(January 9, 2015 at 9:45 pm)bob96 Wrote: ok, good point.
Can some material thing come into *our* universe from nothing without God putting it there?
Your question (and I'm ignoring the God part for now) concerns the physics question of energy conservation. It seems to hold if we ignore the curvature of space. If we allow for spacetime curvature matters are not as simple any more - energy can be converted into spacetime curvature and vice versa, and one can attempt to formulate a quantity which encapsulates the total energy plus curvature energt if you will. It suggests that in an expanding universe, no real particles should pop up out of vacuum or, more generally, existing particles gain energy. However, the origin of the energy (equivalent to matter) we observe now goes back all the way to the earliest moments of the universe where an inflationary epoch is suspected to have occurred. Here, a quantum fluctuation could have produced space with negative energy curature and positive energy content. However, as I've said before, the concept of time and causality becomes fuzzy hereand your everyday intuition that stuff has to come from other stuff does not hold.
The fool hath said in his heart, There is a God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.
Psalm 14, KJV revised edition