astronomy

John Baumgardner

John Baumgardner is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand John Baumgardner rather than just read about it. In short: John R. Baumgardner is an American young earth creationist and geophysicist.

Key takeaways

John Baumgardner belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect John Baumgardner to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of John Baumgardner from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

John R. Baumgardner is an American young earth creationist and geophysicist.

Biography Baumgardner earned a B.S. from Texas Tech University in 1968, an M.S. from Princeton University in 1970, and a Ph.D. in geophysics and space physics from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1983. He worked at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and in 2002 joined the staff of the Institute for Creation Research. As a professional scientist, Baumgardner is known for developing TERRA, a finite element code designed to solve problems in mantle convection. In 1994 he presented research at a geophysics conference stating that the slip-sliding geologic plates that cover the Earth might once have moved thousands of times faster than they do today. In 1997, U.S. News & World Report described him as "the world's pre-eminent expert in the design of computer models for geophysical convection". Baumgardner is a Christian who sometimes pursues creationist research. He has, for example, created a computer simulation called Terra to model the Noachian flood. In 1985, Baumgardner joined the amateur adventurer Ron Wyatt and salvage expert David Fasold to Durupınar, Turkey, for an expedition recounted in Fasold's The Ark of Noah to locate the biblical ship's remains. Baumgardner did not support Wyatt's and Fasold's claims to have found a boat-shaped 'object' which was the Ark. He argued that the object was a natural formation.

Select publications According to Web of Science, he has published 20 peer-reviewed papers, including:

Baumgardner, John R. (1 June 1985). "Three-dimensional treatment of convective flow in the earth's mantle". Journal of Statistical Physics. 39 (5–6): 501–11. Bibcode:1985JSP....39..501B. doi:10.1007/BF01008348. S2CID 121461665. cited 75 times. Bunge, H.P.; Richards, M.A.; Baumgardner, J.R. (1 February 1996). "Effect of depth-dependent viscosity on the planform of mantle convection". Letters to Nature. Nature. 379 (6564): 436–8. Bibcode:1996Natur.379..436B. doi:10.1038/379436a0. S2CID 40897219. cited 89 times Bunge, Hans-Peter; Richards, Mark A.; Baumgardner, John R. (10 June 1997). "A sensitivity study of three-dimensional spherical mantle convection at 108 Rayleigh number: Effects of depth-dependent viscosity, heating mode, and an endothermic phase change". Journal of Geophysical Research. 102 (B6): 11991–2007. Bibcode:1997JGR...10211991B. doi:10.1029/96JB03806. cited 65 times. Sanford, J.C.; Baumgardner, J.; Brewer, W.; Gibson, P.; et al. (2007). "Mendel's Accountant: A biologically realistic forward-time population genetics program". Scalable Computing: Practice and Experience. 8 (2): 147–65.

References

External links John Baumgardner's website Geologists Explain Evolution, Reports of the National Center for Science Education

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with John Baumgardner

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what John Baumgardner claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to John Baumgardner before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about John Baumgardner ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of John Baumgardner

In research: John Baumgardner appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses John Baumgardner in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: John Baumgardner is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics American geophysicists, Creationism stubs, Flood geology, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for John Baumgardner outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study John Baumgardner in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what John Baumgardner means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain John Baumgardner out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is John Baumgardner in simple terms?

John R. Baumgardner is an American young earth creationist and geophysicist.

Why does John Baumgardner matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study John Baumgardner?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on John Baumgardner.