Reason 1: A Fully Functioning World
If all the separate parts of a car were strewn about on a factory floor – the four wheels, windscreen wipers, engine, exhaust pipe, car doors, steering wheel, hood, oil, petrol, battery, and so on – could chance alone ever fix them together in a roadworthy way? Let’s assume for the sake of argument that a truly infinite amount of time is not available (it rarely is). Surely the answer must be no.
When we look at our world suspended in space, it could be compared to a fully functioning car. Just as petrol keeps a car running, the sun fuels all activity on earth. But like the battery inside a car, within the world there are additional energy sources: oil, coal, wood, and others. As a car’s engine turns the wheels, so the extraordinary phenomenon of life powers growth, motion, and reproduction. The parts of a car are tightly screwed into place, and similarly everything in the world holds together: a protective atmosphere, tidal oceans, rain-bearing clouds, soil-covered land, and fresh water rivers. The warning lights on a car’s dashboard could be compared to the invaluable advance signs of changing weather patterns. The complexity of a car’s cooling system is surpassed by the earth’s water cycle, which even oscillates successfully between salty and fresh.
So if we agree that the components of a car could never slot together by accident to form a roadworthy vehicle, shouldn’t we also agree that raw chance couldn’t fix the components of our world into a fully functioning unit?
sixty guilders 