Comments on: Just A Stranger On The Bus: atheist ads and the Big Bang http://mediadarlings.net/2009/12/19/buses-bluster-and-the-big-bang/ Student journalists on education, social issues and all the rest of it. Thu, 26 Aug 2010 23:35:52 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Josh http://mediadarlings.net/2009/12/19/buses-bluster-and-the-big-bang/#comment-28 Josh Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:06:22 +0000 http://mediadarlings.net/?p=154#comment-28 So does your induction that there is probably a God who kicked off the universe - a Big Banger, if you will - apply to traditional religion? What, if anything, does it have to do with the crazy god of the Old Testament, or Brahma, or Thor, or the Great Cosmic Cow, or anyone? These are the beliefs the atheist buses are challenging, not your cosmic kick-off musings, which have nothing to do with them. These are not scientific positions, and neither is yours. Positing an unknown, adding the anthropic principle, and calling it God appears to me like ignorance. So does your induction that there is probably a God who kicked off the universe – a Big Banger, if you will – apply to traditional religion? What, if anything, does it have to do with the crazy god of the Old Testament, or Brahma, or Thor, or the Great Cosmic Cow, or anyone? These are the beliefs the atheist buses are challenging, not your cosmic kick-off musings, which have nothing to do with them. These are not scientific positions, and neither is yours. Positing an unknown, adding the anthropic principle, and calling it God appears to me like ignorance.

]]> By: Jeff Tallon http://mediadarlings.net/2009/12/19/buses-bluster-and-the-big-bang/#comment-27 Jeff Tallon Mon, 21 Dec 2009 08:54:01 +0000 http://mediadarlings.net/?p=154#comment-27 A couple of corrections to Rory’s comments. First, I am no longer at Victoria University – that was a dual position with my present employer (with whom I have been for 42 years) and I retired from VUW 12 months ago. Second, I think that he has missed my point. The bus adverts say “There’s probably no God”. In other words “when you look at the Universe it has all the properties consistent with the absence of design”. In my article I showed that this is absolutely not the case. What is this bus advert claim based on? It is clearly not based on our modern scientific knowledge of the universe because the universe has precisely the opposite properties. It is fine tuned to an incredible precision. It has the appearance of createdness – it’s dripping with it. Third, in order to get around this (and avoid the God inference) Rory effectively invokes the supernatural. He appeals to gazillions of other universes outside of our own natural universe. But what is the scientific evidence for this? There is none. And the general conclusion is that there can never be any evidence because these posited universes are all by definition “beyond” our universe and subject to totally different laws. This is actually non-scientific. It is at heart a dogmatic religious position. The only justification for multi-universes is to attempt to eliminate God at all costs. Fourthly, let’s confine ourselves to the universe that we know – the natural world. Forget about the fine tuning of the universe, just accept that this universe exists with its marvellous properties. Now what is the probability of the biological world arising by chance in this one universe that exists. The odds are stacked hugely against it. It is straightforward to show that if you consider the universe as a giant computer and all the energy of the universe (by converting matter into energy – E=mc^2) is available to do nothing but computational steps; then the maximal number of computations is 10 raised to the 120th power. But to arrive at the protein nitrogenase the number of attempts you need to make is 10 raised to the 2600th power. Quite simply it will never happen. As I say the odds are stacked hugely against it. And that’s just one protein. Etc etc. So we need to be clear that the claim that there is no Designer, no Creator, is not one based on scientific deduction. It is a faith claim. I suggest that the God believer has more science on his side than the atheist believer. Professor Anthony Flew had been a very public atheist all his professional life as a professor of Philosophy. In the end he renounced his atheism for the very reasons I have stated above. A couple of corrections to Rory’s comments.

First, I am no longer at Victoria University – that was a dual position with my present employer (with whom I have been for 42 years) and I retired from VUW 12 months ago.

Second, I think that he has missed my point. The bus adverts say “There’s probably no God”. In other words “when you look at the Universe it has all the properties consistent with the absence of design”. In my article I showed that this is absolutely not the case. What is this bus advert claim based on? It is clearly not based on our modern scientific knowledge of the universe because the universe has precisely the opposite properties. It is fine tuned to an incredible precision. It has the appearance of createdness – it’s dripping with it.

Third, in order to get around this (and avoid the God inference) Rory effectively invokes the supernatural. He appeals to gazillions of other universes outside of our own natural universe. But what is the scientific evidence for this? There is none. And the general conclusion is that there can never be any evidence because these posited universes are all by definition “beyond” our universe and subject to totally different laws. This is actually non-scientific. It is at heart a dogmatic religious position. The only justification for multi-universes is to attempt to eliminate God at all costs.

Fourthly, let’s confine ourselves to the universe that we know – the natural world. Forget about the fine tuning of the universe, just accept that this universe exists with its marvellous properties. Now what is the probability of the biological world arising by chance in this one universe that exists. The odds are stacked hugely against it. It is straightforward to show that if you consider the universe as a giant computer and all the energy of the universe (by converting matter into energy – E=mc^2) is available to do nothing but computational steps; then the maximal number of computations is 10 raised to the 120th power. But to arrive at the protein nitrogenase the number of attempts you need to make is 10 raised to the 2600th power. Quite simply it will never happen. As I say the odds are stacked hugely against it. And that’s just one protein. Etc etc.

So we need to be clear that the claim that there is no Designer, no Creator, is not one based on scientific deduction. It is a faith claim. I suggest that the God believer has more science on his side than the atheist believer.

Professor Anthony Flew had been a very public atheist all his professional life as a professor of Philosophy. In the end he renounced his atheism for the very reasons I have stated above.

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