In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, let there be light: and there was light.
Genesis (1:1-3)
We must not suppose that any other object is to be gained from the knowledge of the phenomenon of the sky … than peace of mind and a sure confidence.
Epicurus
How old is the universe and how it was created? Is the universe eternal or it will end some day; will humanity also be extinguished? Does the universe have a plan or purpose? Does the Earth inhabit a special place in the universe? What is the origin of life on Earth, including humans? Is there intelligent life elsewhere in the universe? Are there other universes?
How and when were the universe and life created? Does the universe have a purpose? These are huge questions! Humans have asked these questions for millennia, probably not long after they developed the capacity to reason and became aware of their own mortality. The way we answer these questions sets the stage for our perceptions about nature and reality, the divine, the origins of human life, the purpose of human existence, our role and position in the universe, and how we cope with matters of life and death. Every religion and philosophical system have its own cosmology, that is, a view of the origin and development of the universe.
In the Hindu or Vedic (“knowledge”) cosmology, for example, the present universe is part of an infinite cycle of universes. In Buddhism, the universe comes into existence dependent upon the actions (karma) of its inhabitants. Buddhists see the universe in eternal flux, with neither an ultimate beginning nor an end, passing in and out of existence, parallel to an infinite number of other universes doing the same thing.
In the Biblical cosmology, God created the universe and everything in it for humans’ sake. The entire Judeo-Christian-Islamic worldview is grounded on this human-centered dogma as everything derives from it. Thus, the universe has a purpose: us, which is why we can claim ownership over “the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the cattle, and all the earth.” Since we are God’s creation, there must also be a plan for us, although it is for us to find out what this is.
The Greek philosophers also developed their own cosmologies. For example, in the cosmology developed by the Stoics (300 – 200 BC), the cosmos is finite, but it is surrounded by an infinite void. It is also in a state of flux and pulsates in size and undergoes periodic upheavals and conflagrations. In Aristotle’s cosmology, the spherical earth is surrounded by concentric celestial spheres, and the universe exists unchanged throughout eternity.
These cosmologies form the foundation of people’s core narratives – beliefs that explain creation, the purpose of life, how we ought to live, and what happens in the afterlife. However, dogma and ideology usually supersede fact. For instance, the Epicureans, who followed the teachings of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus, developed the idea of an endless universe, composed of an infinite number of atoms, as a means of overcoming the fear of death (see Epicurus’ quote above). Aristotle argued that the universe is finite because a boundary was necessary to fix an absolute reference frame, which was important to his worldview.
In the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong denounced Albert Einstein and his work on relativity as reactionary and bourgeois. Groups of scholars and scientists were set up to criticize relativity because it appeared to collide with Marxist dogma that the universe was infinite and endless, eternally embroiled in a sort of cosmic class struggle. Einstein himself thought the universe infinite and eternal, purely for aesthetic purposes, despite the evidence from his own theory that the universe was expanding.
All humans share some bias in their thinking, which is why it takes a long time for some scientific facts to permeate the popular culture, even when the supporting evidence is definite and overwhelming. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, for instance, the Earth is the place of creation as God created every being there. The primary species of creation is human beings. Reflecting this view, Christian doctrine endorsed a geocentric universe, with the sun, planets and stars orbiting around Earth, and humans the object of creation.
Now we know that our solar system is in the periphery of a galaxy containing millions of stars. Our galaxy in turn is just one out of billions of galaxies. Yet, despite the overwhelming evidence, religious fundamentalists refuse to abandon their geocentric model of the universe.
Something similar happens with Darwin’s theory of evolution, which continues to face strong opposition from religious conservatives as it challenges another entrenched dogma: The spontaneous creation of humans in God’s image and likeness. As polls consistently show, most Americans believe God created humans in their present form about 10,000 years ago and would like this belief to be taught along with evolution in public schools. Many Christians also believe that accepting evolution undercuts religious faith and produces an amoral, materialistic worldview that easily embraces abortion, embryonic stem cell research and other practices they abhor.
But after all the rhetoric dust has settled, there is no credible scientific challenge to the idea that all living things evolved from common ancestors, that evolution has been going on for billions of years, and that evolution can be and has been tested and confirmed by the methods of science. As the great biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky said, nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.
Given the accelerating pace of scientific progress, the tension between science and religion is bound to intensify. As we shall see in the following ideas, cosmologists are closing in on the fundamental forces that created and shaped the universe. No longer content to examine the birth and fate of the universe and the emergence of life, scientists are raising the bar by searching for the origin of matter and consciousness, previously considered the sole domain of religion and philosophy. Many of these theories are no more than educated speculations, but there is no indication that science has reached a hard limit on how far it can go in finding answers to our deepest conundrums.
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