Unfortunately, I decided to begin my book Counterargument for God with my criticisms of Darwin and worked backward, instead of beginning with the Big Bang, the beginning of the universe and working forward.
As a result, many atheist readers stopped reading before they reached my observations on the evidence for the Big Bang, because they couldn’t accept the truth when I shed light on what I believe to be the obvious flaws in Darwin’s theory of evolution.
After reading my book and corresponding with me, professor C. W. Bobbitt was kind enough to allow his personal thoughts in regard to the existential questions to be published here on my website.
He offered this excellent suggestion as he wrote, “I think it best to have you read and mull on it for a day or so. I will just mention a couple of things to pique your interest: visualize God commanding “nothing” to split into two universes of matter and anti-matter (some might think of this a right-handed and a left-handed system) with each flying away from the other to its pre-assigned space and each experiencing an initial behavior which we mortals call the Big Bang. Thus our universe comes into being in a way consistent with scientific thinking… after God initiates it.“
Without further ado, here are Professor Bobbitt’s thoughts on the Big Bang theory.
ON THE FORMATION OF THE UNIVERSE
by C. W. Bobbitt
We suppose that the universe had a beginning, that it came into being by an act of creation, that the creating agency was (is) God. As mortal men we seek to know how it came into being, how God performed this act. It is doubtful that man will ever know, in this world, the answer to the question, but out of our curiosity and our vanity it is unlikely that we will give up the search. With this in mind, let us consider some possibilities.
We identify the universe as space which contains matter, and because we believe in an infinite and almighty God we can accept that space and matter came into being by God’s spoken word: “Let there be space,” and “let there be matter in the space.” This is our starting point. What we really want to know are answers to these questions: What characteristics and attributes did God impart to space and matter? What laws did He establish for the behavior of matter in space? How did He distribute the matter throughout the space? How did He put energy into the system? How did He provide initial conditions of motion?
Between the beginning and the present time there are any number of ways that God could have distributed matter and given it initial conditions which, subject to the laws of the universe, would produce the present configuration. It seems proper, however, seeing as how men of scientific and philosophic persuasion have put so much effort into it, to go along with the Big Bang Theory. This still leaves us with plenty of things to wonder about. Did God infuse the matter with energy then command it to explode? Or did He simply command it to explode? (There is yet another mechanism which will be mentioned later, but it is to bizarre for the present discussion.) Did the glob of matter explode into countless pieces of various sizes, or were the pieces all infinitesimal, to later combine into atoms, molecules, and so on? Were the seeds of life present immediately after the Big Bang, or did they form at some later time according to God’s formula? Are they still being formed at the present time?
These are the kinds of questions for which we cannot produce proofs, so of the various scenarios which are consistent with present observations, the curious student who insists upon a mechanism should just choose the one he likes best and go with it. We suspect, however, that space and time have other attributes, and are governed by other laws that have not yet been discovered, and it is a proper function of science to diligently seek them out.
With regard to the origin of the universe and of life, we have acknowledged that God created the universe and was the author of life, so it matters little whether the seeds of life came out of the Big Bang or formed in the universe at some later time; the essential point is that God created life, and we further declare that only God can create life.
There are perhaps many things that can be said about the origin of the universe that are best deferred to a later time. The primary purpose here is to establish clearly that God created the universe and the life which ultimately appeared and flourished on planet earth.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Scientific models of the things of the universe include the notion of matter and anti-matter. One concept is no more extraordinary than the other; they are both mass and, as such, have energy equivalence in accordance with Einstein’s laws. They are named as they are to imply that when matter and anti-matter come together, there results a mutual annihilation of equivalent amounts of each, with release of energy, presumably in accordance with the equation e = mc’. (continued on page 2)
It is inevitable that one should wonder how matter and anti -matter came to be, and thus be led to consider the reverse process of mutual annihilation. Since matter and anti-matter join- with an output of energy-to make nothing, it is reasonable to suppose that nothing-with an input of energy–can be separated into two somethings (matter and anti-matter) when a suitable power (God) chooses to effect the separation. Thereafter He might be disposed to create separate spaces for the two components with maybe some fraction of each kind appearing in the other’s space. This of course is pure fancy, but it does present an alternate understanding of God’s creation of matter.
To carry this fancy full circle, we might imagine the coming of a time when, for whatever reason, perhaps an act of God, the universes of matter and anti-matter come together and softly and suddenly vanish away, like the Baker who saw the Boojum.
While it may be of interest to readers for our separate views to be contrasted, that is analysis best saved for another day, perhaps even tomorrow.
Following the advice of professor Bobbitt, this afternoon I shall limit this post to publishing his ideas without contrasting them to mine.
Professor Bobbitt also supplemented his thoughts on the origin of the universe with an interesting analogy that readers may find extremely useful as they contemplate the information offered in his papers. It follows below:
NOTES ON THE UNIVERSE, EXISTENCE, AND GOD
Upon contemplating the universe, two things immediately stand out to even the most casual observer: 1) it’s big, and 2) it has got a lot of stuff in it. The vastness of space boggles the mind, and its very dimensions dull our apprehension of the incalculable amount of matter it contains. There is little wonder that many people are content to believe that the universe is all that there is.
There are others, however, who think bigger; whose fertile imaginations envision other universes, perhaps many others, each with its own time and space, and these people go so far as to suggest that universes might actually be connected by some configuration of existence that is yet to be discovered.
One thing is certain: our universe is real and has actual being, both material and spiritual, in space and time, it is included in the totality of being. This much is said to emphasize that all the universe is in the realm of existence, but that all existence is not confined to the universe. Indeed, existence, viewed as a domain, contains everything that has being; every material body, every thought, every emotion, everything that is. It is really not out of place here to make the succinct defining statement, “Existence is.”
There is a certain abstractness about existence that sometimes causes difficulty in communication. It is helpful to devise a concrete analogy which is readily understood by everyone in order to facilitate one’s comprehension of various ideas and notions which are to be examined in relation to existence.
To this end, let us represent existence by a flat plane of indefinite extent which is covered by a uniform layer of sand, and things that have being; that is, things which exist, will be represented by a disruption in the surface of the sand. As an example, suppose someone places his finger in the sand, draws it some distance across the surface, then removes it. There is now a furrow in the sand which did not exist previously, something new has come into being, something has been created. This creation can be of any sort the analogist chooses; in this present argument we are considering the universe, so we will make the analogy that the sand is to existence as the furrow in the sand is to the universe. The actual system here is the existence-universe combination and the analogous system is the sand-furrow pair. Some points of correspondence present themselves clearly: both the furrow and the universe have a beginning, a duration, and an end. Both were created. The agent of creation is obvious in the analogous system, but is presently obscure in the actual system.
We note that the furrow in the sand can be extended indefinitely in either or both directions; the starting and stopping points are arbitrarily chosen to indicate the origin and demise of the universe, the connecting line is its duration.
There is a point of view which holds that the universe did not have a beginning and will not have an end; that it always was and always will be–that it is eternal. The present state of knowledge of astronomy and astrophysics points overwhelmingly against this view, but it is conceivable. In the analogous system this state of the universe would be represented by a line in the sand extending forward and backward, without end, from the present state. This unquestionably would represent eternalness, but the idea must be rejected altogether on the basis of the scientific evidence from astronomy that the universe is temporal; that it had an origin at a reasonably estimated time, and presently is changing with time.
As a point of interest, we note that a temporal universe without beginning or end can easily be imagined as the analog of a closed curve in the sands of existence. One would expect such a system to be non-isentropic and to eventually run down to a state of complete chaos.
Returning to the consideration of existence, it must be evident that existence, by and of itself, takes no note of time and space. Existence is eternal (timeless), and it knows no bounds except itself. On the other hand, physical space can be conceived to be limited; and even if it is not, a particular space such as that which contains the matter of our universe cannot justifiably be taken as the only physical space that exists.
Time and space are the attributes of creation. It is only when something comes into being and progresses from its starting point that time has meaning; thus, for example, when we speak of the universe in terms of the expression “in the beginning,” which is obviously temporal, but we cannot apply the same expression to existence, or anything else that is eternal. The designation of space as an attribute of creation is made to emphasize that each individual created universe (analogously, each line in the sand) has its own space into which other universes do not encroach — as far as is known.
Since there are many different kinds of spaces, and, at least, several definitions of physical space made to fit particular situations, we will arbitrarily define the space occupied by a universe to be the region enclosed by a spherical shell whose diameter is the distance of separation of the two most widely separated physical bodies of that universe. Obviously, the shell diameter changes with relative motion of the two bodies. (We note that this discussion applies to universes which contain matter.)
Existence, then, represented as a level surface of sand, can support as many creations, of whatever kinds, that the creating entity chooses. A mortal man, standing over the (analogous) sand of existence can, with his finger–with a wave of his hand–originate disruptions in the sand to his heart’s desire. Does this not suggest that the agency which caused our universe to come into being could do a similar thing in actual existence? Does the analogy hold even through this? Is it too much to suppose that in the eternity of existence there have been innumerable separate and distinct creations, including universes, brought into being by the same instrumentality which occasioned our own universe? Is there truly no limit to this force, this power, this presence, which created our universe and everything within it? The time has come to put a name to it.
Up to this point, the author of this paper has refrained from mentioning God as the author of these creations, so as not to generate bias, one way or another, in the reader’s mind, but now there is no escaping the truth that this awesome, almighty presence is God, and yes, there is no limit to what God can do. Just as man stands over the “sands of existence” and makes his mark, so God hovers over actual existence and makes His creations at will. Just as existence is eternal, so also is God eternal, and not only does God oversee existence, He also permeates it so as to know every detail of eternity at all times. In view of this, one might be tempted to define God as being existence endowed with Godly attributes, but this does not allow for God’s attribute-supporting essence, that part of God which will forever remain a mystery to mortal man.
Who then, what then is this Almighty God to us? What do we know of Him? We know of God what He has revealed to us through His creations and His attributes. We know He is infinite, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and sovereign. Apart from these things is God’s essence, a knowledge of which is forever forbidden to us in this world. “Why?” is a question to which we expect no answer. It is not for man to know the mind of God.
As a closing thought, we note that Adam and Eve, tempted by the serpent, disobeyed God in the hope of acquiring knowledge of His essence, and thereby brought about the fall of man.
By this writing, the author clearly reveals himself to be a theist, seeing God as the Supreme Being; directing, in particular, the course of mankind, and interceding at His will. Any suggestion that the acknowledgement of God must give rise to a “science versus God” struggle for the control of man’s mind is unwarranted and is a disservice to both parties. There will always be theists and there will always be a-theists, and it will always be improper to associate either of these labels with the disciplines of science.
Tomorrow we shall attempt to reconcile the Big Bang argument culled from my Counterargument for God to professor Bobbitt’s approach to the same problem, hoping to see how we reached the same conclusion with different means of getting there.
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