The absolute absurdity of God

[The Grand Nudger]

If the universe has an explanation of it's existence, that explanation is BOB SAGET!

The universe exists, therefore it has an explanation..and that explanation is BOB SAGET!

[SteveII]

I really, really don't understand this rabbit trail we are going on and how it relates to any part of any argument, but...

So an infinite spacetime, in this vacuum state is always in a constant production of particles and fields. What's keeping this mechanism from popping a Universe?
No matter how unlikely it actually is, in an infinity of spacetime, it must surely happen... perhaps even an infinity of Universes are bound to happen. Surely, not all at the same point of spacetime.

You continue referring to spacetime as something other than a model of the real things it describes: 3 spacial, 1 time dimensions. Spacetime is not itself a concrete object. When you propose that spacetime is infinite, that is inaccurate. You are proposing that the 3+1 dimensions are infinite. These 3+1 dimensions are bound in our universe--a universe that by most accounts had some sort of beginning. So, talking about anything outside of our universe is pure metaphysics where anyone can dream up anything. The problem is that dreams have to be internally consistent. 

If this magic quantum vacuum (that apparently can produce anything) always existed, it would have created our universe an infinite time ago and infinite amount of times exactly as it is now. In addition, there would be an infinite amount of universes that ALSO existed that I typed this sentence without punctuation. You have just traded one brute fact (our universe) with an infinitely more complex brute fact (a truly infinite amount of universes). I think William of Occam would have something to say about that. 

What keeps the quantum vacuum from popping out universes? I would be thoroughly impresses if it popped out a can of Coke. Speaking of cans, all you have done it kicked the can back (see next section).

It relates to your argument(s), because it totally removes any agency from the cause of the Universe. It's just random.
Like your first cause, god, needs to be a brute fact to you... I keep things simple and think it's more reasonable to consider spacetime as the brute fact.

If you posit a physical thing always existing, you have to wave your hand at the impossible logic of traversing an infinite series of events and just declare it must be so for the sole reason of avoiding a first cause. Fine. You are probably willing to pay that intellectual price and go with 'brute fact'.

However, God is by definition not a brute fact. It is not that he does not have an explanation, it is that the explanation of his existence is built into the definition of God. Plain and simple, if God exists, he is a necessary being. That means he does not need an explanation. 

Spacetime has the added benefit of having actually been verified to produce these particles... which should be a very good hint.

First, quantum vacuum =/= spacetime. 

Second, the energy for the particles are already in the quantum vacuum. We don't understand is what determines when they will materialize and fade back into the energy field. You have an extraordinary leap to get from indeterminately appearing particles from an energy field that produces, well, indeterminately appearing particles to a can of Coke appearing, let alone producing a universe with its own matter, energy, physical laws, etc.  

After all this, believing in God seems pretty mundane.

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Not with real objects (1). Premise 2 still intact.

It's questionable whether past events are real objects...they did exist but they don't exist now.

You are equivocating between the 'past' and physical events that were in the past. Of course they are real. We would not have the effect today without the causes of yesterday.

[Angrboda]

However, God is by definition not a brute fact. It is not that he does not have an explanation, it is that the explanation of his existence is built into the definition of God. Plain and simple, if God exists, he is a necessary being. That means he does not need an explanation. 

A brute fact by any other name....

[SteveII]

Sounds fishy that a mathematical model can affect anything in the real world. Links?

The mathematical model of spacetime models, um, spacetime, which is really real. Currently really real. Unlike the past, which is in the past, which is not a real place in the same sense that Albuquerque is a real place (for now).

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Yes, there is very much a need. If it was not past eternal it would need an explanation for its existence. The whole point to the argument is to get back to a necessarily-existing first cause and break an infinite regress.


No, not "to the best of our knowledge it is a transformation of a previous state...". We have no knowledge of any kinds. It is metaphysical musings at best. The universe cannot be past eternal because material things can't be. See the other post on the impossibility of a past series of events. Something purely material cannot "have existed statically forever until something changed"--see premise (4). Nothing in the argument proposes there was 'nothing' at one point. 


Since this is a sub-argument that Jorm inquired about to get to a "personal" cause, I focused on the logic specifically to that point--and not feeling the need to include the whole argument up to that point. The larger argument specifically avoids arguing by composition. "An explanation" is rooted in the metaphysical principle that things don't just pop into existence: a PSR. 

i. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
ii. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
iii. The universe exists.
iv. Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1, 3).
v. Therefore, the explanation of the universe’s existence is God (from 2, 4).


Seems like my effort survived all your criticism.

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What? Quantum mechanics describes quantum events of real quantum particles in the four actual dimensions of the universe. Spacetime is a mathematical model of how the three dimensions of space and the one dimension of time might work together. The mathematical model of spacetime is the very definition of an abstract object. Abstract objects are causally effete.  Therefore spacetime does not cause or affect anything.

1. In other words, YOU need it for YOUR argument to work.

What are you talking about? You must really not understand the argument at all if you think a first cause did not have to be past-eternal. 

2. Up to the point where our knowledge ends, only transformations are observed. Inserting something different than transformations beyond that point is unjustified. You don't get to posit a whole new thing because of our ignorance. The most you can posit is that the series of transformations might not hold. And I'd be interested in your proof that material things can't be past eternal. We've never observed a material thing (energy or matter) ceasing to exist above the quantum level. In fact we only observe matter and energy transforming, never ceasing to exist. On what basis can you conclude that they can't be eternal? And how can you eliminate the possibility of a 'causeless cause' when such events seem to be common at the quantum level? I know it's inconvenient for your premise, but it's what the available evidence points to.

No a series of transformation going back never will "hold". Here is the proof that material objects can't be past eternal:

1. An event is a change in a concrete material object. 
2. From any point in the past, there is a finite amount of events to the present and can be counted down en...e3...e2...e1...e0(now).
3. If there are an infinite amount of events in the past, we could never count down from infinity to e3...e2...e1...e0 because there would always be an infinite amount of events that would still have happened on the leading edge of the series.
4. With an infinite series of past events we could never arrive to the present.
5. Therefore an actual infinite series of past events is impossible.

Events are not 'causeless' at the quantum level. They are indeterminate. There is a huge difference. So...not any evidence of anything.

3. The 'metaphysical principle' that things don't just 'pop into existence' was a reasonable inference before we began to understand quantum mechanics and became capable of devising instrumentation that can observe events on a subatomic scale. To infer that 'everything has a cause' and to maintain that despite new observations that indicate otherwise is a form of foolishness. That it's conceivable that someday quantum events may be discovered to not actually be stochastic in nature is not a justification to cling to a principle that denies evidence. 

Again, quantum particles materialize out of an energy field (the material cause). We don't know why they seem indeterminate. Seems like an argument from ignorance only repeated in atheist forums.

[pocaracas]

So an infinite spacetime, in this vacuum state is always in a constant production of particles and fields. What's keeping this mechanism from popping a Universe?
No matter how unlikely it actually is, in an infinity of spacetime, it must surely happen... perhaps even an infinity of Universes are bound to happen. Surely, not all at the same point of spacetime.

You continue referring to spacetime as something other than a model of the real things it describes: 3 spacial, 1 time dimensions. Spacetime is not itself a concrete object. When you propose that spacetime is infinite, that is inaccurate. You are proposing that the 3+1 dimensions are infinite. These 3+1 dimensions are bound in our universe--a universe that by most accounts had some sort of beginning.

Round and round we go?
Spacetime is a framework upon which the Universe and everything in it are.
Spacetime is not a model.
The mathematical description of spacetime may be considered a model, yes.

So, talking about anything outside of our universe is pure metaphysics where anyone can dream up anything. The problem is that dreams have to be internally consistent.

Yes, anyone can dream up of anything in metaphysics.... That's why, earlier, when I brought forth this notion, I used words such as "can" and "might"... and you mocked me for it.

If this magic quantum vacuum (that apparently can produce anything) always existed, it would have created our universe an infinite time ago and infinite amount of times exactly as it is now.

I think not.... It seems that such a generation of a Universe should be a cascading event that would result in what we call a big bang.... and everything then flows.

In addition, there would be an infinite amount of universes that ALSO existed that I typed this sentence without punctuation. You have just traded one brute fact (our universe) with an infinitely more complex brute fact (a truly infinite amount of universes). I think William of Occam would have something to say about that. 

Yeah.... Will might have a problem with your view of this potential reality...

It relates to your argument(s), because it totally removes any agency from the cause of the Universe. It's just random.
Like your first cause, god, needs to be a brute fact to you... I keep things simple and think it's more reasonable to consider spacetime as the brute fact.

If you posit a physical thing always existing, you have to wave your hand at the impossible logic of traversing an infinite series of events and just declare it must be so for the sole reason of avoiding a first cause. Fine. You are probably willing to pay that intellectual price and go with 'brute fact'.

Spacetime, as the framework that it is, has an existence that transcends a time vector... it IS the time vector (along with the other 3 spatial vectors).
Our inability to properly define time is a huge hurtle in any discussion of this sort and I totally own that it's a difficult concept to put into words and I am probably doing a very poor job at it.

If spcaetime is indeed independent from our Universe, as some theories suggest, then it may well be infinite and contain in it all the potential to create a Universe and, within that, life and reasoning minds.

However, God is by definition not a brute fact. It is not that he does not have an explanation, it is that the explanation of his existence is built into the definition of God. Plain and simple, if God exists, he is a necessary being. That means he does not need an explanation. 

If I remember the meta correctly, the most basic feature attributed to God is "existence" itself. The concept of existence.
Existence is necessary for anything to exist, right?


Wrong. Not necessarily right, at least.
Existence can simply be a quality that humans have bestowed upon all that exists.
Humans and their pattern seeking brains... Other sentient being may have similar pattern seeking "brains" that would make them come to the same categorization of things that exist... But does that mean that existence is an feature independent of those reasoning minds?

Spacetime has the added benefit of having actually been verified to produce these particles... which should be a very good hint.

First, quantum vacuum =/= spacetime. 

Perhaps... perhaps not.
The way I see it, Quantum vacuum and spacetime are indistinguishable.

Second, the energy for the particles are already in the quantum vacuum. We don't understand is what determines when they will materialize and fade back into the energy field. You have an extraordinary leap to get from indeterminately appearing particles from an energy field that produces, well, indeterminately appearing particles to a can of Coke appearing, let alone producing a universe with its own matter, energy, physical laws, etc.  

I see you like aluminium.

As to the leap, yes there is such a leap.
My point is, essentially, that such a thing can happen and it can fit with what is reasonably expected of a Universe precursor.

At some point, the philosophy argues that this precursor must have features of a mind, for, if we have true free will, independent of the brain substrate, our mind is essentially disembodied, and so a disembodied mind must be a possibility of that precursor.
I think the human mind is an emergent property of the brain and all the connections it makes with the rest of the body, along with the extension to its environment.
As such, I see no need to posit a mind-ness (or whatever we may call it... simply a mind?) as a property of a precursor of the Universe.
If there is no mind, there is no need to call it god, for that word comes along with a whole lot of baggage.

After all this, believing in God seems pretty mundane.

I don't think so... but feel free to think how you do. It's not like we can probe beyond the Universe... (https://www.sciencealert.com/penrose-b-m...-cosmology... maybe we can... )

[Angrboda]

You are suggesting that an impersonal cause could have created the universe. My response what that if an impersonal cause is sufficient to create the universe, then it just does.

And my response was that this wasn't necessarily the case. This seems to be an article of faith with you. One that can be countered with a definition of a supernatural automaton that parallels your description of libertarian free will. Therefore, if a mind with libertarian free will can do it, so can an automaton that is omniscient. Otherwise you're just engaged in special pleading.

[Mister Agenda]

It's questionable whether past events are real objects...they did exist but they don't exist now.

You are equivocating between the 'past' and physical events that were in the past. Of course they are real. We would not have the effect today without the causes of yesterday.

They were real. 'Are' is the incorrect tense.

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The mathematical model of spacetime models, um, spacetime, which is really real. Currently really real. Unlike the past, which is in the past, which is not a real place in the same sense that Albuquerque is a real place (for now).

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1. In other words, YOU need it for YOUR argument to work.

What are you talking about? You must really not understand the argument at all if you think a first cause did not have to be past-eternal. 

I understand that your statement is an assertion, not an argument.

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Again, quantum particles materialize out of an energy field (the material cause). We don't know why they seem indeterminate. Seems like an argument from ignorance only repeated in atheist forums.

Not an argument from ignorance, and you should see how physicists go on about it. And the energy field is a property of space, quantum particles are all about location, a property of space, and the impossibility of knowing both the location and momentum of a particle, even if it's (0,0), the location and momentum of a particle that doesn't exist. Space itself generates the false vacuum.

[LadyForCamus]

LadyC, I know you directed this reply to SteveII so I hope you don’t mind my addressing this point.

SteveII is very good at presenting a wide swath of observations that Christians believe support their faith and serve as evidence for it, such as historicity of the New Testament, changed lives, and cosmological arguments. These are all fine and good, though I suspect that few unbelievers find apologetics sufficient to positively convince him or her that the claims of the Christianity are true.

The value of the believers’ list of evidences, IMHO, is revealed in the very word apologetics -  from the original Greek meaning “speaking in defense”. The arguments serve, in part, as defense against objections to the sacred doctrines of special revelation held by faith. More than anything they remove barriers to belief. The question for believers is not whether there is empirical evidence or compelling logical proof that Christianity is true; but rather, if it is rational to believe that the articles of faith accurately reflect the highly individual and personal sense that there is something Divine calling out to your innermost being.

I submit to you that at least some people, perhaps not all, feel a profound sensus divinitatis (No, not divine ta-tas, that’s another discussion) that requires religious explanation and which in the absence of defeaters is rational to accept as indicative of important truths about reality.

Always a pleasure hearing your thoughts, Neo.

How could one even go about offering defeaters to an falsifiable, subjective experience like sensus divinitatus? Just because I can’t demonstrate such a feeling isn’t the lord calling to you, that doesn’t mean it’s rational for you to believe that it is.  Can you honestly say that you have ruled out every natural explaination for this spiritual yearning to the conclusion that a divine sense is the most well-supported and most likely cause?  What about people who don’t feel it?

[The Grand Nudger]

What sense organ is involved, that's what I want to know. Which mechanoreceptor(s) is picking up god..because that is entirely amenable to objective confirmation or falsification.

If we knew which one it was, and it was working in neo..we could even figure out why it is either not present or not working in others.

[robvalue]

Mine must have been sliced off at birth.