Rabbi Moshe Averick Nonsense of a High Order: The Confused World of Modern Atheism

[Music] so just in terms of the topic I think it's I think the first apropos you know I've Rama V knew he came to understand God the the essence of the the fact that there is a God at a very young age the Rambam discusses the idea that some people can just look into nature some people are more scientific some people may be philosophical some people just need some real guidance and through the Torah itself so everybody is an individual and everyone's going to come to the Shem come to the recognition of the Shem either on their own or not at all and I guess that's part of the tonight's topic the confused world of modern atheism so I just want to read real quick a to two small paragraphs from a book called the discovery booklet which I'm sure many people in this audience are familiar with but these are around two quotes short I'm gonna shorten them up because they're quite long one is by Leo Tolstoy the other one is by Mark Twain and really the the summary paragraph so after the news that we received this week this past week from the president of the United States to let's say tell like it is it's just the reality so sometimes that's how people see things and most of the world as we mentioned many times it's an oiler macheted so it's a world of illusion and lies and sometimes we were able to see feel experience or know what's real you're much better off but everyone has to come in their own journey to where it's going to take that so these are two famous people as many people that have similar quotes as I'm about to read but postally says at the very end of some periodical Jewish world in London 1908 the Jews the M the Jew is the emblem of eternity to whom neither slaughter nor torture thousands of years could destroy he whom neither fire nor sward nor Inquisition was able to wipe off the face of the earth he who is the first the Oracles of God he has been for so long the guardian of prophecy and who transmitted it to the rest of the world such a nation cannot be destroyed the Jew is as everlasting as eternity itself and the end of Mark Twain concerning the Jews the Egyptian the Babylonian and the Persians Rose filled the planet with sound and splendor then faded to dream stuff and passed away the Greek and the Roman followed and made a vast noise and they are gone other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time but it burned out and they sit in Twilight now or her vanished the Jew saw them all beat them all and is now what he always was exhibiting no decadence no infirmities of age no weakening of his parts no slowing of his energies no thawing of his alert and aggressive mind all things are mortal but the Jew all other forces past but he remains what is the secret of his immortality so look you could just say I believe in God because the Jews are round you know there's something is unique miraculous supernatural trend descend into go on and on something is and I'm sure this is not what Rabbi Moshe is gonna speak about I couldn't even begin to think but I have a feeling it's more on the scientific side anyway so let me just give you his bio real quick and then we'll get this over with and put him on stage Robin Moshe Abra has taught theology spirituality and religious philosophy for nearly thirty years many of the students have gone on to become educators and rabbinic leaders in North America England and Israel he is known for a singular ability to explain complex topics a clear understandable language and to bar the description of one University of Chicago trained philosopher of science his wicked sense of humor actually I'm looking forward today rabbi average grant educational programs at the UCLA and Northridge University in Los Angeles and then became one of the founding faculty members of a stir on tow and later the Shah beam a rabbinical Seminary in Israel he's the proud father and grandfather of eight children and many grandchildren well a avrech was also a floor trader in the S&P pit at the Chicago tile exchange in wrote and produced an album the spiritual coup stick rock feet on the ground he's the author of nonsense of a higher order or the confused world of modern atheism distributed through help feldheim and available on Amazon so please order the book without any further ado promotion okay thank you all for coming I know that it's maybe it's a little bit a little bit maybe not so poor des can everybody hear me all right is there any problem that all hearing okay great I have a paranoia about people hearing me I'll tell you where it came from it's kind of stuck in my head and never left back in the day I know it's hard for you to imagine but but pretend you can see me with long thick brown hair and back in the day when I was an aspiring folk singer I wanted to be a folk singer now the knot of the younger people I don't even know what a folk singer is you'll have to consult with an anthropologist of ancient American music but in any case so I I was a one-man one guitar act and I used to very carefully if I saw a great one-man act I would go see it and watch very carefully to pick up pointers this is really I would just it did at the time this was my my my great ambition in life anyway the best one man one guitar performer is aw my life was a country performer he had traveled around the country circuit he win the Triple A so he never made it to the big time triple a country circuit eight years living in the back of like I got like a UPS truck that's what he lived in eight years traveling around the country and he was incredible arrey after the show I spoke to myself waiting I like the master you know the student sitting with the master please tell me show me the secrets and he looks at me like this is a true story I think look see it he says shun your show begins and ends with the sound system that's what he said that was eight years of distilled wisdom okay now it may sound simplistic but I found and this is true I found this was the most consistent absolute rule in in my performing that ever was lousy sound system lousy show great sound system lousy show so the reason I'm telling you the story is so that you understand why I'm an aging bald Orthodox Rev right talking about God as opposed to a inappropriately funcly' dress for my age guy with the guitar trying to sing blowin in the wind which maybe if the talk doesn't go so well maybe we'll we'll switch to folk music in any case okay thank you for coming again as I said it's very important that we have to define what our topic is tonight and it's also important to define what the topic is not we are not talking about divine revelation tonight we're not talking about the first chapter of Genesis aberration we're not talking about science and Torah none of that that's all important stuff but not for tonight tonight the topic is the existence of God okay and particularly the existence of God the Creator there's a lot of ways of approaching the concept of the existence of God we're going to be speaking specifically about that okay it's important to keep that in mind a lot of times part of the reason why there's so much confusion around this topic is go people kind of conflate all those things together and they they are very very separate in any case I also want to make it clear that although I am unequivocally half a tenth in the my position and I'm unequivocally confident in the arguments that I'm going to present and not only that I may speak sharply and I may speak harshly even about certain ideas of atheism and certain proponents of atheism I don't want to please that's one thing that's my talk but when it comes to question and answers I will I am very very much be very very careful I want answer honestly respectfully I respect other people's opinions even if I disagree so please nobody should feel uncomfortable or intimidated if so be it about asking questions please okay it's very very important okay so now yeah yeah yeah unless if there is a really important point of information like what you don't understand something but you know questions will hold to the end and stuff okay there are three categories main categories of issues that are dealt with in the book in terms of the actual arguments if you will call them in the first section is called origin of life clear scientific evidence of a creator the second section is called man's search for meaning and spirituality and the third section is called atheism and morality now obviously we can't cover everything tonight we're really going to focus on the first ones on that an origin of life first of all because I think it's the easiest to present and understand in a form like this in a relatively short time the second reason is is because I have found and I have you know I've been working thoroughly researching this you know over the last eight or nine years one of the things that that the modern militant atheist love to do is to wave the banner of science in the face of you know uh you know what they look at is primitive backward non-believers in other words many times a person like you know I'd say Richard Dawkins or Jerry Coyne I'm not sure if you're all familiar with these names they will present themselves as rational enlightened educated scientific edge based thinkers whereas someone like myself they will kind of portray as you know dancing around a fire under a full moon with animal bones wearing a hat with buffalo horns now being very serious and that's that's sorted sometimes the way it's presented okay and sometimes the biggest problem is just leveling the playing field I don't have no problem with somebody with different points of views but you know don't don't come at me with that type of you know that type of attitude I'm not speaking to anyone here I'm talking in general so in fact what I'll try to show you is that interestingly enough it's really just the opposite in order to embrace atheism I would propose to you you must take giant leaps of faith not only that you even have to be anti science and deny certain basic sign typical realities that may sound strange but I hope as that as we go on it'll become clear okay so without further ado let's move right into the into the topic the people like Authority in the world of modern atheism is a gentleman by the name of Professor Richard Dawkins he's an oxford-educated biologist I would imagine a very accomplished biologist in fact if anyone has read some of his books I've read a number of his books his descriptions of the natural world I actually am a little jealous of him he has a grasp of the of the scope of the of what's going on in the natural world in a way that I'll probably never have in my whole life and I wish I had some of his descriptions of how different parts of animals work like he has a description of how a spider spins a web it's mind blown in any case but he is the one that many ideologically committed atheists look to as sort of this great authority figure now he wrote a book about evolution called the blind watchmaker and in the blind watchmaker he says the following listen carefully to what he says quote I could not imagine being an atheist at any time before 1859 when Darwin's Origin of the Species was published I'm going to read that again listen carefully I could not imagine being an atheist at any time before 1859 when Darwin's Origin of the Species was published now some of you might grasp immediately what he's talking about but just in case I want to I want to present you with something very similar statement by another very well known atheist ideologue he's also a professor of biology he's a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Chicago's name's Jerry Coyne he happens to be Richard Dawkins is not Jewish Jarek wins a nice Jewish boy he writes like this he wrote a very well-known book called why evolution is true and then on the very first page he writes the following quote if anything is true about nature it is that plants and animals seem intricately and almost perfectly designed for living their lives squids and flat fish tank change color and pattern to blend in with their surroundings becoming invisible to predator and prey bats have radar to home in on insects at night hummingbirds are far more agile than any human helicopter what does all this seem to imply a master mechanic of course Darwin himself raised a question of design before disposing of it in 1859 so he also the Year 1859 when Darwin published his theory was a was a game-changer okay now what exactly does he mean and what he means is really very simple if you if you didn't already if you don't know really ready understand it before 1859 before there was this new explanation anyone looking at the natural world there wasn't any possible other conclusion that it was a creator how could you possibly explain something is incredible as though as an eagle the flight of an eagle or the Marmaray shion's of starlings do you know that that there is just as an aside I don't want to get too off track there is you have to realize that the the flight of birds leaves our most advanced flying machines in the dust the only thing that we have done on birds is we can fly higher and faster but in terms of actual aerodynamic skill are meant iff an f-15 fighter bomber is positively primitive so no one could honestly look at then say I've just happened by itself until Darwin's theory came out and then all of a sudden everything changed as Dawkins himself writes the following quote Charles Darwin discovered a way in which the unaided laws of physics could in the fullness of geological time come to mimic design it's an incredible idea it mimics designed biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose - the sounding statement and finally just to sum it up here is an article by world-famous biologist by the name of Francisco Ayala who also started off as a priest abandoned the act became a biologist and a philosopher of science he wrote an article for the National Academy of Sciences called Darwin's greatest discovery design without designer it's an incredible idea okay you have to it's important to understand the reason I'm emphasizing this you need to understand that the entire edifice of respectable intellectual scientific academic atheism rests on Darwinian evolution you pull Darwinian evolution out of the picture we're back in the old days where as one writer put it every village had its head its meshuggenah every village hit its trunk and every village had its atheist no there's Fred hey yes that's Fred he kicks it all happened by itself there was this one guy who was ever Casey and though the village atheist now it's respectable its scientific it's the academic okay so now I would imagine that any number of people sitting here are assuming that I'm going to launch into an attack on Darwinian evolution nothing could be further from the truth remember our topic here is not the first chapter abrasion of Genesis our topic is the existence of God the Creator and regarding that topic existence of God the real evolution is completely irrelevant and I say that again it has zero relevance and zero bearing on the whole question we don't need even talk about it and as a matter of fact although personally I happen to think personally that what in evolution is a hopelessly inadequate explanation for the organized complexity of the living world but for the purposes of our discussion a few things for straightforward and simple I am prepared to totally concede for argument's sake totally concede the theory of evolution is being true I will consider it for the purposes of our discussion and I do the same thing in the book is the most wonderful substantiated proven theory that in the history of science okay so we're going to assume the truth of Darwinian evolution now why do I say it's irrelevant why do I say it doesn't matter for a very simple reason first what's going to quick a thumbnail description of Darwinian evolution now we're in evolution is based on random mutations in the replication of the DNA of a living organism now sometimes by pure luck DNA is is digitally encoded information that has all the information needed to build the things yet the cell needs to live and there's a lot this has to be copied there's sometimes copying mistakes they're called mutations and sometimes by pure luck these mistakes confer a slightly different you know configuration for the the organism giving it a slight survival advantage ostensibly that will make it more likely to pass it on to its offspring and they're these little changes over millions tens of millions hundreds of millions of years they all add up and from the original microscopic bacteria here we are sitting on the havi Island vodka okay that's in a nutshell okay so now surprise Darwinian evolution is only relevant and operative from the moment life begins in forward ok it's very important to realize that in other words before Darwinian evolution can take place and we've assumed that for argument's sake you need a fully functioning living cell with the DNA based genetic system and all the the molecular machinery that a cell needs to live and then you can go forward and evolve into all these different types of life forms right only after life begins and by the way that is not a scientifically controversial statement that everybody understands Darwinian evolution does not even pretend to account for the existence of the first bacterial cell which is the so called simplest and oldest known living organism that exists by the way did I mention that we're going to assume we're not going to deal with the issue of age of the universe either we're going to sidestep that we're just going to put as far as tellers beyou we're just going to deal with modern you know scientific cosmology ok modern the way the the the number of years that they talk about so as Richard Dawkins says in his book The God Delusion that was his magnum opus he says like this quote Darwinian evolution proceeds merrily once life has a rigid but how does life get started end of quote yes professor Dawkins that's the question how does life get started and that is not a small question at all because when you understand what a bacterial cell is when you understand that a bacterial cell contains technology beyond anything that is it is within the capabilities of our technology today to reproduce it could be one day they will build us we will be able to build a cell but not today where did it come from I'm gonna reach you very briefly I don't want to take up too much time but just too you have to have and understand what the issue is here this is a this is written by dr. Paul Davies of Arizona State University he is a non-believer I think he recently came out of the causes in there as a natural atheist as opposed to a deist he believed that God created things but then left it alone I don't know what exactly his theology is and also dr. Michael Denton who is an Australian geneticist and microbiologist quote the living cell is the most complex system of its size known to mankind its hosts of specialized molecules execute a dance of exquisite fidelity orchestrated with breathtaking position how can mindless molecules capable only pullian pushing their immediate neighbors cooperate to form something as ingenious as a living organism scientists have fabricated invisible cogwheels motors the size of a pinhead and individual and electrical switches as Tiny as individual molecules the burgeoning field of nanotechnology building structures and devices measured on a scale of billions of a metre promises to revolutionize our lives but we should not lose sight of the fact that nature got there first the world is already full of nano machines they are called living cells each cell is packed with tiny structures that might have come straight from an engineer's manual miniscule tweezers scissors pumps motors rubbers veils pipes chains and even vehicles abound although the tiniest living things known to science bacterial cells are incredibly small each is a veritable micro miniaturized Factory containing thousands of elegantly designed pieces of machinery more complicated than any machine built by man and without parallel in the nonliving world what we would be witnessing would be an object resembling an immense automated Factory however it would be a factory that which had one capacity not equal in any of our own machines for it would be capable of replicating its entire structure and dr. Denton goes on to describe the cell as quote the complexity of a jumbo jet picked in respect of dust invisible to the naked eye moreover it is a speck size jumbo jet which can duplicate itself quite easily now you have to realize what this means a Xerox machine you put a bit of color photograph it gives you a perfect copy of a color photograph what we're talking about here is a Xerox machine that makes another Xerox machine now wouldn't that be something right you put up you leave up you'll leave a airplane in the hangar and next morning you come back this two of them that is that that is beyond the wildest engineering dreams that we have today and yet it happens trillions and trillions of times a day on a microscopic level okay so that's what we're talking about when we talk about the the how the living cell got there I just want to make also one comment most people don't really understand what DNA is besides all this nanotechnology DNA is the genetic the genetic code which contains the information how to building the machinery that the cell needs let me give you this quote again these are from people who by the way all disagree with me I wouldn't want to tell you something no I'm serious I I when I wrote the book it when I started doing the research for the book as soon as I discovered that somebody agreed with me I would refuse to read anything that he wrote I only did research based on people who are on the other side of the argument okay it's very important this is dr. Paul Davies who although is a world-renowned expert on origin of life he's devoted the last 35 40 years of his life to it he's the head of the origins Institute at Arizona State University listen to what he writes about DNA quote the living cell is best thought of as a supercomputer in information processing and replicating system of a dashing complexity DNA is not a special life-giving molecule but a genetic data bank that transmits its information using a mathematical code most of the workings of the cell are described as information or software trying to make life by mixing chemicals in a test tube is like soldiering switches and wires in an attempt to produce Windows 98 it won't work because it addresses the problem at the wrong conceptual level and to and finally just to quote Bill Gates in his book the road ahead he said DNA is like a software program but far far more advanced than anything we've ever created DNA is literally in fact if anything I'm understanding it is the most sophisticated digital information processing system in the known universe so now where did it come from in other words what you have to understand now is that once this machinery is in place the reading evolution can move forward so what we get what happens here is there's a paradigm shifting insight because what it turns out is that not only is Darwinian evolution not the cause and not the explanation of the staggering complexity and sophistication on life of this planet Darwinian evolution is a process which is the result of the staggering complexity and sophistication of life on this planet in other words once you have in place fantastic machinery fantastic things but the notion that fantastic machinery can do fantastic things was never really a point of contention was it what is the question that with that that is the point of contention where this fantastic machinery come from in the first place Darwinian evolution does not answer the question at all and by the way it is a bitter pill to swallow sooner or later of the non-believers are going to have to accept this there right now they're protected by a by a heavily atheistic academic establishment but they're going to have to eventually accept this bitter pill that all the writings of guys like Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne and PZ Myers and Victor stator and all the rest touting Darwinian evolution is the solution to not believing in God they have done nothing but present us with the grandest of tautologies in other words they have explained the amazing complexity of living organisms by invoking processes that are based on the amazing complexity of living organisms that's all it is so now by the way what you know I'm not the only one to notice this ok here is Thomas Nagel Thomas Nagel is a highly distinguished philosopher in New York University and avowed atheist also a nice Jewish boy and happens if he had known he obviously a very candid atheist by the way very honest very straightforward but as 100% he says I am just as much an outsider to religion as Richard Dawkins he writes like this quote the entire apparatus of evolutionary explanation therefore depends on the prior existence of genetic material with these remarkable properties since the existence of this material or something like it is a precondition of the possibility of evolution evolutionary theory cannot explain its existence we are therefore faced with a problem we have explained the complexity of organic life in terms of something that is itself just as functionally complex as what we originally set out to explain so the problem is just pushed back a step how did such a thing come into existence dr. Paul Davies quote there a purgative machinery of life is based on the DNA molecule which is itself is structurally complicated and intricately arranged as an automobile assembly line if replication requires such a high threshold the complexity in the first place how can any replicative system have arisen spontaneously end of quote and one last one dr. hardy prossies professor of chemistry ben-gurion University quote despite the widespread view that Darwinian evolution has been able to explain the emergence of biological complexity that is not the case Darwinian Theory does not do what the question how life was able to come into being the Troublesome question still in search of any answer is how did a system capable of evolving come about in the first place by the way it's only a troublesome question if you assume that somehow it happened by itself if you assume what might be the obvious intuitive reaction then it was created well it's not a troublesome question at all it's obvious right okay so now now the question not that we have to ask is the the the issue of where this original life came from is the domain of a fundamentally and conceptually separate area of science called origin of life research okay how a scientist doing in the origin of life research well how would you expect them to be doing you know the example I always give people is you know the lego set for the Brooklyn Bridge contains 853 pieces each of those pieces is specifically designed and engineered to build a model of the Brooklyn Bridge let's say a Nobel Prize winning scientist announced these undertaking a project I'm going to investigate how it's possible to find a path from these 853 pieces to a model of the Brooklyn Bridge using only natural unguided forces wind rain lightning cosmic rays volcanoes running water thermal energy whatever you anything you want to guess what would you think if somebody announced such an investigation you think they'd lost their mind probably and they're doomed to failure there's no way you're gonna do it you know that if it can't possibly happen so now what would you expect if somebody says I'm investigating how it's possible to entirely unguided naturalistic of a process to come up with the most sophisticated nano technology in the universe and the most sophisticated digital information processing system in the known universe how are they doing on this project and the fact is the progress in origin of life research is exactly what you'd expect for undertaking a project that is so absurd and so ridiculous and so nonsensical as they think that life could start by itself I'm just gonna read you again in the book I have 83 quotes running from a 18:59 to-night 2015 which which covered and with many Nobel prize-winning scientists but I'm just gonna give you a few 2016 professor James tor a lecturer at University of Waterloo James Tour happens to be he's a professor of chemistry Rice University he's one of the top 10 most cited chemists in the world he is a world-class synthetic chemist quote there is collective ruthlessness those who say this is well worked out they know nothing nothing about chemical synthesis those who think that scientists understand the details of life's origin are wholly uninformed nobody understands when will the scientific community confess to the world that they are clueless on life's origin that the emperor has new clothes Eugene Koonin who is a very respected microbiologist in Washington also has been for the last several decades working on origin of life he wrote in his book in 2011 quote the origin of life field is a failure end of quote Lee Hartwell Nobel Prize winner 2011 quote with respect to the origin of life I find the more we learn about cells the more complex they seem they're just incredibly complex things and to go from what we can see today and try to reason where it came from I think is really impossible Paul babies who I mentioned several times in a lecture at 2010 quote how he says he was speaking to the audience he says how meaning how did life begin we haven't a clue end of quote Franklin Herald molecular biologist colostate Colorado State University 2001 quote the origin of life appears to me as incomprehensible as ever a matter for wonder but not for explication and finally Hubert yaki physicist renowned information theorist 1981 quote since science does not have the faintest idea how life on Earth originated it would only be honest to confess this to other scientists to granters and to the public at large not only has origin of life research been a complete failure not only has it not literally not progressed at all since 1859 it's that doesn't tell you this story it's gone backwards by many orders of magnitude and if we plot origin of life prot us investigate research on an XY graph the the X graph represents the understanding of how life could begin through a naturalistic process 1859 0 2017 0 cluelessness but that doesn't tell the whole story on the y graph were plotting the understanding since 1859 of the magnitude of the problem you're trying to solve see in 1859 it was down near the near zero because they didn't really have a profound understanding of what a living cell was but with the breakthroughs in biochemistry and microbiology in genetics in 2017 the y-axis is off the graph which means they're getting further from the answer not closer to the edge you understand now why John Horgan who was a senior writer for Scientific American an anti intelligent design person by the way he wrote the following quote he said if I were a creationist I would cease attacking the theory of evolution and focus instead on the origin of life this is by far the weakest strut of the chassis of modern biology the origin of life is a science writers dream that abounds of exotic scientists and exotic theories which are never entirely abandoned or accepted but merely go in and out of fashion now when he says by the way the chassis of modern biology what he means of course is the chassis of a theistic biology a review of biology that leaves God entirely out of the picture that's what he means it's the weakest trunk but in fact that's not accurate it's not true that it's the weakest drug it is a strut it doesn't exist at all which leaves its coolest --mess there is no understanding of origin of life which means the entire edifice of atheistic thought rests on thin air and wishful thinking you have to take a leap of faith that somehow that happens somehow ok in the question and answer period we can talk about it more so where does this leave us and with this we're going to conclude it leaves us really right back where we started from it leaves us with molecular machinery that is so fantastic that in the words of University of Chicago microbiologist James Shapiro quote it outstrips scientific description it leaves us with this astoundingly complex molecular machinery of life with no clue to explain its origin in other words for Jerry Coyne and Richard Watkins it leaves us in 1858 evolution didn't change anything we're right back we're looking at an incredible complexity of life no explanation nothing to explain in other words where it leaves us is that for the rational truth seeker there is only one possible conclusion and that is that life what's created now what I've presented here is this kind of a scaled-down version of the argument in the book the origin of life section is well over a hundred pages but in any case I now the most important part of evening I look forward to any comments and questions and I thank you very much for listening tries to show that it's impossible there hasn't been enough time in the world and we talk about five thousand years right it's impossible but even then right in other words what I do what I think Gerald I'm not talking what we're gonna leave evolution aside here I'm talking about what Gerald Schroeder was talking about is that the amount of time to for the first living cell to form because the earth cooled off only a certain amount of you know years ago the oldest life is somewhere they have discovered between three point three 3.8 billion years ago what's a few hundred billion years between friends but and the Earth only cooled down a little bit before that there was a very any window of time for that first living cell to form and of course it's absurdly improbable we'll get into them it may be depending on what questions is we'll get into more of that how because obviously I'm not the only one to notice these things the other side the other side the atheist you know polemicists also are very aware of this and obviously they have their approach to dealing with it but in any case the other a bit more quite yes this gentleman right [Music] if you want to recognize or you want to design a robot that they will walk very simple very simple principle that if we give it enough time and only [Music] okay so I mean you said a bunch of different things you mentioned a different a bunch of different points the first thing is all the algorithms and all the thing your solution you're talking about you're the one doing it an intelligent creator you're writing the program you know what what you're looking for you know that you're looking for a solution to a particular problem when you have a swamp with a bunch of chemicals in it they don't know anything you're just mixing up chemicals one after the other so you cannot you can't even begin to compare and by the way you you can't compare that you're talking about a cook you are talking about a completely random process dump a bunch of chemicals in a swamp and therefore and tell me how you're going to get end up with a with a the most methodical information processing system loaded with a digitally encoded information how are you how are you filing another way wait let me I'm answer no I heard what you said that's the first thing it's it can only come from a completely random process which of course is absurd it's absurd it's absurdly improbable secondly you didn't realize that's the reason why I wrote I read in the beginning I could not imagine being an atheist before 1859 that the idea that living organisms could happen by themselves before Darwinian evolution was incomprehensible only a few like I said you had the village atheist scientifically it made no sense whatsoever yeah yeah what's your name Tuvia okay Tuvia go tell it to Richard Dawkins he was the one who said it Jerry what is Jerry what did Jerry Coyne who is a zealous atheist he said before Darwin the obvious implication was a master mechanic of course what else would you conclude now you should also know something you should also know something else there is a there is a very interesting you you haven't really grasped in my opinion you haven't really faced up to the fact that what you're what you're that all the things you're talking about are after you have complex systems in place to perform all the things that you want you don't realize you're starting with a swamp Robert Shapiro's who was the professor of chemistry at NYU he said the following he said I don't I don't I don't know that much about he's a he's a world-class chemist and an expert in the origin of life he says I don't know that much about there with evolution but I have no reason to doubt my other scientific colleagues who talk about it as if it's really true so I'm going to assume that they're right he said however the debate about intelligent design is not really focused on Darwin evolution it is the origin of life where the real problem comes in he said because the gulf between a mixture of similar simple chemicals even with a bunch of amino acids the gulf between that and no bacterium is much more profound than the gulf between a bacterium and an elephant lynn margulis said the exact same thing she said that it is a bigger step to go from a mixture of chemicals to a bacterium than it is to go from a bacterium to you would think oh I didn't finish I didn't finish my answer to you I may finish my answer there is a very well-known philosopher of science called doctor named iris Frye she's at Tel Aviv University and the Technium she wrote a seminal paper called about or the philosophy of origin of life research she said there's basically two camps okay she said there is the camp that what she calls the continuity thesis meaning that there's the camp of researchers who hold that there is a there must be an unbroken gap between nonliving things and living things meaning there is some natural process we haven't discovered yet that inevitably will lead to a living organism that's one camp okay the other camp she says that's a philosophical position it has no it has no experimental basis it has no evidence for it it's a philosophical presuppositions she calls it okay number two the other kin she calls the other you know she calls the other camp the almost miracle camp okay who are some of the by and who are some of the the proponents of the almost miracle camp Francis Crick Nobel Prize winning scientist the one who discovered DNA Jacques Monod Nobel Prize winning biochemist Ernst Mayr one of the most famous evolutionary biologists end of the 20th century Sir Karl Popper okay and others the almost miracle camp what's the difference okay why is it that what what is that what is the basis for the for the people who say that there is this continuity thesis that there there must be I pad look what I'm what and what is it based it's not based on any experimental evidence at all because as we've seen the origin of life field is a complete failure you know what it's based on only a faint that's what a philosophical philosophical presuppositions is it's a leap of faith it's it oh it's a it's an article of faith I accepted no evidence I accept it because that's what the way I want it to be it's an article of faith and what about the almost miracle camp she says why did they hold it's almost a miracle because they have concluded if there is no way that there's a natural process to go from a living to go from chemicals to living so therefore the only possibility is what is blind chance and therefore like America we got it we got lucky yeah you know Jack Munoz said he said lucky for us our number came up in the Monte Carlo game that's what he said you know what free it's his Creek said he said to say happy accident we got lucky that's all there is to it which of course is ridiculous so now because astoundingly improbable things don't happen so you take your choice you you you have your degree in neuroscience I'm talking about the people actually doing the origin of life research you have two choices you either take it as an article of faith and by the way you think that you think that scientists don't take leaps of faith Harold Urey you know what Harold Urey was Nobel Prize winning chemist you know who his student was Stanley Miller you know who Stanley Miller was Harold Urey was the mentor of Stanley Miller Harold Urey 1962 this is nine years after the famous experiment he said those of us who study the origin of life we can't believe that it ever actually could have possibly happened we all accept it as a literally as an article of faith that is the term that he uses you don't think that scientists have faked article faith you know Chandra Wickramasinghe said when he undertook for the Sir Fred Hoyle to study the origin of life in sir Fred Hoyles later years he said if he had started off as an atheist he realized it's impossible there's no way it could have happened by itself you know what he said he said I was brainwashed as for my earliest days as a scientist you can't talk about God you can't talk about creation he says I'm very uncomfortable but there was no choice there's no way out of it so you wanted to stay in neuroscience that's perfectly fine you want to go into origin of life take your pick take an article of faith or believe in almost miracles believe an astoundingly improbable climb up those are the two choices anyway yes I'll give you one last chance to make a comment I don't want to I will give you the last word [Music] when I when I was saying is I basically hold the same thing as Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne once you don't have evolution you're stuck with the obvious [Music] it could happen what they could come up with a perpetual motion machine to I mean you don't know right maybe you see you're saying maybe maybe answers all questions maybe means you don't have to ever make a decision because maybe right right I I'm not gonna twist your arm if you think if you're willing to live with maybe maybe this astoundingly improbable event happened maybe you wouldn't say what I would suggest is you would never save for anything else but for this people are prepared to say this watch happened by itself would you say it no what do you mean a bacterial cells is a million times more complex and sophisticated why it's not different at all it's not different at all how is it different you know I'm gonna give you one last you tell me how it's different how is it different how how is the complexity of a bacterial cell why is it fundamentally different than the complexity of a watch but you don't know what the origin of a bacterial cell okay I mean you're saying that our betrayal II but I don't that's what I think it just you're making an arbitrary difference and there really is no difference a digital information processing system is a digital information processing system okay so I'll be reality so we disagree and you know look we got to think about it I would suggest you read the book because really see this is what you're bringing up is really most of the objections of some of a theists are not scientific because science has no answer whatsoever they're all philosophical like you're bringing up and I deal with the philosophy I didn't have time to go into it I deal with the philosophical objections it's important but any case I hear what you said we're going to take some other questions so thank you very much yes learn about the god particle visits both I don't know anything about the Higgs boson and so therefore I can't really talk about it I don't know that I don't really I don't know that much about it I don't know what to tell you III don't really know I'm I I'm not up I'm not enough up on physics to to make any any meaningful comment yeah it's I think it perfectly after reading you know I have an article here called atheists are waiting for the Darwinian origin of life Messiah every so often the science writers are into hype they've got to sell their articles and they usually overhyped things a lot of times when you actually know what's going on it's not really as big a deal as the science writers make it out to seem you should know that there was a very famous case with a guy named Jeremy England how many people have heard of Jeremy England okay you haven't heard of I'm happy to talk about it yeah everyone yes you have a question what yes yes so they claim had come up with this theory that was completely gonna well if you if you if you actually read what he what he said and what actually was going on it was it was like you wouldn't even know that that that he hip was talking about the origin of life at all but in any case that's so a lot of its hype I'll be very honest with you I've discovered there yeah any other did you want to say something oh this gentleman let me just jump back yet right right well in other words like this in other words I'll try to briefly give you a fan of the philosophical you know the syllogism here everyone in this room is absolutely certain that this watch was made by a watchmaker everyone in this room okay in fact you are so certain that this watch was made by a watchmaker you are as certain that this dad is true as two plus two equals four which is about a certain agent get about anything in this world right so the question is why are you so certain how are you so certain of it okay now one second you didn't see this watch being made there's some people say experience though they sort of they have this philosophical idea it's experience it's not experience there's no one in this room who experienced this watch being made so how do you know what's true well I know from experience that there are watches that are made by watchmakers so what then you're saying it that's in philosophy called an argument from analogy you're saying since I know there are watching people who make watches there and this one is like those other watches and must be that this one was also made maybe in philosophy an argument from analogy is one of the weaker arguments it's sort of all in the eyes of the beholder so then it's certainly not two plus two equals four so then how are you so certain two plus two equals four that this was made by a watchmaker and the answer is very simple and I'm gonna read to I I'm trying to answer your question I normally wouldn't do this but I'm going to I'm going to read you a the perfect the actual explanation written by an atheistic physicist by the name of dr. Leonard Susskind he said Stanford University listen carefully this is how you know that this was made by a watchmaker as certain as to us to Eagles for listen quote Oh bill by the way this isn't a book that Bret Leonard Susskind wrote it's called the black hole war my battle was Stephen Hawking to make the world safe for quantum mechanics that's quite a mouthful huh okay he writes like this quote it would be a bad idea to park your BMW in the rain forest for five hundred years when you came back you find a pile of rust if you left the pile of rust for another five hundred years you could be pretty sure it wouldn't turn back into a working BMW then in short is the second law of thermodynamics by the way he's one of the fathers of string theory he is a very prominent physicist okay both the BMW and the rusty are collection of about 10 to the 28 atoms that means 10 multiplied by self 28 times a 1 followed by 28 zeros that's a very big number 10 to the 28 atoms mostly iron imagine that you took those atoms and threw them together randomly meaning you just applied natural forces to them what is the likelihood they would come together to form a working automobile meaning a functionally complex machine I think we can all agree it would be extremely unlikely if you imagine all the possible ways you could assemble the atoms the overwhelming majority of the arrangements would look like rust heaps if you shook up the atoms of a car you would be much more likely to get a pile of rust because there are so many more rust pile Arrangements than car arrangements and just one last paragraph here is another example ok this is not me this is Leonard Susskind here is another example an ape banging away to typewriter will almost always type jibberish very rarely will we type a grammatically correct sentence what's more if you take the letters a meaningful sentence and shake them up like tiles in a Scrabble game the result will almost always be gibberish the reason there are a lot more nonsensical ways to arrange 20 or 30 letters than there are meaningful ones if you want to just get an idea of how many ways let's say you have a sentence that consists of 50 letters okay at each of those 50 letters how many different letters could you put in each of those spaces 26 dip letters how many different combinations are there 26 to the power of 50 the number 26 to the power of 50 is beyond our comprehension okay if you want to understand how big that number is that number the number of atoms in the entire universe is 10 to the power of 80 that's atoms in the whole universe 26 to the power of 50 is in that type of category it's certainly more atoms than there are in the Milky Way galaxy that's how many combinations you are that's why you know by the way when you walk into a kitchen and you have magnetic letters and it says I'll be home late dear I put meatloaf in the freezer you know that somebody arranged those letters you know why because there's for it to have hip and randomly there's just too many possible combinations for an effort to come out like that that's how you know and you want to know something what second I'll just conclude and then you can come and that's why you are absolutely certain that this watch was made by a watchmaker because if you took the parts of this watch and you applied random forces to them what would be the probability that they come together to form a working watch almost essentially zero exactly what would be you know how many atoms there are in a bacterial cell you're talking about a trillion atoms what is the possible but what is the like impossible nonsense it is complete nonsense to assume that's how you know and that's why this gentleman I forget to view there is no difference between it's the same principle there's just too many parts too many different combinations and by the way you want to know something even more the first one I noticed who actually identified the argument properly was Richard Dawkins he said it's the argument from a probability that is the biggest challenge to atheist the argument that's what this is that's all okay so another that's how you know it was a creator because functionally complex machinery doesn't happen by itself it's too improbable yeah go ahead please I'm coming at it from a rational point remember remember what I said at the beginning what's our topic the existence of God the Creator I we're not here to talk about divine revelation yeah and I'll tell you something else I'll tell you something yeah it's highly improbable that life could have happened by itself yeah and I'll tell you one last story and then we'll give her but see we're gonna ask you a question in other the first time I ever spoke about origin of life I was invited by the secular student Society of Elmhurst College okay now I had never spoken about this I was in the middle of writing the book and I sent out some emails because I wanted to get some experience talking and when the truth is I went was they invited me to speak I went with a little trepidation I didn't really know what was going to happen okay and I thought it was going to be for the public it turned out to be it was a closed meeting of the secular student society I spoke for about 45 minutes okay and I said now you know please I wanted the most important part of the evening your questions dead silence now I've been a teacher I you know for over 30 years I know there's different types of silences and Romano's does also okay sometimes there's a silence in the room because you've put everyone to sleep okay that's true it happens once in a while sometimes there's a silence because nobody really knows what you're talking about and their eyes are kind of glazed over and they're out there bored they want to go eat watch sometimes there's a silence because everybody's very uncomfortable they don't know what to say you just said now ask questions and nobody knows what to say finally this guy one guy sort of raised his hand very uncomfortably he said to me like this he goes he goes but the first the first question that I was ever asked on the topic he goes okay rabbi maybe God did create life I said my god the sister I didn't expect to hear that he goes maybe God did create life but it doesn't you mean eight years inverses believe what they're saying is the Nazis may be right that there is no creator but we ought to be acting in this period and so what what we have to ask is what's wrong with burning people into so you have the consequences of what makes it as well because we are all naturally driven with the concept of what I want to do as a thorough servant do I will do the wrong thing consciously but we should understand that I'm the question of what makes it right a wrong turn people into bars of soap I would say the Nazis are right the Jews does hoodwinked us now let's understand that everything we've done morality is irrelevant now we have the Jews are right it's not reciprocated again what we're saying is all that we do consider biology irrelevant human beings have nothing again in effect the biology crated human being to ever drive for sex in order to have babies we will create condom condoms are not sins against nature right [Music] I think I think what Mattias is pointing out is I'll give you a quote there was a there was a British writer in a 19th century author by the name of Samuel Butler and he said the following he was talking about and from an atheistic world point the world of the point of view he said morality is the custom of one's country and the current feelings of one's peers cannibalism is moral in a cannibalistic country in other words - via your right you can come up with all kinds of systems any system you want except that it doesn't obligate it doesn't have any significance beyond your own head in other words let's say you come up with a system of morality I say to you I have an idea instead of me listening to your system why don't you listen to my system it's just as good as yours so in other words you're right you can come up with systems he's pointing out that your system has no real significance if you want to listen to it be my guest you don't want to listen good be my guest it's up to you whatever floats your boat really is what it boils down to that's a very it's a very good question and if P I don't know how patient people are I could sit here and talk about that all night I might but but your data question is very important what obligates you to listen to God it's what [Laughter] ultimately ultimately that in other words ultimately ultimately because and again if this doesn't do that the subject justice at all the question is an incredibly important question the answer is an incredibly important answer ultimately only one thing is that doing what God asked to do connects you with the only reality of existence that there is and that's God Himself anything else is a connection to nothingness in illusion if you don't want reality if you want your illusion be my guest and live any way you want if you want reality if you want what's actually real then you then you listen to God but that's even that doesn't really do it justice you really need to work it through by the way I'm sure you've heard you've ever heard of the Euthyphro dilemma okay you throw the let have you heard of it the Euthyphro dilemma is this is a philosophical challenge that's that is put out by non-believers to this argument that remedy was talking about about morality okay and ultimately when the answer to the fifth dilemma and there's what I've got a whole chapter on in the book is really the answer to your question and most people don't eat no and not everybody even realize how important the question is so I if I can tell you please read the book okay and then call me and we can argue about it I mean argue we can discuss it because really you know this really is important so I'm a little hesitant to go what do you think are there anyone else have any comments questions anyone want to bring up anything else right I feel like I would love to really address to this question I thought we just we it would be it would be for another hour at least just to really even get into the question I don't think everyone else is is is ready to handle that I don't know if it's appropriate [Music] yeah okay anyway in case anyone wants to buy the book its back there in case and I've got a list of articles if you want to and if you want to be in touch I'm more than happy to discuss to talk any rate you should everyone whether you believe it or not god bless you all okay [Music] you