In honor of Stephen Hawking’s 70th birthday, a meeting of the minds took place to discuss the state of cosmology. New Scientist[1] reported on the events of the night, one of which was a talk delivered by famed cosmologist, Alexander Vilenkin, describing why physical reality must have a beginning. But first, a little background is in order.
For a long time scientists held that the universe was eternal and unchanging. This allowed them to avoid the God question—who or what caused the universe—because they reasoned that a beginningless universe needed no cause.[2] They recognized that if the universe began to exist in the finite past that it begged for a cause that was outside of the time-space-continuum. As Stephen Hawking told his well-wishers in a pre-recorded message, “A point of creation would be a place where science broke down. One would have to appeal to religion and the hand of God.”
Scientific discoveries in the early and mid-20th century, however, forced cosmologists to the uncomfortable conclusion that our universe came into being in the finite past. The scientific consensus was that the origin of our universe constituted the origin of physical reality itself. Before the Big Bang, literally nothing existed. The universe came into being from nothing and nowhere. This sounded too much like the creation ex nihilo of Genesis, however, and seemed to require the God of Genesis to make it happen. As a result, some cosmologists were feverishly looking for ways to restore an eternal universe.
Several theories have been put forward over the last 50 years. None of them have enjoyed the empirical confirmation that supports the Big Bang model. They are either lacking in empirical support, or have been disconfirmed by the empirical evidence. But every time one theory goes down in flames, cosmologists think up a new possibility or a variation of an older one.
In the not-so-distant past, Vilenkin himself has advocated cosmogenic theories that entail an eternal universe, but based on cosmological theorems he developed with Alan Guth and Arvin Borde, as well as an examination of the various candidates for an eternal universe, Vilenkin has come to see that all the evidence points in a singular direction: the universe had an absolute beginning in the finite past.
Vilenkin discussed three models for an eternal universe in his presentation, describing why each cannot deliver on what it promises. The first is Alan Guth’s eternal inflation model which proposes eternally inflating bubble universes within a multiverse that stretches both forward and backward in time. In 2003 Vilenkin and Guth discovered that the math for this model will not work because it violates the Hubble constant. Speaking of the inflationary multiverse, Vilenkin said “it can’t possibly be eternal in the past,” and that “there must be some kind of boundary.”
The second cosmological model was the cyclical model, which proposes that the universe goes through an eternal series of contractions and expansions – our Big Bang being the latest contraction in an eternal series. Vilenkin shows that this model cannot extend infinitely into the past either because disorder would accumulate with each cycle. If the universe has been going through this process eternally, we should find ourselves in a universe that is completely disordered and dead. We do not, hence a cyclical universe cannot extend infinitely into the past.
The final cosmological model Vilenkin deconstructed is the cosmic egg model. On this model the universe exists eternally in a steady state, but then it “cracked” resulting in the Big Bang. The problem with this model is that quantum instabilities would not allow the “egg” to remain in a steady state for an infinite amount of time. It would be forced to collapse after a finite amount of time, and thus cannot be eternal.
Vilenkin concluded by saying “All the evidence we have says that the universe had a beginning.” The power of this statement, and its source, should not be underestimated. Like many other cosmologists, Vilenkin was not satisfied to conclude that the Standard Model (Big Bang) was the end of the story. He wanted the universe to be eternal. He has been involved in projects trying to restore an eternal universe, and yet based on the evidence, he is willing to admit that an eternal universe does not appear to be a physical possibility. All the evidence points to a beginning. And if there is a beginning, then the question of what caused the universe to come into being needs to be answered.
Science cannot answer this question because science trades on material causes, and you can’t have a material cause before the origin of material reality itself. Whatever caused the universe to come into being must be immaterial, timeless, non-spatial, powerful, and intelligent. Furthermore, the cause must be personal as well. As William Lane Craig has argued: “[I]f the cause of the universe were an impersonal set of necessary and sufficient conditions, it could not exist without its effect. The only way for the cause to be timeless and changeless but for its effect to originate de novo a finite time ago is for the cause to be a personal agent who freely chooses to bring about an effect without antecedent determining conditions.”[3] And again, “As a free agent God is able to exercise His causal power without any antecedent determining conditions. That is what differentiates a personal agent from an impersonal cause. … Thus, the moment of God’s creating the universe is the moment at which the universe begins to exist. So God exists changelessly (though not immutably) without creation with a timeless intention that a world with a beginning exist, and by exercising His causal power brings such a world into being at the first moment of time.”[4] An immaterial, timeless, non-spatial, powerful, personal, and intelligent agent sure sounds a lot like the God of theism!
The scientific evidence for a temporally finite universe continues to mount, and this fact leads us toward a theological conclusion about its origin. As Robert Jastrow famously wrote, “For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance: he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”
[1]Lisa Grossman, “Why physicists can’t avoid a creation event,” New Scientist, Issue 2847, 11 January 2012, pp. 6-7.
[2]Arguably, even an eternal universe needs a cause. Indeed, the Greeks believed the universe was eternal and unchanging, but still believed an Unmoved Mover was necessary to explain motion in the universe. I am reporting what the early cosmologists believed, not necessarily claiming that they were correct.
[3]William Lane Craig, “Beyond the Big Bang”; available from http://www.bethinking.org/viewall.php?ID=51; Internet; accessed 20 May 2010.
[4]William Lane Craig, “Wes Morriston on Divine Creation”; available from http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7001; Internet; accessed 03 January 2011.
January 23, 2012 at 6:00 pm
“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream.
That statement is just flabbergasting. Why do the atheists not want there to be a God? Do they really want to die someday and just cease to exist? They would rather be right about atheism than there actually be a loving God with an eternity of life yet left?
Years ago I had an extended conversation with an agnostic/atheist friend. After hours of talk he simply refused to admit anything. I finally said “Don’t you want there to be a God?” His reply astounded me, he said “No, not unless I am that God.”
I know the atheists have concluded that we believers are delusional and simply unwilling to admit the “scientific” truth. Well, nonsense. There really is a God. The evidence is overwhelming. That there is a God is obvious and all the real evidence proves there really is a God. The only way to explain the atheists’ refusal to acknowledge the obvious is that they simply cannot (yet) see the truth. They are literally blind to the truth.
Randy
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January 25, 2012 at 10:46 am
Jastrow’s point was not related to the intentions of atheists. His point was that scientists reject religious dogma (as nonsense, or as invalid data for pursuing scientific investigations), but then come to the same conclusions themselves using reason and the scientific method.
But to your point, different atheists have different reasons, but for most it is an issue of moral autonomy. They don’t want a cosmic daddy figure telling them what they can and cannot do with their lives. Moral rebellion runs deep in humanity, not just in atheists. The difference between atheists and Christians is that Christians stopped acting contrary to reason and submitted their will to the will of God.
Jason
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January 26, 2012 at 3:33 am
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January 27, 2012 at 1:40 am
Hi, Jason
Can you interpret this quote from your post above?
“So God exists changelessly (though not immutably)…”. Looks like it was Lane’s statement, not yours, but, could you offer some insight, nonethless?
Thanks.
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January 27, 2012 at 5:30 am
Yes Aaron. His point is that God’s changelessness was not a necessary property of God’s existence, but a contingent one. Changelessness was not necessary to God’s existence. Craig argues that God ceased being changeless at the moment of creation when God engaged in His first creative act. At that moment He experienced a change. Time was born, and God entered into the temporal realm He created. See http://www.onenesspentecostal.com/divineeternity.htm for a summary of Craig’s argument.
Jason
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January 29, 2012 at 11:50 pm
It seems you are using logic to try and prove God’s existence. Give up. It can’t be done; it can’t be proven. Fools may fall for this, but you are doing them a disservice. Tricking people into believing in your concept of God will not help them. The only way to find faith is through experiencing truth for yourself through introspection, contemplation, prayer.
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January 30, 2012 at 12:14 am
Why should I believe what you are saying? I know personally that there are good reasons to believe God exists, and I also know by experience that many people come to believe in God’s existence due to intellectual reasons. While experience is part of the package, it’s not all there is to it.
And why wouldn’t logic reveal the existence of God if God is a logical being Himself? Why would we expect that our minds are incapable of leading us to God when God is the one who created our minds, and created them to know Him?
Jason
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June 11, 2012 at 5:14 pm
[…] from the fact that all of the evidence points to a temporally finite universe and a temporally finite multiverse (if a multiverse even […]
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June 15, 2012 at 5:47 pm
Who or what created God?
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June 18, 2012 at 9:31 am
Monte,
No one. As an eternal being, God has no cause. Only things that begin to exist require a transcendent cause to bring them into being.
Jason
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February 12, 2013 at 11:22 am
[…] finitude of physical reality, even if physical reality extends beyond the Big Bang (see here and here). And yet, scientists continue to come up with mathematical models that permit an eternal […]
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February 21, 2014 at 7:40 am
[…] a beginning, then the question of what caused the universe to come into being needs to be answered. Alexander Vilenkin: Then if there was even a slight doubt left as to what he meant he then put that to rest buy going […]
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February 27, 2014 at 8:06 am
“This sounded too much like the creation ex nihilo of Genesis”
Well, it also sounds like creation ex nihilo as expressed in EVERY creation myth ever dreamed up by man. Try on the Vedas for size, or any of the numerous Aboriginal creation “dreams” and you’ll see what i mean.
Now, do remember, the BGV only uses classical physics which Vilenkin admits breaks down. As Vilenkin wrote in Inflationary Spacetimes are not Past-Complete:
“Whatever the possibilities for the boundary, it is clear that unless the averaged expansion condition can somehow be avoided for all past-directed geodesics, inflation alone is not sufficient to provide a complete description of the Universe, and some new physics is necessary in order to determine the correct conditions at the boundary [20]. This is the chief result of our paper.”
You see, inflation wipes out any information that existed about the Universe before inflation. Except for the last 10-20-to-10-36 seconds of inflation (depending on the exact model parameters you choose), we have zero information in our Universe today about what happened prior to that.With that in mind, the phrase you are in fact looking for is: “we don’t know what was happening pre-inflation/BB, and won’t know until we have a working theory of quantum gravity.”
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June 2, 2014 at 9:36 pm
In reply to John Zande:
I think there is a deep misunderstanding here about the meaning of ‘nothing.’
‘Nothing’ does not exist. If ‘quantum gravity’ exists, it is NOT ‘nothing’.
If GOD exists, He is NOT ‘nothing’.
If there is something, than there is NOT ‘nothing’.
With this in mind, the question or the phrase you are in fact looking for is: Why is there something rather than nothing?
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May 17, 2019 at 9:50 am
There is much confusion over terms in this debate over the Borde, Guth, Vilenkin, (BGV Theorem) – The Big Bang was the BEGINNING of the universe CAUSED from NOTHING – therefore God. Let’s break it down, Alexander Vilenkin, one if BGV Theorem authors said the theorem “does not prove the universe had a beginning, only that inflation had a beginning.” The Inflation is the expansion of the universe (Before the Big Bang: A Multiverse from “Nothing” APRIL 21, 2019, https://www.patheos.com/blogs/tippling/2019/04/21/before-the-big-bang-a-multiverse-from-nothing/
So what was the beginning? He says that it took matter and gravitational energy to create the Big Bang so the BEGINNING had a CAUSE. (See “Alexander Vilenkin – Why is There ‘Something’ Rather Than ‘Nothing’?” 1:00 https://youtu.be/PSESZR3wC8s
Ok, but what did he mean, in the original theorem that the Big Bang came from NOTHING? In his mathematical formula that describes the moment when the Big Bang took place, matter, gravity and time were in a balance – canceling each other out to zero in the equation. Like an ascending ball reaches the highest point just before it descends – if you capture that very moment in a mathematical formula the ball has a Zero vertical velocity – upward velocity cancels gravity = 0. Just before it falls, the most unstable moment, the formula indicates the ball has stopped but a moment later it is falling to earth – the moment before the Big Bang the mathematical formula says the sum of time, gravity and matter are zero – the most unstable moment – then POW the Big Bang!
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March 24, 2022 at 7:43 am
Randy?
If the evidence was overwhelming, more people would agree with you.
I also suggest your atheist friend is unusual. I don’t give the existence of a god anymore thought than I do the existence of Big Foot. I just don’t care.
Your God can keep allowing the molestation of kids, plagues, murder, rape, natural disasters….. but thankfully he can’t give us Polio anymore. Science took care of that one. “Thanks science”.
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