01 Mar Free Miracle #4: Consciousness Came from Non-consciousness Part 1 of 2
Blog Series
Why Believe in God? ~ If You Reject God, You’ve Only Done Half the Job.
To keep us in context as we progress in this blog series on “Why Believe in God?”, I remind us once again of what ethnobotanist Terence McKenna said in a TED talk: “Modern science is based on the principle: ‘Give us one free miracle and we will explain the rest.’ The one free miracle is the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing.”
But in reality, it is far worse than that. Modern science is not asking for one free miracle. They are asking for five:
- Something came from nothing.
- Order came from chaos.
- Life came from non-life.
- Consciousness came from non-consciousness.
- Transcendence came from consciousness.
Modern science has no explanation for any of these five things, so for the most part, it simply doesn’t talk about them. They assume these five things somehow happened and try to explain what fills in the gaps between them.
We have already looked at the first three free miracles that they ask for…
We decided we are not going to give them these miracles for free, and in doing so, expose the barrenness of modern secular science, and reinforce the reasonableness of believing in God. Because if you reject God, you have only done half the job. The other half is that you have to explain reality – you have to explain “what is” – without Him. And as the evidence accumulates, we see it cannot be done with credibility.
This week, we look at free miracle #4 that modern science asks for, that consciousness came from non-consciousness.
Free Miracle #4: Consciousness came from non-consciousness.
For the fourth time, modern science has no idea how to answer a foundational issue: how consciousness came from non-consciousness.
It’s one thing to have bacteria or viruses, or mold or moss, or grass or trees – non-conscious life forms – but it’s an entirely different thing to have consciousness. It’s an entirely different thing to have a brain that thinks. It’s an entirely different thing to be aware of your existence in space and time.
Modern science doesn’t have a clue as to how we started thinking and became aware.
Modern science, on the whole, is naturalistic. That is, they do not believe in God; they do not believe in a non-physical world; they do not believe in anything that cannot be explained by the Big Bang plus evolution. As a result, modern science, for the most part, believes that there is nothing in the universe that cannot be accounted for by swirling molecules. Therefore, consciousness doesn’t fit their presuppositions. Swirling molecules can’t think.
But holding to this position in the face of logic and reality is a massive problem that they cannot solve. Renown physicist John Hagelin said, “There is a deep philosophical problem surrounding how you get consciousness from a hunk of meat.” The hunk of meat to which he is referring is the brain. If there is no God, if there is nothing but whirling molecules, how in the world do we account for consciousness?
It is such a big problem that some deeply committed secular scientists go so far as to deny consciousness. They assert that consciousness is an illusion. It only seems to exist.
Other scientists hold to what some have called “promissory materialism,” the commitment to believe, in spite of no evidence or reasonable hypothesis, that they will ultimately find an answer for the mystery of consciousness.
And, if you believe that the Big Bang + evolution is a non-negotiable starting point, there really are no other options: either deny consciousness or hope against hope for an answer someday.
Since most scientists can’t bring themselves to go that far, they just ask for the fourth free miracle giving them consciousness from non-consciousness. Then, they’ll explain everything else.
The Naturalistic shot in the dark
Perhaps the most entertaining explanation for how you can have consciousness coming from swirling molecules is championed by super scientist Ray Kurzweil, recipient of the prestigious National Medal of Technology, and called the “ultimate thinking machine” by Forbes Magazine. He has taken a shot in the dark in asserting that computers with artificial intelligence will become so advanced that they will achieve consciousness. He writes, “Will these future machines be capable of having spiritual experiences? They will certainly claim to. They will claim to be people, and to have the full range of emotional and spiritual experiences that people claim to have.” *
This assertion is based on the Darwinian assumption that at some point the human brain evolved to such a complex point that people spontaneously became “conscious,” with subjectivity, feelings, hopes, a point of view, self-awareness, introspection, etc.
So, if this were true, why couldn’t androids (human-looking robots with super-computers for brains) reach a similar or higher level of complexity and organization and also become conscious?
This assumption is alive and well, not only in science, but also in science-fiction. You may know of Data, an android in the television show, Star Trek: The Next Generation. He looked like a human, had a super-computer for a brain, but “evolved” to the point where he became “conscious,” began to experience human emotions and even fell in love. He was an example of the naturalist assumption about how consciousness was achieved in nature.
This conclusion has severe critics, however, both from naturalists and non-naturalists. Darwinian philosopher Michael Ruse wrote,
“Why should a bunch of atoms have thinking ability? Why should I, even as I write now, be able to reflect on what I am doing and why should you, even as you read now, be able to ponder my points, agreeing or disagreeing, with pleasure or pain, deciding to refute me or deciding that I am just not worth the effort? No one, certainly not the Darwinian as such, seems to have any answer to this…. The point is that there is no scientific answer.”*
Further, John Searle, a professor of mind at the University of California at Berkley has written,
“I cannot recall reading a book (the one by Ray Kurzweil) in which there is such a huge gulf between the spectacular claims advanced and the weakness of the arguments given in their support. You can expand the power all you want, hooking up as many computers as you think you will need, and they still won’t be conscious, because all they’ll ever do is shuffle symbols.”*
Conclusion
So, we see readily that there are serious problems with the naturalists’ “shot in the dark”, trying to explain of how consciousness came from non-consciousness without a 4th free miracle.
Next week, we will look at part 2 of this topic, the evidence in support of consciousness as a mark of the image of God in humans. I hope to see you then.
*From Lee Strobel’s book, The Case for a Creator, chapter 10, which is the best source I have found on this subject.
In case you’re new here
This blog post is part of a series titled “Why Believe in God? If You Reject God, You’ve Only Done Half the Job.”, introduced on January 5, 2022. As the series continues, each succeeding post will be added to and available in the blog archives at www.maxanders.com.
If you know anyone who you think might enjoy joining us in this study, please forward this blog to them and encourage them to go to my web site (www.maxanders.com) and sign up for the free video, “Master the Bible So Well That the Bible Masters You”, available there on the home page. This will put them on my regular mailing list and they’ll receive my weekly blogs on this subject.
I look forward to going through this faith-affirming journey with you.
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