I heard on the news that Bill Nye the 'Science Guy' was to debate Ken Ham, head of the Creation Museum.
Mentioning it to someone in passing, it sparked a comment from them that although they believe in evolution and don't believe in creation science, nor do they believe that a supreme being is actively involved in day to day affairs, this person felt that when you think about how incredible and complex life is, it could only have come about by divine action. The world as we know it along with human beings just couldn't have happened by chance. The comment stuck with me and I woke up the next morning with the following argument/reply running through my head. I felt compelled to write it down. It went as follow:
Let's do a thought experiment. Let's
imagine two people are having a debate about the makeup and nature of
the world. These two individuals are living on earth 6,000 years ago
and therefore all their knowledge and understanding of the world and
things in general are limited to that period in history. Our two
debaters are having this discussion in front of a respected panel of
community elders and leaders. The two points of view are as follows:
The first is that the earth is a large flat disk that rests on the
back of a giant turtle which slowly moves through the cosmos. The
second view is that the earth is a sphere that revolves around the
sun and that the sun is one of many suns swirling in an elliptical
pattern called a galaxy.
Which of these two postulations would
seem most probable to someone 6,000 years ago? I would argue the
disc on the back of a giant tortoise would seem the most plausible.
To an ancient observer of the earth, the earth itself would appear
flat. Although the surface is rough, with mountains and valleys,
there is no perceptible drop off or curve. When you look from one
mountain range to the next, the strata upon which the mountain ranges
rest seems level. On large flat plains or even on the open ocean,
the world looks level for as far as the eye can see. Why might the ancient observer decide on a disk and
not another shape for the perimeter? When you look from a high point of observation or
from an expansive flat plain, the horizon seems equidistant in every
direction, thereby lending support to a uniform disk shape.
Next, why argue that the disk is supported, let alone by a tortoise
and not simply a rock or other inanimate object? The ancients clearly had a sense of movement
as they noticed the stars in the heavens moved across the sky over time.
To them, something was clearly moving, be it the earth or the heavens. Given their life experience I would imagine that the motion of the stars would resemble the motion of distant trees or other fixed object as you walk along a path. As you walk, the relative position of nearer objects to the walker change relatively quickly, while you would have to walk farther to get the relative position of a distant object to change. The concept of the distant objects moving in a regular pattern would be harder for them to imagine because it would not have been in their life experience, not to mention that the position of the stars themselves always remain fixed relative to all other stars similar to fixed objects on earth. Why would one argue that the earth be on
the back of an animal and specifically a tortoise? Since the pattern
of movement repeats itself over time with each season repeating the motion of the stars, the movement is not haphazard
or random. The disk is not floating or moving out of control as on a body of water or the air.
Clearly it is moving with purpose and intent. The only things on
earth that move with purpose and intent are living animals and
people. The tortoise, if large enough, is clearly the best option
because of it's sturdy compact form, hard shell, and slow, steady
gait. Glue a rock on the back of a tortoise and depending on it's
size and weight, the tortoise would never notice it. Another animal,
say an elephant, might be sturdy enough, but it has a relatively soft
skin and one could imagine the problem of chaffing and pressure
sores. An elephant is also apt to get up to a running gait now and
again, which wouldn't fit with observations. This all presupposes that my imagined ancients had experience with both animals. Obviously our early cosmologist could imagine some unknown creature, but that would be more easily assailed by critics.
Now what about our proponent of the
sphere model. There would clearly be a lot of obstacles that would
be hard to overcome. To start, no wandering observer has ever
reported back an area where the earth curves off. The observation of
a relatively level earth is one that everyone at the debate would
probably share. Additionally, if the earth were a sphere, anything
on the sides and bottom would simply slide off into the cosmos, or at
the very least, if you traveled far enough down the side of the
sphere, you would get to a part of the earth where you began to feel
like you were sliding off and no distant traveler has reported this.
It is true that the disk must have an edge and no one has made it to
the edge yet, but clearly on a sphere as big as the disk appears to
be, you would begin to reach the slope within the know distances
people have traveled.
Having the earth travel around the sun would also be hard to support. The earth moves at a slow and steady pace in
reference to the stars, but clearly the sun is moving much faster
across the sky. If the earth was the object moving that fast around
the sun, the stars would also be flying across the sky. A much stronger argument could be made that the sun
is the faster body and moving around the disk. As to the sun being
one of many, and that all the stars in heaven are moving, this could not
be supported by their level of observation. To them, the stars appear fixed. Each season the
pattern of stars is repeated as the disk travels around the cosmos.
They have remained unchanged in their seasonal positions for as long
as anyone can remember.
With these arguments for the disk model, our sphere model
proponent might feel out-matched at the end of the
debate. There might be a weak attempt to show that the sun appears
to travel in an arc above the earth, connoting a circular movement.
It might therefor follow that if the sun moves in a circle, perhaps the earth is round in the
vertical plane as well and the horizontal. As noted before, the opponent would refer to the argument that things would slip off a sphere and possibly add the fact that a sphere is
unstable. What is to prevent it from spinning or rolling? In the
end, absent the ability for all present to zoom out into the cosmos
and look back at the earth from a distance to see for themselves how
the earth was arranged, one could only make logical conclusions from
all that was known and observed about the world to that point. The
disk on tortoise model clearly fit very well with all observations. Thus would end the debate.
It is impossible for us to know exactly
how the earth and the cosmos came in to being at our current level of
collective knowledge. What is clear is that we need to resist the
temptation to treat whatever we deduce, theorize, or assume about the
origin as being actionable fact. It is useful to have working
hypothesis and theories on which to work on and build on in order to
find the answers to the beginning of it all, but we must always be
wary and constantly remind ourselves that we really just don't know.
When evaluating ideas on how the cosmos began, one must constantly
re-evaluate that idea and constantly tests it's ability to hold up to
new observations, making sure that all know facts can be explained
and accounted for. As we saw in the flat disk analogy, even if all
the facts fit, you can be way off base. Only time and exploration
will sort out the good hypotheses from the bad.
If you imagine tracking how the acceptance
of the flat disk model might hold up over the following 6,000 years to the present,
one could imagine the model holding firm and becoming quite ingrained in
the culture of origin for several thousand years. Today, the disk model of the cosmos, which would seem
most plausible 6,000 years ago, is clearly not true and that which would have been
inconceivable 6,000 years ago is actually true.
When trying to evaluate the
plausibility of a creator for the cosmos or that the beginning was
the result of a divine spark or intervention, critically evaluate
whether such a concept realistically explains our observations and
understanding of the world today, or whether it is simply our modern day giant tortoise. We can't conceive the complexity of life beginning without an intelligent agent causing it to happen, because that is the limit of our experience. An intelligent agent starting life on earth fits with current know facts almost as well as the giant tortoise fits with known facts 6,000 years ago. One main difference is people could see and evaluate the properties of a tortoise which we cannot do with currently proposed candidates for the intelligent agent of creation as their is no tangible evidence of its/their existence. Clearly all types of intelligent actors could be swapped into the role of "Creator of Life on Earth", from an alien race, a god or deity, a council of gods or deities; the list is limited only by our imagination.
Without elaboration, here are just some quick observations against the existence of a divine creator or supreme being(s):
Evolution of species and man,
extinction of many animals over eons before the arrival of humanoids
and after.
Absence of life on earth for eons
before life began. Absence of man for eons after live began.
Constantly changing planet. No
indication of divine hand in natural events.
Conflicting beliefs on deities,
changing and evolving religious ideas and concepts.
No scientific evidence for supernatural
or the existence of a “soul”.
Unreliability of a single human
observer. Fallibility of human observer, ingrained instinctual behaviors, limits to biochemical and physical function and capacity of the human brain, susceptible to
conditioning, indoctrination, manipulation, and self-deception.
