How many kilometers is 1 light year. How long is a light year? Cosmic dust confirms the youth of the Earth

Everything, however, turns out to be simpler than it seems at first glance. The fact is that from childhood, from the school bench, we were “hammered” with the theory of evolution with its billions of eras. It is worth noting here that there were about a thousand theories of evolution, and all of them often directly contradicted each other.

Often in countries former USSR the question of the origin of life on earth is often passed over in silence, since the received atheistic upbringing does not allow talking about the Creator. The scope of one article does not allow us to dwell even briefly on the analysis of the theory of evolution, and therefore we will focus only on a few very clear evidence that the age of our planet cannot exceed 6000 years.

Without going into the depths of physical, chemical, astronomical scientific evidence, here are 10 irrefutable facts of the youth of our planet.

1. Earth's magnetic field

It is well known that tension magnetic field The Earth falls twice in 1400 years, that is, 1400 years ago the planet's magnetic field was twice as strong as it is today, and 2800 years ago it was four times stronger than today. Based on these data, it was determined that the maximum possible age of the Earth is about 10,000 years, since then the strength of the Earth's magnetic field will be unacceptably large.

2. Meteor dust

It is known that tens of tons of meteoric dust fall on the earth, and taking this into account, it becomes clear that if the age of the earth were millions of years, then the earth would, firstly, be covered with a huge layer of cosmic dust (up to tens of meters in height), and , secondly, in earth's crust huge deposits of nickel would have been contained (as is known, meteoric dust contains up to 2.8% nickel). Today, the nickel content and the amount of meteoric dust allow us to assert that the age of the earth does not exceed 6000-7000 thousand years.

3. Soil erosion

Today it is proved that if the age of the earth exceeded several million years, then the earth's surface would long ago be equal to sea level.

It is known that during the decay of uranium, lead and helium nuclei are formed, which are released into the atmosphere in the amount of 300 thousand tons per year. Today it has been proven that the atmosphere contains more than 3 billion tons of helium, which means that the age of the planet does not exceed 6 thousand years.

5. Age of the Moon

When the American went to the moon spaceship, then there was a serious fear that the ship could “drown” in meteor dust, because the moon, according to the theory of evolution, was formed several billion years ago, like the Earth, which meant that this dust would have to be an incredible amount on it. But after the crew reached the lunar surface, it turned out that there was a very thin layer of dust on the surface of the moon, and, in addition, it turned out that the moon had a magnetic field, seismic activity and thermal radiation, in other words, its age is not more than 6000 years.

6. River deltas

Studies of river deltas show that the age of the Earth is in the range of 5,000 years.

7. Silicon in the oceans

The entry of silicon into the ocean with river water does not allow us to speak about the age of the Earth more than 8000 years.

8. Nickel in the world's oceans

The entry of nickel into the ocean with river water also indicates the youth of the planet - within the maximum limits of 9000 years.

9. Comet breakup

The study of the decay process of short period comets also suggests that the age of the Earth cannot exceed 10,000 years.

10 Radioactive Substances On The Moon

The Moon contains a fair amount of uranium-236 and thorium-230, short-lived isotopes that would not exist long ago if the Moon were billions of years old.

In fact, this list could go on and on.

• We invite you to get to know .

What is the age of the earth? How old is the Earth: thousands or billions?

According to the Bible, Adam, the first man, was created on the sixth day of the existence of the planet Earth. Accordingly, we can calculate the age of the Earth for the chronology of mankind. Assuming that the calculations of Genesis are correct, it can be argued that the six days of the creation of the Earth described there are a literal 24 hour day, devoid of any chronological gaps.

Based on the genealogy of Adam and all his descendants, up to Abraham, recorded in the fifth and eleventh chapters of Genesis, who make up a single family line, we can calculate the age of our planet. By determining where Abraham was chronologically in history, and adding the time periods described in Genesis, it becomes clear that our earth is about 6,000 years old, plus or minus a few centuries.

So what about the most popular assumption, that the Earth is about 4.6 billion years old, accepted by most scientists and studied in the world's most reputable institutions? This age has been determined by two main methods: radiometric and geological dating. Scientists who support a younger age (6,000 years) insist that radiometric dating cannot be considered reliable due to the fact that it relies on a number of incorrect assumptions, and geological dating uses circular reasoning. They also point to the debunking of myths associated with the "ancient Earth", such as the popular misconception that stratification, petrification, the formation of diamonds, coal, oil, stalactites, stalagmites, etc. it takes a lot of time. Scientists who support the theory of the “young planet” present their evidence, instead of the arguments of their opponents that they refute. They admit that they are a minority today, but they are confident that over time, more scientists will reconsider their positions on the assumption of an "ancient Earth" that is ruling in modern times.

In principle, the age of the Earth cannot be accurately determined. Whether it's 6,000 years or 4.6 billion years (and everything in between), both of these theories are based on guesswork. People who adhere to the version about 4.6 billion years believe in the reliability of the radiometric method and in the impossibility of anything that could prevent the natural decay of radioisotopes. Those who adhere to the 6,000 year version believe that the Bible is true, and that there are other factors that explain the "observable" age of the earth (which we can easily track), such as a global flood or the creation of a universe by the Lord that "seems" to exist for a very long time. time. For example, we can take Adam and Eve, whom God created as adults and full-fledged people. If a doctor had to test them on the day they were created, he would probably assume that they were, say, 20 years old, although they were not even a day old. Be that as it may, there will always be reasons to believe in God's Word above the atheistic speeches of modern scientists with an evolutionist worldview.

Do you know why astronomers don't use the light year to calculate distances to distant objects in space?

A light year is a non-systemic unit for measuring distances in outer space. It is ubiquitous in popular books and textbooks on astronomy. However, in professional astrophysics, this figure is used extremely rarely and often to determine distances to nearby objects in space. The reason for this is simple: if you determine the distance in light years to distant objects in the Universe, the number will be so huge that it will be impractical and inconvenient to use it for physical and mathematical calculations. Therefore, instead of a light year, professional astronomy uses such a unit of measurement as , which is much more convenient to operate when performing complex mathematical calculations.

Definition of the term

We can find the definition of the term "light year" in any astronomy textbook. A light year is the distance that a ray of light travels in one Earth year. Such a definition may satisfy the amateur, but the cosmologist will find it incomplete. He will notice that a light year is not just the distance that light travels in a year, but the distance that a beam of light travels in 365.25 Earth days in vacuum, without being affected by magnetic fields.

A light year is 9.46 trillion kilometers. This is the distance a ray of light travels in a year. But how did astronomers achieve such an accurate determination of the ray path? We will talk about this below.

How is the speed of light determined?

In ancient times, it was believed that light propagates in the universe instantly. However, beginning in the seventeenth century, scholars began to doubt this. Galileo was the first to doubt the above proposed statement. It was he who tried to determine the time during which a ray of light travels a distance of 8 km. But due to the fact that such a distance was negligible for such a value as the speed of light, the experiment ended in failure.

The first major shift in this issue was the observation of the famous Danish astronomer Olaf Römer. In 1676, he noticed the difference in the time of an eclipse depending on the approach and removal of the Earth to them in outer space. Roemer successfully connected this observation with the fact that the farther the Earth moves away from, the more time it takes for the light reflected from them to travel the distance to our planet.

Roemer caught the essence of this fact exactly, but he did not succeed in calculating the reliable value of the speed of light. His calculations were wrong, because in the seventeenth century he could not have accurate data on the distance from the Earth to other planets in the solar system. These data were determined somewhat later.

Further advances in research and determination of the light year

In 1728, the English astronomer James Bradley, who discovered the effect of stellar aberration, was the first to calculate the approximate speed of light. He determined its value at 301 thousand km / s. But this value was inaccurate. More advanced methods for calculating the speed of light were produced independently of cosmic bodies - on Earth.

Observations of the speed of light in vacuum using a rotating wheel and a mirror were made by A. Fizeau and L. Foucault, respectively. With their help, physicists managed to get closer to the real value of this quantity.

Accurate speed of light

Scientists managed to determine the exact speed of light only in the last century. Based on Maxwell's theory of electromagnetism, using modern laser technology and calculations, corrected for the refractive index of the ray flux in air, scientists were able to calculate the exact value of the speed of light 299,792.458 km/s. This value is still used by astronomers. Further, to determine the light day, month and year was already a matter of technology. By simple calculations, scientists got the figure of 9.46 trillion kilometers - that is how much time it would take for a beam of light to fly around the length of the earth's orbit.

We will never be able to give an exact answer to this question. For a long time, man has been interested in the question: “How old is the Earth?”. The answers to this question have come down to us in the form of myths, legends, traditions. From a scientific standpoint, scientists began to look for an answer a little more than four hundred years ago, when the heliocentric theory of the existence of the solar system appeared and began to strengthen. To find out how old the planet Earth is, it was first necessary to answer the question: “How did the solar system form, one of the elements of which is our planet Earth?”. It is the third planet from the Sun. Currently, the most famous are two hypotheses of the appearance of the Sun and planets, which can tell us how old the Earth is. .

The first, called the nebular hypothesis, states that before the formation of the solar system, there was a gigantic red-hot gas cloud in space, which decreased in size, throwing out huge clots of gas. The gas cloud, decreasing in size, turned into the Sun, and huge clumps of gas, concentrating, turned into planets, one of which was our Earth.

Another theory that also tried to clarify the question of how old the Earth is is called planetesimal. According to this theory, before the appearance of the Sun and the Earth in space, there were huge accumulations of relatively small in size, relatively solids, which scientists call planetesimals, and the Sun was in the middle of this mass. When a large star flew near this cluster of bodies, parts of this mass were torn off under the influence of a massive star. These parts, in turn, began to attract small planetesimals. It's like snow sticking to a big snowball in winter. So, according to this theory, the planets appeared, and our Earth is one of them.

Which of these two theories is more correct, we do not know, but regardless of this, astronomers, answering the question of how old the Earth is, calculated that it is about five and a half billion years old. But in science it is so accepted that, in order to consider information true, confirmation from other sources is necessary. More accurate information was obtained using the radiometry method. According to these data, the age of the Earth was established as 4.54 billion years ± 1%. As a result, and the development of radiometry methods, it turned out that some samples of minerals on Earth are more than one billion years old. In Australia, they found zircon crystals, the age of which was determined using this method and it turned out to be approximately 4 billion 404 million years old! Based on these facts, and also taking into account the mass and luminosity of the Sun and other stars, scientists came to the conclusion that the age of the solar system and, accordingly, the Earth cannot be much older than the age of these crystals.

In meteorites there are concretions with a high content of calcium and aluminum. These are the most ancient samples known to science, formed in solar system. Scientists determine their age as 4.567 billion years. This will be the upper bound, which will help us answer the question of how old the Earth is.

Scientists suggest that approximately ten million years after the appearance of the planet Earth, it had its own satellite - the Moon, which began to revolve around the Earth and at the same time influence the seas and oceans, the speed of rotation of our planet. At the same time, the inclination of the Earth's axis became constant.

Over the billions of years of existence, it has changed significantly, including due to the fall of meteorites, the largest of which could influence climate change on the planet, lead to the formation of lakes, islands and seas.

Galactic distance scales

Light year ( St. G., ly) is an off-system unit of length equal to the distance traveled by light in one year.

More precisely, as defined by the International astronomical union(MAS) A light year is equal to the distance that light travels in vacuum, unaffected by gravitational fields, in one Julian year (which by definition is equal to 365.25 standard days of 86,400 SI seconds, or 31,557,600 seconds). It is this definition that is recommended for use in popular science literature. In professional literature, parsecs and multiples of units (kilo- and megaparsecs) are usually used instead of a light year to express large distances.

Previously (until 1984), a light year was the distance traveled by light in one tropical year, referred to the 1900.0 epoch. The new definition differs from the old one by about 0.002%. Since this unit of distance is not used for highly accurate measurements, there is no practical difference between the old and new definitions.

Numeric values

A light year is:

• 9 460 730 472 580 800 meters (approximately 9.46 petameters)
• 63,241.077 astronomical units (AU)
• 0.306601 parsecs

Related units

The following units are used quite rarely, usually only in popular publications:

• 1 light second = 299,792.458 km (exactly)
• 1 light minute ≈ 18 million km
• 1 light hour ≈ 1079 million km
• 1 light day ≈ 26 billion km
• 1 light week ≈ 181 billion km
• 1 light month ≈ 790 billion km

Distance in light years

The light year is convenient for qualitative representation of distance scales in astronomy.