Barnes obtained three degrees in Physics: an AB from Hardin-Simmons University in 1933, an MS from Brown University under Robert Bruce Lindsay in 1936, and an honorary Sc.D. again from Hardin-Simmons University in 1950. His detractors have questioned his credentials based on that fact that his doctorate was honorary. Serving from 1938 until his retirement in 1981, Barnes was a Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP). As an electrical engineer during World War II, Barnes invented DODAR, an electronic device used by the Marines for locating enemy guns. He acted as Director of the Schellenger Research Laboratories at UTEP from its beginning in 1953 until 1965. A founding fellow of the Creation Research Society (CRS) in 1963, Barnes served as the first Chairman of the Textbook Committee and third President from 1973 to 1976. He was an original member of the Institute for Creation Research Technical Advisory Board and the first Dean of its Graduate School from 1981 to 1984. His writing consisted of five books and thirty-five articles on a wide range of topics in classical physics and creation science. Active until his death in 2001, Barnes served on the Editorial Board of Galilean Electrodynamics from its inception in 1990 and as an associate scientist with Common Sense Science from its inception in 1997.

Barnes' scientific arguments are considered to be pseudoscience or fringe science, appearing in non-mainstream, non-peer-reviewed sources like Galilean Electrodynamics and Creation Research Society Quarterly.

Earth's Magnetic Field Decay

Just as Lord Kelvin argued for a young earth due to a weakening magnetic field, Barnes claimed to calculate the half-life of the earth's magnetic field as approximately 1,400 years based on 130 years of empirical data. Some creationists have used Barnes' argument as evidence for a young earth, less than 10,000 years as suggested by the Bible. His critics discredit this concept, explaining that Barnes failed to take experimental uncertainties into account and used an obsolete model of the interior of the earth.

Classical Gravitation

Arguing in the manner of British scientist Herbert Dingle against the relativitistic "twin paradox", Barnes claimed several logical and experimental problems in the accepted theories of electrodynamics and the relativity. He rejected current experimental evidence for relativity, for example rejecting the Rossi-Hall experiment of muons as evidence of time dilation for allegedly having too many uncontrolled variables and judgment factors. Rejecting both Maxwell's classical ether and Einstein's constancy of speed of light c, Barnes proposed the "light-bearing mechanism" as the "self-field" of a source charge. The acceleration of a charge, according to Barnes, caused a disturbance wave in its fields, which obeyed Maxwell's equations in the reference frame associated with that source's fields. He claimed that "relativistic" effects were feedback phenomena, and claimed to derive many "relativistic" results employing Galilean transformations and without assumptions of time dilation or length contraction.

Electron model

Barnes believed that many questions in physics would remain unanswered without an "acceptable" physical model for the electron. His 1978 paper, with Richard R. Pemper in the CRS Quarterly, claimed that a physical model of the electron could be established without what he saw as inherent contradictions in quantum mechanics. Barnes insisted on the physical reality of classical physics instead of the quantum reality of modern physics. The Common Sense Science organization continues to pursue this idea under the name toroidal ring model.

Books

• Thomas G. Barnes, Science and Biblical Faith: A Science Documentary, Creation Research Society Books, 191pp. (1993) (ISBN 978-0963755001).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Space Medium: The Key to Unified Physics, Geo/Space Research Foundation, 170pp. (1986) (ISBN 978-0936961019).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Physics of the Future: A Classical Unification of Physics, Master Books, 208pp., (1983) (ISBN 978-0932766090).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Origin and Destiny of the Earth's Magnetic Field, Institute for Creation Research, (1973) (ISBN 978-0890510131).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Foundations of Electricity and Magnetism, Heath, 331pp., (1965) (ASIN B0006BMTRU).

Articles

• Thomas G. Barnes , "Resonant Optics for Detection of Rotation and Translation", Galilean Electrodynamics, V2, N3, p. 55 [Correspondence V2, N4, p. 77] (1991).
• Thomas G. Barnes & Harold S. Slusher, "Space Medium Theory Applied to Lunar and Stellar Aberration", Galilean Electrodynamics, V1, N4, p. 43 [Correspondence V1, N5, p. 68] (1990).
• Thomas G. Barnes, "Electric Explanation Of Inertial Mass ", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V19, N4 (Mar 1983).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Harold S. Slusher, G. Russel Akridge, & Francisco S. Ramirez IV, "Electric Theory of Gravitation", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V19, N2, pp. 113-116 (Sep 1982).
• Thomas G. Barnes & Franciso S. Ramirez IV, "Velocity Effects on Atomic Clocks and the Time Question", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V18, N4 (Mar 1982).
• Thomas G. Barnes, "Satellite Observations Confirm the Decline of the Earth’s Magnetic Field", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V18, N1 (Jun 1981).
• Thomas G. Barnes, "New Proton and Neutron Models", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V17, N1, pp. 41-47 (Jun 1980).
• Richard R. Pemper & Thomas G. Barnes, "A New Theory Of The Electron", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V14, N4, pp. 210-220 (Mar 1978).
• Thomas G. Barnes, Richard R. Pemper & Harold L. Armstrong, " A Classical Foundation For Electrodynamics", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V14, N1, pp. 38-45 (Jun 1977).
• Thomas G. Barnes & Raymond J. Upham, Jr., "Another Theory of Gravitation: An Alternative to Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V12 N4, pp. 194-197 (Mar 1976).
• Thomas G. Barnes, "Earth’s Magnetic Energy Provides Confirmation of Its Young Age", Creation Research Society Quarterly, V12, N1 (Jun 1975).