Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Latter-day Saint
Was I the last to know?

Was I the last to know?

Last updated on: February 21, 2020 at 11:07 pm by Dan Peterson

Was I the last to know? 2020-02-21T23:07:19-07:00 Dan Peterson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A view at Dead Horse Point State Park, Utah. It’s a dismally ugly state, and utterly without interesting landscapes.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

I really hope that this idea will come to fruition:

“Utahraptor State Park would protect discovery site of Utah’s namesake dinosaur: Lawmaker seeks $10 million to establish Utah’s 45th state park, conserve world-famous fossil treasure trove”

***

“Climate change is slowly drying up the Colorado River: Average annual water flow dropped more than 11 percent over the last century due to warming”

Not to worry, though. We’ll always have fossils, and plaster of Paris:

“Hot, dry and not a fish in sight – now at least: Aquatic remains by the hundred found in Saharan rock shelter.”

“Economic costs of rising seas will be steeper than we thought, unless we prepare: A study estimates 4 percent in annual global GDP losses by 2100 unless coastal regions prepare”

But why prepare? Nature is pretty friendly.

“Bubonic plague: Mass grave shows how Black Death devastated the countryside: Grave in Lincolnshire dates to medieval pandemic of 1348 and reveals rural plague catastrophe”

***

A passage from Richard Panek’s The 4% Universe: Dark Matter, Dark Energy, and the Race to Discover the Rest of Reality that caught my eye. He’s talking about roughly December 1965, by which time, he says, the discovery by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson of the cosmic microwave background radiation that had been predicted as an after echo of the Big Bang had definitively altered the balance between Big Bang cosmology and Steady State models of the universe:

You could feel the shift, if you were an astronomer or physicist. Both the Steady State and Big Bang interpretations had relied not just on math and observation but on speculation. They were modern counterparts to Copernicus’s attempt to save the appearances; they were theories in need of evidence. And just as Galileo, with the aid of the telescope, had detected the celestial phenomena that decided between an Earth-centered and a Sun-centered cosmos, forcing us to reconceive the universe, so radio astronomers, with the aid of a new kind of telescope, were now detecting the evidence that decided between the Steady State and Big Bang cosmologies, necessitating a further reconception of the universe. (24)

It’s a matter of considerable autobiographical curiosity to me, however, that I didn’t feel the shift. I was still in elementary school in December of 1965. Not only did I hear nothing of the shift then — no big surprise, that — but I went all the way through high school graduation, if I’m not mistaken, still assuming that the fight between Steady State and Big Bang cosmologies was ongoing. I leaned toward the Big Bang, personally, because the idea of isolated atoms of hydrogen popping into existence at intervals out in space didn’t appeal to me at all. But I saw it as still an open question, when, in fact, it was closed, or rapidly closing.

In fact, I can’t really recall when it was that I woke up one day to realize that the debate was over. Was it before my mission? Perhaps not. I just don’t remember. But I remember that I was surprised. Not so much at the answer, but at how long it had taken to reach me. Had I been asleep? In a coma?

By then, of course, my interests had shifted to ancient and medieval history and languages, and if popular magazines like Discover existed then I wasn’t reading them. But still . . .

How long does it take — how long should it take — for news of such scientific turning points to percolate down to lay people such as myself?

Heck, I think that I was still visualizing electrons, protons, and neutrons as hard little submicroscopic billiard balls forming teensy tiny “solar systems” at the time that I graduated from high school. And that image, of course, was at least a generation or two obsolete.

Uncategorized

big bang

cosmology

steady state cosmology

steady-state

Previous Post

February 21, 2020

"First Visions and Last Sermons"

Next Post

February 21, 2020 "The Hermit and the Cat"

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 March 2014 August 2013 February 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Which Christian hymn is often called the most popular in history and was written by John Newton?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Amazing Grace Silent Night How Great Thou Art Onward Christian Soldiers