Acritical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

A CRITICAL REVIEW OF STEPHEN HAWKING’S GODLESS UNIVERSE

Junaid Hassan, M.Phil., Ph.D.

A Foundation for Islamic Research and Education

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher except for the brief quotations in critical reviews or articles.

Cover photograph by courtesy of Truls Tiller; taken at Ullsfjorden, Norway, on Dec. 30, 2011. All quotations and interpretations of the Quran are based on Ghamidi (2018a) and Islahi (2009).

With names of prophets, a Muslim reader is expected to consider a prayer peace be upon him/them) implicit in the) عليه/علهيم السالم or صىل هللا عليه وسمل like text. A non-Muslim reader may read the title ‘Prophet(s)’ as ‘the acclaimed Prophet(s)’.

Publisher: Al-Mawrid Printer: Fine Printers 1st Edition: July 2019 Price ISBN: 978-969-681-026-1 Address: P.O. Box 5185, Lahore, Pakistan www.al-mawrid.org [email protected]

Contents

Preface 9 Introduction 11 In search of ultimate answers: metaphysics, religion, and science 11 The limits of science 13 The blind following of scientists is no less hazardous 15 Following where reason and evidence lead 18 A probe into Stephen W. Hawking’s Godless cosmology 19 1. What is a law of nature? 22 Prevalent definition in science 22 Definition of The Grand Design (TGD) 23 Governing laws 24 The term ‘laws of nature/science’ is misleading. 25 No external laws, but inherent powers of particulars ‘governing’ their individual and collaborative behaviours/effects 26 2. Do fixed laws leave any room for human free will and God’s intervention (miracles) in the universe? 29 Scientific determinism and free will 30 From laws to scientific determinism 30 No human being or society can function without a firm belief in free will. 31 Naturalism and religion on evolution and free will [reductive/non- reductive physicalism] 33 Rejection or acceptance of free will depends on one’s worldview, not science 38 Divinely-integrated dualism 41 Cartesian dualism 43 Religious determinism 46 Miracles 47 Have regularities in nature rendered God’s intervention in the universe (miracles) impossible? 47

Miracles and their purpose 49 3. Where do laws come from? 51 Fundamental laws: a consequence of M-theory 52 M-theory allowing for 10500 universes ≠ Presence of 10500 universes [many-worlds interpretation] 54 The law of gravity – a consequence of M-theory? 55 4. How could quantum theory and the law of gravity necessitate a universe out of nothing? 59 Spontaneous emergence of the universe out of nothing [quantum fluctuations; virtual particles] 60 The law of gravity necessitating the formation of matter 61 Negative and positive energies 63 Gravity, inflation, and the spontaneous creation of matter [repulsive gravity; free-lunch/zero-energy hypothesis] 65 Quantum vacuum is manifestly not nothing! 69 Has physics rendered creatio ex nihilo impossible? [Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle] 71 ‘Nothing’, once again, turns out to be something! [pre-existing spacetime and the repulsive-gravity material] 72 5. Is it time to celebrate/mourn a personal God’s death? 77 Model-dependent realism 78 Model-dependent realism leaves no room for truth or ontological claims, such as ‘God does or does not exist’. 80 Are laws self-explanatory? 82 God or the multiverse? 85 Why is there something rather than nothing? 90 It’s the question of potential! [inherent potentials of spacetime and primitive energy] 91 A desperate measure to get rid of God [levels of explanation; material cause; formal cause; efficient cause; final cause] 94 Does the ‘no boundary condition’ render God unnecessary? [atemporal act of creation] 96 Who created God? [‘atheistic’ anthropomorphism; self-explanation] 99 Conclusion [God, cosmological evolution, and that by natural

selection] 102 Epilogue: God and His Grand Scheme 108 The Meaning of it All 109 A petty purpose of a great God? 111 Judgement – an objectionable idea? 111 Eternal retribution? 112 An unjust accountability? 116 If there is a God, why is He hiding from us? 120 The Problem of Evil 122 The Quest for truth 136 Bibliography 138

To Ellinor, Harris, Aléa, Ibrahim, Ayaan, Aden, Hana, Zamad, Angelina, Imaan, Adam, Amina, Sophia, and all those young ones who will, sooner or later, ponder upon ultimate questions of life

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and Sajid Shahbaz Khan (aka Sajid Hameed) for their readily available guidance, valuable input, and constructive advice. I must thank Dr. Rani Lill Anjum and Dr. Fredrik Andersen (Norwegian University of Life Sciences) for inspiring me to do philosophy, encouraging me to start drafting the present work as a term-paper in their philosophy course, providing useful literature, interesting discussions, and a very happy time together. My thanks are also due to my wife, Selina Köhr, for her encouragement and support, despite my philosophical wanderings, absent-mindedness, and lack of response. Finally, I must show gratitude to Al-Mawrid, Pakistan, for funding and publishing this work. My special thanks are due to Dr. Aamer Abdullah, Jawad Ahmed Ghamidi, Azhar Ameer, Hasnain Ashraf, Muhammad Mushtaq, and Azeem Ayub.

Preface

‘Temperate, sincere, and intelligent inquiry and discussion are only to be dreaded by the advocates of error. The truth need not fear them.’ James Rush Provisions of the Last Will and Testament of Dr. James Rush (1869), 13

rrogance – presupposing that all with a different viewpoint to ours are simpletons or wrong, ego- Asatisfaction – ridiculing stereotypes of an opposing school-of-thought, self-deception – blind faith or evading the evidence opposing our views, self-consolation – getting false reassurance by the like-minded, submission to in vogue views in the name of modernity, and know-it-all disposition after a superficial survey of our opponents’ views, unfortunately, are still ubiquitous attitudes of so-called seekers and bearers of truth in the modern world. Our topic here – the all-important theism and atheism1 discussion – is no exception to this, even at the academic level. This short book is written to urge both the camps to listen to each other with due respect, follow evidence and one another’s arguments to conclusions, engage in a constructive debate, and approach this disagreement in a rational and academic manner. Although I exclusively belong to one of the two camps, I have tried to sincerely understand arguments of both sides and present them as impartially and plainly as I could. To

1 Despite nuances of meaning, the terms ‘atheism’ and ‘naturalism’ will be synonymously used in the text.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe represent the naturalistic worldview, Stephen Hawking’s narrative is used, as it is his Godless universe we intend to explore here. Surely, not all naturalists endorse all of Hawking’s views, so this book by no means represents all major views within naturalism. The same goes for theism. In accepting or rejecting a view or drawing my own conclusions, I have tried my best to listen to the voice of my conscience and follow reason and evidence. I hope this humble attempt will pave the way for a small step forward in our quest for knowledge, truth, and enlightenment.

Junaid Hassan Moss, Norway 2018

Introduction

‘There is no quicker way for a scientist to bring discredit upon himself and upon his profession than roundly to declare […] that science knows, or soon will know, the answers to all questions worth asking, and that questions which do not admit a scientific answer are in some way non-questions or “pseudo-questions” that only simpletons ask and only the gullible profess to be able to answer.’ Peter B. Medawar, Nobel Laureate in Physiology/Medicine (1960) Advice to a Young Scientist (1979), 31 ‘The existence of a limit to science is, however, made clear by its inability to answer childlike elementary questions having to do with first and last things – questions such as “How did everything begin?”; “What are we all here for?”; “What is the point of living?” […] It is not to science, therefore, but to metaphysics, imaginative literature, or religion that we must turn for answers to questions having to do with first and last things.’ Peter B. Medawar The Limits of Science (1984), 59-60

In search of ultimate answers: metaphysics, religion, and science heoretical contributions of science, particularly in biology and physics,2 have prompted many scientists to T directly or indirectly make their way into the realm of

2 For instance, the theory of evolution and the multiverse theory, respectively

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe religion and philosophy. With immense intellectual and technological success of science in the physical world, we are now lured to set hopes on scientists, instead of philosophers or theologians, to unravel metaphysical3 mysteries of the

3 Metaphysics, a major branch of philosophy, may be understood by comparing its scope and methodology with that of physics. Concerning scope, metaphysics deals with ultimate questions, whereas physics typically deals with practical questions, avoiding the ultimate. For example, the metaphysician may ask if there really exists a world around us, or it is something like a virtual reality created by our minds or by some being(s) in control of our minds. The physicist, in contrast, would take the external world as given and start exploring it with whatever means available, typically asking questions like these: What are the fundamental forces operating in the universe? What makes up the material universe? How do ships float on the water surface? Why is it easier to walk downhill than uphill? How do natural systems work? Regarding the methodology, the metaphysician uses logic and reasoning to reach a conclusion. Physicists do the same but, in addition, pay special attention to observation and experimentation to gain knowledge. For example, based on reason, Aristotle – the father of metaphysics – postulated that objects fall at speed proportional to their mass. After almost 2000 years, however, Galileo – the father of modern science/physics – thought of an experiment, which ultimately falsified Aristotle’s hypothesis. In metaphysics, such experimentation – the hallmark of physics – is not undertaken. That is why those mathematical proofs or (rational) hypotheses of theoretical physics that lack empirical evidence (observation and experimentation) are often compared with metaphysics. E = m × c2 was such a mathematical proof when proposed by Einstein in 1905, but experimental physics has accumulated so much evidence for it to date that it is now regarded a scientific reality. For a very short and useful overview, see Spitzer, Robert. “What is the difference

Introduction universe as well. We are keen to know what scientists have to say about ultimate questions of life pertaining to the existence of God, ultimate cause of the universe, human soul/mind, purpose of life, determinism/free will, eternity, resurrection, true nature of reality, and so on. ‘Philosophy is dead,’ claims Stephen Hawking. ‘Philosophy has not kept up with modern developments in science, particularly physics. Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest of knowledge.’ (Hawking and Mlodinow 2010, 5) Caution must be taken here for, at least, two reasons: 1. The limits of science Great achievements of science in the physical world is no guarantee of its success in the metaphysical world, too. Scientific method4 appears to be inherently inadequate to answer metaphysical questions5, such as whether our senses between metaphysics and physics, and what are the limits of each?” 2016. Available from: www.magiscenter.com/difference-between-metaphysics-physics- limit 4 ‘Contrary to popular impression, there is no one agreed scientific method, though certain elements crop up regularly in attempts to describe what “scientific” activity involves: hypothesis, experiment, data, evidence, modified hypothesis, theory, prediction, explanation, and so on.’ (Lennox 2009, 32) For a typical description of scientific method, see Bradford, Alina. “What Is Science?” 2017. Available from: www.livescience.com/20896-science-scientific-method.html 5 One may argue that it cannot be said about all metaphysical questions; for instance, theoretical together with experimental physics has provided insights into or given useful directions to

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe and scientific instruments reveal the real picture of reality (See Medawar 1985). It seems extremely implausible, if not impossible, to design an experiment to confirm or falsify this. Thus, Hawking and Mlodinow (2010, 42) write: ‘How do we know we are not just characters in a computer- generated soap opera? If we lived in a synthetic imaginary world, events would not necessarily have any logic or consistency or obey any laws. The aliens in control might find it more interesting or amusing to see our reactions, for example, if the full moon split in half. […] But if the aliens did enforce consistent laws, there is no way we could tell there was another reality behind the simulated one.’ Similarly, questions of morality – without which no human or, at least, humanly life can be imagined – are beyond the scope of science, such as whether or not murder, rape, or violence is evil; or truth, justice, or faithfulness are to be cherished. Albert Einstein made this point with utmost clarity when he said the following, as quoted by one of his close colleagues, Max Jammer (2002, 69): ‘Einstein declared that our moral judgements, or sense of beauty, and religious instincts are “tributary forms in helping the reasoning faculty towards its highest achievements. You are right in speaking of the moral foundations of science, but you cannot turn round and speak of the scientific foundations of morality." Einstein proceeded to point out that science cannot form a base for morality: "every attempt to reduce approach metaphysical questions about, e.g., the reality of time and space. Those sceptics, however, would not agree who do not trust our senses, instruments, and reasoning as sources of authentic knowledge.

Introduction ethics to scientific formulae must fail".’ Richard Feynman (2005, 33 & 43), Nobel Laureate in Physics (1965), also expressed a similar view when he argued that ‘the sciences do not directly teach good or bad’, and that ‘ethical values lie outside the scientific realm’. However, the inability of science to answer ultimate questions pertaining to metaphysics, purpose, morality, and so forth does not undermine it. Rather, it only reminds us of the scope and limits of science. Medawar (1984, xiii) elegantly illustrated this point as follows: ‘Science is a great and glorious enterprise – the most successful, I argue, that human beings have ever engaged in. To reproach it for its inability to answer all the questions we should like to put to it is no more sensible than to reproach a railway locomotive for not flying or, in general, not performing any other operation for which it was not designed.’ 2. The blind following of scientists is no less hazardous We must not forget that when Greek philosophy ruled the world, we enthusiastically placed our faith in philosophers to lead our way, so much so that even such propositions gained currency: ‘Males have more teeth than females in case of men, sheep, goats, and swine.’ Similarly, most of us submitted our will to that of the clergy during the so-called ‘age of faith’6. Those heroes of ours now seem outdated and defeated, at least, to many of us. Scientists are our new

6 I.e., the period of medieval civilisation from 325 to 1300 AD. It is named so by the historian William J. Durant (1950) because of the extraordinary rise of Christianity and Islam during it.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe superheroes. Surely, they deserve to be so, but we must be careful not to start, so to speak, hallowing, idolising, idealising, or following them blindly, as is commonplace in the so-called ‘celebrity’ and ‘popular culture’. The hazard here is twofold: First, when scientists make science-based claims, we must be aware that not all science comes with the same credibility and authority. For example, gene mutation and evolution within similar species (sometimes called “microevolution”) is an observable, repeatable, and testable phenomenon, but no one has ever observed or replicated the evolution of, for instance, fish into reptiles or reptiles into mammals (sometimes called “macroevolution”); the idea is based on inference from indirect observations. Regarding more acute cases in scientific disciplines like evolutionary psychology, the evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne7 (2000) warns: ‘Unfortunately, evolutionary psychologists routinely confuse theory8 and speculation. […] Depression, for example, is seen

7 Emeritus Professor at University of Chicago 8 In science, the word ‘theory’ is typically used for such an explanation or description of a phenomenon that has been substantiated by experimentation, data, and evidence. For example, ‘diseases are caused by microorganisms’ was merely a hypothesis once, which became a theory subsequent to the accumulation of empirical evidence for it. In theoretical physics, however, ‘theory’ is used for an interrelated set of mathematically driven rules and notions (hypotheses), whether or not these hypotheses are substantiated by observation and experimentation. For example, Einstein’s special theory of relativity, which gives us the rule E = m × c2, is deservedly called a theory, for it is backed by rich empirical evidence. But the multiverse

Introduction as a trait favored by natural selection to enable us to solve our problems by withdrawing, reflecting, and hence enhancing our future reproduction. Plausible? Maybe. Scientifically testable? Absolutely not. If evolutionary biology is a soft science, then evolutionary psychology is its flabby underbelly. But the public can be forgiven for thinking that evolutionary biology is equivalent to evolutionary psychology.’ Second, as the Oxford mathematician John Lennox (2011, 9) puts it, ‘Not all statements by scientists are statements of science, and so do not carry the authority of authentic science even though such authority is often erroneously ascribed to them.’ Regarding philosophical statements of scientists, we must not forget Einstein’s (1936, 349) remark: ‘It has often been said, and certainly not without justification, that the man of science is a poor philosopher.’ However absurd it may sound, even prestigious scientists are often found guilty of elementary philosophical and logical fallacies, as we shall soon see. Furthermore, scientists (especially contemporary ones) often disregard or are found unaware of the fact that, like all other humans, they carry a priori beliefs, preconceived theories, metaphysical commitments, and philosophical worldviews, even while doing science. The irony here is that the scientific method itself is based on philosophical presumptions, not science. In short, as scientists9 enter a theory, string theory, M-theory, supersymmetry theory, and so on are also called so, despite lacking evidence. 9 Such general statements by no means apply to all scientists. Einstein and some other men we just quoted were also, after all, scientists.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe philosophical discussion, like that of theism/atheism, such philosophical shortcomings immediately start to surface. Lennox (2011, 32), therefore, warns: ‘Nonsense remains nonsense even when talked by world- famous scientists. What serves to obscure the illogicality of such [philosophical] statements [of scientists] is the fact that they are made by scientists; and the general public, not surprisingly, assumes that they are statements of science and takes them on authority. That is why it is important to point out that they are not statements of science, and any statement, whether made by a scientist or not, should be open to logical analysis. Immense prestige and authority does not compensate for faulty logic.’

Following where reason and evidence lead The upshot of the preceding discussion is that, rather than blindly following a celebrated prophet, spiritual leader, philosopher, or scientist, we ought to always follow our conscience, reasoning, and evidence, if it is truth we are after. Regarding our topic, this proposition implies that one must be able to follow scientific, philosophical, religious, naturalistic, and historical evidence/arguments to their conclusions. That is not straightforward. For one, concepts and theories in all branches of knowledge have become increasingly complex, specialised, and difficult to grasp for nonexperts. Furthermore, we often find interpretational and other differences among experts, so much that even the same evidence sometimes leads them to different conclusions. The way forward, therefore, is to adequately decode specialised knowledge for nonexperts and make plain any disagreements among the experts. Only then can

Introduction people be empowered to rationally decide for themselves. The present work was undertaken with this aim in view. A probe into Stephen W. Hawking’s Godless cosmology As for naturalism/theism debate in view of modern science, many experts have attempted to produce explanatory literature for laypersons. The late Stephen Hawking (1942– 2018) is among them, one of the most popular scientists, a brilliant theoretical physicist, and an epitome of fortitude in face of debilitating motor neuron disease. In his last complete book The Grand Design (TGD), co-authored with Leonard Mlodinow10, he specified some ultimate questions of humankind and set out to answer them in light of modern science, including his own research. In doing so, he challenged some fundamental traditional concepts like that of a personal God, His intervention in the universe, human free will, and philosophical realism. TGD’s central conclusions are based on mind-boggling concepts from theoretical physics. These concepts are cursorily explained in the text, probably because TGD is a popular-science book and a general audience might not be too interested in details. But the devil, as they say, lies in the details. Here, therefore, I first interpreted TGD’s narrative, using helpful illustrations and explanations from carefully chosen academic resources. Considering that, this book may be used as a short guide to Hawking’s cosmology. Then, I critically analysed the reasoning, evidence, theories, and conclusions of TGD, using works of some eminent theologians, philosophers, mathematicians, and physicists.

10 Ph.D., theoretical physics

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

The second exercise was necessary because, first, as the aphorism goes, extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence – and such evidence, I add, demands extraordinary scrutiny. Second, Hawking was not an expert of all the scientific, philosophical, and religious areas he touched upon. Even if he were, history shows that greatest of experts can falter. Third, a good part of the theoretical work in physics upon which TGD’s bold claims are based is by no means as well established as, say, Einstein’s theory of relativity or even the big bang theory. It is still metaphysics rather than physics in that it awaits empirical evidence. More so, it seems rather humanly impossible, as we shall see, to think of experiments which could verify or falsify such work. Fourth, the extrapolations of TGD from the well-established theoretical physics are debatable, to say the least. Thus, I felt compelled to not only tell Hawking’s part of the story but of those specialists, too, who disagree with him. I hope this exercise would facilitate my readers to adequately explore both sides of the argument and draw informed conclusions. To represent the religious discourse, I have turned to the Quran. That is because out of Abrahamic Scriptures – believed to be revealed by God – it is the only book whose historical authenticity, at least, is beyond doubt. It is transmitted through the most reliable mode of historical transmission: unanimous consent of and continuous, verbatim mass-transmission by all generations of Muslims, since Prophet Muhammad (Ghamidi 2018b, 158 and Saleem 2012). No disrespect is intended for Judeo-Christian Scriptures. I have also barred myself from using the Hadith

Introduction literature11 from among the key Islamic texts, for it is historically transmitted by individuals. Such transmission, no matter how careful, always carries an element of doubt. Coming back to TGD (180), its main conclusion is succinctly spelled out like this: ‘Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.’ This conclusion raises several important questions with direct or indirect implications for theism/atheism debate. These questions may be summarised as follows: 1. What is a law of nature? 2. Do fixed laws leave any room for human free will and God’s intervention (miracles) in the universe? 3. Where do laws come from? 4. How could the law of gravity necessitate a universe out of nothing? 5. Is it time to celebrate/mourn a personal God’s death? Each of these questions constitutes a chapter in this book. In each chapter, TGD’s answer is first presented and elaborated upon, followed by a critical commentary on it taking aboard works and views of other experts, reason, and evidence. Let’s fasten our seatbelts to embark upon this challenging but fascinating journey now!

11 Except at a couple of places, where it corroborated the Quran or explicated something implicitly alluded therein.

1. What is a law of nature?

‘[I]t is a perversion of language to assign any law as the efficient, operative cause of anything. A law presupposes an agent, for it is only the mode according to which an agent proceeds; it implies a power, for it is the order according to which that power acts. Without this agent, without this power, which are both distinct from itself, the “law” does nothing; is nothing.’ William Paley “Natural theology.” The Works of William Paley (1838), 157

his question may seem irrelevant to our topic of discussion, but it has such profound implications for atheism/theism discussion that without an explicit Tanswer thereof, this discussion will always remain prone to confusion and misunderstanding. The concepts discussed in this chapter will be repeatedly referred to, expounded upon, and used to draw important conclusions in the chapters to follow.

TGD’s (The Grand Design) Position Prevalent definition in science TGD (27-28) says that most scientists today take a law of nature as a rule derived from an observed regularity. Based on this understanding, ‘the sun rises in the east,’ for example, is a candidate for a law because it is a rule derived from the regular rising of the sun in the east, witnessed for thousands of years without exception. Because a law consistently holds, it is expected to provide predictions; for example, we predict on the daily basis that, ceteris paribus, the sun will rise in the

1. What is a law of nature? east tomorrow. TGD further qualifies the definition of laws as follows. Definition of TGD TGD (28-29) says that all observed regularities cannot be put into the category of laws. Seemingly, it says so in the wake of the problem of induction12. A law, it argues, is more than just

12 Induction is a form of reasoning in which a generalisation is inferred based on a few or many observations that support, but do not necessarily guarantee that generalisation. For example, after seeing many miserly people from a certain country, one can reach an inductive generalisation that all people of that country are misers. In science, induction may go somewhat like this: Premises A liquid x1 evaporated when heated at 1000 °C at times t1, t2, t3… A liquid x2 evaporated when heated at 1000 °C at times t4, t5, t6… A liquid x3 evaporated when heated at 1000 °C at times t7, t8, t9… . . . A liquid xn evaporated when heated at 1000 °C at times tn1, tn2, tn3… Conclusion All liquids evaporate on heating. The above premises are actually a set of observational statements that are generalised in the form of a law in the conclusion. The premises do not necessarily lead to the conclusion because only some liquids are regularly observed to evaporate at 1000 °C, but the conclusion talks about all liquids. Since there are countless kinds of liquids (and even more are possible through novel chemical reactions), we cannot rule out that there may exist one that would not evaporate at this temperature. Similarly, a liquid which has been repeatedly observed in various laboratory settings to evaporate at 1000 °C may not do so under some conditions not

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe a description of what is commonly observed to happen, for it is based on unavoidable or necessary regularity, such as ‘all uranium-235 spheres are less than a mile in diameter’. The statement is not based on induction or mere observations, but on the theoretical understanding of the phenomenon that if a uranium-235 sphere approaches a diameter exceeding ~6 inches, it will inevitably explode with a nuclear explosion13. TGD, however, accepts Newton’s laws of motion, although they need to be modified for objects moving at a speed approaching that of light. That is because these laws consistently hold in our everyday world, where people, trains, aeroplanes, or the like do not move at the speed of light. As per TGD’s definition, therefore, a law must precisely or approximately hold universally or, at least, ‘under a stipulated set of conditions’. Finally, TGD reminds that a law generally exists as part of a system of interrelated laws and that in contemporary science, laws are generally expressed in the language of mathematics. Governing laws At several places, TGD14 talks about natural laws governing the universe, which ‘is to say, its behavior can be modelled’ (i.e., mathematically expressed). To elucidate the point, let yet tested. 13 In philosophy, the view that such a physical necessity is a property of natural laws is termed ‘nomological’ or ‘nomic necessity’. 14 For example, see p. 32, 54, 58, 72, 87, 134, 171, and 181.

1. What is a law of nature? us consider, for instance, Boyle’s law, which can be simply put like this: Under constant temperature, the pressure an ideal gas exerts on the walls of its container decreases proportionally with increase in the volume of the container (expansion of the gas). Mathematically, Boyle’s law can be modelled as P = k/V, where P is the pressure of a gas, V volume, and k is a constant equal to the product of volume and pressure. Once we have established this law or mathematical model through appropriate means, we can say that a gas will obey or be governed by this law under the stated conditions.

Commentary The term ‘laws of nature/science’ is misleading. The problem with this term is that it creates a misleading picture in one’s mind as if there are powerless passive particulars15 in the universe, which are controlled and governed by laws external to them (See Mumford 2004, 204). The problem worsens when, for example, TGD (8-9) says that out of nothing ‘multiple universes arise naturally from physical law’ or another eminent physicist says (as quoted by Lennox 2011, 41) regarding the origin of the universe and life that ‘for me it is much more inspiring to believe that a set of mathematical laws can be so clever as to bring all these things into being’. Such discourses seem to presume that laws existed when there was nothing, with powers to bring into existence everything. To make plain flaws of such presumptions, we need to consider an alternative view to

15 ‘Particulars’ is used synonymously here with ‘objects’, ‘existents’, or ‘entities’.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe that of laws, namely ‘lawlessness’. No external laws, but inherent powers of particulars ‘governing’ their individual and collaborative behaviours or effects Rather than invoking the rule of (external) law, Stephen Mumford16 in his book Laws in Nature (2004) correctly traces regularities or necessities17 in nature to tendencies, capacities, or causal powers in action, which particulars in the universe inherently possess.18 To illustrate this view, let us turn to Boyle’s law again. It is an inherent power of gas molecules to diffuse away from each other, and it is an inherent power of a solid material, of which gas containers are typically made, to resist anything trying to diffuse through it. Thus, any gas molecules in a container will necessarily hit the walls of the container and, thereby, produce force per unit area, i.e., pressure. Suppose a container with gas having pressure = 5 newton per each square meter (m2), where the total area of the container = 20 m2. If we increase the volume of the container, its area will concurrently increase too. Suppose an increase in the volume, such that the internal area of the container increases

16 Professor of Metaphysics and Dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Nottingham 17 That is, something necessarily causing another, as a uranium sphere approaching a diameter of roughly 6 inches necessarily causes an explosion. 18 Mumford, however, is not the first one to propose this idea. For a brief and well-articulated summary of this view and an overview of other useful resources, see Chalmers 1999, 217-221 & 225.

1. What is a law of nature? from 20 to 40 m2. Now if everything else remains constant, the pressure of 5 newton per 1 m2 of total area = 20 m2 will necessarily reduce to 2.5 newton per 1 m2 of total area = 40 m2. This negative relationship between pressure and volume of gas is what Boyle’s law describes. To say, then, that Boyle’s law governs the behaviour of gas or gas obeys it can be grossly misleading. Boyle’s law, rather, is only a description of how gas is predisposed to behave due to its inherent powers. Hence, it would be erroneous to assume that Boyle’s law could exist prior to the existence of gas itself and even more erroneous to assume that it could, somehow, create gas. Same is true for all other laws. The so-called ‘laws of nature’ are nothing but descriptions of certain consistent behaviours, coactions, or phenomena that particulars in the universe are predisposed to produce due to their inherent tendencies, capacities, or causal powers. Since these powers are dispositions or properties, there is no question of them (what to speak of laws) without a prior existence of particulars (essentially, matter, energy19 and/or space). So, for a law to be there, there has to be three things first: 1) a particular with 2) consistent power(s), producing 3) a fixed behaviour

19 Expressions like ‘matter/energy/space’ are used throughout the text to refer to the entities that the universe is made up of. Strictly speaking, such usage is problematic, but I have persisted with it for it simply and readily conveys the message for our purposes. For details, see Strassler, Matt. “Matter and Energy: A False Dichotomy” 2012. Available from: https://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and-posts/particle-physics- basics/mass-energy-matter-etc/matter-and-energy-a-false- dichotomy/

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe or outcome (regularity); to describe this regularity, eventually, a law can be formulated (See Paley’s quote at the opening of this chapter). Next, we shall turn to the problem of free will and miracles, and see how they are thwarted by fixed laws in Hawking’s universe.

2. Do fixed laws leave any room for human free will & God’s InterventIon (mIracles) in the Universe?

‘It is extremely dangerous to fit physical theories to a priori concepts, or to deduce too highly extrapolated philosophical consequences from them. Any scientists have tried to make determinism and complementarity the basis of conclusions that seem to me weak and dangerous; for instance, they have used Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle to bolster up human free will, though his principle, which applies exclusively to the behavior of electrons and is the direct result of microphysical measurement techniques, has nothing to do with human freedom of choice. It is far safer and wiser that the physicist remain on the solid ground of theoretical physics itself and eschew the shifting sands of philosophic extrapolations.’ Louis Victor de Broglie, Nobel Laureate in Physics (1929) New Perspectives in Physics (1962), viii ‘For we say that all portents [miracles] are contrary to nature; but they are not so. For how is that contrary to nature which happens by the will of God, since the will of so mighty a Creator is certainly the nature of each created thing? A portent, therefore, happens not contrary to nature, but contrary to what we know as nature.’ St. Augustine The City of God (2009), 700

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

hapter 2 of TGD (The Grand Design) is devoted to the discussion whether fixed laws can be suspended C through miracles and whether these laws leave any room for free will. Here, after presenting TGD’s view, we shall first discuss the problem of free will and then move on to miracles.

TGD’s Position

Scientific determinism and free will From laws to scientific determinism TGD (30-34 & 171) assumes scientific determinism20: Since science has discovered laws that hold without any exception, ‘there must be a complete set of laws’ that fully determines how the universe would behave in the future from any time onwards. This implies that there is no room for miracles – God’s intervention in the universe – and free will. As for free will, our bodies and brains (with all their thoughts) are governed by biological processes. These processes, ultimately, are governed by fixed laws of chemistry and physics, compelling us to adhere to them. Therefore, ‘it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion’ (ibid., 32). As evidence against Descartes’ (1596–1650) idea of a volitional agency (mind or soul) within us which is not subjected to any physical law, TGD (ibid.) refers to modern experiments in neuroscience. In one such experiment, brain regions of patients going through

20 The idea is credited to the French mathematician and philosopher Pierre-Simon Laplace (1749–1827).

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awake brain-surgery were electrically stimulated. This produced ‘desire’ in them to move various parts of their bodies, including lips, and encouraged them to talk. Such experiments indicate that ‘it is our physical brain, following the known laws of science, that determines our [thoughts and] actions, and not some agency [having free will] that exists outside those laws’ (Brackets mine). Furthermore, if there is anything like free will, TGD (31) asks its proponents to show where it developed in the evolutionary tree. Quantum physics (due to its probabilistic nature) seems to weaken the idea that the universe is governed by laws with fixed outcomes, hence challenging scientific determinism. Regarding that, however, TGD (72) maintains that ‘it leads us to accept a new form of determinism: Given the state of a system at some time, the laws of nature determine the probabilities of various futures and pasts rather than determining the future and past with certainty’.

Commentary No human being or society can function without a firm belief in free will. If there is no free will, courts of law have no right to punish criminals, employers cannot hold their employees responsible for their actions, a student cannot be admonished for bad grades, Hitler cannot be blamed, and Martin Luther King, Jr. does not deserve any appreciation. The Quran (75:14-15) proclaims that ‘man [upon doing something wrong] himself is a witness against his own soul, no matter how many lame-excuses he may invent’. This claim implies that we are well aware of what right/wrong is, and

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe we very well know that we can make choices with so much freedom that we can be held responsible for them; there is a ‘judge’ within each of us, who appreciates us whenever we do good and testifies against us whenever we choose to be evil (Islahi 2009, vol. 9, 75-84). However, religion as well as human societies do generally acknowledge that, sometimes, a person’s will is impeded by circumstances beyond her control, is not employed in her unintended actions, or produces results other than that intended. Hence, the Quran (24:33), for example, does not consider blameworthy (but sympathises with) the bondwomen who were forced to prostitution in the Arabian Peninsula. The Quran (5:89 & 33:5) also explicates that man will only be held answerable for his wilful actions, not unintentional mistakes. Similarly, our law-makers do not prescribe any punishment for crimes committed by, for instance, minors and mentally disabled persons. This is our collective wisdom regarding free will, which all of us employ with full confidence in our daily lives. As soon as anyone tries to challenge this wisdom verbally, he necessarily creates a contradiction between his words and actions. Thus, on the one hand, he denies free will but, on the other, shows no hesitation whatsoever in blaming people for their misconduct. Hawking, of course, was no exception to this; hence, the Guardian (2017) reported that ‘Stephen Hawking blames Tory politicians for damaging NHS’ (National Health Service, the UK). But if the free will of these politicians was just an illusion, how could they be blamed for the choices they had made? The same goes for all murderers, terrorists, rapists, child abusers, and other horrendous criminals. In real life, however, no sane person will be ready to accept the justification that it is not their fault, for just like robots all of

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them were forced to ‘dance to their DNA’s music’, as Dawkins21 (1995, 155) puts it. Thus, scepticism regarding morality or free will has no place whatsoever in real life, but only in philosophical wanderings or narratives against religion (Ghamidi 2009). Furthermore, the proposition that we have no control over our thoughts and behaviours tends to take away what we humans cherish the most: the will to take control of our evil temptations and bad habits to evolve ourselves into better individuals. But does this idea, after all, have sound arguments and scientific evidence at its back? Let us have a closer look. Naturalism and religion on evolution and free will TGD (31) is justified in asking where free will developed in the evolutionary tree for, in a naturalistic/materialistic worldview, it seems rather difficult to argue for free will. That is because whether we are purely a physical product of the so-called fixed laws of physics or probabilistic (lawless) events, neither case makes us free in our decision-making (Mumford and Anjum 2013, 45). For example, regardless if pumping of adrenalin is an outcome of strict laws or certain probabilistic processes, once pumped, it may incline us to be violent. To overrule that inclination and act civilly, we need willpower. But if our willpower, again, is at the mercy of fixed laws or probabilistic behaviour of molecules that make us up, then one has to wonder whether there really is any room for free will! Such a view is called ‘reductive physicalism’ wherein

21 Prof. Richard Dawkins is a British evolutionary biologist, often referred to as one of the ‘Four Horsemen of New Atheism’.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

‘every mental property is identical with some physical property’ or activity in the brain (Plantinga 2011, 18). Francis Crick22 (1995, 3) put it this way: ‘“You,” your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve-cells and their associated molecules.’ Thus, all subjective perception in this view (including free will, as TGD indicates) is an illusionary, inconsequential by-product of physical events in the brain (See Ward 2008, 142-145). Compatible with naturalism, however, there is a view which supports free will. In this view, called ‘non-reductive physicalism’, ‘humans are purely physical beings, but thoughts, feelings, and perceptions are higher-level emergent properties of brains that have causal effects on the complex physical systems that are human beings’ (Ward 2008, 156). Quoting a proponent of this view, Warren Brown23 (2004), Ward (156-157) further writes, ‘“Conscious decisions and will are real phenomena that are effective in exerting a top–down (or whole–part) causal influence on the neuro-physiological processes of the brain”. The patterns that emerge from complex physical systems have genuine causal powers. There are no new “entities” or physical forces involved, but there are new “levels of causal efficacy”.’ In this

22 Prof. Francis H. C. Crick (1916–2004) was a British physicist, molecular and neurobiologist; a joint Nobel Laureate (1962) for the identification of DNA’s structure. 23 Warren S. Brown is a Christian; Director of the Lee Edward Travis Research Institute (Clinical Psychology) and Professor of Psychology at the Fuller Theological Seminary, California.

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view, the higher-level properties of the brain (thoughts, perceptions, and feelings) emerge naturally, with the evolving complexity of the brain and integration of its physical processes. Religion’s viewpoint, by contrast, is as follows (Quran 32:7-9, 37:11 & 91:7-8): Human creation was initiated from the constituents of sticky clay; thereafter, it went through various evolutionary stages until a to-be-human animal was accomplished, capable of reproduction. Like other animals, this animal was conscious (aware of its existence) and possessed instincts, emotions, will, and so on (Quran 32:8, Ghamidi, pers. comm). Into two such animals (Adam/Eve), God blew His subtle breath24, thereby, bestowing upon them capacities which distinguished them from other animals. These capacities include intellect, aesthetic sense, moral sense, and the willpower to choose between right and wrong (Islahi 2009, vol. 6, 161). This willpower (equipped with reason and aesthetic/moral awareness) is such that it makes humans responsible for their deeds and answerable to God for the choices they make. The same divine breath is blown into every human foetus, i.e., animal-form, in the mother’s womb, which transforms it into a totally new creation i.e., a human being (Quran 15:29 & 23:14, Ghamidi, pers. comm. & Al-Bukhari 1997, vol. 4, no. 3208).25 (For details, see Hassan

24 ‘Blowing of divine breath’ is a metaphor, used to communicate an event whose reality is beyond human knowledge, reason, and imagination (Ghamidi, pers. comm). 25 Here, I find it necessary to mention that the aim of religion is to purify humans morally, so that they can render themselves eligible for an eternal life with God (Quran 87:14-17). With this aim in view, various scientific, philosophical, historical, and other topics are

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

2018b.) According to religion, a human being, therefore, is a combination of a 1) physical body, 2) basic animal-like consciousness, and 3) mentally and spiritually-rich divinely- infused consciousness. We do not know what 2, as such, is26 and how it is produced. Regarding 3, it is not explicated whether it is infused as a distinct, non-physical being/person, which overlays 2 and very much takes control of 1 & 2 (as in Cartesian dualism). In this worldly life, such a mind would be dependent upon the brain as much as, say, a driver is dependent upon the car she must drive. At the time of death (but not before that), the driver will be able to leave the car, taking away all the experiences and memories of the drive with her. However, 3 might not be such a separate person, but only a alluded to in the Quran to substantiate its argumentation. Examples of such topics include prominent events in human evolution and the means through which rich spiritual element is bestowed upon humans, as mentioned above. Such information is not accepted as a matter of blind faith, but after establishing, through compelling evidence and reason, that there is an immensely intelligent/wise God (a), who has communicated with and guided His sentient creatures through revelation (b). (b can be falsified, for example, by pointing out contradictions within the Quran or between the Quran and scientific facts. a is difficult to falsify but can be seriously challenged by showing that our universe is self-explanatory and, thus, does not require God to explain its existence.) 26 I.e., for example, a separate person (as in dualism) or an emergent property of the physical nervous system (as in non- reductive physicalism) etc.

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part (although an integral one) necessarily requiring 1 & 2 to form a human person. If so, then 3 would basically be awareness/knowledge necessary to produce moral, aesthetic, and intellectual capacities in the to-be-human animal, already possessing 1 & 2. We cannot say with certainty if this knowledge exists in physical or spiritual form and how 1 & 2 relate to it. The ‘soul’, ‘spirit’, ‘self’, or the ‘real human being’ in this case is, practically speaking, the total continuous, conscious experience of spiritually and intellectually-rich human life in such an integrated form. This experience is basically information, which we know can be stored, transferred, expressed, and embodied in many ways. So, resurrection or life after death – an important tenet of religious worldview – does not pose a problem for this view. To facilitate further discussion, we can refer to this view as ‘divinely-integrated dualism’27.

27 This view is similar to what is called ‘integrative dualism’, held by two popular Anglican priests, the senior theoretical physicist John Polkinghorne (2010, 41-43) and the Oxford theologian Keith Ward (2008, 134-161). However, they view all of human consciousness (i.e., 2 as well as 3) as an emergent reality, not a product of divine intervention. In non-reductive physicalism, too, all of consciousness (including the experience of free will) is viewed as an emergent property of the physical brain-activity. The difference, however, is that herein this emergent property is not considered a ‘new entity or physical force’, but only ‘a new level of causal efficacy’, as Brown (2004, 65) puts it. In contrast, integrative dualism holds that ‘consciousness and its contents, though generated by the physical brain, are distinct kinds of existent entities’ (Ward 2008, 160). For divinely- integrated dualism, we shall assume this latter view.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

As for TGD’s question where free will developed in the evolutionary tree, its answer according to both these views will be that free will, at least as experienced by humans, is not a product of evolution or any other natural process. Considering the other products of evolution, i.e. animals28, this answer seems plausible because the mental/spiritual difference between animals and humans is so huge that something additional and unique must take place to produce humans. Rejection or acceptance of free will depends on one’s worldview, not science. Dualism and divinely-integrated dualism are not in conflict with science per se. It is not science alone, but science done with or interpreted under naturalistic/materialistic worldview that, by definition, makes any immaterial reality unacceptable. However, if dualism is true, science will have to deal with a non-physical, subjective, immeasurable decision-maker (mind) enclosed in our physical body. And if integrative or divinely-integrated dualism is true, science will have to deal with subjective spiritual/mental experience (mind), for example, that of liking/disliking someone. But science can only deal with observable, objective, measurable, and testable phenomena. This implies that mind in both these senses can hardly be the topic of scientific inquiry, just like many other questions pertaining to, say, music, art,

28 Regarding the consciousness of animals, however, it is only a speculation that it is a physical (reductive or non-reductive) outcome of evolution. In fact, no one knows what it really is and how it came/comes to be.

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literature, or even the very philosophical assumptions on which the scientific method is based (Ward 2008, 142). This, however, does not imply that dualism is unnecessary or false, or that mind in the sense of integrated consciousness is an illusion. Because it is inherently difficult for science-proper to deal with subjective mental-experience, psychology – starting as introspective psychology – turned out to be a futile exercise. It had to be replaced by behavioural psychology because behaviour can be publicly observed and tested, at least to some extent. More recent fields, like cognitive psychology and neuroscience, correlate the behaviour as well as conscious experience (e.g., that of pain) to brain functionality. Here, rather than publicly inaccessible experience of pain itself, its corresponding observable and measurable brain activity becomes the primary subject of scientific inquiry (Ward 2008, 142-143 & 160). Since scientists (because of the very nature of science) are predisposed to explain things in physical terms, physicalism naturally becomes the default position for most of them. However, neuroscience, biological psychology, evolutionary psychology, and related fields turn out to be intrinsically difficult and highly controversial when it comes to the problem of consciousness and free will.29 Firstly, it is a daunting task to design an appropriate experiment to confirm or falsify hypotheses regarding these. Secondly, for

29 For a quick overview of the controversies, see Wikipedia. “Neuroscience of free will.” 2018. Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Neuroscience_of_fre e_will&oldid=858574065

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe some experiments, it becomes necessary to rely on subjective statements/reports of the subjects, which compromises objectivity. Thirdly, the experimental results are prone to many interpretations, depending upon the philosophical presumptions or perspective with which they are viewed (i.e., naturalism, physicalism, dualism, and so on). The evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne (2000), a Jewish-born atheist, thus writes: ‘The problem is that evolutionary psychology suffers from the scientific equivalent of megalomania. Most of its adherents are convinced that virtually every human action or feeling, including depression, homosexuality, religion, and consciousness, was put directly into our brains by natural selection. In this view, evolution becomes the key – the only key – that can unlock our humanity. Unfortunately, evolutionary psychologists routinely confuse theory and speculation. Unlike bones, behavior does not fossilize, and understanding its evolution often involves concocting stories that sound plausible but are hard to test. Depression, for example, is seen as a trait favored by natural selection to enable us to solve our problems by withdrawing, reflecting, and hence enhancing our future reproduction. Plausible? Maybe. Scientifically testable? Absolutely not. If evolutionary biology is a soft science, then evolutionary psychology is its flabby underbelly. But the public can be forgiven for thinking that evolutionary biology is equivalent to evolutionary psychology. Books by Daniel Dennett, E. O. Wilson, and Steven Pinker have sold briskly, and evolutionary psychology dominates the media coverage of research on evolution. […] In view of the scientific shakiness of much of the work, its popularity must rest partly

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on some desire for a comprehensive "scientific" explanation of human behavior. Evolutionary psychology satisfies the postideological hunger for a totalistic explanation of human life, for a theory of inevitability that will remove many of the ambiguities and the uncertainties of emotional and moral life.’ Next, we shall look into some typical science-based criticisms levelled against divinely-integrated dualism and dualism, respectively. We shall also look at some new empirical findings that support these views and go against reductive physicalism. Divinely-integrated dualism Some philosophers and neuroscientists claim that nothing else is required to produce human consciousness except the nervous system. Divinely integrated dualism would agree because, in this view, our nervous system comes already equipped with a spiritual/intellectual element. This element is experienced, whereas its corresponding physical element can be observed in the functional nervous system. Here, one may claim that it is superfluous to believe that, to achieve a person with moral/intellectual element, God equips our physical being with some potential awareness/knowledge (by means of divine breath). If this claim were true, then human-like morality and reasoning should have been there or could have been taught to, at least, some animals, too. The non-existence of human-like consciousness in animals with seemingly equally sophisticated nervous systems points to the need of something additional to achieve a human being – something which is not an outcome of evolution that both humans and

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe animals have gone through (See Ghamidi 2012b). More radically, reductive physicalists claim, like TGD, that our consciousness is nothing more than physical events in the brain and, thus, personal spiritual-experience (including that of free will) is just an illusion. No matter how confidently such assertions are made and how credible the asserter is, they are at best hypotheses, which may not even be verifiable or falsifiable. The brain is still very much a black-box, but such melodramatic claims give an impression as if the brain is an open book, science has unravelled what consciousness really is, and how it is produced in the dead matter. None of this is even remotely true. We, scientists, do not hesitate to label others arrogant, but we should not forget to be a little humble ourselves, too. When TGD (32) says that ‘it seems that we are no more than biological machines and that free will is just an illusion’, it assumes that causation only goes one way, i.e., from the brain (governed by fixed physical laws) to fixed thought and behaviour. But there is ample evidence that causation goes in the opposite direction too, i.e., from behaviour as well as mental element to physical changes in the brain (See Ward 2008, 153-158). An example of this is the placebo effect, known for ages. Recent studies have shown that it works because ‘non-physical mental expectations’, encouragement, or subjective meanings ‘translate into bodily responses via real physical changes in the brain’ activity (See Andrews 2012, 257-259 and references therein.)30

30 For a reductive physicalist’s explanation of the placebo effect, see Yasushi 2013, 346-349. Like Yasushi, we also consider physical

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Not only this, but the brain can be physically altered by subjective mental activity. Mason et al. (2017), for example, indicate that talk therapy, a thought-involving process used to help manage various psychological disorders, works because it alters the brain wiring. Similarly, evidence accumulated over the past two decades shows that meditation increases the brain’s grey-matter volume (E.g., see Hölzel et al. 2011).31 Such studies show that mental events or activities are not merely an illusionary, inconsequential by-product of physical events in the brain. Quite the contrary, mental activities can not only physically influence the brain but are capable of taking control of it. Therefore, the experiment TGD has alluded to wherein the electrical stimulation of brain regions produced ‘desire’ in the subjects to move their body parts is half the story. In the full version, a conscious brain may choose to reject that desire by manipulating the brain activity. Cartesian dualism The empirical evidence discussed in the preceding paragraph is compatible with both divinely-integrated dualism as well mechanisms, working in response to the mental/conscious element to produce results. However, what Yasushi does not and cannot deny is – and here is our point – the case of mind over matter, where subjective meaning or expectation (even if generated by physical brain activity) feeds back to cause a physical response. For an extremely interesting case clearly demonstrating this, see Mr. Wright’s story on p. 342 in Yasushi’s article. 31 Comprehensive critical peer-evaluations of the positive studies are available, confirming that meditation does induce structural changes in the brain; see, e.g., Fox et al. 2016.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe as dualism. Although it does not necessarily imply that dualism is true, it clearly wards off a common criticism against it that ‘there’s no possibility of something non- physical like a soul affecting what happens at the physical level’ (Law 2006, 69). TGD’s (32) allusion to the electrical stimulation of brain regions, producing ‘desire’ in the subjects to move certain body-parts, does not have any implications for the Cartesian mind or free will. That is simply because such a mind, if not rejected a priori, can easily choose to follow or reject that desire. Rather than a mere desire, however, our brain is also known to compel us to behave or act in a certain manner. For example, consider obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD): A psychological illness wherein the patients experience persistent, unwanted, and uncontrollable thoughts (obsessions). To cope with them and relieve the anxiety caused therefrom, the patients are compelled to repetitively perform certain mental/physical rituals or actions, for instance, handwashing, double-checking things, or habitual tics. According to biological theories (backed by evidence), OCD is caused by imbalances in certain brain chemicals, other physical abnormalities, or damage to the brain. Thus, all we see is the physical brain at work, obstructing the free will of OCD patients. Does this mean that mind is unnecessary or, more so, non-existent? Not necessarily. That is because the brain can be thought of as a screen on which mind’s ‘sight’ depends. As dirt, damage, too much sunlight, scratches, or other issues with a vehicle’s windscreen may seriously hinder the driver’s ability to see the road ahead, mind’s functions can also be seriously hindered by problems with the brain

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and its functions. Some argue that after a brain injury, tumour, or the like, people have been repeatedly observed to lose their mental abilities, like memory or even moral awareness/control (See Choi 2002), suggesting that the brain is all there is. A similar analogy to that of a screen may help here as well, where we can think of the brain as the information source for mind, just like a computer serves as the source through which information on the web becomes available to us. A damaged or malfunctioning hardware or the software may make such information inaccessible to us, but that obviously does not negate our existence – the recipients of that information and controllers of the computer. Similarly, damage to some brain region making it impossible to, say, recollect a thought or maintain moral sense, does not negate the existence of mind. The analogy presented in the preceding paragraph is wrong in the sense that a malfunctioning computer does not make a person lose their mental abilities, but a problematic brain can and does sometimes takes away all mental experience. That is not surprising because in the dualistic view, as mentioned earlier, mind or soul is incarcerated in the physical body and cannot leave or function independent of the brain, at least, in this worldly life. Moreover, for mind to function properly and govern the body effectively, a healthy brain is required. As for free will, this means that it may be fully or partially impeded by an abnormal brain, as we saw in the case of OCD. Such an observation, however, does not falsify our collective wisdom regarding free will. That is because, as indicated earlier, it is already acknowledged therein that a person’s free will can, at times, be impeded or is not even employed in certain actions, e.g., involuntary

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe ones. And, in such cases, our collective wisdom does not hold anyone responsible for their actions. It seems that science may not be able to falsify dualism (or divinely-integrated dualism), but it can certainly show that the idea is superfluous. That can be done by, for example, achieving human-like consciousness in complex computers or machines, as an emergent property. More than half a century ago, practitioners of artificial intelligence thought that it was an easy task, but so far even animal-like consciousness has not been realised in machines. To conclude, although neuroscience and related scientific disciplines are highly controversial (at least regarding the problem of consciousness and free will), modern science can certainly correct many of Descartes’ false ideas regarding the anatomy and physiology of the brain. But as for his principle distinction between the body and mind (latter being the bearer of free will), modern science as yet does not have a verdict to pass (See Ward 2008, 142-161). Religious determinism Before discussing miracles, we should, perhaps, also touch upon the idea referred to as religious determinism: because God is omniscient (having knowledge of all future events), everything is predetermined, and free will is just an illusion. This argument does not hold water because knowing something in advance is one thing and to impose something on someone is another. If I somehow foresee a murder in, say, a dream, how could my advance knowledge of the murder impede the free will of the murderer? Similarly, what God knows in advance is that we, employing our free will,

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shall act in a certain way tomorrow.32 Why does God, then, not intervene and stop evil from happening? So that we can freely exercise our will in this fleeting world, such that the righteous can be separated from wrongdoers based on concrete evidence. Then, God will finally intervene and do justice between the two on the Judgement Day: wrongdoers will meet an ill-fate after they are left with no excuse to defend their crimes, and the righteous will reap God’s eternal Kingdom of Heaven. In other words, God is selecting individuals to inhabit His eternal Paradise, based on such a scheme which is just, objective, and indisputable.33 Such is the grand scheme of God, disclosed by revealed religion.

Miracles Have regularities in nature rendered God’s intervention in the universe (miracles) impossible? First, rather than adopting the misleading view of laws in

32 The problem of religious determinism can also be dealt with by appealing to Boethian conception of God’s eternal (timeless) cognition, discussed in Chapter 5 (No boundary condition). In that view, it is denied that the past/future (or time) exists for God, hence rendering the question of foreknowledge of people’s future actions irrelevant. Here, we have not taken that route because even if this question is supposed to be valid, it has a pretty straightforward answer. 33 Certain things in this world, however, seem to be predetermined, for instance, our time and place of birth, family, skin colour, natural aptitudes, and so on, but for these, religion does not hold anyone responsible (Ghamidi 2009).

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe nature, we should go back to Mumford’s (2004) view that regularities in nature are an outcome of inherent properties/causal powers of natural existents. When these existents exert their specific powers on one another, a fixed outcome (the so-called law) manifests. For instance, because the earth is heavy due to its mass and the spacetime fabric has the power to substantially warp in the presence of heavy objects, the interaction of these powers necessitates a force (gravity)34. This force, in turn, causes an apple to fall (through warped space) towards the earth – a regularity which is said to have inspired Newton to discover his law of gravity. This implies that the space, the earth, and the apple are predisposed to mutually produce a certain behaviour/phenomenon, ceteris paribus (a law or regularity – whatever we name it). But how can such predisposition put any restriction whatsoever on an agent to intervene in its manifestation and stop the apple from falling? It simply cannot (Lennox 2011, 86-87). Thus, the idea that the so-called laws of nature can somehow restrict an agent like God to intervene in the universe is simply false. God should not only be able to intervene but exploit those powers of things, too, that are not yet discovered by our science.35

34 To visualise this idea based on Einstein's theory of general relativity, visit http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/what-is-gravity/en/. 35 TGD (29-30) refers to Newton’s belief that God had to periodically adjust the orbits of planets as a ‘miracle of a sort’. If Newton were alive, I am sure he would have happily accepted naiveté of his assumption and would have been even more humbled to know that God works in much more sophisticated ways

2. Fixed laws, free will, and miracles

Miracles and their purpose Miracles, by definition, are exceptions (rare events). The idea, however, is often misused by religious people. Francis Collins36 (2007, 51-52) thus correctly warns that ‘the only thing that will kill the possibility of miracles more quickly than a committed materialism is the claiming of miracle status for everyday events for which natural explanations are readily at hand.’ Perhaps, it is this misuse to which many scientists understandably show antipathy. If miracles begin to take place daily, science would become difficult, if not impossible.37 The Quran38 refers to miracles as ‘clear signs [from God]’ and tells that they were performed by God or were given to His messengers to achieve some extraordinary purposes: For example, they helped certain messengers empirically establish their veracity (Ghamidi 2018b, 135-138). That was necessary because through such messengers, God set up miniature days of judgement right in this world: This means that after each of them delivered truth with such arguments and evidence (including miracles) that none among its receivers was left with any excuse to deny it, God’s judgement came to pass. The enemies of God’s messenger – than he anticipated. 36 A physician and geneticist, who led the Human Genome Project to completion; currently Director of the National Institutes of Health, USA 37 For a detailed discussion on science and miracles, see Lennox 2009, 193-206 and 2011, 81-95. 38 See 26:10-16, 28:30-32, & 54:3.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe i.e., the enemies of reason, truth, and morality – received humiliating punishment. Conversely, the messenger and his followers – no matter how few, weak, or oppressed – were bestowed with honour, salvation, and authority in the land (For details, see Ghamidi 2018b, 49-51 & 169-178). Alluding to this, the Quran (10:47) says: ‘[According to God’s law,] there is a messenger for every community: when their messenger comes [before them], they are judged with fairness, and no injustice is shown to them.’ The Quran, the Bible, and history reveal that God set up many such miniature days of judgement by directly interfering in this world and dealing with select communities according to their moral conduct. The exercise was important in that it substantiates the central claim of religion on a smaller scale, i.e., the existence of a just God and the advent of one such universal day – the Day of Judgement – for the entire humankind.39 Similarly, another function of miracles, for example, was to armour God’s messengers against their mighty and atrocious addressees, like Pharaoh in the case of Moses. Miracles not only shielded messengers from such despots, who would have otherwise butchered them straightaway, but compelled them to attend to their message (Ghamidi 2016b).

39 The last such miniature judgement took place on the Arabian Peninsula in the seventh century AD, when the last messenger of God Muhammad came to this world. This event is the topic of the Quran, which unfolds its details before our eyes and invites us all to witness God through the pages of established history.

3. Where do laws come from?

‘It is a common rule in theoretical physics, one accepted by many physicists, that anything not forbidden by the basic laws of nature must take place.’ Isaac Asimov “The ultimate speed limit.” Saturday Review of Sciences (8 Jul. 1972), 56 ‘We have thus assigned to pure reason and experience their places in a theoretical system of physics. The structure of the system is the work of reason; the data of experience and their mutual relations are to correspond exactly to consequences in the theory40. In the possibility of such a representation lies the sole value and justification of the whole system, and especially of the concepts and fundamental principles which underlie it. These latter, by the way, are free inventions of the human intellect, which cannot be justified either by the nature of that intellect or in any other fashion a priori.’ Albert Einstein, Nobel Laureate in Physics (1921) A lecture “On the Method of Theoretical Physics” at Oxford (10 Jun. 1933) Essays in Science (2011), 10

he question is raised in Chapter 2 of TGD (The Grand Design, 29), but the answer is deferred to later T chapters. As for the idea of God being the law-giver, however, the question is followed by a quick comment that

40 The phrase is originally translated as ‘the empirical contents and their mutual relations must find their representation in the conclusions of the theory’. However, I have adopted a better translation from Philosophy of Science, vol. 1, pp. 163-169, 1934.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe it is merely ‘substituting one mystery for another’.

TGD’s Position Fundamental laws: a consequence of M-theory In the famous CNN talk-show Larry King Live (10th Sept. 2012)41 Stephen Hawking said, ‘Gravity and quantum theory cause universes to be created spontaneously out of nothing.’ When asked how the law of gravity came into existence, Hawking said, ‘Gravity is a consequence of M-theory, which is the only possible unified theory. It is like saying why is 2 + 2 = 4?’ M-theory, according to TGD (8), is a set of mutually coherent theories each of which can be successfully applied in limited range of scenarios; whenever two or more of these theories overlap to predict or describe the same phenomenon, they mutually agree. TGD (165 & 181) claims that M-theory is ‘the only candidate’ for the ‘theory of everything’: Einstein’s dream theory ‘that would account for every detail of the matter and forces we observe in nature’. TGD (140-142) tells that M-theory, along with the three dimensions of space, has seven additional space dimensions, plus one of time. These extra dimensions, however, are not visible because they are highly curled up on a scale too small to be observed. The shape of these curved dimensions ‘determines both the values of physical quantities, such as the charge on the electron, and the nature of the interactions between elementary particles, that is, the forces of nature’.

41 Available from: http://transcripts.cnn.com/transcripts/1009/10/lkl.01.html

3. Where do laws come from?

In other words, laws of nature are determined by the shape of the seven curled-up dimensions of space, sometimes called the ‘internal space’ in contrast to the visible three- dimensional space. ‘M-theory,’ says TGD (116-118), ‘has solutions that allow for many different internal spaces, perhaps as many as 10500, which means it allows for 10500 different universes, each with its own laws.’ TGD (58-83 & 135-136) goes on to claim that these many universes actually exist. That is because, based on Richard Feynman’s42 formulation and interpretation of quantum theory, anything that can possibly take place will necessarily take place in one of the parallelly existing universes (multiverse). So, if M-theory is correct and it allows for 10500 different internal spaces, it implies that 10500 parallel universes exist, each with a uniquely shaped internal space, resulting in a unique set of laws. We are compelled to believe this, no matter how outrageous it may sound, because it is an implication of quantum theory, which ‘has passed every experimental test to which it has ever been subjected’.

Commentary Despite being highly speculative and severely criticised by top-of-the-line physicists (See Lennox 2011, 51-56), let us accept M-theory at face value for the sake of discussion.

42 Prof. Richard P. Feynman (1918–1988) was an American theoretical physicist; a joint Nobel Laureate (1965) for his fundamental contributions to quantum electrodynamics.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

M-theory allowing for 10500 universes ≠ Presence of 10500 universes As alluded to above, the idea of the multiverse is based on one interpretation of quantum mechanical observations, called ‘many-worlds interpretation’. Various other interpretations exist that do not support the multiverse, and which interpretation to choose seems like a matter of taste. Nothing could be more pertinent here than the following words of Richard Feynman (2017, 168): ‘[E]very theoretical physicist who is any good knows six or seven different theoretical representations for exactly the same physics. He knows that they are all equivalent, and that nobody is ever going to be able to decide which one is right at that level, but he keeps them in his head, hoping that they will give him different ideas for guessing.’ So, hard quantum mechanical facts per se do not necessitate belief in the multiverse. This implies that M-theory’s allowance for 10500 universes can be treated like any other mathematical model, which may or may not correspond with the actual reality. The other day, for instance, I was solving a mathematical equation for calculating concentration of a gas in a liquid, and the equation predicted a positive as well as a negative concentration. Any concentration obviously has to be positive, and that was what I was looking for. But what about the negative concentration? That solution was meaningless. The same goes for M-theory’s solutions that allow for 10500 different universes: they are nothing more than science fiction unless backed by empirical evidence, which is not yet there. The evidence for quantum theory is not relevant to the multiverse hypothesis, for as mentioned earlier, it is not a necessary consequence of quantum theory.

3. Where do laws come from?

Let us listen to Einstein’s words once more (quoted in more detail at the opening of this chapter): ‘[T]he data of experience and their mutual relations are to correspond exactly to consequences in the theory. In the possibility of such a representation lies the sole value and justification of the whole system.’ When TGD (136) says that ‘many universes exist with many different sets of physical laws’, one needs to be careful not to take ‘existence’ in the literal sense. That is because TGD (45- 59) assumes ‘model-dependent realism’, which simply means that our reality is at the mercy of models (world picture and theories) created by our brains. These models may or may not correspond with the actual reality, if any such exists. So, in the strict sense, model-dependent realism does not allow any ontological claims such as, ‘Universes exist!’ The correct statement, according to this view, would be somewhat like this: Many universes exist in the model (M- theory) of the model-reality created by our brains. (For more on model-dependent realism, see Chapter 5.) The law of gravity – a consequence of M-theory? As we have seen, according to TGD, all fundamental laws of our universe are a consequence of M-theory in that M-theory postulates seven additional, hidden/internal dimensions of space; the shape thereof determines behaviours/actions of particulars, described by laws. So, when Hawking says, ‘Gravity is a consequence of M-theory,’ he means to say that gravity is a consequence of the shape of the internal space. That is why he equates the question of the origin of the law of gravity to the arithmetic law 2 + 2 = 4. We cannot question this law because it accurately describes and predicts what

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe happens in our universe if we add up a particular number of things of the same kind. However, if someone would ask about its origin, we can answer that it is a consequence of what happens in the world around us, given that such a world is there with things that can be added together. To make matters clearer, imagine some animals locked up in a cage. We can say that their freedom of movement, level of happiness/sadness, or interaction with each other and the environment etc. depends upon the design of the cage (a causal power). But this is just a description of how things are set up, not an explanation of the presence of the cage or the animals with such behaviour that could be influenced by the design of the cage. The same goes for M-theory’s description of the shape of the internal space (a causal power) and its effects on the individual or collaborative actions of particulars, described by laws. To take gravity specifically, it might be a consequence of the coaction of the shape of the internal space (as M-theory suggests) and other particulars (essentially, matter/energy) present in the universe. But this obviously begs the question where those particulars (space and matter/energy) came from in the first place. Let us recall Hawking’s (2012; brackets mine) answer, ‘Gravity and quantum theory cause universes [including the one like ours, with space and matter/energy] to be created spontaneously out of nothing.’ Hawking’s reasoning here seems to be circular and contradicting what we have learnt so far about laws and theories comprising those laws that they are written or verbal descriptions of natural phenomena (See Fig. 1). This obviously means that they cannot cause anything on their own. ‘Newton's celebrated laws of motion,’ explains Lennox

3. Where do laws come from?

(2011, 41), ‘never caused a pool ball to race across the green baize table. That can only be done by people using a pool cue and the action of their own muscles. The laws enable us to analyse the motion, and to map the trajectory of the ball's movement in the future (providing nothing external interferes); but they are powerless to move the ball, let alone bring it into existence.’ This means that the so-called laws do not, in fact, exist in nature (Mumford 2004); what exist are particulars with specific dispositions or powers, causing regularities. These regularities can then be expressed as mathematical laws (such as E = m × c2), which can become part of theories (such as special relativity).

Fig. 1. Circular reasoning of TGD

But this sequence of events is turned on its head by Hawking’s claim that the law of gravity and quantum theory cause spontaneous creation of universes, out of nothing. Is

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe he simply wrong or are we missing something? To find the answer, let us see how TGD and other experts explain this interesting thesis.

4. How could Quantum Theory and the law of gravity necessitate a universe out of nothing?

‘To him who is a discoverer in [theoretical physics], the products of his imagination appear so necessary and natural that he regards them, and would like to have them regarded by others, not as creations of thought but as given realities.’ Albert Einstein “On the Method of Theoretical Physics.” Essays in Science (2011), 10 ‘We are in the habit of talking as if [laws] caused events to happen; but they have never caused any event at all. The laws of motion do not set billiard balls moving: they analyze the motion after something else (say, a man with a cue […]) has provided it. They produce no events: they state the pattern to which every event – if only it can be induced to happen – must conform, just as the use of arithmetic state the pattern to which all transactions with money must conform – if only it can get hold of any money. Thus in one sense the laws of Nature cover the whole field of space and time; in another, what they leave out is precisely the whole real universe – the incessant torrent of actual events which makes up true history. That must come from somewhere else. To think the laws can produce it is like thinking that you can create real money by simply doing sums. For every law, in the last resort, says “If you have A, then you will get B”. But first catch your A: the laws won't do it for you.’ C. S. Lewis Miracles (1974), 93-94

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

TGD’s (The Grand Design) Position Spontaneous emergence of the universe out of nothing GD (139) suggests that ‘we are a product of quantum fluctuations in the very early universe’. To understand quantum fluctuations, we first need to understand Twhat a quantum vacuum is, which TGD (113) explains as thus: Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle dictates that both the position and the velocity of a particle cannot be measured accurately at the same time. The more accurately one is measured, the more uncertain the other becomes. The same applies to the energy value of a field and its rate of change. But empty space would violate this principle because its energy value and the rate of change would simultaneously turn out to be exactly zero. Thus, there cannot be any such thing in the universe as completely empty space or, in other words, nothing. However, the next closest thing to nothing is a tiny ‘speck’ of space in a state of minimum or lowest possible energy, called the ‘quantum vacuum state’. In this state, the space is unstable, meaning that within it ‘particles and fields quiver in and out of existence’ on a scale as small as the space between the three quarks that make up a proton. The phenomenon is called ‘vacuum/quantum fluctuations’, and the particles spontaneously popping into existence are called ‘virtual particles’43. TGD (136-137) argues that since the universe started on an extremely tiny/quantum scale, it is reasonable to assume that

43 Virtual particles cannot be observed, but their effects can be very precisely measured.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

it spontaneously emerged as an infinitesimal particle out of a quantum vacuum (or, essentially, out of nothing) and, then, underwent inflationary expansion. Here, the word ‘particle’ may create a false picture of the early universe in one’s mind. So, it needs to be clarified that what abruptly came into existence because of a quantum mechanism was actually spacetime (or, simply, space). This space – the early universe – ‘might typically be 10-33 cm in size’ and was, virtually, void of matter (Davies 1990, 214-215). The law of gravity necessitating the formation of matter TGD (179-181) argues that ‘the energy of an isolated body (of matter) surrounded by empty space is positive,’ which means that energy is required to create a body. But energy of a closed system is a ‘conserved’ (fixed) quantity, meaning that it can neither be created nor destroyed – the first law of thermodynamics. If so, then how could the whole universe be created out of nothing, without violating the first law (i.e., without first creating energy)? As for the energy of a quantum vacuum, it remains constant in spite of spontaneous materialisation of virtual particles (which may further expand into universes), so no new energy is required for this process. But the crucial question here is that the universe which spontaneously materialised as a virtual particle was essentially empty; then, how did countless matter particles appeared within it without violating the first law? In other words, where did the energy come from to create particles – the building blocks of light, matter, or anti-matter, all of which have (positive) energy? TGD suggests that the answer lies in the law of gravity. Since gravity has negative energy, on the scale of the entire

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe universe ‘the positive energy of the matter can be balanced by the negative gravitational energy’. This has an astonishing implication: the need of positive energy for the creation of all the building blocks of matter could be annulled by their negative gravitational energy. Thus, matter particles could spontaneously come into existence in the empty space of the universe, without requiring any energy. In other words, the net energy of the universe, before and after the spontaneous formation of all the matter particles, could remain zero (conserved) and, therefore, ‘there is no restriction on the creation of the whole universes. Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing’. Following ‘can’, the ‘will’ of necessity is purposefully added here because of Richard Feynman’s formulation and interpretation of quantum theory. Owing to it, TGD (61-83 & 135-136) claims that if, say, any ten events could possibly take place in the universe, all of them would simultaneously take place in ten parallelly existing histories of the universe (multiverse). Since matter exists in our universe, we know that the probability of its spontaneous formation in the history of the universe observable to us is 100% (i.e., certain). However, in other non-observable universes, there would either be no matter, or completely different stuff with different laws of physics, or some other possible alternative.44

44 As we saw in Chapter 3, this so-called ‘many-worlds interpretation’ is just one of many proposed interpretations of quantum mechanics. The other (equally valid) interpretations do not support the multiverse. So, hard quantum mechanical facts per se do not make it necessary for us to believe in the multiverse.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

Coming back to the spontaneous creation of matter, Hawking (1998, 129) has explained this phenomenon in his book A Brief History of Time as follows: ‘Where did they [1080 particles in the universe] all come from? The answer is that, in quantum theory, particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle pairs [quantum fluctuations]. But that just raises the question of where the energy came from. The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus, in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.’ (Brackets mine)

Further Explanation of TGD’s Position Negative and positive energies Since the idea of negative energy and spontaneous creation of matter particles is quite counterintuitive, we should explore it further with the help of the theoretical physicist and astrobiologist Paul Davies45 (1996), who knows the art of explaining complicated concepts simply and in layman terms:

45 Professor at Arizona State University

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

‘The big bang was the source of prolific energy, enough to make all the matter that constitutes the stars and gases of the galaxies, plus the heat radiation that bathes the cosmos. But we are bound to ask, where did all that cosmic energy come from in the first place? Totting up the energy of the Universe is a straightforward exercise, except that not all the contributions are positive. Importantly, gravitational energy actually counts as an energy deficit. Using a monetary analogy, the energy of matter represents savings, but gravitational energy represents a debt. To take a practical illustration, positive energy, such as that stored in a battery, can be used to perform useful work, eg to power a motor. But gravitational energy requires the expenditure of work to overcome it. Thus to pluck the Earth out of the solar system, to which it is bound by the Sun's gravitational force, would require a huge input of energy to work against the Sun's attraction. Conversely, dropping the Earth toward the Sun would release energy. Gravitation is a universal force: every object in the Universe pulls on every other object. A rough calculation of the (negative) energy of all this cosmic attraction reveals a remarkable result. Though enormous, it turns out to be very close to the same enormous (positive) energy contained in the material of all the stars. In other words, when the energy of all the matter in the stars is added to the gravitational energy of this same material, the answer comes out to be about zero. Actually, this is not quite true. The gravitational energy of the stars is only a few per cent of the matter energy. However,

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

astronomers are convinced that the stars represent only a small fraction of all the cosmic matter that exists. They have good evidence that substantial quantities of unseen, or dark, matter lurk in the depths of space. Taking the dark matter into account, it is plausible that the total energy of the Universe is precisely zero! If this sum is correct, it carries a startling implication: a particle of matter can come into existence without the need for any additional energy. The energy locked up in the material content of the particle is exactly offset by its gravitational interaction with the rest of the Universe. Thus, matter can appear in empty space without actually violating the law of energy conservation. Once again, merely identifying a possibility is not the same as producing a detailed physical theory. However, unlike the situation for the quantum origin of the Universe, there is a considerable body of theory about the origin of matter. This theory goes under the beguiling name of the "inflationary Universe scenario", or simply "inflation”.’ Gravity, inflation, and the spontaneous creation of matter To understand inflation, we turn to the father of this theory Alan Guth46 (2001, 68-70). According to the inflationary theory, he explains, the early universe (or, more precisely, 10- 33 cm space) created by a quantum fluctuation contained a tiny patch filled with an unusual form of matter. It was unusual in that the matter we are familiar with produces gravity, which we all know is an attractive force, but the

46 Victor Weisskopf Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe matter contained within that patch produced repulsive gravity – sometimes called ‘anti-gravity’. This repulsive gravity fuelled a rapid exponential expansion of the early universe, namely inflation or ‘bang of the big bang’, as Guth (1998, xiv) puts it. The big bang theory, he explains, describes the aftermath of the bang, but not the actual bang. The inflationary theory, on the other hand, describes ‘the first tiny fraction of the second of the history of the universe, and then the description merges with that of the standard big bang theory’. (See Fig. 2, which puts inflation in context of the overall history of the universe.) Inflation had two peculiar features: One was that, during its ephemeral course, the universe expanded at a much faster rate compared to that at which it continued to expand afterwards. The other is explained by Guth (2001, 69) as follows: ‘Whenever a normal material expands its density goes down, but this [repulsive gravity] material behaves completely differently. As it expands, the density remains constant. That means that the total amount of mass contained in the region increased during inflation by a colossal factor. The increase in mass probably seems strange at first, because it sounds like a gross violation of the principle of energy conservation. Mass and energy are equivalent, so we are claiming that the energy of the matter within the patch increased by a colossal factor. The reason this is possible is that the […] energies are not always positive. In particular, the energy of a gravitational field is negative. This statement, that the energy of a gravitational field is negative, is true both in the context of the Newtonian theory of gravity and also in the more sophisticated context of general relativity.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

Fig. 2. Fig.

A timeline of major events in the universe’s evolution (A public domain image; descriptions mine) image; descriptions domain public (A evolution universe’s the in events major of timeline A

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

So, during inflation, total energy is conserved. As more and more positive energy (or mass) appears as the patch expands at constant density, more and more negative energy is simultaneously appearing in the gravitational field that fills the region. The total energy is constant, and it remains incredibly small because the negative contribution of gravity cancels the enormous positive energy of the matter. The total energy, in fact, could very plausibly be zero. It is quite possible that there is a perfect cancellation between the negative energy of gravity and the positive energy of everything else.’ This leaves us with the question how ordinary matter (with attractive gravity) finally came into existence. According to Guth (2001, 69-70), the repulsive-gravity matter was unstable and, eventually, underwent radioactive decay. Resultantly, enormous amount of energy was released, which evolved into a hot soup of ordinary matter particles – the building blocks of galaxies, stars, planets, and life. This idea that various forms of positive energy can be cancelled out by the equal amount of negative energy present in the universe is called the ‘zero-energy hypothesis’, first proposed by Edward P. Tryon47 in 1973. To summarise this rather lengthy discussion in Michio Kaku’s48 (2013) words: ‘It takes no energy to create a universe,’49 and in that

47 Professor of Physics at Hunter College, New York 48 Henry Semat Professor of Theoretical Physics at the City College of New York 49 Like zero net matter-energy content on the scale of the whole universe, Kaku explains, other stuff in the universe will also cancel out to give zero; for example, net negative and positive charge of all the particles in the universe will yield zero and the net effect of

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

of Guth (1998, 15): ‘It is fair to say that the universe is the ultimate free lunch.’

Commentary Quantum vacuum is manifestly not nothing! In context of the spontaneous emergence of the universe, TGD implicitly50 takes quantum vacuum as ‘nothing’. A quantum vacuum, however, is far from nothing; it is, indeed, something. The theoretical cosmologist Lawrence Krauss51 takes the same position as that of TGD in his 2012 book A Universe from Nothing, but he is much more explicit on the idea of ‘nothing’. In one of his talks (2009), hosted by Richard Dawkins, he explained nothing as follows: ‘Nothing is not nothing anymore in physics. Because of the laws of quantum mechanics and special relativity, on extremely small scales, nothing is really a boiling, bubbling brew of virtual particles that are popping in and out of the spin of galaxies in various directions will also be zero. This has led some to believe that the universe is both something as well as nothing, which is false. Zero energy before particles came into existence and zero net-energy after their formation is not the same: zero energy before the particles existed means absence of energy, but zero net-energy after their existence means the presence of equal amounts of positive and negative energies. The same goes for all other balancing/opposite forces in the universe. 50 The way TGD’s narrative is put together and explained above has already explicated many things. However, the original text is quite vague, indirect, and incoherent, especially regarding the topics covered in this chapter. 51 Professor of Astrophysics at Arizona State University

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe existence on a time scale so short you can't see them.’ Obviously, Krauss is referring to quantum fluctuations here. David Albert52 (2012) sternly criticised such labelling of quantum vacuum as nothing in one of his articles in the New York Times: ‘Relativistic-quantum-field-theoretical vacuum states – no less than giraffes or refrigerators or solar systems – are particular arrangements of elementary physical stuff. The true relativistic-quantum-field-theoretical equivalent to there not being any physical stuff at all isn’t this or that particular arrangement of the fields – what it is (obviously, and ineluctably, and on the contrary) is the simple absence of the fields!53 The fact that some arrangements of fields happen to correspond to the existence of particles and some don’t is not a whit more mysterious than the fact that some of the possible arrangements of my fingers happen to correspond to the existence of a fist and some don’t. And the fact that particles can pop in and out of existence, over time, as those fields rearrange themselves, is not a whit more mysterious than the fact that fists can pop in and out of existence, over time, as my fingers rearrange themselves. And none of these poppings – if you look at them aright – amount to anything even remotely in the neighborhood of a creation from nothing.’ The word ‘field’ is used here several times. In context of this

52 Ph.D., theoretical physics; currently a professor (engaged in philosophy of physics and science) at Columbia University, New York 53 I would like to add the absence of space too, since space has certain measurable properties.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

discussion, its definition is worth considering: ‘The field, although nearly as ethereal as the ether itself, can be said to have physical reality. It occupies space. It contains energy. Its presence eliminates a true vacuum. We must then be content to define the vacuum of everyday discourse as a region free of matter, but not free of field.’ (Wheeler and Ford, 163) To conclude this section, the correct statement ought to be ‘a universe out of a quantum vacuum and because of the quantum vacuum energy’ which, as Lennox (2011, 30) says, are ‘manifestly not nothing’. Has physics rendered creatio ex nihilo impossible? As we have seen, both TGD and Krauss claim that physics, or more precisely Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, does not allow the existence of ‘nothing’ in the sense the word is understood in philosophy (nihil) or ordinary language (non- being). But as we have discussed in Chapter 1 and 3, there is no question of the so-called laws or principles of physics without a prior existence of particulars in nature, whose doings the laws or principles describe. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is no exception; it is an outcome of the presence of particles in the universe or, at least, the primitive quantum vacuum out of which the universe is claimed to have spontaneously emerged. If such a quantum vacuum itself was created out of absolutely nothing (ex nihilo), Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle was not even there to ‘allow’ or ‘disallow’ that! Let us use this opportunity to touch upon the concept of creatio ex nihilo in religion. ‘Ex nihilo’ (out of nothing) here

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe implies ‘out of no prior material cause’, but the word54 of God. This word, carrying the will of God, metamorphosed into the material that kicked off the evolution of the universe, as per His plan and purpose of creation (Quran 36:82; Ghamidi 2018b, 98). Next, we turn to TGD’s (180) conclusion that ‘because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing’. Elsewhere, as we saw in the previous chapter, Hawking put it like this: ‘Gravity and quantum theory cause universes to be created spontaneously out of nothing.’ ‘Nothing’, once again, turns out to be something! To free the conclusion of TGD from the misleading view of laws in nature, we should translate it into Mumford’s (2004) view of causal powers at work in the universe (presented in Chapter 1): Because there is energy or matter with mass (giving it the power to cause, so to speak, craters in the spacetime fabric) and because there is the spacetime fabric with its peculiar structure (giving it the power to curve in the presence of energy or objects with mass), the coaction of the powers of pre-existing energy/matter and space results in gravity. So, if gravity itself is dependent for its existence on the prior existence of matter/energy and space, then how could gravity cause their self-creation from nothing (Lennox 2011, 31 & 39-44)? Regarding this matter, the text of TGD is vague throughout and lacks necessary details. To make matters clearer, let us go through some explanatory passages found

54 The word ‘word’ is metaphorically used here. The exact nature of what is referred to as ‘the word of God’ is beyond human comprehension.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

elsewhere: ‘The key idea – the underlying physics – that makes inflation possible is the fact that most modern particle theories predict that there should exist a state of matter that turns gravity on its head, creating a gravitational repulsion. […] Inflation is the proposition that the early universe contained at least a small patch that was filled with this peculiar repulsive-gravity material.’ (Guth 2001, 68) ‘Conceived in the early 1980s, inflation remains the favoured version of the big bang theory. Boiled down to its essentials, the inflationary scenario goes something like this. Shortly after the Universe originated in a quantum process, and before ordinary matter came to exist, space was filled with an exotic type of energy field. This field had the property of producing a gravitational repulsion – antigravity if you like – that caused the Universe to expand faster and faster, so that it jumped in size (inflated) by a huge amount in a split second.’ (Davies 1996) ‘[I]f the quantum properties of matter and radiation end up endowing even an infinitesimally small region of empty space with energy at very early times, this region can grow to be arbitrarily large and arbitrarily ﬂat. When the inﬂation is over, one can end up with a universe full of stuff (matter and radiation), and the total Newtonian gravitational energy of that stuff will be as close as one can ever imagine to zero.’ (Krauss 2012, 104) In light of these passages, TGD’s conclusion can now be explicated as follows (See Fig. 3): The spacetime fabric (baby universe) that spontaneously emerged out of a quantum vacuum contained an infinitesimal patch filled with the

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe repulsive-gravity material. As the repulsive gravity caused this material to explode, the universe (i.e., this material and the boundaries of the spacetime fabric) started to expand with the ‘bang’. During this inflation, the repulsive-gravity material maintained its density, i.e., it underwent massive self-replication55 (producing all the energy required for making up all the matter particles in the universe) without requiring any energy. The energy requirement was bypassed due to the amazing properties of the repulsive-gravity material and the spacetime fabric. As this material and space swelled, equal positive energy (matter) and negative energy (gravity) simultaneously resulted, such that the total energy requirement amounted to zero. It now becomes clear that TGD’s ‘from nothing’ here, like in the case of quantum vacuum, once again turns out to be something: pre-existing spacetime and the repulsive-gravity material. Regarding how this material came into existence, there are various theories and hypotheses ‘based on ideas ranging from chaotic initial conditions to the creation of the universe as a quantum tunnelling event’ (Guth 2001, 68). However, none of these point to its self-creation out of nothing, such that it becomes self-explanatory. A couple of decades before TGD was published, Paul Davies (1990, 217) was spot on in concluding this story as follows: ‘The “free lunch” scenario claims that all you need are the laws – the universe can take care of itself, including its own creation. […] But what of the laws? They have to be “there” to start with so that the universe can come into being.

55 This self-replication is what TGD refers to as the spontaneous gravity-driven self-creation of the universe, out of nothing.

4. Quantum theory, gravity, and spontaneous creation

Quantum physics has to exist (in some sense) so that a quantum transition can generate the cosmos in the first place.’

Fig. 3. Highlights of TGD’s (The Grand Design) creation story

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

In light of our discussion of laws, it should be clear that by saying ‘laws’ and ‘quantum physics’, Davies here is alluding to the peculiar properties of the pre-existing stuff. Even if the zero-energy/free-lunch hypothesis were well- established it, at best, answers how questions, not any fundamental why questions (which essentially are beyond the scope of science). To be precise, it describes how an enormous amount of new matter was spontaneously generated in the universe in an energy-efficient manner. But it does not answer why the quantum-vacuum energy possessed such an awe-inspiring propensity to transmute into self-replicating repulsive-gravity matter, elementary particles of conventional matter, atoms, galaxies, stars, heavy elements, planets, water, and, eventually, life. ‘By chance’ is obviously a non-answer here, no matter if it comes wrapped in an exciting proposition like the multiverse, as we shall see. Now when the core of TGD’s creation story lies open in front of us (Fig. 3), we can move on to see what implications it has for the theistic God.

5. Is it time to celebrate/mourn A Personal God’s death?

‘To the majority of those who have reflected deeply and written about the origin and nature of the universe, it has seemed that it points beyond itself to a source which is non- physical and of great intelligence and power. Almost all of the great classical philosophers — certainly Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant, Hegel, Locke, Berkeley — saw the origin of the universe as lying in a transcendent reality. They had different specific ideas of this reality, and different ways of approaching it; but that the universe is not self-explanatory, and that it requires some explanation beyond itself, was something they accepted as fairly obvious.’ Keith Ward God, Chance and Necessity (1996), 1 ‘Both religion and science require a belief in God. For believers, God is in the beginning, and for physicists He is at the end of all considerations. […] To the former He is the foundation, to the latter, the crown of the edifice of every generalized world view.’ Max Planck, Nobel Laureate in Physics (1918) A lecture on “Religion and Natural Science” in Baltic region (May 1937) Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers (1949), 184

efore coming to this question, it seems appropriate to see how TGD (The Grand Design) epistemologically interprets scientific knowledge: its validity on the B world around us and the question of God.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

Model-dependent realism

TGD’s Position TGD (39-59) argues that modern physics neither supports ontological realism (the position that a concrete universe exists independent of us, the observers) nor subjective idealism/anti-realism (suggesting that there is no external universe, and all that exists merely exists within our minds). Therefore, TGD adopts a view called ‘model-dependent realism’. The term is coined by the authors to represent the idea that what we see as, for example, a chair is actually only a picture/model created by our brain, as it interprets the visual data. There is no way we can reach the actual chair (if any) independent of our brain-model to pass any verdict about its ontological status: we cannot tell if the visual data is originating from a real chair existing independent of us out there (and is modelled sufficiently well by our brains) or it is fed into our brains through some other source56. Ontological questions, therefore, are beyond the reach of our knowledge and are pointless. In addition to the involuntary models our brains create as a routine, we also make models (laws or theories) in science to explain observations and make predictions. One such model is the famous equation based on Einstein’s special theory of relativity: E = m × c2, where E represents energy (potential to

56 For example, as for a chair we see in a dream, its data is not fed into our brains from what we call the ‘external world’. Similarly, while being awake, we might be conscious characters in a dream- like (or a virtual reality-like) situation, who are fed with mere data without any concrete reality behind it.

5. God and Stephen Hawking

do work), m mass, and c the speed of light57. This elegant (i.e., concise and simple) model explains the relationship between mass and energy, has the ability to explain complex observations, and make scientifically useful predictions. For example, if we want to know how much energy an object of specific mass will contain on Mars, we can confidently employ this equation. TGD (ibid.) suggests that all such scientific models should be discussed in the framework of model-dependent realism. That will require us to avoid ontological questions about scientific models58 and encourage us to judge them on the basis of their elegance59,

57 E = m × c2 implies that the amount of energy in an object is equal to its mass times the speed of light squared; for example, if we want to know the amount of energy in a stationary stone with mass of 2 kilograms (kg) we can find it out using this equation: m = 2 kg c = 299,792,458 meters per second (m/s) E = 2 kg × (299,792,458 m/s)2 = 599,548,916 kg × m2/s2 Since 1 kg × m2/s2 = 1 joule, a 2 kg stone will contain 599,548,916 joules of energy in it. 58 For E = m × c2, for example, it will be irrelevant to ask whether mass and energy are particulars or properties of particulars, present in the real external world. Instead, we shall start our discussion from the point that the relationship between mass and energy is so, according to our perception. 59 Elegance here refers to simplicity and conciseness (of the sort we find in E = m × c2). It further implies that the model need not be adjusted on ad hoc basis to fit with observations and contain only a few (if any) arbitrarily adjustable elements. E = m × c2 would have been an inelegant model if, for example, the value of c needed to be arbitrarily altered to conform to or explain the observations.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe utility to explain existing observations, and ability to make experimentally testable predictions. If two or more such models live up to this criterion while attempting to describe the same phenomenon, they will be accepted as equally valid.60

Commentary Model-dependent realism leaves no room for truth or ontological claims, such as ‘God does or does not exist’. ‘Realism’ in ‘model-dependent realism’ is a rather misleading term because, as mentioned above, TGD does not take as real or absolute truth what our mental and scientific models

60 To further illustrate the point, TGD (39-46) asks us to think of fish kept within a spherical bowl. Due to the curved surface of the bowl, the fish will have a distorted view of the world outside the bowl; for example, an object moving in a straight line will appear to the fish to take a curved path. But if one such fish happens to be Newton, it can still formulate laws of motion from its point of reference, which will agree with observations of moving objects from within the bowl and also make correct predictions about their motion. The laws of motion formulated by the fish will be different to ours; nonetheless, they will be completely valid from the fish’s perspective, and leave, at least, the realist fish with no reason to doubt its picture of reality. Our laws and the fish’s laws of motion both will model the motion of the same objects adequately but from different frame of references, and both will be useful and valid – ours outside the bowl and that of the fish within it. Similarly, if we ourselves happen to be inside some invisible spherical bowl distorting our view of ‘reality’, that will have no bearing on the validity of our laws from the perspective of model-dependent realism.

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tell us. Rather, it takes an idealist approach where the external reality is neither negated nor affirmed [Lennox (2011, 57) correctly refers to TGD’s position as anti-realism]. So when it makes ontological or truth statements, model- dependent realism restricts us not to take them literally. For example, when TGD (59, 136, 153, 154 & 165, respectively) claims that ‘every possible version of the universe exists simultaneously’, ‘in fact, many universes exist with many different sets of physical laws’, ‘planets of all sorts exist’, ‘our own knowledge of our existence’ and ‘the fine-tunings in the laws of nature can be explained by the existence of multiple universes’, all it implies is that according to our perception or scientific models, things exist in such and such manner. As for reality, model-dependent realism fully endorses the possibility that our brain and scientific tools might be showing us a completely false picture of it. Thus, any truth claims by definition are beyond the scope of TGD, and that includes the existence/non-existence of God. That is why TGD does not go as far as to claim that God does not exist. During Larry King Live (2012), Hawking explicated his position in this regard saying, ‘God may exist, but science can explain the universe without a need for a creator.’ At one place, TGD (42) says: ‘How do we know we are not just characters in a computer- generated soap opera? If we lived in a synthetic imaginary world, events would not necessarily have any logic or consistency or obey any laws. The aliens in control might find it more interesting or amusing to see our reactions, for example, if the full moon split in half. […] But if the aliens did enforce consistent laws, there is no way we could tell there was another reality behind the simulated one.’

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

This exactly is the scope of TGD’s science, which has got nothing to say about the ultimate reality. Even if it can show that the universe is self-explanatory, it is mute to go on and claim that a creator61 is unnecessary, let alone does not exist. TGD’s position is quite understandable for only a creator (if any) can answer the ultimate questions and reveal the ultimate knowledge. This highlights the importance of divine revelation (if such exists) as a source of knowledge and invites every sincere seeker to seriously investigate this matter, rather than outrightly rejecting such a possibility or showing antipathy to religion because of naïve claims and attitudes of people who carry its name. Next, we shall anyway go through important passages of TGD with direct implications for the question of God and see how TGD defends its claim that ‘science can explain the universe without a need for a creator.’

Are laws self-explanatory?

TGD’s Position TGD’s ultimate explanation of the universe boils down to the so-called laws of physics. Are laws self-explanatory, such that they do not need any further explanation? TGD’s answer, at least regarding the fundamental laws of nature, is in the affirmative. Presenting John Conway’s Game of Life62 as an

61 The words like ‘creator’ or ‘supreme being’ and corresponding pronouns are only capitalised when referring to the Abrahamic (theistic) God. 62 Lennox (2011, 69-70) has produced a useful summary of Conway’s Game of Life as follows:

5. God and Stephen Hawking

‘Conway envisioned a “world” consisting of an array of squares like a chess board, but extending indefinitely in all directions. Each square can be in one of two states, “alive” or “dead”, represented by the squares being coloured green or black respectively. Each square has eight neighbours (up, down, left, right and four on the diagonals). Time moves in discrete steps. You start with any chosen arrangement of alive and dead squares; there are three rules or laws that determine what happens next, all proceeding deterministically from the initial chosen state. Some simple patterns remain the same, others change for several generations and then die out; yet others return to their original form after several generations and then repeat the process indefinitely. There are “gliders”, consisting of five alive squares, which morph through five intermediate shapes and then return to their original shape, albeit displacing one square along the diagonal. And there are many more sophisticated forms of behaviour exhibited by more complex initial configurations. Part of Conway’s world (remember that it is assumed infinite in all directions) can be modelled on a computer, so that one can watch what happens as generation succeeds generation. For instance, “gliders” can be observed crawling diagonally across the screen (To see what this looks like visit wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_Game_of_Life). This world with its simple laws holds great attraction for mathematicians, and has been instrumental in the development of the important theory of cellular automata. Conway and his students, as Hawking points out, showed that there are complex initial configurations that self-replicate under the laws. Some of them are so-called Universal Turing Machines that can, in principle, carry out any calculation that could be carried out on a computer. Configurations of alive and dead squares in Conway’s world that are able to do this have been calculated as being of enormous size – consisting of trillions of squares (See http://rendell-

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe example, TGD (179) argues that ‘even a very simple set of laws can produce complex features similar to those of intelligent life. There must be many laws with this property. What picks out the fundamental laws (as opposed to the apparent laws) that govern our universe? As in Conway’s universe, the laws of our universe determine the evolution of the system given the state at any one time. In Conway’s world we are the creators – we choose the initial state of the universe by specifying objects and their positions at the start of the game.’

Commentary In his critical response to TGD, Lennox (2011, 71-72) quotes the same paragraph and wittily responds to it as follows: ‘At this point Hawking diverts from the Game of Life, and leaves the reader uncertain as to exactly how he is applying it. Nevertheless, one can surely say that the impression has been communicated to the reader that, just as in Conway’s world a simple set of laws can produce lifelike complexity, in our world a simple set of laws could produce life itself. However, the analogy shows nothing of the sort, but rather the exact opposite. First of all, in Conway’s world the laws do not produce the complex self-replicating objects. Laws, as we have constantly emphasized, create nothing in any world: they can only act on something that is already there. In Conway’s world the immensely complex objects that can self- replicate under the laws have to be initially configured in the system by highly intelligent mathematical minds. They are created neither from nothing nor by chance, but by attic.org/gol/utm/index.htm).’

5. God and Stephen Hawking

intelligence. The same applies to the laws. Secondly, Conway’s world has to be implemented, and this is done using sophisticated computer hardware with all its attendant software and high-speed algorithms. The alive and dead cells are represented by pixellated squares on a screen, and the laws governing their behaviour are programmed into the system. It should go without saying – but it clearly needs to be said – that all of this involves massive intellectual activity and input of information. In this way, even though he is allergic to the notion of intelligent design, Hawking has just given an excellent argument in its support. Ironically, he actually admits this by saying that, in Conway’s world, we are the creators. And in our universe the Creator is God.’

God or the multiverse?

TGD’s Position TGD puts forward the multiverse hypothesis as an alternative to that of a personal God. It presents its case as follows: ‘Our universe and its laws appear to have a design that both is tailor-made to support us and, if we are to exist, leaves little room for alteration. That is not easily explained, and raises the natural question of why it is that way. Many people would like us to use these coincidences as evidence of the work of God.’ (162-163) ‘But the discovery relatively recently of the extreme fine- tuning of so many of the laws of nature could lead at least some of us back to the old idea that this grand design is the work of some grand designer. […] That is not the answer of

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe modern science. […] Our universe seems to be one of many, each with different laws. That multiverse idea is not a notion invented to account for the miracle of fine-tuning. It is a consequence of the no-boundary condition as well as many other theories of modern cosmology. But if it is true, then the strong anthropic principle can be considered effectively equivalent to the weak one, putting the fine-tunings of physical law on the same footing as the environmental factors, for it means that our cosmic habitat – now the entire observable universe – is only one of many, just as our solar system is one of many. That means that in the same way that the environmental coincidences of our solar system were rendered unremarkable by the realization that billions of such systems exist, the fine-tunings in the laws of nature can be explained by the existence of multiple universes. Many people through the ages have attributed to God the beauty and complexity of nature that in their time seemed to have no scientific explanation.’ (164-165)

Commentary Firstly, there are top-level scientists who, rather than rejecting ‘the old idea’63 of God on the basis of scientific evidence, use this evidence to argue for God (See Lennox 2009). Therefore, the statement that God ‘is not the answer of modern science’ is misleading as if it is a well-established fact within the scientific community. Secondly, it is rather a

63 Lennox (2011, 48) correctly points out that the word ‘old’ here gives a wrong impression as if the idea is false and replaced by something better.

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lame philosophical speculation that the fine-tuning64 of the universe is a coincidence, not a scientific hypothesis. The multiverse concept does not make it any better because, for one, it is far from being verifiable. (Verifiability is important in that it is a basic requirement for any hypothesis to be called scientific.) The prominent quantum theorist John Polkinghorne (2007, 95) writes: ‘Let us recognize these speculations for what they are. They are not physics, but in the strictest sense, metaphysics. There is no purely scientific reason to believe in an ensemble of universes. By construction these other worlds are unknowable by us. A possible explanation of equal intellectual responsibility – and to my mind greater economy and elegance – would be that this one world is the way it is, because it is the creation of the will of a Creator who purposes that it should be so.’ Even if the idea of the multiverse is accepted, it neither explains the fine-tuning65 of the universe in scientific (or any other) terms nor does it remove the need of God as the ultimate explanation of all there is (Lennox 2011, 47-66). To illustrate this point, suppose we come across 10500 heaps of stones (whatever that number means), among which one

64 To get a glimpse of how remarkable the fine-tuning is that has made possible the universe and its sentient beings, see a sub- section devoted to this in Lennox’s ‘God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? (2009, 68-73). 65 It needs to be appreciated, but is often overlooked, that the ‘miracle of fine-tuning’ is not the occurrence of a few extremely improbable events that have made possible the universe and life herein; instead, it is a tale of countless such events.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe happens to be an automatic plant, producing Mercedes Benz. Would such a marvel of engineering not require us to explain it by seeking the engineer responsible for it, even if no engineer is there to be seen? Would the ingenuity and purpose exhibited by that plant be explained away or become ‘unremarkable’ by the presence of numerous worthless heaps of stones around? Of course, not.66 Now, how various processes in that plant work would be a subject of our scientific inquiry. Science might also reveal that the plant slowly self-assembled (evolved) from some primitive material. However, what science would not explain is why, in the first place, that primitive material came loaded with a potential to perfectly evolve into various parts and components of such a plant. Similarly, it would, for instance, not answer why all the other conditions/factors were readily there for a harmonised evolution of the plant toward such a purposeful end. What is beyond science, however, is not necessarily beyond reason and rationality.67 Through abduction (inference to the best explanation), therefore, one can readily infer a mind behind the plant. That, however, will

66 Admittedly, however, there arises a question why all the other heaps of stones show no signs of design. In regard to the fine- tuning and life to be found only on the earth among countless other planets, the Quran (14:48) answers this question. It tells that the other lifeless planets, stars, and galaxies are there as the raw- material for the forthcoming universe. According to the promise of God, that universe shall be created as a perfect, eternal abode for the meek. 67 This sentence is inspired by the title of Epilogue in Lennox 2009, 207.

5. God and Stephen Hawking

not be ‘the answer of science’. Not because science has invalidated it or is in conflict with it, but because, in the strict sense, such an inference is beyond the scope of the scientific method. In the above analogy, we presumed that only one out of 10500 heaps of stones happened to be a brilliant plant. From the naturalist’s perspective, this presumption may colossally increase the margin of error for the nature (whatever that agent means) to eventually come up with the right plant, fine-tuned to produce Mercedes Benz. Regarding 10500 universes postulated, however, it is by no means obvious that they are not fine-tuned for life or some other purpose (Lennox 2011, 49). In that case, the multiverse concept would colossally augment the need for an intelligent and wise creator, rather than eliminating it. Post-script: Just before his death, Hawking endorsed the point made in the last paragraph, originally written sometime in 2014. Philip Goff68 (2018), thus, reports in the Guardian: ‘In Hawking’s older version of the multiverse hypothesis, there is great variety among the laws in different universes. […] [I]n his final paper, “A Smooth Exit from Eternal Inflation?”69, Hawking and his co-writer, Thomas Hertog, formulate strict limits to the kind of universes that populate the multiverse. The problem is that the less variety there is among the universes, the less capable the multiverse hypothesis is of

68 Assoc. Professor of Philosophy at Central European University, Budapest 69 Available from https://arxiv.org/abs/1707.07702

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe explaining fine-tuning. If there is a huge amount of variation in the laws across the multiverse, it is not so surprising that one of the universes would happen to have fine-tuned laws. But if all of the universes have exactly the same laws – as in Hawking and Hertog’s proposal – the problem returns, as we now need an explanation of why the single set of laws that govern the entire multiverse is fine-tuned. Hertog seems not to agree, arguing that the paper does make progress on fine-tuning: “This paper takes one step towards explaining that mysterious fine-tuning… It reduces the multiverse down to a more manageable set of universes which all look alike.” However, this merely puts off the explanation of fine-tuning, for the result is that the laws underlying the generation of the multiverse are fine-tuned. We now need to explain not only why our universe is fine- tuned but why every universe is fine-tuned! In terms of explaining the fine-tuning, this is not a step forward but a step back.’

Why is there something rather than nothing?

TGD’s Position ‘Spontaneous creation,’ says TGD (180), ‘is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.’ (For details, see Chapter 4.)

5. God and Stephen Hawking

Commentary It’s the question of potential! By appealing to spontaneous creation, TGD is attempting here to eradicate the need of God as the so-called ‘First Cause’. That does not work because it is, in fact, spontaneous creation out of a pre-existing quantum vacuum (spacetime and energy) and, subsequently, the repulsive-gravity matter. And that raises the obvious question who or what caused the quantum vacuum and such matter, if not God? Why God? Because whether it was out of a quantum vacuum or ex nihilo creation, the primitive vacuum-energy70 came loaded with a wonderful potential to produce the self- replicating repulsive-gravity matter, building blocks of conventional matter, atoms, attractive gravity, galaxies, stars, heavy elements, planets, water and, eventually, life. Such evolution would have been impossible if the primitive energy did not have the potential to transform into new existents with splendid properties (such as those necessary to produce gravity). All these existents then proved to be perfectly complementary to form a universe which is a marvel of beauty, elegance, and creativity. It exhibits, for instance, mathematical order and symmetry; delicate balance of forces; harmony and coherence amidst the presence of opposite entities; complex self-sustaining systems and natural cycles; efficient means to meaningful ends; and sustenance for not only sentient but intelligent life, capable of appreciating all these wonders. This grand design,

70 ‘Vacuum’ is used as an adjective with ‘energy’ to take into account TGD’s hypothesis of creation. In a broader perspective, it should be read ‘primitive energy/matter’.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe resulting from the potentiality ingrained within matter/energy, is obviously impossible without massive intellectual input, planning, prudence, power, and authority. And that necessarily requires knowledge, wisdom, will, and volition, but energy/matter/space is void of these.71 That is what compels us to infer an external mind – the grand designer – behind our universe. Furthermore, when even a small automated system cannot be run without continuous supervision, how can such a gigantic and complex universe go on, on its own? Thus, our universe not only ought to have an all-knowing and all-powerful creator (the First Cause) behind it, but a creator who is constantly supervising it, as claimed by revealed religion (See Ghamidi 2018b, 90-123 and Quranic references therein).72

71 Even if the universe possessed all these attributes, it is absurd and self-contradictory anyway to postulate that the universe (or anything else for that matter) could create itself, out of nothing (See Lennox 2011, 30-31). 72 Here, we have inferred the existence of God to explain the existence of the universe. Such an inference to the most likely or best explanation of some observation(s) is formally called ‘abductive reasoning’ or ‘abduction’. Abduction is ubiquitous in all fields of study, including science. The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (2017) states: ‘Philosophers of science have argued that abduction is a cornerstone of scientific methodology; see, for instance, Boyd 1981, 1984, Harré 1986, 1988, Lipton 1991, 2004, and Psillos 1999. According to Timothy Williamson (2007), “[t]he abductive methodology is the best science provides” and Ernan McMullin (1992) even goes so far to call abduction “the inference that makes science.”’ An example of abductive reasoning is the theory of evolution, wherein common descent is inferred as the most likely explanation of available data (showing variation within

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As for who that creator is and why he has kept himself hidden, these metaphysical questions are beyond the scope of science. However, they are unanimously answered by revealed religion, such that these answers have become a common heritage of humankind (Ghamidi 2006a and 2018, 93-96). If one intends to challenge this heritage, one has to refute the arguments and evidence provided by religion therefor and enlighten the world with an alternative answer.73 The only alternative answer available so far, as we have seen, is the absurd and self-contradictory claim that the universe itself is its own creator (See Lennox 2011, 30-31).

species; homologous structures among species; and similar or, sometimes, identical genes across species etc). Another example is the discovery of sub-atomic particles, whose existence cannot be directly perceived but inferred from their effects. Yet another interesting example is the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI), wherein radio signals are monitored from the outer space for semantic messages. The underlying idea here is based on abductive reasoning that if such a message is received or intercepted, it would be indicative of other intelligent beings in the universe. In 1982, a petition from Carl Sagan (426) advocating SETI was published in one of the most prestigious scientific journals, Science. The petition was signed by 68 scientists, with seven Nobel Prize winners among them. Since then, many expensive projects have been undertaken and much collective effort is dedicated to SETI. In 2015, a Stephen Hawking-backed programme, ‘Breakthrough Initiatives’ (2017), was launched for this purpose with $100 million cash investment. One project of the programme, ‘Breakthrough Listen’, is dedicated to probe over one million stars for radio or laser signals in anticipation of intelligent life. 73 For a Quran-based argument for God, see Hassan 2018a.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe

A desperate measure to get rid of God What if we take for granted the existence of a tiny patch of repulsive-gravity material, about one-billionth the size of a proton (Guth 2001, 69), and accept that it caused the early universe’s space to inflate? Can we, then, not go on to argue that this material played no role as a cause in the emergence of new such material during inflation and that the new material did not emerge out of it, but independently emerged out of nothing? Since the new material provided the raw-material for essentially all the matter in the universe, can we not say that the whole universe emerged from nothing, without any cause? As for the cause, we cannot sidestep the repulsive-gravity material because its enormous replication would simply have been impossible if its infinitesimal amount, with the potential to expand with a constant density, were not already there. However, it may be argued that the new material did not already exist within the infinitesimal primitive material and, thus, it emerged out of nothing without any further material cause; the non-requirement of energy for this process sidestepped the need for such a cause. But is the material cause, which is only partially sidestepped, the only necessary cause for such a phenomenon, such that it makes God unnecessary? To answer this question, let us turn to Lennox (2011, 36-39) once more: ‘Suppose, to make matters clearer, we replace the universe by a jet engine and then are asked to explain it. Shall we account for it by mentioning the personal agency of its inventor, Sir Frank Whittle? Or shall we follow Hawking: dismiss personal agency, and explain the jet engine by saying that it arose naturally from physical law?

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It is clearly nonsensical to ask people to choose between Frank Whittle and science as an explanation for the jet engine. For it is not a question of either/or. It is self-evident that we need both levels of explanation in order to give a complete description. It is also obvious that the scientific explanation neither conflicts nor competes with the agent explanation: they complement one another. It is the same with explanations of the universe: God does not conflict or compete with the laws of physics as an explanation. God is actually the ground of all explanation, in the sense that he is the cause in the first place of there being a world for the laws of physics to describe. Offering people the choice between God and science is therefore illogical. In addition, it is very unwise, because some people might just choose God and then Hawking could be accused of putting people off science! […] The laws of physics can explain how the jet engine works, but not how it came to exist in the first place. It is self-evident that the laws of physics could not have created a jet engine on their own. That task also needed the intelligence, imagination, and scientific creativity of Whittle. Indeed, even the laws of physics plus Frank Whittle were not sufficient to produce a jet engine. There also needed to be some material that Whittle could use. Matter may be humble stuff, but laws cannot create it. Millennia ago Aristotle thought a great deal about these issues. He spoke about four different “causes” that we can, perhaps, reasonably translate informally as “levels of explanation”. Thinking of the jet engine, first there is the

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe material cause – the raw material out of which the engine is crafted; then there is the formal cause – the concept, plan, theory, and blueprint that Sir Frank Whittle conceived and to which he worked. Next there is the efficient cause – Sir Frank Whittle himself, who did the work. Fourthly, and last in the list, there is the final cause – the ultimate purpose for which the jet engine was conceived and built: to power a particular aircraft to fly faster than ever before. […] Much as I find it hard to believe, Hawking seems to wish to reduce all explanation to formal causes only. He claims that all that is necessary to create the universe is the law of gravity.’

Does the ‘no boundary condition’ render God unnecessary?

TGD’s Position ‘No-boundary condition’ or, alternatively, the ‘Hartle- Hawking state’, is explained in TGD (134-135) as this: ‘In the early universe […] there were effectively four dimensions of space and none of time’, since ‘time behave[d] like another dimension of space’. ‘That means that when we speak of the “beginning” of the universe, we are skirting the subtle issue that as we look backwards towards the very early universe, time as we know it does not exist!’ So, ‘the question of what happened before the beginning of the universe is rendered meaningless’. No-boundary condition ‘removes the age-old objection to the universe having a beginning, but also means that the beginning of the universe was governed by the laws

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of science and doesn’t need to be set in motion by some god’.

Commentary Again, TGD is attempting here to eradicate the need of God as the First Cause and, again, it fails to do so, even if we ignore the technical problems associated with the no- boundary condition and accept it at face value. That is because, irrespective of the existence/non-existence of time, the primitive space/energy came equipped with the potential to create the entire universe, including time. This potential and its subsequent manifestation, which made the evolution of a breath-taking universe possible, clearly points to a mind behind it. It cannot be explained away by a ‘horizontal’ (scientific/physical) reasoning or causation, but necessarily requires a ‘vertical’ (metaphysical) explanation, to borrow the terms of Wolfgang Smith74. Smith (2011, 29-31) elucidates with utmost clarity that these two modes of explanation are complementary, not contradictory. Smith (2011, 31-34) goes on to argue that the removal of time has no implication for God’s act of creation, for that does not take place in time. Time, as St. Augustine (354–430) points out, is a created phenomenon and, therefore, does not apply to the Creator Himself. Boethius (480–525) followed him in this view, maintaining that God does not exist in time, but is timelessly eternal. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2017) explains his view as follows: ‘All temporal events are before the mind of God at once. To

74 A senior mathematician, physicist, philosopher, and metaphysician

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe say “at once” or “simultaneously” is to use a temporal metaphor, but Boethius is clear that it does not make sense to think of the whole of temporal reality as being before God’s mind in a single temporal present. It is an atemporal present in which God has a single complete grasp of all events in the entire span of time.’ Following in Boethius’ footsteps, St. Thomas Aquinas (1225– 1274) writes: ‘[A]lthough corporeal and temporal particulars do not exist simultaneously, God surely has simultaneous knowledge of them. For He knows them according to His manner of being, which is eternal and without succession. Consequently, as He knows material things in an immaterial way, and many things in unity, so in a single glance He beholds objects that do not exist at the same time. And so His knowledge of particulars does not involve the consequence that anything is added to, or subtracted from, His cognition. This also makes it clear that He has certain knowledge of contingent things. Even before they come into being, He sees them as they actually exist, and not merely as they will be in the future and as virtually present in their causes, in the way we are able to know some future things. Contingent things, regarded as virtually present in their causes with a claim to future existence, are not sufficiently determinate to admit of certain knowledge about them; but, regarded as actually possessing existence, they are determinate, and hence certain knowledge of them is possible. Thus we can know with the certitude of ocular vision that Socrates is sitting while he is seated. With like certitude God knows, in His eternity, all that takes place throughout the whole course of time, for His eternity is in present contact with the whole course of time,

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and even passes beyond time. We may fancy that God knows the flight of time in His eternity, in the way that a person standing on top of a watchtower embraces in a single glance a whole caravan of passing travelers.’75 (Aquinas 2012, 142) All this implies that time did not exist at the outset of the universe or came to be with the existence of the universe as a local phenomenon, exactly as TGD claims. But then, according to TGD, ‘the beginning of the universe was governed by the laws of science’. These laws, as we have seen, call for an explanation for their existence, which only means that the inaugural act of the universe’s creation could not be ‘mediated by a temporal (horizontal) sequence of events’ but necessarily had a vertical (timeless or transcendent) cause. And this is exactly what Judeo-Christo- Islamic tradition maintains.

Who created God?

TGD’s Position ‘It is reasonable to ask who or what created the universe,’ argues TGD (172), ‘but if the answer is God, then the question has merely been deflected to that of who created God. In this view it is accepted that some entity exists that needs no

75 Such views are brilliant but humble attempts to understand the mind of God. Are they true? We cannot know, unless God Himself reveals to us how He is beyond time and, so to speak, experiences our time. However, these views are extremely useful for the purpose of stretching our minds and appreciating new possibilities that we often fail to see due to our rigid religious or scanty scientific spectacles.

A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe creator, and that entity is called God.’

Commentary Indeed, revealed religion introduces God as an uncreated, self-explanatory agent. The insistence of atheists on the impossibility of this proposition is mere anthropomorphism, as the physicist Edgar Andrews76 (2012, 25) in his book Who Made God? points out: ‘Cause and effect do indeed reign supreme in the physical realm – both science and normal life would be impossible unless they did. But why should they operate in the same manner in a spiritual realm (if such exists)? We have a choice. Firstly, we can assert a priori that there is no such thing as a spiritual realm – that nothing exists that is not physical and open to scientific investigation. On this basis we can proceed to claim, with some logical justification, that every possible effect must have a cause, because that is how the physical world works. But what we cannot do is use this claim to disprove the existence of God on the grounds that he doesn’t have a cause! Why not? Because our argument would be completely circular. We begin by assuming that no spiritual realm exists and conclude by ‘proving’ our initial assumption.’ Furthermore, the ‘reasonable’ question ‘who or what created the universe’, as TGD puts it, arises because the universe cannot explain its own existence. If, like our universe, God does not happen to be self-explanatory but made, only then would the hypothetical question ‘who made God?’ become valid (Ghamidi 2006a). In that case, we shall try to settle this question, too. But how can we, for the sake of avoiding a

76 Emeritus Professor at Queen Mary, University of London

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hypothetical question, endorse a self-contradictory position that the universe itself is its own creator?

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‘Have they come into being without any creator? Or are they their own creators? Or have they created the heavens and the earth? Nay, they do not believe [for doubt has blinded them]!’77 The Quran (52:35-36)

The hypothesis presented in TGD (The Grand Design) and its implications are summarised towards the end of the book (p. 180) as follows: ‘Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. [...] Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.’ According to this hypothesis, the story of our universe began from a quantum vacuum, termed ‘nothing’. That nothing, however, was far from being so. It contained space and energy, which gave birth to our baby universe – namely infinitesimal space, containing a tiny patch of self-replicating

77 Originally, the Quran put these questions to the Meccan Polytheists, who believed in God but denied the Hereafter. The implication is that if they believed in God, they also had to believe in the Judgement Day because that is a necessary consequence of a just, wise, omniscient, and omnipotent Creator (Ghamidi 2018a, vol. 5, 58). These questions, however, are so fundamental, natural, and universal that all of us can be their addressees, especially those who deny the existence of God.

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repulsive-gravity matter. The repulsive gravity caused that peculiar matter to explode. During the explosion, it – unlike conventional matter – kept its density uniform. It means that it underwent enormous self-replication, producing all the raw-material to be transformed later into conventional matter. During this process, the space of the universe expanded from a flat 10-33 cm to the size of a golf-ball. Since this inflation happened in no time (10-32 sec), TGD refers to it as gravity-driven spontaneous self-creation of the universe, out of nothing. Again, this ‘nothing’, like the quantum vacuum, was not nothing but, as mentioned, a tiny space with a patch of prodigious repulsive-gravity matter (baby universe). It could not be nothing, for nothing begets nothing; there must exist something first to bring about another. Lennox (2011, 31), therefore, commits no error as he points out this: ‘[Hawking] says the universe comes from a nothing that turns out to be a something78 (self-contradiction number one), and then he says the universe creates itself (self-contradiction number two)79. But that is not all. His notion that a law of nature (gravity) explains the existence of the universe is also self-contradictory, since a law of nature, by definition, surely depends for its own existence on the prior existence of the

78 I.e., a quantum vaccuum. 79 ‘If, therefore, we say “X creates X”,’ explains Lennox (2011, 31), ‘we imply that we are presupposing the existence of X in order to account for the existence of X. This is obviously self-contradictory and thus logically incoherent – even if we put X equal to the universe! To presuppose the existence of the universe to account for its own existence sounds like something out of Alice in Wonderland, not science.’

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe nature it purports to describe.’ Correctly speaking, the hypothesis of TGD, therefore, describes the evolution of our universe from a quantum vacuum. This postulated vacuum contained energy equipped with an awe-inspiring disposition to produce self-replicating repulsive-gravity matter, building blocks of conventional matter, atoms, attractive gravity, galaxies, stars, heavy elements, planets, water and, eventually, life. Based on this hypothesis, TGD oddly claims that the universe itself is its creator and, thus, needs no external creator for its explanation. However, once made explicit, the hypothesis does not lend any support to this claim. Quite the contrary, the existence and evolution of such a spectacular universe cannot be explained without a stupendous mind behind it. ‘By chance,’ as hastily exclaimed, is an embarrassingly bad answer, with no explanatory power. The situation does not get any better when it comes wrapped in an intriguing speculation like that of the multiverse (See Chapter 5). Looking closely, the evolution of our universe would have been impossible if the primitive energy/matter were not, in the first place, equipped with the potential to transform into new existents with splendid properties. All these existents then perfectly complemented each other to shape a universe which is a marvel of beauty, elegance, and creativity: It has mathematical order from atoms to galaxies. It exhibits aesthetical design from a snowflake, butterfly, and pineapple to the sun and the Milky Way. It demonstrates a delicate balance of forces along with harmony and coherence amidst the co-existence of opposite entities – electrons and protons, the male and the female, day and night, spring and autumn, urine and milk gushing forth from within the same body, and

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so forth. It houses complex self-sustaining systems and natural cycles for recycling, say, nutrients in ecosystems. It maintains efficient means to meaningful ends; consider pollination and production of seeds to vegetation, achieved through numerous agents timely and effectively working together. It provides a benevolent home, or rather a womb, fine-tuned for not only sentient but intelligent life, capable of appreciating all its wonders. Even seemingly dreadful and destructive phenomena within it, such as lightning and supernovas, pave way to new worlds. Such a spectacular enterprise evidently demands massive intellectual input, planning, prescience, prudence, power, authority, supervision, and diligence. And all this is impossible without knowledge, wisdom, will, and volition – the attributes of a mind. Hence, our universe inevitably points beyond itself to a magnificent mind of an omniscient and omnipotent creator.80 Interestingly, TGD’s creation hypothesis can be compared with the theory of evolution by natural selection. The latter is often cited to claim that it has explained away the so-called ‘apparently miraculous design’ of the biological world, thereby sidestepping the need for a creator (See TGD, 165). The theory, however, only describes how diverse life-forms may have evolved from a primitive self-replicating creature, under the influence of natural selection. That creature, like the primitive vacuum-energy, itself requires an explanation in the first place. Not only it needs to be explained how it came into existence (i.e., the process adopted therefor) but, also, who brought it about (i.e., the efficient/agent cause

80 See Ghamidi 2018b, 92-93 & 99-101 and Islahi 2007, 183-210.

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe involved). Why the latter? Most evidently because at the heart of any living creature lies genetic material, encoded with ‘complex specified information’ – the information that translates into vital structures and functions of life. The mechanism exactly mimics an advanced language, involving syllabary, codes, syntax, and semantics. Since we know of no other source of such language but mind (intelligence), the conclusion is quite obvious (Andrews 2012, 173-192). Secondly, just like in TGD’s hypothesis, numerous pre- requisites without which any such evolution is impossible are taken for granted while doing away with God. These requisites include, for example, the potential ingrained within matter to evolve into entities necessary for the existence of life – water, carbon, enzymes, nucleic acids, and nutrients to name a few. Then, all these things turned out to be perfectly complementary to produce, maintain, and replicate life through astounding mechanisms. Similarly, there happened to be a universe with conditions finely tuned for the existence and evolution of life. This fine-tuning is so extreme that much of it is beyond human conception and can only be mathematically dealt with. Since it emanates from unfolding of the inherent potentiality of matter/energy/space, it was this potentiality that needed to be fine-tuned at the outset. And that makes our universe a miracle of foresight and prescience. Thirdly, just like the evolution of cosmos, biological evolution81 and its wonderful end-products cannot be

81 The word ‘biological evolution’ is used here as an all- encompassing term, referring to all the processes involved in the origin and diversification of species, starting from dead matter.

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explained away in terms of physics and chemistry alone. The mechanism manifestly points to the involvement of a mindful agent. Suppose we come across some self-assembling automatic-manufacturing-plant on a remote planet, or instructions for synthesising novel bio-molecules encoded in a radio-signal from the outer space, or something as simple as a few animal drawings inside a hitherto unexplored cave.82 Before thinking of any physical/chemical analyses, would these things not immediately compel us to seek a mental agency for their explanation? Those who think not may corroborate their case by creating not a universe, not even a living being but, perhaps, something as humble as Conway’s Game of Life83 (or anything worth considering for that matter), without involving mental/intellectual input. The desperation of Lennox (2009, 210), therefore, is quite understandable when he writes: ‘Either human intelligence ultimately owes its origin to mindless matter; or there is a Creator. It is strange that some people claim that it is their intelligence that leads them to prefer the first to the second.’

82 Lennox 2009, 41-44, 175-176 & 180 83 See Chapter 5.

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Epilogue: God and His Grand Scheme

We embarked upon a fascinating voyage into Stephen Hawking’s universe (or rather multiverse) with an anticipation to discover how the new physics has done away with God. With each passing mile, however, as darkness slowly turned to light, we became more and more certain that we were heading toward the same grand designer we were told to leave behind in our outmoded universe. It is time to say goodbye to Hawking’s universe which, after all, turned out to be the exact opposite of godless. We can now return to our conventional universe and embrace the conventional wisdom with even more conviction, suggesting that creatureliness is so profoundly interweaved with us and our universe that it is impossible to avoid a personal creator. This proposition, however, further raises some critical questions: Who is that creator? Is there only one or many? Why is the creator hidden? What is the purpose of it all? What does the creator wish to achieve with pain, suffering, disease, and death? As Feynman (2005, 34) pointed out in The Meaning of it All, ‘no discussion can be made of moral values, of the meaning of life and so on, without coming to the great source of systems of morality and descriptions of meaning, which is in the field of religion’.84 We shall,

84 Feynman was not a believer, nor am I quoting him here as such. However, whether one is satisfied with the answers provided by religion or not, the point he is making is an important one, i.e., the ultimate questions are beyond the domain of science and belong elsewhere.

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therefore, next see what religion has to say about these questions and analyse some major criticisms hurled at that.

The Meaning of it All As Feynman alluded, the ultimate questions are beyond the scope of science and belong to the realm of metaphysics and religion. That, however, does not, as the so-called ‘scientism’ suggests, imply that these are beyond reason and evidence, too. As we saw, we can infer from our existence and that of the universe the presence of an all-powerful, all-knowing creator. That creator has endowed us, too, with curious and intelligent minds, capable of making such inferences and unravelling the mysteries of our universe. If so, then it is very hard to conceive why such a creator would not communicate with us, introduce himself, and answer the all-important questions, beyond the reach of our science. We, the followers of Abrahamic religion, believe – based on rational arguments and evidence – that our Creator has indeed spoken to us, introduced Himself, and revealed the ultimate purpose of His Grand Design. As in any field, there may be differences in details, but the basic message of revealed religion is unequivocal, namely that our Creator is a just God, who has made the prevalence of justice incumbent upon Himself at the end of this temporary world. That is what is referred to as the Day of Judgement, when the fate of all humans shall be impartially decided based on their moral conduct. Alluding to that, the Quran says:

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‘Have you assumed that We85 created you without any purpose and you will not be brought back to Us?’ [Know,] then, [that] God is sublimely exalted [to indulge in anything purposeless], the ultimate Sovereign; there is no god but He, Lord of the noble throne! (23:115-116) ‘We created not the heaven and the earth and all that is in between for play and fun. [It does not behove God to have done so, but even] if We had willed to indulge in a pastime, We would have produced it from [what is] with Us86, if such had been Our will at all!’ (21:16-17) ‘[He is the One] who created death and life to test [and thus show] which of you is best in conduct. And He is the Mighty [so evil-doers cannot get away from Him], truly Forgiving [for those deserving his love and forgiveness].’ (67:2) ‘When the earth is shaken with an indescribable quake. And when the earth throws out [all] its contents [especially, the dead and the evidence buried therein against criminals]. And humanity cries out, ‘What is [wrong] with it?’ That day it will relate all its chronicles, for your Lord will have directed it [to do so]. That day humankind will come forward, cut off from one another [i.e., without any helper or intercessor], to be shown their [past] deeds. So, whoever would have done an atom's weight87 of good shall see it, and whoever would have

85 In Arabic, plural pronouns are used for singular nouns to express respect or eminence. Some other languages also share this stylistic feature, for instance, German, Urdu, and French. In English, we have the so-called ‘royal we’ for this purpose. 86 I.e., rather than making humans and other sentient creatures a victim of such a play. 87 The word translated as ‘atom’ is ‘dharrah’; literally, it refers to an

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done an atom's weight of evil shall see it [too].’ (99:1-8) ‘Beware of the Day when you shall be returned to God; then, every human shall be paid in full for whatever [good or evil] they earned [in the worldly life], and no one will be wronged.’ (2:281)88 A petty purpose of a great God? Against this purpose, it is argued that humankind, compared to the size and age of the universe, is so infinitesimal and insignificant that it seems absurd that God, if any, would be concerned about their morality and the ultimate dominance of justice. Such reasoning, being pessimistic and overly-materialistic, completely misses the point. Humans are not lumps of matter to be compared with the size and age of the material universe. They are intellectual beings, entrusted with a will and a sophisticated aesthetic as well as a moral sense. As such, they are far superior than anything else in the known universe and a masterpiece of creation. If our universe has achieved its culmination in anything, it is the blend of physical and spiritual being of humans. Therefore, what should come as a surprise is not concern but indifference of any creator toward their masterpiece. Judgement – an objectionable idea? Similarly, some dislike the idea of judgement – moral-based reward and retribution. This dislike, however, is completely infinitesimal speck of dust. 88 Although many resources are consulted for the English translation of the Quranic verses, their meaning and interpretation are based on Ghamidi (2018a) and Islahi (2009).

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe unjustified: The foundations of such judgement are deeply ingrained in human nature. We have a strictly dichotomous perception of good and evil, where good is immediately appreciated and evil reproached by our conscience. Accordingly, we cherish justice and show antipathy to injustice. Thus, whenever we form a society, these proclivities are expressed as an inevitable component of our social fabric (Ghamidi 2006b). So, never do we like to treat alike, for instance, the faithful and the unfaithful spouse, the obedient and the disobedient child, the good and the poor student, the competent and the incompetent employee, the martyr and the traitor, or the philanthropist and the serial-killer. What would we make of a jury deciding to award the Nobel Peace Prize to Hitler or a court of law sending Sir Alexander Fleming to jail for discovering penicillin? On what basis, then, can anyone blame God for not treating the good and the wicked alike? Keeping in view such human nature, the Quran sceptically wonders: [You suppose that the Judgement Day will never come. What!] Shall We treat the obedient ones and the criminals alike! What is amiss with you? How [ill] do you judge! (68:35- 36) Eternal retribution? Perhaps, it is the idea of eternal damnation for trivial sins that is understandably hard to swallow. The idea, however, is but a parody of religion. Only criminals of the worst kind are threatened with such punishment, who deserve no mercy. As per the Quran, they are such who resolutely decide to rebel against the Almighty and go on to commit horrendous crimes

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for petty reasons, such as satisfying their ego, lust, or avarice (Ghamidi 2006b). Rather than acknowledging their Creator’s countless favours, leading a righteous life, and paving their way to the eternal life promised to the righteous, they choose to do the opposite. One example, repeatedly occurring in the Quran, is of those who violently persecuted or slayed prophets, even after recognising them as ambassadors of God. The Quran (6:20- 28) tells that when punishment will be shown to such criminals, they will implore God to give them another chance. But their plea shall be rejected, for they will be lying – ‘even if they were to be brought back [to the worldly life], they would revert to what they were forbidden from’. And that is because their hearts were well-aware of truth and consequences of rejecting it earlier in the worldly life, too. To them, God sent most magnanimous and benevolent messengers with irrefutable signs and evidence. But they kept on rejecting, reviling, and ridiculing them, blinded by the love of the material world, personal interests, power, wealth, malice, arrogance, and the like. Therefore, even if they were given another chance, that would be to no avail. As they rejected other indisputable evidence from God, including miracles, they would also reject their witnessing of the hellfire as, say, nothing but a nightmare and continue in their rebellion against God (Islahi 2009, vol. 3, 36-37).89

89 At another place, the Quran (23:105-111) reports the following dialogue, to be taken place on the Judgement Day between God and the Meccan Polytheists: ‘[It will be said to them,] “Were My messages not recited to you, but you kept on rejecting them?” They will cry, “Our Lord, our ill-fate

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No doubt, all such sins and crimes take place in a temporal world, but their magnitude and effects are such that defy all our yardsticks and, thus, demand unimaginably great or, at times, eternal retribution (Ghamidi 2006b). As another concrete example, consider those responsible for genocide, horrific war-crimes, and nuclear assault during the World War II, wherein millions of people were slaughtered and survivors were permanently damaged – owing to the death of loved-ones, sexual assault, humiliation, loss of body parts, radiation effects (incl. genetic damage and defective offspring), mental disorders, and so on. What can be a just requital for that, except immeasurably great damnation? Such an example can help us readily relate to and understand the acuteness of some crimes. Nonetheless, even for such extreme crimes, everlasting retribution cannot be justified, for they are committed against temporal beings and their requital is still possible. But what can redeem the sin of insolently rebelling against God, without remorse? If justice be done, nothing less than eternal retribution! This might be hard for a materialistic mind to understand; however, a spiritual mind – although even best of them can only slightly took hold of us, and we really were a people astray! Our Lord, take us out of this [fire once]. If we ever return [to denial], we would truly be wrongdoers.” He will respond, “Away with you! Remain therein, and do not speak to Me! Verily, there were those of My servants, too, who would pray, ‘Our Lord! We have believed, so forgive us and have mercy on us, for You are the best of the merciful!’ But you made them a target of ridicule to the point where it made you forget to be mindful of Me, and you went on laughing at them. Today, I have rewarded them for their perseverance, and it is they who have succeeded.”

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appreciate the eminence of God – starts to shiver while thinking of the gravity of this sin. It is defiance against the One who is Originator of everything, Lord of the known and the unknown, the ultimate, most-honourable, most-exalted, perfect, incomparable, omniscient, omnipotent, omnificent, and omnitemporal – eternal. Yet, at one place, the Quran indicates that God may show mercy to even such arrogant rebels. That is because, unlike His reward, His punishment is a threat, not a promise (Ghamidi 2018b, 195).90 So, the Almighty certainly has a right to mitigate their punishment out of grace or, sooner or later, put an end to it by turning them into dust and ashes: ‘Those who [by their deeds] will have brought wretchedness upon themselves will enter the fire, where they will bawl and bray. They will abide in it as long as the heavens and the earth [of that world] remain, unless your Lord wills otherwise.91 Your Lord does whatever He wills.’ (Quran 11:106-107) As for those who do not deliberately rebel against God, He is most loving, compassionate, and forgiving. If they avoid

90 As we saw, however, the Quran emphasises that, on the Day of Judgement, ultimate justice shall prevail. So, the mercy and forgiveness of God under discussion here and mentioned elsewhere only pertains to transgressions done against God. As for crimes committed against fellow humans, they shall not be forgiven unless forgiven by the victims (Ghamidi 2008). 91 The next verse (11:108) reveals that the heavens and the earth of that new world will remain forever, since the Garden of God – an everlasting gift promised to the righteous – will also be a part of that. The indication of God’s mercy and forgiveness, therefore, lies in the words ‘unless your Lord wills otherwise’ (Ghamidi, pers. comm).

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe major sins, He forgives their minor wrongs (Quran 53:32). And even if they commit a serious offense, the Quran offers them the following hope: ‘Your Lord has taken it on Himself to be merciful: if any of you foolishly committed evil, and afterwards repented and mended his ways, God is most merciful and ever affectionate.’ (6:54) ‘O My devotees who have harmed yourselves [by sinning], do not despair of God’s mercy. [If you repent and make amends] God shall forgive all [your] sins. No doubt, He is All-merciful, Ever-Affectionate.’ (39:53) On the positive side, the Quran repeatedly asserts that God is most appreciative of those who listen to their conscience and do good: submit to truth, show patience, uphold justice, remain obedient to God and kind to parents, fulfil the rights of relatives, free slaves, feed the poor, safeguard the wealth of orphans, respond to evil with goodness, give their lives up for noble purposes, and so forth. For them, God shall open the doors of everlasting heaven, conferring such honour and bounties upon them that no eye has ever seen, no ear has ever heard, and no mind has ever perceived (Al-Bukhari 1997, vol. 9, no. 7498). An unjust accountability? The test we are put into demands submission to truth and living by it. But the truth does not become apparent to everyone likewise, nor do all of us have an equal opportunity to act accordingly. Humans have a wide disparity in their circumstances, capabilities, interests, habits, knowledge, wisdom, and so on. If so, then how can they all be held answerable likewise? They are not. As per the Quran, their

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accountability is as individual and just as one may expect from a wise and merciful God: 1. The Quran divides humans in three major groups as regards their accountability. The first group comprises those who would somehow remain unaware of God’s message or receive it in such a form that would not convince their hearts. The second group consists of those who, after receiving this message, would become aware of its veracity. Finally, the third group includes those who would receive God’s message, directly or indirectly, via the last messenger Muhammad and become certain of its veracity (Ghamidi 2015b). People of the first group will be answerable about two things only, namely whether they 1) acknowledged their creator and sustainer, and 2) led an ethical life (Quran 91:7-10 & 7:172-174)92. Regarding 1, each of us can readily perceive that our self and the universe are being meticulously created. As such, they constantly bear witness to and remind us of a creator. ‘A creator’ not ‘creators’, the Quran insists, because our nature is monotheistic, predisposing our minds to and being satisfied by the idea of one supreme being. This predisposition is so strong that even among many assumed partner-gods of polytheistic mythologies, the greatest happens to be only one. Regarding 2, the idea of good and evil has always been there in all known periods of human history. Such universality, tells the Quran (91:7- 10), emanates from human nature, into which the latent

92 See commentary on these verses in Ghamidi 2018a. For a detailed discussion on this topic, see Islahi 2004 and 2007.

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awareness of good and evil is inbred. It is such awareness that in turns manifests as the voice of our individual and collective conscience. This implies that it should be possible to hold any human at any time and place accountable for their evil conduct. And that is exactly so. Suppose a man murdered an innocent individual at some place in the year 3000 BC and got away with that. If the murderer is somehow resurrected and evidence becomes available against him, it will still be possible to prosecute him in a court of law and penalise him for his crime. No one can refer to such prosecution as unjust. Similar is the case of those who will one day be subjected to God’s judgement, even if they remained unaware of that.93 People of the second group, in addition, will be asked whether they duly believed in the theistic God, as introduced by messengers, and the Day of Judgement. Besides, they will not only be answerable for their deeds as per the universal moral code but also as per laws and principles given by their messenger(s) (Quran 2:62 & 5:44). Finally, people of the third group will, in addition, be as a (ﷺ) asked whether they acknowledged Muhammad messenger of God and lived their lives according to his

93 However, the Quran (33:72) tells that humankind has been subjected to the test of this world with their consent. At more than one places, the Quran refers to certain covenants which God made with humankind before sending them to this world. The remembrance of these covenants, however, has been removed from our memories, pro tempore, for we could not be tested otherwise.

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teachings.94 This shows that the accountability of all humans will not be identical but subjected to their knowledge and understanding. 2. Regarding unintentional errors, lapses under some coercion, misdeeds due to ignorance or misunderstanding, excesses out of helplessness, and even expression of disbelief to protect one’s life, the Quran explicitly states that there will be no accountability.95 People shall, therefore, only be indicted for their deliberate transgressions, done with the awareness of indulgence in evil. 3. The Quran (2:286) asserts that ‘God does not burden any soul more than what it can bear’. Based on this principle, demands of religion are not the same from the rich and the poor, the sick and the healthy, the traveller and the local, the freeman and the slave, the man and the woman, the child and the adult, and so forth. 4. The Quran stresses that, on the Judgement Day, God shall establish through evidence that His judgement is just. Thus, such evidence will be produced against the wrongdoers that they will feel impelled to admit their guilt (Quran 67:11). As a principle, the Quran proclaims: ‘No injustice shall be done to [anyone even] by as much as a hair’s breadth.’ (17:71) ‘We shall place the scales of justice for the Resurrection Day, so no soul shall be wronged in the least. And if there

94 This is a recurrent topic in the Quran. 95 See, for example, 5:89, 24:33, 33:5, 17:15, 2:173, 16:106, respectively. For an explanation of these verses, see Ghamidi 2018a and Islahi 2009.

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is [even] the weight of a mustard seed [of good or evil of someone], We shall bring it forth. And sufficient are We for the accountability [of people].’ (21:47) Not only this but, as we saw in the previous section, the Quran is explicit that anyone who would deserve God’s mercy or have a genuine excuse to put before Him shall not be disappointed. To conclude, therefore, the Quran’s conception of accountability is highly individualised and just. Next, in light of God’s Grand Scheme, we shall try to seek answers of the other important questions raised at the start of this chapter, namely why God is hidden and why there is so much evil in the world. If there is a God, why is He hiding from us? The answer to this question directly lies in the very test of morality we are subjected to. To be explicit, our morality is reflected in our thought and action, both of which are being tested. This implies that, in this test, only those will succeed who purify their thought (knowledge) and action, i.e., listen to their conscience, let evidence lead them to truth, and adhere to good moral-conduct despite having a choice to do the opposite.96 But if God were before our eyes, neither our knowledge nor action could be tested, for the freedom of choice would have been virtually eliminated (Ghamidi 2016a). However, we could be put into a test like that of prophets. Although God is not visible to them; at least, He (indirectly) communicates with them. But the Quran and other

96 See the Quran 4:135, 103, 2:256, 76:3, and 91:7-10.

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Scriptures reveal that, in such a case, the test justifiably becomes very demanding, and only humans of extraordinary qualities (prophets) can fulfil its requirements (ibid). Thus, our test, like our universe, is also ‘fine-tuned’ according to our state of affairs. No doubt, a different test could be designed, for instance, one in which God would have been visible, but then many parameters would have been different, too. For instance, humans might have required no intellect then, for believing upon seeing is what animals can also readily do (unless there exist anti-realists among them). One of the basic functions of intellect is to infer unknown realities from known facts, whether it be the inference of, say, subatomic particles from their effects or that of a personal creator from the presence of created objects. The latter is so obvious that the demand of seeing or, say, hearing the creator seems absurd. God, however, did not leave our intellect to that but provided it with additional evidence to ascertain that the inferred creator is He – the theistic God (See Hassan 2018a). In the same vein, some question the very scheme of test and go on to dictate God as to what He should or should not have done. Such objections are, for one, futile, for they cannot change anything if we are already amid a test. Furthermore, they express arrogance and reveal one’s ignorance of scantiness and limitations of human knowledge, especially in metaphysical matters. The way forward, therefore, is to focus our attention on the necessary metaphysical information claimed to have been provided by God. If this information does not satisfy our intuition, intellect, and conscience, we have every right to reject it, as a myth. But if it does, we would be in a great loss to show indifference to it

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe for any reason, be it that the world is not as we wish it to be or we are not in a God-like position to understand everything. If the promise of God is true, unlimited knowledge awaits us anyway along with an opportunity to inquire Him whatever we will (Ghamidi 2016a). The Problem of Evil The Grand Scheme of God also greatly helps us understand the so-called ‘problem of evil’97. Those for whom this fleeting world is all there is infer the non-existence of a theistic God from injustice, bloodshed, misery, and the like and bad ‘design’ from disease, natural calamities, death, and so on. From religious perspective, however, this world is not designed on the principle of justice, well-being, and perfection. That will be the cornerstone of the next permanent-world, to be evolved from the raw-material scattered around in the form of billions of galaxies (Quran 14:48). The present world, as discussed above, is a transitory abode designed, at least as far as humans are concerned, for the purpose of test. It is this purpose for which it is perfected (Ghamidi 2015b). In light of this, let us take a closer look at the problem of evil. Evil may be categorised into human-generated evil and natural evil. The first is an inevitable consequence of the test to which God has subjected humankind. A pre-requisite for this test is the free will of humans, which when exercised creates both good as well as evil (Ghamidi 2016a). Such materialisation of good and evil produces the concrete

97 Typically, i.e., if there is an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-wise, all- compassionate, and all-just God, why is there injustice, suffering, disease, natural disasters, death, and so on?

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evidence based on which the righteous and the wrongdoers shall be separated, and dealt with very differently on the Judgement Day. Seen in this larger perspective, God’s temporary allowance of human-generated evil cannot in fact be labelled evil, since it has a greater, noble, and lasting objective behind it: eternal ‘survival of the morally-fittest’ and the ultimate triumph of justice.98 Regarding natural evil in the form of suffering, disease, death, tsunamis, and so on, it is also there for a reason: it is a means through which humans are being tested. Essentially, it is a test of patience and gratitude towards God. Patience is tested by means of pain; gratitude and humility by pleasure, health, affluence, power, and so on (Islahi 2009, vol. 5, 147). The Quran (21:35) proclaims: ‘Every human is bound to taste death; We test you through the bad and the good [things of life] to [empirically] determine99 [the good and the evil of your hearts], and unto Us you shall all return.’

98 As for those who will be doomed, they themselves are to be blamed, not God. The aim of God’s scheme is not to punish humans, but to bestow upon them His eternal blessings, based on merit. Despite all the opportunities to achieve that – together with extremely lenient, forgiving, and gracious nature of God – very unfortunate are those who choose to transgress against Him and His creatures. As discussed earlier, He might forgive transgressions against Him but not against His creatures, for that will be sheer injustice. 99 The word translated as ‘determine’ is ‘fitnah’, used for ‘examining’ or ‘evaluating’, just as a goldsmith evaluates the quality of gold through assaying (Islahi 2009, vol. 5, 50).

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At another place, the Quran (2:155), while addressing the companions of Prophet Muhammad, says: ‘We shall certainly test you with some fear and hunger, and loss of property, lives, and crops. But [Prophet], give good news to those who patiently endure – who, when disaster strikes them, say, ‘Surely we are God’s and to Him we shall return.’ Similarly, the Quran (9:111) declares: ‘The truth is that God has purchased from the believers their lives and wealth in exchange for Paradise – they fight in the cause of God, so they kill and are killed. This is a true promise binding on Him in the Torah, the Gospel, and the Quran. And who could be more faithful to his promise than God? So, rejoice in the bargain you have made with Him. That is the triumph supreme!’ The Quran alludes to many other greater goods that God achieves by means of natural evils, some of which are as under: – To punish wicked nations Natural calamities are unleashed to punish certain nations. These nations include 1) those which after given dominance by God plunge themselves into moral and intellectual degradation100 and 2) those to which God sends His messengers with extraordinary evidence, but they obstinately reject to accept their call101 (Ghamidi 2018b, 119

100 See the Quran 13:11, 17:58 & 34:15-17. 101 This is a recurrent topic in the Quran; see Chapter 54 for a summarised account of such punishments.

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& 121-122). Such a punishment per se is good in that it is a manifestation of God’s justice. Besides, it carries a warning and a lesson for other nations to keep from moral and intellectual depravity. It also serves as a token of God’s greater judgement, to be similarly taken place for the entire humankind one day. Lastly, from one angle, such a punishment indeed brings death and destruction, but from another, there is life, freedom, peace, and prosperity in it for the victims of the perished people. – To remind, warn, and wake people from their slumber Natural evils are also inflicted upon people to wake them from their slumber of indifference toward bigger realities of life, such as being mindful of God, fulfilling their responsibilities toward fellow humans, and preparing for the real-life after death. Death itself is a powerful tool to remind people of the transitory nature of this world – a fact oft- forgotten in the hustle and bustle of our daily lives (Ghamidi 2015a). Thus, an individual death serves as a powerful reminder for the social circle of the deceased, whereas collective death at the hands of tsunamis, plagues, volcanic eruptions, famine, and other natural calamities is a loud reminder for cities, nations, or even the entire world. Such reminders, therefore, are not flaws in design, but very much a part and parcel of it. Alluding to this purpose of natural evil, C. S. Lewis (2015, 91) in his book The Problem of Pain writes: ‘Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.’ Various examples of such ‘shouts’ are found in the Quran and

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe other Scriptures, some of which are as under: ‘We inflicted years of drought and crop failure on Pharaoh’s people, so that they might take heed. But when something good would come their way, they said, “This is our due!” And when something bad would come, they ascribed it to the evil omen of Moses and those with him. Behold, their evil omen was from God [as a result of their misdeeds], though most of them did not realise that. They said, “We will not believe in you, no matter what signs you produce to bewitch us.” So, We let loose on them the flood, locusts, lice, frogs, and blood. These were all signs, detailed [in Scriptures of the Israelites]. But they persisted in arrogance and were [indeed] a wicked people. Whenever some punishment descended upon them, they said, “Moses, pray to your Lord for us by virtue of the promise He has made to you: if you relieve us of this penalty, we will believe you and let the Children of Israel go with you.” But every time We removed the penalty from them until a term […] they broke their promise. So, We exacted retribution from them: We drowned them in the sea, for they rejected Our signs [including miracles] and remained heedless of them.’ (Quran 7:130-136) About the Israelites, the Quran (7:168) says: ‘And We tested them with blessings and misfortunes, so that they might return [to righteousness].’ Similarly, about the Hypocrites of Medina, the Quran (9:126) wonders: ‘Do they not see that they are tried [with affliction] once or twice a year? Yet, they neither repent nor take heed.’ The Quran also cites positive examples in this regard (Hameed 2008, 53-54). About Adam and Eve, it tells that

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‘Satan made them slip from [the garden] and removed them from the state [of bliss] they were in. […] Thereafter, Adam learnt some words [of repentance] from his Lord and [as he repented using them,] He accepted his repentance. Indeed, He is Ever-Relenting, Ever- Affectionate!’ (2:36-37) Similarly, the Quran tells that Prophet Jonah showed impatience in a matter. Consequently, God inflicted on him the hardship of being flung into the sea and swallowed by a large fish. Thereupon, he cried out to His Lord, ‘There is no deity but You, glory be to You! Verily, I was wrong.’ ‘Then,’ says the Quran, ‘We heard his prayer and saved him from the anguish. Thus do We save believers!’ (21:87-88 & 68:48-50) Hardships, therefore, compel us to think and to rethink; learn not to repeat the ill-deeds or bad decisions responsible for our plights; return to God; become humbler and appreciative of God’s bounties; show empathy towards others facing similar difficulties; and so forth. However, for hearts which become barren by obstinacy and persistent sinning, there indeed is no opportunity or cure in such hardships. The above discussion may also help us understand the case of mentally retarded persons, inculpable children suffering and dying from disease or hunger, those facing unbearable situations, and the like. On the one hand, they serve to test the attitudes of those around them while, on the other, joltingly remind us of God’s favours and our powerlessness if He decides to withdraw them (Ghamidi 2015b).102 It is these

102 As for the victims of such suffering, they are not subjected to any test themselves, for ‘God does not burden any soul more than its capacity’ (Quran 2:286). To compensate their transitory suffering, it is beyond imagination what God has in His eternal store, for He has promised that He shall compensate each soul with

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe favours – health, wealth, physical beauty, knowledge, intellect, or power – that are often taken for granted. Consequently, they cause people to forget to be mindful of God, feel invincible, and spread evil on His earth. – To expiate sins of good people The Quran (3:195) also reveals that, through hardships, God expiates sins of good people, so that they may become eligible to be saved from the punishment of the Hereafter (Hameed 2008, 41). Prophet Muhammad said: ‘No fatigue, nor disease, nor sorrow, nor sadness, nor hurt, nor distress befalls a Muslim, nor even pricking of a thorn, but God expiates some of their sins for that.’ – To raise the ranks of those devoted to God and set excellent examples for others Those devoted to God are also inflicted with pain and misery so that, through their perseverance and unshakable faith, God may raise their ranks and make them worthy of achieving the best, i.e., utmost love and extraordinary favours from God. In the Quran, such people are presented

the best in the Hereafter, and ‘none shall be wronged even by as much as a hair’s breadth’ (Quran 4:77). It cannot be emphasised enough that pains and pleasures of this world, taken far too seriously by us, are nothing in the eyes of the Quran compared to those of the Hereafter, neither in value nor in duration (See, e.g., 4:77, 23:112-114 & 29:64). To draw people’s attention to the totality of God’s scheme, Prophet Muhammad compared the Hereafter with an ocean and this world with water sticking to one’s forefinger as it is dipped into that ocean (Muslim 2007, vol. 7, no. 7197).

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as role-models for humanity. Seen thus, all pains of this fleeting world seem worthwhile to believing men and women (Hameed 2008, 51-52). For such purpose, God took away everything from Prophet Job – family, wealth, health, and status. But when he remained steadfast in his devotion to God, He gave him twice as much as he had before ‘as a mercy from [God], and a lesson to all who understand’. At the same place, the Quran (38:43-44) lauds him as follows: ‘Verily, We found him patient [in every trial]. How excellent a devotee [of Ours]! Ever did he turn [to Us]!’ Similarly, when Prophet Abraham successfully passed severe tests and trials, God made him ‘His friend’ and declared him ‘a leader for humankind’ (Quran: 4:125 & 2:12). The Quran repeatedly presents him as an example for people to imitate. Likewise, God sent trials after trials to Prophet Muhammad and refers to his endurance and dedication as ‘an excellent model’ for believers (Quran 33:21). – To safeguard people from greater evil The Quran also reveals that by means of minor trials or hardships, God protects people from greater adversities. This is one of the morals of the fascinating story of Prophet Moses and the Guide, narrated in Chapter 18 (60-82) of the Quran. The story reveals near-sightedness of Moses, being a mortal with limited knowledge, and far-sightedness of the Guide, most probably an angel working under God’s command. Moses accompanied him on a journey so that Moses could learn how God actively manages the affairs of this world, with utmost wisdom. This wisdom often skips our sight because of our limited knowledge and perspective. We take things at

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe face value, viewing them with respect to their apparent, immediate benefit and harm. God, on the other hand, has a larger perspective in view and, thus, has His eye on the ultimate good or evil of things, i.e., with respect to their end- results. In the story, Moses and the Guide first boarded a vessel, into which the Guide deliberately made a hole. Upon that, Moses immediately protested, ‘Have you done this to drown its people? You have certainly done a terrible thing!’ The Guide replied, ‘Did I not tell you that you would not be able to bear with me patiently?’ As he said so at the start of their journey, he had added something important, saying, ‘And how can you be patient with what is beyond your [realm of] knowledge?’ During their time together, the Guide similarly did things that Moses found hard to make sense of and expressed resentment about. Before they parted ways, however, the Guide enlightened Moses by revealing to him the rationale behind each of his actions. Regarding the hole he made, he disclosed that ‘the vessel belonged to some poor people who made their living from the river, and I [with God’s command] caused a defect in it, for there was a [tyrant] king ahead of them who seizes every [intact] vessel by force.’ Thus our benevolent God, in the guise of certain minor evils, works for our benefit and saves us from greater harms (See Ghamidi 2018a, vol. 3, 148-156).103

103 Sometimes, however, opposite is the case, i.e., something good is given to wicked people in which lurks the curse and wrath of God. About the Hypocrites of Medina, for example, the Quran (3:178) says:

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– Infliction of evil upon the wicked to create good for others Among other things in the above story, the Guide also killed an innocent boy, to which Moses similarly protested. At the end, however, the Guide revealed that the parents of that boy were people of faith. But he was going to become an evil man, who would bring them much grief and trouble. So, God intended to rid them from him and grant them a virtuous, obedient, and loving child instead. Although God grants extraordinary strength and endurance to His faithful men and women to fight hardships, the death of the boy must have been a hard trial for parents. Furthermore, from the boy’s perspective, his killing could be labelled evil. But as for the consequences, it was a blessing in disguise for his virtuous parents.104 Since they were faithful, the pain of losing their child was also, in fact, a blessing, for their patience must have brought them closer to God and His eternal blessings in the Hereafter. So, in evil happening to a wicked (or a potentially wicked) person, there might be a favour for others. Likewise, as we discussed above, in the destructions of wicked nations, there is life for their victims and other meek nations. In a similar vein, the Quran draws our attention to greater goods hidden behind some of its seemingly violent

‘And let not these disbelievers think that Our respite is better for their souls; We grant them respite only that they may add to their sins, and [in the end] a disgraceful chastisement awaits them.’ 104 As for what will be the fate of that boy in the Hereafter, God knows best. Justice, however, can be done to him in many ways, for instance, by not resurrecting him at all or by giving him another worldly life to fully express his goodness/evilness.

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe injunctions, like the law of retaliation (“an eye for an eye”) and warfare: ‘There is [security of] life for you in [the law of] retaliation, O people of reason, so that you may become mindful [of the limits set by God].’ (2:179) ‘If God did not repel some people by means of others [through warfare], monasteries, churches, synagogues, and mosques, where God’s name is much invoked, would have been demolished. (22:40) – To nurture people’s qualities and virtues, and make them achieve extraordinary things Misfortunes may initially bring about grief, frustration, discouragement, and depression but, sooner or later, become a source of learning, wisdom, strength, and resilience. They propel our evolution toward excellence, hone our qualities and virtues, prepare us to meet new challenges, bring out the best in us and, ultimately, enable us to achieve extraordinary things (Hameed 2008, 45-52). Regarding the hardships surrounding Prophet Muhammad’s life, the Quran (94:1-6) says: ‘Have we not opened up your heart for you, relieved you of the burden breaking your back, and raised high for you your repute? So, [rest assured,] with this difficulty [you are facing], there [similarly] awaits a great ease. With this difficulty, there awaits a great ease.’ The first paragraph reminds the Prophet how God wiped out previous hardships of his life, as they achieved their purpose of opening up his heart for wisdom and insight. The next

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paragraph reassures him that God would similarly turn his current miseries into ease, after they would achieve their intended objectives. What is referred to as ‘the burden breaking [his] back’ was twofold: 1) Before being granted messengership, the Prophet remained extremely anxious for the guidance of true religion, a large portion of which was lost by the progeny of Abraham. For that, he left no stone unturned, devoted himself to God, and invoked Him day and night. Eventually, when God had ripened his heart through a quarter-century’s trial, He not only showed him the right path but entrusted him with the responsibility of messengership. 2) That led him to his next, even harder trial. Unlike him, his people had no longing for acquiring such guidance and, hence, showed no aptitude to embrace and cherish it. For more than ten years, he strained every nerve to convince them to pay heed, but to little avail. It only increased their hatred and barbarity toward him and his companions. Nevertheless, these testing and extremely aggrieving circumstances made the Prophet wiser and stronger, prepared him for new challenges, amplified his dedicated efforts, brought his exemplary magnanimity and goodness to light, and paved the way for the success of his mission. Thus, his struggle first bore fruit outside Mecca, where God raised his reputation high and gave currency to his message, as mentioned in the first paragraph. Through such ease after every hardship, ultimately, God fulfilled His promise of the dominance of truth in and around the Arabian Peninsula (Quran 9:33), which for most part of the Prophet’s career seemed unachievable. Similarly, for all of us, life is a vicissitude of hardship and ease,

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe where the first drives our evolution and the second reinvigorates us to meet the next challenge. It can be compared with a staircase of mental evolution, where each step upward is an edifying hardship followed by a period of ease (the tread). At the end of this staircase lies the ultimate success for a believer – the everlasting life of bliss in God’s company (See Islahi 2009, vol. 9, 426-429). The rationales behind apparent evils extracted from the Quran above by no means constitute an exhaustive list. There may be countless others, some permanently hidden from our narrow frame of reference. Nevertheless, these purposes and principles provide us wisdom and insight with which to view all such evils. A case in point may be animal suffering at the hands of wildfires, earthquakes, cyclones, diseases, and so on. Although we know that fear and pain have survival value and that animals have inbuilt mechanisms to cope with pain, we find ourselves unable to satisfactorily explain their suffering, especially one that persists. Seen in light of the Quran, that is because we are not fully aware of their purpose of creation and what role such suffering plays therein. Before such information at hand, therefore, it would be unfair to jump to conclusions and suspect God’s goodness. To make matters clearer, let us look at an everyday example. Consider a mother forcibly waking her little girl every day before sunrise and pushing her out of the house in bitter cold. It may seem evil to the little girl; however, when she would realise the importance of school with age, she would eventually acknowledge it as an act of care, wisdom, and dutifulness (Ghamidi 2016a). Similarly, although we cannot yet make sense of all data around us, we must not lose our trust, hope, and faith in God. He deserves to be thought

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about positively because of His countless blessings upon us, myriad good things He has created, and all the good purposes He has revealed (or we have discovered) behind the ups and downs of this world. After all, who would have thought that an event as catastrophic as the big bang could produce a universe as marvellous as ours and, similarly, something as cataclysmic as supernovas could turn out to be furnaces for producing the essential elements of life? Conclusion The upshot of the above discussion is that God is all-good and intends no evil; whatever He does or allows to happen has a good, greater purpose behind it. While talking about the Hypocrites of Medina, the Quran (4:78-79), as a principle, says: ‘And if success comes their way, they say, "This is from God," and if harm befalls them, they say, "This is from you [Prophet]." Say, "All [things] are from God [for whatever happens, happens with His permission]." What is [the matter] with these people that they are not ready to understand anything! Whatever good befalls you is from God, and whatever evil befalls you is from yourself.’ The implication is that although no evil occurs without God’s permission, He cannot be held responsible therefor. That is because it is permitted for reasons attributable to humans, such as to show them consequences of their evil deeds or bad decisions, to rid them of some shortcoming of theirs, or to lay bare the goodness or evil lurking in their hearts (Ghamidi 2018a, vol. 1, 522-523). Here, we have to content ourselves with this brief introduction of religious worldview, but the next crucial

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A Critical Review of Stephen Hawking's Godless Universe question remains: what evidence does religion have for its basic tenets, especially, the existence of God and the Day of Judgement? That will be the topic of my next book. For now, the reader is recommended to see Ghamidi 2018b (85- 200)105. In this brilliant work, the author has concisely but comprehensively discussed arguments and evidence put forth by the Quran to establish its metaphysics.

The Quest for truth As a final remark, I would like to say that if it is truth we are after (as many of us claim), then we ought to scrutinise our religious texts also with the same zeal with which we have scrutinised TGD’s narrative here. Especially, that ought to be the case regarding interpretations which ask us to accept, support, or do such things in God’s name that our hearts – made in the image of God – feel aversion to. Such scrutiny is also imperative to understand differences among revealed religions and discover the truth. According to the Bible, Judaism and Christianity are not different religions, nor does the Quran presents Islam as a new religion from a new God. The three religions are a sequel of the same religion given, as per the Quran and the Bible, to the parents of us all – Adam and Eve. That is why we find no difference in their basic claim. As for interpretational differences, they exist in all fields including natural sciences, as we saw in this book, and must be decided by a critical investigation.

105 An English translation of this work is also available: 2017. Islam: A Comprehensive Introduction. Translated by Shehzad Saleem. Lahore: Al-Mawrid.

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To sincere seekers, the Bible and the Quran have the following glad tidings to offer: ‘Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.’ (Matthew 7:7-8; New International Version) ‘He has ordained for you [O people] the religion He enjoined upon Noah, and that which We have revealed to you [O Muhammad], and that We enjoined upon Abraham, Moses, and Jesus, [commanding], “Uphold the religion [in your lives], and make no divisions in it.” What you call the polytheists to [O Prophet] is unbearable for them. God chooses to draw to Himself whoever He wills, and He guides those to Himself who turn [to Him].’ (Quran 42:13)

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Junaid Hassan has a B.Sc. in Computer Science, an M.Phil. in System Dynamics, and a Ph.D. in Systems Microbiology. Besides, he studied biological physics, Norwegian, academic writing, and philosophy at Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway, and German at Mannheimer Abendakademie, Germany. He completed various courses in Islamic studies from Al-Mawrid, Pakistan. Currently, he is carrying out secondary research on Islam and Hamiduddin Farahi’s theory of knowledge, under Javed Ahmed Ghamidi’s supervision. He is particularly interested in interpretations of the Quran, philosophy of science, science and religion, theology, epistemology, and ontology.

A foundation for Islamic Research & Education

51-K, Model Town, Lahore 54700, Pakistan Tel: +92 42 35865145 www.al-mawrid.org

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