How do you answer this question?

  • Thread starter Thread starter johnnyt3000
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
J

johnnyt3000

Guest
One of the arguments for the existence of God is that He is the first mover. This argument works if one assumes that there has not been an infinite amount of movement in the universe. Here is the question:

Is it possible that the universe has been in motion for eternity/infinity and that we just don’t know it’s origin or may not be able to?

also…

How does one come to the conclusion that the first mover is God?
 
Well the simplest consideration might be is what is the relationship to another optiom? I understand how God always existed but not space/time… I have heard no other answer.
 
johnnyt3000 said:
One of the arguments for the existence of God is that He is the first mover. This argument works if one assumes that there has not been an infinite amount of movement in the universe. Here is the question:

Is it possible that the universe has been in motion for eternity/infinity and that we just don’t know it’s origin or may not be able to?

also…

How does one come to the conclusion that the first mover is God?
Click to expand...
Because HE told us sooooo. God Bless, Memaw
 
There is no other answer… Something had to exist first.

Matter cannot come from nothing. (Even if matter springs from energy, energy is still something.)

Matter is a something, so it must come from something else. (God can be considered, very imperfectly, as a form of energy. Existence itself might be considered energy.)

The only something else from which matter can come, is something immaterial - something GREATER than matter.

Hence, the only logical first mover must be eternal and omnipotent.

That’s how I understand it.
 
johnnyt3000 said:
Is it possible that the universe has been in motion for eternity/infinity and that we just don’t know it’s origin or may not be able to?
Click to expand...
The cyclical theory of the universe claims it is possible.
 
There is such a thing as less than infinite, and more than infinite. There are such things as more causing and less caused, less causing and more caused.

We can only perform calculations with approximations.

A so-called “cyclical” view is either monotonously “cyclical”, which is impossible, or spiral, which means curved, and curves have existed in all things all along.

It is true that we don’t know what is “before” the “before”.

A “conclusion” some people come to that God is prime mover is somewhere between somewhat probable and highly probable. These people are often ones who have had some experience of God in their lives.

To people without experience of God in their lives, science hints, it doesn’t furnish an “open and shut”, “cut and dried” case.

Why this obsession with bashing people over the head with claims to have established “proof”? Whatever made the terribly old-fangled concept of a “working hypothesis” so unfashionable?
 
johnnyt3000 said:
One of the arguments for the existence of God is that He is the first mover. This argument works if one assumes that there has not been an infinite amount of movement in the universe. Here is the question:

Is it possible that the universe has been in motion for eternity/infinity and that we just don’t know it’s origin or may not be able to?

also…

How does one come to the conclusion that the first mover is God?
Click to expand...
If t he universe had been in motion for eternity, then it had no beginning and not end, Motion is the passage from potency to act. A material universe can not move itself, if it could, it would be all that it could be,pure act, but the universe exhibits constant change, a passage from potency to act, from a capacity to be, to becoming Things that are moved are moved by another, since they can not move themselves, they are not all they can be, but constantly changing. An outside source of motion is needed, that does not change, A thing does not change if it has the fullness of act, or being, and has existence for it’s nature, and had no beginning and no end. because the universe shows change, it had a beginning, a first Mover, and necessarily an Unmoved Mover, for it it have a Mover, it would not be the first mover This Unmoved Mover is God So to say if the universe had been in motion for an eternity, is a logical contradiction. Only God is Pure Act, and Pure Being
 
ynotzap said:
An outside source of motion is needed, that does not change, A thing does not change if it has the fullness of act,
Click to expand...
Gravity can supply an unlimited source of energy even though it may not have a fullness of act.
 
Gravity, as a force, is still a ‘thing’, that itself requires a prior cause.
 
I don’t need to prove that it isn’t self-fulfilled; I find the default position to be that it is not; therefore, the burden of proof is on you.

However, let’s say it is self-complete. Gravity is not a force of creation, but mostly of destruction. It keeps stuff on the ground, but also forcibly drags it there.

Even if it does possess ‘fullness of act’ - whatever that means - it still requires a first cause.

It is a something – in that sense a positive force – and still needs to come from somewhere.
 
Tomdstone said:
Can you prove that gravity does not have fullness of act? Gravity is always acting.
Click to expand...
If gravity had the fullness of act it would not vary as it does from planet to planet, it is not all that it can be, unchanging, and it does change, and if a thing is acting, it is not pure act
 
ynotzap said:
… if a thing is acting, it is not pure act
Click to expand...
I thought that God was pure act? But God is acting all the time. He acted when He created Adam and Eve. He acted when He sent His Son to save mankind. He came down from heaven and was made man. He was angry and He changed His mind according to Scripture.
 
SilverShadow22 said:
… of course.

That’s the whole point.

EVERYTHING has a first cause EXCEPT the First Cause.
Click to expand...
That is your assumption. But the question was:
johnnyt3000 said:
Is it possible that the universe has been in motion for eternity/infinity and that we just don’t know it’s origin or may not be able to?
Click to expand...
To simply say of course there had to be a first cause, only gives your opinion on the point and will not convince those who vouch for the cyclical theory of the universe and say that causality applies to what we see within the universe, and not to the universe as a whole. There is no scientific evidence that the whole universe had to have a cause. This is some sort of reasoning from theories such as the fullness of act. The concept of fullness of act is not universally accepted across the board.
 
It is logically ridiculous to claim that any amount of something came from absolute nothing.

Cyclical or no.

The OP asked how I (anyone in general) answered the question… and I answered. I guess that is all.
 
SilverShadow22 said:
It is logically ridiculous to claim that any amount of something came from absolute nothing.
Click to expand...
How do you explain virtual particles which pop into and out of existence? Most people who have studied QED don’t think that quantum field theory is logically ridiculous. Tests of QED have been performed to obtain the value of α is obtained by comparing an experimental measurement to a theoretical expression. The agreement found this way is to within ten parts in a billion (10−8). So to say that quantum field theory is logically ridiculous is untenable. Others claim is that some energy was always there. What law or rule of logic is contradicted by the cyclical theory of the universe? AFAIK, the theory of fullness of act is not a law of logic.
You can call the following paper logically ridiculous, but anyone can call any argument ridiculous. Tell us, what rule of logic is violated by the following paper from Princeton university:
physics.princeton.edu/~steinh/vaasrev.pdf
 
Tomdstone said:
I thought that God was pure act? But God is acting all the time. He acted when He created Adam and Eve. He acted when He sent His Son to save mankind. He came down from heaven and was made man. He was angry and He changed His mind according to Scripture.
Click to expand...
God moves things but does not move Himself. Movement is always toward being, a potential to be to being eg. growth of a child to an adult, reasoning towards more knowledge, eating and breathing to maintain life. God does not need to move to gain something, since He is the source of all things, full being, or pure act, He is self-sufficient, and self-subsistent. We look at God from a human perspective, making an analogy , but when God acts it is not in time, but it is eternal, God is the creator of time, it is our condition and not His. Time is change, or a measure of change ( a quantum approach, the second degree of abstraction) But when we speak of God we are in the sphere of qualitative abstraction (metaphysical, the nature of things, and not the measurement of things (quantitative- mathematical measurement)
God is not subject to time, except in Jesus Christ because He assumed human nature and became man, God-man Things do not pop in and out of existence, science can not destroy matter, it change it’s state of existence, and exists in some form because what God creates, He creates eternally, He sustains what He creates. He doesn’t create to annihilate.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top