the ratios of intensities of various spectral lines. The ratio of intensities of the i-->j transition and the i-->k transition in some particular atom is set solely by quantum mechanics. Since the potential energy appearing in Schrodinger's eqn for electron transitions is the electromagnetic potential, you end up with something that depends only on quantum electrodynamics. Which means you are measuring the one coupling constant of that theory, which is alpha, the fine structure constant. All the other dependencies drop out.
Speciation events have been observed. Hence rendering your arguement moot.
Look up science and find out what qualifies for that title.
As a practicing scientist, I know what science is. I am, however, skeptical as too whether or not you do.
Just because a scientific journal mentions God does that make it unscientific?
It depends on the context. Also a unscientific article does not make a unscientific journal. And what relevance this has too evolution (which is god neutral) escapes me.
What if a scientific journal mentions some observed facts and then the scientist gives his unproven thoughts on what it might mean? Is it still scientific? The scientist is simply mixing science with philosophy.
Science doesn't deal with proofs (except in a mathematical sense). This is highly suggestive that you don't know what is and what isn't science.
BTW, what you described is calling hypothesising. It's a important part of science.
Warning: Some ideologies on the Net are smaller than they appear.
The evolution of HIV is a good example of a new species arising.
Warning: Some ideologies on the Net are smaller than they appear.
const double alpha = 1.0/137;
hack_universe() {
*(double *)&alpha += 1e-9;
}
// don't call this; the universe requires
// double-word aligned doubles
crash_universe() {
*(double *)(1+(char *)&alpha)) += 1e-9;
}
Maybe I'm missing something from the article, but I don't think that "constants" like alpha changing is a new idea (though it is very cool if alpha changing over time can be directly observed like this). Changing coupling "constants" is already a part of the established "Standard Model" of physics, and is an essential feature of Grand Unified Theories.
Grand Unified Theories rely on all of the interaction strengths for all known forces (Strong force, weak force, electromagnetic force, and sometimes gravity) becoming the same at some energy scale earlier on during the formation of the Universe. In the present Universe, the strong force that holds quarks together is much stronger than the electromagnetic force, but if GUTs hold true then they were much closer earlier on.
See here for a graph illustrating this effect, or rather its failure for one particular GUT theory. This is the first I found using a quick google search for "GUT" and "coupling constant"; it is a common plot shown for papers on GUTs in general.
Its been a couple of years since I studied this stuff. I'd be interested to know if this article is pointing to something new theoretically.
The Oklo reactor you refer to tests a quantity that depends on alpha, and some other combination of parameters. This makes it a more ambiguous test as, for example, a shift in the proton/electron mass ratio or something could affect the results.
I am well aware that many scientists claim the earth is 4.5 billion years old. Millions of years was just a simple statement. If I said billions of years it makes it sound in excess of 10 billion, or some very large number of 'billions'.
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As for God hiding somewhere in the universe, from my experience He is a lot more visible than that. Also, don't apply Scriptures to people without understanding it's context. My beliefs do not blind me, more than most I know I am willing to consider opposing opinions. However, I also don't accept something just because the majority of people believe in it.
I was also saying that death, disease, famine must be considered good IF one says that the Bible and evolution are compatible. This is simply because after God created everything (including man), He said that it was "very good". Since this involved 4.5 billion years of death, disease and famine, then one must believe these are good if one is to accept the Biblical creation history. I don't believe they are good either...I don't believe they played any part in the creation of our species.
Since I have already typed it up elsewhere, here is a list of articles I found very informative (a select few). Tell me what you think:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/382.
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/Mag
Significant is this one: http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/Magazin
The following quote from it:
:
When the method is tested on rocks of known age, it fails miserably. The lava dome at Mount St Helens is not a million years old! At the time of the test, it was only about 10 years old. In this case we were there-we know! How then can we accept radiometric-dating results on rocks of unknown age? http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/Magazin
Here's one about genetic mutations and loss of information:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/doc
An interesting article on erosion as evidence for young earth:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/41
Young earth evidence:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/a
Population problems and evidence:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/a
If you find yourself interested in reading more, you can read through many of the articles in the magazines listed here:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/
Here is a good definition on science that I found from a quick google search. But as you are a scientist, I shouldn't need to tell you that the theory of evolution is not science.
If you are convinced that evolution is scientific, then perhaps you can present to me a falsafiable statement that can be tested using the process of science.
Everyone knows that constant's value is 42.
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
Sorry about the nipicking (millions/billions).
When I used the term "hiding", don't take offense at that. I meant no connotations of cowardice, apathy, etc. By "hiding", I meant something along the lines of "quarks hide well below the level of the atom". Which while we can probably agree they are there for certain (we can agree on that, can't we?), I sure as hell have never seen one. Have you? We found them, in such a way though, that they are mostly undeniable. Perhaps it may be that way for god too, some day (and he is certainly deniable by some).
Again, the bible says that it was "very good". (I don't know this, taking your word for it). In the KJV, it's greek/aramaic, translated to latin, translated to english. Do you know how many subtlies can be lost? Let's say you go back and read it in the original language though. Even there, can you be sure just which subtlies you're still missing? Perhaps it was meant, that the fact that there was a humanity finally was a good thing. The order out of chaos, the light of new souls burning in the universe. Good does sometimes come out of evil acts, you know, and does so without validating the cause.
If a women is raped, and raises the child, loving it, does that imply the rape was a good thing? No.
So the process of evolution isn't necessarily a morally good thing. Besides, most christians see nothing wrong with eating meat, or a predator hunting. Among animals, this is neither evil or good, in the sense that those words apply to mankind. Am I wrong? So the death/disease/famine doesn't even apply at all, up until you get to the hominids. I certainly don't sympathize with those first little amoebas that died in the first billion years of this planet. Should I? Even if a few starved? Now, I agree that once things got close, that is nothing to make light of. Then again, it's possible that a few of the gaps you see in the evolution of proto-human group, are actually gaps. Maybe "he" skipped over those parts. Would be a practical solution.
Plus, he would have had a chance to fix the placement of some arteries (on the back of the head, iirc) that just wouldn't work for modern humans. It's still a mystery, how they managed to switch locations in a short amount of time... and without the switch, your brain would fry before you were 4 yrs old.
I don't have time to explain the various geological dating methods, or why and when they will fail. And I'm far from an expert, in any event. But you have to ask yourself if you'd even accept the results at all. If you're just nitpicky about bad results, science likes that. Let's us weed out all the bullshit. And remember, there are a few ultra-othodox rabi's that still believe the world is flat... simply because the Torah describes the "4 corners of the world".
Heck, unlike some, I don't even have a problem with you having sneaking suspcions what the results will be, before the experiment begins. Just as long as you accept them even if you don't like what you see. And just so you know I'm not picking on you, there are a few atheists with that same problem.
Did you read any of the articles I posted? Some of them look at two things:
* The date given compared to the real date
* The date given compared to two different, established dating methods
The tests failed in both circumstances.
As for the Rabbi's that believe in a flat earth, I am not like that. I don't see how I should be expected to accept evolution when I have seen evidence fit to sink a ship. I would accept evolution if the problems with it could be answered, and if evidence could be presented to support it. The only evidence I can see that supports it is the ultra-old dates, and these have been demonstrated to be wildly innacurate for known dates (not just a little bit innacurate). Look at those articles and you will see some of the reasons why I believe what I do.
Again, I don't see why people talk to me as if I believe just for religious reasons. If I thought there was evidence to support it I would accept it.
Quick note: my translation of the Bible (New King James) is translated from Hebrew texts for the Old Testament and Greek texts for the New Testament - not from Hebrew/Greek/Aramaic to Latin to English. The best available text is probably the Septuagint for the Old Testament - written in ancient greek, since it was translated from older copies of the Hebrew than we have today.
Gravity is not an instantaneous force, it propogates at the speed of light.
This isn't necessarily true: The Speed of Gravity - What the Experiments Say
http://carbane.eng.yale.edu/alpha.html
AA6E
Fiat Lux.
Here [csicop.org] is a good definition on science that I found from a quick google search. But as you are a scientist, I shouldn't need to tell you that the theory of evolution is not science.
Ironic really that you are using a defination from a organisation which supports evolution. Perhaps you know more than the entire scientific community about what constitutes science?
If you are convinced that evolution is scientific, then perhaps you can present to me a falsafiable statement that can be tested using the process of science.
That human fossils (or any other recent species) won't be found in geologically ancient rocks.
That closely related species (such as chimps and humans) will have similar DNA, whereas species with similarities due to convergent evolution (such as dolphins and sharks) will have much less similar DNA.
If you would like to falsify either of these two statements (with full citations to the scientific lit. of course) be my guest.
Warning: Some ideologies on the Net are smaller than they appear.
When creationists put forward stuff like the St Helens lava, they move themselves firmly into the fraud category (I'm talking about the authors of the research, not you). K/Ar dating cannot be used on young samples (30 years). This is widely known. I understand that the lab which Austin submitted the work to has a disclaimer about this. Yet there isn't a mention of this in the paper. What next will they try to do? Measure a atom with a meter ruler. What you have presented is nothing but fraud designed to trick laypeople.
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OK, first off, I applaud you for considering what is meant as "good". Now, this is hardly scientific, but here's what you have to do. You'll have to do it alone, because it seems you're much more well read than I.
Think of every single interpretation where good doesn't rule out evolution at all, and every single interpretation that absolutely denies it. Write all of them, even write down the possibilities that don't clean fall into either category. Then eliminate the ridiculous ones. If you come up with less than 10 total interpretations, you aren't trying hard enough. I'm willing to bet there will be several left, and at least one for each category.
I agree, it's not simple. And if it somehow shows you that evolution might possibly fit... what then? Will you be sent to hell for even considering such, if it turns out you were right all along, and God has to correct the mistaken notion? At the worst, it will give you some insight how creation might have worked, if only a little (much more interesting would be figuring out how the very first life forms would have developed/been created. No one claims to know that, after all).
Now, if you get that far, and realize I'm not some demon sent from hell to destroy your faith, I invite you to go just a bit further. It may take some work, mind you. But try to find some books that deal with geological dating. If you can (there isn't much of it), find the most rabidly atheistic texts on the subject you can. Chuckle to yourself all the time they waste promoting atheism, but look for some of the truths they may have stumbled onto, in their delusions. Then, move on to the religious-neutral texts (which you may have to do anyway). They will be full of history on the mistakes made in the past. Even scientists aren't often satisified with the results. Mind you, most don't have a stake in whether a rock is 13.7 million years old, or if it's really 13.9 million years old (though even then, sometimes if you're the person who first said 13.7, you're reputation is on the line). In many cases, there isn't alot of agreement. Sometimes, the best they manage, is "this one has to be really old, can't be any younger than 1 million". Other times, they are complete anomalies, that they won't even venture guesses.
But this isn't proof that it's crackpot science. It's evidence that the whole thing is undergoing refinement. No grand conspiracies lurk here, to hide the truth. Again, even if you become convinced that the age of the earth is much older than you once thought, does it somehow disprove the existence of God? Hardly. I might even have an explanation, if you care to hear.
You claim that he created the earth in seven days (forgive any minor mistakes). Yet, the earth itself determines just how long a day is. Not the sun, not anything external. Does the term day have any exact meaning, if the earth isn't fully formed, and rotating? The bible doesn't say that it was created in 3.45 x 10^29 vibrations of the cesium atom, or anything like that. Just "day" (or am I wrong?). And then, there is an old tradition of even using the term "day" poetically, when it doesn't mean ~24 hours at all. It is possible, that maybe it means that God created the world in seven stages, each of indeterminate (and not even equal) duration? And finally, it would be interesting to know which word is used in the original Hebrew, and if it was ever used in a context where it doesn't mean approx. 12 hours of daylight + approx. 12 hours of night. And the absolutely best part of all this is, I'm not even coming close to asking you to change a core part of your beliefs. Your morality, which I respect, isn't altered by this at all. And you might even come to appreciate yet another perspective of the bible... one where there is much more poetry in addition to the lessons it teaches you about life. I find it hard to believe that someone could be so inspired to write down the story of creation, without attempting to use metaphor of one form or another. Neither atheist or believer will deny that the entire event was anything but awesome, mind you (and what could be more awesome than a being that would think nothing of performing a creation that spans several billion years?).
And please, don't take this the wrong way. But christians in particular, seem to want to argue what I would think amount to insignificant details, when all it does it make them look like fools to the public. And the greatest irony is, instead you could be using that effort to teach them the real truths that you really do have, which the non-religious seem to lack. Why? A god that teaches his worshippers to run around trying to ban biology textbooks isn't very worthy compared to a God that can't be bothered to worry about that because his followers are busy trying to teach people to be decent to one another (no matter what the details of their origin are).
Or would it make the light generated within the flashlight stay in the flashlight (as the source is moving in the same speed as the product) such that we would never see it until we slow down the ship?
Wasn't the universe created in 4000 B.C.? Could a right-thinking American set us straight on this issue, please?
Who is is to say is the guy who measures the stability of carbon in old stars, that's who. And it has been done already, to a high degree of accuracy, probably thousands of times by thousands of grad students.
It is called science, and a nodding familiarity with it would relive you of the urge to ask idiot questions like this one.
Go study! y'dork!
here and here.
Finally a changing speed of light is predicted in a DSR approach here.
This is interesting news.
Since modern attempts to unify the fundamental physical forces began, gravity in particular has presented a difficulty for scientists, and it appears that the solution may be changes in constants we previously believed to be, well, constant.
This could have far-reaching implications for the way we think about science, and especially our understanding of what science can tell us. It seems possible that our disciplines of science and natural history might actually be driven farther apart, as we lose any reliable base indicators on which to base assumptions about the past.
For some in the scientific orthodoxy, this is anathema and they will fight it tooth and nail to the bitter end, for it forces them to accept a reality that they have long denied. The liberals constantly tell us that because of the relatively slow travel of light from distant galaxies, it must have been traveling for long periods of time, and the universe must therefore be quite old (billions and billions... you know the drill). Now their rationalizing will be laid bare and they must admit that the Bible has again withstood vigorous attempts at disproof, that they have a Creator and are therefore accountable to Him.
Vidi, Vici, Veni
But does this support (if either) Setterfield or Humphries, who have quite different hypotheses.
Serious question.
Really! A perfect vacuum? No one has ever measured c in that.
Let alone that the density of the virtual photon sea that has been demonstrated for some years via certain ZPE effects.
Is that "thinner" between galaxies? Between stars out beyond the Kuiper belt?
Who knows?
What has been measured is the speed of light in low Earth orbit, which is NOT a vacuum, whether in terms of particles or EM fields.
Can you not disagree without engaging in ad hominems? If not, don't bother posting. You will be moderated down.
I have, and they don't say what you think you say. First off, your emphasis on radio-carbon dating in the context of age-of-the-earth discussions demonstrates your ignorance on the subject. Carbon-14 has a relatively short half-life and is only used for very recent events. Rocks are dated with much longer-lived radioisotopes.
And even within radiocarbon dating... well, show me a wildly misdated organism that is not a shellfish or something that eats shellfish, and then I'll take an interest.
--
Do I look like I speak for my employer?
Please note that it's always possible to say "maybe there's some other unknown explanation" for any phenomenon... the best we can do is rule out all known alternatives. (And even if there were some other explanation, it would probably be labelled as "variation in the `effective' fine structure constant", since it has the same observed effects as an actual variation.
Funny you should say that. It was because people thought that a rational god would make a rational universe which would be regular & could be studied by man that people began thinking scientifically to begin with...
Aren't you being a bit arrogant?
This whole sub-debate presents us all with 3 view points: science alone, science with God, just God.
What about Buddah? Or our cousin the Crow? Lord Ganesh, the Hindu elephant God?? Yes, they all imply a higher power, but when one presents this to most folks, they respond as if Christ having been born, the son of god, etc., is a given, discounting all other views.
The truth, the real truth is that, first, a 6th grader can deduce that the bible is not the literal word of any all knowing being. Second, science cannot disprove a higher power. Third, neither science nor anyone/anything else can anyone prove that there is a higher power of any sort.
The only conclusion is that if one does believe in a God, it might just be Zeus and not a thirty something white man with a beard and long hair up there. Once you enter the realm of faith, anything goes.
The fact that folks think it's either Christ or atheism comes from the fact, obviously, that most of us live in Christian countries, which in and of itself says alot about just how free our "choice" of a belief system we really have.
My question to you is this: if you discount evolution, carbon dating, etc., why turn to the bible?
The Rites of Odin make much more sense than the 10 Commandments any day...besides, the bible is so easy to debunk!
right. I'd have to say that putting out scientifically false material for the aim of discrediting science itself, and then presenting the Bible as an alternative is, well, evil (pun intended).
Look at the example (and I just noticed my weblinks didn't work, poor programming on the answersingenesis.org website I think) and then comment. Even different samples from the same location gave different ages. So give it another 20 years when it's old enough to be dated and I'm expected to believe it will suddenly balance out and they will give:
a) Similar dates
b) Dates indicating an age of around 40 years old?Answers in Genesis, once you choose your location click on Creation Magazine/TJ in the Highlights box on the main page. Once there, select Creation Magazine(sorted by Issue), Vol 23 no 3, then pg 23 "Radio-dating in rubble"
I could show you many living fossils (ie, creatures dated millions of years old in fossils but are still alive today). I don't think there's any evidence that would destroy your opinion. I have shown people evidence of fossils in the wrong timeline, dating failures, living fossils - all the kinds of things that they tell me "show me this and you will prove us wrong", suddenly there is an excuse every time I present these things they ask for. Are you going to be any different?
Perhaps culture can hold a strong power over people to cause them to forget things.
Perhaps. But personally, I'll put my trust in scientists to know what science is, rather than a slashdot poster who has fallen for fraudulent reports, and who's earlier statements about science suggest that he doesn't know that much about it.
Seriously, are you telling me that if I could show you example(s) of fossils in the wrong strata, or strata in the wrong position (ie above a younger period when it should be below) that you would consider evolution to be false? I don't believe you. I have shown this sort of evidence before. I say "what evidence would demonstrate evolution false". So they say "any of the following...". I then show them the evidences they asked for, and suddenly it is no longer sufficient. So I remain unconvinced. Be careful about what you say would be sufficient to disprove evolution. I remain very skeptical on the falsafiable nature of evolutionary hypotheses. I will find these examples if I believe that there is any chance you will change your mind instead of finding excuses like "time did it" (evolutionary equivalent of "God did it").
Nice try about slipping the strata in the wrong position into this. Do a basic geology course before trying to slip traps like that into discussions.
However if you can find a modern fossil (such as a human) in a geologically ancient strata, which doesn't have a natural explaination (such as tampering, misidentification etc), which is published in a scientific peer reviewed journal, I would consider that to be strong evidence against evolution.
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I did read a couple of the pages (the URLs are easy enough to put back together). The one on population growth was just plain stupid, and shows that the author has absolutely no clue about populations or is trying to mislead people into believing a lie. The St Helen's paper fits quite cleanly into the fraud paper. If this is the level of evidence that creationists are accepting nowdays, then I truely worry about them.
So let me get this straight. You consider K/Ar to be scientificly proven methods for dating - yet they are impossible to test? (because you can't use it on young samples - ie, the ones that form during our lifetime).
You don't need to test it on young samples. Isochron dating techiques are a good test. By testing the same sample with multiple techniques, one should get very similar results. An exmample of this is the dating of a Norweigen Fen complex. The results where as follows:
40Ar/39Ar 588 +/- 10 Ma
K/Ar (whole rock) 575 +/- 25 Ma
Rb-Sr 578 +/- 24 Ma
Pb-Pb 573 +/- 60 Ma
Th-Pb 570-590 MaK/Ar (mica) 565 Ma (error unknown)
The close promixity of these results (which were carried out by a number of different scientists) is very strong evidence for K/Ar accurate. Other techniques have been calibrated vs. known historical events (such as Ar/Ar being used to date a volcano erruption reported by Pliny.
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I agree. They insult both themselves and the religion they claim to follow. The sad part is, that by using lots of scientific terminology that fool quite a lot of people. An example of this is large number of clueless creationists on the web raving on about the 2nd law of thermodynamics and how it contridicts evolution, because they read it somewhere and it sounds pretty technical.
Pity somebody forgot to tell the physicists, chemists etc this.
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Specifically, examples of where the date is known are excellent examples, because they verify the date of something. If I see a car coming down the freeway, I can say that it is likely it came from the previous city. However, I can never be certain because I don't know the journey that car took - it might have turned on from a sidestreet. Same with dating back millions of years. We don't know what happened that might upset dates.
Example, the Bible says there was a worldwide flood, and everything was covered in water. Only creatures on the ark survived (and sea creatures of course). The environment before the flood is hypothesised by creation scientists to be very different to what we see today...a more optimal/paradise type environment. Of course, we can't be sure. But the point is that when the past is not known, we don't know what effects there have been on, eg, samples absorbing certain elements such as C14.
Your norwegian fen complex showed similar dates for different tests on the same sample. There have been times when this has show to be very different. There have also been times when different samples supposedly from the same age have come up with very different dates from each other. Anyway, I would appreciate some web references if you have any.
Forget the population and the St Helen's article. Look at some of the others. There is one about Cambrian strata there too.
what about evidence to alter your perceptions? Explain to me how one can fit 2 of every animal into a boat - but this is a bit off topic, I think.
Instead, I challange you to visit a non-pro christian web site, something unbiased, perhaps the History channel, it doesn't matter, that provides information suggesting that any of what you say is true, and the large implications, age of the earth, fossil record, etc. Just post one link - email me if you wish, I'm not logged in, but my email address is davros4269@attbi.com.
Naturally, you could claim that all sites such as Scientific American and the like are athiest or perhaps anti-christian sites. If this is the case then we probably have no basis for even having a debate. Perhaps we can include the fellow that posted in response to your posts as well and have a fun little email debate.
A more useful number for me would be the fraction of successful dates (*1), which, while non-zero, can be seen to converge to within espilon of zero as T goes to T(divorce) + infinity. We can represent this value by the lowercase Greek letter sigma (*2).
Raise sigma to the power of the money spent on those dates (which, perhaps counter-intuitively, appears to be inversely related to sigma itself), and we have a value that can be substituted for zero for most practical purposes, while remaining safe for division, though it may strain the limits of floating-point precision.
--
(*1) For any given meaning of "successful". I'll leave it to you sick monkeys to guess whether I mean what you think I mean.
(*2) For reasons that should be obvious.
David Gould
main(i){putchar(340056100>>(i-1)*5&31|!!(i<6)<< 6)&&main(++i);}
Ok, I look at a few more of the articles, but bear in mind, that I'm extremely distrustfully of AIG, due to it's use of highly misleading (completely dishonest, IMHO) information.
But first, a small opps on my part. K/Ar dating should only be used on samples >2 Mya, not 30 as I stated in a earlier post. My mistake, this is due to the very long half life of K (in the billions of years). Ar/Ar dating is much better for geological dating of much more recent objects.
Radioactive ?Dating? in Conflict
Ignoring critisms of Snelling's ethics (he also publishs in the science lit. quoting dates in the millions and billions of years without mentioning that he disbelieves them), this paper is very sparse on experimental details. In particular, the inclusions of xenoliths (which are well known to give a false reading if the sample isn't correctly prepared). There may be many other problems with his analysis but it is impossible to tell, as he really hasn't given any experimental details away. Also (admittly a not a major part of this paper) there is a real problem with his explaination of the false dates (" fluctuating, magnetic field affected the incoming cosmic ray influx, resulting thus in a lower radiocarbon production rate and therefore radiocarbon ?ages? much greater than the true ages"), when carbon is celibrated it tends too underestimate the ages, therefore, if anything the dates are too low, not too high.
I couldn't connect to your second link.
The next page which I looked at Superbugs: Not super after all, is just plain stupid. The whole paper is just a giant strawman arguement. Evolution doesn't have to lead to a gain of information (loss of eyesight in cave fish is a good example), so the authors foundation is built on a falsehood. He then presents no evidence to support his claim (instead he pretty much states some dumbed down first year cell bio information). This isn't a arguement, it's a joke.
I couldn't get the next three links to work (this is quite strange as I managed to get the third one to go yesterday, but didn't get time to read it), however, on the basis of the four that I've read, I really aren't impressed. What your presenting is propaganda not science.
If your interested, here is a article by a Christian geologist on radiodating.
As a postscript, I found this site which mentioned Snelling's paper. Apparently, there is considerable doubts over whether or not it is wood at all in the rock. Alex Cherkinsky, of the Geochron Labs Radiocarbon group, stated "I remember this sample very well. So they called it "wood'? It wasn't wood at all and more looked like the iron concretion with the structures lightly similar to wood. I have told about that to submitter, but anyway they wanted to date the sample". If this is true, then Snelling is a downright lier. (Source)
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Part II
Here is the webpage where I got these numbers from. Within it are links to the science lit.
The problem with your flood theory is that there are essentially no ways to alter radioactive decay significantly which could realistically happen on earth. What your proposing isn't science. If you want to propose extrondary events, you should back them up with massive amounts of evidence, not wishful thinking.
If you want a good example of calibrating radiodating, a good paper to read (sorry I don't think that it's online - you'll have to go to the library) is by Renne and coworkers. They used Ar/Ar dating on Vesuvius lava (dated from Roman records as occuring 1918 years ago) and got a date of 1925 +/- 94 years ago. (Science, vol 277, 1997).
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For an excellent resource read The Genesis Flood by Henry Morris and some other guy I can't remember. That talks about differences in dating methods based in different environments of the past.
When I said that these experiments could not be tested, you said they have been. Now you have said that K/Ar is only accurate >2Mya, which means we would have to wait at least that long to test it (although checks at intervals might indicate whether it is fairly accurate or not).
Sorry for the late reply, but I've been kind of busy.
Working on the assumption that their was a worldwide flood (this is a extremely tenous assumption given the complete lack of evidence for a worldwide flood - especially when one considers that several ancient civilisations lived right through it apparently unaware of the whole thing), radiodating should still work fine. The only way to alter radioactive decay involves conditions which are far more extreme that just the presence of massive amounts of water (they include travelling close to the speed of light).
As for the accuracy of dating, isochron dating is a execellent check for accuracy. However, because dating is a very complicated technique (one must remove feldspars and the like from material - just to give one example), it is a rich field for creationists to abuse. In all of the links that you have cited about dating, there is a element of deception. For example, Snelling not informing his readers that there is debate over whether or not the wood in his rock is actually wood.
The best place to find your science info is in the science lit. The peer review process (while far from perfect) acts as a rubbish filter. When someone submitts a incorrectly prepared sample and then measures with the wrong technique (such as Austin in St Helens) it gets knocked back. If you look here, you will find the real science.
And when you look in the science lit. you will find that isochron dating works. When done correctly it gives consistant dates, only when it is abused does it fall down.
As for Henry Morris (I believe that the other guy was Whittcombe (sp?)), I've seen enough fraud from ICR (which he was a founding member) not to trust anything he writes.
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Hmm, don't have one of my books around, but it mentioned some of the things that affect the rate of C14 in the atmosphere, and how much is absorbed.
Are there any websites of good science lit that undergo a good peer review process? I agree that this is essential to filter rubbish.
As for fraud from the ICR, what are you talking about? Honest mistakes? Evolution has had it's fair share of red herrings, so using that logic I could reject evolution on the basis that scientists have given fraudulant data and red herrings.
Anyway, if you have any good websites on information for learning more about physics, chemistry and biology I would appreciate it. Also any sites that publish good quality science lit.
Thanks
Hmm, don't have one of my books around, but it mentioned some of the things that affect the rate of C14 in the atmosphere, and how much is absorbed.
Yes, this is well known and calibrated for. This is due to the way that C14 is formed. I believe that if you see a date written as BCE it is calibrated, whereas bce isn't (or maybe round the other way, I can't remember off the top of my head.
Are there any websites of good science lit that undergo a good peer review process? I agree that this is essential to filter rubbish.
To my knowledge there isn't (unless you belong to a university with a online subscription to a scientific journal). Your best bet, when checking up articles is head over to your nearest university and raid their library. While not peer reviewed, a academic textbook can be execellent in get a good overview of a particular field.
As for fraud from the ICR, what are you talking about? Honest mistakes? Evolution has had it's fair share of red herrings, so using that logic I could reject evolution on the basis that scientists have given fraudulant data and red herrings.
No, I'm not talking about honest mistakes. I'm talking about fraud. One on the most well known creationists, Duane Gish, has a very bad habit of having claims refuted to him, and then ignoring the refutation and making false claims to his audiences (who are ususally not particularly scientifically literate). An example of this can be found here.
Anyway, if you have any good websites on information for learning more about physics, chemistry and biology I would appreciate it. Also any sites that publish good quality science lit.
This is differcult, as you've named a pretty massive field, and whereas my chemisty knowledge is pretty good (I'm doing a PhD in it), I wouldn't the best judge on physics and biology.
But ignoring all that, here goes:
The best site on evolution and creationism from a scientific perspective is talk origins.
A site which may interest you is this one from the Christian Geologists, who find that their faith is fully compatible with science. Another interesting geogogy link is this one (it has, to my knowledge, no religon in it).
Answers In Science appears to have a ton of interesting links.
I'm not sure if this is exactly what you where after. If it's general science, then I'll have to know more about your science background to even know where to start looking.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Clem
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I was looking for more general science rather than opinions of creationists or evolutionists, since I prefer to understand an issue and be able to judge arguments rather than just accept them. If you know any sites on general science that would be great. My knowledge is hard to explain. I'm a quick learner, but my current knowledge is in spots.
As for the fraud of ICR, that is a serious accusation that I will have to investigate further. As a Christian, I consider honesty and openness to be very important, and behavior of that type would be unnacceptable (making it hard for me also to accept anything the ICR states).
Still I am far from convinced. It has only highlighted the fact that there is a lot I don't know about dating methods. I feel the same way about your knowledge. When thinking about claims against evolution, I usually think up answers that I would give if I believed evolution were true. I don't think many do the same for creation - when evolution presents a claim against creation, think up what answers a creationist would give. The biggest example I can give is the flood. A lot of the way creationists answer the current state of the earth is because of the great flood. Yet I find most people forget that when considering their understanding of creation, and considering evolution. If there was a worldwide flood (with or without evidence), that would affect a great deal of assumptions in science when dealing with history.
Basically, we have the scientific data. Evolution and creation are two ways of explaining the same data. This is philosophy - we both actively seek that set of data that contradicts fundamental assumptions of the opposing theory.
I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge is spotty. However, this suggests to me, that in this case it would be best to see what the experts say. And given that the absolutly vast majority of the worlds biologists believe in evolution, it seems resonable that evolution is the best possible answer.
x .h tm?once=true&rnk=r2&terms=Potassium-argon
As for the flood changing everything, this doesn't strike me as the best answer. One could just as well argue that Merlin changed everything. Without evidence that a global flood (or a wizard) has altered the earth, it isn't really much of a arguement (at least in the scientific sense).
Basically, we have the scientific data. Evolution and creation are two ways of explaining the same data. This is philosophy - we both actively seek that set of data that contradicts fundamental assumptions of the opposing theory.
While I would dispute that creationism can explain the data (for example, why is human DNA very similar to chimp DNA, when other similar creatures such as sharks and dolphins very different - evolution explains this well, whereas I can't see how creationism can), what are the fundamental assumptions of creationisms, that scientists could disprove?
As a side note, I personally know of at least three creationists who (having studied biology degrees at uni, gave up creationism and Christianity. This was mostly because they felt lied to. Therefore any Christian wanting to investigate further should remember that lots of mainstream Christian faiths have accepted evolution (and that there are plenty of Christian scientists, they aren't mutally exclusive).
And here are some more sites:
http://geology.about.com/cs/dating_methods/inde
http://my.erinet.com/~jwoolf/rad_dat.html
http://www.nearctica.com/evolve/history.htm
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/
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As for evidence of the flood, well, creationists give the following (among others I have not heard/forgotten):
* Fossil record - the great number of fossils worldwide
* Memories of a worldwide flood in cultures and tribes worldwide (from Aboriginee's in australia, to Hindu legend, and more I'm sure).
Still, my point wasn't evidence for the flood, just that lots of evidence becomes questionable once different assumptions are made.
I suppose you would have to analyse the differences. Where are humans and chimps similar and different? where are sharks and dolphins similar and different? Isn't it like only around 1% of our DNA or some low percentage that determines our appearance?I can't say much about those ex-Christians. I like to understand an issue first. My understanding of creation theory has progressed a long time from the early days when I first began reading, and even now I know very, very little. How much did those guys know? Eg, I think some Christians denounce natural selection because they think it is evolution. Natural selection is observed and demonstrated...it's just the way things work, and doesn't contradict the creation model in any way.
If you are interested I found another site of Creation researchers who produce a peer reviewed journal. They have a list of 20 challenges to those who believe evolution...you may or may not be interested to read them:
http://www.creationscience.com/
Cya around.