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Before looking at the apparent fine tuning of the Universe, it might be useful to first look at what is known as the cosmological argument.

The cosmological argument

The cosmological argument sets out to logically infer the existence of God based upon the knowledge that the Universe had a beginning. A form of the argument recently made popular by the Christian philosopher William Lane Craig is known as the Kalam Cosmological Argument. This can be stated simply in just a few steps:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

In order for something to bring the Universe into being, it must exist independent of the Universe, i.e. the cause must exist outside of both space and time. This cause must be beginning-less and itself uncaused. Lane Craig also argues that this cause must be personal. We only know of two types of immaterial object as described here, a mind, or abstract objects such as numbers. Numbers cannot directly cause things to happen, therefore the cause must be an intelligent mind.

4. There exists a personal creator of the Universe who is time-less, space-less, beginning-less,  uncaused and enormously powerful.

The rise in popularity of the cosmological argument can partly be attributed to advances in scientific understanding.  Up until around the 1930’s, the majority of physicists believed the Universe to be eternal, and so would have disputed point 2 in the above version of the argument. Over the past 80 years more and more observational evidence has accumulated showing that the Universe did indeed begin to exist at some point in the finite past (~13.7 billion years ago). In order to avoid the conclusion of a creator, some people have recently moved on to dispute point 1, that whatever begins to exist has a cause. The debate is too complicated to detail here however, and does not affect what is perhaps one of the most interesting problems to arise from modern cosmology: Why does the Universe appear to be so ‘finely tuned’ for life?

Fine Tuning

The laws of physics that govern the behaviour of our Universe can only really be understood when parameterised and expressed as mathematical equations. These equations often contain physical constants,  an example can be seen in the well known E=mc2. Here we have as variables E (energy) and m (mass), however c (the speed of light in a vacuum) is a constant. There are over 20 such constants in modern physics, the majority of which have arbitrary values; there is no known reason why they have the values they do. A common hypothesis is that these parameters may be somewhat random. This may not at first seem very interesting, but if some of these constants were significantly different then the Universe would be a very different place.

In his book ‘Just Six Numbers’, Astronomer Royal Martin Rees discusses six constants that are fundamental to the present structure of the Universe. These numbers have to be almost exactly what they are in order for us to exist. Different values for just one or two of these parameters could have led to a universe full of black holes and nothing else, or maybe just a vast cloud of protons and electrons, neither of which would allow for the evolution of life.
The Universe appears to be finely tuned or designed in such a way that it is inhabitable. Why is this the case?

There are two main ways of answering this question:

Multi-verses and the Anthropic Principle

The Anthropic Principle states that the Universe, with all its different laws and constants, must be the way it is for us to exist, and so since we exist, we should not be surprised to observe what we do, no matter how unlikely. If the Universe were different, then we would not be here to see it. 
While this is certainly true, it does not mean that we should not be surprised to be here at all. A very popular way of explaining away the improbability is by speculating that there are many universes (maybe an infinite number), each with a different set of random physical constants. In this model, there will be at least one universe that just happens to be ideally suited for life.

Some theories exist suggesting that the Universe is in fact oscillating in a series of Big-Bangs, where each time it expands, then re-collapses and starts again. These theories can be ruled out based on scientific observations demonstrating that no re-collapse can happen to our Universe. 
 
An alternative has been suggested to allow many universes, even though there appears to be only one. In this theory there are many different universes all existing at the same time (The Multi-verse). Theoretically, this is a nice way of solving the fine tuning problem, since one of these universes is bound to appear like our own. But there is no evidence to support the idea, and even if it were true,  there appears to be no way of ever proving it. This fact alone puts the idea well outside of what can be called science, it is really just speculation. For many people, scientists included, there is another explanation that fits better with what we see around us.

Conclusion

Based on the information that we have looked at, it seems that taken on face value there is a very strong case to be made for the existence of God. There certainly seems to be a design to the universe that we are in, and it seems that unless you have a prior commitment to naturalism, (that God can’t possibly be the answer) the most probable explanation of our existence in this finely tuned universe is that there as an intelligent designer, who created the universe we live in. This goes some way to explain why the apostle Paul was able to say that the existence of God was clear for all to see, (Rom 1:20) so that we can’t claim to have an excuse that God has not provided enough evidence for us.

From here the question becomes not ‘Does God exist?’, but ‘Who is God?’. At this point, it is worth looking at the identity of Jesus Christ. He made some astonishing claims which any thinking person must surely consider, but that is for another article.

Other useful articles: 

What does it mean to become a Christian?

Who made God?

Hasn’t the theory of evolution shown the bible to be false?

How does modern science show there is a God?

The Bible promises that anyone who searches for God will find him

You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)

Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. (Matthew 7:7)

This includes the search through scientific investigation, indeed there are many areas of modern science that point to the existence of the God of the Bible (some of which will be discussed below).

Can science see, detect or measure God?

Despite its great successes there is a limit as to how much science can tell us. Science is the study of the material world around us, its aim is to provide an explanation for the way the physical world works. God does not fit into the realm that science is able to directly study: for God to have created space and time, He must exist somewhat outside of it. A study of God is largely spiritual, and an exercise in faith – faith is the assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen. Belief in God and what he has done for us requires faith and trust in Him. This does not have to be “blind faith” with no intelligent thought involved, however, there is still a necessary step of faith. If a person has rejected God and hardened their heart to Him it would be difficult to change their mind based on the scientific evidence alone, but for those who are willing to look, God has left his fingerprints all over creation for us to find:

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. (Psalm 19:1)

.. his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. (Romans 1:20)

In fact there are many scientists who have sought to find God through studying the world around them and come to faith in Jesus as a result (e.g. Dr Hugh Ross (Co-founder of Reasons-to-Believe)).

The discussion of science and God is such a vast one that many books continue to be written on the topic, and I’d encourage Christians and  non-Christians alike to investigate the subject. Many people have objections to faith based on the common mis-conception that science and Christianity are at odds with each other. This is not the case, areas of contention are often resolved by new scientific data or in some cases by people re-examining a poor interpretation of a passage of scripture.  

Science can give us an insight into the way God has created.

Scientific studies to date have revealed a little of just how amazingly beautiful and complex the world around us is, all of this points to an amazing God who is all the more amazing to have created it in a way that we are able to study it, and enjoy it. 

An Example from Astrophysics:

An obvious place where religion and science do overlap, is the question of creation itself: “Where did the universe come from?”. Until the mid 1900’s much of the scientific community believed that the universe was static and eternal, clearly in disagreement with the account in Genesis. In 1916 Einsteins theory of General Relativity highlighted the theoretical difficulties with this view of the  universe, and indicated an expanding universe with a beginning. In 1929 Hubble provided observational support for this new model. Measurements of distant galaxies show that they are receding from us with increasing speed the further away they are. If everything is moving apart, things must have been closer together in the past. Taking this idea back far enough leads to a very dense and energetic beginning to the expansion- An event now known as the Big Bang.
 
Many independent observations of the Cosmic Microwave Background, and chemical abundances in the universe have resulted in the Big Bang model being almost universally accepted. The model very successfully describes the history of the universe back as far as the first 10-43 seconds, but as far as the absolute beginning goes, modern science can say nothing. It appears to be creation from nothing, with a cause that may be outside the view of scientific study. A Nobel Prize winning physicist Arno Penzias said of the Big Bang: “The best data we have are exactly what I would have predicted had I nothing to go on but the first five books of Moses, the Psalms and the Bible as a whole.”    

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. (Genesis 1:1)

It also appears that the universe we live in is incredibly fine tuned in order to exist for any length of time let alone to support life (known as “The Fine Tuning Problem”). There are a vast number of physical parameters (the speed of light, the strength of gravity and various aspects of electromagnetism to name a few) that all have to be precisely the value they are, or else we would not exist. There is no reason to suggest that these values should all arise naturally, in fact it is highly unlikely, many people see this as very strong evidence for design, and therefore an intelligent creator.

Suggested books to start with:

The case for a Creator -   Lee Stroble
The Language of God: A scientist presents evidence for belief -   Francis Collins
God’s Undertaker: Has science buried God? -  John C. Lennox