Sorry, Stephen Hawking, but you're wrong...

It's funny about the timing of some things. I just had this revelation two days ago and I've been mulling it in my head, trying to figure out how to phrase it. Then the news breaks today that noted physicist Stephen Hawking has decided that physics alone can explain the universe and that God is not needed. Well, quite frankly, he's wrong, and I can actually prove it using scientific theory.

This is a bit convoluted - which is why I was trying to figure out a correct way of phrasing it - but I'll give it a shot.

The Big Bang theory suggests that at some point roughly 40 billion years ago (give or take) the Universe existed as a single point without space or time. For whatever reason, this point then exploded with enough force to create the entire universe out of hot gasses and matter. My knowledge of physics here is a bit shaky, but I will concede the fact that the Big Bang did occur. The issue is whether the Big Bang occurred randomly as Stephen Hawking contends or whether God was its instigator.

Here is the gist of the problem with Stephen Hawking's idea. His theory is that the universe was created randomly - that the laws of physics clearly show that such a thing is possible and that, therefore, it must have happened that way. However, if the Universe was created randomly, it could have also NOT been created randomly. Random events are, well, random. They happen, or they don't. But in the only example that we have (our universe), the event DID happen. The Universe was created. And as a result we are here to speculate about whether the universe could be created. If the universe wasn't created, we wouldn't be here to speculate about whether it could happen. Therefore, we have a determinate outcome - the Universe WAS created. It does have a reason for existing. If it has a reason for existing (even if that reason is only so that we can say that the Universe does exist) its creation could not be random.

Think of this theory as a giant cosmic version of I Think, Therefore I Am.

By Stephen Hawking's rationale, there were two possible outcomes to the Big Bang - that it occurred randomly, or it didn't occur randomly. But obviously it did occur - the mechanics of which are not important to the discussion. Science clearly dictates that any fact must be repeatable scientifically. The Big Bang has not been repeated. Anywhere. So, the big idea that a universe could just form randomly has yet to be shown and can't be repeated. Also, the idea that the universe could NOT just form randomly has also yet to be shown and can't be repeated.

The problem with science is that it must, by its very nature, explain everything. Some things don't have explanations - no matter how much science wants to come up with one. If the universe could just randomly appear, it could also just randomly not appear - in which case this blog would have a seriously small audience. Since the universe is here, especially in light of the fact that the science shows that the universe is not a foregone conclusion, doesn't that argue for the fact that there is a reason the universe exists? If there is a reason for its existence, someone must have determined what that reason is. The idea that all of this is just here, with no grand scheme or design, is much the same argument you might have with yourself when you say, "What if I don't really exist?" What if you don't? Then your argument doesn't matter. If the universe was created for no purpose, completely randomly, then anything we discover about it, or about ourselves, also has no purpose. We exist randomly. We have no meaning, no purpose. We might as well not exist - because in the end, its just a different toss of the dice.