(June 8, 2014 at 1:07 am)Freedom of thought Wrote: If you've read the grand design, Hawking claims that because there is a law of gravity, the universe can create itself out of nothing. Well, I understand he's not saying the universe is actually 'creating itself' in any sense, its slightly absurd to say the universe is creating itself, because it would have to exist before it existed to create itself, it sounded like sloppy wording to me. I understand the consequences of the uncertainty principle, and Hawkings (and many other cosmologists) arguments, but I'm not entirely sure. Can, by the laws of physics, something like a universe be brought into existence? My guess is that if a law of nature is described mathematically, and it tells us a universe can come from nothing, then the creation ex nihilo of the universe is permitted. But I don't know if I would say the laws are 'causing' anything, but permitting a universe to arise naturally, just as the guidelines of gravity only permit certain orbits of planets. Lennox has said mathematics cannot 'cause' anything, and when there is nothing to describe, the mathematics mean nothing. Then again, when a radioactive material decays, it 'creates' a new particle. I think the laws can re-arrange energy in this way, so if the total energy of the universe is 0, then the universe is simply a new arrangement of 'nothing' by the laws of physics. As Einstein has shown, energy cannot be created nor destroyed, but it can be re-arranged. What is your take on this?
you have to understand that these laws were not the reason the universe is here. The laws are here because of the universe. Silly people think they are the ones that tell the universe how to be the universe.
