Science Proves God!

Following is borrowed from a seminar “New Scientific Evidence for the Existence of God” by Astrophysicist Dr. Hugh Ross given in 1994

The Extreme Precision of Physical Constants

Electromagnatism

Unless the force of electromagnetism takes on a particular value, molecules won't happen. If the force electromagnetism is too weak, the electron will not orbit the nucleus. If electrons cannot orbit nuclei, then electrons cannot be shared so that nuclei can come together to form molecules. Without molecules, we have no life.If the force electromagnetism is too strong, the nuclei will hang onto their electrons with such strength that the electrons will not be shared with adjoining nuclei and again, molecules will never form.

Strong Nuclear Force

Protons and neutrons are held together in the nucleus of an atom by the strong nuclear force, which is the strongest of the four forces of physics. If the nuclear force is too strong, the protons and neutrons in the universe will find themselves stuck to other protons and neutrons, which means we have a universe devoid of Hydrogen. Hydrogen is the element composed of the bachelor proton. Without Hydrogen, there's no life chemistry. On the other hand, if we make the nuclear force slightly weaker, none of the protons and neutrons will stick together. All of the protons and neutrons will be bachelors, in which case the only element that would exist in the universe would be Hydrogen.

It's so sensitive that if we were to make this force 3/10 of 1% stronger or 2% weaker, life would be impossible at any time in the universe.

Mass of the Proton and Neutron

The neutron is 0.138% more massive than the proton. Because of this, it takes a little more energy for the universe to make neutrons, as compared to protons. That's why in the universe of today we have seven times as many protons as neutrons. If the neutron were 1/10th of 1% less massive than what we observe, then the universe would make so many neutrons that all of the matter in the universe would very quickly collapse into neutron stars and black holes, and life would be impossible. If we made the neutron 1/10th of 1% more massive than what we observe, then the universe would make so few neutrons, that there wouldn't be enough neutrons to make Carbon, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, etc. So, we must delicately balance that mass to within 1/10 th of 1%, or life is impossible.

Electrons

In order for life to exist in the universe, the force of gravity must be 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 to the 40th power) times weaker than the force of electromagnetism. It's essential that the force of gravity be incredibly weak compared to the other three forces of physics.

Gravity

Yet planets, stars and galaxies will not form unless gravity is dominant in the universe, so the universe must be set up in such a way that the other forces of physics cancel out and leave gravity, the weakest of the forces, dominant. It's necessary for the universe to be electrically neutral. The numbers of the positively charged particles must be equivalent to the numbers of negatively charged particles or else electromagnetism will dominate gravity, and stars, galaxies and planets will never form. The numbers of electrons must equal the numbers of protons to better than one part of 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (10 to the 37 th power).

Earth: An Insignificant Speck?

Mass of the Universe

Astronomers have discovered that the total mass of the universe acts as a catalyst for nuclear fusion and the more massive the universe is, the more efficiently nuclear fusion operates in the cosmos. If the universe is too massive, the mass density too great, then very quickly all the matter in the universe is converted from Hydrogen into elements heavier than iron, which would render life impossible because the universe would be devoid of Carbon, Oxygen, Nitrogen, etc. If the universe has too little mass, then fusion would work so inefficiently that all that the universe would ever produce would be Hydrogen, or Hydrogen plus a small amount of Helium. But there again, the Carbon and Oxygen we need for life would be missing.

We live in a Special Solar System, Too

It's not that easy to get the right galaxy. Life can only happen on late born stars. If it's a first or second-generation star, then life is impossible because you don't yet have the heavy elements necessary for life chemistry. There's a narrow window of time in the history of the universe when life can happen. If the universe is too old or too young, life is impossible. Only spiral galaxies produce stars late enough in their history that they can take advantage of the elements that are essential for life history, and only 6% of the galaxies in our universe are spiral galaxies.

Besides Hydrogen and Helium, the other elements are made in the cores of super giant stars. Super giant stars burn up quickly; they're gone in a just a few million years. When they go through the final stages of burning up their fuel, they explode ashes into outer space, and future generations of stars will absorb those ashes.

Births & Deaths of Multiple Stars Required to have Metals in Earth's Crust

When those stars go through their burning phase, they will take that heavy element ash material. This time when they explode, they make a whole bunch of material, capable of forming rocky planets and supporting life chemistry.

But we want these supernovae exploding early in the history of the galaxy. We don't want them going off now. If the star Cereus goes Super Nova, we're in serious trouble because it's only eight light years away. It would exterminate life on our planet.

We observe in our galaxy that there was a burst of Super Nova explosions early in its history, but it tapered off to where it isn't a threat to life that is now in existence. The Super Nova explosions took place in the right quantity and in the right locations so that life could happen here on Earth.

Life is impossible in the center of our galaxy, or in the heel of our galaxy. It's only possible at a distance 2/3 from the center of our galaxy.The stars at the center of our galaxy are jammed so tightly together that the mutual gravity would destroy the planetary orbits. Moreover, their synchrotron radiation would be destructive to life molecules. But we don't want to be too far away from the center, either. If we get too far away, then there aren't enough heavy elements from the exploded remains of supernovae to enable life chemistry to proceed.

There's one life essential element that the supernovae do not make, however, and that's Fluorine. Fluorine is made only on the surfaces of white dwarf binaries. A white dwarf is a burned out star. It's like a cinder in a fireplace, just glowing. Orbiting this white dwarf is a star that hasn't yet exhausted its nuclear fuel. It's an ordinary star, like our Sun. The white dwarf has enough mass relative to the ordinary star orbiting around it that it is capable of pulling mass off of the surface of the ordinary star and dragging it down so that it falls on its surface. When that material falls on the surface of the while dwarf, it ignites some very interesting nuclear reactions that produce Fluorine. We need a white dwarf binary whose gravitational interactions between the white dwarf and the ordinary star are such that a strong enough stellar wind is sent from the white dwarf to blast the Fluorine beyond the gravitational pull of both stars, putting it into outer space, so that future generations of stars can absorb it. Then we have enough Fluorine for life chemistry.

A Trillion Galaxies - but as far as physicists know, only ours can support life

Two American astrophysicists concluded about a year ago that rare indeed is the galaxy that has the right number of this special kind white dwarf binary pair in the right location, occurring at the right time, so that life can exist today. The universe contains a trillion galaxies. But ours may be the only one that has the necessary conditions for life to exist.

We can't have a star any bigger than our Sun. The bigger the star, the more rapidly and erratically it burns its fuel. Our Sun is just small enough to keep a stable enough flame for a sufficient period of time to make life possible. If it were any bigger, we couldn't have life on planet Earth. If it were any smaller, we'd be in trouble, too.

Smaller stars are even more stable than our star, the Sun, but they don't burn as hot. In order to keep our planet at the right temperature necessary to sustain life, we'd have to bring the planet closer to the star.

Tidal Forces

The physicists in the audience realize that when you bring a planet closer to its star, the tidal interaction between the star and the planet goes up to the inverse fourth power to the distance separating them. For those of you who are not physicists, that means that all you have to do is bring that planet ever so much closer to the star, and the tidal forces could be strong enough to break the rotational period.

That's what happened to Mercury and Venus. Those planets are too close to the Sun; so close that their rotational periods have been broken, from several hours to several months.
Earth is just barely far enough away to avoid that breaking. We have a rotation period of once every 24 hours. If we wait much longer, it will be every 26 or 28 hours, because the Earth's rotation rate is slowing down. Going back in history, we can measure the time when the Earth was rotating every 20 hours. When the Earth was rotating once every 20 hours, human life was not possible. If it rotates once every 28 hours, human life will not be possible. It can only happen at 24 hours.

Speed of Earth's Rotation

If the planet rotates too quickly, you get too many tornadoes and hurricanes. If it rotates too slowly, it gets too cold at night and too hot during the day. We don't want it to be 170 degrees during the day, nor do we want it to be below –100 at night, because that's not ideal for life.

We need the right Earth. If the Earth is too massive, it retains a bunch of gases such as Ammonia, Methane, Hydrogen and Helium in its atmosphere. These gases are not acceptable for life, at least, not for advanced life. But if it's not massive enough, it won't retain water. For life to exist on planet Earth, we need a huge amount of water, but we don't need a lot of ammonia and methane.

Remember high school chemistry? Methane's molecular weight 16, ammonia's molecular weight 17, water's molecular weight is 18. God so designed planet Earth that we keep lots of the 18, but we don't keep any of the 16 or the 17. The incredible fine-tuning of the physical characteristics of Earth is necessary for that.

Jupiter Necessary, too

Unless you have a very massive planet like Jupiter, five times more distant from the star than the planet that has life, life will not exist on that planet. It takes a super massive planet like Jupiter, located where it is, to act as a shield, guarding the Earth from comic collisions. We don't want a comet colliding with Earth every week. What astrophysicists discovered in their models of planetary formation was that it's a very rare star system indeed that produces a planet as massive as Jupiter, in the right location, to act as such a shield.

We Even Need the Right Moon

The Earth's moon system is that of a small planet being orbited by a huge, single moon. That huge, single moon has the effect of stabilizing the rotation axis of planet Earth to 23½ degrees. That's the ideal tilt for life on planet Earth. The axis on planet Mars moves through a tilt from zero to 60 degrees and flips back and forth. If that were to happen on Earth, life would be impossible. Thanks to the Moon, it's held stable at 23 ½ degrees.

At Least 41 Fine-Tuned Characteristics, to have One Planet that Supports Life

The bottom line to all of this is that we have 41 characteristics of the solar system that must be fine-tuned for life to exist. But even if the universe contains as many planets as it does stars, which is a gross overestimate in my opinion, that still leaves us with less than one chance in a billion trillion that you'd find even one planet in the entire universe with the capacity for supporting life.