Recently a christian blogger in Slovakia wrote that Dawkins is defending multiverse theory.
Googled a bit, only person i found stating this was… William Lane Craig. Did not found Dawkins speaking or writing about it, maybe he mentioned something of work by Sagan or Krauss…
Can you please confirm that my impression is right, and Dawkins is being attributed to say something he did not said?
Defending what?
Fancy mathematical formulas no one can understand?
I must have done the same Google search you did, because I did not find anything about Dawkins defending the multiverse theory either. If memory serves, he briefly mentioned the multiverse theory in his book “The God Delusion”, but only as an example of other possible theories. I’m pretty sure he didn’t defend it or endorse it. I’ll go home and look that up in my copy and make sure. (Of course that doesn’t mean he didn’t mention it in passing in some Tweet or an interview or something.)
The question for me is: So what if Dawkins is defending multiverse theory? It’s just a theory. It makes a lot more sense than the theory that the Earth is only about 5000 years old and Adam and Eve had pet dinosaurs.
A biologist like Dawkins should not be defending any physics theories, there’s a good chance he’d make a fool of himself. Let the astrophysicists handle that stuff.
It took me some time to realize what Lane Craig (and the slovak blogger) meant by “supporting the Multiverse theory”.
Dawkins in God Delusion wrote about it, comparing “God Hypothesis” and “Multiverse hypothesis”.
The thing is I would have to start explaining whats the difference between theory and hypothesis, and also explain whats the difference between “mentioning/comparing” and “supporting/endorsing” if I have to reply to the blog in Slovakia.
Reading with comprehension is not a common skill here…
So if I’m understanding correctly, Dawkins may have been equating religion with the multiverse conjecture (because it certainly isn’t a ‘theory’ by any stretch).
Each playing with unknowable, one by dint of one’s own mind, the other by incredible advanced and complex math, which is a human construct.
We can construct way more in our imaginations than the physical reality out there will allow. Multiverse is a hall of mirrors.
Hey how about looking at all this from a slightly different angle?
https://centerforinquiry.org/forums/topic/missing-key-to-stephen-goulds-nonoverlapping-magisterium/
Dawkins compared “god hypothesis” and “multiverse hypothesis” in a manner that multiverse hypothesis may look “extravagant” by taking one “working universe” and an infinite multitude of universes which “do not work at all” or “do not work as ours” simply because known physical constants have different values there.
“God hypothesis” (when assuming only one “fine tuned universe”, when there was present an “agency” or act of a sentient being, acting purposely by “setting those constants”) is extravagant or even more extravagant when compared to Multiverse hypothesis.
Of course there is also third option when there is just one universe, and physical constants were not set by anyone.
It took me a while, but it appears that what REALLY annoys theists on Dawkins is his way of speech about nature - regardless if its his fascination of evolution, genetics or cosmology. He certainly speaks about those phenomenons in a way which is typical for a believer to speak about God, and “all his infinte archievements”.
They question how is it even possible he can get so excited about that (especially in case when the theist denies evolution or certain cosmological theories), and then get angry for using rhetoric and variant of speech which is “reserved for God only”.
I like your third option.
Regarding Dawkins, I thought he was easily disliked because he comes across as so condescending.
<i>Oh and the multi-verse, my bet is on it being a mathematical artifact. And, we’ll never have a way to actually find out one way or the other.</i>