The big bang, the multiverse and fine-tuning

 The Big Bang, time and Simultaneity

Prior to the evidence of the big bang and the beginning of the universe, it was widely regarded that the universe was eternal and static. Evidence in the last one hundred years or so turned this belief on its head and we are beneficiaries of the standard model, which now shows the universe most definitely had a finite beginning some 13.7 billion years ago.

For instance, the BGV (Borde-Guth-Vilenkin) theorem, the evidence shows that any universe that is on average expanding, in its history cannot be indefinitely continued into the past. Vilenkin writes “The BGV Theorem is sweeping in its generality. It makes no assumptions about gravity or matter. Gravity may be attractive or repulsive, light rays may converge or diverge, and even general relativity may decline into desuetude: the theorem would still hold.” He continues by elucidating on potential models that try to get away from this conclusion he writes “We do not find ourselves in such a state."¹

Vilenkin is blunt about the implications: “It is said that an argument is what convinces reasonable men and a proof is what it takes to convince even an unreasonable man. With the proof now in place, cosmologists can no longer hide behind the possibility of a past-eternal universe. There is no escape, they have to face the problem of a cosmic beginning.” ² In Cambridge at a conference celebrating the 70th birthday of Stephen Hawking, Vilenkin delivered a paper which surveys current cosmology with respect to the question “Did the Universe Have a Beginning?” He argued that “none of these scenarios can actually be past-eternal.” ³ He concluded, “All the evidence we have says that the universe had a beginning.” ⁴

The implications go further,  as he writes "One might imagine that closed universes are popping out of nothing like bubbles in a glass of champagne, but this analogy would not be quite accurate. Bubbles pop out in liquid, but in the case of universes, there is no space out of which they might pop. A nucleated closed universe is all the space there is, aside from the disconnected spaces of other closed universes. Beyond it, there is no space, and no time."¹ In other words, the universe (all space-time reality) didn't come out of some more fundamental space time, rather space and time was created out of nothing (creatio ex nihilo).

If you feel I've dismissed other eternal models too soon, I go into more depth the issue in the Kalam Cosmological Argument⁵. Or look more in detail here ⁶,⁷,⁸,⁹.

This brings me to the first issue I want to try and address; Some sceptics have some issues that even granting God does exist,  how is it coherent that God simultaneously at the point of creating the universe, brings all space-time, matter and enters into space-time?

The point being, for event causation to take place, time has to exist. But I do not see the force of this objection,  there doesn't seem to be any contradiction or issue with time and event causation happening simultaneously, where time and space come into existence with the singularity at time t=1 and God enters time as well. God’s causal act doesn’t require a “before” in a temporal sense. Instead, God’s causation is logically prior, not temporally prior, to the universe.

To clarify, consider causation in two senses:

• Temporal causation: Cause precedes effect in time (e.g., a hammer hitting a nail causes it to sink).
• Logical/simultaneous causation: Cause and effect occur together, with the cause sustaining the effect (e.g., a chandelier’s chain holding it up causes it to stay suspended).

The creation of the universe fits the second type. At t=1 (the first moment of time), God’s act of will sustains the existence of the universe, including space-time. There’s no need for a prior temporal moment because time itself begins. This avoids contradiction: God’s causation and the universe’s existence are simultaneous at the boundary of time.

Additionally,  as my preamble states, that time and space and the universe come into existence uncaused sans the universe,  so it seems the issue is prevalent for the sceptic too. That is, if the sceptic insists the universe is uncaused or a brute fact, the sceptic must grapple how the universe comes into existence sans the universe, when sans the universe there is no time or space?

Therefore, sceptics needs further evidence to justify their claims, other than appeals to speculative models that try to avoid a beginning.

Fine-tuning and the Multiverse

In previous posts, I've maintained that once nomological laws are set by God, God is logically restrained by the consequences of such entailments. For instance, the laws required for combustion has the positive attributes that it can warm, cook food and sustain life, but equally it has the potential to burn and destroy life in extreme situations.

Sceptics might insist God could have created different laws, which is true,  but even once these 'different' laws are instantiated,  they will have logical consequences on the universe.

As science has discovered more about the universe we live in, they have discovered fine-tuning, which as we delve deeper into reality, shows exquisite fine-tuning for complex life¹⁰,¹¹,¹².

One such sceptical reply is the multiverse hypothesis. However,  as i delve into elsewhere,  positing an infinite number of universes ends up explaing everything and nothing,  as given an infinite resource,  every event could have occurred. Moreover,  even granting some finite number, the current estimate is 10^500 many physicists think it might be that the majority or even most aren't life permitting¹³. 

Take Physicists Paul Davies "How seriously can we take this explanation for the friendliness of nature? Not very...To be sure, all cosmologists accept that there are some regions of the universe that lie beyond the reach of our telescopes, but somewhere on the slippery slope between that and the idea that there are an infinite number of universes, credibility reaches a limit....At the same time, the multiverse theory also explains too much. Appealing to everything in general to explain something in particular is really no explanation at all...Problems also crop up in the small print. Among the myriad universes similar to ours will be some in which technological civilizations advance to the point of being able to simulate consciousness...For every original world, there will be a stupendous number of available virtual worlds -- some of which would even include machines simulating virtual worlds of their own, and so on ad infinitum. Taking the multiverse theory at face value, therefore, means accepting that virtual worlds are more numerous than ''real'' ones. There is no reason to expect our world -- the one in which you are reading this right now -- to be real as opposed to a simulation."¹⁴


But a more fundamental issue, is that even if such a multiverse generator  is possible,  that reality, itself would require fine-tuning itself with even more extreme fine-tuning to have an eternal perpetual universe generating machine¹⁵,¹⁶. Consider an analogy proposed by Dr Robin Collins in 'The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology' he proposes us to imagine a bread making machine, it can only make bread if the ingredients, program etc are in place, he writes afterwards "invoking some sort of multiverse generator as an explanation of the fine-tuning reinstates the fine-tuning up one level, to the laws governing the multiverse generator." He concludes the section by stating "In sum, even if an inflationary-superstring multiverse generator exists, it must have just the right combination of laws and fields for the production of life-permitting universes: if one of the components were missing or different, such as Einstein’s equation or the Pauli exclusion Principle, it is unlikely that any life-permitting universes could be produced. Consequently, at most, this highly speculative scenario would explain the fine-tuning of the constants of physics, but at the cost of postulating additional fine-tuning of the laws of nature."¹⁷

In Conclusion


I have argued that God, as a timeless intelligent cause, coherently accounts for the universe’s emergence at t=1 through logical, simultaneous causation, creating space-time and matter without requiring a pre-existing temporal framework. Sceptical objections that causation needs time dissolve under scrutiny, as their alternative of an uncaused universe faces the same hurdle: explaining a beginning sans time or space, with no empirical models escaping a finite past.

Furthermore, the universe’s fine-tuning seen in the precise constants enabling stars, planets, and life points to purposeful design. Laws set by God entail logical consequences, balancing benefits like combustion’s warmth with risks like destruction, a necessity for any life-permitting physics. The multiverse hypothesis, often proposed to counter fine-tuning, falters: an infinite ensemble explains everything and nothing, risking absurdities like simulated realities outnumbering real ones, as Paul Davies warns.

A finite multiverse, potentially comprising 10^500 universes, likely yields mostly sterile worlds and, as Robin Collins’ bread-machine analogy illustrates, requires its own finely tuned laws to function reinstating the problem it seeks to avoid.

Theism, by contrast, offers a unified, parsimonious explanation: a single, intentionally designed universe. Sceptics must provide more than speculative models to overturn this conclusion, as the weight of evidence cosmological, physical, and philosophical favors a purposeful beginning.

This study invites further exploration into the nature of divine causation and the universe’s purpose, affirming that our existence is not a cosmic accident but the result of deliberate intent.

References

1. https://inference-review.com/article/the-beginning-of-the-universe
2. Andrei Linde has offered a critique, suggesting that BVG imply that all the individual parts of the universe have a beginning, but perhaps the WHOLE does not. This seems misconstrued, however, since BVG are not claiming that each past inextendible geodesic is related to a regional singularity. Rather, they claim that Linde’s universe description contains an internal contradiction. As we look backwards along the geodesic, it must extend to the infinite past if the universe is to be past eternal. But it does not (for the observer co-moving with the expansion). Rather, past inextendible geodesics are the ‘symptom’, not the ‘disease.’ As Robert Wald says (Wald 1984, p. 216), “Unfortunately, the singularity theorems give virtually no information about the nature of the singularities of which they prove existence.” So we don’t know the nature of the singularity that the BVG theorem indicates; we know only that Linde’s description of an infinite past is in error.
3. Many Worlds in One [New York: Hill and Wang, 2006], p.176.
4. Audrey Mithani and Alexander Vilenkin, “Did the universe have a beginning?” ArXiv 1204.4658v1 [hep-th] 20 April 2012. Cf. his statement “There are no models at this time that provide a satisfactory model for a universe without a beginning” (A. Vilenkin, “Did the Universe Have a Beginning?” lecture at Cambridge University, 2012). Specifically, Vilenkin closed the door on three models attempting to avert the implication of his theorem: eternal inflation, a cyclic universe, and an “emergent” universe which exists for eternity as a static seed before expanding.
5.https://micahministries.blogspot.com/2024/05/the-teleological-argument-for-gods.html
6.https://evolutionnews.org/2022/08/cyclic-universe-cant-avoid-a-cosmic-beginning/
7.https://evolutionnews.org/2022/12/4-story-of-2022-science-journal-reaffirms-universe-had-a-beginning/
8.https://amzn.eu/d/dZFwNQ4
9.https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/science-theology/the-scientific-kalam-cosmological-argument
10.https://www.cltruth.com/2019/factors-fine-tuning-life-universe/
11.https://www.discovery.org/a/fine-tuning-parameters/
12.https://www.discovery.org/v/the-fine-tuning-of-the-universe/
13.https://www.livescience.com/63204-string-theory-multiverse.htm
14.https://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/12/opinion/a-brief-history-of-the-multiverse.html
15.https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/why-a-multiverse-would-still-need-to-be-fine-tuned-in-order-to-make-baby-universes/
16.https://spot.colorado.edu/~heathwoo/Phil383/collins.htm
17.The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology Edited William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. p.263-265