Bible answers to physics questions?

Martin_Taylor · February 5, 1999, 3:28pm

[Martin Taylor 990205 10:20]

[From Kenny Kitzke (990204.2100EST)]

Hey, if you want to really think, try the Bible. It has answers to
physical questions that scientists have not answered to this day.

This is really interesting. Could you give us some examples? Finally we
might learn something from this interchange!

On the other hand, your wording suggests a rather strange view of
"science." Although scientists often talk about resolving some questions
(answering them), the very nature of science is to doubt those answers,
and to recognize the unsolved mysteries that the new "answers" reveal.

I know some scientists get involved in their own hype about the ultimate
answers in physics being near to hand--it seems to happen around the end
of each century--but soon enough most of them come back to the reality
that something wild may be hiding around the 16th decimal place. A
true scientist never _knows_. All scientific answers are provisional.

However, despite all that, it would still be interesting to know on what
questions that currently puzzle physicists the Bible has answers that
they could and should use.

Martin

KENNETH_J_KITZKE1 · February 12, 1999, 8:13pm

[From Kenny Kitzke (9902012.1000EST)]

In your perception?

I perceive this is not true of science. It may be the attitude of good
scientists (like Bill Powers) but even then it is not typical of every
scientist. I would hope you agree and I guess your following words express
that perception which I also have as a reference.

It is your view of "science" that I find strange. You seem to percieve
true science as something that inherently always leaves doubt or
uncertaintly. This would fit with the idea that evolution or creation is a
science of how man became man. But, these are only theories. Neither has
ever been proven scientifically.

True science to me, gets rid of the doubt. In Mathematical Science, 2 + 2
= 4. It is science because the theory of addition has been proven and is
treated as a law of science. In Physics, Force = Mass X Acceleration.
Velocity = distance / time. That is what we count on to exist successfully
in the world. If science only gives us guesses, it would not be worth
much.

And, as a PCTer, I'm sure you know how most psychologists will strenuously
defend behaviorism and reinforcement as science. The idea that their
science is incorrect and incomplete is no feather in their cap. It's
people like Bill Powers who have doubted and challenged them about a better
understanding, a radically different science of behavior. It is he who
doubts even his own theory. As far as I know, Bill still calls perceptual
control a theory. What would it take to make it a science we can prove and
accept?

best wishes,

kenny

KENNETH_J_KITZKE1 · February 12, 1999, 8:13pm

[From Kenny Kitzke (990212.0900EST)]

Thank you for your challenging question. I have been away from the net for
about a week. So, I am sorry to not have responded sooner. I will repeat
your entire post so that we can recall our frames of mind.

Hey, if you want to really think, try the Bible. It has answers to
physical questions that scientists have not answered to this day.

This is really interesting. Could you give us some examples? Finally we
might learn something from this interchange!

On the other hand, your wording suggests a rather strange view of
"science." Although scientists often talk about resolving some questions
(answering them), the very nature of science is to doubt those answers,
and to recognize the unsolved mysteries that the new "answers" reveal.

I know some scientists get involved in their own hype about the ultimate
answers in physics being near to hand--it seems to happen around the end
of each century--but soon enough most of them come back to the reality
that something wild may be hiding around the 16th decimal place. A
true scientist never _knows_. All scientific answers are provisional.

However, despite all that, it would still be interesting to know on what
questions that currently puzzle physicists the Bible has answers that
they could and should use.

Martin

···

**************************************************************************

Well Martin, here is an answer. There are actually so many topics that
puzzle and allude physicists and scientists that are answered in the Bible,
it is hard to decide which one to pick. But, to give you a good chance to
show what science has revealed and failed to reveal so far, I'll start with
a cream puff.

I would like you to tell me what science knows about TIME. I perceive time
as a physical reality of my world. I think that most scientists, in fact
most people, also perceive time this way. One clue is that most people
wear a watch on their wrist. Are there any members of the CSG that never
wear wrist watches?

Here are some questions for you and science about TIME:

1) What is time? Define time. Tell us what time means. How do we know
we are sensing time?

2) Is time an absolute or relative aspect of our world? Is time different
on some other planet in or out of our galaxy?

3) Do animals sense time? Is there anything different about how they
sense time? If so, what explains this difference?

4) Did time always exist? When did time begin? Will time ever end? Is
time finite or infinite?

5) Can time literally stand still or stop for some period? How can this
occur in the physical world?

6) Why does the Greenwich Mean Time have to be adjusted periodically? How
is the amount of adjustment determined? Why does there have to be a leap
year in the way time is measured by our calendar? Who decided this?

7) What measure of time is most accurate: millenniums, centuries, decades,
years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds, of nanoseconds?

8) If all clocks/watches/time measuring devices quit working, how would
you know when Friday began and ended? By extension, how would you know
when the Fourth of July should be celebrated?

9) Why are there seven days in a week?

10) From where did the idea of the months we use come? Why are there
twelve months in a year? Why do months vary from 28 to 31 days?

Well, that's my Letterman Top Ten questions off the top of my head. I
await your answers.

best wishes,

kenny

Martin_Taylor · February 12, 1999, 10:54pm

[Martin Taylor 990212 15:54]

[From Kenny Kitzke (9902012.1000EST)]

<Martin Taylor 990205 10:20>

<On the other hand, your wording suggests a rather strange view of
"science.">

In your perception?

<Although scientists often talk about resolving some questions
(answering them), the very nature of science is to doubt those answers,
and to recognize the unsolved mysteries that the new "answers" reveal.>

I perceive this is not true of science.

Then you are not talking about what scientists are taught is the core
nature of science. Every scientist learns this, but being human, most
feel at some moments that they have "the answer." Usually, though, they
come to realize that the answer they have is only a (hopefully) closer
approximation to a good answer.

... A
true scientist never _knows_. All scientific answers are provisional.>

It is your view of "science" that I find strange. You seem to percieve
true science as something that inherently always leaves doubt or
uncertaintly.

Of course it does. How else could it be?

There is no other way of finding out about the world than observing it
and poking it to see what happens when you do, so of course there
is always inherent doubt. All you have is what is built from the genes
you got from your parents and what you get through your sensory systems.

Even if you believe in the _absolute and complete_ truth of the Bible,
you still got its content through your eyes and ears. There is _always_
doubt. Any writings are open to multiple interpretations, as the frequent
misunderstandings on CSGnet will attest:-) Even the least ambiguously
written things, such as mathematical theorems, sometimes get reinterpreted.
And the recognition of the possibility of error is what enables us to
learn. Unless there is doubt, evidence cannot change understanding.

This would fit with the idea that evolution or creation is a
science of how man became man. But, these are only theories. Neither has
ever been proven scientifically.

Nothing is ever _proven_ scientifically. But much is _dis_proven, as being
inconsistent with evidence. No evidence has been found that is inconsistent
with evolution. But such evidence _could_ be found. On the other hand, it
is impossible _in principle_ to find evidence that would be inconsistent
with special creation. Whatever evidence is ever found can be explained
by "Yes, that's the way God willed it to be."

True science to me, gets rid of the doubt.

Then you will never understand true science.

In Mathematical Science, 2 + 2
= 4. It is science because the theory of addition has been proven and is
treated as a law of science.

Not so. There is no "theory" of addition. There is a procedure called
addition, which you can apply to objects called numbers. Addition is
an agreed process that can be used within a system of axioms that in
themselves might or might not be acceptable. But as axioms, its doesn't
matter whether they are accepted. They are if "if X is so" part of "If
X then Y." Whether X is so in fact is immaterial to the truth of the
expression. When you apply the agreed processes that constitute "addition",
one of the results you get is that 2+2=4. There's very little relation
to "science" in it. The only relationship is that over many centuries
we have found that the relevant axioms and processes produce results
that match very well what we observe in the world, and we have no serious
reason to believe they will stop doing so.

In Physics, Force = Mass X Acceleration.
Velocity = distance / time. That is what we count on to exist successfully
in the world. If science only gives us guesses, it would not be worth
much.

"Guesses" is quite different from "reliable prediction and description"
which is what good science most often provides. There's quite a difference
between a guess that the sun will rise at some time after it sets and a
prediction that it will rise at 7:43:27 tomorrow morning. But one can
never be certain that it will rise at that second just because all the
previous predictions of sunrise time have been correct within milliseconds.
We might be quite wrong about gravity and relativity. Perhaps the whole
world will turn blue tomorrow at 7:43:27. Science as we now know it would
have no explanation, but the process of "science" would have a good shot
at trying to figure out a better understanding.

Usually the uncertainties are much less obvious than that.

As for your two equations, they are not "science" but definitions of
quantity relationships. The first is defining either Mass or Force,
depending on which you take to be more fundamental. The second defines
velocity (average velocity, actually). They have nothing to do with physics
except insofar as both the fundamental and the defined quantities appear
in the results of experiments.

And, as a PCTer, I'm sure you know how most psychologists will strenuously
defend behaviorism and reinforcement as science.

Sure. They are human, aren't they?

... The idea that their
science is incorrect and incomplete is no feather in their cap.

They know it's incomplete, and most would assume it's incorrect. If it
were complete, they wouldn't be continuing to study it, would they? Most
scientists assume that their basic notions will eventually be shown to
be incorrect, but probably not in their lifetime:-)

It's
people like Bill Powers who have doubted and challenged them about a better
understanding, a radically different science of behavior. It is he who
doubts even his own theory. As far as I know, Bill still calls perceptual
control a theory. What would it take to make it a science we can prove and
accept?

What it would take is to give up the idea of being a _scientist_ and to
become a fundamentalist.

You have to remember that there are levels of "theory" and levels of doubt.
It's not a question of "theory" becoming "truth" and doubt being either
"guess" or "certainty." Some theories are frameworks that account in
principle for many facts, but need to be fitted with boundary conditions
if they are to account in detail for specific cases. The "God" theory is
like that. It accounts for everything in the world, but if you want to
find out about a particular circumstance, you have to ask about that
specific circumstance, because God could always intervene to make the
answer whatever he wants. Such a theory isn't very useful when we want to
deal with the real world, however correct it may or may not be. On the
other hand, a theory like Newton's Law of Gravity F = m1*m2*G/r^2 is
_known_ to be inaccurate and wrong. But it's close enough that we can
do things like make pendulum clocks, weigh groceries, and shoot rockets
to particular spots on Mars, without worrying about the fact that we know
it to be incorrect. It's useful science.

Einstein's theory of General Relativity gives answers indistinguishable
from Newton's gravity provided things are not too big or small, and
don't move too fast. When things get outside that "comfortable" region,
it has never yet given an answer that can be distinguished from the
experimental results. Is it correct? Almost certainly not, but we can't
know that until we can show that it is _incorrect_. No amount of
experimentation can show that it is correct.

But both Newton's gravity and Einstein's General Relativity apply only to
a very small aspect of the world that is interesting to us. Neither
explains why trees are green--or why there are trees! The God theory
explains that _and_ gravity. Much more powerful, until you remember that
to answer the question with other than "That's the way God wanted it"
you have to get an answer from God directly as to "why" things are the
way they are. And you have to get that answer individually for every
question. Why is my toaster shiny? Why is the top of my table shiny?
Two different questions with the "God wills it so" answer. No answer
at all, if it answers everything.

···

--------------------

You asked in a separate message ten questions about time, as a response
to my request for Bible solutions to problems that vex physicists. I see
no Bible answers to these questions, nor do I see evidence that these
questions currently present problems to physicists. Perhaps you will
provide those two items for each of the questions. However, although I
haven't claimed to be a physicist in over 40 years, here are my answers.

1) What is time? Define time. Tell us what time means. How do we know
we are sensing time?

Four questions, with not much relationship to each other. Nor is it clear
what _kind_ of answer you want. However, I'll try, starting from the last.

1d.How do we know that we are sensing red? The answer is the same (sorry
not to be more definite, but the status of the conscious observer of the
perceiving process is far from settled in PCT).

1c. Tell us what time means to whom? To me it sometimes means I miss a bus,
sometimes that even though I was away on holiday for a month, only a
couple of days seem to have passed away from work. Or is a suitable answer
for the meaning of time that I am getting older and less physically
capable?

1b. Definition of time. I don't know where one would begin on this. What
could such a definition start from? Definitions are words that involve the
relationships in the world among the things referenced. In that sense,
time could be what is measured by a clock, where "clock" is anything
that repeats some movement in a way that makes the interpretation of the
rest of the world easiest if the repetition is defined as being regular.
One second used to be defined as an exact number of oscillations of
some particular transition in a cesium atom, but I think there is a better
definition now. Is this along the lines you were seeking?

1a. What is time? Perception of ordering of events in one's own personal
world.

2) Is time an absolute or relative aspect of our world? Is time different
on some other planet in or out of our galaxy?

Two separate questions this "time."

2a. If we believe Einstein, one's experience of time depends on how one
is moving relative to the sources of the events one perceives. So I
guess if I understand what you mean by "absolute" and "relative," it
clearly has to be "relative."

2b. What do you mean by time being different? On Mars the day is about
half-an-hour longer than on Earth, so if you used Earth clocks on Mars,
you would have a problem with keeping track of what time you get up. So
time is different there. Or, do you mean a question relating to I, on
the Earth, see a flash in my backyard as happening before another flash
that I see on mars through my telescope, whereas you on Mars see the
flash in your backyard before you through your telescope see the flash
in my backyard. Again, the answer is that time is different. Or are you
asking about the effect of a thin atmosphere and oxygen deprivation on
the feeling of how fast time is passing?

3) Do animals sense time? Is there anything different about how they
sense time? If so, what explains this difference?

You would have to ask them. How you do that, I wouldn't care to guess.

4) Did time always exist? When did time begin? Will time ever end? Is
time finite or infinite?

My time seems to have an indefinite beginning, but certainly nothing before
1936 or 37 is in it, so I'd have to say that it began sometime around then.
Or do you mean the "time" dimension in the general relativistic equations
of the Universe? That twists when you get far enough back, so that you
have to imagine standing outside the Universe entirely, and even then
it's hard to understand how time and space smudge together--is there a
beginning there? Depends on how you want to label it. A matter of wording,
and words refer to everyday experiences that really don't apply.

Will time ever end? To imagine this as a sensible question, you have to
ask what the question would mean if you were to answer either "yes" or
"no," since it is within the reference frame of time itself that you must
measure whether it has ended. It's a nonsense question.

5) Can time literally stand still or stop for some period? How can this
occur in the physical world?

What it would mean is that nobody could tell that it had happened, since
every observation would be exactly the same as if it hadn't happened, no
matter what kind of observation it might be. It would mean absolutely
nothing to anyone anywhere. To even conceive of the question, you have to
imagine two independent time Universes, and stand in one to observe the
other--just as for the previous question.

6) Why does the Greenwich Mean Time have to be adjusted periodically? How
is the amount of adjustment determined? Why does there have to be a leap
year in the way time is measured by our calendar? Who decided this?

At last, easy questions!

6a: Why does GMT have to be adjusted? Because the rotation of the Earth
speeds and slows depending on several factors. There's a general change
in rotation rate because of the tidal drag of the Moon (which also pushes
the moon outward), and there are changes on scales of hours, days, years,
decades, and millenia due to such things as atmospheric and oceanic
circulation, solar winds, even large storms and volcanos.

6b. The amount of adjustment is determine by comparison with whatever
clock is at present thought to be most regular (isn't it the oscillation
of a single sodium atom or something these days?). And, as noted above,
"most regular" refers to the relationship of the measure to all the other
observations that are made on physical variables. The one that most
simply connects all the variables is the "most regular."

6c. Why does there have to be a leap year? Because the Earth spins on its
axis a non-integer number of revolutions while it goes once around the sun.
(I'd be fascinated if there is a different Biblical answer to this one:-)

6d. Who decided there should be leap years? I've forgotten. Wasn't it Pope
Gregory the something or other?

7) What measure of time is most accurate: millenniums, centuries, decades,
years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds, of nanoseconds?

How could they be different? Actually, they can, even though it doesn't
seem so at first sight. Years are not exactly the same length, so any
measures based on counting years are less accurate than those based on
counting oscillations of cesium atoms (or whatever). The same applies
to days, if you are counting actual rotations of the earth, but not if
you take them as 24 hours exactly.

8) If all clocks/watches/time measuring devices quit working, how would
you know when Friday began and ended? By extension, how would you know
when the Fourth of July should be celebrated?

Well, if you knew what day and date it was when it happened, you could
do what prisoners sometimes do, and cross off one day at a time. It's
a matter of counting.

9) Why are there seven days in a week?

Social convention. Where did this convention come from? I'll hazard a
guess. One obvious marker of periods of many days is the phase of the
moon, which repeats after about 28 days. 28 is too many days to keep
track of whether you are at the 12th or 13th, if you are having a
repetitive work cycle. Also, the season changes too much during a 28
day period for there to be much benefit in developing a repetitive cycle
of that duration. People like to rest a bit more often than that, and
if they rest periods happened only once in 28 days, they would have to
be several days long, during which time nasty things might be happening.
A shorter cycle is needed. Why 7 days? Two possible reasons: (1) it is
easy to see the new, full, and half phases of the moon quite accurately,
and they occur about 7 days apart; (2) 28 has two factors, 4 and 7. The
only repetitive cycles that fit moderately well into a lunar cycle are
7 days and 4 days. One rest day every fourth might be a bit much, and 7
ties in nicely with the observable phases of the moon.

10) From where did the idea of the months we use come? Why are there
twelve months in a year? Why do months vary from 28 to 31 days?

This is an interesting question. There are 13 lunar repetitions in a year,
so one might expect there to be 13 named months. All I can guess, and it
is only a guess, is that it comes from the Babylonian counting tradition
that has 12 and 60 as its foundation. There's probably a known explanation
in the archeological literature.

-------------------
I'm not sure what any of these questions except number 2 have to do with
physics, let alone how they presently vex physicists. Perhaps you could
explain that when you give your Bible answers. And I'd still love to see
instances where the Bible does answer questions that real physicists are
puzzling over.

Still less do I see what any of it has to do with PCT.

Martin

Martin_Taylor · February 14, 1999, 3:25pm

Martin Taylor 990214 10:00]

[Martin Taylor 990205 10:20]

[From Kenny Kitzke (990204.2100EST)]

Hey, if you want to really think, try the Bible. It has answers to
physical questions that scientists have not answered to this day.

This is really interesting. Could you give us some examples? Finally we
might learn something from this interchange!

We've been waiting. You have provided a list of questions about the
perception of time, but without Bible answers to them. None of them
seem to be questions that would puzzle, or even interest, physicists.

Since you haven't yet provided any examples of physical questions that
scientists are trying to answer, so far without success, and for which
the Bible has provided answers, I'll try a selection of a few questions
from different areas of physics. I am under the impression that physicists
are presently puzzled about these questions--presented in no particular
order of importance.

Maybe you could give us the Bible answers to them, and save scientists a
lot of puzzlement by doing so.

1. What is the nature of "dark matter?"

2. Does the Higgs boson exist, and more importantly, what is its mass if
it does exist?

3. If string theory is an appropriate starting point for the physics of
the next century, are there meso-scale dimensions as well as the large
ones we perceive and the tightly curled ones originally envisaged for
the remaining six (or seven) dimensions?

4. At what energy do the four forces coalesce? Is there a fifth force?

4a. Specifically, is there a cosmic repulsive force, and if so, does it
provide exactly the mass/energy required to make the large scale geometry
of the Universe Euclidean (flat)?

5. What is the mechanism of high-temperature superconductivity?

6. Do magnetic monopoles exist? If so, where are they?

There are probable many others that are equally puzzling, and perhaps
more important for leading us to the next "new physics"--something that
often seems to happen around the ends of centuries;-)

Martin

KENNETH_J_KITZKE1 · February 16, 1999, 3:22am

[From Kenny Kitzke 990215.1700EST]

<I'm not sure what any of these questions except number 2 have to do with
physics, let alone how they presently vex physicists. Perhaps you could
explain that when you give your Bible answers.>

I feel your pain. Let me briefly explain. Sorry it has taken a while to
read and respond to your questions.

First, let me refresh your memory about what I had originally posted.

Kenny said:
Hey, if you want to really think, try the Bible. It has answers to
physical questions that scientists have not answered to this day.

Martin responds:
This is really interesting. [Bryan, if you are there, notice how topics
evolve, sort of like species. 8-)] Could you give us some examples?
Finally we
might learn something from this interchange!

So, I picked TIME. There were many other choices. Space, light, gravity,
life or love all might have been relevant to my assertion. I am sorry I
did not pick your favorite physical topic.

However, Martin, since that initial jest, you have indeed been adding your
perceptions to my words perhaps to get the answers you so desparately want.
Here is one example of your reforumlation:
Martin says:
None of them seem to be questions that would puzzle, or even interest,
physicists.

I never mentioned physicists. I referred to scientists which was far more
broad. It could include many types of science, even human behavior
psychologists and astronomers. It was you who introduced physicists for
your purpose.]

<I'll try a selection of a few questions from different areas of physics. I
am under the impression that physicists are presently puzzled about these
questions--presented in no particular order of importance..

I am not the least interested in these questions or their answers that you
perceive physicists to be puzzled over. Nor would I claim such issues are
answered in the Bible. I don't even know how they are relevant to us
humans?

However, I can fully understand why such matters puzzle them. If they
cannot understand "time" very well, how they gonna explain this stuff you
list? It reminds me of psychologists who spend their lives trying to
explain the appropriate causes for observed effects.

Before addressing your answers to my questions on time, I think they are
all relevant to some aspect of our physical world. For time is part of
that. Even with your invocation of talking about physics, time plays a key
role in the speed of light which is fundamental to Einstein's theory of
relativity.

Any way, I'll try to address your scientific answers about time and compare
them to what the Bible says. Having seen your answers as a scientist, I am
sure you will learn something you did not know before. That would be one
reason to study the Bible.

kenny

KENNETH_J_KITZKE1 · February 16, 1999, 3:22am

[From Kenny Kitzke (9902015.1800EST)]

I am not going to debate our views of science. I have little to add or
say. I am no expert on science nor Christian Science beliefs. I would be
willing to listen at a low gain.

That may also be wise advice for people who know little about the Bible but
who like to shoot holes in it as if they knew a great deal. That can
illicit behavior from believers. Just the same way I can denegrate the
achievements of so called psychology scientists and get a response from
them. Bryan rightly calls this baiting and some on the forum are very good
at it.

I did not use the word physicists, as I have previously stated.

I'll try Martin. But, the list I gave you were just ideas off the top of
my head. If I remade the list today, I suspect it would be somewhat
different. It was an examplar list; not a scientific or spiritual
treatise.

But, since you took the effort to try to give honest answers to my
questions about time, I do owe you a serious response. Although, I have
more fruitful things to do tonight, I will follow through as I promised in
my folly.

The Top Ten Questions about Time

···

********************************

1) What is time? Define time. Tell us what time means. How do we know
we are sensing time?

<1d.How do we know that we are sensing red? The answer is the same (sorry
not to be more definite, but the status of the conscious observer of the
perceiving process is far from settled in PCT).>

Red isn't different than time? As a scientist, you cannot distinguish what
is sensed when you see red and when you experience time? I do not see a
definite answer from you. If we have no reference for time, how could time
affect our behavior? So, I will let the question ride.

<1c. Tell us what time means to whom? To me it sometimes means I miss a
bus,
sometimes that even though I was away on holiday for a month, only a
couple of days seem to have passed away from work. Or is a suitable answer
for the meaning of time that I am getting older and less physically
capable?>

I meant what does time mean to you Martin as a scientist. It is
interesting how you sense time. This may be relevant to answering question
#1. Your answer tells us nothing about the meaning of time and what about
it that you are sensing. Perhaps you can try again.

<1b. Definition of time. I don't know where one would begin on this. What
could such a definition start from? Definitions are words that involve the
relationships in the world among the things referenced. In that sense,
time could be what is measured by a clock, where "clock" is anything
that repeats some movement in a way that makes the interpretation of the
rest of the world easiest if the repetition is defined as being regular.
One second used to be defined as an exact number of oscillations of
some particular transition in a cesium atom, but I think there is a better
definition now. Is this along the lines you were seeking?>

When you don't know where to begin, is that because the concept of time in
the real world is confusing to you? Is time too complex or too simple to
confuse you? Would time exist Martin if there were no clocks to measure it
and humans to know what time it is? Cesium atom oscillations are not time.
They are a way used by humans to measure time. Are you aware of any other
ways to measure time?

<1a. What is time? Perception of ordering of events in one's own personal
world.>

Time is a perception in one's own personal world? It does not exist in our
world like light and mass and space?

I'm afraid I must give you at best a "D" or Incomplete on your answers.
Missing buses and anniversaries are important topics in life. They take an
understanding of time. Since everyone senses time, I thought you could
come up with a better definition. I do appreciate you trying to define
time in PCT language. Perhaps others can improve on your understanding.

Since this is foundational to the other questions, I'll leave it for
further discovery.

<2) Is time an absolute or relative aspect of our world? Is time
different
on some other planet in or out of our galaxy?

Two separate questions this "time."

2a. If we believe Einstein, one's experience of time depends on how one
is moving relative to the sources of the events one perceives. So I
guess if I understand what you mean by "absolute" and "relative," it
clearly has to be "relative.">

RIGHT Martin! Einstein discoved what was stated in the Bible long before
he realized that time is relative. For God said:

2Pet. 3:8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a
day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.

This suggests that time is relative to God and different than how humans on
the earth see it. It took a long time for our eminent scientist to
discover that this simple thought was science.

The importance of understanding time as a relative property of the universe
does much to help our understanding of how our world began and how it will
end and even become eternal.

2b. What do you mean by time being different? On Mars the day is about
half-an-hour longer than on Earth, so if you used Earth clocks on Mars,
you would have a problem with keeping track of what time you get up. So
time is different there. Or, do you mean a question relating to I, on
the Earth, see a flash in my backyard as happening before another flash
that I see on mars through my telescope, whereas you on Mars see the
flash in your backyard before you through your telescope see the flash
in my backyard. Again, the answer is that time is different. Or are you
asking about the effect of a thin atmosphere and oxygen deprivation on
the feeling of how fast time is passing?>

I was trying to show that God knew that time was different depending on
your point of observation. I think you did well on science's discovery of
what God already knew and revealed in some sense in the Bible thousands of
years ago.

3) Do animals sense time? Is there anything different about how they
sense time? If so, what explains this difference?

I can't give you a right or wrong here. I guess you just don't know. I
doubt that asking animals (even man's closest relative the ape according to
those with an evolution belief) would be likely to yield an answer. Lower
animals have a hard time explaining what they do and do not sense to higher
order humans.

I would guess that experiments could determine if dogs control for time.
Rick could probably think of an experiment for his website that we could
play on our computers for our dogs. This would be an advancement in
science, useless as you might think it to be.

4) Did time always exist? When did time begin? Will time ever end? Is
time finite or infinite?

So, time began for you before you could sense it? Is it scientific to say
it began sometime around 1936 or 1937?

I meant either one. I doubt if you have any better sense about when time
began in the perceived universe that in your own life.

I must say "mush" to your answer. When you don't know the answer to a
question you make the question too complicated to answer and hide behind
words. If you cannot express an answer in words that you can choose for
your explanation, then it is hard to show anyone that you understand time
and when it started to be there for you or for the universe.

I don't agree it is a nonsense question. The answer comes both from
Einstein and from God in the form of eternity.

Doesn't Einstein's theory suggest there if there is no relative motion,
time stops or seems to stand still and disappers from one's reality?
Existance can become eternal as time stops. Do you think that is the
correct answer? Or does time always exist but differently depending upon a
being's perception of the sequence events they observe?

Can the God of the Bible create and destroy time as humans on earth know
it? Of course! He tells us the heavens and earth will be rolled up like a
scroll and disappear as fast as they were created. Such knowledge is
profound beyond the scientific realm. Science has no real answer at all.

Perhaps the words written by Solomon would help:

Eccl. 3:11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set
eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done
from beginning to end.

Is God is talking about you Martin? Would that surprise you?

Or perhaps you could increase your understanding of earth time by reading
what God saw fit to explain to the Hebrews:

Hebr. 1:10 He also says, "In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the
foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands.

Hebr. 1:11 They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like
a garment.

Hebr. 1:12 You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be
changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end."

Time as humans know it, will end if you believe the words of the Creator
God to his human creations.

5) Can time literally stand still or stop for some period? How can this
occur in the physical world?

So it can happen but no human could tell that it happened? Is that your
answer? Could God tell it happened even if mankind cannot? Can you
imagine a God that exists in a different time universe than man? Could God
also exist in both?

Martin, have you heard of the time regression analysis done by the Rand
Corporation that reveals scientifically that a day of time seems to be
missing? They have no explanation. But, God gives us the answer which
escapes their models of time.

Josh. 10:13 So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, till the nation
avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the Book of Jashar. The
sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full
day.

Josh. 10:14 There has never been a day like it before or since, a day
when the LORD listened to a man. Surely the LORD was fighting for Israel!

There is the explanation for the missing day of science. God does miracles
for those who love him and ask. That is what I believe. For, I have seen
evidence of miracles. God is as real as you are to me.

6) Why does the Greenwich Mean Time have to be adjusted periodically? How
is the amount of adjustment determined? Why does there have to be a leap
year in the way time is measured by our calendar? Who decided this?

So you think Canuck!

<6a: Why does GMT have to be adjusted? Because the rotation of the Earth
speeds and slows depending on several factors. There's a general change
in rotation rate because of the tidal drag of the Moon (which also pushes
the moon outward), and there are changes on scales of hours, days, years,
decades, and millenia due to such things as atmospheric and oceanic
circulation, solar winds, even large storms and volcanos.>

Yes, this is a good answer for an easy question.

<6b. The amount of adjustment is determine by comparison with whatever
clock is at present thought to be most regular (isn't it the oscillation
of a single sodium atom or something these days?). And, as noted above,
"most regular" refers to the relationship of the measure to all the other
observations that are made on physical variables. The one that most
simply connects all the variables is the "most regular.">

Don't sound scientific to me. Sounds like a guess. What other
observations would there be that are relevant to adjusting an atomic clock?

<6c. Why does there have to be a leap year? Because the Earth spins on its
axis a non-integer number of revolutions while it goes once around the sun.
(I'd be fascinated if there is a different Biblical answer to this one:-)>

The answer from the Bible is a 360 day year. God's calendar is very simple
and is adusted exactly when needed by adding an extra month to some years,
just as God explained in his word. Man and science have tried to improve
on God's calendar. Astronomers have made our Gregorian calendar so
complicated and innacurate that it has confused the whole world.

One atta boy for science. The more you can confuse things the more need
there is for scientific experts. This applies, me thinks, to physicists,
PCTers, psychologists and certainly to lawyer politicians.

Confusion is good for job security. I bet you would like to be one of
those lawyers on the President's legal team. They, more than anyone else I
can think of, benefited from the Impeachment of Mr. Bill (except perhaps
studpid Paula Jones who took Mr. Bill to the cleaners big time).

<6d. Who decided there should be leap years? I've forgotten. Wasn't it Pope
Gregory the something or other?>

Yeppers. Those darned Christians, or so called Christians, who call
themselves Catholics. Pope Gregory and his scientist Socigenes found the
Julian calendar was getting farther and farther off in measuring time. It
was discoverd by an Anglo-Saxon monk in 730 AD. But science was slow in
recognizing its impact, like it usually is. So Pope Gregory started the
leap year system some 800 years later.

What is more intriguing, is the Pope skipped some days to adjust the long
used Julian calendar, the one began by Julius Caesar in 46 BC. In the year
1582, Pope Gregory decreed that the day following October 4, 1582 would be
October 15 was say Sept 1 today and September 29 the next day. Man
adjusted his calendar to remove 10 days though time had not really changed
one iota. God's calendar remained perfectly correct. The scientists lose
again.

But, I'll give you another correct score. That is two right and you are on
a roll. It is funny to me that man is still trying to correct a calendar
by invented rules when the simple instructions of God say how to do it
perfectly.

By the way, I keep track of all days by watching the sun set and the months
by watching the moon. I have a chart and all I need to do is get a clear
sky and check it. It has never been wrong. And, I know it will never be
wrong during this age.

7) What measure of time is most accurate: millenniums, centuries, decades,
years, months, days, hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds, or nanoseconds?

Being in a generous mood, I'll give you another correct answer. That makes
three. Whee for science! 8=)

Actually, the mean solar day is the most accurate measue of time in our
universe. Days are getting longer by 0.0001 seconds a year. That's pretty
stable as most things go.

God told us plainly about days when he said they begin and end at sunset.
He also told us there are 12 hours in the evening and 12 hours in the
daylight (a variable hour during the year).

Of course, man could not accept God's answer and changed the measure of
days from midnight to midnight, put 60 minutes in every hour and even leap
years in decades. It is totally absurd. Science is absurd at times.
God knew how to keep time accurately, for God created time.

I'm skipping scriptures now to save time. This is the longest post I have
ever written. Just know I'm not making this stuff up. I read it in my
Bible. And, there is much more there than what I am referencing.

8) If all clocks/watches/time measuring devices quit working, how would
you know when Friday began and ended? By extension, how would you know
when the Fourth of July should be celebrated?

<Well, if you knew what day and date it was when it happened, you could
do what prisoners sometimes do, and cross off one day at a time. It's
a matter of counting.>

This answer I cannot accept I doubt if most prisoners would be able to know
when to throw in a leap year. BTW, I forgot you were a Canuck when I
picked the 4th of July. Sorry. I could have picked something universal
like New Year's Day.

Well, any prisoner who read his Bible would know exactly when the holidays
of God are. It is a matter of counting and observing the sun and the moon.
God made the sun and moon for light for man to be able to judge the times
and the seasons and appoint his holy day festivals. If the prisoner can
see the sky, he would know when the years, seasons, months, days and hours
are. He knows more than a scientist who would be lost and confused without
his quartz crystal watch.

9) Why are there seven days in a week?

<Social convention. Where did this convention come from? I'll hazard a
guess. One obvious marker of periods of many days is the phase of the
moon, which repeats after about 28 days. 28 is too many days to keep
track of whether you are at the 12th or 13th, if you are having a
repetitive work cycle. Also, the season changes too much during a 28
day period for there to be much benefit in developing a repetitive cycle
of that duration. People like to rest a bit more often than that, and
if they rest periods happened only once in 28 days, they would have to
be several days long, during which time nasty things might be happening.
A shorter cycle is needed. Why 7 days? Two possible reasons: (1) it is
easy to see the new, full, and half phases of the moon quite accurately,
and they occur about 7 days apart; (2) 28 has two factors, 4 and 7. The
only repetitive cycles that fit moderately well into a lunar cycle are
7 days and 4 days. One rest day every fourth might be a bit much, and 7
ties in nicely with the observable phases of the moon..

This is totally wrong. Nice guessing though. Sorry.

The moon has a different phase every night that is observable. Four phases
are an invention of man. God only refers to the new moon (no moon) and the
full moon.

Check a little and you will find the seven day week came from the seven day
week of Creation by God described in Genesis.

10) From where did the idea of the months we use come? Why are there
twelve months in a year? Why do months vary from 28 to 31 days?

No, there is a known explanation in the Bible. The twelve months come from
the calendar given by God to his people as revealed in 1 Chronicles 27:
2-15. Of course they at first had no names but were called by number (the
first month). Later, the months were named with Hebrew names like Nisan
(1) and Adar (12).

But, the Roman scientists not wanting to use any Jewish names some 2,000
years ago, gave the months names from celestial bodies and mythological
gods. Actually March was the first month. This followed God's calendar.
This too had to change for we know the Emporer did not want anything to do
with the God of Abraham. The month in Latin was called Martius, after
Mars, the Roman God of War.

Well, that's finally it. Here is my conclusion. You answered four
correctly or correct enough (7, 6, 5 and 2). However, all four are easily
found in the Bible. No help from scientists was ever needed. If you knew
the Bible the answers would have been readibly available and accurate
enough for man's basic needs.

Then, you had four clearly wrong where I gave you the correct answer from
the Bible (10, 9, 8 and 4). It is my hope that you at least learned four
things from the Bible that you did not know from being a scientist.

That leaves two (1 and 3) that I did not score. Generally, you gave no
comprehensible answer. Perhaps others can and we can see if they agree or
disagree with the word of Almighty God.

So you got 4 or 10 right. Feel good? I grade on a curve and that may be a
"C". You'll have to leave the "As" to the Christian Bible thumpers. But,
having worked for three hours on this answer. I frankly want to stop
teaching you anything more about time, at least for tonight.

I shudder at the thought that you will want to know about light or space or
human nature or life and its purpose. I'll mail you an old Bible and you
can figure them out for yourself. 8=) Deal?

Respectfully,

kenny

Martin_Taylor · February 16, 1999, 4:29am

[Martin Taylor 990212 11:17]

[From Kenny Kitzke 990215.1700EST]

You puzzle me more and more.

<Martin Taylor 990212 15:54>

<I'm not sure what any of these questions except number 2 have to do with
physics, let alone how they presently vex physicists. Perhaps you could
explain that when you give your Bible answers.>

I feel your pain. Let me briefly explain. Sorry it has taken a while to
read and respond to your questions.

First, let me refresh your memory about what I had originally posted.

Kenny said:
Hey, if you want to really think, try the Bible. It has answers to
physical questions that scientists have not answered to this day.

and now you say

I never mentioned physicists.

I assumed that "physical questions" are questions addressed by physicists.
If they aren't, what are they?

So, I picked TIME. There were many other choices. Space, light, gravity,
life or love all might have been relevant to my assertion. I am sorry I
did not pick your favorite physical topic.

I answered YOUR topic to the best of my ability, treating your questions
as "physical." It was your choice of topic, but you gave no answers even
to those questions. According to your original assertion, you think
they are "physical questions that scientists have not answered to this
day"--language which seems to assert that they have tried and failed
to answer them. And to these questions, the Bible has answers.

But you gave no Bible answers, and I did give "scientist answers" to the
best of my ability. And, since you asked about "physical questions" I tried
to give "physical answers." I did not "introduce physicists for my purpose".
It was you who introduced "physical questions."

Since you gave no Bible answers relating to time, I had hoped you might
give them in respect of physical questions to which scientists presently
do not have answers. That was, after all, your original claim. Now you
say that you are not the least interested in that kind of question. What am
I now to believe of what you write? Why do I bother?

Martin

Martin_Taylor · February 16, 1999, 5:26am

[Martin Taylor 990215 11:40]

[From Kenny Kitzke (9902015.1800EST)]

Kenny, I'm sorry, but I have the weirdest feeling you mean your long
message to be taken seriously. So I will. Sorry if I'm missing a joke.

1) What is time? Define time. Tell us what time means. How do we know
we are sensing time?

<1d.How do we know that we are sensing red? The answer is the same (sorry
not to be more definite, but the status of the conscious observer of the
perceiving process is far from settled in PCT).>

Red isn't different than time?

That's not my answer at all. Your question was a very PCT-related one about
knowing that we are perceiving X. We perceive X, whatever it may be, by
virtue of having perceptual functions whose outputs vary as X varies.
When we see something that is red, certain perceptual signals have
values that always exist when and only when we see it as red. Your
question may have been misworded, but as it stands, it asks about how
we perceive the act of perceiving. Consciousness of perceiving something
is an issue not addressed in PCT.

... If we have no reference for time, how could time
affect our behavior?

This seems a very strange comment. The signals in every control loop
vary over time, whether we are controlling a perception of time or not.
And it is only controlled perceptions that have a reference.

So, I will let the question ride.

<1c. Tell us what time means to whom? To me it sometimes means I miss a
bus,

I meant what does time mean to you Martin as a scientist.

That's easy. It's one of the dimensions used to describe events, or as
an axis on a world-line graph.

It is
interesting how you sense time.

A quite different question from the one you asked, about the meaning
of time. And yes, it is interesting. I have to speculate here. It is
clear that the perceptual passage of time can be very variable--perhaps
not as variable as what you quote for God, 1000 years being like a day
and vice-versa--but that kind of relation between clock time and
perceived time happens. A clock second can seem like minutes sometimes
(as when a car knowcked me off my bike, and it seemed to take several
minutes before I hit the road, giving me lots of time to think about
alternative ways to try to roll, and to see whether there was traffic
in the other lanes, etc.), and hours can pass like seconds. (At my age,
years sometimes seem like days, too). So it's clear that there isn't any
fixed relationship between perceived time and clock time.

So how do you sense time? I'm guessing that it has to do with the number
of perceptual events, or more properly of novel events, that you experience
(not necessariloy consciously). I think time is always measured in events,
whether we are talking about perceptual time or physical time.

<1b. Definition of time. I don't know where one would begin on this. What
could such a definition start from? Definitions are words that involve the
relationships in the world among the things referenced. In that sense,
time could be what is measured by a clock, where "clock" is anything
that repeats some movement in a way that makes the interpretation of the
rest of the world easiest if the repetition is defined as being regular.
One second used to be defined as an exact number of oscillations of
some particular transition in a cesium atom, but I think there is a better
definition now. Is this along the lines you were seeking?>

When you don't know where to begin, is that because the concept of time in
the real world is confusing to you?

No, it's because I had no idea what kind of answer you were looking for.
So I tried one. You didn't like it. But you didn't provide a clue to
what you would approve as a real answer. I think the answer I gave is
reasonable.

<1a. What is time? Perception of ordering of events in one's own personal
world.>

Time is a perception in one's own personal world? It does not exist in our
world like light and mass and space?

You use the word "exist" a lot, don't you? It's as if you are standing
outside and looking in at a picture, rather than being a part of what
you are talking about.

Take a PCT view, recognizing that all you can know is what you were born
with or what you have since acquired through interacting with the world.
That we grow to perceive the passage of time, and throughout life do not
lose that perception, argues that the perception is likely to correspond
to some stable attribute of our environment. The perception of time is
an ordering of events in one's own personal world. The physical time
we assume to correspond to this is related to the ordering of events
in a physical world that we perceive.

<2) Is time an absolute or relative aspect of our world? Is time
different
on some other planet in or out of our galaxy?

Two separate questions this "time."

2a. If we believe Einstein, one's experience of time depends on how one
is moving relative to the sources of the events one perceives. So I
guess if I understand what you mean by "absolute" and "relative," it
clearly has to be "relative.">

RIGHT Martin! Einstein discoved what was stated in the Bible long before
he realized that time is relative. For God said:

2Pet. 3:8 But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a
day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.

This is completely unrelated to what Einstein theorized. This quote is
simply an exaggeration of normal human experience.

This suggests that time is relative to God and different than how humans on
the earth see it.

No, it suggests that whoever wrote it had experienced the phenomenon of
minutes seeming like hours, and hours like minutes, and figured that God
had to do the same in a superlative way.

The importance of understanding time as a relative property of the universe
does much to help our understanding of how our world began and how it will
end and even become eternal.

Yes, you are quite right there (probably), but to do so requires the
use of Einstein's mathematics. A simple statement that time is relative
isn't much help.

3) Do animals sense time? Is there anything different about how they
sense time? If so, what explains this difference?

<You would have to ask them. How you do that, I wouldn't care to guess.>

I would guess that experiments could determine if dogs control for time.

We do know that almost all (perhaps all) animals have internal clocks,
and that their physiological and behavioural states changes regularly.
Whether this is equivalent to "controlling for" time, I wouldn't know.
But I'm not clear what "controlling for time" means, anyway.

4) Did time always exist? When did time begin? Will time ever end? Is
time finite or infinite?

<My time seems to have an indefinite beginning, but certainly nothing
before
1936 or 37 is in it, so I'd have to say that it began sometime around
then.>

So, time began for you before you could sense it? Is it scientific to say
it began sometime around 1936 or 1937?

An "indefinite beginning" means not an abrupt beginning. As for being
scientific, psychologically its a datum, not a theory. The questions
sometimes seem to relate to personal time, sometimes to clock time, so
I tried to answer both ways.

<Or do you mean the "time" dimension in the general relativistic equations
of the Universe?>

I meant either one. I doubt if you have any better sense about when time
began in the perceived universe that in your own life.

<That twists when you get far enough back, so that you have to imagine
standing outside the Universe entirely, and even then it's hard to
understand how time and space smudge together--is there a beginning there?
Depends on how you want to label it. A matter of wording, and words refer
to everyday experiences that really don't apply.>

I must say "mush" to your answer. When you don't know the answer to a
question you make the question too complicated to answer and hide behind
words.

That is an offensive comment. I tried to simplify the answer into words
you would understand. You don't, but there's no need to be insulting
about it. I know that it's very hard to get your mind around how space
and time twist around in strong gravitational fields. But they do, and
it is a question of how you want to label it as to whether there was
a beginning.

<Will time ever end? To imagine this as a sensible question, you have to
ask what the question would mean if you were to answer either "yes" or
"no," since it is within the reference frame of time itself that you must
measure whether it has ended. It's a nonsense question.>

I don't agree it is a nonsense question. The answer comes both from
Einstein and from God in the form of eternity.

Doesn't Einstein's theory suggest there if there is no relative motion,
time stops or seems to stand still and disappers from one's reality?

No.

Existance can become eternal as time stops.

What does that mean?

Do you think that is the
correct answer?

It's no answer at all. Again, you can't even talk about time stopping
unless you can stand outside in a different time stream and observe it.
Get out of our Universe and look in? hard to do when the Universe is
itself a black hole.

Can the God of the Bible create and destroy time as humans on earth know
it? Of course! He tells us the heavens and earth will be rolled up like a
scroll and disappear as fast as they were created. Such knowledge is
profound beyond the scientific realm. Science has no real answer at all.

So according to the Bible, Omega > 1. Well, it could be so, but at present
the evidence seems to be to the contrary.

5) Can time literally stand still or stop for some period? How can this
occur in the physical world?

<What it would mean is that nobody could tell that it had happened, since
every observation would be exactly the same as if it hadn't happened, no
matter what kind of observation it might be. It would mean absolutely
nothing to anyone anywhere. To even conceive of the question, you have to
imagine two independent time Universes, and stand in one to observe the
other--just as for the previous question.>

Martin, have you heard of the time regression analysis done by the Rand
Corporation that reveals scientifically that a day of time seems to be
missing?

No. Could you provide a reference?

6) Why does the Greenwich Mean Time have to be adjusted periodically? How
is the amount of adjustment determined? Why does there have to be a leap
year in the way time is measured by our calendar? Who decided this?

<At last, easy questions!>

So you think Canuck!

<6a: Why does GMT have to be adjusted? Because the rotation of the Earth
speeds and slows depending on several factors. There's a general change
in rotation rate because of the tidal drag of the Moon (which also pushes
the moon outward), and there are changes on scales of hours, days, years,
decades, and millenia due to such things as atmospheric and oceanic
circulation, solar winds, even large storms and volcanos.>

Yes, this is a good answer for an easy question.

<6b. The amount of adjustment is determine by comparison with whatever
clock is at present thought to be most regular (isn't it the oscillation
of a single sodium atom or something these days?). And, as noted above,
"most regular" refers to the relationship of the measure to all the other
observations that are made on physical variables. The one that most
simply connects all the variables is the "most regular.">

Don't sound scientific to me. Sounds like a guess. What other
observations would there be that are relevant to adjusting an atomic clock?

Huh!?! What a strange question. Just about everything else in the world!
For the simplest example, just drop an apple.

<6c. Why does there have to be a leap year? Because the Earth spins on its
axis a non-integer number of revolutions while it goes once around the sun.
(I'd be fascinated if there is a different Biblical answer to this one:-)>

The answer from the Bible is a 360 day year. God's calendar is very simple
and is adusted exactly when needed by adding an extra month to some years,
just as God explained in his word. Man and science have tried to improve
on God's calendar. Astronomers have made our Gregorian calendar so
complicated and innacurate that it has confused the whole world.

Astronomers decided how fast the earth rotates and how many times it rotates
while it goes once around the sun? Pretty powerful scientists, particularly
when you realise they didn't even have telescopes at the time:-)

Kenny, I'm sorry I took your message seriously at the beginning. Now I
know it was a joke--but it's not even April 1, so it was hard for me
to know initially.

I'm stopping here--anyway, I still have to prepare slides for a talk on
PCT I'm giving tomorrow morning. And I'm not prepared to waste any more
time when I know you aren't serious. It's a subtle joke, and I'm still
not 100% sure you don't believe some of what you write.

Martin

KENNETH_J_KITZKE1 · February 17, 1999, 5:32pm

[From Kenny Kitzke (9902016.2100EST)]

<Kenny, I'm sorry, but I have the weirdest feeling you mean your long
message to be taken seriously. So I will. Sorry if I'm missing a joke.>

My original statement concerning thinking about the answers in the Bible
about certain physical world issues, that scientists still do not
understand, was made as a quip. I never thought anyone would respond.

Since you did, I prepared 10 questions about how well scientists understand
TIME (something everyone uses every day). They were serious. I treated
your answers seriously. I spent many hours trying to show you that the
Bible does have answers to everyday questions about the physical world that
baffle scientists. There are many more areas where science has no answer,
including the behavioral sciences; but the Bible does.

As I recall, you answered 4 correctly and the same as the Bible answers
them. You also answered 4 wrong and I gave you the Bible answer which I
believe is the correct answer. There were 2 you had a hard time answering
(What is time? and When did time begin and will it end?) partly because
what I was after was vague to you. However, these 2 questions were the
most profound. They still baffle scientists, although the Bible gives an
answer of how God says time was made, works in our universe and will end as
we know it.

<I'm stopping here--anyway, I still have to prepare slides for a talk on
PCT I'm giving tomorrow morning. And I'm not prepared to waste any more
time when I know you aren't serious. It's a subtle joke, and I'm still
not 100% sure you don't believe some of what you write.>

Even though I was totally serious about the answers, I would be more
interested in the talk you are giving than continuing the discussion of
time. Care to describe what you are teaching about PCT and to whom? I
would enjoy that. Some of your posts about PCT and reorganization and
anarchy have been outstanding and very helpful to me.

Anyway, thanks for the interchange. I think we can say you at least
learned four things about time in our world that you did not know before:

* the use of 12 months in a year was established by God in the Bible but
man (the Roman Caesar) had to change the names and number of days in the
months and in the year for the Julian calendar, which to no surprise to me,
the scientists once again made inaccurate.

* the reason a week has 7 days is straight from the Creation Week account
in Genesis

* the most accurate measure of time is the mean solar day and God said to
use it beginning at sunset but once again man decided in his wisdom that
days start at midnight which to me is ridiculous for without a watch, man
would have no idea when a new day actually started

* time can stand still; mathematical science regressions reveal a missing
day that the Bible fully explains was by the divine command of Joshua for
the sun and moon stop

The calendar we use today was decreed by Pope Gregory and is full of errors
that require frequent adjustments. The calendar given to man by God in the
Bible works flawlessly with only one simple occasional addition of a 13
month needed [BTW, I keep time by the Hebrew calendar because it is God's
way. It is also more relevant to the timing of prophecy events and knowing
when the appointed Annual Feasts of the Lord are to be celebrated.]

I don't suspect this new knowledge will cause you any reorganization but it
might help you in a Trivial Pursuit game sometime. At least I hope it
will be of some value to you or others on the CSGNET. Perhaps not as much
as such PCT oriented topics as anarchy or impeachment. 8=)

best wishes,

kenny

Bruce_Gregory · February 17, 1999, 6:11pm

[From Bruce Gregory (990217.1308 EST)]

Kenny Kitzke (9902016.2100EST)

I don't suspect this new knowledge will cause you any
reorganization but it
might help you in a Trivial Pursuit game sometime.

I suggest we declare Kenny the winner and stop this game of Trivial
Pursuit.

Bruce Gregory