ARGUMENTS AGAINST GOD AND RELIGION — Part I From Physical Sciences

practicability and precision of human observation, it has been possible to deduce the natural laws that govern the universe and according to which it functions to perfection. For instance, in ancient times, man simply knew that drops of water fell out of the clouds on to the earth. But now the whole process of rainfall is widely understood, from the evaporation of sea-water to the precipitation of rain and the final journeying of the fresh water back to the sea. But the kind of understanding brought by these discoveries is nothing but the possession of more highly detailed information, which does not tell us ultimately why these physical processes take place. Science does not tell us how or why the laws of nature came into being, how or why they continue to exist or why they cause the earth and the heavens to function with such unfailing precision that, simply by observing them, it was possible to establish immutable scientific laws. The claim that by learning the laws of nature one could arrive at an explanation of the universe was a mere delusion. It provided an answer to the question, but it was an irrelevant one in that it accepted the intermediary physical links in the chain as primary causes. As Cecil Boyce Hamann so aptly says, ‘Nature does not explain; she is herself in need of an explanation’. ‘Intelligent design’ explains these similarities and disparities amongst species in nature as one of ‘common design’. ‘Why is blood red in colour?’ If you were to ask a doctor the reason, he would answer, ‘Because your blood contains millions of little red discs (5 million to each cubic centimeter), each some seven-thousandths of an inch in diameter, called the red corpuscles. ‘Yes, but why are these discs red?’ ‘Because they contain a substance called haemoglobin, which, when it absorbs oxygen from the lungs, becomes bright red. That is why the blood in the arteries is scarlet. As it flows through the body, the blood gives up its oxygen to the organs of the body and the haemoglobin becomes brownish—this is the dark blood of the veins.’ ‘Yes. But where do the red corpuscles with their haemoglobin come from?’ ‘They are made in the spleen.’ ‘That’s marvellous, Doctor. But tell me, how is it that the blood, the red