The firmament of Genesis 1 assumes flat earth

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Sorry, but without any indication as to how they arrived at this number, assuming they did actually make this claim, it isn't a value I can remotely take seriously. Given the challenges of actually detecting an earth like planet, and considering the error factors involved, I suspect that their estimate is actually a very broad estimate, with the low end being one earth like planet.
Probably. The number sounds like a fantastic SWAG to me. But it is a NASA number, so by using it I immunize myself from attacks that I’m not using respectable data. Now, of course if NASA behaves like swashbucklers and puts out dubious information, that’s lamentable because it diminishes the respect people have for scientific institutions in general. NASA has in the past gotten quite political and made some pretty unwise and questionable assertions to get funding.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
In the end is any of this a salvation issue?
Whether the earth is spherical or not let us all get on with the job
of preaching the gospel of salvation.

I guess we'll find out the truth when we rise up to meet the Lord in
the air at the marriage feast. We can look down and see for ourselves.
It depends on how you look at it. At the heart of the topic is the factual reliability of Genesis 1. And the heart of that issue, then, is whether the spiritual aspects of the Bible are reliable if the scientific aspects of it are not.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
It's a compressed gas and we know what happens when it is exposed to a vacuum. I don't need any theories about gravity (I say "theory" because no one has really identified it, kind of like dark matter) it may be true but what can we observe and repeat? That is what science is about!
Gravity? You can drop things, fire projectiles and generally test the behavior of gravity over and over again ad nauseam, and observe and repeat the same things over and over again. The behavior of gravity is probably the most tested and best established aspect of all of the sciences. That doesn’t mean the we know what exactly it IS, but we certainly know how it behaves.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
It's a compressed gas and we know what happens when it is exposed to a vacuum. I don't need any theories about gravity (I say "theory" because no one has really identified it, kind of like dark matter) it may be true but what can we observe and repeat? That is what science is about!
The atmosphere is not a compressed gas. It is a free-standing gas. There is compression at the base of the column because of the weight of the gas above in the column.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Well I for one am untroubled by the idea there could be zero life on other planets, not even algae like life. Not a problem for me. Abiogensis is a huge unknown, only speculative stuff, like we notice there are moderately complex organic molecules made in nature, observable by spectra, and then it's suggestive if one wants to believe it means abiogenesis is more likely.

I'm very neutral about that.

I'm content to say -- "yes, it's totally speculative, unproven, so long as it cannot be done in an experiment starting with non living organic compounds we know nature does produce".

My guess is that since God surely did create the laws of nature, physics, that He made a Universe in which life can indeed get started naturally. Just a guess. Not important to many people, but possibly for a few here and there it could help them get past a barrier to seeking God.

My guess is that nature as He made it, chemistry, physics, is amenable to life, and life doesn't necessarily require entire wholesale intervention then as would be required for instance to make a horse out of a log.

Less intervention than that, subsequently then. Still intervention though. I think it's very likely He directly intervened into nature to make our modern human DNA just-so, as it is. But all of this is merely my viewpoint, and not of any importance in itself, and I don't even rely on it. :) I know God exists because I ended up doing just what Christ said to do in Matthew 7 to find Him, and that's how I tell others to find out about God. It's the way Christ said. It requires some faith, to seek Him, and that's a key thing, an act of seeking the Good, a good will act.

It is important for 100% of believers though to realize the only secure basis for their faith is never some version of small details about creation -- never that -- but only and solely the basis Christ said, also in Matthew 7, about that which is rock instead of sand. That alone gives real assurance we can endure. Nothing about small details of creation will give that assurance.

So, please know I'm totally content with others thinking zero abiogenesis happens. It's not a bad thing to think that. It's merely an optional thing to think that. It's a guess about unknowns, and that's fine. We are allowed to guess about unknowns all day long. My guesses are that life happens often out there on other worlds, and ends just as often, every time, too soon, mere thousands or mere millions of years, and the simple organism is extinct, and that we are the exception, and possibly the only one anywhere, though this last is highly speculative.
I know God exists because He grabbed my face out of the air and started to talk to me. I’ve been working backwards from the answer ever since.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Halbhh
Upvote 0

Waggles

Acts 2:38
Supporter
Feb 7, 2017
768
476
69
South Oz
Visit site
✟112,244.00
Country
Australia
Faith
Pentecostal
Marital Status
Widowed
It depends on how you look at it. At the heart of the topic is the factual reliability of Genesis 1. And the heart of that issue, then, is whether the spiritual aspects of the Bible are reliable if the scientific aspects of it are not.
I think people are taking these flat earthers way too seriously.
That's why my postings have been jokes.
Really a "flat earth" planet. Is that not the attack of mockers and unbelievers attempting
to discredit the authority and truth of the scriptures.
If it isn't flat earth nonsense then they rabbit on about evolution and science to discredit
the truth of God.
Even some "Christians" deny God and put their faith in Darwinism.

In the end those of us who experience God through the Holy Spirit KNOW as
knowledge the truth of Creation by Jesus of not only our round little planet
but also the universe.

Genesis one is not scientific. It contains a direct challenge to Darwinists
and atheists by declaring that plant life (trees, shrubs, flowers, veggies, herbs)
came into being BEFORE the creation of our Sun (and Moon, etc).
To believe otherwise is to call God [Jesus] a liar.
yes that could well be a salvation issue.
 
  • Agree
Reactions: Doug Melven
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
I think people are taking these flat earthers way too seriously.
That's why my postings have been jokes.
Really a "flat earth" planet. Is that not the attack of mockers and unbelievers attempting
to discredit the authority and truth of the scriptures.
If it isn't flat earth nonsense then they rabbit on about evolution and science to discredit
the truth of God.
Even some "Christians" deny God and put their faith in Darwinism.

In the end those of us who experience God through the Holy Spirit KNOW as
knowledge the truth of Creation by Jesus of not only our round little planet
but also the universe.

Genesis one is not scientific. It contains a direct challenge to Darwinists
and atheists by declaring that plant life (trees, shrubs, flowers, veggies, herbs)
came into being BEFORE the creation of our Sun (and Moon, etc).
To believe otherwise is to call God [Jesus] a liar.
yes that could well be a salvation issue.
Hmmm. Well, I don’t think that doubting the literalness of Genesis 1 in English is calling Jesus a liar. I guess that comes down to what one thinks the Bible is, exactly. Pretty sure that a Catholic and a Protestant are not going to agree on that. Pretty sure it doesn’t ultimately matter as long as we follow Jesus by doing what h said to do.
 
  • Agree
Reactions: gordonhooker
Upvote 0

Dig4truth

Newbie
Aug 23, 2014
563
132
✟38,877.00
Faith
Messianic
Marital Status
Private
Gravity? You can drop things, fire projectiles and generally test the behavior of gravity over and over again ad nauseam, and observe and repeat the same things over and over again. The behavior of gravity is probably the most tested and best established aspect of all of the sciences. That doesn’t mean the we know what exactly it IS, but we certainly know how it behaves.

But can you define it? Obviously not.
You can drop things but if it is denser than the air it will fall to the ground because of buoyancy and density. If it is lighter than the air it will float up and if it is the same density it will just float around - my favorite.

So why is your theory any better than that one? At least buoyancy and density is definable and it seems to work. Why do we need a "theoretical" answer?

Look, don't get me wrong on this thread, I'm asking difficult questions but if you have answers, I'm open minded and I want to hear. I am simply looking to science which is observable and repeatable.

Try to contain an atmosphere in a vacuum (obviously without a container, i.e. firmament) then get back to me. If you can do this test and make it repeatable I'm all ears.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
But can you define it? Obviously not.
You can drop things but if it is denser than the air it will fall to the ground because of buoyancy and density. If it is lighter than the air it will float up and if it is the same density it will just float around - my favorite.

So why is your theory any better than that one? At least buoyancy and density is definable and it seems to work. Why do we need a "theoretical" answer?

Look, don't get me wrong on this thread, I'm asking difficult questions but if you have answers, I'm open minded and I want to hear. I am simply looking to science which is observable and repeatable.

Try to contain an atmosphere in a vacuum (obviously without a container, i.e. firmament) then get back to me. If you can do this test and make it repeatable I'm all ears.

You're not really asking difficult questions. You're befuddling yourself.

You say buoyancy works, but it doesn't unless there is gravity. Without gravity, there's nothing to prevent things from drifting apart into attenuated gas, and then space. There's no buoyancy involved. Ships whose hulls are breached sink because of gravity. Buoyancy merely counteracts gravity, to an extent.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
But can you define it? Obviously not.
You can drop things but if it is denser than the air it will fall to the ground because of buoyancy and density. If it is lighter than the air it will float up and if it is the same density it will just float around - my favorite.

So why is your theory any better than that one? At least buoyancy and density is definable and it seems to work. Why do we need a "theoretical" answer?

Look, don't get me wrong on this thread, I'm asking difficult questions but if you have answers, I'm open minded and I want to hear. I am simply looking to science which is observable and repeatable.

Try to contain an atmosphere in a vacuum (obviously without a container, i.e. firmament) then get back to me. If you can do this test and make it repeatable I'm all ears.

Make an atmosphere in a vacuum? What does that even mean? Earth's atmosphere? Space isn't really a vacuum, but we can treat it as such. You're asking why the atmosphere doesn't just float away? The answer is gravity. That's why.
 
Upvote 0
This site stays free and accessible to all because of donations from people like you.
Consider making a one-time or monthly donation. We appreciate your support!
- Dan Doughty and Team Christian Forums

Dig4truth

Newbie
Aug 23, 2014
563
132
✟38,877.00
Faith
Messianic
Marital Status
Private
You're not really asking difficult questions. You're befuddling yourself.

You say buoyancy works, but it doesn't unless there is gravity. Without gravity, there's nothing to prevent things from drifting apart into attenuated gas, and then space. There's no buoyancy involved. Ships whose hulls are breached sink because of gravity. Buoyancy merely counteracts gravity, to an extent.


Ships whose hulls are breached will sink because of the water density added to the weight of the ship, i.e. less buoyant than water. Simple, not theoretical.
If the material of the ship added to the weight of the water is lighter than the water itself it will be somewhat buoyant. Some materials float because they are more buoyant than water, like cork or many kinds of wood, assuming they are not saturated by water.

So your theory is bouyancy and gravity? Then wouldn't bouyancy just be another name for anti-gravity? Hmm.
 
Upvote 0

Dig4truth

Newbie
Aug 23, 2014
563
132
✟38,877.00
Faith
Messianic
Marital Status
Private
Make an atmosphere in a vacuum? What does that even mean? Earth's atmosphere? Space isn't really a vacuum, but we can treat it as such. You're asking why the atmosphere doesn't just float away? The answer is gravity. That's why.


Do a few experiments and you will see what I mean.
A higher density gas exposed to a less denser gas will seek equilibrium, every time it's tried. Unless it remains contained. Observable and repeatable.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Ships whose hulls are breached will sink because of the water density added to the weight of the ship, i.e. less buoyant than water. Simple, not theoretical.
If the material of the ship added to the weight of the water is lighter than the water itself it will be somewhat buoyant. Some materials float because they are more buoyant than water, like cork or many kinds of wood, assuming they are not saturated by water.

So your theory is bouyancy and gravity? Then wouldn't bouyancy just be another name for anti-gravity? Hmm.

Well, actually, no. As you pointed out above, the earth is spinning at a frantic rate. Centrifugal force would fling the air and water off the planet and there would be no atmosphere or ocean at all, if there were not a counteracting force.

That counteracting force is gravity.

If you go out in space and let a blob of water float about in the space shuttle, and then put a piece of lead on the surface of the water, the lead will not sink into the water at all. The lead and the water will move relative to the energies rippling within them. The water does not buoy the lead, nor does the lead sink into the water, in space, because there is no gravity reaching through the water to pull the lead downward into it. That "downward principle" of gravity is why buoyancy works. Without weight, there is no buoyancy, because there is not relative force causing one thing to sink into another.

Buoyancy as anti-gravity? I suppose you can look at it that way. But really, the gravity works on the water and on the ship both equally, per unit of mass. However, the ship has greater mass, and will sink through the water in a gravity field. In space, without gravity, there's no buoyancy.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Do a few experiments and you will see what I mean.
A higher density gas exposed to a less denser gas will seek equilibrium, every time it's tried. Unless it remains contained. Observable and repeatable.

The two gases will mix into a uniform mixture if they are contained. If they are not contained, the two gases will mix into a uniform mixture with the wider atmosphere.

If there is no atmosphere - the condition found in space, but not findable on the earth other than in containers - the gas molecules will disperse as widely as they can into space.

The reason that the whole atmosphere does not dissipate into space, or is not flung away by the rotating earth, or left behind by the earth as it moves through space, is the gravity of the earth working on each gas molecule heavier than Helium to hold it into place. Helium does outgas, as it has too little mass to be held by earth's gravity and so dissipates into space.

The Law of Entropy drives things to naturally increase the chaos. Something has to counteract that or it will proceed to maximum chaos every time. The atmosphere would all outgas but for gravity. The moon lacks sufficient gravity to hold onto an atmosphere, so any gas that the moon encounters does outgas. The water, frozen as ice, in deep lunar craters does not evaporate into a water vapor atmosphere for the moon. Rather, it sublimates directly into space.
 
Upvote 0
This site stays free and accessible to all because of donations from people like you.
Consider making a one-time or monthly donation. We appreciate your support!
- Dan Doughty and Team Christian Forums

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
the water density added to the weight of the ship,

Weight does not exist as an inherent property. Weight is what happens when mass is in a gravity field - it is measured as weight. If there is no gravity field, the water holds together as a blob because of the weak force chemical attraction, and the ship with the breached hull will either remain upon the water for the same reason, or will float off the water because of slightly different momentum energy, or will pass through the water to the other side, or will take up orbit upon the water. It won't sink into the water because of buoyancy or lack thereof, because without the gravity field, there is no weight.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Well, I happen to believe God creates life and it has to do with His love.
It is certainly true that God is source of all life. Our very spirits are his breaths. That is certainly so.
 
Upvote 0

Vicomte13

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,655
1,816
Westport, Connecticut
✟93,837.00
Faith
Catholic
Marital Status
Married
Politics
US-Others
Do a few experiments and you will see what I mean.

You have suggested experiments a few times. Here is one you can do. Telescopes are very powerful things. With the Hubble Space Telescope, for example, we can see details of galaxies 100 million light years away. With a good strong backyard telescope we can easily see the craters and mountains of the moon, and we can easily see the rings of Saturn and the Moons of Jupiter and the Great Red Spot. We can easily see all of these things hundreds of thousands or millions of miles away in great detail.

So, get yourself a good strong optical telescope and go look at the Moon, the Rings, the Great Red Spot.
Go show yourself directly how well that you can see things at tremendous distances.

Now go up on the roof of your house and look around your range of vision, as far as you can see in any direction along the land until your vision is blocked by a tree, a hill, a mountain, a building. Now peer through your telescope at that farthest object. The farthest I can see from my house, other than looking straight up, is less than a quarter of a mile, because I live in tree-tangled Connecticut, where everything is beneath the trees and the sky is only visible above the trees, about 45 degrees off the ground. I can see the trunks and the big boughs of those trees a quarter mile away. I cannot distinguish the individual leaves. But if I pointed my strong telescope at them, I could make out the leaves and the birds easily.

You do the same, to demonstrate that at short distances you can see everything pretty plainly with your telescope.

Now take a vacation. Go out West, to the Grand Canyon. Go up on a rocky promontory and look over at the other rim, a mile or more away. Now look up the Canyon at the crack and it winds off to the North and East or South and West. The air is clear, the desert is mostly flat. From your little elevation, you can see many, many miles, to the mountains and mesas in the distance. Now point your telescope at those things in the distance: they are sharp and clear. You can make out the boulders. You can see that which is 15 miles away. If you go up a mountain, you can see that which is 25 or 30 miles away. With the telescope, in clear air, you can see everything in the range of vision clearly with your telescope. Nothing is faded or fuzzy. You have only a small sight picture through the tube, but what you see, you see clearly.

From the mountain top you can look through your telescope and see very clearly the houses that are 25 miles away. You can see their windowframes and lightbulbs at dusk.

Now come back down the mountain to the foot and look down down the same sightline. You cannot see the house, or its lights, even through your telescope. What you see is some piece of ground between here and there. If you had the Hubble Space Telescope, you could not see the house - because it is blocked by the earth.

That is the effect of the curvature of the earth. But, of course, as we have said before, the hard ground doesn't conform to the shape of the earth. Mountains rise up, uplands are thrust up. That blockage may not be the curvature of the earth at all, it may just be the result of seismic activity moving pieces of the earth's crust around.

Now take your telescope and go to the ocean beside a seaport on a sunny and clear day. Set yourself up next to a lifeguard tower that is unoccupied. Pick a ship leaving port and focus your telescope on the name on the stern, the letters and the sternlight and the flag that it bears. As it nears the horizon, watch it intently through your telescope. You can still read the letters and see the flag. They do not disappear into the haze. But you see it all getting lower and lower in the water, and you see the individual waves moving up next to it and past it. And then you can't see the letters any more, because the ship has followed the curve of the earth and that part has dipped below the horizon. You can still see the stack and the upper superstructure, but not the name or the colors on the stern.

Now go climb the lifeguard station with your telescope and point it right at the stern. Presto - you can see the name and the flag again, perfectly clearly. Keep watching, and they will sink below the waves again.

It is not a matter of visual acuity failing or the ship no longer being visible through the air. As you noted, you can still see it clearly with a telescope. But then you can't - because it went below the horizon because of the earth's curvature. If you had the Hubble Space Telescope and the earth was flat, you could see the coast of France from Cape Cod. You can't. That's because the earth is round.

You can conduct this experiment yourself, with telescope or binoculars, as many hundreds of times as you like, and you will always see the same thing.

I HAVE conducted that very experiment, as part of my work at sea, watching ships rise from over the horizon until I could identify them and their heading, and watching them sink back over the horizon steaming away. In the middle of the ocean on a four hour watch there is not a great deal to do, so another ship is a thing to look at it, so you do, and you see just exactly what I have described, over and over again.

These are practical, real world experiments you can do to satisfy yourself that yes, the world is in fact round, and no, the atmosphere does not so devour light that you can't see past 10 miles or so. That's certainly not true. You can see stars trillions of miles away, and you can see a light on a ship as far as you have a line of sight to it. If you go up in a helicopter, the distance to the horizon extends and you can see farther. If it is clear, and there is a light, you can always see the light.

It is true that at the horizon, the atmosphere seems to refract the light and make things bigger. You're looking through a lot more air molecules that lens it when something is right at the horizon than when something is above.

You've seen the big rising sun get small, the big rising moon get small as they rise off the horizon, and the sun get bigger and bigger until its finally huge as it sinks into the sea. We have all seen this. Some have asserted that it's an optical illusion. That is not true. You can measure the arclengths of the horizon that the sun or moon takes up as it settles into the water, and compare it to the arclengths when it is high in the sky. The setting sun doesn't just LOOK bigger, it IS bigger, MUCH bigger.

Again, these are simple tests you can do yourself to satisfy your mind, if you really want to.
 
Upvote 0
This site stays free and accessible to all because of donations from people like you.
Consider making a one-time or monthly donation. We appreciate your support!
- Dan Doughty and Team Christian Forums

Denadii

Well-Known Member
Aug 27, 2017
710
300
75
Western
✟31,027.00
Country
Canada
Faith
Non-Denom
Marital Status
Married
As for the prevalence of life, it is my own thinking that since God is love, and God created such a vast universe, there should be oodles and oodles of other life out there. But what if that life is - unfallen? Could not communication then be done spiritually? In the same way that God speaks to our hearts? No radio receiver would ever pick up on the cross talk of such a situation. We would call the living things of unfallen nature "angels" or "sons of God", should we run into one of them.
I like your question here..."What if life out there is unfallen? What if Satan and his followers were cast to Earth and our Solar system?....What if he was not allowed to go to other star systems? Then there is no way the other planets and people out there could have been contaminated with Satans sin. Yeah. I believe Earth and out solar system is fallen but not the rest of creation.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Edison Trent
Upvote 0