James Webb Space Telescope – Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Jason Lisle made some amazing predictions about the data that would come back from the James Webb Space Telescope.

On January 21, 2022, he made his predictions less than a month after the mission launched on December 25, 2021. In July the results began coming in. On September 9, 2022, he announced that his predictions were confirmed.

Essentially, he predicted that there would be more galaxies at further redshifts than anticipated. He predicted that the composition of the stars would contain heavier elements than expected. He also predicted that scientists would claim that stellar evolution went further into the past than they previously thought.

Lisle’s predictions were not randomly contrary to what many scientists expected to see. They were grounded on Hans Reichenbach’s conventionality of simultaneity thesis for relativity theory and Genesis 1.

Reichenbach’s thesis claimed that the constant speed of light posited by relativity theory was best represented by the two-way speed of light, not its one-way speed. No one can measure the one-way speed of light given relativity since two clocks can’t be kept synchronized when one of them moves away from the other. However, the two-way, round-trip speed of light could be measured with a single clock and a mirror.

It is that round-trip speed, the only measurable speed, that is the constant called the speed of light. That means that the speed of light going to the mirror does not have to be the speed of light coming back. So, for example, the speed of light going from the earth to a galaxy 13.8 billion round-trip light years away from the earth could go at half the round-trip speed on the way out taking 27.6 billion years to get there, but come back almost instantly on the return trip. The total distance traveled would be the distance to the galaxy (13.8 billion light years taking 27.6 billion years) plus the distance back (13.8 billion light years taking 0 years) for a total of 27.6 billion light years travelled in 27.6 billion years.

Because of Reichenbach’s thesis what we see in those space telescopes may be happening right now, not billions of years ago. From relativity theory alone, properly using the round-trip speed of light, one cannot tell.

If light from those distant galaxies arrived on Earth almost instantaneously then what we would be seeing would be how those galaxies actually look today. Such galaxies would not be expected to show any hypothesized stellar evolution and, indeed, they don’t. Their light shows heavier elements than lithium, significantly oxygen which with hydrogen are the elements of the water molecule (see Genesis 1:2, 6-8). Their size is too large and orderly. They are too close to that God-surrogate, the big bang.

But if the speed of light incoming from space were nearly instantaneous that would mean that the Earth is very, very, very, very special.

I have wondered if one could save the big bang by acknowledging as nearly instantaneous the speed of the incoming light to the earth. All of that hypothesized stellar evolution would no longer have to be there. However, that would likely be too much for secularists (or even Christians trapped by the charm of the big bang’s unbiblical beginning) to pay. They would no longer be able to assert how old the universe was. They would no longer be able to say that the Earth is just some insignificant blue dot lost in space. Rather they would be admitting that such light were specifically aimed toward the earth. And although it might save the big bang in the eyes of its followers it would demote it to an unfalsifiable, pseudo-scientific myth. So, I guess that wouldn’t save it after all.

Jason Lisle could make his predictions with confidence not only because he accepted Reichenbach’s conventionality of simultaneity thesis, but also because Genesis 1:14-19 told him that the heavens were set there “to give light upon the earth”. And, as soon as God spoke the heavens into existence, “it was so”. When the heavenly lights reached the earth, they did what they were told to do that very day, that very moment, nearly instantaneously.

Genesis 1:14-19 KJV
14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: [he made] the stars also.
17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that [it was] good.
19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

Genesis 1:2, 6-8 KJV
2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
…
6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which [were] under the firmament from the waters which [were] above the firmament: and it was so.
8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

The Fairy Tale Bible has the same words in it as the Real Bible. What makes it different from the Real Bible is that the words in the Fairy Tale Bible mean something different from what they mean in the Real Bible.

It is easy to get started with a Fairy Tale Bible. Go online and find any popular bible offered. To transform it into a Fairy Tale Bible rather than a Real Bible, don’t read any more of the book than you have to. This is the first rule regarding the Fairy Tale Bible. The second rule is to fake-read this bible by listening to New Age or atheist leaning commentators who will tell us what the text says since we aren’t going to be reading it ourselves anyway.

We can then babble about “evolution” or write poetic nonsense about “the universe” and pretend that we are just as “biblical” as the next guy.

Examples of Fake-Reading

Genesis 1

For example, if we were reading about the six days of creation in the Real Bible, we would understandably think of six 24-hour days because they have an evening and a morning and we know how to read.

To fake-read this in the Authorized Atheist Version of the Fairy Tale Bible we would let some commentator tell us that the word “day” means a gazillion number of years over which an unscientific process called “evolution” turned a random explosion called the “big bang” into stars, galaxies and people through chance events. The commentator may, or may not depending on how supposedly Christian he is, graciously give God permission to “guide” that unscientific process (which doesn’t actually exist) so God has something useless to do.

Admittedly fake-reading is a pathetic alternative to actually reading the Real Bible, but I suspect, indeed from my own personal experience I am convinced, that is how some people read the bible.

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts – the whole NT

As another example, if we read about the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus in the Real Bible we would see these as real historical events with significance for ourselves and our families regarding repentance and salvation.

However, if we were fake-reading the Lalaland Edition of the Fairy Tale Bible we would read a commentator who’d compare what happened to Jesus to what happens in near-death experiences. Then we would listen to a commentator claim someone found the very box in which the very bones of Jesus were stored. And then we’d watch a movie based on a novel that showed us how Jesus and Mary Magdalen had children who became royalty in Lalaland.

Genesis 6-9

It doesn’t get any better when reading about Noah’s flood. In the Real Bible we would think of a global catastrophe which ultimately formed the mountains, glaciers, canyons and oceans that we see around us. Our praise and gratitude to God would be immense for His mercy in protecting those eight people along with two of each kind of breathing creature so they could have survived that event and we could be here.

Should we want to switch over to the Fairy Tale Bible all we’d have to do is pretend that flood catastrophe never happened or at least wasn’t global. We would see it as one of those goofy things primitive people without any brains make up. We’d blindly believe that “scientists” one day would be able to explain, or at least convince each other, how those mountains, glaciers, canyons and oceans got there.

Real Life Example of a Fairy Tale Bible Commentator

Consider what the philosopher and supposed Christian apologist William Lane Craig said about Genesis: There are hints in the text itself that a seven day twenty-four hour day Creation week is not contemplated by the author. (1:44)

In case you didn’t notice, Craig is reading “hints” which aren’t actually there, in spite of him saying “in the text itself”, rather than the actual words which are, indeed, in the text itself. Although I’ve been plenty gullible in the past, today, as soon as I hear words like “hint” about a bible verse I anticipate that I will be led down a rabbit hole the commentator himself can’t find his way out of.

It is also worth noting for those not familiar with fairy tale thought patterns that Craig said contemplated by the author, but not contemplated by Moses whom most people would recognize as the author of Genesis. This omission of the name “Moses” was likely deliberate. The point of the Fairy Tale Bible is to discredit the Real Bible as an historical document. One way to do that is to fictionalize the people mentioned in it. Here Craig is subliminally suggesting that someone other than Moses might have written Genesis to raise our suspicion about the truth of anything else in that book or in any other book in the bible.

If the Real Bible is history we would have to take it seriously. That is why historicity is attacked by those promoting the Fairy Tale Bible. Fairy tale commentators do not want us to take the Real Bible seriously.

Craig excuses his position in advance by saying, I think that the book of Genesis is open to a wide range of legitimate interpretations. (1:19)

That he has to make this excuse at all is a sign that he’s aware that his position is not what his audience is ready to accept. He wants to disarm any hostile reaction from them. Some of them may even see him as a heretic. To avoid such a charge up front he asserts on his own authority that the book of Genesis is “open” to “wide” interpretation.

Since Craig is a philosopher, it’s a fair question to ask him what it means philosophically for him to call his interpretation “legitimate”? Unless he’s an atheistic humanist believing that man is the standard of all things, it doesn’t really matter what he thinks. What matters is: Does God think his interpretation is legitimate? What evidence does he have that God agrees with him?

If Craig is honest, he would not be able to answer that question and so he would likely throw it back at me. He would demand to know: What evidence do I have that God agrees with me? My response would be that I am a reader of the Real Bible. My “interpretation” is neither more nor less than accepting God’s Word as it was written. Given his searching for hints that contradict the actual words in the text that would be a response Craig could no longer honestly give.

Craig also said, There is a very tiny minority of Christians today who believe that the world was created some ten to twenty thousand years ago. (0:45)

And he proudly proclaimed that he’s not one of them. Oddly, this analytic philosopher doesn’t seem to know that truth does not depend on a majority vote. His reference to “a very tiny minority” does sound like an underestimation to make his own position look better than it is.

However, even if his poll numbers were correct (which I doubt), being part of a remnant is not necessarily a bad thing especially if one considers the remnant entering by the narrow way in Matthew 7:13-14. You would have to be reading the Real Bible to even know those verses. So, just in case you aren’t, let me quote them. (The red emphasis, however, is mine.)

Matthew 7:13-14 (KJV)
¹³Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat:
¹⁴Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

Admittedly, anyone who persists in fake-reading the Fairy Tale Bible will start thinking in fairy tale English, but the quantity of people suffering from a delusion does not make that delusion true.

Confession

The reason all of this bothers me is because I used to read, talk and think fairy tale English just as fluently as the next deluded babbler. I even tried to make sense out of atheistic big bang mythology using Craig’s Kalam cosmological argument.

But then I broke the first fake-reading rule. I actually read the Real Bible. Although I still listened to commentators, I didn’t just listen to questionable ones talk about it. I noticed that there was a history in the Real Bible that I do remember people, long ago, having mentioned but which I had forgotten. Then I became very suspicious of those commentators leading me into either an atheistic or New Age direction.

However, I can’t take full credit for this change of heart. If it were up to me alone it would not have happened, because I would not have had an experiential base for trusting what I read in the Real Bible. The Holy Spirit had to smack me around a bit.

It is helpful to realize that fairy tale English has two overlapping dialects: atheist and New Age. These dialects seem contradictory, but they actually complement each other. Each dialect contains its own blend of pseudoscientific speculation and magical witchcraft. That is, each dialect contains a different blend of Star Wars and Harry Potter, but otherwise they are pretty much the same delusion. What I have come to realize is that the Holy Spirit has nothing to do with either of them.

With results coming from the James Webb Space Telescope even atheists today are smartening up. Some of them now think that the big bang either didn’t happen (which leaves them with what?) or the mythical bang has to be pushed back another gazillion years to place it outside the falsifying reach of modern technology. Although they don’t appreciate it, they are at a fortunate crossroads where they have to start thinking and make better choices.

Craig thought he saw a crack in atheism because they hypothesized a beginning to the universe. He bought into their fairy tale of deep time and imaginary chance processes just to keep this hypothetical beginning afloat. Unfortunately he had to throw Genesis under the bus to do that.

When the big bang reaches the status of a falsified hypothesis (because it really makes no sense in any self-respecting atheistic, closed universe constrained by increasing entropy) I wonder how these compromising Christians will respond? May they repent as well as I did and may they start using their academic training to do real apologetics work in support of the Real Bible.

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