Stephen Hawking: God did not create the universe

British physicist and mathematician Stephen Hawking has revealed that God was not needed for the creation of the universe.

Excerpts from his new book The Grand Design published in the British newspaper The Times on Thursday state that the 'Big Bang' was an inevitable consequence of the laws of physics. Hawking explores the possibilities of a new theoretical framework known as 'M-theory' to explain the creation of our universe and its laws of nature. He says, "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."

While M-theory attempts to whittle creation down to the laws of physics, it doesn't account for what, or who designed these laws. Nor does it explain the origins of space, time and the physical matter required for the Big Bang. If the theory is backed up by experiment it may be a scientific breakthrough, but will likely do little to disprove the existence of a creator.




It reminds me of the story about a scientist who approaches God and says, "We no longer have any need for you. We can create new life from the dust and we have a theory for every scientific phenomena, now why don't you just leave us alone." God listened patiently and when the scientist finished he said, "Alright then, how about we have a man making competition to settle this once and for all." The scientist, excited at the opportunity to prove his point agreed and reached down to grab a handful of dirt. God quickly interrupted, "No, no, no... Get your own dirt."

It's obviously intended as a joke, but the point is that science can never achieve the creation of something from nothing. We can never return to a state of 'nothingness' to even try.

Stephen Hawking's new book is the latest in a string of bestsellers with the primary objective of debunking the existence of God and the relevance of religion. The publicity surrounding the release of these controversial excerpts from The Grand Design may be nothing more than a marketing strategy to cash in on the popularity of anti-God books in recent years.

Hawking is by no means the first scientist to declare that it is unnecessary to invoke a supernatural creator to explain the Universe. It's not original, it's not certain, and even if true it should do little to shake authentic faith.

Credit to 3news.co.nz & stuff.co.nz for this story.