In recent times, scientists have extended their understanding of the little phenomenon called “sonoluminescence”. This compound word basically means “sound which produces light”. Scientists can effectively convert sound into light by bombarding an air bubble trapped under water with intense sound waves (ultra-sound), causing the bubble wall to collapse supersonically until it reaches a minimum radius where it pulsates under the bombarding sound to emit light waves! You can see sonoluminescence in action via the link here.

From a creation science point of view, this phenomenon can be used to explain a number of Biblical events. For one thing, the creative acts of God in the first chapter of Genesis revolve around the spoken word of God. “Then God said” is a phrase repeated nine times in the first chapter. God spoke, and it was so. God’s sound energy, combined with His creative reasoning, formed His Word (the Greek word “logos,” John 1), which produced light, energy, and all matter. All physical matter is fundamentally energy as understood by the famous equation of modern science and nuclear power, E=mc². Mass equals energy through a constant of proportionality, the speed of light squared!

Thus, energy is at the root of all physical matter, and sound, as understood through sonoluminescence, can produce light and therefore energy! Elsewhere, of course, the Bible affirms this creative power of the spoken Word of God: “By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth… For He spake (spoke), and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast” (Psalm 33:6,9).

One problem for people thinking in terms of evolutionary models for the origin of the universe and the solar system is that the sun, moon, and stars were not created until the fourth day of creation (per Genesis 1). So, what provided daylight up till then? A divine sonoluminescent phenomenon could very well have lit up the earth before there were any celestial light-producing bodies. Since water is an important medium in sonoluminescence, filling the void created by the collapsing bubble and trapping it simultaneously, the availability of water and the sequence of statements in the opening verses of Genesis become quite significant. We are told at the end of Genesis 1:2, “and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters”, followed by verse 3, “Then God said, ‘Let there be light’, and there was light.” There was plenty of water for the sound of God’s spoken word to penetrate into.

And we are told that God separated the light from the darkness and established day and night at the end of the first day. It is interesting to note that God’s creative act of speaking things into existence, sounding forth His Word, was always completed before we are told by the text repeating at the end of each creation day, “and there was evening and there was morning, the (first through sixth) day” (Genesis 1:5-31). In other words, when God finished the work of each day, the light ebbed and nighttime came upon the earth. If He ceased “sounding forth” His creative proclamations of the day, then it stands to reason that the day would turn to night with the cessation of sonoluminescence, without the sun, moon, and stars in place, until the sound of God’s Creative Word began the next day. Once the sun, moon, and stars took their places in the heavens, the familiar cycle of day and night as we know it could begin.

Sonoluminescence is indeed a neat little phenomenon, which may not have been so little at the beginning of the world!

Image: Image: Single-bubble sonoluminescence, Theearthling, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Sonoluminescence, Dake, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons.

• Mark Cadwallader, Board Chairman of Creation Moments

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