Potentially Big News On The Human Evolution Front

[GrandizerII]

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...

Yay, nailed it. Agree with every word you said here.

[Minimalist]

 I find the phrase, "something coming from nothing" to be an internally logically inconsistent statement.

Probably because it is bullshit.  The Big Bang Theory points to :

Most scientists now believe that we live in a finite expanding universe which has not existed forever, and that all the matter, energy and space in the universe was once squeezed into an infinitesimally small volume, which erupted in a cataclysmic "explosion" which has become known as the Big Bang.

Thus, space, time, energy and matter all came into being at an infinitely dense, infinitely hot gravitational singularity, and began expanding everywhere at once. Current best estimates are that this occurred some 13.7 billion years ago, although you may sometimes see estimates of anywhere between 11 and 18 billion years.



http://www.physicsoftheuniverse.com/topics_bigbang.html

Thus, not "nothing" but "everything."


For "something coming from "nothing" you need to consult

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

Gen 1

It is He Who created the Night and the Day and the sun and the moon: all (the celestial bodies) swim along each in its rounded course.

Sura 21:33

In the beginning, before there was any land of Egypt, all was darkness, and there was nothing but a great waste of water called Nun. The power of Nun was such that there arose out of the darkness a great shining egg, and this was Re. He was all-powerful, and he could take many forms. His power and the secret of it lay in his hidden name; but if he spoke other names, that which he named came into being.
"I am Khepera at the dawn, and Re at noon, and Tem in the evening," he said. And the sun rose and passed across the sky and set for the first time.
Then he named Shu, and the first winds blew; he named Tefnut the spitter, and the first rain fell. Next he named Geb, and the earth came into being; he named the goddess Nut, and she was the sky arched over the earth with her feet on one horizon and her hands on the other; he named Hapi, and the great River Nile flowed through Egypt and made it fruitful.
After this Re named all things that are upon the earth, and they grew. Last of all he named mankind, and there were men and women in the land of Egypt.

Egyptian creation myth

If you ask me the Egyptian myth far surpasses the other two tales.  At least it doesn't begin from "nothing."

[Succubus]

Hmm, it's a bit clickbaity that article.

Most scientists now believe that we live in a finite expanding universe which has not existed forever, and that all the matter, energy and space in the universe was once squeezed into an infinitesimally small volume, which erupted in a cataclysmic "explosion" which has become known as the Big Bang.

Then they shoot themselves in the foot.

In fact, “explosion” is really just an often-used analogy and is slightly misleading in that it conveys the image that the Big Bang was triggered in some way at some particular centre.

Then why use the analogy? The singularity is 'classic' BBT, I think modern cosmology has moved on,* no need for a singularity.

* Much like the Goddit faction has abandoned this thread.

Sorry about the dodgy fonts, I did try.

[Minimalist]

Hmm, it's a bit clickbaity that article.

Yeah - I got it from a site with lots of embedded links and I was too goddamn lazy to figure out how to take them out.