Dear Resident Theists

[Whateverist]

You are deluded.


ETA: I take the Creator as omnipotent because, having been a Catholic, I remember what the Creed said:

The fact that you called me deluded ends all discussion.

Hey, I never called you deluded. Did my response not interest you at all? (#180 of this thread.)

But I never expect a response. That is entirely up to you as it is each of us.

[Pizza]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyZDZCGQJf8

I couldn't stop myself.

[Ronkonkoma]

Hey Boss, sorry I thought you called me delusional. I mistook your post for somebody else.

Let me respond to your last point first.

I think ever since the past 15 years most Astronomers agree that the matrix of space, time and matter that we call the universe had a beginning. They conclude this among others from the fact that the universe is expanding in all directions. So they are able to look back in time all the way to its common origin. Our telescopes are now so precise as to be able to look back 14 billion light years, to the moments after the Big Bang. Ever since 2003, mathematical proofs also exist for the beginning of the universe. http://www.technologyreview.com/view/427...beginning/

So what caused the Big bang? All I'm saying at this point is that whatever caused it must be immaterial and beyond space and time, since those things came to exist only at the moment of the Big Bang.

So these developments in science are a blow to the belief that only material things exist (materialism), since clearly the cause of the big bang was beyond space time and matter.

So the example of a stack of turtles is not the best example, because the stack of turtles have simply ran out. I suggest a better example, which is a stack of money. Once money runs out, we nowadays print it "out of nothing". We actually print it out of something completely immaterial called FAITH. Should money run out, faith in the value of the economy has the capacity to generate new money. Should faith in that value cease to exist, money would become just paper.

You argue that values exist only in our minds. They are physical. I guess that would imply that since we have a collective value for things, we also have a collective mind. But surely you can't believe that that collective mind is physical - like a giant mega-mind.

Or is it?

Let's take the internet as an analogy... Sure its the information super highway, but in physical terms it is nothing but hardware and the binary system of 1s and 0s.

But speaking in terms of the philosophy of the mind, lets ask Dr. Viktor Frankl, founder of the Third Vianese School of Psychotherapy after Freud and Adler. After all, he wrote the book titled, "the Unconscious God", and "The unheard Cry for Meaning"

Does information, ideas and values really exist, or are those things just a product of our mind? Does our mind generate values, or does it recognize values already existing?

According to Frankl, values are immaterial. Our unconscious "organ of purpose" constantly weighs these values and puts them in the context of our personal lives. The values come from outside. It is our unconscious "organ of purpose" that senses, them, registers them in the context of the gap between what I am, and what I ought to be. Values can be taught through example, experienced, or obtained through our conscience, which constantly reminds us, "do this, shun that". Values can be converted into reality through our actions. For example, lets say I value my children so I read to them every night, and as soon as I close the book, that value becomes an irreversible happening in the past. It happened, and the fact that I may die will not erase the fact that it happened, whether there is anybody around to realize it or not. In that regard, it is not material, but does exist, and my children sense it. It would have been true because it happened. Should the whole universe stop existing, it is true that it happened and it seems to me that truth itself is above space and time.

Another point, I said we are good at sensing intelligence, but the intelligence we sense through studying the universe in just one of its aspects that is crucial for life, is at an order of a billion trillions of magnitude above our own capacity of calculation, despite our best efforts with top super-computers and money invested on it. Therefore it cannot possibly originate from our minds.

---

More on this topic, it would be interesting to google the early Greek philosophers' notion of the "soul". In fact the greeks were the first to introduce the term "soul". They noticed that mathematical laws were immaterial, but had a great impact on mater. So they reasoned that immaterial things do exist, just like material things exists. These people formed and important basis of western thought.

[Cyberman]

Who said the Big Bang needed a cause?

[rexbeccarox]

Oh boy...

[Ronkonkoma]

Who said the Big Bang needed a cause?

Most things happen because of a cause. Science is always looking for a cause. The more answers we get, the more questions come up. To say the big bang had no cause is like giving up on science.

And that might be an option because the big bang is the beginning of space and time, and our scientific method fails when we go beyond space and time. Beyond that, we go into philosophy.


Or we can propose other sci-fi versions of reality like multiple universes. Who knows?

[Homeless Nutter]

Who said the Big Bang needed a cause?

Most things happen because of a cause.[...]

Well - if "most things" happen "because of a cause", that means not all things have a cause. Why can't Big Bang be one of those few things, that - as you claim - don't have a cause?

[Lemonvariable72]

Who said the Big Bang needed a cause?

Most things happen because of a cause. Science is always looking for a cause. The more answers we get, the more questions come up. To say the big bang had no cause is like giving up on science.

And that might be an option because the big bang is the beginning of space and time, and our scientific method fails when we go beyond space and time. Beyond that, we go into philosophy.


Or we can propose other sci-fi versions of reality like multiple universes. Who knows?

But then if you say god did it then you have to account for a cause to God. If you say god had no cause then why not use occams razor and slice out God entirely and say the universe had no cause?

[Whateverist]

Who said the Big Bang needed a cause?

Most things happen because of a cause. Science is always looking for a cause. The more answers we get, the more questions come up. To say the big bang had no cause is like giving up on science.

And that might be an option because the big bang is the beginning of space and time, and our scientific method fails when we go beyond space and time. Beyond that, we go into philosophy.

I agree that what takes place beyond the level of the universe of which we are a part certainly seems beyond the reach of science at this point, and quite likely for all time. Perhaps someone will propose an indicator which would be, for theoretical reasons, an indicator of a multiverse. I don't know, but I doubt there will ever be an entirely satisfying conclusion which will convince all parties.

So we can call the alternatives philosophy but really, aren't we just spitballing possibilities? What I think you really must give up saying is that the universe, space and time had a beginning before which there was absolutely nothing. There is no more reason for thinking that than for thinking there is a multiverse or for thinking something supernatural.

Nothing is the one thing we can all rule out. There was never nothing. As far back as we can investigate, there are always pre-existing conditions which meld with what follows. (That was what I wished to imply by the 'turtles all the way down' analogy.) Even if you choose to believe time, space and everything had a beginning, you still believe there was a God capable of bringing all that into being. So you really do not believe in a true nothingness.

Or we can propose other sci-fi versions of reality like multiple universes. Who knows?

Indeed, who? Not me. Not you. But we are all free to speculate. For me it is impossible to imagine that there is not a level of description -perhaps with its own timeline- wherein big bangs are a dime a dozen and their expansion and contraction are like a big pile of frothy bubbles. That anything happens in isolation is beyond the power of my imagination.

[Whateverist]

Got to stop you there.  How could you possibly know what there has got to be?

That's a slightly deceptive edit, Whateverist. I did not use the multiverse as the premise of a proof for God. The speculative theory of the multiverse is an argument of convenience for atheists who do not want to face-up to the obvious implications of a fine-tuned universe. My point was that the multiverse theory provides no such opportunity. The theory says that the particular fundamental forces and constants of our universe need not have been as they are. The natural laws governing an adjacent universe could be otherwise. The whole theory resolves into one of two positions, either 1) reality is absurd or 2) meta-laws govern the process of universe generation. If the atheist takes the first option then he undermines the very idea of rationality. If he takes the second, he must acknowledge that fine-tuning is a real aspect of, not only our universe, but of the multiverse as a whole.

Sorry I missed this, Chad.  (Been pretty busy on the home front.)

I'm surprised you would say "the multiverse is an argument of convenience for atheists who do not want to face-up to the obvious implications of a fine-tuned universe".  Personally, I am unable to imagine that there is not a larger frame of reference than a universe.  Obviously you think so too.  But for you the larger frame of reference involves the supernatural.  Surely though you don't really think the multiverse theory only exists as an atheist strategy.  That would really be quite a conspiracy.  I guess you mean that's why we like it.  But my sense on this forum is that multiversalists are not in the majority among atheists.

As to facing up to a well tuned universe, what is the comparison by which we are to conclude that ours is more or less well tuned than your average universe?  That again is information none of us may possess as far as I know.

I haven't a clue why you think anything I might believe which has to do with being an atheist obliges me to think reality is absurd.  I suppose one could look at it that way.  But I don't.  I'd rather say it is exquisite.