Chris and Sieben's Creationist Thread

Miscellaneous General
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To Epicurus: (your latest post)

Do you believe knowledge of God is unknowable? That requires a strong argument. I haven’t seen it from you yet. That’s a hefty burden of proof that I wouldn’t wish on myself.

Totally pointless with no bearing on real people in the real universe? You pre-suppose a deistic God from the start. It seems as though you’re unwilling to admit a personal God perhaps because of the implications.

Implications, however, have no bearing on the truth value of a conclusion. You don’t believe in an acting/God, but do you have evidence that one does not exist? Do you have evidence that only a deistic God exists or can exist?

You are a deist, but deists believe that God created the world, God handed down a moral law (natural law), and that God doesn’t intervene through revelation or miracles. Do you accept this, or are you a modified deist?

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You are using a very narrow definition of deism (maybe even a 19th century definition). Deism does not entail natural law, nor that God doesn’t intervene in the world (although most deists believe these proposition also). All deism entails is that at least one god exists, that we can discover his existence through reason, and that God (or gods) created the world (whether it be a universe or multiverse).

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The unification of General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics is not Ad Hoc. And as for wonderland, imaginary time isn’t any more of living in wonderland than explanations of how force particles actually carry force. Are you going to say that god causes that too, and be done with it? Besides, imaginary time isn’t ad hoc anyway, as it has uses beyond getting around the big bang singularity. It may be wrong, but do not dismiss it out of hand simply because you think it’s living in wonderland. Again, here’s some wonderland material for you.

The big bang has no unavoidable conclusions, just ones that some minds intuitively go to when it is first heard about. That doesn’t make those initial conclusions correct. But apparently to you any attempt at a natural explanation is ad hoc. I suppose Louise Pasteur was creating Ad Hoc theories to justify unbelief in demonic afflictions? Give me a break.

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You are right, it isn’t ad hoc. A unified theory would be a logical-falsehood, since both theories contradict eachother. One or both has to be modified to be unified (in which case it will cease to be the same theory, so would not be a true unification, but simply a new more general theory).

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With that in mind, it seems you’ve accepted my argument of the creation of the universe, albeit with reservations on the personal nature of God.

Im more of a buddhist deist. I give reverence to creation and as such try to promote its upkeep. But as far as surmising on God, the soul, or miracles, I do not discount these things. Nor do I think they, if they exist, are supernatural. If it happens, it is natural. If God exists there will be evidence, it is unfortunate there is no proof. But in the face of a lack of physical proof, I will just try, once again, try to upkeep creation. If I go to heavan, awesome. If I go to hell, terrible, but I made the gamble (besides, my social circles are usually atheists, or at least not conventional believers). If nothing happens, I find that likely, and am prepared.

Im what you call a human. I dont follow what some other guy told me to.

Your idea of what can be verified is nothing but circular reasoning. You simply pre-suppose that the only things that can exist are what can be ‘verified’ by the five senses.

Don’t you see how this is a flawed method of knowing and understanding reality? You leave no room for logical possibilities, no room to follow wthe evidence where it leads, you simply pre-suppose naturalism.

Once again, I dont think these things are not possiblle. I just think, until we can objectively verify them, and we should thoroughly try to find out the possibilities of life… until then, we should focus on what is real, and what will really impact people here in the real world.

I already argued for his personal nature in my cosmological argument. Do you have anything to counter that

I did counter them, I found them weak and based on many assumptions. I think the argument is valid, but I am not sure the premise is true.

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Do you believe knowledge of God is unknowable?

Depends on what definition of God you are using.

ou pre-suppose a deistic God from the start. It seems as though you’re unwilling to admit a personal God perhaps because of the implications.

You have me all wrong. I am an individual.

You don’t believe in an acting/God, but do you have evidence that one does not exist?

No. I have no evidence that unicorns do not exist either. How can one prove that something does not exist? One can only prove that things either have not, or possibly cannot be objectively verified.

You are a deist, but deists believe that God created the world, God handed down a moral law (natural law), and that God doesn’t intervene through revelation or miracles. Do you accept this, or are you a modified deist?

The only things I share with deism are a reverence for all that is, was, and will be. And a belief that things are just heresy and conjecture until objectively verified (I have strong evidence to back up this stance; see, the last 500 years). I am a big fan of trying to recreate miracles, but as yet, it has not happened. So, I keep my practical focus on the things that affect the objective world.

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BTW, I do think we are starting to come up with some very good evidence of the power of focused thought (prayer if you will) on material reality.

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First, I’m going to deal with imaginary time.

You’ll notice that the only way Stephen Hawking’s theory can survive even the most basic criticism is his appeal to outdated positivist theory. I say outdated, because almost the entire philosophical world has realized the internal inconsistencies of such a philosophy.

The only way he can avoid science and logic is to adopt some sort of odd skepticism about the world. You can reduce his quote down to this: “I don’t like these conclusions, but the only way to avoid it is to throw up my hands and say that we really can’t know anything anyway. Is reality really real? It probably isn’t, so I can avoid accepting the notion of a creator while destroying the very foundations of science at the same time.”

If that’s how you would like to proceed then be my guest. But let it be known whose side is rational and whose side is irrational. I find it very weak and even desperate that the only way to defeat my argument is an appeal that is not dissimilar to solipsism in its intellectual viability.

Conclusion? Imaginary quantities have little ontological significance on the real world unless you adopt absurd philosophical stances.

On to Epicurus:

Find me some professional logicians that go for the 'You can’t prove a negative" bit.

Proving a negative is significantly easier than proving a positive. Many atheists just blabber that point because they’ve adopted a position that has a very large burden of proof. I’ll admit, I don’t envy their position, but that’s what they decided on.

Here are some negatives that we can prove:

3 is not equal to 2

The Greeks did not have access to cable TV

The Native Americans weren’t using jumbo jets a hundred years ago

So you see, it’s not at all hard to prove lots of negatives. Only some like the statement ‘God does not exist’. I pity the person who tries, but it’s not my fault that they adopted such a difficult position.

The definition of God I’m using is (at this point) one of the three monotheistic Gods of the abrahamic religions:

Islam

Judaism

Christianity

I can narrow it down because of the ‘personal’ trait that the cause must have. I would proceed to eliminate Islam through historical arguments or inconsistencies.

A belief that things are just heresy until they’re not verified? I think you’re using the wrong word here.

Now I’m going to finish by going after your verification principle. Can it itself be empirically verified? Other than that, your verification principle begs the question. That is to say, it is fallacious. It is wrong. You cannot use it anymore.

You need to adopt a more realistic method of verification, since the one you’re using now is untenable.

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[QUOTE]
You’ll notice that the only way Stephen Hawking’s theory can survive even the most basic criticism is his appeal to outdated positivist theory. I say outdated, because almost the entire philosophical world has realized the internal inconsistencies of such a philosophy.

The only way he can avoid science and logic is to adopt some sort of odd skepticism about the world. You can reduce his quote down to this: “I don’t like these conclusions, but the only way to avoid it is to throw up my hands and say that we really can’t know anything anyway. Is reality really real? It probably isn’t, so I can avoid accepting the notion of a creator while destroying the very foundations of science at the same time.”[/ENDQUOTE]

How very convenient for you to lump everyone in with one man’s surmising.

If that’s how you would like to proceed then be my guest. But let it be known whose side is rational and whose side is irrational. I find it very weak and even desperate that the only way to defeat my argument is an appeal that is not dissimilar to solipsism in its intellectual viability.

Whoa, sorry champ. Didn’t mean to cast a shadow on your everpresent glory. The only way? Seriously, the only way? How very pompous an assertion that is. And by the way, when did it start being rational to appeal to magical white wizards in the sky who can be said to have done anything, but never understood?

I saw your argument, I told you that and why I thought it was weak. But, you never rebutted that, and just moved on as if you had some incontrivertable law of nature. It was a valid argument, within its own construct. But some of the premise was weak at best.

The Greeks did not have access to cable TV

You can prove that? You can prove that it is not likely, but unless you have a time machine, that isn’t something that can be proved. And can you really prove that 3 !=2? Suppose a guy comes from a land/planet whose symbol for 2 is 3?

A belief that things are just heresy until they’re not verified? I think you’re using the wrong word here.

Which is why I said “conjecture” as well, please pay attention. Nit-pick and dismiss is a laughable tactic and serves noone the better.

Can it itself be empirically verified? Other than that, your verification principle begs the question. That is to say, it is fallacious. It is wrong. You cannot use it anymore.

Convenient. It can only be believed in by faith, it is impossible to physically know. Than it is nothing, irrelevant, and absolutely useless. Even if it were true, who cares? It is impossible to record/use it in the physical world. It is impossible to know if what you think is correct. Just shut up and listen to what the old man in the robe says, because he found a book written by a bunch of primitives in the desert following a cloud for 40 years.

So, it begs the question, what purpose does this imaginary wizard serve you, other than to feel better than atheists?

Also, please

It cannot be physical, it cannot be in time or space, it must be tremendously powerful, and personal.

Why can’t it be physical? It would have to be to have any impact on physical reality at any given point, even before the Big Bang. Imaginary constructs don’t effect physical reality, not directly anyway. Why again must it be personal? Oh right..

the cause has certain criteria that only a powerful, personal mind.

RIght, why is that again? You never really backed up that claim. You made some claim that minds are immaterial and timeless (a fallacy, my mind is partially dependant on the physical make-up of my brain, and it most certainly will end one day), and that implies personhood or something, but I didnt really get it.

I like a good debate on God, but your pompous attitude, based on unproven/provable claims, only further makes me disbelieve in any kind of creator/actor God. (Besides, perfect actor is a logical fallacy in itself. Actions are taken to change things, a perfect being needs nothing to change, ergo cannot act)

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Just to make my last post clear; your claim that there was nothing material before the bang was absolutely wrong. Every possible material thing that is now existed in the singularity. It wasn’t no thing. It was everything which exploded into every thing.

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I didn’t mean to sound pompous, I just get over-excited sometimes. I lumped everyone into one category because almost everyone on this thread that has objected to my argument has borrowed from the logical positivist camp. Even Stephen Hawking’s quote appeals to it.

Yeah, it kind of is the only way. A proposition is either true or false – it cannot be asserted to be meaningless because the verification principle begs the question.

Dressing it up by calling it a magic white wizard makes it sound like you’re appealing to ridicule.

I never said God couldn’t be understood. If you’ll look back at my posts, I think you’ll find I addressed virtually every objection, no matter how small .

I nitpicked because words are very important in a philosophical debate. I didn’t, however, dismiss the proposition because of that word alone.

We have reason for a reason – to reason. There is no “shut up” clause included in it. I think if you’ll read much of the Old Testament, you’ll find that Yahweh, as opposed to the other gods in the surrounding regions, actually listened to their arguments and let them have their way based on their reasoning ability.

When you call it a book written by a bunch of primitives, you’re invoking the old therefore wrong fallacy.

Now, for the attributes again.

  1. Materiality - it cannot be physical, since matter came into existence at a singularity. If matter is not the cause, then the cause is immaterial.

So I imagine that you have proof that the immaterial cannot affect the material? Think of what you’re claiming here.

  1. I never said that all minds are immaterial and timeless. I said that that is the nature of the first cause. I don’t think you’re taking exception with my claim that the cause must be ‘powerful’. I think by now we’ve reasoned that that is obvious.

  2. Personhood

There are two types of explanations for causality: scientific explanations in terms of laws and personal explanations involving agents and their will.

We can narrow it down a little bit. The universe cannot have a scientific explanation. Why? These laws operate on initial conditions and initial conditions alone. It cannot apply before these initial conditions came about.

But the most powerful argument for personhood is based off of a dichotomy. The only things that possess both immateriality and timelessness are either abstract objects or minds.

Abstract objects, however, cause nothing. Therefore, it must be a mind. That’s a simple and logical argument.

Of course a perfect being needs nothing to change. A perfect being by definition is complete. But why say that it cannot act? What if it wills to act?

Also, I’ll address the negatives. I gave poor examples. Here’s a few that are more reasonable:

We can prove that the earth is not flat.

One of the basic laws of logic (the law of non-contradiction) proves a negative. It states that a proposition cannot be both true and not true.

We can prove that there isn’t a gigantic astroid about to smash into the earth and blow us all to bits.

For further reading: http://departments.bloomu.edu/philosophy/pages/content/hales/articlepdf/proveanegative.pdf

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Can I get a cite for that? From a reliable source? I have many quotes from scientists affirming an ex nihilo big bang.

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Dressing it up by calling it a magic white wizard makes it sound like you’re appealing to ridicule

It is immaterial, I can describe it as I desire. Perhaps I was, but I felt attacked.

I think if you’ll read much of the Old Testament, you’ll find that Yahweh, as opposed to the other gods in the surrounding regions, actually listened to their arguments and let them have their way based on their reasoning ability.

I have read the Bible, I grew up a catholic actually (but read it much more intently after I left the fold. And it gave me a much greater insight. But appealing to Yawheh, who acted upon the universe well after the Big Bang (and whose creation story is contradictory to the Big Bang) invalidates your claim that god is immaterial.

When you call it a book written by a bunch of primitives, you’re invoking the old therefore wrong fallacy

I am. But I will not run from it, lest I can be shown proof to the contrary.

So I imagine that you have proof that the immaterial cannot affect the material? Think of what you’re claiming here.

You’re right, I am claiming to proof a negative. My bad. Let me rephrase it to; nothing immaterial (not part of the nautral world) has ever been shown to have effected the physical world, and it is unlikely ever will.

never said that all minds are immaterial and timeless.

Also, it’s really fascinating because personhood is implied by timelessness and imateriality. The only things which fit that criteria are either minds or abstract objects.

The only things that possess both immateriality and timelessness are either abstract objects or minds.

You did assert that.

The universe cannot have a scientific explanation.

What? Since when? The universe is a scientific explanation. Perhaps you meant creation cannot have a scientific explanation. Besides trying to prove a negative again, this is utterly untrue. If it acted upon physical reality there will be evidence; cause, effect.

The only things that possess both immateriality and timelessness are either abstract objects or minds.

What mind, other than this supposed creator is immaterial and timeless?

But why say that it cannot act? What if it wills to act?

If it is both perfect and creator, its creation is perfect. A perfect being cannot choose to act imperfectly. If it can, you go back into the incomprehensible argument about a being that can do anything, but never be shown to exist. If it acts it changes something. If it changes something, it was not perfect.

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The Big Bang singularity is a point of zero volume, but very high mass, which makes the density infinite. This singularity contained all of the matter and energy in the Universe.

I thought it was self evident that matter couldnt have come from nowwhere, that the initial singularity was an infinitely massive thing… I really dont feel like searching for Hawking to say it or anything, tho I will if you need. But perhaps the definition above from http://www.physlink.com/education/askexperts/ae649.cfm will suffice.

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I think you may been led astray a little bit by young earth creationists. If you take a little peek into the theology world, I think you’ll find that progressive creationism rather than young earth creationism is by far the more plausible theory.

The beautiful thing about logical fallacies is that using them makes you illogical. Are you saying that your claim is illogical and you just don’t care?

Your verification principle as a hidden assumption is still creeping up in your claim that nothing immaterial and outside the natural world can ever affect the physical world and ever will. That’s begging the question again.

Thanks for the correction, I meant a scientific explanation of the cause of creation. What evidence would you be looking for? I am, after all, a firm believer in cause and effect.

Any mind that is immaterial, timeless, powerful, personal, etc., may qualify. That’s originally what polytheists held. Of course, polytheism is taken care of with Ockham’s razor.

You do pose an interesting counter argument about creation, but what sort of ‘perfect’ do you mean? Did I say God was perfect?

This argument that you pose destroys pantheism, but doesn’t affect my argument. Suppose God was perfect – why can’t he act imperfectly? What is imperfect? What is imperfect about our universe?

Even if the universe had defects, suppose it was for a reason? A reason for fulfilling his purpose. We may observe something as being imperfect, e.g, something not functioning the way we want it to, but does that mean God sees it the same way? It could be doing exactly what he wants it to.

This may not sound convincing to you, I understand that. But as long as there is any possible (not plausible) way that a perfect being may create an ‘imperfect’ world, then it is no longer logically impossible.

That’s what I’m doing. This is a defeater for your argument. Questions?

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“If we extrapolate this prediction to its extreme, we reach a point when all distances in the universe have shrunk to zero. An initial cosmological singularity therefore forms a past temporal extremity to the universe. We cannot continue physical reasoning, or even the concept of spacetime, through such an extremity. For this reason most cosmologists think of the initial singularity as the beginning of the universe. On this view the big bang represents the creation event; the creation not only of all the matter and energy in the universe, but also of spacetime itself.” – P.C.W. Davies, “Spacetime Singularities in Cosmology,” in The Study of Time III, ed. J.T. Fraser (Berlin: Springer Verlag, 1978), 78-79

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You’ll notice that the only way Stephen Hawking’s theory can survive even the most basic criticism is his appeal to outdated positivist theory. I say outdated, because almost the entire philosophical world has realized the internal inconsistencies of such a philosophy.

The only way he can avoid science and logic is to adopt some sort of odd skepticism about the world. You can reduce his quote down to this: “I don’t like these conclusions, but the only way to avoid it is to throw up my hands and say that we really can’t know anything anyway. Is reality really real? It probably isn’t, so I can avoid accepting the notion of a creator while destroying the very foundations of science at the same time.”

If that’s how you would like to proceed then be my guest. But let it be known whose side is rational and whose side is irrational. I find it very weak and even desperate that the only way to defeat my argument is an appeal that is not dissimilar to solipsism in its intellectual viability.

Conclusion? Imaginary quantities have little ontological significance on the real world unless you adopt absurd philosophical stances.

We wouldn’t even be having this conversation if the name of this concept wasn’t “imaginary time”. Once you reach singularity, concepts such as time are destroyed. You either admit conditions can arise that are not “realistic”, thus you concede imaginary time is possible, or you reject it, and thus reject singularities, thus destroying your notion of the beginning of the universe being ex nihilo based on singularities anyway.

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The beautiful thing about logical fallacies is that using them makes you illogical. Are you saying that your claim is illogical and you just don’t care?

what claim is this you are referring to?

is still creeping up in your claim that nothing immaterial and outside the natural world can ever affect the physical world and ever will.

Can you name one time (let us put aside creation for the moment) that it has?

What evidence would you be looking for?

A fingerprint, something. The closest thing you have now is that there is more matter than anti-matter, which we dont have a definitive explanation for (it has a name, this observation, but I cant remember it).

Even if the universe had defects, suppose it was for a reason? A reason for fulfilling his purpose. We may observe something as being imperfect, e.g, something not functioning the way we want it to, but does that mean God sees it the same way? It could be doing exactly what he wants it to.

This may not sound convincing to you, I understand that. But as long as there is any possible (not plausible) way that a perfect being may create an ‘imperfect’ world, then it is no longer logically impossible.

None of this matters. You posited Yawheh; a being claimed to be perfect by his representatives who has acted upon the universe well after the Big Bang. The Bible is full of stories of God creating things, then changing his mind and acting upon the universe to change it.

Perfect arguments aside, if you bring up Yawheh you speak of a God who has acted upon the physical universe. If this were so there would be some evidence of it, remember this happened well after creation. Unless you are positing some being that can both act upon the universe as he sees fit, but at the same time is unknowable and incomprehensible. And whatever you think of Ocham’s Razor, it would cut that being in half, as it is the prime assumption.

Questions?

Could you lay out this God theory you have one more time? I am not clear on what you are describing God as. I dont think you have directly posited what you believe in the first place. Most of what you have said has been in response to other comments.

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It’s getting late over here. I’m going to do one more post and then I’ll reply Epicurus’ post tomorrow.

Sam, I’m not sure what you’re getting at here. Time began to exist so there must’ve been a state of timelessness. This does not mean ‘imaginary time’. It means no time at all! There are no hours, seconds, days, or years. I see nothing unrealistic about this concept at all, besides creating criteria for the cause of the universe – timelessness.

More fun from Stephen Hawking: “I’m a positivist . . . I don’t demand that a theory correspond to reality because I don’t know what it is.” Hawking and Penrose, Nature of Space and Time, p. 121.

I’ve already dealt with logical positivism and I don’t think I need to bring it up again.

I look forward to more good discussion tomorrow.

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How are you even criticizing this anyway? You already agree that something with explanatory power can be postulated without any evidence. You say that God can explain the big bang without any evidence. I say that imaginary time can explain the big bang without any evidence. So tell me, which requires fewer assumptions. That there exists a God outside of this universe (which would require another dimension) which we can’t detect, who is so powerful he can create matter out of nothing, and can change the laws of the universe as he sees fit, or that there exists another dimension in space time (imaginary time) which we can’t detect.

You are yourself a positivist. Or are at least using positivist logic.