GQaggie said:
I believe God created via the Big Bang. The first option requires an actual infinite past which seems absurd to me. The idea of the Big Bang has been the dominant scientific theory for quite awhile now and also fits very nicely with the idea of something resembling creatio ex nihilo and then the idea of God bringing order from disorder and an inhabitable space for man out of the wild wasteland.
TheGreatEscape said:
1. The universe is eternal.
2. The universe came into existence by a spontaneous unexplainable "Big Bang." Or that of a slow spontaneous/incremental occurrence…
3. The universe was created by the eternal God.
Where do you stand?
caused, fallible, in time, in space, finite power consciousness trying to make sense of the actions of an uncaused, infallible, outside of time and space, infinite power = sensible ???kurt vonnegut said:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
Martin Q. Blank said:caused, fallible, in time, in space, finite power consciousness trying to make sense of the actions of an uncaused, infallible, outside of time and space, infinite power = sensible ???kurt vonnegut said:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
GQaggie said:
I guess it really depends on what we mean by absurd and sensible. Our reality of existing on an infinitesimal speck in an unfathomably large universe and being able to question it all is pretty fantastical. The truth behind it all will on some level inevitably seem absurd.
An infinite past to me seems absurd in that I can't even understand how we arrive at our current time. How does one traverse infinite time to arrive at a given time? For other absurdities created by the existence of an actual infinite, checkout Hilbert's Hotel. As fantastic an idea as God seems to be, He seems way more sensible to me as a cause of intelligent life. His timelessness also seems like a relatively (relative to an infinite past) sensible explanation for an infinite cause without the difficult question of how we eventually arrived here.
Claims? We can only hold onto what this God condescends to reveal. Otherwise we just go around saying we don't know anything and any claim that does is met with a "sensible ???".kurt vonnegut said:Martin Q. Blank said:caused, fallible, in time, in space, finite power consciousness trying to make sense of the actions of an uncaused, infallible, outside of time and space, infinite power = sensible ???kurt vonnegut said:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
No, absolutely not. Remember, I'm the one saying 'I don't know'. You are the caused, fallible, in time, in space, finite power consciousness that claims to know the purpose of existing, how it was all made, and who God is. In the context of human short comings and the proposed infinity of God, are any of our claims sensible?
I do not see anything non-sensible about it. A God outside of time with His ability can do as He choses whether it's create one planet around one start to interact with a humanity He creates or to create millions of habited planets.Quote:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
DirtDiver said:I do not see anything non-sensible about it. A God outside of time with His ability can do as He choses whether it's create one planet around one start to interact with a humanity He creates or to create millions of habited planets.Quote:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
Martin Q. Blank said:
Claims? We can only hold onto what this God condescends to reveal. Otherwise we just go around saying we don't know anything and any claim that does is met with a "sensible ???".
ramblin_ag02 said:
A much stronger argument (to me anyway) for the creation of the universe by God is the character of the universe. The universe is relatively uniform, well ordered, and follows consistent physical laws that are independent of both space and time. For example, we think the speed of light is the same everywhere in the universe from the start of it until now. Neither location nor time period matters to fundamental physical laws. That all makes sense if the universe was designed by a rational Creator. It's harder to wrap our heads around the idea that the universe is this way from happenstance
kurt vonnegut said:DirtDiver said:I do not see anything non-sensible about it. A God outside of time with His ability can do as He choses whether it's create one planet around one start to interact with a humanity He creates or to create millions of habited planets.Quote:
Infinite past = absurd
Uncaused supernatural infallible consciousness existing outside of time and space with infinite power that created hundreds of billions of galaxies so that one planet around one star in one of those galaxies might have life after 14 billion years or so have passed = sensible ???
Fantastic. Have you ever existed as a consciousness outside of time or the affects of causation? Define for me 'outside of time'. Give me a falsifiable, understandable, and rational explanation of how outside of time works for a supernatural being. Explain the rules and realities of a being that exists outside of time. How does a being that exists outside the affects of time or rules of causation interact with our temporal reality? I submit that 'outside of time' might simply be pure speculation. I don't know that to be true. . . . I've just never existed outside of time and so I don't know what its like.
The problem with 'outside of time' or 'uncaused cause' is that it is affectively saying 'because magic'.
Imagine you run a business and are having trouble attracting clients. So you hire someone to help, explain your problem with finding clients, and ask for their solution. And then imagine their solution is "What you need is a magic box and conjures clients into existence for you." Unless they have such a box, know how to build one or understand how client conjuring magic boxes work, its NOT a solution.
The same goes for 'outside of time' or 'uncaused case'. Unless you can explain it, prove it, demonstrate it, or sprinkle fairy dust on me and take me a reality without time. . . . I don't see how inventing these phrases answers anything. Its simply answering the question of creation by attributing it to something that is about as accessible to us as 'magic'.
TheGreatEscape said:
Both the spontaneous big bang and the spontaneous gradual incremental bang have a poof magic element in order to believe that something came from nothing.
kurt vonnegut said:TheGreatEscape said:
Both the spontaneous big bang and the spontaneous gradual incremental bang have a poof magic element in order to believe that something came from nothing.
I could argue that plenty of 'versions' of the big bang exclude claims of what existed at or before t=0. But, I think what I'd rather note is that if I accept your point, then there is still quite a difference to the importance each of us places on our respective belief in 'magic'.
The puddle feels the size and shape of the hole and every detail about the hole is exact and significant. Without the hole, the puddle doesn't exist - at least not in the form that it identifies itself as. Any variation in the hole distorts or changes or destroys the puddle.ramblin_ag02 said:
That video had almost nothing to do with what I said. With or without humans, the speed of light is still the speed of light. Gravity still works, entropy still happens. I never made the argument that the universe was built for humans. Only that it seems to have been built
ramblin_ag02 said:
I feel like my argument has nothing to do with intention. Thus my confusion. I feel like you are doing a good job arguing against the weak anthropic principle, but I'm not advocating that. I don't know any other way to describe my argument except that natural laws are metaphysical principles that control physical behavior without any limitation with respect to time or space. They supercede physical phenomenon in a universal way. It would be accurate to say that things like the constant speed of light are supernatural properties that the natural universe must obey. How does the presence of one universal metaphysical principle, much less a plethora, make sense in an arbitrary, happenstance universe? At least in my mind, the Occam's razor answer to that question is that they were put in place and are enforced by a universal being that is not limited by time or space. Not saying this is a proof or anything, but I've yet to hear a materialistic explanation for the presence of universal, atemporal, aspacial natural laws.
