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(Today at 4:06 am)LoneWolf Wrote: Counter proof (just to show the absurdity of it all)
P1: The christian god is and always was perfect (infinite, eternal and actual)
P2: God created the universe and everything in it, thereby adding some finite actuality
From P1 and P2 it follows that either P1 is false or P2 is false because you cannot add more existence to something that is already all existence
If P1 is false than the christian god was not perfect and therefore did not exist according to christian definition
If P2 is false than the christian god did not create the universe and everything in it, and does not exist according to christian definition
My chief problem with the Abrahamic creation myth isn't that it's non-logical, but that it's SO bloody boring - *poof* and there's a universe.
Where's the drama, the dragons, the magic gourds, parents eating their kiddies, and so on? All the so-called 'lesser' cultures seem to have put a lot of thought into where things came from.
Boru
‘I can’t be having with this.’ - Esmeralda Weatherwax
That "poof" serves as an excellent cover up for all the hidden game levels and weapon cabinets in there. The how part is notoriously missing. No explanatory power whatsoever. Why is the universe so big if everything that is of interest for god is on this tiny planet. That seems a bit like overdoing the headroom thing. I just created the whole thing, maybe a bit bigger than needed but you never know what the little buggers are up to, they might invent instantaneous space travel.
"The Discworld offers sights far more impressive than those found in universes built by Creators with less imagination but more mechanical aptitude". - Terry Pratchett, The Colour of Magic
Boru
‘I can’t be having with this.’ - Esmeralda Weatherwax
(Today at 6:03 am)LoneWolf Wrote: That "poof" serves as an excellent cover up for all the hidden game levels and weapon cabinets in there. The how part is notoriously missing. No explanatory power whatsoever.
That's certainly true if you limit yourself to the Bible. I'm sure you know that lots of Christians have offered explanations in addition.
Not that I think you should necessarily believe any of them, but it's not like they haven't worked on it.
Quote:Why is the universe so big if everything that is of interest for god is on this tiny planet. That seems a bit like overdoing the headroom thing. I just created the whole thing, maybe a bit bigger than needed but you never know what the little buggers are up to, they might invent instantaneous space travel.
From early on, Christian theologians defined God as being infinite. Or infinity itself. An infinity wouldn't think in terms of efficiency, as people with limited resources have to do. So if God created the whole universe for the sake of one insect, it wouldn't be an effort. That's what they say.
It's also not sure that God would only be interested in human beings. Nicholas of Cusa, for example (a priest and mathematician) argued that the earth isn't at the center of the universe. (A long time before Galileo.) Because, again, if the universe is infinite it won't have any borders, and without edges it has no center. And he suggested that there could well be living beings on other planets, and that God cares for them too. Whether they would need salvation or not was a topic of speculation.
Again, I'm not arguing that these things are true -- only that there is a lot more to Christian thought than literal readings of the Bible.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: I'm sure you know that lots of Christians have offered explanations in addition.
I don't know about any explanation in the modern sense. Are you referring to the doctrine invented by the church fathers involving words like actuality and potentiality? Pkease let me know if there is more.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: From early on, Christian theologians defined God as being infinite. Or infinity itself. An infinity wouldn't think in terms of efficiency, as people with limited resources have to do. So if God created the whole universe for the sake of one insect, it wouldn't be an effort. That's what they say.
An infinity would also not seek to create something extra, see my proof of nonexistence above. It wouldn't be an effort, but it would undermine the infinity part.
Apart from that it does not radiate the virtue of 'temperance/modesty' as coined (nicked from Plato really) by those same church fathers as mentioned. So is the virtue 'temperance' not a part of god being 'all good'? That's also odd isn't it. Too many loopholes if you ask me.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: It's also not sure that God would only be interested in human beings. Nicholas of Cusa, for example (a priest and mathematician) argued that the earth isn't at the center of the universe. (A long time before Galileo.) Because, again, if the universe is infinite it won't have any borders, and without edges it has no center. And he suggested that there could well be living beings on other planets, and that God cares for them too. Whether they would need salvation or not was a topic of speculation.
Another chap, called Bruno Giordano a dominican priest, contested something along the same lines but was burned alive in Rome (piazza di fiori, nice place to visit btw) by the church for it. In general it is not a good idea to bring up christian thinkers of the early ages of the church as examples of tolerant and coherent christian thought. You can find any deviant idea you like among them, but most of those men (sic) ended in a bad place as a result of church doctrine.
8 hours ago(This post was last modified: 8 hours ago by Angrboda.)
It's not clear that people are speaking correctly about infinity and the transfinite. These terms have specific meaning that is often ignored in favor of intuitive but incorrect senses. But then, the intuitive sense predates the mathematical one, so a choice has to be made about whether the older usages are constrained by the mathematics. If not, it would seem that infinity and the transfinite do not possess the behaviors that our/their intuitions attributed to them.
Quote:It's also not sure that God would only be interested in human beings.
‘If one could conclude as to the nature of the Creator from a study of creation, it would appear that God has an inordinate fondness for beetles.’ - J.B.S. Haldane
Boru
‘I can’t be having with this.’ - Esmeralda Weatherwax
5 hours ago(This post was last modified: 5 hours ago by LoneWolf.)
(8 hours ago)Angrboda Wrote: It's not clear that people are speaking correctly about infinity and the transfinite. These terms have specific meaning that is often ignored in favor of intuitive but incorrect senses. But then, the intuitive sense predates the mathematical one, so a choice has to be made about whether the older usages are constrained by the mathematics. If not, it would seem that infinity and the transfinite do not possess the behaviors that our/their intuitions attributed to them.
I guess if you allow for mathematical sense infinities (i.e. in a mathematical hierarchy of infinities) than either god is or is not the biggest infinity. I suspect the latter is not endorsed by christianity (god is GOAT). If the christian god is GOAT than my counterproof leads to the same result. If not, the christian god definition is breached. Maybe there is a hierarchy of gods all the way up, as there are turtles all the way down. Solves the fine tuning of the christian god.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: I'm sure you know that lots of Christians have offered explanations in addition.
I don't know about any explanation in the modern sense. Are you referring to the doctrine invented by the church fathers involving words like actuality and potentiality? Pkease let me know if there is more.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: From early on, Christian theologians defined God as being infinite. Or infinity itself. An infinity wouldn't think in terms of efficiency, as people with limited resources have to do. So if God created the whole universe for the sake of one insect, it wouldn't be an effort. That's what they say.
An infinity would also not seek to create something extra, see my proof of nonexistence above. It wouldn't be an effort, but it would undermine the infinity part.
Apart from that it does not radiate the virtue of 'temperance/modesty' as coined (nicked from Plato really) by those same church fathers as mentioned. So is the virtue 'temperance' not a part of god being 'all good'? That's also odd isn't it. Too many loopholes if you ask me.
(Today at 7:04 am)Belacqua Wrote: It's also not sure that God would only be interested in human beings. Nicholas of Cusa, for example (a priest and mathematician) argued that the earth isn't at the center of the universe. (A long time before Galileo.) Because, again, if the universe is infinite it won't have any borders, and without edges it has no center. And he suggested that there could well be living beings on other planets, and that God cares for them too. Whether they would need salvation or not was a topic of speculation.
Another chap, called Bruno Giordano a dominican priest, contested something along the same lines but was burned alive in Rome (piazza di fiori, nice place to visit btw) by the church for it. In general it is not a good idea to bring up christian thinkers of the early ages of the church as examples of tolerant and coherent christian thought. You can find any deviant idea you like among them, but most of those men (sic) ended in a bad place as a result of church doctrine.
You're right: there is no explanation "in the modern sense," if by that you mean one that would satisfy a modern physicist. They are metaphysical explanations, and therefore not testable by empirical means.
As I understand it, the Christian God is not said to "radiate" temperance, modesty, or any of the other virtues. Those virtues are habits people develop through their behavior, but God has no behavior. As the Form of the Good (for Neoplatonic Christians) and as actualization without potentiality (for the more Aristotelian kind) a Christian would attempt to become in line with God through such behaviors. Though God, being ideal, wants nothing, people say metaphorically "God wants you to be temperate." This really means that it's in one's own best interest to be temperate, in order to be as good as possible.
But there are a LOT of variations on this stuff, so if you have read "radiates" somewhere it wouldn't surprise me.
As for Giordano Bruno, he was an early adopter of lots of newish ideas, but that's not what got him killed. He was executed for going to Rome and loudly advocating the overthrow of the Catholic Church, so it could be replaced with a set of even wilder ideas supposedly recovered from an ancient tablet, which even then was identified as a forgery. If he had published his cosmological speculations as speculation, and not poked his thumb in the pope's eye he would have been OK.
This is from Frances Yate's book:
Ever since Domenico Berti revived him as the hero who died rather than
renounce his scientific conviction of the truth of the Copernican theory, the
martyr for modern science, the philosopher who broke with medieval
Aristotelianism and ushered in the modern world, Bruno has been in a false
position. The popular view of Bruno is still roughly as just stated. If I have not
finally proved its falsity, I have written this book in vain.
For what is the truth? Bruno was an out-and-out magician, an “Egyptian” and
Hermetist of the deepest dye, for whom the Copernican heliocentricity heralded
the return of magical religion, who in his dispute with the Oxford doctors
associated Copernicanism with the magic of Ficino's De vita coelitus
comparanda, for whom the Copernican diagram was a hieroglyph of the divine,
who defended earth-movement with Hermetic arguments concerning the magical
life in all nature, whose aim was to achieve Hermetic gnosis, to reflect the world
in the mens by magical means, including the stamping of magic images of the
stars on memory, and so to become a great Magus and miracle-working religious
leader. Sweeping away the theological superstructure which the Christian
Hermetists had evolved, using Cabala only as subsidiary to Magia, Bruno is a
pure naturalist whose religion is the natural religion of the pseudo-Egyptian
Hermetic Asclepius. Bruno's world view shows what could be evolved out of an
extension and intensification of the Hermetic impulse towards the world.
Through a Hermetic interpretation of Copernicus and Lucretius, Bruno arrives at
his astonishing vision of an infinite extension of the divine as reflected in nature.
The earth moves because it is alive around a sun of Egyptian magic; the planets
as living stars perform their courses with her; innumerable other worlds, moving
and alive like great animals, people an infinite universe.
From our modern perspective, Bruno's fake-ancient beliefs may be no better than what Catholics believe. But it wasn't the science-y part that got him in trouble.
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