Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site utastro.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!seismo!ut-sally!ut-ngp!utastro!bill From: bill@utastro.UUCP (William H. Jefferys) Newsgroups: net.religion Subject: Re: Scientific Creationism Message-ID: <777@utastro.UUCP> Date: Tue, 1-Nov-83 17:55:21 EST Article-I.D.: utastro.777 Posted: Tue Nov 1 17:55:21 1983 Date-Received: Fri, 4-Nov-83 03:25:39 EST Organization: UTexas Astronomy Dept., Austin, Texas Lines: 66 While I certainly do not defend the travesty that is "Creation Science", one point that Andrew Klossner (orca!andrew) made in his recent article is in error. He says (first quoting from the article he was responding to, and then giving his reply): ************************************************************************ "The fact that the Moon is recessing from the earth points toward a young Earth - Moon system." It might if it were true, but if anything the moon is moving steadily closer to the earth. ************************************************************************ The guy in the office next to me has been measuring the recession of the Moon from the Earth with the Texas Lunar Laser Ranging project for the past 15 years. It most certainly does recede. The following is from the 16 September 1983 issue of *Science* (p. 1166): "Where was the moon in the early days of the solar system? Experts will only agree that it was not orbiting at its present distance of 380,000 kilometers; it was much closer to Earth in the past. Today the moon is moving outward at about 4 centimeters per year. A new study of the gravitational interaction of the moon and Earth over geologic time suggests that the moon was never closer than 225,000 kilometers, which would avoid the apparent problem of a close encounter of the two bodies only 2 billion years ago. It also argues against the Earth originally calving the moon while still young and hot, or capturing the moon as it made a near miss." The article goes on to outline the theory, which essentially shows that tidal dissipation (the culprit in the story) is much more efficient now than it was in the past because at present there are resonances in the great ocean basins that did not exist in the past (because of the faster rotation of the Earth in the past). What the creationists have picked up on here is the fact that if you naively extrapolate the present 4 cm/year recession back in time, you find the Earth and moon in contact only 2 billion years B.P., which if it were true would obviously cause problems for the rest of solar system dates. The answer to this objection to evolution obviously is that simple extrapolations are not necessarily a valid method of extending trends beyond the the interval over which the measurements have been made. The recent work is important because for the first time there is a believable model that resolves the apparent difficulty. (The reference to the actual work is Kirk Hansen, *Rev. Geophys. Space Phys. 20*, 457 (1982); I haven't read it yet since it is in a journal I don't normally read, but now I am going to have to!) This is just another example of how "Creation Scientists" attempt to exploit scientific controversy, *THE LIFE-BLOOD OF SCIENCE*, for their own nefarious ends. They misrepresent phenomena that are not well understood as "proof" that science is wrong. FEH! I can't stand it! Bill Jefferys 8-% Astronomy Dept, University of Texas, Austin TX 78712 (Snail) {ihnp4,kpno,ctvax}!ut-sally!utastro!bill (uucp) utastro!bill@utexas-20 (ARPANET)