Emerging Scholars Blog

InterVarsity's Emerging Scholars Network

Astronomy

Finding Christian Community in the Planetary Sciences

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Images: Above: Figure 1. (Left) Planetary scientists view the geology of Pluto’s surface in 3D. Figure 2.(Center) Conference bulletin board made for a good place to advertise this new group. Figure 3. (Right) Conference Poster hall. End of Post: Figure 4. (Left) Conference bulletin board. Figure 5. (Right) Pluto, credit: NASA

1 The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
2 Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they reveal knowledge. . . .

In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
5 It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
6 It rises at one end of the heavens
and makes its circuit to the other;
nothing is deprived of its warmth. (Psalm 19:1-6)

On Palm Sunday, March 20th, 2016, a group of 16 researchers gathered in a grass roots effort to connect as Christians at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in the Woodlands, Texas. This group spanned all levels from graduate students through senior researchers, at various institutions across the United States, including academic labs and NASA centers. Jesus has transformed our lives and this one fact brought us together from varying denominational backgrounds. “Jesus is good professional development!” shared one researcher about how her Christian faith encourages and enables her to be a better researcher, less critical of her peers.

Planetary Science is an interdisciplinary field that is enabled by disciplines within earth sciences (geology, geophysics, geochemistry, atmospheric dynamics), as well as astronomy and astrophysics. Similar groups meet regularly at conferences in those fields; however, this was the first time for planetary scientists.

Several, but not all, shared about experiencing loneliness, isolation, and discrimination as the only Christian in their professional institutions. Others shared experiencing discrimination and misunderstanding by fellow church members for being a scientist. Discussions about intersections of Christian faith and science ensued throughout the week including a daily time of prayer for the conference, for the needs in the world, and to praise God for science, the wonder of creation, and all the amazing things we are learning about planets.

This group is putting together an email list for future communications and to advertise future opportunities to meet including the opportunity to hear planetary scientist, Roger Wiens, speak at the upcoming the American Scientific Affiliation (ASA) conference this July. Anyone interested in joining the Christians and the Planetary Sciences email list, please email ESN with “Planetary Sciences” in the subject line.

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Interview with Jennifer Wiseman, Part 2

Jennifer Wiseman is an astronomer who studies star forming regions of our galaxy using optical, radio, and infrared telescopes. Her career has involved oversight of national astronomical facilities as well as public science policy and discourse. In 1987 she co-discovered the periodic comet 114P/Wiseman-Skiff as an undergraduate researcher at MIT. She has a bachelor’s degree in physics from MIT, and a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University. In Part 1 of her interview with ESN, she shared some of the latest astronomical findings. In Part 2 she shares how science shapes her personal life of faith.

ESN: Are there areas of your research that move you to worship?

“Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image Reveals Galaxies Galore” from Hubblesite.org.

JW: I am fascinated by galaxies. The Hubble space telescope produced a marvelous image called the ultra deep field, which is the result of staring out into space for several days and collecting light so that it could image the faintest objects, thereby seeing a whole collection of galaxies. When you look at this image and you realize it’s only a tiny fraction of one area of the sky, and then extrapolate in your mind around the whole sky, you get a visceral sense of how enormous the universe is. And when you imagine that each galaxy, each speck of light contains potentially hundreds of billions of stars, and there are potentially planetary systems around most of those stars, it is awesome to contemplate. I find both the magnitude of the universe I sense by looking at images of these galaxies, and also the beauty of these galaxies, to be one of the most spirit-gripping parts of astronomy that I’ve ever seen.

So then for me, if I think about these things through the lens of faith, because I am someone who believes God is responsible for the universe and the natural processes we study in science, I have to realize God has been upholding and watching over and supporting an evolving universe over billions of years, long before life and human life existed on this planet. What does that mean? One way people react to this is by feeling a great sense of insignificance, since we occupy such a small fraction of time and space. My reaction is not that, but a sense of almost fearful gratefulness that this whole universe has been allowed to mature over eons of time to the point where planets, at least one, can support abundant life, and that I get to be a part of that for just a little while. So I’m grateful. And it also makes me a little fearful: am I using my time well? [Read more…] about Interview with Jennifer Wiseman, Part 2

Interview with Jennifer Wiseman, Part 1

Jennifer Wiseman, Ph.D., an astronomer who studies star forming regions of our galaxy using optical, radio, and infrared telescopes.

Jennifer Wiseman is an astronomer who studies star forming regions of our galaxy using optical, radio, and infrared telescopes. Her career has involved oversight of national astronomical facilities as well as public science policy and discourse. In 1987 she co-discovered the periodic comet 114P/Wiseman-Skiff as an undergraduate researcher at MIT. She has a bachelor’s degree in physics from MIT, and a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University. In Part 1 of this interview with ESN, she shares some of the latest astronomical findings. In Part 2 she will share how science shapes her personal life of faith.

ESN: What are the most exciting frontiers of discovery right now in your field?
JW: Well, the two hottest topics right now in astronomy are 1) the detection of planets outside our solar system (we call them exoplanets), and 2) Dark energy—which is this mysterious force that seems to be accelerating the expansion of the universe.

ESN: What’s currently happening with the discovery of Exoplanets?
JW: In the exoplanet field the technology has improved so much in the last few years, that we’ve gone from not even knowing whether there are planets outside our solar system to now having confirmed nearly 1,000 of these exoplanet systems and almost 3,000 potential candidate systems that need more study. Most of these planets have been detected through indirect means because it’s hard to take an image of a tiny planet next to a very bright star; it gets lost in the glare. Instead, astronomers have developed techniques to detect planets around stars by looking at the effects the planets have on the star. So if a planet is orbiting in front of its parent star along our line of sight, we may not be able to see the planet itself, but we can see the total amount of starlight dipping periodically with every orbit as the planet blocks our view of part of the star. That tells us a lot about the size of that planet and about its distance from the star, and it tells us about the planet’s temperature and even its density. Through this method the Kepler space telescope has detected almost 3,000 systems that are potentially planetary systems. Another way planets are found is by noticing the mutual gravitational pull between the planet and its parent star that causes the star to appear to wobble with every orbit. So measuring the wobble of stars is another way of detecting planets. [Read more…] about Interview with Jennifer Wiseman, Part 1

“What, then, is time?”

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“Objects of Time.” Kevin Birth. Palgrave Macmillan.New York, NY: 2012.

As some of you know, I’ve been enjoying ESN blogger/mentor Kevin Birth‘s provocative Objects of Time: How Things Shape Temporality (Palgrave Macmillan, New York, NY: 2012).

Augustine of Hippo wrote, “What, then, is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I want to explain it to someone who asks me, I do not know” (1997 [ca. 397-98], 256). The question stumps us for quite different reasons. We surround ourselves with cognitive artifacts to tell us what time is, and the time these artifacts represent is demonstrably confused in accuracy. We have hyper-accurate atomic clocks and a calendar that poorly represents the duration of the earth’s orbit. The nature of time’s existence is confused by cognitive artifacts and by the human invention of the time constructs these artifacts indicate. . . . [Read more…] about “What, then, is time?”

Who’s Afraid of Angels and Aliens, Alienation and Etcetera?

Socially speaking, as opposed to orations in solipsism, it can be quite alienating to bring up the promises and perils of alien life, especially in the middle of a serious conversation.  By aliens, I do not mean our fellow human beings who rarely ever garner the support of rabid nationalists anywhere. Imagine the late Jean Marie Le-Pen breaking a baguette with a North African immigrant, not for the sake of a photo‐shoot but out of a genuine sense of ubi caritas et amor.  It is nearly impossible to persuade an increasingly hostile sub-culture to replace a pejorative term such as ‘breeding’ with a personably proper, more germane, and humane term such as ‘child-birth.’ Instead, I am referring to extra-terrestrial beings whose putative existence is debated in hushed corners for fear of social ostracism and a commensurate fear of mischief mongering.

Aerial View of the Crop Circle in Diessenhofen. Hansueli Krapf Permission (Reusing this file). Attribution ShareAlike 3.0

Crop circles, after all, were not created by alien spacecrafts but by nocturnal practical jokesters or bona fide experimenters in social psychology privileged with a large pot of research money to advance imaginary agendas of perceived good.  The loss of face that comes with having a cherished theory falsified by a frowning fact can be disheartening to those who cultivate their religiosity around visitations by Extra-Terrestrials. Proponents of ancient astronaut theory suggest that prophetic visions, be it Ezekiel’s or those of John of Patmos, revolve around alien spacecraft.  For aesthetic reasons, the angels in heaven themselves might prefer to be conceived as celestial beings blessed with warp drives and complex forms of space ships rather than be depicted as chimerical creatures who look half-bird and half-human. Humor aside, the point for those of us who believe in angels as the side kicks in God’s redemptive story is not to turn them into the focus of our faith.  Thus, we can agree with the author of Hebrews that Christology is far important than angelology or to render that epistle with a modern ring, Christology is even more important than the quest for intelligent alien life.   It is precarious to our faith if we think too much of angels and aliens, but it is treacherous to our imagination if we think too little of them. After allaying the fears of the alarmed, these topics can nonetheless be useful in enlarging our understanding of God’s sovereignty if approached with percipience and a gently tethered imagination. [Read more…] about Who’s Afraid of Angels and Aliens, Alienation and Etcetera?