🚀 go-pugleaf

From:  "Keith F. Lynch" <KFL@MX.LCS.MIT.EDU>

    From: "James J. Lippard" <Lippard@HIS-PHOENIX-MULTICS.ARPA>

    ...  When asked to explain how we can see stars millions of light years
    away if the universe is very young, [a creationist] ... indicated that
    the speed of light is decreasing.

    In ... 1934 ... Frank R. Edmondson ... said that by 1941, conditions
    would have changed enough that it would be possible to determine [whether
    the speed of light is decreasing] ...

    Can anybody tell me what was finally determined?

  For the past ten years it has been possible to measure the speed of
light to 9 place precision.  During that period no change has been
measured.  One might argue that it only recently stopped slowing down
I suppose.
  A more common creationist answer to the question is that the light
was created in transit, complete with information about nonexistant
supernova explosions, fictitious recessional velocities, spectral
spectral lines, etc.  Another common answer is that we are mistaken
about the scale of the universe and everything we see is within 6000
light years or so.  A less common answer is that scientists have good
evidence for creationism (including a small universe) and are
deliberately deceiving the rest of us to promote irreligion or secular
humanism or free love or whatever.

  Since 1982 the length of the meter (and hence of the inch, mile, etc)
has been defined in terms of the length of the second and the speed of
light.  This means that the speed of light is now constant by
definition.  This also means that since 1982, nobody has measured the
speed of light.  Anyone who thought he was doing so was actually
measuring the length of the meter!
								...Keith