Eternal universe? I’m still not convinced!

I seem to have struck a nerve with a few unbelievers on X.com with my last post (here).  I had given five problems in believing the universe is eternally old and some critics tried to explain why I was wrong.  One skeptic in particular made a brief rebuttal to each point.  Other skeptics chimed in with similar thoughts.  

I don’t normally engage skeptics too much on social media.  It seems like once it starts, it’s hard to end the conversation and it ends up consuming all my time.  Instead, I thought I’d take some of their comments and address them here, in a new post.  Maybe they’ll leave future comments on my blog.

Before getting into their comments, one thing that struck me is that, by criticizing my arguments against an infinitely old universe, I can only assume they are tacitly admitting that the universe is infinitely old.  Once upon a time, some people believed in the Steady State Theory of the universe.  Explainingscience.org describes the theory this way:

[F]or a while the Steady State theory was very popular. This theory was developed in 1948 by Fred Hoyle (1915-2001), Herman Bondi (1919-2005) and Thomas Gold (1920-2004) as an alternative to the Big Bang to explain the origin and expansion of the Universe. At the heart of the Steady State theory is the Perfect Cosmological Principle. This states that the Universe is infinite in extent, infinitely old and, taken as a whole, it is the same in all directions and at all times in the past and at all times in the future.  In other words, the Universe doesn’t evolve or change over time.

We see that the Steady State Theory is an alternative to the Big Bang.  It’s not especially popular anymore and the Big Bang Theory is now the most widely accepted origin story in the secular science community.  Holders to the Steady State Theory are definitely the minority and could be described as fringe.  So, as I read the comments attempting to rebut my five points, I had to ask myself, do these people really believe in an infinitely old universe?  I doubt the critics commenting on my X thread really endorse the Steady State Theory.  I think, instead, they were simply disagreeing with a creationist without realizing they essentially agree with all my points.  Oh the irony!!

The primary critic posting on my thread goes by the handle God Fodder (@PeteAlonSoCrazy).  In his bio is the hash tag, #Atheism, which leads me to believe maybe there’s a bias there.  No worries; I have a bias too.  It’s just nice to know his frame of mind as I read his arguments.  I’m using his points to outline my rebuttal.  

To be fair, due to character limits on X, God Fodder had to keep his rebuttals to a few sentences.  I think he made his points fairly well and I think it’s obvious what he was getting at with all of them.  However, if had been able to write longer responses, he might have made better arguments.  But, these are all I have so they are what I have to work with.

Are we ready, then?  Let’s look at some of the comments.  I will note my points with RKB and his response with GF:

RKB: 1. It's not scientific.

GF: Yes because the origin of the universe is UNKNOWN. God is in the same boat. Not an argument against it.

OK, so on point #1 we are in agreement.  Claiming the universe is eternally old is a faith statement not unlike a religious dogma.  I’ve written before about how some things in science rely on faith and how scientism is a danger to science.  

My pointing out the faith-like assumptions behind believing the universe is infinitely old is meant to disqualify it from being scientific.  People only cling to it because they don’t want to believe in an Eternal Creator.  In a real sense, they are merely using their faith to attack my faith.

By the way, GF also has contradicted an oft used criticism of creationism.  Creationists are often told that creation can’t be true because it’s not scientific!!  So I agree with GF -  just because something isn’t scientific isn’t sufficient to prove it’s not true.

RKB: Entropy

GF: Without knowing the cause of the Big Bang causes this is complete guesswork.  Let me guess, entropy magically does not apply to god? Why?

GF is employing a sort of “you too” response as though it excuses him from explaining why the universe isn’t already in total entropy.  It seems, to me, a tacit admission that an enterally old universe should have reached entropy already but, since God hasn’t reached entropy, then it doesn’t matter.  //RKBentley scratches his head// 

There is nothing in this response - not one thing - that attempts to explain how energy could be eternally old without having reached heat death.  Let me remind the readers, too, that claiming the universe is infinitely old yet still has usable energy is to admit that perpetual motion exists!

Concerning God, entropy is a property of the universe.  It’s an observed part of nature.  God, by definition, is supernatural so I don’t expect the things of nature to apply to Him.  This is like saying, “How could Jesus walk on water?  Does gravity or buoyancy magically not apply to Him?”  

RKB: Time

GF: How does an eternal consciousness experience time?  Eternal god has just as many issues if not more.

More “you too.”  Sigh.  God does not experience time.  Psalm 90:4 tells us of the Lord, “For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.”  

Time is a property of the universe.  We experience time.  Since God is transcendent and supernatural, therefore, there’s no reason to believe He experiences time like us.  

Again, there’s no rebuttal here.  The inescapable conclusion of the Steady State Theory is that we have arrived here after infinity has already passed!

RKB: Universe is expanding.

GF: So what? It could be in a cycle or big bangs could be repeated.  Why would a god make an expanding universe?  What’s the point?

I see a lot of things wrong with GF’s response.  First, a cycle of bang-crunch-bang-crunch universes is another faith statement (see point #1).  There is no scientific evidence to support it.

Next, this flies in the face of entropy (see point #2).  Imagine a spring that continuously springs out, then contracts again - infinitely!  What, it never runs out of energy?  It’s perpetual motion all over again.

Finally, what about Aristotle’s “First Cause” argument?  GF is simply invoking an infinite regress of bang-crunch events with nothing to start the chain.  It’s turtles all the way down to him!

RKB: Bible

GF: Who care what an ancient story book says?  

Really bad reasoning here.

There are billions of people in the world who care very much about what the Bible says.  Why do you think the Bible is still so popular after more than 2,000 years?  

I believe the Bible for the same reasons I believe anything - I’m convinced that it’s true.  There are myriad reasons I believe it’s true but I’ll have to save that discussion for another time.  To ignore the Bible in favor of a theory that makes literally no sense would indeed be “really bad reasoning”!

Five problems with an infinitely old universe

One of the many problems faced by unbelievers is the ultimate origin of everything.  Atheists really have no good answer to obvious questions like, what caused the Big Bang?  Where did matter or energy come from?  How could “nothing” have created everything?  

The reason atheists struggle with questions like this is because they know that if the universe began to exist, then it had a cause.  This idea has been around since Aristotle, who discussed the uncaused “first cause” or “The unmoved mover.”  I found a decent summary of Aristotle’s argument here:

Aristotle’s theology is based on his perception that there must be something above and beyond the chains of cause and effect for those chains to exist at all…. Everything is subject to change and motion, but nothing changes or moves without cause. Tracing how things cause one another to change and move is the source of many of Aristotle’s most fundamental insights…. [A]ll causes must themselves be caused and all motion must be caused by something that is already in motion. The trouble with this belief is that it leads to an infinite regress: if all causes have antecedent causes, there is no first cause that causes motion and change to exist in the first place. Why is there change and motion rather than stillness? Aristotle answers that there must be a first cause, an unmoved mover, that is the source of all change and motion while being itself unchanging and unmoving.

An uncreated being that caused the entire universe sounds an awful lot like God.  Of course, unbelievers reject that possibility so they’re faced with a dilemma: how can they claim the universe began to exist without appealing to a Prime Mover?  One way is to assert that time and energy are themselves eternal and uncaused!  

I see at least five problems with believing the universe is eternal.  

IT’S NOT SCIENTIFIC

The first problem with believing in an eternal universe is that it really isn’t a scientific claim.  How is saying that the universe is infinitely old significantly different from saying it was created by an eternal God?  To me, it merely seems to ascribe divine-like qualities to nature.  Nature becomes the god of unbelievers and “Nature just is” is a faith statement similar to saying “God did it.”   

Now, the lost are welcome to believe whatever they want to believe - just please don’t pretend this belief is enlightened, thought out, and it's certainly not scientific!

ENTROPY

It’s an accepted Law in science that systems degrade over time.  No system is perfectly efficient so some energy is lost.  Over time, all systems fail and will no longer produce energy.  This is why we know that something like perpetual motion is impossible.  Any system that produces work will always start with more energy (useful energy) and end with entropy (useless energy).  

Sometimes, people will argue that entropy only applies to closed or isolated systems.  They love to point out, for example, that earth isn’t a closed system because it receives energy from the sun.  But the stubborn truth of entropy is that it applies to all systems.  My car, for example, is an open system.  I have to add gas, change the oil, replace worn out parts, and continuously maintain the vehicle but - eventually - it will succumb to entropy and become scrap.  

Besides, the universe is a closed system.  No new energy is being added.  Over time, all the stars will burn out, all motion will stop, and everything will have reached total entropy.  This has been called “the heat death” and would be the eventual fate of the universe if Christ were to not return.  

If the universe were infinitely old, it should have reached total entropy already - there should be no useful energy left.  To claim that useful energy has remained constant over the infinite amount of time that has supposedly already passed, is to claim that something like perpetual motion is possible after all!  

Since the universe hasn’t reached total entropy already is de facto evidence that the universe cannot be infinitely old.  

TIME

This point may seem more philosophical but, I think, it’s one of the most stubborn problems with claiming the universe has been here for an eternity.

There’s an old joke that goes like this: “Chuck Norris has counted to infinity…. Twice!”  What makes the joke funny is that it would be impossible to count to infinity - even for Chuck Norris //rkbentley chuckles//.  I could count for the rest of my life time and merely reach bigger and bigger numbers.  In a thousand lifetimes, I could never reach infinity.  I wouldn’t even reach “half” of infinity.  And are you ready to have your mind blown?  Even after a million life times of counting, I would never be any closer to reaching infinity than when I’d first started counting!!  

Infinite or eternal are terms our finite minds struggle to grasp.  Infinite means it has no end.  We could count until we run out of names for the numbers and there would still be an infinite amount of numbers left to be counted.  Get it?  

Here’s the problem, then, for the unbelievers.  To say the universe is infinitely old is to say we have arrived at this time after an infinite amount of time has already passed.  That’s nonsense.  It’s funnier than the Chuck Norris joke; at least the joke is meant to be funny.

THE UNIVERSE IS EXPANDING

As we look around in the universe, we observe about the same number of stars no matter which direction we look. It would be very reasonable to conclude from this observation that we are somewhere near the center of the universe. Of course, the universe is very, very large and since we cannot see the edge of it in any direction, it makes it hard to be sure that we're in the center.  It would be like being in the ocean with no land in sight; you would really have no idea if you're in the middle of the ocean or just outside sight of the shore. To really know we're in the center, we'd have to have more information.

In the mid-19th century, Dutch physicist, Christian Doppler noticed that sound waves changed frequency relative to the observer when the source was in motion. He dubbed this phenomenon, “the Doppler Effect” and believed it would apply to all waves including light and radiometric waves. In the beginning of the 20th century, we were able to observe this phenomenon in the light from distant stars. The light from the stars was “redshifted” indicating that the light wave was being stretched and that the star was moving away from us. As we began to survey more and more stars, we realized that the stars uniformly seemed to be moving away from us at a constant speed.

The implications of what was being observed was huge. Obviously it meant the universe was expanding but more than that, the general movement of the stars directly away from us further seemed to confirm our position near the center of the universe. In this enormous universe, the odds of us coincidentally being in the center are mind numbingly small. If God had intended us to be in the center of the universe, then the remote odds of it happening randomly don't matter.

The fact that we seem to be at the center of the universe isn’t really my point right now.  Instead, I want to draw attention to this simple fact: if the universe is expanding, we can extrapolate backward only so far until all the matter would be at a single point.  In other words, the universe had to begin expanding at some point in the past, but it cannot have been expanding forever.  

I don’t believe in the Big Bang, of course, but it wouldn’t matter if I did.  Whether the universe began to expand 14 billion years ago or 6,000 years ago, both preclude an infinitely old universe.

THE BIBLE SAYS THE UNIVERSE BEGAN

Genesis 1:1, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

People seldom stop to think about it but what does this verse mean when it says, “In the beginning”?  In case it isn’t obvious, it’s talking about the beginning of time.  Time is a property of the universe, a property which was created simultaneously with space and matter (i.e., “the heaven and the earth”).  

Time hasn’t always existed.  The clock began ticking at one time and it was here, in the beginning.  If the universe has existed forever, then the clock never started ticking - it has always ticked!  Such a ridiculous claim directly contradicts the clear meaning of the very first verse in the Bible.  

Call me simple, call me dogmatic, call me any name you want but I will choose the clear meaning of the words of the Bible over the fanciful theories invented by men with corrupt minds and deceitful hearts.

Each was partly in the right and all were in the wrong!

Drawing on inspiration from an old Hindu parable, John Godfrey Saxe gave us the wonderful poem, The Blind Men and the Elephant:

It was six men of Indostan, to learning much inclined,

who went to see the elephant (Though all of them were blind),

that each by observation, might satisfy his mind.

The first approached the elephant, and, happening to fall,

against his broad and sturdy side, at once began to bawl:

"God bless me! but the elephant, is nothing but a wall!"

The second feeling of the tusk, cried: "Ho! what have we here,

so very round and smooth and sharp? To me tis mighty clear,

this wonder of an elephant, is very like a spear!"

The third approached the animal, and, happening to take,

the squirming trunk within his hands, "I see," quoth he,

the elephant is very like a snake!"

The fourth reached out his eager hand, and felt about the knee:

"What most this wondrous beast is like, is mighty plain," quoth he;

"Tis clear enough the elephant is very like a tree."

The fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said; "E'en the blindest man

can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an elephant, is very like a fan!"

The sixth no sooner had begun, about the beast to grope,

than, seizing on the swinging tail, that fell within his scope,

"I see," quothe he, "the elephant is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan, disputed loud and long,

each in his own opinion, exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right, and all were in the wrong!

So, oft in theologic wars, the disputants, I ween,

tread on in utter ignorance, of what each other mean,

and prate about the elephant, not one of them has seen!

Saxe, of course, used the poem to illustrate the tensions between believers of different faiths.  However, I believe the poem better illustrates the attitudes of unbelievers.  It’s funny how people with such limited knowledge and understanding can still have such confidence in their opinions. Let’s face it, even the most zealot followers of scientism would have to admit there is far more we don’t know than we do know.  What’s more, the things we don’t know often have a bearing on things we think we know.

To demonstrate how things we don’t know can affect things we think we know, I have sometimes done this exercise: In a room of people, I will hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers I’m holding up.  Every time I’ve done this, everyone has always answered, “two.”  What they don’t know is that, either under the table or at my side, I’m also holding up two fingers on my other hand.  So, I was truly holding up four fingers but they only ever saw two of them.  

Think about some of the claims of science that no one has ever seen: the universe came from nothing, stars formed from collapsing hydrogen clouds, life rose from non-living matter, and so forth and so forth.  Scientists see birds eating one shade of moth and extrapolate that same process could turn a bacterium into a bird.  They see a similarity between a human hand and a whale’s fin and surmise it means they have a common ancestor.  It’s all nonsense.

Seeing an event like natural selection or noticing some similarity between different animals is merely a tiny piece of knowledge in a history that wasn’t seen.  It’s like the blind men who experienced only one part of the elephant but were wrong about the whole thing.  Science is only done in the present.  The past is beyond scientific inquiry.  In a real sense, we are blind to the things of antiquity.  The only thing we can hope to know with any certainty is what was written down by those who lived in the past.  

Concerning the origin of the world and of man, Christian have the written revelation of the only One who was a witness to the events.  We have the word of the One who made the universe. 

I admit that I don't know everything. I also admit there's far more that I don't know than I do know. However, God is the One who does know everything and I will trust what He has said about the past. Everyone else is welcome to grope about for the truth! 

A SURE WORD: Is hell unfair?

In this video, I talk about an argument I once heard from an atheist who tried to criticize God's justice by saying He's being unfair.

For those who don’t know, I’ve been blogging for nearly 20 years.  I actually started my first blog in October, 2007 (you can check out my old blog here).  I relaunched this blog a few years ago but I never get to write as often as I’d like.

In the time between my old blog and this new blog, I made a few videos I called, “Roadside apologetics” and posted them on YouTube.  I was spending a lot of time driving for my work and thought I could use the time to make more content to share.  I only made a few and never really did anything to promote the videos so they’ve gone largely unnoticed.  Yet, they’re still available online so why not share them now?

I always had a point in mind before starting a new video but I never had a script for them.  Most of them are about things I’d already written about so I had a good idea of what I might say.  There are no edits.  It’s just me and the camera.  

I’d like to invite my readers to watch them now.  I’ll probably post one each week or so until I get through them all.  Who knows, maybe I’ll make more in the future.

God bless!!

How Jesus is not like Elvis

I was watching a video on YouTube some years ago where a Christian was debating Matt Dillahunty about evidence for the Resurrection.  At one point, Dillahunty asked how eyewitness claims to the risen Savior are substantially different from witnesses claiming they’d supposedly seen Elvis Presley still alive.  I’m not sure if this was a question Dillahunty had planned to ask or he spoke it entirely off the cuff but it seemed to catch the Christian off guard.  

For my younger readers, let me give a little backstory about Elvis sightings.  Elvis Presley was an American Icon who became enormously popular in the 1950s. He is sometimes credited as the inventor of “rock and roll” and has been referred to as “The King.”  He died unexpectedly in 1977 at the young age of only 42, apparently from a life of excess and drug abuse.  

After his death, conspiracy theories began to spread that he’d only faked his death and that he was still alive.  Then people started coming forward, claiming they had seen Elvis in places like a mall or an airport.  Tabloid magazines would even publish “photos” they alleged to be of Elvis.  It was quite the spectacle.

Elvis would be 90 years old now.  In the years since his death was made public, he never came forward to announce it was a hoax.  None of his friends or family ever came forward and admitted it was a hoax.  And the fact that some people have never even heard of some of the things I’m explaining now, demonstrates that the Elvis-faked-his-death conspiracy never really amounted to anything.

I guess Dillahunty brought up the Elvis sightings to make this point: what if, 200 years from now, people began to claim Elvis was still alive after he was pronounced dead?  What if they produced the doctored photos and sketchy testimonies made in the 70s and 80s?  His question was, how is the testimony of the witnesses to the Resurrection substantially different than that?  Well, I’m going to explain how they’re different!

What is being claimed?

The first and most obvious difference between the two scenarios is what is being claimed.  Jesus rose from the dead!  He was dead.  People saw Him die.  Later, some of these same people saw Him alive again.  It was a resurrection.  

On the other hand, nobody has ever claimed Elvis rose from the dead.  The entire conspiracy was that he had faked his death - that is he didn’t really die.  I’ve heard of cases where people try to get insurance money or try to hide from justice by trying to convince others they had died.  So what?  Faking your own death lies within the realm of the plausible and even if someone does come forward with convincing evidence that Elvis didn’t die in 1977, it still has no bearing on whether or not Jesus rose from the dead!

A very public death

One of the things that made Elvis’ faked-death conspiracy plausible is that so few people had seen him dead.  Toward the end of his life, Elvis was not only older, but he had gained a lot of weight.  He was no longer the handsome icon people remembered from the 50s and 60s.  Some people were shocked when they saw him in his last public concert before his death.  

He was found dead in his own home by close friends and staff, so there wasn’t a large hospital staff treating him for some lingering death.  After he died, his family decided to have a closed casket funeral, apparently not wanting his appearance to diminish his legacy.  To my knowledge, no photos of Elvis dead were ever published.  Thus, it was easy for people to claim he wasn’t dead.

Now, compare that to the death of Jesus.  His death was intentionally made a spectacle.  It was the practice of Rome to publicly punish criminals as a way to deter others who might have similar intentions.  Jesus’ death was seen by His friends, His family, mobs of strangers, Roman authorities, and religious leaders.  He was dead and everyone knew it.

To say Elvis was still alive after the news of his death is something that could still be possible.  To say Jesus was alive after His very public execution would have required a miracle!

Who are the witnesses?

Elvis was a celebrity.  He was adored by millions and was probably one of the most recognized people on earth at the time.  But of all those millions of fans, how many of them really knew Elvis?  Think about it.  One sacrifice made for fame is privacy.  The more popular someone becomes, the more he must hide himself lest he be mobbed by his own fans.  

So how many fans ever talked with Elvis face to face?  How many ever shared a meal with him?  How many ever had him in their homes?  Like any celebrity, Elvis probably had a very close circle of friends that really knew him.  Everyone else had to admire him from a distance.  

Remember too that Elvis was past his prime.  He had not been in the spotlight for years.  Many people who once admired him, only remembered the younger, thinner version of him from a decade or two earlier.  They might not have recognized him at all if they bumped into him in his most recent visage.  

In the case of Elvis sightings, none of his closest friends ever claimed he was still alive.  What we have is a man claimed to be seen by people who really didn’t know him personally and certainly didn’t know him intimately.  They might have known what he looked like from photos or TV appearances years earlier.  Now they claimed to catch a fleeting glimpse of someone who they thought looked like him!  That hardly sounds credible.  For all I know, they may have spotted an Elvis-impersonator on his way to a performance!

Jesus, on the other hand, was seen alive by people who knew Him intimately.  They had talked with Him, eaten with Him, and even had Him in their homes.  They had seen Him die.  Later, they saw Him alive again.  Theirs weren’t glimpses of someone in a crowd that may have looked like Jesus.  After His resurrection, they talked with Him, ate with Him, and had Him in their homes.  There’s no chance they were mistaken about who He was.

Conclusion

In summary, I hopefully have made clear the qualitative difference between these two claims.  It shouldn’t be hard to understand that the testimony given by someone who claimed to see a person he only knew from television in support of a conspiracy that theoretically was possible might make interesting conversation but it’s nothing more than that.

On the other hand, the zealous testimony of witnesses who knew Jesus when He was alive, who had also seen Him die, then later claimed they’d seen Him alive again is evidence of a miracle!  

So there you go, Mr. Dillahunty.  That’s how Jesus is not like Elvis!