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Author: Helge S. Kragh
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317142489
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 278
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Book Description
Entropic Creation is the first English-language book to consider the cultural and religious responses to the second law of thermodynamics, from around 1860 to 1920. According to the second law of thermodynamics, as formulated by the German physicist Rudolf Clausius, the entropy of any closed system will inevitably increase in time, meaning that the system will decay and eventually end in a dead state of equilibrium. Application of the law to the entire universe, first proposed in the 1850s, led to the prediction of a future 'heat death', where all life has ceased and all organization dissolved. In the late 1860s it was pointed out that, as a consequence of the heat death scenario, the universe can have existed only for a finite period of time. According to the 'entropic creation argument', thermodynamics warrants the conclusion that the world once begun or was created. It is these two scenarios, allegedly consequences of the science of thermodynamics, which form the core of this book. The heat death and the claim of cosmic creation were widely discussed in the period 1870 to 1920, with participants in the debate including European scientists, intellectuals and social critics, among them the physicist William Thomson and the communist thinker Friedrich Engels. One reason for the passion of the debate was that some authors used the law of entropy increase to argue for a divine creation of the world. Consequently, the second law of thermodynamics became highly controversial. In Germany in particular, materialists and positivists engaged in battle with Christian - mostly Catholic - scholars over the cosmological consequences of thermodynamics. This heated debate, which is today largely forgotten, is reconstructed and examined in detail in this book, bringing into focus key themes on the interactions between cosmology, physics, religion and ideology, and the public way in which these topics were discussed in the latter half of the nineteenth and the first years of the twentieth century.
Author: Helge S. Kragh
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317142489
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 278
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Book Description
Entropic Creation is the first English-language book to consider the cultural and religious responses to the second law of thermodynamics, from around 1860 to 1920. According to the second law of thermodynamics, as formulated by the German physicist Rudolf Clausius, the entropy of any closed system will inevitably increase in time, meaning that the system will decay and eventually end in a dead state of equilibrium. Application of the law to the entire universe, first proposed in the 1850s, led to the prediction of a future 'heat death', where all life has ceased and all organization dissolved. In the late 1860s it was pointed out that, as a consequence of the heat death scenario, the universe can have existed only for a finite period of time. According to the 'entropic creation argument', thermodynamics warrants the conclusion that the world once begun or was created. It is these two scenarios, allegedly consequences of the science of thermodynamics, which form the core of this book. The heat death and the claim of cosmic creation were widely discussed in the period 1870 to 1920, with participants in the debate including European scientists, intellectuals and social critics, among them the physicist William Thomson and the communist thinker Friedrich Engels. One reason for the passion of the debate was that some authors used the law of entropy increase to argue for a divine creation of the world. Consequently, the second law of thermodynamics became highly controversial. In Germany in particular, materialists and positivists engaged in battle with Christian - mostly Catholic - scholars over the cosmological consequences of thermodynamics. This heated debate, which is today largely forgotten, is reconstructed and examined in detail in this book, bringing into focus key themes on the interactions between cosmology, physics, religion and ideology, and the public way in which these topics were discussed in the latter half of the nineteenth and the first years of the twentieth century.
Author: Danny Faulkner
Publisher: New Leaf Publishing Group
ISBN: 0890514151
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 251
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Book Description
"The universe was created with purpose and reason; and modern science with all of its experiments, exploration, and sophistication has ever proven otherwise. In fact, as author Dr. Danny Faulkner makes plain, advanced science argues more for a created cosmology than a big bang"--Cover page 4.
Author: Paul Halpern
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541673611
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 304
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Book Description
A respected physics professor and author breaks down the great debate over the Big Bang and the continuing quest to understand the fate of the universe. Today, the Big Bang is so entrenched in our understanding of the cosmos that to doubt it would seem crazy. But as Paul Halpern shows in Flashes of Creation, just decades ago its mere mention caused sparks to fly. At the center of the debate were Russian American physicist George Gamow and British astrophysicist Fred Hoyle. Gamow insisted that a fiery explosion explained how the elements of the universe were created. Attacking the idea as half-baked, Hoyle countered that the universe was engaged in a never-ending process of creation. The battle was fierce. In the end, Gamow turned out to be right -- mostly -- and Hoyle, along with his many achievements, is remembered for giving the theory the silliest possible name: "The Big Bang." Halpern captures the brilliance of both thinkers and reminds us that even those proved wrong have much to teach us about boldness, imagination, and the universe itself.
Author: Kyle Greenwood
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 0830898700
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 255
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Book Description
Kyle Greenwood introduces readers to ancient Near Eastern cosmology and the ways in which the Bible speaks within that context. He then traces the way the Bible was read through Aristotelian and Copernican cosmologies and discusses how its ancient conceptions should be understood in light of Scripture?s authority and contemporary science.
Author: John H. Walton
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 1575066548
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 229
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Book Description
The ancient Near Eastern mode of thought is not at all intuitive to us moderns, but our understanding of ancient perspectives can only approach accuracy when we begin to penetrate ancient texts on their own terms rather than imposing our own world view. In this task, we are aided by the ever-growing corpus of literature that is being recovered and analyzed. After an introduction that presents some of the history of comparative studies and how it has been applied to the study of ancient texts in general and cosmology in particular, Walton focuses in the first half of this book on the ancient Near Eastern texts that inform our understanding about ancient ways of thinking about cosmology. Of primary interest are the texts that can help us discern the parameters of ancient perspectives on cosmic ontology—that is, how the writers perceived origins. Texts from across the ancient Near East are presented, including primarily Egyptian, Sumerian, and Akkadian texts, but occasionally also Ugaritic and Hittite, as appropriate. Walton’s intention, first of all, is to understand the texts but also to demonstrate that a functional ontology pervaded the cognitive environment of the ancient Near East. This functional ontology involves more than just the idea that ordering the cosmos was the focus of the cosmological texts. He posits that, in the ancient world, bringing about order and functionality was the very essence of creative activity. He also pays close attention to the ancient ideology of temples to show the close connection between temples and the functioning cosmos. The second half of the book is devoted to a fresh analysis of Genesis 1:1–2:4. Walton offers studies of significant Hebrew terms and seeks to show that the Israelite texts evidence a functional ontology and a cosmology that is constructed with temple ideology in mind, as in the rest of the ancient Near East. He contends that Genesis 1 never was an account of material origins but that, as in the rest of the ancient world, the focus of “creation texts” was to order the cosmos by initiating functions for the components of the cosmos. He further contends that the cosmology of Genesis 1 is founded on the premise that the cosmos should be understood in temple terms. All of this is intended to demonstrate that, when we read Genesis 1 as the ancient document it is, rather than trying to read it in light of our own world view, the text comes to life in ways that help recover the energy it had in its original context. At the same time, it provides a new perspective on Genesis 1 in relation to what have long been controversial issues. Far from being a borrowed text, Genesis 1 offers a unique theology, even while it speaks from the platform of its contemporaneous cognitive environment.
Author: George Gamow
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 0486165485
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 178
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Book Description
Lively and authoritative, this survey by a renowned physicist explains the formation of the galaxies and defines the concept of an ever-expanding universe in simple terms. 1961 edition. 40 figures.
Author: Natan Slifkin
Publisher: Zoo Torah
ISBN: 1933143150
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 367
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Book Description
The Challenge of Creation is a completely revised and vastly expanded edition of The Science Of Torah. That work was widely hailed as the best book of its kind for its honesty and thoroughness of approach. The Challenge of Creation builds upon its approach, covering more issues and in greater depth. Carefully, methodically, and eschewing sensationalistic or dogmatic claims in favor of reasoned analysis, it shows how some of the greatest Jewish thinkers explained Judaism and Genesis in a way that complements modern science rather than conflicts with it. The Challenge of Creation is an invaluable resource for anyone grappling with conflicts between science and religion. It is a profound work that is sure to become a classic
Author: Steve Zeitlin
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780805048162
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 148
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Book Description
A collection of folk stories from around the world, each accompanied by background information, that explain the various perspectives of different peoples on how the universe and their world came to be.
Author: Robert C. Bishop
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 0830891641
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 690
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Book Description
From five authors with over two decades of experience teaching origins together in the classroom, this is the first textbook to offer a full-fledged discussion of the scientific narrative of origins from the Big Bang through humankind, from biblical and theological perspectives. This work gives the reader a detailed picture of mainstream scientific theories of origins along with how they fit into the story of God's creative and redemptive action.
Author: John Leslie
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 380
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Book Description
Did the universe originate from a "big bang" as argued by leading astrophysicists and others? Or does some other theory more accurately describe its beginnings? Are there other forms of life in the universe? What about other universes? This volume discusses these and other topics in this hotly debated area where philosophy and science meet.
