Subject
Our culture assumes that there is a conflict between science and Scripture, that the world that we can see and measure is not compatible with what the Bible tells us. But modern physics reveals a very different world, one that is not at all like the world of our experience. Relativity shows us time and space bound together, bending and stretching to form our universe. Quantum mechanics tells us of another world behind the one that we see, an insubstantial world where ‘solid’ matter is only light and shadow in a cloud of possibilities.
Scripture does not fit very well with the world of our experience, but what we experience is only an illusion. The world of modern physics is the true world, a true world that fits very well with the portrayal of Creation in Scripture.
Quantum Genesis presents the basics of modern physics, relativity, quantum mechanics, and particle physics, with an interpretation of Scripture that is compatible with the world of modern physics. At our current level of understanding, there is not necessarily any conflict between science and Scripture. Logically, modern physics supports an implication that we live in a Creation made by God.
Goal
Quantum Genesis has a very modest goal: to end the conflict between science and Christianity. Or, at the very least, reduce the conflict to a minor, unimportant difference of interpretational opinion.
Thesis
The core perspective is engineering: maybe our knowledge of physics has grown enough that we can now glimpse how this Creation was made.
Quantum Genesis suggests that two speculations in modern physics, eternalist time and a mathematically based reality, can be used along with more mainstream theories of modern physics to develop an interpretation of the Creation story in Genesis 1 that fits nearly perfectly with cosmology, geology, and paleontology.
Furthermore, an evaluation of the reasons why our reality might have a mathematical basis leads to a logical conclusion that, based on the physics, our reality is most likely to be a Creation made by God.
Comparison to Similar Books
Quantum Genesis is a Scriptural apologetic among many, many books on Scriptural apologetics. However, Quantum Genesis offers some perspectives that are, to the best of the author’s knowledge, unique in Genesis apologetics:
The Genesis Creation story should not be evaluated using classical physics because classical physics is wrong. The Genesis Creation story must be describing the origin of a relativistic spacetime filled with subatomic quantum objects because that is the world that we see around us. Modern physics offers a very different view of what physical events might be described by Genesis 1.
Modern physics implies that our time might be eternalist, that past, present, and future all have a real, simultaneous physical existence.
Eternalist time provides a physical basis for the prophetic ability of the Father.
Eternalist time also implies that the six days in Genesis 1 might not have any relationship at all to times in our reality. The six days of Creation might have been in God’s time, the millions and billions of years of geologic time might only be in our time.
The events described in Genesis 1 are probably not even chronological in our time.
The speculation that our reality might have a mathematical basis offers some possible reasons for why our reality is based on quantum mechanics and why this Creation is only temporary.
Author Qualifications
Stuart Allen, B.S. Engineering, Harvey Mudd College, is an experienced design engineer who converted from atheism to Christianity by analyzing the science, which convinced him of the truth of both science and Scripture.
Target Readership
The potential audience is Christians concerned about the literal truth of Scripture.
It is particularly written for young Christians with faith tested by the alleged discrepancy between science and Scripture.
It is for all Christians to reassure us that science does not conflict with Scripture, to provide us with an answer for the hope that lies within us, and to help us see the delightful power of God in this Creation.
One of the first draft reviewers of Quantum Genesis commented that the book made God’s physical presence very real to her.
Outline of Quantum Genesis
Introduction
Any evaluation of Scripture and science can only be a speculation. The literal meaning of the Genesis Creation story is unknown. The fundamental nature of our world is also unknown. Science has revealed much about what our world does but very little about what it is.
The interpretation of Genesis presented is formed by mainstream modern physics and by a couple of very unconventional perspectives in modern physics. The key unconventional perspective is that time is eternalist: all of time, past, present, and future, has a real, simultaneous physical existence. Eternalist time is supported in physics by relativity and by the mathematics of quantum mechanics.
A Speculation in Physics
This section presents the basics of physics, beginning with the Cartesian coordinate system and culminating in relativity, quantum mechanics, and particle physics. The presentation emphasizes that the observed fundamental behavior of this world is very different from our experience of it, that the observed physical behavior can only be described by very abstract mathematics, and that the mathematics only describes behavior. No one knows what this world is made of or why it behaves the way it does.
The section includes some discussion of how the perspectives of modern physics fit with Scripture.
A Speculation in Computation
The other unconventional perspective is that our reality might have a mathematical basis. The presentation suggests that our reality might possibly be a computational model, but only as an allegory. The notion that our reality might have a computational basis is allowed by physics and is supported by some physicists. Some aspects of a computational model fit into the interpretation of Genesis, but the fit is not flawless.
Requirements of Creation
This section is a very brief presentation of some additional science that plays a role in forming the interpretation of Genesis 1.
A Speculation in Theology
This section is a literal, verse-by-verse interpretation of the Genesis 1 Creation story based on the original Hebrew. The interpretation is formed by four assumptions: Scripture is true; science is correct; time is eternalist; this Creation is, in some ways, similar to a computational model. The eternalist perspective implies that Genesis 1 describes the making of all of spacetime, with billions of years from beginning to end, in six days of God’s time.
A Speculation in Games
This section discusses some of the implications of the possibility that this Creation is a computational model. Logically, if it is a computational model (or something like a model), then it is most likely to be a Creation made by God.