Our Amazing Spaceship Earth

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Scientists have spent multiple years and billions of dollars searching for life elsewhere in the universe, only to find that earth alone not only teems with life, but seems to be expressly designed for life. An amazing intelligence seems to be behind it all. What is that intelligence telling us?
by Mario Seiglie

Have you ever dreamed of traveling through space? The prospects sound exciting to most people.

Amazingly, we are already traveling through spacebut without being aware of it! Planet earth can correctly be compared to a giant spacecraft carrying on board more than 6 billion people and billions more animals and plants. American scientist Buckminster Fuller coined the fitting term "Spaceship Earth" to describe our planet.

We are truly hurtling through space on this giant spacecraft called earthat the incredible speed of 65,000 miles per hour! This is far faster than man's speediest aircraft. At the same time, this space vehicle is spinning at more than 1,000 miles per hour. Every year we complete an entire circuit around the suna journey of more than half a billion miles!

Yet perhaps the most amazing aspect of our voyage is we don't feel the trip at all. Certainly as we travel in a car at 50 miles per hour, we can sense the velocity and see the scenery go by. But the paradox is, once we get out of the car and sit down, everything on the ground seems at restyet we are still traveling at an incredible speed through space.

If we finish our life's journey with an average life span, we will have traveled around the sun some 76 times, and completed a trip of more than 38 billion milesthe equivalent of traveling several times to the planet Pluto and back! All of this without ever feeling the velocity or being aware of the trip itself.

This is just one of the incredible features of our remarkable spaceship .

Our privileged planet

In the last 30 years scientific discoveries have undermined the idea, once popular among some scientists and scholars, that we live on an unexceptional planet. This idea was summarized in the view of the late astronomer Carl Sagan (of the famous TV series Cosmos), who spoke of "the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe" (Pale Blue Dot, 1994, p. 7, emphasis added throughout).

We have come quite far from the similar notion posed by philosopher Bertrand Russell that humanity is merely, as he put it, "a curious accident in a backwater" (Religion and Science, 1961, p. 222). As scientific discoveries have accumulated, planet earth has turned out to be not a backwater region, but instead a very privileged planet.

Astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez and philosopher Jay Richards recently wrote a book about the latest scientific findings that refute Sagan's assertion that we live on an insignificant planet. They aptly titled the book The Privileged Planet (an interview with Dr. Richards begins on page 8 ).

Instead of a universe once thought to be possibly teeming with life, more and more scientists are now realizing the rare qualities of our terrestrial globe. Cosmologists Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee recently wrote the book Rare Earth: Why Complex Life Is Uncommon in the Universe to explain some of our planet's unique features and how difficult it would be to duplicate these conditions on some other planet.

Similarly, the influential science textbook Earth begins its introduction with a section titled "the uniqueness of the planet Earth" (1986, p. 3). So many factors have to be just right to duplicate the feats of our amazing Spaceship Earth that hope is slowly fading of ever finding intelligent life on other planets.

"From the seventeenth to the twentieth century," explain Drs. Gonzalez and Richards, "many expected to find intelligent, even superior life on the Moon, Mars, and other planets in the Solar System . . . Now, at the beginning of the twenty-first century, despite PR blitzes from Martian-life enthusiasts, the search has moved from the planets to a few obscure outlying moons. At the same time, the aspirations have been substantially downgraded" (The Privileged Planet, 2004, p. 253).

What are some of the remarkable features of our Spaceship Earth? Let's explore some of these characteristics so we can appreciate how carefully crafted it is. We can then ask, Could all these precise conditions be only a lucky accident? Hand-in-hand is another crucial question: What is the ultimate purpose of our life's journey through space?

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Part2

Portholes to see beyond Spaceship Earth

As every spaceship has a porthole to view the outside, so our atmosphere acts in the same way.

In fact, we have a much better window than an ordinary spacecraft. Our "window" on this Spaceship Earth is not limited to a certain viewing area, but actually covers the entire planet. It is like having a porous crystal 430 miles thick that allows everyone aboard to have a full view of everything outside our planet and yet still blocks out the airless outer space.

Some planets are covered in thick clouds that make it impossible to see out. But our atmosphere enables us to view and discover the universe around us. Our earth is thus an exploration vessel.

The transparent canopy covering the planet also houses a renewable supply of oxygen for human beings and animal life and carbon dioxide and nitrogen for plants. It also provides the proper air pressure for living things, and the outer edge of this translucent shell is composed of an ozone layer that protects life from harmful ultraviolet rays.

Strange as it may sound, this canopy even comes equipped with a protective force field! It sounds like something out of the TV series Star Trek, but it's true. We have a magnetic field generated by the spinning iron core at the center of our planet that deflects damaging cosmic rays and deadly solar winds. Without these features, life here would not be possible.

Last but not least, this marvelous canopy contains an automatically adjusting "curtain" to shade the terrestrial orb from too much light hitting its surface. This delicate shroud is formed by clouds, which act as moving shades that cover some 60 percent of the earth's surface at any given time.

What's in the cockpit?

What if we enter the cockpit of Spaceship Earth? What do we find?

Incredibly, no pilot is aboard, but instead we find an "autopilot" system governed by carefully adjusted physical laws. Although no one is seen physically aboard our spaceship who manages the system, our planet faithfully obeys the programmed, finely tuned commands of the myriad of physical laws and completes its year-long journey around the sun, dutifully returning to its starting point only to begin yet another circuit.

What keeps the earth in its orbit? It is mainly the gravitational force of the sun that keeps the planet on its circular path.

Truly, as the Bible says about our invisible and omnipotent God, "He hangs the earth on nothing" (Job 26:7). That "nothing" is outer space, and the earth is able to "hang" suspended on nothing through the unseen force of gravity.

In this cockpit, although not seen, are the equivalent of hundreds of elaborate dials, each regulating an aspect of our planet's features. Each dial has been carefully calibrated to permit life to flourish on the planet. You can't see the great Engineer who set up the system, but you can measure the precision of every settingand each one is just right!

When Sir Fred Hoyle, the renowned British astrophysicist and mathematician, examined the different settings that regulate our planet and the rest of the universe, he marveled:

"A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with the physics, as well as the chemistry and biology [of the universe], and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature . . . The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question" ("The Universe: Past and Present Reflections," Engineering and Science, November 1981).

Professor Robin Collins compares the earth's precise settings in this way: "I like to use the analogy of astronauts landing on Mars and finding an enclosed biosphere, sort of like the domed structure that was built in Arizona a few years ago.

"At the control panel they find that all the dials for its environment are set just right for life. The oxygen ratio is perfect; the temperature is seventy degrees; the humidity is fifty percent; there's a system for replenishing the air; there are systems for producing food, generating energy, and disposing of wastes.

"Each dial has a huge range of possible settings, and you can see if you were to adjust one or more of them just a little bit, the environment would go out of whack and life would be impossible" (quoted by Lee Strobel, The Case for a Creator, 2004, p. 130).

Everything everything down to the tiniest details is "adjusted" just right for us to live comfortably on this planet. We get a glimpse of the marvelous Designer who set up the whole system when the Bible speaks of "the Lord , Who created the heavens, Who is God, Who formed the earth . . . Who did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited" (Isaiah 45:18 ).

Truly, our planet is not some lucky accident since the evidence shows it was carefully designed to be inhabited by mankind and all other forms of life.

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Part3

The spaceship's engines

What drives this craft and propels it through space? There are "twin engines" aboard, one pushing the planet forward and the other keeping it spinning and fueling its interior heat.

The centripetal force caused by gravity keeps the globe in its orbit. When an object reaches a certain speed and is spun by centripetal forces, it stays in a stable circuit around the center. This is what the earth does when orbiting around the sun. And our planet's distance from the sun, though varying slightly, is perfect for lifenot so close to the sun that we would all burn up, nor so far that we would freeze.

The second engine is deep inside the earth itself. There, the fuel is decaying radioactive elements that heat the planet and drive plate tectonics. Geologists Frank Press and Raymond Siever call this "a gigantic but delicately balanced heat engine fueled by radioactivity" ( Earth, p. 4).

"Not only does plate tectonics help with the development of continents and mountains, which prevent a water world," adds astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, "but it also drives the Earth's carbon dioxiderock cycle. This is critical in regulating the environment through the balancing of greenhouse gases and keeping the temperature of the planet at a livable level . . .

"This radioactive decay also helps drive the convection of the liquid iron surrounding the Earth's core, which results in an amazing phenomenon: the creation of a dynamo that actually generates the planet's magnetic field" (quoted by Strobel, pp. 182-183).

Surely, as Proverbs 3:19 says: "The Lord by wisdom founded the earth, by understanding He established the heavens."

The passenger cabin

What about the passenger cabin? How well designed is it? We find the earth provides all the comforts a space traveler could desireabundant and delicious food, plenty of water, gorgeous and entertaining scenery, a comfortable climate, challenging work and plenty of room to have a family.

Our planet is a veritable Noah's ark of animals and plants traveling on its timeless journey through space. It is a self-contained unit with renewable resources that can last, if properly taken care of, for potentially thousands of years into the future.

To keep the temperature comfortable for the passengers, the planet remains in orbit at just the right distance from the sun and is designed with an optimum tilt of 23.5 degrees.

"If the earth had been tilted as much as 45 degrees instead of what it is," notes Fred Meldau, "temperate zones would have torrid zone heat in the summer and frigid zone cold in the winter. On the other hand, if the axis of the earth were vertical to the plane of its orbit, January and July would have the same climate and ice would accumulate until much of the continents would be ice-covered six months and flooded the other six months" (Why We Believe in Creation Not in Evolution , 1972, pp. 27-28 ).

Psalm 104:24 says: "O Lord, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all. The earth is full of your possessions."

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Part4

A protector fleet of spaceships

Not only does our terrestrial vessel have a magnetic force field and renewable resources, but it also has a number of accompanying spacecraft to stabilize and protect it.

The first of these is our moon. It is a veritable workhorse. Not only does it shield our planet from taking some meteorite hits, but it stabilizes earth's vital tilt. Just as a clock has counterbalancing weights, so the moon acts as a counterbalance to the earth, keeping the planet's tilt carefully adjusted to allow the four seasons of the year. This tilt permits the sun's rays to uniformly heat the globe, much like a rotisserie slowly roasts a chicken.

The moon, along with the sun, also regulates our tides. The earth's tides help circulate the water in the oceans and sweep away waste products from the coasts.

"If the moon were half as far away, or twice its present diameter," adds Fred Meldau, "great tides would wreck most of our harbors . . . If the moon were smaller and farther away, it would not have sufficient pull on our tides to cleanse our harbors or adequately rejuvenate (with oxygen) the waters of our oceans" (p. 31).

Also remarkable is the relative size and placement of the moon with respect to the sun. The sun is 400 times larger than the moon but also 400 times farther awayan arrangement that produces perfect solar eclipses when viewed from earth.

This extraordinary phenomenon has revealed crucial scientific facts about the composition of the sun and other stars, as well as providing concrete evidence of Einstein's theory of relativity (again illustrating how our earth is set up to allow us to make scientific discoveries about the universe).

Yet the moon is only the first of Spaceship Earth's protector fleet. The two gas giants, Jupiter and Saturn with their strong gravitational pulls, also help shield the planet by functioning as giant vacuum cleaners, sweeping the solar system of dangerous comets and asteroids.

Astronomers witnessed a stark example of such protection in 1994 when Jupiter took a hit as the Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet broke apart due to Jupiter's gravitational pull and smashed into its atmosphere.

As the book The Privileged Planet notes: "The existence of a well-placed moon, of circular planetary orbits . . . of the outlying gas giants to sweep the Solar System of sterilizing comets . . . all these and more are profoundly important for the existence of complex life on our planet" (p. 256).

The neighborhood

Not only is Spaceship Earth just the right distance from the sun to have a temperate climate, but its solar system is in an excellent neighborhood of stars. It lies between two spiral arms of the Milky Way galaxy, far away from the dangerous galactic core or the spiral arms, and is in what astronomers call a "safe zone."

"Certainly, our type of galaxy optimizes habitability," explains Guillermo Gonzalez, "because it provides safe zones. And Earth happens to be located in a safe zone, which is why life has been able to flourish here . . .

"Places with active star formation are very dangerous, because that's where you have supernovae exploding at a fairly high rate. In our galaxy, those dangerous places are primarily in the spiral arms, where there are also hazardous giant molecular clouds. Fortunately, though, we happen to be situated safely between the [Milky Way's] Sagittarius and Perseus spiral arms" (quoted by Strobel, p. 169).

This clear zone is a good vantage point for viewing our own galaxy and the rest of the universeonce again demonstrating the way our exploratory spaceship is set up for cosmic discovery.

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Part5

Asking some tough questions

We can learn a great deal from examining the universe with telescopes or viewing life through a microscope, but even with the best scientific instruments we will never find the ultimate purpose of why we are traveling through space or what the meaning of our existence is.

All we can infer from the precise natural laws and the fine-tuned features of our planet is that the earth was optimally designed for life and for scientific understanding. Even a skeptical astrophysicist such as Stephen Hawking admits as much on the matter of life. "Wheeler agrees with Hawking and Carter," writes John Boslough, "that our own universe is uniquely fine-tuned to produce life, even if in just one small, lost corner" (Stephen Hawking's Universe, 1985, p. 125).

After surveying the astronomical and biological evidence, biochemist Michael Denton comes to this conclusion: "Four centuries after the scientific revolution science has provided no significant evidence that any alternative life is possible . . . Scientific exploration has found no token of another life, no shred of evidence for something other than ourselves or of our type of life as it exists on earth.

"On the contrary, science has revealed a universe stamped in every corner, riven in every tiny detail, with an overwhelmingly and all-pervasive biocentric [life-centered] and anthropocentric [human-centered] design" (Nature's Destiny: How the Laws of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe, 1998, p. 380).

So here we are, traveling on this spaceship called earth, and everything we see around us is carefully designed and calibrated to sustain our existence. But what is the purpose of our life's journey? Is it just an unceasing and meaningless journey around the sun, much as a hamster runs inside a wire wheel?

Our purpose on earth revealed

Whoor whatput forth all this effort to create the earth and have us live here? This is something science cannot answer. And yet it is the ultimate question. For the full answer we must turn not to the first witness of God as a Creator, the book of nature, but to the second witness, the book of Scripture. It was inspired by the very Creator God of the universe, the Grand Designer.

Here we learn that this Spaceship Earth comes equipped with a manufacturer's instruction manual, letting us know the purpose of our existence and trip through space.

Why was man created on the earth? God reveals the answer in the very first chapter of that instruction manual, the Bible: "Then God said, 'Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea . . . over all the earth" (Genesis 1:26).

Here we see that we are made in God's image and were placed on earth to learn to administer it. Unknown to most people, God's ultimate purpose is to share His incredible powers and immortality with us! As the Bible says, "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him" (1 Corinthians 2:9).

Astonishing as it sounds, we are to be part of the God family, with God as the Father and Jesus Christ as our elder brother!

Notice what Romans 8:29-32 says: "For whom He [God the Father] foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren . . . He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" including the vast universe outside our atmospheric window (see also Hebrews 2:5-13; Deuteronomy 4:19).

This is very good news indeed!

So we have an incredible potential, and this life is just the first stage of our cosmic journey. As the apostle Paul again says, "For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us" (Romans 8:18 ).

Moreover, God designed this journey for us to learn not only physical properties of the universe, but to develop spiritual character by applying the biblical principles to accept Christ's sacrifice for our sins, to overcome trials and to successfully manage our life and our family. This will lead to eventually inheriting eternal life in the Kingdom of God.

As God the Father says about this first stage for mankind, "He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son" (Revelation 21:7).

This wondrous earth, which regrettably has been largely mismanaged, polluted and bloodstained by mankind, will one day be renewed and beautified when Jesus Christ returns as King of Kings and His true followers from this age rule with Him. Earth will then become a gleaming jewel of peace and happiness, and ultimately, the place where the New Jerusalem will set its foundations (Revelation 21:2-3).

Yes, we have a wonderful future. Just as the earth and the universe have been carefully crafted, so God has planned the purpose of our lives. But we still have free choice, and God respects us so much that He allows us to make our own mistakes and learn from them. Yet He wants us to acknowledge Him as our wonderful Creator and Father and then submit to His wonderful laws.

Are you willing to discover the truth of your Creator's plan for youand to act on that truth? If so, it will truly turn your life aroundafter all, His incredible plan and His righteous laws were designed just as carefully as everything else we see around us. If you do so, then you can be sure that your long journey through space will not have been in vain! GN