God and Science

Science and the Bible

King’s College, London

6/11/2014

John Oakes PhD

www.evidenceforchristianity.org

Thomas Huxley, Darwin’s “bulldog”

“We are as much the

product of blind forces

as is the falling of a

stone to earth, or the

ebb and flow of the

tides. We have just

happened, and man was

made flesh by a series

of singularly beneficial

accidents.”

RICHARD DAWKINS

In the universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt and other people are going to get lucky: and you won’t find any rhyme or reason to it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is at the bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good. Nothing but blind, pitiless indifference. DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is, and we dance to its music.

Accident or Design?

William

Paley

The Teleological Argument

Evidence for Design in Nature

The Anthropic Principle

Boeing 747

Design or

Accident?

1. Ideal solvent to support life (dissolves ions and

molecules

2. Right boiling and melting points

3. High specific heat

4. Solid floats on liquid

5. Contracts from 0 to 4 degrees centigrade

Water

Designed Elements?

Carbon: The Central Element of

Life

3-D molecules

Large, complex yet flexible

molecules

The Ozone Layer:

Is oxygen a designed element?

NO URANIUM, NO PLATE TECTONICS

a) b)

DNA

Protein

Nature creates order, but not information

A House of

Cards: Order

and

Information.

A much better

analogy for

living things.

Simplest life form: break it down

• E. coli: about 1 trillion bits of information.

• E. coli have 3000-4000 different proteins.

• DNA and RNA to make and be made by

these proteins.

• Lipids (membrane), Carbohydrates, etc.

• The simplest living cell is an unimaginably

complex nano factory

Charles Darwin

“It is mere rubbish

to think at this

point of the origin

of life. One might

as well think of the

origin of matter.”

Science before the 1950s:

The universe was NOT created.

Hebrews 11:3

“By faith we understand that the universe was

created… so that what is seen has been made from things that are

not visible.”

Genesis 1:3

God said “Let there be light,” and there was light.

The Big Bang

· 1929 Hubble. The Red Shift: The universe is expanding.

· 1965 Penzias and Wilson, background microwave radiation.

Physicists now:

The universe was created.

Physics:

The Finely Tuned Universe

.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001

Fine Tuning of the Universe

Constant A Little Bigger A Little Smaller

1. Gravitational constant very short-lived stars no stars

2. Ratio of electrons to protons no stars or galaxies no stars or galaxies

3. Strong Nuclear Force no hydrogen, fusion only hydrogen

4. Weak Nuclear Force all H2 He at big bang no He at big bang

no heavy elements

5. Electric Force no chemical bonding no chemical bonding

6. Expansion rate of universe no galaxies universe collapses quickly

7. Ratio of matter to antimatter too much radiation for life not enough matter

for galaxies to form

and many more….

A finely-tuned

instrument

built by

humans. Good

to one part in a

billion?

Fred Hoyle on Fine-Tuning

“… a super-intellect has monkeyed with

physics, as well as with chemistry and

biology.”

Antony Flew Considers God...

Flew is increasingly persuaded that some sort of Deity brought about this universe. He says he has in mind something like the God of Aristotle, a distant, impersonal "prime mover." It might not even be conscious, but a mere force. In formal terms, he regards the existence of this minimal God as a hypothesis that, at present, is perhaps the best explanation for why a universe exists that can produce complex life

The Right Kind of GalaxySpiral Irregular

Eliptical

The Right Galaxy

• Our galaxy is a spiral, which produces

stars over much of its history.

• Not an elliptical, where star formation ends

before there are many heavy elements.

• Not an irregular, where radiation events

would have destroyed life.

The Right Star Location

• Right distance from center of galaxy:

- Closer: too much radiation, disruptive gravity

- Further: too few heavy elements

• Right relation to supernovae:

- More or closer: exterminate life

- Less or further: too few heavy elements

• Right number of stars in system

- Zero – pretty cold!

- Two or more – unstable orbits if planets at all.

The Right Kind of Star

The Goldilocks Star

The Right Kind of Planet

Right distance

Rocky planet with plenty of

oxygen and water

Thin, light planetary “crust”

Huge moon for stable

planetary rotation

Conclusion:

“Since the creation of the world God’s

invisible qualities—his eternal power and

divine nature—have been clearly seen,

being understood from what has been

made, so that men are without excuse.”

Romans 1:20

The heavens declare the glory of God; the

skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day

after day they pour fourth speech. Night

after night they display knowledge

Psalms 19:1-2

Part II

Science and the Bible

Delos B. McKown:

“Christianity is scientifically unsupported and

probably insupportable, philosophically suspect at

best and disreputable at worst, and historically

fraudulent.”

Papyrus Ebers

The Ebers Papyrus:

“To prevent hair from turning gray, anoint it with the blood of a calf which has been boiled in oil or with the fat of a rattlesnake.”

“A mixture of six fats, namely those of the horse, the hippopotamus, the crocodile, the cat, the snake and the ibex.... to prevent hair loss.”

Drugs of Choice in Papyrus Ebers:

• Lizards blood

• Swine’s teeth

• Putrid meat

• Moisture from Pigs’ ears

• Excreta from animals including human

beings, donkeys, antelope, dogs, cats and

flies

“I will not bring on you any of these diseases...”

Exodus 15:26

“The pig... is unclean for you...those that walk on their paws...the weasel, the rat...are unclean for you.”

Leviticus 11

“The sting of a hornet is healed by the house-fly, crushed and applied to the wound.”

“The gnat, feeble creature, taking in food but never secreting it is a specific against the poison of the viper.”

An ancient Hebrew medical manuscript.

“Whoever touches the dead body of anyone will be unclean for seven days. He must purify himself with the water on the third and seventh day...take some hyssop, dip it in the water and sprinkle the tent and furnishings and the people who were there.”

Numbers 19

Semelweiss

Vienna, 1847

• In maternity wards one out of

every six women dies.

• Obstetricians ascribe deaths to

constipation, fear and poisonous

air.

Death Rate falls from

18% to 0.5%

Thymol: A Powerful Disinfectant

“As long as he has the infection he

remains unclean. He must live alone;

he must live outside the camp.”

Quarantine for infectious disease

Leviticus 13:46

LEPROSY

• Killed millions of people in Europe and

around the world for thousands of years.

• “Fear of all other diseases taken together

can hardly be compared to the terror

spread by leprosy.”

—Dr. George Rosen

Leprosy

MEDICAL COMMUNITY HAD

NO ANSWERS

They taught that it was brought on by eating hot food, pepper, garlic and the meat of diseased hogs.

Other physicians said it was caused by a malign conjunction of the planets.

Leviticus 13:46

“As long as he has the infection he remains unclean. He must live alone; he must live

outside the camp.”

The life is in the blood

Leviticus 17:14 “… the life of every

creature is in its blood. That is why I have

said to the Israelites, ‘You must not eat the

blood of any creature, because the life of

every creature is its blood; anyone who eats

it must be cut off.’ ”

Bloodletting

The most common medical practice

in 1700s and 1800s

1693).

George Tiemann & Co. American armamentarium

Bloodletting Instruments from 1800s

“For the generations to come, every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised...”

Genesis 17:12

Vitamin K

Prothrombin: a clotting protein.

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

days

% o

f n

orm

al

Clotting Protein Peaks on Day Eight

Available Prothrombin

Day

Circumcised

Number of Hebrew

Boys

Number of Deaths

1 823 4

3 759 6

5 693 8

7 855 3

9 770 2

11 698 4

How Did Abraham Pick the Eighth Day?

Other reasons I believe the Bible is

inspired by God

Fulfilled messianic prophecies

Fufilled types, prefigures and foreshadows

Historical accuracy

Consistency of message and lack of

contradiction

2 Tim 3:16 All scripture is inspired by God….