If the remarkable coincidences that make up the parameters or context for life on our world are amazing, the actual development of life is infinitely more so.  The discussion on the parameters for life fundamentally assumes that if life is to exist (which it obviously does) there are necessary ingredients and processes that the world and the universe must have to sustain that life.

Now we take a further step and ask how life itself began, given the incredible context of “remarkable coincidences” that make sustaining life possible.  Did some unknown, transcendent being (not confined to time or space) start the universe and then leave life to come into being through natural processes?

Can Darwinian evolutionism be saved by the Anthropic Principle with only a minimal deistic acknowledgement of the transcendent?  Apparently not.

Astrophysicist Hugh Ross explains:

For the universe and the solar system we noted some characteristics that must be fine tuned to better than one part in 10(37) for life to be possible.  But, the fine tunings necessary to build an independent, functioning organism require precision crafting such as people have never before imagined, precision to one part in a number so big that it would fill thousands of books to write out.

The first problem that biologists face, when it comes to the origin of life, is the issue of the time scale.  There simply isn’t enough time available “for natural processes to perform the necessary assembly.”   Life is recent and unexpected on earth despite conditions that would sustain that life.  In fact, some of the very atmospheric conditions that are necessary to sustain life are not the right conditions necessary for life to develop naturally without any intelligent intervention.

It isn’t just the development of a basic living entity from non-living building blocks (as difficult, if not impossible, as that may be), but also the assembly of those basic living entities into a living organism.  The incredible amount of specific information contained in every living cell and the vast array of options that need to be decided for the step-by-step construction of each cell are far beyond anything that Mr. Darwin could imagine in his time, long before the advent of molecular biology.

Lee Strobel puts the issue of the origin of life into a succinct summary that is hard to refute.

Darwinism can offer no credible theory for how life could have emerged naturally from nonliving chemicals.  Earth’s early atmosphere would have blocked the development of the building blocks of life, and assembling even the most primitive living matter would be so outrageously difficult that it absolutely could not have been the product of unguided or random processes.  On the contrary, the vast amount of specific information contained inside every living cell – encoded in the four-letter chemical alphabet of DNA – strongly confirms the existence of an Intelligent Designer who was behind the miraculous creation of life.

No one doubts that there is some form of microevolution within a species but the basis for a macro-evolutionary origin to human life is at odds with the strong evidence for intelligent design in the creation of living organisms.  The necessity for a DNA/RNA source for the development and assembly of any living organism and the obvious unavailability of such a key piece of the puzzle begs for a supernatural origin from the same transcendent being who both created the universe out of nothing and did so in such a way as to support and sustain human life.  The “creation” of human DNA/RNA strands by an intelligent being is a necessary and logical condition for the existence of human life on our planet.

Of course, one could argue that, in light of the available information, it is best to remain agnostic and wait for more details to surface or for another explanation of the origins of life to come to light.

Perhaps in the context of scientific debate, that agnosticism would be the most intellectually honest approach, but in the context of life in general, many scientists and atheists are having a difficult time maintaining their former positivism and/or absolutism for a naturalistic explanation of the world.

God has made his presence known – scientifically.

*****

Click here to read more……

Whispers of the Desert Warrior by Bert A. Amsing
Copyright © 2012 by vanKregten Publishers.  All rights reserved.
http://www.desertwarrior.net     info@desertwarrior.net

Footnotes and references included in original manuscript.

One of the assumptions of the last two and a half centuries has been that the universe was infinite in size and that it always existed.  That has now been shown to be incorrect.  Our generation has discovered how to measure the cosmos and probe the deepest mysteries of the universe.

The other assumption made by the Kantian worldview is that the basic building blocks of life have always been available and that the universe, and our world specifically, had enough time to allow random chance to assemble those building blocks in such a way as to naturally cause life to develop.   There are two sets of evidence that have come to light that make this assumption fail.

On the one hand, the relatively recent origin of the universe, measured in billions rather than trillions of years, does not leave enough time for random chance to function even if the right ingredients for life were readily available.

On the other hand, molecular science, as well as astronomy and physics, has discovered a complex world of molecules, atoms, nucleons and electrons that are so finely tuned that even a small variation in a complex web of parameters would make life impossible in our universe (or on our earth).

Lee Strobel makes the comment that “In the past thirty-five years, scientists have been stunned to discover how life in the universe is astoundingly balanced on a razor’s edge.”  This idea that the universe “possesses narrowly defined characteristics that permit the possibility of a habitat for humans” is called the Anthropic Principle.

Of course, it could just be coincidence but the statistical level of possibility (blind chance) is so astronomical that it is patently difficult to quantify it.  The popular approach, used by many rational atheists today, is to assume that blind chance has indeed happened since we are here after all.

This is, of course, to abandon a rational approach to a naturalistic explanation for the world as it is observed and experienced.  A rational approach would attempt to attach all truth statements to the observable reality of our world.

A dependence on blind chance to account for the “cause” of the universe is as much a faith statement as a belief in a personal God – without even accounting for the inescapable indications of intelligence, creativity and design.

Cosmologists Bernard Carr and Martin Rees state that “nature does exhibit remarkable coincidences and these do warrant some explanation.”  Bernard Carr, in another article, gives a further thought that is worth mentioning.  He says:

“One would have to conclude either that the features of the universe invoked in support of the Anthropic Principle are only coincidences or that the universe was indeed tailor-made for life.  I will leave it to the theologians to ascertain the identity of the tailor!”

If these “remarkable coincidences” are truly a sign of intelligence, creativity and design with the purpose of supporting life, especially human life, on earth, the obvious question would be –why?  And if there is a purpose, there must be a “who” behind that purpose.  There can be no intelligence, creativity or design without a personal being to exercise those attributes.

But perhaps that is already a step of faith that is beyond most people’s ability to take.  Suffice it to say that the burden of proof is now on the other side of the equation and we now live in a post-positivist world in which the minimum expectation for intellectual honesty would be some form of theistic agnosticism.

Atheism and all forms of Pantheism and the worldviews depending on them, are now scientifically suspect.  Theism, especially biblical theism, fits the scientific evidence most closely and is therefore rational even if not conclusive.

That is, to say the least, an interesting place to be.

***** 

Click here to read more……

Whispers of the Desert Warrior by Bert A. Amsing
Copyright © 2012 by vanKregten Publishers.  All rights reserved.
http://www.desertwarrior.net     info@desertwarrior.net

Footnotes and references included in original manuscript.

One of the key aspects of the Big Bang theory is the discovery of eternity.

Not everyone would use that language of course, but the facts are still irrefutable.  There was nothing and then, there was something.

When we say that there was “nothing”, we are stating that energy and matter did not exist.  Therefore, space and time did not exist.  By space, we refer to the universal experience of height, length and depth – our three dimensional experience.  By time, we refer to that dimension in which cause-and-effect take place, in which the laws of physics are at work, and which continues at a set pace and is not reversible.

Of course, we are talking about time and space in the real world of observable phenomena and experience.

In essence, general relativity theory refers only to matter and energy and postulates that the universe began in an explosion of energy producing matter with the resulting formation of galaxies and planets.  Then, in the late 1960´s, came the space-time theorem of general relativity.

Astrophysicist Hugh Ross, explains what happened.

In a series of papers appearing from 1966 to 1970, three British astrophysicists, Stephen Hawking, George Ellis, and Roger Penrose, extended the solution of the equations of general relativity to include space and time.  The result was called the space-time theorem of general relativity.  This theorem demonstrated that if general relativity is valid for the universe, then, under very general conditions, space and time must have originated in the same cosmic bang that brought matter and energy into existence.  In Hawking´s words, time itself must have a beginning.

The validity of the space-time theorem is directly related to the validity of the principles of general relativity as proposed by Einstein.  He, himself, proposed tests that would either validate his theories or not.

Other tests have been added and much work has been done to validate the theory of general relativity with observational evidence.  Tests began within the context of the gravity fields of our solar system and were found to be consistent with Einstein’s theory.

But what about further into space?

Perhaps general relativity might not apply in much stronger gravitational fields such as a binary pulsar.  But, by 1992, these concerns were also laid to rest.  The shrinking of errors and the confirmation of multiple tests reduced the possibility of inaccuracy in the general relativity equations practically to nil.

If time and space, matter and energy all had a beginning, what started it all?

Quantum physicists and particle theory scientists may want to study the dynamics of that initial split second of released energy in what we call the Big Bang, but what about “before”?

What was before the Big Bang?  What caused the Big Bang?  Was it a spontaneous event of chance?  How?

Even blind chance must have something to work with, some power (energy), some thing (matter), which, if it existed pre-Big Bang, must be outside of our concept and experience of time and space.

That is the key to our dilemma.

There must be another dimension of time and of space, another source of power (or energy) that can create matter.  Whether that source of energy, existing in another dimension of space and time, is a person or simply an amoral, unthinking, force of pre-nature, still needs to be determined.

The implication is that the universe, as we experience it, did not actually come from “nothing” but rather “something.”  Better said, our universe, with its four dimensions of time and space and it’s interaction of matter and energy, was certainly created out of “nothing” but it was created by “something.”

Something was there.

At the same time, that “something” is by definition and in relation to us, transcendent (existing outside of our space-time continuum and not made up of any matter or energy that we are familiar with or that exists in our universe).  It can also, logically, be called the “creator” or, if you like, the “causer” (or First Cause) of our universe.

Whether this is merely an extra-dimensional “force” or a “personal being” of some sort, can be determined by a study of the incredible precision necessary in the releasing of the energies and forces at the beginning so that life, especially human life, became possible in the universe that was created.

Noted journalist and former atheist, Lee Strobel, sums up the scientific evidence this way:

The Big Bang was actually a highly ordered event… An infinitesimal difference in the rate of the universe’s initial expansion, the strength of gravity or the weak force, or dozens of other constants and quantities would have created a life-prohibiting rather than a life-sustaining universe.

Even Einstein believed in “the presence of a superior reasoning power” present at that initial moment of time.  He believed that this transcendent cause was intelligent and creative but not necessarily personal.  Not for scientific reasons, as he himself readily admits, but rather because he simply could not accept the personal God of the Bible in a world full of pain, suffering and evil.  He could not resolve, philosophically, the paradox of God’s predestination and man’s free choice.

However we resolve the secular or religious problem of evil or the paradox of free choice, there seems to be no rational argument to hold that a being who is both intelligent and creative is not also personal.

Einstein did not live to see the incredible accumulation of scientific evidence that strongly indicates that the universe was created with the purpose of providing a habitat for human life.

Intelligence and care in the initial moments of the universe have been supplemented with incredible design and other, subsequent “out of nothing” creative moments as the universe expanded, as our solar system was formed and, especially, as our planet became populated with life.

Creation may have begun with the Big Bang but it did not end there.  The out of nothing creational “days” apparently continued until the dawn of human life on earth.

In other words, subsequent scientific inquiry has shown that the Big Bang event did not merely set in motion certain “evolutionary” processes that resulted in life the way we experience it today.

There were, apparently, other “out of nothing” creative moments that were vital to the development of life as we know it.

Eternity at work.

*****

Click here to read more…….

Whispers of the Desert Warrior by Bert A. Amsing
Copyright © 2012 by vanKregten Publishers.  All rights reserved.
http://www.desertwarrior.net   info@desertwarrior.net

Footnotes and references included in the original manuscript.

Until recently, most people believed that the universe was infinite and held the potential for life everywhere.

The laws of mechanics developed by Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1726) dominated the thinking of the majority of scientists and philosophers and with good reason.

Great strides were made in our understanding of the world and the processes that made up how our complex existence functioned.

But beyond Sir Isaac Newton, following close on his work and bringing it to its logical and philosophical conclusion, was one of the most influential thinkers of all time, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804).

He believed that the origin of the universe was unknowable and, in any event, unimportant.  What mattered was that the universe was infinite.  He believed that the universe always had life-favorable conditions, even though life on our world developed more recently.

Since the universe was, for him, infinitely old and also infinitely large, without boundaries or end, the possibility existed that life could result naturally by random chance.

This belief in a static, infinite universe is the foundation of Darwinian evolutionism and rational Atheism.

It is this view of the world that has, over the last two centuries, radically changed how people understand life and reality.  It is easy to understand why that was the case.

Astrophysicist Hugh Ross sums it up this way:

The view of an infinite cosmos in which these changes were rooted received greater and greater theoretical and observational support. As stronger optics carried astronomers deeper into the heavens, all they could see was more of the same kinds of stars and nebulae (gas clouds) they had already seen up close.  Thousands of stars and a few dozen nebulae became billions of stars and millions of nebulae.  It seemed endless.  Astronomers and laypeople alike were boggled by the immensity of it all.

But then an engineer, and part time physicist, named Albert Einstein (1879-1955), discovered relativity.  The first accurate measurements of the velocity of light were made and a revolution began.

One key concept about the universe that came from the equations of general relativity shows that the universe is both expanding and slowing down at the same time.

Edwin Hubble (1889-1953), a well-known astronomer, measured forty different galaxies and proved in 1929 that the galaxies were indeed expanding away from each other. He was also able to determine the velocity of that expansion.

It wasn’t until 1992 that the final elements in the Big Bang theory were confirmed.

The closest analogy that we have to explain the phenomena of a universe that is both expanding and slowing down is an explosion, hence, the name the “Big Bang” theory.

In any event, the fact of expansion and deceleration, worked backwards, will eventually result in a beginning point.

It is not just movement but movement away from each other that is the key to understanding that in the past the universe had an ever decreasing size to the point of “singularity.”

However that singularity is understood, it is now an accepted scientific belief that there was a beginning point to the universe in terms of energy, matter, space and even to time itself.

There was nothing and then, there was something.

*****

Click here to read more……

Whispers of the Desert Warrior by Bert A. Amsing
Copyright © 2012 by vanKregten Publishers.  All rights reserved.
http://www.desertwarrior.net      info@desertwarrior.net

Footnotes and references included in the original manuscript.