Before the Beginning and After the End: An Educational Journey to the Reality of God

By Floyd Ernest Bell Jr. PhD

Before the Beginning and after the End: An Educational Journey to the Reality of God frames an enduring set of questions about Gods nature with the authors memoir of his undergraduate and graduate journey through studies in biology. By pairing his accounts of study and query, Floyd Ernest Bell Jr., PhD, presents a work that is both personal and universal.

Despite the great deposit of wisdom that he encountered in numerous classes, the author continued to carry with him questions that reached out to touch the unknown. Readers of Before the Beginning and after the End may find themselves asking these same questions:

Where does matter come from in the first place?
Was there a beginning? If so, what happened the day before?
How do finite minds comprehend infinity?
All matter occupies space and has mass, but when an organism dies, no space or mass is lost. Thus life is not matter. So, what is life? Would it be defined as the spirit?
What is the conscience? Did it emerge through evolution? Do nonhuman species have consciences? What is the DNA code for a conscience?

Before the Beginning and after the End invites you to step out with the author and to share his educational journey leading to the reality of God. In the course of this exploration, you will find yourself confronted with the questions that push against the boundaries of knowledge and experience and lead to a life-changing encounter with the truth of God

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Dec 8, 2017
• ISBN: 9781973608172

Floyd Ernest Bell Jr. PhD

Floyd Ernest Bell Jr., PhD, earned two graduate degrees in biology from East Carolina University and the University of South Carolina. He has taught both undergraduate and graduate classes, worked in healthcare management and public health, and served in the South Carolina Army National Guard as a brigadier general. He lives in Columbia, South Carolina.

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Copyright © 2018 Floyd Ernest Bell Jr., PhD.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

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ISBN: 978-1-9736-0816-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-0818-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-0817-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017917991

WestBow Press rev. date: 02/21/2018

CONTENTS

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1:   Birth through Kindergarten

Chapter 2:   Elementary School

Chapter 3:   Middle School

Chapter 4:   High School

Chapter 5:   College

Chapter 6:   Graduate School

Chapter 7:   Life from Thirty Thousand Feet

Chapter 8:   Astronomy and the Universe

Chapter 9:   Summary

Postscript:   Letter from God

References

PREFACE

The reality of God has recently been documented through several near-death experiences involving people young and old. Several have reported experiences that cannot be explained absent some sort of divine encounter, as they were able to describe meeting people whom they had never known who had predeceased them. These reports and books describing their experiences are compelling and certainly support the idea that there is some sort of life or spiritual cognizance after physical death.

This text takes a different road to the reality of God. Humankind has been on a journey to study and unravel the mysteries of nature for thousands of years, and the progression of that collective knowledge has exponentially exploded during the past two hundred years. Phenomenal discoveries in biology, medicine, physics, communications, electronics, aerospace, and energy production have propelled modern humankind into a collective mind-set of independence from any supreme being. Many today think that a belief in God is a throwback to the superstition and dependence of an unenlightened populace baffled by the simple, or in some cases complicated, tenets of science. With highly educated biochemists, mathematicians, engineers, physicists, physicians, and computer scientists, modern humankind has tried to debunk an outdated belief in God as an unnecessary support system for the uneducated who cling to the idea of some sort of deliverance from their helpless existence. With the internet and access to all the collective information amassed by all the humans who have ever lived, many highly educated people believe that they have all the answers to all the mysteries of the universe and that if there are any mysteries they have not yet solved, they will solve them soon. This concept of collective human deity is unfortunately becoming more of the mainstream belief among our planet’s most advanced cultures. Many of those supporting these thoughts have discounted the existence of God totally, while others believe that if they know everything, then what can God (if he or she even exists) teach them?

The problem with these highly educated egotistical geniuses is that they fail to follow threads of evidence that fly in the face of their own scientific discoveries. They trace threads of knowledge with a determined zeal if it supports their own purposes, but they often avoid threads that lead to questions they cannot answer. This inability to see the duplicity in their reasoning leads them further and further away from the undeniable scientific support for the existence of God. They tout the wonders of science, particularly the absolute truths of the hard sciences found in physics, chemistry, and math, but they fail to explain the concept of infinity in time and space, and the laws of thermodynamics stating that matter can neither be created nor destroyed. Where did it come from in the first place? and How many times will three go into ten? These are simple questions that despite the collective knowledge of humankind, no one has ever been able to answer. Where did all this matter, including atomic and subatomic particles, come from in the first place? If we must base all our belief in science on the fact that these particles just existed, then is that not blind faith in the unseen and unexplained? An interesting thought, seeing as those who believe totally in science demean others for their blind faith in God. Where does this stuff in the world come from? How did all the elements on this planet, this solar system, this universe, get here? If we can accept that it just was, then why can’t we accept that it was created?

This text will chronicle my journey of educational enlightenment from birth through a doctorate in biology with an emphasis on evolutionary speciation (explained in chapter 6). The journey includes questions asked and answers derived along the way from kindergarten to elementary school, to middle school, to high school, to undergraduate college, to graduate school. All along this journey, I was provided with answers to the mysteries of our planet, our universe, and to some extent life, but for all the answers there were several important questions that were not answered. These are a few:

1. If matter is neither created nor destroyed, where did it all come from in the first place?

2. Was there a beginning? If so, what happened the day before?

3. How many times will three go into ten? How do we, with finite minds, comprehend infinity?

4. All matter occupies space and has mass, and when a living organism dies, it occupies the same space and mass as it did when it was alive. If it lost its life and this did not result in a reduction in space or mass, then that life did not occupy space or have mass, and therefore life is not matter. So, what is life? Would it be defined as the spirit?

5. What is the conscience? Is humankind the only species with a conscience? Was this an evolutionary development? What is the DNA code for a conscience?

The questions created through science far outweigh the answers, and a rational statistical analysis of the possibility that the biodiversity and complexity of the life-sustaining biochemical reactions occurring in our bodies every second of every day just developed by random chance is just too far-fetched to accept.

Join me now and follow one scientist’s journey to the absolute reality of God.

INTRODUCTION

Homo sapiens, the biological nomenclature for a human being. Humankind, the unique species among the more than 1.7 million species of animals, plants, and algae identified on our small planet, third from the sun in our small solar system, in a galaxy we refer to as the Milky Way, which is one galaxy amid the millions of galaxies that make up the universe. In addition to the 1.7 million species of animals, plants, and algae identified, there are millions of species of bacteria and viruses found in the soil, sea, and air. To say that the earth has great biodiversity is an understatement. Humankind’s place in the great diversity of the earth is unquestioned. Man is, to our knowledge, the only species on the earth with the ability to ponder its place in the natural world and to seek answers to the laws of nature.

While scientists have studied natural phenomena for thousands of years, many believe that the earth has been around for billions of years. We have geological and fossil evidence linked with carbon dating to track animal and plant life through various eons, eras, and periods. Paleontologists have speculated that the earth may have been created between 3.9 and 4.6 billion years ago, during what they call the Hadean eon. This led to the Archean eon 2.5 to 3.9 billion years ago, and then the Proterozoic eon from 540 million to 2.5 billion years ago. This eon has been associated with the first multicellular life and sponges. The Phanerozoic eon began 540 million years ago, and continues up to today. Paleontologists begin to describe eras between 540 and 280 million years ago as the Paleozoic era, which is composed of the Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian periods, where life-forms exploded with shellfish, corals, land plants, insects, spiders, amphibians, sharks, bony fish, and reptiles. As part of the Mesozoic era, which ranged from 146 to 245 million years ago, there are three categorical periods. During the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods, the first mammals, dinosaurs, frogs, turtles, and crocodiles appeared. The Cenozoic era was from 65 million years ago until today. This era has been divided into three periods, the Paleogene, Neogene, and Quaternary. During these periods, paleontologists believe, deer, cats, pigs, rhinos, elephants, horses, owls, rabbits, sheep, cattle, whales, bears, mice, rats, apes, monkeys, dogs, birds, mammoths, mastodons, saber-toothed cats, and humankind appeared.¹