Scientists form theories and then they observe how nature adheres to the theory or they experiment to create recurring results based on the theory. That's what I love so much about science and why I spend so much time to this day (long after my college classes about zoology, anatomy, entomology, mammalogy, physics and, yes, even evolution). I am fascinated with the discovery of water on the moon. I am amazed when astronomers can witness the pulsating death of Chi Cygni, a star some 550 light-years from earth.
Human nature is equally fascinating, but a bit more beyond the grasp of scientists. The fairly dramatic fact that all of us seem to know we ought to act the right way, but often do just the opposite is one of those things that must puzzle all of us.
It is observable that all mankind has this notion of right and wrong.
But where did this really come from? Is this just an animal instinct, a product of what our parents have taught us or is it a fluke of nature? Or are we dealing with something that happens outside the ability of science to explain it?
Scientists know that gravity exists. Scientists know what causes gravity. But scientists cannot explain who put gravity into the universe. They know there was a big bang, but they cannot explain what caused it to go bang, or why. This, as Professor Lewis notes, is not the job of science.
He writes:
Science works by experiments. It watches how things behave. Do not think I am saying anything against science; I am only saying what its job is. But why anything comes to be there at all, and whether there is anything behind the things that science observes ... this is not a scientific question. If there is "Something Behind" it will either have to remain unknown to man or else make itself known in some other way. If scientists came to know every fact there is about the whole universe, it still could not answer why there is a universe, why it does what it does or whether it has any meaning.
Lewis contends that science cannot explain what it cannot see. But there is a clue that there is something behind the universe. The clue happens to be in ourselves ... this notion of right from wrong. We happen to know a fair amount about humans because we are, after all, human. We know that we have put ourselves under a global moral law that we did not legislate or make up. Where did this law come from if we did not invent it? It had to come from somewhere beyond ourselves.
As to the universe and its existence, we know that if there was something that caused it to exist, that "something" would not be part of the universe. That "something" would have to be outside of and preceding the existence of the universe.
Again, I return to Professor Lewis's words:
If there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe -- no more than the architect of a house could actually be a wall or staircase or fireplace in that house. The only way in which we could expect it to show itself would be inside ourselves as an influence or a command trying to get us to behave in a certain way. And that is just what we do find inside ourselves.
The only thing we are allowed to observe is ourselves. When we open the thing that we are as individual human beings, we find that we do not exist alone. We find that we are under a common law that somebody or something wants us to follow. Something seems to be directing us and it is not us.
That should arouse some suspicions about the universe. Is there something or somebody outside of the universe that has directed it to follow the laws of physics and chemistry. If so, why?
Current interpretations of astronomical observations indicate that the age of the Universe is 13.75 billion years, and that the diameter of the observable universe is at least 93 billion light years. According to general relativity, space can expand faster than the speed of light, although we can view only a small portion of the universe due to the limitation imposed by light speed.
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