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00:00 If you believe the Bible, it took God just six days to create the heavens and the earth,
00:05 less than a week to build the universe.
00:07 If true, that would be pretty impressive.
00:10 Although actually, if you follow the most mainstream scientific model as to how and
00:14 why we're here, the Big Bang Theory, then the initial moment of creation really happened
00:19 in less than one second.
00:21 The singularity collapsed and everything there ever was rushed out, in a cosmic dance that's
00:26 been running now for 13.8 billion years and counting.
00:30 Again, pretty impressive.
00:32 And also, quite a robust argument against what many religions claim.
00:36 Indeed, over the years, decades and centuries, there has been a rivalry between science and
00:41 religion when it comes to working out all the deepest, most fundamental and most profound
00:46 facts of life.
00:48 But while the exact figure of God does change from belief system to belief system, it's
00:53 usually they who can provide the knowledge and reasons we need.
00:56 The buck stops with them whenever there's anything that can't be figured out.
01:01 Which is fine… except for when it isn't.
01:05 This is Unveiled, and today we're taking a closer look at ten massive questions that
01:10 God can't answer.
01:12 Do you need the big questions answered?
01:14 Are you constantly curious?
01:16 Then why not subscribe to Unveiled for more clips like this one?
01:19 And ring the bell for more thought-provoking content!
01:22 Number Ten - What is the true scale of the universe?
01:25 The vastness of space is something that's difficult to fully comprehend.
01:29 It's estimated that there are more than two trillion galaxies in our observable universe
01:33 alone.
01:34 Beyond that, perhaps there are trillions more.
01:37 There are some pretty staggering numbers, including in relation to the total stars,
01:42 planets and even black holes that are out there.
01:44 But why, in general, does such immensity exist?
01:48 And what lies beyond our observable limits?
01:51 In a purely practical sense, physics does offer up some explanations.
01:55 We know that the universe is expanding, and that that expansion is accelerating.
02:00 One of the ways we can be sure of this is through observing redshift in the stars, a
02:04 sign that they're certainly moving away from us.
02:07 In a theoretical sense, there are countless implications, too, including that the universe
02:12 could be infinite in nature, and that if so, an endlessly repeating multiverse is the only
02:18 logical conclusion for reality as a whole.
02:21 Theists and theological views certainly vary in how they approach this.
02:25 The cyclical nature of Hinduism means that it's arguably the most in line with the
02:28 possible endlessness of the universe.
02:30 It's one reason why Carl Sagan famously suggested that Hinduism offers a sense of
02:35 scale that truly "corresponds" with cosmology.
02:39 That said, the general openness of the universe is a bit of a headache.
02:43 Because from a God's point of view, why does it need to be so big?
02:47 And if it does need to be like this, then why are we still yet to find anyone else or
02:52 anything else alive?
02:53 Here, the question bleeds over into the Fermi Paradox; the seeming contradiction between
02:58 the overwhelming likelihood that aliens should exist, and the persistent reality that we
03:03 haven't discovered any.
03:04 It's a major fork in the road for God, with a further question along each path.
03:09 On the one hand, if we were to find aliens, then did God create those, too?
03:14 On the other, if we never find aliens, then again, why is this universe quite so huge?
03:28 Number 9.
03:29 Why are there so many religions?
03:31 One way in which religions can be split is monotheism versus polytheism.
03:36 Monotheistic faiths have one God.
03:39 Polytheistic systems have many.
03:40 Christianity is headed by what followers believe to be "the God", so it's mono.
03:45 Hinduism offers an entire roster of deities, so it's poly.
03:49 The pantheons of Ancient Greece, Rome, Egypt, and Old Norse are further examples of godly
03:55 hierarchies that contain many figures, although often there's a lead god like Zeus at the
04:00 top.
04:01 For some, though, while it's an interesting aspect of human culture, this variety is an
04:06 issue.
04:07 If God really exists, they say, then why hasn't there been a unified message leading to one
04:12 faith?
04:13 Consider that countless wars are fought over religious differences, and it's clearly
04:17 an urgent matter… but one that will seemingly always be open.
04:22 To some degree, religious diversity might be argued as a reflection of God's desire
04:26 for humans to seek them in their own unique ways.
04:29 But still, why would a supreme being create such confusion to begin with?
04:34 If there is an omnipotent and omniscient ruler, then why would such a figure allow for so
04:38 many factions?
04:40 While there's no real physical approach towards answering this question, it might
04:43 be viewed "away from God" as purely a sociological phenomenon that's run and run
04:49 for centuries.
04:50 There are entire fields dedicated to researching the psychology of groups, and perhaps the
04:55 formation and continuation of multiple religions is solely that, just on a momentous scale.
05:01 "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor."
05:11 Number 8.
05:12 Why are there non-God objects?
05:14 At the crux of the matter of God, there's a long-standing philosophical battle.
05:19 Creationism vs. naturalism.
05:21 While creationists, to varying degrees of literalness, believe that God created everything,
05:26 scientists say that everything that exists has arisen via natural forces in the universe,
05:31 without any higher, transcendental power required.
05:34 With that in mind, it's been argued that the presence of any non-God objects could
05:38 be an unsolvable paradox for God.
05:41 Why does anything exist apart from God?
05:44 If everything emanates from an all-powerful being who is perfect, self-sufficient and
05:48 complete within itself, then why create trees, rocks or planets at all?
05:53 The problem is that to do so is to do one of two things.
05:57 Either the act of creating stuff is God willingly risking the ultimate perfection of their own
06:02 state, a move which in itself might suggest an imperfect assessment of the risk involved.
06:08 Or the act of creating stuff is God clearly and for whatever reason desiring to want more.
06:14 Perfection isn't enough, and so it can't have been perfect to begin with.
06:18 To trivialise it down to the oft-repeated comparison of humans and video games, why
06:22 does a person choose to play world-building games?
06:25 For a number of reasons.
06:26 Not least to pass the time and out of boredom.
06:29 So the problem of non-God objects is that anything that isn't God seemingly shows
06:34 that God, if they do exist, was at one stage also looking to pass the time and was also
06:39 bored.
06:40 Which perhaps calls into question their unquestionably supreme state.
06:50 Number 7.
06:51 What happens to the uncontacted?
06:54 In many ways, religious following is a tricky thing to track.
06:57 Mostly because no one person views, follows or even dismisses religion in quite the same
07:03 way.
07:04 From ardent worshipper to casual believer, a devotee of one faith to an identifier with
07:09 many or a refuser of all, there's an infinitely wide scope.
07:13 However, what's clear is that there are some that actually have zero opinion on religion
07:18 at all, because they very literally have never heard of it.
07:22 In most cases, these are members of uncontacted tribes, groups of people that have always
07:27 lived outside of so-called "modern civilization".
07:30 In the most extreme circumstances, there are some who may even be almost wholly unaware
07:35 of life beyond their own community.
07:37 Here, followers of religion, particularly of Christianity, and especially in the 19th
07:43 and 20th centuries, may well have embarked on missionary trips to spread the word of
07:47 their faith.
07:48 For better or worse.
07:49 Nevertheless, there will have been countless people before and still that simply haven't
07:54 heard of God.
07:55 Whichever God.
07:56 And that's seemingly a bit of a conundrum for God.
07:59 Because if knowledge of specific doctrines or deities is essential for salvation or enlightenment,
08:04 according to many faiths, then what happens to those who live isolated from such teachings?
08:09 For physicists, naturalists, many scientists and for anyone who doesn't believe in God,
08:14 clearly this isn't a problem at all.
08:17 And in fact, some might argue that a life free of the knowledge of religion might even
08:21 be enviable.
08:22 But still, while God can seemingly tell you what will happen to those who are loyal to
08:27 them and to those who aren't, the fate of those who are neither one nor the other is
08:31 something that there's apparently no simple answer for.
08:38 Number 6.
08:40 Why is there evil?
08:41 The problem of evil is surely one of theology's most enduring challenges in general.
08:46 In short, it asks why does evil exist?
08:49 But beyond that, it's a potential hammer blow to the nature and effectiveness of God
08:53 overall.
08:54 The problem is that if an omnipotent and benevolent God really does exist, then how can evil continue
09:00 unabated throughout history?
09:02 Why is there cruelty when God should be both powerful enough to stop it and good enough
09:07 to not want it?
09:08 Similarly, there's the problem of hell.
09:11 In much the same way, it asks why hell needs to exist if God is good and supreme enough
09:16 to rise above it.
09:17 And from a different point of view, how can heaven exist for so long as hell does too?
09:22 Shouldn't knowledge of hell be enough to ruin heaven?
09:24 And if you're just not aware of hell while you're in heaven, then how do you know you're
09:28 in heaven to begin with?
09:30 The presence and prevalence of evil in the world is enough for many to lose faith or
09:34 to never gain it in the first place - again, in any God or religion, period.
09:39 And while believers at times argue that evil could be necessary for, say, free will or
09:43 moral growth, the question of why remains one of the thorniest and most controversial
09:48 of all.
09:49 "All of you, you just have to repent and God takes you into his bosom.
09:57 In all the worlds, in all the universe, no other creature can make such a boast save
10:01 man."
10:02 5.
10:03 Where did God come from?
10:05 Particularly in most monotheistic traditions, God created everything.
10:09 At first there was nothing, and then there was something, all thanks to God.
10:14 But here's where it gets a little murky.
10:16 Because if God made all of this, then who made God?
10:19 This is known as the problem of the Creator God.
10:22 And it's another aspect of the divine that appears paradoxical.
10:25 Sit with the issue for just a moment and you realise that it's what's known as an infinite
10:30 regress.
10:31 A situation where a series of circumstances are directly linked and governed by whatever
10:35 comes before and after, continuing on and on forever.
10:39 God creates us, then who creates God?
10:42 And who creates whatever created God, and so on.
10:45 Some believers claim that the counter-argument is simple.
10:48 God is what's known as the "first cause".
10:50 This links all the way back to Aristotle, who figured that eventually there must be
10:54 what he termed an "unmoved mover" - something that affects something else, but is not affected
10:59 by anything else itself.
11:01 For believers, this is God.
11:03 But for those who don't believe, it just isn't possible.
11:06 And ultimately, it is a pattern and problem in almost all major religions.
11:11 The supreme figure or figures don't provide details of how they came to be, almost as
11:16 a default aspect of their existence.
11:18 What's interesting is that here there are problems in science that seem to relate.
11:22 If we take the Big Bang theory as true, then it all makes a great deal of sense, all the
11:27 way up to the very, very first moment of all.
11:30 That infinitely small moment in time in which something really did come from nothing, or
11:34 so it appears.
11:36 For most scientists, whatever happened here wasn't God.
11:39 But there's no universal clarity as to what it was, either.
11:42 "I thought you were the greatest of all the gods.
11:45 Now look at you.
11:47 You have nothing.
11:49 I am the greatest god."
11:53 Number 4.
11:54 Do we have free will?
11:56 God is all-powerful.
11:58 Humans have a choice.
11:59 Can both of these sentences be true together?
12:02 Herein lies the eternal complexity of free will.
12:05 And of course, it's a subject of debate far beyond the religious context.
12:08 But for now, can God say whether free will exists?
12:12 It may be that the answer is no, if the answer is yes.
12:15 If that sounds confusing, that's because it kinda is, but it also kinda isn't.
12:20 Religious texts often emphasise human agency, while also asserting divine omniscience, suggesting
12:25 predestined outcomes known by God or gods ahead of time.
12:30 The question is, if our choices are already known or determined, then is true free will
12:35 even possible?
12:36 It could be argued that free will and God can't exist together.
12:40 If God creates free will and grants it to us, then how free is that will, really?
12:45 If it's only ever what God has allowed.
12:47 On the other hand, if free will is a phenomena apart from God, then God isn't quite so
12:52 godly after all, because they aren't all-powerful.
12:55 The counterclaim often reads that God grants free will to enable humans to develop their
12:59 own character, make moral decisions, and experience the consequences of their actions.
13:05 But from God's position of unrivaled perfection, why bother?
13:08 Or at least, why take the risk?
13:10 Interestingly, it's a conundrum that is, in its own way, bleeding over into contemporary
13:15 science and technology, through artificial intelligence.
13:19 Developers are plagued by questions regarding AI and agency.
13:22 How much should it be allowed to do by itself?
13:25 And how much will it learn to do, whether we like it or not?
13:28 From an extremely simplified perspective, though, if you had the perfect computer already,
13:33 why would you give it sentience and thereby risk it perhaps inevitably ruining itself
13:38 or everything else?
13:40 With AI, at least in the beginning, we are or were the gods.
13:44 With us, and with life in general, God supposedly faced similarly tricky decisions.
13:56 Number 3.
13:57 Why do we die?
13:59 In other words, why create something to kill it?
14:01 Of course, many religions offer the promise of an afterlife as reason enough for the existence
14:06 of death.
14:07 But the likes of heaven, hell, purgatory, Elysium, Valhalla, life after death in whatever
14:12 guise is always a product of faith, first of all.
14:16 Although there are some scientific theories leaning towards a more metaphysical continuation
14:20 post-death, most are more likely to suggest that death is the end.
14:25 That if it's the start of anything, it's the start of nothingness.
14:29 Even beyond it being a transition from here to the ever after, though, the purpose of
14:32 death is often unexplained within many religious frameworks.
14:36 Why do we have life that is temporary when presumably it could have been permanent?
14:40 To some degree, it's a question that pits the existence of God against the science of
14:45 evolution.
14:46 With one Charles Darwin leading the way since the late 1850s, when On the Origin of Species
14:50 was first published, we know beyond doubt that life on Earth is an ongoing process.
14:56 Species come and go, adaptations are made and lost.
15:00 The survival of the fittest rumbles on for so long as Earth exists in the universe.
15:04 Life is an interconnected web in the natural world, and death is a major part of that.
15:10 Why do we die?
15:11 So that we can learn to survive.
15:13 Under the gaze of seeming gods, however, the presence of death still seems a little…
15:17 harsh.
15:18 The natural world shows us that everything continues and nothing can stagnate.
15:23 But if any kind of supreme deity made all of this, then why make it that way?
15:27 Here, where God seemingly flounders, nature takes control.
15:38 Number Two - Why is there suffering?
15:41 Although closely related to the problem of evil, as evilness clearly creates suffering,
15:45 the fact that any one person, animal, plant, group, civilization, even ecosystem can be
15:51 made to suffer in any way is arguably the most controversial, unanswered question of
15:56 all.
15:57 If God is omnipotent, so the argument goes, then why does anything bad ever happen?
16:02 Consider natural disasters, which are also ominously and widely termed to be "acts
16:07 of God".
16:08 Hundreds of thousands of people all across the planet are either killed, injured or displaced
16:12 as a result of what might otherwise be characterized as an arsenal of natural disasters.
16:17 Hurricanes, mudslides, forest fires, earthquakes, tornadoes, tsunamis, volcanoes… there is
16:23 a terrifying array of ways in which circumstances almost entirely out of our control can kill
16:28 us.
16:29 So what gives?
16:30 Why wouldn't God intervene?
16:32 Perhaps because they aren't good enough to want to?
16:35 Or they aren't powerful enough to do so?
16:37 Or they aren't all-seeing enough to notice?
16:40 In general, the existence of disasters is something that God seemingly leaves open for
16:44 debate.
16:45 Similarly, the problem of evil and suffering extends far beyond human beings and the effect
16:50 of the world on us.
16:52 Darwin himself wrote extensively about the sufferings of animals.
16:55 Theorists have long mused over the fact that millions of animals, millions of life forms
17:00 on Earth, are made to suffer by their predators, or again by the elements, or directly at the
17:05 hands of human beings, or indirectly as the result of technology.
17:10 Does a bear caught in a landslide deserve to be there?
17:13 Does a beetle on the path want to be stepped on?
17:15 Does the mouse welcome the hawk?
17:17 In all cases, the animal might be left clinging onto life for hours, even days, suffering
17:23 without option.
17:24 And finally, there's the everyday anguish that our brains can force upon us.
17:28 On the one hand, the human brain is often labelled to be the single most complex natural
17:33 structure in the universe.
17:34 It is unparalleled so far as we can tell, and yet within it breeds depression, or paranoia,
17:40 or desperation, or hatred.
17:42 Our mental contemplation of life is never smooth sailing, but again, why should that
17:47 be?
17:48 Neuroscience has moved over recent decades especially to understand better than ever
17:52 exactly why we are how we are, but God provides only guidance in the meantime, in often wholly
17:58 ambiguous ways.
17:59 Do you believe in me now?
18:00 Me now?
18:01 Yes.
18:02 Yes, I believe in you.
18:09 Number 1.
18:10 What is the meaning of life?
18:11 As with so many of life's other big questions, it's something that might never have a universally
18:16 correct, accepted, or logical answer.
18:19 Why are we here?
18:20 Is there a reason?
18:21 However it was that life came to be, what's the ultimate aim?
18:25 It's a line through which religion as a whole can be roughly split.
18:29 While many, including most Abrahamic faiths, posit that the point of life is to live well
18:33 enough for salvation and to transition into the next life, many others, including Hinduism
18:38 and Buddhism, emphasize the need to break free from suffering.
18:42 In one sense, then, the figure of God does at least provide an option as to what the
18:46 meaning is.
18:47 And yet, the meaning of life still remains an entirely personal, and arguably unreachable
18:51 goal.
18:52 Again, there is no universal consensus.
18:55 Interpretations differ from person to person, creature to creature, yes, but also within
19:00 any one person over time.
19:02 What was the meaning of life when you were a child?
19:05 When you were in your twenties?
19:06 Your fifties?
19:07 Does a 100-year-old consider the question in the same way as a 6-year-old would?
19:11 Your meaning could be, and probably is, very different even than that of your best friend,
19:16 the members of your family, your significant other, your children.
19:19 Clearly, for those who follow a religion, or even for those who don't but do have a
19:24 cultural understanding of what God might be, the quest for the meaning of life may well
19:28 be something you look to a divine power to answer.
19:31 But the evidence shows that we don't have an answer.
19:34 In place of meaning, we have assumptions.
19:37 Interpretations.
19:38 Hopes.
19:39 Dreams.
19:40 Fears.
19:41 A whole range of vague conditions.
19:43 Perhaps that in itself is what makes life really worth living.
19:46 But not even the all-powerful ever truly nails it down.
19:50 We must work in the world.
19:54 The world is thus.
19:57 No, Señor Hunter.
20:00 Thus have we made the world.
20:04 What do you think?
20:05 Is there anything we missed?
20:06 Let us know in the comments, check out these other clips from Unveiled, and make sure you
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