If the earth is only a few thousand years old, why can we see light from stars that are billions of light years away? |
Let me point out a few things to be considered: God made a mature creation including stars and starlight (Isaiah 40:22, 42:5, 45:12 and Jeremiah 10:12). There is no way to accurately measure how far away stars are. They are a long way away but no one can say how long it takes light to get here when we don’t know how far away the stars are. The speed of light can vary. The New York Times reported that two independent science teams at Harvard report slowing light to a dead stop and that the NEC Research Institute at Princeton increased light pulses to 300 times its current speed. If mankind can speed up light, the starlight question becomes a non-issue since God could certainly do so. If stars evolve, star births should exceed star deaths. Although many star deaths have been observed, never has a star birth been seen. Various theories include looking at red shifts, the Doppler effect, etc. There are several viable theories on why we can see starlight from distant sources. Personally, I believe that scripture answers the questions. Together with the variability in the speed of light, the starlight issue becomes a non-issue for a young creation. An emerging theory on starlight comes from Dr. Russell Humphries of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR). I would suggest you review his theory should you want to see an interesting and technical explanation that fits with known scientific facts. |
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