Yes, the universe has to be the kind of place where we can exist because
we exist to see it as such. Similiar arguments have been advanced to deal
with a related problem, the extraordinary statistical unlikehood of
chance, even in a universe open to life existing for billions of years,
producing even biogenesis much less the complexity of life we now see.
The evolutionist's solution: "Yes, it is such a rare event that it would,
at best, happen on only one planet in the entire history of the universe,
but we are seeing it because we are part of that process." Their
hypothesis--trillions of planets with only one yielding life--is similar
to one counter to the Anthropic Principle--trillions of parallel
universes with only one having the lucky set of values to make it
life-friendly.
All this evades the real issue. When the Copernician revolution made the
earth a minor artifact in a vast universe and when evolution made man
seem the product of nothing but chance and chemistry, opponents of theism
were arguing probabilities not facts. "Doesn't it seem unlikely that such
a backward planet could be the subject of so much of your God's
attention. Doesn't it seem unlikely that such a God would be interested
in a mere two-legged ape. Your faith in this God seems sadly out of touch
with reality." Those were probabilites and plausibilities not hard facts.
They were what a physics professor I once had referred to as "arm-waving
proofs."
It's simply not kosher to argue from probabilities with two revolutionary
scientific worldviews and refuse to do so with the third. And remember,
the probabilities of the third revolution place us at the center of the
universe far more firmly and to a far greater extent that the previous
two revolutions moved us to the periphery. The old 'watchmaker' proof of
God suggested a God interested in creating complex 'watches' but not
necessarily interested in life much less a troublesome life form like us.
The extraordinary unlikely existence of a life-friendly universe suggests
a God intimately interested in life and, if life, why not in a life that
responds back with an interest in God. It still doesn't prove the
existence of a personal God, nothing can, but it suggests it quite strongly.
Because it centers in physics, the Anthropic principle reverses what was
taken as the anti-God/anti-human implications of the Copernician
revolution. But the worldview that revolution established was rather mild
in the harm it inflected on humanity. It was really an attack on an
Aristolean view of the universe, not a Judeo-Christian one and because it
centered on far distant stars and planets, it had few social implications.
On the other hand the Darwinian revolution was a direct attack on the
Judeo-Christian ethical worldview and was intended as such. As Marx
noted, much of its success came because it rendered 'scientific' a 19th
century mindset that viewed the world as a place of brutal, amoral
struggle where only the fit (then affluent white Europeans, now all sorts
of jerks) have the right to survive. The mindset it supported has been a
vile and pervasive influence in our society ever since. Imperialism,
Social Darwinism, the 'robber barons,' eugenics, population control,
forced sterilization and a wide variety of destructive 'isms' from modern
liberalism, Marxism and Nazism to radical feminism have all drawn on its
view of the world as dominated by a struggle for power. For anyone who
wanted an excuse to stomp on someone else, the retiring Darwin provided
an excellent excuse, generally by justifying radical increases in the
power of the State over people's lives. (Centralized bureaucracies were
once rationalized by claiming that society, like animals, was more highly
evolved if its systems of control were centrally located.) Much of our
contemporary intellectual life, in fact, is dominated by people who can
think and act in no other fashion and that's one reason why our society,
like Weimar Germany, is splintering. (It's also why so many go ballistic
at the thought of teaching any 'equal time' alternatives to evolution in
public schools.)
I've been told by people in a position to know that we may see, within a
decade or so, the scientific equivalent of Darwin's Origin of the Species
written from the perspective that the present existence and complexity of
life admits no other conclusion than the existence of some intelligent
guiding hand. If so, it could radically alter for the good the
foundations of modern society and begin to reduce in scope the horrors we
have been inflicting upon ourselves in recent generations. But it won't
recapture the marketplace of ideas without an enormous and bloody fight.
A lot of people have a vested interest in keeping God marginalized and
their Darwinian roots justify any tactic including lies and slander.
Intellectually, it's a great time to be alive. We should pity those like
Bonhoeffer who lived in a world where there seemed to be no alternative
to the terrible ideas of the 19th century. And we should show a bit of
understanding if the doubts their unfortunate Kultur inspired
occasionally sent them astray.
--Mike Perry, Seattle, WA
Inkling@aol.com