TNRTB Archive - Retained for reference information
A team of British astronomers has uncovered additional evidence for the design of the solar system that also refutes a young-earth creationist claim. With new imaging equipment they made the first-ever discovery of a belt of comets and asteroids orbiting an old solar-type star. The belt they found orbiting the star, tau Ceti, has dimensions similar to the solar system’s Kuiper Belt but is at least ten times more massive. Such a massive comet belt makes the tau Ceti system a noncandidate for a life-support planet because it would generate too many collision events. This discovery demonstrates that old solar-type stars offering conditions safe enough for advanced life may be much rarer than what astronomers had presumed. The discovery also foils the young-earth creationist claim that the formation of solar-type stars will not produce comet cloud reservoirs of adequate size and mass to explain the population of short-period comets in the context of an old-universe model.
· J. S. Greaves et al., “The Debris Disc Around tau Ceti: a Massive Analogue to the Kuiper Belt,” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 351 (2004): L54-L58.
· Related Resource
· Hugh Ross, “Anthropic Principle: A Precise Plan for Humanity"
· Product Spotlight
· Journey Toward Creation, 2nd ed., with Hugh Ross