Why such a large universe?

[filter2700]

Before I begin, let me say this is not an attack on Christianity, it is me simply asking some basic, and essential questions about God. I am a Catholic, but I am having some serious issues with believing in God due to the sheer size of the universe. The questions I have are simple, and extremely important. If you choose to respond, I ask that you show some intelligence and do not be ignorant of scientific facts. If you really believe that the universe was literally created in 7 days, and that humans did not evolve over billions of years, please leave this thread and go back to whatever la-la land you live in. This thread is not for irrational, uneducated creationists/intelligent designers.

These are three simple facts you must accept in order for me to consider you an intelligent and rational being:

The universe is roughly 14 billion years old. All living organisms today evolved over billions of years. Humans evolved over billions of years.

I’m not saying God didn’t create the universe, or give humans souls, I believe he did. However, the scientific evidence proves the universe is billions of years old, and that humans evolved over billions of years. These are scientific, documented facts. If you disagree with these basic facts, you are simply ignorant and uneducated and should not respond to this thread.

Pope John Paul II accepting evolution:

In his encyclical Humani Generis (1950), my predecessor Pius XII has already affirmed that there is no conflict between evolution and the doctrine of the faith regarding man and his vocation, provided that we do not lose sight of certain fixed points… Today, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical, some new findings lead us toward the recognition of evolution as more than a hypothesis. In fact it is remarkable that this theory has had progressively greater influence on the spirit of researchers, following a series of discoveries in different scholarly disciplines. The convergence in the results of these independent studies—which was neither planned nor sought—constitutes in itself a significant argument in favor of the theory.

Ken Miller, a Catholic, and very well known biologist, proves evolution is a fact, and disproves intelligent design (creationism):

youtube.com/watch?v=zi8FfMBYCkk. Full presentation: youtube.com/watch?v=JVRsWAjvQSg

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With that being said, here are my questions:

The drake equation proved there are other planets suitable for life, and that there are other beings in our universe. The sheer size of our universe, and the incredible distances between planets that inhabit life mean that it will take another civilization many, many years before we come into contact with them. Just because we haven’t come into contact with other lifeforms doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Your car is outside in your garage, but how do you really know? Sitting inside, not being able to directly view your car, how do you know its really in your garage? Can you prove its in there without actually seeing it? Of course not, but this doesn’t mean it isn’t actually there. You can prove by probability that your car must be in your garage, without direct evidence. Just because a person can’t see something in their view doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

The universe is at LEAST 28 BILLION light years in diameter (light travels at 186,000 miles per second), but quoting NOVA:

The most distant galaxies we can now see are 10 or 12 billion light-years away. We could never see a galaxy that is farther away in light travel time than the universe is old—an estimated 14 billion or so years. Thus, we are surrounded by a “horizon” that we cannot look beyond—a horizon set by the distance that light can travel over the age of the universe.

This horizon describes the visible universe—a region some 28 billion light years in diameter. But what are the horizons of a civilization that inhabits the most distant galaxies we see? And what about galaxies at the limits of their vision? There is every reason to think that the universe extends a long way beyond the part of the universe we can see. In fact, a variety of observations suggest that our visible patch may be a small fraction—maybe an infinitely small fraction—of the whole universe.

pbs.org/wgbh/nova/space/how-big-universe.html

So since there are other lifeforms, other civilizations in our universe, why did God create such a large universe for a single planet if we’re supposedly the only humans in the universe? And what about other planets with civilizations on them? Are they humans also, and has Jesus revealed himself to them?

If the universe wasn’t so unimaginably, almost infinitely large (to our tiny, tiny minds), Christianity would be easier to believe. If there was a single galaxy in our universe, and we were the only lifeforms in it, then Christianity would be much more believable.

But how am I, as a relatively intelligent Christian, supposed to believe God is real when he created such a large universe? How can I believe in Christianity when I know the universe is so large, and that there are other civilizations out there? We know there are other civilizations in our universe, the probability is so high, so it begs the question; are they humans too? Did God reveal himself to those civilizations through Jesus Christ? Do they have their own Adam and Eve?

This is probably the main reason I doubt Christianity and my faith, because the universe is so insanely large, and that we know other lifeforms exist. So why? Why did God create such a large universe if we are the only inhabitants of the universe (but we aren’t the only inhabitants of the universe)? We know we aren’t alone in the universe, so what about the other lifeforms/civilizations? Are they humans too, are they sinful? Does Jesus exist on other planets?

 

[DavidFilmer]

This is probably the main reason I doubt Christianity and my faith, because the universe is so insanely large

Yet, at one time the universe was insanely small. In fact, it was a singularity - a zero-dimensional infinitely small point. Somehow, this entire universe emerged from absolutely nothing (this is called the “big bang”). Does that sound familiar? Does it sound kinda like Genesis?

The Judeo-Christian religion is rather unique in comparison to other religions - we maintain that God created the universe out of nothing. Other religions believe that their gods created the universe out of some existing primordial matter. According to modern physics, we got it right.

Your question reminds me of what is widely recognized as the finest short story ever written in the science-fiction genre - namely Isaac Asimov’s timeless classic, Nightfall. The people of Lagash seem to hold a viewpoint similar to what you have expressed - when the vastness of the universe finally becomes apparent to them, they question the very foundations of their beliefs. If you have not read it, you should.

The Church has never taken a position on the possibility or nature of extraterrestrial life. I guess we will figure it out when we meet such beings - but this event is scientifically unlikely.

But consider that God is infinite. It is no “trouble” for God to create an incredibly vast (yet finite) universe while only populating a single planet. It might seem “overkill” to us, but an infinite God should be expected to express his creation in an overwhelming manner (why create a single star system when you could - just as easily - create an incomprehensibly vast universe).

One of the five classic proofs of God by St. Thomas Aquinas is that creation reveals the creator. Aquinas was speaking mainly about the marvels of terrestrial creation - he had scant knowledge of the astonishing marvels of our universe. But these marvels only serve to further his argument, not contradict it.

 

[filter2700]

I guess we will figure it out when we meet such beings - but this event is scientifically unlikely.

It is “unlikely” that other life exists?

The probability that other life, and other civilizations exists is so high that we know they exist without actually being in contact with them. Research the drake equation.

Other civilizations exist, the universe is large enough. God really created a universe at least 28 billion light years across with billions of galaxies, all for one tiny planet? Really? That isn’t the case. Other lifeforms exist, there are other civilizations. Using probability scientists know other life exists, its why SETI has been sending radio signals out into space for decades; in order to contact the extraterrestrial life they know exists. The reason why we haven’t come into contact with these other civilizations is because the universe is so large, and it takes an incredible amount of time for space travel. Physics prevent humans from going faster than the speed of light (186,000 miles per second).

Why would God create such a large universe if we were the only ones inhabiting the universe? We aren’t the only ones inhabiting the universe, so has God revealed himself through “Jesus” on other planets?

 

[DavidFilmer]

It is “unlikely” that other life exists?

I mean it is unlikely we will ever meet them. As you have said, the universe is incredibly vast. Unless we can exceed the speed of light, we have little hope of traveling to other star systems.

Einstein tells us that we cannot exceed the velocity of light - as an object approaches lightspeed, its mass increases (an object traveling at lightspeed has infinite mass - and no finite propulsion (the best we can muster) can move an object of infinite mass).

Science fiction author Frederick Pohl (in the Heechee Saga) imagines a scenario where the mass of an object (a spacecraft) can be nullified, meaning it has zero mass. Such an object could achieve (and possibly exceed) lightspeed, because infinity times zero (mass) is zero (force) (F=MA).

The CERN supercollider is searching for the (aptly named) “God particle” - the Higgs Boson, which gives mass to matter. The Big Bang theory is absurd if all matter had mass to begin with - it had to acquire mass after the Bang (even in a tiny fraction of a second after the Bang). If we can figure out how matter acquires mass, maybe we can figure out how matter might rid itself of mass, and lightspeed becomes possible.

But this is my own personal idea. I have never heard it expressed by any reputable physicist. The problem is that nobody suspects the existence of an “anti-Higgs Boson” - something that might remove mass from matter. It is not predicted in Einstein’s view.

There is nothing in current science - even in our wildest imaginings, which suggests that travel beyond our own solar system will ever be practical.

 

[prodigalson2011]

Not all scientists think so highly of the Drake equation:

Maybe We Are Alone in the Universe After All

From the article:

authors of “Rare Earth,” show that the Drake Equation is riddled with hidden optimistic assumptions. Their stance, the authors say in the preface, is “rarely articulated but increasingly accepted by many astrobiologists,” the general name for scientists who study the likelihood of extraterrestrial life.

I would also recommend finding some of William Lane Craig’s talks/debates, either on Youtube or reasonablefaith.org

One short but notable clip is titled something along the lines of “Evolution Proves God.”

But if nothing else, definitely read that article. It provides plenty of food for thought (and faith!)

 

[filter2700]

Ok, lets say that drakes equation is wrong.

Why such a large universe then? Why at least 28 billion light years across? All for humans? That doesn’t make any sense.

 

[greenwoj]

Filter, I think about this too. I stare up at the night sky regularly and pray to God, asking him “why Lord, why go to all this trouble for us? If you created us in your image to love you and be in union with you for all eternity, to behold your glory through your creation, why create things in such precise detail that we could never hope to see?” The notion haunts me in a way because I can’t understand it. It makes this personal God who humbled himself, through his son who shares in his divinity, to live as a man, so… incredibly unrelatable to me in some ways. How can a God this incomprehensible even care about what happens in our pitiful little galaxy, much less our tiny solar system, much less our little blue planet, much less humanity, much less me? How can I believe that a God that can do all of that can care about what happens to me?

I haven’t figured it out, needless to say, haha. But I like to think about a frequent saying of Fr. Serpa on these forums: “God isn’t simply a bigger version of us.” He utterly transcends human understanding, and, oddly, the more we learn the greater the gap that is revealed to us. That’s why science and the Catholic faith are so compatible, in my opinion. They both reinforce our smallness relative to the big picture. And until science tells me how something can be created from nothing, what else makes sense but a divine intelligence behind it all? That’s what I keep coming back to-- humility to accept what I will never understand, the lack of any hope of a plausible alternative, and the body of evidence present in the scriptures, the church and human experience, which to me all point to my Lord.

Incidentally, my understanding (which isn’t deep) is that the Drake equation only calculates a number of intelligent civilizations in the universe, given all of the assumptions that we believe to be true at present day. It doesn’t “prove” intelligent life exists. The only thing that would accomplish that is some kind of contact, which we haven’t yet experienced in some 40 some odd years of trying (a blip in astronomical time I realize). And as the other poster said, short of some technology able to circumvent Einstein’s speed limit, like bending the fabric of space-time to take a short cut, we’ll likely never visit our nearest star much less an intelligent civilization.

And let’s just say an intelligent life exists somewhere out in the cosmos, made in the image of the same God, beholden to the same moral law that we are compelled to live by, with their own salvation history, I say … so what? I don’t believe we’ll ever meet them or hear from them because God has set it up that way. Just one more thing I’ll be glad to learn all about (hopefully) when I expire.

This was stream of consciousness typing on my iPad so hopefully it wasn’t too incoherent. Good discussion.

 

[prodigalson2011]

Did you read that article?

They might not exist.

We don’t KNOW that they do.

Even if the odds were in favor of life evolving elsewhere, the odds of it matching the intelligence of humanity is astronomically low.

You’re asking for answers to a question whose premise is entirely presumptive. It is entirely possible that there is NOT life elsewhere, and even if there is, there is no reason to assume it is as advanced, and even less reason to assume it is more advanced, than us.

 

[prodigalson2011]

Ok, lets say that drakes equation is wrong.

Why such a large universe then? Why at least 28 billion light years across? All for humans? That doesn’t make any sense.

If the universe were smaller, it could not support life.

I think this site would be a valuable resource for you:

www.godandscience.org

They have an article on just this topic, and countless others.

 

[prodigalson2011]

Here’s the link to that specific article:

godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

I also like this quote (paraphrased):

"Is the universe big? I don’t know, it all depends on perspective. There are literally trillions of cells in my body. Am I big? So, who knows? Maybe God’s like, “Universe, universe, where did I put that universe?” -Frederick Larson

 

[greenwoj]

Here’s the link to that specific article:

godandscience.org/apologetics/universe_too_large.html

I also like this quote (paraphrased):

"Is the universe big? I don’t know, it all depends on perspective. There are literally trillions of cells in my body. Am I big? So, who knows? Maybe God’s like, “Universe, universe, where did I put that universe?” -Frederick Larson

That is a hilarious quote. Yet, instructive to how blind we can be to our own limited perspective on these things.

 

[DavidFilmer]

Why such a large universe then? Why at least 28 billion light years across? All for humans? That doesn’t make any sense.

You have not answered my question - why NOT a super-huge universe? For an infinite God, a really, really big (but finite) universe is nothing. It does not EVEN amount to trivial - it is NOTHING.

No modern physicist claims that the universe is infinite (there is debate about whether empty space is infinite, but nobody claims that matter is infinitely dispersed, and no current cosmological model would support such a claim).

Suppose God had intended to create only one inhabited planet. He could have done so by creating only the earth and the sun. There is no need for the other planets, much less for the other stars or the other galaxies. But God is infinite. Does it make sense for an infinite being to confine himself only to what is strictly necessary? Or, does it not make more sense for an infinite being to express himself in a manner which (to us) is practically infinite, when painting on a finite canvas?

I say it makes more sense for an infinite creator to create a vast (practically infinite) creation, even for the sake of a single microbe, than for an infinite creator (with equal effort) to create only the minimum required environment. The “practically infinite” environment is more closely aligned with the nature of the creator. It is counterintuitive to suggest that an infinite creator should do anything in a small manner.

 

[filter2700]

Sure, that makes sense.

Does anyone have any scripture that talks about space, the universe, the size of God, etc., or anything like that?

 

[Khalid]

I must not be an intelligent and rational being, because I only accept the first of your three premises (most of the time), with the caveat that it’s 13.57±0.20 billion years, I think (according to WMAP). I’m an old-earth, day-age framework progressive creationist. Theistic evolution has its merits, but I find inadequate - and you far overstep your bounds claiming the Church teaches evolution. It has no opinion on the matter, other than “special creation is mandatory, and atheistic evolution is unacceptable” - beyond that, the entire range of opinions from young-earth creationism to theistic evolution are areas of legitimate disagreement and non-dogmatism in the Church and her teachings. (The Church doesn’t teach science, but salvation.)

Part of it is a theological question: do we give priority to the word of God, or to the sciences of fallen man? Of course, our interpretation of the Bible is done through a lens of sin too, so the only thing I am sure of, is, when both the hard sciences and interpretation of the Bible have reached their absolute pinnacle, neither can contradict the other, and both will agree.

Whether our interpretation of the Bible, tradition, and religion, or our sciences or our interpretations thereof, seemingly contradictory at this time on several issues, are more affected by our fallen nature and original sin, I do not claim to know (that is, is our interpretation of the Bible or of science closer to the truth at this point?) Me, an arch-rationalist in every other way, waffles on the issue, but generally leans towards the theological, where there are less opportunities for our fallen nature to affect it. For example, with the Bible, our fallen nature does not affect it qua it, but only our interpretation of it, where our fallen natures themselves invented from scratch the “new organon” of Bacon and the modern scientific method that grew from its germ.

So since there are other lifeforms, other civilizations in our universe, why did God create such a large universe for a single planet if we’re supposedly the only humans in the universe?

There are most likely not. Look at the Drake equation, and then the Fermi paradox.

Drake’s equation is utterly farcical, the space-alien theorists’ equivalent of young-earth creation science. The parameters are unknown and unknowable, the form of the equation is questionable, it is not testable nor falsifiable, it is not rigorous or even valid maths…Drake should have read Newton’s “non fingo hypotheses” first. It is hypothesizing to match a conclusion.

I could just as easily give the parameters, within reason as:

R* = 10/year, fp = 0.5, ne = 0.01, fl = 0.13, fi = 0.001, fc = 0.01, and L = 1000 years

The drake equation proved there are other planets suitable for life, and that there are other beings in our universe.

It proved no such thing - there is no proof in science, proof is for maths and philosophy alone - and it far from demonstrated it. It is in fact strongly militated against and shown to be likely false - but not disproved, any more than it can be proved - by Fermi’s paradox.

 

[po18guy]

Think of God as the only One who is capable, not only of creating infinity, but also of surrounding and containing it.

 

[DavidFilmer]

Does anyone have any scripture that talks about space, the universe, the size of God, etc., or anything like that?

Are you asking for Scripture which explicitly teaches Einstein’s cosmological view? Do you want his field equations as well? Do you want BOTH special AND general relatively?

I’m pretty sure that Einstein was the first Jew who expressed this viewpoint in a manner which modern physicists can test today. Moses did not do it, and Peter & Paul did not do it, and Jesus did not do it.

But all of these Jews had knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures. Einstein’s ideas would have been suggested to them by passages such as:

Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; and his greatness is unsearchable. (Psalm 145:3)

And the house that I build is great: for great is our God above all Gods. But who is able to build him an house, seeing the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain him? who am I then, that I should build him an house? (2 Chron 2:5-6a)

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have built. (1 Kings 8:27)

Can any hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him? saith the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord. (Jer 23:24)

 

[Khalid]

I finished reading the first post - CS Lewis dealt with every single one of your questions in Mere Christianity. Read it if you haven’t: it should be required reading.

 

[po18guy]

Are you asking for Scripture which explicitly teaches Einstein’s cosmological view? Do you want his field equations as well? Do you want BOTH special AND general relatively?

I’m pretty sure that Einstein was the first Jew who expressed this viewpoint in a manner which modern physicists can test today. Moses did not do it, and Peter & Paul did not do it, and Jesus did not do it.

But all of these Jews had knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures. Einstein’s ideas would have been suggested to them by passages such as:

The Book of Job is apparently the first to suggest that the earth was in the midst of a greater universe. I.e.** Job 26:7**
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
7He stretched out the north over the empty space, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.

 

[Evan]

I am mathematician and was quite impressed when an math journal publish and article that had proved an limit on some math entity that was less than infinity. The limit was so large a notation had to be invented to give the number. It could not be written using exponential notation or factorials or exponents of exponents. These numbers were WAY TOO SMALL. Even with the new notation it took nearly a page to write the number.

The size of the universe is teeny and young, less than a trillion years old and a trillion light years across. We even have words for the numbers that are used.

Oh yeah, the big deal in the math article was that the number was reduced from infinity to a finite number, they though the actual answer was 6, but the big step had been made: it was less than infinity.

God is infinite. The universe, invisible from His perspective.

BTW I find it odd that people still conflate creationism with intelligent design.

Intelligent design is trying to use the latest scientific information to detect the action of a ‘designer’ in the universe. It does not deny the big bang, evolution, general or special relativity.

 

[Khalid]

Yeah, I know all too well - I’m a creationist.