Can Science Disprove God?

1. Physics Evidencefor GodAwanaMarch 17, 2013Allen HainlineReasonable Faith UTDwww.OriginsDiscussion.info

2. Can Science Disprove God? • Suppose that there were no scientific evidence for God, would that disprove His existence? • No! strong evidence for God beyond science • Philosophical argument (morality, Leibnizian etc.) • Fulfilled prophecies • Miracles • Religious experience • But some claim science is only source of knowledge

3. Can All Knowledge Be Scientific? What is wrong with these claims? • “Don’t believe in anything you can’t perceive with your 5 senses” • “If you can’t verify something scientifically you can’t know it” They are self-refuting! • Like saying “No English sentence is longer than 3 words” • These claims cannot be verified by our senses or science • Science itself assumes logic and mathematics are valid but these cannot be proven scientifically

4. Are science and Christianity at war? • No – historians of science reject warfare metaphor • Science birthed out of Christian culture • Science studies only nature • Generally assumes nothing supernatural happens • Inability to detect supernatural based primarily on assumptions • Hard in principle to show nothing exists beyond nature by studying nature • Do we expect science to detect God creating now? • No, we’re in the 7th day – the day of rest • Is there tension at some points? • Yes, primarily related to statements in Bible

5. Points of Conflictbetween Bible and Science

6. ChristianView of Origins • Even in early 20th century, many scientists believed universe was eternal and static • Bible claimed that: • Universe created out of nothing (Gen 1:1, Heb 11:3) • Even time had a beginning • Bible claims God existed before time began (Titus 1:2, Jude 24)

7. Cosmological Argument for God’s Existence • Whatever begins to exist has a cause • The universe began to exist • Therefore, the universe has a cause • Science has shown that even space and time had a beginning • Cause must be outside of time, space, matter; extremely powerful • Can anyone think of a being that fits this description?

8. Consensus Science:Universe had a beginning • Vilenkin: "All the evidence we have says that the universe had a beginning.“ • “With the proof now in place, cosmologists can no longer hide behind the possibility of a past-eternal universe. There is no escape, they have to face the problem of a cosmic beginning.” • Even time and space cannot be extended into eternal past • BVG Theorem • Independent of whether or not Big Bang model is accurate

9. Fine-Tuning of Universe “Our universe and its laws appear to have a design that both is tailor-made to support us and, if we are to exist, leaves little room for alteration.” Stephen Hawking "The really amazing thing is not that life on Earth is balanced on a knife-edge, but that the entire universe is balanced on a knife-edge, and would be total chaos if any of the natural 'constants' were off even slightly. - Dr. Paul Davies, Physicist ASU

10. Our Universeis Finely-Tuned • Among possible universes, only a tiny fraction would permit life • Finely-Tuned in 3 Aspects • Laws • Fundamental constants of laws • Initial conditions “If anyone claims not to be surprised by the special features that the universe has, he is hiding his head in the sand. These special features are surprising and unlikely.” David Deutch(Oxford Physicist, Fellow of Royal Society)

11. Fine-Tuning of Gravity If gravity can vary up to strong nuclear force strength: • If stronger by 1 in 1034, stars burn out too fast for life • If stronger by 1 in 1036, stars implode • If stronger by 1 in 1040, universe dominated by black holes not stars • If weaker by 1 in 1036, stars lose material to radiation pressure • If too weak, no stars or planets possible “It is an unexplained miracle that gravity is as weak as it is” Susskind Multiple finely-tuned life-permitting criteria make it look even more “rigged”

12. Comprehending the Fine-Tuning • 1 chance in 1036 is equivalent to • Color one tiny grain of sand red • Mix it in sandpile in Eurasia up to 5 times the height of moon • Randomly select the 1 red grain of sand

13. Initial Conditions Finely-Tuned Oxford Physicist Roger Penrose computed probability for our universe to begin in such an ordered state • Fine-tuned to 1 in 10 to power of 10123 • Writing number out requires more 0’s than particles in universe • “This number tells us how precise the Creator’s aim must have been” • Much more improbable than 1 monkey typing out all writings in human history in a particular order • Otherwise universe dominated by black holes!

14. Argument for God’s ExistenceBased on Fine-Tuning • Fine-tuning due to law, chance or design • Not Due to Law • Not Due to Chance • Therefore the fine-tuning is due to design The most plausible Designer at this fundamental level is God Argument doesn’t require that universe has maximum amount of life

15. Could Life Originate From Non-Life Apart from a Creator? Most scientists admit no plausible naturalistic scenario exists • “A scenario describing the genesis of life on earth by chance and natural causes which can be accepted on the basis of fact and not faith has not been written.“ Hubert Yockey • “The formation of the first life is viewed as a chance process that occurred in spite of minuscule odds such as 1:10300 and which is accepted only because we are here. “ Christian Schwabe • Evolutionist Eugene Koonin puts odds at 1 in 101018 • “No one has an adequate materialistic explanation for how life arose“ Dawkins • Atheists cannot appeal to biological evolution for the origin of life • “Pre-biological natural selection is a contradiction in terms” Dobzhansky • Simplest organism has at least 400 proteins • Odds of finding a single functional protein by chance is 1 in 1063 among possible proteins of length 100 • $1,000,000.00 is offered to anyone who can provide a plausible theory • http://www.us.net/life/

16. Origin of Life Problems Can’t form long chains of the right kind of molecules “All speculation on the origin of life on Earth by chance cannot survive the first criterion of life: proteins are left-handed, sugars in DNA and RNA are right-handed.” Yockey Right and left-handed versions of amino acids – credit NASA

17. Current leading theory for the origin of life is compared to “a golfer, who having played a golf ball through an 18-hole course, then assumed that the ball could also play itself around the course in his absence. He had demonstrated the possibility of the event; it was only necessary to presume that some combination of natural forces (earthquakes, winds, tornadoes and floods, for example) could produce the same result, given enough time. No physical law need be broken” Robert Shapiro (Origin of Life expert)

18. Questions

19. Different interpretations of Gen exist • I’m not trying here to argue for a particular interpretation on age but if you become convinced from science of an old universe this should not be seen as evidence against the Bible • Not a lot of predictions or details but there are some • Bible aims to teach us about God not science

20. Has Science Disproven God? • Science is not in business of proving things • Science studies the natural world • God, if he exists, is beyond nature • Methodological Naturalism limits science to searching for natural causes • Leads to a blind spot • Cannot distinguish between a research problem and a paradigm problem • Does science intersect with religion at all?

21. Intersection of Science and Christianity is Minimal Science Chr. • Science could show problems with certain interpretations of Scripture • Our ability to interpret the Bible and the natural world is imperfect • Some occasional tension is expected • If unambiguous clear scientific error in Bible, at most that would pose a problem for inerrancy • At most science could indicate a lack of evidence for God from the natural world • God could have chosen solely to use philosophical arguments, historical evidence, religious experience • Science doesn’t say anything, scientists do • Implications beyond science domain is highly subjective

22. What about Conflicts between Science and Naturalism? Note that Naturalism is falsified unless it accounts for all origins issues

23. Atheist Thomas Nagel’s Honest Appraisal “[D]oubts about the reductionist account of life go against the dominant scientific consensus, but that consensus faces problems of probability that I believe are not taken seriously enough, both with respect to the evolution of life forms through accidental mutation and natural selection and with respect to the formation from dead matter of physical systems capable of such evolution.“ “It is no longer legitimate simply to imagine a sequence of gradually evolving phenotypes, as if their appearance through mutations in the DNA were unproblematic -- as Richard Dawkins does for the evolution of the eye.” From recent book Mind and Cosmos: Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False