According to Richard Morris’ book “The Universe, the Eleventh Dimension, and Everything” Four Walls Eight Windows, New York, 1999), there are several “fine tunings” of the laws of nature in the universe, without which life would not have arisen and we would not be here.

For example, the neutron is slightly heavier than the proton, and so the neutron decays but the proton does not (in measurable time). And hydrogen is necessary for star formation and for life. Who would want a universe full of nothing but neutrons and electrons?

Again, if the strong nuclear force which binds atomic nuclei together were 5% weaker, deuterium could not be formed; and its formation is a step in the formation of helium and any heavier elements, i.e. in nucleosynthesis in general, both right after the Big Bang and in the centre of dying stars. Stars and living forms would never arise out of hydrogen alone.

Continuing: If gravity were a little stronger, stars would burn out very fast; life on any planets would not have time to originate or evolve. If gravity were very strong, nascent stars would explode like huge bombs.

If the electromagnetic force that binds molecules together were a little weaker, liquids and solids would not form; only gases would exist. If the e-m force were a little stronger, no nucleus bigger than a single proton would form. Again, there would be only hydrogen in the universe.

If the energy levels in beryllium and carbon nuclei were a little different, the carbon nucleus could not ever be formed in the interior of stars. I seem to remember having read about other such cases of “fine tuning” e.g. of certain fundamental constants.

Morris considers this fine tuning “almost as if intelligently designed”. But then he explains it by hypothesizing multiple universes, most of them without higher elements and without stars or life; we inhabit one in which life is possible, because otherwise we would not be here to observe it. This is the anthropic principle.

This is a plausible explanation, but it is not the only one. God the intelligent Creator is also a possible hypothesis, and seems rather more plausible than multiple universes. Why is the God Hypothesis so unacceptable to scientists? If we are ever to achieve a synthesis of science and religion, we will have to abandon this dogmatic reluctance. Even the Big Bang itself looks like an act of creation. (“Let there be light…”) It was originally so greeted when it became accepted rather than Fred Hoyle’s universe of continuous creation that had always existed. The eternal fact is not the universe, or even many of them, but God alone. (That is my preference, anyway.)