How Water Forms in Interstellar Space at 10K 270
KentuckyFC writes "Water is the most abundant solid material in space. But although astronomers see it on planets, moons, in comets and in interstellar clouds, nobody has been able to show how it forms. In theory, it should form easily when oxygen and atomic hydrogen meet. The problem is that there is not enough of it floating around as gas in interstellar dust clouds. So instead, the thinking is that water must form when atomic hydrogen interacts with frozen solid oxygen on the surface of dust grains in these clouds. Now Japanese astronomers have demonstrated this process for the first time in the lab in conditions that simulate interstellar space. That's cool because all the water in the solar system, including almost every drop you drink on Earth today, must have formed in exactly this way more than 5 billion years ago in a pre-solar dustcloud (abstract)."
Re:5 billion years ago ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Must it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why must it? Could you justify that statement?
Gravity alone tends to cause interstellar clouds to collapse into stellar accretion disks, and then into stars and planets.
Although the Hydrogen and Oxygen in the original cloud may have had almost zero chance of getting together, once the cloud collapsed into relatively dense planetary atmospheres, why couldn't water have formed then?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
If that is true (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:5 billion years ago ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:If that is true (Score:2, Insightful)
You, ah, DO realize that God told us all of this, far before we could understand it, right?
Complaining about apparent nuance in the deity's creation is kind of like complaining that your stoner parents are straight-laced professionals now, even though they tell you they were stoners whenever you ask.
I could tell you how easy it is to reconcile the six-day creation with the universe's apparent age without the introduction of deception, but you've obviously made a religious choice to be atheist, and nothing I can say would dissuade you from that.
Instead, how about the gospel in 26 words? "God exists, He loves you, and even though you probably deserve to go to hell, He's willing to let you off if you love Him back."
So if you can't take it literally... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If that is true (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Sure looks that way (Score:1, Insightful)
Now if we could find 5 billion year old wine, *that* would be news!
Re:If that is true (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I agree that we should toss christianity (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If that is true (Score:4, Insightful)
If man were created without the possibility of sin, he wouldn't be truly free. He wouldn't have the choice of living within or without God's presence. Again, not very interesting for God.
Why would God's sense of right and wrong be any more artificial than yours? And where does your sense of right and wrong come from? And how does your sense of right and wrong differ from the Biblical sense of right and wrong?