Chapter 1: EXPLAINING THE VERY IMPROBABLE

Complicated things everywhere, deserve a very special kind of explanation. We want to know how they came into existence and why they are so complicated. (pg 1)

I agree. The most basic, fundamental and all-important questions that could ever be asked stem from this; Why are we here? How did I get here? What is my purpose? ToE must – apparently - have an answer to this of some sort… I look forward to seeing how it measures up to the answers that the Bible provides. I’ll discuss this more later when we get to the point where ToE attempts to answer this. Until then…

… Rocks, clouds, rivers, galaxies and quarks. These are the stuff of physics. Chimps and dogs and bats and cockroaches and people and worms and dandelions and bacteria and galactic aliens are the stuff of biology.
The difference is one of complexity of design. Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose. Physics is the study of simple things that do not tempt us to invoke design. (Pg 1)

How glad I’m sure some astrologers must be to hear this. No design in galaxies? What about the astronomically perfect equations that had to be before the universe could even come into being? The ratio of electrons to protons, the expansion rate of the universe, the cosmological constant. (You can read more on this here.)

Psalm 19:1 reads, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” The Bible says that galaxies were designed. Even the very beginning of the Bible says, in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Once a little more research is done on exactly how the universe is said to be designed, I think you might agree that they are not quite so “simple” a thing after all.

I would much rather it be said that here we are talking about LIVING biological entities, as compared to say, non-biological ones; such as stars and rocks and water. There can still be an argument for design when we start to delve into the atomic and physics levels of the world around us… heck, of the very things that make up the world around us; and were here first by the way.

At first sight, man-made artefacts like computers and cars will seem to provide exceptions. They are complicated and obviously designed for a purpose, yet they are not alive, and they are made of metal and plastic rather than of flesh and blood. In this book they will be firmly treated as biological objects. (Pg 1)

Never mind whether cars and computers are “really” biological objects. The point is that if anything of that degree of complexity were found on a planet, we should have no hesitation in concluding that life existed, or had once existed, on that planet. (Pg 2)

I once used the analogy of a computer in the desert in a discussion with an atheist and got told that the analogy didn’t count because computers aren’t alive, they don’t reproduce, that is – to use the jargon Dawkins is using here – it’s not a biological object. How glad I am now to see that Dawkins agrees it is! But here’s the kicker:

If a computer (metal, plastic and whatever else it’s made out of) is indicative of the existence of “designers” – why not biological (flesh and blood) objects?
I agree with my atheist objector’s viewpoint; a biological object is more complex, it’s alive! A living, breathing animal CANNOT compare to a constructed object. And if a complex, inanimate object qualifies as evidence for a designer… WHY THEN NOT LIFE?
Bad example of logical thought here, I think, it shows Dawkins’ prejudices for what evidence qualifies for “design”… He goes on to say:

Machines are the direct products of living objects; they derive their complexity and design from living objects, and they are diagnostic of the existence of life on a planet. The same goes for fossils, skeletons and dead bodies. (Pg 2)

Allow me to clarify here: Fossils, skeletons and dead bodies DO NOT fall into the same category as machines. They are NOT the direct product of living objects; they are a part of the living objects themselves!
A human being designs and creates a machine through the process of their will, imagination and ingenuity – using the tools and methods at their disposal. It is a conscious act of creation.
An animal – monkey, horse, dinosaur – DOES NOT design and create anything using the same process… it doesn’t do anything remotely similar. Animals create complex objects! Let alone can they be said to create their own skeletons and bodies; for this is something which happens at a genetic level and has no interaction whatsoever with their own conscious will – if they can even be said to have such a thing.

That being said though; allow me to continue by saying I do understand what Dawkins is attempting to put across here. If there was a new planet that was discovered, and all it had on it was the equivalent of an Apple MacBook, it would be only fair to imagine that “Life” of some sort had once existed on the planet. The complex and designed machine of a laptop computer is evidence of this.
Likewise, if one were to discover a planet with nothing but a fossilized skeleton 20m in length, it would seem only logical to assume that the skeleton had once not been a skeleton, ie: been ALIVE, hence; “Life” must have at one point existed on said planet.

Let me take it one step further though…

Just as a complex piece of machinery - a computer - on a planet is indicative of there having once been a DESIGNER to CREATE the machine… so likewise a complex piece of biological engineering – a skeleton - is indicative of there having once been a DESIGNER to CREATE the biological object!
Surely what’s good for the goose is good for the gander? It seems to me only fair that this argument be able to work both ways… and if not, why? What presuppositions are being forced on the argument a priori? Mr Dawkins?

Physics appears to be a complicated subject, because the ideas of physics are difficult for us to understand. Our brains were designed to understand hunting and gathering, mating and child-rearing: a world of medium-sized objects moving in three dimensions at moderate speeds. We are ill-equipped to comprehend the very small and the very large; things whose duration is measured in picoseconds or gigayears; particles that don’t have position, forces and fields that we cannot see or touch, which we know of only because they affect things that we can see or touch. (pg 2)

Were our brains really designed that way? Was Mr Dawkins there when our brains were put together, when they were designed? Does he have some insight or knowledge that the rest of us don’t know about?
(Again, the use of this word “design” to explain how something came about as a result of what Dawkins will state on page 5 is a “blind, unconscious, automatic process” with “no mind and no mind’s eye”, which does not, “plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all”, leaves me perplexed.)
At the same time, surely the concept of God is something that is very large, whose duration we cannot comprehend, whom we cannot see or touch, which we know of only because of how He affects things? So by Mr Dawkins’ own admission, we are “ill-equipped to comprehend” God. I would agree.

Isaiah 55:8 reads, "’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the LORD.”

Little wonder then that some people have a difficulty with the idea of God. I think this is exactly why Mr Dawkins is having such a hard time comprehending His existence. Not just Mr Dawkins though, a lot of people do. That’s why they stick to something that they can understand – yet have no solid evidence for – that being, ToE, or any other convoluted theory that fits into their way of seeing a world that has no need for God.

Physics books may be complicated, but physics books, like cars and computers, are the product of biological objects – human brains. The objects and phenomena that a physics book describes are simpler than a single cell in the body of its author. And the author consists of trillions of those cells, many of them different from each other, organized with intricate architecture and precision-engineering into a working machine. (pg 3)

Again, how does a “blind, unconscious, automatic process” with “no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all.” (pg 5), how does this “organize the intricate architecture and precision-engineering” of a human cell? I look forward to reading further on for Mr Dawkins’ explanation – it’s sure to be a doozy.

Nobody has yet invented the mathematics for describing the total structure and behaviour of such an object as a physicist, or even one of his cells. What we can do is understand some of the general principles of how living things work, and why they exist at all.
This was where we came in. We wanted to know why we, and all other complicated things, exist. And we can now answer that question in general terms, even without being able to comprehend the details of the complexity itself. (pg 3)

I remember that I once used to watch a TV channel that would every now and then, show on the screen a mysterious object, the challenge being to figure out what it was and what its purpose was. (It might have been “Antiques Road Show”, “Going for a Song” or some such other - I forget…) Most of the time I would be wrong. Some were easier than others, and some were quite difficult. Granted, when actually handed an object or implement – rather than just seeing it on TV – it would be a lot easier to figure out exactly what it does. Does it turn, pluck, spin, gouge, crush etc. Now these were “simple” tools and objects. What about complicated and complex machines? If NASA were to show me one of their computers and expect me to explain what its purpose was and how it was made, at best, general terms would all I would be able to offer. (It’s a computer and it calculates and programs things, maybe?) I wouldn’t be able to explain exactly HOW it was made and WHY it was made.
Oh, I could offer up an explanation, all right, speaking in “general terms”; but would it be accurate? Would it be the truth? We would have to look much more into things than explaining them just in general terms, especially when a theory has as many flaws in it as ToE does. However, this is still only chapter 1 and I’m sure this will be built upon in later ones.
Furthermore, as Dawkins has already pointed out, human beings are extremely complicated and complex objects, with more than one apparent purpose! A spade is used – primarily – to dig. A camera takes pictures of whatever it captures through its lens. What does a human being do? What is our purpose? Does ToE explain this?

Dawkins’ answer as to WHY we exist is apparently ToE. At best – were it true to begin with – ToE is an explanation as to HOW we came about; not WHY. It does not give us a purpose because the (alleged) cause of our being is itself a, “blind, unconscious, automatic process” etc. The Theory of Evolution CANNOT offer up an explanation as to what the ultimate purpose of Man is. I would argue that, nothing that has ever come into existence, did so for no apparent reason whatsoever.

Moving on:
To understand how he means by “general terms”, Dawkins uses the analogy of an airliner being built. I’m not going to type out the whole paragraph but the highlights of his argument are as follows (in my opinion):
To take an analogy, most of us don’t understand in detail how an airliner works. Probably its builders don’t comprehend it fully either… But however incompletely we understand how an airliner works, we all understand by what general process it came into existence. It was designed by humans on drawing boards… The process by which an airliner came into existence is not fundamentally mysterious to us, because humans built it. The systematic putting together of parts to a purposeful design is something we know and understand, for we have experienced it at first hand… What about our own bodies? Each one of us is a machine, like an airliner only much more complicated. Were we designed on a drawing board too, and were our parts assembled by a skilled engineer? The answer is no. (pg 3)

Where do I begin…? No one would deny that his observation on how an airliner is built is mostly accurate. However, to use this as an analogy for how the human body came about is absurdly inappropriate. First of all; the initial design and construction of an airliner is something that is observable, verifiable and falsifiable. The initial design and construction of the human body is not. How does Mr Dawkins know for an absolute fact that the human body was not initially designed on a drawing board? I agree, it’s an absurd comment to make, but the point is moot; Mr Dawkins was not there to observe exactly HOW human beings were designed… so what makes him so confident that his answer is absolutely true? Does he again know something that the rest of us don’t?

Likewise, if an airliner needs specially trained and intelligent designers and mechanics to build it and – as he says – the human body is even more complicated; then how come we don’t need any form of intelligence behind our creation and design? Is this logical? A sandcastle in the sand is a lot less complicated than the computer I am currently typing on. Is it then fair to say that as something becomes more complicated, the intelligence behind it decreases? Would anyone agree with that? Is not God – by very definition – more intelligent than the mechanics and engineers that put an airliner together? Why were we NOT assembled by a skilled engineer? Just because Mr Dawkins doesn’t want us to be?

Dawkins started this analogy off by saying that as we can understand in general terms how an airliner is made, so we can understand in general terms how complicated things exist, without having to understand the details of the complexity itself. Now I can accept this statement at a rudimentary level. I don’t understand how electricity is made, but I can guess that somewhere a machine or generator of some sort does its thing, I turn the light switch on and, hey – presto. But to truly comment on such profound questions as to how and why human beings came into existence, complexities are essential! Otherwise, what is wrong with my own general term for how the world and everything in it came into being? That being: God created it all.

Unfortunately, no one in the world is in any position as to be able to answer the question of our origins adequately enough from a purely “scientific” angle; let alone Mr Dawkins. An example if I may, using one of the scenes from a favourite movie of mine, “The Waterboy” starring Adam Sandler, (and I’m paraphrasing here from memory, so forgive me if it’s not completely verbatim):

Lecturer: “Why are alligators so mean and vicious?”
Waterboy: “Mama says that alligators is ‘ornery because of their having all dem teeth and no toothbrush.”
Lecturer: “Well, that’s funny. But it’s wrong. Alligators are mean and vicious because of their oversized medulla oblongata.”

You see, an idea can be general in terms, but it can also be incorrect. It is only when we get right down to the nitty-gritty of understanding things, that we can see what actually IS; what the truth of the matter really is. Otherwise, were this not so, any theory at all can be passed off as satisfactory for those who want to believe in it. Like the Theory of Evolution.

The watchmaker of my title is borrowed from a famous treatise by the eighteenth-century theologian William Paley. His Natural Theology – or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity Collected from the Appearances of Nature, published in 1802, is the best-known exposition of the “Argument from Design”, always the most influential of the arguments for the existence of God. (Pg 4)

That’s funny because I would’ve thought that the most influential argument for the existence of God is that Jesus Christ was resurrected from the dead…! As Paul says 1 Corinthians 15:12-19, ”Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.”

Paley talks about finding a watch in a field and comparing it to finding a stone in a field; and wondering as to how either came to be there. As Dawkins continues to write:
Paley here appreciates the difference between natural physical objects like stones, and designed and manufactured objects like watches… If we found an object such as a watch upon a heath, even if we didn’t know how it had come into existence, its own precision and intricacy of design would force us to conclude

That the watch must have had a maker: that there must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer or artificers, who formed it for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed its use.

Nobody could reasonably dissent from this conclusion, Paley insists, yet that is just what the atheist, in effect, does when he contemplates the works of nature, for:

Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation.

I draw back again to my comparison of the intelligence behind the creation of a sandcastle and a laptop computer. Is it logical to conclude that the more complicated something is, the less intelligence is behind its creation? Is it logical to consider a watch having less intelligence behind its creation than that of a four-year old’s “stick-man” picture which is now hanging on the fridge door? Do you really, really think that, Mr Atheist? Mr Dawkins seems to speak for all of you… do you agree with his view here? If, as Mr Dawkins says, it is unreasonable to dissent from Paley’s conclusion here… I find it safe to say that anyone who does is exactly that; unreasonable or lacking reason.

All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way. A true watchmaker has foresight: he designs his cogs and springs, and plans their interconnections, with a future purpose in his mind’s eye. Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If it can be said to play the role of a watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker. (pg 5)

Oh man! This particular paragraph just opens up the can of worms! First of all… HOW – please, someone tell me – HOW is it possible that we “now know” that ToE is the explanation for Life and everything else? ToE as a theory has so many gaps and unresolved questions, it is anything but conclusive. This statement is Dawkin’s own opinion, nothing more. It is certainly not the absolute Truth of the matter, this is his own philosophical position.
And, how is it that something that has “no purpose” can bring about the “purposeful form of all life”?
If I might take you back to the opening page of Dawkins' preface: “The complexity of living organisms is matched by the elegant efficiency of their apparent design. If anyone doesn’t agree that this amount of complex design cries out for an explanation, I give up.” As I’ve said before, I agree. Apparently the answer for all this elegant efficiency and complexity is something that has no mind, mind’s eye, vision, foresight or purpose…
I beg of you please: disassemble an airliner into all its separate parts and then lock it up in a warehouse with a lump of plastic putty for a billion years. Are you trying to tell me that you honestly believe that this plastic putty – which as far as I’m aware has no mind, mind’s eye, vision or foresight – is going to produce anything, ANYTHING, even remotely complex or intricate in design? Or will it just sit there, accomplishing what anything with no vision, purpose, foresight, or power to accomplish anything, would do; that being, nothing at all.

HOW CAN SOMETHING THAT HAS NO PURPOSE PRODUCE SOMETHING THAT IS PURPOSEFUL?

HOW CAN SOMETHING WITH NO MIND PRODUCE COMPLEX DESIGNS?

These are my two biggest questions that I have of Mr Dawkins and I look forward to reading further as to how he can possibly explain their answers in a manner that seems not absurd or ludicrously delusional. (I’m guessing it can’t be done.)

(I know I’ve come off pretty strong here – sarcastic in the extreme as well – but here Mr Dawkins just strikes me as being a hypocrite. As the saying goes, “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.” How Mr Dawkins can cry complex design brought about by something that does not have a mind or purpose to create or design, is to me, an example of an argument that is lacking in both reason and logic. However, let me read further and see what else he says. I must give him the chance to expound and defend his position… seeing as it is that I’m still only on the first chapter!)

As for David Hume himself, it is sometimes said that that great Scottish philosopher disposed of the Argument from Design a century before Darwin. But what Hume did was criticize the logic of using apparent design in nature as positive evidence for the existence of God. He did not offer any alternative explanation for apparent design, but left the question open. An atheist before Darwin could have said, following Hume: “I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn’t a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that someone comes up with a better one.” I can’t help feeling that such a position, though logically sound, would have left one feeling pretty unsatisfied, and that although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.

Do you see what is written here? That before Darwin an atheist could have said that “God isn’t a good explanation” as to why everything is, and that they must “wait and hope that someone comes up with a better” explanation. Well, now you have your explanation; ToE. It might not be true, but an explanation it is nonetheless.
Can you imagine a court trial going something like this:

Defendant’s Lawyer: “Your Honour. We, the Defence, have no explanation for how the murder of Mr Jones took place. All we know is that the explanation that our client, Mr Smith, did it, isn’t a very good one, and so we must wait and hope that someone comes up with a better explanation. In the meantime we suggest he be allowed to go free.”

Or how about:

Doctor: “You have cancer and unless you quit smoking immediately, chances are you won’t have much longer to live.”
Patient: “But I like smoking! Your diagnosis can’t be right… I’ll just keep going to doctor after doctor until I find one who gives me a better explanation as to why this lump is in my throat so that I can keep smoking as much as I like.”

Since when is that a very good way to search for the Truth? Oh, I don’t like your answer because it doesn’t fit into how I want to see things, so I’ll wait until something else comes along that does and then I’ll follow and support that theory. Is this position, “logically sound” as Mr Dawkins says?

This method of discovery doesn’t fulfill us intellectually or logically in the slightest. It’s called DELUSION, ie: wanting to ignore the evidence at hand because you don’t want to accept it.

The Bible offers up a reason as to why that is.
“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.” (Romans 1:18-23)

Mr Dawkins then goes on to attempt to define just what it is exactly that we mean when we use the word complex? How would we recognize something as being complex and something else as simple? He arrives at this point:
The answer we have arrived at is that complicated things have some quality, specifiable in advance, that is highly unlikely to have been acquired by random chance alone. In the case of living things, the quality that is specified in advance is, in some sense, “proficiency”; either proficiency in a particular ability such as flying, as an aero-engineer might admire it; or proficiency in something more general, such as the ability to stave off death, ot the ability to propogate genes in reproduction. (pg 9)

I am no rocket-scientist or English professor, so I can’t quite debate whether Mr Dawkins’ explanation above of what makes something “complex” or not is an accurate definition of the term when used in a scientific and biological context… so I suppose I’m happy enough working with how he has put it for now.
The only thing I would question is: with ToE, how are qualities specifiable in advance? For something to be specified denotes that there is someone or something that has a mind that is able to choose, decide, promote, to determine or bring about; and that this is done in advance, ie: before the thing originally comes to be. How does ToE work with this as we have already seen - at least, according to Mr Dawkins - that it has no mind, purpose or vision? How then can ToE specify anything?

We have seen what we are going to mean by a complex thing. But what kind of explanation will satisfy us if we wonder how a complicated machine, or living body works? The answer is… look to its component parts and ask how they interact with each other. If there is a complex thing that we do not yet understand, we can come to understand it in terms of simpler parts that we do already understand. (pg 11)

Mr Dawkins continues from this paragraph with the example of how he might ask an engineer how an engine works. He explains how he might initially accept an explanation that is quite broad in detail, with “quite large subcomponents, whose own internal structure and behaviour might be quite complicated and, as yet, unexplained.” But here is my problem with this analogy. We continue:
The engineer would assert, without explanation initially, what each of these units [the large subcomponents] does. I would accept this for the moment, without asking how each unit does its own particular thing. Given that the units each do their particular thing, I can then understand how they interact to make the whole engine move.
Of course, I am then at liberty to ask how each part works. Having previously accepted the fact that the steam governor regulates the flow of steam, and having used this fact in my understanding of the behaviour of the whole engine, I now turn my curiosity on the steam governor itself. (pg 11-12)

Here is my problem with this analogy: it cannot be applied to all situations or complex creations; not without having someone who can see the whole picture and knows intimately the workings of what they are explaining; based on observable and repeatable, non-falsifiable first-hand knowledge; such as Mr Dawkins’ example of him asking an engineer.

Allow me to illustrate what I mean here with a poem by Mark of “A Spot of Blogger.”

As you can see, the blind men, through their disability, could not see what the whole of an elephant really is like. Were the next person to have come upon the elephant had both eyes - or at the very least, one - working; they would have been able to see exactly what an elephant is like… because they can see the whole picture. Likewise, only someone who has the full knowledge about something, can describe it correctly and truthfully. Now tell me: who is it on this planet that can explain God – or the lack thereof – by seeing all there is to see and know about Him? Mr Dawkins? I think not.

You might think that I’ve jumped the gun here from engines and engineers to talking about God, but my point is that this particular argument doesn’t hold true for all things and all cases. I am not saying that engineers don’t know about engines, and microbiologists about genetics and molecules and stuff – for clearly they do – but they cannot claim to have a 100% accurate view of what it is they are talking about when it comes down to exactly HOW everything came about – in terms of Life and this planet, Evolution, etcetera – reason being, they weren’t there, they don’t know all the facts! I’m not saying that we cannot find out a lot about how things came to be, but we cannot exclude the concept of a Creator right from the get-go just because it doesn’t fit into how we see things. And that is where I ultimately feel that this little “method” of Mr Dawkins’ for working out complex things is aiming to go. Just because we might understand how something WORKS, doesn’t mean that we know HOW it came to BE.

We began this section by asking what kind of explanation for complicated things would satisfy us. We have just considered the question from the point of view of mechanism: how does it work? We concluded that the behaviour of a complicated thing should be explained in terms of interactions between its component parts, considered as successive layers of an orderly hierarchy. But another kind of question is how the complicated thing came into existence in the first place. This is the question that this whole book is particularly concerned with, so I won’t say much more about it here. (Pg 13)

I shall just mention that the same general principle applies as for understanding mechanism. A complicated thing is one whose existence we do not feel inclined to take for granted, because it is too “improbable”. It could not have come into existence in a single act of chance. We shall explain its coming into existence as a consequence of gradual, cumulative, step-by-step transformations from simpler things, from primordial objects sufficiently simple to have come into being by chance. Just as “big-step reductionism” cannot work as an explanation of mechanism, and must be replaced by a series of small step-by-step peelings down through the hierarchy, so we can’t explain a complex thing as originating in a single step. We must again resort to a series of small steps, this time arranged sequentially in time. (pg 14)

To start with; I told you he was going this route with his methodology… Now here’s the problem. Dawkins’ cannot explain something complex as having originated in a single step. Why? Because that, my friends, sounds something very much like what a Creator would do, what God can do. And Mr Dawkins doesn’t like that idea at all, which is why we “must resort” to another reason. But there’s a hiccup in the reasoning behind this logic: what if the first “simple” things weren’t simple at all but were, in fact, complex?
Scientists in the days of Darwin believed – and apparently Mr Dawkins does as well – that as we would study the supposed originators from which complex things evolved, we would see that they were simple. The problem with today’s modern technology is that we now have the capacity to study these “simple” things in greater detail and on a level which Darwin could not even dream about. And what these new studies are now showing is that; rather than getting simpler and simpler the further “inwards” (into the molecular and cellular levels of organisms) our research into these things goes, we are finding out that these things are in fact getting more and more complex! There is no such thing as a “simple” thing or cell anymore. The term is effectively and scientifically redundant. Mr Dawkins must not have got the memo…

The fundamental original units that we need to postulate, in order to understand the coming into existence of everything, either consist of literally nothing (according to some physicists), or (according to other physicists) they are units of the utmost simplicity, far too simple to need anything so grand as a deliberate Creation. (pg 14)

This is Dawkins paraphrasing what Peter Atkins (an Oxford physical chemist) says in his own book, The Creation. Dawkins takes the answers that Atkins gives above to be true and valid, since he does not attempt to correct them in any way. My problems with this way of thinking are as follows: The need to postulate. It seems silly to mention, but obviously we need to postulate (defined as: 1. to assume to be true as the basis of an argument or theory 2. to ask, demand, or claim) what happened at the dawn of time because no one was there to watch the sun come up. And this leads to several problems. How do we know we’re getting it right being the main one. How do we know this is exactly as it happened? Are we 100% sure? Are we automatically precluding the notion of a Creator out of the equation? If so, why? The problem with postulating anything is that we are assuming things to be true for the sake of our own arguments; and if that argument has no space for God – because we don’t want there to be – then that’s how it’ll work out, with no room for a Creator at all. This does not make it the Truth.
Then; please explain physicists of the world: how does something come from nothing (according to some physicists)? Is it magic? Is it God? Is it divine intervention? If there are no physics, there are no laws, there’s no anything, no thing. So how did any thing come about? Can physics even answer this question?
Likewise; physicists of the world: how is it that the requirements for the creation of the universe, being units of the utmost simplicity (according to other physicists), have not yet been recreated by modern man’s scientific progress? We’ve split the atom. How come we can’t recreate whole universes? Apparently only simple elemenets are needed, no need for God here, so how come we can’t do it? It’s supposed to be simple, right?

Convenient theories all, that do not have, nor want, a Creator in them. Apparently, neither is the Truth a necessary requirement either…

I am a biologist. I take the facts of physics, the facts of the world of simplicity, for granted. If physicists still don’t agree over whether those simple facts are yet understood, that is not my problem. My task is to explain elephants, and the world of complex things, in terms of the simple things that physicists either understand, or are working on. The physicist’s problem is the problem of ultimate origins and ultimate natural laws. The biologist’s problem is the problem of complexity. The biologist tries to explain the workings, and the coming into existence, of complex things, in terms of simpler things. He can regard his task as done when he has arrived at entities so simple that they can safely be handed over to physicists. (pg 15)

If the physicist’s role is to explain ultimate origins and ultimate natural laws; why then does Mr Dawkins attempt to use ToE as an explanation for those exact questions? I refer you back to pg 3, “We wanted to know why we, and all other complicated things, exist. And we an now answer that question.” What about pg 13? “But another kind of question is how the complicated thing came into existence in the first place. This is the question that this whole book is particularly concerned with…” So which is it, Mr Dawkins? Are you a biologist attempting to explain complexity or are you delving into the realms of physicists when you are as much qualified as I am to do so academically?
The problem for Dawkins, is that the two roles overlap when one starts applying ToE. We have already seen that the more inward we go, things become more complicated. But in order for ToE to work, it has to break things down into their previously simpler origins. But where do you start when everything is complex to begin with? Well, you have to come up with new ways of taking things even further backwards, and with ToE, that takes it back to the levels of an Origins Theory. And that is not hard “science” as the Freedictionary.com defines science, being: the study of the nature and behaviour of the physical universe, based on observation, experiment, and measurement. Has ToE been observed, experimented and measured conclusively? I think not.

The rest of this chapter is devoted to a detailed explanation of how the eye works, and is simply far too long for me to re-type here. In it, Dawkins re-emphasizes the incredible complexity and detail of how the eye actually works. He talks about ganglion cells (those cells responsible for preprocessing information and then relaying it to the brain) as a “satellite computer”. He uses the term “architecture” when speaking about the photocell. He goes on about how “each nucleus… contains a digitally coded database larger, in information content, than all 30 volumes of the Encyclopaedia Brittanica put together”. He even emphasizes that this incredible “figure is for each cell, not all the cells of a body put together.”

Now here’s where I can’t quite fathom his thinking… Mr Dawkins recognizes - as I’ve stated earlier on - the incredible complexity that is found in nature. He touches on some of this in his passage about the formation of the eye. Yet he still believes that all of this architecture, design, and incredible high level of complexity (some of which we humans have still yet to achieve!) came about as a result of a “blind, unconscious, automatic process” which has “no purpose in mind… no mind and no mind’s eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all.”

Please, how is this possible?

Bottom-line – it isn’t.

But for Mr Dawkins, ToE must be the answer, because as he has already stated, “I have no explanation for complex biological design. All I know is that God isn’t a good explanation, so we must wait and hope that someone comes up with a better one.”