Why Couldn't the Universe Exist Without a Cause?

[inocente]

An excuse for what?

Not thinking.

*"From a philosophical point of view, the inherent problem with a God of the Gaps apologetic is that it relegates God to only a portion of creation — the portion that we don’t understand yet. It places the apologist at a disadvantage by ignoring how the underlying patterns in the things we understand speak to the work of the Creator God. It also denies, in effect, the Christian view of science, which is that science is “thinking God’s thoughts after him”; it does this by suggesting that we can only see God in the areas of nature which we do not understand, rather than seeing him most clearly in those which we do understand.

From a pragmatic point of view, the main problem with a God of the Gaps apologetic is that the gaps are getting smaller with every passing year. No one felt this more keenly than Isaac Newton, a religious man (in the end a Deist) who closed more gaps than any other scientist. As recorded in the General Scholium, Newton struggled to find a gap big enough for God. He eventually settled on gravity’s action at a distance, unwilling to believe that a simple force could act across vast empty spaces and penetrate to matter in the center of the planets. That gap, of course, has long since disappeared from classical and relativistic physics." - theopedia.com/god-of-the-gaps*

 

[inocente]

441.6nm, a gorgeous deep blue

And as I said above, not just physics but metaphysics breaks down in a naked singularity, should such an indecent entity actually exist - so nope, I can’t.

I went searching for that color and found a wavelength to RGB converter here - academo.org/demos/wavelength-to-colour-relationship/

But we need to test it. Overwrite the wavelength in the box on the right then press the enter button - is that your He-Cd color? If so then agreed, gorgeous.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Good grief, Charles. It was only a day or a so ago that you were supporting the notion of everything having the appearance of being intelligently designed. That is the basis of Natural Theology: ‘Look, it can only have been God’.

For Natural Theology read The God of the Gaps. For every case where it has been claimed that God did something specific because we didn’t know better at the time, the argument now runs that, well…ok, we know how it was done, but God caused it to happen that way (ie what we call naturally as opposed to some miraculous supernatural method).

One does begin to wonder that the Creationists and others do have a point. Why on earth didn’t God make everything just as it is? The more you learn about the natural world, the more you learn about how vastly complex it is. Why did something as simple as God not make everything simple.

It all seems so…convoluted.

Sometimes YOU seem convoluted!

You disagree with Einstein. You would have said “Good grief!” to Einstein, who offered God as the basis for the intelligent design of the entire universe, never mind the forbidden topic of this forum … which you are getting dangerously close to introducing.

 

[inocente]

I have no idea of what you are asking here, Inocente. I am sorry.

This is what I think: If based on some experiences I define certain physical variables and observe their behavior, perhaps I could be able to develop a mathematical model of it. Let’s suppose I do. Let’s suppose then that once ready I use my model to make predictions and also to formulate hypothesis about the past (of course, limited to the phenomena I am dealing with). Let’s suppose that the power of my model to make predictions is acceptably good (not perfect, but for the moment satisfactory to me and to the scientists). This ability to make predictions makes me think that it’s ability to reveal the past is equally good. However, I observe that when I go far into the past with my model, the behavior of the variables looks anomalous. I could think that the scope of my model is limited to a certain range; but I could think also that the behavior of the variables which I defined is anomalous in itself and well represented by my model. Let’s suppose I prefer to think in this last fashion. Then I think, “my model works”, that is to say, “my model represents what was happening at those distant times, and it is true that the variables had an anomalous behavior”; therefore, based on my model I could say something about those distant times. And what I would expect about whatever I said of the past is that it was a logical discourse. If it was not, I would definitely think: “Now I see that my model really does not work; it gives me inconsistent results”.

OK, let’s look at it in terms of the mathematical model (presumably containing GR and the standard big bang cosmological model). As I understand it, whatever you ask of the model, you get reasonable results for every past time t except t=0, when you get infinities.

Assuming this is the case, your original question was whether the principle of non-contradiction could be employed. I doubt it, and to rephrase my question in terms of the model - do you think the model can tell you something which cannot be both true and false about causality at t=0?

*The principle of causality! You request a logical necessity for it to be applied at those moments which a mathematical model represent as a singularity. I don’t see how the principle of causality could be derived from any set of axioms. Your request really doesn’t make sense to me. However, let’s suppose that because we cannot deduce the principle of causality from any set of axioms we are forced to think that it is just an empirical statement. It doesn’t have ontological value nor universal applicability. Today our defined variables exhibit certain behavior, but tomorrow we don’t know. And we cannot make hypothesis about the past either. Today I perform an experiment under controlled conditions (all is merely accidental, because without causality we cannot control anything) and obtain certain results. It will not be necessary that another experimenter obtains similar results if he performs the experiment in his laboratory, according to my descriptions. He could very well obtain something quite different. Analogously, any cosmological model would have absolutely no value.

But, was David Hume right? Is our principle of causality just an empirical statement?*

Don’t know where you’re going with that. Look at it another way using Hume’s fork.

The question is whether it could be proven that physical causality is logically necessary in all possible worlds. It so then it would have been deduced a priori, without any reference to our world.

But unless you can do some fancy footwork, that seems not to be the case. What we can say is that when certain physical conditions occur we always observe a particular phenomenon (which is how a physical law is defined), and we generalize this by talking of causality or of cause and effect. We know this by logical inference, not by deduction, and so we cannot call it a proof. It relies on our observations, and we can never know that tomorrow some new observation will expose a limitation with Einstein’s gravity, just as it did with Newton’s. But Newton’s theory still works within its limits, and Einstein’s will still work within whatever limitations may be exposed in future.

 

[thinkandmull]

Why the constant accusations by some religious people that scientists do science to justify agnosticism or atheism? I can assure you, that the primary reason people do experiments in Quantum Physics is because they like most scoientists, are fascinated by learning more, in this case about the bizarre counter-intuitive world of quantum phenomena that seems to underpin reality. It’s not all about God. Oh, and hidden variable hypotheses are always considered. And not all scientists are agnostic or atheist.

The 2003 study by A. J. Leggett “Nonlocal Hidden-Variable Theories and Quantum Mechanics: an incompatibility theorem” was “debunked” by Anton Zeilinger by his study “An experimental test of non-local realism” in 2007. Zeilinger says there can not be hidden variables in quantum theory. This would rule out God even. If there are no hidden variables behind physics and the amazingly improbable things that have happened in this universe, then the “natural theology” arguments you spoke of would be in jeopardy. I don’t see how it’s even possible ever to rule out a hidden variable, but I need to learn more about the methodology, so maybe you can help us at least know what the argument is. I do know the argument from physics that the future can influence the past

 

[fisherman_carl]

According to Aquinas’ five ways, anything nothing can be put in motion or exist without a cause. As he demonstrates, therefore, there must be something outside our universe that caused it.That is true of our own universe. What we are speaking of though, are things apart from our own universe.There must be something, yes, that led to the universe in some way, but not necessarily by causing it. It seems inconceivable to us because we are used to a universe where everything is caused.

But we don’t know what something outside of or before our universe was like. Whatever our universe came out of, the laws of thermodynamics may or may not have applied to it. Science has no claims about such a time and place. Such an existence might function entirely differently from the universe we know. Therefore, perhaps in such an existence, things could exist without being caused.

That is, before the Big Bang, there may have been a different set of rules from those we know. 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?

I think that we have to look at the concept of a necessarily existing being. The question we need to ask is why does anything exist at all? There has to be something that exists that is metaphysically necessary. Or that exists as a necessarily existing being. And in this being it would be the only being whose nature is existence itself. Everything that is contingent on something else for its existence has existence, but its very nature is not existence, but has received existence. Whereas a necessarily existing being exists by its own nature. Nothing else brought it into existence. But if this necessarily existing being did not exist then nothing else could exist. Since it is metaphysically impossible for something to come from nothing or non being. Therefore, a necessarily existing being must exist.

Now, could the universe be this necessarily existing being? Is the universe’s nature existence itself? It’s hard to see how the universe could be a necessarily existing. We could for example, ,imagine a different universe with different laws of physics and arrangements of matter. In fact you would be hard pressed to even find atheists who think the universe is necessary existing.

Note, this is true whether the universe had a begginning or not. Just because something has been around forever does not mean it is a necessarily existing being. For instance you can imagine an apple sitting on a desk. The apple does not cause itself to suspend itself in the air. The desk holds it up. This would be true even if the apple was sitting on the desk from all eternity. Thus, even if the universe always existed that doesn’t mean it is a metaphysically necessary being. It may be in existence because of something else.

Now, if the universe has a beginning then it becomes even more clear that the universe is not a necessarily existing being because anything that begins to exist must have a cause outside itself. For as we already said it is impossible for something to bring itself into existence. For it would already have to exist to do so. Aso, if the universe came from nothing then why should we expect only universes to come from nothing? Why not pizza pie or Einstein? Why would nothing be so discriminatory that only universes should pop out of it? Since nothing defined as non being is not discriminatory since it has no properties.

 

[thinkandmull]

Kant had a well-known “kind distinction” between the understanding and sensibility, our knowledge requiring the cooperation of both faculties together. But in reality, Kant let the analytical side have to much rein, and crashed

 

[Charlemagne_III]

I think that we have to look at the concept of a necessarily existing being. The question we need to ask is why does anything exist at all? There has to be something that exists that is metaphysically necessary. Or that exists as a necessarily existing being. And in this being it would be the only being whose nature is existence itself. Everything that is contingent on something else for its existence has existence, but its very nature is not existence, but has received existence. Whereas a necessarily existing being exists by its own nature. Nothing else brought it into existence. But if this necessarily existing being did not exist then nothing else could exist. Since it is metaphysically impossible for something to come from nothing or non being. Therefore, a necessarily existing being must exist.

It’s good to hear that you are familiar with St. Thomas’ third proof. It is one of my favorite.

Even those who advocate the multiverse have to come back to Aquinas. Why is the multiverse not also subject to the requirement of a necessary being that sustains and governs it?

 

[hecd2]

But, was David Hume right? Is our principle of causality just an empirical statement?

It seems to me that the principle of causality and the principle of non-contradiction and the other axioms of metaphysics, while being axioms on which rational discourse is based, yet have their roots in sense experience. We, individually and collectively, observe that these things are true in our world, to the extent that they become self-evident and can form the foundation for all reasoning. But is it necessarily so?

And these axioms take their dents - causality from quantum theory, non-contraddiction from old ideas like the liar’s paradox. They possibly, even probably survive these, with a bit of wriggling, and we desperately cleave to them because saving reason is so very important.

We can describe a world (if we are talented in that way) in which these principles are modified or absent. Back to the Future. It isn’t this world as far as we can see, and yes, paradoxes and absurdities arise. But we have paradoxes and absurdities enough in this world.

So while I’m content to work with the generally agreed axioms in this world, I’m not sure they necessarily apply where the conditions on which they depend break down. Our intuition and what appears to us to be obvious consequences of certain observations break down regularly on closer inspection: Copernicanism, Euclidean space, quantum behaviour all violate a prior common sense and agreed self-evident truth. What warrant do we have for saying that these metaphysical principles ike non-contradiction and causality are the same in all possible worlds?

 

[hecd2]

With respect to the existence of the Big Bang, how does scientific knowledge undermine natural theology? Can you give me an example?

You referred to Darwin and Dawkins and I responded to that.

But there was a time when Catholic theology had hitched its wagon to Aristotlian cosmology and the perfection of the heavens. And then along came Copernicus and Kepler and Galileo with his pesky telescope, and then Newton and Halley and Hubble and LeMaitre and Einstein and Hawking, and then the story of the seven days of Creation and the tiny Universe that God had created with the Earth and us at its centre, well, somehow it didn’t quite seem so compelling anymore. People look at the unimaginable vastness of the observable universe and the huge time to its beginning and they think with Feynman: “the stage is too big for the drama.” We might not agree with them, but that is a reasonable and understandable conclusion.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

You referred to Darwin and Dawkins and I responded to that.

But there was a time when Catholic theology had hitched its wagon to Aristotlian cosmology and the perfection of the heavens. And then along came Copernicus and Kepler and Galileo with his pesky telescope, and then Newton and Halley and Hubble and LeMaitre and Einstein and Hawking, and then the story of the seven days of Creation and the tiny Universe that God had created with the Earth and us at its centre, well, somehow it didn’t quite seem so compelling anymore. People look at the unimaginable vastness of the observable universe and the huge time to its beginning and they think with Feynman: “the stage is too big for the drama.” We might not agree with them, but that is a reasonable and understandable conclusion.

I partly sympathize with your conclusion. The stage is so vast, however, that it seems to require a playwright and director for the drama. Such vastness with nothing or no one behind it results in theatre of the absurd, which I never did like even when I was an atheist.

“True science discovers God in an ever-increasing degree — as though God were waiting behind every door opened by science.” Pope Pius XII

 

[hecd2]

I went searching for that color and found a wavelength to RGB converter here - academo.org/demos/wavelength-to-colour-relationship/

But we need to test it. Overwrite the wavelength in the box on the right then press the enter button - is that your He-Cd color? If so then agreed, gorgeous.

Well yes, that’s the colour as far as a display can manage with its RGB colour filters each passing a spread of wavelengths. But it’s a poor simulacrum of the real thing - a single wavelength (ok - there might be a smattering of mode-hopping). Expand the beam and it’s one intense pure colour, enriched by speckle. A He-Cd lasing at 441.6nm is a wonderful thing and congrats - you’re the first person in getting on for 20 years of me posting with that username to spot the connection.

 

[hecd2]

The 2003 study by A. J. Leggett “Nonlocal Hidden-Variable Theories and Quantum Mechanics: an incompatibility theorem” was “debunked” by Anton Zeilinger by his study “An experimental test of non-local realism” in 2007. Zeilinger says there can not be hidden variables in quantum theory. This would rule out God even. If there are no hidden variables behind physics and the amazingly improbable things that have happened in this universe, then the “natural theology” arguments you spoke of would be in jeopardy. I don’t see how it’s even possible ever to rule out a hidden variable, but I need to learn more about the methodology, so maybe you can help us at least know what the argument is. I do know the argument from physics that the future can influence the past

Is there such an argument? If so, I really don’t know what you are referring to so perhaps you can be more specific?

And with regard to the violation of Legett’s inequality, aren’t you galloping before you can crawl? The Bell inequality is not to be understood in a minute and the Aspect and other Bell experiments are really very tricky and subtle. You need to be a competent optical physicist and understand quantum theory to follow the arguments. Legett’s inequality and the Zeilinger tests just take it to another level of difficulty and it’s really a specialist subject. I’m not sure how you (or I or anyone who is not a specialist in quantum theory) can say anything confidently (and correctly) about Legett’s proposal.

OK, I understand that Zeilinger’s experiments apparently rule out non-local (as well as local) hidden variables, and I can vaguely see how they do that, but Bell’s experiments are not without loopholes, and so I suspect Zeilinger’s also have loopholes (but I am not competent to identify them). But your suggestion that no hiddden variables rules out God is unwarranted - I don’t think hidden variable theories mean what you think they mean.

 

[hecd2]

Now, could the universe be this necessarily existing being? Is the universe’s nature existence itself? It’s hard to see how the universe could be a necessarily existing. We could for example, ,imagine a different universe with different laws of physics and arrangements of matter. In fact you would be hard pressed to even find atheists who think the universe is necessary existing.

How about a Universe (of which our world, our universe, is a miniscule part) that encompasses every imaginable and unimaginable set of laws of physics and arrangements of matter in different times and different places? How about the idea that the existence of such a Universe is simply a brute fact and we start from there?

Also, I seem to remember a philosphical paper which purported to prove that something rather than nothing must exist - that the Universe necessarily exists. I can’t remember who wrote it but I’ll see if I can find it.

 

[hecd2]

I partly sympathize with your conclusion. The stage is so vast, however, that it seems to require a playwright and director for the drama. Such vastness with nothing or no one behind it results in theatre of the absurd, which I never did like even when I was an atheist.

I’m sure that’s what you think, and that too is reasonable and understandable, but more people find the size, and our place in it, leads away from a Natural Theology than towards it.

 

[fisherman_carl]

How about a Universe (of which our world, our universe, is a miniscule part) that encompasses every imaginable and unimaginable set of laws of physics and arrangements of matter in different times and different places?

Then we would ask Why does such a Universe with every imaginable set of laws exist?

How about the idea that the existence of such a Universe is simply a brute fact and we start from there?

That doesn’t really answer the question. And, it assumes atheism is true.

Also, I seem to remember a philosphical paper which purported to prove that something rather than nothing must exist - that the Universe necessarily exists. I can’t remember who wrote it but I’ll see if I can find it.

That would be interesting to read. I am sure all philosophers would be very interested in such a paper that could prove the universe necessarily exists. SInce no one has done it yet.

 

[thinkandmull]

Euclidean space violating prior common sense and agreed self-evident truth? The universe necessarily exists? These are strange notions. “The atheist experience show” asked why a toaster outside of time couldn’t have created the world. Science is getting so far out from our natural undestandings that it’s like “what can be known at all and when?” People seem to like feeling that they are strange beings. Also, Bell’s inequality has been explained to me as if when you compare, on the quantum level A with B, you get a 10% difference, when you compare B with C, you also get a 10% difference. But when you compare A with C, you get a 30% difference instead of 20, thus the result is “unreal” as is often said. How this relates to proving that Einstein was wrong in saying there must be a hidden variable, acting on two particles which cause them to act in accord, I do not know. But I do know that if every single solitary variable can be ruled out, then even a cause that is personal is ruled out. And I don’t see how a study, however subtle, can prove this. Who is to say smaller particles of the particles aren’t hidden variables? You see what I am trying to say?

 

[hecd2]

Euclidean space violating prior common sense and agreed self-evident truth? The universe necessarily exists? These are strange notions. “The atheist experience show” asked why a toaster outside of time couldn’t have created the world. Science is getting so far out from our natural undestandings that it’s like “what can be known at all and when?” People seem to like feeling that they are strange beings. Also, Bell’s inequality has been explained to me as if when you compare, on the quantum level A with B, you get a 10% difference, when you compare B with C, you also get a 10% difference. But when you compare A with C, you get a 30% difference instead of 20, thus the result is “unreal” as is often said. How this relates to proving that Einstein was wrong in saying there must be a hidden variable, acting on two particles which cause them to act in accord, I do not know. But I do know that if every single solitary variable can be ruled out, then even a cause that is personal is ruled out. And I don’t see how a study, however subtle, can prove this. Who is to say smaller particles of the particles aren’t hidden variables? You see what I am trying to say?

No.

 

[hecd2]

Then we would ask Why does such a Universe with every imaginable set of laws exist?

Because it’s the necessarily existing entity? Because it’s a brute fact?

That doesn’t really answer the question. And, it assumes atheism is true.

I don’t know what the question is in this instance. And even if I did, not all questions have answers, and not all questions that have answers have answers accessible to us.

And isn’t atheism the null hypothesis? Don’t you have to prove a) that the Universe needs a cause and b) that cause is God, in order to prove theism?

That would be interesting to read. I am sure all philosophers would be very interested in such a paper that could prove the universe necessarily exists. SInce no one has done it yet.

Sheesh - and you haven’t even read the paper. I think it’s called prejudice.

 

[fisherman_carl]

Because it’s the necessarily existing entity?

What about the Universe makes it a necessarily existing entity?

I don’t know what the question is in this instance. And even if I did, not all questions have answers, and not all questions that have answers have answers accessible to us.

The question is why does anything at all exist? To assume that the universe or the multi-verse is a ‘brute fact’ does not answer the question.

And isn’t atheism the null hypothesis? Don’t you have to prove a) that the Universe needs a cause and b) that cause is God, in order to prove theism?
Sheesh - and you haven’t even read the paper. I think it’s called prejudice.

No. I’ve already shown that there needs to be a necessarily existing being. It seems that you have already agreed with me about that by your answers. Do I have to prove that the universe itself needs a cause? It would make more sense that you would have to prove that it doesn’t need a cause. Because if there was a default position it would be that things have causes. To say that everything in the universe has a cause but then to say without any justification or precedence that the universe itself doesn’t have a cause is to commit the ‘taxi cab’ fallacy, where you have arrived at your destination so you can just dismiss the taxi cab. You don’t need to ask where the taxi cab came from. You might assume it just popped into existence so it could take you to your destination.