Kid Genius Jacob Barnett Disproving the Big Bang

This is an odd article from The Blaze with a title intended to get your attention, “A BEAUTIFUL MIND? 12-YEAR-OLD BOY GENIUS SETS OUT TO DISPROVE BIG BANG.” But in the story itself, it doesn’t appear that Jacob Barnett is out to disprove the Big Bang Theory, he seems to be asking valid questions? Is he really out to disprove the Big Bang? His main question appears to be where did carbon come from during the Big Bang? Does the Big Bang Theory fall apart concerning this issue on carbon?

Now please note that The Blaze is quoting Jacob from an interview with The Indianapolis Star. You’ll want to read the article for the entire quote but here is what Jacob asks in reference to the Big Bang, “The other day I calculated, they have this period where they suppose the hydrogen and helium were created, and, um, I don’t care about the hydrogen and helium, but I thought, wouldn’t there have to be some sort of carbon?”

Yes, he’s a smart kid. Jacob has Asperger’s Syndrome which is considered to be a form of autism but it is mild in comparison to other forms of autism. Per Wiki, “… characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, along with restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests.” I remember reading a personal introduction to Asperger’s Syndrome in a Harvey Pekar collection where one of his readers with that type of autism wrote him a long letter and Harvey had it turned into a comic book story. The personal aspect made it a good read. You can find it in The Best of American Splendor.

But still, why is The Blaze saying that Jacob is out to disprove the Big Bang rather than understand it or correct it? Is Jacob Barnett a creationist, a religionist?

I’m not a scientific expert so I can only keep asking questions and quoting resources and I’m happy to have readers chime in with their comments, but if Jacob is expanding on a theory, then that is not the same as disproving a theory. However, I did look Jacob Barnett up in Wiki and it does say, “He is also developing an alternative theory to the Big Bang Theory, his hypothesis being that the Big Bang couldn’t be responsible for the amount of carbon present in the universe via his calculations.”

So now The Blaze puts it in terms of “disproving” while Wiki puts it as an “alternative theory” which I would read as meaning “disproving” as well. But no direct quote from Barnett that I can find in the article. There are implications to how all of this is being worded, keep reading.

Einstein, who’s Theory of Relativity is being discussed, if you recall made a mistake that he later regretted concerning the idea that our universe was expanding because of a Big Bang. Per an article on The Big Bang Theory from TheKeyBoard.org.uk which I found informative:

“The first clear hint that the universe might change as time passes came in 1917 when Albert Einstein developed his General Theory of Relativity. Einstein realised that his equations said that the universe must be either expanding or contracting, but it could not be standing still, because if it were then gravity would attract all the galaxies towards one another. This was, at the time, a revolutionary concept, so revolutionary that Einstein refused to believe it and introduced his infamous ‘cosmological constant’ into the equations so that the sums agreed that the universe could be static. He later claimed it was the biggest blunder of his career. It was in 1920 that Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe was expanding by measuring the light from distant galaxies. This discovery was followed in 1927 by Georges Lemaitre, a Belgian astronomer, who was the first person to produce a version of what is now known as the Big Bang model.”

The same author of this article on the Big Bang adds his insight, “The situation is such that any new theory, far from displacing the Big Bang, would have to incorporate it. In other words, it can only be improved upon in much the same way that Einstein incorporated Newton’s theory of gravity into his own theory of relativity. Relativity did not overthrow Newton’s theory, it incorporated and developed it.” And this is what I’m saying with boy genius Jacob Barnett, we need to tread carefully in understanding what he is trying to do. Maybe he will destroy the Big Bang theory, but I doubt it. My opinion is that, if anything, he will end up redefining it.

So again, why did the author of The Blaze article trumpet that Jacob was disproving the Big Bang theory? I looked up the author Jonathan M. Seidl and here’s his brief bio: “Jonathon M. Seidl is an assistant editor at The Blaze. His writing has appeared in WORLDmagazine and online with The American Spectator. Although a Green Bay Packers fanatic, he and his wife live in New York City with their dog, Gus. Seidl graduated from The King’s College-New York City with a degree in politics, philosophy, and economics.”

Ahh, stupid me. The Blaze is an ultra-conservative “news” site (sorry, I guess I’m out of the loop). I honestly didn’t know as I found the story through a search engine and it looked like a standard news site. What’s more–it’s a Glenn Beck site. Geez, is that guy behind everything?! From the About Us page: “The Blaze is a news, information and opinion site brought to you by Glenn Beck and a dedicated team of writers, journalists & video producers. Our goal is to post, report and analyze stories of interest on a wide range of topics from politics and culture to faith and family.”

Alright, that doesn’t mean that Jacob Barnett isn’t working on disproving The Big Bang Theory by coming up with his own theory, but we can surmise that Mr. Seidl of The Blaze is making the assumption that Jacob will come up with a “creationism” inspired alternative because creationists believe that when scientists disagree it proves God is the creator [Note, this is where I made the error or rather an improper insinuation. Seidl would most likely have gotten the confirmation on Barnett disproving the Big Bang from Beck's upcoming show. Even if it was not already videotaped in advanced I'm sure there was discussions with the family and so forth. I assumed too much.]. Far from it. When scientists disagree, it’s good for science because inaccuracies are corrected, new theories come about and with The Big Bang it may mean expanding our understanding of it or coming up a competitive theory that will be peer reviewed. It doesn’t mean that Jacob will ask his valid questions and the resulting answers will be the unexplained–God.

Give the kid some time! He may be a genius but even geniuses make mistakes or need further study before they arrive at a conclusion. Right now Jacob is asking questions. That’s all. When Jacob comes back and says the math all adds up to God then the overly-biased disciples of Beck can gloat that they have a boy genius backing up their superstition. Meanwhile, I’ll be interested to see what this kid can do.

UPDATE 04/4/2011: I decided to reword this into one update and highlight my error in the article. Sorry, I hate mistakes. Simply put, this was a flawed article in relation to what The Blaze knew in advance from being part of Becks’s staff or other resources. Happy to concede that to all the readers’ comments who protested after reviewing it again. It also was flawed, or at least I think so, because there was an intermingling of Expanded Theory of Relativity and Big Bang Theory making it sound like they were one. I believe one incorporates the other but they would be separate theories. I did remove the confusing language because it doesn’t make sense. Feel free to correct me further. I just rather have people discuss Big Bang theory in the comments more than anything–so if you think I ran my mouth, you are correct! If you think this is a poorly worded article, you’re correct! If you think I’m an a-hole for picking on Beck, hey that’s fine too since I won’t stop doing that.

BUT I will say in my defense that I never stated Barnett was not out to disprove the big bang. My error is directly related to The Blaze and their article and assuming what they knew. My goal was to show the creationist intent behind choosing their article title (twice, also for another article). They are factually correct though in using that title. Prior behavior of Beck’s outfit is not inconsistent with a creationist bias, but my case was not made.

And BTW, I’m not a liberal. That’s an easy out on these issues. I’m a political moderate. I just don’t like anti-science. I am definitely a biased atheist, so if you want to go after me on that note, makes sense to me. For penance on this whole issue I forced myself to watch Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, the intelligent design movie by Ben Stein. You can read my review of it here.