Is The Big Bang Really Proof Of Gods Existence?

[liquidpele]

The famous atheist philosopher Kai Neilson in justifying atheism stated: “You can have all these purposes in life even though there is no purpose to life so life doesn’t become meaningless and pointless if you were not made for a purpose.”

So an atheist can find meaning in his life by the purposes he/she chooses for him/herself. O.K. in a world full of atheists, what purpose in life can be given to the blind and deaf paraplegic whose prognosis looks dim, the schizophrenic who is immune to medications and lives in an alternative reality, the severely developmentally challenged we have with us in our homes or in our family homes. If you were born as one of them what purpose in life would you choose AntiT to give your life meaning? Atheism provides no hope or answers to these folks.

You can say what you want AntiT because by the looks of it you come from a comfortable Western existence which blesses you with pleasure. What purpose for those in life hanging by the thread from a fatal disease. At least Christianity provides a purpose and has a Theodicy which we believe to be eminently true and that all lives, even the most miserable, are not without purpose in Christ’s salvific mission on earth.

Christianity can answer the deepest longings of the human heart in the middle of suffering. Atheism can’t. This is a side note. This is just a reflection of mine and not an argument for the existence of God. As C.S. Lewis argued, however, in the Argument from Desire: Every innate desire corresponds to a real object, and there is an innate desire for God.

Ah… I good topic for a philosophy section

You’re exactly right. There is no promise that people’s problems will vanish and be solved after they die with atheism, but their problems persist in this world whether they believe in God or not. In this respect, taking the assumption that God doesn’t exist, a paraplegic who is blind and deaf is in the same situation whether they believe in God or not and any promises by Christianity would be a hopeful delusion (not to say that’s necessarily bad, we can manufacture our own happiness after all.).

I think the real difference is simply what happens to inspire a particular person. If you’re inspired by some religion to live a good life, or even to just get by, that’s great. If believing that “this is it” inspires you to live life to the fullest and be the best you can be then that’s great too.

 

[KyivAndrew]

Oh and just so I stick with the original O.P. question: the Big Bang does not prove God’s existence but it surely makes belief in a Creator God more reasonable than a belief in no god and in a random, purposeless universe.

I’ve quoted this article in another thread but I post it here as well since it is right to the matter at hand herfe:
From the Catholic News Agency: New astrophysical discoveries leave little to no room for Atheism, expert says:

"Fr. Spitzer explained that, since science is based on a empirical model, it can change at any time. Nevertheless, as science develops and the so called “Big Bang” theory of the origin and existence of the universe becomes more refined, “it becomes less and less possible for other explanations (of the universe) to be scientifically viable.”

The theory, developed by the Belgian Catholic priest and astronomer Georges Lemaître, proposes that the Universe has expanded from a primordial dense initial condition at some time in the past (currently estimated to have been approximately 13.7 billion years ago), and continues to expand to this day.

The model, according to Fr. Spitzer, has been revised, refined and scientifically established to a point that any other theory of the origin and existence of the universe has become harder and harder to defend.

Fr. Spitzer explained that, what we know from the most recent scientific evidence is that “the universe is not the universe of Mr. Newton anymore, it is not infinite, it is finite, it started at some point, and is in constant expansion.”

He then explained the complexity of the universe, saying it is based on “an incredibly delicate balance of 17 cosmological constants. If any of them would be off by one part of a tenth at a forty potency, we would be dead and the universe would not be what it is.”

“Every single Big Bang model shows the existence of what scientists call a ‘singularity,’ and the existence of each singularity demands the existence of an external ‘element’ to the universe,” Fr. Spitzer said.

The priest physicist then proceeded to explain the different, complex versions of the various Bing Bang theories.

He quoted Roger Penrose, the world-famous English mathematician and physicist, who corrected some of the theories of his friend and colleague Stephen Hawkins to conclude that every Big Bang theory, including the one known as Quantum theory, confirms the existence of singularities. Therefore, said Spitzer, the need to find an explanation to the universe’s existence drives us to seek “a force that is previous and independent from the universe.”

Fr. Spitzer also quoted the 2003 experiments by three leading cosmologists, Arvin Borde, Alan Guth, and Alexander Vilenkin, who were able to prove that any universe which has, on average, been expanding throughout its history cannot be infinite in the past but must have a past space-time boundary.

“The concept at this point is clear: nothing is nothing, and from nothing, nothing comes, since nothing is… nothing!” Fr. Spitzer said, to explain the fact that contemporary astrophysics demands “something with sufficient power to bring the universe into existence.”

“It sounds like a theological argument, but is really a scientific conclusion.

“There is no way to ignore the fact that it demands the existence of a singularity and therefore of a Creator outside space and time,” he added."

catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=17267

 

[AntiTheist]

itinerant1:

To say that beautiful sounds differ from noise reflects something about the real world.

Well, obviously a song is going to sound different than random notes, in most cases, anyway. But the idea that the different-sounding song is beautiful is something that an individual decides. It’s not inherent in the different sound.

And on top of this, there’s such a thing as avant garde music that actually in some cases does sound like random notes or random sounds or “noise” – and yet some people find it beautiful.

There is something objectively different in a stone carved by an artist and a stone randomly chipped at with a hammer and chisel.

And not everyone finds the same statue beautiful! Some people might prefer different statues or even – gasp – find the “randomly chipped” stone beautiful as a piece of avant garde art.

Anyway, if you don’t understand what I’m trying to say by now, I don’t think I’m capable of making it much clearer.

Andrew:

Christianity can answer the deepest longings of the human heart in the middle of suffering. Atheism can’t.

That’s right – Christianity provides answers – false anwers, but answers nevertheless – because Christianity is a religion with a whole system of thought and philosophy behind it, whereas atheism is nothing more than a position on a single question (“Do gods exist?”).

Thank you for demonstrating that atheism is not a religion.

You’re also right that atheim can’t offer a “theodicy” --i.e. a justification for evil/suffering in a world made by a supposedly good god. When one realizes that there’s no reason to believe that there is a “good god” behind existence, one also realizes that there’s no metaphysical problem created by suffering.

People just live their lives. Good things happen and bad things happen. That’s it. We try to make the best out of whatever situation we find ourselves in. There’s no problem that goes any deeper than that. Some people don’t like living in a world with a lot of suffering and try to do something about it; other people are alright with it. But that’s it.

Just look at your post: it’s obvious that you don’t like the fact that some people lead incredibly sorrowful and/or painful lives and that you especially don’t like the fact that there’s no super magical justice for these people to give their lives “meaning.”

But just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean it’s not true.

the Big Bang does not prove God’s existence but it surely makes belief in a Creator God more reasonable than a belief in no god and in a random, purposeless universe.

I addressed this silly article in another thread. No one responded to me, so I paste my answer below:

1. No one knows what came before the Big Bang. We literally have no idea what happened before it or even if it makes sense to talk about “before” it (since it’s likely that time began after the Big Bang).

It’s possible that the “stuff” that existed before the Big Bang always existed. It’s possible that the “stuff” that preceded the Big Bang has gone through numerous expansion cycles and that what we call “the universe” is only the most recent expansion. It’s possible that the cause of the Big Bang (if it’s possible to speak of “causes” before time) is something natural that we don’t currently understand. It’s possible that “a force that is previous and independent from the universe” exists but is completely natural, unintelligent, and/or not in existence any more.

1. The argument from “fine tuning” simply doesn’t work. The article says that the universe “is based on ‘an incredibly delicate balance of 17 cosmological constants. If any of them would be off by one part of a tenth at a forty potency, we would be dead and the universe would not be what it is.’”

All of that is true.

The problem is that you’re taking the current state of things and evaluating the evidence as if the current state was an intentional goal. There’s no justification for doing so, unless you want to make your first assumption the conclusion you want to get to (and thus have a big circular argument).

If the cosmological constants had been any different, we would have had a different universe. Maybe there would have been life in that universe, maybe there would have been a different kind of life, or maybe there would have been no life at all. Each of those potential universes would be equally unlikely.

Think of it this way: what are the odds of being dealt a perfect bridge hand? I mean 2 through Ace, all of the same suit – the odds are somewhere in the ballpark of 1 in several million. But what are the odds of being dealt any old hand, say King of Clubs, Jack of Diamonds, Seven of Hearts, etc.? The odds of any other hand are exactly the same. It’s just that we attach value to one kind of hand and not to others.

So just because you like the outcome of something and the odds of it happening are remote, it in no way demonstrates that intelligence arranged the outcome.

 

[Matthias123]

1. No one knows what came before the Big Bang. We literally have no idea what happened before it or even if it makes sense to talk about “before” it (since it’s likely that time began after the Big Bang).

It’s possible that the “stuff” that existed before the Big Bang always existed. It’s possible that the “stuff” that preceded the Big Bang has gone through numerous expansion cycles and that what we call “the universe” is only the most recent expansion. It’s possible that the cause of the Big Bang (if it’s possible to speak of “causes” before time) is something natural that we don’t currently understand. It’s possible that “a force that is previous and independent from the universe” exists but is completely natural, unintelligent, and/or not in existence any more.

I really do enjoy hearing atheists speak about the big bang, because they hug several improbable cosmological models and assert that they are much more likely then they are. There is a good reason why people like Quentin Smith don’t talk about Oscillating models anymore, this is they have for the most part fallen through. There is however some new osculating models, one of which is supported by String Theory, but they are highly speculative. The fact is that oscillating models are contrary to empirical evidence that show that not only is the expansion of the universe not slowing down, but it is accelerating.

What atheists are now raving about now is quantum tunneling. They point to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics to prove that something does come out of nothing, for we can see that virtual particles appear seemingly out of nowhere in a vacuum. This however would be false because what they are doing is quantum tunnelling from quantum nothingness into our universe. This “quantum nothingness” is often mistaken for metaphysical nothingness. Now this is not the case – although this is the greatest nothing we can imagine, it is not “nothingness” per se. The first reason is that the laws of physics exist in this quantum nothingness. The second reason is that metaphysically “nothingness” per se cannot exist, because it is a metaphysical evil. If nothing existed, then something would exist, and that something would be nothing. So we must come to the conclusion that what the particle physics are talking about when they say “tunnelling” from nothing, is really tunnelling from something to something else.

So even if our universe is tunneling into existance, it is not tunneling from nothingness per se.

As for an infinite past in 2006 Dr. Alexander Vilenkin in the Borde-Guth-Vilenkin theorem proves for certain that not only the universe has a beginning, but if there is a multiverse, it has a beginning too. He was not shy about the implications:

“It is said that an argument is what convinces reasonable men and a proof is what it
takes to convince even an unreasonable man. With the proof now in place, cosmologists can no longer hide behind the possibility of a past-eternal universe. There is no escape, they have to face the problem of a cosmic beginning (Many Worlds in One [New York: Hill and Wang, 2006], p.176).” – Dr. Alexander Vilenkin

Science is heading towards God like a frieght train – and I believe it is going to catch certain “free thinkers” by suprise.

is something natural that we don’t currently understand.

So lets have faith in mechanical causes, but not in the truths of God?

The fact is that since it is outside of time, a mechanical cause will still be in effect now unless it was caused by a will that can rescind the cause.

 

[James_Least]

I am glad that God does not fit our paradigms of God. God is, and He will reward those who diligently seek Him–probably not many cosmologists.

Skeptics come and go daily–The Word of God abides forever, all forms of higher textual criticism notwithstanding.

Where will you be in 100 years? Choose wisely.

Selah,

James Least

 

[Matthias123]

) The problem is that you’re taking the current state of things and evaluating the evidence as if the current state was an intentional goal. There’s no justification for doing so, unless you want to make your first assumption the conclusion you want to get to (and thus have a big circular argument).

If the cosmological constants had been any different, we would have had a different universe. Maybe there would have been life in that universe, maybe there would have been a different kind of life, or maybe there would have been no life at all. Each of those potential universes would be equally unlikely.

Think of it this way: what are the odds of being dealt a perfect bridge hand? I mean 2 through Ace, all of the same suit – the odds are somewhere in the ballpark of 1 in several million. But what are the odds of being dealt any old hand, say King of Clubs, Jack of Diamonds, Seven of Hearts, etc.? The odds of any other hand are exactly the same. It’s just that we attach value to one kind of hand and not to others.

So just because you like the outcome of something and the odds of it happening are remote, it in no way demonstrates that intelligence arranged the

This is not used to prove the existance of God, this is used as evidence for the existence of God. Something you atheists always claim doesn’t exist.

 

[itinerant1]

itinerant1:

Well, obviously a song is going to sound different than random notes, in most cases, anyway. But the idea that the different-sounding song is beautiful is something that an individual decides. It’s not inherent in the different sound.

And on top of this, there’s such a thing as avant garde music that actually in some cases does sound like random notes or random sounds or “noise” – and yet some people find it beautiful.

And not everyone finds the same statue beautiful! Some people might prefer different statues or even – gasp – find the “randomly chipped” stone beautiful as a piece of avant garde art.

Anyway, if you don’t understand what I’m trying to say by now, I don’t think I’m capable of making it much clearer.

It’s not the case that you are not being clear. The problem is you are going in circles, very small circles that are exclusionary.

The subject of individual tastes, which are quite subjective, was already sufficiently addressed. You are avoiding the implications of the Golden Ratio. And while we are on that topic I will add a reference to the Fibonacci series found in nature, and the Golden Ratio found within the Fibonacci series.

If the terms art and music are to have any meaning at all, then not everything visual can possibly qualify as art, any more than any series of sounds be considered music. It is truly irrelevant to my point that some people might consider the random piling of rusted out scrap metal in a junk yard to be beautiful, or even think the noise of rush hour traffic in the big city is music to the ears.

In keeping with the recognition of individual tastes there is a standard. If there were no standard then anything whatsoever, regardless of how deformed, stinking putrid and ugly could qualify as beautiful. And this is to make nonsense of the aesthetic experience.

Thus to carry your argument to its logical conclusion leads to a reductio ad absurdum.

 

[Cecilianus]

I addressed this silly article in another thread. No one responded to me, so I paste my answer below:

1. No one knows what came before the Big Bang. We literally have no idea what happened before it or even if it makes sense to talk about “before” it (since it’s likely that time began after the Big Bang).

It’s possible that the “stuff” that existed before the Big Bang always existed. It’s possible that the “stuff” that preceded the Big Bang has gone through numerous expansion cycles and that what we call “the universe” is only the most recent expansion. It’s possible that the cause of the Big Bang (if it’s possible to speak of “causes” before time) is something natural that we don’t currently understand. It’s possible that “a force that is previous and independent from the universe” exists but is completely natural, unintelligent, and/or not in existence any more.

This seems to me like evidence FOR the existence of God, however; since we know (or the current models of the Big Bang indicate that) time began at a definite point, the cause of the Big Bang must be outside of time. (We know that there can’t be an infinite regression of causes - the buck has to stop somewhere. If time began at a definite point, then the cause of the state of events at that point must itself be outside of time and therefore outside of the temporal universe.)

1. The argument from “fine tuning” simply doesn’t work. The article says that the universe “is based on ‘an incredibly delicate balance of 17 cosmological constants. If any of them would be off by one part of a tenth at a forty potency, we would be dead and the universe would not be what it is.’”

All of that is true.

The problem is that you’re taking the current state of things and evaluating the evidence as if the current state was an intentional goal. There’s no justification for doing so, unless you want to make your first assumption the conclusion you want to get to (and thus have a big circular argument).

If the cosmological constants had been any different, we would have had a different universe. Maybe there would have been life in that universe, maybe there would have been a different kind of life, or maybe there would have been no life at all. Each of those potential universes would be equally unlikely.

Think of it this way: what are the odds of being dealt a perfect bridge hand? I mean 2 through Ace, all of the same suit – the odds are somewhere in the ballpark of 1 in several million. But what are the odds of being dealt any old hand, say King of Clubs, Jack of Diamonds, Seven of Hearts, etc.? The odds of any other hand are exactly the same. It’s just that we attach value to one kind of hand and not to others.

So just because you like the outcome of something and the odds of it happening are remote, it in no way demonstrates that intelligence arranged the outcome.

Good point. I made it either above or in a different post. I wish one of the Thomists out there would address it instead of dismissing it.

 

[Cecilianus]

I really do enjoy hearing atheists speak about the big bang, because they hug several improbable cosmological models and assert that they are much more likely then they are. There is a good reason why people like Quentin Smith don’t talk about Oscillating models anymore, this is they have for the most part fallen through. There is however some new osculating models, one of which is supported by String Theory, but they are highly speculative. The fact is that oscillating models are contrary to empirical evidence that show that not only is the expansion of the universe not slowing down, but it is accelerating.

I wish however that theists would relax and let science do its work, without damning them a priori because the attempts to explain the data (which may not be the most refined data we will eventually get) happen to contradict your previous conceptions (including theism). Truth is one, and whatever discrepancies between scientific hypotheses and religion will be worked out eventually, if you step back and let scientists do their job.

What atheists are now raving about now is quantum tunneling. They point to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics to prove that something does come out of nothing, for we can see that virtual particles appear seemingly out of nowhere in a vacuum. This however would be false because what they are doing is quantum tunnelling from quantum nothingness into our universe. This “quantum nothingness” is often mistaken for metaphysical nothingness. Now this is not the case – although this is the greatest nothing we can imagine, it is not “nothingness” per se. The first reason is that the laws of physics exist in this quantum nothingness. The second reason is that metaphysically “nothingness” per se cannot exist, because it is a metaphysical evil. If nothing existed, then something would exist, and that something would be nothing. So we must come to the conclusion that what the particle physics are talking about when they say “tunnelling” from nothing, is really tunnelling from something to something else.

So even if our universe is tunneling into existance, it is not tunneling from nothingness per se.

What is “metaphysical nothingness”? What is “metaphysical evil”? I don’t have infused knowledge of your terminology; you need to explain what your terms mean. Are you talking about the vacuum? It is indeed nothing - even though we have a word for it. Is that really too difficult a concept for modern-day Thomists to understand?

(I say modern-day Thomists because Aquinas himself understood this perfectly fine, as Sr. Mary Consilia O’Brien O.P. demonstrated in her dissertation “The Antecedents of Being: A Study of the Concept De Nihilo in St. Thomas Aquinas”, published by Catholic U of America press.)

So lets have faith in mechanical causes, but not in the truths of God?

What do you mean by “having faith in mechanical causes”? We explain the world through mechanical causes, not through constant divine intervention. That’s the way science works. And it’s a discipline not only approved but INVENTED by the Catholic Church.

The fact is that since it is outside of time, a mechanical cause will still be in effect now unless it was caused by a will that can rescind the cause.

Mechanical cause outside of time? What are you talking about??

 

[Cecilianus]

I am glad that God does not fit our paradigms of God. God is, and He will reward those who diligently seek Him–probably not many cosmologists.

Skeptics come and go daily–The Word of God abides forever, all forms of higher textual criticism notwithstanding.

Where will you be in 100 years? Choose wisely.

Selah,

James Least

How do you know that “not many cosmologists” diligently seek Him? Who appointed you a judge over souls? Since when has it been a sin to seek to understand God’s creation?

 

[itinerant1]

Good point. I made it either above or in a different post. I wish one of the Thomists out there would address it instead of dismissing it.

I sometimes use this article as a reference point in discussing Big Bang cosmology.
Aquinas and the Big Bang You would interested, I’m sure, in some of the author’s statements on the subject.

 

[KyivAndrew]

People just live their lives. Good things happen and bad things happen. That’s it. We try to make the best out of whatever situation we find ourselves in. There’s no problem that goes any deeper than that. Some people don’t like living in a world with a lot of suffering and try to do something about it; other people are alright with it. But that’s it.

Just look at your post: it’s obvious that you don’t like the fact that some people lead incredibly sorrowful and/or painful lives and that you especially don’t like the fact that there’s no super magical justice for these people to give their lives “meaning.”

But just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean it’s not true.

Agreed. Just because you don’t like belief in God or Morality, doesn’t mean they are untrue.

And this attributing to theists or Christians of belief in “super magical” stuff is pretty adolescent don’t you think? If you wish to argue the merits of points fine. But to attribute belief in God as being akin to childish magic does your argument a disservice especially since on other threads you have mentioned you are still open to belief in the supernatural should you be presented with proof, since materialism certainly doesn’t explain everything. Whatever shall you do in such a situation, start proclaiming yourself a believer in Magic? You’ve previously allowed that materialism cannot account for Everything in the Universe so why make a caricature of the view opposing yours? Does that make your argument any stronger? It just feeds into the stereotype that people are atheists often because they are extremely self-centered, arrogant, and amoral? On the last attribute, however, on other threads you’ve already admitted you do not believe in any system of morality so I assume that is not an insult.

You aver of human suffering that there is nothing deeper involved but that hey bad things happen. Now to hold such a view I would argue is extremely naive if one has somewhat studied Human History. There is Evil in this world, but you do not recognize it as such. Stalin’s Genocide of Ukrainians in the 1930s, Mao’s Famines, Pol Pot, Hitler – any historian worth his weight understands that the study of history involves contemplating morality, a point the great Sovietologist Martin Malia, whom I met, always stressed. He studied the 20th Century intensively throughout his life and knew there was such a thing as “evil”. But you will not even acknowledge such a concept. You revert back to custom or evolutionary “pattern recognition” as to how we act. You can believe this, but I believe it to be eminently unreasonable to not acknowledge that there is objective good and that there is evil. You stated before you had heard of Natural Law before and I encourage you to study it.

I mentioned to you that in the Father Coplestone/Bertrand Russell debates, Russel felt that analyzing the good and bad in the Holocaust was akin to analyzing between the colors of red vs. blue and that maybe the “unpleasantness” of the Holocaust in his words stemmed from some internal amorphous “feelings”. This is a recipe for cutting humanity off from our moral bearings, bearings which cannot simply be explained by “evolutionary biology”.

There is good, and there is bad in the world. The more people who believe this to be childish “magic” talk, the more irrationality will sweep our world. As Malcolm Muggeridge quoted some time ago, the alternative to belief in God is not belief in Nothing, it is belief in Anything, i.e. maybe there is objective morality, maybe not, maybe that animal is just as worthy of value as that ill wheel-chaired bound child - who knows, who cares. No deep meaning here folks.

 

[KyivAndrew]

Ah… I good topic for a philosophy section

You’re exactly right. There is no promise that people’s problems will vanish and be solved after they die with atheism, but their problems persist in this world whether they believe in God or not. In this respect, taking the assumption that God doesn’t exist, a paraplegic who is blind and deaf is in the same situation whether they believe in God or not and any promises by Christianity would be a hopeful delusion

What historical studies or analyses of the beginnings of Christianity lead you to believe it was all a delusion? Just your personal view, or something heftier. Even the most anti-Christian biblical specialists acknowledge that Jesus Christ was a Historic Person and that his Followers all claimed Something Extraordinary had occurred well within the lifetime of witnesses to Jesus’ Crucifixion. Many studies of Near East legends point out that most legends take several generations to work their way into some sort of belief. St. Paul was already writing of Christ’s crucifixion and Resurrection in the 40s A.D., something even liberal theologians acknowledge.

Yes problems may persist whether you believe in God or not but for starters, the Christian is forbidden in the depths of his/her problems to kill himself as life is a gift from God. What is the atheist’s case to someone in deep suffering from not committing suicide, or is there even one since all that is common to you atheists I am told is a negative postulate, that there is no God.

 

[Matthias123]

I wish however that theists would relax and let science do its work, without damning them a priori because the attempts to explain the data (which may not be the most refined data we will eventually get) happen to contradict your previous conceptions (including theism). Truth is one, and whatever discrepancies between scientific hypotheses and religion will be worked out eventually, if you step back and let scientists do their job.

Agreed

What is “metaphysical nothingness”? What is “metaphysical evil”? I don’t have infused knowledge of your terminology; you need to explain what your terms mean. Are you talking about the vacuum? It is indeed nothing - even though we have a word for it. Is that really too difficult a concept for modern-day Thomists to understand?

(I say modern-day Thomists because Aquinas himself understood this perfectly fine, as Sr. Mary Consilia O’Brien O.P. demonstrated in her dissertation “The Antecedents of Being: A Study of the Concept De Nihilo in St. Thomas Aquinas”, published by Catholic U of America press.)

A a vacum is not nothing, there still exists space-time, which is something. Metaphysical evil is non-being, thus non-being doesn’t really exist, it is just the absense of being.

What do you mean by “having faith in mechanical causes”? We explain the world through mechanical causes, not through constant divine intervention. That’s the way science works. And it’s a discipline not only approved but INVENTED by the Catholic Church.

I was criticizing him for being able to have faith in a mechanical cause for the universe but not being able to have faith in a universe caused by a Free Agent.

Mechanical cause outside of time? What are you talking about??

The first cause is outside of space-time because it brought spacetime into being.

To sum things up, everything was very evident from my post; I don’t understand why you are picking it apart.

 

[AntiTheist]

Matthias123:

So even if our universe is tunneling into existance, it is not tunneling from nothingness per se.

No one is arguing that the universe came from “nothingness.” No one knows what happened before the Big Bang. It is possible that whatever “stuff” was around before the Big Bang always existed, whether or not it’s ever expanded before (again, if it makes sense to speak of a “before” in this context).

The fact is that oscillating models are contrary to empirical evidence that show that not only is the expansion of the universe not slowing down, but it is accelerating.

No one is arguing that we are necessarily in a universe that will “Big Crunch” one day. Yes, it seems that this particular expansion is speeding up and not slowing down – perhaps this universe is the only expansion that the pre-Big-Bang “stuff” has ever had. Maybe it’s expanded before into different universes that did Big-Crunch. Maybe not. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Nobody knows.

So lets have faith in mechanical causes, but not in the truths of God?

No. Let’s get rid of the puerile idea of “faith,” and let’s see where the evidence points. When there’s not enough evidence to form a conclusion, let’s be honest and say “we don’t know.”

This [the fine-turning argument] is not used to prove the existance of God, this is used as evidence for the existence of God.

…which, as I demonstrated with the bridge hand analogy, does not suggest the intervention of an intelligent force directing the cards. I’ll repeat: just because something is unlikely, occurs anyway, and is valued by you, it in no way suggests that it is any more likely that an intelligent force made it happen.

I really do enjoy hearing atheists speak about the big bang

And I really do enjoy hearing believers assert that “we don’t know” really means that supernatural explanations are more likely.

itinerant1:

In keeping with the recognition of individual tastes there is a standard.

And who gets to decide that standard? You? The culture you grew up in? I dare say that cultural standards of beauty are quite different in other cultures (the African trbe that does the “lip discs” and other body modifications comes immediately to mind)

If there were no standard then anything whatsoever, regardless of how deformed, stinking putrid and ugly could qualify as beautiful.

And yet that is indeed the case – different people find different things beautiful, even things that seem putrid and ugly to others (the “lip disc” example is indeed applicable here).

And this is to make nonsense of the aesthetic experience.

It doesn’t – it just means that the experience of the “beautiful” is a value judgment. What a culture or individual considers beautiful might give us insights into the individual or the culture, but it has nothing to do with there being some kind of objective “standard” of beauty.

I agree that there might be some things that are almost universally regarded as beautiful because the makeup of our brains tends to respond to these things in similar ways – hence, it’s possible to talk broadly of things that will be, in general, found beautiful by people: symmetry, the mixing of certain shades, etc. But such things are not always universally regarded in this way – and certainly specific works of art are not always universally regarded as beautiful – and it is to utterly confuse the issue to attempt to see “beauty” as anything other than a judgment by a human consciousness.

Andrew:
First of all, hope you had a nice Canadian Thanksgiving. You write:

You aver of human suffering that there is nothing deeper involved but that hey bad things happen. Now to hold such a view I would argue is extremely naive if one has somewhat studied Human History.

Bad things happen. Things that I, on the basis of my values, personally despise and hate – like genocides – happen. Where’s the “deeper” part?

I believe it to be eminently unreasonable to not acknowledge that there is objective good and that there is evil.

But just because one recognizes that morality doesn’t exist doesn’t mean that one suddenly stops having values.

Your argument consists of just insisting over and over again that good and evil are “objective.” They’re not. This is similar to the nonsense of insisting that beauty is “objective.” It’s simply not.

These words are expressions of values, nothing more and nothing less.

Look, if you’re insisting that these words refer to “objective” things, your arguments are all going to boil down to “What’s beautiful is what I say is beautiful, and what’s good is what I say is good, and anybody who disagrees is just wrong.” As an example, I pointed out earlier that some people find pain and rape beautiful, and I was told that such people are “clearly wrong.” But just declaring that people are “wrong” for a subjective value judgment is completely and totally unconvincing. What if I told you that you’re “clearly wrong” for finding a sunset beautiful? Obviously, that wouldn’t convince you – I can’t argue away a feeling that you have – because these questions of “good” or “beauty” are subjective value judgments that usually can’t be argued away.

[an exception might be if my arguments led you to see the object in question in a different way, one that now strikes your subjective values as “ugly” or at least “not beautiful” in some way – but still, it’s your values that are making the judgment, not some standard outside of yourself]

Now, my values might lead me to want a world in which, for example, elderly members of society are respected and cared for – perhaps not the least because I have personal relationships with some elderly people and/or expect to be elderly myself some day. So I might be driven to contribute to efforts to respect and care for the elderly – not out of a sense that there’s some “objective” value and greatness to human life or some “objective” moral imperative, but out of my values.

Here’s the thing: someone else might have values that drive him to not care about the elderly or even actively oppose efforts to care for them. There’s nothing objectively “evil” about this – it’s merely a point of view that I might hate and oppose.

And that’s really it – there’s only the actions people take and the way people feel about actions, all driven by values. The only “argument” you could possibly mount in opposition to this is repeatedly insisting, in shriller and shriller tones, that “evil” exists objectively. Maybe you’ll throw in an appeal to emotion for good measure, too, and bring up crippled children and wounded puppies. But obviously, repeatedly insisting something isn’t a convincing argument.

 

[Matthias123]

No one is arguing that the universe came from “nothingness.” No one knows what happened before the Big Bang. It is possible that whatever “stuff” was around before the Big Bang always existed, whether or not it’s ever expanded before (again, if it makes sense to speak of a “before” in this context).

I agree with you, the period before plank time is like a sign on a map that says “There be dragons there!” Actually we are arguing that the universe came from nothingness, but we are saying that quantum nothingness is not nothingness per se, therefore if it tunneled into existance it came from something to something else.

No one is arguing that we are necessarily in a universe that will “Big Crunch” one day. Yes, it seems that this particular expansion is speeding up and not slowing down – perhaps this universe is the only expansion that the pre-Big-Bang “stuff” has ever had. Maybe it’s expanded before into different universes that did Big-Crunch. Maybe not. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Nobody knows.

I agree

No. Let’s get rid of the puerile idea of “faith,” and let’s see where the evidence points. When there’s not enough evidence to form a conclusion, let’s be honest and say “we don’t know.”

My epistimology is diffrent then yours – I have faith in revalation

…which, as I demonstrated with the bridge hand analogy, does not suggest the intervention of an intelligent force directing the cards. I’ll repeat: just because something is unlikely, occurs anyway, and is valued by you, it in no way suggests that it is any more likely that an intelligent force made it happen.

I will agree, but I would assert that an intellegent agent is the best explanation for this phenomenom.

And I really do enjoy hearing believers assert that “we don’t know” really means that supernatural explanations are more likely.

No, I believe the evidence points to a supernatural casue.

To sum things up, we agree on almost everything.

 

[itinerant1]

itinerant1: And who gets to decide that standard? You? The culture you grew up in? I dare say that cultural standards of beauty are quite different in other cultures (the African trbe that does the “lip discs” and other body modifications comes immediately to mind)

And yet that is indeed the case – different people find different things beautiful, even things that seem putrid and ugly to others (the “lip disc” example is indeed applicable here).

It doesn’t – it just means that the experience of the “beautiful” is a value judgment. What a culture or individual considers beautiful might give us insights into the individual or the culture, but it has nothing to do with there being some kind of objective “standard” of beauty.

I agree that there might be some things that are almost universally regarded as beautiful because the makeup of our brains tends to respond to these things in similar ways – hence, it’s possible to talk broadly of things that will be, in general, found beautiful by people: symmetry, the mixing of certain shades, etc. But such things are not always universally regarded in this way – and certainly specific works of art are not always universally regarded as beautiful – and it is to utterly confuse the issue to attempt to see “beauty” as anything other than a judgment by a human consciousness.

You are still going 'round in the same very small circle. It makes little difference to my point whether differing tastes are viewed as between individuals or between cultures or even between races on different planets.

Arguing your conclusion is no substitute for evidence or proofs for a position. So far, you have added nothing to your original assumption except mere verbiage.

 

[Cecilianus]

Matthias123:
And I really do enjoy hearing believers assert that “we don’t know” really means that supernatural explanations are more likely.

Keep in mind however that the beginning of faith - the reason for belief in God - is not in a scientific or philosophical explanation of the world, but in a relationship with Him initiated by divine grace. If you attack the wrong thing as the underpinning of religion, of course your job is going to be easier. Christian dogma teaches that faith is an effect of divine grace, even though His existence can be also discerned from reason.

itinerant1: And who gets to decide that standard? You? The culture you grew up in? I dare say that cultural standards of beauty are quite different in other cultures (the African trbe that does the “lip discs” and other body modifications comes immediately to mind)

And yet that is indeed the case – different people find different things beautiful, even things that seem putrid and ugly to others (the “lip disc” example is indeed applicable here).

I would like to see itinerant1’s response, but what I want to know is: how do you know that they don’t see something we don’t?

I agree that there might be some things that are almost universally regarded as beautiful because the makeup of our brains tends to respond to these things in similar ways – hence, it’s possible to talk broadly of things that will be, in general, found beautiful by people: symmetry, the mixing of certain shades, etc. But such things are not always universally regarded in this way – and certainly specific works of art are not always universally regarded as beautiful – and it is to utterly confuse the issue to attempt to see “beauty” as anything other than a judgment by a human consciousness.

Regarding works of art, don’t you think that cultured have a better right to judge than the uncultured? Art critics have an eye for that which ordinary people don’t.

Look, if you’re insisting that these words refer to “objective” things, your arguments are all going to boil down to “What’s beautiful is what I say is beautiful, and what’s good is what I say is good, and anybody who disagrees is just wrong.” As an example, I pointed out earlier that some people find pain and rape beautiful, and I was told that such people are “clearly wrong.” But just declaring that people are “wrong” for a subjective value judgment is completely and totally unconvincing. What if I told you that you’re “clearly wrong” for finding a sunset beautiful? Obviously, that wouldn’t convince you – I can’t argue away a feeling that you have – because these questions of “good” or “beauty” are subjective value judgments that usually can’t be argued away.

Again, Andrew can respond to the rest of this, but I’m itching to point out two things: (1) You clearly believe there is no God, and that truth is objective, so do you believe that “What’s true is what I say is true, and anybody who disagrees is just wrong”? How’s that any different from “What’s good is what I say is good”?

(2) When you say “But just declaring that people are ‘wrong’ for a subjective value judgment is completely and totally unconvincing”, you’re begging the question. Whether they are subjective value judgements is the question being debated.

 

[itinerant1]

Regarding works of art, don’t you think that cultured have a better right to judge than the uncultured? Art critics have an eye for that which ordinary people don’t.

You have hit upon a key idea. The expert proffers an informed and learned judgement on what is admirably beautiful. This is true in both cases of things in nature and man made works of art. An expert in Greek architecture renders a competent judgement on the beauty of Greek temples.

However, the non-expert may disagree with the expert’s opinion on which temple is most beautiful. The non-expert may derive the most pleasure from a different temple than the one judged most admirably beautiful.

There may even be someone who derives the most pleasure from a temple in ruins. But this matters not, as there are dysfunctional individuals who prefer pain over pleasure.

Form, especially in its philosophical sense, is an important factor in what is admirably beautiful in nature and art.

Art and beauty are something that it is difficult to say much that is final and widely agreed upon. The question of morals differs. While it is common to ascribe relativity to moral values, there remains an objective standard based on human nature that accounts for the similarity in values found cross-culturally. No one decides on this standard. It is one of the permanent things that the discerning mind discovers. It’s called the natural law or the natural moral law, which was made possible, I suppose, by the groundwork initially provided by the specificity of the Big Bang.

 

[AntiTheist]

[regarding lip-discing] how do you know that they don’t see something we don’t?

You’re referring to members of the African tribes here?

I’m saying that their values lead them to interpret a phenomenon as “beautiful” that we Westerners would – and do – recoil from in disgust. I find myself disgusted by that cultural practice and some others around the world; I’m alright with people doing things that I find disgusting, but you’re not going to be able to convince me through arguments that it’s “not so disgusting.”

I can understand perfectly well that some people find it beautiful – indeed, I can imagine a person born into such a culture might find it very beautiful indeed and be turned off by some of the things considered “beautiful” in our culture. But just because I can concede that not all people find the same things beautiful that I do – that doesn’t mean that I start seeing other things as beautiful.

“Beautiful” is a value judgment. That’s it.

(2)When you say “But just declaring that people are ‘wrong’ for a subjective value judgment is completely and totally unconvincing”, you’re begging the question. Whether they are subjective value judgements is the question being debated.

No, the question we’re debating is whether beauty is something objective. That’s the positive claim here.

I’m just observing that different people value different things as “beautiful,” which is a fact that I haven’t seen anyone dispute – we can all see that that is the case with African lip-discing.

You guys are the ones claiming that “beauty” is something objective, with an objective standard, and that people can be more or less “correct” about something being beautiful. But you have not sufficiently made your case – at all. The closest you’ve come is to bring up the Golden Mean, which is a concept whose application yields results that tend to be aesthetically pleasing – but that’s a far cry from “objective.” Not only are there works of art that conform to the mean that are not considered beautiful universally, there are things that don’t conform to the mean that are considered beautiful by some.

Again, I don’t have a problem admiting that there are some ratios that will cause a majority of people to judge as “beautiful” – but not all people will, and the people who do are still making judgments dictated by their values, not a universal, objective concept of beauty that they are somehow “right” about.

If you just want to have “faith” that beauty is objective, then fine. That is, I think, the only option you really have if you want to take such view.

Regarding works of art, don’t you think that cultured have a better right to judge than the uncultured?

Well, right away, “cultured” is a loaded word that assumes the values of the person making the claim. I presume you think that you are more “cultured” than a member of an African tribe that engages in lip discing? They might think themselves far more “cultured” than you (after all, the women in your society don’t disc their lips – how uncivilized and revolting!).

What you mean by “cultured” is “someone who is steeped in the traditions of the culture of which I am a part.” And becoming steeped in the traditions of a culture is certainly going to have an effect on your values, likely leading you to value things as “beautiful” that many other people in that culture do.

Moreover, just because some “authority” says something doesn’t mean it’s true. For example, there are certainly professional art critics, who are probably very “cultured” by your standards, who find beauty in abstract works of art that look like junk to the average person.

So we’re right back to square one: different people find different things “beautiful” because “beauty” is a subjective value judgment.

(1) You clearly believe there is no God, and that truth is objective, so do you believe that “What’s true is what I say is true, and anybody who disagrees is just wrong”? How’s that any different from “What’s good is what I say is good”?

I think you’re misunderstanding me.

I believe in truth – i.e. I think there is a real world outside of our minds to which our thoughts can more or less conform.

There’s a difference between a factual statement and a statement of values. A factual statement is something like, “That car is moving at 55 miles per hour.”

A statement of values is something like, “Apples taste good.”

The difference is that factual statements can be investigated and determined to be true or false; but a statement of values isn’t a statement that is true or false. Apples don’t objectively “taste good.” The phrase “taste good” is a value judgment that we make when we taste apples.

In other words, value statements have no truth content to them.

I think that morality is a series of value statements. They express, not truth, but values. When I say, “it’s good to share your things with friends,” I mean, “My values lead me to conclude that sharing things with friends is something I really, really like.” There’s nothing inherent about sharing things with my friends that makes it “good,” just like there’s nothing inherent about apples that makes them “taste good.”

Does that clear up the confusion? Your question doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, so let me know if you need more clarification.