There really aren’t Natural Laws. This may seem an odd statement, but the universe seems to appear just as if nothing is guiding it from a book of rules. Things that seem like rules, such as the conservation of energy and Newton’s laws of motion turn out to be nothing more than what you would expect if there is nothing special about any given position in time, or space, or any state of motion. If there was some kind of rule that was different at different times, then energy would not be conserved, for example. Also, things stay more or less the same over time because the universe is, typically, pretty empty and almost as cold as it is possible to get. I have used a phrase to describe the universe: “barely shaped nothingness”.

Posted: November 4th 2009

See all questions answered by Steve Zara

Swinburne argues that the existence of consistent, natural laws implies an intelligent creator. It seems to me that if there were no consistent natural laws, you could use this fact to argue for the same thing. Why not?

Swinburne has to show that the appearance of a universe with coherent physics is somehow less likely than a universe with incoherent physics. In order to make his argument convincing, he has to show that the likelihood of incoherent physics is so overwhelming that its absence is reason enough to believe that some force tipped the scales. However, there’s no way to make these arguments without evidence of what makes some universes possible and others not. No such evidence is to be found.

Now that I have shown that the entire argument is bogus, I should like to point out a specific error in the way he makes his point, an example of confusing the map with the territory. He conflates nature and science. Science is the study of nature. Whereas science is limited in its ability to describe nature according to the weaknesses of scientists, limits for science are not limits for nature. Nature may have laws that are impossible for us to determine.

In the following quotation from the above link, he refers to the orderly behavior of the universe in terms of 'power and liabilities’; electrons have certain 'powers’, e.g. acting on charged bodies via coulombs law, and 'liabilities’, e.g. they are annihilated by contact with positrons.

...science cannot explain why all bodies do possess the same very general powers and liabilities. It is with this fact that scientific explanation stops. So either the orderliness of nature is where all explanation stops, or we must postulate an agent of great power and knowledge who brings about through his continuous action that bodies have the same very general powers and liabilities (that the most general natural laws operate); and, once again, the simplest such agent to postulate is one of infinite power, knowledge, and freedom, i.e. God.

By conflating science with nature, he presents us with a false dichotomy. Swinburne argues, rightly or wrongly, that science cannot explain the orderliness of nature. He then argues that either there is no explanation for this orderliness, or the explanation must be God. The fallacy in the argument is using the premise that there can be no scientific explanation for order to conclude that there can be no natural explanation. He denies the possibility that there may be something essential about existence that requires a certain form of order. In other words, he denies that our natural laws may be the only possible natural laws.

Swinburne applies the principle that the simplest explanation is usually best, so let me do the same. The simplest addition to scientific understanding of nature that would explain order is not some intelligent agent that somehow “exists outside the universe”, but rather a natural property of universes which requires order. Mind you, I am not aware of such a property, but that’s beside the point. If, as Swinburne claims, the orderliness of the universe is so peculiar as to demand explanation, I offer an alternative to his bizarre suggestion that a non-corporeal, universe creating, intelligent spirit is the simplest possible choice.

Posted: October 30th 2009

See all questions answered by George Locke

Swinburne’s argument is a philosophical one.

If you look at the history of philosophy, you will find that many of the philosophical questions of today are the same ones that were discussed thousands of years ago.

If you can’t settle a question in that amount of time, I think it’s pretty clear that you have no yardstick by which to measure the quality of your answer.

This realization led me to quickly become disinterested in philosophy as a study. The path of planets around the sun is a question you can answer. The nature of truth is not.

(I do find ethics to be an interesting area of study)

Swinburne’s argument is somewhat typical of philosophical argument – it has a lot of explanation, and a lot of examples, but it has some underlying assumptions that rest on a shaky foundation.

First, when talking of probability, it is critical to know the overall population. We don’t know whether our universe is the only 1, 1 of 100, or 1 of billions.

Second, we have no idea about the coupling of physical laws. It may be that a universe can only exist if, rather than being independent, certain fundamental constants are linked together.

Third, it’s very easy to make a mistake around probability after the fact.

If you deal me five cards from a deck of 52, the chances of me getting that specific hand are about 1 in 2.6 million. How lucky am I to get a hand against such long odds.

So, I think it’s silly to spend a ton of time constructing an argument on such shaky foundations.

From a theological perspective, Swinburne is also on shaky ground. Swinburne has already concluded that he knows what God’s character is, and therefore can deduce what sort of universe god would create. This is pretty obviously a circular argument…

Posted: October 30th 2009

See all questions answered by Eric_PK

I don’t explain temporal order. Currently no one is in a position to do anything but speculate about it.

To simplify somewhat Swinburne is claiming that the fact of the uniformity of nature (the way the universe works in predictable ways and seems to behave in accordance to what we call 'natural laws’) is best explained by appealing to God.

To anyone who’s not a theist it’s obvious that this 'explanation’ generates more problems than it solves. Here are a few snags:

How can anything outside of spacetime be meaningfully said to think or to have an identity? (prerequisites of personhood).

How can an entity without a brain have intention?

As far as we know, no such thing as a person without a body exists. We have no clear idea of what the phrase 'a person without a body’ even means. So far theists have failed to render this concept intelligible.

This is just the tip of the iceberg as far as reasons that God is not a sensible solution to the question of why the universe seems uniform.

Posted: October 29th 2009

See all questions answered by bitbutter