Potentially Big News On The Human Evolution Front

[LadyForCamus]

And why couldn't that just be the cosmos?  if you're willing to accept that a god could have those attributes, why couldn't our universe have them?  The problem begins when we start asserting other things on top of those qualities, such as agency, will, desires, a plan, and an ability to interact with existence while remaining physically undetectable.

My bold.

Where would the cosmos have come from though?

In the natural, physical world, things have an origin. There is no evidence that anything can materialize out of nothing, only evidence to the contrary.

So, a couple of things:  I do think it's important as others have mentioned, to distinguish between the universe and the cosmos.  As I understand it, the universe represents our local reality so far as we can explore and comprehend it; the space-time that exists, that we're fairly certain exists as the result of the Big Bang and expansion.  The cosmos, on the other hand, represents everything that exists whether we know of it or not, including whatever else may exist "beyond" our universe.  A good example of what would be included in "the cosmos" is the hypothetical multiverse.  

Going forward from there, bold above is mine.  This is a classic composition fallacy, meaning you're applying the known laws of physics that describe how things operate within the universe, to the universe as a whole entity.  A good example of how this argument fails in practice is WLC's scenario of a bicycle appearing out of thin air.  He asserts (I'm paraphrasing), 'bicycles don't just poof into existence out of nothing, so how could the universe?'  The problem with this ofc, is that the molecules in air are not 'nothing'.  Space and time are not 'nothing'. Matter is not 'nothing'.  If a bike did pop into existence right now, it would certainly be from something.  To try and compare the two is simply unsound logic.  

That being said, we can hypothesize pretty much anything our imaginations can come up with, with regard to the origin of existence, including that existence is necessary and eternal, or that a timeless, spaceless, changeless, thinking being created it.  I'm not here to tell anyone what they should believe but I won't concede that these two possibilities are equally probable either, and to assert that the cosmos can't be infinite and necessary, but that a god can, is most definitely special pleading.

I'll say one last thing on the nature of existence, and I suppose it's more of a personal philosophical position than anything else, though it's rooted in logic.   I find the phrase, "something coming from nothing" to be an internally logically inconsistent statement.  When we say, 'something can't come from nothing,' or 'existence can't arise out of non-existence,' we are unconsciously assigning attributes of existence to non-existence.  We are illogically speaking of "nothing" as though it is a state or condition of being that things could potentially come from.  Absolute nothingness, by its very definition, cannot exist; cannot be anything.  'No-thing' cannot be any type of thing, lol.  The existence of non-existence It's like saying 'square circle' or 'married bachelor'.  In short, I think existence exists because that's what it is, and what it does.  What's the logical alternative?  😋  

My head hurts...