asymptotes

Stephen Hawking argues that God is not needed for creation in his new book, “ The Grand Design ” (co-authored with Lleonard Mlodinow). He writes, “Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.” Has Hawking killed God? No, I certainly do not think so. Hawking explains that “because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing,” but he does not explain why there is gravity in the first place. He argues that “spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing” but he does not give a reason why spontaneous creation should necessarily happen. His axiomatic acceptance of the law of gravity and spontaneous creation seems to me as dogmatic as a theist’s acceptance of the...