This is my second response to Don’s posting of 21 May 2005 in which he made various claims about cosmology. It covers the last part of Don’s post where he was commenting on my statements about the lack of any mention of God in technical works on cosmology, but that God was mentioned in a number of popular writings for non-experts.

This one can be read quite independently of my first response.

I’ll take up Don’s comments about technical works in another post, and just cover the popular writings I mnetioned in this one.

And to whet everybody’s appetite, Don has provided evidence that I quoted Duane Gish sufficiently accurately to satisfy any but the most pedantic of pedants.

Taking it up following the technical works:

Things are slightly different in books written in a popular style for the average person who has little or no scientific training. Paul Davies has mentioned God in a number of his writings – one book is even entitled “The Mind of God: Science and the Search for Ultimate Meaning” (Penguin 1992). And there is the comment at the end of Stephen Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time” that discovering a comprehensive theory would enable us to “know the mind of God”. And there is Einstein’s remark “science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

Don:

All of these mentions of ‘God’ have nothing to do with the creator-God who reveals himself in the Bible. Careful study underlines the non- or anti-Christian philosophies of these cosmologists / physicists. Hawking uses ‘God’ as a metaphor for ultimate knowledge (a theory of everything; TOE). Davies could be some sort of deist, but not a Christian. He abandoned Christian beliefs as a teenager when the local vicar could not answer his questions about creation and the universe (The Australian, March 9, 1995, p. 1). Einstein explicitly shared the pantheism of Spinoza, of whose views ‘The Hutchinson Softback Encyclopedia’, 1996, says: ‘Mind and matter are two modes of an infinite substance that [Spinoza] called God or Nature, good and evil being relative.’ Like New Age and Eastern thought, this is a ‘monistic’ belief, which explicitly denies a Creator in the normal meaning of the word, i.e. one who pre-existed (and is thus independent of, or ‘outside’) that which was created. (see http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v23/i1/einstein.asp ). So Einstein’s religion ‘sighted’ by science is pantheism. This web article finishes with: ‘Christians who inappropriately invoke Einstein in their preaching, writing or witnessing do so to the detriment of their cause.’ See also my article on ‘Physicists’ God Talk’: http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v17/i3/god_talk.asp which also mentions that a lot of the ‘God’ talk of physicists is in fact blasphemous – such as calling the Higgs boson the ‘God Particle’ (Lederman). It is ridiculously naive to think that any of this has any relevance to supporting biblical Christianity. I have to say that Ken’s use of these quotes from Einstein and co. in this way amounts to serious quoting out of context.

K:

I was tempted to ask Don to provide us with some information on the Higgs boson, but managed to say “Get thee behind me, Satan.”

D:

But here again, with one exception, I have not come across anything in books on cosmology which could, even by enormouse stretching of the imagination, be interpreted as denying the existence of God. The exception is Fred Hoyle in his “The Nature of the Universe” (Blackwell, 1950). In the final chapter Hoyle makes some unflattering remarks about religion, and these could be interpreted, by someone strongly opposed to Hoyle’s “continuous creation” ideas, as denying the existence of God. And since Hoyle, in this book, was responsible for the origin of the phrase “big-bang”, which he ridiculed, his words should not be taken to heart by others who wish to treat the BB in a similar fashion. And for the sake of peace on a.r.c I’ll pass over the attempt by Duane Gish, in a debate in Brisbane in 1988, to describe ^^^^^^^^^^^ Hoyle as a “creationist”.

K:

See below for a comment on Don’s objection to these words.

D:

You did not pass over it at all! (Yet another attempt at ‘guilt by association’ fallacy.) But once again it is next to impossible for anyone to check the accuracy of your accusation. Unfortunately for you, Ken, we actually have the tape of this debate in our library. Here is a transcript of what Gish said, in context, so that readers can be disabused of your slander:

K:

I also happen to have a tape of the debate, and I was quoting from it. Thank you, Don, for producing, from the Answers in Genesis library, evidence that Gish *did* describe Hoyle (and Wickramasinghe) as creationists.

[Gish citation of newspaper article snipped] [Don is here quoting from the tape]

D:

“Now, Hoyle and Wickramasinghe have concluded (now they are not Christians, they don’t believe the Book of Genesis or anything like that) but they have concluded that wherever life exists in the universe it had to be created. Therefore there must be a God. Did they become creationists because of their religion? Obviously not. They became ^^^^^^^^^^^ creationists in spite of their religion, you see, because when they ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ began their studies they were atheists.”

“Now this notion that life evolved on this planet, ladies and gentlemen, is a myth, not science. It is pseudo-science.”

So Gish was perfectly correct (in context!). So please retract this ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ slander (and while you’re at it, please repudiate the vile gutter ^^^^^^^ slander by your buddy Plimer saying that Gish was travelling in Australia ‘with an entourage of young boys who were continually touching him’).

K:

Just what “slander” are you referring to the first time the word is used here, Don? And just who is being slandered? Hoyle? Wickramasinghe? Gish? Answers in Genesis?

Would you like me to withdraw the words “to describe Hoyle as a “creationist”.” and replace them with the words “to describe Hoyle as someone “who became a creationist”.” ? Or is this still slander? I suspect that this sort of nitpicking wouldn’t go down very well with most people who think over the two phrases.

And while we’re on the subject, I don’t know if you were there, or (if you were, whereabouts in Mayne Hall you were), but I happened to be standing near the place where several Christian staff members were, and also a couple of staff from the Department of Studies in Religion. And when Gish described Hoyle and Wicjramasinghe as “creationists” – I’m still going to used that form of words – looks of horror came over *all* their faces. They had assumed that the word “creationist” was used in the ordinary, modern sense of belief in a six twenty-four hour day creation, and a world-wide (in the modern sense) flood. And they had all read some of Hoyles writings about life arriving on earth from passing comets, and viruses doing likewise. In particular, a number of them had read and discussed “Evolution from Space” by Hoyle and Wickramasinghe, and in particular chapter 9, `Convergence to God’. I don’t know whether this is in the AiG library, but you might consider getting hold of a copy.

On page 158, after discussing a sequence of levels, there is an equation which I can only write, restricted to ASCII characters, as

God = universe

God” is in italics for emphasis. But it isn’t an ordinary “equals” sign. Hoyle and Wickramasinghe are both mathematicians, and they must have chosen the symbol with care. Instead of just two horizontal lines it has three. Now any student who has done more than an introductory mathematics course at a nuiversity (and many school students) would be able to immediately identify the symbol as that used for an identity. So putting the equations into words it would read

God is identical with the universe

And these are people who “became creationists” and then proceeded to write this book? I’ll let other people comment on this!

And Ian Plimer is of age – he can speak for himself.

Barry Parker is Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Idaho State University. He concludes his book “Creation: The Story of the Origin and Evolution of the Universe” (Plenum Press, 1988) with the paragraph: Before I end the book I feel I should address a question that some of you will no doubt be wondering about: Why does a book on the creation of the universe have no mention of God? Scientists do, indeed, rarely mention God when they talk about creation. Furthermore, they are sometimes accused of trying to do away with the need for God by attempting to explain creation in scientific terms. And it is true: scientists would prefer a purely scientific explanation of the beginning of the universe. That is not to say, though, that all scientists are atheists (few are). Furthermore, there is no fear that scientists will ever eliminate the need for a God. If we look back at the early universe we see that regardless of how far things are pushed — even if we were someday able to explain creation itself in an entirely satisfactory scientific way — there is still something that is unexplained. Creation depends on the basic laws of nature — without them it would not be possible. Who created these laws? There is no question but that a God will always be needed.

D:

Is that all God did, Ken? He set the laws of the universe (and He certainly did that) that allowed cosmic, geological and biological evolution to create everything we see today? This is Deism, not Christianity – you’d make a good Freemason with beliefs like that. It’s no wonder that you are so reluctant to engage the biblical issues that I raised in my first post.

K:

Quite frankly, I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s worth quoting scientists, with the way Don seems to misunderstand both what those I quote write, and my reasons for quoting them.

This was in the context of my claim that mention of God in technical works on cosmology appeared to me to be non-existent, but that there were a number of works intended for non-specialists which mentioned God. I simply quoted Barry Parker, an astronomer, as an example of such writing. I’m not sure whether Don expects me to say which words of any scientist I quote I believe, and which I reject, and which I suspend judgment over pending further research data. Life is just too short for this.

I suggest that Don read the quote again and take note of Parker’s words “. . . even if we were someday able to explain creation itself in an entirely satisfactory scientific way . . . “

Ken Smith — Dr Ken Smith – Christian, husband, unpaid mathematician, skeptic, … `It is now clear how large a price had to be paid for a misunderstanding of both science and religion: to base religious beliefs on an estimate of what science cannot do is as foolhardy as it is blasphemous.’ Gerald Holton

D:

If, by posting this quote, Ken, you suppose that we are on about a ‘god of the gaps’, it once again shows how poorly you have researched what we believe. It is not because of lack of knowledge that we can see that there must be a Creator, but because we do understand. We understand it from the testimony of God’s Word and study of God’s creation backs this up. For example, a fairly full understanding of the complexity of the bacterial flagellum, the ATPase enzyme motor, the blood clotting cascade or the vertebrate immune system drives one to realize that such systems could not have developed by Darwinian/Dawkinsian small step-wise lucky accidents (mutations), because natural selection can only work on traits that have at least some function. If you remove just one of the 40 components of a flagellum it does no work at all, so there is no stepwise process to evolve it from no components. Period. And the more we learn about the flagellum, for example, the more it underlines the need for a Creator. Creationists do not believe in a ‘God of the gaps’ (‘we don’t understand it so God must have done it’). But evolutionists are quite happy to believe in ‘mutation plus natural selection of the gaps’, even against the evidence. Google AiG’s site for ‘god of the gaps’ and you will find quite a number of articles refuting this misconception.

K:

It seems from this that Don is going to want to get into a discussion about complexity. Let’s do just that. My master’s thesis at Sydney University was on heat convection, and included some work on instability, bifurcation and the development of complex convection currents. So I’m already prepared and won’t have to go chasing up references if we get into this.

Salaam Ken Smith

— Dr Ken Smith – Christian, husband, unpaid mathematician, skeptic, … `It is at least equally true that biblical literalism, from its earlier flat-earth and geocentric forms to its recent young-earth and flood-geology forms, is one of the major causes of atheism and materialism.’ Conrad Hyers