questions of origin for the Atheist
Offline Forgive my ignorance, but I am curious about Atheists' beliefs about the universe. What is a singularity? Compressed matter of infinite density, a mass of infinite gravity? Two problems with the BB that have been bothering me are 1) Gravity existed after the BB; and 2) Gravity is a measure of force (attractive) between matter, meaning particles had to have existed before the BB - albeit packed together in infinite density. Is this correct?
Do Atheists believe in BB thoery, String theory or 11 Dimensional theory (sometimes called 26D theory I think)? I know most Atheists believe in evolution, but what about the origins of the universe?
Sorry if these have already been answered btw.
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Offline A positive, coherent definition would require an actual enumeration of specific capabilities. 'All' runs into those cases where he can't do anything which he cannot undo, and so on, which arise when you try to define such unlimited capabilities. So you are still defining the capabilities negatively - anything which does not give rise to some such contradiction. So he cannot create something absolutely indestructible - he can destroy it, presumably.
This is actually a thread about your beliefs, Bobspence1. Refer to the title "Questions...for Atheists." I'm just worried that you might pull the old "hey, look over there" trick instead of addressing question directed at Atheists. With that in mind:
1. I suggest you read Richard Swinburne's book, "Is there a God." It deals withe the powers and liabilities that God is supposed to have.
2. If God was able to do the logically impossible (LI), i.e. if God was above logic, then it would be utterly pointless to try and argue his existence. I am not saying this is an impossibility (that God is above logic), but I am saying that if you take this road, the debate terminates at "God does and does not exist, simultaneously." That is a logical impossibility of course, but God can (apparently) do anything logically impossible, so God is perfectly able to both exist and not exist. In effect, you have made yourself "half wrong" (he does not exist), or "half right" (he does not exist.) I personally am undecided about logical impossibility. It may be a sensible construct, universally so, it may not.
3. You mentioned contradiction. There are three types of contradiction: a) Explicit b) Implicit and c) Formal. Which one were you referring to in the sentence "So you are still defining the capabilities negatively - anything which does not give rise to some such contradiction" - in fact, what do you actually mean by this statement?
4. The last two sentences are waffle unless you sate what the powers and liabilities are for an "OOO" being. If God can do what is LI and creating something that is absolutely indestructible is an LI, then couldn't God do that? NOTE: Pay very close attention to modus ponens, modus tollens, and the two fallacies when evaluating this conditional.
Virtual particles can become real particles - eg, Hawking radiation from black holes event horizon.
Is that a Wikki moment? I believe it was Hawkings himself that said those particles you are referring to are matter particles going backwards in time, giving them their "anti" nature. If this is the case then they were always "real particles" just temporarily re-located in the fourth dimension. Or were you referring to the "fuzz" emitted from black holes? If you were, you will find this also does not support your "something out of nothing" idea. If I have misrepresented something, feel free to correct me.
I am still waiting for a response to my other posts as well. Have I gotten something wrong again?
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Offline Quote:A positive, coherent definition would require an actual enumeration of specific capabilities. 'All' runs into those cases where he can't do anything which he cannot undo, and so on, which arise when you try to define such unlimited capabilities. So you are still defining the capabilities negatively - anything which does not give rise to some such contradiction. So he cannot create something absolutely indestructible - he can destroy it, presumably.This is actually a thread about your beliefs, Bobspence1. Refer to the title "Questions...for Atheists." I'm just worried that you might pull the old "hey, look over there" trick instead of addressing question directed at Atheists. With that in mind:
1. I suggest you read Richard Swinburne's book, "Is there a God." It deals withe the powers and liabilities that God is supposed to have.
2. If God was able to do the logically impossible (LI), i.e. if God was above logic, then it would be utterly pointless to try and argue his existence. I am not saying this is an impossibility (that God is above logic), but I am saying that if you take this road, the debate terminates at "God does and does not exist, simultaneously." That is a logical impossibility of course, but God can (apparently) do anything logically impossible, so God is perfectly able to both exist and not exist. In effect, you have made yourself "half wrong" (he does not exist), or "half right" (he does not exist.) I personally am undecided about logical impossibility. It may be a sensible construct, universally so, it may not.
3. You mentioned contradiction. There are three types of contradiction: a) Explicit b) Implicit and c) Formal. Which one were you referring to in the sentence "So you are still defining the capabilities negatively - anything which does not give rise to some such contradiction" - in fact, what do you actually mean by this statement?
I was referring to the class of statements about 'omni' power are of the form:
Can an all-powerful being create an absolutely unbreakable object, and also have the capability to break any object? Note each of the 'powers' or capabilities are not logically impossible in themselves, but cannot both be true simultaneously, hence the potential contradiction. Now if you want to preserve the 'all' category, you have to exclude one or both of such pairs of 'powers'.This sort of thing can be extended indefinitely, IOW, there will be whole sets of logically possible attributes which are mutually exclusive across the whole set, ie, they cannot all be true at the same time, maybe only one can be true.
Just pointing out that the 'all' powerful does not define the capabilities in a positive manner. You would still have to somehow provide a way to define which of 2 or more mutually exclusive powers apply.
God is not a coherent concept. Note - This I believe. I also believe it follows from logic, such as I have just given an example.
4. The last two sentences are waffle unless you sate what the powers and liabilities are for an "OOO" being. If God can do what is LI and creating something that is absolutely indestructible is an LI, then couldn't God do that? NOTE: Pay very close attention to modus ponens, modus tollens, and the two fallacies when evaluating this conditional.
"If God can do what is LI", then it is an incoherent concept, and no principles of logic can be applied.
Quote:Virtual particles can become real particles - eg, Hawking radiation from black holes event horizon.Is that a Wikki moment? I believe it was Hawkings himself that said those particles you are referring to are matter particles going backwards in time, giving them their "anti" nature. If this is the case then they were always "real particles" just temporarily re-located in the fourth dimension. Or were you referring to the "fuzz" emitted from black holes? If you were, you will find this also does not support your "something out of nothing" idea. If I have misrepresented something, feel free to correct me.
Anti-particles are still in our space-time. They are just as real as 'normal' particles They can be considered as going 'backwards in time, since QM has a basic principle that particle interactions and trajectories should still be consistent with the fundamental physical laws if 'played backwards'. The curvature of space-time near such mass-concentrations as BH's can make it ambiguous as to which particle is effectively going backwards in time, ie it will depend on the position of the observer.
The idea of the antiparticle somehow always existing in another dimension, is pure B-grade SciFi...
The theory of particle pairs forming at the event horizon of a black hole have the one falling into the BH acquiring negative energy, to match the positive energy of its entangled companion. It therefore ultimately reduces the energy of the BH, so the whole process is equivalent to a particle 'escaping' from the BH.
I am still waiting for a response to my other posts as well. Have I gotten something wrong again?
What have you got right?
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
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The word 'why' is actually a word the English language could completely lose and all it would do would be to force us to communicate more precisely without losing any information.
Compare the following questions
1) Why do birds sing?
2) What is the advantage to evolution via natural selection of a bird singing?
Both questions are enquiring about the same activity but question 2 doesn't use the 'why' word. Question 2 is actually better because the word 'why' implies intent ie its a loaded statement. Why was the universe created almost by definition implies an conscious entity which makes it a poor question in the first place as it makes assumptions of such an entity
The thing is jumbo, all the thread users have already admitted to this. The origin of the universe is an unknown. There's no other way around it. BBT doesn't describe the creation of the universe, simply how the universe as we percieve it was formed. It's an important distinction. As far as I now the furthest we could ever postulate back is 1 planck unit of time (5 x 10-44 s) after the initial event - although I'll gladly accept correction from the more cosmology-wise individuals out there. We don't, and perhaps can't, know anything beyond that point. You won't find anyone here arguing that.
Of course the other problem with this line of argument is the inherent assumption that the universe had an origin or that it was created, that it started somewhere. We don't even know that.
Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss
Then why didn't you just say that? I mean, I already said that we don't know what happened before the big bang, but the descriptions approaching the big bang are all mathematical, so I'm not sure what you're arguing.
Math does really well at explaining physical systems. You haven't really offered an alternative to math that is equally convincing. Plantinga? Seriously? I'm a lay philosopher at best, and I can lay flat his arguments. "Weak" seems inadequate to the task of describing them. But go ahead.
Also, God doesn't just defy scientific description (whatever that is), God also defies philosophical description.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Philosophy obviously employs logic and reason, but you need more than that to have meaningful discussion - the assumptions and propositions to which you apply such tools have to be valid and meaningful. The discussions sholuld also take into account the best current observations and theories from the more rigorous discipline of science, where relevant. Otherwise it amounts to little more than expressions of personal opinion...
I have read and listened to far too many 'philosophical' discussions that fail such criteria to retain any intrinsic respect for the 'discipline' of Philosophy as such, altho certain 'schools' of philosophy and certain individual philosophers do seem to be aware of these pitfalls and are worth listening to.
I was listening to a recent BBC podcast about Logical Positivism and was very gratified to find at least one Academic expressing many of the sentiments I have just described.
My point was not that philosophy is all 'babble', but as I specifically said, it is far too easy to wander off into total fantasy, using terms which sound profound and significant, but are ultimately so ill-defined or obsolete as to render the discussion meaningless. In one sense this openness is potentially a strength, allowing the exploration of all aspects of thought. The risk of vacuousness is the flip side of this freedom.
At some point the ideas need to be mapped into and compared against empirical reality, to see if the free-ranging speculation has come up with something useful...
Logic and reason applied to analysing evidence is really part of Science, once known as Natural Philosophy, but now related to philosophy as tenuously as modern Chemistry is related to Alchemy.
The current idea is that their were two classes of energy in the fireball - gravitational and the other kind - which can be reasonably shown to complementary in an important sense. Gravitational energy is mathematically negative, so cancelled out the other in totality.
So the question is still what triggered the separation, and were those balancing energies somehow existing in some tension within the raw substrate from which the 'singularity' emerged, and so on.
The point is that the issues of energy conservation and balance, and the emergence of matter particles is very much part of the theorizing around the ultimate origin of the BB, but you need science, not mere philosophy, to address the issues at this level.
Specifically with regard to particles condensing out of intense energy concentrations, this is not mere hypothesis, this is observation at particle colliders.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Very clever. Although some other line of reasoning could come up with "What neurological porcesses made that bird sing?" but overall, being specific is very important.
Really? I am curious. If we may digress for a while, where Plantinga answers Mackie on "The free will defence" objection, where exactly do you "lay him flat?"
For those following at home, Mackie recalls an age old "inconsistency" about the nature of God:
1. God is omnipotent
2. God is all-good
3. Evil exists
I personally like the question, "Can God create a stone so heavy that he cannot lift it?"
I'm not sure what you mean by meaningful, even with your description below it. I am of the opinion that constrcutive speculation on topics that cannot rely on O's can lead to both scientific and philosophical breakthroughs - are they not meaningful? The earth is round because someone took the time to pose awkward questions about things that clearly went against scientific understanding at that time. If you don't feel comfortable offering H's and then systematically debating their plausability, then don't. You write beautifully, but I'm not finding you very convincing, unless I am misinterpreting what you are saying. Additionally, this "rigorous dscipline of science" just happens to break down where I need it most, "at the beginning". Is science not meaningful? Should we not bother?
P.S. Is that you in the picture (there is no motive behind that question, I am just curious lol)?
?? Fireball of Zeus? "Other kind" is his wife? So gravity was the first thing produced, or produced the first things? I'm totally lost witht this one.
He caught her sleeping with Isis and told her to pack up her shit, you're out.
Meaningful, in the sense of comprehensible and coherent in terms of current understandings.
I fully agree that the constructive speculation is an essential part of the hypothesis formation and testing which an essential part of science - I said in that same post:
"At some point the ideas need to be mapped into and compared against empirical reality, to see if the free-ranging speculation has come up with something useful..."
I presume you are asking us to come up with and debate H's regarding the origin of the Universe? Are you suggesting I am not comfortable with that?
I have mentioned a range of hypotheses that have been put forward regarding the origin of the Big Bang. Note, again, the BB is not really a theory of the ultimate origin of the Universe - it is a description of what a lot of detailed observation strongly suggests is the history of our Universe after some event whose cause we would be hypothesising about.
Yes.
"The other kind" is all the other, non-gravitational energy, such as kinetic energy of motion, energy in electrical and magnetic fields, energy states of sub-atomic particles. Gravity is something different, physics is still trying to reconcile quantum mechanics, which addresses four of what seem to be the fundamental forces, and Einstein's General Relativity, which addresses gravity.
Nowhere did I suggest that gravity was "produced first". You seem to have some basic comprehension difficulties about these concepts, which are admittedly not easy to get your head around. The ultimate nature of the universe at this level is not something which our brains have evolved to handle. We have to rely to a large extent on the mathematical modelling.
It also isn't so much a matter of one thing 'producing' another, it is about intensely concentrated energy changing state as it expands and falls in density - at lower temperatures and densities other entities, such as some particles, become stable, so some of the energy changes state into such particles.
I used the term "fireball" as a common reference to this state of the universe, filled with enormous energies, typically conceived as being at an enormously high temperature.
However, all that is not directly relevant to the question of ultimate origin of the primeval energy-filled Universe, which is currently assumed, with good evidence, is its earliest known state. This is what any such hypothesis has to 'explain'.
We may get clues as to the behavior of energy and space-time at these enormous energies from experiments at the LHC and similar machines.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Oh my... You mean to tell me that is not what you were doing with BBT? Woweee, um, so "questions of origin for the atheist" was too ambiguous? No wonder people kept posting comments about science when sciene clearly breaks down in the first place with regards to the beginning of their own theory.
So lets start again at the point where I thought we were talking about what created everything, and examine whether I was at all misleading:
If you don't believe the BB created everything, then it is useless as a theory of origin and hence SHUUUTT UUUPPP, or offer something useful. If you do, then "2. You cant explain why" is perfectly logical. I think I have heard enough. I must really suck as a philosopher.
You asked a bunch of questions about the Big Bang in the original post, and have continued to bring it up, even after several of us had already pointed out that the BB is not really an origin theory. Those original questions and your later comments reveal you lack a real grasp of the basic science and nature of gravity, forces, and particles.
It is not that Science 'breaks down', it is that we are getting to a point in time and an event beyond which it may well be forever impossible to gain any knowledge, period. Science does allow us to make at least partially informed speculation about plausible hypotheses, as I mentioned in that post. In the process of analysing these speculations, it is hoped to come up with something which may allow us to test some of these ideas, so Science will continue to explore this area.
To be able to establish the scenario so far back in time as we have, with good evidence, is so far beyond any of the primitive 'creation stories' of any of the old religions, that it would be pretty silly to use anything associated with that sort of thinking as likely to be anything but misleading in giving us insights into ultimate reality.
So its our tentative hypotheses vs. your illogical beliefs.
You beg the issues when you use the words 'believe' and 'created', and ask the question 'why' rather than 'how'.
Of course deduction (alone) is not going to get you to any empirical truth about existence.
At least Science gives some small chances of gaining some insight into this question. Theism is purest unverifiable speculation.
Yes you suck - you are a typical philosopher in this area. Don't feel bad, Platinga sucks too,
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
This is pathetic. Ok, How did the immense energy condense into a "singularity" or vice versa? E=mc2? Involves mass doesn't it? Mass is stuff last time I checked. Infinite mass is infinite stuff. BBT doesn't state where that stuff comes from. Come on man, seriously, you are avoiding any answer at all. Go back and plug "How" into that argument if you feel like it. Doesn't change a thing. This web site should be re-named "the rational non-response avoid-the-issue-like-the-christians-do squad." I give up.
Here's a hint, Jumbo.
I don't really understand it yet either. I might understand it after I take general relativity and quantum dynamics next year. Or, maybe there will be a class that discusses the physics of the Big Bang.
Hehe.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
And you're creating an argument out of nothing here. No-one here is arguing or has ever argued that the big bang is a theory of origin. If you ask most of us what created the universe we'll say "I don't know". Because - we don't. You want an answer to that question and now you have it.
If you want it more direct fine, I'll repeat myself; I don't know how the universe as we perceive it "began", but the big bang is a perfectly reasonable explanation for how we got from just after that moment to the current state of events. I don't have a philosophical position on the creation or origin of the universe because I think that these things are unknowable. Not only that, but to look for these things relies on the implicit assumption that the universe had a beginning. This is an unknown. For all we know the big bang was a transformative event from one shape of universe to another, or any other thing you can come up with. The point is that, because we don't know, we can apply occam's razor and say "we don't know so lets stop making assumptions" - which leads us to using BBT as an idea for formation of the current universe but shrugging our shoulders as to how it all began.
With that in mind, please explain how belief in a creator is a valid philosophical position.
Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss
So, now that you so "cleverly" "exposed" the fact that we don't know everything about the universe, care to explain why the god (probably of the bronze age desert tribe flavor) you want to fill that gap with is an "answer"?
Try this article for one of the ways of explaining this.
Or this one.
Now I will freely admit that we may well have no way of knowing whether these ideas actually match the reality.
But here is something you also don't seem to be considering in your attempt to put scientific cosmology in as ignorant a position as Theism:
There are at least two conditions which would make it valid to say we do not know how or why something happened in any situation:
1. We cannot come up with any plausible explanation;
2. We have many plausible explanations, but no way to know which one actually corresponds to the actual event.
You should acknowledge that these two states have very different implications for your argument...
All we have to do is describe at least one 'explanation' that is coherent and consistent to trump the vacuous 'GoDodIt', even if we cannot prove if it is true.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
That's beautiful...
Respectfully,
Lenny
"The righteous rise, With burning eyes, Of hatred and ill-will
Madmen fed on fear and lies, To beat and burn and kill"
Witch Hunt from the album Moving Pictures. Neal Pert, Rush
I'm still waiting on a response to platingas free will defence. Too hard for you all?
So you dont understand it, yet you believe it happened. Good. Thats what I believe about God.
The evidence you offer is not evidence. Good. Thats all I can offer about God, speculation.
Just so we don't go bacwards from this point:
No more questions than your own theory raises, even though you didn't even undestand those questions until I forced you to ask them. The facts you refer to are not facts about the beginning, my friend, the beginning is an extrapolation of the observable facts.
Good to see you can admit you were wrong. I'm getting to the second half soon.
Really? What are your beliefs? Nothing? The BBT? Dont get me started. All you have offered is rhetoeric.
It was stated earlier that the universe contains energy. It was also stated earlier that energy cannot be destroyed. This however, is completely inconsistent with the link that bobspence1 provided. This means one very important thing: The universe is a contingent anomaly.
Taylor makes the distinction between a contingent and natural truth. Does anyone know what this distinction is?
EDIT: Oh, and to lighten up the mood a bit: How many philosophers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? We dont know, they are still debating it. Aha ha ha ha...
That is not what I said, and doesn't follow. We have several broadly understandable possibilities, based on extrapolation from current knowledge in the physics of particles and energy, etc, we just have no way of knowing, at the moment anyway, which if any of these actually applies.
When you say I "believe it happened", what are you referring to? The BB itself? We know, with a high degree of confidence, based on observation and calculation, that the BB did happen. We don't know what triggered it, but we have some plausible broad scenarios. This does not remotely correspond to your belief in God, AFAICS.
Did you really understand my last post, where I pointed out the distinction between something beyond understanding, and something which we understand could come about by any of several different processes, but we aren't able to determine which. We don't know what caused that Airliner to crash into the ocean - that does not mean it is mysterious in the sense that God is...
You mean those articles I linked to? They weren't meant as evidence for the naturalistic origin of the Big Bang, if that's what you were thinking of, rather as evidence that the point you had a problem with, namely where did all that energy come from, is not such a fundamental problem.
That is purely your uninformed opinion, my friend - you have amply demonstrated you lack anywhere near enough grasp of fundamentals of physics and cosmology to be competent to debate this point.
You demonstrate this again later in this post when you refer to one of those links I provided.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
First of all there is no Atheist Big Book of Answers that give us a party line that we all agree to accept as "gospel". As has been pointed out in this thread and many, many other times in many, many other threads, the only true common thing all Atheists share is a lack of belief in your or any deity.
This "Atheist" doesn't believe in the concept of "origin". There is no actual beginning. No matter how far back you go, there was time before it. No matter how far you go into the future, there will be time after it. Time, as I understand it, is infinite, period.
"Why" is an irrelevant concept that the human mind tries to attach to what it doesn't understand. It's our big brains trying to make sense of our surroundings. As far as origin is concerned there is no why. Everything has always existed, in one form or another. And will always exist, in one form or another. Personally I think of our universe as like a small "corner" of an infinite ocean that has always existed. Our evidence of whats commonly called the BBT is just the latest expansion, or rising of the tide of matter and energy into this "corner". At some point everything will again collapse into a small area and back again forever, on and on. You could also look at it as similar to winds forming weather by high pressure areas flowing into low pressure areas and so on and on. I was happy to see some really smart person positing a theory of something very similar in some magazine I was reading this past year, maybe Scientific American, I don't recall now. In any event, Why is irrelevant and meaningless no matter how much you want to attach it to what you don't understand.
As far as all those "interesting", exotic theories and such like singularities and string theory and multiple universes and other such nonsense that really super smart people come up with to explain shit. It's all mental masturbation with and without math as far as I'm concerned. But then again I'm not far removed from the frozen caveman lawyer...
Respectfully,
Lenny
"The righteous rise, With burning eyes, Of hatred and ill-will
Madmen fed on fear and lies, To beat and burn and kill"
Witch Hunt from the album Moving Pictures. Neal Pert, Rush
Another avoidance. Gee you're good at that. How about answering my questions in that post. FYI I studied astro-physics and can give you a list of authors larger than your IQ. I can also link websites I googled and pass them off as something I know or have studied, like some people I won't mention. Whether you believe I actually have done what I said I have done (for example, I have an HD in Theories of Human Nature, but that is giving too much away). Attacking my credibility does not answer continue debate, in fact it shows you are losing ground. If I have misunderstood your linked article, I am all ears. Notice how I'm referencing the links you provide, and quizzing you about them? To which you reply, "I just don't know..." I might add. Once again, well done for the no-response squad. I sometimes wonder why I bother...
It's frustrating when people continually avoid a response - even more frustrating when responses are provided that don't answer the question, or admit a fallacy. For this reason (as in, I actually provide one), I will not post again untill someone - i don't care who - answers my questions adequately. If you can't, say so. Admit you have no idea about origin, but stop hiding behind LIT101 ol' faithfull polly talk.
"several broadly understandable possibilities" - If I talk enough, hopefully I'll get something right
"we just have no way of knowing" - I don't know what I mean when I talk
"knowing, with a high degree of confidence" - educated guess
"We don't know what triggered it" - i can't answer your specific question about origin
"(links) weren't meant as evidence for the naturalistic origin of the Big Bang" - what the hell, he read my link and found me out. Damn.
"you have amply demonstrated you lack anywhere near enough grasp of fundamentals of physics and cosmology to be competent to debate this point" - I am losing. I better insult his intelligence in case anyone believes him instead of me.
So long.
BTW, love the evidence for that last one, phew, a real mind blower - "You demonstrate this again later in this post when you refer to one of those links I provided" - great explanation of where I went wrong.
If you and I were to walk through a forest and happen upon a glowing, yellow sphere, and I ask "what is this sphere? Why is it here?
You reply, "it has always been here."
Now suppose we walk a bit further, and stumble upon a train carriage, and I ask "Why is that train carriage moving?
You reply, "Because the carriage in front is pulling it."
To which I ask "and why is the one in front moving"
You reply, "Because it is being pulled by another carriage"
I ask, "What is pulling the carriages?
and you reply "Don't be daft, there's just carriages all the way down"
Is an answer of infinite duration (of the universe) really an answer? Simple yes or no will do.
While I have time I might post something on Occums razor:
Occums razor (the rule of simplicity) states that you should not multiply hypothesis beyond necessity. If the aforementioned are not competing theories, then the God hypothesis is not an H multiplied beyond necessity, since there are no competing thoeries to which it is multiplied beyond.
A little exercise in hypothetical syllogisms:
If BBT is not competing with creation as an hypothesis of origin then BBT must adequately explain the creation of the universe
If the BBT adequately explains the creation of the universe then you could adequately explain to me how it created the universe
You cant explain how (or why)
---
it is not the case that BBT is not competing with creation
Given by:
IF p THEN q
IF q THEN r
NOT r
-----
NOT p
= VALID.
Its up for discussion of course.
You really do seem to have a comprehension problem, and serious lack of logic.
"If BBT is not competing with creation as an hypothesis of origin then BBT must adequately explain the creation of the universe"
That does not seem to be a valid logical statement. If BBT is not "competing as" a hypothesis of origin, it is because it is NOT a hypothesis of origin, as we keep trying to get through to you. Therefore to assert that BBT "must adequately explain the creation of the universe" is explicitly inconsistent with the first part of the statement, unless you consider "explain the creation of the universe"" to not be what a "hypothesis of origin" is trying to do, which I would find difficult to make sense of.
How many times do we have to tell you that the BBT is NOT a theory of the ULTIMATE origin, as in the "creation of", the Universe - it is a model of how the currently observed universe emerged and developed from the state of extremely concentrated energy about 10-37 seconds after 'time zero'. The assumed sequence of events is not well-defined until about T = 10-15 sec, after the proposed 'cosmic inflation' phase.
Or are you still asking us to explain how electrons etc condensed out of the cooling energy? Do you consider that part of the "creation" process?
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
I'm studying physics at the University of Washington, Seattle.
Did you/are you attend(ing) a college? What classes did you take? Mechanics, electromagnetism, general relativity, quantum mechanics, etc?
Aww, that's so sweet of you. Alright, show me a couple. Give me a list of about, say, five books.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
Not to sound all "Me! Me! Me!" here, but I answered that I didn't believe the BBT was a theory which explained the origin of anything. I've been honest enough to say "I don't know" (so has everyone in fact but you keep ignoring that) and that I don't know if we'll ever find out the nature of the beginning of the universe (if it had a beginning). So, Jumbo, how about you answer a simple question I put to you a couple of posts back - "Why is belief in God a valid philosophical position?". As you've studied philosophy and astro-physics I'm sure you have a credible answer.
Forget Jesus, the stars died so that you could be here
- Lawrence Krauss
Yes...
Respectfully,
Lenny
"The righteous rise, With burning eyes, Of hatred and ill-will
Madmen fed on fear and lies, To beat and burn and kill"
Witch Hunt from the album Moving Pictures. Neal Pert, Rush
Well, let me try to answer this guy's question(s).
First, about gravity: It is my understanding that gravity, as the force massive objects (objects that have any mass) apply to space-time, is stronger than the expansive force of the universe, but is demonstratively weaker than the strong and weak nuclear forces and electromagnetism.
Are you referring to a gravitational singularity? If you are, then it is the typical result of matter collapsed upon itself to form a black hole, which, hidden by the event horizon, contains the singularity.
If you are referring to the singularity proposed as existing before the Big Bang, then it is different from the types of singularities that exist in the universe today. It is different, because the universe did not exist, therefor space-time did not exist and neither did any recognizable particles. Further, the four fundamental forces are supposed to have existed as one and therefor did not exist in any way we would recognize. The singularity proposed is not comparable to singularities that exist in the universe; it is fundamentally different, containing all of the energy that would, during the Big Bang, coalesce to be all that exists in the universe, including matter and all those subatomic particles and everything that exists (which all are different forms of energy).
There is a small problem with asking questions about that singularity, however; it existed before the universe. It is only possible for us to trace the universe's existence back to its inception. We can speculate about what happened before that, based on extrapolation of the events that followed, but as far as I know and understand, it would be practically (literally in practice) impossible to investigate further back than that empirically. All we may ever have as knowledge of the universe's origin could be those events that occurred at 10-43 seconds.
Similarily, I do not believe in either String theory or 11 Dimensional theory (What is 11 Dimensional theory? Are you referring to Supergravity or M-theory?). As far as I know, there is no presently accepted grand unified theory and neither String theory, Supergravity nor M-theory are really grand unified theories.
I had stated that I don't know why you asked the question like that. It is because your question seems to imply that a choice must be made between the theories. As far as I know, neither String theory, Supergravity nor M-theory are mutually exclusive of the Big bang theory. I understand that String theory, for instance, would be necessarily compatible with Big Bang theory.
About the origins of the universe, I do not know. What I know is as much as any person can presently know: that the universe exists and that we have evidence up to and including 10-43 seconds after its inception that it existed and that the extant properties of the universe began to emerge at that point in time. I do not know how the universe began. It currently appears as though the properties of the early universe (and those conditions which existed before its inception, such as the absence of space-time and the extant properties of the universe) will forever prevent us from gaining direct insight of it before its inception and perhaps before the Plank epoch.
1) Evidence is collected.
2) An explanation of the evidence is put together. (For conciseness, let's just include in this step the rest of the scientific method and say that the explanatory model, the theory, has been shown to have those qualities necessary for it to be acceptable.)
3)I can explain exactly why I believe the Big Bang theory to be true. The Big Bang itself, however, is true regardless of my belief. It is something that happened. The theory is merely the best explanation of that.
That should clear this up, right? No one knows how the universe began. No one even knows that the universe even had a beginning. Certainly, in it's present state, there was what we perceive as a start. It is, however, not certain that the previous state had to have had a start. It may not have at all. We just don't know. No one presently knows.
I fail to see how this has to do with god-belief or the lack of god belief though. If I see where you're going with this correctly, and it seems obvious through rest of the thread that you'd like to take the spin I'm thinking of, then I don't see how ignorance of the origin of the universe should lead to god belief being as valid as ignorance. Those who propose not to know, do not necessarily propose any explanation at all, except perhaps some hypothetical. Those who propose that a god is the origin of the universe have offered an explanation and that explanation requires evidence and a referrent for this god and the god requires an explanation of its origins and it all must necessarily be coherent and meaningful. So, again, I don't see how this has to do with god belief or the lack of it.
By the way, do you have a god belief? If you do, you should guess at what I'll want to know next. I'd hate for you to get away with any more intellectual dishonesty.
BigUniverse wrote,
"Well the things that happen less often are more likely to be the result of the supper natural. A thing like loosing my keys in the morning is not likely supper natural, but finding a thousand dollars or meeting a celebrity might be."
'God' does not qualify as a hypothesis of the ultimate origin any more than the BBT does.
It merely inserts something for which we have far less evidence (if any) than for than the BBT, an entity which is ill-defined, and which still requires an explanation of its own origin.
There is no logical requirement that any event have a identifiable 'cause'.
At the quantum/Planck scale, causation is problematic. All that seems to be necessary for some event to possibly occur, is that it does not require a violation of mass/energy conservation greater than a certain very small amount for a very brief time interval. The larger the violation, the shorter the time for which it can persist. The actual timing of such events appears to be as purely random, effectively uncaused, as can be measured.
The Uncertainty Principle means that we cannot measure directly or indirectly the precise energy state of any particle, only the probability that it is has any particular state. This includes the state of zero energy, so the minimum state of energy of anything which actually exists is not absolutely zero, but has a finite probability of temporarily occupying any energy state, but with rapidly diminishing probability for states further away from some particular level, which represents its current 'effective' state. So there seems to be an ultimate 'twitchiness' in even what we would consider empty space. This is what allows the possibility of effectively 'spontaneous', 'uncaused' events.
If there is some physical situation, such as an 'unstable' atomic nucleus, which only would require a very small 'kick' of additional energy in the right direction to overcome the forces holding it together in its current form, then the fundamental energy uncertainty means that there is a finite probability that it will temporarily acquire sufficient energy to kick out one or more particles or photons and change state to something more stable.
This is 'radioactive' decay, which is probably the most well observed and measured manifestation of quantum 'randomness'. The probability of any specific nucleus decaying is a constant value, unaffected by any external conditions, apart from direct collision with another particle, as in nuclear fission. The precision with which we can measure this probability, which is expressed as the time interval which would allow a 50% probability of decay, or 'half-life'. Because there are such a large number of atoms in even a few grams of matter, this value can be measured very precisely, even for very long half-lives, which is what makes radiometric dating so useful. I use this as very strong evidence of the validity of this whole quantum 'randomness' argument.
I am not saying we have anything remotely like a detailed theory of the origin of the original 'singularity', but the idea that such an event would require a specific 'cause' in the traditional sense, is simply not true, according to what we have come to understand from Quantum Theory, one of the best validated theories of Physics. Even if we don't have a comprehensible qualitative grasp or mental 'picture' of what it 'means', or what is the underlying 'reality' behind it, or even if it possible for our minds to really 'understand' at an intuitive level the nature of reality at that fundamental level, the mathematics tying the observations together in a coherent framework 'works' extremely well in predicting the behavior of the ultimate elements of matter and energy.
Now what 'caused' that 'twitchy', not-quite-empty space (or space-time) to 'exist', is the question. One speculation, mentioned by Thomathy, is that it came into existence with the singularity itself, and that that event was the 'beginning' of time itself. Relativity already has shown that time is not a simple constant universal progression.
Any hypothesis of ultimate origin has to show a progression from 'nothing', or as close to nothing as anything can be, up through more substantial 'stuff', entities, particles, agglomerations of particles , whatever. It may never be possible for our very finite minds.
'God', even if it could be defined in some coherent way, would merely be something to be explained, not an explanation.
EDIT:
Now you maybe could identify 'God' as the original 'twitch', but that logically entails none of the infinite, sentient, all-loving, and other attributes traditionally applied. Everything we have studied points to 'sentence' requiring very complex structures and processes, like brains and nervous systems, the very opposite of the raw impulse of an original 'twitch'.
For any variation of the First Cause argument, all those attributes have to be separately argued, even if you ignore the fundamental 'what created God' refutation.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
?
What? You think you caught me in some sort of contradiction or something? What point were you trying to make by copy-pasting two comments (who were only separated by ~50 posts) together like that? Either you have a severe reading comprehension problem, or just a comprehension problem. Maybe you are high when you post?
Really? Because you don't seem to understand astrophysics. Why would a list of authors (of what exactly?) impress anyone? If I wanted a list of authors, I would just go to the ADS, big deal.
Ok, now I am curious. What exactly is an HD in theories of human nature, and how does one go about getting one of those? Is it something pathetic like a "degree" in homeopathy? Is it something divorced from reality like theology?
None of my arguments refute the idea of a finite, but very powerful, intelligent entity, either within our Universe, or even within some parallel universe, or perhaps the 'meta-verse' within which 'universes' arising from separate BB events exist.
Such an entity within another 'universe' or 'meta-verse' could even have set up our particular BB singularity.
Note though, that this entity still has to have arisen from some ultimate original event or state - it cannot logically be THE Creator.
And the need for separate arguments and evidence for its existence and nature still stands.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Good good. I like your last two posts bobspence1, a lot more accurate and generally more relevant to the topic I think.
I am getting confused between the whole belief thing, as in you guys have none, right? And are only providing evidence for the BB not as an origin theory, but an extrapolation of data on what we know at this point in time about.. well, "possible inception", I guess?
If that is the case, my quasi-argument, mutatis mutandis, still stands:
1. You believe nothing (there is nothing to believe)
2. You can't explain why (follows from not having a theory in the first place)
So the BBT is not a theory of ultimate origin.
Objections based on statement 2 then, only leaves two competing hypothesis, atheism vs. theism, or "there is nothing to believe" vs "there is something to believe", or 'to believe or not to believe."
So i quess my next question is, what is it about theism that you believe makes it less plausible than, well, nothing?
Do atheists believe in the Law of excluded middle and the rule of sufficient reason?
BTW, I am eagerly waiting a response to Platinga's response to Mackie's response to the free will defense proposed by Theists. Or should I consider your previous statements mere rhetoric?
God is not a valid theory of ultimate origin either , since 'God' is not an minimal 'thing' like the least possible amount of energy in 'emepty' space, which is the most that is logically and scientifically plausible, especially if imagined as anything remotely like the infinite sentient creator being. That is what makes theism less plausible than going straight from 'Ultimate Origin' to Big Bang.
IOW, even if there is a 'God', you have something even harder to explain than our universe.
Observations and theories in the quantum realm suggest that something from nothing is not necessarily impossible, although it may jsut be that the 'nothing' is some lower level of 'reality' we have yet to be able to measure.
Theism, at best, only inserts an additional step between the ultimate origin and our Big Bang Universe.
The 'Law of excluded middle' only applies to situations where, by definition, there are only two possible states, such as the existence of an object and its non-existence. So there may be a God, or no God, but there also may be a whole range of 'possible' other entities with different attributes, which such a 'Law' really does not help us discuss.
'The rule of Sufficient Reason' is an obsolete, simplistic concept, since we know from quantum and chaos theory, that the ultimate 'cause' of any event may be infinitesimal, or the pure random confluence of several varying environmental conditions being at some particular levels, or crossing some threshhold, or whatever. The 'sufficient reason' for any particular event is something to be empirically ( ie scientifically) investigated, rather than a a 'rule' to be applied.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Careful. There's only one thing you can categorically state about atheists: we don't believe in god. Some atheists have some pretty outlandish beliefs. (Check out Luminon's posts, for example. He is an atheist, though he is labeled a theist. He doesn't believe in god, but he believes some pretty far-out things.)
Many of us believe the universe is observable, consistent, and coherent. The first two assumptions provide the basis for empiricism. The last provides for the deductive power of the testing of hypotheses. The three together provide the basis for the epistemology of science.
So, it would be faulty to assume we believe in nothing. I, at least, believe the universe is observable, consistent, and coherent.
BBT isn't a theory of inception, but development. It doesn't describe the origin event; it describes the results of the origin event, the developmental process that took place between a few femtoseconds after the origin event to the present.
It isn't "possible inception;" it's "probable development."
There are many things to believe. If you take existence at face value, there are several things you can believe: that your experience is an interpretation of objective existence, for instance. I certainly believe in objective existence, though I can't prove it. The alternative is solipsism of any sort. And by "any," I mean "any and all." There's nothing you can say about the nature of experience or reality if you assume the two are divorced. So I assume I experience objective reality (though I may be a biased observer).
But there's no way to prove it.
The same is true of the origin event. There may very well be an objective beginning of the universe, an actual event. Our only data, and our only hypothoses, all lead back to some kind of event preceding or even causing the Big Bang. But, lacking a decent, workable model, we can't assign a probability to any of the competing origin hypotheses. We can provide relative probabilities, like, "The origin event was more likely a naturalistic event, rather than a plan implemented by a deity," but that's about it.
That said, there are a few competing hypotheses. There are a few brave folks who are willing to attempt to model the universe asymptotically back to the origin. At the moment, though, we lack the data necessary. We may one day have the data required, but right now, we don't.
Not quite. There may or may not have been an objective origin event, but if the BBT is the correct model of reality, there was some event. We can be sure that something happened. It's just unknown at this time what that "something" might've been. This is no different than finding a body with a bullet through the head. You can be sure someone fired the bullet, but you can't know who without further data. All you know is that someone died, and was shot.
Neither atheism nor theism are hypotheses. An hypothesis must be testable. As the existence of god is as yet untestable, it is not a valid hypothesis. This leaves atheism as the default assumption.
Your assumption of nothing is incorrect, and so any conclusions drawn from that assumption are faulty.
The assumption that god exists and influences the universe automatically means that god would leave some trace. So far, reality is amenable to empirical study. It seems to be observable, consistent, and coherent.
If god existed and influenced the universe, you would lose both consistency and coherency, as its influence would not be naturalistic, by definition. If you assume the deist position, that god set the universe in motion and otherwise does not interfere, you are merely ascribing the origin even to a non-intervening god. You'd have to ask, "Is god necessary? Why?" Most theists seem to think the universe is too complex to be natural; yet they are willing to accept a deity that would be far less explicable than the universe.
So, basically, these are the things that make a naturalistic universe more plausible than a deity:
1. We observe a naturalistic universe.
2. The universe exhibits no signs of supernatural influence.
3. The origin of the deity is much harder to explain than the origin of the universe.
4. There is no current need for a deity. If you accept that we simply don't know everything about the universe yet, the deity is obviously a vain attempt to paint over ignorance by introducing divinity. Unfortunately, that leaves us ignorant of something which we have no hope of explaining or discovering.
I've never heard of Platinga, but I'll read up on him. I must warn you, though, that I find philosophy to generally be nothing more than intellectual masturbation -- fun, but fundamentally unfulfilling.
[EDIT addendum]
Nevermind. It's all about the "problem of evil," which I've felt was at most a minor irritation to theology, rather than a full-on problem. Theology has much bigger problems than the problem of evil.
If you'd like me to take on his rather bizarre take on the problems of naturalism, however, I'm perfectly game. Suffice to say, the more realistic our interpretation of reality, the higher our survival probabilities. His examples to the contrary are stupid and contrived.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
Platinga's 'argument, at best, merely demonstrates the truism that any natural mechanism of perception can't be perfect, that it may 'misfire' under some circumstances.
To go on to suggest that a mechanism that more closely matches reality in situations most likely to impact the animal's survival is not generally more likely to be successful, and therefore be selected for by 'evolution', which is 'all' that naturalism needs to claim, is being deliberately obtuse, and very contrived, in a effort to shore up and paper over the irrationality and illogic of his theological assumptions.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
"Obtuse." Perfect.
I've noticed a general trend towards a meta-argument for god: that science, logic, and intellect can't work without god. One of my first interactions on RRS was with a bloke who was building an argument that language and logic are unworkable without assuming god. It was an enjoyable exchange that unfortunately ended too soon, as it was my first-ever interaction with an intellectual theist. There haven't been any since to match him here on the forums. I learned a bit about modern philosophy (rather than simple classics like Plato, Sartre, and of course, Hume).
It seems that modern theological philosophers are attempting to usurp science (the epistemology) from its secular foundation by claiming that logic/science/communication/what-have-you is unworkable without god. I've never quite grasped the essence of their argument. God is unnecessary. An observable, consistent, coherent reality provides objective logic more parsimoniously. I must be missing something.
In any case, Plantinga's arguments against naturalism seem to be of the same family. He is wondrously ham-handed, and demonstrates a deep and abiding ignorance of basic evolution, but it appears he's attempting to add to the "science is possible only through god" school of apologetics.
Not that I'm attempting to derail this thread. This is an aside, a parenthesis, a note on a senseless trend I see in modern apologetics.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
When theists state that I believe in nothing, I feel like they're implying that I go to The Church of Nothing on Sundays and worship emptiness, even though I know they're not. Quite simply, there's a lot of things I believe in. I simply don't know the origins of the universe. This is inevitably my position until something is shown to be the cause beyond a reasonable doubt.
So, a better question would be, why don't I think the Creator God has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt? Well, that's easy. As I see it, the Creator God is not even coherently defined, there is no empirical evidence for it's existence, and every argument for it is logically fallacious and/or a purely ad hoc explanation.
Me either. The theists I've communicated with have never explained why morality, intelligence, etc. are impossible without god. They simply assert the claim and then challenges the atheist to present the naturalistic explanation for...seems like everything. If the atheist's explanation seems insufficient, somehow, god wins by default. And, considering the complexity of detailed, naturalistic explanations for these concepts, the average atheist can't explain it at all, and the average theist has no capacity to comprehend it.
Thus, to me, this type of argument is just a god of the gaps.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
What are you, 12? At most? First of all, the "problem of evil" isn't a problem for people who don't consider evil to be anything but a social construct. Given that it's a social construct, who cares if this so-called problem is "solved"?
No, I've been trying to figure out what you're on about. You're objecting to a theory you don't understand. Full stop. You seem to lack the mathematical background to even scratch the surface. How can I help you understand that mathematical extrapolation into the past is a reasonable form of evidence? If you don't understand even rudimentary calculus, it'll be a little rough on you. Calculation and blind obedience are different things. In your case, your belief is dictated entirely by what someone else told you, either in book form or in person. In my case, I can see the math any time I want in the library, and check out that it works myself, because logic works.
You really need some physics education. I suggest, if you have no access to a real university, to go here:
http://academicearth.org/subjects/physics
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
That's because not only is there no referent that the word "God" points to, but once the pointing actually happens, the results are laughable.
"Let me get this straight: you want me to believe that the most powerful being in the universe talks to people using a burning bush?"
"Yes."
"A flaming bush phone."
"Right."
"Most powerful being in existence."
"Yup."
"It's amazing that I'm even talking to you."
Plantinga isn't exactly what you'd call a philosopher. He's more of a theologian. Meaning his arguments start, "Assuming there's a God ..." All I'm saying is grain of salt.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
No.
I believe plenty of things, so I'm not sure what you're talking about.
I already explained that the big bang theory is a description applied to observation and extrapolation. No theory gives us "ultimate origin".
First, when discussing gods (theism), you'd have to tell me what a god is first, and then we could talk about how plausible one is. Since you've said you don't understand gods, then what are we talking about? We can't determine how plausible something you don't understand is. After all, if you can't communicate what the thing is, how am I supposed to figure out its plausibility?
You can consider the problem of evil rhetoric, too, if you like. Neither the problem of evil nor its solution have meaning, as they attempt to deal with a being that is undefinable in a meaningful way.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
Yeah. I'm thinking there are salt mines that aren't up to the task.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
how about this, some do and some don't, how many do and how many don't, no clue, same question applied to theists, do all theists believe in the law of excluded middle and the rule of sufficient reason? I mean all atheists have in common is a non belief in supernatural deities or gods of any sort. That's it that's all.
Amen, brother.
Saint Will: no gyration without funkstification.
fabulae! nil satis firmi video quam ob rem accipere hunc mi expediat metum. - Terence
What sort of "evidence" are you referring to? I assume empirical evidence? Also, why is the notion of God ill-defined? Finally, why assume that God had an origin?
Here you seem to beg the question as it may be that causation is a logical necessity. Also, there are theories of quantum mechanics (e.g. David Bohm) that are deterministic in nature. Furthermore, you seem to make a hasty generalization. That is, quantum mechanics describes how this world operates, but this says nothing about how a world must be. Even if we accept, for the sake of argument, that certain events in this world can occur uncaused, it does not follow that worlds, themselves, can spontaneously occur by themselves (or uncaused).
Again, if we let our world be denoted by W, then we know that the mathematics of quantum mechanics describes very well the space W. However, W itself can viewed as a single point existing in a larger space, say P, of possible worlds and it is not at all clear that quantum mechanics will even have applicability to the space P.
Not true
Thanks to QED, I needed someone else to bring up points, it gets hard when you are one against several.
With regards to Hiswillness:
Is this your knock down argument that "lays Plantinga flat?" "Evil is a social construct?" Have you even read Plantinga?
Oooh boy, where to begin...
Firstly, research validity, then soundness, then what constitues a "good argument" and see if your reply even gets close to a response to Plantinga. If you are too lazy, I can answer these questions for you.
To reply to your second question "Who cares if this so-called problem is 'solved'":
a) It appears on this very forum numerous times under various titles, posted by members of TRRS (eg if god exists why do bad things happen... and so on). If the answer is sooo irrelevant then why ask it?
b) You have not provided a valid objection to any of the premises of plantingas argument i.e. calling it a "so-called problem" is your opinion only.
c) Whether your opinion is held by one, or a billion, does not change the validity or invalidity of an argument, nor does it change the truth of the premises. A billion people believeing the world is flat makes no difference to the premise "the world is round". One would have to provide a sufficient argument to advance the debate (in this case, Plantinga's response to Mackie), which you have not.
Just to re-cap, if the problem of evil was not such a big issue, why do I find it page after page on this forum?
BTW, even if I am "12 at most", does that make you right by default? Moreover, do you then not need to provide anything other than your opinion to win an argument?
I think I understand very well. I understand that instead of addressing any of the conundrums about your own theory (or lack thereof) you would rather insult someone who is genuinely curious about Atheism by being condescending. Your complete lack of positioning is very convenient for a topic such as origin, I might add. Lots of places to hide. Insults being one. Ignorance being another.
I have. I am no genius by any stretch (just look at my spelling lol). I am asking YOU about TBBT. My education is irrelevant, but I know evasion when I see it. If you don't know how the Math works, say so. But don't insult my intelligence in the process. If I don't understand something, I'll ask.
It upsets me when atheists ask everyday-christians questions about things that only a theologian would have answers to, and when I ask an atheist about BBT, they reply "thats something only a physicist can answer" or just plainly "there is no answer."
Personally, and this is my opinion only, it is too easy for Atheists to hide in the grey areas of theories of origin, as if having no theory somehow allows you to systematically fire questions at people, whilst never entering the battlefield yourself and claiming immunity. I'm sure this will rouse anger, and I apologise in advance.
Aww. No replies after 12 hours.
While you are thinking of responses, I'll talk a little more about myself. This is an informal post - socialising, if you will, so there is no need to attack anything hereafter, but if you must, plesae keep in mind I am human and have feelings.
I graduated astro-physics in high school, and found the all-elusive theory of everything, TOE, fascinating. This lead me to authors such as Stephen Hawkin, Michio Kaku, to a lessor extent Brian Clegg, Dr. Kurzweil and a few others I have no chance of remembering. These authors are what I would consider to be by no means authorities on BBT or Origins, but relevant nevertheless. Where I lack raw mathematical prowess, I try to make up for it in reason and logic.
Perhaps its precisely my lack of mathematical ability that lends itself to the belief in God. I know what this entails. That is what I am here to find out.
When all is said and done, my belief system is unlikely to change on any meaningful level. I believe quite simply because I choose to. I know what this entails, also.
Thus far, logic and reason have not excluded the possibility of a fundamental being for me. Swinburne deals with Occum's razor and polytheism, Taylor deals adequately (in my opinion) with sufficient reason and contingency, Plantinga deals with contradiction and logical impossibilities, and science (math) remains silent about origin. The "I don't knows" are on both sides of the equation, hence the choice is mine to believe in either one, or none.
You will find this concept in every post I have made, to which people have offered "I don't know's", "We can't prove a thing", "It's beyond our understanding", "why posit a God when we can't posit bla bla bla..."
I suggest you read the authors I have mentioned to see where I am coming from. I have not cited specific work on purpose, seek and ye shall find.
Failing that, any reply based on scientific analysis I will listen to. Eg. Anti-matter/matter collisions, Cosomological Constants, Quantum vacuum's, Black Holes, Time travel or FTL theories, 10/11 Dimension theory (which is actually 26D theory, research this youself for why it is necessary), or just palin old philosophical debate. No more condescending nonsense, I want to hear it from you. That is why I am asking you. That is why you are replying to me.
Start with E=mc2 if you like. Research what constitutes energy, its forms and if it can truly be destroyed. Find out if its forms can exist independently of mass and light, or vice versa. Explain it to me if I have made a mistake, keep links to a minimum. I AM ASKING YOU.
Empirical evidence is the only 'real' evidence. What is non-empirical evidence?
You tell me why we have no clear definition of God - the 'omni' attributes are neither logically clear or even necessary. They are really negatively defined (without limits) and contradictory.
Spontaneous occurrence of elementary entities at the Planck scale has finite probability. The larger and more complex the less probable, so spontaneous ('uncaused') quantum origin of the BB singularity is infinitely more likely than that of God.
Alternatively how do you justify the plausibility of the eternal existence of a 'God' as more likely or 'necessary' than a quantum foam?
It does mean that the spontaneous emergence of 'worlds' is not empirically or logically impossible.
Your 'argument' does not prove that there are, or even could be, such worlds, but that is irrelevant to allowing quantum mechanics to provide an plausible framework for a natural origin of our universe, which is all I need to show.
I think a more substantial response would be required here...
God is pure, empty, unjustified, incoherent speculation, IMHO. It is the least useful, plausible, or likely 'explanation' for our Universe.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
I believe there is a clear definition of God. Also, it is not the case that the "omni" attributes are negatively defined. "Omni" simply means "all" not "without limits". For instance, to say that God is omnipotent means that God can do whatever is actually possible to do. It does not and cannot mean that God can do what is logically impossible. Thus, there are limits. Is there some other way that such attributes are contradictory? Because it is not at all clear to me how they are.
Now, mathematically speaking, there is a finite probability of spontaneous occurrence of elementary particle (actually I believe they are virtual particles), but this does not mean that they actually occur uncaused. Furthermore, you mistakenly attribute physical size to God, which is supposed to make God less probable? Likewise, you mistakenly attribute ontological complexity to God to make God less probable. Finally, you mistakenly seem to suggest that God had a spontaneous origin, which is supposed to make God's existence less probable.
Note: How would it be infinitely more probable for spontaneous occurrence of a singularity over the existence of God. Probabilities always fall between 0 and 1.
As to the existence of quantum foam, such a thing cannot have a necessary existence as it is easily conceivable and logically possible that only one universe exists. God is not a contingent thing. God must necessarily exist or God must necessarily not exist.
And why should it mean that?
What do you mean by "are"? Possible worlds exist necessarily as possibility, but of course, there is only one actual world.
Well, if this is only a statement of opinion, then fine. But if you are actually claiming these things, well, you are begging the question again.
As you say, the word means "all".
So, on that basis the word "omnipotent" (all powerful) can mean that your invisible friend can do whatever is actually possible to do, and also whatever is actually impossible to do, since both together can also be construed as "all".
I know it's a waste of time giving people of your particular delusional illness some intelligent advice. But on the basis that some rational brain cells in your head might still be triggering I'll give it anyway. Don't try to build a case for your belief on faulty semantics. It's the oldest religious trick in the book and carries as much weight with intelligent people as attributing your belief to the shit distribution pattern of seagulls.
I firmly believe that if everyone had the wit and intelligence to actually learn language and employ clarity in its usage then "god" would have as much chance of perpetuation as bogeymen did when the electric light was invented.
Thanks for the laugh, in any event.
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Do you think god knows whether or not he can make a rock so heavy he can't lift it?
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
A positive, coherent definition would require an actual enumeration of specific capabilities. 'All' runs into those cases where he can't do anything which he cannot undo, and so on, which arise when you try to define such unlimited capabilities. So you are still defining the capabilities negatively - anything which does not give rise to some such contradiction. So he cannot create something absolutely indestructible - he can destroy it, presumably.
He cannot create something which can go against his will.
He cannot know everything - he cannot know what it is like to be not omnipotent, or to be human, or to know what he is going to decide tomorrow and have free will, etc.
You cannot define such an entity except by a whole bunch equivocations and exceptions, ie, negatively.
Its a mess, an unnecessary mess, because omni attributes are not logically necessary attributes for a creator of our universe. You simply have no justification for even proposing such an incoherent entity.
I imply that the probability of God is infinitesimal, ie, approaches zero...
Virtual particles can become real particles - eg, Hawking radiation from black holes event horizon.
It doesn't mean they aren't effectively uncaused, either.
God must have very large 'effectiveness', some 'supernatural' analog of energy or physical extent, to be capable of wielding his presumed powers.
All my arguments are based on extrapolation from what we understand about physical reality - which is all we have to base any real arguments on.
If you are just going to pull concepts out of thin are and claim them somehow as possibilities, then of course you can put together words which seem to be describing something, but it tells us absolutely nothing about likelihood or plausibility of such ideas. The further the enetities described are fromwhat we actually experience or deduce from observation and experiment, the less they deserve to be taken seriously. Talk to that guy Occam.
Dunno what you thought 'quantum foam' referred to, but this extract from here should clarify:
Because it is a direct logical consequence of the statement you made.
You said:
Even if we accept, for the sake of argument, that certain events in this world can occur uncaused, it does not follow that worlds, themselves, can spontaneously occur by themselves (or uncaused).
That is not a valid statement.
If you had said that it does not follow that worlds actually do spontaneously occur, it would be valid.
But the fact that events do at least seem to occur spontaneously, means that it cannot logically be ruled out as impossible.
What do you mean by "are"? Possible worlds exist necessarily as possibility, but of course, there is only one actual world.
So "Possible worlds" are possible ( d'uh! ), but do not necessarily exist as actual worlds, that's what 'are' means there. Why do you have difficulty with that statement?
I presume you meant by 'one actual world', one actual reality.
Opinion based on argument - I qualify it because all these topics have a strong measure of personal judgement, yours as much as mine. I am simply drawing the most obvious (to me) conclusion.
Something which is demonstrably unnecessary, and definitely adds complexity to reality, deserves such a conclusion. Not proof, of course, but a balance of probabilities.
Whatever the ultimate nature of a 'first cause', even if it is assumed to be 'necessary', there is no logical argument for it being infinite or sentient. The only arguments I have seen for such attributes are based on intuitive assumptions about causation which Quantum Mechanics and Chaos Theory have clearly demonstrated are, at the very least, not necessarily true, and definitely in need of drastic revision. Reality is far more complex and subtle than philosophers thought, and in ways that they never imagined.
Even if the underlying reality of QM is deterministic, that neither makes it predictable or effectively non-random. The 'deterministic' interactions of an infinite number of elementary particles produce behavior which has all the essential attributes of a 'true' random process, including the finite probability of an arbitrarily sized fluctuation over any specified interval of time.
God ideas need to be re-thought in the context of current insights, probably abandoned as hopelessly obsolete.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology