As the 20th century dawned, most people believed in God. Toward the second half of the century, USA and European buildings containing believers began to empty at an increasing rate creating a secular Western world. During that time, my own education did not convince me that God mattered too much, but I felt that everyone should believe in something. This is where we came in.

Since I started writing about God in the 21^st century, the pro-God evidence has begun to pile up.  Before sharing this new evidence, let me summarize some of my past arguments.  Previously, without arguing that God exists, I observed that believers in God are more ethical, make better neighbors, and generally make the world better.  I definitely think the World works better when people are believers. 

Atheists: “Religion is Evil”

In contrast, 20th century atheists, led by Dawkins, Hitchens, etc., made a case that, over the millennia, Holy Wars conducted by believers, were the world’s biggest problem.  Secular feeling ran so strong in the late 20^th century (and after 9/11) that atheists seemed to have a point.  Still, a balanced look at the 20^th century tells another story.

Atheist Dictators Run Amok in 20th Century

Atheists were rare, and had little impact until the 20^th Century, which was definitely their heyday.  Ignoring the contributions of lesser-known atheists, it can be argued that Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, and Castro (all avowed, doctrinaire atheists) did more harm than all previous Holy War mongers throughout History.  This argument is simply validated by using the number extra-judicial executions as the metric of evil.  Simply put, these atheists killed more innocent people than all the theists in history.     

Leaving statistics aside, and going poetic, Nietzsche’s 19^th century statement that the death of God would lead to big ethical problems now seems, if anything, understated, and visionary, as well.  Solzhenitsyn was channeling Nietzche when he said that Stalin, Hitler, Mao (and their ilk) could not have performed mass executions of innocent humans if they had believed that God was watching.  As non-believers, they were liberated to sin.

Oh, God

In the past, I said that my favorite representation of a pro-God world view is the one dramatized by George Burns in the movie Oh, God.  In this gem, God (Burns) corners a disciple (John Denver) and tells him God has created the Universe and has given man everything he needs.  Having created the Universe, he is now done.  “I gave you everything you need.  Now, it’s up to you (mankind).”

In Burns’ worldview, God is the Creator, but declines further participation in worldly events.  This position is quite consistent with that of our ultimate scientist, Albert Einstein, who argued against quantum theory, saying “God does not play dice”.  Clearly, Einstein, a champion of reason, had enough confidence in man’s independent agency to advocate creation of an atomic bomb and Hitler’s defeat.  This same quote demonstrates Einstein’s strong belief in a Creation.  

I used to view the “Oh, God” worldview as consistent with Nietzche’s suggestion that humans created their own Gods in pre-history, began to kill them off in the 19^th Century, finishing the job in the 20^{th (}“God is Dead”).  In this view, man created God, rather than God creating man.

New Science Creates Doubts About Darwin

In the 20^th Century, especially since 1957, evidence has been appearing in support of a Creation.  A new breed of mathematical biologists has taken up a cudgel against Darwin arguing from now-established laws of the genetic code, that the origin of new species that arise from existing species via random mutations (evolution) is statistically unlikely in the extreme, essentially impossible.

In his own time, Darwin’s theory was attacked, and he admitted a weakness in his argument was that extensive data from the fossil record had so far failed to produce a single, definitive example of the origin of a new species created via evolution.  Since Darwin’s time, a greatly increased fossil record has produced an ever-increasing number of “new species”, with yet little evidence of corresponding evolutionary pre-cursors.

Independent of other evidence, neo-creationist scientists are now using the so-called “Big Bang” as powerful evidence of a finite Creation event that argues against gradual evolution

These three 20^th Century findings, assembled in the 21st, have begun to shake the confidence of neo-Darwinists, especially when viewed in a balanced perspective.  Evolution was always a legitimate social and biological mechanism, and was championed before (and after) Darwin, by Herbert Spencer, among others.  Darwin’s distinction was his idea that evolution (via random mutations) is the only tenable mechanism for the “Origin of Species and the Descent of Man”. 

In his time, while under attack by the traditional religious world, Darwin was supported by an elite corps of intellectuals who desired to discredit the clergy (their cultural competitors) by invalidating the idea of a Creation.  If each individual were to honestly examine his/her own beliefs about The Origin of Species, most would admit that a strong belief in the Creation makes Darwin hard to swallow.  Conversely, strong doubts about the Creation, make Darwin’s theory seem appealing, even intoxicating.

Despite the inner power of belief or skepticism about Creation, scientists, since Darwin, have argued that a strong belief in God (or in The Creation) is not factual data and cannot be used as “evidence” against The Origin of Species.  If so, for the exact same reason, a strong belief in atheism is not factual data and cannot be used as evidence in favor of The Origin of Species.

Here is what has changed since 1957.   Whatever you think about God, a growing corps of scientists now sees the origin of species via random mutations as extremely unlikely.  At the same time, they cite the Big Bang and the inability of the growing fossil record to document species creation as evidence of a Creation event.  So, neo-creationist scientists have three separate pieces of evidence that argue against gradual evolution and in favor of Creation.

If Darwin is Out, Can God Return?

Many scientists who now argue against Darwin, shrug their shoulders about God, but support some sort of Creation event.  Dennis Prager, a polymath who produces educational programs (PragerU) on the internet, says a strong case for God can be made using inductive logic.  I see Prager’s argument as following the same approach as Ayn Rand’s axiomatic concepts.

Ayn Rand said that Existence, Identity, and Consciousness are ”axiomatic concepts”. That is, you can’t prove them by measurement or deduction, but you are a fool if you don’t believe in them.  You prove them inductively by asserting (or assuming) them as axioms, and then seeing what happens.  If you go around assuming Existence, Identity, and Consciousness, then the World (and everything in it) begins to make sense.  If you do not believe the axiomatic concepts, nothing makes sense. Without axiomatic concepts, you are left with the world of nihilism, existentialism, and other isms that believe little or nothing.     

Prager would say that if you go around believing in God (and in a Creation) each day, the World will begin to make more sense, and you will tend to be more successful and happy than if you didn’t believe.  In Prager’s view, this is an inductive proof that God exists, and is the Creator.

This makes more sense to me than the other approaches to the so-called “problem of God”.   

Categories: Commentary

Tags: christianity, evolution, god, religion, science