I guess that "because God put me here" is supposed to be the meaningful answer to this deep and insighful question?
Is that supposed to be a question? If so, it's a poor one - it assumes that there is a why. Is there?
Classic example of running away from a question with another question. Why are you here? Why would the Universe just start automatically? Please provide a scientific explanation for that.
I said that your argument for a Creator is vacuous and logically flawed. You are claiming that everything requires a creator, but you then turn around and claim that the Creator doesn't. This is bullshit. Unless you can definitively and concusively explain why the Universe requires a Creator but the Creator doesn't, you have no argument.
I believe a design needs a designer. The Universe is observable, measurable and fine tuned. Just as a building, car, watch or computer can be viewed, measured, and experienced. This to me is a design. The Creator in my mind is only known through the design. So this question is invalid. We cannot measure or observe this Creator. So you cannot make the claim that the Creator is a design.
You ask me what I believe - and you highlight that term as if the word is supposed to offend me or prove something about me. I told you before, there's a difference between rational and irrational beliefs. You believe, irrationally, that a Creator is required and you have faith (whether in the absence of or contrary to evidence) in that Creator. I lack the capability to have faith like you do - I value my mind too much to forego its use.
But this is your subjective opinion. Its not irrational to claim the Universe is highly fine tuned, because scientists have done the calculations and measurements already. These values were calculated rationally. Are you saying the research is bogus?
Yawn... ad hominem attacks. The last bastion of the defeated keyboard warriors. What's next? You'll call me a nerd and a pointdexter because I took part in mathematical olympiads instead of playing football when I was in highschool? Or maybe you'll call me a bald-pate because I've lost my hair? Do you really think that insults are effective and that you can come out on top of this conversation if you manage to hurt my feelings?
Believing, based on empirical evidence, that they'll be at their home doesn't mean that they will. And if they aren't, then my worldview doesn't collapse. This is in stark contrast to the belief that you have when it comes to the Creator.
Lighten up Princess. Just messing with you. It's fine if you live in the basement. I'm cool with that.
No, I don't have faith that they will. I believe that they will be based on empirical evidence (they are usually at home on Sunday evenings). There's a difference. It's possible that they won't be home tonight; let's say they don't. So what?
Then they might be home tonight
That's your interpretation. Here's what I've actually said instead: that you claim that everything requires a creator, and that since the Universe is something then then Universe requires a creator, before adding "oh and by the way, the Creator is exempt from this requirement that everything requires a creator." That this claim is logically irrational and inconsistent and the argument you're making is fundamentally flawed.
I also added that even if your argument was consistent and not irrational, it still doesn't help us understand anything. It merely adds another layer of complexity. You claim that, somehow, positing a Creator with unknown (and perhaps unknowable) attributes gives us answers. But it does not - it answers nothing and only brings up more questions.
I believe I said every design needs a designer. Not everything requires a Creator. I don't think the Creator requires a Creator. That would result in a never ending circular loop. I still would like to know how the Universe could self start from nothing - from an Atheist point of view? You are here, the Universe is here. Why is there a Universe?
See Big Bang.
Your question presupposes that the well-ordering principle applies to time.
Appeal to authority, but let's let that slide for a second. Please tell us which leading scientists have proven that the Universe is fine-tuned.
In other words, "there's no evidence pointing towards design, and that implies a designer!"
Objection. Assumes facts not in evidence.
Deep man... deep.
"I was reminded of this a few months ago when I saw a survey in the journal Nature. It revealed that 40% of American physicists, biologists and mathematicians believe in God--and not just some metaphysical abstraction, but a deity who takes an active interest in our affairs and hears our prayers: the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob."(1)
Fred Hoyle (British astrophysicist): "A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question." (2)
George Ellis (British astrophysicist): "Amazing fine tuning occurs in the laws that make this [complexity] possible. Realization of the complexity of what is accomplished makes it very difficult not to use the word 'miraculous' without taking a stand as to the ontological status of the word." (3)
Paul Davies (British astrophysicist): "There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all....It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the Universe....The impression of design is overwhelming". (4)
Paul Davies: "The laws [of physics] ... seem to be the product of exceedingly ingenious design... The universe must have a purpose". (5)
Alan Sandage (winner of the Crawford prize in astronomy): "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." (6)
John O'Keefe (astronomer at NASA): "We are, by astronomical standards, a pampered, cosseted, cherished group of creatures.. .. If the Universe had not been made with the most exacting precision we could never have come into existence. It is my view that these circumstances indicate the universe was created for man to live in." (7)
George Greenstein (astronomer): "As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency - or, rather, Agency - must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?" (
Arthur Eddington (astrophysicist): "The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory." (9)
Arno Penzias (Nobel prize in physics): "Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say 'supernatural') plan." (10)
Roger Penrose (mathematician and author): "I would say the universe has a purpose. It's not there just somehow by chance." (11)
Tony Rothman (physicist): "When confronted with the order and beauty of the universe and the strange coincidences of nature, it's very tempting to take the leap of faith from science into religion. I am sure many physicists want to. I only wish they would admit it." (12)
Vera Kistiakowsky (MIT physicist): "The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." (13)
Robert Jastrow (self-proclaimed agnostic): "For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries." (14)
Stephen Hawking (British astrophysicist): "Then we shall… be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason - for then we would know the mind of God." (15)
Frank Tipler (Professor of Mathematical Physics): "When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics." (16) Note: Tipler since has actually converted to Christianity, hence his latest book, The Physics of ChristianityThe Physics of Christianity.
Alexander Polyakov (Soviet mathematician): "We know that nature is described by the best of all possible mathematics because God created it."(17)
Ed Harrison (cosmologist): "Here is the cosmological proof of the existence of God – the design argument of Paley – updated and refurbished. The fine tuning of the universe provides prima facie evidence of deistic design. Take your choice: blind chance that requires multitudes of universes or design that requires only one.... Many scientists, when they admit their views, incline toward the teleological or design argument." (18)
Edward Milne (British cosmologist): "As to the cause of the Universe, in context of expansion, that is left for the reader to insert, but our picture is incomplete without Him [God]." (19)
Barry Parker (cosmologist): "Who created these laws? There is no question but that a God will always be needed." (20)
Drs. Zehavi, and Dekel (cosmologists): "This type of universe, however, seems to require a degree of fine tuning of the initial conditions that is in apparent conflict with 'common wisdom'." (21)
Arthur L. Schawlow (Professor of Physics at Stanford University, 1981 Nobel Prize in physics): "It seems to me that when confronted with the marvels of life and the universe, one must ask why and not just how. The only possible answers are religious. . . . I find a need for God in the universe and in my own life." (22)
Henry "Fritz" Schaefer (Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry and director of the Center for Computational Quantum Chemistry at the University of Georgia): "The significance and joy in my science comes in those occasional moments of discovering something new and saying to myself, 'So that's how God did it.' My goal is to understand a little corner of God's plan." (23)
Wernher von Braun (Pioneer rocket engineer) "I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science." (24)
Carl Woese (microbiologist from the University of Illinois) "Life in Universe - rare or unique? I walk both sides of that street. One day I can say that given the 100 billion stars in our galaxy and the 100 billion or more galaxies, there have to be some planets that formed and evolved in ways very, very like the Earth has, and so would contain microbial life at least. There are other days when I say that the anthropic principal, which makes this universe a special one out of an uncountably large number of universes, may not apply only to that aspect of nature we define in the realm of physics, but may extend to chemistry and biology. In that case life on Earth could be entirely unique." (25)
There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind - Antony Flew (Professor of Philosophy, former atheist, author, and debater) "It now seems to me that the findings of more than fifty years of DNA research have provided materials for a new and enormously powerful argument to design." (26)
Frank Tipler (Professor of Mathematical Physics): "From the perspective of the latest physical theories, Christianity is not a mere religion, but an experimentally testable science." (27)
1. Jim Holt. 1997. Science Resurrects God. The Wall Street Journal (December 24, 1997), Dow Jones & Co., Inc.
2. Hoyle, F. 1982. The Universe: Past and Present Reflections. Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics: 20:16.
3. Ellis, G.F.R. 1993. The Anthropic Principle: Laws and Environments. The Anthropic Principle, F. Bertola and U.Curi, ed. New York, Cambridge University Press, p. 30.
4. Davies, P. 1988. The Cosmic Blueprint: New Discoveries in Nature's Creative Ability To Order the Universe. New York: Simon and Schuster, p.203.
5. Davies, P. 1984. Superforce: The Search for a Grand Unified Theory of Nature. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984), p. 243.
6. Willford, J.N. March 12, 1991. Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomers Quest. New York Times, p. B9.
7. Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 200.
8. Greenstein, G. 1988. The Symbiotic Universe. New York: William Morrow, p.27.
9. Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 233.
10. Margenau, H and R.A. Varghese, ed. 1992. Cosmos, Bios, and Theos. La Salle, IL, Open Court, p. 83.
11. Penrose, R. 1992. A Brief History of Time (movie). Burbank, CA, Paramount Pictures, Inc.
12. Casti, J.L. 1989. Paradigms Lost. New York, Avon Books, p.482-483.
13. Margenau, H and R.A. Varghese, ed. 1992. Cosmos, Bios, and Theos. La Salle, IL, Open Court, p. 52.
14. Jastrow, R. 1978. God and the Astronomers. New York, W.W. Norton, p. 116.
15. Hawking, S. 1988. A Brief History of Time. p. 175.
16. Tipler, F.J. 1994. The Physics Of Immortality. New York, Doubleday, Preface.
17. Gannes, S. October 13, 1986. Fortune. p. 57
18. Harrison, E. 1985. Masks of the Universe. New York, Collier Books, Macmillan, pp. 252, 263.
19. Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 166-167.
20. Heeren, F. 1995. Show Me God. Wheeling, IL, Searchlight Publications, p. 223.
21. Zehavi, I, and A. Dekel. 1999. Evidence for a positive cosmological constant from flows of galaxies and distant supernovae Nature 401: 252-254.
22. Margenau, H. and R. A. Varghese, eds. Cosmos, Bios, Theos: Scientists Reflect on Science, God, and the Origins of the Universe, Life, and Homo Sapiens (Open Court Pub. Co., La Salle, IL, 1992).
23. Sheler, J. L. and J.M. Schrof, "The Creation", U.S. News & World Report (December 23, 1991):56-64.
24. McIver, T. 1986. Ancient Tales and Space-Age Myths of Creationist Evangelism. The Skeptical Inquirer 10:258-276.
25. Mullen, L. 2001. The Three Domains of Life from SpaceDaily.com
26. Atheist Becomes Theist: Exclusive Interview with Former Atheist Antony Flew at Biola University (PDF version).
27. Tipler, F.J. 2007. The Physics Of Christianity. New York, Doubleday.
