Government allocation, that is, allocation by politicians and bureaucrats, at least partly replaces market signals and incentives.
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Wild enthusiasm for a government project usually occurs only when we are putting costs on other people.
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Wild enthusiasm for a government project usually occurs only when we are putting costs on other people.
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The Watchmaker
Penrose and Hawking did calculations based on their research on black holes. Two of their conclusions:
“The odds against an ordered universe happening by random chance are 10^10^30th to 1, against."
“The odds against an ordered universe happening by random chance are 10^10^30th to 1, against."
And,
"The odds against life are 10^10^123rd to 1, against.”
"The odds against life are 10^10^123rd to 1, against.”
"If you like, you can say the laws are the work of God, but that is more a definition of God than a proof of his existence."--Hawkings
God, as the Watchmaker, made this complex and precise world but did not interfere with it. Once created, the watch ran on its own.
Not only could a reasonable man look at the complexity of life and see the logic behind this complex Creator, he could rationalize why he need not hold God responsible when things went wrong. This analogy continues to this day in various guises, most recently in the Intelligent Design movement, which argues that the cellular information-based genetic system is a modern example of the computer-oriented Watchmaker. So each age builds its own spiritual mirror.
Not only could a reasonable man look at the complexity of life and see the logic behind this complex Creator, he could rationalize why he need not hold God responsible when things went wrong. This analogy continues to this day in various guises, most recently in the Intelligent Design movement, which argues that the cellular information-based genetic system is a modern example of the computer-oriented Watchmaker. So each age builds its own spiritual mirror.
Our current mirror is now clouded. Our new understanding of the universe has become arcane, mathematical and recondite, creating a new, upper strata of knowledge-priests reminiscent of older times..
"It seems to be one of the fundamental features of nature that fundamental physical laws are described in terms of mathematical theory of great beauty and power, needing quite a high standard of mathematics for one to understand it. You may wonder: Why is nature constructed along these lines? One can only answer that our present knowledge seems to show that nature is so constructed. We simply have to accept it," Dirac wrote in 1963. "One could perhaps describe the situation by saying that God is a mathematician of a very high order, and He used very advanced mathematics in constructing the universe."
Dr Willie Soon, an astrophysicist and aerospace engineer who has worked at the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, has recently claimed that a mathematical formula could be the ultimate proof of God's existence. (Warning. The good Dr. Soon is hated by many because he is a global warming skeptic.)
At the core of Soon's thesis is the fine-tuning argument, which posits that the precise nature of the universe’s physical laws is too perfect to have occurred by chance. The theory, initially proposed by Cambridge mathematician Paul Dirac, implies that the universe’s conditions are so precisely balanced that they suggest intentional design. A small variation in constants like gravity or the cosmological constant could have prevented the formation of galaxies, stars, and even life itself.
In an interview on the Tucker Carlson Network last year, he referenced Dirac, who predicted the existence of “antimatter” in 1928, specifically a counterpart to the electron. Four years later, in 1932, Carl Anderson discovered the positron, a particle with the same mass as an electron but with a positive charge. Soon described this as miraculous, highlighting Dirac’s ability to predict its existence before any experimental confirmation.
Dr. Soon also referred to geometry in mathematics, specifically the concept of closed curvature in spacetime without gravity, which has long challenged the understanding of how mathematics relates to the real world. He noted that studies have explored this topic extensively. Hermann Weyl, a German mathematician, introduced the Weyl tensor to measure spacetime curvature without relying on mass-energy. This tensor helps describe tidal forces in a gravitational field without referencing the energy-momentum tensor.
John Archibald Wheeler, an American theoretical physicist, gave “Geometrodynamics”, proposing all physical phenomena could be understood in terms of spacetime geometry, and suggesting that curvature can exist due to the vacuum structure rather than mass-energy. He also introduced geons—self-contained gravitational or electromagnetic waves held together by their own energy, demonstrating curved spacetime without traditional gravitational sources.
Willem de Sitter’s solutions to Einstein’s field equations describe “de Sitter and anti-de Sitter spacetimes,” where a universe with positive curvature is driven by a cosmological constant, independent of any matter content.
"It seems to be one of the fundamental features of nature that fundamental physical laws are described in terms of mathematical theory of great beauty and power, needing quite a high standard of mathematics for one to understand it. You may wonder: Why is nature constructed along these lines? One can only answer that our present knowledge seems to show that nature is so constructed. We simply have to accept it," Dirac wrote in 1963. "One could perhaps describe the situation by saying that God is a mathematician of a very high order, and He used very advanced mathematics in constructing the universe."
Dr Willie Soon, an astrophysicist and aerospace engineer who has worked at the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, has recently claimed that a mathematical formula could be the ultimate proof of God's existence. (Warning. The good Dr. Soon is hated by many because he is a global warming skeptic.)
At the core of Soon's thesis is the fine-tuning argument, which posits that the precise nature of the universe’s physical laws is too perfect to have occurred by chance. The theory, initially proposed by Cambridge mathematician Paul Dirac, implies that the universe’s conditions are so precisely balanced that they suggest intentional design. A small variation in constants like gravity or the cosmological constant could have prevented the formation of galaxies, stars, and even life itself.
In an interview on the Tucker Carlson Network last year, he referenced Dirac, who predicted the existence of “antimatter” in 1928, specifically a counterpart to the electron. Four years later, in 1932, Carl Anderson discovered the positron, a particle with the same mass as an electron but with a positive charge. Soon described this as miraculous, highlighting Dirac’s ability to predict its existence before any experimental confirmation.
Dr. Soon also referred to geometry in mathematics, specifically the concept of closed curvature in spacetime without gravity, which has long challenged the understanding of how mathematics relates to the real world. He noted that studies have explored this topic extensively. Hermann Weyl, a German mathematician, introduced the Weyl tensor to measure spacetime curvature without relying on mass-energy. This tensor helps describe tidal forces in a gravitational field without referencing the energy-momentum tensor.
John Archibald Wheeler, an American theoretical physicist, gave “Geometrodynamics”, proposing all physical phenomena could be understood in terms of spacetime geometry, and suggesting that curvature can exist due to the vacuum structure rather than mass-energy. He also introduced geons—self-contained gravitational or electromagnetic waves held together by their own energy, demonstrating curved spacetime without traditional gravitational sources.
Willem de Sitter’s solutions to Einstein’s field equations describe “de Sitter and anti-de Sitter spacetimes,” where a universe with positive curvature is driven by a cosmological constant, independent of any matter content.
How many people can understand this? But, as difficult--and harmonious--as the obscure might be, it is not necessarily spiritual. A Rubik's Cube is difficult and harmonious.
Dr. Soon concluded by saying, “There are many incidents and examples like this. So sometimes we have to bow down and occasionally take a deep breath, and maybe some ever-present forces will illuminate our lives. God has given us light. All we have to do is just follow the light.”
Dr. Soon concluded by saying, “There are many incidents and examples like this. So sometimes we have to bow down and occasionally take a deep breath, and maybe some ever-present forces will illuminate our lives. God has given us light. All we have to do is just follow the light.”
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