The recent
meteor explosion over Russia has triggered more inquiries than usual concerning
the hazards of living in our Solar System. There are countless multitudes of
objects whirling through our Solar System apart from the familiar planets.
Uncounted millions of meteoroids and asteroids larger than the Russian object
inhabit our region of the Milky Way Galaxy. Many tiny objects strike each year
adding thousands of tons of meteor dust to Earth’s mass. Asteroids and
meteoroids are closely associated with the orbit of giant planet Jupiter which
marshals the movement of these extra-planetary bodies.
Jupiter
has .001 times the mass of the sun. Next to our life-giving sun, no Solar
System object is more important for past or present life on earth. When the Solar
System formed 4.5 billion years ago, the planet Jupiter was “assigned” a unique
role in organizing the developing planetary system. Its structure and the
eventual hospitable conditions on our planetary home owe much to the gas giant
Jupiter. Its beauty and its fourth-ranking brightness in our sky, behind the
Sun, Moon, and planet Venus, serve to remind us of its importance in terms of
our survival.
Based on
knowledge that our Solar System is absolutely unique with its assemblage of four
small inner terrestrial planets and four larger outer gas giant planets, the
evolution of our Solar System was a divinely ordained process. Other planetary
systems in our galaxy have been observed and many more are developing as the
eons of time pass. Many stars in the Milky Way Galaxy possess one or more
planets. Theories of star and planet formation posit that great, diffuse clouds
of cosmic dust condense under their own gravitational attraction, spinning more
rapidly as condensation proceeds. A flat disc of material forms around a
central star and accretion eventually occurs, forming planets. This event sequence
in our home planetary system has been generally deduced. Our system formed
roughly 4.5 billion years ago. Some of the most interesting scenarios occurred
between 4.1 and 3.8 bya.
Jupiter,
and to a lesser degree Saturn, were responsible for a dramatic rearrangement of
the developing solar system about 3.9 billion years ago. Rocky and icy bodies
were flung inward toward the entire retinue of inner, developing planets. The
event was termed the “late heavy bombardment.” Pictures of a heavily crated
moon and information gathered from the Moon by visiting Apollo astronauts from
1969-1972 attest to the ancient bombardment. No atmospheric and geologic events
were ever present to erase the ancient impact features on the Moon as have
evidences of impacts on Earth. Jupiter has supervised the reigning in of “errant”
solar system impactors since that time. At present we encounter very rare
strikes of asteroids such as the Russian meteor of February 2013. Jupiter has
become an “order keeper.”
One
theory concerns the ability of Jupiter to “take a punch” in boxing parlance.
The famously publicized 1994 comet strike on Jupiter joins with the July 19,
2009 asteroid impact which left behind a sizable dark bruise on the planet’s
face. From 2009 to 2012 there have been four additional Jupiter impact events
observed. Science writers have made reference to Jupiter’s “vacuum cleaner”
role in protecting Earth from potential harmful impacts of meteoroids and
asteroids.
Both
Jupiter and Saturn possess unusually regular orbits. Astrophysicist Jacques
Lasker in 1994 determined that if the outer planets were less regular in their
orbital characteristics, the inner planets would be orbitally chaotic. Planet
Earth would suffer from climatic instability as a result. Hundreds of factors
affect the welfare of life on our planet. Climate stability, however, is one
factor without which life on earth could not exist to sustain our existing seven
billion souls.
There are
hundreds of other parameters known concerning a planet’s capacity to support
life. Naturalists ascribe the finely tuned adherence of our planet to each of
these parameters, along with many other finely tuned physical constants
governing the operation of physical matter to a fortuitous cosmic accident of
chance. The existence of thousands of separate evidences of divine design in
our universe, from the micro cosmos to the macro cosmos presents a powerful
case for the hand of the Creator. From the moment the time dimensions of this
universe were put in place to the present instant of cosmic existence, we
observe a world of incredible wonder. The feeling of certainty of the existence
of divine design is difficult to dismiss as an illusion.
