Is Anything Real?

As a starting point let us consider the nature of the universe, the external world. What we see around us, that which is independent of our minds we westerners call reality. We assume it’s real but eastern religions would disagree. The question is thus: is the external world we perceive real?

  1. No, it’s an illusion, my private dream
  2. Yes, it’s real, independent of us

In Buddhism and Hinduism nothing we see is real. There is no you, no me, no pain, just illusion and, at the end of the day, we all get absorbed into an undifferentiated oneness called Nirvana. I find this absurd, illogical, unlivable and unverifiable. Anyone can say that I and my perceptions are unreal or illusory but no one could prove it. I could easily retort: “that which you call an illusion, I call reality” and we could fight about definitions and names. Or, I could lean on Descartes and say “Cogito, ergo sum” – Because I think, I exist. Even if what I see is an illusion, I still must exist in order to perceive the illusion AND something else probably exists to provide the illusion (I cannot be the deceived, deceiver and the deception).

I think the successes of science in predicting our external reality’s operation as well as common sense do away with any religion or philosophy which rejects ultimate mind-independent reality. I also think the fact that Buddhists look both ways before crossing the street speaks for an external, non-debateable reality ;-)

Is the External Physical World All of Reality?

All other religions have the basic, reasonable assumption that the universe is real and exists. Here we have another major branch based on the following question.
Is the world we can sense all there is?

  1. Naturalism: Yes, the material world is all there is. Matter, energy that’s it.
  2. Supernaturalism: No, there is more: spirit, God, eternity.

Naturalism has the following problems:

  1. Time cannot be explained in terms of matter and energy and yet, according to Einstein it is real and, according to Big Bang, it had a beginning
  2. Physical laws, like gravity, are clearly real (not mind tricks) and yet, they are neither matter nor energy. In modern times we have begun to see that Information also falls into this category of being non-physical and yet essential for explaining the universe.
  3. Naturalism cannot explain itself. We know that the universe had a beginning but we know that matter and energy cannot be produced from nothing – only transformed.

We thus have a philosophy which cannot explain itself and offers only a partial, albeit useful, perspective and description of the world.

Inferring the Supernatural

The word “supernatural” conjures up ideas of UFOs, magic and other esoteric “powers”. However, all it means is that there are real things which are not physical. We call them supernatural not because they are somehow unnatural but because they transcend the material world we call Nature consisting of matter and energy. A spirit has no mass or volume, exists not in time nor can be measured by physical instruments.

How do we know that anything other than Nature exists?

  1. Nature and natural laws had a beginning approximately 14 billion years ago yet cannot have started themselves – Natural laws and entities cannot create themselves (The Law of Energy Conservation).
  2. We see a progression in the universe’s history from disorder and simplicity to the order and complexity of life today. This goes against the nature of matter and energy which tends to become more orderly (The Law of Entropy).
  3. We discern within ourselves something which is more than chemicals and atoms, something with a will and consciousness which cannot be simulated or created with any amount of technology nor be explained or predicted. We are spiritual beings with minds and wills which are housed in but not dependant on our bodies (The Spirit).

We have therefore, good reason to suspect something else exists other than the measurable material world. Atheists and Materialists may say that we cannot measure or investigate the afterlife and thus it does not exist but this is also a mistake: we cannot assume something does not exist just because we can’t measure it. In fact, it’s impossible to prove that something does not exist since we are not all-knowing. On the contrary, all we know points to something more than nature!

Starting from scratch the odds of an afterlife are perhaps 50/50. The odds that something supernatural started what we call “nature” are, as I have argued, very high if not 100% certain. Science tells us that nature cannot cause nature and thus we have good cause to invoke supernaturalism.

God: Personal or Non-Personal

Although we’ve not yet used the word “God” that’s where we are now: everything we know has a cause and was created and if we trace them all back through the eons we must arrive at a First Cause. This creative force we call “God” even if, as the deists content, it is just a force and not a personal being.

One might reasonably ask: why should this force not just be a power or gas. What makes us think God is the grey-bearded bully we read about in the Bible or other holy books? What makes us think this amazing creative force should be interested in what we do, think or eat? This is a good question.

I agree that to say God is a person like us is probably incorrect – but the solution is not to make him impersonal – to take him down a notch. We know personality is more complex, advanced and progressive than impersonal stuff like rocks and to make God impersonal is to imply that we persons are above him. The God I know and believe in is more than personal: a person yet transcending the personalities we know in each other.

Describing God

I think therefore we have good reason to believe that nature is not all that there is, that God started all we see and that he is personal. We cannot see him because he is spirit, we cannot find a single simple common religion (description of God) because he is personal and complex just as we cannot find a single simple common description of Abraham Lincoln. We can say true things about God (eternal, creator) just as we can say true things about Abe Lincoln (16th president of the US) but we cannot completely describe this person God because our encounter with him is sublime and personal.

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