Current stellar parallax measurements, I think, are much less than the 6000
lightyear range that would be helpful to your list of arguments. The
Hipparchus mission has rough measurements out to 1,000 parsecs (~ 3,250
lightyears), with only 10% accuracy at 100 parsecs.
If the SIM mission takes place (2012 or later), however, 10% accuracy is the
goal for stars at around 25,000 parsecs ( > 80,000 lightyears).
Until then, trigonometric distance determinations may offer greater
argument. Supernova 1987A ( 160,000 lightyears) and V838 Mon (~ 20,000
lightyears) are the best examples.
Galaxy morphology is another argument since the more distant galaxies do
appear less mature.
One of my favorite arguments against a small size for the universe is,
"Wwhere do you put the 130 billion galaxies that the Hubble Telescope's
observations reveal?"
"Coope"
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
Behalf Of Jon Tandy
Sent: Wednesday, April 01, 2009 10:33 AM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: [asa] 10 Evidences for the Age of the Universe
I am putting together some summaries of scientific evidences, possibly as a
PowerPoint, etc., as a quick summary of the most powerful evidences that
need to be dealt with by any creation science theory that wants to take
science seriously. Except for the first one, I don't have all the items
identified, so I'm not sure what quantity that I'll end up with. For
instance,
10 Evidences for the Age of the Universe
20 Evidences for the Age of the Earth
20 Evidences against a Global Flood
20 Evidences for the Fossil Record
20 Evidences for Common Descent
20 Evidences from Human History
For my "10 Evidences for the Age of the Universe", I have the following so
far:
1. Speed of Light - distance to objects much further than 4000 light years
2. Stellar Parallax - using geometry to measure distance, independent of
speed of light
3. Size of Astronomical Objects - another geometry issue, huge galaxies of
billions of stars that appear to us only miniscule
4. Star formation and death - time and space required for life cycles of
stars
5. Detailed history of stellar events - details of supernova explosions,
etc., indicate real history over real time
6. Light echoes from supernovas - geometry of space from reflections of
supernovas
7. Redshift of Galaxies - confirmation of expansion of the universe
8. Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation - confirmation of Big Bang theory
9. Age of moon rocks - radiometric dating of rocks from the moon
10. Age of meteorites - radiometric dating of meteorites agrees with moon
and earth rocks
Any other thoughts?
Jon Tandy
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Received on Wed Apr 1 17:42:06 2009
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