Common theist argument: "You know, I used to be an atheist myself..."

[bilby]

Bilby says the existence of past-eternal things is metaphysically possible.
So do creationists

Bilby says you don't need to account for the origin of past-eternal things.
So do creationists

See? Everyone can do simple logic.

No shit, Sherlock.

That someone agrees with you on the factuality of some premises merely implies that you are able to consider having a discussion. It doesn't imply agreement about conclusions.

Lion believes that multiplying entities for no reason other than to conform with preconceptions and bias is acceptable in logical discourse. His epistemology is broken, because he has foolishly subordinated it to his personal preferences, leading him to completely unsupported conclusions.

Lion doesn't even have the testicular fortitude to engage in honest debate on the question at hand, preferring instead to reiterate the parts of the conversation that are not at issue, with the rather slimy objective of pretending that this forces his correspondents to concur with his intellectually weak conclusions.

I wonder whether Lion thinks he is fooling anyone.

 

[Copernicus]

READ MOAR carefully...

A. Creationists believe that things which come into existence have a cause.
B. Creationists believe that God did not come into existence.

Do you see any contradiction here Learner?
Nope. Me either.

It's kinda implied by the word creationist.

I think that Bilby and others have done an excellent job of holding your feet to the fire on the contradiction inherent in the creationist argument, but I want to point out a problem with your claim of implication here. There is nothing inherent in the meaning of "creation" to suggest that an act of creation has no prior cause (i.e. necessary antecedent event). The word "create" just means "cause to come into existence". That's what artists and builders do. However, human creators are not uncaused beings. So, the fact that creationists believe that God did not come into existence in no way frees them of the contradiction inherent in that belief.

Causation always refers to a relationship between two events--a causing event and a resulting event. To claim that there can be an "uncaused cause" is to contradict the very meaning of "cause". To claim that the "universe" (i.e. everything that exists) always existed does not entail the same contradiction, because it does not entail that the universe actually causes any event. It is itself the sum total of all events.

 

[abaddon]

To claim that the "universe" (i.e. everything that exists) always existed does not entail the same contradiction, because it does not entail that the universe actually causes any event. It is itself the sum total of all events.

There's another distinction too that might clarify the talk about "the universe".

"The universe" can't mean "everything that exists" anymore now that it's possible there are many universes. The universe really might not be everything that exists.

Matt Dillahunty, for one, talks about everything that exists as "the cosmos". He makes it clear that term is distinct from "this local universe" which apparently does have a beginning.

The cosmos might be cycling universes, a multiverse or nothing but this universe -- no one knows. The point isn't to claim something more than "this universe" exists, since that isn't known. The point is emphasizing for theists that humans DO NOT KNOW "the universe" (the local universe we're in) is the sum total of all existence.

It'd help, I think, if everyone picked up this distinction. Theists say "the universe" to mean "everything that exists (aside from God)", and atheists say it to mean the same (except with no God attached as a lame non-explanation)... So one term to mean 2 things can confuse the discussion. Two words can clarify it.

 

[bilby]

To claim that the "universe" (i.e. everything that exists) always existed does not entail the same contradiction, because it does not entail that the universe actually causes any event. It is itself the sum total of all events.

There's another distinction too that might clarify the talk about "the universe".

"The universe" can't mean "everything that exists" anymore now that it's possible there are many universes. The universe really might not be everything that exists.

Matt Dillahunty, for one, talks about everything that exists as "the cosmos". He makes it clear that term is distinct from "this local universe" which apparently does have a beginning.

The cosmos might be cycling universes, a multiverse or nothing but this universe -- no one knows. The point isn't to claim something more than "this universe" exists, since that isn't known. The point is emphasizing for theists that humans DO NOT KNOW "the universe" (the local universe we're in) is the sum total of all existence.

It'd help, I think, if everyone picked up this distinction. Theists say "the universe" to mean "everything that exists (aside from God)", and atheists say it to mean the same (except with no God attached as a lame non-explanation)... So one term to mean 2 things can confuse the discussion. Two words can clarify it.

I disagree. If you state upfront exactly what you mean, there's no legitimate confusion. If you don't, there's no way to avoid confusion by using alternative words.

When I say 'the universe', I mean (as I have already said more than once) 'everything that exists'. If the MWI is true, then those other 'worlds' are part of my definition. If there are any gods, then those would also be part of my definition.

If you want to use the word 'universe' to mean something else, then that's your choice, and as long as you give a clear definition of what YOU mean by it upfront, there's no problem. But it's probably a good idea not to have the same word mean multiple things in a single conversation, as far as it is practical to do so - so if you are not the first person in a conversation to define a word, the smart choice is to pick a different word or phrase (eg 'local universe' or 'observable universe) to avoid confusion.

You may note that I tend to spell it out as 'everything that exists' anyway, when discussing with people who are known abusers of the equivocation fallacy.

 

[Wiploc]

To claim that the "universe" (i.e. everything that exists) always existed does not entail the same contradiction, because it does not entail that the universe actually causes any event. It is itself the sum total of all events.

There's another distinction too that might clarify the talk about "the universe".

"The universe" can't mean "everything that exists" anymore now that it's possible there are many universes. The universe really might not be everything that exists.

I'm with Plantinga on this one. If more than one "universe" exists, then we still need a word for the whole ball of wax, for everything that exists, and that word is universe.

If people want to use the same word to describe parts of the whole, it's up to them to make that clear in context. It'd help, I think, if everyone picked up on this.

I have been reduced, in some conversations, to speaking of partaverses and the allaverse.

Matt Dillahunty, for one, talks about everything that exists as "the cosmos".

What's he going to do when Christians insist that god is "outside the cosmos"? Fall back to a new position?

I choose to hold the line at universe.

He makes it clear that term is distinct from "this local universe" which apparently does have a beginning.

That's not apparent to me. I had an online Christian insist that this was now established, that this is the scientific consensus. So I went on campus, found me a cosmologist, and put the question to him.

He said, "Nobody knows what happened before the big bang. Nobody knows what happened before the big bang. Nobody knows what happened before the big bang."

I conclude that there is no scientific consensus that the big bang was the ultimate beginning.

The cosmos might be cycling universes, a multiverse or nothing but this universe -- no one knows. The point isn't to claim something more than "this universe" exists, since that isn't known. The point is emphasizing for theists that humans DO NOT KNOW "the universe" (the local universe we're in) is the sum total of all existence.

It would be nice, then, if we had a word like "universe" that refers to the totality of existence.

It'd help, I think, if everyone picked up this distinction. Theists say "the universe" to mean "everything that exists (aside from God)", and atheists say it to mean the same (except with no God attached as a lame non-explanation)... So one term to mean 2 things can confuse the discussion. Two words can clarify it.

You're asking logical people to retrench in the attempt to lend clarity to illogical people. That's never going to work. Most of their arguments are based on equivocation. Clarity would only hurt their attempts to miscommunicate. They must reject any such attempts.

 

[Copernicus]

FTR, I want to endorse what bilby said about my use of the expression "everything that exists" as a definition for "universe". If you ask whether or not the multiverse exists, then you are implying that existence refers to a framework that transcends the local post-BB universe. So, we might claim that our pocket universe circumscribes real time, but the multiverse exists in a temporal frame of reference that physicists have called  imaginary time.

 

[Lion IRC]

We had a definition of universe. And an approximation how old it was.
And a word for the point in historical time prior to which science conceded that "the laws of physics" did not apply, and therefore supra-universal theories were empirically unknowable - unverifiable - unfalsifiable.

But atheistic cosmology hated the First Cause implications of a Big Bang Genesis, and it hated the fine tuning implications of there being just One anthropic universe. So atheism-of-the-gaps physicists have been fantasizing about multiverses and perpetual motion universes ever since CMB was detected.

...what's next? Hidden universes inside an old wardrobe behind all the fur coats?

 

[bilby]

We had a definition of universe. And an approximation how old it was.
And a word for the point in historical time prior to which science conceded that "the laws of physics" did not apply, and therefore supra-universal theories were empirically unknowable - unverifiable - unfalsifiable.

But atheistic cosmology hated the First Cause implications of a Big Bang Genesis, and it hated the fine tuning implications of there being just One anthropic universe. So atheism-of-the-gaps physicists have been fantasizing about multiverses and perpetual motion universes ever since CMB was detected.

...what's next? Hidden universes inside an old wardrobe behind all the fur coats?

You do know that changing scientific opinions are the result of new data, and not in any way related to what anyone 'hates', don't you?

Of course you don't. You think truth is influenced by your opinions; And you cannot imagine that anyone else might exhibit the intellectual rigour and honesty that you eschew.

There are many definitions of 'universe' - just as the word 'set' can mean a collection of objects, or a place where a badger lives, or the act of solidification, 'universe' means whatever the person using the word defines it to mean. I have at no time left any doubt what I mean by it in the context of this thread; So whether 'we' (whoever 'we' may be) 'had' (or still have) a different definition is completely irrelevant.

You really should try thinking sometime. It's not easy, but it's very rewarding. It does require that you let go of your hatred for (or love of) opinions not supported by the evidence though. I think you will continue to resile from that.

Congratulations for your successful steering of the conversation away from the uncomfortable thinking you are desperate to aviod though. I didn't expect anything less, but you did it with some well practiced skill.

But to get back on track; Do you have a non-evasive response to the simple logic I presented earlier? Your avoidance of it suggests to me that you really don't want to think it through - or that you don't like the implications you find when you do:

This is really simple.

If anything can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' is needless - the answer can simply be 'there always was something'. Adding a God does nothing in this case, it's just an extra entity for which there's neither evidence nor need.

If, on the other hand, nothing can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' can only be answered with 'something began to exist spontaneously'. Again, adding a God achieves nothing other than to add unnecessary and unevidenced complexity.

Lion wants to have his cake and eat it too, by claiming that when we are talking about that 'something' being the material universe, it cannot be eternal; But when 'something' is his preferred God, suddenly that something can be and is eternal. That's practically the textbook definition of special pleading; It's a fallacy, and to persist with it is intellectually dishonest.

There's no consistent explanation for the existence of something rather than nothing, wherein a God adds explanatory power, rather than simply raising a whole new set of questions that are even more intractable than the one we started with.

It's a difficult question; And I don't know the answer to it (and nor does Lion, or anyone else). But one thing is obvious - trying to make the question less difficult by adding a God or Gods is as effective as trying to fix a leaky bucket by drilling more holes in it.

Explaining the observed universe is hard. Explaining the observed universe plus an unobserved God can only be harder.

 

[Learner]

This is really simple.

If anything can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' is needless - the answer can simply be 'there always was something'. Adding a God does nothing in this case, it's just an extra entity for which there's neither evidence nor need.

I think at last we can make the distinctions between the eternal universe i.e. "All things inclusive" (I know this is what you mean) and the "local" universe as Abbadon points both out. (local I'll be using from now on to distinguish between the two).

If, on the other hand, nothing can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' can only be answered with 'something began to exist spontaneously'. Again, adding a God achieves nothing other than to add unnecessary and unevidenced complexity.

I think the concept of the theistic POV is better clarified as: God is outside of the "local" universe which had a beginning and may therefore, not be eternal.

(obviously with clarification, all of us can discuss both contexts of "universe" with less confusion)

 

[Copernicus]

We had a definition of universe. And an approximation how old it was.
And a word for the point in historical time prior to which science conceded that "the laws of physics" did not apply, and therefore supra-universal theories were empirically unknowable - unverifiable - unfalsifiable.

I think that we all understand the difference between the observable universe and the various scientific models that scientific cosmologists have proposed. Your smug theism is essentially just another cosmological model--a claim about how the observable universe came about. It isn't a scientific model, because it posits a spiritual or supernatural plane of reality that somehow impinges on and influences causal events in physical reality. The question we are discussing here is what that assumption buys you. You go too far when you start using words like "unknowable", "unverifiable", and "unfalsifiable". In fact, scientific theories are always just models that are more or less good at explaining what we observe, not on what we could not, in principle, observe. It is quite likely that current theories about the origin of the observable universe--the Big Bang model--will be replaced by a different one that is a better fit for the evidence, and those models might well be based on evidence of events prior to the Big Bang. That's why scientists study Cosmic Background Radiation (CMB).

But atheistic cosmology hated the First Cause implications of a Big Bang Genesis, and it hated the fine tuning implications of there being just One anthropic universe. So atheism-of-the-gaps physicists have been fantasizing about multiverses and perpetual motion universes ever since CMB was detected.

What a bizarre thing to say. Science is inherently godless, because it assumes that all events have natural explanations. So far, that assumption has led to greater progress in understanding how observable reality works than the assumption that miracles--supernaturally caused events--happen. The success of natural science has driven theists to retreat from earlier positions on how the universe worked, but scientific models never provide us with perfect explanations. Hence, we get theistic explanations that seem to constantly try to fill in the gaps in scientific theories with alternative supernaturalist explanations. Big Bang Genesis is one of those "God of Gaps" explanations, but the alternative naturalist explanations--Everett's  Many-Worlds Interpretation (MWI), for example--don't require us to posit a spiritual plane of existence to explain what might have caused it. So Occam's Razor is relevant here. What is the justification for assuming a "spiritual" layer of reality that is entirely separate from physical reality? If something had to always exist, why couldn't that something just be physical reality? It is unnecessary to assume the existence of anything like a creator deity. That speculation explains nothing at all about why the universe exists. It just moves the goal posts.

 

[atrib]

Exactly .. no more , no less than any other variation of cause and uncause. Why is yours, the real mccoy?

*Edit:

But your special pleading metaphysics expects us to simply accept on blind faith that a) the universe has always existed and b) that its 'laws' and deterministic nature lack any ontological contingency whatsoever.

You're making that up. You have nothing but hope that we will believe your claim and give you a hall pass.

Aren't you even a little embarrassed to be doing exactly what you accuse creationists of doing?

Lion says it better.

Lion is full of shit. His argument presents God as a perpetual motion machine, and we know perpetual motion machines do not exist. Here is why:

In order for God to do things, think, create universes, rain down plagues and death, God has to be subject to time. This is because the dimension of time is required to define change. Not an electron can move in God's brain without the passage of time.

If God is subject to time, it is also subject to the arrow of time, or what we call entropy. Entropy leads all systems from a state of order to disorder. If God is eternal (has existed for an infinite amount of time), as Lion postulates, entropy would have reduced God to a sea of undifferentiated photons, or in plain English, to nothing. Eternity turns you god into nothing; no energy gradients, no ability to do work.

God's eternal existence as an argument is self defeating.

To add to this debate, cause and effect is an emergent phenomenon in the universe that is perceived by humans, the images and sensations created by our nervous systems. The real nature of the universe is very different, and is defined by quantum field theory. At the quantum level there is no cause and effect, and the laws of physics are not directional in time. To use cause and effect to debate the properties and expansion of the early universe is absurd.

 

[atrib]

I explicitly define God as the Creator of your 'universe'.

By making the claim that God is not part of the set of everything that exists, you are telling us that God does not exist.

Logic. So easy, yet so hard for some people.

 

[atrib]

Wiploc - Are you postulating that...

Ahh.

So I was correct in my assessment:

Perhaps you are ignoring my earlier posts, and responding only to wiploc, who you see as providing a distraction so that you can get away with not addressing my simple logic?

He is trolling you. He has nothing meaningful to add to the discussion and he knows it, so he throws out random shit and ignores the points you make so he can keep stirring the pot.

 

[bilby]

This is really simple.

If anything can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' is needless - the answer can simply be 'there always was something'. Adding a God does nothing in this case, it's just an extra entity for which there's neither evidence nor need.

I think at last we can make the distinctions between the eternal universe i.e. "All things inclusive" (I know this is what you mean) and the "local" universe as Abbadon points both out. (local I'll be using from now on to distinguish between the two).

If, on the other hand, nothing can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' can only be answered with 'something began to exist spontaneously'. Again, adding a God achieves nothing other than to add unnecessary and unevidenced complexity.

I think the concept of the theistic POV is better clarified as: God is outside of the "local" universe which had a beginning and may therefore, not be eternal.

(obviously with clarification, all of us can discuss both contexts of "universe" with less confusion)

Perhaps. But that doesn't make one iota of difference to our consideration of everything that exists. It remains true that to explain everything that we can observe is made no easier (and indeed must be made at least a little harder) by adding anything we cannot observe (eg a God) to the question. You can't fix the leaks in a bucket by drilling extra holes.

Discussion of what you define here as the 'local universe' gives us no insights of any kind into the problem of how everything that exists came to be - indeed, you can't even demonstrate that the two are not synonymous, although I am prepared to consider the possibility, ad argumentum.

 

[atrib]

This is really simple.

If anything can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' is needless - the answer can simply be 'there always was something'. Adding a God does nothing in this case, it's just an extra entity for which there's neither evidence nor need.

I think at last we can make the distinctions between the eternal universe i.e. "All things inclusive" (I know this is what you mean) and the "local" universe as Abbadon points both out. (local I'll be using from now on to distinguish between the two).

If, on the other hand, nothing can be eternal, then the question 'why is there something rather than nothing?' can only be answered with 'something began to exist spontaneously'. Again, adding a God achieves nothing other than to add unnecessary and unevidenced complexity.

I think the concept of the theistic POV is better clarified as: God is outside of the "local" universe which had a beginning and may therefore, not be eternal.

(obviously with clarification, all of us can discuss both contexts of "universe" with less confusion)

Good post, but the problem still stands!

Let us assume that the visible universe is not all that exists. Cosmological inflationary models point to such a possibility. There is some form of a spacetime continuum or energy field beyond the reach of our instruments, and interactions in this domain triggered the inflationary expansion that gave rise to our visible universe. And there may be a whole collection of universes that have been, and are being spawned by similar interactions, and these universes exist within their own bubbles, distinct from our own visible universe. Some of the brightest minds working on the problem consider such a possibility to be realistic.

But if such is the case, why is God necessary? If there is something outside our visible universe, why could our visible universe not have been triggered by events that occurred within this domain? Why does this event need to have an intelligent, self-aware entity to initiate it? Adding God to the equation does nothing to help us find the answer, it simply adds another layer of complexity to the problem.


So lets get back to the point I was trying to make:

Some creationists believe:
1. It is impossible for simple, single-celled self replicating molecules to form from natural processes.
2. Our visible universe was created by a complex, intelligent entity that just happens to exist.

Why are you so unwilling to acknowledge the contradiction inherent to believing 1 and 2 simultaneously?

 

[Rhea]

It seems weird to have these religionists claim that the “universe” did a thing they call “began.” Are y’all saying that prior to the big bang nothing existed?

I thought it was well known that there was a something prior to the local visible products of the big bang. Some call it a singularity, but at anyrate everyone agrees it wasn’t nothing.

 

[Copernicus]

It seems weird to have these religionists claim that the “universe” did a thing they call “began.” Are y’all saying that prior to the big bang nothing existed?

I thought it was well known that there was a something prior to the local visible products of the big bang. Some call it a singularity, but at anyrate everyone agrees it wasn’t nothing.

My take on it is that the theists here would dearly love to think of the Big Bang as having a supernatural cause. The idea that it might have a natural cause makes it harder to justify belief in supernaturalism, although it doesn't absolutely preclude it. Of course, even if there were a spiritual plane of reality that was separate from physical reality and interacted with physical reality, they would still have a long way to go before their version of God could even remotely be justified by that fact alone. Our species has managed to come up with a huge number of competing theistic cosmologies. Nevertheless, that would get them a foot in the door.

 

[Lion IRC]

Proponents and skeptics
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse

Proponents of one or more of the multiverse hypotheses include Hugh Everett,[23] Brian Greene,[24][25] Max Tegmark,[26] Alan Guth,[27] Andrei Linde,[28] Michio Kaku,[29] David Deutsch,[30] Leonard Susskind,[31] Alexander Vilenkin,[32] Yasunori Nomura,[33] Raj Pathria,[34] Laura Mersini-Houghton,[35][36] Neil deGrasse Tyson,[37] Lawrence Krauss, Sean Carroll[38] and Stephen Hawking.[39]

Scientists who are generally skeptical of the multiverse hypothesis include: David Gross,[40] Paul Steinhardt,[41][42] Anna Ijjas,[42] Abraham Loeb,[42] David Spergel,[43] Neil Turok,[44] Viatcheslav Mukhanov,[45] Michael S. Turner,[46] Roger Penrose,[47] George Ellis,[48][49] Joe Silk,[50]Carlo Rovelli,[51] Adam Frank,[52] Marcelo Gleiser,[52] Jim Baggott[53] and Paul Davies.[54]

 

[Lion IRC]

I explicitly define God as the Creator of your 'universe'.

By making the claim that God is not part of the set of everything that exists, you are telling us that God does not exist.

Logic. So easy, yet so hard for some people.

Where did I say God is not part of the set of things which exist?
Forget logic pal. You can't even read.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I think at last we can make the distinctions between the eternal universe i.e. "All things inclusive" (I know this is what you mean) and the "local" universe as Abbadon points both out. (local I'll be using from now on to distinguish between the two).




I think the concept of the theistic POV is better clarified as: God is outside of the "local" universe which had a beginning and may therefore, not be eternal.

(obviously with clarification, all of us can discuss both contexts of "universe" with less confusion)

Good post, but the problem still stands!

Let us assume that the visible universe is not all that exists. Cosmological inflationary models point to such a possibility. There is some form of a spacetime continuum or energy field beyond the reach of our instruments, and interactions in this domain triggered the inflationary expansion that gave rise to our visible universe. And there may be a whole collection of universes that have been, and are being spawned by similar interactions, and these universes exist within their own bubbles, distinct from our own visible universe. Some of the brightest minds working on the problem consider such a possibility to be realistic.

But if such is the case, why is God necessary? If there is something outside our visible universe, why could our visible universe not have been triggered by events that occurred within this domain? Why does this event need to have an intelligent, self-aware entity to initiate it? Adding God to the equation does nothing to help us find the answer, it simply adds another layer of complexity to the problem.


So lets get back to the point I was trying to make:

Some creationists believe:
1. It is impossible for simple, single-celled self replicating molecules to form from natural processes.
2. Our visible universe was created by a complex, intelligent entity that just happens to exist.

Why are you so unwilling to acknowledge the contradiction inherent to believing 1 and 2 simultaneously?

That kind of rational thought is lost on a person who is in love with the urban legend that is god. The basic claim is that intelligence and design cannot simply exist, these things must be created. Strangely, however, a god is intelligent and undesigned and just happens to exist because it is supernatural.

So the way is works is to sprinkle some supernatural magic dust onto everything and voila, it works just fine. The gigantic contradiction just doesn't matter because the thought process is not there to recognize it.