In 1963, my metaphysics professor in college was W. Norris Clarke, SJ According to him, the cosmological argument for the existence of God began historically with Aristotle’s concept of the “prime mover.” Blindly following Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas called the “first mover” the “first cause.” In the 1920s, Etienne Gilson made the cosmological argument logical and persuasive by focusing attention on the metaphysics of Thomas Aquinas. The cosmological argument is this: a finite being needs a cause, therefore an infinite being exists. It is an argument, not a proof, because it is based on the assumption that humans are finite beings and the hope that the universe is intelligible. In Western religions we call the infinite being God.

In the early 1960s, it was discovered that the universe, with all its galaxies and stars, came into existence 13.7 billion years ago as an infinitesimally small particle (the Big Bang). This is one reason to believe that God inspired the human authors of the Bible because the Bible says many times that God created the universe out of nothing. Since the human authors knew nothing about the expansion of the universe and the cosmic background radiation, the Big Bang is a sign or a reason to believe the Bible.

Another reason to believe the Bible is that atheist-agnostics generally do not discuss the cosmological argument in a reasonable, intelligent, and honest way. Instead of saying that the cosmological argument for God’s existence is unconvincing, they say, “I don’t know whether God exists or not.” Suffering from cognitive dissonance, atheist-agnostics don’t like to think about the cosmological argument.

Father Spitzer believes that the Big Bang is evidence for the existence of God. I think it is evidence that God does not exist because it is evidence that the universe is not intelligible. If two juries reach different verdicts after a long trial, one jury has a better judgment than the other. But if one juror says that one piece of evidence indicates guilt and the other says it indicates innocence, then one juror is more informed, intelligent, rational, or honest than the other.

Father Spitzer also thinks that the “fine tuning” of the constants of physics is evidence of an “intelligent designer”. This nonsense is based on the fact that physicists do not understand why the mass of an electron and the speed of light are what they are. If these numbers were different from what they are, the universe would not be the same as it really is and there would be no mammals. Since human beings are mammals, we would not exist.

Another example of this reasoning arises from the fact that the Earth is exactly 93 million miles from the Sun. If this number were 92 or 94, it would have been too hot or cold for living organisms to have arisen and evolved. This is not evidence of an intelligent designer because we know what caused the number to be 93. What caused this distance is Newton’s laws of motion and chance. If someone does not understand the concept of random luckyou can explain this by pointing out that there are many planets that are not 93 million miles from their star.

In “fine tuning” reasoning, physicists don’t know why the numbers are what they are. Enthusiasts for and against the religion, however, dispute whether or not there are many other universes with different physical constants. They do not even consider the metaphysical question of whether the universe is intelligible or not.

There is a passage in the book that sounds as if it is consistent with belief in God, but actually supports atheistic ignorance and stupidity:

Acts of self-awareness (awareness of consciousness) are difficult to explain through regular space-time models (an act of consciousness capturing itself, so to speak). (rent 2211)

I agree that our ability to turn in on ourselves and catch ourselves in the act of our own existence proves that humans are spirits incarnate and that the existence of other humans proves that we are finite beings. But compare Spitzer’s quote with a quote from the most widely used biology textbook in the United States:

And certain properties of the human brain distinguish our species from all other animals. The human brain is, after all, the only known collection of matter trying to understand itself. For most biologists, the brain and the mind are the same; understand how the brain is organized and how it works, and we will understand such conscious functions as abstract thought and feelings. Some philosophers are less comfortable with this mechanistic view of the mind and find the Cartesian concept of mind-body duality more appealing. (Neil Campbell, Biology, 4th edition, p. 776)

Father Spitzer confuses two different methods of investigation: physics and metaphysics. Many atheist-agnostics will admit that human consciousness is a mystery. But if you ask them what caused the Big Bang, they’ll tell you the same thing: it’s a mystery. There are no mysteries in science. There are only unanswered questions because science has an extraordinary success record. If scientists didn’t assume this, they wouldn’t work as hard and for as long trying to answer scientific questions. There are only mysteries in metaphysics. We must stop trying to understand what a human being is because that gives us a reason to believe that there is a transcendent reality and our freedom is before that reality.

In the cultural conflict over Intelligent Design for Evolution (ID) theory, both sides misbehave in different ways and for different reasons. In the Wikipedia “Sternberg Peer Review Controversy” headlines, the editor of a biology journal published an article promoting ID behind the backs of his fellow editors at the Biological Society of Washington. His colleagues at the Smithsonian Institution were so outraged that they were very mean to him and had a congressional committee write a report titled “Intolerance and Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian: Senior Smithsonian Officials Enable the Demotion and Harassment of Scientists.” skeptical of Darwinism. Evolution.”

There is another example of enthusiasts for and against religion who disagree with science. In this case, the God-fearers are paragons of reason and the atheist-agnostics are behaving very irrationally. According to the second law of thermodynamics, heat flows from hot objects to cold objects, not the other way around. Thinking that a cold object is more orderly and complex than a hot object, some God-fearing people say and think that evolution violates the second law. In 2008, the American journal of physics published an article on evolution and thermodynamics with a crazy calculation showing that evolution does not violate the second law. Tea American journal of physics he refuses to take corrective action because it would become news. The American public would then discover how irrational and unintelligent people can be about science and religion.