Response To Stephen Hawking

  • Thread starter Thread starter Faith1960
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Faith1960 said:
I prefer answers from scientists intellectually on par with Hawking.
Click to expand...
Isn’t Einstein on a par with Hawking? :confused:

Again, this whole question revolves around whether Hawking can think like a philosopher, and there’s great doubt about that.

Einstein can’t speak against Hawking as a poorly informed philosopher, but his remarks certainly can.

“I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today - and even professional scientists - seem to me like somebody who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is - in my opinion - the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth.” Albert Einstein. letter to Robert A. Thornton, 7 December 1944. EA 61-574.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
Isn’t Einstein on a par with Hawking? :confused:

Again, this whole question revolves around whether Hawking can think like a philosopher, and there’s great doubt about that.

Einstein can’t speak against Hawking as a poorly informed philosopher, but his remarks certainly can.a

“I fully agree with you about the significance and educational value of methodology as well as history and philosophy of science. So many people today - and even professional scientists - seem to me like somebody who has seen thousands of trees but has never seen a forest. A knowledge of the historic and philosophical background gives that kind of independence from prejudices of his generation from which most scientists are suffering. This independence created by philosophical insight is - in my opinion - the mark of distinction between a mere artisan or specialist and a real seeker after truth.” Albert Einstein. letter to Robert A. Thornton, 7 December 1944. EA 61-574.
Click to expand...
I mean scientists of our day, ones who have responded to the claims in Hawking’s book.
 
utunumsint said:
Well his first point is simply to delineate philosophy from science. What Hawking is doing in the first three chapters of the book is philosophy. The way I understand what he is saying is that science does not give a total explanation of reality. From the get-go with Galileo and Descates, you had a move to mathematize of all physical reality. This move of Galileo was inspired by the philosopher Pythagoras who believed that mathematics was the underlying reality behind the material universe. Aristotle had the 10 causes to describe every physical thing. These were:
  1. Substance
  2. Quantity
  3. Quality
  4. Relation
  5. Place
  6. Time
  7. Position
  8. State or habitus
  9. Action
  10. Affection
As you can see, when you use the scientific method to make predictions, you primarily do this though measurable observations and focus exclusively on category 2- quantity. This is not a bad thing in itself, but it is a constriction of reality as we humanly know it. If you have read chapter 3 of Hawking’s book, you will notice that he tried to reduce all the hard and soft sciences to physics, going from physics to chemistry, to biology, and finally to psychology, but the higher up the chain of sciences you get, the less quantitative methods are effective, the more you have to take into account other categories of reality. In short, there is a whole slew of things being discussed in Hawking’s book that are simply outside of the scope of physics.

I think this is a valid point to make before looking at what Hawking is doing to try to prove that the universe does not need God to create it. Most of the (good) proofs for the existence of God are not scientific. They are philosophical. They rest on intellectual reasoning that look at reality as a whole, not just the limited focus of physics (math).

So that is a commentary on his first point. I’ll check out his next point later. Let me know if this is helpful.

(If you are looking for a discussion based on physics alone about the existence of God, then you have to understand that all such attempts fundamentally point to probabilities. Given X, Y, or Z, it is fundamentally unlikely that the universe began by chance. If that is what you are looking for, then this book by Father Robert Spitzer may be pretty good. amazon.com/New-Proofs-Existence-God-Contributions/dp/0802863833/ref=la_B001K7TYHC_1_1/177-5597049-2118763?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1402172044&sr=1-1 He also has some clips on his web site that describes some of the theories in his book magisreasonfaith.org/science_creation.html ).

God bless,
Ut
Click to expand...
St Thomas Aquinas in the Summa Theologica uses metaphysical principles in his 5 proofs to demonstrate the existence of God the denial of which is conceptually incoherent and inexplicable. Now metaphysics is a science for Aristotle calls it the science of being as being. Being is the most universal concept for it applies to everything that is and its only contrary is non-being which is nothing. And as every science aims to arrive at universal and necessary knowledge through causes, the scope of metaphysics is the totality of reality and the ultimate cause or causes of reality or being. This is why metaphysics is called First Philosophy in the sense of being primary. It is the highest of all the sciences attainable by the natural light of reason. For metaphysics leads to God as the First Being, First Cause, and the First Mover of all. Particular sciences such as physics, chemistry, biology, study a particular aspect of being or this or that kind of being and the causes of this or that kind of being. Metaphysics is the science of the principles and causes of being as being for whatever is, is or has being. And since the principles and causes of being as being must be the most universal, metaphysics studies the highest and ultimate and most universal principles or causes of everything.
 
Br. Guy Consolmagno, SJ, PhD is on par with Hawking. You can actually email him too. 🙂
 
Hawking’s claim that science now carries the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge reveals his ignorance of philosophy.

What does science tell us about truth, goodness, freedom, justice, beauty and love?

His view of reality is impersonal, valueless, purposeless, meaningless and devoid of everything that makes life worthwhile…
 
Faith1960 said:
I mean scientists of our day, ones who have responded to the claims in Hawking’s book.
Click to expand...
Stephen Barr is an example, as he responded in the link provided.
Anthony Rizzi, as someone else mentioned is a good one.
There are a number of others that posters here have mentioned.

I think though, it is the wrong approach to look for a scientist to say where Hawking is wrong. Scientifically speaking, he may be correct, as Barr points out, there are a number of possibilities as to how the universe began, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need God.

The error Hawking makes is not necessarily scientific, it is more philosophical in nature. He is arguing for self-causation. Yet in order for something to act as a cause, it must exist, so obviously self-causation is impossible.

Further, Hawking is saying something can come from nothing…as long as gravity is there. Well, gravity certainly isn’t “nothing.” Hence his philosophical errors are quite apparent, even if he is scientifically correct in the sense of saying that the beginning of the universe can be explained using a theory of Quantum Gravity (hypothetically at least because we don’t yet have a theory of QG).

Hawking asks in his earlier book Brief History of Time What breathes fire into the equations (laws of nature) to give them a universe to describe?

Obviously, gravity can’t do the trick since it is among those equations which need to be “breathed into.”
 
TomD123 said:
Stephen Barr is an example, as he responded in the link provided.
Anthony Rizzi, as someone else mentioned is a good one.
There are a number of others that posters here have mentioned.

I think though, it is the wrong approach to look for a scientist to say where Hawking is wrong. Scientifically speaking, he may be correct, as Barr points out, there are a number of possibilities as to how the universe began, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need God.

The error Hawking makes is not necessarily scientific, it is more philosophical in nature. He is arguing for self-causation. Yet in order for something to act as a cause, it must exist, so obviously self-causation is impossible.

Further, Hawking is saying something can come from nothing…as long as gravity is there. Well, gravity certainly isn’t “nothing.” Hence his philosophical errors are quite apparent, even if he is scientifically correct in the sense of saying that the beginning of the universe can be explained using a theory of Quantum Gravity (hypothetically at least because we don’t yet have a theory of QG).

Hawking asks in his earlier book Brief History of Time What breathes fire into the equations (laws of nature) to give them a universe to describe?

Obviously, gravity can’t do the trick since it is among those equations which need to be “breathed into.”
Click to expand...
Do you not have to have a material substance or matter before you can have gravity? Gravity appears to be a force of some kind exerted by matter or a material substance such as the earth’s pull on the moon and the moon’s pull on the earth and the sun’s pull on our planetary system. It seems that matter or a material substance causes gravity and not the other way around, i.e, that gravity can cause matter to be.
 
TomD123 said:
Stephen Barr is an example, as he responded in the link provided.
Anthony Rizzi, as someone else mentioned is a good one.
There are a number of others that posters here have mentioned.

I think though, it is the wrong approach to look for a scientist to say where Hawking is wrong. Scientifically speaking, he may be correct, as Barr points out, there are a number of possibilities as to how the universe began, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need God.

The error Hawking makes is not necessarily scientific, it is more philosophical in nature. He is arguing for self-causation. Yet in order for something to act as a cause, it must exist, so obviously self-causation is impossible.

Further, Hawking is saying something can come from nothing…as long as gravity is there. Well, gravity certainly isn’t “nothing.” Hence his philosophical errors are quite apparent, even if he is scientifically correct in the sense of saying that the beginning of the universe can be explained using a theory of Quantum Gravity (hypothetically at least because we don’t yet have a theory of QG).
Click to expand...
If a theory of Quantum Gravity is found, will God still be necessary?
 
TomD123 said:
Stephen Barr is an example, as he responded in the link provided.
Anthony Rizzi, as someone else mentioned is a good one.
There are a number of others that posters here have
Click to expand...
Rizzo said that it’s crazy to say some thing came from nothing but then goes on talking about stuff over my head again. 🤷
So, to summarize his article, does he believe God is needed to create the universe or is does he believe God’s not necessary and the universe(s) created itself (themselves?)
 
Richca said:
Do you not have to have a material substance or matter before you can have gravity? Gravity appears to be a force of some kind exerted by matter or a material substance such as the earth’s pull on the moon and the moon’s pull on the earth and the sun’s pull on our planetary system. It seems that matter or a material substance causes gravity and not the other way around, i.e, that gravity can cause matter to be.
Click to expand...
I know what you are saying and I am not certain about the physics. I do think though it can be complicated by the fact that how we conceive of matter isn’t necessarily the same as what a physicist means in the sense that matter of our everyday experience is only one form of matter whereas there are others…So it might be complicated by that fact.

Even if you are right, what Hawking might have been saying is that gravity helps us understand how the beginning of the universe occurred naturally, that is, without any need for a miracle. Gravity might be simply resolving certain theoretical difficulties about the nature of the big bang. I am not sure, this is all said as speculation
Faith1960 said:
If a theory of Quantum Gravity is found, will God still be necessary?
Click to expand...
Yes, quantum gravity will potentially help us understand how the universe began. There is a lot of mystery surrounding the big bang, why it happened, and certain other physical puzzles about it. QG is a theory, not directly related, which gives us a description of gravity in terms of quantum mechanics. With this in place, we would presumably have a better description of the universe in its early moments. But how the universe began doesn’t tell us much about why it exists. That would be like pointing to the first chapter of a story to eliminate the need for an author.

What must be understood also is this: science simply does not have the tools, no matter what it discovers, to show God is not necessary.
Traditionally, theism asks three main questions:
  1. Why are there contingent things?
  2. Why is there intrinsic order/intelligibility to our universe?
  3. Why are there transcendent things like goodness or beauty in our world?
These questions are posed in various ways, articulated in the forms of various arguments. Obviously 3 has nothing to do with science. The first one, science can’t answer because you can’t invoke contingent things (what science does, whether they be laws, objects, events or whatever) to explain why contingent things exist. The second one, science can’t give us an answer because you can’t explain intrinsic order or rationality to the universe by appealing to further examples of intelligibility or order in the laws of nature. So science has no power to discredit these traditional philosophical questions which have led people to believe in God.

If Quantum Gravity is true, we must still ask, why there is a physical system such that it is governed by QG in the first place.

These links may be helpful:
catholicxray.com/creation-god-the-author/
edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2013/07/fifty-shades-of-nothing.html
reasonablefaith.org/contemporary-cosmology-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe (although this link is trying to defend the beginning specifically, something which I don’t think is particularly useful in proving God)

catholicxray.com/proof-of-god-and-the-laws-of-physics/
edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/12/dreaded-causa-sui.html
Faith1960 said:
Rizzo said that it’s crazy to say some thing came from nothing but then goes on talking about stuff over my head again. 🤷
So, to summarize his article, does he believe God is needed to create the universe or is does he believe God’s not necessary and the universe(s) created itself (themselves?)
Click to expand...
I am not sure what you mean by the second part of this question.
 
Bahman said:
The possibility among multiverse which is infinite. So we are lucky to experience these qualities.
Click to expand...
Science still tells us nothing about** the nature of** truth, goodness, freedom, justice, beauty and love - regardless of the multiverse.
 
tonyrey said:
Science still tells us nothing about** the nature of** truth, goodness, freedom, justice, beauty and love - regardless of the multiverse.
Click to expand...
So science in that regard is dumb, whereas philosophy is eloquent. 👍
 
TomD123 said:
I know what you are saying and I am not certain about the physics. I do think though it can be complicated by the fact that how we conceive of matter isn’t necessarily the same as what a physicist means in the sense that matter of our everyday experience is only one form of matter whereas there are others…So it might be complicated by that fact.

Even if you are right, what Hawking might have been saying is that gravity helps us understand how the beginning of the universe occurred naturally, that is, without any need for a miracle. Gravity might be simply resolving certain theoretical difficulties about the nature of the big bang. I am not sure, this is all said as speculation

Yes, quantum gravity will potentially help us understand how the universe began. There is a lot of mystery surrounding the big bang, why it happened, and certain other physical puzzles about it. QG is a theory, not directly related, which gives us a description of gravity in terms of quantum mechanics. With this in place, we would presumably have a better description of the universe in its early moments. But how the universe began doesn’t tell us much about why it exists. That would be like pointing to the first chapter of a story to eliminate the need for an author.

What must be understood also is this: science simply does not have the tools, no matter what it discovers, to show God is not necessary.
Traditionally, theism asks three main questions:
  1. Why are there contingent things?
  2. Why is there intrinsic order/intelligibility to our universe?
  3. Why are there transcendent things like goodness or beauty in our world?
These questions are posed in various ways, articulated in the forms of various arguments. Obviously 3 has nothing to do with science. The first one, science can’t answer because you can’t invoke contingent things (what science does, whether they be laws, objects, events or whatever) to explain why contingent things exist. The second one, science can’t give us an answer because you can’t explain intrinsic order or rationality to the universe by appealing to further examples of intelligibility or order in the laws of nature. So science has no power to discredit these traditional philosophical questions which have led people to believe in God.

If Quantum Gravity is true, we must still ask, why there is a physical system such that it is governed by QG in the first place.

These links may be helpful:
catholicxray.com/creation-god-the-author/
edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2013/07/fifty-shades-of-nothing.html
reasonablefaith.org/contemporary-cosmology-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe (although this link is trying to defend the beginning specifically, something which I don’t think is particularly useful in proving God)

catholicxray.com/proof-of-god-and-the-laws-of-physics/
edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/12/dreaded-causa-sui.html

I am not sure what you mean by the second part of this question.
Click to expand...
I mpean does Rizzi acknowledge God made the universe or does he discount God like. Hawking does?
 
Faith1960 said:
If a theory of Quantum Gravity is found, will God still be necessary?
Click to expand...
Yes, as Quantum Gravity is simply a means of explaining gravity as a quantum field vs a relativistic warping of spacetime. It does not address the causality of the universe.
 
Catholics, please pay attention. Science will never prove that the universe created itself. God himself has Revealed that he created the universe, in time, out of nothing. And that is the De Fide Dogma of the Catholic Church. So if certain people. like Richard Hawkins, claim or intimate that they can do so, they are simply lying, period. How do I know? God does not lie. So when you run into these clever people, making such claims, if you can’t find the holes in their reasoning, you are not defeated. You have your faith that tells you the truth. You hang on to that. Now in this thread, there have been links to works which refute Hawkings. If you can’t understand them, then simply hang on to the faith and let it go.

P.S.
Anthony Rizzi is a Catholic Physicist who defends the teaching of the Church, carte’ blanche. So do Smith and the others.

Linus2nd
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top