Can anyone please throw some light on this?

Sir Stephen Hawking said, "God did not create the universe" but I did not find any specific mentioning by him that reflects like "God does not have existance" or like "religions are useless". Can anyone please throw some light on this issue?

Soumendra Nath Thakur 's Blog: Creation of the Universe: Religion vs Science: Ste...

Soumendra Nath Thakur 's Blog: Creation of the Universe: Religion vs Science: Ste...: "The years during 1610, bitter opposition by the then Roman philosophers and clerics against Galileo's heliocentric view about the Sun. The y..."

Creation of the Universe: Religion vs Science: Stephen Hawking, The Big Bang, and The God.

The years during 1610, bitter opposition by the then Roman philosophers and clerics against Galileo's heliocentric view about the Sun.

The years during 1686-87, Sir Isaac Newton's law of universal gravitation, an accurate equation about the strength of gravity but not how gravity works. Newton thought force of gravity acts instantly across any distance so, about 250 years scientists were content with it but later Albert Einstein's speculation on behaviour of light enabled him to see a big problem with Newton's law of universal gravitation that gravity does not act instantly across any distance.

The years during 2010, worldwide bitter opposition against Stephen Hawking by many believers of God for his clarification about creation of universe and the role of god.

It took about 250 years to establish the fact and to resolve a mere conflict between Newton and Einstein that gravity does not act instantly across any distance but even after passing of about 400 years since Galileo, religious believers of god yet to resolve the conflict with the scientists that there can not be real differences between true religious belief and the reasons of scientists or, between interpretation of philosophy and the science or, between a genuine belief and the reality. If in 250 years conflict between two scientists (Newton and Einstein) can permanently be resolved, why can not we religious believers resolve the conflict with the scientists even after passing of 400 years since then?

Stephen Hawking did not say God does not exist but he only said that god did not created the universe. He did not intend to attack religious believers or believers of but he only reasoned that the human beings should inhabit space and need to abandon earth. He also said, "is at the ever-increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster such as sudden global warming, nuclear war, a genetically engineered virus or other dangers ... I think the human race has no future if it doesn't go into space."

Does any religious leader or anyone from this earth have true knowledge and capacity to challenge Stephen Hawking so as to genuinely prove that god indeed created this universe? I presume not, so till then we better consider what Sir Stephen Hawking said.

Religion, Belief, Faith. Fact, Science, Reality:

Belief is a vague idea in which some confidence is placed similarly, any religious faith is a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny where science would mean ability to produce solutions in some problem domain in the state of the world as it really is providing with information about circumstances that exist or events that have occurred rather than as you might want it to be.

Who God is?

God is the supernatural being conceived as the perfect and omnipotent and omniscient originator and ruler of the universe; the object of worship in monotheistic religions. The general conception of God may be said to be that of an infinite being who is supremely good, who created the world, who knows all and can do all, who is transcendent over and immanent in the world, and who loves humanity.

Why God needs us?

The teleological argument maintains that, since from a comprehensive view of nature and the world everything seems to exist according to a certain great plan, a planner (God) must be postulated. The ontological argument maintains that since the human conception of God is the highest conception humanly possible and since the highest conception humanly possible must have existence as one attribute, God must exist. Immanuel Kant believed that he refuted these arguments by showing that existence is no part of the content of an idea. This principle has become very important in contemporary philosophy, particularly in existentialism. The consensus among theologians is that the existence of God must in some way be accepted on faith.

 

Why not?

However, there are several famous arguments for the existence of God. The argument from the First Cause maintains that since in the world every effect has its cause behind it (and every actuality its potentiality), the first effect (and first actuality) in the world must have had its cause (and potentiality), which was in itself both cause and effect (and potentiality and actuality), i.e., God. The cosmological argument maintains that since the world, and all that is in it, seems to have no necessary or absolute (non relative) existence, an independent existence (God) must be implied for the world as the explanation of its relations.

 

Religion:

A religion is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a supernatural agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.

Relevance of religion:

In the early years of the 20th century, fashionable opinion probably would have dismissed the idea that the latter decades of this century would be a time of religious revival. The conventional wisdom of the time was that this modern age of reason and science could hold little room for something as supposedly "irrational" as religious faith. The religious liberty says something very important about the relevance of religion to the great issues of our time.

 

Throughout the world, that religion remains a powerful force. It inspires men and women of all races and nationalities; religious institutions hold the allegiance of hundreds of millions on every continent.

We will have to leave to future historians the full explanation of this resurgence of faith in the modern age. Perhaps the social dislocations of an era of progress have strained people's inner resources which traditional values have traditionally buttressed.

 

Whatever the cause, the new vitality of religion represents a clear rejection of the "modern" notion that reason and science hold all the solutions to the problems of earthly existence, or that they can adequately fulfill mankind's spiritual needs.

 

A free society requires religious liberty. For without religious liberty, what other aspect of individual thought can be spared? Once the border of that sacred realm is crossed, all freedoms inevitably become vulnerable.

 

Indeed, the close relationship between religious liberty and all other forms of individual freedom should be even more apparent to us in our own time.

Relevance of Religion in the Modern Times:

Between religion and science, there has been a prolonged conflict in which science has invariably victorious. Ever since science has been opposing the authority of religious institutions and the sanctity of creeds, the two important institutions of religion. The change in outlook was marked very distinctly after the Industrial Revolution and the publication of Darwin's Theory of Evolution. There was not a creed which wasn't shaken, not a dogma which was not shown to the question, not a tradition which wasn't threatened to dissolve. As knowledge advanced, the domain of religion in the narrow sense of the word shank. People, today, have a feeling that as a result of progress of education and science, the old religion would die and the only religion of science would dominate their life.

 

Religion is needed in formation of character. Modern life hasn't simplified but multiplied desires, and with that multiplication have assumed varied and intensified shapes. As desires are multiplied without the corrective of a sense of spiritual values, knowledge of science and technology doesn't reduce either greed or lust. On the contrary, it finds fresh tools for evil and facilitates greater indulgence in all forms of greed and lust. The only thing that fortifies men against temptation and give them live to work is the religious sense. It is religion that fixes good and sound habits of thought and of external activity. Morals like empty bags cannot stand on their own feet unless they are based on religion. We require true religious men in the administrative services, on the bench, at the bar, in the medical profession, in the industry and commerce, in the legislature, indeed in all walks of life. if there is corruption in in public life, it is because people aren't truly religious and they have no reverence and awe for the Divine Power that rules the universe.

 

Before man is able to build up space colonies, he has to usher in a new world order in which justice, security and equitable distribution of wealth are ensured for everyone. Such a life will be nothing short of a virtual heaven on earth!