1 00:00:06,320 --> 00:00:10,240 Welcome to Judaism Demystified, a podcast for the perplexed. 2 00:00:10,600 --> 00:00:12,760 We are joined by Doctor William Lane Craig. 3 00:00:13,160 --> 00:00:16,560 Doctor Craig is Visiting Scholar of Philosophy at Talbot School 4 00:00:16,560 --> 00:00:20,000 of Theology and Professor of Philosophy at Houston Christian 5 00:00:20,000 --> 00:00:22,760 University. Doctor Craig pursued his 6 00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:26,600 undergraduate studies at Wheaton College and graduate studies at 7 00:00:26,600 --> 00:00:30,040 Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, the University of 8 00:00:30,040 --> 00:00:32,520 Birmingham, and the University of Munich. 9 00:00:33,120 --> 00:00:37,280 From 1980 to 1986 he taught philosophy of religion at 10 00:00:37,280 --> 00:00:40,960 Trinity, during which time he and his wife Jen started their 11 00:00:40,960 --> 00:00:44,400 family. In 1987 they moved to Brussels, 12 00:00:44,400 --> 00:00:47,640 Belgium, where Doctor Craig pursued research at the 13 00:00:47,640 --> 00:00:51,120 University of Lubain until assuming his position at Talbot 14 00:00:51,120 --> 00:00:54,200 in 1994. He has authored or edited over 15 00:00:54,200 --> 00:00:58,920 30 books, and in 2016, Doctor Craig was named by the best 16 00:00:58,920 --> 00:01:02,840 schools as one of the 50 Most Influential Living Philosophers. 17 00:01:03,280 --> 00:01:13,280 Without further ado, Doctor Craig, thank you for joining the 18 00:01:13,280 --> 00:01:16,880 Judaism Demystified podcast. It is an honor and privilege to 19 00:01:16,880 --> 00:01:19,360 have with us Doctor William Lane Craig. 20 00:01:19,840 --> 00:01:22,440 First of all, for our audience, would you tell us a little bit 21 00:01:22,440 --> 00:01:26,880 about yourself? I am a Christian philosopher. 22 00:01:26,920 --> 00:01:31,880 I have a position at Talbot School of Theology in California 23 00:01:31,880 --> 00:01:35,440 and at Houston Christian University in Texas. 24 00:01:35,720 --> 00:01:40,120 I'm also the president of an online ministry called 25 00:01:40,120 --> 00:01:47,840 reasonablefaith.org, and I'm involved in the philosophical 26 00:01:47,840 --> 00:01:51,200 and theological exploration of Christian theism. 27 00:01:52,360 --> 00:01:54,760 Thank you very much and for those listening, my favorite 28 00:01:54,760 --> 00:01:58,680 interview that I've seen with Doctor Craig is with Roger 29 00:01:58,680 --> 00:02:01,880 Penrose. I recommend all of you tune into 30 00:02:01,880 --> 00:02:02,960 that one. That was a great one. 31 00:02:03,240 --> 00:02:06,840 So first, my first question is, would you elucidate your stance 32 00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:10,240 on creation ex nilo? That is, creation from nothing, 33 00:02:10,479 --> 00:02:13,440 integrating perspectives from both theological doctrine and 34 00:02:13,440 --> 00:02:16,960 contemporary scientific understanding, particularly in 35 00:02:16,960 --> 00:02:23,640 relation to The Big Bang theory. I think that Genesis 11 implies 36 00:02:23,640 --> 00:02:28,080 logically Kriyatio ex nihilo. That is to say, the doctrine 37 00:02:28,480 --> 00:02:33,200 that God created the universe but not out of any kind of 38 00:02:33,200 --> 00:02:38,840 material substratum of the initial verse of Genesis says in 39 00:02:38,840 --> 00:02:44,120 the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and the 40 00:02:44,120 --> 00:02:49,320 word there Baraf or created, is a word that has only God as its 41 00:02:49,320 --> 00:02:54,040 subject and does not require any sort of material substratum. 42 00:02:54,440 --> 00:03:00,240 And the expression the heavens and the earth is an idiom in the 43 00:03:00,240 --> 00:03:04,760 Hebrew language denoting the entire universe, the entirety of 44 00:03:04,760 --> 00:03:09,040 physical reality. So at face value verse one 45 00:03:09,560 --> 00:03:15,480 teaches that God at the very beginning created the entire 46 00:03:15,480 --> 00:03:20,160 physical universe. And I think that verse one is 47 00:03:20,160 --> 00:03:25,520 neither a subordinate clause, it is an independent clause and nor 48 00:03:25,520 --> 00:03:29,920 the title of chapter one, but it is providing background 49 00:03:29,920 --> 00:03:33,040 information for verses 2 and following. 50 00:03:33,040 --> 00:03:38,600 So I think right from the very first verse of the Bible you 51 00:03:38,600 --> 00:03:43,400 have a teaching of Kriyati OX nihilo, and this is confirmed. 52 00:03:43,400 --> 00:03:48,000 That and in the prophets such as Isaiah and other passages in the 53 00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:55,200 Hebrew Bible, And in connection with modern scientific 54 00:03:55,200 --> 00:04:00,480 understanding, the ancient Jewish commitment to creatio ex 55 00:04:00,480 --> 00:04:08,160 nihilo creation out of nothing, put Judaism in conflict with 56 00:04:08,520 --> 00:04:13,440 Greek philosophical thought, which taught the past eternity 57 00:04:13,440 --> 00:04:16,680 of universe, the universe and materialism. 58 00:04:16,680 --> 00:04:23,320 That matter has always existed, and for thousands of years this 59 00:04:23,720 --> 00:04:28,440 Jewish point of view stood in opposition to this mainstream 60 00:04:28,440 --> 00:04:33,320 view of materialism, from ancient Greek materialism up 61 00:04:33,320 --> 00:04:38,800 through modern Marxism and materialistic theories of the 62 00:04:38,800 --> 00:04:42,960 universe. This, however, was dramatically 63 00:04:42,960 --> 00:04:49,080 upended in the second decade of the 20th century, when Albert 64 00:04:49,080 --> 00:04:53,680 Einstein applied his newly discovered gravitational theory, 65 00:04:53,680 --> 00:04:57,200 the general theory of relativity, to the universe as a 66 00:04:57,200 --> 00:05:00,680 whole. And to his shock and the shock 67 00:05:00,680 --> 00:05:03,840 of everyone else, it was discovered that the general 68 00:05:03,840 --> 00:05:09,480 theory of relativity would not permit a past eternal universe. 69 00:05:09,480 --> 00:05:15,040 Rather, the equations indicated that the universe is expanding, 70 00:05:15,360 --> 00:05:19,640 and that as you trace the expansion back in time, the 71 00:05:19,640 --> 00:05:25,000 universe becomes denser and denser until at a point in the 72 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:27,640 finite past, it literally disappears. 73 00:05:28,040 --> 00:05:31,400 That there is an absolute beginning not only of all matter 74 00:05:31,400 --> 00:05:35,640 and energy, but a physical space and time themselves. 75 00:05:36,040 --> 00:05:41,680 And so, completely contrary to expectation, contemporary 76 00:05:41,920 --> 00:05:47,120 astrophysics confirmed the ancient Jewish view of the 77 00:05:47,160 --> 00:05:51,280 beginning of the universe and its origination ex nihilo. 78 00:05:52,640 --> 00:05:53,920 Amazing. Amazing. 79 00:05:55,120 --> 00:06:00,200 So regarding the concept of Ex Dio, the idea that the universe 80 00:06:00,200 --> 00:06:03,880 emerged from God and is inherently united with his own 81 00:06:03,880 --> 00:06:08,400 being, while we both align against Panantheism, could you 82 00:06:08,400 --> 00:06:12,640 explore any any interpretations within the biblical narrative, 83 00:06:13,000 --> 00:06:17,400 specifically the Old Testament or Tanakh, that refute this 84 00:06:17,400 --> 00:06:20,600 perspective? Furthermore, could you delineate 85 00:06:20,600 --> 00:06:25,920 the reasons why both Panantheism and pantheism stand in 86 00:06:25,920 --> 00:06:30,000 contradiction to our faiths, prefacing your explanation with 87 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:33,480 a clarification of these terms for our audience? 88 00:06:34,040 --> 00:06:38,000 OK, so let's begin with a clarification of terms for the 89 00:06:38,000 --> 00:06:44,720 sake of the audience. Pantheism means that the entire 90 00:06:44,720 --> 00:06:49,120 universe, the all physical reality, is itself God. 91 00:06:49,400 --> 00:06:53,280 It identifies the physical universe with God. 92 00:06:53,280 --> 00:06:58,000 Pantheism is characteristic of many Eastern religions, which 93 00:06:58,000 --> 00:07:02,360 deny that there is a transcendent creator of the 94 00:07:02,360 --> 00:07:06,520 universe who exists beyond space and time, who is himself 95 00:07:06,560 --> 00:07:11,360 immaterial, and who brings all physical reality into being. 96 00:07:11,720 --> 00:07:17,920 Pan and Theism, by contrast, is the view that physical reality 97 00:07:18,040 --> 00:07:22,840 exists in God. It doesn't exhaust God's being. 98 00:07:22,840 --> 00:07:26,960 It's not identical to God as in pantheism, but it says that 99 00:07:26,960 --> 00:07:31,800 everything is in God. The physical universe somehow, 100 00:07:31,800 --> 00:07:36,320 in some mysterious ways emanates out of the very beginning of 101 00:07:36,320 --> 00:07:39,080 God, out of the very being of God. 102 00:07:39,080 --> 00:07:45,040 So even if God is more than the universe, he is no nothing less 103 00:07:45,040 --> 00:07:48,160 than the universe. The universe emanates or or 104 00:07:48,160 --> 00:07:50,680 proceeds out of the very being of God. 105 00:07:51,960 --> 00:07:56,920 Now these world views or perspectives I think are both 106 00:07:56,920 --> 00:08:04,440 antithetical to theism which is taught in the judeo-christian 107 00:08:04,640 --> 00:08:08,040 tradition. We saw that the Bible begins 108 00:08:08,040 --> 00:08:11,560 with the words. In the beginning, God created 109 00:08:11,720 --> 00:08:16,920 the heavens and the earth. For God to create the material 110 00:08:16,920 --> 00:08:21,720 universe out of himself, he would himself have to be 111 00:08:21,960 --> 00:08:25,720 material. But that contradicts the 112 00:08:25,720 --> 00:08:32,559 fundamental teaching of the Hebrew Bible that God is Spirit 113 00:08:32,799 --> 00:08:37,480 rather than material reality. The word that is used for God 114 00:08:38,120 --> 00:08:42,880 over and over again in the Hebrew Bible is ruach, a spirit, 115 00:08:43,120 --> 00:08:46,000 and this characterizes the being of God. 116 00:08:46,000 --> 00:08:49,800 In contrast to say, a flesh or Bashar. 117 00:08:50,160 --> 00:08:54,960 That word Bashar, is never used of God in the Hebrew Bible, 118 00:08:55,200 --> 00:09:02,600 whereas ruach is used some 136 times of God in the Hebrew Bible 119 00:09:02,600 --> 00:09:08,880 and indicates the antithesis between spirit and materialism. 120 00:09:09,440 --> 00:09:14,120 And the most theologically significant use of ruach or 121 00:09:14,120 --> 00:09:21,280 spirit is for spiritual beings or spiritual agents, that is to 122 00:09:21,280 --> 00:09:27,080 say, agents without bodies. And I'm thinking here of the use 123 00:09:27,080 --> 00:09:31,040 of ruach to describe first human spirits. 124 00:09:31,440 --> 00:09:36,320 When human spirits are described apart from the body, when the 125 00:09:37,440 --> 00:09:42,960 body has died and is laid in the earth, human spirits continue to 126 00:09:43,120 --> 00:09:47,760 exist and are referred to as being ruach spirits. 127 00:09:48,560 --> 00:09:53,720 In addition to that, ruach is used of non human finite 128 00:09:53,720 --> 00:09:58,600 spiritual beings such as angels or demons which are also 129 00:09:58,600 --> 00:10:01,960 personal agents without bodies. And then finally, as I 130 00:10:01,960 --> 00:10:06,720 indicated, the preeminent use of ruach in the Hebrew Bible is of 131 00:10:06,720 --> 00:10:10,520 God Himself. God is a spiritual being. 132 00:10:10,520 --> 00:10:15,960 He is an immaterial reality who transcends the physical world 133 00:10:15,960 --> 00:10:18,080 and has created the physical world. 134 00:10:18,480 --> 00:10:24,120 So I think that pantheism, not to say pantheism, is completely 135 00:10:24,120 --> 00:10:28,160 incompatible with the conception of God in the Hebrew Bible. 136 00:10:29,880 --> 00:10:32,400 Fascinating. And I actually wanted to point 137 00:10:32,400 --> 00:10:37,160 out there's a famous verse that says holy, holy, holy God is 138 00:10:37,920 --> 00:10:41,640 his, His honor fills the world. I'm paraphrasing it, but 139 00:10:41,640 --> 00:10:44,360 basically the the real translation of Kadosh, which is 140 00:10:44,360 --> 00:10:48,200 holy, is actually sanctified or separate, That God is separate. 141 00:10:48,200 --> 00:10:50,800 It's a separate, separate, separate Hashem, tuvaquot 142 00:10:50,800 --> 00:10:53,840 melokala, aritzke, vodo. His honor fills the world, 143 00:10:53,840 --> 00:10:56,560 meaning meaning to say that it's not him who fills the world, 144 00:10:56,800 --> 00:10:59,720 it's his. We can see evidence for his, you 145 00:10:59,720 --> 00:11:03,120 know, his his glory or his honor or his intelligence. 146 00:11:03,400 --> 00:11:05,000 We see evidence for that in the world. 147 00:11:05,000 --> 00:11:08,520 But it's not him. That's a very important verse I 148 00:11:08,520 --> 00:11:11,040 feel like people should really analyze. 149 00:11:11,840 --> 00:11:14,200 But thank you so much. That was really, really 150 00:11:14,800 --> 00:11:17,920 fascinating. So another topic I want to get 151 00:11:17,920 --> 00:11:23,560 into is the accusation from atheistic circles that often 152 00:11:23,560 --> 00:11:28,280 centers around theists resorting to a God of the gaps argument 153 00:11:28,480 --> 00:11:30,640 for phenomena unexplained by science. 154 00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:33,880 Interestingly, some atheists appear to embrace the concept of 155 00:11:33,880 --> 00:11:38,200 an eternal universe, potentially through the unverifiable notion 156 00:11:38,200 --> 00:11:42,280 of a multiverse, to circumvent the implications of The Big 157 00:11:42,280 --> 00:11:45,400 Bang, yet dismiss the plausibility of God's 158 00:11:45,400 --> 00:11:47,520 eternality. Notably, figures like Richard 159 00:11:47,520 --> 00:11:50,840 Dawkins have posited that the complexity observed in DNA 160 00:11:51,160 --> 00:11:55,600 suggests an intelligent designer, albeit ascribing it to 161 00:11:55,600 --> 00:11:58,240 extraterrestrial origin rather than a divine entity. 162 00:11:58,480 --> 00:12:01,680 Could you address this apparent science of the gaps 163 00:12:01,720 --> 00:12:05,280 contradiction and share your compelling arguments for theism 164 00:12:05,280 --> 00:12:07,960 when confronting atheistic critiques? 165 00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:11,040 All right. There are a number of facets to 166 00:12:11,040 --> 00:12:14,120 the question that you've asked. First of all, I think it's very 167 00:12:14,120 --> 00:12:18,640 important to understand that the basis for belief in creation out 168 00:12:18,640 --> 00:12:23,640 of nothing is not science. It is the Bible. 169 00:12:23,880 --> 00:12:30,000 The Bible teaches creatio ex nihilo, and for millennia, Jews 170 00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:34,960 and Christians have believed this doctrine wholly apart from 171 00:12:34,960 --> 00:12:38,800 modern science. It wasn't until roughly 100 172 00:12:38,800 --> 00:12:43,120 years ago that we had scientific evidence for the beginning in 173 00:12:43,120 --> 00:12:46,720 the universe. So the basis for the belief in 174 00:12:46,720 --> 00:12:51,360 creation out of nothing is Biblical teaching, not science. 175 00:12:51,680 --> 00:12:55,360 The question for the Bible believer, then, is, is this 176 00:12:55,360 --> 00:13:00,160 biblical teaching at odds with the deliverances of modern 177 00:13:00,160 --> 00:13:04,680 science, or is it in accord with the deliverances of modern 178 00:13:04,680 --> 00:13:07,160 science? And here it's indisputable. 179 00:13:07,160 --> 00:13:10,600 I think that the doctrine of creation out of nothing is 180 00:13:10,600 --> 00:13:14,120 certainly in accord with modern science. 181 00:13:14,560 --> 00:13:18,800 Whether or not it's proved by modern science is irrelevant. 182 00:13:18,800 --> 00:13:24,200 The Jew or Christian who comes to the table with his biblical 183 00:13:24,200 --> 00:13:29,200 theism firmly in hand, is adopting a position concerning 184 00:13:29,200 --> 00:13:32,080 the origin of the universe that is right at the center of 185 00:13:32,080 --> 00:13:35,880 contemporary cosmogony and astrophysics. 186 00:13:35,880 --> 00:13:40,640 There is no discord between the belief in criottio ex nihilo and 187 00:13:40,640 --> 00:13:45,280 contemporary science, even if one doesn't regard modern 188 00:13:45,280 --> 00:13:49,200 science as a positive proof of criottio ex nihilo. 189 00:13:49,880 --> 00:13:54,840 Now, with respect to this idea of a God of the Gaps argument, I 190 00:13:54,840 --> 00:14:01,480 think it's very important to understand that arguments that 191 00:14:01,480 --> 00:14:07,400 appeal to scientific evidence are not using God to be a 192 00:14:07,400 --> 00:14:13,200 stopgap to plug up the holes in our scientific understanding of 193 00:14:13,200 --> 00:14:15,880 reality. Rather, the proper way to view 194 00:14:15,880 --> 00:14:21,880 these arguments is that science can provide evidence in support 195 00:14:21,880 --> 00:14:27,760 of a premise in a philosophical argument leading to a conclusion 196 00:14:27,960 --> 00:14:32,040 of theological significance. Let me repeat that just to make 197 00:14:32,040 --> 00:14:37,720 it clear, science can provide evidence in support of a premise 198 00:14:38,200 --> 00:14:42,360 in a philosophical argument for a conclusion that has 199 00:14:42,360 --> 00:14:47,400 theological significance. So for example, take the Kalam 200 00:14:47,640 --> 00:14:52,760 cosmological argument, which has been defended historically by 201 00:14:52,960 --> 00:14:57,960 Jews, Muslims, and Christians. This argument is very simple. 202 00:14:57,960 --> 00:15:02,800 Premise one is that the premise one is that whatever begins to 203 00:15:02,800 --> 00:15:06,320 exist has a cause of its beginning. 204 00:15:06,640 --> 00:15:12,000 Premise 2 is that the universe began to exist, and then three. 205 00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:15,960 The conclusion is therefore the universe has a cause of its 206 00:15:15,960 --> 00:15:19,720 beginning and you can then do a conceptual analysis of what it 207 00:15:19,720 --> 00:15:23,160 is to be a cause of the universe, and a number of 208 00:15:23,320 --> 00:15:27,400 theologically striking properties can be recovered from 209 00:15:27,400 --> 00:15:31,480 such an analysis. Now notice that the 2nd premise 210 00:15:31,480 --> 00:15:38,200 of that argument, the universe began to exist, is a religiously 211 00:15:38,200 --> 00:15:42,240 neutral statement that can be found in any textbook on 212 00:15:42,240 --> 00:15:46,360 astronomy and astrophysics. To claim that the scientific 213 00:15:46,360 --> 00:15:51,640 evidence supports this premise is not in any way to postulate a 214 00:15:51,640 --> 00:15:55,920 God of the gaps. This is a theologically neutral 215 00:15:55,920 --> 00:16:01,360 premise which has, I think, really compelling scientific 216 00:16:01,360 --> 00:16:06,440 evidence in its support. So someone who uses the 217 00:16:06,440 --> 00:16:12,560 scientific evidence in support of a premise in an argument for 218 00:16:12,560 --> 00:16:16,760 theological conclusion is not postulating God of the gaps 219 00:16:16,760 --> 00:16:20,440 reasoning, that is to say, using God to stop up the gaps in our 220 00:16:20,440 --> 00:16:23,720 scientific knowledge. This argument is based on what 221 00:16:23,720 --> 00:16:29,480 we do know about the universe. It is based on what contemporary 222 00:16:29,480 --> 00:16:34,960 science does tell us about the past, namely that the universe 223 00:16:35,200 --> 00:16:39,480 is in all probability not past eternal, but had an absolute 224 00:16:39,480 --> 00:16:44,120 beginning of finite time ago. Now, you spoke of a kind of 225 00:16:44,120 --> 00:16:49,560 science of the gaps that is often used by naturalists in 226 00:16:49,560 --> 00:16:51,520 response to arguments of this sort. 227 00:16:52,080 --> 00:16:56,720 And I wouldn't characterize that Ben, as science of the gaps. 228 00:16:57,040 --> 00:17:00,400 I don't think this is an opposition between theism and 229 00:17:00,400 --> 00:17:03,720 science in any way. Rather, I would characterize it 230 00:17:03,720 --> 00:17:08,839 as a naturalism of the gaps. Naturalism is the view that 231 00:17:08,839 --> 00:17:12,520 there are no supernatural entities, particularly there is 232 00:17:12,520 --> 00:17:17,800 no God that all that exists. It's just space-time and its 233 00:17:17,800 --> 00:17:23,119 contents, and I think it is a kind of naturalism of the gaps 234 00:17:23,440 --> 00:17:28,319 that motivates a lot of these desperate attempts to avoid 235 00:17:28,560 --> 00:17:32,960 where the evidence points. And here I think that's evident 236 00:17:32,960 --> 00:17:37,280 in that there would be no reason to resist where the evidence is 237 00:17:37,280 --> 00:17:40,640 pointing, for example, the beginning of the universe, if it 238 00:17:40,640 --> 00:17:44,640 were not for the fact that these naturalists see where that's 239 00:17:44,640 --> 00:17:48,160 leading leads to an unacceptable conclusion. 240 00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:51,960 And therefore they have a kind of naturalism of the gaps that 241 00:17:52,880 --> 00:17:56,640 whatever caused the universe or whatever the the evidence is, 242 00:17:56,960 --> 00:18:01,680 somehow the universe is not past eternal, despite the fact that 243 00:18:01,680 --> 00:18:03,920 all the evidence points in that direction. 244 00:18:04,320 --> 00:18:07,440 And so I would ask them, apart from the presupposition of 245 00:18:07,440 --> 00:18:13,280 naturalism, which is to beg the question, why resist where the 246 00:18:13,280 --> 00:18:17,040 evidence points? Why not accept where the 247 00:18:17,040 --> 00:18:20,440 evidence points, which is that the universe is not past 248 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:25,520 eternal, but had a beginning? Now, in terms of the arguments 249 00:18:25,520 --> 00:18:29,000 for theism that one might present, I've presented multiple 250 00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:34,520 arguments for theism, only some of which appeal to scientific 251 00:18:34,520 --> 00:18:36,920 evidence in support of some of its premises. 252 00:18:36,920 --> 00:18:39,800 Let me just list some of these arguments for you. 253 00:18:40,560 --> 00:18:45,920 Number one, I think that God is the best explanation for why 254 00:18:46,240 --> 00:18:50,000 anything at all exists, rather than nothing. 255 00:18:50,400 --> 00:18:54,600 This version of the cosmological argument doesn't appeal to 256 00:18:54,600 --> 00:18:56,800 scientific evidence. Rather, it's a purely 257 00:18:57,400 --> 00:19:01,960 philosophical argument that at the basis of all reality there 258 00:19:01,960 --> 00:19:05,760 must be a metaphysically necessary being which is 259 00:19:05,760 --> 00:19:09,680 distinct from the universe and supplies a sufficient reason why 260 00:19:09,680 --> 00:19:13,400 the universe exists. The second argument would be 261 00:19:13,680 --> 00:19:19,520 that God is the best explanation for the origin of the universe 262 00:19:19,520 --> 00:19:25,320 at a point in the finite past. This is the Kalam cosmological 263 00:19:25,320 --> 00:19:29,640 argument to which I've already alluded, and I think it has both 264 00:19:29,640 --> 00:19:34,120 philosophical and scientific Gavin in support of its key 265 00:19:34,240 --> 00:19:38,160 premises. The third argument would be the 266 00:19:38,160 --> 00:19:43,680 argument from the uncanny applicability of mathematics to 267 00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:48,040 physical phenomena. Why is it that the physical 268 00:19:48,040 --> 00:19:54,120 phenomena of this world are describable by elegant 269 00:19:54,320 --> 00:20:00,440 mathematical equations that are incomprehensible in their 270 00:20:00,440 --> 00:20:04,600 accuracy and so valuable in their utility? 271 00:20:04,920 --> 00:20:07,960 This argument from the applicability of mathematics has 272 00:20:07,960 --> 00:20:13,920 been defended in our day by the Jewish philosopher Mark Steiner 273 00:20:13,920 --> 00:20:18,120 in his book The Applicability of Mathematics as a philosophical 274 00:20:18,280 --> 00:20:23,320 problem. 4th would be that God is the best explanation for the 275 00:20:23,320 --> 00:20:29,200 fine tuning of the universe. For embodied conscious agents 276 00:20:29,400 --> 00:20:33,720 like ourselves, the fine tuning of the universe refers to the 277 00:20:33,720 --> 00:20:38,040 fundamental constants and quantities that were simply 278 00:20:38,040 --> 00:20:42,840 given in The Big Bang itself, that show that the universe is 279 00:20:42,840 --> 00:20:48,800 fine-tuned to an exquisite precision for the existence of 280 00:20:48,800 --> 00:20:53,800 embodied conscious agents like us against all probability. 281 00:20:54,240 --> 00:20:58,640 Given naturalism, the 5th argument would be that God is 282 00:20:58,640 --> 00:21:04,200 the best explanation for the objectivity of moral values and 283 00:21:04,200 --> 00:21:08,200 moral duties in the world. Again, this is not a scientific 284 00:21:08,200 --> 00:21:10,200 argument. It's a philosophical argument 285 00:21:10,600 --> 00:21:13,840 that appeals to our moral experience. 286 00:21:13,840 --> 00:21:19,240 We sense that certain things are really right and and really 287 00:21:19,240 --> 00:21:23,160 wrong, really good and really evil. 288 00:21:23,480 --> 00:21:27,800 And the best explanation for the objectivity of the moral values 289 00:21:27,800 --> 00:21:32,800 and duties that we grasp are that these are grounded in God, 290 00:21:33,040 --> 00:21:37,640 who is the paradigm of moral goodness and whose commands 291 00:21:37,640 --> 00:21:41,280 constitute for us our moral obligations. 292 00:21:41,760 --> 00:21:48,080 The 6th argument would be that the very possibility of God's 293 00:21:48,080 --> 00:21:51,040 existence and tales that God exists. 294 00:21:51,040 --> 00:21:55,680 This is the famous ontological argument of Saint Anselm, and I 295 00:21:55,680 --> 00:21:59,640 persuaded that a sound and plausible version of the 296 00:21:59,680 --> 00:22:04,840 ontological argument can be formulated such that the atheist 297 00:22:04,840 --> 00:22:08,120 has to deny not merely that God exists. 298 00:22:08,120 --> 00:22:13,000 He has to deny that it's even possible that God exists so long 299 00:22:13,000 --> 00:22:15,280 as God's existence is even possible. 300 00:22:15,720 --> 00:22:19,440 The argument shows that that entails that God exists. 301 00:22:19,800 --> 00:22:24,240 And then finally, I think that God can be personally known and 302 00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:26,760 experienced. This isn't really an argument 303 00:22:26,760 --> 00:22:30,200 for God's existence, but it's the claim that, wholly apart 304 00:22:30,200 --> 00:22:34,440 from arguments, you can know that God exists by having a 305 00:22:34,440 --> 00:22:40,760 personal relationship with God. And so, for all of these 306 00:22:40,760 --> 00:22:46,600 reasons, I think that we have a powerful cumulative case for 307 00:22:46,600 --> 00:22:51,240 believing that God exists. So I want to just ask a few 308 00:22:51,240 --> 00:22:53,800 questions on this and Zeb also has questions on this 309 00:22:53,880 --> 00:22:59,200 particular. So what is the the strong, what 310 00:22:59,200 --> 00:23:01,920 is the argument of the of the multiverse theory? 311 00:23:01,920 --> 00:23:05,120 And like for example the fine tuning, they seem to be trying 312 00:23:05,120 --> 00:23:09,240 to kind of dismiss that by saying that well this universe 313 00:23:09,240 --> 00:23:12,040 that we live in in particular happens to be fine-tuned, but 314 00:23:12,040 --> 00:23:14,960 the other ones are not. So how how does that work? 315 00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:16,440 I'm trying to understand like the the log. 316 00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:17,960 Maybe Zed would understand it better. 317 00:23:18,640 --> 00:23:21,880 I think I can make this very clear to our listeners. 318 00:23:22,240 --> 00:23:28,280 If you have just one roulette wheel spinning, then the 319 00:23:28,400 --> 00:23:32,480 probability that you're going to come up with just a particular 320 00:23:33,080 --> 00:23:36,720 number like the red 20 is very remote. 321 00:23:37,240 --> 00:23:41,600 But if you have hundreds, thousands, and that's the 322 00:23:41,600 --> 00:23:45,360 millions of roulette wheels all spinning at the same time, then 323 00:23:45,360 --> 00:23:50,000 the chances are that in at least one of them that the red 20 is 324 00:23:50,000 --> 00:23:54,840 going to come up. And if getting the red 20 is a 325 00:23:54,840 --> 00:23:59,560 necessary condition of your existing, then of course anybody 326 00:23:59,560 --> 00:24:02,760 that is alive is going to observe the red 20. 327 00:24:02,760 --> 00:24:07,840 Because the other universes that are not fine-tuned would be 328 00:24:08,120 --> 00:24:10,920 unobservable. You you wouldn't exist in them, 329 00:24:10,920 --> 00:24:13,000 so you you couldn't observe them. 330 00:24:13,000 --> 00:24:17,440 And so the claim is that if you multiply your probabilistic 331 00:24:17,440 --> 00:24:23,200 resources sufficiently that anything can be explained away 332 00:24:23,560 --> 00:24:28,440 on the basis that there is this infinite multiverse of worlds, 333 00:24:29,120 --> 00:24:33,920 so that fine-tuned worlds will appear somewhere in this world 334 00:24:33,920 --> 00:24:37,120 ensemble. And those are the only ones that 335 00:24:37,120 --> 00:24:40,840 are observable, and therefore there's nothing here to be 336 00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:43,840 surprised about or to be explained Now. 337 00:24:44,120 --> 00:24:49,560 Roger Penrose has raised an objection to this multiverse 338 00:24:49,560 --> 00:24:55,360 explanation of fine tuning that I think is really devastating. 339 00:24:55,640 --> 00:25:01,000 What he points out is that it is not true that only fine-tuned 340 00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:05,640 worlds are observable. You can have worlds that are not 341 00:25:05,640 --> 00:25:09,880 fine-tuned for the existence of of embodied conscious agents 342 00:25:09,880 --> 00:25:14,120 like us, but that which would be still observable. 343 00:25:14,120 --> 00:25:19,480 There could be freak observers that could observe their worlds. 344 00:25:19,520 --> 00:25:21,320 These are often called. Boston brains. 345 00:25:21,840 --> 00:25:27,520 Or yes, yes, these are often called Boltzmann brains after 346 00:25:27,520 --> 00:25:32,320 the great 19th century Austrian physicist Ludwig Boltzmann. 347 00:25:32,960 --> 00:25:39,080 And these Boltzmann brains would be just a brain that fluctuates 348 00:25:39,080 --> 00:25:43,800 into existence, say out of the quantum vacuum, and just exist 349 00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:48,600 for a little time with illusory perceptions of an external world 350 00:25:48,840 --> 00:25:51,360 around it. But in fact, the Boltzmann brain 351 00:25:51,360 --> 00:25:54,640 is the only thing that exists, and the rest of the universe is 352 00:25:54,640 --> 00:26:01,320 all an illusion of this brain. Well, that kind of universe is 353 00:26:01,320 --> 00:26:06,480 incomparably more probable than a finely tuned universe like 354 00:26:06,680 --> 00:26:09,680 ours. And yet it is observable. 355 00:26:10,080 --> 00:26:13,760 And so on The multiverse hypothesis, it leads to a 356 00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:21,880 radical skepticism about the world around us that the the the 357 00:26:21,880 --> 00:26:27,080 atheist would have to believe that he is all that exists and 358 00:26:27,080 --> 00:26:31,520 that the rest of the universe, his own body, his wife, other 359 00:26:31,640 --> 00:26:35,360 people are just illusions of his own consciousness. 360 00:26:35,360 --> 00:26:39,920 Well, no sane person believes that he's a Boltzmann brain. 361 00:26:39,920 --> 00:26:44,400 And yet, if the multiverse hypothesis is true, there's no 362 00:26:44,400 --> 00:26:50,000 way to distinguish between a normal, decent observer like 363 00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:55,920 ourselves and a Boltzmann brain. And therefore this is really, I 364 00:26:55,920 --> 00:27:00,560 think, a devastating objection to the rationality of the 365 00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:04,320 multiverse hypothesis. Yeah, I mean, that almost sounds 366 00:27:04,320 --> 00:27:06,960 like solipsism. Like, you know, which is insane. 367 00:27:08,160 --> 00:27:10,760 Solipsism. That's right, you would be the 368 00:27:10,760 --> 00:27:15,480 only thing that exists and everything else is an illusion 369 00:27:15,680 --> 00:27:18,160 of your consciousness. Exactly. 370 00:27:18,160 --> 00:27:21,480 And I and I I love how you the arguments you marshalled in 371 00:27:21,480 --> 00:27:24,640 favor of God basically being the final theory of everything. 372 00:27:24,960 --> 00:27:27,400 I had two questions on on two of the points. 373 00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:30,280 There was one about the column cosmological argument. 374 00:27:30,280 --> 00:27:34,000 I know that the second point about everything that begins to 375 00:27:34,000 --> 00:27:38,240 exist that has obviously the in some circles is more 376 00:27:38,240 --> 00:27:42,320 controversial. So I I would be curious to hear 377 00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:46,880 what you say about that. So I'll take that question 378 00:27:46,880 --> 00:27:47,400 first. That'll. 379 00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:49,040 Be Yes. Let's review. 380 00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:52,840 The first premise is that everything that begins to exist 381 00:27:52,960 --> 00:27:57,040 has a cause of its beginning. Now, as you say, I think that's 382 00:27:57,040 --> 00:28:00,280 hardly controversial. Things don't just pop into 383 00:28:00,280 --> 00:28:05,720 existence out of nothing. Out of nothing, nothing comes. 384 00:28:06,040 --> 00:28:10,640 So if something begins to exist, there must be a 'cause that 385 00:28:10,640 --> 00:28:13,480 brings that thing into being. I think that's quite 386 00:28:13,480 --> 00:28:16,120 perspicuous. So the more controversial 387 00:28:16,120 --> 00:28:19,440 premise is the second one, that the universe began to exist. 388 00:28:20,000 --> 00:28:25,120 And here I would Marshall both philosophical arguments as well 389 00:28:25,120 --> 00:28:29,600 as scientific arguments in support of this premise. 390 00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:33,760 Concerning philosophical arguments, a medieval Jewish 391 00:28:33,840 --> 00:28:39,520 philosopher like Sadia Ben Gian, defended arguments for the 392 00:28:39,520 --> 00:28:43,120 beginning of the universe on purely philosophical grounds, 393 00:28:43,440 --> 00:28:48,080 showing that there cannot have been an infinite regress of past 394 00:28:48,120 --> 00:28:50,840 events. And therefore Sadia claimed 395 00:28:50,840 --> 00:28:54,120 there must have been an absolutely first event which was 396 00:28:54,120 --> 00:28:56,880 brought into being by a transcendent creator. 397 00:28:57,240 --> 00:29:00,520 And I'm persuaded that these purely philosophical arguments 398 00:29:00,560 --> 00:29:04,680 are sound arguments and have defended them in my published 399 00:29:04,680 --> 00:29:08,320 work. What is incredible is that since 400 00:29:08,920 --> 00:29:12,080 the 2nd decade of the 20th century, there has been 401 00:29:12,680 --> 00:29:17,520 accumulating increasingly scientific evidence or 402 00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:21,240 confirmation of this second premise. 403 00:29:21,240 --> 00:29:24,600 And I have reference here to two things. 404 00:29:24,600 --> 00:29:28,080 First would be the discovery of the expansion of the universe 405 00:29:28,720 --> 00:29:32,160 and The Big Bang model of the origin of the universe, which 406 00:29:32,160 --> 00:29:36,440 shows that the universe cannot be past eternal, but must have 407 00:29:36,440 --> 00:29:40,440 had an absolute beginning. Over the decades since this was 408 00:29:40,440 --> 00:29:46,240 first proposed in the 1920s, there has been a parade of 409 00:29:46,240 --> 00:29:50,400 alternative theories trying to avert the beginning of the 410 00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:52,760 universe predicted by the Standard Model. 411 00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:58,280 We've seen oscillating models, vacuum fluctuation models, 412 00:29:58,280 --> 00:30:02,960 steady state models, and over and over again these theories 413 00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:07,000 have been shown to be either mathematically untenable or 414 00:30:07,080 --> 00:30:12,880 physically impossible, or they actually wind up implying the 415 00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:16,240 very origin of the universe that they sought to avoid. 416 00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:22,040 And so the evidence is such that a cosmologist like Alexander 417 00:30:22,280 --> 00:30:27,040 Velenkin, A preeminent astrophysicist at Tufts 418 00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:32,840 University, can say that all the evidence we have says that the 419 00:30:32,840 --> 00:30:36,200 universe had a beginning. Now that's a remarkable 420 00:30:36,200 --> 00:30:37,200 statement. Think about it. 421 00:30:37,200 --> 00:30:41,560 Velenkin does not say that the evidence for a beginning 422 00:30:41,880 --> 00:30:44,880 outweighs the evidence against the beginning. 423 00:30:45,000 --> 00:30:49,760 No, he says. All the evidence we have says 424 00:30:49,960 --> 00:30:53,360 that the universe had a beginning, and in fact I'm not 425 00:30:53,360 --> 00:30:57,760 aware of any evidence that the universe is past eternal. 426 00:30:57,760 --> 00:31:01,800 What evidence we have is all on one side of the scale, and so I 427 00:31:01,800 --> 00:31:05,360 think that makes it highly probable that in fact the 2nd 428 00:31:05,360 --> 00:31:09,360 premise is true that the universe began to exist. 429 00:31:10,360 --> 00:31:13,400 In addition to that, there's also scientific confirmation 430 00:31:13,400 --> 00:31:15,560 from the second law of thermodynamics. 431 00:31:16,120 --> 00:31:19,680 The second law of thermodynamic shows that the universe cannot 432 00:31:19,680 --> 00:31:25,520 be projected into past Infinity. Rather, there must have been a 433 00:31:25,520 --> 00:31:30,480 beginning of finite time ago in which the energy of the universe 434 00:31:30,480 --> 00:31:33,400 was Simply put in as an initial condition. 435 00:31:33,760 --> 00:31:39,000 And since then the energy level has been running down, just like 436 00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:43,560 a clock that has been wound up and is gradually running down. 437 00:31:43,920 --> 00:31:49,440 And so we have very positive and powerful scientific evidence in 438 00:31:49,440 --> 00:31:52,720 support of that second premise, that the universe began to 439 00:31:52,760 --> 00:31:55,480 exist. And and even if we go past, 440 00:31:55,920 --> 00:31:58,120 because I know that this is a little bit out of my depth, but 441 00:31:58,120 --> 00:32:01,880 I I know you discussed this with with Rodger Penrose that there's 442 00:32:01,880 --> 00:32:05,440 time there's like ordinary space-time and then there's of 443 00:32:05,440 --> 00:32:08,760 course before that you could still, there's still cause and 444 00:32:08,760 --> 00:32:11,000 effect in the sense of temporal order time. 445 00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:13,520 Is that correct? Like like even if we were, say, 446 00:32:13,520 --> 00:32:17,080 before The Big Bang, there would be time in a certain sense. 447 00:32:17,880 --> 00:32:23,800 In physical cosmology, Ben, there is no time before The Big 448 00:32:23,800 --> 00:32:28,920 Bang that is inept to say what was before The Big Bang. 449 00:32:28,920 --> 00:32:32,560 That's like asking what is north of the North Pole? 450 00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:38,640 They initial cosmological singularity in the standard 451 00:32:38,640 --> 00:32:44,120 model simply represents the beginning of time and space-time 452 00:32:44,120 --> 00:32:47,880 cannot be projected further backwards than that. 453 00:32:48,520 --> 00:32:53,000 Now as a philosopher however and metaphysician, I think it is 454 00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:58,960 coherent to talk about a sort of metaphysical time that existed 455 00:32:59,200 --> 00:33:03,440 prior to the inception of physical time. 456 00:33:03,960 --> 00:33:06,640 And I think a knock down argument for that would be that 457 00:33:06,880 --> 00:33:13,320 God could count down to the moment of creation -3 negative 458 00:33:13,320 --> 00:33:19,400 two -1 let there be light. And in that case there would be 459 00:33:19,520 --> 00:33:24,320 a series of mental events that would be sufficient for time 460 00:33:24,320 --> 00:33:29,560 even prior to the inception of the physical universe. 461 00:33:29,560 --> 00:33:33,960 So I think it is possible to have a kind of metaphysical time 462 00:33:34,280 --> 00:33:40,040 prior to creation, though I see no basis for postulating that 463 00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:44,440 sort of pre creation time. And indeed I don't think it 464 00:33:44,440 --> 00:33:49,240 could be infinitely extended and therefore I I adopt Occam's 465 00:33:49,240 --> 00:33:52,840 razor here. You don't postulate entities or 466 00:33:52,840 --> 00:33:56,720 hypothesis beyond necessity. I think it's simpler simply to 467 00:33:56,720 --> 00:34:00,200 say that time began at the moment of creation. 468 00:34:00,560 --> 00:34:06,200 So on the model of time that I adopt, I argue that God without 469 00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:12,440 creation is timeless, but that he enters into time at the 470 00:34:12,440 --> 00:34:18,480 moment of creation in virtue of his causal relationships and 471 00:34:18,480 --> 00:34:24,000 knowledge of the temporal world. And I guess you can't. 472 00:34:24,000 --> 00:34:26,719 So this might sound like a silly question. 473 00:34:27,000 --> 00:34:29,600 I know that there's this notion of quantum foam. 474 00:34:29,600 --> 00:34:32,560 Maybe this is one of the models you were talking about that 475 00:34:32,600 --> 00:34:36,840 wouldn't be eternal and or or or it would be because there would 476 00:34:36,840 --> 00:34:40,560 have to be like some 'cause that brought that into being, right? 477 00:34:40,560 --> 00:34:42,960 Or. Yes, it can't be projected into 478 00:34:42,960 --> 00:34:47,719 the infinite past. The Lincoln himself tries to 479 00:34:47,719 --> 00:34:51,800 offer a quantum physical model to explain the origin of the 480 00:34:51,800 --> 00:34:55,520 universe, and these models, if they're to be consistent with 481 00:34:55,520 --> 00:34:59,240 the evidence, cannot be projected into past Infinity. 482 00:34:59,640 --> 00:35:02,880 So the argument for the beginning of the universe 483 00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:06,200 doesn't depend on there being an initial cosmological 484 00:35:06,200 --> 00:35:08,520 singularity. You could have a quantum 485 00:35:08,520 --> 00:35:11,920 physical model of the origin of the universe that would not 486 00:35:11,920 --> 00:35:15,320 involve A singularity, but nevertheless these are still 487 00:35:15,320 --> 00:35:19,200 past finite. They cannot be projected to past 488 00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:22,480 eternity and be physically adequate. 489 00:35:23,480 --> 00:35:25,840 Excellent. And I know Ben just asked about 490 00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:27,840 the the, the fine tuning, the constants. 491 00:35:28,120 --> 00:35:32,600 I had a question about the mathematical, how you said the 492 00:35:33,000 --> 00:35:36,720 collaboration in mathematics and how that's in the fact that we 493 00:35:36,720 --> 00:35:39,320 can even do mathematics and how, you know, amazing it is. 494 00:35:40,040 --> 00:35:44,000 So one question I had was, and I know you've written a lot about 495 00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:49,400 this and I know it's it's a long subject, so, but the idea of is 496 00:35:49,400 --> 00:35:54,200 mathematics real, you know, because some people can make the 497 00:35:54,200 --> 00:35:57,160 argument that, well, mathematics and laws, physical law, 498 00:35:57,160 --> 00:35:58,440 everything came from physical laws. 499 00:35:58,720 --> 00:36:02,040 Maybe those are eternal, they're abstract, they're timeless, 500 00:36:02,040 --> 00:36:05,560 they're formless. So how would we respond to that? 501 00:36:05,920 --> 00:36:09,760 Very good. This is again the argument from 502 00:36:09,760 --> 00:36:13,880 the applicability of mathematics to the physical world that I 503 00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:17,440 described. Eugene Wigner, the Nobel Prize 504 00:36:17,440 --> 00:36:22,040 winning quantum physicist, presented this argument based 505 00:36:22,040 --> 00:36:25,840 upon what he called the unreasonable effectiveness of 506 00:36:26,120 --> 00:36:29,440 mathematics. And what Wigner noted is that 507 00:36:29,440 --> 00:36:35,600 mathematics is not pursued for reasons of empirical adequacy 508 00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:39,000 the way scientific theories are. In science. 509 00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:43,560 You only postulate such entities as are warranted by the 510 00:36:43,560 --> 00:36:46,120 scientific evidence. But that's not the way 511 00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:50,240 mathematics works. Mathematics adopts maximal 512 00:36:50,240 --> 00:36:54,160 principles, where you posit as many mathematical entities as 513 00:36:54,160 --> 00:36:56,840 you can short of of contradiction. 514 00:36:57,240 --> 00:37:00,680 And therefore mathematics is pursued for what Wigner called 515 00:37:00,720 --> 00:37:06,280 aesthetic reasons, not empirical reasons, it having to do with 516 00:37:06,280 --> 00:37:10,800 mathematical beauty. Moreover, these mathematical 517 00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:15,200 entities, as you just described them, even if they exist, if you 518 00:37:15,200 --> 00:37:21,720 adopt a Platonic or realist view of these mathematical objects, 519 00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:26,240 they are by definition causally effete. 520 00:37:26,680 --> 00:37:31,600 That is to say, because they're abstract, they have no causal 521 00:37:31,600 --> 00:37:36,360 effect upon anything. Abstract objects like numbers 522 00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:40,600 and sets and functions and so forth exist beyond space and 523 00:37:40,600 --> 00:37:44,720 time, and they have no causal powers, and therefore they are 524 00:37:44,720 --> 00:37:48,200 impotent to affect the physical world. 525 00:37:48,600 --> 00:37:53,480 And this is one of the mysteries that Roger Penrose was so 526 00:37:53,480 --> 00:37:58,080 tortured by. How do you explain the fact that 527 00:37:58,080 --> 00:38:03,920 this abstract, causally effete mathematical realm is so 528 00:38:03,920 --> 00:38:08,240 descriptive of the physical phenomena which he is a 529 00:38:08,240 --> 00:38:12,880 physicist explores? And it seems to me that the best 530 00:38:12,880 --> 00:38:20,480 explanation is the one that Plato in fact gave, namely, that 531 00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:26,880 God can look to the mathematical realm and fashion a world on the 532 00:38:26,880 --> 00:38:30,960 basis of the mathematical model that he prefers. 533 00:38:31,400 --> 00:38:35,160 And a view similar to this was defended by the ancient Jewish 534 00:38:35,480 --> 00:38:41,000 philosopher Philo of Alexandria, who was contemporaneous with the 535 00:38:41,280 --> 00:38:46,840 New Testament authors. Philo argued that the conceptual 536 00:38:46,960 --> 00:38:52,040 universe, the conceptual world, it exists in the mind of God 537 00:38:52,040 --> 00:38:54,920 himself. It's not distinct from God, as 538 00:38:54,920 --> 00:38:58,520 Plato thought. Rather, these are divine ideas 539 00:38:58,520 --> 00:39:03,160 that exist in God's mind, and that God then fashions the 540 00:39:03,160 --> 00:39:08,800 physical universe on the basis of the mental model that he had 541 00:39:08,800 --> 00:39:13,600 in mind that he prefers. And I have argued that this 542 00:39:13,640 --> 00:39:20,960 theistic perspective provides a far more plausible explanation 543 00:39:21,320 --> 00:39:24,880 of the mathematical applicability to physical 544 00:39:24,880 --> 00:39:28,880 phenomena the naturalism is capable of. 545 00:39:28,880 --> 00:39:32,160 And I I formulated the argument very simply in the following 546 00:39:32,160 --> 00:39:35,920 way. If God does not exist, then the 547 00:39:35,920 --> 00:39:40,320 applicability of mathematics to physical phenomena is just a 548 00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:43,760 happy coincidence. Premise 2. 549 00:39:44,000 --> 00:39:48,320 The applicability of mathematics is not just a happy coincidence. 550 00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:52,640 Three, therefore God exists. I think that this is a 551 00:39:53,200 --> 00:39:56,960 surprisingly powerful argument for the existence of a 552 00:39:56,960 --> 00:40:01,960 transcendent, omniscient cosmic creator. 553 00:40:02,560 --> 00:40:04,760 Yeah, I think that makes a lot more rational sense than saying, 554 00:40:04,760 --> 00:40:07,560 as I've heard some suggest that there were these numbers and 555 00:40:07,560 --> 00:40:10,720 forms and God was just like a chained to them. 556 00:40:10,720 --> 00:40:12,520 He had no choice. He had to obey these 557 00:40:12,520 --> 00:40:15,840 mathematical constructs. It makes more sense. 558 00:40:15,840 --> 00:40:17,880 They have no causal power that he they would be. 559 00:40:17,960 --> 00:40:20,840 He would be the originator of. Yeah, that that's exactly right. 560 00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:24,560 I mean, the infinite or the realm of the mathematical is 561 00:40:24,560 --> 00:40:30,040 infinite, and so it is not limited exclusively to one set 562 00:40:30,040 --> 00:40:35,280 of natural or mathematical laws. There would be an infant variety 563 00:40:35,280 --> 00:40:40,400 for God to choose from, and so I don't think anyone can plausibly 564 00:40:40,400 --> 00:40:45,960 maintain that the laws of nature that physicists articulate are 565 00:40:45,960 --> 00:40:50,760 metaphysically necessary. The the universe doesn't have to 566 00:40:50,760 --> 00:40:55,000 be described by these elegant mathematical laws, and in fact, 567 00:40:55,000 --> 00:40:59,400 physicists regularly toy with alternative models of the 568 00:40:59,400 --> 00:41:01,800 universe that would operate according to different 569 00:41:01,920 --> 00:41:05,200 mathematical laws, and they then see what would happen in these 570 00:41:05,200 --> 00:41:07,680 universes. Thank you. 571 00:41:07,880 --> 00:41:10,760 That was amazing. And before we move to the next 572 00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:14,200 question, I wanted to get back to the Richard Dawkins part of 573 00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:18,520 it because he, I, I was watching a documentary once and I was a 574 00:41:18,520 --> 00:41:21,520 flabbergasted. He was talking about DNA and how 575 00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,120 you know, there is evidence for signature in DNAI, don't know if 576 00:41:25,120 --> 00:41:28,440 you've seen this before. And then, and then he says, 577 00:41:28,440 --> 00:41:32,120 well, it must be that an extraterrestrial race, you know, 578 00:41:32,120 --> 00:41:33,880 created as a spawned our existence. 579 00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:38,960 First of all, could you explain to the audience why there, what 580 00:41:38,960 --> 00:41:41,160 that means? What is this signature in DNA 581 00:41:41,200 --> 00:41:43,480 that he's talking about? And then his answer also like 582 00:41:43,480 --> 00:41:44,480 what? What is he trying to say? 583 00:41:45,080 --> 00:41:51,120 The DNA that isn't the basis of all life on this planet, from 584 00:41:51,120 --> 00:41:56,640 bacterial life up through human beings, exhibits roughly the 585 00:41:56,640 --> 00:42:01,400 same genetic code. And the possibility of this just 586 00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:07,680 coming together by accident is so remote that contemporary 587 00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:12,360 origin of life scientists have no explanation for where this 588 00:42:12,360 --> 00:42:18,320 came from or or how it arose. And so some of them, in a move 589 00:42:18,320 --> 00:42:21,040 similar to the multiverse theorists, have appealed to 590 00:42:21,080 --> 00:42:24,920 outer space. If you multiply your 591 00:42:24,920 --> 00:42:30,840 probabilistic resources, then maybe on some planet somewhere 592 00:42:30,840 --> 00:42:35,920 in the infinite universe, the DNA and RNA would accidentally 593 00:42:35,920 --> 00:42:41,280 come into being, and that might as well be our planet as well as 594 00:42:41,280 --> 00:42:43,720 some other. Or one could say that then it 595 00:42:43,720 --> 00:42:48,600 was transported to our planet by comets and meteors and 596 00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:52,440 asteroids, so that ultimately life came from outer space. 597 00:42:53,000 --> 00:42:58,960 Well couple of problems with that is that even if the entire 598 00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:02,520 observable universe were filled with what's called primordial 599 00:43:02,520 --> 00:43:09,080 soup, the odds against the chance origination of the 600 00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:13,280 genetic code are so remote that they would never have happened 601 00:43:14,280 --> 00:43:18,120 in the time available. But secondly, you run into the 602 00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:22,720 Boltzmann brain problem again. If you multiply your your 603 00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:29,360 probabilistic resources to Infinity, then how do you know 604 00:43:29,440 --> 00:43:33,360 that these organisms evolved on Earth at all? 605 00:43:33,800 --> 00:43:38,960 Maybe they just sprang into being fully formed, looking as 606 00:43:38,960 --> 00:43:42,160 though they had evolved. But in fact evolution is an 607 00:43:42,160 --> 00:43:45,280 illusion. And if the theorist like Dawkins 608 00:43:45,280 --> 00:43:46,840 replies, well, no, that's absurd. 609 00:43:46,840 --> 00:43:51,360 That's that's too improbable for fully formed organisms to simply 610 00:43:51,360 --> 00:43:54,720 pop into existence without predecessors. 611 00:43:55,200 --> 00:43:57,840 The answer, then, would be from the multiverse theorists. 612 00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:02,680 In an infinite universe, anything can happen, and indeed 613 00:44:02,680 --> 00:44:06,920 will happen an infinite number of times over, so that the 614 00:44:06,920 --> 00:44:13,200 appeal to extraterrestrial life actually turns out to completely 615 00:44:13,200 --> 00:44:17,360 undermine the theory of biological evolution and would 616 00:44:17,360 --> 00:44:22,320 make its adoption irrational. Brilliant. 617 00:44:23,640 --> 00:44:27,840 So from my limited view, the acceptance of evolution among 618 00:44:27,840 --> 00:44:31,120 Christians seems rare. This perspective, however, seems 619 00:44:31,360 --> 00:44:34,560 more prevalent among some Orthodox Jewish scholars, such 620 00:44:34,560 --> 00:44:37,680 as Doctor Gerald Schroeder, who advocates for the notion of 621 00:44:37,680 --> 00:44:41,440 guided evolution. This stance appears less 622 00:44:41,440 --> 00:44:44,360 contentious within Jewish interpretation of the Genesis 623 00:44:44,360 --> 00:44:46,480 accounts compared to the Christian tradition. 624 00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:50,040 Doctor Craig, can you articulate your position on this matter, 625 00:44:50,040 --> 00:44:53,520 how it harmonizes with biblical texts, and how you would counter 626 00:44:53,520 --> 00:44:56,360 skeptics like Doctor David Berlinski who challenges the 627 00:44:56,360 --> 00:44:59,480 scientific validity of evolution based on its perceived 628 00:44:59,480 --> 00:45:02,720 mathematical and probability? One last related point I'd like 629 00:45:02,720 --> 00:45:05,120 you to address. You've been involved in 630 00:45:05,120 --> 00:45:07,840 defending the age of the universe as roughly 14 billion 631 00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:10,840 years old, which has been controversial in conservative 632 00:45:10,840 --> 00:45:13,440 Christian circles. What evidence pointed you in 633 00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:18,000 this direction? To begin with, Ben, it's really 634 00:45:18,000 --> 00:45:22,080 important that we defend what we mean by the word evolution if 635 00:45:22,080 --> 00:45:25,560 we're not to lose our way. In this discussion, the word 636 00:45:25,560 --> 00:45:30,520 evolution is a sort of accordion word that can be expanded or 637 00:45:30,520 --> 00:45:33,800 contracted to cover many different things. 638 00:45:34,280 --> 00:45:37,760 In contemporary evolutionary theory, the word is used in at 639 00:45:37,760 --> 00:45:43,040 least three different ways. One would be simply to say that 640 00:45:43,160 --> 00:45:48,960 all life on earth is genealogically connected. 641 00:45:49,240 --> 00:45:53,880 That is to say that all of the living organisms are descended 642 00:45:53,880 --> 00:46:00,560 from a handful of primordial ancestors, and in that sense 643 00:46:00,560 --> 00:46:07,360 evolution is a widely, almost universally accepted today, even 644 00:46:07,360 --> 00:46:11,920 among Christians. I think that it is only the 645 00:46:11,960 --> 00:46:17,360 young Earth creationists who would deny that there is a 646 00:46:17,400 --> 00:46:22,640 history of the evolution of life in that sense on this planet, 647 00:46:23,000 --> 00:46:27,680 and they are in an increasingly dwindling minority even among 648 00:46:27,680 --> 00:46:32,520 evangelical Christians, not to speak of the Christian community 649 00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:38,720 more broadly. So don't be misled by the highly 650 00:46:38,720 --> 00:46:43,480 public nature of some of these Young Earth creationists. 651 00:46:43,680 --> 00:46:48,240 They really do represent a dwindling minority, even within 652 00:46:48,240 --> 00:46:53,080 evangelical circles. Now the 2nd way in which 653 00:46:53,400 --> 00:46:58,120 evolution can be understood is the reconstruction of the tree 654 00:46:58,120 --> 00:47:02,840 of life, determining which organisms branched off of which 655 00:47:02,840 --> 00:47:06,440 others, and tracing this tree of life back to its root. 656 00:47:07,040 --> 00:47:11,480 This is hugely controversial today, and by no means 657 00:47:11,680 --> 00:47:15,000 universally accepted. Indeed, Dawkins himself says 658 00:47:15,400 --> 00:47:18,480 that the debates among evolutionists on this 659 00:47:19,640 --> 00:47:23,840 reconstruction of the tree of life are so acrimonious that 660 00:47:23,840 --> 00:47:27,000 even some have despaired of Darwinism itself. 661 00:47:27,400 --> 00:47:29,640 So that is not universally agreed. 662 00:47:29,920 --> 00:47:33,560 And then the third area would be an account of the causal 663 00:47:33,720 --> 00:47:38,600 mechanisms that would go to explain the evolution of 664 00:47:38,600 --> 00:47:42,240 organisms. And this, again, is hugely 665 00:47:42,440 --> 00:47:47,520 controversial today. The old modern synthesis, 666 00:47:47,520 --> 00:47:51,200 sometimes called Neo Darwinism, is being increasingly 667 00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:54,160 challenged, and I think could even be said to be overthrown 668 00:47:54,160 --> 00:47:58,640 now in favor of what's called the extended evolutionary 669 00:47:58,640 --> 00:48:02,440 synthesis, which posits additional causal mechanisms 670 00:48:02,720 --> 00:48:07,680 beyond just genetic mutations and natural selection. 671 00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:12,800 So when you look at skepticism among Christians concerning 672 00:48:13,040 --> 00:48:17,560 evolutionary theory, it is primarily directed at those 673 00:48:17,560 --> 00:48:23,520 second and especially the 3rd way of understanding evolution. 674 00:48:23,840 --> 00:48:27,680 So for example, a theorist like Stephen Meyer, who is a 675 00:48:27,680 --> 00:48:31,600 colleague of David Berlinski, whom you mentioned, is very 676 00:48:31,600 --> 00:48:36,080 ready to accept the thesis of common ancestries. 677 00:48:36,080 --> 00:48:40,160 Is this really needn't be a point of contention or dispute. 678 00:48:40,560 --> 00:48:46,040 What he disputes is the causal mechanisms that are at the root 679 00:48:46,040 --> 00:48:51,640 of the evolution of complex life forms, and so I think this would 680 00:48:51,640 --> 00:48:54,800 be the same for Berlinski. I I think what Berlinski is 681 00:48:54,800 --> 00:49:01,440 challenging is the mathematical probability of these causal 682 00:49:01,440 --> 00:49:06,280 mechanisms producing, in the limited time available, the sort 683 00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:11,760 of biological diversity and complexity that we see. 684 00:49:11,760 --> 00:49:16,480 And this is in fact eminently challengeable and is a matter of 685 00:49:17,040 --> 00:49:19,680 tremendous dispute among evolutionary theorists 686 00:49:19,840 --> 00:49:23,160 themselves. Now, as to your last point about 687 00:49:23,160 --> 00:49:28,760 the age of the universe. Again, this is only controverted 688 00:49:28,760 --> 00:49:33,960 by these Young Earth Creationists who are dwindling 689 00:49:33,960 --> 00:49:36,920 minority within the evangelical community. 690 00:49:37,280 --> 00:49:43,040 The very fact that we can see light from stars billions of 691 00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:48,680 years away shows that the universe is older than 10 to 692 00:49:48,680 --> 00:49:52,680 20,000 years of age. As Young Earth Creationists 693 00:49:53,000 --> 00:49:56,920 would assert. In order to explain the fact 694 00:49:56,920 --> 00:50:01,120 that we can see the stars, the Young Earth Creationist has to 695 00:50:01,120 --> 00:50:05,000 adopt the theory of apparent age. 696 00:50:05,600 --> 00:50:09,080 That is to say that God not only created the Earth and the 697 00:50:09,080 --> 00:50:14,080 distant stars, but he created the light ray in between them, 698 00:50:14,520 --> 00:50:17,920 so that in the limited time available we can see these 699 00:50:17,920 --> 00:50:20,640 stars, which are billions of light years away. 700 00:50:21,040 --> 00:50:26,560 And so ultimately, the Young Earth Creationist is reduced to 701 00:50:26,560 --> 00:50:32,160 accepting this wild hypothesis of the mere appearance of age. 702 00:50:32,320 --> 00:50:36,400 Which just is to admit that the evidence on face value does 703 00:50:36,400 --> 00:50:39,760 suggest a very ancient universe. Brilliant. 704 00:50:39,840 --> 00:50:44,200 And you know, for us when we read the Torah, we see, you 705 00:50:44,200 --> 00:50:47,440 know, the the creation process, the the sun was created on the 706 00:50:47,440 --> 00:50:50,360 4th day. So clearly there's this idea of 707 00:50:50,560 --> 00:50:53,080 days as we know it is not applicable. 708 00:50:53,360 --> 00:50:55,720 Clearly talking about something, you know as as you were 709 00:50:55,720 --> 00:51:00,120 mentioning, there's clearly a 14 billion or whatever it is that 710 00:51:00,120 --> 00:51:03,080 the number is, it's clearly an an old universe. 711 00:51:03,080 --> 00:51:06,560 And I really, really thank you for making the time. 712 00:51:06,840 --> 00:51:09,680 I want to also thank Doctor Brian Crawford, a friend of ours 713 00:51:10,040 --> 00:51:11,600 who made the connection with you. 714 00:51:11,920 --> 00:51:16,320 That was really amazing and we really wish you all the best. 715 00:51:16,320 --> 00:51:19,440 God bless you and thank you for everything you do, and we hope 716 00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:22,680 to do this again one day. Well, thank you, Ben and Zev. 717 00:51:22,920 --> 00:51:26,240 It's been a pleasure. And I I just want to say I I 718 00:51:26,240 --> 00:51:30,600 realized that not all Jews are Zionists. 719 00:51:30,880 --> 00:51:35,560 But for my part, I want to express my personal support for 720 00:51:35,560 --> 00:51:39,040 Israel in this tremendous struggle in which it's engaged. 721 00:51:39,520 --> 00:51:44,120 I believe Israel has the right of defending its own security 722 00:51:44,120 --> 00:51:50,920 and national integrity, and so I stand fully behind her in its 723 00:51:50,920 --> 00:51:53,360 battle with Hamas. Thank you so much I. 724 00:51:53,520 --> 00:51:55,440 Really appreciate that. Thank you so much. 725 00:51:56,040 --> 00:51:57,680 Well, have a great one. Thank you. 726 00:51:57,840 --> 00:51:59,520 Thank you. God bless. 727 00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:00,600 Appreciate it. God bless. 728 00:52:06,880 --> 00:52:09,000 Hey guys, thanks so much for tuning into the Judas and 729 00:52:09,000 --> 00:52:12,000 Demystified podcast. We really appreciate all your 730 00:52:12,000 --> 00:52:15,880 support and your feedback. If you want to help us grow the 731 00:52:15,880 --> 00:52:17,920 podcast, keep spreading the word. 732 00:52:17,920 --> 00:52:20,880 Share with your friends, family, or whoever you think would be 733 00:52:20,880 --> 00:52:24,640 interested. We also opened a Patreon so you 734 00:52:24,640 --> 00:52:27,280 can become a patron. Contribute any small amount 735 00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:29,960 you'd like, which would really help us grow the show. 736 00:52:31,120 --> 00:52:38,840 Our Patreon is www.patreon.com Judaism Pretty easy to remember. 737 00:52:39,240 --> 00:52:42,360 Thank you again and we hope to keep putting out great shows for 738 00:52:42,360 --> 00:52:53,360 you guys. Before we go, we want to thank 739 00:52:53,360 --> 00:52:57,840 our Patreon supporters by name. Those are the supporters that 740 00:52:57,840 --> 00:53:00,880 are helping make this show happen because frankly, Benzie 741 00:53:00,880 --> 00:53:04,520 and I are full time workers who don't really have so much time 742 00:53:04,520 --> 00:53:07,760 on our hands because we have families, we have kids, and it's 743 00:53:07,760 --> 00:53:11,680 just a passion project that got way bigger than we expected. 744 00:53:12,120 --> 00:53:14,760 So we're dedicating more time to this. 745 00:53:14,760 --> 00:53:17,600 And obviously our production value up until this point hasn't 746 00:53:17,600 --> 00:53:21,800 been great considering that we filmed this in Benzie's basement 747 00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:25,760 using a green screen and a crappy little microphone and not 748 00:53:25,760 --> 00:53:29,080 such great equipment to be honest, I'm sure you all realize 749 00:53:29,080 --> 00:53:32,240 that. So we are hoping to up our 750 00:53:32,240 --> 00:53:37,520 quality and get better equipment and part of that process is 751 00:53:37,520 --> 00:53:40,160 going to be due to you guys, the listeners and supporters. 752 00:53:40,920 --> 00:53:46,480 If you go to our Patreon page, patreon.com/judaism, you will 753 00:53:46,480 --> 00:53:48,800 see all the different tiers of ways you can help us out. 754 00:53:48,800 --> 00:53:52,120 So first of all, we want to thank our Super Patron Jordan 755 00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:56,720 Carmeli, our Platinum Patron Craig Gordon, our Gold patrons 756 00:53:57,360 --> 00:54:01,000 David Abram, Khayev, Laser Cohen, Travis Krueger, Vasily 757 00:54:01,000 --> 00:54:07,280 Volkov, Silver patrons Ellen Fleischer, Daniel Maximov, Rabbi 758 00:54:07,280 --> 00:54:09,520 Penny Rosenthal, and Jeffrey Wasserman. 759 00:54:09,840 --> 00:54:14,040 Thank you all for supporting the show and we hope you guys enjoy.