Allah's Univocal Sign (2/3)

The strongest argument – and indeed the most manifest and accessible to humanity across the ages [1] - that can be levelled against theories of chance and Darwinian speculation is the 'Anthropic Teleological Argument'. The argument propounds that the fundamental qualities and critical physical characteristics of our universe have been fine-tuned or conditioned in such a way as to ultimately permit and sustain the existence of intelligent beings like us. The argument is further corroborated by two undeniable facts:

-  “Humans enjoy a highly sophisticated capacity to observe, explore, and quantify.

And,

- The universe exists in a manner that lends itself to human observation, exploration, and quantification.

As Paul Davies, cosmologist and director of the Beyond Center at Arizona State University, lucidly puts it:

"The world is both rational and intelligible. This is often expressed as the "principle of sufficient reason", which states that everything in the world is at is for some reason"[2].

A fact which still represents a nightmare for many atheistic evolutionists is the clear distinction that can be made between the one ultimate cause of a natural process and the process or mechanism itself. The Islamic thinker Wahiduddin Khan perceptively pinpoints where evolution is at fault:

"Think of the railway engine speeding along the track. How do its wheels revolve? If we attempt to answer this question by studying the different parts of the engine and their movements, we shall arrive at the conclusion that the movement of the wheels is an extension of the functioning of the locomotive's mechanism. But would we be justified in believing that the (prime) reason for their movement is the engine and its various parts? Obviously, we would not. We should first have to consider the respective roles of the engineer who designed the engine and the engine driver who set it in motion. Without their instrumentality, the engine could neither exist, nor move. The engine and its parts are not then the final reality. The final reality is the mind which has brought the engine into existence, and runs it at will"[3].

Terms such as adaptation, natural selection, and genetic mutation do not daunt the learned Muslims, who are well acquainted with the Qur’an and the meanings of Allah's Attributes, The All-Wise (Al-Hakeem), The Originator of everything, including the laws of evolution for:

"Without God, evolution, continuity of nature, natural selection, conservation of energy, or whatever other phrases happen to have currency for the hour, are mere sound and smoke, and imaginations of science falsely so called" [4].

The fact that we can speak of living cells, for example, as containing "pumps, levers, motors, rotors, turbines, propellers, scissors, and many other instruments familiar from a human workshop"[5] must not escape serious contemplation. Why are we capable of both observing and naming such phenomena, even at such infinitesimal scales, so conveniently? This effective ability to transfer daily language into the realm of extra-personal realities, such as that of science, is clear evidence that human experience and the cosmos are not only significantly interrelated but also deliberately destined to coexist meaningfully. This conclusion is so self-evident that any attempt to invoke fortuitism would be utterly absurd. Those who wish to stick their heads in the sand will see nothing but dark. Those who are passionately after the signs, after truth, will effortlessly fail to see nothing but light.

This meaningful relationship between the explorer and the explored, the discoverer and the discovered, the observer and the observed, compels us to believe in a 'Grand Will' behind the scheme of things. Indeed, we not only live in the appropriate planet but also exist in a hospitable universe. Let us consult the language of facts and let this be from the vital function of universal constants. If, for instance, Planck's constant had a slightly different value, "the whole universe would be different from the way it is, which means that intelligent life (human beings) could not have evolved in a substantially altered universe. If gravity were significantly stronger than it is, stars would exhaust their hydrogen fuels much faster, and humanoid life (as we know it) could not appear in a universe where stars "died young". Or if the 'strong force', which binds the nuclei of atoms together, were stronger, helium nuclei would dominate the universe, and no hydrogen would be left over, and without hydrogen there would be no water, and without water there could not be life as we know it"[6].

To round off the Anthropic argument, let's quote Bruno Guiderdoni, a French astronomer who embraced Islam several years ago. He says:

"Historically, the vastness of the cosmos has been used as an argument against religion; the argument goes that if the cosmos is so extended, man is nothing and the concept of a revealed religion on the small planet where we are living has no sense. We now know that the age of the universe and the size of the observable universe are intimately linked to our presence on earth. We could not have appeared in a cosmos with a different age and size. The old age of the universe is necessary for heavy element enrichment, which is necessary for the formation of planets and the appearance of life. The size of the universe is a consequence of its age, and so we need this space around us and this time behind us in order to be here now on earth"[7].

In their analysis of the Anthropic Teleological Argument, L. Stafford Betty & Bruce Cordell conclude:

"...the Anthropic principle presents us with a potentially powerful argument for the existence of a universal creating intelligence"[8].

However, to reject evolution entirely would certainly make a fine example of throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Whether we like it or not evolution is a fact of life, but what kind of evolution are we talking about here? Countless phenomena display various forms of evolution, from language, culture, ideologies, economical systems, to genes, organisms, the solar system, and galaxies. All these have undergone – across the ages – numerous kinds of evolution. By and large, the Qur’an does not reject evolution conceived this way. In fact, it is stated in the Qur’an that humans were created in different stages[9], and that human beings shall move from one stage to another[10]. Moreover, one of Allah's Names, frequently invoked by Muslims in their prayers, is 'Al-Baari' (Qur’an: Surah Al-Hashr, 59: 23-24)[11] which roughly means the One who evolves things from their beginnings towards their final existence. The Qur’an also speaks of a battery of laws such as the law of Tasreef (change)[12] as well as Taqleeb (alteration)[13], Tadbeer (proper disposition of affairs)[14], Hisaab (calculation)[15], Ihssaa (enumeration)[16], and Halaak (annihilation)[17]. From the Islamic viewpoint, change is a fundamental feature of life. Heraclitus' quote that "change is the only constant" and which happens to bear a lot of truth is endorsed by the Qur’an. However, it should be noted that evolution is more than just change and many of its aspects and mechanisms no doubt exhibit extreme complexity at various levels and stages.