The question of the existence of the God has been one that consumed philosophers, scientists and priests since time immemorial and it is a question that will continue to occupy inquisitive minds and be explored for as long as man exists. Scientists such as Isaac Newton saw God as the masterful creator of the universe. A view that is consistent with classical theism espoused by philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle and Descartes who also believed in the existence of the supernatural being that was the source of the origin of the universe and species.
Charles Darwin on the other hand credits the existence of species to evolutionary biology. His Theory of Evolution suggests that species have common ancestry and have diversified over time. It has been widely reported that astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, in his new book The Grand Design, said that God had no role in the creation of the universe. Hawking said that “because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist”.
If Darwin and Hawking’s theories are true it would be reasonable to expect that man would have evolved into something else as evolution would be a continuous process, that other planets which never existed since the beginning of our time would have possibly created themselves from nothing. As far as we know, we remain the same species of humans that we were at the beginning of human existence. Surely if we evolved from apes, the same apes would have evolved from something. At what point did evolution begin?
The universe within which we exist today remains the same it was since its creation, except for continuously dying stars and the new ones that are formed from a “cloud of cool and dense molecular gas”. One may proceed further to ask, “what is the force driving such formation of these stars” and proponents of classical theism would argue it is God and so we would proceed on a neverending inquisition.
G Stolyarov II also holds a view that God could not have created the universe. He says: “If the universe is ‘everything that exists’ and it could be created, then, whatever entity could create the universe, would be outside that universe. It follows, then, that such an entity would be outside ‘everything that exists’. An entity ‘outside’ existence does not exist! A non-existent entity cannot do anything. Creation is an action that an entity must perform; it cannot be performed if the entity that would perform it does not exist!”
Stolyarov makes an interesting observation. If those whose views revolve within the orbit of religion establish that God was the omnipotent being that created the universe and all that exists in it, then where did God exist in the absence of the universe? Heaven? Where is Heaven? None of the religious faithfuls substantiate the veracity of such claim. This is primarily because faith is generally not premised on reality and rationality. Though atheists refuse to give consideration to the possibility of a supernatural being as the primary driving cause of the existence of the universe and species; they too cannot advance a convincing counter-argument on this causation.
Even Georges Lemaitre’s Big Bang Theory still raises some questions. According to the Big Bang Theory “the universe expanded with incomprehensible speed from its pebble-size origin to astronomical scope”. This theory suggests that the universe existed in some other form before its evolution to how we know it today. Lemaitre does not answer the question of the original creation of the universe. The advocates of this theory are also unable to conclusively explain how the universe evolved since the supposed Big Bang. One can safely say that even science has limitations and is not conclusive in some instances.
These atheistic arguments attempt to dispel views by proponents of classical theism such Plato who in The Laws claimed something must have created the world, the sun, the moon, the stars and the order therein, and that something must have been the gods.
On the same side as Plato is Descartes who in his treatise Meditations on First Philosophy says: “I know that I exist, and since I am not perfect in every way, I cannot have caused myself. So something else must have caused my existence, and no matter what that something is, we could ask what caused it to exist. The chain of causes must end eventually, and that will be with the ultimate, perfect, self-caused being, or god.”
Saint Thomas Aquinas, who was a priest of the Catholic Church said: “Therefore, whatever is moved is moved by another. If that by which it is moved be itself moved then this also must needs be moved by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because there would be no first mover, and consequently no other mover … therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover moved by no other, and this everyone understands to be God.”
None of the arguments put forward to proof the existence or non-existence of God and to explain the creation of the universe and species are of indubitable certainty. Such arguments of causal determinism advanced by Aquinas, Descartes and Plato suggest that everything else that exists has an antecedent cause but fail to explain how the original cause itself came into being. This line of argument is inconsistent with rationality. Neither science nor religion is able to explain beyond reasonable doubt the causality of everything that exists.
When science speaks of energy, matter and atoms, some may continue to ask what gave rise to all those elements and so we shall proceed on the endless journey of inquisition. It is safe to accept that we only have an idea, that we do not completely possess the requisite knowledge to remove all doubt about the origin of the universe and species.
Thandinkosi, I do not argue like a religious person when it comes to matters of our origins or the foundations of our beliefs.
There is no God, no guiding intelligence, no rationale to the cosmos. This is a fairly bleak and irreligious belief of mine.
However, when we debate matters of ethics of course there is much common ground. Much of the most profound thinking about morality has occurred within a religious context (and notably the catholic church, that utterly mind-blowing repository of culture, art and human achievement).
Scientists are tongue-tied when it comes to coping with complex matters like modern society and how we should conduct ourselves. There are however often no differences at all between secular and theological philosophy on this. All that religion adds is a (to my mind) spurious set of underpinning hypotheses.
The arrogance in contemporary debate often comes from scientists – hence my ‘fundamentalist’ point earlier – who are so enamoured with the elegance of their tools that they think they can answer all questions. But they often have a large blind spot in the centre of their field of view.
They are better off who accept without evidence what they know already than those who require evidence before accepting what they know already. Friends let me ask something. Do you believe it is right to kill an innocent defenceless without any reason at all but to satisfy your own curiousity? Most people who are themselves will agree that it is wrong. They don’t need religion to tell them because they know already. You don’t need evidence for that because you feel the consequences of that action inside you. Likewise many know inside what they should confess as true but refuse to accept because they are too self important to stoop to such low proportions. For most of you friends it is not that you don’t know or need evidence, you refuse the evidence you have already. Even if one were to go to the highest and return you will still refuse to accept what you know already. The matter is not about evidence ladies and gents, it is the condition of one’s heart.
@Oneflew – what you actually mean to say is ignorance is bliss and there is no conclict if everyone just believe, do and say what the church tell them to? Have you ever come across any of the social sciences or are you not allowed to read those books either? They might have something to say about the claims you make, if they could be bothered.
@One Flew
I hope you’re being satirical. ‘Almost the entire body of Western moral and ethical thought was developed under religious auspices.’
This does NOT mean that the religious auspices were positive. As you yourself have noted, morality is mutable (odd, don’t ya think, if a man in the sky gives us the rules- does He change his mind?), and most of this mutability has come from people who opposed the religious view of the time.
It is true that we may not be entirely sure where morality comes from, but we can be CERTAIN it didn’t come from religion. In fact, religion has justified so many crimes against humanity that your claim that it should be respected for contributing to the way people live is laughable. Slavery? Patriarchy? Religous wars? 9/11? Homophobia? Paedophilic priests? These, and many others, are all directly justified by religion, and many are still promoted today for no other reason than because a holy book ‘says so’.
Morality is complex, and whilst science doesn’t have all the answers, that doesn’t mean we should doff our caps at a system that is flawed at best, and evil at worst. The world is more ‘moral’ today than at any time in History, all because we are moving away from the idea that religion can tell us right from wrong (it obviously can’t).
@Ms Anne Thrope – I almost missed your comment
It is tempting isn’t it? The only thing that stops me is the fact that believers normally torture and kill their own messiahs just before they start doing it to others who fail to conform to their idea of the universe.
With respect I think you are missing the point XCepting.
Humans have for millennia thought through how to live. Is it lex talionis? Do you turn the other cheek?
These are normative questions.
Of course morality doesn’t ‘come’ from religion. Of course religion, like morality, comes from man. But where has man, for most of his history, most intensely and thoroughly debated these questions?
Western thought on these subjects is hugely developed and intricate. For thousands of years the church offered the institutional repository and natural conduit for such thought.
Much of Western philosophy was casually presumptive of the premise of a God. This was why it was a bit shocking when Laplace claimed not to need that belief (he was developing his determinist model at the time).
Most of the philosophical, moral or jurisprudential reasoning which develped under raligious auspices survives perfectly intact even if the God hypothsesis is false.
Of course I have read some social science. (At post-graduate level.) Don’t be fooled by the name: ‘science’ is really just a fashionable suffix. Of course they now offer a conduit for the development of some thought. So what?
There was a period when some people thought science would answer all questions. That period ended decades ago.
We need the moral philosophy. Science cannot provide. God doesn’t exist. And the church is the repository of some of our best thought.
This hatred is just so juvenile and time-warpishly old-fashioned…
@Oneflew – Alastair answered you beautifully, I have nothing to add except to say hatred does not enter the equation so much as scorn or disdain. The catholic church stole and hid away a lot of work they cannot lay claim toi but did try to suppress. The arrogance of western religion is astounding.
Alistair asks: “…if a man in the sky gives us the rules- does He change his mind?”
An interesting one is about food.
Genesis 1:29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food.”
In other words we should all be vegan. Unless of course there was a slight change of mind. Like say, Jesus died for our sins so we can eat animals too. How convenient it all is. Braai and biltong we must. There’s got to be a loophole in there somewhere. So in essence, Christians are saying the Almighty made a little mistake and changed his mind later. Thou shalt not kill, unless thou art too very much hungry.
I’m confused. Dominee, please explain. Or I’m keeping my R2.
No-one has yet proven the existence of God. God is a hypothesis that cannot be proved for hundreds of years.
There are some idiots that will claim his non-existence has neither been proven. How do you disprove a non-fact?
The facts are that in ancient Mythology – The sun was personified as the light of the world, bringing life to all creation. The sun was seen to be in a daily battle with “seth” darkness or night. depending on the solstices, the sun would die for three days and be resurrected again.
What we know as the bible, koran, etc are but duplications of mythology – a story or fable.
When rational scientists try to establish the origins of the earth they do so independently of the story book, the bible, koran, etc.
Religion, like politics, like Racism, Like Money are all man made devices intended to keep people in subjection, and divided in order that they may never establish the true origins of the earth.
@ Pastor J Mcpherson, do you really consider this universe light? Well lets take a closer look at this environment that you consider ‘light’ i.e bodies are destroying other ‘enemy’ bodies, planets are smashing into one another, a whole Galaxy has been captured from a NASA telescope being swallowed by a black hole. As if thats not enough even our own sun is a ticking time bomb in which in a few million years it will explode.
Now, I don’t know how long can religion keep encouraging people to sweep the ‘dirt’ beneath the carpet, but I don’t think its long before people get tired of listening to the same old explanations whilst the house is on fire.
I think the day religion stopped living in fear and amnesia, they would stand a better chance salvaging the sanity of people. Thanks to science we are getting closer to understanding the revolutionary teachings of leaders such as Jesus who never advocated for religion. Well, ofcourse this was before a Roman Emporer came along to form a religion called ‘Christianity’ which hijacked such teachings for his and his followers own ‘Glory’.
With respect I don’t think you have understood evolution at all.
It does not claim we evolved from monkeys. Where did you read this?
Which of Darwin’s and Hawking’s arguments to you think suggest “evolution would be a continuous process”?
You seem to love the first cause argument although stop short of applying this to a god.
Many of the questions you pose about how things came into being might be answered if you read The Grand Design.
You seemed concerned that science does not answer all the questions you raised. Are you equally concerned that religion doesn’t either?
Hope you will explore these issues more and blog your findings.