Stephen Hawking: God did not create Universe

There is no place for God in theories on the creation of the Universe, Professor Stephen Hawking has said.

He had previously argued belief in a creator was not incompatible with science but in a new book, he concludes the Big Bang was an inevitable consequence of the laws of physics.

The Grand Design, part serialised in the Times, says there is no need to invoke God to set the Universe going.

"Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something," he concluded.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11161493

FYI this is in the physics and not the religion forum for a reason, by all means discuss the physics involved but please don't turn this into yet another "God did it" "No he didn't" argument.

I don't quite understand his reasoning though (at least not the one sentence quote used to summarize his point in the article I read, lol), where he says that spontaneous creation of the universe is a result of the existsnce of gravity. But the problem is, gravity is a property of matter, and before the big bang there was no matter, so therefore no gravity. I'm sure if I read the book it would make more sense, but that's how it strikes me right now.

There's nothing to go on to discuss the physics of it. What does it mean that gravity is what makes spontaneous creation possible?

Can gravity exist before the earth was created?

Awww, I don't understand physics, i don't understand religion either. But I find rambling works very well sometimes. Can we ramble?

The creation of the Universe (a singularity) was infinitely dense with infinite gravity, before even matter was formed so I don't think it is a property of matter.



Yes, it did.

If an athiest says there is no place for God it must be true.

If a theist says there is a place for God it must be true.

Yup.

Just so I don't look like a complete dumbass, I meant universe.

Compared to the universe itself (and, obviously, the fundamental forces of nature), the earth is a newborn.

That's like asking if life could exist before you were born.

In any case, I can't really find fault with any of the quoted statements.

No one can know what happened before the Universe started, for all practical purposes gravity came into existence at the moment of the Big Bang. It's a bit more complicated, for a time all the various forces (electric, magnetic, strong, weak, and gravity) were one unified force until the universe cooled and they branched off into separate ones. (I think lol)

I know!

But how that disprove god?

He's not disproving God, he's saying God isn't necessary.

The thing is that that's not new (and it doesn't explain the gravity statement), nor is the idea that god isn't necessary, which is what makes me think that he's going further than that.

The only new statement is , which doesn't quite make sense with no further explanation. (at least, i don't understand without further explanation.)