Is there any purpose in the universe?

[Lion_IRC]

God is not capable of having expectations because he can only have certainty.

I don’t think the ability to know anything/everything entails the necessity to know everything.
Omnipotence is ability not compulsion.

 

[Bob_Crowley]

To go really fast. I mean seriously, even if the universe has no other purpose, we do seem to hurtle through it at ridiculous speeds. We’re spinning around on this planet at about 1040 MPH. Earth is hurtling itself and us around the Sun at about 65,000 MPH. The sun and solar system are hurtling around the galactic center at about 483,000 MPH. And the galaxy is moving at 1.3 million MPH through space.

I can only conclude even if we didn’t know anything else about God, that God love speed.

Thanks for quoting those figures. Now for my reason for being interested - way back around Christmas 1983, I had my first “double whammy” (psychiatrist’s term - he’s experienced it too), which is like a breath going through in waves from head to foot, very pronounced, very clear, and it didn’t come from me. It was used to highlight a phrase (a Scriptural quote) that someone was saying at the time.

I won’t go into the background now as it would take a bit long, but I believe God was the one who sent the “double whammy”.

The purpose was to encourage me as a new Christian, and the phrase that was highlighted at the time was “a man after my own heart” (originally referrring to David).

Now this same “double whammy” happened twice more in the succeeeding months, both times in church when the pastor was speaking, and this time the phrases were “little man of great insight and wisdom” (referring to St. Paul) and “an intellectual ministry that went around the world” (referring to CS Lewis).

And they haven’t happened since. But they got my attention, and it also meant God knew exactly what was about to be said, where I was at the time, and how to make these particular phrases stick in my mind, without anybody else being aware of the “double whammies” unless I chose to tell them.

Let’s suppose that it was six months between first and third “double whammy”.

Going on Padre’s figures, I moved something like a combined 1.8 million miles per hour (2.88 million kilometres per hour) over that six months, or if you like, about 7.8 billion miles (or 12.5 billion kilometres) through space in a complex path involving several high speed spirals.

Yet on 3 separate occasions as I spun through space with about another 6 billion human beings on a dust speck called earth, God knew exactly where to find me, what was about to be said, how to highlight the phrases He wanted to emphasise, without anybody else knowing about it.

So if there’s a purpose to all these high speed jinks, He’s the one to ask. It certainly doesn’t bother Him.

He knew precisely what I was doing, and where to find me.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I don’t think the ability to know anything/everything entails the necessity to know everything.
Omnipotence is ability not compulsion.

True, but God has other properties besides omnipotence/omniscience, including being changeless. If God forfeited some omniscience and learned things over time, he would be changing over time.

 

[Lion_IRC]

Surely God has prerogatives.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

Could God possibly love each and everyone of us as he loves himself?

We are given the greatest commandment to return God’s love. Because God loves each and everyone of us, we are given the second greatest commandment to do likewise.

The greatest commandments must be a greatest purpose, but can these commandments have a greatest meaning for God?

Just a thought.

 

[JurisPrudens]

Some people don’t believe there is any purpose in the universe but David Hume who was a notorious sceptic wrote:

davidhume.org/texts/dnr.html

What is your opinion?

The natural world has no inherent purpose, by the human beings, to whom the natural world belongs, have a purpose: serve the Creator, by preparing the creation for the second coming.

 

[tonyrey]

Tony,
Here is my simple view:

“What do I mean when I ask, what is the nature of God and the meaning of life? I am not sure about others, but what I mean is this: our existence, our presence on earth, has a purpose. If this were not so and life had no purpose, then surely, life would have no hope. Purpose and hope are what a God-oriented paradigm sets before us; therefore, my quest begins with the belief that there is a God, that there is a purpose that promises hope; because without hope there is no meaning. For me, it is not the hope that we win the lottery—that is a very transitory hope—the hope I seek is that of something beyond this life. The secret, then, to finding the meaning of life is to ascertain God’s purpose for creating us and the nature of that promised hope.”

Yppop

It may be simple but it rings true! To think we invent purpose(s) in a purposeless system is absurd given the significance of the term “system”:

“A set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or an interconnecting network; a complex whole.”

Our ability to plan ahead presupposes an orderly, predictable world but the world need not exist. It is a miracle that anything exists because there is no obvious reason why there should be something rather than nothing nor why there is order instead of chaos nor why there is sufficient order to serve as a basis for rational existence. In nature the higher the degree of complexity the more unlikely it becomes that it is fortuitous because there is no obvious reason why there should be stability rather than instability:

A remarkable feature of the universe is that it is orderly as the result of complementary laws:

The laws of thermodynamics are special laws that sit above the ordinary laws of nature as laws about laws or laws upon which the other laws depend (Swenson & Turvey, 1991). It can be successfully shown that without the first and second laws, which express symmetry properties of the world, there could be no other laws at all…

There are also examples of **deliberately **

unstable systems in nature. (my emphasis)

books.google.co.uk/books?id=3P1zTw1HmyIC&pg=PA98&lpg=PA98&dq=unstable+systems+in+nature&source=bl&ots=FBcsZpS_XA&sig=_4VpiyCSpoNwqQCcxJKgykMLTts&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj_kpTGkrDOAhUEKcAKHbFuCQ8Q6AEIRjAE#v=onepage&q=unstable%20systems%20in%20nature&f=true

 

[tonyrey]

I don’t think the ability to know anything/everything entails the necessity to know everything.
Omnipotence is ability not compulsion.

Excellent point! The Creator is not subject to necessity but transcends it, i.e. has absolute freedom.

 

[tonyrey]

The natural world has no inherent purpose, by the human beings, to whom the natural world belongs, have a purpose: serve the Creator, by preparing the creation for the second coming.

It certainly isn’t an end in itself but surely the Creator intends the natural world to be a home for us and other forms of life?

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Suppose a man creates a toy to entertain himself. The purpose of the toy is to entertain the man.

Suppose the larger universe has no purpose. Some religious people would argue that this implies the toy therefore cannot actually have a purpose, because purposelessness cannot give rise to purpose. Such people would claim that God allows us to solve this problem.

Therefore, I would demand that any such person explicitly state what God’s purpose is, and who gave it to him.

 

[tonyrey]

Suppose a man creates a toy to entertain himself. The purpose of the toy is to entertain the man.

Suppose the larger universe has no purpose. Some religious people would argue that this implies the toy therefore cannot actually have a purpose, because purposelessness cannot give rise to purpose. Such people would claim that God allows us to solve this problem.

Therefore, I would demand that any such person explicitly state what God’s purpose is, and who gave it to him.

God is creative Love and the Source of all love. God both gives and receives love. That is why there is a divine Family united by perfect love for one another. A solitary God would be the apotheosis of egoism! The unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are reflected in a human family which consists fundamentally of the father, mother and child whose attributes are derived from both parents. It also explains the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity because we are all brothers and sisters with the same Father in heaven. Otherwise we would be related solely by an accident of birth and have no obligations towards one another. If we fail to love others we can never be truly fulfilled and live in harmony. Love literally makes the world go round and brings us peace and happiness…

 

[JapaneseKappa]

God is creative Love and the Source of all love. God both gives and receives love. That is why there is a divine Family united by perfect love for one another. A solitary God would be the apotheosis of egoism! The unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are reflected in a human family which consists fundamentally of the father, mother and child whose attributes are derived from both parents. It also explains the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity because we are all brothers and sisters with the same Father in heaven. Otherwise we would be related solely by an accident of birth and have no obligations towards one another. If we fail to love others we can never be truly fulfilled and live in harmony. Love literally makes the world go round and brings us peace and happiness…

Sure. So if God is “creative Love,” then what is “creative Love’s” purpose?

 

[Della]

Sure. So if God is “creative Love,” then what is “creative Love’s” purpose?

See my first post for the scriptural answer. From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

280 Creation is the foundation of “all God’s saving plans,” the "beginning of the history of salvation"117 that culminates in Christ. Conversely, the mystery of Christ casts conclusive light on the mystery of creation and reveals the end for which “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”: from the beginning, God envisaged the glory of the new creation in Christ.118

 

[Tomdstone]

That is why there is a divine Family united by perfect love for one another. A solitary God would be the apotheosis of egoism! The unity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are reflected in a human family which consists fundamentally of the father, mother and child whose attributes are derived from both parents.

A Muslim or a Jew might reject the concept of a “divine Family” on the basis that it is not monotheism.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

See my first post for the scriptural answer. From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

280 Creation is the foundation of “all God’s saving plans,” the "beginning of the history of salvation"117 that culminates in Christ. Conversely, the mystery of Christ casts conclusive light on the mystery of creation and reveals the end for which “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”: from the beginning, God envisaged the glory of the new creation in Christ.118

But you’re just describing the kind of purpose a man gives a toy, except the man is God and the toy is the universe:

Suppose a man creates a toy to entertain himself. The purpose of the toy is to entertain the man.

Suppose the larger universe has no purpose. Some religious people would argue that this implies the toy therefore cannot actually have a purpose, because purposelessness cannot give rise to purpose.

I want to know what God’s own purpose is and who gave it to him, not what you think he wants from us.

 

[Della]

But you’re just describing the kind of purpose a man gives a toy, except the man is God and the toy is the universe:

Well, firstly, I’m not describing anything–I’m quoting the CCC. It clearly states creation is part of God’s saving plan. Being God he knew from the foundations of creation that he would make man in his image and that man would need to be redeemed in Christ. As I quoted in my other post, creation was made in Christ and for Christ and bestowed on us in Christ.

I want to know what God’s own purpose is and who gave it to him, not what you think he wants from us.

No one “gave” God anything. He initiated everything in himself alone. No one existed before him, therefore no one could have given him anything. I have never expressed what I think he wants from us. I have only related what he himself has said he wants from us–to be redeemed in Christ to share the new creation with him and in him. This is the essence of the Christian faith.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Well, firstly, I’m not describing anything–I’m quoting the CCC. It clearly states creation is part of God’s saving plan. Being God he knew from the foundations of creation that he would make man in his image and that man would need to be redeemed in Christ. As I quoted in my other post, creation was made in Christ and for Christ and bestowed on us in Christ.
No one “gave” God anything. He initiated everything in himself alone. No one existed before him, therefore no one could have given him anything. I have never expressed what I think he wants from us. I have only related what he himself has said he wants from us–to be redeemed in Christ to share the new creation with him and in him. This is the essence of the Christian faith.

So you do not know what God’s own purpose is, or he does not have one?

 

[Lion_IRC]

God has stated that He has a purpose AND God has declared what that purpose is.

Now, a person might reject that God exists but otherwise it seems rather strange to think that a personal being who exists - a Higher Being - lacks intentionality or volition.

And since God exists and we, His Creation, exist as the result of His volition, I believe we can safely conclude that God had a purpose in creating us. Moreover, if we ask our Creator why or what on the question of purpose, surely He is able to communicate with us in reply. Surely no one is suggesting God lacks interest in His creatures.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Now, a person might reject that God exists but otherwise it seems rather strange to think that a personal being who exists - a Higher Being - lacks intentionality or volition.

And since God exists and we, His Creation, exist as the result of His volition, I believe we can safely conclude that God had a purpose in creating us. Moreover, if we ask our Creator why or what on the question of purpose, surely He is able to communicate with us in reply. Surely no one is suggesting God lacks interest in His creatures.

I have, at no point, been asking what purpose God intended when creating us. I was addressing this specific scenario:

Suppose a man creates a toy to entertain himself. The purpose of the toy is to entertain the man. Suppose the larger universe has no purpose. Some religious people would argue that this implies the toy therefore cannot actually have a purpose, because purposelessness cannot give rise to purpose.

In this scenario, the objection raised is “the man has no higher purpose, and so he cannot give a purpose to his toy.”

Now, if update the scenario to be:
Suppose God creates a universe to entertain himself.

I am raising the objection “God has no higher purpose and so he cannot give purpose to his universe.”

God has stated that He has a purpose AND God has declared what that purpose is.

So what is it?

 

[Lion_IRC]

“God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world, and to be happy with Him for ever in heaven.”