A Universe from Nothing?

[Ben Dhyan]

I think it is idiotic to think you would know more than the people who have worked or who have done the research in the fields.

Have you ever worked at any of observatories? Have you ever work at NASA or ESA or whatever the Russians called their own space agency?

I don't think anyone who rely on religions, their religious belief would know more than those who have the experiences.

I am not saying they don't make mistakes...but that's what finding evidences are for.

You on the other hand, is simply used your religious belief to dictate what is true or not true about the universe, and you expect other people to take you seriously.

You have offer no verifiable evidences to check on what you claim, and yet, you claimed you have overwhelming evidences to support your personal belief. That's not evidence, that just your opinion and conjecture.

If it wasn't for science, you wouldn't know that the universe was larger than what we could see with the naked eye. The ancient people thought the universe was only what they could see with their eyes.

Before Edwin Hubble, since Galileo, people thought the Milky Way was THE UNIVERSE. They thought Andromeda Galaxy was simply another nebula in the Milky Way. It was only the development of larger optical telescope - the Hooker Telescope, built by the 1919. Not only did Hubble discovered Andromeda Galaxy was a separate spiral galaxy, it was also more massive than the Milky Way, containing more stars than the Milky Way.

This led quickly to discoveries of even more galaxies in our universe.

A few years later (in 1922), Alexander Friedmann, a Russian astronomer and physicist, who was the first to theorise that the universe was expanding, 5 years before Georges Lemaitre independently published his own hypothesis (1927).

Two years after that publication, Hubble discovered the evidences for the universe expanding, by observing and measuring the redshift of galaxies.

You say not to rely on these scientists and their discoveries, but have you anything more concrete and alternative mean of discovering new?

All you have presented is your personal belief the universe, that's all. You have shown no evidences, but expect Polymath to show evidences. That's rich. It's bloody double standard. Especially when in your older reply, you have stated you have overwhelming evidences.

I am still waiting for you to present those abundant of evidences you have hidden in your sleeve or pocket.

Don't make claims of having evidences, if you don't have any.

I am not against people working in any field of knowledge that sincerely tries to understand the universe, but I don't defer to another's pov based on the their claim to authority, I am free to challenge claims whenever I find them less than convincing to my understanding of reality.

If you read my posts, I said I like science, I didn't say you can not rely on all scientific claims, but because I find fault with some of the conclusions of some scientific claims does not mean I am anti-science, just that there is more to it than most scientists know....and you can take that as another fact.

As for raising particular scientific claims such as Hubble doppler shift of em light waves, it has nothing to do with my reasons for claiming the universe to be eternal, the universe is eternal for the reasons given in my last post to you.

 

[gnostic]

So don't just ignore my point and then claim again later in this or another thread that I don't provide you with the factual reason why the universe is eternal.

No, Ben.

Fact is not based on reasoning, but on evidences.

Anyone can provide reason for anything they believe. That's known as an "opinion".

Do not confuse "reason" with "fact" or with "evidence".

Evidence and fact are independent of reason, opinion or bias.

You have stated your opinions and personal belief, that's all.

Reasoning are for philosophy, not science. It is also subjective and subjected to bias.

In science, scientists are supposed to doubt everything, including their own formulated hypotheses, to question and challenge any explanation and any prediction made in the hypotheses. The truth of the hypothesis can only be determined by the test results or discovery of evidences.

The more evidences found or the more successes you have in the lab, the more probable is that hypothesis.

But if the evidences or tests go against the scientist, or his hypothesis turn out to be untestable, then he should ditch his hypothesis and admit he is wrong. That because his hypothesis is not probable.

When you were arguing with polymath over the matter of finite vs infinite, and time vs eternity, you have made positive claim that you have evidences. You weren't saying your claim is "probable".

No, in fact, you clearly stated that you have "overwhelming" evidences on your side. If that's true, then why haven't you presented any. This post would be the 100 post, since you have made your unsubstantiated claim of "overwhelming" evidences.

You have evaded admitting that you made such claims, but now it is not "overwhelming" evidences, but "factual reason".

You are moving the goalpost here, Ben.

Sorry, but "reason", even if you think or believe it to be "factual", doesn't make it "fact".

Again, fact required evidences, not reason, and certainly not your personal belief or opinion.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

No, Ben.

Fact is not based on reasoning, but on evidences.

Anyone can provide reason for anything they believe. That's known as an "opinion".

Do not confuse "reason" with "fact" or with "evidence".

Evidence and fact are independent of reason, opinion or bias.

You have stated your opinions and personal belief, that's all.

Reasoning are for philosophy, not science. It is also subjective and subjected to bias.

In science, scientists are supposed to doubt everything, including their own formulated hypotheses, to question and challenge any explanation and any prediction made in the hypotheses. The truth of the hypothesis can only be determined by the test results or discovery of evidences.

The more evidences found or the more successes you have in the lab, the more probable is that hypothesis.

But if the evidences or tests go against the scientist, or his hypothesis turn out to be untestable, then he should ditch his hypothesis and admit he is wrong. That because his hypothesis is not probable.

When you were arguing with polymath over the matter of finite vs infinite, and time vs eternity, you have made positive claim that you have evidences. You weren't saying your claim is "probable".

No, in fact, you clearly stated that you have "overwhelming" evidences on your side. If that's true, then why haven't you presented any. This post would be the 100 post, since you have made your unsubstantiated claim of "overwhelming" evidences.

You have evaded admitting that you made such claims, but now it is not "overwhelming" evidences, but "factual reason".

You are moving the goalpost here, Ben.

Sorry, but "reason", even if you think or believe it to be "factual", doesn't make it "fact".

Again, fact required evidences, not reason, and certainly not your personal belief or opinion.

Sorry gnostic but you are avoiding facts, nothing does not exist! Are you saying this is not a fact?

 

[gnostic]

Ben.

I didn't say I reject the concept of eternal universe.

I am saying there are no evidences...SO FAR...to support the eternal universe.

The eternal universe as well as all the other different cosmologies, including the oscillating model (other known as the Big Bounce, as the universe going through a cycle of Bang-Crunch) and the multiverse model(s), are all untestable, and very hypothetical and theoretical.

I have attempted to learn and understand each model, but I have not accepted any of them to be true, because as I have said many times before, there are no evidences to back any of them up...YET.

Perhaps, in the future, we may develop better technology than we have now, to see beyond Recombination epoch.

The Recombination epoch is the period when electrons finally bound to the ionised hydrogen and ionised helium atoms, forming electrically neutral and stable atoms. This bonding of electrons to atomic nuclei, released a lot of energy, in the form of heat and photons (light).

Those light is the most oldest photons that are detectable, measurable and observable. We cannot view these light with our eyes, but from special radio telescopes that can measure microwave wavelength. It is called Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR).

CMBR is older than the oldest quasars, older than the earliest stars. And there were no planets before the first stars.

It was predicted in 1948, by Ralph Alpher and Robert Herman, but only accidentally discovered by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson in Bell Laboratory in 1964. It is this CMBR that finally debunked Fred Hoyle's competing theory - Steady State model, but verifying the Big Bang model to be more "probable".

You have seen those images from the space probes - NASA's WMAP and ESA's Planck.

My point about Recombination epoch and CMBR is that the universe before this period, the universe was opaque. The older Big Bang epochs are un-observable.

So the Recombination epoch represent the limited of our observable universe. The date from now to the start of the Recombination epoch is still 13 billion years.

But since we don't currently have the technology to see beyond the Recombination, we don't know if the universe is eternal or not. We have no way of knowing.

So for you to claim that you have "overwhelming" evidences or "factual reason", I would very bluntly called that "pseudoscience BS", because there are no evidences today or in the past, to indicate the universe is eternal.

You are simply rationalising your unsubstantiated and unscientific claim.

All those theoretical models about the universe are still conjectures, and so is your claim.

 

[gnostic]

Sorry gnostic but you are avoiding facts, nothing does not exist! Are you saying this is not a fact?

First you use circular reasoning and making outrageous claims...then you switch to moving the goalpost, but using more circular reasoning...

...and now, with this new reply, here, you have resorted to "straw man".

Nice one, Ben, but you are wrong again.

I have never made any claim that the universe formed from "nothing".

Did you really have to make things up, which I didn't say and have never claimed?

It is clear to me that we cannot have honest debate, because you lack integrity. Is that what your religion teaches you?

Man, you are digging a deeper hole to bury your head under.

Can you show me where I have said anything about nothingness?

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Ben.

I didn't say I reject the concept of eternal universe.

I am saying there are no evidences...SO FAR...to support the eternal universe.

The eternal universe as well as all the other different cosmologies, including the oscillating model (other known as the Big Bounce, as the universe going through a cycle of Bang-Crunch) and the multiverse model(s), are all untestable, and very hypothetical and theoretical.

I have attempted to learn and understand each model, but I have not accepted any of them to be true, because as I have said many times before, there are no evidences to back any of them up...YET.

Perhaps, in the future, we may develop better technology than we have now, to see beyond Recombination epoch.

The Recombination epoch is the period when electrons finally bound to the ionised hydrogen and ionised helium atoms, forming electrically neutral and stable atoms. This bonding of electrons to atomic nuclei, released a lot of energy, in the form of heat and photons (light).

Those light is the most oldest photons that are detectable, measurable and observable. We cannot view these light with our eyes, but from special radio telescopes that can measure microwave wavelength. It is called Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR).

CMBR is older than the oldest quasars, older than the earliest stars. And there were no planets before the first stars.

It was predicted in 1948, by Ralph Alpher and Robert Herman, but only accidentally discovered by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson in Bell Laboratory in 1964. It is this CMBR that finally debunked Fred Hoyle's competing theory - Steady State model, but verifying the Big Bang model to be more "probable".

You have seen those images from the space probes - NASA's WMAP and ESA's Planck.

My point about Recombination epoch and CMBR is that the universe before this period, the universe was opaque. The older Big Bang epochs are un-observable.

So the Recombination epoch represent the limited of our observable universe. The date from now to the start of the Recombination epoch is still 13 billion years.

But since we don't currently have the technology to see beyond the Recombination, we don't know if the universe is eternal or not. We have no way of knowing.

So for you to claim that you have "overwhelming" evidences or "factual reason", I would very bluntly called that "pseudoscience BS", because there are no evidences today or in the past, to indicate the universe is eternal.

You are simply rationalising your unsubstantiated and unscientific claim.

All those theoretical models about the universe are still conjectures, and so is your claim.

I don't see how any of this is relevant, what makes you think it is? What is it you believe I have claimed for which I have no supporting evidence?

 

[Ben Dhyan]

First you use circular reasoning and making outrageous claims...then you switch to moving the goalpost, but using more circular reasoning...

...and now, with this new reply, here, you have resorted to "straw man".

Nice one, Ben, but you are wrong again.

I have never made any claim that the universe formed from "nothing".

Did you really have to make things up, which I didn't say and have never claimed?

It is clear to me that we cannot have honest debate, because you lack integrity. Is that what your religion teaches you?

Man, you are digging a deeper hole to bury your head under.

Can you show me where I have said anything about nothingness?

Well then that leaves both of us baffled, what precisely is it that I am supposed to have claimed that you are claiming I have no evidence for?

 

[gnostic]

Well then that leaves both of us baffled, what precisely is it that I am supposed to have claimed that you are claiming I have no evidence for?

How the hell should I know?

You are the one who have made a claim that I supported the universe form from nothing.

I said no such thing.

You wrote :

Sorry gnostic but you are avoiding facts, nothing does not exist!

What do you mean by what I have highlighted in red?

Can you quote me where I support the existence of "nothing"?

And what fact am I avoiding?

Is a straw man attack? Or are you misinterpreting what I have written - a misunderstanding? I don't know where you get this rubbish.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

How the hell should I know?

You are the one who have made a claim that I supported the universe form from nothing.

I said no such thing.

You wrote :


What do you mean by what I have highlighted in red?

Can you quote me where I support the existence of "nothing"?

And what fact am I avoiding?

Is a straw man attack? Or are you misinterpreting what I have written - a misunderstanding? I don't know where you get this rubbish.

I mean that, if someone believes the universe is not eternal, since the only other option if it is not eternal is that it had a beginning, and if it had a beginning, it had to come from nothing, and since nothing does not exist, the belief is in error.

 

[gnostic]

I mean that, if someone believes the universe is not eternal, since the only other option if it is not eternal is that it had a beginning, and if it had a beginning, it had to come from nothing, and since nothing does not exist, the belief is in error.

Instead of making faulty assumptions about what I do or don't accept, why not trying to ask me which model I do accept?

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Instead of making faulty assumptions about what I do or don't accept, why not trying to ask me which model I do accept?

The question of what models you accept or don't accept is not relevant, this is what I am trying to address...you said..."You keep talking of "eternal universe" but presented no evidences to support your claim." #3140 gnostic, Yesterday at 11:21

 

[Polymath257]

Wow, what a rant gnosis mate...why don't you write a book?

Thing is, all science has to offer wrt understanding the universe is conceptual models, and these models are not the universe, mere attempts to model it based on observations, experiments, etc.. You may have faith in one or another of these models, but at the end of the day, that's all you've got, faith in a conceptual model. Now I get it, that is what physical science does, and while I am interested generally in what they have to say, due to their not understanding that everything they observe of the universe is an aspect of the one universe, everything is connected, there is an underlying unity to the universe that they do not incorporate into the models. If you ignore that, you will never develop your own mind to apprehend the underlying unity of the one universe.

It is just so lazy to regurgitate the stuff learned in high school, college, uni, or self taught by studying the same source material, and not add significantly to humanity's collective ever evolving understanding of the universe by self discovery, introspective reflection on the nature of your own consciousness. For, if it has errors, most of its conclusions will also be found wanting.

First, of all, the models need to be tested. Competing models need to be distinguished by observations whcih determine the model to be discarded. So, through elimination els that fail, we converge to correctness.

I think the thing you fail to see is that the 'unity' you are talking about *is* an aspect of these models. The very universality of the proposed physical laws is only one aspect of that unity. The fact that cosmology now considers the universe throughout same and time as a single entity is another aspect of that unity. If anything, the scientific method reveals that unity better and in a deeper way than philosophy ever could. But is *also* looks at the internals and learns how those work also.

 

[ChristineM]

Apart from a disagreement that there was a start to the universe, and the agreement that concepts are, relative to that which they are meant to represent, somewhat illusory, the "arrow of time" is a fine example of a conceptual figure of speech to represent the changes taking place in the universe caused by the natural laws of nature, gravity, inertia, etc., not that an entity called time is causing the changes.

As I keep explaining, the universe is real in the sense it exists, and its existence is not an illusion in that it sometimes disappears, it exists without ceasing to exist, this persistence of existence to continuing existing is what makes reality real. The arrow of time you talk about is merely focusing attention on the changes taking place due to the natural working of the universe, cause and effect, effect then becoming cause, etc., in that order....one way arrow of change....it's a passive act to observe 'time'.

The creation of clocks, etc., to measure the rate of change, etc., are merely cause and effect oscillators that are a simulators for calibrated finite rates of change that can then be used as a universal standard against natural change.

The arrow of time is quite obviously something you know nothing about. It is integral to the second law of thermodynamics. A tangible phenomenon that is a part of our reality whether it is observed or not. You may deny the facts all you want, it only means you are denying facts.

Clocks have nothing to do with it

 

[Ben Dhyan]

First, of all, the models need to be tested. Competing models need to be distinguished by observations whcih determine the model to be discarded. So, through elimination els that fail, we converge to correctness.

I think the thing you fail to see is that the 'unity' you are talking about *is* an aspect of these models. The very universality of the proposed physical laws is only one aspect of that unity. The fact that cosmology now considers the universe throughout same and time as a single entity is another aspect of that unity. If anything, the scientific method reveals that unity better and in a deeper way than philosophy ever could. But is *also* looks at the internals and learns how those work also.

I do not dispute the benefit to mankind through science in the support of his physical nature. I do also not dispute the benefit to mankind wrt his spiritual nature through religious practice. It' a matter of which master you choose to serve. But you can not serve both without serving one second best, and it works both ways.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

The arrow of time is quite obviously something you know nothing about. It is integral to the second law of thermodynamics. A tangible phenomenon that is a part of our reality whether it is observed or not. You may deny the facts all you want, it only means you are denying facts.

Clocks have nothing to do with it

So Christine dear, what form of tangibility does 'the arrow of time' take that we can observe it.....touch, taste, smell, hearing, or seeing?

 

[ChristineM]

So Christine dear, what form of tangibility does 'the arrow of time' take that we can observe it.....touch, taste, smell, hearing, or seeing?

Your existence is a consequence (as i explained 2 days ago)

The formation of galaxies, suns, planets is a consequence (as i explained 2 days ago)

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Your existence is a consequence (as i explained 2 days ago)

The formation of galaxies, suns, planets is a consequence (as i explained 2 days ago)

That does not address my question, what is this tangible time substance that can cause this existence?

 

[Polymath257]

So Christine dear, what form of tangibility does 'the arrow of time' take that we can observe it.....touch, taste, smell, hearing, or seeing?

Why are those the only ways to be tangible? And why is such tangibility important when we know full well that human senses are limited and fallible?

 

[Thief]

The arrow of time is quite obviously something you know nothing about. It is integral to the second law of thermodynamics. A tangible phenomenon that is a part of our reality whether it is observed or not. You may deny the facts all you want, it only means you are denying facts.

Clocks have nothing to do with it

there it is.....thank you

so...can God be a phenomenon? .....even though He might be tangible

(dark energy and dark matter seem....intangible......be reasonable to believe)

 

[ChristineM]

there it is.....thank you

so...can God be a phenomenon? .....even though He might be tangible

(dark energy and dark matter seem....intangible......be reasonable to believe)

Is any god tangible? There are several evidences to indicate gods don't exist, even can't exist.

Dark matter has been indirectly detected for several years, and may recently have been directly detected but this is not confirmed independently.

Dark energy ... Who knows if it exists? Its certainly a feasible tool to explain certain phenomenon.