Arguing for the existence of God how do you answer: the Designer needs a designer

[Prodigal_Son]

The designer can’t have a designer because that designer would also need a designer, and this would go on perpetually. If the designer had a designer, we wouldn’t be here because there would be no beginning to all of this.

This is called special pleading. Why couldn’t we stop the train a step earlier and say that the universe can’t need a designer because, if it did, that designer would need a designer and so on?

 

[Thom18]

Why, then, does the designer need a designer, but not their designer?

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Why, then, does the designer need a designer, but not their designer?

I agree that the infinite regress happens, Thom. I’m just suggesting that – IF the infinite regress is a problem that causes us to say we must deny that a designer needs a designer – it should also be a problem that causes us to say that the universe doesn’t need a designer. The infinite regress STARTS one step before we get to the designer.

 

[De_Maria]

You are confusing the universe that started at the Big Bang, our current universe with the multiverse.

rossum

You are ignoring my answers to your questions.

1. The cosmologist has to deal with the science which provides evidence that the universe has not always been here.
2. Then provide evidence for the other universes they claim exist alongside the first.

Your claim that I’m confusing this universe with universes that can’t be proven, is besides the point.

 

[De_Maria]

God has not always been the creator. 20 billion years ago, God was not the creator since there was no universe 20 billion years ago. He only became the creator at the instant of the Big Bang.

You didn’t understand JC’s answer.

God does not live in time. He lives in eternity. According to science, there was no time before the Big Bang. We count 20 billion years. God does not. For anyone to say, “God was not a creator until…” is a non sequitur.

 

[De_Maria]

Arguing for the existence of God how do you answer: the Designer needs a designer

I answer that this universe is so grand that it is obvious by simply meditating upon it, that the Designer of this universe, needs nothing.

 

[rossum]

The cosmologist has to deal with the science which provides evidence that the universe has not always been here.

It is precisely that evidence of a start to the current material universe which is the evidence for a multiverse (or equivalent).

rossum

 

[rossum]

God does not live in time.

But He acts in time, as with His actions on the second and subsequent days or parting the sea for Moses. Hence either God exists inside time (as you would expect of an omnipresent being) or else God does not exist in time, and something else, other than God, is acting inside time on God;'s behalf.

The second option leads to something like the Gnostic Demiurges or the Sephirot of the Kabbalah. This question is not new.

According to science, there was no time before the Big Bang.

Debatable. The most common hypothesis of the pre-BB state uses 11 dimensions, of which four opened out at, or shortly after, the BB itself. Hence, what is now the time dimension existed before the BB, but it was very tightly wrapped, as the other 7 dimensions still are. Modern cosmology can get very strange.

For anyone to say, “God was not a creator until…” is a non sequitur.

I will not accept the existence of a creator unless there is a creation. Can I validly claim to be “rossum, creator of the universe” if no universe exists?

rossum

 

[ynotzap]

A cause by definition is anything that can produce an effect, it doesn’t mean that if something does not produce an effect ceases to be a cause. There are two states of causes, one potential, the other, actual. Potential meaning the cause EXISTS and has the capacity to produce an effect, the other to bring the effect into actuality. This Is the nature of our reality. Not accepting the reality of an independent cause is your prerogative, many have for GOOD REASON.

 

[jcrichton]

Hi, Rossum!

…let’s see if I understand correctly… until you created/did something you were not Rossum?

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

Yet, that position is flawed–see my reply to your post.

Maran atha!

 

[jcrichton]

Rossum, again you are flawed.

The term “unchanging” does not mean that God does not have the Power to Create; it means that God IS.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

Hi, Thom!

The premise that God needs a designer is the fallacy of rejecting that the Universe Came into Being due to the Designer and not a compilation of eons of happenstance and the goldilocks effect/phenomenon.

Just look at how complex the Universe is and consider that nothing made all that exist with nothing–however, if “building materials” are some how injected then the same must be applied (nothing rule) to morphing the then existing matter into the ooze of the Universe’s Life–which then must also take into consideration the eons upon eons of happenstance and the goldilocks effect/phenomenon.

Just one example of the causality… in the vastness of empty nothingness two masses took a course that would pit them into an explosive encounter (what is the possibility of just the right two masses traveling at the right speed and meeting in the dark empty?); then the explosive encounter birthed the eons upon eons of happenstance and goldilocks effect–rejecting (without clue or purpose) anything that would not be conductive to the “right” amounts of the “just right” components that would take to modify the explosive residual into the potentiality to promote more eons upon eons of happenstance doused with the “correct” goldilocks effect/phenomenon that would, at the right juncture, produce the necessary ooze that would then, at the right apex, be bombarded by the right amount of energy to procure the final eon upon eon of happenstance merged with the final goldilocks effect/phenomenon (by this time it might be a syndrome) that would produce Life in the millions upon millions of bodies and species… oh, and let’s not forget how the sun, the moon and the other extra-earthly bodies were position in that merry-go-round that we call the Milky Way Galaxy.

Yeah, not sweat–there’s a theory for that that makes perfect sense: 'chaos (you see) brings, through the law of deaf, dumb (lack of intelligence), and blindness, order.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

Rossum, the multiverse is a thought/conjecture not even a possible theory (you know, if we can’t prove the actual Universe’s Creation how can thousands/millions/billions be rendered in a better understanding?); we have actual knowledge (yeah observed both by the naked eye–even the most stupid of humans–and the instruments of science) of its actual existence (unless you buy into that 'a “xyz” is not really “xyz” mumbo-jumbo pretense of intellectualism–although if we accept the premise of sci-fi [what the programs/novels purport is in the making or have been achieved, thing] there is indeed time travel and a multiverse).

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[rossum]

A cause by definition is anything that can produce an effect

No. A cause is something that has actually caused an effect. Almost any adult human being is physically capable of killing a baby. That does not make all those human beings the causes of the deaths of babies. Your “can” needs to be replaced with “has”.

it doesn’t mean that if something does not produce an effect ceases to be a cause.

As long as it actually has produced the effect in the first place. If there is no effect then there was no cause. The two are mutually dependent.

There are two states of causes, one potential, the other, actual.

I do not accept this. A potential cause has not actually caused anything yet. A two-year-old child is a potential parent, but it is an error to call such a child “father” or “mother”. Potential is not actual. A potential sandwich will not be of any use to assuage my hunger. Only an actual sandwich can do that.

rossum

 

[rossum]

…let’s see if I understand correctly… until you created/did something you were not Rossum?

You have not understood correctly. Before I created anything I was rossum. Only after I created something did I become “rossum the creator.” The ‘creator’ description is contingent on actually having created something.

rossum

 

[rossum]

The term “unchanging” does not mean that God does not have the Power to Create; it means that it means that God IS.

The word “unchanging” has a perfectly good dictionary definition, which I use. If you want to redefine the word to suit your particular theological needs, then I disagree with your definition. Unchanging describes something that does not change. The God of the Bible changes, as I have pointed out. Ether the Bible is wrong or you are wrong.

One of the things that God IS, is changing. He parts seas and He closes them again. He makes fish one day and He makes animals another day. He sends ten different plagues at ten different times. how is that no change, or can I go to the Red Sea and see that the unchanging God has unchangingly parted it?

rossum

rossum

 

[De_Maria]

It is precisely that evidence of a start to the current material universe which is the evidence for a multiverse (or equivalent).

On the contrary, the only other plane of existence for which we have existence if the heavenly sphere. And you won’t accept that.

 

[De_Maria]

But He acts in time, as with His actions on the second and subsequent days or parting the sea for Moses. Hence either God exists inside time (as you would expect of an omnipresent being) or else God does not exist in time, and something else, other than God, is acting inside time on God;'s behalf.

Since He is the Creator of time, He is superior to it. He is not affected by it. God transcends time.

The second option leads to something like the Gnostic Demiurges or the Sephirot of the Kabbalah. This question is not new.

The question has been answered but you simply don’t like it.

Debatable. The most common hypothesis of the pre-BB state uses 11 dimensions, of which four opened out at, or shortly after, the BB itself. Hence, what is now the time dimension existed before the BB, but it was very tightly wrapped, as the other 7 dimensions still are. Modern cosmology can get very strange.

Atheists deny everything and debate everything whether they have evidence of not. But their denials are not evidence. All they prove is that some people will argue with a rock.

I will not accept the existence of a creator unless there is a creation. Can I validly claim to be “rossum, creator of the universe” if no universe exists?

If you can’t see that you are a creature and part of this universe, you are living in denial. As Scripture says:

Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

 

[Wesrock]

If God did not create He would not be a creator, but there’s no before He created. He never changed from not creating to creating. There was no 20 billion years ago, no time before creation.