The Argument from Probability.

GRANTED that men have only inhabited the earth for 200,000 years, that human civilisation has only existed in one shape or another for about 5,000 years, and that the earth is considered to be approximately 4 and half billions of years old, the raw odds of there being a civilisation to-morrow are about 1 in 900,000, and the raw odds of there being any human beings at all to-morrow are about 1 in 22,500. These are facts and absolutely true of themselves, but we all know by experience they are false, or rather, they are true, but day after day the odds are defied.

   Bookies would dismiss an employee who dared to calculate such odds but there is nothing wrong with them, they are absolutely correct as statistics. In the same way, nine tenths of all statistics are absolutely correct in themselves and represent mathematical certainty. They are true, but we know they are wrong. This I apply to a great deal of science as well, I trust to the findings of scientists as loyally as anyone of this generation; they put a great deal of effort and an even greater quantity of money into their research, and they make them watertight. Yet I may build a watertight boat out of wood which neither can float nor sail. To be watertight is necessary but not sufficient. It is not enough to say a proposition has no flaws, as though to take up a flawless example of manure, a proposition must be of value in the first place. When a thing is valuable it is desired despite its flaws. People have paid thousands of pounds for chipped and imperfect diamonds or rubies, but none will pay such an amount for a perfect example of quartz. Thus only so much value is attributed to atheism, though it be presented in the most watertight fashion, though its proponents seem wise, unanswerable, indomitable, and courageous. Their proposition is quartz, it is not valuable, it is abundant and easy. No one will write hymns in honour of atheism, there will be no gothic cathedrals built for it, no requiems composed, no Sistine chapels painted. It seems very probable, it is quite watertight, but it is worthless.

   To return to the probability of there being human civilisation or human beings at all to-morrow, I think I have been too generous to the statisticians. They would assert that I am mistaken exceedingly, that all the evidence of yesterday and the yesterdays before compel them to give very favourable odds to the continued existence of human beings and civilisation. Yet this is no different to my original method of calculation, it is taking things in isolation. What of the chance of astral debris killing us? What of the chance of a fatal virus? What of the chance of nuclear war? What about everything else of which we are unaware? What if an undetectable black hole is approaching? What if something collapses in the solar system? What if the sun undergoes some unexpected change, what if it flares up, and we are instantly incinerated? Moreover, there are so many things which we cannot even imagine which could happen to us, and we so fragile, that surely the odds of there being any human beings in the next minute are enormously higher than 1 in 900,000, surely they are almost incalculably high. Yet we trust that we will outlive the next minute, not because we know it but because we believe it. So a Christian, or any theist, believes in his faith.

   The atheist then falls upon probabilities, tracing with the gridlines of science so many causes and effects, presuming philosophically upon the framework of time and the trustworthiness of empirical truth. He will emphasise the fallibility of believers (but not of unbelievers), he will recite examples of fabricated miracles, of contradictory scripture, and portray ecclesiastical history with a weighted imbalance towards all its mistakes. Such is the nature of a polemicist. Anyone of these clever individuals could make a watertight speech in a debate. Let us suppose one such does so. Every one of his propositions may be statistically correct and so well expressed as to seem invincible, but ultimately he is only concerned in detraction. The great ruby of theism sits there on the table all the while, dazzling its followers with its value and beauty. The impressive atheist will say, 'It is only aluminium oxide, they are only their atoms, and the atoms are only their...' but the ruby shines in the glow of the firelight and even the atheist within himself is drawn to it. 'Why am I drawn to it?' might he wonder to himself, and answer through scientific terms, through psychological-social-evolutionary terms, but that is only his way of allaying his own fixation. Physics may explain the mechanism of the magnet, but magnetism alone is self-revealing. The mechanism is only secondary to the thing itself, as a student may learn a great deal by reading a commentary on Shakespeare but will learn a great deal more by actually reading Shakespeare himself. What happens to us when we look at the night sky is ten thousand times more powerful and important, meaningful and moving, than learning about nuclear fusion. To this extent the first homo sapiens knew as much as we, or rather—more, for we distract ourselves too much with little lights, while he warmed himself by the great fire from the beginning.