Does creation need a creator, as per reason?

[belorg]

Understood.

Well, actually, the last three words should be omitted.
So, my position is :

No, based on arguments and reasoning I see no reason to conclude there is any kind of personal creator.

 

[joe370]

This is a very odd position to hold to in my opinion. Imagine that you live in a society which has an almost universal belief in the existence of dragons. One day, you decide that you wish to study dragons, but after going through all of the studies, you are struck by a lack of evidence for the existence of dragons. You refuse to believe in the existence of such dragons without proof, and you tell your colleagues that because there is no evidence for their existence, they should abandon their belief in their existence. One of them simply claims “You are the one asserting a claim, and so the burden of proof rests on you to show that they do not exist, not on us to show that they do exist.”

Who is right in this situation? Does the burden of proof rest with the one asserting existence or the one advancing the new claim?

I agree with Belorg. The burden of proof is always on the person making the claim. Can you show the lack of evidence for the existence of God? Just because God does not reveal God to humans does not mean that God does not exist.

 

[belorg]

This is a very odd position to hold to in my opinion. Imagine that you live in a society which has an almost universal belief in the existence of dragons. One day, you decide that you wish to study dragons, but after going through all of the studies, you are struck by a lack of evidence for the existence of dragons. You refuse to believe in the existence of such dragons without proof, and you tell your colleagues that because there is no evidence for their existence, they should abandon their belief in their existence. One of them simply claims “You are the one asserting a claim, and so the burden of proof rests on you to show that they do not exist, not on us to show that they do exist.”

Who is right in this situation? Does the burden of proof rest with the one asserting existence or the one advancing the new claim?

I do not claim that people should abandon their belief in God.

 

[belorg]

Can you show the lack of evidence for the existence of God?

I can. Here is the lack of evidence.

 

[joe370]

I can. Here is the lack of evidence.

Your lack of evidence is missing in that post…I would like to read it…

 

[joe370]

Well, actually, the last three words should be omitted.
So, my position is :

No, based on arguments and reasoning I see no reason to conclude there is any kind of personal creator.

 

[Alberti_Devoveo]

However, this is a false analogy. This argument only works because being larger than something is an expansive property. If the property being discussed is not expansive, then the fallacy still applies. I see no evidence that causation is an expansive property.

I would posit that you should actually look for evidence of causation’s expansive property, rather than assert that it is not. And, despite being asked for it, you have offered no evidence suggesting that causation is not expansive.

Being sucked into a black hole doesn’t equal leaving existence. If the whole universe fell into a black hole, then the universe would still exist. It would exist as a black hole with its singularity.

Correct, though it is completely improbably that the universe could fall into a single black hole.

Could you expound on these examples in some detail? I don’t have that book.

See the document at the Magis Center of Reason and Faith’s document page (the page is what is linked), specifically pages 6 and 7. It is a short synopsis of what is discussed in his text that JDaniel cites.

 

[JDaniel]

However, this is a false analogy. This argument only works because being larger than something is an expansive property. If the property being discussed is not expansive, then the fallacy still applies. I see no evidence that causation is an expansive property.

Bakmoon:

So you agree that it is completely dependent upon “properties.” Although it doesn’t really matter here, answer this, then, if causation is not expansive how did the human race go from two (or, ten, or a thousand) to seven billion? Or, let’s take someone’s earlier analogy. Why does knocking down the first domino ultimately result in an entire chain of dominoes falling?

If, in other words, if your contention that causation is not expansive can be sustained, then no one thing can ever be said to be the cause of any other; therefore, we have no rational basis for calculation or prediction, since both calculation and prediction assume that the same causes will in the future produce the same effects as they have done in the past. But now we have grown the number of existing causes, i.e., for example, we have many more parents

Being sucked into a black hole doesn’t equal leaving existence. If the whole universe fell into a black hole, then the universe would still exist. It would exist as a black hole with its singularity.

And a “singularity” is what exactly? If you were to say, “a dimensionless finite number of stacked point particles,” I might have a tough time arguing against it. However, I doubt you will. But, why, then, is the BB called the “beginning of the universe (and time),” and not simply “The Universe?” That is very selective, it seems to me. Such ‘selectivism’ mythologizes the science of the big bang.

Could you expound on these examples in some detail? I don’t have that book.

I’ll give you the shortest one as a direct quote:
“The Entropy Paradox
As we have see, entropy keeps getting released as stars burn. So the amount of entropy should grow with each cycle. But as we shall see later, the entropy of our universe at the time of “our” big bang 13.7 billion years ago was fantastically small. In fact, the entropy in our universe at the time of the big bang was so small that it constitutes one of the small-number/fine-tuning puzzles that theorists have been grappling with for a long time. How, after a huge number of cycles, in which entropy was being generated, can our cycle have started with tiny entropy? Here again we see the Second Law at work.” - (Ibid., pg. 29)
God bless,
jd

 

[joe370]

JDaniel;9700903]Bakmoon:

Bakmoon:

So you agree that it is completely dependent upon “properties.” Although it doesn’t really matter here, answer this, then, if causation is not expansive how did the human race go from two (or, ten, or a thousand) to seven billion? Or, let’s take someone’s earlier analogy. Why does knocking down the first domino ultimately result in an entire chain of dominoes falling?

Why one would not apply this same causation to the largest material thing that exists (the universe) I just don’t understand, Also, where did the first domino come from that ultimately resulted in an entire chain of dominoes falling…

 

[joe370]

JDaniel;9700903]Bakmoon: But, why, then, is the BB called the “beginning of the universe (and time),” and not simply “The Universe?”

Good point…

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Because my atheism does not require faith.

Based on actual proof?

I think the problem here is that you two are probably using two entirely different definitions of “atheism.” Correct me if I am wrong here.

**Joe370 **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is the doctrine that there is no God.

**Belorg **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is a classification used for those that don’t assert the existence of any gods.

If so then the irreconcilability between those two definitions is in that the definition from Joe370 involves a truth claim (which would be backed by evidence and/or faith) while Belorg’s definition is pretty much the null hypothesis for existential claims. I don’t think you two will achieve agreement until you are both talking about the same thing.

But this is just my guess.

 

[joe370]

I think the problem here is that you two are probably using two entirely different definitions of “atheism.” Correct me if I am wrong here.

**Joe370 **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is the doctrine that there is no God.

**Belorg **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is a classification used for those that don’t assert the existence of any gods.

If so then the irreconcilability between those two definitions is in that the definition from Joe370 involves a truth claim (which would be backed by evidence and/or faith) while Belorg’s definition is pretty much the null hypothesis for existential claims. I don’t think you two will achieve agreement until you are both talking about the same thing.

But this is just my guess.

I’ll wait and see what Belorg says.

 

[belorg]

I think the problem here is that you two are probably using two entirely different definitions of “atheism.” Correct me if I am wrong here.

**Joe370 **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is the doctrine that there is no God.

**Belorg **- the definition that you are using is that atheism is a classification used for those that don’t assert the existence of any gods.

If so then the irreconcilability between those two definitions is in that the definition from Joe370 involves a truth claim (which would be backed by evidence and/or faith) while Belorg’s definition is pretty much the null hypothesis for existential claims. I don’t think you two will achieve agreement until you are both talking about the same thing.

But this is just my guess.

I define my atheism as ‘lack of belief in a personal God’ and not as the doctrine that there is no God.