Why Couldn't the Universe Exist Without a Cause?

[JapaneseKappa]

I don’t see how your words can be an answer to my questions. Could you please clarify?

I’m sorry that I can’t think for you.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I don’t care about Descartes, JK. If I mentioned him it was because you decided to mention him. I am interested in the meaning you give to the term “probably” and on the absolute certitude you seem to display on your example or on whatever example you like. So, please forget Descartes if you like, but be so kind to focus on the key terms and answer the question.

As I’ve been saying all along, we never get absolute certitude. If you read that into any of my responses, you read them wrong. In my very first response, I said that all we have is a spectrum of justified beliefs. I’m not going to qualify every sentence I ever write as such, because such writing is tedious for everyone involved.

Now, we have drifted too far from the original topic. My first assertion was

And indeed, this thread sort of took that form at the beginning. Specifically, the argument is:

1. Assume the universe exists without a cause.
   2a. The PSR (or equivalent) says that everything has a cause.
   2b. Line 1 violates line 2a.
2. Therefore the universe must have a cause.

However, the problem is this: The PSR and it’s variants are, to the best of my knowledge, based on inductive reasoning.

I subsequently defended the “inductive reasoning” quip with:

And so we are discussing two different things:
A: The PSR as an axiom
B: The PSR as the way the real world actually behaves

[The original argument] has the PSR making a claim about how the real world actually is. In order to do this, we need empirical evidence about how the real world actually is, and consequently inductive reasoning.

To which you asked a very peculiar question:

Empirical evidence about how the real world actually is? Oh!..

By “real world” do you mean the world which is beyond any empirical evidence or one which is only accessible through a peculiar empirical evidence?

And so let us return to the root of this discussion. Now I have, over the course of these meandering questions, argued that

1. We can’t be certain of anything really.
2. a. Pragmatism says that we should be optimistic.
3. b. We should therefore have some faith in our ability to figure things out about the world through senses and reason.
4. When our senses and reason conflict, neither side wins by default.

From the original discussion, I claimed
3. We can’t make a-priori dicta about how the world works without backing that up with empirical evidence (i.e. information about how the world actually works.)

And so, with all that in mind, I will consider a “world which is beyond empirical evidence.” Specifically, I will consider a hypothetical world with the following properties:

1. It is completely separate from our own. There are no interactions between the two. We have absolutely no way of getting any empirical evidence about that world.
2. All the physics and properties of that world are completely different from our own.
3. In that world, there is no causation whatsoever, things happen randomly, and stuff pops into and out of existence randomly.

Given the above as postulates, could you prove that such a world was necessarily caused?

I would assert, given my position which I previously summarized, that since we can’t get any empirical evidence about that universe (aside from the postulated lack of causality) any beliefs we might formulate about that world would be very weakly justified. Anything that we did would involve extending a metaphysics (which is derived from this world’s physics) to that world (which has a different physics and consequently a different metaphysics.) But such a thing would be tantamount to making a-priori dicta about how that world works without any actual information regarding how that world works.

 

[Nixbits]

ynotzap:

When one uses the terms, open your heart, it really refers to the will of man, a desire for the encounter, and the mind,to receive the enlightenment, we call it “amazing grace” which is the work of the Holy Spirit. There are requirements, sincerity, humility, repentance.

This may be the problem. I have no desire for the encounter. I don’t believe that God exists. Therefore I don’t believe that an encounter with God is possible. Why then should I desire it?

As for sincerity, I sincerely wish to know the Truth, but that’s not the same as sincerely wishing to know God. I may consider myself relatively humble, but not with respect to the magnificence or power of God, who I don’t think exists. As for repentance, I’m truly sorry for some of the things that I’ve done or failed to do. But if repentance relies on the concept of sin, which I reject, then I can’t claim to be repentant. What you’ve described seems to me to be a list of obstructions that no atheist can overcome without first believing in God. Which is a rather circular argument.

 

[Nixbits]

PRmerger:

Or just simply being fundamentalist.

I’ve really struggled with what you mean by this. If by ‘fundamentalist’ you’re referring to ‘strict adherence to the basic principles of any subject or discipline’ then I don’t think it applies. Atheism has no basic principles beyond rejection of the claim that God exists. That’s all there is. So you seem to be saying that atheists strictly adhere to their rejection of the God claim. Well, yes. By definition, they do. Perhaps you could explain what you mean.

PRmerger:

Clearly, one doesn’t have to be a Believer to get the concept of opening one’s heart.

I agree. One doesn’t have to be a Believer to understand a concept of opening one’s heart. In the example of the YouTube song about welcoming refugees, it means to be charitable, sympathetic, loving and caring to one’s fellow human and, by extension perhaps, to other creatures and our world.

But, as I’ve stated before on other threads, we’re not talking about opening one’s heart, we’re talking about opening one’s heart to God. What is meant by opening my heart to something that I don’t believe in and strongly suspect does not exist? How, for example, would you open your heart to the god of Sikhism?

 

[inocente]

You have seen already that according to Hume there is no reason to expect similar “effects” from similar “causes”. I think he wouldn’t say that the hot water jet is the First Cause of the rivulets. According to him, if you think that it is the First Cause it is just because every time you have done the experiment you have observed that the formation of the rivulets follows the application of the hot water jet. “Custom” is his key word. But he lacked intellectual penetration or reflexivity because he could not see that “custom” already involves the causality that he wanted to explain by other means.

I agree with you, against Hume, that the hot water jet is part of the cause for the formation of the rivulets.

I think Hume says we can’t get through even one day without the principle of causation, but we can never prove it. We observe a billiard ball striking another (event A), and then see the second ball moving (event B), but we cannot logically prove that A causes B.

While we might casually say A causes B, Hume says if instead we’re careful, the best we can do is to state that whenever A, we customarily see B. This leads to the notion of a universal law, as a statement that if certain conditions apply (A) then a particular phenomenon (B) is always observed to occur. And this is exactly how we now define a physical law. I think Hume’s skepticism, the careful refusal to go with intuition alone, then becomes the foundation for knowledge in the physical sciences.

One issue with it is that it doesn’t work for one-off events. Historians can’t use it to construct a law of Napolean to explain his motivation, since there’s only one of him and he only fought each battle once, etc. So it can’t be a foundation for all knowledge. And of course the initial singularity is a one-off.

 

[inocente]

“Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.” Matthew 16:18

Presumably according to your logic the true Church is going to have hell prevail against it, because you seem to differentiate Christ from his Church in a way he never intended.

It’s sectarians who try to separate Christ from his church.

 

[inocente]

And you did this because…why?

Because the New Testament said this is what you do?

And why do you follow what’s in the NT?

Because it’s the inspired Word of God?

And how do you know it’s the inspired Word of God?

Because…

You know nothing about me and so must have invented that out of thin air. Not surprising then that not one word of it is true. There’s no concern for my soul in your words, only that I should outwardly observe your self-made rule.

You reminded me, no doubt unfairly, of something Cardinal Ratzinger said: “It is on the many half-hearted interpretations of the biblical Word that can be found everywhere that a sickly Christianity takes its stand – a Christianity that is no longer true to itself and that consequently cannot radiate encouragement and enthusiasm. It gives, instead, the impression of being an organization that keeps on talking although it has nothing else to say, because twisted words are not convincing and are only concerned to hide their emptiness.”

Ratzinger was talking of something else, but you have given me the impression that you can only talk of some long gone committee, of past glories, of “an organization that keeps on talking although it has nothing else to say”. Your evangelizing might work a lot better if you got off this negative spin, the attempt to trap souls into submission, and instead said something positive about your Church, something to radiate encouragement and enthusiasm about your Church. Have a go, try being upbeat, it might even work.

 

[o_mlly]

… We don’t know what such a time and place would be like, because we have no way of observing it! So, how can we know there must be a First Cause?

Metaphysics, a rational science, always begins with observed phenomena. Science fiction, however, is not bound by any such constraint but begins with imagination rather than observation.

 

[DrTaffy]

Ah, at last an answer I can believe. You are in it for sport.

A strange conclusion to draw from what I said. Should I take it that that is also the answer to why you spend so much time responding to atheists? You are in it for sport?

But no, for me the point of debating a topic of interest to me with those who take a different view of that topic is both to improve the understanding each side has of the other and to expose my views to hostile scrutiny - that being the best way to test them, or at least the way I express them.

And yes, sometime the truth sounds rude.

Unjustified insults also tend to sound rude.

 

[PRmerger]

The ‘you’ in ‘The only evidence that I consider is that supplied by you’ means Christians, not you personally or just the forum. Although I would expect the forum to be able to be able to supply a reasonable argument a la Aquinas and the rest.

One wonders how many have read enough to be able to do it. Versus the general population of Christians. From past polling I would suggest a very small proportion indeed.

Too true, too true.

But anyone who goes by Reason Alone (as opposed to Fides Quarens Intellectum) is under a greater obligation to investigate the evidence, don’t you think?

As you say, it is quite important if you want to make sure you’ve made the right decision.

Indeed.

 

[PRmerger]

I’m sorry that I can’t think for you.

This is a snarky, unwarranted response.

The poster is simply asking for clarification.

You should be able to provide that.

 

[PRmerger]

I’ve really struggled with what you mean by this. If by ‘fundamentalist’ you’re referring to ‘strict adherence to the basic principles of any subject or discipline’ then I don’t think it applies.

Think of some Fundamentalist Christians you’ve encountered.

Now, simply apply their way of approaching the Bible to a general principle of how atheists approach the Bible as well as how they digest anything that attempts to apprehend the Numinous.

 

[PRmerger]

I agree. One doesn’t have to be a Believer to understand a concept of opening one’s heart. In the example of the YouTube song about welcoming refugees, it means to be charitable, sympathetic, loving and caring to one’s fellow human and, by extension perhaps, to other creatures and our world.

See? I knew you had it in ya, Nix!

But, as I’ve stated before on other threads, we’re not talking about opening one’s heart, we’re talking about opening one’s heart to God. What is meant by opening my heart to something that I don’t believe in and strongly suspect does not exist? How, for example, would you open your heart to the god of Sikhism?

And, again, it’s not the “opening one’s heart” that you don’t understand, despite your claims to the contrary. It’s the fact that you reject God.

So you simply need to grant God’s existence, for the purpose of this context, and then you can understand what “opening one’s heart to God” means.

I know you can do it!

 

[PRmerger]

You know nothing about me and so must have invented that out of thin air. Not surprising then that not one word of it is true. There’s no concern for my soul in your words, only that I should outwardly observe your self-made rule.

You reminded me, no doubt unfairly, of something Cardinal Ratzinger said: “It is on the many half-hearted interpretations of the biblical Word that can be found everywhere that a sickly Christianity takes its stand – a Christianity that is no longer true to itself and that consequently cannot radiate encouragement and enthusiasm. It gives, instead, the impression of being an organization that keeps on talking although it has nothing else to say, because twisted words are not convincing and are only concerned to hide their emptiness.”

Ratzinger was talking of something else, but you have given me the impression that you can only talk of some long gone committee, of past glories, of “an organization that keeps on talking although it has nothing else to say”. Your evangelizing might work a lot better if you got off this negative spin, the attempt to trap souls into submission, and instead said something positive about your Church, something to radiate encouragement and enthusiasm about your Church. Have a go, try being upbeat, it might even work.

I noticed you didn’t answer the question, inocente, but attempted to deflect.

Again, the ONLY way you know that Hebrews is theopneustos is because…

wait for it…

wait for it…

you give your tacit submission to the authority of the CC.

You would NOT know it ANY OTHER WAY.

(Unless, of course, you’re one of those folks who, amusingly and bewilderingly and astonishingly, asserts that God just speaks to him and tells him what’s theopneustos. I have encountered this absurd claim more and more these days, curiously.)

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=13629719&postcount=86
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=13283680&postcount=157

 

[Solmyr]

And, again, it’s not the “opening one’s heart” that you don’t understand, despite your claims to the contrary.

Quote from the forum rules / guidelines: **It is never acceptable to question the sincerity of an individual’s beliefs ** So your “despite your claims to the contrary” was out of line.

It’s the fact that you reject God.

Not believing something is not the same as rejecting something. Only a believer can “reject” God (which would be a pretty stupid to do). An atheist can only reject the concept of God. I hope you understand the difference.

So you simply need to grant God’s existence, for the purpose of this context, and then you can understand what “opening one’s heart to God” means.

One can only grant the possibility that God might exist, and is not helpful to “open one’s heart to God”.

 

[PRmerger]

It’s sectarians who try to separate Christ from his church.

Indeed.

One cannot have Christ without the Catholic Church.

Otherwise, one serves a disembodied head.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

This simply a cop-out. I have been advised all sorts of activities, but none of them made any difference. Of course the believers have a ready-made comment on that, too: “God is not a vending machine”. You should really not try to blow both hot and cold from your mouth, it only decreases your credibility.

This kind of rhetoric only decreases your credibility.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

It’s sectarians who try to separate Christ from his church.

Who are you calling a sectarian?

Catholics refer to the Church as the Body of Christ. We consum e the Body of Christ at Mass.

How could Catholics ever want to separate themselves from Christ.

It’s the Protestants who reject the Body of Christ ansd have separated themselves from Christ.

 

[inocente]

I noticed you didn’t answer the question, inocente, but attempted to deflect.

Again, the ONLY way you know that Hebrews is theopneustos is because…

wait for it…

wait for it…

you give your tacit submission to the authority of the CC.

You would NOT know it ANY OTHER WAY.

(Unless, of course, you’re one of those folks who, amusingly and bewilderingly and astonishingly, asserts that God just speaks to him and tells him what’s theopneustos. I have encountered this absurd claim more and more these days, curiously.)

forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=13629719&postcount=86
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=13283680&postcount=157

Those two posters are both Catholic, and both in the Spirit. That’s how they know, that’s how anyone knows - “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” - John 14

It may appear amusing and bewildering to some, but “Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.” - 1 Cor 1

I think it’s not them who has a problem. Might be time to stop interfering and leave others to make their own walk with God.

 

[Nixbits]

PRmerger:

So you simply need to grant God’s existence, for the purpose of this context, and then you can understand what “opening one’s heart to God” means.
I know you can do it!

I thank you for your confidence in me, but I fear it’s misplaced.

I don’t want to keep labouring this point. Really I don’t. I’d rather give up and move on. But let me just see if I understand you correctly. If I grant God’s existence (i.e. accept that God exists), then I can understand what opening my heart (i.e. being charitable, sympathetic, loving and caring) to God means? Is that it? I don’t think that I need to grant God’s existence to reach this understanding of what this phrase means. It’s not that complicated a concept.

If, on the other hand, you’re saying that by doing this it will lead me to believe in God, then I can’t agree. To ask me to just accept God’s existence as the first step to believing in Him is putting the cart before the horse. It requires intellectual dishonesty in order to achieve a goal that I don’t think is worthwhile. I cannot just choose to believe in something. That’s not how belief works. Even if I could, why would I or anyone else want to do this?

As I mentioned before, are you prepared to grant the existence of the God of Sikhism, and open your heart to that god so that you can learn the truth of his existence? Since I suspect that you’re not going to answer this question again, let me suggest that you would not be prepared to do this, in fact you cannot, because you don’t believe that the god of Sikhism is real. That’s how I feel about the Christian God.

I daresay that you will think that I’m just being obtuse, pedantic or fundamentalist. You’re entitled to your view. I don’t seem to be able to dissuade you. The fact is I just don’t get this ‘opening one’s heart’ business as a way to learn the truth of anything. I need to be persuaded by evidence of some sort. And any evidence that can only be gained by starting with the unfounded belief is not any sort of evidence that I can take seriously.