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The Inevitable Evidence for God
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Don't believe everything you thinkThe liminal space Veteran
I'm curious as to what others make of this article.
I guess his reasoning seems sound to me and I'm wondering if anyone sees any flaws in it.
A remarkable discovery has gradually emerged in astrophysics over the past two decades and is now essentially undisputed: that certain key physical constants have just the right values to make life possible. In principle these constants could have taken on values wildly different from what they actually are, but instead, they are in some cases within a few percent of the “just right” values permitting us to exist in this universe. As Sir Martin Rees, the British Astronomer Royal and one of the world’s foremost cosmologists writes in his widely read Just Six Numbers: “Our emergence and survival depend on very special ‘tuning’ of the cosmos --- a cosmos that may be vaster than the universe that we can actually see.”He goes on to give some good arguments against the explanation of infinite universes, which has been my view. He goes on to make an argument for God, not the anthropomorphic God most theists would recognize but more of a universal consciousness/intelligence that sounds more in line with eastern religious thinking.
Science today is based on the premises of materialism, reductionism, and randomness. Materialism is the belief that reality consists solely of matter and energy, the things that can be measured in the laboratory or observed by a telescope. Everything else is illusion or imagination. Reductionism is the belief that complex things can be explained by examining the constituent pieces, such as the illusion of consciousness arising from elementary chemical processes in the brain. Randomness is the conviction that natural processes follow the laws of chance within their allowed range of behavior.
Given those beliefs there is one and only one way to explain the fine-tuning of the universe: An infinite number of universes must exist, each with unique properties, each randomly different from the other, with ours only seemingly special because in a universe with different properties we would never have originated. Our existence is only possible in this particular universe, hence the tuning is an illusion. This view suffers from three problems...
http://www.superconsciousness.com/topics/science/inevitable-evidence-god
I guess his reasoning seems sound to me and I'm wondering if anyone sees any flaws in it.
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Or, could the dharma exist outside of time and space, à la older than the universe? What about things such as music or mathematics? It's a least conceivable that they could exist outside of the universe.
I tend to agree with the "our existence is only possible in this particular universe, hence the tuning is an illusion" part but I mentioned these other things just as an example. I'm sure God could exist but I'm still not sure how I feel. Sometimes I feel that I believe in God, other times not. Sometimes I wonder if ultimate reality is even more complex than we can imagine, i.e. what if God and Heaven/Hell, etc. are only temporary and there is a larger, permanent reality underlying everything? This, of course, would probably preclude the existence of other dimensions and/or parallel universes, which I tend to believe are real anyway.
Good question, and I will be sure to read the full article when I have time.
It seems rather obvious to me that our bodies would be suited perfectly for the atmosphere after hundreds of thousands of years of evolution. Personally, I don't understand why people feel the need to believe that there is a god behind it all. I believe his primary intention was to find supportive evidence for god rather than observing the facts and seeing it as evidence for god. But of course, people will always try to find reasons to support previously held notions. That's all it seems to me, seeing complexity/amazing odds and explaining it away with god. Just like the classic intelligent design saying, "There must be a watchmaker."
This is all my personal opinion. I am not bothered by people believing in god, I just don't see anything in the excerpt from his book as infallible evidence. I also don't understand his use of the word "reductionist". Why does science without god have to be reductionist? Say the scientists DID believe in god and threw that into their theories... we'd still be no closer to understanding quantum physics or gold foil experiments or the observer or any of that crap. Would assuming god's reasoning actually help us discover anything new? So what if our proposed universes are devoid of purpose from a scientific perspective? That doesn't change anything. He even infers that scientists are plagued by the lack of belief in a god! Obviously he is, and that's okay, but why generalize that feeling? It's like when people tell me that my views are depressing because I don't believe in a Heaven. I'm just going off what I see. It's not depressing when you spend your life truly living and making each moment with your loved ones count, rather than betting on some "forever" elsewhere. Likewise, I don't find science depressing/lacking without belief in some grand conductor.
I think if it helps someone to believe in a god, they should do it, but don't assume that it's somehow necessary.
@zombiegirl It isn't the classic intelligent design argument that you do a good job of debating. Its an argument against multiple universes that I hadn't heard before.
Having mulled it over for a bit I see some issues.
First there's this one He talks about the fine tuning of the universe's physical laws that came into existence with the Big Bang but then here makes an argument about quantum laws which I don't think are in quite the same realm as gravity, thermodynamics, etc. Meaning quantum fluctuations could give rise to any number of physical laws and their preexistence could just speak to something prior to the Big Bang.
Number two Apparently there are some ways we might be able to detect other universes. So it isn't correct to say we can't even in principle.
These are our highest 'knowings'. Not the highest that is knowable by evolved or superior or god like 'intelligence'. Anything that can create time and space is considered god like. To a god this might be the equivalent of a child-gods random thought with their cornflakes . . .
We can not conceive of a being that can 'exist' in its own 'non being' . . .
not if anything to say about it I have
Yoda
His three "problems" are also trite. The first "problem" is explained away by m-theory en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-theory. His second "problem" is hypocritical, he bemoans scientists having "faith" in the multiverse theory and then immediately extols his own faith-based theory, at least the multiverse theory is based on mathematics, his "theory" is based on his desire for there to be a God, which leads us to his third "problem", that without God we have no purpose, no reason to live. Well, suck it up buddy you're a speck living on a speck, and when our insignificant species is eventually snuffed out the universe will not mourn, or even notice, our passing. His desire for his life to matter, to be important, isn't a good foundation for a theory of universal creation.
It's been a very long time since I saw anything really new from either side. In fact, I doubt that there is anything new from either side. It's a classic debate.
Ok, what are the odds that would happen in that particular sequence? Tiny. Can we say that since the odds were so small that God must have controlled the dice?
And on top of that, it's wrong with the assumption that the universe fosters life. In fact, the universe as it exists is a deathtrap and life as we know it has barely survived the cosmic dance of destruction and might not be around for very long, on a cosmic time scale.
Oh, and the Science today is based on the premises of materialism, reductionism, and randomness. sounds like something learned from a home-school creationist textbook. Such a statement would certainly get a failing grade from any competent high school science teacher.
If god cannot be experienced and known then the idea of god is just that, a concept, an idea, subjective in its nature.
I can't walk on Venus. So is it not there?
Does Mara exist?
Were there 28 (or some other number) Buddhas?
Did the naga serpent protect Buddha in a violent thunderstorm?
Did Buddha see "it all"?
And in a different universe, we lowly carbon-based life forms may not exist. But who is to say that other, drastically different forms of "life" would not come forth there as well? We are a product of the Universe around us. We were not planned, nothing was. We arrived here by mere happenstance. Somewhere out there, among the trillions and trillions of galaxies, and the unimaginable amount of stars, and the even more unimaginable number of planets, life arose despite the overwhelming odds against it. Because no matter the odds, the sheer number of possible life-supporting worlds transcends it entirely. It is simple mathematics. Even if there is just a 0.01% chance of intelligent life (us) coming about, when you have trillions of planets... I mean it's just plain bound to happen, simple as that. Yes the conditions are just right, but the conditions are all that there are. It is not intelligence, it merely is.
*WE* are the Universe's intelligence. WE sprang forth from nothing more than hydrogen gas, so, so long ago. Throughout the aeons, we became the conduit through which the universe around us has achieved self-awareness. You, reading this, are the universe. You are the universe looking at itself, you are the universe asking questions, and gaining perspective.
Let's take Materialism. This is the belief that physical matter and energy are the only things that make up reality. Science supports this to a great extent because in all our investigation of the universe all we've ever found compelling evidence for is matter or energy in countless forms. But, the work of the deep thinkers in science are saying now that reality might be much stranger than it seems beginning with quantum physics. Because it's science and not a philosophy, this remains an unproven theory until they can design experiments to provide evidence one way or another.
See, creationists in particular keep trying to sell the idea that science is only a belief, because their creationism is a belief and they want to make the two equal. Science is not a belief. Science is a method of investigating reality. It is certainly not a set of beliefs about reductionism or randomness (and that one in particular is stupid talk from creationists when attacking evolution. Science in fact says the evidence is, almost nothing is really random).
I blame our educational system for people not knowing that science isn't just a set of facts or beliefs. I had a high school science teacher that was passionate about teaching us to investigate the world and the freedom in the classroom to nurture this instead of spending all his time handing out standard tests.
It also works for the flying spaghetti monster. Spaghetti is a manufactured substance, so you'd have to say that some alien race thought spaghetti was the best material to engineer a flying biological creature into. I guess this doesn't %100 disprove it, but it makes it more unlikely.
In the same way I feel it is appropriate to use logic and reason to investigate certain claims about God or the supernatural that cannot be disproven or empirically measured. There are many reasons to doubt an anthropomorphic God which is omnipotent and omnibenevolent but would allow people to go to hell through no fault of their own, because they weren't born into a good Christian home. There are many interpretations of God that aren't like this that do hold up better to scrutiny though. Personally, I don't believe in a creator God.
A phenomenon outside of spacetime cannot be old or young but it can be ontologically prior. Kabbalism, although it can be seemingly theistic, also has a fundamental phenomenon that is prior to God.
Music and mathematics require spacetime, so logic would suggest they are emergent. But it must be the case that their potential is contained in the Tao, along with the laws of physics, spacetime, pianos, bicycles and you and me.
But I do believe in God. He must exist in some sense because I created Him. I think of Him as a golfer thinks of a 'swing-thought', and very useful He is.
Scientists make philosophical claims all the time. And that is fine. The problem is when they try and treat their philosophical views as scientific facts.
There is a skeptical mindset which is used to critically analyze certain claims, I'm on board with this. What I see then is that having discredited certain views there is often an unanalyzed counterclaim that whatever has been discredited doesn't exist. For example, I see no evidence for the existence of God so no reason to believe in him, so far so good. Then the counterclaim therefore God does not exist, this is a claim and as such requires the burden of proof skeptics like to put to other such supernatural claims but somehow always seems to get a free pass.
Crux of my point is. There are so many possibilities, and so so much is unknown, that its stupid to assume what does or doesn't exist, or to limit the possibilities of what could exist only to that which is considered "normal" according to an egocentric human perspective.
There is very little, if anything, which I can say "I KNOW". For me, there are only likelihoods until some way of figuring out how to have absolute knowledge is discovered. I'm not even sure of my own existence. And not knowing is very interesting.
- imagine pouring sand onto a big "cosmos" sheet
.. in some places the sand gathers up and creates little mountains of sand (dunes)
the dunes hang out for a little while, now imagine that they dissolve into the sheet of the cosmos
that's sorta how i envision the birth of world systems / planetary systems.
perhaps that can take you somespace beautiful
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn12/sn12.044.than.html
Such are the ways to transcendence and extinguishing. It is enough to drive one to Buddhism
Bottom line, it does not matter. God is as useful as a mirage is for thirsty mouths.
Scientists make philosophical claims all the time. And that is fine. The problem is when they try and treat their philosophical views as scientific facts.
I don't think scientists make philosophical claims at all ... they leave that for the philosophers ... the present metaphysical thinking is quite fascinating and I think people would be a bit surprised at how close it reads to the Emptiness Teachings. There is currently a debate in metaphysics as to whether there are "things" at all - it could be that all that exists is structure. Ontic Structural Realsim
There is also the theory of the Universe being like a hologram, a projection.
Yes I think karma is huge in Buddhist theory and also real life application.
Like breeds like, and there are strands which bind certain peoples' lives, for better or worse.
It's all very interesting, but the Buddha did warn against too much thinking about this - I believe it is one of the four imponderables, and it is more 'revealed' to individuals who are practicing, rather than something which can be intellectually grasped.
I have sympathy for people going through some existential angst, craving a purpose. It can be a rather difficult thing. Sure, in the end whether the universe is random or not does not really matter. You are here already - now what?
It would be much easier to answer, if we can point to something and say, "This is what." I can only really speak from my perspective, but unfortunately - there doesn't really seem to anything to point to other than already existing. Despite what some theists may argue - the problem of knowledge stills exists within their paradigm. The problem has been thought about for thousands of years and still we are no closer to an answer, some of the best minds work on these metaphysical issues are coming up with, "Well, maybe we can't talk about 'things.'"
I suppose some may argue this, however, it seems to me that we are handed a blank canvas and we are to paint a picture, yet there is no one there to tell us what exactly to paint. There is no choice though, you must paint something.
It seems to be a shift in perspective. Sure, the nature of the canvas matters to some degree - if we are not aware of the canvas or don't accept our relationship with the canvas, our decisions on what paint to use, or something, may not be successful (perhaps our strokes completely miss the canvas!) - but the question shifts, from "why paint?" to "why are you painting this particular picture?"