John Baumgardner

Background

About John Baumgardner

I am passionate about the new dimension I discovered in Jesus while in graduate school in 1970 and for the adventure and fulfillment in life He has granted me ever since. Although my early training was in electrical engineering, a new interest in the Bible and Christian apologetics motivated me to switch to earth science and to pursue a Ph.D. in geophysics, specifically to investigate the Genesis Flood at a professional level. My Ph.D. research included the development of a 3D finite element computer model of the earth’s interior, now known as TERRA. After completing my Ph.D. at UCLA, I served for 20 years as a staff scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory engaged in a variety of research projects in computational physics, including application of TERRA to various aspects of the Flood. This work is generally viewed as providing crucial early support for the concept of runaway subduction and catastrophic plate tectonics as a key aspect of the Flood. Between 1997 and 2005 I was privileged to serve on the Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth (RATE) team that documented multiple independent lines of radioisotope evidence that the earth is thousands, not billions, of years old. This evidence included high retention levels of radiogenic helium in zircons in Proterozoic granite and consistently high levels of C-14 in essentially all fossils throughout the rock record. Between 2005 and 2010 I was part of a small team that developed Mendel’s Accountant, a computer model for exploring key topics population genetics relating to the origin and history of life. I currently serve as a senior research associate with Logos Research Associates based in Santa Ana, California, and an adjunct faculty member of Southern California Seminary in San Diego.