Classic example of running away from a question with another question.
Really? Asking if your question makes sense means "running away"?
Why are you here?
I don't ascribe any particular supernatural meaning to my (or yours, or anyone else's) existence. Why are
you here? Because the Creator wanted it? If so, why? And how do you
know that?
Why would the Universe just start automatically?
Please provide a scientific explanation for that.
Science is concerned with the natural. Permit me to slight "abuse" the word cause for a second by using it as if I were you: the cause of the Universe,
if there is a cause, is outside the realm and purview of science.
I believe a design needs a designer.
That's a tautology that tells us nothing.
The Universe is observable, measurable and fine tuned.
Plenty of things are observable and measurable. That's hardly evidence of design. Take your shit, for example. You can observe it by looking into the toilet bowl. You can even measure it, by shitting inside a bucket and weighing it or calculating the volume it occupies. Yet, your observable and measurable shit is hardly evidence of design.
You again claim that the Universe is "fine tuned" but the term is meaningless as you use it. You claim that if one value was off by a microscopic amount, the Universe could not exist and you cite the ratio of the electromagnetic and strong nuclear forces as an example. But your argument is flawed. First of all, even if
this Universe could not exist, you cannot rule that no other could. And even if you could rule the possibility out, you have to contend with the fact that unlikely does not imply impossible.
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.
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.
It's not a subjective opinion. You claim that the Universe is highly fined tuned because - and this is what your argument boils down to - "
unless it has the values it has it wouldn't exist, and it exists, therefore the values were carefully selected." This is not a joke or a misrepresentation. This is what you are
actually claiming.
These values were calculated rationally.
Sure. And? Are you suggesting that anything that's been calculated rationally cannot be misused or used in an irrational way?
Are you saying the research is bogus?
Since you haven't provided any links to such research, I can't say. But I am fairly confident that there is scientific consensus that "the Universe is finely tuned" but just to be sure, I went by the Physics department today and spoke with a friend who is an astrophysicist and he also ensured me that there he's aware of no such research that is published in a peer reviewed journal.
Lighten up Princess.
You first, I'm shy.
I believe I said every design needs a designer.
Again, that's a tautology.
Not everything requires a Creator.
Oh! Now we're getting somewhere.
I don't think the Creator requires a Creator. That would result in a never ending circular loop.
Right. I'm glad to see you get with the program.
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?
I don't know, and, to be honest, I don't think it matters in the sense that if something is "outside" the Universe (again, pardon my slight abuse of the term "outside") then it is outside the purview of science.
Now, we get to the part of your post that you copied from
http://www.y-origins.com/index.php?p=quotes. I will point out ahead of time, that
every single one of these quotes is, at its core, an appeal to authority. "Look, this scientist says X!" as if that, automatically, lends credence to the saying.
"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)
Good for them I guess. But so what? Is the existence of God subject to a straw poll?
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)
Fred Hoyle's personal beliefs are his business but I doubt he'd present them as scientifically supported or publish this "common sense" interpretation of his for peer review.
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)
Well,
if you assume that "amazing fine tuning occurs" then yes... but does it? George Ellis brushes that question aside by simply asserting the truth of his premise.
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)
Dr. Davies (whom I met at ASU for a conference about astrobiology) is, no doubt, a very smart man. But the "powerful evidence" he cites hasn't convinced the scientific community at large.
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)
He may find it improbable, but the improbable is not impossible.
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)
John O'Keefe was entitled to his view, but there's little actual evidence that humans are pampered, cosseted or cherished - whether by astronomical or other standards. The argument that "if the Universe wasn't just so we wouldn't be here and were are so it was made just so" is a logical fallacy known as
affirming the consequent.
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?" (
Really? The thought "instantly arises"? There are plenty of scientists for whom that thought doesn't instantly arises. Why should we treat this as anything other that Greenstein's personal opinion?
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)
Well, thinking about it is one thing. Showing scientific evidence that is is quite another.
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)
It's unclear why Arno Penzias thinks that only these conditions permit life, or why life is, somehow, special. But hey, let's not worry about such (some might say silly) questions.
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)
OK... so Dr. Rothman apparently took a leap of faith. He then takes another by claiming he knows that many other phycisists want to as well before lamenting they won't admit to doing it. And?
Vera Kistiakowsky (MIT physicist): "The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." (13)
Unfortunately, the divine hasn't answered yet...
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)
Dr. Jastrow might have been a self-proclaimed agnostic, but his beliefs on creation - as he expressed them - paint him as nothing short of a Creationist.
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)
Dr. Hawking is using the term "God" metaphorically here, but let's not worry about such things.
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.
And yet, plenty of other prominent physicists in that same special branch of physics haven't been forced into those conclusions. Is their logic, somehow, flawed?
Alexander Polyakov (Soviet mathematician): "We know that nature is described by the best of all possible mathematics because God created it."(17)
Huh?
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)
And, apparently, many don't. Who cares what scientists incline toward? The question is what can they
prove?
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)
If you're going to claim that the picture is incomplete without God, then you really aren't leaving much for the reader to insert, are you?
Barry Parker (cosmologist): "Who created these laws? There is no question but that a God will always be needed." (20)
Barry Parker may be a cosmologist, but he's not above logical fallacies. His first question assumes facts not in evidence. If only he'd proven that the laws in question were, actually, created...
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)
Even if true, so what? Correlation does not imply causation.
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)
If he finds a need for God in his own life, he's welcome to have God in his life.
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)
Well, if Dr. Schaefer goes into the lab and uncritically looks for God, I'm sure he'll have no problem finding him. After all, the easiest person to fool is oneself.
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)
Well, sounds like Dr. von Braun had some communications issues.
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)
I'm unsure what the point is here...
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)
If that's how it seems to him, then great. What's that got to do with the rest of us?
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)
Well damn... let's get to experimentally testing then. Oh, by the way, which sect? Let me guess.. whichever sect Dr. Tipler's church happens to belong to. How convenient!
