RE: Is There A Fourth Possibility?
November 30, 2009 at 3:28 am
(This post was last modified: November 30, 2009 at 3:33 am by Joe Bloe.)
The first-cause argument goes something like this:
(1) Nothing happens without a cause
(2) So the Universe must have a cause
(3) This first cause can be described as "god".
(4) You can read about god in the bible
(5) He is the "cause" of the Universe.
This argument uses the fallacy of equivocation.
In the first part of the argument, "god" is just another word for "first-cause of the Universe" and we still know nothing about it - except that it caused the Universe.
In the second part, "god" has become much more specific...good, jealous, omnipotent, talking to people, handing out laws, smiting Egyptians, killing Midianites, etcetera.
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Even if the Universe had a first cause (and that's debatable) and even if we called it "god", there is still no way to take the next step and declare that the Christian god (or the god of any other religion) is the first-cause of the Universe.
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Maybe the fourth possibility is the phrase, "I don't know." (We don't have to know everything, do we?)
(1) Nothing happens without a cause
(2) So the Universe must have a cause
(3) This first cause can be described as "god".
(4) You can read about god in the bible
(5) He is the "cause" of the Universe.
This argument uses the fallacy of equivocation.
In the first part of the argument, "god" is just another word for "first-cause of the Universe" and we still know nothing about it - except that it caused the Universe.
In the second part, "god" has become much more specific...good, jealous, omnipotent, talking to people, handing out laws, smiting Egyptians, killing Midianites, etcetera.
------------
Even if the Universe had a first cause (and that's debatable) and even if we called it "god", there is still no way to take the next step and declare that the Christian god (or the god of any other religion) is the first-cause of the Universe.
------------
Maybe the fourth possibility is the phrase, "I don't know." (We don't have to know everything, do we?)
