God’s unseen quantum world of atoms and subatomic particles

At the dawn of creation, God created two worlds: a tangible world that can be seen and a quantum world of unseen particles so small they defy comprehension. Circa 460 B.C., a Greek philosopher named Democritus asked the question: “If you break a piece of matter in half, and then break it in half again, how many breaks will you have to make before you can break it no further?” 

Democritus deduced this halving would end at the point where the smallest particle of matter existed. Over 2,000 years elapsed before an English chemist, John Dalton, in the early 1800s, performed experiments that showed matter consisted of elementary particles, which he called atoms. 

In size, the typical atom is a ten-billionth of a meter. One million atoms, edge to edge, would approximate the thickness of a sheet of paper. Every physical object, from a grain of sand to the largest star (labeled R136a, whose radius is 265 times the size of the Sun) is composed of atoms, which cannot be seen with the naked eye. 

All atoms have three common particles: protons, neutrons and electrons. Protons and neutrons comprise the atom’s nucleus. Revolving around the nucleus are the negatively charged electrons, which are held in orbit by their electrical attraction to the positively-charged nucleus. The relative size of a single nucleus is comparable to a marble inside a football stadium. Swirling within the confines of the stadium would be the electrons. 

Excluding all atomic particles, the atom is 99.999 percent empty space.  Which means the chair you are sitting in is almost total empty space. In actuality you are not touching it. You are hoovering a miniscule distance above it, because the electrons in your body repel those in the chair. When you clap your hands, the electromagnetic fields in each hand prevent them from passing through one another.

The basic elements are identifiable according to the number of protons in their nucleuses. Thus, the only difference between a piano and a penny is the configuration of their respective atoms. Since lead has 82 protons and gold 79, lead could conceivably be converted to gold by removing three protons. 

The Uranium isotope with 235 protons is fissionable. When its nucleus is split, a minute portion of its mass is converted into energy. A chain reaction of splitting U-235 atoms releases an awesome destructive force, sufficient to level major cities, like Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII. 

Delving deeper into the atom are its subatomic particles, some 35 elementary varieties like fermions, quarks, leptons, bosons, hadrons, baryons, mesons, neutrinos, etc. So infinitesimal are these particles that mathematical exponents must be used to describe their size and speed. The neutrino is so penetrating that it can shoot through 100 trillion miles of lead like a bullet through a cloud.  

The speed of falling apples and the orbits of planets and stars are predictable based on Newton’s laws of gravity and motion; however, the actions of subatomic particles must, of necessity, be based on uncertainty principles and probability theory-one reason being, an electron can occupy multiple positions in space simultaneously. 

Man is limited because he exists at the geometric midpoint between the microcosmic world of the atom and the macrocosmic universe. Although he cannot comprehend the extremes, he can marvel at the majesty of the setting sun or the wonderment of a spider spinning a web.

God’s unseen world described herein is confirmed by the Bible: “The world was created at God’s command so that what is seen was made of things that cannot be seen.”