- Russell Humphreys
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Russell Humphreys Born David Russell Humphreys
February 2, 1942
Wyandotte, Michigan, USA[1]Occupation Independent Researcher for Creation Ministries International Known for Advocate of Young Earth Creationism Religion Baptist Dr. David Russell Humphreys is an American physicist and creationist author. He has offered a young Earth creationist cosmological model to deal with the distant starlight problem.
Contents
Education and affiliations
Humphreys graduated B.S. from Duke University and was awarded his Ph.D in physics from Louisiana State University in 1972.[1] He has worked for General Electric and Sandia National Laboratories in nuclear physics where he received a patent and a science award.[1] From 2001-2008 he was an associate professor at The Institute for Creation Research.[1] He currently works for Creation Ministries International (USA).[1] Humphreys is a board member of both the Creation Research Society and the Creation Science Fellowship of New Mexico.[2][3]
Cosmological model
Humphreys' book, Starlight and Time, presents an alternative cosmological model to the currently accepted Big bang theory, that attempts to solve the Distant Starlight Problem. Its thesis is that the Earth is about six thousand years old, and the outer edge of an expanding and rotating 3-dimensional universe is billions of years old (when measured from earth). It proposes using the principles of relativity to postulate that time ticked at different rates during the universe's origin.[4] In other words, according to his theory, clocks on earth registered the six days of creation while those at the edge of the universe counted the approximately 15 billion years needed for light from the most distant galaxies to reach earth.[4] The model places the Milky Way galaxy relatively near the center of the cosmos.[5]
Criticism
His model has been criticized by other scientists and old earth creationists such as Hugh Ross and Samuel R. Conner.[6] Humphreys has replied to Ross and Conner's critiques.[7]
On Humphreys' thousands-of-years-old universe, in 1998 physicist Dave Thomas wrote that Humphreys "has his astronomy backwards - the Kuiper Belt contains the remains of the "volatile" (icy) planetesimals that were left over from the formation of the solar system - numbering in the hundreds of millions. If anything, it is the Kuiper Belt that supplies the more remote Oort Cloud, as some icy chunks are occasionally flung far away by interactions with large planets."[8]
Sea Salt Issue
Thomas also criticised Humphreys' idea that there is "not enough sodium in the sea" for a several billion year old sea, writing, "Humphreys finds estimates of oceanic salt accumulation and deposition that provide him the data to "set" an upper limit of 62 million years. But modern geologists do not use erratic processes like these for clocks. It's like someone noticing that (A) it's snowing at an inch per hour, (B) the snow outside is four feet deep, and then concluding that (C) the Earth is just 48 hours, or two days, in age. Snowfall is erratic; some snow can melt; and so on. The Earth is older than two days, so there must be a flaw with the "snow" dating method, just as there is with the "salt" method."[8]
Helium Problems
Geologist Kevin Henke has criticised Humphreys for stating that "zircons from the Fenton Hill rock cores... contain too much radiogenic helium to be billions of years old."[9][10] Henke wrote that the equations in Humphreys' work "are based on many false assumptions (isotropic diffusion, constant temperatures over time, etc.) and the vast majority of Humphreys et al.'s critical a, b, and Q/Q0 values that are used in these 'dating' equations are either missing, poorly defined, improperly measured or inaccurate."[9] Humphreys has replied to Henke's criticisms.[10][11]
Earth Cooling Model
Scientists Glenn Morton and George L Murphy have dismissed Humphreys' cooling model as "wrong" because "it is ineffective, it is falsified by observational data, and it is theologically flawed."[12] First, in a classical model for a harmonic oscillator (like a particle oscillating in a crystal), "the particle does not lose energy to the cosmic expansion."[12] Second, Humphreys' model "is too slow to be useful to the creationist agenda."[12] Thirdly, "there would be visible effects in the spectra of light emitted during the Flood, including those from stars a few thousand light years away in our own galaxy. A change in the energy levels of atoms (which this idea would entail) would change the frequencies at which light is emitted in a fashion that would be observable. The lack of such observations rules out Humphreys' cooling mechanism as a reasonable possibility."[12] Lastly, they criticized it for contradicting the theological foundation Humphreys uses in another publication.[12]
Bibliography
Book
- Starlight and Time: Solving the Puzzle of Distant Starlight in a Young Universe (Green Forest, AR: Master Books) 1994. ISBN 0-89051-202-7
References
- ^ a b c d e "Russell Humphreys Biography". Creation Ministries International. 2008. http://creation.com/d-russell-humphreys-cv. Retrieved 2008-02-19.
- ^ http://www.creationresearch.org/board.html
- ^ http://www.creationsciencenm.org/3.html
- ^ a b Starlight and Time, Russell Humphreys, Chapter 2, p.34, ISBN 0-89051-202-7
- ^ Our galaxy is the centre of the universe, ‘quantized’ redshifts show
- ^ Ross, Hugh (March 22, 1999). "Starlight and Time Review". Reasons to Believe. http://www.reasons.org/unraveling-starlight-and-time. Retrieved 2007-02-19. RNCSE 24 (1): 31-32
- ^ Starlight Wars: Starlight and Time Withstands Attacks, D. Russell Humphreys
- ^ a b "Creation Physicist" D. Russell Humphreys, and his Questionable "Evidence for a Young World", Coalition for Excellence in Science and Math Education
- ^ a b Young-Earth Creationist Helium Diffusion "Dates", Kevin R. Henke, TalkOrigins Archive
- ^ a b Helium Evidence for A Young World Remains Crystal-Clear, D. Russell Humphreys
- ^ Helium Evidence for a Young World Overcomes Pressure, D. Russell Humphreys
- ^ a b c d e "Flaws in a Young-Earth Cooling Mechanism". National Center for Science Education. 2008. http://ncse.com/rncse/24/1/flaws-young-earth-cooling-mechanism. Retrieved 2007-02-19. RNCSE 24 (1): 31-32
External links
- Russell Humphreys on Creation Ministries International
- Russell Humphreys from Institute for Creation Research
- Talk Origins: "Young-Earth Creationist Helium Diffusion 'Dates':Fallacies Based on Bad Assumptions and Questionable Data" by Dr. Kevin R. Henke
- Answers In Creation Old Earth Creationist Reviews of Russell Humphreys
- Starlight and Time Review by Hugh Ross.
- Young Helium Diffusion Age of Zircons Supports Accelerated Nuclear Decay Humphreys's and others' work on helium diffusion.
Categories:- Christian writers
- Christian creationists
- Answers in Genesis staff and speakers
- Duke University alumni
- American people of Welsh descent
- 1942 births
- Living people
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