Retired hedge fund titan Robert W. Wilson lost his faith in God years ago, yet he believes in Catholic schools and gave $5.6 million to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York this summer.
It’s the latest of many gifts from Wilson to the city’s Catholic hierarchy and educators, this one aimed at funding the Catholic Alumni Partnership, a program he founded that helps elementary schools track down their 750,000 alumni and recruit them as donors.
“Most of what the Catholic schools teach are the three Rs,” said Wilson, 83, in a phone interview, referring to reading, writing and arithmetic. “And they do it better than the union-controlled inner-city schools.”
Wilson, a Detroit native, said he began questioning the existence of God after enrolling in Amherst College in Massachusetts to study economics.
“Religious people say you couldn’t have our surrounding environment without the Creator, but then who created the Creator?” Wilson said.
Wow, nobody ever saw that flaw before. All those theists that came before us overlooked this item. I am stunned and guess I will have to become an atheist once again because of this unsurmountable bit of logic.
Well not really, but it does interest me that this would be offered as a proof. Though this is an answer you often get and I use to make the same errors myself by making similar statements and never checking to see what a theist might say in reply. As an atheist it is easy to assume that the other side has absolutely nothing going for it in the area of reason and besides we call ourselves “Brights” – so there. The same atheist smugness that I use to have is fairly easy to detect. Of course believers can be as equally smug against atheists and forget that faith is a gift. One of my favorite quotes on this subject:
…both the believer and the unbeliever share, each in his own way, doubt and belief, if they do not hide from themselves and from the truth of their being. Neither can quite escape either doubt or belief; for the one, faith is present against doubt; for the other, through doubt and in the form of doubt. It is the basic pattern of man’s destiny only to be allowed to find the finality of his existence in this unceasing rivalry between doubt and belief, temptation and certainty. Perhaps in precisely this way doubt, which saves both sides from being shut up in their own worlds, could become the avenue of communication. It prevents both sides from enjoying complete self-satisfaction; it opens up the believer to the doubter and the doubter to the believer; for one, it is this share in the fate of the unbeliever; for the other, the form in which belief remains nevertheless a challenge to him. – then-Cardinal Josef Ratzinger “Introduction to Christianity”
Now getting back to the “Who created God” argument. This argument is usually a response to the first two of St. Thomas Aquinas’ five ways of knowing God exists. Asking who then created God makes sense at first if you just see God as just another chain in the event in an order of efficient causes. Though the argument of motion and efficient causes are arguments used within the material universe and simply would not apply to the concept of God being outside of time and space. Living in a material universe where we experience time it is of course very difficult to make sense of God being outside of time and space. The material universe requires a first efficient cause. Telling an atheist that God’s existence in the first place is a mystery is not exactly a satisfying reply, but then again the atheist having to say the same thing about the existence of matter being a mystery even if they don’t use those words amounts to the same. But if matter has always than it also means that matter has existed for an infinite amount time, but it is self-evident that an infinite amount of time could not have passed.
Ironically we can thank God for Robert W. Wilson and his contributions. I just pray that he might think a bit deeper into why he is an atheist and that there might actually be Sed Contra arguments otherwise.
Update: Here is a post on The Deeps of Time on the same question well worth reading.
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By coincidence, as I was leaving work tonight, a co-worker who knows that I have a Catholic blog myself, looked at me and said, “being an atheist requires a lot of faith, too”. Most atheists I have known would have had a cow (so to speak) over that statement.
Anytime the question of who created God comes up, I always respond very quickly, “McGyver.”
I used to have that objection (who created God) when reading summaries of Aquinas’ arguments. Then I took a philosophy class and we read a translation of the original text and that objection vanished.
I believe that even defenders of the faith present an argument an argument much weaker than Aquinas’ original on the “first cause” issue. The typical thing I hear goes like this:
1. everything has a cause
2. therefore there must be a first cause with no cause
But in this case the standard objection rightly points that the idea of God contradicts the first premise.
As far as I understand Aquinas, it goes like this:
1. either everything has a cause or at least one thing does not have a cause
2. if everything has a cause, then we have an infinite sequence of causes
3. an infinite sequence of causes is absurd (or at the very least requires a greater leap of faith than any theist has ever made)
Therefore something without cause must exist.
If you can’t believe in God because no one created Him, then how can you believe in yourself when you’ve gotten rid of your Creator? (or am I completely missing the point–I’ve always had trouble understanding how anyone could not believe in at least a Creator)
3. an infinite sequence of causes is absurd (or at the very least requires a greater leap of faith than any theist has ever made)
and is undermined by the scientific evidence showing our universe had a beginning.
“Religious people say you couldn’t have our surrounding environment without the Creator, but then who created the Creator?”
Every time I hear this question I feel like banging my head against the wall. There are some good arguments for atheism. There are some good critiques of belief in a creator. This is not one of them…
I did address this question a while ago on my blog:
http://deepsoftime.com/2009/01/07/are-a-self-existing-god-and-a-self-existing-universe-parallels/
This kid has a song that pretty much says it all in song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY1z0slvZ30&feature=related
I hope you enjoy her song.
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WHO CREATED GOD?
Earlier it was impossible for us to give any satisfactory answer to this question. But modern science, rather we should say that Einstein, has made it an easy task for us. And Stephen Hawking has provided us with the clue necessary for solving this riddle. Actually scientists in their infinite wisdom have already kept the ground well-prepared for us believers so that one day we can give a most plausible and logically sound answer to this age-old question. Let us first see how Hawking has helped us by providing the necessary clue. In his book “A Brief History of Time” (Chapter: The origin and fate of the universe) he informs us that there are 1080 particles in the region of the observable universe. Then he raised the question regarding the origin of these particles, and gave the answer himself. According to quantum theory particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle pairs. But there the question does not stop. Another question props up regarding the origin of that energy. But when it is said that total energy of the universe is exactly zero, then all is said and done. So this is the clue: if we can somehow arrive at zero, then no further question will be raised, and there will be no infinite regression. What I intend to do here is something similar to that. I want to show that our God is a bunch of several zeroes, and that therefore no further question need be raised about His origin. And here comes Einstein with his special theory of relativity for giving us the necessary empirical support to our project.
God is a Being. Therefore God will have existence as well as essence. So I will have to show that both from the point of view of existence as well as from the point of view of essence God is zero. It is almost a common saying that God is spaceless, timeless, changeless, immortal, and all-pervading. Here we are getting three zeroes; space is zero, time is zero, change is zero. But how to prove that if there is a God, then that God will be spaceless, timeless, and changeless? From special theory of relativity we come to know that for light both distance and time become unreal. For light even an infinite distance is infinitely contracted to zero. The volume of an infinite universe full of light only will be simply zero due to this property of light. A universe with zero volume is a spaceless universe. Again at the speed of light time totally stops. So a universe full of light only is a spaceless, timeless universe. But these are the properties of light only! How do we come to know that God is also having the same properties of light so that God can also be spaceless, timeless? Scientists have shown that if there is a God, then that God can only be light, and nothing else, and that therefore He will have all the properties of light. Here is the proof.
Scientists have shown that total energy of the universe is always zero. If total energy is zero, then total mass will also be zero due to energy-mass equivalence. Now if there is a God, then scientists have calculated the total energy and mass of the universe by taking that God into consideration. In other words, if there is a God, then this total energy-mass calculation by the scientists is God-inclusive, not God-exclusive. This is due to two reasons. First of all, even if there is a God, they are not aware of the fact that there is a God. Secondly, they do not believe that there is a God. So, if there is a God, then they have not been able to keep that God aside before making this calculation, because they do not know that there is a God. They cannot say that they have kept Him aside and then made this calculation, because by saying so they will admit that there is a God. They cannot say that the behind-the-picture God has always remained behind the picture, and that He has in no way come into the picture when they have made this calculation, because by saying so they will again admit that there is a God. At most they can say that there is no God. But we are not going to accept that statement as the final verdict on God-issue, because we are disputing that statement. So the matter of the fact is this: if God is really there, then total mass and total energy of the universe including that God are both zero. Therefore mass and energy of God will also be zero. God is without any mass, without any energy. And Einstein has already shown that anything having zero rest-mass will have the speed of light. In other words, it will be some sort of light. So, if God is there, then God will also be light, and therefore He will be spaceless, timeless. So from the point of view of existence God is zero, because he is spaceless, timeless, without any mass, without any energy.
Now we will have to show that from the point of view of essence also God is zero. If there is only one being in the universe, and if there is no second being other than that being, then that being cannot have any such property as love, hate, cruelty, compassion, benevolence, etc. Let us say that God is cruel. Now to whom can He be cruel if there is no other being other than God Himself? So, if God is cruel, then is He cruel to Himself? Therefore if we say that God is all-loving, merciful, benevolent, etc., then we are also admitting that God is not alone, that there is another being co-eternal with God to whom He can show His love, benevolence, goodness, mercy, compassion, etc. If we say that God is all-loving, then we are also saying that this “all” is co-eternal with God. Thus we are admitting that God has not created the universe at all, and that therefore we need not have to revere Him, for the simple reason that He is not our creator!
It is usually said that God is good. But Bertrand Russell has shown that God cannot be good for the simple reason that if God is good, then there is a standard of goodness which is independent of God’s will. (Book: A History of Western Philosophy, Ch: Plato’s Utopia). Therefore, if God is the ultimate Being, then that God cannot be good. But neither can He be evil. God is beyond good and evil. Like Hindu’s Brahma, a real God can only be nirguna, nirupadhik; without any name, without any quality. From the point of view of essence also, a real God is a zero. Mystics usually say that their God is a no-thing. This is the real God, not the God of the scriptures.
So, why should there be any need of creation here, if God is existentially, as well as essentially, zero?
But if there is someone who is intelligent and clever enough, then he will not stop raising question here. He will point out to another infinite regression. If God is light, then He will no doubt be spaceless, timeless, etc. Therefore one infinite regression is thus stopped. But what about the second regression? How, and from whom, does light get its own peculiar properties by means of which we have successfully stopped the first regression? So, here is another infinite regression. But we need not have to worry much about this regression, because this problem has already been solved. A whole thing, by virtue of its being the whole thing, will have all the properties of spacelessness, timelessness, changelessness, deathlessness. It need not have to depend on any other external source for getting these properties. Thus no further infinite regression will be there.