© 2021 International Urantia Association (IUA)
The Urantia Book presents a cosmology that stirs the soul: a central and perfect universe, fringed by spacetime shallows in which finaliters are born—finaliters, destined to launch from this cosmic continental shelf into oceanic depths, seeding the light and life of personality throughout nested levels of outer space.
Soul stirring indeed! A cosmology pervaded by meaning and value, eclipsing in its scope our finest Sci-fi. What a relief from the consensus-materialist models that native science has managed to evolve.
However, right after having thus stirred our souls, the authors pour cold water over our expectations.
…within a few short years many of our statements regarding the physical sciences will stand in need of revision… [UB 101:4.2]
“Will stand in need of revision.” When compared with current consensus cosmology of a young universe beginning with a hot Big Bang, the cosmology of The Urantia Book is so unorthodox, and so apparently wrong, that some students of these papers now see this cosmology as little more than decoration for the book’s more important themes: its spiritual and philosophical revelations. But take another look at the “Limitations of Revelation” discussed in Paper 101. Immediately after stating that they were limited in what scientific facts they could reveal, they go on to list a number of things they were permitted to do. The first of these is especially interesting.
1. The reduction of confusion by the authoritative elimination of error. [UB 101:4.6]
“[T]he authoritative elimination of error.” As far as I can tell, there is only one place where the authors point explicitly to one of our scientific assumptions, and tell us bluntly that it’s wrong. This is in Paper 12, regarding the use of redshift to determine the distance to galaxies in outer space.
But this apparent speed of recession is not real… [UB 12:4.14]
Recall that the “apparent speed of recession” of distant galaxies forms the foundation of our current consensus cosmology, that the universe began with a big bang a mere 14 billion years ago. So, if this “apparent speed of recession” is in fact “not real,” then this single assumption (about “Hubble’s Law”) is indeed responsible for an awful lot of confusion! And so the authors would be well within their rights to attempt some “reduction of confusion by the authoritative elimination of error.”
Which opens the door to an opportunity for students of The Urantia Book to present a model of the cosmos that can explain all the data and anomalies that (increasingly) confuse and contradict current mainstream assumptions. One attempt at sketching such a model can be found at this link:
Playlist – Urantia Book Cosmology
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLujf81__tQbQ_tAoVrvr6xOPm4XkZUStU
Regarding the final video in that series (Part 4D), the James Webb Space Telescope is to be launched this week (Christmas 2021). Given what this infrared-optimized space telescope might reveal, video Part 4D was tuned to predict a few simple but game-changing facts about our home spiral of stars, the ancient Milky Way. Stay tuned!