The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library, whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written.
The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God.
We see a universe marvellously arranged, obeying certain laws, but we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that sways the constellations.
— Albert Einstein
Cited from George Sylvester Vereck, Glimpses of the Great (London: Duckworth, 1930), 373.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) was an influential German physicist from the twentieth century most known for the development of the special and general theories on relativity. He received the Nobel Prize for research on the photoelectric effect. Neither pantheist nor atheist nor theist. He mentioned a fascination with Spinoza’s Pantheism. Yet, Einstein expressed awe about dwelling within a universe with detectable design. “Despite the uncertainty regarding the appropriate way to label his view on God, it is indisputable that Einstein perceived a kind of inscrutable divinity in the mathematical organization of the universe and found it remarkable that human beings have the capacity to comprehend even a small part of it,” writes Melissa Cain Travis (Melissa Cain Travis, Science and the Mind of the Maker: What the Conversation Between Faith and Science Reveals About God [Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2018], 145). I find it uncanny that the workings of the universe can be expressed so well through mathematics, and because the universe is ordered, we can use the scientific method to discover how it works. It is equally amazing that we homo-sapiens have reason and intelligence to decipher secrets of the universe. The very cosmos bears the fingerprints of an Intelligent Designer.
Love Truth Blog 
so, why did your “designer” manage to make the sun give humans cancer?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sun and cancer connection nothing to do with signs of intelligent design in the universe. You miss the point.
LikeLike
Nice try, Warren, but you fail. The sun giving us cancer shows that your god is either a moron when it comes to design or malicious. Your claims of intelligent design fail if your god can’t simply make the sun not kill humans.
So much for your nonsense that this god has made the universe especially for humans.
LikeLike
and do tell me this supposed “point” I am missing.
LikeLike
@clubschadenfreude It is disappointing that you are really not interacting with the Einstein quote.
The fact that the Sun causes cancer is hardly a refutation of point on our complex and information rich universe being sublime.
The Sun causes cancer is an oversimplification to the point of being incorrect. Yes, over exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation puts us at risk for cancer, but UV radiation in proper amounts of exposure is healthy, it assist our bodies in the processing of Vitamin D.
The fact that things created (or made) breakdown is hardly proof against intelligent design. Cars occasionally need repairs, things break down, but the fact that such happens is neither proof for a flawed designer, the designer being a “moron,” nor purposefully malicious in producing an inferior product.
Human sickness and death along with natural evil do come as the result of the fall. But that is not the full Christian message. There is God’s plan of redemption, which involves the resurrection of the saints immortal, imperishable, and incorruptible, and the restoration of the Cosmos.
LikeLike
Nice lies, Warren. It’s always fun when a Christian tries to gaslight me and claim I didn’t “really” interact with the quote, since I did interact with it just not in the way you want.
How about we look at that quote again, in its entirety:
“Your question is the most difficult in the world. It is not a question I can answer simply with yes or no. I am not an Atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a Pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds.
May I not reply with a parable? The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues. The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects.
That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God. We see a universe marvelously arranged, obeying certain laws, but we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that sways the constellations. I am fascinated by Spinoza’s Pantheism. I admire even more his contributions to modern thought. Spinoza is the greatest of modern philosophers, because he is the first philosopher who deals with the soul and the body as one, not as two separate things.[“
So we have Einstein not believing in your god at all. At best, Einstein can be considered a deist. There is no evidence for any god needed at all for the order we perceive. Your Christian god fails miserably since Christians each invent a god of their own, unable to agree on the most basic things.
Funny how you cut off the parts of the quote that show Einstein doesn’t agree with your nonsense.
The fact that the sun causes humans to get cancer is very much a point of refutation of your god, since if you claim it is the designer and is a benevolent god toward humanity, it certainly failed miserably in showing this to be true. Your supposedly “sublime universe” is 99.999…% lethal to humans.
Yep, the universe is pretty neat and has lots of information. Your god isn’t needed at all.
It’s hilarious how you can’t show that my point about the sun, our major source of energy that allows life to exist on the earth, causes cancer is somehow an “oversimplification”. You try to cover up your god’s incompetence by saying that exposure to the sun allows for Vitamin D to be produced. There is no “proper” amount of sun exposure, it can always cause cancer. Vitamin D is a nice product of evolution but does not cancel the fact that the sun causes cancer.
Yep, the fact that things breakdown is evidence against intelligent design. If the design is perfect from a perfect being, there should be no flaws. If your omnipotent god is the designer, nothing prevents it from making things that don’t break down. Indeed, if this god designed everything, then it has made things that don’t breakdown since some sea life repeatedly goes back and forth between youth and senescence, being effectively immortal. Cars are made by fallible humans, so the analogy fails miserably.
I always love when Christians try to explain why the world is like it is because of the magical “fall” which means that they have no idea what “design” their god actually wanted, and thus cannot claim their god is a designer. The full Christian message is that this god is incompetent, and repeatedly fails in trying to fix its failure in Eden. It ends up with a human blood sacrifice by torture to convince itself not to kill its creations. Happily, that idiotic story is complete fiction.
Funny how no saints are resurrected at all, just like your imaginary jesus.
LikeLike
@clubschadenfreude Still missing the point.
The matter of Einstein and Spinoza is adequately dealt with in the comment supplied with the quote. Not a selective citation.
Yes, there is a difference between Spinoza’s pantheism and Christian theism, but this was already addressed in my comment in the post. The point of agreement is on universe being information rich and ordered but sublime. Moreover, the uncanniness of the way discovered workings of the universe could be so well expressed mathematically. All this points to the mind of God.
The universe bears the signs of an intelligent designer. Philosophical naturalism really falls short on explaining how the information imbued within the universe came into existence without a mind generating that information. Nothing comes from nothing.
I find it best to complete this discussion in agreeing to disagree.
Good day.
LikeLike