The following is not a question: Can something come from nothing?

[John V]

I make no claims about the future.

"claims about"?

---

Ah, that's actually good.
Now, what if I were to tell you that the singularity didn't exist eternally. In fact, it didn't exist for any length of time.

Then I'd say it had a beginning and we're back to the something from nothing line of the thread.

[Jackalope]

http://arxiv.org/abs/1404.1207

It appears that for some values of "nothing" that the idea something can come from nothing may be supported by a rigorous mathematical proof.

This paper was published only a week ago. It will be interesting to see how it all shakes out.

[Jackalope]

Ah, that's actually good.
Now, what if I were to tell you that the singularity didn't exist eternally. In fact, it didn't exist for any length of time.

Then I'd say it had a beginning and we're back to the something from nothing line of the thread.

You appear to be misunderstanding what LL is saying here. Or perhaps I am.

[pocaracas]

I make no claims about the future.

"claims about"?

Yes.

[John V]

"claims about"?

Yes.

Exactly.

[LostLocke]

I make no claims about the future.

"claims about"?

---

Ah, that's actually good.
Now, what if I were to tell you that the singularity didn't exist eternally. In fact, it didn't exist for any length of time.

Then I'd say it had a beginning and we're back to the something from nothing line of the thread.

Nope. No beginning either.

[John V]

You appear to be misunderstanding what LL is saying here. Or perhaps I am.

I understand it. I disagree with it.

[bennyboy]

I'd like to go on record here, and say that anyone who has made a positive assertion, of any type, in this thread is full of shit. To the ones who say the universe has a beginning, I'd ask what caused it. To the ones who suggest it needn't have, or didn't have, a beginning, I'd ask you why then it exists. Be careful of the brute-fact, "Just because," because when you make all of existence a brute fact, you are just invoking the same magical mystery box that Christianity does, just with a less interesting background plot.

The question of cosmogony isn't meaningless-- it lies at the root of who and what we are. It lies at the center of our awareness, and the bounds of our imagination. But as for answers-- there's only one response to the question that makes sense now, ever did in the past, and ever will in the future. There's nothing wrong, even in an age of science, of accelerated learning and information, with looking the universe in the face and saying. . .

I. . .
don't. . .
know!


If you can't say these words without thinking, ". . . yet!" then congratulations: you have embraced the mysteries of life with an attitude of optimism and faith. You've removed from your minds the idea of God, which was never more than a myth, and instead mythologized mankind itself. Because the truth is this-- we are all just big-brained, bald monkeys, and while our confidence and imaginations are huge, the universe is infinitely huger.

Agnosticism ftw!

[John V]

I. . .
don't. . .
know!

Meh, that's what people say when they don't like where things are leading.

[Silver]

I. . .
don't. . .
know!

However, I do know that religion is an invention of man and I do know that there are no deities in existence. I do know.