Are these statements true?

[Fraught]

Spiral galaxies rotate much too quickly for an old universe. They would be twisted beyond recognition if they were really as old as secular astronomers claim.

A spiral galaxy consists of a spiraling disc of dust, gas, and stars orbiting a central "bulge" with a much denser concentration of dust, gas, and stars. Galaxies are pretty much just clumped up groups of stuff and as more stuff clumps together it generates more gravity pulling more and more stuff in towards itself. The center of the a spiral galaxy contains a huge amount of material and, in some cases, possibly even a really big black hole. The gravity generated by all this mass "pulls" on the surrounding matter making it spin. Think of it as a glorified solar system.

The AIG article you're quoting from is citing Russel Humphreys very problematic assertion that "Stars closer to the center of a spiral galaxy orbit the galaxy faster than stars farther away. Over many millions of years, the difference in orbital rates should wind the spiral tighter and tighter. We do not see any evidence for this in galaxies of different ages.

[Fraught]

but doesn't an old universe rely on the fact of things staying the same over those millions of years? otherwise, how could it be calculated at all? i'm a creationist, of course, and a proponent of young earth. i do know, however, that young earth does not preclude old universe.

i do enjoy tweaking the minds of those who just think it's all so self-evident when it certainly is not.

The view that the universe is old relies on things actually being what they look like - so light from distant stars, as an example, doesn't just look like it took hundreds of thousands or even millions of years to travel the distance between a star and our eyeballs but actually did take that much time to travel that far. So. . .unless god is trying to trick us and created a false history things actually are what they are. This concept can be applied equally to the age of the earth.

why would you presume that light has always traveled at the same speed?

[sysvr4]

but doesn't an old universe rely on the fact of things staying the same over those millions of years? otherwise, how could it be calculated at all? i'm a creationist, of course, and a proponent of young earth. i do know, however, that young earth does not preclude old universe.

i do enjoy tweaking the minds of those who just think it's all so self-evident when it certainly is not.

The view that the universe is old relies on things actually being what they look like - so light from distant stars, as an example, doesn't just look like it took hundreds of thousands or even millions of years to travel the distance between a star and our eyeballs but actually did take that much time to travel that far. So. . .unless god is trying to trick us and created a false history things actually are what they are. This concept can be applied equally to the age of the earth.

why would you presume that light has always traveled at the same speed?

This is actually a somewhat valid question; the macroscopic speed of light may be less than c, given various media.

[Shiloh62]

Spiral galaxies rotate much too quickly for an old universe. They would be twisted beyond recognition if they were really as old as secular astronomers claim.

how about this one?

The magnetic fields of planets and moons in our solar system are consistent with their age of a few thousand years, but are much too strong for an age of billions of years.

I agree, and that would be in line with the bible's aging too.

[sysvr4]

why would you presume that light has always traveled at the same speed?

Aside from the fact that every observable indicator shows the speed of light in a vacuum to be constant? I'd say the ramification on the energy output of stars is pretty drastic, not to mention devastating to life on earth, if you start tinkering with the speed of light

Edited July 2, 2009 by sysvr4

[sysvr4]

Perhaps the assertion may be that the light which we observe has not always traveled in free space? Provided, light traveling through a transparent medium travels (macroscopically) slower than it does in a hypothetical vacuum.

So. . .it took even longer for light from distant stars to reach earth? I'm not seeing how that helps a young earth view. When we talk about the speed of light we're talking about the value "c" which stands for the speed of light in a vacuum. Of course you can slow down light by passing it through a medium (although, technically the actual speed of photons doesn't change, they just spend a bit more time being absorbed and re-emitted by particles within that medium) but you can't speed light up past c. And yes, that's the same "c" which appears in E=mc^2 which means that if you increase the speed of light you increase the amount of energy released in subatomic reactions like nuclear decay. So if you increased the speed of light to a million times faster than its present speed (which would be necessary to get all that light from stars millions of light years away to earth within a few thousand years) you would increase the energy released from these reactions by a quadrillion times. Enjoy your molten earth.

Indeed it doesn't help the young Earth argument. I am significantly in favor of the presumption of the infinite multiverse. The Earth may be billions of years old or may have developed in the previous microsecond, either way, it's all only superficially interesting to me.

[sysvr4]

Spiral galaxies rotate much too quickly for an old universe. They would be twisted beyond recognition if they were really as old as secular astronomers claim.

how about this one?

The magnetic fields of planets and moons in our solar system are consistent with their age of a few thousand years, but are much too strong for an age of billions of years.

I agree, and that would be in line with the bible's aging too.

Why do you agree that it would be in line with the Bible's aging? For that matter, what is the Bible's aging?