Physics, Earth & Space Icon Physics, Earth & Space

The Heavens Declare: Looking Forward to 2021

Photo: Caldwell 78, by NASA, ESA, and G. Piotto (Università degli Studi di Padova); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America).

I’d be grateful for a fact-check on this from readers who are more scholarly than I am with their ancient literature. However, as to evidence for intelligent design, my impression has long been that the ancients gave more weight to the stars than to their own bodies. Most emphatically, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.” It’s curious, then, that the modern theory of ID has focused far more on biology than on cosmology. That will be corrected next year in March with the release of Stephen Meyer’s book, Return of the God Hypothesis. You can pre-order it now here. It is one reason we are looking forward to 2021, among others.

What does the statement in Psalm 31 tell us? Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik wrote, “This revelation to which cosmic man is receptive is attained only in the rapturous experience of Being in all its glory and grandeur. Creation, abounding in orderliness, architectural magnificence, and overpowering beauty, is the medium which is employed by God for disclosing himself man.” There are, I would say, other ways that God discloses himself, but this is surely one.

Our Favorite Ten Stories of 2020

With that in mind (I am thinking wishfully), NASA has released 30 images for the 30th anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope. They add that, “there’s something extra special about these 30 celestial gems: All of them can be seen through backyard telescopes. Some of them can also be spotted with binoculars or even the naked eye.” Above is one spectacular example, captioned by NASA: “Caldwell 78 (or NGC 6541), a globular star cluster roughly 22,000 light-years from Earth.” You can find the rest here.

Enjoy! Tomorrow, Evolution News will begin releasing its own gems from the past year: Our favorite ten stories of 2020. I hope you will enjoy those, too.