Let their be light

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/05/01/spark-life-science-and-bible-meet-again.html

For me, images released recently by Northwestern University scientists of tiny light flashes signaling the moment of human conception are evocative of a larger, cosmic-sized truth espoused by both science and the Bible. Namely, the creation of the universe itself – the mother of all moments of conception – was likewise marked by an explosion of light.

According to their article in Scientific Reports, the Northwestern researchers collected immature human eggs from willing female patients at the Fertility Center of Illinois – eggs that would have been discarded in the normal course of the patients’ fertility treatments. The researchers used special chemicals to mimic the moments of conception – the law forbidding them to use actual sperm. In each case, they discovered, the decisive moment was accompanied by a small burst of zinc atoms. The eruptions appeared as flashes of light because of fluorescing agents used by the scientists.

According to science – at precisely a moment of conception known as recombination & decoupling – an incomprehensible outburst of light accompanied the creation of hydrogen and helium, the first atoms of the embryonic cosmos. To this day, the dim afterglow of that seminal light – the so-called cosmic microwave background – is visible to certain kinds of powerful telescopes.

According to inflation and big bang theories, it didn’t end there. Hydrogen atoms eventually began to fuse, the way they do in a hydrogen bomb, and – voila! – once again, in a flash of light, the first stars came into being. They, in turn – like colossal stoves – cooked up the heavier elements known to us today. Including the zinc atoms that explode, like fireworks, every time a human being is conceived.

I find it notable that the Bible agrees with science that the universe was conceived in a paroxysm of illumination – I imagine, unlike anything we’ve ever seen. According to Genesis 1:3, that event happened at exactly the moment God uttered the immortal words, “Let there be light.”

The Bible’s explanation of things goes even further, by actually assigning a sacred status to light. In 1 John 1:5, light is identified with the Creator himself: “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”

Scientists don’t use that sort of language, of course, but amazingly, they do agree that light very definitely has a transcendent status. It wasn’t always the case, though: scientists made that discovery only relatively recently.

The momentous change of heart began in 1905, when an unknown outsider named Albert Einstein published his heretical theory of special relativity. According to Einstein, contrary to what scientists had always believed, light experiences a reality wholly unlike the one you and I do – inhabits an otherworldly realm where, among other things, the commonplace laws of space and time are not obeyed. Like God, if you will, light transcends the restrictions of the ordinary, physical world.

Scientists were slow in coming around to believe Einstein’s heterodoxy. But today, it is a key component of the modern scientific catechism.

Like the Bible, therefore, science now agrees that whenever we interact with light, we interact with something that is at once in this world, but not of this world. Chief among these divine-like encounters are those instances when light makes abrupt, attention-getting appearances. Like a moment of creation when something truly special suddenly comes into existence that wasn’t there before – be it a human embryo, a star, or an entire universe.



Michael Guillen’s newest book "Amazing Truths: How Science and the Bible Agree" (HarperCollins) will be released on February 9, 2016. Born in East Los Angeles, he earned his BS from UCLA and his MS and PhD from Cornell University in physics, mathematics and astronomy. For 8 years he was an award-winning physics instructor at Harvard University. For 14 years he was the Emmy-award-winning science correspondent for ABC News, appearing regularly on "Good Morning America," "20/20," "Nightline," and "World News Tonight." Dr. Guillen is the host of the History Channel series, "Where Did It Come From?" and producer of the award-winning family movie "LITTLE RED WAGON." For more information, go to www.michaelguillen.com.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2009/jul/17/human-bioluminescence

Amazing pictures of "glittering" human bodies have been released by Japanese scientists who have captured the first ever images of human "bioluminescence".

Although it has been known for many years that all living creatures produce a small amount of light as a result of chemical reactions within their cells, this is the first time light produced by humans has been captured on camera.

Writing in the online journal PLoS ONE, the researchers describe how they imaged volunteers' upper bodies using ultra-sensitive cameras over a period of several days. Their results show that the amount of light emitted follows a 24-hour cycle, at its highest in late afternoon and lowest late at night, and that the brightest light is emitted from the cheeks, forehead and neck.

Strangely, the areas that produced the brightest light did not correspond with the brightest areas on thermal images of the volunteers' bodies.

The light is a thousand times weaker than the human eye can perceive. At such a low level, it is unlikely to serve any evolutionary purpose in humans – though when emitted more strongly by animals such as fireflies, glow-worms and deep-sea fish, it can be used to attract mates and for illumination.

Bioluminescence is a side-effect of metabolic reactions within all creatures, the result of highly reactive free radicals produced through cell respiration interacting with free-floating lipids and proteins. The "excited" molecules that result can react with chemicals called fluorophores to emit photons.

Human bioluminescence has been suspected for years, but until now the cameras required to detect such dim light sources took over an hour to capture a single image and so were unable to measure the constantly fluctuating light from living creatures.

While the practical applications of the discovery are hard to imagine, one can't help wondering what further surprises the human body has in store for us.

Originally posted by whodey
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/05/01/spark-life-science-and-bible-meet-again.html

For me, images released recently by Northwestern University scientists of tiny light flashes signaling the moment of human conception are evocative of a larger, cosmic-sized truth espoused by both science and the Bible. Namely, the creation of the universe itself – the m ...[text shortened]... ard-winning family movie "LITTLE RED WAGON." For more information, go to www.michaelguillen.com.

The "light" was produced by "fluorescing agent" used by the scientists. So it wasn't real.

Are you aware that light visible to the human eye is just one narrow part of an extremely broad electromagnetic spectrum which contains infra-red light, invisible to the human eye, but which emanates from humans, animals and in fact anything. It is visible to detectors when the heat of the subject is higher than the ambient temperature.

Originally posted by divegeester
The "light" was produced by "fluorescing agent" used by the scientists. So it wasn't real.

And it wasn't conception either, so no 'soul' could have been present, unless God got confused.

Originally posted by divegeester
Are you aware that light visible to the human eye is just one narrow part of an extremely broad electromagnetic spectrum which contains infra-red light, invisible to the human eye, but which emanates from humans, animals and in fact anything. It is visible to detectors when the heat of the subject is higher than the ambient temperature.

Yes, the second article (which incidentally is from 2009) is not about bio-luminescence at all but about black body radiation.

I'm probably going to get bitch-slapped and accused of all manner of treachery and treason by the other Christians here, but commentary like this is excruciatingly embarrassing:

"Like the Bible, therefore, science now agrees that whenever we interact with light, we interact with something that is at once in this world, but not of this world. Chief among these divine-like encounters are those instances when light makes abrupt, attention-getting appearances. Like a moment of creation when something truly special suddenly comes into existence that wasn’t there before – be it a human embryo, a star, or an entire universe."

Every day (on a nice clear day) we get out of bed and go outside and there is the sun beaming its "other-worldly" "not of this world" light down at us. This is not a "divine encounter" anymore than looking at proxima centuri is a "divine encounter".

Originally posted by whodey
https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2009/jul/17/human-bioluminescence

Amazing pictures of "glittering" human bodies have been released by Japanese scientists who have captured the first ever images of human "bioluminescence".

Although it has been known for many years that all living creatures produce a small amount of light as a result of chemical ...[text shortened]... to imagine, one can't help wondering what further surprises the human body has in store for us.

The 'let there be light' phrase is used by the Abrahamic religious set as if it were a projection of scientific truth, 'see, we told you so' kind of thing.

Technically, the BB did not come in with a flash of light.

It came in with an extremely fast build up of matter at extreme elevated temperatures and then cooled down but it was only 400,000 odd years later that light was ALLOWED to be seen.

Light was not the first thing going on in the early BB theory.

And of course you will respond with 'BB is just a theory'.

It does, however, answer a large number of already done astronomical observations.

It is an explanatory theory, and there are other's that try to do the same.

Regardless of how many others there are, the Abrahamic set will diss THAT ONE because they don't even know of the alternative theories.

AND they don't want to even KNOW about alternatives.

BB is not bible. Therefore it is wrong. By definition. ONLY the bible is right.

Originally posted by sonhouse
It came in with an extremely fast build up of matter at extreme elevated temperatures and then cooled down but it was only 400,000 odd years later that light was ALLOWED to be seen.

Light was not the first thing going on in the early BB theory.

Actually that is far from technically accurate.
There was light even in the very early stages. the particles themselves were born from energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation.
What you are talking about is light that can still be seen today.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Actually that is far from technically accurate.
There was light even in the very early stages. the particles themselves were born from energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation.
What you are talking about is light that can still be seen today.

Of course, photons were there but at every wavelength possible. We could never actually see if we were telekinetically transported to that era, we would in maybe a pico second, no, maybe a nanosecond or two, would just be a part of that soup and wouldn't see anything.

It is possible however, if we were telekinetically transported to the same scene but say a million years later, humans could see stuff without getting immediately fried, assuming they had good insulation and a nice thick glass to see through🙂

Originally posted by sonhouse
Of course, photons were there but at every wavelength possible.

Including light. Requiring humans to be there and physically be able to see it, is just ridiculous. That is like saying there is no light on the far side of the sun.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Including light. Requiring humans to be there and physically be able to see it, is just ridiculous. That is like saying there is no light on the far side of the sun.

I think what sonhouse is getting at is not that light was seen only 400,000 years (or whatever) after the BB, but rather than the early universe was so hot that light could not propagate (with or without any perceiving agent who might have seen it).

Originally posted by moonbus
I think what sonhouse is getting at is not that light was seen only 400,000 years (or whatever) after the BB, but rather than the early universe was so hot that light could not propagate (with or without any perceiving agent who might have seen it).

It wasn't because it was hot, it was because it was full of stuff. And yes, I am well aware that that is what he wanted to say. But there still was light. His argument was that there wasn't light, not that it couldn't propagate very far.
And the 400,000 year figure has to do with the universe becoming so sparsely populated with matter that light could then propagate essentially forever and be seen by us billions of years later. Well before that light would have been able to propagate appreciably large distances.

He said:

Technically, the BB did not come in with a flash of light.
Light was not the first thing going on in the early BB theory.

And technically he couldn't have been more wrong.

It depends a bit on how you define "light," of course. Photons were certainly there but, according to contemporary cosmological understanding, existed in a quark-gluon plasma. In such a state the energy density is so high that photon pairs may recombine into matter-antimatter pairs. This state is, needless to say, quite different from what we ordinarily call "light."

I should stop trying to second-guess what other posters might have meant and just let them speak for themselves.

Originally posted by KazetNagorra
It depends a bit on how you define "light," of course. Photons were certainly there but, according to contemporary cosmological understanding, existed in a quark-gluon plasma. In such a state the energy density is so high that photon pairs may recombine into matter-antimatter pairs. This state is, needless to say, quite different from what we ordinarily call "light."

Geneis 1:1
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.