The God Hypothesis is a valid Scientific Theory

It is certainly a great pleasure. Note that my bibliography is in APA 6th Edition style. Before I begin to discuss why pro is wrong, we need to first define a “theory. ” A theory is “a well supported conceptual framework that encompasses a large body of scientific facts, inferences, observations, and experiments and explains them in a coherent way. ” (Fairbanks, 2012) Refutation of Pro’s Case Pro has laid out several arguments showing why the God hypothesis to be a valid scientific theory. In the debate, pro defined “God” as “A personal God who is the creator of the universe and who is interested in human affairs. ” I will start by refuting each of my opponent’s contentions. I. The beginning of the Universe My opponent begins by pointing out that the universe must have had a beginning and that God was the cause. To state this is an appeal to ignorance. Instead, let’s see if we can find a natural cause. First, we must note that “[i]n the everyday world, energy is always unalterably fixed; the laws of energy conservation is a cornerstone of classic physics. But in the quantum microworld, energy can appear and disappear out of nowhere in a spontaneous and unpredictable fashion. ” (Davies, 1983) Moreover, there is no such thing as “nothing. ” The reason is that even in a perfect vacuum; pairs of virtual particles are constantly being created and destroyed. “The existence of these particles is no mathematical fiction. The assumptions that they exist leads to predictions that have been confirmed by experiments to a high degree of accuracy. ” (Morris, 1990) So, the consequence is that the universe can indeed come into existence by itself. Moreover, I propose that the universe has always been here and have simply changed forms over time. Finally, the argument cannot account for whether or not God is interested in human affairs or not. Consequently, my opponent fails to meet the burden of proof. II. Finely Tuned Universe Richard Carrier notes in his interview: "Similarly the “fine tuning” of the universe’s physical constants: that would be a great proof—if it wasn’t exactly the same thing we’d see if a god didn’t exist. If there is no god, we will only ever find ourselves in a universe finely tuned (in that case, by random chance), because without a god, there is no other kind of universe that can produce us. Likewise, a universe that produced us by chance would have to be enormously vast in size and enormously old, so as to have all the room to mix countless chemicals countless times in countless places so as to have any chance of accidentally kicking up something as complex as life. And that’s exactly the universe we see: one enormously vast in size and age. A godless universe would also only produce life rarely and sparingly, and that’s also what we see: by far most of the universe is lethal to life (being a deadly radiation filled vacuum) and by far most of the matter in the universe is lethal to life (constituting stars and black holes on which no life can ever live). Again, all exactly what we’d expect of a godless universe. Not what we’d expect of a god-made one. " Thus, we have exactly the universe we’d expect to have if there is no god. Whereas a god does not need vast trillions of star systems and billions of years to make life. He doesn’t need vast quantities of lethal space and deadly matter. Only a godless universe needs that. I make a more detailed survey of this kind of evidence in “Neither Life Nor the Universe Appear Intelligently Designed” in John Loftus’s The End of Christianity. It also does no good to say such a random accidental universe is improbable, because the convenient existence of a marvelously “super-omni” god is just as improbable. Either way you are assuming some amazing luck. Which leaves the evidence. And the evidence is just way more probable if there’s no god. Thus, we’re forced to choose between which lucky accident it was, and the evidence confirms the one and not the other. " (Carrier, 2012) So, the universe is not finely tuned at all! Atheism makes better predictions as to what type of universe we see—and what do you know? It’s exactly that! Once again, the finely tuned universe fails a predicting whether or not God is interested in human affairs. Finally, Richard Dawkins notes in his book The God Delusion: "The temptation [to attribute the appearance of a design to actual design itself] is a false one, because the designer hypothesis immediately raises the larger problem of who designed the designer. The whole problem we started out with was the problem of explaining statistical improbability. It is obviously no solution to postulate something even more improbable” (Dawkins, 2006) III. The God Hypothesis My opponent states, “Philosophically, there cannot be an infinite amount of time because Time is by definition a series of "moments". The nature of a moment is "a beginning of the future and an end of the past. " The assumption of an absolutely first moment would consequently carry with it the implication of a period of which is terminated by, and prior to, that first moment, and the prior time would itself contain moments. Thus, if time was eternal in the past, we would have never have arrived at this point, which means there has to be an absolute first cause. Science has essentially stumbled upon the same conclusion. ” The problem is that science has not stumbled upon the same conclusion. The Big Bang Theory (BBT hereafter) is not about the origin of the universe; rather it is about its development with time. (Feuerbacher, 2006) Hence, we cannot say for absolute certainty that science has proved that the universe must have had a beginning. Finally, my opponent states that it has been philosophically proved. Has he given any evidence for that assertion? No. Until he does, this point should be ignored completely. IV. Predictions For anything to be a valid scientific hypothesis (or a theory)[1], it must make scientific predictions. My opponent made an interesting prediction: “If the God hypothesis is true, then the universe should exhibit divine attributes from a divine intelligence. Moreover, this divine intelligence would have to be similar to human beings but without the limitations the universe possesses. The null hypothesis is that there is no cause for this finley-tuned (sic) universe and it just quantum fluctuated out of nothing. However, CON can falsify my hypothesis completely by showing that intelligence arises entirely from natural processes. ” First, what is “divine intelligence” and how can we measure whether or not the universe exhibits “divine intelligence”? Second, you state that it has to be similar to human beings, but without the limitations the universe possesses—yet why? Please elaborate on this contention in the next round please. I’m out of room. 1. I note the difference between “hypothesis” and “theory” because they are two different things. A “hypothesis” is an educated guess whereas a “theory” has been something so well documented it can no longer be reasonably disputed. For more on this difference see . http://evolution.berkeley.edu...; Bibliography Carrier, R. (2012, January 3). Richard Carrier Interview. (TheBestSchools, Interviewer) Retrieved from . http://goo.gl... Davies, P. (1983). God and the New Physics. London: J. M. Dent & Sons. Retrieved from . http://goo.gl... Dawkins, R. (2006). The God Delusion. London: Bantam Books. Fairbanks, D. J. (2012). Evolving: The Human Effect and Why it Matters. New York: Prometheus Books. Feuerbacher, B. (2006, January 25). Evidence for the Big Bang. Retrieved from Talk. Origin Archive: . http://goo.gl... Morris, R. (1990). The Edges of Science. New York: Prentice Hall.