Creation's Tiny Mystery

My Presentation at the AAAS Symposium

The creation-based organization, Students for Origins Research (SOR), previewed the AAAS creation/evolution symposium and featured a discussion of my research in the Winter-Spring 1982 issue of their publication, Origins Research. About this time Drs. Awbrey and Thwaites, symposium organizers, sent a letter (dated March 1, 1982) to SOR containing the [p. 179] statement, "It would certainly make the Santa Barbara meetings the most important meetings of the century, if even one piece of bonafide evidence for creation could be presented" (emphasis theirs). They further explained they wanted to see hard data from properly controlled experiments or observations, not meaningless extrapolations, out-of-context quotations, or vague generalities.

With this challenge in mind, I set out for Santa Barbara to present my published scientific results in the context of a creation model of origins. A lively crowd of about 200 scientists was present in the amphitheater where I spoke on the first afternoon of the day and a half of lectures; my presentation was video-taped the following day for wider distribution (Battson, 1982). The symposium was billed as a collision encounter—"Evolutionists Confront Creationists." Believing that my published evidences for creation might satisfy the demand "to see hard data," I decided to reverse the emphasis of the symposium and make the theme of my talk "Creation Confronts Evolution." The Abstract of my talk, published in the Proceedings of the symposium, shows how this theme was developed:

ABSTRACT

If the earth was created, it is axiomatic that created (primordial) rocks must now exist on the earth, and if there was a Flood, there must now exist sedimentary rocks and other evidences of that event. But, if the general uniformitarian principle is correct, the universe evolved to its present state only by the unvarying action of known physical laws, and all natural phenomena must fit into the evolutionary mosaic. If this fundamental principle is wrong, all the pieces in the evolutionary mosaic become unglued. Evidence that something is drastically wrong comes from the fact that this basic evolutionary premise has failed to provide a verifiable explanation for the widespread occurrence of Po halos in Precambrian granites, a phenomena which I suggest are in situ evidences that those rocks were created almost instantaneously in accord with Psalm 33:6,9: "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast." I have challenged my colleagues to synthesize a piece of granite with ²¹⁸Po halos, as a means of falsifying this interpretation, but have not received a response. It is logical that this synthesis should be possible if the uniformitarian principle is true. Underdeveloped U halos in coalified wood having high U/Pb ratios are cited evidences for a Flood-related recent (within the past few thousand years) emplacement of geological formations thought to be more than 100,000,000 years old. Results of differential He analyses of zircons taken from deep granite cores [p. 180] are evidence for a recently created, several-thousand-year age of the earth. A creation model with three singularities, involving events beyond explanation by known physical laws, is proposed to account for these evidences. The first singularity is the ex nihilo creation of our galaxy nearly 6000 years ago. Finally, a new model for the structure of the universe is proposed, based on the idea that all galaxies, including the Milky Way, are revolving about the Center of the universe, which from Psalm 103:19 I equate with the fixed location of God's throne. This model requires an absolute reference frame in the universe whereas modern Big Bang cosmology mandates there is no Center (the Cosmological Principle) and no absolute reference frame (the theory of relativity). The motion of the solar system through the cosmic microwave radiation is cited as unequivocal evidence for the existence of an absolute reference frame. (Gentry 1984a, 38; Appendix)

As the Abstract reveals, I suggested how the evidences for creation discussed in this book can be embodied within a viable model of origins based on the Genesis account of earth history. This tentative creation model postulates three special periods, or singularities, which cannot be explained on the basis of known laws. These singularities are the creation, the fall of man, and the flood—events marked in a major way by the intervention of the Creator.

The last part of the Abstract refers to my most recent investigations involving astronomy. Technical comments on the interpretation of galactic red shifts, the cosmic microwave radiation, and its surprising implications about the theory of relativity are given in the full article (Gentry 1984a; Appendix). This report elaborates on my discovery that the mathematical basis for the Big Bang model of an expanding universe is based on erroneous assumptions. My alternative model postulates that the galaxies in the universe are revolving in different orbital planes around a fixed Center, the Creator's throne. This Center is calculated to be several million light-years away from our galaxy, the Milky Way. (These results formed only a small part of my talk and thus were not included in subsequent discussions at the symposium.)

During the question and answer session, doubts were expressed that my proposed creation model could account for all the data adapted into the evolutionary framework. I reminded all those present that their own model involves at least one singularity, the Big Bang, and then complete uniformity to the present. In contrast, my proposed creation model involves three singularities, with uniformity between those events. I suggested that whatever data can be fitted into a one-singularity model must also fit into a model with three singularities, for in this case there is much greater latitude.

[p. 181]

Still, many of those in attendance seemed to think that evolution must be true because of the abundance of data already fitted into this framework. I improvised a parable to show that these numerous points of agreement in no way confirm evolution. The quest for truth was analogized to the "Parable of the Grand Design," which is featured in the Epilogue of this book.

A National Forum

In the same month that the AAAS symposium was held, the nationally circulated physics journal, Physics Today, opened the pages of their Letters section to the creation/evolution topic. From those Letters it was quite apparent that many physicists were still unaware of the implications of my work for creation. Taking advantage of this new forum, I published a letter describing the results of my research in the October 1982 issue (Gentry 1982). This first letter precipitated objections from a geologist. His comments and my response (Gentry 1983a) were both published in the April 1983 issue of this journal. Other objections and my responses (Gentry 1983b, 1984c, 1984d) were published in the November 1983, April 1984, and December 1984 issues.

Most of these objections reasoned from the assumption of the uniformitarian principle; hence it was argued that my interpretation of polonium halos must be incorrect. Significantly, none of those letters attempted to directly refute the evidence for creation. And most significantly, there was no mention of the crucial granite synthesis experiment.

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