Cauality in Biblical Physics

In previous essays I compared scientific presuppositions and rules of evidence with those in biblical physics. It is helpful to compare causality in the two systems. Causal knowledge tends toward two opposite poles: natural or elaborated.

We observe how a bird's wings and tail move for flight and landing. The uncomplicated observer accepts that birds are by nature masters of flight. Wings and tails are obviously used to fly and maneuver. Using modest causality, we observe nature and its phenomena and accept what we see without mathematical theories.

History shows that those who look for more elaborate explanations often use erroneous principles. A principle is a basic assumption, comprehensive doctrine or foundational idea. Pagans accepted the principle that planet-gods influenced the earth and sky. Their principle suggested that a god drove the sun chariot. The Greek philosophers sought for geometrical explanations without planet-gods. They reasoned that the sun moved around the earth because circles were geometrically perfect. According to scientific causality, the sun seems to move because gravity and inertia influence earth's orbit and rotation. Yet they cannot explain the cause of gravity. Where does the power come from to accelerate the earth into an elliptical path?

Spontaneity is freedom from causality. It is natural, uninduced, wild. Relationships in nature function as organic wholes. For example, a caterpillar dissolves every cell in its body into an organic mush. Out of the mush, a new creature forms. We cannot prove a metamorphosis cause because it involves trillions of interacting complexities. We may detect the metamorphosis sequence, but no independent variables are seen. Even the dissolving enzyme suppresses parts of the DNA. What we see is relational change. No element in relational change causes relational change. In relational change, all entities change together.

A biblicist * should focus on simple explanations instead of mathematical theories, especially with regard to earth history. This is because the first principle of biblical physics contradicts the first principle of science. What is the first principle in biblical physics?

Romans 8:19 - 22 contains the particle "gar" three time. This word "gar" properly assigns a reason, as in arguments or explanations. Paul explains the reason. The creation, the original formation (ktisis), is passively and reflexively subordinated to corruption. It will someday be liberated from "douleias tês phthoras" its slavery to phthoras. The Greek philosophers used the word phthora for the process whereby everything, even matter, continually changes. In verse 22, Paul illustrated this universal corruption with two compound together words. Biblical physics stands on the biblical principle that all things change spontaneously, reflexively, change as a relation, change together. Relational changes are not logical. We cannot prove precise causes in a dynamic relationship. Yet we verify the biblical principle with sight. We can see the past all the way back to the beginning of the universe. No perpetual motion atoms gleam from hundreds of billions of primordial galaxies.


It is impossible to precisely define independent parts of a dynamic relationship because every part is dependent. A scientist might claim, "This is an electron; this is its mass; this it its charge; this is how electrons give atoms their form and chemical properties." Yet we cannot isolate the electron's properties without presupposing that what we measure are not changing relationally. Electrons can exhibit dual properties, seemingly changing into a wave that can pass through two slits. In some experiments, electrons can seemingly affect distant twins, exhibiting non local properties. This is what one would expect if electrons are not substance, but a relation with light. Clearly light affects an atom's volume, its clock frequencies and how it interacts with its environment. In biblical creation, matter was actualized by light. At first all the matter in the universe was in a transitory, formless stage until God commanded light to be.

How can we verify that matter always changes relationally since such changes are not measurable? It is visible. We observe the history of the universe in hundreds of billions of galaxies at many ranges, eras. Primordial galaxies were naked and packed with tiny stars. In billions of galaxies, at many closer ranges, we observe how spiral galaxies continually grew, as the stars and gas accelerate outward continually. What we see, with sight, violates every principle of science because every atom in the universe is observed to change as it ages, relationally. Since this does not fit the scientific first principle, scientists fill the universe with phantom matter and undetectable vacuum processes. Their universe is 99% invisible. Yet what is visible fits biblical cosmic history and biblical physics.

A reader may insist that atoms cannot change without a cause. Indeed the Bible provides a final cause for the universe's visible history.

Isaiah 44:24 - 25 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, and the one who formed you from the womb, "I, the LORD, am the maker of all things, Stretching out the heavens by Myself And spreading out the earth all alone, Causing the omens of boasters to fail, Making fools out of diviners, Causing wise men to draw back And turning their knowledge into foolishness."

Three Hebrew active participles describe how the starry heavens change in unbroken continuity. Asah (to continually make, to continually fashion), natah (to continually stretch out, extend) and raqa (to continually beat out, stamp out, spread out). We observe the history of how galaxies formed, not with mathematics, but with optics in all parts of the spectrum. What we see is what He says He continually does. The visible history of the universe, in contrast to its invisible, mathematical, scientific history, conforms to what He says He is doing.

Isaiah 40:26 "Lift up your eyes on high. And see who has created these stars, The One who leads forth their host by number, He calls them all by name; Because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, Not one of them is missing."

Look on the heavens and observe the ultimate cause of the continuously accelerating stars as they continuously spread out and come out of billions of primordial galaxies. We see creation as it happened long ago. We see those stars continually coming out as all matter visibly changes relationally. Look upon His great wisdom and limitless power. He even defeats science and turns it into foolishness. Every atom in the whole universe is observed to change relationally. Yet they follow their blind dogma that atoms are perpetual motion machines. Look!

* a biblicist is one who interprets the Bible literally.

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Last modified on October 23, 2008