Which leading champion of atheism for more than a half-century has changed his mind ar age 81?

Question

He said this...

“A super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature,”


Which well known atheist after using science said this….

"When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics."

Answer 1

Yes, Frank Tipler has officially gone senile in his old age. It's sad really.

Answer 2

Antony Flew, a British philosophy professor and leading champion of atheism for more than half a century, changed his mind and became a deist at the age of 81. In a telephone interview with ABC News (12/9/2004), Flew indicated that a "super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature." Nicholas Wade in the New York Times (6/13/2000) summarized the current state of the affairs regarding the origin of life as follows: "The chemistry of the first life is a nightmare to explain. No one has yet developed a plausible explanation to show how the earliest chemicals of life—thought to be RNA—might have constructed themselves from the inorganic chemicals likely to have been around on early earth. The spontaneous assembly of a small RNA molecule on the primitive earth 'would have been a near miracle' two experts on the subject helpfully declared last year." What is it about the origin of life that has so confounded scientists and persuaded atheists to become deists or theist? Why is the origin of life considered one of the "great, unsolved mysteries of science" (Discover 1993)?

Answer 3

Couple Guesses
Issac Asimov
Stephen Hawking
Stephen Jay Gould

Answer 4

The answer would be Frank Tipler. He is the Professor of Mathematical Physics at Tulane University.

Answer 5

yes-----people often change their minds late in life as death approaches. I don't know the name of this scientist but I believe that nothing ever dies---not really---and we will live again to work out our Karma or "issues" in the next life. It is a great comfort to me to know that two thirds of the worlds population believes in reincarnation, as do I. I don't know about the Laws of Physics but I know that matter/energy isn't destroyed, but just changes forms. Blessings!

Answer 6

Antony Flew

yet consider the logic of Athiesm=you want to tell me the good news about athiesm-well i guess. lets see what could u tell me-"I am an athiest, i believe there is no God-yet i have never entered the spiritual realm, nor have i been everywhere at one time in the physical realm to be sure there is no God so i cant prove what i say is a fact, cant even make it a theory because unless i was God i couldnt be everywhere at once to prove God isnt anywhere in the universe or on earth.

As an athiest I have never died so i dont know if there is a hell of torment forever for rejecting Jesus-who many of us athiests claim never even existed-which is about as believeable considering the proof of history and even are ad calendar.

as an athiest =
I believe the world came by accident with age and more was added on with age so it was created without a creator and more created with time without a creator from nothing because before its creation it didnt exist or it wouldnt have a date of age.

i believe that the first life, came by accident -molecules came together by accident and formed a perfect dna with millions of parts perfectly together, the cell walls were formed on this ameoba and a digestive system all by accident and without a fairy or angel it became alive by accident, and

and then a billion perfect accidents later it turned into a human being all with perfect blueprints to only make that specific species in kind.

actually you are maybe the best comedian that ever lived!

do you have any more jokes to share? what has your non god done for you? He has healed me, saved me, become my best friend, promises me heaven! what does your good news have to offer???

John 3:16 " For God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life."

what could their good news be "For no God exists so your not loved unconditionally, he didnt give anything for you, and we dont know if there is a hell or any place of heavens everlasting life-till we die! is that your good news???

thanks for this question of another ex athiest seeing some of his errors in belief

Answer 7

Nonsense. All this has been proven false years ago. The only super-intelligence in the universe is the one that we, or some other form of life, creates in our future laboratories.

Answer 8

Claim CA115.1:

Design arguments have caused philosopher Antony Flew to renounce 66 years of atheism and admit that the universe is created. Specifically, he was convinced by the complexity of life and the improbability of abiogenesis.
Source:

Yahya, Harun. n.d. The scientific world is turning to God. http://www.harunyahya.com/articles/70scientific_world.html
Response:

Antony Flew's conversion was not to theism, but to a weak deism, a belief that a creator set the universe in motion but has not participated in any way since (Carrier 2004).

Flew's one and only piece of relevant evidence for accepting a deistic god was the apparent improbability of a naturalistic origin for life (Carrier 2004). Flew, by his own admission, had not kept up with the relevant science and was mistaught by Gerald Schroeder, a physicist and Jewish theologian (e.g., Schroeder 2001). He later conceded, "I now realize that I have made a fool of myself by believing that there were no presentable theories of the development of inanimate matter up to the first living creature capable of reproduction" (Carrier 2005). Thus Flew's conversion is, by Flew's own admission, baseless.

Flew remains a deist but calls his belief a "very modest defection from my previous unbelief" (Carrier 2005).

The argument from authority is weak to begin with, and Flew has never been a spokesperson for atheism, much less for the unrelated subject of evolution. Nobody's unsupported beliefs, including Flew's, constitute an argument for or against evolution (nor for or against atheism). Only evidence and logical argument are legitimate reasons to accept or reject any objective position.
Links:

Carrier, Richard. 2004. Antony Flew considers God--Sort of. The Secular Web (Oct. 10), http://www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=369

Young, Matt. 2005. Antony Flew's conversion to deism: An update. http://www.pandasthumb.org/pt-archives/000723.html (Jan. 9).
References:

Carrier, Richard. 2004. Antony Flew considers God--Sort of. The Secular Web (Oct. 10), http://www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=369
Carrier, Richard. 2005. Antony Flew considers God--Sort of; Update (January 2005). The Secular Web (Oct. 10), http://www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=369#January2005-1
Schroeder, Gerald. 2001. The Hidden Face of God: How Science Reveals the Ultimate Truth.

Answer 9

Frank Tipler.
All atheists DO NOT eventually become believers, deluded "Jesusfan." It makes you feel superior to think so, but it is false.

Answer 10

I don't know who it is, and I don't care. One person's change of opinion doesn't change the fact that religion is superstition.

Perhaps being in your 80s makes you go nutty, when you're staring your mortality in the face. Who knows.