This is the online edition of In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood, 8th Edition (2008), by Dr. Walt Brown. It is designed to be read online.
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47. Planetary Rings
Planetary rings have long been associated with claims that planets evolved. Supposedly, after planets formed from a swirling dust cloud, rings remained, as seen around the giant planets: Saturn, Uranus, Jupiter, and Neptune.a [See Figure 24.] Therefore, some believe that because we see rings, planets must have evolved.b
Actually, rings have nothing to do with a planet’s origin. Rings form when material is expelled from a moon by a volcano, a geyser, or the impact of a comet or meteorite.c Debris that escapes a moon because of its weak gravity and a giant planet’s gigantic gravity then orbits that planet as a ring. If these rings were not periodically replenished, they would be dispersed in less than 10,000 years.d Because a planet’s gravity pulls escaped particles away from its moons, particles orbiting a planet could never form moons—as evolutionists assert.
Figure 24: Planetary Rings. The rings of Saturn, Uranus, and Jupiter (left to right) are forming today and steadily breaking up. Rings are not composed of debris remaining after planets evolved.