The Grand Universe
I do feel sorry for those who follow ancient religions because they can't really appreciate the grandeur of the universe as it is. The people who wrote the bible had such a limited understanding, and they could not completely grasp how incredibly amazing the universe really is. I am so happy that modern science can show us now just how amazing the universe is.
Self-organization is a core principle of the universe causing never ending creation around us. Human intuition is blind to this concept, making it a challenge to see and understand.
A Universe that Creates
In a nutshell, the universe is in a constant state of creation. Creation is not something that happened a long time ago, and then stopped. The universe didn't have to be created by some other entity, but instead it is in a state of constant creation.
I can't say much about what triggered the big bang. If you insist that God did that, then I can't disprove it. What I do know though is that since that point in time, the universe has been constantly creating newer and bigger and more complex structures than ever before. Here are some examples:
- subatomic particles: photon, electrons, quarks, etc. The big bang did not come with all those particles in it, but they were created shortly after the big bang.
- atoms started being created long after the big bang when things cooled enough for protons to form, and that created the bulk of the hydrogen that exists today.
- molecules started forming after atoms were available to make into molecules
- stars started for form, collected automatically by gravity. The burning of the stars started the formation of higher numbered elements: helium, lithium, beryllium, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, etc. No entity created these, they did so just from the properties of the universe itself.
- stars often end their lives with a huge nova explosion, which creates all the elements higher than iron that exist in the universe.
- Once higher elements were available complex molecules were created, even complex hydrocarbons, formed in space, automatically and without guidance.
- Later stars formed out of heavier elements include planets circling them. The planets offer a unique environment where energy shines on them
- planets include volcanos, plates, faults, rifts which run all on their own.
- planets with atmospheres automatically create storms, and evaporation/precipitation cycles, all on their own.
- in the midst of all this activity, complex hydrocarbons start forming more and more elaborate cycles of creation, including replication of existing chains of molecules. I realize that Christians reject especially the notion that life was another thing that started automatically, however this is just one thing out of the many many things that universe creates all the time.
- once life gets started, and whole new level of creation is started, with an endless sequence of creatures, plants, animals, fungi all in a perpetual battle to out survive the others. New species are created all the time, automatically, and without any external guidance.
- once life gets complex enough, it gains an ability to model the world, and to react to it, in order to hunt for food, and escape predators.
- even at this level, the universe is not done creating: our own consciousness is part of this patter of continual creation. People invent things that have never been seen before.
- We are now starting to make machines that are themselves creating new innovative things.
Every time a seed is planted, and a tree grow, that tree is a new creation that was not there before. There might have been many trees like it, but actually every individual tree is genetically unique. Each individual is a creation that never existed before.
Christians Can't See This
Most Christians insist that the universe is a static place that does not change. It was created long ago by a God who designed everything in it's current form, and essentially nothing has changed since. Birds were created as birds. Fish were created as fish. Stars were created as stars. And since then no change.
The obvious things that change are somehow ignored. Trees grow, but that is not considered creation. New storms form, but that is not counted as creation. Landscapes change, mountains rise, rivers cut through the land, but that is somehow excluded from the creative process. This is a very primitive way of looking at the world, a way that was common 2000 years ago, but should today be considered out of date.
Written history goes back less than 10,000 years, and in that time span the universe does not change much. 10,000 years is a tiny slice of time compared the the history of the universe. So it is not surprising that people look at the changes over the period of history, and get the idea that everything stays the same.
Modern research has shown that this view of a static universe is not correct. Even in periods as short a 10,000 years we can see very small examples of creation happening all around us.
Forgive me if you are a Christian who can see this, because if you can you are in a very very small minority of Christians.
Rejoice at Continual Creation
For me, the idea that the universe is engaged in continual creation is invigorating. I want to know what possibilities exist in the future that we could never dream of.
Every perturbation pushes creation in a new direction. Plants and animals and thrown together into ad-hoc ecosystems, some of which work, and some don't. When they do work, it can be because of novel combinations in ways that never worked before.
We most not separate ourselves from this. We too are part of the universe, and all human creativity is further example of how creation is still going on. We fight against diseases and come of with new ways of protecting ourselves. We invent machines which leverage the power of the sun, and do work for us. As technology gets more and more complex, we can expect more and more complex interactions and ecosystems to develop.
Where Does it End?
There is no sign of this stopping. There is no reason to believe we are at some kind of pinnacle and it all will stop going tomorrow. The universe is really big. We are about in the middle scale on the scale of the universe: much bigger that the kinds of processes that run a single cell, but still much smaller than planets or galaxies. There is plenty of room to expand into.
My feeling is that the entire universe is on the road to somewhere inconceivable. Creation has not stopped and will not stop.
The most satisfying part of this is that we human still play a critical role in all of this. We have changed our planet in ways far beyond any life before us. If we can learn to live sustainably, and to preserve the Earth enough to live fruitfully, there is on reason to believe that the process of invention will stop any time soon.
Yet, I do feel sorry for those trapped into ancient view of a static world, created by a single entity long ago. Those people have no appreciation for exactly how grand the universe really it. It is a continual fountain of creation, and we are part of it.