The place of humans in the universe

EXPLORING CHRISTIANITY - SCIENCE

THE BIBLE
Can we trust a book written 2000 years ago?

EYEWITNESS
Did the writers of the New Testament get their picture of Jesus right?

GOD - MAN
Is Jesus really God?

RESURRECTION
Did Jesus really rise from the dead?

RELIGIONS
With so many religions, why Christianity?

SUFFERING
If there is a God, why is there so much suffering?

TRINITY
Understanding the Trinity.

SCIENCE
The complementary nature of Science & Christianity.

FORGIVENESS
What it is and why it matters?

GUIDANCE
How does God guide?

REPENTANCE
What it is and why you can't get to heaven without it.

BORN AGAIN
What does it mean to be converted and born again?

SAVING FAITH
The kind of faith that will get you to heaven

ASSURANCE
Can I know for sure that I am going to heaven?

TRUTH
What is truth and does it matter?

MORALITY
Does it matter how we live? A Christian view of morality.

THE CHURCH
God's vision for his family, the Church. A call to the churches of the new millennium.

PURPOSE
How can I find a great purpose for living?

IDENTITY
Who am I; Finding my true identity as a human being and as a child of God.

SELF-ESTEEM
How can I feel good about my self? The Christian basis for proper sel-esteem.

LIFE AFTER DEATHChristianity's Hope & Challenge.

THE CROSS
Why did Jesus Die? What the Bible says about the Cross.

The place of humans in the universe

What has become increasingly clear over recent decades, particularly in studies on the creation of the universe in the big bang and the formation of galaxies, is that a number of amazing "coincidences" seem to have happened, without which no life could ever have developed. To give a few examples:

Physicist Stephen Hawking makes the point in his book Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays:

If the density of the universe one second after the Big Bang had been greater by one part in a thousand billion, the universe would have recollapsed after ten years. On the other hand, if the density of the universe at that time had been less by the same amount, the universe would have been essentially empty when it was about ten years old.

Physicist John Polkinghorne in One World points out that the expansive force (driving things apart) and the force of gravity (pulling things together), in the early part of the big bang, had to differ from equality by not more than 1 in 1060 (10 followed by 60 zeros).

Very precise factors were required in the first three minutes of the big bang to allow the right ratios of helium and hydrogen to develop.

The mass of the neutron outweighs that of the proton by a fraction of a per cent. If this were not so, stars would not be able to shine for more than just a few hundred years.

The charge on the electron and proton are exactly equal and opposite, otherwise stable bodies like ours could not exist.

If one of the four fundamental forces in nature (weak interaction) had been very, very, slightly different, then stellar production and distribution of essential heavier elements could not have taken place.

Very, very precise energy levels in helium-4, beryllium-8, carbon-12, and oxygen-16 are needed for carbon to form in stars without it all turning into oxygen. Cambridge Professor of Astronomy, Martin Rees, and popular science writer John Gribbin, in Cosmic Coincidences, state:
This combination of coincidences, just right for resonance in carbon-12, just wrong in oxygen-16, is indeed remarkable.

Quoting astrophysicist Brandon Carter in his book Superforce, Paul Davies sees
an almost unbelievable delicacy in the balance between gravity and electromagnetism within a star. Calculations show that changes in the strength of either force by only one part in 10 to the power of 40 would spell catastrophe for stars like the sun.

To all this we could add the seeming "coincidences" that occur on our particular planet that make life possible: the amazing properties of water and carbon; the precise distances from, and the mass of, the sun and moon; the exact strength of the strong force that holds the nucleus together that enables the maintenance of nuclear reactions that power the shining of the sun; the ratio of ocean to land mass; the ratio of gases in the atmosphere; the rate of earth's revolution and its density; the thickness of the earth's crust, etc.

"It is typical of skeptics and pessimists that they will sometimes rather timidly use the word Purpose; but blush at the very mention of the word Person" C.K.Chesterton

Dr Hugh Ross, in Creation and Time, states:

As of October 1993, twenty-five different characteristics of the universe were recognised as precisely fixed. If they were different by only slight amounts, the differences would spell the end of the existence of any conceivable life. To this list of twenty-five can be added thirty-eight characteristics of our galaxy and solar system that likewise must fall within narrowly defined ranges for life of any kind to exist.

Eight years after first publishing this booklet, (1997--now 2005) it is worth noting the very significant recent book by astronomers Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay W. Richards The Privileged Planet (Regnery Publishing, One Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20001). Though there are something like two hundred factors about our universe and planet that are now recognised as necessary for life to be able to exist, many of these are inter-related. Gonzalez and Richards have isolated about 20 such factors that are independent of one another. They sum up as follows:

With respect to habitability, our existence depends on such local variables as a large stabilising moon, plate tectonics, intricate biological and nonbiological feedback, greenhouse effects, a carefully placed circular orbit around the right kind of star, early volatile elements--providing asteroids and comets, and outlying giant planets to protect us from frequent ongoing bombardment by comets. It depends on a Solar system placed carefully in the Galactic Habitable Zone in a large spiral galaxy formed at the right time. It presupposes the earlier explosions of supernovae to provide the iron that courses through our veins and the carbon that is the foundation of life. It also depends on a present rarity of such supernovae. Finally, it depends on an exquisitely fine-tuned set of physical laws, parameters, and initial conditions.

They also show that we are superbly placed in the right sort of solar system, in the right place, in the right sort of galaxy, at the right time to be able to study the rest of the universe.

What are we to make of all this? Physicist and mathematician Freeman Dyson notes:

The more I examine the universe and the details of its architecture, the more evidence I find that the universe in some sense must have known we were coming.

British physicist, Paul Davies, who in the past has denied the possibility of God as Creator, stated in his book Superforce:

[I see] powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all. The impression of design is overwhelming.

However, the moment you suggest that there may be some purpose behind it all you have a problem. G. K. Chesterton put it like this:

It is typical of sceptics and pessimists that they will sometimes rather timidly use the word Purpose; but blush at the very mention of the word Person...We do not need anything but our own common sense to tell us that if there has been anything from the beginning that can possibly be called Purpose it must reside in something that has the essential elements of a Person. There cannot be an intention hovering in the air all by itself any more than a memory that nobody remembers or a joke that nobody has made.

In a more recent book, God and the New Physics (1992), Paul Davies even goes as far as to say:

It may seem bizarre, but in my opinion science offers a surer path to God than religion.

"The very fact that humans can observe it, and can also worship the One who planned it all, maybe gives a clue as to the purpose of it all"

Of course, one way around the problem is to suggest that there may be an infinite number of universes, and we were the lucky ones who happened to be in the one that had everything right to support life. Paul Davies estimated that for every time a big bang produced a universe in which life could exist, there would be one followed by at least a thousand billion billion billion zeros of universes where life was impossible! However, this is guesswork for which there is no evidence - and that is not science!

One thing is clear. All the evidence seems to point to the fact that this universe was created to support life - and ultimately human life. An interesting question is: Would there be any point in having a universe if humans were not here to observe it? When Harry Elmer Barnes asserted that "Astronomically speaking, man is insignificant," George Coe replied, "Astronomically speaking, man is the astronomer." The very fact that humans can observe it, and can also worship the One who planned it all, maybe gives a clue as to the purpose of it all.

Over the last generation scientists have talked about what they call the "anthropic principle" (from Greek "anthropos", meaning "man"). It is one way of bringing the seeming importance of humans in creation into the discussion, without necessarily talking about God or purpose. The hypothesis takes a number of forms, but basically it recognises that the physical features of the universe are conditioned by the requirement that it must be capable of supporting life. Why this is so, it is not necessary to state. The empirical evidence, however, all points to the fact that that's the way it is. It is at this point that some scientists and some theologians are co-operating to provide interesting debate. Scientist Gordon Rodley, in a series of lectures given in Christchurch, New Zealand, stated:

Was our universe created in a very special state, carefully fashioned so that, in the fullness of time, life and eventually mind, would blossom forth to marvel at it? Or do we live amid a monstrous and meaningless accident, a cosmic eruption from nothing, that has occurred purely at random? Surely there can be no more pressing task for today's cosmologist than to tackle that central question of existence.

This question leads on to our next subject, the need of science and Christianity for each other.