Author: Jay Wile

Discovering Design With Physics

As I mentioned in my previous post, I haven’t been blogging much because I have been busy teaching classes and writing my new physics course, Discovering Design with Physics. However, that book is now at the printer, so I have more time for blogging. My previous post discussed how I begin and end the course, and now I want to give my readers an idea of what the differences are between my new physics course and the one that is still in print (Exploring Creation with Physics, 2nd Edition).

I wrote Exploring Creation with Physics, 2nd Edition almost 20 years ago, and while the material required for a college-prep physics course hasn’t changed since then, there have been some new developments in physics that are worth addressing. For example, over the past 11 years, the Voyager spacecrafts left our solar system. That is not only interesting in and of itself, but it is also a dramatic demonstration of Newton’s First Law of Motion. After all, they have been moving at roughly the same velocity since 1989, despite the fact that they haven’t used their fuel for propulsion since then! As another example, Pluto lost its status as a planet about 17 years ago. Thus, in this new physics book, it is not listed as one of the planets in the solar system.

More importantly, I decided to take a completely different approach in writing this new book. The “traditional” approach to physics is to start with the definitions of displacement, velocity, and acceleration. From there, you use equations to analyze motion in both one and two dimensions. After that, you then discuss Newton’s Laws, which actually dictate the behavior you have been using equations to analyze. That’s how I wrote Exploring Creation with Physics, 2nd Edition, because that’s the way every text from which I taught did it. However, I have never been happy with that approach. So for the new book, I decided to discuss displacement, velocity, and acceleration in the context of Newton’s Laws. That means the students learn about displacement and velocity in the context of Newton’s First Law, and then they learn about acceleration in the context of Newton’s Second and Third Laws. That way, the students learn why the motion being analyzed actually happens. The PhD physicist who reviewed the book for accuracy told me that this was a more satisfying treatment of motion.

In addition, I decided to take a new approach with the experiments as well. In the previous book, the students did several experiments where they were measuring things like acceleration, velocity, the period of a system’s motion, etc. Since those experiments involved measuring short intervals of time, the students had to repeat the experiment several times and then average the results so as to reduce experimental error. That is an important technique to learn, but it is also time-consuming. In the new physics course, the students do fewer experiments like that. They still learn the technique, but since they don’t use it as much, the experiments are not as repetitive or time consuming. Of course, that doesn’t mean there are fewer experiments. In fact, there are six more experiments in the new course compared to the old course!

Also, since I have been teaching physics for many years since the first book was written, I have learned better ways to communicate some of the more difficult concepts in the material. As a result, students will understand the material better. To ensure this, I field-tested the course with more than 70 students. They regularly communicated with me regarding how they were learning, and they even offered some excellent suggestions which led to some changes in the text. I have something very exciting to share about the results of that field test, but I am not at liberty to do so at this time. Be assured that I will do so when I am allowed.

Finally, my publisher has given me assurances that the student text will always be published as a hardcover book, since we encourage parents to use it for all their children over the course of many years. This is important, as there are some homeschooling publishers who have been producing their student texts as softcover books, which I think is unfortunate.

Of course, you might be wondering whether or not you should get this new text if you already have Exploring Creation with Physics, 2nd Edition. The new course is most certainly better than the old one for the reasons mentioned above. However, the old one is still a very good course. Thus, it really depends on how much strain the cost of the new course will put on your budget.

How I Begin and End My New Physics Book

Dr. Alfred Kastler (left), Dr. Isidor Isaac Rabi (middle), and Dr. Nathan T. Brewer (right)

My blog has been mostly silent because I have been teaching classes and working on my new physics book, Discovering Design with Physics. However, classes are winding down, and my new physics book is at the printer. I will have a more thorough post about the book itself next week, including how it is different from my old physics book. For right now, however, I thought my readers might be interested in how it begins and ends. The introduction to the student text begins this way:

Have you ever taken something apart in an attempt to figure out how it works? I have. Usually, I end up ruining it and not learning much. On the rare occasion when I am successful, however, I get a wonderful feeling of accomplishment. In some ways, that’s what the subject of physics is all about. We try to “take the world apart” to see how it works. We look for laws and equations that allow us to analyze processes that occur on a very small scale (like electrons traveling through a conductor), processes that occur on an everyday scale (such as baseballs being hit by bats), and processes that occur on a very large scale (like planets orbiting the sun). If we can properly analyze these processes, we can start to understand how the world works.

As you start “taking apart” the world in this course, you should be struck by how intricately designed everything is. The world runs amazingly well, because all its parts have been designed to work together. As French physicist and Nobel Laureate Alfred Kastler states:

The idea that the world, the material universe, was created all by itself, seems absurd to me. I only conceive of the world with a creator, therefore a God. For a physicist, a single atom is so complicated and so rich in intelligence, that the materialistic universe has no meaning.
(Fabre-luce Alfred, L’été de la résurrection, Grasset 1971, p. 105, translated from French by Fernando José Walsh)

I hope that as you read this book, you will come to see the truth of Dr. Kastler’s words.

After spending 16 chapters “taking apart the world,” I end my discussion of physics this way:

You have reached the end of this high-school physics course. You have learned a lot about how God’s creation works, and I hope that this has given you a deeper sense of awe for our Creator. That’s certainly what studying physics has done for me. As I learn more and more about the intricacies of how the world works, I cannot help but be filled with wonder for its Designer.

I think Dr. Isidor Isaac Rabi, who won the 1944 Nobel Prize for physics, said it best:

Physics filled me with awe, put me in touch with a sense of original causes. Physics brought me closer to God. That feeling stayed with me throughout my years in science. Whenever one of my students came to me with a scientific project, I asked only one question, “Will it bring you nearer to God?”
(“I. I. Rabi As Educator and Science Warrior,” Physics Today, 52(9):38, 1999).

I think that’s a great question to ask of any endeavor you wish to pursue.

It’s important to note that many other scientists share Dr. Rabi’s view. Homeschool graduate Dr. Nathan T. Brewer is a nuclear physicist whose research is focused on creating new elements. He says,

The world is absolutely breathtaking, and studying the world’s beauty fuels my faith.
(https://blog.drwile.com/dr-nathan-t-brewer-homeschool-graduate-and-nuclear-physicist)

As you continue to study more of the amazing creation that God has given us, I hope you end up agreeing with Drs. Rabi and Brewer!

Logos Research Associates Video Series

I know I haven’t posted anything since September, but that’s because this has been a very busy academic year for me. I hope to get back to regular posting by the end of May, but I wanted to let my readers know about a video series that is being produced by Logos Research Associates. It promises to convey cutting edge scientific evidence for the creation account. The director of the organization, Dr. John Sanford, is one of the most gifted scientists with whom I have ever worked, and he is also one of the most genuine Christian men I know. Since he and many of the associates are actively doing original scientific research related to creation, I am sure there will be a lot of awesome information shared throughout the series.

The first presentation is scheduled for February 22, 2023 at 9:00 PM Eastern (8:00 PM Central). It will present the big picture and the relevance of creation apologetics, setting the stage for the series of talks that will follow.

You can watch a promotional video for this presentation here.

If you would like to attend, registration is required, but it is free.

You can register here.

A Significantly Better Way to Address the Possibility of Global Warming

An illustration of carbon dioxide molecules (left) becoming ethylene molecules (right) by passing through an electrified grid in water. (Credit: Meenesh Singh, one of the study’s authors.)

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you know that I am very skeptical of the idea that global warming (aka climate change) is a serious problem. There are many scientific reasons for this, most notably the fact that we still have no real understanding of how increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere affects global temperature. However, we do know that the amount of carbon dioxide in the air is increasing, and we also know that human activity is causing that increase. As a result, it is reasonable to try to do something about that, as long as we don’t kill people or a disproportionate number of animals in the process. The problem, of course, is that most of the proposed solutions for reducing humanity’s carbon dioxide emissions do both (see here, here, here, and here).

Rather than trying to replace efficient and inexpensive sources of energy with our current unreliable, expensive, and deadly “green” sources, we should work on developing technologies that reduce carbon dioxide emissions in a way that doesn’t affect energy price and availability. One example of this better approach can be found in a recently-published study that reports on a new method which can be used to convert carbon dioxide into ethylene, a chemical that is used in a wide range of industrial processes.

The most common method currently in use for producing ethylene is called “steam cracking,” and it is a high-temperature process that is estimated to produce 260 million tons of carbon dioxide each year. However, the process described in the study can be done at much lower temperatures. It involves passing an electric current through a chemical reaction vessel that contains carbon dioxide and a water-based solution. Hydrogen atoms from the water end up combining with carbon atoms from the carbon dioxide to produce ethylene. While such methods have been explored in the past, this method is significantly more efficient. In addition, if the electric current powering the cell is produced by solar or other renewable energy sources, the process actually uses up carbon dioxide. In other words, this process turns an activity that adds carbon dioxide to the atmosphere into an activity that pulls carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

But wait a minute. If this process requires renewable energy sources to pull carbon dioxide out of the air, aren’t we just falling back on the old “green” technologies that cause so many problems in the first place? Not really. Two of the biggest problems with current “green” technologies are that they make energy more expensive and often cannot keep up with our energy demands. This process actually reduces cost significantly, because it doesn’t require so much heat. Thus, the higher expense of “green” technologies is offset by the lower cost of the process as a whole. Also, we don’t need to be making ethylene constantly. We can make lots of it when the “green” sources are producing energy, and we can wait when they aren’t. As a result, we are not harmed by their limitations.

In addition, scaling up this technology to make it useful for industrial purposes will probably lead to ideas of how similar processes can be used in other industrial applications. In my view, this kind of technology should be the focus of any proposed solutions for reducing humanity’s carbon footprint.

Number of Families Homeschooling Drops, Probably For The First Time

Graph from the study being discussed.

When the pandemic shut down the schools, many parents were horrified to see what their children were being taught on a daily basis. Others saw that “zoom school” just wasn’t a good way to educate children. As a result, many parents started homeschooling. Along with others, I read the news reports (like this one) covering this phenomenon.

Unfortunately, I have a rather cynical view of my fellow parents. I think that a lot of people who have children would be better off with pets, because they don’t really want to spend the time, effort, and energy necessary to properly raise their children. Thus, while I was happy to see more parents choosing the most effective model of education, I was skeptical that it would last.

Well, homeschooling researcher Dr. Brian Ray has released an analysis that at least partially confirms my cynical view. Using data from the United States Department of Education, the United States Census Bureau, an Education Next survey, and all state-level departments with relevant publicly available data, Dr. Ray estimated the number of students being homeschooled in 2020, 2021, and 2022 and then compared those numbers to previous estimates. The results are shown in the graph above.

Notice that homeschooling grew quite a bit from 2020 to 2021, which is consistent with the news reports. However, in 2022, the numbers dropped, which is consistent with my cynical view of my fellow parents. Nevertheless, I am actually surprised at how little the numbers dropped. Look at the growth in homeschooling from 2016 to 2019. In that three-year period, it grew by about 9%. Compare that to the growth from 2019 to 2022, which includes the year of decline. That growth is 25%! So even after a lot of people left homeschooling, the growth has still been unusually high.

Now, of course, there are at least two caveats here. First, it is very difficult to estimate the number of children being homeschooled. However, given the fact that Dr. Ray has been doing it for decades, I think he is probably the most reliable source on the matter. The second caveat is that 2022 might not be the last year in which the numbers drop. We will have to wait and see.

Nevertheless, given what we know now, it seems that many more parents have discovered the fact that homeschooling is the best solution for their children. More importantly, they have stuck with it (at least so far). This gives me more hope for the next generation.

An Excellent Debate on Climate Change

The Soho forum recently held an Oxford-style debate on climate change between two experts on the matter. The resolution being debated was:

Climate science compels us to make large and rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Arguing for the affirmative was Dr. Andrew Dessler, professor of geoscience at Texas A&M and director of the Texas Center for Climate Studies. Arguing for the negative was Dr. Steven Koonin, a professor of civil and urban engineering at NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering, who served as undersecretary for science at the Department of Energy during the Obama administration. You can watch it here:

You can watch it on YouTube by clicking here.

The debate was excellent, with both debaters showing why they are considered experts on the issue. However, Dr. Koonin was the clear winner, because the debate audience was asked to respond to the resolution both before and after the debate. Before the debate, 24.69% of those in attendance agreed with the resolution, while 48.77% disagreed. The rest were undecided. Thus, the audience was probably better educated on the issue than most of the public (and most politicians), since a plurality had the more scientifically-defensible reaction to the resolution. However, by the end, the “yes” votes had decreased by 5.56%, while the no votes increased by 24.69%.

Now, of course, you have to be the judge of why Dr. Koonin won the debate. For me, it was because his statements were backed up by data. I hope there are more debates like, because the better educated the public is on the science related to climate change, the more likely it will be for the world to enact sane measures to address it.

Science and Imagination

Last semester, I taught a course for Memoria College. Students read works from the great scientists of the past, and we discussed them. It was an excellent course, and I hope to teach it again this spring. After the class was over, they asked me to write an article about why reading scientific works from the past is so important. Here is what I wrote for them:

Science and Imagination

Another Failed Global Warming Prediction

A portion of the Great Barrier Reef (click for credit)

Climate change alarmists (aka global warming alarmists) are constantly making dire predictions, and over time, those predictions end up being falsified*. This doesn’t stop them from making even more dire predictions, however, since the media rarely point out how wrong they have been in the past. Usually, those dire predictions are found in the popular media, but since climate science has been infected with craziness, such nonsense even makes it into the the scientific literature.

Consider, for example, this 2012 study, which was published in the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States. The authors claim that their study shows coral in the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) had been declining for the past 27 years, and then they state:

Without significant changes to the rates of disturbance and coral growth, coral cover in the central and southern regions of the GBR is likely to decline to 5–10% by 2022. The future of the GBR therefore depends on decisive action. Although world governments continue to debate the need to cap greenhouse gas emissions, reducing the local and regional pressures is one way to strengthen the natural resilience of ecosystems.

So governments must act decisively to cut greenhouse gas emissions, or the GBR is going to dwindle to a fraction of its original glory. Well no decisive action was taken, and it’s now 2022, so we might as well see how close to accurate the prediction is.

Probably the most reliable source on the state of the GBR is the Australian Institute of Marine Science. Every year, it does an extensive survey of the GBR and publishes its results. The study splits the GBR into three specific regions (Northern, Central, and Southern). I showed the results from last year’s survey about a year ago. Here are the results of this year’s survey:

Notice that for the northern and central regions of the GBR, coral cover is at an all-time high, and more than THREE TIMES the value predicted in the prestigious scientific journal. While coral cover in the Southern region isn’t at an all-time high, it is still more than three times the amount that was predicted.

Obviously, then, we can add this to the ever-growing list of falsified predictions made by those who care more about scaremongering than good science.

*NOTE: By “falsified,” I do not mean “altered in order to mislead,” which is the first definition. I am using it in the scientific sense, which means “shown to be false.” Scientific theories must make predictions. If those predictions are verified, the theory gains credibility. If they are falsified, the theory loses credibility.
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Many Scientists Believe Scientific Theories Religiously

Many scientists believe the Big Bang Model religiously, not scientifically.
Those who understand the formation of our universe using the Big Bang model are forced to believe that the vast majority of the universe is made up of material about which scientists know absolutely nothing. As shown in the picture, to believe in the Big Bang model today, you must believe that all the matter involved in all the experiments done by all the scientists in history makes up only about 5% of the universe. 72% of the universe is composed of dark energy, a form of energy that was completely unknown until the 1990s and is so far undetectable and not understood at all. The other 23% is made of dark matter, which is matter that we cannot see because of the limitations of our experimental capabilities. Scientists have been trying to detect dark matter for decades, but so far, nothing has been found.

Why must those who are guided by the Big Bang believe that the vast majority of the universe has gone undetected? The Big Bang model predicted that over time, the expansion of the universe should be slowing down, since all matter is gravitationally attracting all other matter. However, data that started being collected in the 1990s indicate that in the past, the expansion of the universe was slower, which implies that the universe’s expansion is actually speeding up. The current amount of dark energy that is supposed to exist is what’s necessary to retrofit the Big Bang model to allow for this increase in expansion rate.

Belief in dark matter, on the other hand, is used to explain around certain observations that are surprising based on currently-accepted physics. For example, the way most galaxies rotate is not what is expected based on Newton’s Universal theory of Gravitation, but assuming a specific distribution of unseen matter, we can “fix” the galaxies so they rotate as expected. In addition, there are ways to indirectly determine the mass of galaxies, and those indirectly-determined masses usually don’t agree with the masses indicated by the matter that we can see in them. Thus, there must be unseen matter there.

On a personal level, I think dark energy exists only in the minds of those who are committed to the Big Bang Model. I see no serious evidence for its existence. Dark matter, on the other hand, has at least some serious evidence behind it. After all, either the physics we currently say we “know” is wrong, dark matter really exists, or something else that hasn’t been theorized exists to explain the discrepancies. Of course, as anyone who has read this blog for a while knows, I am just as likely to believe that the physics we currently “know” is wrong. As a result, I have always been intrigued by an alternate model of gravity called Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND). Its proponents claim that it can not only account for all the effects currently attributed to dark matter, but it has also made predictions which have later been confirmed by new data.

Well, one of its proponents recently wrote an article for The Institute for Art and Ideas. The title is simple and says it all: “Dark Matter Doesn’t Exist.” He goes through experimental evidences that support MOND, and he notes the failures of multiple searches for dark matter. While I am inclined to think that MOND is more likely to be true than dark matter, I am not convinced that it is the way to go. However, I did find this statement in his article very interesting:

We need to scientifically understand why the dark-matter based model, being the most falsified physical theory in the history of humankind, continues to be religiously believed to be true by the vast majority of the modern, highly-educated scientists. This is a problem for the sociological and philosophical sciences and suggests a breakdown of the scientific method.

While I am not sure that the dark matter hypothesis is “the most falsified physical theory in the history of humankind,” I wholeheartedly agree with him on the rest of his point. However, I would broaden his statement to include many other scientific theories, like evolution as a creation myth, the dogmatic belief that the earth is billions of years old, and the Big Bang model. One of the problems that exists in science today is that too many scientists believe these theories with a religious fervor. As a result, they tend to reject all the evidence that questions them. This, of course, holds back science.

While I don’t know if MOND is the correct answer to the question of why certain astrophysical observations are not consistent with currently-accepted physics, I can say that this particular MOND proponent has hit the nail on the head when it comes to a very big problem in today’s scientific enterprise!

Religious Students Earn Better Grades

A bit more than a week ago, I spoke at an education event focused on those who were considering homeschooling. One of the talks I gave focused on why you should educate your children from a Christian worldview. Afterward, a woman came up to me and asked if I had seen the studies that show that being religious improves a student’s academic performance. I told her I had not, and later on, she graciously sent me some examples. I was amazed that I had not seen this research before, because it conclusively demonstrates that more religious adolescents are simply better students than those who are less religious.

For example, the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth performed in 1997 collected a “…nationally representative sample of 8,984 men and women born during the years 1980 through 1984.” It collected “…extensive information on respondents’ labor market behavior and educational experiences.” Analysis of those data indicated that the more frequently a student attended religious services, the better his or her GPA:

While these data are a bit old, a review article published just last year surveyed 42 studies that have been published from 1990 to 2020. They all show that the more religious a student is, the better his or her academic achievement.

Now, of course, correlation doesn’t mean causation, so it is possible that religion doesn’t directly affect academic achievement. However, the first conclusion drawn by the review article is:

First, research has advanced from correlational studies to methodologically rigorous designs suggesting religion can play a causal role in academic success.

One of the more interesting of those “methodologically rigorous” studies compared children in the same family. It found that even within a given family, the more religious siblings had higher grade point averages than the less religious siblings. It also found (in agreement with other studies not focused on siblings) that the more religious siblings completed more years of education than the less religious ones. Thus, even with the same parents and family structure, religious adolescents are better students.

Why does being religious produce better grades? One study suggests that going to religious services broadens the students’ social network, giving them better access to adults other than their parents, peers who also share similar views, and extracurricular activities that are education focused. Others suggest that religion encourages students to be cooperative and conscientious, and such traits are positively correlated with academic achievement.

While those reasons might help explain the well-known fact that religious students have higher academic achievement, I think I can offer at least a couple of other suggestions. As a Christian, I have been taught that God gave me certain gifts, and it is my duty to Him to develop those gifts as much as possible. Most of my motivation for doing well in college and getting my Ph.D. was because I knew God had given me gifts in science and teaching, and it would be an affront to Him had I not concentrated on honing those gifts to the best of my ability. While not everyone has God-given gifts in academic subjects, it is clear that a good education (especially through high school) helps you develop any gift better.

However, there is another reason. It was given by the father of the Scientific Method, Roger Bacon, nearly 800 years ago. He wrote:

For the grace of faith illuminates greatly, as also do divine inspirations, not only in things spiritual, but in things corporeal and in the sciences of philosophy
(The Opus Majus of Roger Bacon, Robert Belle Burke (trans.), Russel & Russell, Inc. 1962, p. 585)

Faith illuminates all areas of life, including academics.

So, in addition to the reasons I gave in my talk about why you should educate from a Christian worldview, I must add this:

A Christian Worldview Produces Greater Academic Success.