Season 3 Podcast 226 A Layman's Argument for the Existence of God Pt 3
A Layman’s Argument for the Existence of God Pt 3
Atheists such as Richard Dawkins use the anthropic principle to prove that God does not exist by showing that life can occur by accident if the numbers are large enough. However, his hypothesis cannot be verified or falsified because the galaxies are too far away. The fact is, if the anthropic principle were acceptable evidence that God does not exist, then the same tautology could also be used to prove that God does exist. But because it is unsound it is void to any party, atheists or theists, to use as proof or disproof of the existence of God.
The anthropic principle addresses existence, not the cause of existence. If, however, using the anthropic principle you are saying
“I observe the universe; therefore, I create the universe.”
Then you become God. But, of course, that is a ridiculous statement. It is the nineteenth century idea that life is just a dream, and the dreamer is the creator. It is a strange form of the multiverse theory that is coincidentally coherent only when we share the same dream. It is a multiverse where you can move freely in and out of anyone’s dreams. Sleep is the only way to escape the madness.
I am going to turn to The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, the self-appointed spokesman for scientific atheists. I shall draw my quotes from
· The Anthropic Principle Planetary Version
· The Anthropic Principle Cosmological Version.
First of all, let’s examine Mr. Dawkins’ fundamental argument on the origin of life.
“The origin of life only had to happen once. We therefore can allow it to have been an extremely improbable event, many orders of magnitude more improbable than most people realize.”
If you find that statement believable, I would appreciate you explaining how. Flaws are often revealed if you can reduce a statement to the absurd. The statement is inherently absurd. And Mr. Dawkins’ argument goes downhill from there. Effectively he is saying that anything can happen regardless of the magnitude of improbability if it only must happen once. Therefore, imagine any world you want, and it can happen: a world where water runs up hill, where ice doesn’t expand when it freezes, where cold moves from cold to colder, where there are no laws and no constants. Every morning I fill my glass with ice and water. Within a short time in my warm den the ice melts. There are no exceptions. Right now, I am sitting before a glass of water with no ice. Only moments ago, it was filled with ice. Why? Because the laws of thermodynamics always hold true in our world. Imagine a world where that did not happen, and you would imagine a world with no life. It would be a frozen wasteland.
But Mr. Dawkins follows that argument with an equally illogical argument. He actually gives a number to probability and claims that one in every billion planets life spontaneously occurs just like on earth. He assumes that you will accept that argument without question. In his words:
“Scientists invoke the magic of large numbers. It has been estimated that there are between 1 billion and 30 billion planets in our galaxy, and about 200 billion galaxies in the universe. Knocking a few noughts off for reasons of ordinary prudence, a billion billion is a conservative estimate of the number of available planets in the universe. Now, suppose the origin of life, the spontaneous arising of something equivalent to DNA, really was a quite staggeringly improbable event. Suppose it was so improbable as to occur on only one in a billion planets.”
One flaw is that it is a hypothetical situation without a shred of proof, yet Mr. Dawkins is asking you to accept it as a fact. Actually, he assumes that you will accept it as a fact. It is a magician’s trick. It is a sleight of hand. You have been taken in.
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free