Stars Died For You

Dixie said:
You said before, the stars fused helium and produced iron, and that was how iron came to exist. If something came to exist, it must not have existed before... simple logic. But you've not really explained how stars produced something that previously didn't exist, and I am still waiting.
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Stars produced elements that did not exist immediately following the big bang. However, the atoms that make up those elements already existed. They were merely rearranged to form new elements.

This is actually Biblical. While I don't take Genesis literally (it's a form of poetry), I find it interesting that God created Adam from the ground rather than forming him out of thin air. Don't you?
 
Dixie said:
Uhm... that's exactly what faith is.
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No, it isn't. Faith is believing in something for which there is no direct evidence. An agnostic may accept the possibility that a god exists, but that doesn't mean he has faith.

That said, I am not hostile to faith in any way. I am a Christian.
 
As Brent had mentioned and I suggested, the cause of the big bang was all matter from the universe (a previous one) condensing to the point where it could condense no more and thus expanded outwards creating this universe. The theory that we're speaking of then states that the universe will continue to expand until a certain point (which hasn't yet been reached). At this point the universe will invariably contract (equal and opposite reaction), and continue t do until it reaches the point it did about 14 billion years ago. Where it can't get any smaller and expands outword.
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Okay, let's talk about your theory. Is there any indication of what "force" causes the universe to reverse course? If I drop a ball, it will always fall to the ground, and I can't predict that some day the ball will do the opposite and float off into the sky, this defies the principles of physics as we know them... now, the principles of physics as we know them, could change.... that's a possibility, but within the parameters of what we currently understand, it is not possible for the ball to do anything other than react to gravity. The same can be said of our universe, it is expanding, something set the universe in motion many billions of years ago, and I am sorry, but it will take more than a light bulb going off over your stupid head, to change that.

Now you can say, sure the universe is expanding for now, but one day it will stop expanding and begin to contract... but this would mean the universe expansion is constantly slowing down, and this doesn't seem to be the case. It would also mean that some great gravitational force has to exist at the center of the universe, the point of contraction. We've not found evidence of this either. So basically, you have a theory which doesn't even comport with our understandings of the principles of physics, and that is your faith-based belief on the universe. You guys should have choir robes and hymnals by now!
 
General Burnside said:
Stars produced elements that did not exist immediately following the big bang. However, the atoms that make up those elements already existed. They were merely rearranged to form new elements.

This is actually Biblical. While I don't take Genesis literally (it's a form of poetry), I find it interesting that God created Adam from the ground rather than forming him out of thin air. Don't you?
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I find it interesting that an Atheist posits that we should thank the star dust for our existence, and the Bible says God created man by spitting in the "dust."
 
General Mills said:
dixie the big bang did not create the heavier elements in the universe. those came later with the explosion of stars. we are literally made up of elements that are a direct result of supernovas.
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Not entirely correcct. Supernovas account for all of the carbon in the universe (ya know, the stuff of life?) and most of the light elements up through silicon and sulfur, it's the pulsars and white dwarfs created by the explosion/implosion of a Supernova that are resoponsible for creating all the heavier elements.
 
Dixie said:
Oh, I am not the least bit confused, although it seems some of you are. Have any of you idiots ever studied physics?

There are numerous theories about the big bang, one of them being that the big bang wasn't the 'first' in the cosmic sense...

Sorry, but that's just contrary to physics as we know them to be. In 1929, Hubble discovered the universe was expanding, and this is impossible unless there was some energy or force which initiated the expansion. In order for stars to explode, they would have to exist first, so the OP is simply discussing events which came AFTER creation of the universe, and the big bang.

Now you secular asswipes want to cobble together science and fantasy, and pretend you have all the answers, but you don't. The bottom line is, you can't even begin to answer the questions of origin, because nothing comports with your assorted theories and principles, and so that's why we get this gobbledy-gook about stars exploding, as if that somehow explains the origin of the universe or life itself. Try again, idiots!
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Ahhight...asume for the sake of argument you're right. What does that have to do with the fact that all elements heavier then hydrogen and helium are a by product of a dying star that has consumed most or all of its fuel?
 
Dixie said:
Okay, let's talk about your theory. Is there any indication of what "force" causes the universe to reverse course? If I drop a ball, it will always fall to the ground, and I can't predict that some day the ball will do the opposite and float off into the sky, this defies the principles of physics as we know them... now, the principles of physics as we know them, could change.... that's a possibility, but within the parameters of what we currently understand, it is not possible for the ball to do anything other than react to gravity. The same can be said of our universe, it is expanding, something set the universe in motion many billions of years ago, and I am sorry, but it will take more than a light bulb going off over your stupid head, to change that.

Now you can say, sure the universe is expanding for now, but one day it will stop expanding and begin to contract... but this would mean the universe expansion is constantly slowing down, and this doesn't seem to be the case. It would also mean that some great gravitational force has to exist at the center of the universe, the point of contraction. We've not found evidence of this either. So basically, you have a theory which doesn't even comport with our understandings of the principles of physics, and that is your faith-based belief on the universe. You guys should have choir robes and hymnals by now!
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Again, what has this to do with the central fact that all elements heavier than helium are a product of dying stars?
 
General Burnside said:
Dixie, allow me to edumacate you.

Some stars (10+ times the mass of the sun) explode when they run out of the hydrogen fuel. The star carries on in this state for a little while (fusing helium, etc.) until it begins to produce iron, which absorbs energy. At this point the star's core cannot sustain itself and collapses in a matter of seconds, thereby compacting the star's enormous mass into a very small volume. The implosion then rebounds as an explosion, which is known as a supernova.
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Well, it all has to do with whether or not they can form a stable white dwarf after shedding their mass. A white dwarf can only be stable if it's below 1.4 times the mass of our sun - the Chandrasekhar limit. Stars up to 9-10 solar masses tend to form white dwarfs below this mass, while larger ones can't. The larger stars simply blow up into a supernova, forming neutron stars or black holes.

In binary star systems consisting of a white dwarf and another star that's close enough to shed material onto it, over time, enough material can be shed to cause the white dwarf to exceed the Chandrasekhar limit and have a supernova. These kinds of supernovas are one of the "standard candles" that astronomers use to gauge distances of things that are too far away for us to detect a parallax (pretty much anything outside of a few hundred light years; even the closest galaxies are millions of light years away), since they always have the same absolute magnitude. And if two things have the same absolute magnitude, any difference in apparent magnitude is purely due to distance.

General Burnside said:
This is how many of the elements in the universe, such as iron, came to exist. It's not "nonsense," it's fact.
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Any theory could always be disproven. Or it could be incomplete. However, if these theories are ever proven false or incomplete, I do not think that it is going to be some random crazy guy from Alabama on some internet forum that does it. We have a division of labor for a reason. Certain people spend decades of their lives trying to understand all of this shit until they're at a point that they can advance the field themselves. When they come to a conclusion, I'm not going to get all shitty about it and refuse to listen to them because I can't understand it myself. It's not like some crackpot scribbled some meaningless shit on a wall somewhere, in which case I would be justified in refusing to attempt to understand their bullshit; practically everyone who has entered this discipline has come to accept these theories, and I imagine there is probably a reason for that.

Dixie, if you want to understand exactly why we've reached all of these conclusions, and if you think that you can seriously offer criticisms of them, then enroll in a university and get a Ph.D. in astronomy. See you in a decade or two! At least buy textbooks in physics and astronomy, read all of the chapters, and work out all of the problems (although, going that route, you're probably going to make an error at some point and come to the conclusion that your confusion of momentum with force or something like that has disproved Einstein; this has been the birth of many a crank). At the current point in time, you're really not in a place to criticize these guys. It's not my responsibility to educate you if you refuse to do so yourself. Teachers are typically qualified in their discipline and paid a salary; you're not paying me, and I'm not qualified. None of this information is being hidden from you. When you ask "why do stars explode into a supernova?", all that you need to know on the subject is available in books and on the internet. Your refusal to seek this knowledge out in no way justifies your refusal to accept that its true.
 
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Mott the Stoopid said:
Ahhight...asume for the sake of argument you're right. What does that have to do with the fact that all elements heavier then hydrogen and helium are a by product of a dying star that has consumed most or all of its fuel?
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Mott the Stoopid said:
Again, what has this to do with the central fact that all elements heavier than helium are a product of dying stars?
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First of all, you do not know that we know of all the elements, there may be some yet to be discovered. Second, you don't know for certain, any of this stuff you are saying, it is scientific theory, and relatively new theory at that. One of the most amazing things about science, to me, is how it is often stood on it's ear, with regard to what it thought had been answered but wasn't. And finally.... what does all of this debate and discussion have to do with stars exploding and spreading matter all around the universe, which already exists? Yeah, stars explode... they've been doing it since there were stars, but the universe is expanding, so there must have been an initial point where it all began, a point where there was only matter and non mater, and a singular cosmic explosion took place, spreading matter throughout the universe. Energy, friction, heat, time.. yeah... stars explode! The material from the stars is the same material originally 'Big Banged', because matter only changes state, it can't create itself. But now... we still haven't explored the explanations for why all of this started, why the process originally began?

We know that the elements of life are here because of the stars exploding, etc. It's obvious they somehow miraculously managed to form a complete ecosystem, codependent upon itself for existence, on a planet controlled by phases of the moon, a very complex atmosphere which provides perfect conditions conducive for that life to emerge and evolve, and flourish. But WHY? And, if we are just the simple result of a hodgepodge of space debris from exploded stars, why don't we see life teaming on other planets?


Mott the Stoopid said:
No Dixie, acknowledging the possibility of something despite a lack of evidence for it is what requires faith......but that's a different subject.
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You are acknowledging something's possibility despite the lack of evidence, unless you have traveled back in time to when the star exploded. I don't know of any nicer way to put it, but that IS faith, Mott.
 
General Sherman said:
Well, it all has to do with whether or not they can form a stable white dwarf after shedding their mass. A white dwarf can only be stable if it's below 1.4 times the mass of our sun - the Chandrasekhar limit. Stars up to 9-10 solar masses tend to form white dwarfs below this mass, while larger ones can't. The larger stars simply blow up into a supernova, forming neutron stars or black holes.
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I'm aware. I needed to keep it as simple as possible for Dix.
 
General Burnside said:
I'm aware. I needed to keep it as simple as possible for Dix.
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Yeah, because when it gets too complicated, you tend to do this....

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It's because you can't handle being totally schooled on a daily basis. I understand, I get this a lot.
 
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