Jason Lisle: Looked up to by his folllowers
Fundamentalist Christian and YEC guru Jason Lisle has yet to publish his
promised blog posts on the relation between gravity and his solution to the YEC
starlight problem. So, I thought, I’d better keep the matter on the simmer just in
case it gets forgotten. Lisle’s
promise of blog posts are found in a comment he added to one of his other posts.
In this same comment he also gives us his one liner refutation of the objection
that his cosmology entails a gravitational field:
Missing gravitational field: I
had already planned to deal with this in detail in a future blog entry. But the
short answer is: no, ASC does not require a gravitational field. It is simply a
coordinate transformation from the ESC. And coordinate transformations do not
introduce any real forces.
Well yes, you can do almost anything with coordinate systems. In some
coordinate systems objects can look completely distorted or time can run backwards. So, right, ASC doesn't generate a gravitational field. But as Lisle will tell us
there is a difference between his Anisotropic Synchrony Convention (ASC) and his Anisotropic
Synchrony Model. It is when Lisle
moves over to a model rather than a
mere convention that the question of
a gravitational field ultimately arises.
Below I've reproduced one of Lisle’s recent blog comments that impinge
on this matter along with my inevitable interleaved comments. (See the comments section of his post titled Are you Epistemologically Self-Conscious? and dated 6 September 2013)
***
LISLE: Hello
and welcome back.
My Comment: Welcome back? I'm not sure Lisle is the sort
of person to whom I could reciprocate a welcome. I don’t think he compares well
with the more self-critical and self-aware YECs one finds on Uncommon Descent and others like
Paul Nelson who, as far as I can tell, are reasonable evangelicals unlikely to assassinate detractors character's on the heretic's pyre. Lisle, on
the other hand, comes out of the “hell and hamnation” stable of AiG and
Ken Ham, where we find an abrasive religious ethos. Here a strict
observance based faith means that charges of heresy and disobedience to God’s
very words come as naturally as the bad language used in some secularist circles.
(See here and here for example). Lisle, like Ken Ham, takes his cue from Romans 1 and is likely to believe that those who disagree with him are wilfully suppressing the truth in unrighteousness; this belief has the effect of sanctioning the wanton character defamation of detractors.
LISLE There
has been much confusion regarding the difference between the anisotropic
synchrony convention (ASC), and the anisotropic synchrony model (ASM). The
conventionality thesis notes that the one-way speed of light is not measurable
and not even meaningful apart from a defined synchrony convention – and such a
convention is tantamount to defining the one-way speed of light. In other
words, we get to choose the one-way speed of light (within certain constraints)
and then this tells us how to synchronize clocks. The ASC convention has the
one-way speed of light moving infinitely fast toward a given observer (not
necessarily earth, though it happens that all human observers are currently on
earth). Thus, ASC, by itself, does not require any special position for
anything in the universe. If an observer were in the Andromeda Galaxy M31, he
would measure light moving infinitely fast toward him, if he uses ASC. So, ASC
does not require anything in the universe to be in a special position.
When it comes to conventions, we
are free to choose. We can use ASC, or the more commonly used Einstein
Synchrony Convention (ESC). As long as we are consistent, all physics will be
self-consistent and consistent with all observations. It’s just as we can use
the metric system or the English system to measure distances. However, if we
are to switch systems, we must do a conversion
My comment: Nothing wrong here, and he is right about the
confusions of ASC and ASM. But therein is the rub; Lisle’s ignorant lay followers
are so totally fazed by it all that they think Lisle has worked an
intellectual miracle by pulling an infinite speed of light out of the hat. It’s what Lisle doesn't tell them that’s the
problem. In particular, notice the sentence about M31; nothing wrong with that technically
but to the layman it shields the cosmic asymmetry in Lisle’s ASM. This
asymmetry comes out very clearly in Sam Trendholme’s elegant thought experiment.
According to Lisle’s ASC model it
follows that at this moment in time
light (and presumably gravity?) from our galaxy hasn't yet reached M31, but
clearly not vice versa. This asymmetry leads to Lisle’s irrational cosmological
model where he has to posit in-transit-signal-creation
.
.
LISLE: My
theory is that the Bible uses the ASC system and not the ESC system, partly
because the latter was not invented or used until very recent times. But ASC
was implicitly used by all ancient cultures. Since the Bible was written to be
understood, it would make sense for the Lord to use the ASC system which could
have been understood at any time in any culture, and to use Earth as the point
of reference.
My comment: Does the Bible use ASC? I once thought that
this statement by Lisle was at least arguable, but on second thoughts I'm not
so sure. The writers of those ancient times probably thought that distant events
are notified to sight across space instantaneously
in all directions – translating that
in our modern terms this implies a two-way
instantaneous transmission of a signal. But having said that I suspect the
ancients didn't even think in terms of a signal travelling to the eye but
rather in terms of a direct and instantaneous apprehension of an object. For
example, I have recently published a blog post on a primitive YEC who seems to have an intuitive view of
sight notification as a two-way instantaneous affair and which doesn't involve
the transmission of a signal. So, the implicit human historical meanings that lay behind
the Biblical text are likely to be wrong with respect to modern scientific ontology;
these ancients may well have thought in terms of a two-way instantaneous sight
notification. But then Genesis is not to be judged against the criteria of
modern scientific ontology but rather the common sense ontology of pre-scientific
writers who were concerned with mythological religious polemic and wouldn't
know what Lisle was talking about if he told them they were using ASC!
LISLE: Any
system of synchronization must specify a reference position (by ASC) or a
reference velocity (by ESC). There is no getting around that because of the
physics of relativity – e.g. there is no absolute, observer-independent
synchrony scheme. Assuming that I'm right, and the Bible uses ASC, then when
the text states that God made the stars on the fourth day of the creation week,
this would mean that they were all created at the same time by ASC reckoning
from Earth’s position. And they would be instantly visible to anyone on Earth.
On the other hand, if the Bible uses ESC and the stars were made on day 4 by
ESC reckoning, then this means that the stars were made at the same time as
defined by Earth’s velocity on day 4. So either way, the Earth is used as a
reference frame for our benefit. This does not necessarily imply a special
position for Earth (though it does not deny it either).
My Comment: Yes, ASC doesn't imply a general geocentricity in
itself, but ASM certainly does!
LISLE: Now,
why should we accept ASM? Well, it’s a model and not something that the Bible
directly teaches. So perhaps we shouldn't. However, I think it is the model
that is the most consistent with the data and compatible with the history
recorded in Scripture. You asked if there are reasons outside my interpretation
of Scripture. First, my interpretation of Scripture is not the issue, but
rather how the Scriptures interpret the Scriptures. It could be that I'm mistaken in my reading of the text and if I have violated a rule of
hermeneutics, I welcome correction. In any case, I believe the text is quite
clear that God created the universe in 6-days, with the stars being made on the
fourth day. Since God was the only one there at the time, it makes sense to
rely upon His testimony of the events.
My Comment: Here Lisle does no justice to the fact that Genesis,
like the rest of the Bible, was penned in the context of a people who no doubt had
a very different understanding of their world to ourselves – this, what is to us an alien understanding, is implicit in the meaning behind the Biblical texts. But like a lot of other Westerners
Lisle will likely be a dualist who underrates the immanence of God, a God who
is Sovereign in managing the choreography of all that happens under the Sun
(and we must add in this day and age, and well beyond the Sun!). This management
will cover all those delicately poised neural thresholds in the human mind, a mind that in an act of mythological creation wrote the first chapters of Genesis as a polemical attack on the
religion of the day .
Notice Lisle’s common fundamentalist misconception of Bible reading, viz: "The Scriptures interprets Scripture."
This is an epistemic cliché that does the rounds in fundamentalist circles and which
is seldom critically scrutinised. It is based on an unspoken motivation to make
the scriptures a kind of self-contained closed universe of meaning and
interpretation. But Scripture being language does not literally “contain”
meaning. Meaning is an extrinsic not
intrinsic property of language, a property which it gains through its relationship with its
context. The Scriptural texts are, in fact, sequences of symbolic
triggers of meaning that necessarily exploit the resources of their social and
cultural environment in order to generate that meaning. Like many fundamentalists
Lisle’s understanding of language is still at the kind of primitive stage that corresponds
to this YEC’s concept of sight notification. Like sight itself Scripture is not a direct revelation
of God that does without intervening layers of signal and interpretation; by
its very nature, being language, Scripture cannot work in a cultural vacuum. The
upshot is that humanity’s appropriation of revelation through scripture is
still partial (1 Corinthians 13).
And finally let me just note in passing that trying to tie hermeneutics down to a set of "rules" is also rather silly.
And finally let me just note in passing that trying to tie hermeneutics down to a set of "rules" is also rather silly.
LISLE: Second,
apart from the Scriptures, there would be no basis for science anyway. That is,
we would have no rational justification for the inductive principle upon which
all science is based. As a clumsy analogy, it’s a bit like saying, “apart from
data collected in telescopes, do we really have any good reasons to believe in
most of what we read in astronomy textbooks?” Perhaps not. But then again,
there really is no good reason to reject the data collected in telescopes any
more than there is any good reason to reject the history recorded in the Bible.
Rejecting either would undermine our rational confidence in knowing just about
anything about astronomy.
My Comment: I may have a general sympathy with Lisle here:
Without a belief in God as a benevolent and personal benefactor we lose a cognitive
corner stone which means our thinking, epistemology, concomitant ontologies and the whole basis of our rationality have a tendency to crumble into nihilism along with all that we think we
know. And yet, ... and yet Lisle presides over his irrational signal-creation-in-transit
cosmology!
LISLE: Third,
putting aside the above points, ASM accounts for observations in a way that is
better than secular models – such as the expectation of evidences of “youth” at
all distances in space. By “youth” I mean things that cannot last billions of
years, such as spiral galaxies or blue O-type stars. And indeed, these are
found at all distances in space.
My Comment: Notice that Lisle doesn't tell us what precisely classifies as “youth”. After all, recall that as far as Lisle is concerned
anything much over 10,000 years old would classify as “old” and conflict with
his views. As far as I'm aware not enough is yet known about galactic dynamics
to start making pronouncements about a 6000 year old universe. Moreover, even
if galaxies “wind up” they would take millions of years, and not a mere 6000
years, to do so! But YECs like Lisle are
on an anti-science crusade and it is therefore deemed sufficient by them to
simply engage in a negative attack on established science without coming up
with any positive evidence for a 6000 year old universe. (See here for similar misconceptions:
http://quantumnonlinearity.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/an-email-from-fundamentalist.html
)
LISLE: Fourth,
although ASM does not require Earth to be in any special position, there is
indeed evidence suggesting that our solar system has a privileged position in
the universe. This is the research project I'm working on currently here at
ICR. And we have not yet completed our analysis, but hope to have some results
in a few months. So stay tuned.
My comment: Surely Lisle must have meant to write “ASC” rather
than “ASM”? …..because clearly his ASM is radically geocentric! As Lisle makes
clear in his original paper, ESC requires the Earth to be near the centre of a
set of concentric shells of creation that would have started at the outer
reaches of the cosmos billions of years ago, with finally the Earth’s immediate
vicinity only being created around 6000 years ago. This, of course, means that
light from the vicinity of the Earth (and presumably gravitational influence as
well?) hasn't reached beyond a shell of 6000 light years! The rest of the
universe can’t yet see us or feel(?) us! Radically asymmetric indeed! So, I'm not at all surprised that Lisle is lurching toward a form of geocentrism. In fact might he be looking for that gravitational field after all?!
LISLE: I
hope this helps.
My comment: Helped? Most likely it has help lead Lisle’s
followers, who hang on his words, further up the garden path of confusion. Like
garden paths in general, it’s going nowhere.
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