Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Stephen Hawking's Leap of Faith

In his newest book, ironically titled The Grand Design the brilliant physicist Stephen Hawking made the following statement:
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. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.
Another genius once again reaffirms Romans chapter 1 verse 22 which says "Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools." Interestingly enough, this verse is immediately preceded by this thought from verse 20: "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." And now, the upper echelon of academia are using "what has been made" to claim there is no God.

But I digress. It is not my intention to point out Mr. Hawking's logical fallacy by way of the Bible. Let us suppose, for a moment, that Mr. Hawking is correct: The mere existence of "a law such as gravity" does enable the universe to create ex nihilo (out of nothing). From the back of the classroom my had tentatively rises into the air. "Mr. Hawking?" I say hesitantly. "I don't mean to be rude, and I hope this isn't a dumb question but... If that's the case, where did the law of gravity come from?"

If Mr. Hawking is to be believed then there is an inherent organization to the universe which is in direct contradiction to the second law of thermodynamics. All nature moves to a point of equilibrium by way of entropy. It does not move to an imbalance such as suddenly creating matter out of nothing by way of the laws of gravity. A further expedition into this theory reveals that it stems for the concept that the state of energy in the universe is a net of zero. Gravity is negative energy and the energy of motion is positive. In its simplest form, the theory states that, in a vacuum, the combination of these two energies can spontaneously create protons. The problem that I have yet to see answered is that gravity requires mass and, if Einstein is correct, E=MC2 means that energy has mass so once again, we don't have creation ex niliho, we have gravity (reliant on mass) and energy (also reliant on some type of mass) creating other mass. Mass, energy, gravity, even a vacuum had to have some beginning. Any law or energy or even location that exists that might allow for the universe to "create itself" must have been designed by an intelligent architect.

Sorry, once again, I've digressed. I would ask Mr. Hawking where the space in which the universe created itself and the time used to measure it came from, but I believe I know his answer. And this is where he takes his true leap of faith.

You see, Mr. Hawking believes in what is known as a "multiverse." What is a "multiverse?" It is a completely unscientific untestable unprovable theory that our universe is simply one of many universes, either connected or parallel, in which life may exist and the laws of physics may differ. (I'm not making this up.) The M-theory (as it's occasionally called) allows for such a monumentally massive incomprehensibly immense number of galaxies, solar systems, and planets that the law of large numbers makes Earth and the life therein likely and trivial instead of statistically improbable and precious.

One other point I wanted to make is that in the quote Mr. Hawking states "the Universe can and will create itself from nothing. (Emphasis added)" If the universe will create itself from nothing why, in the history of mankind, have we not seen this occur. It has not been seen in nature, space, or the lab. Why did the universe create from nothing for such an extensive period of time to ensure that there was enough matter to fill the universe as we know it and then suddenly decide it was done creating?

So why is it more acceptable, perhaps more fashionable, to place one's faith in the M-theory for which there isn't even experiential anecdotal evidence rather than placing that faith in a purposeful intelligent creator deity? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Hawking?