Theology: Stephen Hawking & More Tiresome Atheism

Word on Fire ^ | 9/3/2010 | Fr Robert Barron

[markomalley]

Father Barron weighs in on renown scientist Stephen Hawking's upcoming book release in which he offers his "scientific" view on the existence of a creator. 

So another prominent British academic has weighed in on the God question. Stephen Hawking, probably the best-known scientist in the world, has said, in a book to be published a week before the Pope’s visit to Britain, that the universe required no Creator. (I’m sure, of course, that there was no “intelligent design” behind that choice of publication date!). I confess that something in me tightens whenever I hear a scientist pontificating on issues that belong to the arena of philosophy or metaphysics. I will gladly listen to Stephen Hawking when he holds forth on matters of theoretical physics, but he’s as qualified to talk about philosophical and religious issues as any college freshman. There is a qualitative difference between the sciences, which speak of objects, forces, and phenomena within the observable universe, and philosophy or religion which speak of ultimate origins and final purposes. Science, as such, simply cannot adjudicate questions that lie outside of its proper purview—and this is precisely why scientists tend to make lots of silly statements when they attempt to philosophize.

Here’s an example from Hawking’s latest book: “Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing.” Well, first of all, which is it: nothing or the law of gravity? There’s quite a substantial difference between the two. If Hawking is saying that the universe, which is marked in every nook and cranny by stunning and mathematically describable intellegibility, simply came forth from Nothing, then I just throw up my hands. The classical philosophical tradition gives us an adage that is still hard to improve upon: ex nihilo nihil fit (from nothing comes nothing). Any teacher worth his salt would take a student to task if, in trying to explain why and how a given phenomenon occurred, the student were to say, “well, it just spontaneously happened.” Yet we are expected to be satisfied with precisely that explanation when it comes to the most pressing and fascinating question of all: why is there something rather than nothing? In my dialogues with atheists, I often come up against this total non-explanation, and I can only smile ruefully. Apparently, the affirmation of God involves far too great a leap of faith, yet the assertion that the universe just popped into being is rationally compelling!

So suppose we say (to return to Hawking’s rather incoherent statement) that gravity is the ultimate cause of the universe. This would mean that a force within nature is the source of the being of the world. To be sure, this sort of claim has a long pedigree, stretching back at least to the pre-Socratics, but it remains highly problematic. The question “why is there something rather than nothing?” is not searching after a thing within the universe, but rather the being of the universe. It is wondering why (to use the technical term) contingent things exist, that is to say, things that do not contain within themselves the reason for their own being. You and I are contingent in the measure that we had parents, that we eat and drink, and that we breathe. In a word, we don’t explain ourselves. Now if we want to understand why we exist, we cannot go on endlessly appealing to other contingent things. We must come finally to some reality which exists through the power of its own essence, some power whose very nature it is to be. But that whose very nature it is to be cannot, in any sense, be limited or imperfect in being, and this is precisely why Catholic philosophy has identified this non-contingent ground of contingency, this ultimate explanation of the being of the universe, as “God.” To claim that something as finite and variable as the force of gravity is this ultimate explaining value is simply ludicrous. However all-embracing or powerful it is, gravity is still a worldly nature, something within the contingent cosmos
.
There is a line from one of the articles describing Hawking’s book that I found, actually, quite helpful and illuminating. The author said, “in his new book, The Grand Design…Hawking sets out a comprehensive thesis that the scientific framework leaves no room for a deity.” Quite right. Since the true God is not a being alongside other beings, not one thing in the universe among many, he is not circumscribable within a scientific frame of understanding. He should not, therefore, even in principle, be either affirmed or denied from a purely scientific perspective. There is, of course, rampant today a “scientism” which would reduce all legitimate knowing to the scientific mode of knowing. You can find this form of dogmatism in the writings of all of the prominent “new” atheists: Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, etc. I must confess that I’m disappointed that Stephen Hawking appears to have joined their company.

[WriteOn]

Hawking is a pantheist.

[2harddrive]

I understand the old boy now maintains that SOMETHING can come from NOTHING. In other words, that there can be a effect with no cause whatsover. But, it was in the popular media, so he may have been misquoted. Otherwise, I fear he HAS gone off the deep end.

[Mojave]

Stephen Hawking, probably the best-known scientist in the world

He's the Paris Hilton of science.

[cameraeye]

I say this in all humility, “this man has his body broken by God and has nothing but contempt to prove he does not exist”. I do not remember if I said this, heard this, read this, but “why is it the atheist do not believe in God, but the devil does?”

[SonOfDarkSkies]

History has shown that even brilliant scientists become quickly derailed when their political or religious biases overwhelm their objectivity.

Hawking sees no God because he wants to see no God...not because he is looking for the truth.

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

Science deals with the observable. God, by definition, is not observable. So science can not say anything about God.

[Erik Latranyi]

Stephen Hawking is destroying his own reputation and credibility as he allows his personal opinion to intermingle with his scientific research.

I feel sympathy for those who allow the insanity of liberalism to destroy themselves.

[HighWheeler]

“Stephen Hawking, probably the best-known scientist in the world,”

— — —

I’ll stick with Einstein. He was a real scientist.

[Wildbill22]

Everything has a beginning. Time began at some point, and something had to initiate it. If time didn’t have a beginning then time has been going for infinity, and from the infinity of our past, how could we end up at this point? It seems impossible, so in my simple linear mind it is more logical to think there is a God. I think humans are incapable of understanding some things, as Job was told by God.

[Wildbill22]

Everything has a beginning. Time began at some point, and something had to initiate it. If time didn’t have a beginning then time has been going for infinity, and from the infinity of our past, how could we end up at this point? It seems impossible, so in my simple linear mind it is more logical to think there is a God. I think humans are incapable of understanding some things, as Job was told by God.

[Tao Yin]

Hawking sees no God because he wants to see no God...not because he is looking for the truth.

That's not how I took his statement. I thought he said the rules of science were so perfect that we don't need God's intervention once the rules were established. Hawking went on to say that it's possible God created the rules. It didn't seem to negate the possibility of God at all. I was more of a statement of the perfection of creation.

[Le Chien Rouge]

Faith...you either have IT or you don’t.

Instead of trying to disprove God, why don’t these highly, enlightened ‘intelligent’ people create a carburetor that runs on water.

[freedomfiter2]

I feel sympathy for those who allow the insanity of liberalism to destroy themselves.

I’ll feel sympathy after they repent.

[left that other site]

Good Morning, Mark!

I am NOT a Theoretical Physicist, a Mathematician, or even a scientist.

Yet, from what I understand, Hawking has fallen from favor in the World of Theoretical Physics, due to advancement of String Theory, and other Alternatives.

Some of his detractors are more Godless than he is, some not.

He is best known for making Theoretical Physics “Popular”.

Not much more, IMNSHO.

But what do I know, I am just a Bass Player! LOL.

[markomalley]

I am NOT a Theoretical Physicist, a Mathematician, or even a scientist.

But did you stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night?

;-)

[left that other site]

I may not have STAYED There,
But I MIGHT have PLAYED there!

hahahaha

[ColdSteelTalon]

For anyone to say there is no God, they must first understand all of the laws of the universe and understand them completely. Stephen Hawking while considered to be a superb cosmologist does not understand all of the laws of the universe therefore cannot say with any certainty that there is no God. Or that even the universe created itself out of nothing.

The fact that there are only two kinds of order in the universe (created and natural), indicates that since we as humans create order (we build things create in other ways) we have to conclude that the natural order which is far far more complex has to have a creator.

[BenKenobi]

Exactly. Science, real science, says nothing about a Creator. It’s like trying to measure temperature with a telescope. Science isn’t calibrated to measure the metaphysical.