The Earth Will Never End?

The Earth Will Never End?

Scientists have raised several plausible hypotheses regarding the end of the earth. The universe which was previously thought to be infinite, is now proven to be finite since it has a finite age ⁽¹⁾ and is expanding faster at a rate than the speed of light.⁽²⁾ Although, they are unable to exactly pinpoint the beginning of the earth, there are various theories regarding the beginning and end to them. There is still no denying the earth will eventually come to an end.  According to the faith of Christianity however, the planet of Earth will never come to an end.

“Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever.” (Ecclesiastics1:4)

“He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth that he established forever.”                         (Psalms 78:69)

However, there another verse indicating the opposite event will take place,

“He also says, “In the beginning, Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are in work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain, they will all wear out like a garment.” (Hebrews 1:10-11)

And the same words are written in Psalm 102:25-26. Depending on whatever Christians arbitrarily cherry-pick, we will look at the leading hypothesis regarding the end of mother earth.

 The Big Crunch

 Is one possible scenario for the ultimate fate of the universe.⁽³⁾ Just like many others, it is based on Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity.⁽⁴⁾ The Oscillating Universe Theory is a cosmological model that combines both the Big Bang and the Big Crunch as part of a cyclical event. That is, if this theory holds true, then the Universe in which we live in exists between a Big Bang and a Big Crunch. The parameter that is used to describe how fast the universe is expanding is the Hubble constant. ⁽⁵⁾ All modern experiments agree on the value of 70km/s per Megaparsec (3.26 million lightyears)

The Big Bang kick-started the growth about 13.82 billion years ago. ⁽⁶⁾

That is, if the Big Bang describes how the Universe most possibly began, the Big Crunch describes how it will end as a consequence of that beginning. It tells us that the Universe’s expansion, which is due to the Big Bang, will not continue forever. Instead, at a certain point in time, it will stop expanding and collapse into itself, pulling everything with it until it eventually turns into the biggest black hole ever. If the universe's expansion speed does not exceed the escape velocity, then the mutual gravitational attraction of all its matter will eventually cause it to contract. 

The exact details of the events that would take place before the final collapse dependent on the length of both the expansion phase as well as the previous contraction phase; the longer both lasted, the more events expected to take place in an ever-expanding universe would happen; nonetheless it's expected that the contraction phase would not immediately be noticed by hypothetical observers because of the delay caused by the speed of light, that the temperature of the Cosmic microwave background would rise during contraction symmetrically compared to the previous expansion phase, and that the events that took place during the Big Bang would take in opposite order.

 Another scenario results in a flat universe which occurs when the critical density is just right. In this state the universe would always be slowing down, and eventually come to a stop in an interminable amount of time. Although, it is now understood that the critical density has been measured and determined to be a flat universe. ⁽⁷⁾  Not Earth, my fellow Christians. 

The Big Freeze: 

 If the density of the universe is less than the critical density, the universe will continue to expand and the gravitational pull will not be enough to stop the universe from expanding. This scenario would result in the Big Freeze, where the universe cools as it expands and reaches a state of entropy. ⁽⁸⁾ 

 

In conclusion:

The Bible not only fails by stating the earth is eternal, but also contradicts itself by simultaneously asserting that it will come to an end while at the same time reasoning it will not.