Evidence, but not as we know it.

 

Grumpy atheist PZ Myers (left above; with the beard) criticizes (rightly in my opinion) the presumptuous assertion of the lady on the right who asks why we should accept evolutionary theory when evolution was "made up by a guy" (presumably she's thinking of Darwin). Well of course one can anticipate straight away what approach PZ is going to take here...evolution wasn't just "made up by a guy", but it is a function of testable evidence;  evolution was no arbitrary creation of Darwin, but it has evidential pointers in its direction; for example anatomical, paleontological and genetic observations which all suggest some kind of common descent is at work. (although the mechanism driving descent might be debated). 

No doubt PZ will counteract by demanding evidence for the Omnigod of Christianity. Fair enough, that's a reasonable demand, but there is an issue with such evidence.  For a start as I've said before intelligent-of-the-gaps arguments fail, and one is left with the evidence of the irreducible logical barrier of physics from which stem strong intuitions (intuitions I share) about this irreducibility having its origins in a sentient creator (*1). But that's not going to work for a grumpy & cynical atheist. Neither is the other sort of evidence likely to impress PZ; namely, the anecdotal & private experiential evidence of Christian living... even if we take, say, miraculous healings as an example, epistemic distance prevents easy access to the data of such experiences. In fact the whole gamut of paranormal observational  irregularities & erratics (if they exist) is a closed book to those who only recognise readily testable normalcy. We cannot expect evidence regarding Deity (or the paranormal in general) to look like the evidence for the simple highly ordered objects of spring extending and test-tube precipitating science. So if grumpy PZ is really serious about wanting evidence of Deity (which somehow I doubt he is), he is just going have to get out on his bike and go and find some anecdotal evidence of his own. (Acts 17:27); let me know, PZ, if you find any in favour of deity. But then you can let yourself off the hook by assuming from the outset that such evidence doesn't exist or is disqualified and therefore no need to bother getting on that bike.

FOOTNOTE

*1 Quantum Non-Linearity: On The Meaning of Life

An Eternal Universe or an Eternal God?

Both the affirmation AND THE DENIAL
of a creation point originate from
 deep theological instincts

I was very interested in the following post by Bruce Gordon on the North American Intelligent Design (NAID) web site Science & Culture ...

 On the BGV Theorem and Eternal Cyclic Cosmology | Science and Culture Today

It's not another of those plastic NAID articles which sets so-called "natural forces" over and against "intelligent intervention design", but instead probes the deep question of an initial creation point. It's particular concern is the defense of the Borde-Guth-Vilenkin (BGV) theorem. This theorem tells us that the geodesics of any universe subject to an on going average expansion, when traced back in time, will converge onto a singularity - that is, an infinitesimal point where it is likely that 0/0 divisions lead to indefinite results which our current physics cannot handle; in short a place where known physics breaks down. When this happens all information is lost and it is impossible to reverse the clock any further back. Therefore the singularity effectively becomes a creation point; a point where the universe starts.  

The BGV "creation point theorem" has been a God-send to those theists who support the Kalam arguments for a creator God such as William Lane-Craig. Contra-wise, it has also been a target for atheists who feel uncomfortable about a creation point and who have therefore tendered physical models which attempt get round this theorem. Bruce Gordon is doing a series of articles that critiques such attempts to overthrow the BGV theorem (*1)

Although Gordon looks as though he is doing a thorough & worthy job I'm not sure that I would want to be too strongly committed to BGV myself. For example, some of the critics of the theorem point out that space-time may not be a continuum (*2) and this puts a question mark over the assumption of geodesic continuity which BGV uses. However, a mere question mark over BGV would not necessarily invalidate BGV; rather it would just have the effect of telling us that BGV cannot be regarded as settled theoretical science which in turn would unsettle attempts to use it in Kalam style arguments. 

But even from a Biblical point of view it is not immediately clear to someone like myself that the Genesis 1 account, where we read about a sequence of separations which impose organization on an existing ontology, teaches a definite creation point; in this connection the semantic intent behind Gen 1:1 is important  - but I'll leave that question to the theologians. 

Whether or not BGV is valid or whether or not Genesis 1 teaches an absolute beginning is not something I'm going to discuss here. What I would like to point out in this post is that for both atheists and theists so much hangs on the question of whether or not the cosmos had an absolute beginning. Why do theists put so much investment in absolute beginnings and why do atheist seek to theoretically overthrow absolute origins in favor of an eternal universe? 

I've already criticized Kalam-like arguments for putting too much stress on the contingent boundary conditions needed at a creation point when in fact it is clear that the cosmic organization mathematically implicit in the "algorithms" of physics entails a highly contingent logical boundary everywhere and everywhen (*3). The question then is this; what motivates both theist's and atheist's deep interest in potential creation-points where indefinite 0/0 divisions entail a breakdown of known physics? The likely (subliminal?) mindsets which drive this interest on both sides of the debate is something I've only recently become cognizance of: My strong suspicion is that the underlying obsession with arguments which  tender either creation-points or anti-creation-point models is a theological mindset common to both theists and atheists. With atheists that mindset may well be subliminal.

If atheists can find alternatives to BGV and convince themselves that the cosmos might just possibly be eternal, where does that put the concept of an eternal God? Is there room for two eternal entities? i.e both God & the cosmos? In attempting to give the cosmos an eternal existence atheists are giving it a quality once thought to only pertain to God. Although to be sure atheists haven't proved it, an eternal cosmos would suggest that like theism's God, the ontology of the eternal cosmos must therefore have an underlying logical necessity which was once thought to only be inherent to the ontology of the Divine (*5). In short for anti-creation-point atheism the cosmos has become a kind of eternal "god", in so far as it has created the Stars, the Earth and its living hosts. But this atheist "god" is an impersonal soulless "god" of utter dispassionate indifference; it has absolutely no sentient awareness, let alone any interest, in our continued existence. According to atheist physicist Brian Cox the huge cosmic machine will, without a scintilla of regret one-day extinguish us. As Brian says.....

In 10 trillion years the last star will fade. The universe becomes a void without light, life or meaning. The darkness will last forever. As the stars fade so does all possibility of life and meaning.

That sums up the "hope" and outlook of many an atheist; this is where their logic takes them. What atheists believe to be an insentient cosmic machine (*4) has of course no interest in calling us to account for our failure to live up to the demands of the superego. No surprise then that some theists are brazen enough to suggest that a cosmos with a complete indifference to our morality explains what is behind motivated atheism's enthusiasm for eternal universes.

Footnotes

*1 See the following link for another of Gordon's articles:

Past-Eternal Loop Quantum Cosmology Gets the Bounce | Science and Culture Today

*2 My own (highly speculative) notions around Quantum Non-linearity which derive quantum gravity from the approximations of the diffusion equation are of this ilk: Gravity and Quantum Non-Linearity - Timothy Reeves - Google Books

*3 See this post Quantum Non-Linearity: The Kalam Argument Sucks.

*4 See: TheRiddleOfTheSphinx.pdf - Google Drive.

See also: cosmicPerspective3.pdf - Google Drive

*5  I am unaware of any really convincing ontological arguments for God any more than I'm aware of ontological arguments demonstrating the logical necessity of the observed cosmos. See Carrier, R for a failed attempt to generate an organized cosmos from probability theory.

On The Meaning of Life

 

Picture from Quantum Non-Linearity: The Fate of Man, by William Shakespeare

In this post by PZ Myers we find our grumpy atheist responding to a less than 60 second video by a cherub faced American Catholic who challenges atheists over their response to the question of the meaning of life. Here's PZ reaction to that video (My emphases)....

My answer to that question is simple: there is no meaning to life. We just are. We exist, and then we try to rationalize our existence, and everyone comes up with a different explanation because our brains will happily spin their wheels in the absence of anything of substance to grapple with.

Maybe you disagree, and maybe you have the one true meaning of life. That’s fine, go ahead and tell me what it is, but if you could, please also tell me what objective evidence you have to support your proposed purpose. Also tell me what makes this purpose a property of life — is it shared with spiders and clams and sugar gliders and ants? After all, they live, too.

That reaction aligns nicely with atheist Galen Strawson's response which I mention here:

Quantum Non-Linearity: Galen Strawson on "Why is there something?"

In the foregoing post I quote Strawson telling us that:

I don’t for all that think the universe has a purpose. I think it just is.

... which in turn aligns with Bertrand Russell who said that....

I should say that the universe is just there, and that's all [there is to it!]

So yes, atheists do hit an impenetrable logically contingent barrier (*1) when it comes to the purpose of our highly organized cosmos, if indeed they can even give a coherent meaning to terms like "purpose" when it comes to the cosmos at large. 

But Myers is not at all being unreasonable in asking for objective evidence of anyone who (like myself) has opted for the search for meaning, purpose and the Divine (see Acts 17:23-28). I also agree that we instinctively try to rationalize and make sense of life.  But as I said in a footnote to this post:

Christianity has a strong existential component in its evidences; that is, Christianity is partly dependent on the testimony of personal experiences. This slant toward anecdotal evidence, of course, cannot qualify as being on the same footing as the formal and sharable evidences of our science which depends on an a-priori high organization. (See also here)

But in spite of that I don't think Christian conclusions are as variable, arbitrary and subjective as PZ makes out: I'm sure I've got a lot of common ground with Catholics and even with cultic fundies like Ken Ham (*2). But I doubt I have very much in common with spiders who probably have no where near the minimum intellectual apparatus needed to formulate questions of meaning! Anyway, nice try PZ, but let's both keep searching for the truth and live the moral lives our superegos tell us we should live; at least we have that in common!

Footnote

(*1) And once again, we can write-off conceited blowhard Richard Carrier's attempt to explain order in terms of disorder. (See here for more on disorder)

(*2) However let me acknowledge that a crypto-cultist like Ken is likely to regard my faith as utterly inferior (See here for Ken's opinion of those Christians who don't support the theme of his theme park; to him they are barely Christian!)

Atheist's Corner

Below are some quotes from a couple of UK's well known atheists; Alice Roberts and Brian Cox (*1). From their media appearances alone both come over as nice people. Although they are unlikely to have a great deal of respect for my own God seeking quest they strike me as polite people who would not be rude about it. But whatever! Let me now look at those quotes:

****

ALICE ROBERTS:

MY COMMENT: I assume that by "non-religious people" Alice means people who don't kowtow to deities of any form and in any case have no proactive or practical belief in them. I don't know the history of non-belief myself but I'll take Alice's word for it that such people have always existed. I would nevertheless want to comment that my feel for history suggests that non-religious people of this ilk were usually in a minority, although this may not be true of modern Western societies. Moreover, it does seem that even in this modern age belief in deities or at the very least a mystical feeling that "there is something out there" is still very widespread; this fragment of observational evidence could be bundled together with other evidences to help build a case for theism. 

Where I get a bit stuck with Alice's statement is with the meaning of her natural phenomenon vs. supernatural side distinction. If we are working with the assumption that natural phenomenon refers to the patterns of our observations which conform to those highly organised and succinct principles we call "laws" then the natural phenomenon category is simply a construct of our definitions. This definition of the "natural world" as a regime of faithfully operating laws standing in contradistinction to deities has, I believe, only become really clear since the enlightenment. However, given this definition it is then very tempting to rule out the far less tractable world of exceptions to the rule, phenomenal erratics, the experientially bizarre and the startlingly unique as mistaken anomalies because their unmanageable infrequency compromises their sense of reality. So called natural phenomenon is then not just a passive category but a way of proactively sorting out the observational sheep from the goats.

But in any case the so called "natural world" with its remarkable and irreducible organization is in another very real sense highly supernatural; that is, its arbitrary contingency leaves me at least with the feeling of an unnatural contrivance. See in particular evolutionary theory. Crass attempts to trivialize this irreducibility by abusing probability theory or via multiverse concepts don't work for me. 

****

BRIAN COX:

MY COMMENT: I wasn't aware this checking principle Brian refers to works as a catch-all principle even for natural phenomenon. Some objects subject to scientific checking such as paleontological, sociological, economic and historical theories, and in particular theories in evolutionary psychology where the intervening mists of time and other epistemic distance factors start to take effect make fact testing problematic. (See here).

****

BRIAN: 

MY COMMENT: Well, yes Brian that is not only a very interesting question, but I would rate it as the most significant question of all. But I think Brian is going to have great difficulty answering such a question; for if as I think he has opined the only source of the meaning of life comes from what we personally invest in it then such subjectivity will ensure that life means different things to different people with the inevitable clashes of interest this will imply. 

Brian believes that the universe itself has no objective meaning of anthropic interest because all patterns and objects of interest are destined to die in the inevitable heat death of the universe. This cosmic destiny makes the elegant laws of physics as anthropically absurd as they are pointless.  

****

MEANWHILE ON PZ MYERS' BLOG: 

PZ Myers is a really grumpy atheist; that may be because he's got various health issues. I can wish him better health although I won't pray for him as he probably hates the idea of prayer. But then who wouldn't be grumpy if you had to live in a country with a strong mix of Christian dominionists, quasi-fascists in powerful positions and a country which is the source of much Christian fundamentalist and anti-science thinking (like Ken Ham *2); and all that's before we get onto the subject of the breathtakingly egotistical D. Trump. On his blog post here PZ quotes a certain Mano Singham and then adds his own indorsing comment: See below (my emphases):

MANO SINGHAM: I left religion for purely logical reasons. not emotional ones. I found that however hard I tried, I just could not reconcile the scientific view that everything (?) occurs according to natural laws with the traditional religious view that seemed to require an entity that could bypass those laws to act in the world to change the course of events. It took me a long time to overcome the emotional attachment to the religious beliefs (and now he's emotionally attached to science? - ed) that I had. So while I can understand how logical reasoning can make one leave religion, (speak for yourself Mano - ed) I cannot see how it can drive the reverse process.... 

PZ MYERS:  Same here, except that my family faith tradition didn’t have much of an emotional attachment to Christianity, so shedding it was relatively trivial. I agree, though, that there are no good rational reasons to compel return to a faith, which is why I reject any attempts to rationalize it. It feels good to you, it connects you to friends and family, you have fond memories of your time in church (and makes sense of life? - ed) …that’s fine. I believe you. Go ahead, I’m not going to deny your feelings. But if you try to tell me you have compelling, logical, scientific reasons to believe in a god, I’m going to tell you you’re full of sh*t. (like I said, he's as grumpy as hell - ed)

MY COMMENT: Well, yes I'd agree; if you are expecting the verification of theism to be a simple case of testing as one might test accessible physical theories like Hooke's law or theories testable by test-tube precipitate then you won't find that kind of compelling "logical" scientific reason to believe in God. In fact testing for the existence of God, a totalizing personality in whose immanent being we are immersed, (Acts 17:27-28) is even more of an epistemic challenge than testing social, economic and historical theories. Much of the evidence relevant to God's existence revolves round personal anecdote, patchy historical documents, and above all a motivation to bring sense, meaning and purpose to both personal and community life. Perhaps that's what PZ is trying to express in his sentence above which I have emboldened. "God seeking" is an existential reaction whereby the individual seeks to find an all-embracing world view which provides meaning and purpose in life.  Christianity is a golden key which unlocks meaning and explains the human predicament.

The meaning of immanence: Pip, a computer games character,
wants to know where the computer simulating him dwells.

But here is the ironic twist: Just as the simple logic of a scientific  kind isn't sufficient to argue that theism is a logical truism, conversely neither is the elementary observational sampling which reveals very general laws a sufficient logical basis to argue one out of theism as Mano is proposing. If anything the strange & ultimately logically unjustifiable high organization which facilitates our expression of that order as those elegant mathematical laws of physics has a strange way of compelling us (at least myself) to start speculating about a logically true creating and sustaining context beyond them: After all, descriptive science cannot get round the impenetrable logical barrier of contingency; if we are looking for the underlying logic which supports the astounding & startling cosmic order we must look beyond that cosmos; at this point it is a very natural human instinct, in fact a very compelling intuition, to evoke the concept of God as Designer, Creator and Sustainer. But such a conclusion is a proprietary one, one which belongs to the individual; for example I myself cannot reconstruct those "purely logical reasons" (sic) which drove Mano Singham away from theism.

Mano's insistence that the existence of physical laws logically bar the existence of a creating and sustaining entity at whose pleasure the course of events may change capriciously betrays an obvious prejudice in his thinking. After all, few of us bulk at the idea that an otherwise fairly sound theoretical framework (like Newton's laws) may well under certain circumstance be bypassed in favour of a more general theoretical framework (like relativity or quantum mechanics), a framework which is the outer context in which less general patterns of behavior are immersed.  So, I take it that Mano only accepts exceptions to rule if they are the outcome of higher level laws. That is, he has an a priori prejudice which means he cannot accept a theistic outer framework. For him it is "turtles all the way down" where in his case the "turtles" are physical laws. For me, of course, the existence of those remarkable general laws governing a highly ordered cosmos has exactly the opposite effect; it drives me to theistic speculations. 

For Mano the unalterable natural laws cannot be bypassed and therefore he elevates them to a kind natural-law deism. So, conversely if PZ is going to accuse those who "try to tell me you have compelling, logical, scientific reasons to believe in a god, I’m going to tell you you’re full of sh*t." (and he might be right)  then does that mean if you try to tell me you have compelling, logical, scientific reasons to reject God, I’m going to tell you you’re full of sh*t? It would, however, be more polite and true to say that Mano's argument is based on innate gut reaction rather than logic. 

Footnotes

*1  Brian Cox appears to be in a mixed state of atheism and agnosticism: According Brian's Wiki page....

Brian Cox has stated he lacks a belief in deities and is a humanist, but he has sometimes rejected the label "atheist" in favor of saying he has "no personal faith". He has indicated he cannot be sure a God does not exist and that science cannot answer every question

*2  Young earthism is of course an ugly manifestation of Ken's fundamentalism. In young earthism God's created objects are sending out false messages about a history they never had. But even if God downloads created objects "as is" straight into creation, they each presumably are first assembled in the mind of God implying that even in Ken's "as is" creation objects have a history in the sense of a history in the divine mind. 

Physics' irreducible logical barrier

There's an isomorphism between data compression and the laws of physics: In the physical sciences observation collects "original data".(blue topped cylinder). Because the cosmos is highly organized this allows human theorizers (the "compressor") to describe its patterns of behavior in the form of succinct (or "compressed") mathematical laws (green cylinder).  We can then think of a physical system as a way of "decompressing" those laws and presenting us with our conscious experience of the world (orange topped cylinder). 

The laws of physics are mathematical devices which are effective because we live in a highly organized universe. This organization makes it possible to describe the patterns of the universe in the succinct forms we call the laws of physics. The opposite of this cosmic high organization is disorder or randomness which by definition eludes simple mathematical description. The purely descriptive role of mathematical science has been a big theme of this blog. See here for example.

***

The following post, written by an Eric Hedin on the North American Intelligent Design (NAID) website "Science & Culture", looks to be an important conceptual step (forward?) for the NAID community...

 Can Equations Serve as a Designer Substitute? | Science and Culture Today

Am I interested in this post because it picks up on that same theme of the purely descriptive nature of physical science, although it appears to make no connection between the high organization of our experience of the world and the succinct mathematical formulations with which we find we can describe it. However, quoting from this post (with my emphases).....

This limitation (i,e, the descriptive nature of science) also applies to all the laws of physics that scientists have visualized, discovered, or derived. These “laws” merely describe how things work in this universe, based on our observations and experiments on what already exists.  "Physics is a mathematical exploration of the universe. We look for patterns, structures, symmetries, and relationships. We use math to capture and describe those patterns, structures, symmetries, and relationships." .....For example, Newton’s universal law of gravitation doesn’t cause an apple to fall from a tree, it simply describes the force between it and the Earth and the apple’s subsequent rate of acceleration towards the ground. No statement of the “law of gravity” has any power to produce the actors or the action in this simple drama.....These expostulations regarding the limitations of the utility of the laws of physics may seem obvious,

Yes, I agree, this lesson does seem obvious. The descriptive nature of science became obvious to me as soon as I was introduced to mathematical science...oh, about 55 years ago.  But it is surprising how many people seem unable to see this and believe the laws of physics have some much deeper "causative" role; for some people these laws are the metaphysical "why?" rather than the mere descriptive  "how". But descriptive mathematical science can never "self-explain"; the best it can do is compress its descriptive algorithms in increasingly succinct forms. But ultimately physics is destined to leave us with an incompressible kernel of apparently contingent information. 

If as Hedin appears to understand this hard core of contingency is irreducible this then opens up the question of the ultimate source or the  "why?" behind the cosmos, if indeed "why?" is an intelligible question. Mathematical physics is not self-referencing in way which means it contains its own explanation. In fact as atheist philosophers Bertrand Russell and Galen Strawson said the universe "just is" (*1)..... because human science can only rightly be expected to supply the "how" but not the deeper "why?" Russell and Strawson are telling us we just have to accept what it throws at us as the given status quo. For motivated atheists the question "why?", which if taken as a desire to find purpose and design behind the universe, is not only a meaningless question but also an anathema. 

But does the enigma of the impassible doorway where descriptive  science leaves us imply that a "designer" is to be found on the other side of that door, as Hedin suggests? Design arguments based on observations made in archeological contexts might suggest that via analogy design arguments are the next port of call in our thinking about cosmic origins. But I don't readily agree with the NAIDs who try to make out that the science of intelligent design, which does apply to archeological artifacts (and perhaps even alien technology) can automatically be extrapolated to the total cosmic context with its high organization. The concept of a totalizing God, who is the outer context in which a whole universe lives, moves and has its being (Acts 17:27-28), is an entirely different genus of entity to humans and aliens: The latter beings are intelligences which move & work within the contingent giveness of creation, as did the Greek gods of old. 

People like myself who propose a creator God are doing so on the basis of a design metaphor, rather than via the logic of ID science, a science which can only be worked out for intelligent agencies who work within the cosmic context.  For me what urges the use of this metaphor is an overwhelming sense that there must be anthropic meaning and purpose to be found on the other side of the enigmatic cliff hanger where descriptive science leaves us. Unless we are going to go along with the "just is" atheism of Russel and Strawson purpose and meaning can be found if we use Hebrews 11:6 as an axiomatic epistemic life principle.....

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. (Hebrews 11:6)

So, I largely agree with what Hedin says here..

To achieve “something rather than nothing” requires more than an equation, more than mathematics — it takes an intelligent mind to imagine what could be and, it would seem, the power of God to bring it to pass.

I can say "Yes" to that because my experience with sophisticated and highly organized configurations in this world does get me thinking along designer lines. But because the concept of "God" is of a totalizing entity in which the observable cosmos is immersed, the ID argument is at best an argument from analogy with a motivation based on largely theological urges & presuppositions and above all the search for purpose and meaning. 

As I discussed in this series of posts there is a feeling even among atheists like R. Carrier that there must be something out there, perhaps something we may find difficult to understand, which is a logical necessity and which is the source of our universe (*1); that source is not going to be descriptive algorithmic physics which inevitably leaves us at a logical hiatus. The status of algorithmic physics is as far as we know contingent; conceivably physics could be something other than what we know (*2). Hence the only way we can arrive at the physics of the universe and nail down the precise nature of its contingency is not through pure logic but through observation. I think this is what Hedin is trying to say here...

Even if an internally consistent theory of “quantum gravity” were developed, its correctness would remain in doubt. The reason is that the universe is contingent — it doesn’t have to play by our suppositions, and the only way to know for certain if any theory or model of nature is valid is to see if nature behaves according to its predictions.

Yes, I agree. But the "just is" atheism of Russel and Strawson, may regard it as futile, if not meaningless to pursue further explanatory aims that seek to answer "why?". It is ironic, however, that for the Christian Hebrews 11:6 suggests a similar "just is" attitude toward the reality of God himself. But in contrast to "just is" atheism (*3) Christian theology does help address the human yearning for ultimate justice, purpose and meaning and also helps fill that "God shaped hole" in our psyche. 

Footnotes

*1 At least Russel and Strawson are being coherent here. Compare that with Richard Carrier's absurd argument employing a bogus concept of probability as a kind logical truism capable of creating a universe. 

*2 Anthropic ideas, however, suggest that only a limited range of cosmic conditions favour a form of life advanced enough to make observations on the cosmos. 

*3 See also Brian Cox on the cosmic perspective.

Motivated Atheism

Motivated atheism: "We don't want none of that God business here, thankyou very much!"

                From: Viewpoint: What 'New Atheists’ get wrong about science and religion - Genetic Literacy Project

Does Humanity Need a God Who Doesn’t Exist? asks fundamentalist theme park supremo Ken Ham in a blog post dated December 2025. After posing the question Ken goes on to say....

KEN: Is God just (Note the "Just" here) an evolutionary necessity? I was recently sent an article titled “The God Construct: Why Humanity Needed God Though God Need Not Exist.”  The abstract of this “atheistic, scientific-philosophical perspective” applied to the idea of God says:

This article argues that humanity created the concept of God to address deep psychological and social needs, even though no empirical evidence requires a God’s existence. Drawing on the philosophy of religion and cognitive science, we demonstrate that belief in gods arises from evolved cognitive byproducts (e.g., hyperactive agency detection and theory of mind) and existential motives (such as meaning, order, and comfort in the face of death and suffering). From an atheistic, scientific-philosophical perspective, we contend that God is a cultural construct (‘man needs God’) rather than a necessary metaphysical being. Logical analysis (e.g. the problem of evil (But see here) and ontological arguments) supports God’s non-necessity, while empirically humans with strong God-belief report greater purpose and reduced death anxiety (Cranney 2013). We argue that religion fulfilled survival functions (community cohesion, moral regulation) but did so via God-concepts as symbolic projections. In sum, the God-idea met human needs, not vice versa. This thesis is supported by interdisciplinary evidence from evolutionary psychology, anthropology, and analytic philosophy. [emphases added]

MY COMMENT: Ironically I don't necessarily disagree with much of that abstract! If for the moment I put on my evolutionary hat (which I don't wear all the time) then I can accept that humans have evolved in such a way that their cognitive, temperamental and emotional needs precipitated an existential crisis which motivated a search for meaning & purpose and ultimately led to the construction of concepts of divinity in various forms; hence the jargon "cultural construct". I would also accept that as far as limited human understanding is concerned God has no known logical necessity. But what about "empirical necessity"? - more on that subject in a bit.

But, and here is the big "but", an evolutionary account explaining the human need for the divine can be taken as empirical evidence which is readily incorporated into a theistic world view. Viz: From the theistic evolutionists world view it is easy to claim that the evolution of the "God shaped hole", a void which humanity seeks to fill, is God's way of revealing himself to the evolved world.  In short, yes, the divine is a cultural construct, but is it only a cultural construct? (See Romans 2:14ff for more)

Ironically, the thesis in the above abstract may not actually be that popular among some motivated atheists. Why? Well, its tantamount to admitting that theism is not some random human foible of relatively recent social origin but a deeply ingrained human trait inextricably intertwined with evolution; a product of an emerging conscious cognition capable of self-awareness, self reflection and in need of existentialist assurance.

***

I wonder if the author of the abstract really understands empiricism and the role of evidence? All evidence is subject to interpretation (*1); it is just that some of the simpler and very accessible ontologies (like Hooke's law and chemical precipitates) provide us with prolific empirical evidences at will; the high organization of this empirical data then allows us to incorporate natural information in succinct laws.  

As we move from elementary ontologies to more complex and  less accessible ontologies, such as human beings themselves, their societies and their histories, and their cosmogonies etc. the vexed question of how to interpret sparse and less accessible data comes very much to the fore. And if that is true of commonplace objects (albeit objects which are very complex and of greater epistemic distance) then we would expect it to be even more true, if it exists, of the Transcendent.  I discuss this more fully elsewhere: See here for example. Compounding the problem is that evidences for God are often found in private experiences and epiphanies that are not easily shared. 

God's apparent lack of logical necessity is true as far as we are concerned but this may be down to a perspective effect of finite cognition and epistemic limitations. These limitations prevent us  from wrapping our minds around a full understanding of God thus thwarting human attempts to appreciate his logical necessity. When it comes to ultimate origins this problem even surfaces in atheism....

In my series on conceited blowhard Richard Carrier we found even him accepting that beyond what appears to us as the unnecessary contingency of our own cosmos there are logical truths out there which cannot be done away with. Therefore he argued that the cosmos didn't come from nothing; at the very least certain logical truths hold eternally, although he at first left open exactly what those logical truths are. But he then went on to erroneously use probability theory as if it were one of those logical truisms, thus allowing him to generate universes at random. But while his identification of what is logically true was in error, the idea that the universe is created and upheld by some underlying logical truism is not out of the way.... although I would regard attempts like Anselm's ontological argument and the first cause argument as weak and even invalid proofs of God's existence... but I have great sympathy with the underlying motivation to get at the logical truisms behind the cosmos. 

****

Now let's see how Ken reacts...

KEN: In other words, there’s no convincing evidence that God exists; but we needed him, so sometime in our evolutionary past, mankind invented a God or gods to serve our purposes. But do you realize that, in making his argument, this atheistic author has already defeated his very premise? Okay, what do I mean by that?

Well, he admits his research comes from an atheistic perspective: He believes everything is material and everything evolved by materialistic (non-supernatural) processes over many millions of years. In this worldview, there cannot be anything immaterial. And yet he is applying logic and reason to make his arguments. But logic and reason are not material! They are immaterial . . . and the immaterial can’t exist in his own worldview. (emphases added)

MY COMMENT: It is simply not clear to me what is meant here by materialism and materialistic processes.  In my view such notions are incoherent and it is likely they have their origins in the bogus God vs natural forces dichotomy; they are crypto-deist categories. I've argued against this sham paradigm many times in connection with the North America Intelligent Design (NAID) community (See here). It is no surprise to see that Ken has been influenced by this error. 

Material objects, so called, exist because the high organization of our sense data allows us to mathematically and logically define material objects such as stars, planets, people, minds, computers, atoms, and fundamental particles etc. geometrically; "materialism" does not make sense without the use of mathematics and logic. Beyond those mathematical constructions we are hard put to it to identify the true nature of the thing-in-itself which supports the high organization of our experience. For Christians of course that thing-in-itself is, whatever its ontological nature, created and sustained by God. 

Because of Ken's undefined use of the term "material", Ken's statement that  logic and reason are not material! They are immaterial . . . and the immaterial can’t exist in his own worldview is unintelligible. It is the very organization of the creation which facilitates our notion of logic. Ergo, an atheist too can appreciate logic and reason although atheism would not, of course, attribute the origin of that organization to a rational creator God. For example the atheist  Galen Strawson (who has no idea where it all came from), as a last resort throws up his hands and declares that the organized cosmos "just is". Well, Christians (such as myself) can't really complain too strongly about that because for us God himself "just is" as per Hebrews 11:6. 

In the above quote from Ken, we find him, as is his wont, yet again putting his own ideas into the mouths and minds of an antagonist - a bad habit of his whether his antagonist is a Christian or atheist. (See here and here for example).

***

KEN: In a chance, random universe, laws of logic that apply to everyone everywhere don’t make sense. Why would randomness produce immaterial laws that don’t change? In order to make his argument, this atheist has to borrow from a biblical worldview because it is only the eternal God of the Bible, who is logically consistent, never changes, and can account for laws of logic. He is borrowing from the very worldview (or theism, at least) that he is arguing against! The very fact that he can argue at all shows he is wrong.

MY COMMENT: Defining randomness is itself quite a challenge in logic; randomness certainly doesn't do away with logic; in fact it needs logic to be understood. But I think I get what Ken is trying to say here: Randomness is the antithesis of the high organisation which facilitates the enunciation of those very successful laws of nature. If that's what Ken really means then its true those laws make the natural world an intelligible place and make logic possible. But beyond those descriptive laws the deeper logical reason for the cosmos remains an enigma, not withstanding Richard Carrier's botched philosophy of probability. As Galen Strawson appears to acknowledge that's where atheism's questions hit an impenetrable barrier.

I'd accept what Ken is trying say in as much Christianity has played a role in helping us to have confidence in the stability, organisation, rationality and consequent knowability of the cosmos. This is the a priori epistemic feature which motivates science. 

***

KEN:  We didn’t invent God. God exists outside of time and space. He created us by the power of his word and then revealed himself to us through his perfect Word and his Son, Jesus Christ, who came to offer his own life in our place so we could be forgiven and spend eternity with him.

MY COMMENT:  I can run with the gist of that Ken, even though you would likely classify me as a pagan. (I'm generally much more generous to cultists than they have any hope of reciprocating that generosity) However, if evolution made the invention of God an existential necessity for searching, seeking humankind it's an invention that not only worked but has revealed The Big Secret behind the universe. 

*** 

KEN: And don’t forget, man can’t escape the fact that “that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, both His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:19–20 LSB).

MY COMMENT:  Well Ken, if I temporarily put my evolutionary hat on, it could be plausibly maintained that the writer of the paper, in a back handed way, concedes one point; namely that that which is known about God is evident within them......etc., but he is proposing that this knowledge has emerged evolutionarily. Of course Ken doesn't believe in evolution but for Christians who are evolutionists this paper can be seen as an acknowledgement that humanity's innate awareness of the numinous comes from deep rooted whisperings within. 

But not everyone responds positively to those whisperings: For one thing is clear however, and Ken may well agree, the writer of this paper is likely to be highly motivated toward atheism; that is, he wants atheism to be true and thus he casts around for arguments which fit this a priori belief; much like Ken does for his a priori beliefs!

Footnote

*1 The view I express here is similar to but is certainly not the same as Ken's bigoted presuppositionalism. Human beings most often work abductively, trying to fit the evidence to some a priori world view which (hopefully) successfully interprets that evidence. But unlike Ken's quasi-cult artistry which motivates him to threaten all but damnation on antagonists, our world views should not be regarded as immutable; if a world view struggles to make sense of the cosmos (such as YEC, flat earth theory, conspiracy theories etc.) then it must be abandoned and a new world view developed. Contrast that with the absurdities of YEC fundamentalism which according to Ken must be held onto on pain of all but excommunication from the faith.