The Case for a Creator (24 page)

“Third, he would need a mechanism to convert the energy of the inflaton field to the normal mass/energy that we find in our universe. Fourth, he would need a mechanism to allow enough variation in the constants of physics among the various universes. In other words, he would need a way to vary the constants of physics so that by random chance he would produce some universes, like ours, that have the right fine-tuning to sustain life.”

“Is there a candidate for that mechanism?” I asked.

“Well, yes—superstring theory,” he replied. “This might work, though it’s far too early to tell.”

When I asked why he brought up superstrings, he explained: “According to superstring theory, the ultimate constituents of matter are strings of energy that undergo quantum vibrations in ten or eleven dimensions of space-time. Six or seven of these dimensions are ‘rolled up’ to an extremely small size. In the jargon of string theory, they are said to be
compactified
. Their shape determines the modes of vibration of the strings. This, in turn, would determine the types and masses of fundamental particles and the characteristics of the forces between them. So they would have different constants of physics and laws governing the forces.”

“That sounds pretty iffy,” I said.

“Well, both inflationary cosmology and superstring theory are
highly
speculative. In fact, theoretical physicist Michio Kaku said recently that ‘not a shred of experimental evidence’ has been found to confirm superstrings.
⁴⁴
Physicists are a long way from even working out the equations. Right now it’s just a theory whose main merits are that it’s mathematically elegant and that it holds the promise of unifying quantum mechanics and general relativity, two branches of physics that physicists have struggled to reconcile for over fifty years.”

I summed up what Collins had said so far. “So the many-universes generator would need all these factors if it ever hoped to produce a functioning universe,” I said.

“Right,” he replied. “For example, without Einstein’s equation and the inflaton field working together harmoniously, it wouldn’t work. If the universe obeyed Newton’s theory of gravity instead of Einstein’s, it wouldn’t work. But that’s not all.

“You would also have to have the right background laws in place. For instance, without the so-called principle of quantization, all of the electrons in an atom would be sucked into the atomic nuclei. That would make atoms impossible. Further, as eminent Princeton physicist Freeman Dyson has noted, without the Pauli-exclusion principle, electrons would occupy the lowest orbit around the nucleus, and that would make complex atoms impossible.
⁴⁵
Finally, without a universally attractive force between all masses—such as gravity—stars and planets couldn’t form. If just one of these components was missing or different, it’s highly improbable that any life-permitting universes could be produced.

“And keep in mind,” he added, “you would need to make trillions upon trillions upon trillions upon trillions of universes in order to increase the odds that the cosmological constant would come out right at least once, since it’s finely tuned to an incomprehensible degree. And that’s just one parameter.”

“What’s your conclusion then?” I asked.

“It’s highly unlikely that such a universe-generating system would have all the right components and ingredients in place by random chance, just like random chance can’t account for how a bread-maker produces loaves of edible bread. So if a many-universe-generating system exists, it would be best explained by design.”

“That means,” I said, “that when scientists appeal to the theoretical existence of many universes to avoid the implications of the fine-tuning of our universe, they still can’t escape design.”

“Exactly,” he declared. “Theists have nothing to fear from the idea that there may be multiple universes. There would still need to be an intelligent designer to make the finely tuned universe-generating process work. To modify a phrase from philosopher Fred Dretske: these are inflationary times, and the cost of atheism has just gone up.”

THE SUPERMIND

I thought for a few moments about Collins’s explanation. Certainly it made sense that generating universes would require the right mechanisms, the right ingredients, and the right precision—all earmarks of intelligent design. But I was still mentally wrestling with something else. To me—admittedly, not a physicist—the whole concept of multiple universes seemed absurd.

I found myself agreeing with the iconoclastic Gregg Easterbrook, a contributing editor for the
Atlantic Monthly
, who researched the discoveries and theories of modern science. He was characteristically blunt in his assessment. “The multiverse idea rests on assumptions that would be laughed out of town if they came from a religious text,” he wrote. “[The theory] requires as much suspension of disbelief as any religion.
Join the church that believes in the existence of invisible objects fifty billion galaxies wide!
”
⁴⁶

When I mentioned my skepticism to Collins, he listened carefully. “There’s a reason you feel that way,” he said. “You see, everything else being equal, we tend to prefer hypotheses that are natural extrapolations of what we already know.”

I wasn’t sure what he was driving at. “Could you give me an illustration of that?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said. “Let’s say you found some dinosaur bones. You would naturally consider them to be very strong evidence that dinosaurs lived in the past. Why? Because even though nobody has ever seen dinosaurs, we do have the experience of other animals leaving behind fossilized remains. So the dinosaur explanation is a natural extrapolation from our common experience. It makes sense.

“Let’s say there was a dinosaur skeptic, however. He was trying to rationalize away the bones you found. Let’s suppose he claimed he could explain the bones by proposing that a ‘dinosaur-bone-producing field’ simply caused them to materialize out of thin air.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I said.

“And that’s exactly what you would tell the skeptic,” Collins continued. “You’d say: ‘Wait a second—there are no known laws of physics that would allow that field to conjure up bones out of nothing.’ But the skeptic would be ready for you. He’d reply, ‘Aha—we just haven’t discovered these laws yet. We simply haven’t detected these fields yet. Give us more time, Lee, and I’m sure we will.’

“My guess is that nothing could deter you from inferring that dinosaurs existed, because this would be a natural extrapolation from what you already know,” Collins concluded. “On the other hand, the skeptic needs to invent a whole new set of physical laws and a whole new set of mechanisms that are
not
a natural extrapolation from anything we know or have experienced. You wouldn’t buy his story. No way.”

“You’re saying, then, that an intelligent designer
is
a natural extrapolation of what we already know?”

“Yes, I am,” he replied. “Think about it, Lee—we already know that intelligent minds produce finely tuned devices. Look at the space shuttle. Look at a television set. Look at an internal combustion engine. We see minds producing complex, precision machinery all the time.

“So postulating the existence of a supermind—or God—as the explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe makes all the sense in the world. It would simply be a natural extrapolation of what we already know that minds can do. And, what’s more, unlike the hypothesis that there are many universes, we have independent evidence of God’s existence, such as a personal experience of the Creator and the other sort of evidence you’re talking about in your book.”

THE BEAUTY OF PHYSICS

Collins took his last sip of tea at about the same time I finished my glass of water. “Let’s go get some refills,” he said, motioning for me to follow him down the hall.

Without students or faculty, the building was eerily quiet, our voices echoing slightly as we ambled down the empty corridor. “The day is too beautiful to be spending so much time indoors,” I commented as we arrived at a self-serve kitchen area.

“Yeah, perfect for a run,” Collins said.

I filled my glass with water while he blended his tea. Silence prevailed for a few moments, then Collins remarked: “Talking about beauty reminds me of another line of reasoning that points toward a designer,” he said.

“Really?” I asked. “Tell me about it.”

“Think about the extraordinary beauty, elegance, harmony, and ingenuity that we find in the laws of nature,” he replied as we headed back to the conference room.

“Whole books have been written about it. Weinberg once spent an entire chapter explaining how the criteria of beauty and elegance have been used to guide physicists in formulating the right laws.
⁴⁷
The theoretical physicist Alan Guth said that the original construction of the gauge theories of fundamental particle physics ‘was motivated mainly by their mathematical elegance.’
⁴⁸

“One of the most influential scientists of the twentieth century, Paul Dirac, the Nobel Prize winner from Cambridge, even claimed that ‘it is more important to have beauty in one’s equations than to have them fit experiment.’ ”
⁴⁹
One historian said mathematical beauty was ‘an integral part’ of Dirac’s strategy. He said Dirac believed physicists ‘first had to select the most beautiful mathematics—not necessarily connected to the existing basis of theoretical physics—and then interpret them in physical terms.’ ”
⁵⁰

“And you see beauty in the laws and principles of nature?” I asked.

“Oh, absolutely,” he declared. “They’re beautiful, and they’re also elegant in their simplicity. Surprisingly so. When scientists are trying to construct a new law of nature, they routinely look for the simplest law that adequately accounts for the data.”

I interrupted with an objection. “Isn’t beauty in the eye of the beholder?” I asked. “What’s beautiful seems so subjective.”

“Subjectivity can’t explain the success of the criterion of beauty in science,” he replied. “We wouldn’t expect purely subjective patterns to serve as the basis of theories that make highly accurate predictions, such as the success of quantum electrodynamics to predict the quantum correction to the g-factor of the electron.

“Besides, not all beauty is subjective; there are also objective aspects of it, at least in the classical sense. In his book
The Analysis of Beauty
, written in the mid-1700s, William Hogarth said the defining feature of beauty or elegance is ‘simplicity with variety.’ And that’s what scientists have found—a world where fundamental simplicity gives rise to the enormous complexity needed for life.”

I ventured another alternative. “Maybe the concept of beauty is merely the product of evolution,” I said. “Perhaps it has survival value, and so our sense of what’s beautiful has been shaped by natural selection.”

“That would only apply to things we can see, touch, or hear—things in our everyday world that are necessary for survival. But evolution can’t explain the beauty that exists in the underlying world of physical laws and mathematics,” he said.

“In physics, we see an uncanny degree of harmony, symmetry, and proportionality. And we see something that I call ‘discoverability.’ By that, I mean that the laws of nature seem to have been carefully arranged so that they can be discovered by beings with our level of intelligence. That not only fits the idea of design, but it also suggests a providential purpose for humankind—that is, to learn about our habitat and to develop science and technology.”

Collins mentioned that Davies had also commented about the beauty of nature in his book
Superforce.
Later I found the passage:

A common reaction among physicists to remarkable discoveries . . . is a mixture of delight at the subtlety and elegance of nature, and of stupefaction: “I would never have thought of doing it that way.” If nature is so “clever” it can exploit mechanisms that amaze us with their ingenuity, is that not persuasive evidence for the existence of intelligent design behind the physical universe? If the world’s finest minds can unravel only with difficulty the deeper workings of nature, how could it be supposed that those workings are merely a mindless accident, a product of blind chance? . . . Uncovering the laws of physics resembles completing a crossword [puzzle] in a number of ways. . . . In the case of the crossword, it would never occur to us to suppose that the words just happened to fall into a consistent interlocking pattern by accident.
⁵¹

“Under an atheistic viewpoint,” Collins continued, “there’s no reason to expect that the fundamental laws would be beautiful or elegant, because they easily could have been otherwise. Even Weinberg, who’s an atheist, conceded that ‘sometimes nature seems more beautiful than strictly necessary.’
⁵²

“However, the fine-tuning for simplicity, beauty, and elegance
does
make sense under the God hypothesis. Think of the classical conception of God—he is the greatest possible being, and therefore a being with perfect aesthetic sensibility. It wouldn’t be surprising at all for God to want to create a world of great subtlety and beauty at its most fundamental level.”

“ALL OTHER THEORIES FALL SHORT”

We walked back into the conference room, knowing that we were getting close to finishing. Collins leaned against the wall, a mug in one hand, the other arm casually folded across his chest, while I perched atop the back of a chair, my feet resting on its seat.

The intersection of faith and physics was a fascinating crossroads to me, and I was curious about the impact of Collins’s research on his personal life.