Page 62 - The Origin of Life and the Universe - International Conference 2016

The Origin of Life and the Universe

It then goes on to say, if that's true if those fixed patterns are constant
and the patterns of heaven and night are not constant then He's going to
break His promises. And so God’s reliability is likened to how reliable the
Creation operates.
And so you see this big contrast between the universe described
through the prophets and the Torah and the scientific understanding
then. Scientific understanding is the universe was eternal, while the
theistic understanding is that the universe was created and it had a
beginning. The scientific understanding said the universe is static and un-
changing. But in the in the religious books the universe is dynamic on the
largest scales. And in the scientific view the laws of physics change as you
move throughout the universe. And yet the theistic worldview talks about
how the laws of physics were constant, that the fixed patterns of day and
night.
What is it that governs how day and night happen in the fixed
patterns of the heavens? That's nothing other than the laws of physics.
And so at the start of the twentieth century science thought that the
universe was eternal, static and unchanging and governed by changing
laws of physics. And yet God had revealed a universe that began to exist,
was dynamic and governed by constant laws of physics.
So let's take a look at some of the important discoveries throughout
the twentieth century. Well, during the early 1900s, Albert Einstein
recognized this scientific description of the day and that the laws of
physics changed as your move throughout the universe. And philosophically
he didn't like the idea. So he set about developing a model of the universe
where the laws of physics were constant. In doing so he developed this
theory of special relativity and theory of general relativity. And the key
feature of these theories that the laws of physics are constant, regardless of
how you're moving or where you're located in the universe. Now I can tell
you this, throughout the twentieth century scientists have thrown numerous
experimental test to the theory of general relativity, to see if it's true or not
and it has passed every one of those tests with flying colors. It is one of the
best-established and best accepted scientific theories known today.