john3610
New Member
I am currently in the process of rereading a book I read last year called "Whats so great about Christianity" by Dinesh D'Souza. It confronts the place of Christianity in the face of Atheism, postmodernism, science, history and other things. Pretty good book, definitely one that will make you think. I like it a lot because the author presents a worldview of Christianity that I have espoused for a long time; that Christianity is not blind faith going against science, but that science backs up the claims of Christianity.
I am reading the section of the book titled, "The Argument from Design", the chapter is titled, "A Designer Planet: Man's special place in creation" and I thought it would be fun to share some of what this chapter is talking about. I won't say much of anything after this brief introduction, but will just put in sections of the chapter into the book to share with y'all.
Quick disclaimer:
Sometimes it feels like there is a Religion vs. Science aspect going on and I want to encourage y'all to move past it a little. Honest science, which is the measuring of the principles of the natural world, backs up what the Bible says. The Big Bang theory, which scientists believe was the beginning of the physical universe, meets up with what the Bible says about creation.
Genesis 1:3 - "And God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light." Scientists believe that the Big Bang was an instantaneous flash of light and energy that came from nothing and sparked creation. There is also a very strong debate about the Hebrew word "yom" (I think that is how it's spelled) used to describe a "day" in Genesis 1 describing the world being created in 6 days. The word yom can be used for several different periods of time.. one of which being "an age" or "long period of time". I don't claim to know 100% how the creation of our universe went down.. but it's important to know that if the world wasn't created in six 24 hour periods that the Bible isn't wrong and our worldview doesn't fall apart.
If you are particularly challenged by these ideas or have questions please feel free to send me a PM on the forums or talk to me in game and I'd love to talk and shed some light on how scripture and science match up.
Now onto the book... lol
------A Designer Planet: Man's Special Place in Creation------
When we look through a telescope we feel the eerie emptiness of space and with it a hint of cosmic alienation. It's hard to avoid the question: if man is so central to God's purposes in nature, why do we live in such a marginal speck of real estate in such a big, indifferent universe?
In recent years, physics has given this question a resounding answer that overthrows the principle of mediocrity and affirms man's special place in the cosmos. It turns out that the vast size and great age of our universe are not coincidental. They are indispensable conditions for the existence of life on earth. In other words, the universe has to be just as big as it is and just as old as it is in order to contain living inhabitants like you and me. The entire universe with all it's laws appears to be a conspiracy to produce, well, us. Physicists call this incredible finding the anthropic principle, which states that the universe we perceive must be of precisely such a nature as will make possible living beings who can perceive it.
Physicists stumbled upon the anthropic princple by asking a simple question: why does the universe operate according to the laws it does? Think about it: the universe seems to follow a very specific set of rules, and yet it didn't have to have these rules. So why these rules and not others? To take a simple example the various forces of nature, such as the force of gravity, operate in ways that can be measured. Why is the gravitational force just this strong, and not stronger or weaker? Or consider that the universe is approximately 15 billion lights years in size. What would have happened if the universe was much older and bigger or much younger and smaller?
The physicists who asked these questions arrived at a remarkable conclusion. In order for life to exist--in order for the universe to have observers take notice of it--the gravitational force had to be exactly what it is. The Big Bang had to occur exactly when it did. If the basic values and relationships of nature were even slightly different, our universe would not exist and neither would we. Fantastic though it seems, the universe is fine-tuned for human habitation. We live in a kind of Goldilocks universe in which conditions are "just right" for life to emerge and thrive.
Astronomer Lee Smolin imagines God as a kind of master technician who is sitting at a control panel with a set of dials in front of Him. One dials sets the mass of the proton, another the charge of the electron, a third the gravitational constant, and so on. God spins the dials randomly. What, Smolin asks, is the probability that this random spinning would result in a universe with stars and planets and life? "The probability," he answers, "is incredibly small." How small? Smolin's point is reinforced by a single example from physicist Stephen Hawking: "If the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by even one part in a hundred thousand million million, the universe would have re-collapsed before it even reached its present size." So the odds against us being here are, well, astronomical. And yet we are here. Who is responsible for this?
We read in Psalm 19:1 that "the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork." Paul writes in verse twenty of his first letter to the Romans that "ever since the creation of the world, His invisible nature, namely His eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made." In the anthropic principle we seem to have a thrilling confirmation of these ancient passages. Not only does the anthropic principle suggest a creator who is incomparably intelligent and resourceful, but it also suggests a creator who has special concern for us.
Through science we are witnessing powerful evidence that our human destiny seems to be an intrinsic part of a divine plan. No longer do we need to be intimidated by the vast empty spaces of the cosmos. They exist, in a sense, for our sake. Contrary to the principle of mediocrity, we live in a meaningful and purposeful universe.
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I'm tired of typing and the chapter goes on for a long long way. But I thought that was at least worth sharing haha. I highly suggest checking out the book.
I am reading the section of the book titled, "The Argument from Design", the chapter is titled, "A Designer Planet: Man's special place in creation" and I thought it would be fun to share some of what this chapter is talking about. I won't say much of anything after this brief introduction, but will just put in sections of the chapter into the book to share with y'all.
Quick disclaimer:
Sometimes it feels like there is a Religion vs. Science aspect going on and I want to encourage y'all to move past it a little. Honest science, which is the measuring of the principles of the natural world, backs up what the Bible says. The Big Bang theory, which scientists believe was the beginning of the physical universe, meets up with what the Bible says about creation.
Genesis 1:3 - "And God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light." Scientists believe that the Big Bang was an instantaneous flash of light and energy that came from nothing and sparked creation. There is also a very strong debate about the Hebrew word "yom" (I think that is how it's spelled) used to describe a "day" in Genesis 1 describing the world being created in 6 days. The word yom can be used for several different periods of time.. one of which being "an age" or "long period of time". I don't claim to know 100% how the creation of our universe went down.. but it's important to know that if the world wasn't created in six 24 hour periods that the Bible isn't wrong and our worldview doesn't fall apart.
If you are particularly challenged by these ideas or have questions please feel free to send me a PM on the forums or talk to me in game and I'd love to talk and shed some light on how scripture and science match up.
Now onto the book... lol
------A Designer Planet: Man's Special Place in Creation------
When we look through a telescope we feel the eerie emptiness of space and with it a hint of cosmic alienation. It's hard to avoid the question: if man is so central to God's purposes in nature, why do we live in such a marginal speck of real estate in such a big, indifferent universe?
In recent years, physics has given this question a resounding answer that overthrows the principle of mediocrity and affirms man's special place in the cosmos. It turns out that the vast size and great age of our universe are not coincidental. They are indispensable conditions for the existence of life on earth. In other words, the universe has to be just as big as it is and just as old as it is in order to contain living inhabitants like you and me. The entire universe with all it's laws appears to be a conspiracy to produce, well, us. Physicists call this incredible finding the anthropic principle, which states that the universe we perceive must be of precisely such a nature as will make possible living beings who can perceive it.
Physicists stumbled upon the anthropic princple by asking a simple question: why does the universe operate according to the laws it does? Think about it: the universe seems to follow a very specific set of rules, and yet it didn't have to have these rules. So why these rules and not others? To take a simple example the various forces of nature, such as the force of gravity, operate in ways that can be measured. Why is the gravitational force just this strong, and not stronger or weaker? Or consider that the universe is approximately 15 billion lights years in size. What would have happened if the universe was much older and bigger or much younger and smaller?
The physicists who asked these questions arrived at a remarkable conclusion. In order for life to exist--in order for the universe to have observers take notice of it--the gravitational force had to be exactly what it is. The Big Bang had to occur exactly when it did. If the basic values and relationships of nature were even slightly different, our universe would not exist and neither would we. Fantastic though it seems, the universe is fine-tuned for human habitation. We live in a kind of Goldilocks universe in which conditions are "just right" for life to emerge and thrive.
Astronomer Lee Smolin imagines God as a kind of master technician who is sitting at a control panel with a set of dials in front of Him. One dials sets the mass of the proton, another the charge of the electron, a third the gravitational constant, and so on. God spins the dials randomly. What, Smolin asks, is the probability that this random spinning would result in a universe with stars and planets and life? "The probability," he answers, "is incredibly small." How small? Smolin's point is reinforced by a single example from physicist Stephen Hawking: "If the rate of expansion one second after the Big Bang had been smaller by even one part in a hundred thousand million million, the universe would have re-collapsed before it even reached its present size." So the odds against us being here are, well, astronomical. And yet we are here. Who is responsible for this?
We read in Psalm 19:1 that "the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork." Paul writes in verse twenty of his first letter to the Romans that "ever since the creation of the world, His invisible nature, namely His eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made." In the anthropic principle we seem to have a thrilling confirmation of these ancient passages. Not only does the anthropic principle suggest a creator who is incomparably intelligent and resourceful, but it also suggests a creator who has special concern for us.
Through science we are witnessing powerful evidence that our human destiny seems to be an intrinsic part of a divine plan. No longer do we need to be intimidated by the vast empty spaces of the cosmos. They exist, in a sense, for our sake. Contrary to the principle of mediocrity, we live in a meaningful and purposeful universe.
-----------------------------------------
I'm tired of typing and the chapter goes on for a long long way. But I thought that was at least worth sharing haha. I highly suggest checking out the book.
