July 2007 - Posts

• There might be giants

  I was standing at the departure gate in Dallas Fort Worth airport, waiting for a flight back to London when I saw I sight that has  been etched in my memory ever since - the Dallas Mavericks basketball team checking in at the adjacent gate. What was so remarkable about that?  Well, these guys were all at least 7 feet (2.1m) tall! At 5ft 8ins, I felt like a midget next to them. I had never stood next to anyone that tall, before or since . It all came back to me when I read about the 56-year-old Mongolian herdsman who stands 7ft 9ins (2.36m) tall. He recently kindly provided a photo opportunity for the world's media by marrying his sweetheart from the same Mongolian village, and who only comes up to his elbow.  However, even he does not come up to the stature of the worlds tallest man in documented history - Robert Wadlow, who lived in the small town of Alton, Illinois, in the U.S.A. At the age of 5 he was already taller than his grandmother, and and eventually reached 2.71m  (almost 9 ft). (Archive B&W footage) These ultra-tall individuals are often a result of 'pituitary gigantism'. Growth hormone excess is the single condition which accounts for nearly all cases of pathologic extreme height. The excess growth hormone usually results from oversecretion by a group of somatotrope cells of the anterior pituitary gland (termed a "somatotrope adenoma"). These cells do not respond to normal controls of growth or function. Other health problems are associated with this problem, not to mention the problems of getting clothes, furniture, and a bed to lie on. By contrast, there are some very tall but immensely fit basketball players, who have reached their enormous size through a combination of genes and a healthy diet, the tallest currently being Sun Ming Ming (unless you know differently? If so please sign in and leave a comment.) who, at 7ft 9 inches (2.36m) doesn't have to jump to reach the basket. He recently signed for Fuerza Regia in Monterrey, Mexico. The ancient Phillistines found a good use for their giant, Goliath, who was shooter for the Gath Warriors basketball team. (OK, I admit I made that last bit up). In a stalemate in the ongoing war between the Israelites and the Phillistines they put forward their champion Goliath and challenged the Israelites to find a champion on their side to come out and fight him, the result of that fight to determine who would be the slaves of whom. You'll find the full story in the OT of the Bible, the first book of Samuel ch 17 The Bible says Goliath was '6 and a half cubits', translated as 'over nine feet', or a little taller than the aforementioned Robert Wadlow. The Israelite army under King Saul just didn't have anyone who stood a chance against him in a man-to-man fight to the death . In this dramatic account, young David, a teenage shepherd, came forward. Rejecting the heavy armour that was offered him, he wisely decided to keep his distance. Instead he put a stone through Goliath's forehead with an accurate sling shot, before getting close enough to grab the giant's sword and finish the job. Now you may be wondering where we're going with all this...   In the recent past such 'tall stories' have been the occasion of much scepticism amongst critics of the Bible. These accounts were used as 'evidence' that the Bible was 'myth' rather than factual, and therefore could not be trusted on historical facts (and by implication, any other matters). Thanks to our Mongolian friend, the sport of basketball, and medical science - we now know that men can indeed be 9 ft tall. It seems that. once again, the Bible is credible and reliable after all. Watch a video clip about David and Goliath Read about David and Goliath in the Bible Posted Jul 29 2007, 07:01 AM by Boffin with 1 comment(s)

• Surprise - the Old Testament is historically accurate!

  Archimedes was so excited with his discovery of how bodies lost weight when immersed in water that he immediately hopped out of the bath, and allegedly rushed naked into the street yelling triumphantly, 'Eureka! 'Eureka!'. It was that kind of Eureka moment in the great Arched Room of the British Museum some days ago when Michael Jursa, a visiting prof from Vienna, made what has been called the most important find in Biblical Archaeology in 100 years. 'A discovery that supports the view that the historical books of the Old Testament are based on fact', said the Daily Telegraph. (Those of you who had already reached that conclusion - stay tuned for confirmation evidence). The aforementioned Arched Room houses a collection of 130,000 Assyrian cuneiform tablets dating back 5,000 years, and Prof Jursa had been rooting through the tablets, looking for Babylonian financial accounts (obviously Assyrian tax collectors never give up...). Anyway, during this foray among the tablets he came across a name that rang a bell, one Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, described there by a hand 2,500 years old as 'the chief eunuch' of King Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon. (Some readers may not realise that court officials in those days had to be eunuchs for security reasons, so this is not so surprising as you might think. It just means he was head of the civil service). So the able prof checked the Old Testament and there, in the book of Jeremiah, chapter 39 he read about Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, capturing Jerusalem and 'all the officials came and took seats in the Middle Gate' including a certain 'Nebo Sarsekim, a chief officer'. Fortunately the good prof knew his ancient languages and recognised that Nabu-sharrussu-ukin in Assyrian sounded the same as Nebo Sarsekim in ancient Hebrew. (You probably already knew that, but it was news to me). The tablet referred to the payment of some gold to a temple in Babylon (maybe it was tax-deductible even then). It is dated to the 10th year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II, 595 years BC, and 12 years before the siege of Jerusalem. Why is this so important? Well, evidence from non-biblical sources of people named in the Bible is not unknown, but Nabu-sharrussu-ukin would have been a relatively insignificant figure. I'll let the prof have the last word: "If Nebo-Sarsekim existed, which other lesser figures in the Old Testament existed? A throwaway detail in the Old testament turns out to be accurate and true, I think that it means that the whole of the narrative takes on a new kind of power". Read the Bible passage - Jeremiah 39 Read a newspaper article about the find. Daily Telegraph  Further study: The Old Testament Documents: are they reliable and relevant? Posted Jul 19 2007, 08:42 PM by Boffin with no comments Filed under: Assyrian, Nebuchadnezzar, British Museum, Archaeology, Is the OT reliable?

• The God Particle

  I must confess to having a great deal of affection for fundamental particles - electrons, protons, neutrons and their newer cousins -quarks. Studying ‘A’-Level Physics, I was stunned by the amazing beauty and subtle complexity of the microscopic world of the atom. Surely here was evidence of a creative mind, a divine Intelligence, at work...  And so began my personal journey to faith, and a life-changing encounter with the Creator himself. Since I studied physics, scientists in their search for the Theory of Everything, and the basic building blocks of matter, have been discovering more and more 'fundamental' particles. In fact, over a hundred of them to date. It is generally agreed that the good old simple protons and neutrons of my school days are made up of even more elementary particles known as 'quarks' (which have lovely descriptions such as 'charm', 'strange', 'bottom', 'top'). All these elementary particles that have been discovered are known collectively as 'hadrons'. Now, can I introduce you to the Large-Hadron Super-Collider that will soon be completed at CERN in Switzerland? 'Am I bothered?' you might ask. You should be, because it is costing you and me and other taxpayers about 8 billion Euros. But first some geek stuff... Under the Standard Model of fundamental particles and interactions, physicists have classified 16 particles that make up all matter. But the sums don’t quite add up for the Standard Model to be true if these particles are considered alone. If only 16 particles existed, they would have no mass (don't ask...) - contradicting what we know to be true in nature. Another particle has to give them this mass. Enter the ‘Higgs boson’, first proposed by University of Edinburgh physicist Peter Higgs and colleagues in the late 1960s. Their theory was that all particles acquire their mass through interactions with an all-pervading field, called the Higgs field, which is carried by the Higgs 'boson'.  The Higgs' is so fundamentally important to the Standard Model that it has led some to dub it the "God particle" Back to CERN then, where a 12-thousand-tonne particle detector is being buried a hundred metres underground, connected to a custom-built 27-kilometre-long circular tube, surrounded by 1600 massive magnets to keep the beams of particles going round in a circle getting faster and faster, eventually smashing into each other with huge energy (huge for a particle, that is), and hopefully splitting them into pieces. One of the pieces will hopefully turn out to be the elusive Higgs' bosun. The monster is due to be switched on in 2008, and physicists (and taxpayers) are holding their breath, hoping the God particle will show itself at last. Meanwhile, some scientists have been wondering if there was a chance of creating a mini- black hole, that would suck half of Switzerland into itself, but these concerns have been apparently allayed (mostly). As for me, whether they find the God particle or not, I will never cease to be amazed at the wonderful works of the master designer, the Creator of the cosmos, and of the tiniest fundamental particle. Oh Lord my God When I, in awesome wonder, Consider all the works your hands have made.. Then sings my soul, my saviour God, to thee How great thou art, how great thou art.   Read more about fundamental particles Visit the website of  CERN Read an article at BBC online about the God particle Read more about the large hadron-collider “Is this the answer to God, the universe and all that? Physicists plan £3bn experiment in a 20-mile long tunnel”   Look up Higgs Boson in Wikipedia Read the book Quantum Physics and Theology: An Unexpected Kinship by John Polkinghorne Posted Jul 12 2007, 04:41 AM by Boffin with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Higgs boson, CERN, God particle, quarks, particle accelerator, black hole