Science and Theology

the laws of physics are not absolute and universal but more akin to local bylaws, varying from place to place on a mega-cosmic scale. A God’s eye view would show our universe as a single representative amid a vast assemblage of universes, each with its bylaws. Mr. Rees calls this system “the multiverse,” and it is an increasingly popular idea among cosmologists. A universe will rarely possess bio-friendly laws and spawn life within the variegated cosmic quilt. It would then be no surprise that we find ourselves in a universe customized for habitation; we would hardly exist in one where life is impossible. The multiverse theory cuts the ground from beneath intelligent design, but it falls short of a complete explanation of existence. For a start, a physical mechanism must make all those universes and allocate bylaws to them. This process demands its laws or meta-laws. Where do they come from? The root cause of all the difficulty can be traced to the fact that both religion and science appeal to some agency outside the universe to explain its law-like order. Dumping the problem in the lap of a pre-existing designer is no explanation, as it merely begs the question of who designed the designer. But appealing to a host of unseen universes and a set of unexplained meta-laws is scarcely any better. This shared failure is unsurprising because the notion of physical laws originates in theology. The idea of absolute, universal, perfect, immutable laws comes straight out of monotheism, which was the dominant influence in Europe at the time science as we know it was being formulated by