I am an Agnostic Theist, which I believe means that I am unsure about the existence, or non-existence of a God. I was raised going to church through grade school, middle school, and high-school, but I was a smart kid and started thinking more independently. I have lately been thinking about 'creation', as well as Christian and Atheist creation arguments.
Atheists bring up the argument of the Big Bang, and how everything created, including time, space, the third dimension, and the law of cause and effect. But it brings up the question of what 'caused' the Big Bang? Upon further thinking, I thought that before the universe, and before the law of cause and effect, the Big Bang didn't have to have a cause, which ties in with the Christian arguments.
Christians claim that God made everything, and it assumes that God could have been the cause of the Big Bang. If God was before the law of cause and effect, then it makes perfect sense that a God could have been the cause of the Big Bang. But...
Because the Big Bang didn't have to have a cause, literally NOTHING could have been the cause of the universe. Just the POSSIBILITY of the universe being able to exist, made it exist.
So this leaves me in an awkward state of mind.
There has to be a God, because something had to create the universe.
or
There doesn't have to be a God, because NOTHING could have created the universe!
I just wanted some input, because maybe there is something that I am missing from this whole idea. If you could please let me know your thoughts, it would be greatly appreciated.

Try saying this: "Science doesn't know yet. They are working on it. However, the idea that some invisible sky-daddy poofed everything into existence is just plain stupid and can be safely dismissed."

God-of-the-gaps; a fallacy that will always find its place no matter how far science has come.

A little clarification: atheists don't usually bring up the argument of the Big Bang, except as a counter to the theists' asserion that their god did it. Also, the originator of the model which came to be christened the Big Bang Theory, Georges Lemaître, was a Catholic priest as well as an astronomer and professor of physics.

(October 17, 2013 at 8:58 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Try saying this: "Science doesn't know yet. They are working on it. However, the idea that some invisible sky-daddy poofed everything into existence is just plain stupid and can be safely dismissed."

Yes, but the problem I am having trouble getting over is, it is possible that a Sky-Daddy did in fact make everything, because there were no rules before everything.

Even if that were true, it in no way makes a sky daddy even remotely possible.

:Welcome:

The big bang isn't the only theory on how our universe came about. For instance, the one eyed one nosed flying purple hippo daddy could've made everything.

Until I find proof for that, I'm not going to believe in it either.

(October 17, 2013 at 8:35 pm)Flair128512 Wrote: I am an Agnostic Theist, which I believe means that I am unsure about the existence, or non-existence of a God. I was raised going to church through grade school, middle school, and high-school, but I was a smart kid and started thinking more independently. I have lately been thinking about 'creation', as well as Christian and Atheist creation arguments.
Atheists bring up the argument of the Big Bang, and how everything created, including time, space, the third dimension, and the law of cause and effect. But it brings up the question of what 'caused' the Big Bang? Upon further thinking, I thought that before the universe, and before the law of cause and effect, the Big Bang didn't have to have a cause, which ties in with the Christian arguments.
Christians claim that God made everything, and it assumes that God could have been the cause of the Big Bang. If God was before the law of cause and effect, then it makes perfect sense that a God could have been the cause of the Big Bang. But...
Because the Big Bang didn't have to have a cause, literally NOTHING could have been the cause of the universe. Just the POSSIBILITY of the universe being able to exist, made it exist.
So this leaves me in an awkward state of mind.
There has to be a God, because something had to create the universe.
or
There doesn't have to be a God, because NOTHING could have created the universe!
I just wanted some input, because maybe there is something that I am missing from this whole idea. If you could please let me know your thoughts, it would be greatly appreciated.

Do you not see the self-defeating proposition in your own arguments?

You talk about events like the universe being "created", "begin to exist", "before the Big Bang" while having already stated that there is no spatio-temporal context without the universe. All these phrases are nonsensical without it. These phrases are used to describe "events" - which occur within a temporal context.

Given that the laws of cause and effect work within the boundaries of space-time, which are within the universe, the terms like "before Big Bang", "cause of big bang", "creation of universe" are as meaningless as "edge of a sphere" or "corner of a circle" or "north of north pole".

I feel like you're going about this the "scientific way", which is to say, trying to see if god lines up with our current knowledge of science.

While an honest approach and much more practical than a philosophical approach, it's deeply flawed. You have to understand that what you're doing is the "god of the gaps" exercise, filling in god when we do not yet know. Like you said, the big bang doesn't have a cause, the laws of the universe at that point are not what they are now, so we literally do not know what the hell happened, and we can't even use the past tense because time didn't exist.

What we do know is that the bible makes no mention of evolution. The bible claims there was a global flood. The bible claims Noah got all the animals into an ark during that flood and survived. So god no longer lines up with our current knowledge of science. You can reject the christian god now.

(October 17, 2013 at 10:22 pm)Flair128512 Wrote:

(October 17, 2013 at 8:58 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Try saying this: "Science doesn't know yet. They are working on it. However, the idea that some invisible sky-daddy poofed everything into existence is just plain stupid and can be safely dismissed."

Yes, but the problem I am having trouble getting over is, it is possible that a Sky-Daddy did in fact make everything, because there were no rules before everything.

Start thinking in terms of probabilities not "possibilities."