(the image seen here is known to cosmologists as "the eye of God"...wow...some beautiful stuff out there and we have just begun searching)
Delusion: a false belief or opinion
I have two questions I'm considering today:
1) Are there any good reasons to believe that belief in God is false (a delusion)?
2) Are there any good reasons to believe that belief in God is true?
The first question is one which I welcome the non-believing community to answer. I'd enjoy hearing what you have to say in response to question #1.
The second question is one which I, as a believer, should be expected to have a response for, as the Bible says, "in season and out of season be prepared to give a response for the hope that is in you."
So here is my first good reason (others will follow) why belief in God is the right choice:
#1 -- God is the best explanation of the origin of the universe.
Ask yourself, why does the universe exist? Or better, why does anything exist? Typically and historically, but not exclusively, atheists have argued here that the universe is "eternal and uncaused." I believe there are good reasons to doubt this is the case.
A) because the idea of an infinite past seems absurd...infinity may exist in our minds as a concept, however it does not exist in reality.
B) because modern science opposes this view with increasing magnitude...David Hilbert, one of the great mathematicians of the 20th Century said, "the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature, nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought. The role that remains for the infinite to play is solely that of an idea."
Therefore, the number of past events in the universe must be finite. Therefore the universe must be finite. Therefore, there must have been a beginning.
Adding to this, the scientific data from the fields of Astronomy and Astrophysics agree. In fact, today we have strong evidence that the universe is not eternal in the past but instead had an absolute beginning approximately some 13 to 15 billion years ago in a cataclysmic event that modern scientists refer to as the "Big Bang."
(Please keep in mind that I am not quoting from the Bible as a source for scientific data in this article, yet some of the concepts coming from science will sound eerily similar to what the Bible says happened--makes me wonder????)
What makes the above "Big Bang" explanation so startling is that it represents the origin of the universe from literally nothing. Yes, even some of the most well respected scientists in the world can be quoted as believing that all matter and energy, even physical space and time, came into being in one cataclysmic event known as the Big Bang. One such scientist, the physicist PCW Davies said, "the coming into being of the universe as discussed in modern science is not just a matter of imposing some sort of organization upon a previous incoherent state, but literally the coming into being of all physical things from nothing."
Although other alternate theories exist, none have commended themselves to the scientific community as more plausible than the above described Big Bang theory.
In 2003, three outstanding and well-respected cosmologists, Arvin Borde, Allen Guth, and Alexander Vilenkin, together are said to have proved the above theory and referred to this proof as applying to any universe. Vilenkin writes, "it is said that an argument is what convinces reasonable men, and a proof is what it takes to convince even an unreasonable man. With the proof now in place cosmologists can no longer hide behind the possibility of a past eternal universe. There is no escape, they have to face the problem of a cosmic beginning."
Anthony Kenney of Oxford University writes, "a proponent of the Big Bang theory, at least if he is an atheist, must believe that the universe come from nothing and by nothing."
But, does such a notion make any sense? Surely not!
In philosophical terms, the out-of-nothing reality comes into a head on collision with the most successful ontological commitment in the history of science, namely the metaphysical principle that out of nothing, nothing comes.
Therefore, we must ask--why does the universe exist?
The only possible response to this question is that there must have been a first cause. Whatever begins to exist has a cause. The universe exists. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
There is so much more to add to this, but in the blogosphere I have already exceeded the average readerships attention span so I'll quit with this one final thought...wow, I'm starting to feel like the Bible was well ahead of its time. Cosmology is just now catching up to what the Bible says in its first four words..."in the beginning God."
