Did James Clerk Maxwell “Disprove” the Nebular Hypothesis of Solar System formation?
A few years ago, I came across the claim, on the website of the creationist organization, Answers In Genesis, that the physicist James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) was not only a creationist, but had also disproved Laplace’s nebular hypothesis of solar system formation. After encountering this, I made several attempts to track down the original paper of this alleged proof, but could find no evidence of its existence. Recently, I discovered that someone had indeed explored the origin of this creationist claim. Charles Petzold had researched this question and has published the results on his site, in the article “Maxwell, Molecules, and Evolution”. This analysis discusses not only the possible origin of the claimed ‘disproof’ of the nebular hypothesis, but also the shameless quote-mining of Maxwell’s “Molecules” lecture by creationists[1]. Mr. Petzold traces the creationist claim back to a high school textbook, Physical Science for Christian Schools (Bob Jones University Press, 1974). Mr. P
