How do we know the First Cause is a Mind?

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But where do ‘complex mechanistic functional processes arise out of natural processes’, unless that possibility is already built into (designed into?) the process to begin with? Don’t we invest too much mystery perhaps into the word “natural” as if that fact alone renders a thing to be totally set apart and incomparable somehow to man-made things? Complexity is complexity-and it’s really just the complexity of a house that causes us to know that it was consciously designed. But a single cell in a hair of a dead dog on the side of the road is quantum leaps more complex than man’s most sophisticated computer, let alone his home. Which is the very simple reason why we can’t make those cells yet-we don’t know how they’re made because they’re too complex. Anyway I think we might miss the forest for the trees when we say, “Oh, it’s natural-doesn’t count”.
 
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fhansen said:
But where do ‘complex mechanistic functional processes arise out of natural processes’, unless that possibility is already built into (designed into?) the process to begin with? Don’t we invest too much mystery perhaps into the word “natural” as if that fact alone renders a thing to be totally set apart and incomparable somehow to man-made things? Complexity is complexity-and it’s really just the complexity of a house that causes us to know that it was consciously designed. But a single cell in a hair of a dead dog on the side of the road is quantum leaps more complex than man’s most sophisticated computer, let alone his home. Which is the very simple reason why we can’t make those cells yet-we don’t know how they’re made because they’re too complex. Anyway I think we might miss the forest for the trees when we say, “Oh, it’s natural-doesn’t count”
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Its not just the complexity of the house, its the requirements needed to put it together, how its put together and the materials used, that makes a natural explanation unreasonable. Its possible that a bunch of trees could fall down in such a way that it would be useful as a shelter, but it wouldn’t be ideal for a house. Natural just means that a thing is acting according to its nature, its moving to its natural end in virtue of what it is instead of being manipulated by an intelligent being. The right circumstances, conditions, chemical reactions, and natures may come together to give rise to a system without interference from a builder.

Of course, while i wouldn’t defend God as an intelligent “builder”, i do defend the idea that a necessary uncaused-cause is required in-order to actualize and endow potential beings with their natural powers because otherwise they have no means or reason to exist and they would have no efficient cause as to why they behave as they do. As such, secondary causes require the existence of an intelligent first cause in order to explain why they exist and why they behave as they do.
 
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IMO we have to account for the enormous complexity of the tree, with a far greater complexity of design than a house. Just because we don’t find houses spontaneously arising in nature doesn’t mean that the “natural” things in our universe don’t demand as much of an explanation as the house does.
 
The question of whats involved in the production and growth of trees does demand an explanation, just not the same kind of explanation we find when we talk about the production of houses.
 
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IDK, but I think that’s exactly where we might be missing it. Maybe the trees really are simply just that: a blaring witness to a tree-maker.
 
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But does this mean the First Cause is also yellow, or round, or a hamster?

You see?

What is it about intelligence that the First Cause could not give what it does not have?
 
I think because the cause is a mind or greater. The fact that we can understand reasons for things, and know they are true, indicates a mind or greater. Reasons exist. Truth exists. Therefore, something mind or greater created the way things do those things in at least the way we know they truly do.
 
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IWantGod said:
I know that physical reality acts according to its nature, and i know that normally physical reality doesn’t self-organize into houses.
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IWantGod said:
I just think it makes more sense to focus on what nature cannot possibly do or account for.
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But is it really reasonable to think that nature or physical reality can self-organize into a tree, without an organizer somewhere in the mix making it happen?
 
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If nature can do this…

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…i wouldn’t assume that nature cannot become self organizing. Also, i have said that without God there is no reason for physical beings to behave the way they do much less exist. I only have a problem with the idea of a builder or a watchmaker. These are very mechanistic concepts that inadvertently gives the impression that the only time teleology exists in nature is when some intelligence decides to build something out of per-existing materials.
 
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Actually, you struck the nail on the head here, for the book I mentioned earlier makes the argument for God being an Intellect from the principle “a cause cannot give what it does not have.” It distinguishes between an effect being in a cause formally, virtually, and eminently (not going to expand on this right now). Your remark about God being yellow would be a case of having the effect in Himself formally, but there are other ways, such as virtually. But for an effect to be in a cause virtually, along with all possible relationships between that and everything else, is most similar to the way knowledge exists in a mind. It’s not the same exact thing as a human mind, which operates differently, but it is most analogous to a mind. And if all existent and possible effects are in God virtually as knowledge, then God is omniscient.

The book I referred to goes into this at greater length and more depth, but the set up in this topic was too good to pass up.
 
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IWantGod said:
If nature can do this…

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

…i wouldn’t assume that nature cannot become self organizing. Also, i have said that without God there is no reason for physical beings to behave the way they do much less exist. I only have a problem with the idea of a builder or a watchmaker. These are very mechanistic concepts that inadvertently gives the impression that teleology only exists in nature when some intelligence decides to build something out of per-existing materials.
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But that’s most likely something nature could never do spontaneously, without intelligence as the cause behind it. And whether the materials are existing or not, we know from our own experience that order doesn’t come from disorder; matter doesn’t assemble itself into an ordered system without reason.
 
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fhansen said:
… whether the materials are existing or not, we know from our own experience that order doesn’t come from disorder; matter doesn’t assemble itself into an ordered system without reason.
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And yet chemical reactions occur and new forms come into existence. I don’t know that nature cannot give rise to complex systems. That seems like an assumption to me.
 
It’s on my way to my house and should be delivered today! Thanks for the recommendation :-]
 
I’m by no means an expert on any of this, but I think I agree that the design argument is not a particularly strong one. However, I think science has made a strong case for an “intelligent designer” insofar as the most essential laws and constants governing our Universe have made it possible for intelligent life to develop, in the first place.

But once we start talking about complexity and design within the Universe itself, I think there’s always a way to point to natural processes – such as biological evolution, etc.
 
Well, I’m way over my head here of course but at this point I think either option might be an assumption. But again, going by experience, order doesn’t arise from disorder. The question then becomes, do ordered systems become that way by “playing by the rules”, laws pre-established that govern their potentialities, or is it all purely random? And if the latter is the case, I tend to think that, considering the incredibly high degree of complexity of many systems, such as life, something far less complex such as trees falling down in a forest could-or should-easily enough eventually result in a neat and complete Lincoln log cabin on occasion. JMO of course.
 
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I didn’t say that the First Cause must instantiate every quality of created things, just that any power possessed by creatures must also be possessed by the First Cause, for where else could it come from?

Certainly the First Cause can do anything that a yellow object, a round object, or a hamster can do.
 
Malice is the only thing I can think of which is possible for creatures but impossible for God. And that’s because malice is purely a defect of will. There’s no positive power to do anything that is present in creatures but lacking in God.
 
Premise 1. A necessary act of reality is already everything that it could possibly be.

Premise 2. Potential reality gets its power from necessary reality. There is no other source of possibility or potential.

Premise 3. Human beings are intelligent beings.

Premise 4. Therefore necessary reality must also be intelligent otherwise there would be a power that does not come from necessary reality, which contradicts premise 2 and premise 1

Conclusion: Therefore necessary reality is an intelligent being.
 
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