The Case for a Creator - Lee Strobel [63]
He pointed toward his rendering of Hawking’s model. “Granted, there isn’t any singular point here, but notice this: the universe is still finite in its past. It still has a beginning in the sense that something has a finite past duration. In other words, pick an interval of time—say, a second, a minute, or a year. For any finite interval of time you pick, there are only a finite number of equal intervals prior to that time. And in that sense, Hawking’s model has a beginning. Even he says that the universe has an origin out of nothing in the sense that there’s absolutely nothing that comes before it.
“So this would be an example of a model that has a beginning but doesn’t involve a singularity. That’s what many scientists are trying to come up with, because the laws of physics would apply all the way back. They don’t break down in a singularity. And that’s more palatable to them.”
Before I could ask another question, Craig added: “Now, I’ve been taking Hawking’s model at face value, but it’s also important to note that he is only able to achieve this rounding-off effect by substituting ‘imaginary numbers’ for real numbers in his equations.”
“What are imaginary numbers?”
“They are multiples of the square root of negative one,” he said. “In this model, they have the effect of turning time into a dimension of space. The problem is that when imaginary numbers are employed, they’re just computational devices used to grease the equations and get the result the mathematician wants. That’s fine, but when you want to get a real, physical result, you have to convert the imaginary numbers into real ones. But Hawking refuses to convert them. He just keeps everything in the imaginary realm.”
“What happens if you convert the numbers into real ones?”
“Presto, the singularity reappears!” Craig said. “In fact, the singularity is really there the whole time; it’s just hidden behind the device of so-called imaginary time. Hawking concedes this in a subsequent book he co-authored with Roger Penrose. 47 He said he doesn’t pretend to be describing reality, because he says he doesn’t know what reality is. So Hawking himself recognizes that this is not a realistic description of the universe or its origin; it’s merely a mathematical way of modeling the beginning of the universe in such a manner that the singularity doesn’t appear.”
I was amazed! Even though Hawking’s Internet site says his theory implies that the universe “was completely determined by the laws of science,” 48 even he wasn’t able to successfully write God out of the picture.
“What’s important to understand, Lee, is how reversed the situation is from, say, a hundred years ago,” Craig continued. “Back then, Christians had to maintain by faith in the Bible that despite all appearances to the contrary, the universe was not eternal but was created out of nothing a finite time ago. Now, the situation is exactly the opposite.
“It is the atheist who has to maintain, by faith, despite all of the evidence to the contrary, that the universe did not have a beginning a finite time ago but is in some inexplicable way eternal after all. So the shoe is on the other foot. The Christian can stand confidently within biblical truth, knowing it’s in line with mainstream astrophysics and cosmology. It’s the atheist who feels very uncomfortable and marginalized today.”
As I sat there in Craig’s office, my mind could conjure up no rational scenario that could derail the inexorable logic of the kalam argument. The philosophical and scientific evidence of contemporary cosmology was pointing persuasively toward the conclusion that a personal Creator of the universe does exist. This was powerful stuff—and I still had a long way to go in my investigation.
I wondered, however, how a cosmologist or physicist might respond to Craig. As compelling as the kalam argument undeniably is, does it really have the potential to change the mind of a scientist? Or would it merely become fodder for more and more creative—or, as some might say, desperate—counter-arguments and objections? Christians often caution