Jerry McDonald's "scientific explanation" for SN 1987A
Rick Hartzog

In the "Comments" section for Todd Greene's video, "Creationist Delusion: Evolution Isn't Science," Jerry McDonald wrote:

One thing to keep in mind is that NOTHING Jerry McDonald has posted in Todd's "Comments" section, and nothing that McDonald has posted in the "Comments" section of his own YouTube video, has been even remotely relevant to showing us why "evolution isn't science". SN 1987A certainly doesn't have anything to do with it.

But Jerry McDonald promised us that he was working on a "scientific" explanation to the problem of how, if the Universe is only 6,000 years old, we can see the light from SN 1987A, 168,000 light-years away.

What Jerry has now posted to his website is itself light-years away from being any kind of scientific explanation, but I think it is a very fitting demonstration of Jerry McDonald's incompetence to make any judgments as to what is science and what is not science.

Jerry's article begins:

Of course, that the Universe is billions of years old was known for many decades before 1987. And of course, the fact that the
Universe is billions of years old is not established by the fact that a certain star exploded 186,000 years ago. But SN 1987A is a good teaching example of the sort of things with which young-earth creationism is unable to grapple, a concrete *event* that occurred relatively nearby and relatively recently, the death of a star some 160,000 years before the young-earth creationists claim the first star was made.

Jerry says:

It is hardly "bias" to assume that the laws of physics have remained the same throughout the time and space of the Universe. There is absolutely no evidence which would lead one to suppose otherwise. Furthermore, the estimate of when the gas ring was expelled is not based on the speed of light at all.

Jerry continues:

There is no evidence that suggests any other explanation is needed.  There is no evidence that the speed of light has changed since the explosion took place. The "alternatives" that Jerry wants are not based on any evidence either, other than the young-earthers' interpretation of Genesis. So yes, the reason Jerry wants a different explanation is a completely UNSCIENTIFIC reason, and the explanation he offers us here is completely UNSCIENTIFIC as well. Call it sneering if you want to, but young-earth creation-science is not science.

And Jerry apparently admits as much when he says:

Which is all well and good. Believe what you want to believe.  But don't try calling it science because it's not. Don't go trying to sneak it into science classes under the pretense that it is science. Jerry's view is a religious view that he holds to because of a narrow-minded, literalist reading of Genesis. That Jerry's interpretation of the text could be wrong does not seem to even enter his mind.

Apparently Jerry has been in contact with Russell Humphreys and Danny Faulkner about the problem of distant starlight and SN 1987A, and as we have come to expect from so-called young-earth creation-scientists, Jerry has gotten an ad hoc explanation but, just like the rest of the creationist ad hoc explanations for various phenomena, it doesn't fit with anything else in either the known Universe or any imaginary universe proposed by the creationists.

Myself, I'm less interested in explaining why Humphreys is wrong than I am in pointing out that what Humphreys tells Jerry IS IN DIRECT CONTRADICTION to Humphreys' claims of rapid radioactive decay and rapid reversals of the Earth's magnetic
field during the "Flood year". What Humphreys tells Jerry is also IN DIRECT CONTRADICTION to Humphreys claim on the ICR website that "galaxies are winding up too fast". Humphreys tells Jerry that Noah's "clock" only recorded the passage of one year, while the light from SN 1987A traveled approximately 160,000 light-years across space. During this same period, according to Humphreys, the Andromeda galaxy went through 500 million years of aging.

Humphreys ignores the fact that there must be a *continuum* of space-time between events. Humphreys doesn't seem to be aware that what he tells Jerry acknowledges that the Universe has been in existence for millions and billions of years, while the Earth has (supposedly) been enclosed in some kind of unconnected space-time envelope. And the *mechanism* for this space-time envelope, *apparently*, is "supernatural" -- meaning there is NO SCIENTIFIC EXPLANATION for it!

In addition to this, depending on where Humphreys ARBITRARILY decides to draw the boundaries of his slo-time envelope, it may be IN DIRECT CONTRADICTION to Humphreys' claim that there are not enough supernova remnants, or otherwise leave Humphreys trying to explain why there appear to be about as many supernova remnants in one galaxy as there are in the next one.

This is a criticism of "young-earth creation-science" I have made before: every time they propose an explanation for something it contradicts a dozen other of their "explanations". They have no coherent model universe in which things fit together in the way they do in the Universe as we know it explained by the results of actual legitimate scientific investigation.

Faulkner mentions time dilation, Humphreys agrees with it, and Jerry is so incompetent that he thinks that means what Humphreys is saying makes any sense. Well, it doesn't. Time dilation is a relativistic effect related to gravity and/or velocity, i.e.,
when it is observed it is observed for a *reason*. There is no *reason* for Humphreys to call on time dilation as one of the effects of the Flood -- if he wants to just claim outlandish miracles as the reason we can see distant starlight, just call it a miracle, withdraw from the creation-science game, and let that be that.



Rick Hartzog
Worldwide Church of Latitudinarianism
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Maury_and_Baty/message/13418