Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Question

What do people who believe the earth is flat or people who believe natural processes can form stars or people who believe that computers are intelligent have in common?

Answer

None of them have benefitted much from looking at a sunrise over a large body of water.

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Flat Earth

Look at the sun on the horizon.

The sun reveals its full diameter when it is only half-way above the horizon. Either the sun is looping the earth or the earth is turning. One thing is sure: the sun is not floating above a flat earth so far away that it vanishes into a dot in the distant sky at night only to grow bigger as it becomes visible in the morning.

But doesn’t Isaiah 40:22 talk about the Lord sitting above the “circle” of the earth?

We live in a three dimensional world, not a two dimensional one. If the earth were flat like a coin, it would only appear as a circle if we were looking directly at it from above. As we moved to the side, the coin would take on an oval shape. When we reached the edge, the coin would look like a line with only its edge visible.

However, looking at a sphere, from any direction, we would always see it as a circle just as we see the moon and the sun in the sky as circles. By describing the earth as a “circle”, which is how it would look from any perspective, Isaiah was describing the earth as a sphere.

I know there are people who try to deceive us with fake photographs. That’s why I did NOT ask you to look at the photo, but at the sun itself as it rises above the horizon.

As the sun rises for us there are people in other time zones. You may even know some of them. Give them a call. Ask them to describe where they see the sun in the sky as you are watching it rise. Where would those people have to be if the earth were flat?

For those who think the Bible erroneously teaches that the earth is flat, see James Patrick Holding’s response to Paul H. Seely. You will need to answer Holdings objections if you agree with Seely. This recommendation to watch a sunrise would only benefit those who themselves believe that the earth is flat based on the teachings of people like Dean Odle.

Astrophysics

Look at the surface of the water.

Gravity pulls water to the earth, but gravity is not so strong that water keeps falling toward the center of the earth. At some point it stops. We get a surface for the water when outward pressure balances inward gravity to keep the water in a state of hydrostatic equilibrium. What is happening is similar to what happens in a stable star where gravity and pressure are also in balance.

But what if all we have are gas clouds without any stars? Can we get stars from gas clouds? Can gravity pull the gas clouds together so tightly that nuclear fusion lights up a cluster of stars?

Gravity by itself cannot overcome the hydrostatic equilibrium between itself and the pressure pushing out on the cloud. If it could, it would be like gravity suddenly taking the surface of the water in front of us and collapsing it toward the center of the earth.

But what about dark matter which would increase the force of gravity?

Physicists describe the patterns of repeatable processes. They are not writers of fairy tales sprinkled with pixie dust to make their stories plausible. If we believed that our theory required dark matter, we would have to produce that dark pixie dust or admit that the theory had been falsified and needed to be replaced with a new one.

At least, that is how science is supposed to advance. Make an hypothesis. If it fails, make a new hypothesis. Don’t add in unfalsifiable pixie dust just to keep a dead hypothesis afloat.

As an aside, Genesis 1 provides a better explanation for why there are stars in the sky than any amount of physical theorizing could since physical theory can’t deal with life, mind or the spirit without reducing them to mindless matter.

But I’m a neutral scientist! I don’t believe in the Bible!

If you say things like that, then you only show that you are self-deluded in your belief that you’re a neutral scientist.

While at the beach notice with gratitude how gravity and pressure are balanced to give the water a surface that gravity by itself cannot overcome.

After reading Michael Richmond’s description of how the “careful balance between gas pressure pushing outward, and gravitational force pulling inward” in a stable star can be broken, I am amazed that there are any stars out there that haven’t already blown up.

Simulation Theory

Look at this photo of the sunrise.

It is a digital file showing an image of the sunrise with some seagulls. It is neither the sunrise nor is it those birds. It is only data.

The computer presenting the image for me is neither conscious nor intelligent. It only responds to data or environmental changes according to its programming. Here, it is programmed to show me the image.

But computers can behave so much like people that they can fool you!

Since you know that computers can be used to deceive, be cautious when people send you information through them. Just because someone tells you that a computer is a mind or that it is intelligent in some artificial way does not make it so.

Almost 45 years ago John Searle published the Chinese room argument undermining artificial intelligence. Back then few people (maybe no one for all I can remember) had a laptop or a mobile phone. We might have been fooled by simulation theories or movies like 2001: A Space Odyssey—back then, but today such devices are so common that no one should see them as more than mindless machines.

The source of any problems with computers rests with people who deceptively use them to manipulate others. By contrast, when someone provides arguments exposing those deceptions, those very same computers become valuable tools providing us with access to the information that deceivers don’t want us to see.

To get a few of the references for this post I used search engines. It took time to come up with something interesting, but I was asking questions like why haven’t all the stars blown up by now. Even with my poor questions and even with search engines possibly programmed to lead me astray, I found most of what I wanted in minutes. That computers could help me with this search doesn’t mean they are intelligent or smart. It only means that they and the databases supporting them are effective, like hammers, to help me get a job that I wanted to do (not something they wanted to do) done.

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If you believe the earth is flat or if you believe that gas clouds can be compressed by gravity to the point where they start shining on their own or if you believe that computers are minds, then spend a weekend at the beach. Take a few pictures of the sun rising above the horizon with birds flying over the surface of the water.

Bring a Bible along, perhaps as an app on your phone, to help you understand what you are looking at.

Proverbs 26:4-5 KJV
4 Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.
5 Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit.