"Now at last you can be properly humble in the face of your maker, which turns out not to be a "who," but a process of mutations with rather more random elements than our vanity might wish."
Christopher Hitchens, God is Not Great
Here are seven steps to prove the existence of a personal God. Let us take them one step at a time and see where we wind up.
Step 1: The scientific mind exhibits the ego of God, providing the first clue.
Over three hundred years ago, Pierre-Simon LaPlace (1749-1827) told Napoleon that he had no use for God as an "hypothesis" to explain the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn; scientific reasoning was enough to do the job. Modern science continues LaPlace's dream of explaining a world without God. Finding they are making progress toward this lofty goal, scientists readily proclaim that God is a man-made delusion of no use for a thinking person, much less for the field of science. See, e.g., R. Dawkins, The God Delusion; C. Hitchens, God is Not Great.
Equipped with the human intellect -and its boundless theorizing power -scientists believe they need nothing else to understand the world. Why resort to an other-worldly force to explain the world when we have the human mind to do the job?
In short, in our modern world, the scientific mind plays the role of God. Thus, scientists believe they can create life, clone humans, and even create baby universes. See 12 Events That Will Change Everything, Scientific American, 36 (June 2010); J. Gribbin, In Search of the Multiverse, 193 (John Wiley & Sons 2009).
The fact that no one has done so does not stop scientists from believing they can reach this goal.
Scientists are most aggressive in attacking the concept of God when they picture this hypothetical being as a mythical figure flowing from the pages of the Bible-a kind old man with a bright face and long white beard. To increase the force of their arguments and belittle those of the opposition, scientists typically use a personal God as a straw man and then take turns bludgeoning the concept to death by comparing it to the theories of science and in particular, Darwinian evolution.
But suppose God is fundamentally a mind?
Step 2: The existence of the mind is beyond reasonable doubt.
In his famous Meditations, Rene Descartes, the great 17th century French philosopher, sought an unassailable foundation for the new field of science, one fact that could not be doubted and that would serve as the pivot point for theories about the world. He found that he could doubt everything, including the existence of the very material objects making up the world, but one thing he could not doubt: his own existence as "a thinking being, that is to say, a mind, an understanding, or a reasoning being[.]" The mind, he said, in the course of this radical skepticism, "recognizes that it is nevertheless absolutely impossible that it does not itself exist." Since Descartes's time, many theories and philosophies have come and gone, but no one has disproved his fundamental finding that the existence of the mind itself is beyond reasonable doubt.
Step 3: Modern scientists have overstated their progress in reaching a final theory of the universe.
With this step we begin to enter more controversial territory, but let's keep going.
The strength of science's argument against God can be said to be proportional to the degree of success science has achieved in explaining the world without God. Clearly, to the extent there are gaps or flaws in science's theoretical model, then we must leave open the possibility that some other theoretical model -even one involving God - might better explain the world. See, e.g., Bernard Haisch, The God Theory. And, indeed, science's current model, based upon materialism, is riddled with mysteries. Here are some of the major features of the world that science has yet to explain:
The origin of the matter that supposedly exploded in the Big Bang.
The origin of the laws of nature.
The nature of the mechanism that organized the universe into mathematical harmonies.
The nature of dark matter and dark energy.
The origin of life.
A coherent, self-consistent theory of physical world, or one that reconciles gravity with quantum physics.
These are not trivial details. Rather, they are the foundational elements to scientific theory.
A further sign of modern science's troubles is that its leading theory of the physical world, 11 dimensional superstring theory, has not moved much beyond mathematical speculation. As one writer describes it, "Much effort has been put into string theory in the last twenty years, but we still do not know whether it is true. Even after all this work the theory makes no new predictions that are testable by current -or even currently conceivable - experiments." Lee Smolin, The Trouble with Physics.
This short list of scientific mysteries is certainly not complete, but it is telling: key features of the world continue to elude science. The fact of the matter is that even though science has exiled God to the pages of ancient mythology, science is far from explaining the cosmos without God.
Step 4: Science Must Redefine Realism
Warning: Here comes the big step, which will take a bit longer to explain.
The failure of modern science to devise a coherent, all-encompassing theory of the material world is only a symptom of the real problem. At the root of the problem is science's death-grip on what it calls "realism" as a necessary model to the practice of science. An excellent example of this prejudice is shown by Lee Smolin in his otherwise masterful work, The Trouble with Physics. Professor Smolin, after exposing the flaws of string theory and calling for radical new ideas to explain the physical world, falls back to the overarching prejudice of realism, which to him means that the "real world out there... must exist independently of us. It cannot depend on our existence." (Kindle, Loc. 413-20).
As an initial matter, it is not easy to argue against realism since the opposite concept is something that is not real, and who can support that? But what if science has defined "realism" to describe a world that not only does not exist but cannot exist? In that instance, what purpose would be served by adopting a fantastical worldview to base the field of science? Since we know the world is real - or at least as real as worlds get -perhaps the problem lies in how science has defined realism.
Realism, to modern science, is a world independent of consciousness or mind. It is a free-standing world disconnected from what we are; a world that does not depend upon us and that will be there when we are not looking.
But at this critical juncture we find an ambiguity. What is the "us" in the sentence "must exist independently of us?" Is "us" our bodies, or our minds?
Of course the natural world - the sky, trees, ground, and other living things - are separate from our bodies. But in order to determine whether the world is independent of "us" we need to define what "us" is; in other words, we have to determine our essence.
Here, we can refer again to Descartes, who provided an answer that is consistent with the spiritual tradition. In the course of his deep meditations on the foundation of knowledge, he found that he was in essence "a thinking being, that is to say, a mind an understanding, or a reasoning being[.]"
So if we are fundamentally thinking things, then both our bodies and the natural world are outside of "us." The question then becomes whether body and world are independent of the mind.
To give some context to this question, consider the following:
When you sneeze violently or receive a sudden jolt to the head and "see stars," are the stars "out there" separate from your mind or are they a simple phantasm of the mind?
When you dream at night and imagine hitting the home run to win the world series, climbing Mount Everest or engaging in any number of other fantasies, is the three-dimensional vision independent of your mind or simply a night dream of the mind?
When sensory deprivation, drugs, or fever cause daytime hallucinations, are the visions independent of the mind?
The answer in each of these real-life cases is that the vision the mind sees arises from the mind. The examples show that the mind is capable of conjuring up a real-seeming, independent world from nothing with no help from any external force. The flashing "stars," the night-dream, and hallucinations are clearly not independent of the mind but rather, projections of the mind.
But what about the public world, the world out there? Isn't that independent of the mind? Here we can quote one of Plato's dialogues:
Socrates: The question I imagine you have often heard asked - what evidence could be appealed to, supposing we were asked at this very moment whether we are asleep or wake, dreaming all that passes through our minds or talking to one another in the waking state?
Theaetetus: Indeed, Socrates, I do not see by what evidence it is to be proved, for the two conditions correspond in every circumstances like exact counterparts.
Perhaps the difference between night-dreams and the public world is only one of degree.
Few, if any, modern scientists consider the significance of these observations in developing their theories or the concept of "realism." They also all but ignore the findings of philosophers in the 18th and 19th century who reached the conclusion that since the mind can only know its own perceptions, it cannot prove that a mind-independent world exists. The great 18th century British philosopher, David Hume, for example, found that "nothing is ever really present with the mind but its perceptions or impressions and ideas, and that external objects become known to us only by those perceptions they occasion." Treatise of Human Nature, Book I, Part II, Section 4. The belief in an independent world, he concluded, had no basis in experience or reason, but was actually a train of ideas propelled by the imagination. Book I, Part IV, Section 2. Immanuel Kant, widely considered one of the greatest philosophers in history, wrote that "we ought, however to bear in mind that bodies are not objects in themselves which are present to us, but a mere appearance of we now not what unknown object." Critique of Pure Reason, A387 (Norman Kemp Smith trans.)
There is a very important reason why modern scientists should not ignore the idealist philosophers: quantum physics is reaching the same conclusion but from a different standpoint. As Bernard d'Espagnet put it in a Scientific American article, " The doctrine that the world is made up of objects whose existence is independent of human conscious turns out to be in conflict with quantum mechanics and with facts established by experience." In Quantum Engima, the authors, Fred Kuttner and Bruce Rosenbloom write that "there is no way to interpret quantum theory without encountering consciousness. Most interpretations accept the encounter but offer a rationale for avoiding a relationship. They usually start with the presumption the physical world should be dealt with independently of the human observer." (Kindle, Loc. 3002-09). " Quantum theory tells us that physics' encounter with consciousness, as is demonstrated for the small, applies, in principle to everything. And that 'everything' can include the entire universe. " (Kindle, Loc. 3941).
Quantum physics teaches that atoms are not things, but mathematical equations; probability waves interconnecting all the things that make up nature's scenery. Free-standing particles, little billiard balls of matter simply do not exist. We may want them to exist but they do not exist.
So physical science assumes a real independent world and finds it is "the stuff of which dreams are made." Idealist philosophers conclude we cannot know anything but the visions in our minds. But it is a real world. A world that is real because the body exists on par with the natural world. A mind-created body confronts a mind-created stage setting. They were made for each other.
Step 5: If there is no world independent of mind then the reason we experience the same world is because we have the same mind.
This is another big step but it follows from Step 4.
If there is no mind-independent world, then there is no free-standing Earth or sky existing outside of the mind. The reason we see the same sky, therefore, must be because we are connected internally, not externally. We have the same mind and are participating in the same dream. In sum, we would be one mind that is dreaming this world.
Step 6: An ultimate source to the dream is the solution to the paradox of solipsism.
The classic criticism of the view that the world is a dream is solipsism, the notion that if the entire world is all "in our heads" then we each experience our own little world. The theory that an ultimate dreamer exists, or a single source to the dream, is a solution to solipsism. This "ultimate dreamer" would be the Godhead, God the Father, the Sky Father, messiah, or whatever other term has been used in the world's belief systems to describe the final source of reality.
Step 7: We live in a real world of real people. The ultimate source of the dream must therefore be a person.
This last step may seem odd, but is not easy to avoid if we follow the other six steps. If the world is a dream then it is a dream of self-conscious humans. It follows that the ultimate source of the dream must be a person: God taking the highest form to experience life.
So now let's put the picture together. Modern scientists, with the ego of God, believe they can explain the world without an external, imagined God in heaven. But in adopting this standpoint, they assume that the external world is independent of the mind. We have indisputable evidence that the mind exists but, in the end, only hopes and dreams that a real material world exists. Our minds are capable of conjuring up a real-seeming world from nothing, and quantum physicists and idealist philosophers seem to be heading toward the same conclusion: consciousness creates reality. But if consciousness creates reality, it must create the same reality for everyone since we experience the same world; therefore, there must be one consciousness. If there is one consciousness, it must have an ultimate source; otherwise, there would be no focal point for the dream. We are real, we are people; the ultimate dreamer is a person. Scientists, in short, with the ego of God, have simply misdirected their reasoning power; they are trying to understand a world without God but what they are really doing is trying to understand the world without a God other than themselves. If science re-defines realism as explained above, then science will consist of God's attempt to understand itself.
Not every reader may follow the steps to the end. But do this: compare the logic connecting these steps with the reasoning connecting modern science's theories of the Big Bang, dark matter, dark energy, origin of law, origin of the laws of nature and theory of the physical world and see how it compares. You may find that science has assumed the foundation to its theories, which all rest upon the fundamental assumption of a mind-independent material world. And one more thing: the seven steps lead to a theory that unites the scientific enterprise with religion. Perhaps the notion of a personal God is not as crazy as modern science says it is.
Philip Mereton is a practicing lawyer with a philosophy degree whose mission is to expose the fallacies in our current materialistic worldview and to advance a more rational -- and promising -- outlook. His first book, The Heaven at the End of Science - An Argument for a New Worldview of Hope, began as a college essay in 1974. The theme is the same: idealism (the world is really a dream) better explains the world than materialism (the world is a decaying machine). His website and blog appear at http://www.heavenattheendofscience.com
Mr. Mereton asks all viewers who have doubts over the truth of the Big Bang, the origin of life from a primordial swamp, humankind's descent from bacteria, or the death of God (among many other doubtful findings of modern science), to join the revolution against scientific materialism. The revolution begins with a question: is materialism correct? Is there a better way to explain the world we live in? After all, if the world is really a dream, it'd be to our advantage to learn and understand that fact now so that we can learn how to master the dream and thus our own lives, rather than manipulate particles in materialism's grand machine. So what can you do? Visit the website; read books that question materialism; raise your hand in class and question science teachers; be kind. Under the tenets of science, the truth will remain standing after all the questioning and experimentation ends. But we must start first start the debate. Join in.
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