RE: Does a God exist?
July 8, 2016 at 1:20 pm
(This post was last modified: July 8, 2016 at 1:20 pm by Ignorant.)
pocaracas Wrote: That's you forgetting Einstein: E = mc^2. [1] Energy is mass. [2] Energy (or mass) equals existence... [3]
1) I definitely haven't forgotten that, or the fact that this version does not account for momentum's contribution to energy.
2) Actually... no... the equation doesn't read E = m, does it? Energy is the product of mass and the square of the speed of light. Mass is the quotient of energy over the square of c. But mass is not simply energy, and energy is not simply mass. This poses a problem for your next assertion...
3) So the claim goes... Like I said, I find that insufficient. You don't. If mass is not simple energy and vice versa, then mass-energy cannot be synonymous with existence itself.
Quote:Enter the Higgs Boson and quantum fluctuations as mechanisms by which these things are generated... by which things come into existence.
If you can't see the problem posed for necessary existence in the face of 'generated' existence, then I'm not sure you've grasped the concept by which the demonstration proceeds.
If mass-energy 'is generated' by higgs bosons and/or quantum fluctuations, then mass-energy exists only on the condition that higgs bosons and quantum fluctuations are/have generated mass-energy. And if that is the case, mass-energy is not fundamental existence itself, but they are instead conditional existences like the rest of us.
Quote:Our language does give it away.... "to exist". Doesn't exactly carry the same ring as "to energize", or "to mass" (whatever this is)
Right. Existence itself is the most fundamental and simple of actions, without which no 'thing' can 'do' or 'be' what it 'does' or 'is'. Either 'something' exists subsistently/without condition, or everything exists dependently/conditionally. Your proposal of several candidates for a fundamental subsistent existence (e.g. space-time, mass-energy, etc.) seems to indicate that you've accepted the demonstration as accurate, since it concludes that there must exist something like that. We seem merely to disagree about what that thing is. I say it is the subsistent action of existing. You say it is mass-energy.
Quote:You know... the conceptual electron is also doing what electron do... just not in real space... in theoretical/modeled space.
Which is to say that a conceptual electron doesn't actually do the one extra thing the real electron is actually doing: existing. =)
Quote:Take away the existence property and nothing is there. yes. Take away the charge property and no charge is to be found on that particle. Like you said, a chargeless thing with the mass of an electron. Why would absence of charge make the particle non-existent?
It doesn't make it this way. Re-read my words: "Take away the charge property and SOMETHING IS THERE (a charge-less thing with the mass of an electron), but it is not an electron." <= Re-read that HERE
Quote:Take away the mass property and no mass is to be found on that particle. A massless thing with the charge of an electron... I don't think any of these two things have been observed, though... that seems to be a forbidden (or rare) state of affairs.
Right. So let me repeat myself: If existence is a 'property', it is the most fundamental of properties which governs the existence of all the other properties, and in this way, it is radically different than the other properties. If that is the case, calling it a property is not helpful, and sticking to the classification of 'action' serves us better.
Quote:A thing "is existing" if it has the property of existence. Which came first, the egg or the chicken? I can't tell.
That was my point. If you don't want to budge on the terminology of property, that is fine, as long as you recognize its essential relationship to the action, I can live with that. It makes things needlessly complicated for you (as your words show), but if that's the way you want to talk about it fine. Denying the action aspect makes taking about existence unintelligible.