Responding to The Problem of God – Page 3

Does the Bible Really Endorse Slavery and Misogyny? A Response to “Cultural Trust” in The Problem of God

This post is part of our ongoing series examining Mark Clark’s book, The Problem of God, one section at a time. Each post critically analyzes Clark’s claims through the lens of reason, evidence, and The God Question’s core philosophy: we don’t begin with belief—we begin with curiosity. This installment responds to Chapter 3, Section 6: “Cultural Trust: Slaves, Women, and Polygamists” (pp. 78–82).

Cultural Context or Moral Failure?

In this section of The Problem of God, Mark Clark tackles a deeply uncomfortable question: Can we trust the Bible when it seems to endorse slavery, misogyny, or polygamy?

Clark’s answer: You’re reading it wrong.

He argues that modern readers misunderstand ancient culture—and that, when rightly interpreted, the Bible is more subversive than supportive of these outdated norms.

But that defense raises a bigger question:

If a text that claims to be divinely inspired requires centuries of cultural and academic translation just to avoid obvious moral failures… can it really be trusted?

Slavery: Just a Misunderstood Institution?

Clark insists that biblical slavery wasn’t as bad as modern slavery. It wasn’t racial, he says, and often allowed slaves to earn freedom.

But the problem isn’t how bad biblical slavery was. The problem is that a holy book treats it as normal—offering no clear condemnation, only regulations and instructions.

Paul’s command for slaves to “obey their masters” (Col. 3:22) isn’t ambiguous. No amount of historical footnoting can turn that into moral leadership.

Misogyny and Polygamy: Descriptive, Not Prescriptive?

Clark points to the dysfunction of patriarchal families as evidence that the Bible is critiquing—not endorsing—those practices. And yes, the family drama of Genesis is a mess.

But here’s the catch: God never condemns any of it.

Jacob has multiple wives.
Women are treated as property.
Children are bartered and favored like livestock.

If God is using these stories to critique injustice, he’s doing so silently.

When Apologetics Becomes Interpretation Gymnastics

Over and over, Clark asks us to reinterpret difficult passages more charitably. But that’s the problem. If the Bible is God’s revelation to the world, why does it require so much explaining?

Why does the “real meaning” always seem to be just one apologetic step away from what the text plainly says?

A message from God shouldn’t need modern filters to be morally sound.

Final Thought: Shouldn’t a Holy Text Be Better Than This?

Clark wants us to trust the Bible’s moral compass. But when that compass seems to point toward slavery, patriarchy, and gender hierarchy, “trust us—it doesn’t really mean that” isn’t good enough.

A truly inspired book shouldn’t look like every other book from its time. It should rise above.

And maybe—just maybe—it doesn’t.

How Trustworthy Are the Gospels? A Response to “Historical, Cultural, and Personal Trust” in The Problem of God

The Gospels and the Illusion of Certainty

📘 In Chapter 3 of The Problem of God, Mark Clark tries to defuse skepticism about the Bible by declaring the New Testament “the best-attested document in antiquity.” He begins with manuscript comparisons and ends with a claim that the Gospel writers were just too honest to have made things up. But beneath the surface, this section reveals more about apologetics than about history.

Let’s take a closer look.

Manuscript Numbers Are Not a Trump Card

Clark’s opening move is to compare the New Testament’s 25,000+ manuscript copies with the much smaller manuscript bases for works by Thucydides, Aristotle, or Caesar. But this is misleading.

Quantity doesn’t prove reliability.

Christian scribes copied the New Testament because they believed it was sacred. Copying error rates were high. Interpolations occurred. And most early copies come from centuries after the events they describe. What matters more than how many copies we have is how early, how consistent, and how free from doctrinal tampering those copies are.

Early Doesn’t Mean Eyewitness

Clark claims the Gospels were written 30–50 years after Jesus’ death and suggests that timeframe is “early.” But let’s ask an honest question:

If someone today published a story about an event that happened in 1974—with no surviving audio, video, or documents—how would we evaluate its historical accuracy?

Being close in time doesn’t make a source true. Especially when those decades were filled with oral storytelling, theological interpretation, and religious evolution.

Were the Gospels Written to Be Eyewitness Reports?

Clark wants us to believe that eyewitnesses would have corrected errors. But he never shows that:

The authors were present at the events.
The authors had access to eyewitnesses.
The early church even prioritized factual correction.

What we do see is theological shaping—Jesus’ last words differ in every Gospel, Judas dies in contradictory ways, and stories grow in drama and detail from Mark to John.

“They Wouldn’t Include That If It Weren’t True”

Clark tries to bolster credibility by pointing out embarrassing details—Jesus’ fear in Gethsemane, Peter’s cowardice, or obscure names like Rufus and Alexander. But this apologetic tactic is weak. Ancient writers often included such “realistic” touches to build emotional resonance or narrative depth.

These details don’t prove authenticity. They prove storytelling skill.

What This Section Reveals

This chapter reveals a lot—just not what Clark intends. It reveals:

The apologetic impulse to defend certainty at all costs.
A reliance on rhetoric over historical rigor.
A refusal to address what actually undermines biblical trust—namely, contradiction, anonymity, theological bias, and historical silence.

Conclusion

If you’ve been told the Bible is historically reliable because it has lots of manuscripts or includes embarrassing details, it may be time to revisit that claim. Real trust requires evidence, not slogans. And when it comes to the Bible’s origin and evolution, the evidence is far more complicated—and far less certain—than this chapter would have you believe.

Chapter 3: “Are There Contradictions Between the Old and New Testaments?”

Welcome back to The God Question, where we examine religious claims through the lens of clarity, logic, and real-world evidence. This blog series is dedicated to exploring the most influential apologetics works in modern Christianity—one argument at a time. Our goal is not to mock or belittle, but to illuminate. Using The God Question’s Core Philosophy, we challenge faith-based claims with curiosity, courage, and a commitment to truth—wherever it leads.

“Are There Contradictions Between the Old and New Testaments?”

(The Problem of God, Chapter 3, pages 71–74)

In this section, Mark Clark attempts to dismiss a common objection raised by skeptics and ex-Christians alike: that the Bible contains obvious contradictions between the Old and New Testaments. He presents this objection in the form of a caricature:

“Read the Old Testament,” people say. “It says that you can’t eat shellfish or pork, but you do! You get tattoos, and you work on the Sabbath!” (p. 71)

Clark concedes that Christians do, in fact, ignore many of the Old Testament laws—but insists that this is not evidence of contradiction. Rather, he argues, it reflects the progressive nature of divine revelation. God’s commands evolve, he claims, because they were never meant to be timeless. They were issued for specific people in a specific season of salvation history, and those rules have now been fulfilled and superseded by Jesus.

Let’s examine this claim using The God Question’s Core Philosophy—with particular attention to clarity, logic, evidence, and coherence.

1. The Shifting Goalposts of Divine Command

Clark’s argument hinges on the idea that God’s laws were always meant to be temporary. He quotes Jeremiah 31:31–33 to suggest that the coming of the Messiah would replace the old covenant. He also cites Paul’s metaphor in Galatians 3:23–29, which compares the Old Testament law to a “childminder” whose role was to guide God’s people until something better came along.

But here’s the problem: if God’s moral commands change based on the season, then morality itself is no longer objective. It becomes relative—not to culture or human consensus—but to divine mood or era. And if divine commands can shift this dramatically, how can anyone today be confident that current Christian teachings won’t be revoked tomorrow?

Clark tries to sidestep this issue by saying the New Testament is the fulfillment of the Old. But this does not solve the problem—it merely repackages it. The Bible still contains mutually exclusive laws and expectations:

In Leviticus, eating pork is an abomination. In Acts 10, it’s divinely permitted.
In Exodus, Sabbath-breaking was punishable by death. In Mark 2, Jesus says the Sabbath was made for man.
In Deuteronomy, uncircumcised men are cut off from God’s people. In Romans, Paul says circumcision no longer matters.

By any standard definition, these are contradictions in doctrine, practice, and theology. “Fulfillment” doesn’t erase contradiction—it just rebrands it.

2. God’s Moral Character Is on the Line

If the Old Testament laws reflected God’s will, then repealing them later raises serious theological questions. Did God change his mind? Were the original laws flawed? Were they a test—or a temporary system of control? Clark attempts to reframe the tension by calling the Old Covenant a “shadow” of what was to come (Colossians 2:17), but this merely reinforces the critique.

Imagine a human parent who forbids their child from eating pork under threat of death—but later tells a sibling, “Actually, pork’s fine now. Eat as much bacon as you want.” Would we call that consistent moral leadership? Or would we call it arbitrary, contradictory, and deeply confusing?

Clark wants us to view this as “progress,” but if divine morality is capable of being superseded, it’s not eternal. And if it’s not eternal, then God is not immutable.

3. Cherry-Picking and the Illusion of Consistency

Clark acknowledges the embarrassing commands in Leviticus 21:20, such as forbidding men with “crushed testicles” from entering the assembly of the Lord—but he brushes these aside as “outdated” temple codes no longer relevant to Christian life. This is classic cherry-picking.

What standard is being used to decide which commands were for “a specific people in a specific time” and which are binding for all time? The answer, of course, is the authority of the New Testament. But this is circular reasoning:

“How do we know the New Testament supersedes the Old? Because the New Testament says so.”

You cannot defend the coherence of the Bible by appealing to the Bible’s own internal claims—especially when those claims conflict across books and centuries.

4. Jesus Did Not Clearly Revoke the Law

Clark references Acts 10 and Peter’s vision of the sheet filled with unclean animals. But Peter initially refuses to eat: “Surely not, Lord! I have never eaten anything impure or unclean” (Acts 10:14). This suggests that Peter—who walked with Jesus—did not believe the Old Testament food laws had been revoked during Jesus’s earthly ministry.

If Jesus truly intended to nullify the Mosaic Law, wouldn’t he have made that crystal clear to his disciples?

Instead, we find Jesus saying the opposite in Matthew 5:17–19:

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets… Not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law.”

The attempt to dissolve Old Testament commands via post-resurrection visions and Pauline reinterpretation only underscores the fragmented, patchwork nature of Christian theology.

5. Conclusion: Contradiction Repackaged as Progress

Clark’s closing line says it all:

“This is of course far different than contradiction. It is the by-product of maturation.” (p. 74)

But maturation implies growth from ignorance to knowledge, or from crudeness to refinement. That might be fine for a human species evolving morally over millennia—but it’s devastating for the idea of a timeless, perfect, all-knowing God. Why would such a being need to mature his moral code?

The truth is that contradictions between the Old and New Testaments exist because the Bible is not a single, unified revelation—it’s a sprawling anthology of evolving human thought about the divine. Different authors, different eras, different agendas.

That’s not a flaw to cover up with theological gymnastics. It’s a clue.

It points not to divine authorship—but to human invention.

Chapter 3 Response, Section 2: Two Case Studies in Contradiction

This post is part of an ongoing series analyzing Mark Clark’s book The Problem of God, which claims to present a case for Christianity in a skeptical age. Each entry evaluates a chapter or section of the book through a critical, secular lens—applying The God Question’s Core Philosophy: evidence over assertion, logic over tradition, and intellectual honesty over inherited belief. If you’re exploring or questioning Christian faith, this series is for you.

The Preacher’s Excuse

In this section of Chapter 3, Mark Clark tries to explain away contradictions in the Bible by telling a story from his days in Bible college. He recalls noticing discrepancies between the parable of the talents in Matthew 25 and the parable of the minas in Luke 19—stories that seem nearly identical but differ in key details. Alarmed, he approached his professor, who handed him recordings of Clark’s own sermons. Each sermon, the professor pointed out, used the same illustrations in slightly different ways.

The implication? Jesus did the same thing. Like any preacher, he reused parables and adjusted details for different audiences. So the Gospel contradictions aren’t real contradictions—they’re just variations of the same teaching moment.

It’s a clever move. But it’s also a dodge.

The Gospel writers never indicate that they’re recording multiple tellings of the same parable. They present these as historical, eyewitness events. And they differ not just in nuance—but in content, sequencing, and meaning. That’s not literary flexibility. That’s inconsistency.

This section continues with two of the most famous examples.

1. Judas’s Death: A Bloody Contradiction

Clark tackles the conflict between Matthew 27 and Acts 1 regarding how Judas Iscariot died.

Matthew: Judas returned the silver and hanged himself.
Acts: Judas bought a field, fell headlong, and burst open.

Clark’s defense? These are “complementary” accounts. He suggests Judas hanged himself, the rope eventually snapped, and his body fell and burst open.

But this isn’t explanation—it’s imagination.

The texts themselves say nothing about a fall in Matthew, or a hanging in Acts. In fact, Acts directly says Judas bought the field, whereas Matthew says the priests did, using the returned silver. These are not two versions of the same story. They are two conflicting stories.

Apologists often attempt to harmonize by inventing plausible scenarios—but these scenarios don’t exist in the text. If two court transcripts offered accounts this contradictory, no one would claim they “complement” each other. We’d question whether either could be trusted.

2. The Angels at the Tomb: Silent Subtraction

Next, Clark addresses the inconsistency between resurrection accounts:

Matthew says there was one angel.
John says there were two.

Clark insists there’s no contradiction—Matthew simply chose to focus on one angel, while John mentioned both.

But this isn’t how precision works.

Matthew doesn’t write, “one of the angels said…” He writes, “the angel said…”—as though there was only one. If two angels had been there and Matthew had simply chosen to omit one, it would raise the question: why omit half of the divine messengers at the most important event in human history?

This isn’t a minor discrepancy—it’s a detail that calls into question the accuracy of either (or both) accounts.

The Larger Problem

Clark closes by accusing skeptics of applying “a level of precision and perfection” to the Bible that we wouldn’t apply to any other ancient text.

But that’s the point.

Apologists claim the Bible is inerrant, God-breathed, and perfect—not just another ancient text. If the Bible is to serve as the foundation of divine authority, it must meet the higher standard that Christians themselves claim for it.

If it’s just human literature, then Clark’s excuse works.

But if it’s God’s Word, it doesn’t.

Are the Bible’s Errors Overblown? A Response to “Contradictions and Mistakes” in The Problem of God

In The Problem of God, Pastor Mark Clark attempts to calm concerns about biblical contradictions by calling them exaggerated and irrelevant—more the product of internet skeptics than serious inquiry. But brushing aside the issue with sarcasm and misdirection doesn’t make it go away. Chapter 3 of his book, titled “Contradictions and Mistakes,” invites a closer, more honest look—not just at the surface-level examples, but at the deeper implications they raise. If the Bible is God’s perfect Word, why are there inconsistencies at all? This post examines Clark’s apologetic claims and offers a critical response rooted in transparency, logic, and respect for the reader’s intelligence.

Are the Mistakes Just Typos?

Clark argues that the 400,000+ variants in the New Testament are largely insignificant—mere spelling errors or different wordings that don’t impact doctrine. And while it’s true that many variations are minor, what Clark doesn’t mention is that we don’t have the originals. All we have are copies of copies—with no way to verify what the authors of Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John actually wrote.

And yes—some of the variants do matter:

Who was at the tomb? (Mark vs. Luke vs. John)
What did Jesus say on the cross? (compare all four Gospels)
How did Judas die? (Matthew 27:5 vs. Acts 1:18)

These are not “typos.” They’re incompatible eyewitness accounts—right where Christians claim we should see divine consistency.

“Only Two Disputed Passages”?

Clark also claims that only two passages in the entire New Testament are seriously disputed—Mark 16:9–20 and John 7:53–8:11. But that claim is misleading. Those two are the longest disputed blocks, but there are dozens of disputed and contradictory statements throughout the New Testament. They may not be flagged in your English Bible—but they are known to scholars.

Even minor contradictions cast doubt on the doctrine of biblical inerrancy—a core tenet of Southern Baptist fundamentalism. Once you admit that human error exists, the entire foundation of certainty begins to shake.

When Apologetics Avoids the Real Question

Rather than addressing the deeper issue—how can a perfect God allow imperfect transmission of His Word?—Clark spends most of this section trying to discredit Bart Ehrman and skeptical readers. He uses false equivalency (comparing Bible copies to book typos), rhetorical minimization, and selective framing.

But these tactics don’t answer the question.

In fact, they prove why The God Question exists in the first place: when belief is built on certainty, even small cracks must be ignored or explained away.

Chapter 3 Begins: Has the Bible Been Changed—or Just Romanticized?

This post is part of our ongoing series examining Mark Clark’s book, The Problem of God, one section at a time. Each post critically analyzes Clark’s claims through the lens of reason, evidence, and The God Question’s core philosophy: we don’t begin with belief—we begin with curiosity. This installment responds to the opening sections of Chapter 3 (pp. 63–67): “The Problem of the Bible,” “Modern Questions,” and “Has the Bible Been Changed?”

What happens when we stop assuming the Bible must be defended, and instead begin asking whether it stands up to scrutiny?

Mark Clark wants us to believe that skepticism toward the Bible is a modern trend rooted in rebellion, not reflection. But that framing betrays a deeper fear: that when we do examine the evidence, the Bible doesn’t hold up.

Clark starts Chapter 3 with a sweeping defense of the Bible’s accuracy and reliability, tying emotional imagery (like Torah celebrations) to claims of textual consistency. But as moving as these traditions are, they don’t prove the Bible’s divine origin or historical accuracy. At best, they show a deep reverence for a text. And reverence, however sincere, is not the same as evidence.

He argues that the Bible “hasn’t changed in any significant way,” but this claim is misleading. Textual criticism tells another story—one filled with variants, edits, redactions, missing books, and theological motivations behind what was preserved and what was excluded. From the dozens of versions of Genesis to the synoptic problem in the Gospels to the contested authorship of nearly half the New Testament, the real issue isn’t scribal accuracy. It’s the content itself. Is it true? Is it moral? Is it coherent?

Clark’s strategy is to confuse preservation with truth. But even if every manuscript had been copied flawlessly, we would still be left with a book filled with contradictions, moral atrocities, and mythic claims unsupported by archaeology or historical consensus.

So has the Bible been changed? Yes—by translation, by interpretation, by exclusion, and by centuries of theological agenda. But perhaps the better question is: Has our willingness to question the Bible changed? Fortunately, for many of us, it has.

Chapter 2 Summary – “The Problem of Science”

Why Mark Clark’s View of Science Fails the Test of Curiosity

This post concludes our multi-part response to Chapter 2 of Mark Clark’s The Problem of God. In this chapter, Clark tackles “The Problem of Science,” arguing that science not only points to the existence of God but fails to function meaningfully without him. Below is a recap of our critiques and key takeaways, analyzed through The God Question’s core philosophy: we don’t begin with belief—we begin with curiosity.

Clark’s Main Argument

Clark opens Chapter 2 by setting up a false choice between atheism and a divinely created universe. He claims that modern science is not only compatible with Christianity but actually supports it—pointing to Big Bang cosmology, the design of the universe, and the structure of DNA as evidence for a divine designer. Relying heavily on quotes from Christian scientists like Francis Collins and William Lane Craig, he builds a cumulative case that science, properly understood, leads naturally to belief in the Christian God.

Our Critique

1. Science is Misrepresented as Religious Support

Clark repeatedly assumes that invoking mystery or complexity in nature (e.g. the Big Bang, DNA) justifies inserting a divine agent. In reality, this is a textbook example of the God of the Gaps fallacy—an argument from ignorance rather than evidence.

2. Methodological Naturalism ≠ Philosophical Atheism

Clark conflates the scientific method (which limits itself to natural explanations) with a worldview of atheism. But scientists can—and do—hold a wide range of personal beliefs while still using a shared, naturalistic method. The method isn’t atheistic; it’s functional.

3. Design Is Assumed, Not Demonstrated

Rather than offering new evidence of design, Clark simply asserts that complexity = intention. But complexity doesn’t require a mind, and biological evolution already explains how intricate systems can emerge naturally. The analogy of DNA to “language” is poetic but not proof of divine authorship.

4. The Real Problem: Circular Reasoning

Ultimately, Clark’s argument assumes what it sets out to prove. He quotes scientists like Collins and builds theological meaning into scientific observations—but only by assuming that God must be the source of meaning in the first place.

Closing Reflection

Science doesn’t need a supernatural safety net. Its beauty lies in its humility—its willingness to admit what we don’t yet know, and to follow the evidence where it leads. If your god can’t survive honest questions, perhaps it’s not the truth you’re defending—but a tradition.

Rational or Religious? A Response to the “What If I Don’t Want to Believe?” Argument

This post is part of our ongoing series examining Mark Clark’s book, The Problem of God, one section at a time. Each post critically analyzes Clark’s claims through the lens of reason, evidence, and The God Question’s core philosophy: we don’t begin with belief—we begin with curiosity. This installment responds to “What If I Don’t Want to Believe?” (pp. 59–62).

🔍 The Real Problem Isn’t Wanting—It’s Projecting

In this section, Mark Clark suggests that atheists reject God not out of intellectual conviction, but emotional rebellion. He opens by quoting philosopher Thomas Nagel, who once admitted he didn’t want there to be a God—and from that admission, Clark builds a universal theory: unbelief is motivated by desire, not reason.

But Clark’s claim quickly falls apart under scrutiny.

🔹 1. One Philosopher’s Quote ≠ Universal Psychology

Quoting Nagel to prove that atheists in general reject God because they “don’t want Him to exist” is like quoting one Christian who doubts and concluding that all Christians secretly disbelieve. It’s anecdotal, not analytical.

Clark commits the psychologist’s fallacy, projecting inner motives onto others. Even if some atheists are emotionally biased, the same can be said of believers who want God to exist. That desire doesn’t invalidate their belief—but neither does its absence invalidate unbelief.

🔹 2. Motivated Reasoning Cuts Both Ways

Clark warns that nonbelievers may be influenced by motivated reasoning. That’s true. But so are believers.

Many religious people believe in a God who offers:

Eternal life
Cosmic justice
Moral clarity
Ultimate meaning
Parental love

Each of those ideas fulfills deep psychological needs. If we’re going to talk about biased motivation, we must admit that religious belief is at least as susceptible to emotional influence as disbelief.

🔹 3. Morality Doesn’t Require a God

Clark claims that without God, we lose all basis for morality. But this is a false dichotomy. Moral frameworks like:

Humanism
Utilitarianism
Kantian ethics
Virtue ethics

…have nothing to do with divine authority, yet still offer strong arguments for good and ethical behavior. They are taught in philosophy departments worldwide, and taken seriously by thoughtful people—religious and secular alike.

Morality grounded in human well-being is no less binding than morality decreed by a deity. It’s just reasoned, not revealed.

🔹 4. The Conscience Isn’t Divine

Clark invokes C.S. Lewis’s “Law of Human Nature” argument: our inner moral compass is evidence of a divine moral lawgiver.

But we now know, thanks to evolutionary psychology and cognitive science, that humans evolved moral instincts through natural selection. Cooperation, empathy, fairness—these traits help social species survive. There’s no need to invoke a cosmic moral source when the biological one explains the data better.

🔹 5. Honest Doubt Isn’t Rebellion

Clark ends by encouraging nonbelievers to “lay down their weapons” and stop fighting God. But this framing presumes too much. It assumes:

A God exists.
Atheists know He exists.
They’re actively resisting Him.

This is not a description of intellectual honesty. It’s a caricature of rebellion.

Many of us left belief not because we hated God, but because we followed the evidence. We grieved our loss of faith. We wrestled. We studied. And eventually, we found something more real than belief: clarity.

✅ Conclusion

If the only way to defend belief is to psychologize unbelief, then the argument is already lost. We don’t need to fear our doubts. We need to follow them—honestly, carefully, and without presuming the conclusions.

That’s what The God Question is about.

When the Universe Isn’t an Argument: A Response to Clark’s “Astronomy” Section

Clark’s Argument: A Watch on the Beach, a Universe in the Sky

Mark Clark opens this section by invoking William Paley’s 18th-century watchmaker analogy: If you’re walking along a beach and find a watch, you don’t assume it came together by accident. The watch implies a watchmaker. Clark then transfers this logic to the universe: something so complex, orderly, and “fine-tuned” must also have a designer.

To bolster this claim, he invokes the anthropic principle, emphasizing the improbability of a life-permitting universe. He cites physicists who say the odds are stacked against existence without divine intervention, referring to “122 variables” that had to be “dialed in” for life to be possible. He then echoes astronomer Fred Hoyle’s famous remark that “a super intellect has monkeyed with physics,” and concludes with Stephen Hawking’s reflection on the razor-thin margin that allowed the Big Bang to avoid collapse. His final move: dismissing “chance” as an explanation and claiming theism is the more rational option.

Why the Watchmaker Still Fails

Let’s begin with the core analogy. Paley’s watch argument—and Clark’s repackaging of it—rests on a category error. Watches are clearly designed artifacts, shaped by intentional human minds, fabricated in factories, and distributed by supply chains. Universes are not.

We recognize design by comparing an object to natural patterns and inferring it doesn’t fit. But we have no comparative universes to use as a baseline. We cannot say “this universe looks designed” unless we’ve seen one that isn’t. The watch is out of place on a beach—its artificial nature obvious because it contrasts with its surroundings. But there is no “outside” to the universe against which we can contrast it. We’ve never observed a universe not made by a god.

The analogy is emotionally compelling—but logically empty.

Fine-Tuning or Just Being Human?

The fine-tuning argument, central to Clark’s case here, suffers from multiple issues:

Selection Bias: Of course the universe appears “fine-tuned”—we are here to observe it. If it weren’t hospitable to life, we wouldn’t be around to ask why. This is not profound; it’s basic logic. This is the weak anthropic principle, and it’s uncontroversial.
Assuming Intentionality: The argument moves from “it’s improbable” to “therefore, someone meant it.” But low probability outcomes happen constantly. A specific hand of cards has odds of around 1 in 600 billion—but someone always gets one. The existence of our universe doesn’t require a designer, just a universe with observers. That’s us.
Misstating the Math: Clark claims the odds of our universe existing are 1 in 10¹³⁸. But where did that number come from? Probability only works if you know the range of possible outcomes. We don’t. We have no idea how universes form, how many variations are possible, or what the distribution of constants might be. So assigning odds is not just speculative—it’s meaningless.
God of the Gaps, Redux: Clark’s appeal to improbability is a classic argument from ignorance: “We can’t explain this without God, therefore God.” But unexplained is not unexplainable. Ignorance is not evidence. It is simply ignorance.

When Did the Laws Begin?

Clark tries to deepen the dilemma by asking when the laws of physics themselves began. He claims that the “laws” must have existed prior to the Big Bang, or the Big Bang couldn’t have occurred. This implies something outside the natural world—like a mind or designer—must have existed first.

But this question is deeply philosophical, not evidentiary. It’s not that Clark is wrong to wonder when or how the laws emerged. The problem is he treats the question itself as proof of a designer. But cosmology has long acknowledged the possibility that time itself began with the Big Bang. If time is a feature of the universe, asking what came “before” the universe is like asking what’s north of the North Pole.

And as physicist Sean Carroll has pointed out repeatedly, “Laws” of physics are not external prescriptions but descriptions of patterns we observe. They are our models, not floating commandments waiting to be enforced.

Quoting Hawking—But Ignoring the Context

Clark ends by quoting Stephen Hawking to bolster his view that the odds against the Big Bang’s success are enormous. But this is selective citation. Hawking himself did not believe the universe required a designer—and explicitly rejected the necessity of God in multiple interviews and writings. He believed that the laws of nature could explain the universe entirely.

Quoting Hawking’s amazement at the universe while ignoring his conclusion is not just misleading—it’s dishonest rhetoric.

“Chance” Is Not the Only Alternative

Finally, Clark claims that “chance” is a non-explanation, and that theism is more rational. But again, he reduces the spectrum of possible explanations to just two: random chance or intentional design. That’s a false dichotomy.

There are naturalistic frameworks (like multiverse theory, quantum fluctuations, and inflationary cosmology) that offer possible explanations without invoking a deity. These may be incomplete or speculative—but they are rooted in scientific curiosity, not theological assumption.

And in the absence of sufficient evidence, the rational position is not to declare “God did it”—it is to withhold belief until more is known.

Closing Thought

Mark Clark’s astronomy section isn’t about astronomy at all. It’s a polished version of an old argument: everything is too perfect to be accidental, therefore God. But perfection is a perception, not a fact. And arguments from awe are still just that—arguments from awe.

The stars don’t prove God.

They just are.

A Leap of Faith in Reverse: Dissecting the “Evidence of Design”

This post is part of our ongoing series examining Mark Clark’s book, The Problem of God, one section at a time. Each post critically analyzes Clark’s claims through the lens of reason, evidence, and The God Question’s core philosophy: we don’t begin with belief—we begin with curiosity. This installment responds to the “Evidence of Design” and “Biology” sections of Chapter 2 (pp. 56–57).

Mark Clark shifts his focus now to a classic apologetic argument: the design of the universe. He claims that an “anti-randomness” within biology and astronomy points to a cosmic designer. His language is familiar: the universe shows “intentional precision and balance,” and to reject this as chance or luck requires “a leap and measure of faith” that Clark says he “can’t justify.”

But isn’t that just a reversal of burden? Rather than asking whether there’s solid, testable evidence for a divine designer, Clark assumes design and asks readers to justify rejecting it. It’s an argument from incredulity, cloaked in awe.

Let’s break down his central assertions in these two sections:

1. “The Evidence of Design” — Precision, Balance, and a Hidden Designer

Clark tells us there is “a strange and mysterious design” to the cosmos that “points strongly to a designer.” But he provides no actual scientific data—just poetic phrasing. The argument leans heavily on what feels designed, not what proves design.

This is the classic “fine-tuning” claim: that the universe’s physical constants are so precise that life could not exist otherwise. But Clark fails to mention how much this argument rests on (a) speculative cosmology, (b) a lack of imagination about alternative life-forms or universes, and (c) a deep misunderstanding of probability.

To say that life exists therefore it must have been designed is to confuse post hoc reasoning with explanation. It’s like marveling that your birthdate matches your birth certificate, and assuming divine planning is the only possible cause.

2. “Biology” — DNA, Amoebas, and Francis Collins

Clark then pivots to biology, quoting Francis Collins, a scientist who happens to be a Christian. He calls DNA “coherent and information-filled code” and declares that an amoeba contains “enough structured and meaningful data to fill thirty encyclopedias!”

This is rhetorical sleight of hand. The comparison to encyclopedias is a metaphor, not a scientific measurement. DNA contains biochemical sequences shaped by evolution—not messages sent from a cosmic author. Calling it a “language” may work poetically, but it doesn’t mean DNA was composed by a mind. We also “observe the presence of structured, coherent communication” in computer viruses—does that imply divine authorship too?

Clark’s core claim is this: if something looks designed, it must be. But this is the same argument William Paley made with the watch in the sand—and it suffers the same flaw. Nature has had billions of years to evolve complexity without foresight or intention.

What Clark Doesn’t Say

Clark never addresses the evolutionary mechanisms that explain complexity without requiring a designer. He doesn’t mention natural selection, cumulative adaptation, or the fossil record. Instead, he focuses on selective amazement, pointing to complexity and declaring: This couldn’t have just happened.

But it could—and we have mountains of evidence showing how.

Today’s Takeaway

Clark suggests that rejecting a divine designer requires faith. But in reality, the only thing that requires faith here is assuming design without evidence. Awe is not evidence. Metaphors are not science. And invoking a designer when we don’t yet understand something is a long-abandoned move in serious scientific inquiry.

We don’t need a telescope or a microscope to see the flaw in this logic. Just a bit of curiosity—and the willingness to follow the evidence wherever it leads.