Hi Joe, that all seems very complicated to try and distinguish light as some sort of fundamental energy. I won’t pretend to understand everything you explained. But of interest Andrew Parker, who is a Biologist of note, discovered over 13 years of research how the evolving perception of light may have played a part in the Cambrian Explosion. His book In the Blink of an Eye. explains his research. Many Christians then contacted him explaining that his research seemed to fit in with the creation accounts of Genesis. Not been Christian but being open minded he was intrigued and looked into this which resulted in a follow-up book, The Genesis Enigma: Why the Bible is Scientifically Accurate, by Andrew Parker. It’s a really interesting read where he explains how his scientific research happened to confirm the creation accounts of Genesis.
Additionally, have you thought that chapter 1 and 2 of the Genesis accounts although metaphorical in nature may be describing separate but related accounts? Chapter 2 describing how God created Adam & Eve ‘ex nihlo’ placing them in a protected Garden - so they could be nurtured and prepared for God’s greater plan. The scriptures indicate this is where He walked with them and introduced them to the spiritual side of his creation, and likely nurtured them making known His expectations for them as a people also giving access to the tree of life. Chapter 1 describes how possibly hundreds of years earlier he imbued the small group of evolving Hominids with a superior intellect to succeed in the tooth & claw of life and spread across the world. When Adam & Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden it would be among these peoples they were sent. This fits with the growing body of evidence for evolution and the future planning of God, knowing exactly what was going to happen in the Eden garden. Of course looking at the book of Revelation and prophesies such as those given by Isaiah, God’s plan is for an everlasting creation - where he makes a new heaven & earth and those faithful to him are raised imperishable. The Eden garden project all revolved around providing choice for humankind, as does the work of Jesus Christ on the cross and his resurrection.
Sounds interesting. As I see it God could have created the universe at any time in the past, yet the classical sciences would see it as very old, because when physical reality is manifested from light it comes with a physical history that is perfectly rational. Too much to explain in a short comment but see the comment in which I posted an explanation of the experiments on complementarity.
Physicists don’t know what the universe was like in the first 10^(-36) seconds but they do agree that it started out as energy. But E=mc^(2) says energy and mass are two forms of the same thing. I think you’re thinking in classical terms (kinetic energy, etc.)
There is no math in the Book of Abraham. I don’t recall seeing any math in the movie “interstellar,” either. But science advisor, co-producer and Nobel Laureate physicist Kip Thorne did a good job of making a movie about time dilation, black holes and Einstein-Rosen bridges (wormholes). The language in the BOA is a bit awkward but an expert like you shouldn’t have any trouble deciphering it. I have written about it in my book. Give me a few days to condense it and I’ll post it. BTW, NONE of what I write about is LDS doctrine. The church doesn’t know what Abraham 3 means. I write about what the Lord gives me, that’s all. I don’t care about which Christian religion you follow.
This is the framing I’m objecting to. All of those things have energy and most of them transmit energy, but there is nothing I’m aware of in physics that says they are energy. All systems can be characterized by their energy, but they can also be characterized by their momentum and angular momentum. Energy is an important concept because its conservation represents something fundamental about the universe: physics is invariant in time. But momentum and angular momentum also represent fundamental truths about the universe, since their conservation reflects the invariance of physics under spatial translations and rotations. These are all characteristics of the fields that I take to constitute the fundamental entities in contemporary physics.
They agree that the energy density of the early universe was very high. That’s not the same thing as starting out as energy.
The standard physics terminology is that they are forms of energy. And it is appropriate because you can convert one form of energy into the another. To be sure there are various conservation laws which restrict these conversions but since most have negatives this is not much of an obstacle. Nevertheless I agreed with the objection to the claim that everything IS energy. There are measures in physics which are clearly not energy. But there is nothing without energy. Take away all the energy from something and nothing of it is left.
Frankly it is like objecting to the idea that ice, water, and steam are different forms of H2O. The objection doesn’t make much sense.
Yes. They are conserved and thus have an existence apart from the various forms of energy which they transfer from one to another. And yet this is not the same status of energy because of the difference from the explanation above. Many things do not have to have any momentum, and most things can give up their momentum to another without ceasing to be what they are. Thus momentum does look very much more incidental and energy more fundamental.
Yes, this is a reference to Noether’s theorem. Momentum is related to invariance under translation and angular momentum to invariance under rotation. But even this gives energy a special status, because time has a special status compared to these others.
Yet there is some truth to what he is saying because the differences between the different forms of energy seem to disappear the closer you get to that origin event.
Here’s the story of the Book of Abraham. A dealer of Egyptian antiquities came through town (I forget where), and Joseph Smith bought from him an Egyptian papyrus. (This was before anybody knew how to translate Egyptian hieroglyphics.) Smith claimed he could translate it, and announced that it was written by Abraham the patriarch! Many of the LDS unique beliefs come from this text, and not from the Book of Mormon, which is fairly Christian in theology. It mentions Kolob, the planet or star that is closest to the throne of God. Anyway, this “Book of Abraham” became part of LDS scripture. When Egyptologists were finally able to translate the document, it bore no resemblance to Smith’s translation. So, I am skeptical.
What is Abraham 3?
The Book of Abraham, first published in 1842, is controversial, it’s true. I’m not here to argue whether Joseph Smith translated it from Egyptian papyri or whether the scroll found a while back is the one he used or one of several that he reportedly had in his possession. But I am very sure that Chapter 3 describes time dilation, a relativistic effect of gravity. I’ll post my article on it in a while.
I don’t know why there is all this discussion about energy. Einstein showed that E=mc^2, which means matter and energy are two forms of the same thing. Look at this "History of the Universe chart from Lawrence Berkley National Lab. The first thing you see is ~ which is a photon, at a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a second.
You left out he didn’t use the papyri but was directly inspired (Mormon scholars are certainly creative). This despite his writings that indicated he did.
The Book of Mormon was supposedly written in “reformed Egyptian.” Smith “translated” it by putting his head in a hat that contained a peep stone.
Yes, they had to tap-dance around the fact that the it’s just a normal Egyptian funeral text–nothing to do with Abraham. Smith even doctored some of the pictures.
Are you going to share your knowledge with the Latter-Day Saints? After all, it’s more relevant to them than to us.
He may have been directly inspired. I’m not here to debate that. But I must correct you about the process. He used the "Urim and Thummim , which OT prophets also used to facilitate the process of receiving revelation from God (Exodus 28:30, Num 27:21, Deut 33:8). The hat was apparently used for privacy. But you’re deflecting from the subject, which is science in the scriptures.
To translate the BOM he used a peep stone. But how did the Urim and Thumin come into his possession?
I think what people are getting at is that no one here accepts the book of Abraham as Scripture. If people won’t grant your givens, it doesn’t matter if your conclusions follow.
We can discuss whether there is insight into quantum physics to be found in “The Lord of the Rings.” I suppose it is possible that some people will find insight or inspiration wherever they may look. We can look at the clouds and see giraffes or mathematical equations. It is only objectively speaking that this is nonsense – and that will tend to be what the first response people give because that is according to what everybody can see.
I suggested War and Peace because it was published in 1867 (pre QP) and would therefore be a better test. I’m not into fantasy novels or movies (except Star Wars :). For all I know Tolkien may have drawn inspiration from QP, which would invalidate the results. But you can use any pre-QP text you like.
Some have looked at the Old Testament and have found evidence of alien astronauts visiting Earth. Remember *Chariots of the Gods*?
What was it that Jesus said about some people would not believe even if a man returned from the dead? Oh, Wait! Millions of people HAVE returned from the dead, and still many people refuse to believe. So I guess you’re right. Show them general relativity published 83 years before Einstein and they still won’t believe.