No. 203 - BEYOND NEPTUNE: VOYAGER II SUPPORTS CREATION

by Russell Humphreys, Ph.D.*

"Predictions have value," writes a prominent space scientist about

planetary theories. "The classic test of a theory," he says, "is

its ability to predict. Successful predictions are so rare that

they are usually regarded as compelling evidence in favor of the

underlying theory."' If that is so, then the Voyager II space

probe has provided "compelling evidence" in favor of the

creationist's theory of the origin of planetary magnetic fields

by confirming two of its predictions. A main tenet of consequence

of creationist theory is that planetary magnetic fields must be

much younger than the billions of years required by evolutionary

theory.

The Creation of Planetary Magnetic Fields

In 1984, when no space craft had yet reached Uranus and Neptune, I

published a theory predicting the strength of the magnetic fields

of those two planets in the Creation Research Society Quarterly, a

peer-reviewed creationist scientific journal. I made the

predictions on the basis of my hypotheses that (A) the raw

material of creation was water (based on 11 Peter 3:5, "the earth

was formed out of water and by water"), and (B) at the instant God

created the water molecules, the spins of the hydrogen nuclei were

all pointing in a particular direction.3 The tiny magnetic fields

of so many nuclei would all add up to a large magnetic field. By

the ordinary laws of physics, the spins of the nuclei would lose

their alignment within seconds, but the large magnetic field would

preserve itself by causing an electric current to circulate in the

interior of each planet. By the same laws, the currents and

fields would preserve themselves with only minor losses, as God

rapidly transformed the water into other materials. After that,

the currents and fields would decay due to electrical resistance

over thousands of years.4 Not all creationists

Dr. Humphreys is an ICR Adjunct Professor of Physics and a

physicist at Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New

Mexico. The Laboratories have not supported this work, and they

neither affirm nor deny its scientific validity.

agree with my hypothesis that the original material was water, but

all agree that once a magnetic field existed, it would decay over

time.

The straight line in Figure 1 shows the maximum magnetic

dipole moment (a measure of the strength of the magnetic field's

source) of each planet at creation, according to my theory. The

present-day magnetic moments depend on the size and electrical

conductivity of each planet's core and on the age of the solar

system. Using accepted models (which are really only guesses) of

the cores' and an age of 6,000 years,6 I estimated the present

magnetic moments for the Sun, Moon, and all the planets for which

we had magnetic data in 1984.1 The values I got agreed

Figure 1 not shown.

Figure 1. Measured magnetic fields in the solar system

well with the measured values shown by the solid dots in Figure 1.

In 1984 we had no magnetic data for Uranus and Neptune. I

estimated magnetic moments of roughly 2 to 6 x 1024 Ampere-meters2

for both planets. Because of the uncertainty about the interiors

of those planets, I widened my prediction to "on the order of"

1024 A M2, by which I meant that the magnetic moments would be

between 1 X 1023 and 1 X1025 A M2. And regardless of assumptions

about planetary interiors, if the present field of either planet

had exceeded the maximum (the line in Figure 1), my theory would

have been falsified. There is no definite minimum, but values

several orders of magnitude lower than the prediction would cast

serious doubt on my theory. Thus I proposed that the Voyager II

measurements would be a good test of my hypothesis.

Voyager Tests the Theory

Two years later, on January 20, 1986, Voyager 11 passed by Uranus.

It showed that Uranus has a magnetic moment of 3.0 x 1024 A M2,

well within the bounds of my prediction. In contrast, many

evolutionists had predicted that Uranus would have a much smaller

field, or none at all.' This prediction grew directly out of their

"dynamo" theories, which assume that the fluid interior of a planet

is like an electrical generator (dynamo) maintaining the magnetic

field forever. The generator mechanism would be driven by heat

in the interior, which would manifest itself by a significant heat

outflow from the planet's surface.

However, astronomic measurements had shown that

Uranus has very little heat outflow. Hence, by their theories,

Uranus should not have a strong magnetic field. But it does!

On August 25, 1989, Voyager 11 passed by Neptune and found

that it has a magnetic moment of 1.5 x 1024 A M2, again about in

the middle of my prediction. Neptune has a significant heat

outflow, so dynamo theorists expected it to have a field as strong

as the one I predicted. Thus for Neptune, the creationist and

evolutionist theories did equally well, as far as predicting the

strength of the field is concerned. However, in other aspects of

the magnetic field, Neptune gave the dynamo theorists a rude

surprise.

Surprise! Tilts and Offsets

The rotation axis of Uranus lies nearly in the plane of its orbit

around the sun. Uranus is thus a planet "tipped on its side." On

the other hand, Neptune's rotation axis is more or less

perpendicular to the plane of its orbit, as is the case for the

rest of the planets. But Voyager discovered that both Uranus and

Neptune have two surprising magnetic features in common. First,

the magnetic axis of each planet is tilted about 60o with respect

to the rotation axis, so that the magnetic poles are near the

equator (Figure 2). Second, the source of each planet's field is

offset by about one-third of a planetary radius away from the

center.

Figure 2 not shown.

Figure 2. Magnetic fields of Uranus and Neptune.

Neither the creation nor the dynamo theory predicted these

features. However, it is much more difficult to explain the tilts

and offsets with the dynamo theory than it is with the creation

theory. According to the dynamo theory, the magnetic and rotation

axes should nearly always be closely aligned, except for a very

small fraction of the time when the direction of the field is

reversing.

Thus, when Voyager passed Uranus,

pundits explained that the planet is in the rare act of flipping

its magnetic field. However, that explanation became highly

unlikely when Neptune's magnetic tilt was discovered. One comment

was: "Two odd magnetic fields is one too many."8 A creationist

explanation could involve the field's source being in the planet's

solid core, which could be displaced by accreted material sinking

through the vast outer planetary ocean of fluid. Such a

displacement could influence both the magnetic and rotational tilt

of the planet.9 Dynamo theories cannot consider this possibility

because their postulated field-generating mechanism cannot work in

a solid.

Significance of the Predictions

The key postulates of my theory come directly from the Bible, as I

mentioned above. If the solar system were much older than the

Biblical age, the predictions would not fit the observations. But

the predictions do fit the observations, thus supporting the Bible

and a straightforward creationist understanding of it. In

contrast, dynamo theory predictions have fared poorly in the solar

system, not only at Uranus and Neptune, but elsewhere,

particularly at Mercury, the Moon, and Mars.10 One commentator

says, ". . you would have thought we would have given up guessing

about planetary magnetic fields after being wrong at nearly every

planet in the solar system. . . ."'l

REFERENCES

1. Dessier, A.J. "The Neptune challenge," Geophysical Research

Letters, 14 (September 1987), 889.

2. Humphreys, D.R. "The creation of pldnetdry magnetic fields,"

Creation Research Society QuarterIV, 25 (December 1984),

140-149. Available from Creation Research Society, P.O. Box

14016, Terre Haute, Indiana 47803.

3. Humphreys, D.R. "The credtion of the earth's magnetic field,"

Creation Research Society Quarterly, 20 (September 1983),

89-94.

4. Barnes, T.G. "Decay of the earth's magnetic moment and the

geochronological impli cations," Creation Research Societ-V

Quarterl-Y, 8 (June 1971), 24-29.

5. Smoluchowski, R. "The interiors of the giant planets-1983,"

The Mc>on and Planets, 28 (1983), 137-i54.

6. Niessen, R. "A biblical approach to dating the earth: a case

for the use of Genesis 5 and 11 as an exact chronology,"

Creation Research Societ_y Quarterly, 19 (June 1982), 60 66.

Uses the Masoretic (Hebrew) text and a "no-gap" chronology.

7. Dessler, A.J. "Does Uranus have a magnetic field?" Nature,

316 (16 January 1986), 174-175. Rossbacher, L. "Voyager 11

encounters Uranus," Episodes, 9 (March 1986), 17-21.

8. Kerr, R.A. "The Neptune system in Voyager's afterglow,"

Science, 245 (29 September 1989), 1450-1451.

9. Humphreys, D.R. "Good news from Neptune: The Voyager 11

Magnetic Measure ments," Creation Research Society Quarterly

(1990), in press.

10. Parker, E.N. "Magnetic fields in the cosmos," Scientific

American, 249 (August 1983), 44-54, see p. 52. Hood, L.L.

"The enigma of lunar magnetism," EOS, 62 (21 April 1981),

161 163. See also Reference 2.

ii. Bagenal, F. "The emptiest magnetosphere," Physics World,

(October 1989), 18-19.