Could the Universe have Created Itself?

[JamesCaruso]

There is no reason whatsoever to believe God is compelled to redeem His creatures in precisely the same way on every planet…

Although I would assume He is compelled by love, so to speak, to redeem His creatures in the most perfect way in accordance with His Perfection. But, I agree, He could creat second class creatures and have them redeemed is a lesser way than we were redeemed, assuming you agree that we were redeemed in the most perfect way imaginable. Maybe you can conceive of a more perfect way of redemption; my puny mind cannot.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

No better…when was the last time my God allowed or directly caused the slaughter of innocents? Oh, I think an absentee God is much better.

Well, if your absentee god truly exists, it is he who walked away from the world and allowed the slaughter of the innocents.

The last time I looked it was cruel and vindictive (and mostly godless) abortionists who are causing the slaughter of innocents.

An absentee god is no better than no god. Deism is a vain attempt to sidestep atheism. It offers no rational hypothesis or explanation for the creation of the universe. The universe just is. The Deity created it but could care less what goes on in it. That’s about the same as pantheism or atheism. The universe just exists. The only logical recourse for the Deist it to get rid of his absentee god and just argue the universe created itself.

A highly rational and satisfying hypothesis for some, I suppose. Why it is more rational and satisfying than your “cruel and vindictive god” (who died on the cross for our sins) beats me.

 

[LogosSokratikos]

So sad the discussion has derailed so far and wide from its actual subject.

Anyway…

There is no mechanism by which something comes from nothing, and positing a deity to resolve it, well doesn’t, because can a deity create itself? Only if you define it as the ground of all being, which is basically an argument from definition.

So it’s unsolved, and by the looks of it, it looks like a miracle! In every case, unknowns always look like miracles to primitive people. We love to mystify the unknown, that’s why ‘mystify’ and ‘mystery’ share the same word root. Everything we have grown accustomed to consider run-of-the-mill ordinary knowledge because of scientific research, was once complete mysteries that inspired mystification, awe, trembling, and… cockeyed supernaturalistic pseudo-explanations: the work of witches, demons, deities, elves, ghosts, fairies and whatnot.

The best attitude, one that has worked excellently for the past 250 years or so, is wait, because scientists are working at it. Patience lets no one down.

All we know is that for 13 billion years no deity has ever done anything, and chances are, none have done anything for even more billions and billions of years. Deities, if you’re out there, come out come out wherever you are! You’ve done a heck of a good job hiding a.k.a. doing nothing at all.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Unanswered questions are far less dangerous than unquestioned answers.
It is wrong always, everywhere and for everyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.

Would it not be equally wrong to conclude the following on the grounds of insufficient evidence?

All we know is that for 13 billion years no deity has ever done anything, and chances are, none have done anything for even more billions and billions of years.

For “sufficiency” of evidence to be determined it would be necessary to know precisely what a “deity” doing “something” would look like, no?

All of creation could be, as far as we know, remarkable evidence for deity. Simply because our expectations for “deity” point in one direction does not mean anything in terms of what deity actually does.

It seems to me that you ought to follow your own advice and not conclude anything about “absence of evidence” either, since the sufficiency of the evidence is not at all so easy to determine - that is, if you want to be completely fair on the matter.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

So sad the discussion has derailed so far and wide from its actual subject.

Anyway…

There is no mechanism by which something comes from nothing, and positing a deity to resolve it, well doesn’t, because can a deity create itself? Only if you define it as the ground of all being, which is basically an argument from definition.

So it’s unsolved, and by the looks of it, it looks like a miracle! In every case, unknowns always look like miracles to primitive people. We love to mystify the unknown, that’s why ‘mystify’ and ‘mystery’ share the same word root. Everything we have grown accustomed to consider run-of-the-mill ordinary knowledge because of scientific research, was once complete mysteries that inspired mystification, awe, trembling, and… cockeyed supernaturalistic pseudo-explanations: the work of witches, demons, deities, elves, ghosts, fairies and whatnot.

The best attitude, one that has worked excellently for the past 250 years or so, is wait, because scientists are working at it. Patience lets no one down.

All we know is that for 13 billion years no deity has ever done anything, and chances are, none have done anything for even more billions and billions of years. Deities, if you’re out there, come out come out wherever you are! You’ve done a heck of a good job hiding a.k.a. doing nothing at all.

Chances are? What kind of evidence is this? Are you so omniscient as to know that no God has been busy for billions of years?

As for patience, that is a straw dog. How do you know that science sooner or later will know everything, so that all we have to do is wait for everything to be known?

 

[oldcelt]

So sad the discussion has derailed so far and wide from its actual subject.

Anyway…

There is no mechanism by which something comes from nothing, and positing a deity to resolve it, well doesn’t, because can a deity create itself? Only if you define it as the ground of all being, which is basically an argument from definition.

So it’s unsolved, and by the looks of it, it looks like a miracle! In every case, unknowns always look like miracles to primitive people. We love to mystify the unknown, that’s why ‘mystify’ and ‘mystery’ share the same word root. Everything we have grown accustomed to consider run-of-the-mill ordinary knowledge because of scientific research, was once complete mysteries that inspired mystification, awe, trembling, and… cockeyed supernaturalistic pseudo-explanations: the work of witches, demons, deities, elves, ghosts, fairies and whatnot.

The best attitude, one that has worked excellently for the past 250 years or so, is wait, because scientists are working at it. Patience lets no one down.

All we know is that for 13 billion years no deity has ever done anything, and chances are, none have done anything for even more billions and billions of years. Deities, if you’re out there, come out come out wherever you are! You’ve done a heck of a good job hiding a.k.a. doing nothing at all.

Thank you…I was growing tired.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

There is no mechanism by which something comes from nothing, and positing a deity to resolve it, well doesn’t, because can a deity create itself? Only if you define it as the ground of all being, which is basically an argument from definition.

If the deity is eternal, it should not have to create itself.

You are falling into the trap Berrand Russell fell into when he asked who caused God.

It is an irrational question.

The universe was caused. It did not always exist. It is therefore rational to ask who caused the universe because everywhere in the universe the principle of causality exists. That very strongly suggests a First Cause.

But if you try to apply that principle to God, you immediately run into a dilemma.

How can this being called God, who created the principle of causality, be subject to the principle he created?

Is it not more reasonable to assume that God is an eternal principle not bound by his Creation?

 

[Tomdstone]

The universe was caused.

I think that this is what the atheist is denying. The atheist might say that everything we see on earth is caused, but that the earth is one extremely tiny part of the Milky Way, which, in turn, is a small part of the whole universe. So although things on earth may have causes, it would not prove that the universe as a whole must have a cause, according to the atheist. That would be an assumption on your part, according to the atheist. Would there be a contradiction in saying that the universe was always there? Of course, oftentimes we hear people quote the Borde Guth Valenkin theorem to support their assertion that the universe had to have a beginning. arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/0110012v2.pdf
But there have been some questions raised about the hypotheses of the theorem.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

I think that this is what the atheist is denying. The atheist might say that everything we see on earth is caused, but that the earth is one extremely tiny part of the Milky Way, which, in turn, is a small part of the whole universe. So although things on earth may have causes, it would not prove that the universe as a whole must have a cause, according to the atheist. That would be an assumption on your part, according to the atheist. Would there be a contradiction in saying that the universe was always there? Of course, oftentimes we hear people quote the Borde Guth Valenkin theorem to support their assertion that the universe had to have a beginning. arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/0110012v2.pdf
But there have been some questions raised about the hypotheses of the theorem.

I’ve been thinking the Big Bang must have been a Big Blow to atheism.

Carl Sagan in Cosmos, 1980 A.D.

“Ten or twenty billion years ago, something happened – the Big Bang, the event that began our universe…. In that titanic cosmic explosion, the universe began an expansion which has never ceased…. As space stretched, the matter and energy in the universe expanded with it and rapidly cooled. The radiation of the cosmic fireball, which, then as now, filled the universe, moved through the spectrum – from gamma rays to X-rays to ultraviolet light; through the rainbow colors of the visible spectrum; into the infrared and radio regions. The remnants of that fireball, the cosmic background radiation, emanating from all parts of the sky can be detected by radio telescopes today. In the early universe, space was brilliantly illuminated.”

Genesis, 1200 B.C. : “In the beginning God said: ‘Let there be light.’”

As astronomer Robert Jastrow pointed out in God and the Astronomers.

“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”

 

[JamesCaruso]

There is no reason whatsoever to believe God is compelled to redeem His creatures in precisely the same way on every planet…

Perhaps not, but it’s impossible to imagine a more perfect way.

 

[Tomdstone]

I’ve been thinking the Big Bang must have been a Big Blow to atheism.

Carl Sagan in Cosmos, 1980 A.D.

“Ten or twenty billion years ago, something happened – the Big Bang, the event that began our universe…. In that titanic cosmic explosion, the universe began an expansion which has never ceased…. As space stretched, the matter and energy in the universe expanded with it and rapidly cooled. The radiation of the cosmic fireball, which, then as now, filled the universe, moved through the spectrum – from gamma rays to X-rays to ultraviolet light; through the rainbow colors of the visible spectrum; into the infrared and radio regions. The remnants of that fireball, the cosmic background radiation, emanating from all parts of the sky can be detected by radio telescopes today. In the early universe, space was brilliantly illuminated.”

Sagan was an important cosmologist, but he was denied tenure at Harvard.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Sagan was also an atheist whose account of the Big Bang might give atheists cause to reflect.

 

[LogosSokratikos]

Would it not be equally wrong to conclude the following on the grounds of insufficient evidence?

For “sufficiency” of evidence to be determined it would be necessary to know precisely what a “deity” doing “something” would look like, no?

All of creation could be, as far as we know, remarkable evidence for deity. Simply because our expectations for “deity” point in one direction does not mean anything in terms of what deity actually does.

It seems to me that you ought to follow your own advice and not conclude anything about “absence of evidence” either, since the sufficiency of the evidence is not at all so easy to determine - that is, if you want to be completely fair on the matter.

You say “All of creation could be, as far as we know, remarkable evidence for deity.” For what deity? It points towards no deity in particular. Therefore it points towards no deity.

And I do follow my own advice, I conclude no absence of deity through absence of evidence of deity.

Nevertheless there is evidence for lack of some deities. For example the Biblical deity. Since we have positive evidence the world was not created in six days a few thousand years ago; positive evidence that the events recounted in the book of Exodus did not happen; positive evidence that the followers of Jesus Christ cannot bring back the dead, heal the sick, drink poisons and not die, or handle venomous snakes and also not croak… it’s what one could call a failed hypothesis. For that deity, the evidence speaks loudly. The same could be said for the deity of the Quran and those of the Vedas.

So I remain agnostic about the existence of deities through lack of evidence, though firmly mind made up about the deities proposed in the Qur’an, the Bible and the Vedas.

 

[Phil_Marinus]

YAWN… How many interpretations can you come up with on this subject ?

 

[Peter_Plato]

You say “All of creation could be, as far as we know, remarkable evidence for deity.” For what deity? It points towards no deity in particular. Therefore it points towards no deity.

And I do follow my own advice, I conclude no absence of deity through absence of evidence of deity.

I am not sure what concluding “no absence of deity” means! but you have certainly not demonstrated a conclusion that “deity must be absent.”

Given that the universe does not explain itself and we could well require a supernatural explanation, the evidence does “point towards” a supernatural deity, in particular. So, there is a sense in which “particular” deity does apply here.

Merely because you do not view evidence as “counting” does not mean no evidence actually exists, and your predeliction towards concluding “no deity” disregarding possible evidence is sufficient to leas us to believe you have a biased view of the issue to begin with.

You haven’t explained what would constitute evidence FOR a deity since you seem to restrict the definition of evidence as disallowing that which YOU won’t accept as counting, which is rather an idiocyncratic and negative definition in any case.

What positive evidence for deity would be acceptable and how would you know?

A very stealthy natural being could be standing right beside you at this moment and you would never know it. It seems to me that to conclude anything about what cannot be possible in any logically necessary way is overstepping the bounds of evidence. We might have evidence to make tentative conclusions about physical events, but not absolute conclusions about anything else.

Nevertheless there is evidence for lack of some deities. For example the Biblical deity.** Since we have positive evidence the world was not created in six days a few thousand years ago;** positive evidence that the events recounted in the book of Exodus did not happen; positive evidence that the followers of Jesus Christ cannot bring back the dead, heal the sick, drink poisons and not die, or handle venomous snakes and also not croak… it’s what one could call a failed hypothesis. For that deity, the evidence speaks loudly. The same could be said for the deity of the Quran and those of the Vedas.

So I remain agnostic about the existence of deities through lack of evidence, though firmly mind made up about the deities proposed in the Qur’an, the Bible and the Vedas.

Actually, the Bible no where holds that creation happened a few thousand years ago - feel free to show where it does.

Second, given the expansion of space and time, as a continuum, it might be logically possible that the duration of initial cosmic events could have been roughly equivalent to the length of “days” when the Biblical narrative was written. There is one MIT physicist who presents that as a possibility.

geraldschroeder.com/AgeUniverse.aspx

 

[tonyrey]

…Nevertheless there is evidence for lack of some deities. For example the Biblical deity. Since we have positive evidence the world was not created in six days a few thousand years ago; positive evidence that the events recounted in the book of Exodus did not happen…

Only Fundamentalists interpret the whole of the Old Testament literally rather than allegorically.

…positive evidence that the followers of Jesus Christ cannot bring back the dead, heal the sick, drink poisons and not die, or handle venomous snakes and also not croak…

What is the positive evidence?

it’s what one could call a failed hypothesis.

A correct description of your counter-hypothesis!

For that deity, the evidence speaks loudly. The same could be said for the deity of the Quran and those of the Vedas.

What is the evidence for the universe having created itself or being eternal?

 

[LogosSokratikos]

I am not sure what concluding “no absence of deity” means! but you have certainly not demonstrated a conclusion that “deity must be absent.”

Good. Because that was not my point. I am (again!) agnostic about the deity. Please pay attention and let’s not go over this point again.

Given that the universe does not explain itself and we could well require a supernatural explanation, the evidence does “point towards” a supernatural deity, in particular.

What deity in particular? Do you even know what “in particular” means?

Merely because you do not view evidence as “counting” does not mean no evidence actually exists, and your predeliction towards concluding “no deity” disregarding possible evidence is sufficient to leas us to believe you have a biased view of the issue to begin with.

“Possible evidence” explains nothing, only actual evidence explains.

You haven’t explained what would constitute evidence FOR a deity since you seem to restrict the definition of evidence as disallowing that which YOU won’t accept as counting, which is rather an idiocyncratic and negative definition in any case.

It seems you read nothing of what I wrote. Or perhaps you did not understand, so let me explain it another way. Every statement of a particular deity (Zeus, Jesus, Vishnu, etc) is in itself a set of hypotheses about the world (for instance hypothetically: “Megagawd made everything taste like vanilla and so everything tastes like vanilla and he saw that it was good”, but the world actually does not taste like vanilla, so it’s a false statement). How the Biblical god is falsified is through the examination of what is said in the Bible and contrasting it with the real world:

Nevertheless there is evidence for lack of some deities. For example the Biblical deity. Since we have positive evidence the world was not created in six days a few thousand years ago; positive evidence that the events recounted in the book of Exodus did not happen; positive evidence that the followers of Jesus Christ cannot bring back the dead, heal the sick, drink poisons and not die, or handle venomous snakes and also not croak… it’s what one could call a failed hypothesis. For that deity, the evidence speaks loudly. The same could be said for the deity of the Quran and those of the Vedas.

So I remain agnostic about the existence of deities through lack of evidence, though firmly mind made up about the deities proposed in the Qur’an, the Bible and the Vedas.

The Biblical god is, therefore, a failed hypothesis.

 

[LogosSokratikos]

Only Fundamentalists interpret the whole of the Old Testament literally rather than allegorically.

If a certain text is to be interpreted allegorically, it doesn’t give actual information: you sort it out, so the text isn’t telling you what to believe, you are telling the text what to believe. If you cherry-pick what to believe and how to interpret it, then you are not letting the text tell you anything you did not decide to believe to begin with.

That is why Christianity is the most split up religion in the world without exception and by a wide margin. No one can really tell what a text says if you shouldn’t take it literally due to self contradiction and contradiction with reality.

So then the Bible is not “revelation”, it is you who interpret it as such. It’s like thinking the spirit of your deceased grandmother speaks to you in tea leaves at the bottom of a cup or in a series of tarot cards you just drew from a stack.

What is the positive evidence?

What is the evidence for the universe having created itself or being eternal?

It is not my job to collect the evidence in favor of your position.

 

[Peter_Plato]

It is not my job to collect the evidence in favor of your position.

Actually, it is your job if you have an interest in being fair-minded on the issue. If not, then no amount of evidence that you have NO interest in will be sufficient to persuade you otherwise, since you will remain blithely ignorant or in denial concerning it.

So, obviously, no one can MAKE you consider the evidence, but your failure even to be open to it does speak volumes about the scope of the evidence you actually do consider.

 

[Peter_Plato]

If a certain text is to be interpreted allegorically, it doesn’t give actual information: you sort it out, so the text isn’t telling you what to believe, you are telling the text what to believe. If you cherry-pick what to believe and how to interpret it, then you are not letting the text tell you anything you did not decide to believe to begin with.

It seems to me that cherry picking is precisely what you are doing regarding passages from Genesis. Considering that science and scientific methods for gathering evidence were not formally developed for several thousand years AFTER the Genesis accounts were written, for you to claim these accounts were making “scientific” claims is preposterous at best.

You are reading your own scientific bias into them and forcing them to do what you want them to. You are the one who is “not letting the text tell you anything you did not decide to believe to begin with.” Obviously, the text could not have been “doing science,” since science was not a valid enterprise at the time, so why would we read science into the account except to cherry pick?

It would be prudent of you to follow your own advice here.

Yet, you “read into” the Genesis text your “scientific” expectation as if it must be true that the author of Genesis was making a modern scientific claim by using “day” as a technically precise and scientific unit of measurement, when, in fact, the author COULD NOT have been.

And I do follow my own advice, I conclude no absence of deity through absence of evidence of deity.

Nevertheless there is evidence for lack of some deities. For example the Biblical deity. Since we have positive evidence the world was not created in six days a few thousand years ago; positive evidence that the events recounted in the book of Exodus did not happen; positive evidence that the followers of Jesus Christ cannot bring back the dead, heal the sick, drink poisons and not die, or handle venomous snakes and also not croak… it’s what one could call a failed hypothesis. For that deity, the evidence speaks loudly. The same could be said for the deity of the Quran and those of the Vedas.

So I remain agnostic about the existence of deities through lack of evidence, though firmly mind made up about the deities proposed in the Qur’an, the Bible and the Vedas.

Again, your lack of fair-mindedness is showing. You claim as “positive evidence” that the followers of Jesus “cannot” perform miracles, yet on what grounds do you dismiss the miracle accounts in the New Testament and those in the lives of the saints? Have you looked into these miracles, or is your position one of dismissal by metaphysical presumption?

Good. Because that was not my point. I am (again!) agnostic about the deity. Please pay attention and let’s not go over this point again.

What deity in particular? Do you even know what “in particular” means?

“Possible evidence” explains nothing, only actual evidence explains.

Actual evidence has a very limited scope since what counts as “actual” depends upon predetermined standards for evidence which is, in fact, biased against the supernatural, since only physical evidence is allowed to count, and biased in favour of what our predispositions determine the evidence should look like. How would we even have a clue as to what supernatural causation would bring into the explanatory picture when, by method, only physical explanatory possibilities are sought?

If only natural events can count as evidence (owing to our methods) then it would be senseless to make a claim that supernatural causes have been disproven or ruled out, precisely because these were never allowed to be considered in the first place.

It seems you read nothing of what I wrote. Or perhaps you did not understand, so let me explain it another way. Every statement of a particular deity (Zeus, Jesus, Vishnu, etc) is in itself a set of hypotheses about the world (for instance hypothetically: “Megagawd made everything taste like vanilla and so everything tastes like vanilla and he saw that it was good”, but the world actually does not taste like vanilla, so it’s a false statement). How the Biblical god is falsified is through the examination of what is said in the Bible and contrasting it with the real world…

Certainly, if a claim logically entails that “everything tastes like vanilla” and would continue to do so to this day, then you might have a case for saying Megagawd did not make everything taste - in any lasting way - like vanilla. However, if the claim was that Megagawd made everything that was part of the king’s banquet taste like vanilla, you have not disproven that claim by demonstrating that your breakfast cereal does not, today, taste like vanilla or that Megagawd could not have done such an act in the past because he does not do so to your repast today.

Likewise, you cannot count the fact that you have never witnessed anyone rise from the dead as disproof of the claim that God raised Jesus from the dead. The Resurrection of Jesus was claimed to have been a special case for special reasons. You can’t claim that because human beings are not typically raised from the dead that Jesus COULD NOT have been. It is only your own metaphysical presumptions that lead you to that belief. It isn’t even a case of “lack of evidence” because exemplary eye-witness accounts of the event do exist and it is only a bias against miracles that would lead you to discount them. If these accounts had left out all supernatural references you would have no issue concerning their authenticity.