The Fine-Tuning Argument for God's Existence

Fountain, at
Monroe County Community College

(I am re-posting this for a friend.)

THE FINE-TUNING ARGUMENT FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

The argument can be stated this way.

1. The fine-tuning of the universe is due to either physical necessity, chance, or design.
2. It is not due to physical necessity or chance.
3. Therefore, it is due to design.

Define “fine-tuning”

Almost everything about the basic structure of the universe – for example, the fundamental laws and parameters of physics and the initial distribution of matter and energy – is balanced on a razor’s edge for life to occur.

Our fine-tuned universe is an event that demands to be explained.

Examples of fine-tuning

1. If the initial explosion of the big bang had differed in strength by as little as one part in 10\60, the universe would have either quickly collapsed back on itself, or expanded rapidly for stars to form. In either case, life would be impossible. (An accuracy of one part in 10 to the 60^th power can be compared to firing a bullet at a one-inch target on the other side of the observable universe, twenty billion light years away, and hitting the target.)
2. Calculations indicate that if the strong nuclear force, the force that binds protons and neutrons together in an atom, had been stronger or weaker by as little as five percent, life would be impossible.
3. If gravity had been stronger or weaker by one part in 10\40, then life-sustaining stars like the sun could not exist. This would most likely make life impossible.
4. If the neutron were not about 1.001 times the mass of the proton, all protons would have decayed into neutrons or all neutrons would have decayed into protons, and thus life would not be possible.
5. If the electromagnetic force were slightly stronger or weaker, life would be impossible, for a variety of different reasons.

And so on…

Premise 1 seems to exhaust the alternatives. The soundness of the argument depends on the plausibility of premise 2.

Premise 1

Can cosmic fine-tuning be plausibly attributed to physical necessity?

By “physical necessity” we mean: the constants and quantities must have the values they do. If this is true, there was really no chance of the universe’s not being life-permitting.

But this alternative seems extraordinarily implausible. Because it requires us to believe that a life-prohibiting universe is physically impossible. But surely a life-prohibiting universe seems possible. That, e.g., the universe might have expanded just a bit more slowly does not seem physically impossible.

A person who claims that the universe must be life-permitting is taking a radically position that requires strong proof. But as of now there is no such proof.

NOTE: support for the idea of “physical necessity” being false is given, inadvertently, by multiverse theorists. Such theorists use multiverse thinking to show that, while nearly all possible universes are life-prohibiting, it’s possible that one or more could be life-permitting.

Can cosmic fine-tuning be plausibly attributed to chance?

 
Philosopher John Leslie gives an example, as an analogy, to show the implausibility of the universe coming into existence by chance.

Suppose you line up against a wall and 50 sharpshooters take aim at you and fire. All of them miss. This event demands an explanation, for their missing me is needed for my survival.

I shouldn’t at all be surprised that I observe that all the bullets missed me, since I am alive to observe that they did all miss me. There is nothing improbable about that at all.

But I should be very, very surprised that in fact all the bullets missed me. That seems very, very improbable.

It seems reasonable to infer: design. That is: the sharpshooters missing me was planned for my continued existence.

This is a case of “inference to the best explanation.”

Analogically, the fact of the fine-tuned universe means the universe is life-allowing rather than life-prohibiting. This is very imporbable on atheism. This is not improbable on theism.

 The main atheist objection to this is multiverse theory. “If there is only one universe,” British cosmologist Bernard Carr says, “you might have to have a fine-tuner. If you don’t want God, you’d better have a multiverse.” (Discover, December 2008)

Sin: Admitting, Confessing, Remorse, Repenting

 

                                                                   (Williamsburg, MI)

One example of a moral truth, used in philosophical ethics, is the statement Raping children for fun is wrong.

Christians would say Raping children for fun is sin. The concept of sin implies a Divine Command Giver to whom persons are responsible and accountable.

Imagine a person, whom we'll call 'X', gets caught while raping a child for their own pleasure. They may admit that they did this. From their admittance it does not necessarily follow that they believe what they did was wrong. Indeed, if they are an intellectual atheist, or even a village atheist (see Nietzsche), they may not believe morality exists at all (viz., objective morality),

To admit something it just to say, "Yes, I did this."

If someone confesses something, they have gone beyond mere admittance. If someone confesses "I raped a child for fun," there can be guilt involved. The person who merely admits they did something is often found out. The person who confesses something is often moved by guilt, and comes forth. An admittance is often involuntary. A confession is often voluntary.

If someone confesses a sinful action, how can we tell if their confession is genuine? We can discern genuineness when it is accompanied by remorse. By sadness. Even, grief. About not only how our sin may have hurt others, but how it has disappointed God, and created a breach in the God-relationship. 

Psalm 51 exemplifies this, where David is writing from the darkness of his sexual and murderous sin. Ps. 51 is confessional, remorseful, and repentant.

Have mercy on me, O God,
    according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
    blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash away all my iniquity
    and cleanse me from my sin.

3 For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is always before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight;
so you are right in your verdict
    and justified when you judge.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
    sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;
    you taught me wisdom in that secret place.

7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
    wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
    let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins
    and blot out all my iniquity.

10 Create in me a pure heart, O God,
    and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me from your presence
    or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation
    and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
    so that sinners will turn back to you.
14 Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,
    you who are God my Savior,
    and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
15 Open my lips, Lord,
    and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
    you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
17 My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit;
    a broken and contrite heart
    you, God, will not despise.

Remorse usually leads to repentance. When remorseful people confess their sin to others, and to God, they run after "doing a 180." They get the help they need to morally and spiritually move in the other direction. The seeds sown in the ongoing acts of confessional remorse begin to emerge and grow from the soil of genuine repentance.

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One Absurd Type of Normative Ethical Relativism

Richard Brandt, in his essay "Ethical Relativism," distinguishes between three types: 1) descriptive relativism; 2) metaethical relativism; and 3) normative relativism. (In Moser and Carson, Moral Relativism: A Reader)

Descriptive relativism states that "the values, or ethical principles, of individuals conflict in a fundamental way. A special form of this thesis, called "cultural relativism," is that such ethical disagreements often follow cultural lines." (25)

Metaethical relativism "denies that there is always one correct moral evaluation." (26)

Normative relativism "asserts that something is wrong or blameworthy if some person or group - variously defined - thinks it is wrong or blameworthy." (28)

One type of normative relativism is considered to be absurd. Some say that: "If someone thinks that it is right (or wrong) to do A. then it is right (or wrong) to do A." Brandt writes: "This thesis has a rather wide popular acceptance today but is considered absurd by philosophers if it is taken to assert that what someone thinks is right really is right for him. It is held to be absurd because, taken in this way, it implies that there is no point in debating with a person what is right for him to do unless he is in doubt himself; the thesis says that if he believes that A is right, then it is right, at least for him." (28)

I've encountered this kind of thinking in my philosophy classes. "Right" or "wrong" are defined by what one thinks or believes to be right or wrong. If that were true then we're not really talking about ethics but about psychology. If someone believes it is right to kill Jews for fun, then for them it is right for them to kill Jews for fun. Which is, of course, absurd.

(Note: the logic textbook I used is Vaughn's Power of Critical Thinking, which has a section on cultural relativism and its absurd [incoherent] implication that, on cultural relativism, a culture cannot be mistaken and is therefore infallible.)

Richard Rohr?

 

                                                                         (Monroe, MI)

Someone asked me if I recommend Richard Rohr, as a good source for understanding Jesus and Christianity.

I answered them with. No. 

I became familiar with Rohr in the mid 1990s, when someone gave me a book containing collected writings.

I critiqued Rohr in my book Deconstructing Progressive Christianity. For example.

"Progressive Christianity’s logical endgame, due to its inherent skepticism, and its reluctance to endorse endorse a supernatural narrative, includes a denial of the resurrection of Jesus. Look at how Richard Rohr escorts us in this direction. He writes: 

“To believe that Jesus was raised from the dead is actually not a leap of faith. Resurrection and renewal are, in fact, the universal and observable pattern of everything. We might just as well use nonreligious terms like “springtime,” “regeneration,” “healing,” “forgiveness,” “life cycles,” “darkness,” and “light.” If incarnation is real, then resurrection in multitudinous forms is to be fully expected, or, to paraphrase that earlier statement attributed to Albert Einstein, it is not that one thing is a miracle, but that the whole thing is a miracle! This point is worth sitting with for a few moments.” 

I’ve sat with that point, a lot. Einstein was using ‘miracle’ metaphorically. His awe before the universe has been called “Einsteinian wonder.” Einstein was, most likely, if anything, a pantheist, influenced by the philosophy of Spinoza. A ‘miracle,’ on the other hand, is an event that cannot be reduced to scientific explanation. Einstein did not believe in such things. Which makes me wonder what Rohr really believes? What, exactly, does Rohr want us to ponder? Resurrection is the universal pattern of everything? We could substitute “springtime” for “resurrection?” 

Linda and I have a little garden in our front yard. Every year, tulips emerge from the soil, and beautifully bloom. Neither of us drops to our knees declaring it a miracle. Yes, it’s nice. But, really, is that substitutable for the resurrection of Jesus from the dead? On Easter Sunday, and elsewhere, I envision the resurrected Jesus coming alive, out of death. I never see him as a tulip blooming in the spring, only to quickly lose his bloom again. 

I never see emerging tulips as representative of some kind of “resurrection in multitudinous forms.” Rohr seems to think I should see a resurrection pattern here. I don’t. Actually I see, in the historical resurrection of Christ, something that far transcends flowering tulips and emerging butterflies and light coming out of darkness. I believe that Jesus was clinically dead, for three days, and that he was brought to life in a transformed, resurrection body that was impervious to change and decay. Anyone have a tulip that can do that?

(Piippo, John. Deconstructing Progressive Christianity (pp. 120 - 122). 

(Should some ex-vangelical wonder whether or not I understand Rohr's form of mysticism, please note that part of my PhD studies included studying mysticism, and a one-on-one independent study on Meister Eckhart, with Northwestern U. medieval scholar Richard Kieckhefer. Thank you Dr. Kieckhefer!) 

For a more complete dismantling of Rohr, see "A Heretic’s Christ, a False Salvation: A Review of The Universal Christ" (Rohr), by theistic philosopher Douglas Groothuis.

To Love Deeply Is to Suffer Deeply

 

(Linda and I in Green Lake, Wisconsin.)

The one who loves much suffers much.

To surrender to love is to risk. To risk is to be vulnerable. It is to be open. This includes openness to suffering, because eventually, there will be loss.

Examples abound. Our family loved our dog So-fee. When she became so sick that we had to put her down, it was painful. It made me think that I never want another dog, because I never want to go through that dark valley again.

Suffering can cause one to stop loving, since loving entails suffering, a hurting-with (com-passion) the beloved. When we open ourselves to transparency and vulnerability we invite all things emotional, from celebration to mourning. 

Will Hernandez writes: 

“It is equally accurate to say that only one who has known the experience of deep suffering can freely love and give love with true abandon. If suffering happens to be the consequence of true love, then that same love also becomes the fruit of real suffering.” (Hernandez, Henri Nouwen and Spiritual Polarities: A Life of Tension, K231)

Henri Nouwen has written: 

“Yes, as you love deeply the ground of your heart will be broken more and more, but you will rejoice in the abundance of the fruit it will bear” (IVL:60; cited in Hernandez, K240).

Just what might that fruit look like? One example for me, and Linda, is when our baby son David died. I became a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Out of the roots of our grief, much fruit has grown. It began when the HOPING group at the hospital David died in asked us to become their pastors, and minister to parents who lost children in the hospital. To do this with greater effectiveness, one must be familiar with the valley of the shadow of death.

To immerse yourself in the sufferings of others is to grow in your capacity to love others, one’s own self, and God. “Love and suffering are bound to change anyone radically.” (Hernandez, K240)

How Do I Rebuild Trust Once It Has Been Broken?

 

The way to rebuild trust is...

CB

T

Consistent Behavior over Time.

For example, always keeping your word.

Breaking the Chains of Shame - A Few Resources

 

                                                                            (Jerusalem)

Here are some resources on breaking the chains of shame.

Four excellent books.

For more on freedom from shame see Lewis Smedes's Shame and Grace: Healing the Shame We Don't Deserve. This is one of the best books I have ever read!

Check out Curt Thompson, The Soul of Shame: Retelling the Stories We Believe About Ourselves.  

Take every thought captive. 2 Cor. 10:5 - We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. For help on how to do this, see Francis Frangipane, The Three Battlegrounds.

The opposite of "shame" is "acceptable." See Philip Yancey's beautiful book What's So Amazing About Grace? 

Blog Posts

Shamed People Shame People

Overcoming Shame

Shame, Abuse, and Grace

Pride and Shame

God's Kingdom Replaces Honor/Shame Hierarchies

Where God's Love Is, Self-Hatred Is Not

SERMONS

"Healing of Shame"

"Breaking the Chains of Shame"

Suggested Books on Healing and Prayer

(South Haven, Michigan)

Someone asked me: 

What books do you recommend on healing and prayer??? I would like a deeper understanding on the ups and downs and whys...

My response to them is:

The two books I recommend to enter into this subject are:

Power Healing, by John Wimber 

Healing, by Francis MacNutt 

Also:

MacNutt, The Healing Reawakening: Reclaiming Our Lost Inheritance

Charles Kraft, Deep Wounds, Deep Healing

Neil Anderson, Freedom From Fear: Overcoming Worry and Anxiety

Henry Cloud and John Townshend, What to Do When You Don't Know What to Do: Overcoming Worry and Depression

Mike Hutchings, Supernatural Freedom from the Captivity of Trauma: Overcoming the Hindrance to Your Wholeness

Craig Keener, Miracles Today: The Supernatural Work of God in the Modern World

Max Lucado, Fearless

David Seamands, Healing for Damaged Emotions

Everett Worthington, Moving Forward: Six Steps to Forgiving Yourself and Breaking Free from the Past

Randy Clark, Authority to Heal: Restoring the Lost Inheritance of God's Healing Power

Candy Gunther Brown, Testing Prayer: Science and Healing (the best empirical study on the connection between prayer and healing) 

Candy Gunther Brown, ed., Global Pentecostal and Charismatic Healing

J. P. Moreland, Finding Quiet: My Story of Overcoming Anxiety and the Practices that Brough Peace 

HERE are some books that are not on healing, but God has used to heal to me.

C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces

Henri Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love

Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline

Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Flannery O'Connor, Collected Works

The Four Gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John


***
For some of my thoughts on prayer and healing see my book Praying.

Freedom From Two Illusions

(Teaching in Eldoret, Kenya)

When I was teaching in Eldoret, Kenya, I told the Kenyan and Ugandan pastors that the #1 thing they need to do is stay connected with God. Abide in Christ. Dwell in the shadow of the Almighty. Send roots to the river of God. Live, 24/7, in the fortress of God. 

That's what you need to do. That's what your people need you to do. Because what they need is not you, but God. They need "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

Dwell in God's presence, and he will free you of the illusion of your indispensability. 

I told these pastors that they are not needed by God. God is able to accomplish his purposes with or without them. Yes, God loves them and wants to use them. And God will, if they trust in him and abide in him.

We can't change other people. Only God can do that. I told the pastors: "Today you can let go of your striving to change other people."

Some told me how novel and freeing this was. I added, "But God can change you."

The change happens as we live connected to God. You cannot consistently nurture the "in Christ" relationship and remain unchanged. And, as you make God your Shepherd (in practice, not theory; viz., trust in him), he "restores your soul." So, you don't have to "work on your own self." Just step into God's presence, stay there, and the Restorer of Souls will strip away all that has covered over your soul to get to the original "in God's image," the psuche, which is you.

The changes God works in you will not be just for you, but for others. This is called influence. What God works in you can, and will, influence other people, by God's Spirit.

Be free of two illusions:

1. The illusion of your indispensability
2. The illusion that you can change people

Focus on abiding in Christ. As he speaks, obey. This is the place of all authentic spiritual formation.

Distinguishing Between Love and Desire

Monroe County

Dallas Willard, in Knowing Christ Today: Why We Can Trust Spiritual Knowledge, writes: 

"Love means will-to-good, willing the benefit of what or who is loved. We may say we love chocolate cake, but we don't. Rather, we want to eat it. That is desire, not love. In our culture we have a great problem distinguishing between love and desire, but it is essential that we do so." (K 810-18)

I've met with persons who interpret their sexual desire for their significant other as love. They view their partner as a treat to be consumed, like a piece of chocolate cake. 

Willard writes: "Agape love, perhaps the greatest contribution of Christ to human civilization, wills the good of whatever it is directed upon. It does not wish to consume it." (Ib.)