# Kirk Cameron schools Stephen Hawking in science **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 22, 2011, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818 "2011-05-22T21:45:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/21 "2011-05-23T01:05:55Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I guess it depends on if God is alive or not. I’m starting to wonder if Kirk believes that HE is god. He certainly acts like it. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/22 "2011-05-23T01:34:43Z")
Generally I’m all for making fun of Kirk Cameron, but I’m wondering if he actually has a strong point. According to Hawking’s and science’s viewpoint there is a point in time or space where there was no time or space or anything at all; no mass, no matter, nothing absolutely nothing at all. The big bang occurred from which everything else promulgated. How is that different from "in the beginning there was darkness and the darkness was without form or void, and God moved across the face of the darkness and said “Let there be light.” For something originally written several thousand years ago, that is eerily similar to the scientific explanation. That’s always bothered me. Hawking says no God or anything is required to have created that Big bang, but waving off the question isn’t the same as answering it. Both Hawking’s and Cameron’s claim have this unknowable unexplainable event indistinguishable from magic wherein the universe just suddenly appears out of nothing. Hawking is engaging in a bit of vanity to claim that God wasn’t responsible for the event. He doesn’t really offer a better explanation. Further, 20 years ago he wrote “A Brief History of Time” wherein he discusses this fundamental problem and suggests that this is what separates science from theology and why they don’t conflict because science can’t answer these questions. Kirk Cameron is an idiot and I’m a big fan of Hawking, but just saying… ---
**Author:** ![woodstockbirdybird](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/woodstockbirdybird/32/7905_2.png) [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/23 "2011-05-23T01:43:33Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > For something originally written several thousand years ago, that is eerily similar to the scientific explanation. That’s always bothered me. Except for the part about God creating it. > [@Scylla](#): > > Hawking says no God or anything is required to have created that Big bang, but waving off the question isn’t the same as answering it. Neither is making up deities with no evidence. > [@Scylla](#): > > Hawking is engaging in a bit of vanity to claim that God wasn’t responsible for the event. He doesn’t really offer a better explanation. Occam’s Razor - “No God” is actually a better explanation than “God”. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/24 "2011-05-23T01:49:12Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] Both Hawking’s and Cameron’s claim have this unknowable unexplainable event indistinguishable from magic wherein the universe just suddenly appears out of nothing. [/QUOTE] I’m not an astrophysicist, but I don’t think any of them claim the universe suddenly appeared out of nothing or anything remotely like. What do Cameronites answer when asked the very obvious question “If everything had to be created what created God?” ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/25 "2011-05-23T01:53:57Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Hawking is engaging in a bit of vanity to claim that God wasn’t responsible for the event. He doesn’t really offer a better explanation. I think he is just implying that there is no need to put god in the theories, and there is an historical precedent for that. “[No, Sire,] I had no need of that hypothesis”… Pierre Simon Laplace to Napoleon in the early 1800’s ---
**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/26 "2011-05-23T01:55:50Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > How is that different from "in the beginning there was darkness and the darkness was without form or void, and God moved across the face of the darkness and said “Let there be light.” > > For something originally written several thousand years ago, that is eerily similar to the scientific explanation. That’s always bothered me. And yet it doesn’t bother you that Genesis 2 explicitly contradicts Genesis 1? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/27 "2011-05-23T02:04:12Z")
Wood: None of that is really an answer. Kirk’s explanation offers an answer. Hawking’s does not. So, that’s one point for Kirk. Further, Kirk’s explanation is actually pretty good. One strong definition of God is the creator of the universe. Another is that God is omnipotent. Creating a universe from nothing comes pretty close to passing my shit test for omnipotence (it’s a pretty good trick, you’ll admit.) Hawking ignores a cause or a reason or an explanation for the Big Bang. I don’t think simply ignoring that huge question is either satisfactory, or good science or even good thinking. Cameron addresses the question and calls the answer “God.”. Ignoring a question doesn’t get you any further, addressing it and defining it can get you further. If you don’t like the word “God” you can call it Fred, or the prime mover or the first cause, but in any case you are looking at something that created the universe out of nothing. Since the universe contains all things and possibilities, whatever did it was for all intents and purposes omnipotent. So, when science comes up with an explanation of the universe that doesn’t require an omnipotent creator to make the universe out of nothing, than it can tell Kirk Cameron to fuck off… But science equites an omnipotent creator, or there is no Big Bang. Therefore Kirk Cameron has a point, QED. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/28 "2011-05-23T02:05:42Z")
> [@wevets](#): > > And yet it doesn’t bother you that Genesis 2 explicitly contradicts Genesis 1? :dubious: Oh sure, multiple authors and such. I’m just saying that first bit seems to hold up. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/29 "2011-05-23T02:08:12Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > I’m not an astrophysicist, but I don’t think any of them claim the universe suddenly appeared out of nothing or anything remotely like. > > What do Cameronites answer when asked the very obvious question “If everything had to be created what created God?” Oh, that’s easy. God created himself. One of the many benefits of omnipotence. ---
**Author:** ![Archergal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Archergal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Archergal)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/30 "2011-05-23T02:13:38Z")
“In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.” Terry Pratchett. That’s my personal favorite. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/31 "2011-05-23T02:15:32Z")
> [@woodstockbirdybird](#): > > Occam’s Razor - “No God” is actually a better explanation than “God”. That’s a misapplication of the razor. The razor states that given two explanations, choose the simpler one. Example: My beer disappeared. Explanation 1 is God magically transported it to heaven. Explanation # 2 is somebody took my beer. Explanation # is simpler no requires no magical entity and is therefore better. In the case of Hawking versus Cameron, the problem is that the universe was created suddenly out of nothingness. Cameron says God did it. Hawking offers no answer. Occ.'s doesn’t apply. You need to choices to apply the razor, we only have one. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/32 "2011-05-23T02:16:49Z")
> [@Archergal](#): > > “In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.” Terry Pratchett. > > That’s my personal favorite. Yup I like that. Terry addresses the fundamental problem succinctly. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/33 "2011-05-23T02:16:52Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > So, when science comes up with an explanation of the universe that doesn’t require an omnipotent creator to make the universe out of nothing, than it can tell Kirk Cameron to fuck off… But science equites an omnipotent creator, or there is no Big Bang. > > Therefore Kirk Cameron has a point, QED. A receding point like many hairlines… 🙂 Really, Kirk is not talking about a deistic God there. And > [@](#): > > Hawking writes, “The question is: is the way the universe began chosen by God for reasons we can’t understand, or was it determined by a law of science? I believe the second.” He adds, “Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing.”[58][59] > … > Hawking has stated that he is “not religious in the normal sense” and he believes that “the universe is governed by the laws of science. The laws may have been decreed by God, but God does not intervene to break the laws.”[62] > **[Stephen Hawking](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Hawking)** > > Stephen William Hawking (8 January 1942 – 14 March 2018) was an English theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author who was director of research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at the University of Cambridge. Between 1979 and 2009, he was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, widely viewed as one of the most prestigious academic posts in the world. > Hawking was born in Oxford into a family of physicians. In October 1959, at the age of 17, he began his university educa... ---
**Author:** ![ataraxy22](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ataraxy22/32/307_2.png) [@ataraxy22](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ataraxy22)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/34 "2011-05-23T02:18:21Z")
The Growing Pains must have hurt so much he just gave up. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/35 "2011-05-23T02:29:53Z")
GIGO: I’ve read that before and it puzzles me. Hawking predicted virtual particles self creating and it was found to be true with the observation of Cherenkov energy. But the laws of physics are set shortly after the big bang, during inflation. There is no gravity before the big bang, right? ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/36 "2011-05-23T02:42:13Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > According to Hawking’s and science’s viewpoint there is a point in time or space where there was no time or space or anything at all; no mass, no matter, nothing absolutely nothing at all. The big bang occurred from which everything else promulgated. No, scientific thought doesn’t say that there was no time or space. It says we don’t know what there was before there was _this_ particular cosmos/universe/reality. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/37 "2011-05-23T02:43:45Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Hawking ignores a cause or a reason or an explanation for the Big Bang. I don’t think simply ignoring that huge question is either satisfactory, or good science or even good thinking. It isn’t “ignoring” something if you don’t have any idea what the answer is. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/38 "2011-05-23T02:50:24Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > There is no gravity before the big bang, right? How would we know that? We have no hypothesis for any of the conditions before the big bang. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/39 "2011-05-23T03:03:23Z")
Only a real dipshit would think, “Because God did it!” is a sensible answer. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2011, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818/40 "2011-05-23T03:10:40Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > No, scientific thought doesn’t say that there was no time or space. It says we don’t know what there was before there was _this_ particular cosmos/universe/reality. As I’ve read about this, including Hawking’s explanations, there is no time and space before the big bang. Universal constants such as the speed of light, gravity, things like pi, space and time are defined shortly after thin Big Bang. The planck increments of time and space are also defined. They are a function of things that occurred during the big bang. There is no time and space before the big bang. There is no such thing as “before.” it’s a meaningless term. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kirk-cameron-schools-stephen-hawking-in-science/582818.md?page=3)