(December 5, 2018 at 9:25 am)Cherub786 Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 9:10 am)Jörmungandr Wrote: Now if you could prove that, you might have something.  As it sits, you've got nothing.

ِAlready been proven by the cosmologists and physicists.

(December 5, 2018 at 9:32 am)Jörmungandr Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 9:25 am)Cherub786 Wrote: ِAlready been proven by the cosmologists and physicists.

Jehanne already cited it:

Creation of Universes from Nothing

(December 5, 2018 at 9:39 am)Cherub786 Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 9:32 am)Jörmungandr Wrote:

Jehanne already cited it:

Creation of Universes from Nothing

From that paper: "A cosmological model is proposed..."

Proposed, not proven. Can you even read, buttnose?

(December 5, 2018 at 7:26 am)Cherub786 Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 7:22 am)Jehanne Wrote: I think that you are taking Dawkins out of context.  Read his The God Delusion sometime, which I just saw on the shelves of Barnes & Noble here recently!

As for the Universe being "not eternal", if you read Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick and Walker (voted by the APS as being the greatest undergraduate physics textbook of the 20th century), they say that speculating what came "before" the Big Bang is a meaningless question, that is, nothing came before the Big Bang.  This is, of course, a very old observation.

That's what I've been saying all along. The universe had a beginning,

The universe as we know it had a beginning at the big bang; we do not know whether the matter.energy that makes up the universe began then or not.

Quote:and is therefore finite,

That does not follow.  It has a boundary in spacetime at one end but that doesn't make it finite.  The set of positive numbers is bounded at the lower end but still infinite.

Quote:and before it there was nothing, so the universe came from ex nihilo.

That has not yet been demonstrated, only asserted. Some physicists/cosmologists are proposing it but it is still speculative as far as I have seen.

Quote:The question I'm posing is what caused it to come into existence and how.

The "cause" of the big bang is unknown, and there may be none.  You can't extrapolate the laws from within this universe and apply them to something that is completely undefined.

(December 5, 2018 at 8:33 am)Cherub786 Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 8:24 am)Jehanne Wrote: I have no idea who your sources are; if you are alluding to the BGV theorem, here it is:

Inflationary spacetimes are not past-complete

I have read the paper (it's only 4 pages); the authors call for "new physics" and not belief in some supernatural agency.

Vilenkin's paper was also posted here and I read it too.
Obviously the paper doesn't say a supernatural agency created the universe. But do you at least agree that the universe came from nothing?

Btw, Vilenkin's proposal as outlined in Creation of Universes from Nothing dispenses with the big bang model.

Professor Vilenkin is one of at least several hundred cosmologists in the World today who are actively publishing, which means that you are cherry-picking your sources, having already settled upon an "answer" you are now in the process of asking "questions".   I have read Einstein's General Theory of Relativity: With Modern Applications in Cosmology by Øyvind Grøn and Sigbjorn Hervik:

Einstein's General Theory of Relativity: With Modern Applications in Cosmology 

as well as a number of other undergraduate texts in physics.  It is universally agreed among professional physicists that General Relativity is an excellent model of universal gravitation, but it is also universally agreed that GR is incomplete, and that no physical model, at present, describes the Universe at its earliest moments.

And, so, physicists simply do not know.  Professor Sean Carroll was absolutely correct when he pointed out to WLC that the Universe may have had a beginning or that it may be eternal.

No one knows for sure.  You can posit "god" if you wish, just as you can ascribe planetary motion to angelic or other invisible beings.

P.S. The negative reviews on Amazon are due to the print quality and not the text, so typical of some negative reviews on Amazon!

(December 5, 2018 at 9:43 am)unfogged Wrote: The "cause" of the big bang is unknown, and there may be none.  You can't extrapolate the laws from within this universe and apply them to something that is completely undefined.

I agree with your last sentence completely.

As for the cause of the big bang or any other model that attempts to explain how the universe began (like Vilenkin's model), there has to be a cause logically.

This is where you have to accept the limitations of theoretical physics and enter the realm of logic and philosophy.

Every effect has a cause. Simple as that.

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(December 5, 2018 at 9:47 am)Jehanne Wrote: Professor Vilenkin is one of at least several hundred cosmologists in the World today who are actively publishing, which means that you are cherry-picking your sources, having already settled upon an "answer" you are now in the process of asking "questions".

I'm not cherry picking, only pointing to the general consensus among these contemporary cosmologists that the universe is finite and has a beginning. Very few credible scientists say the universe is infinite and doesn't have a beginning. Some scientists even say the universe has an end and propose the big crunch model.

Our theology of creatio ex nihilo is a radical thought and break from all the classical philosophy and religion before the advent of modern physics and Einstein's theory of general relativity and the proof that spacetime has a curve. The eternality and infiniteness of the universe is dependent on the model of it being absolutely flat. So our medieval theology insofar as the universe being finite and having a beginning and coming out of nothing has been largely confirmed by 20th century physics which is quite amazing.

Quote:as well as a number of other undergraduate texts in physics.  It is universally agreed among professional physicists that General Relativity is an excellent model of universal gravitation, but it is also universally agreed that GR is incomplete, and that no physical model, at present, describes the Universe at its earliest moments.

I would suggest the problem is that the universe in its infancy and the big bang as a singularity, its reality cannot be accurately understood under the prevailing framework of what are considered set laws of physics and thermodynamics.

In the end I must emphasize that so much of this is theoretical, speculative and not empirical. But if you combine both logic/philosophy with 20th century physics and cosmology then the case is very much strengthened that the universe has a beginning, is finite and came out of nothing.

Quote:you can ascribe planetary motion to angelic or other invisible beings.

Who says that?

Still waiting for that citation, buttnose.

(December 5, 2018 at 10:21 am)Jörmungandr Wrote: Still waiting for that citation, buttnose.

Lift the epicanthic folds over your eyes and maybe you'll see them

(December 5, 2018 at 9:54 am)Cherub786 Wrote:

(December 5, 2018 at 9:47 am)Jehanne Wrote: Professor Vilenkin is one of at least several hundred cosmologists in the World today who are actively publishing, which means that you are cherry-picking your sources, having already settled upon an "answer" you are now in the process of asking "questions".

I'm not cherry picking, only pointing to the general consensus among these contemporary cosmologists that the universe is finite and has a beginning. Very few credible scientists say the universe is infinite and doesn't have a beginning. Some scientists even say the universe has an end and propose the big crunch model.

Our theology of creatio ex nihilo is a radical thought and break from all the classical philosophy and religion before the advent of modern physics and Einstein's theory of general relativity and the proof that spacetime has a curve. The eternality and infiniteness of the universe is dependent on the model of it being absolutely flat. So our medieval theology insofar as the universe being finite and having a beginning and coming out of nothing has been largely confirmed by 20th century physics which is quite amazing.

Most cosmologists are atheist:

Why (Almost All) Cosmologists are Atheists

(December 5, 2018 at 10:53 am)Jehanne Wrote: Most cosmologists are atheist:

Why (Almost All) Cosmologists are Atheists

So what it's immaterial