Atheists, where did the universe come from?

[PruePhillip]

You have to be kidding. It fails at the very first claim. The "21%" claim is worthless because the amount of oxygen in the air varies quite a bit with elevation. For example the amount of O2 in the air at the Tibetan plateau will be more than 40% less than the amount of O2 at sea level. Clearly that 21% figure is not "fine tuned".

The distance from the Sun varies by over 3%, but the "Goldilocks Zone" is much larger than that. Most of those figures are merely the state that we evolved in, not a perfect or ideal state.

Exactly, agree with you. I pulled this one off Google Images.
Oxygen levels vary wildly over time. And the earth's orbit
is eccentric, not circular. And I am not sure about the
importance of the speed of light - in hindsight I ought to got
a better image!
but the principle of fine tuning is still there, ie gravity,
electric charge etc..

 

[Subduction Zone]

Exactly, agree with you. I pulled this one off Google Images.
Oxygen levels vary wildly over time. And the earth's orbit
is eccentric, not circular. And I am not sure about the
importance of the speed of light - in hindsight I ought to got
a better image!
but the principle of fine tuning is still there, ie gravity,
electric charge etc..

I am not even sure of those. Talk to some physicists, biologists, and chemists. Some of the so called "fine tuning" could be merely the result of not fully understood laws of physics. At best fine tuning is an argument from ignorance, it is based upon a logical fallacy.

 

[Altfish]

There's two ways to explain the universe being here.
Both require a miracle.

At this point you lose me.
I don't do miracles.

 

[ratiocinator]

Of course my point is that atheists accept many things by faith. Atheism itself is an exercise in faith, "there is no God".

An utterly unprovable belief.

I have no faith that there is no god. I'm an atheist because I can see no reason to take any of the many god-ideas seriously. It's the same reason I don't believe in pixies, vampires, or the Loch Ness monster.

If somebody comes up with a sensible reason to take one of the god-ideas seriously, I'll happily revise my position.

So, if you are an atheist and adopt the BB with itś singularity, you can only have faith and nothing more that it existed.

Why on earth would anybody (atheist or otherwise) need to believe in a literal singularity by faith? I have no idea if there was a literal singularity - it seems somewhat unlikely but I don't know - neither does anybody else. The scientific BB theory doesn't include the possible singularity, it's about the expansion of space from a hot, dense state some 14 billion years ago. There is plentiful evidence to support it.

 

[PruePhillip]

At this point you lose me.
I don't do miracles.

Okay. Science speaks to cause and effects.
This effect from that cause.

Rain isn't a miracle, it's the condensation of water vapor
What causes that?
The sun.
What causes the sun?
Sunshine isn't a miracle but heat and photons from our nearest star
What causes photons, a miracle?
No, photons emerge from the fusion process - hydrogen to helium
What causes the fusion, a miracle?
No the power of gravity
What causes gravity, a miracle?
We aren't sure what gravity is, but most likely an explanation will soon emerge
But at the end of the chain of events, what started the first event, a miracle?
No, it was caused by .... wait, you said the FIRST EVENT? It couldn't have been
caused by anything, by definition.
So, that's a miracle then?
No, we don't believe miracles.
So how did the first event in the chain happen?
Please don't ask.

 

[PruePhillip]

There is plentiful evidence to support
it.

Sure is. But what started the Big Bang?
Maybe it was hyper-dimensional membranes colliding
So what caused the membranes?
Ultimately, it can't be 'turtles all the way down'
Way, way back there were no laws of physics, there weren't even numbers.

Someone external to the system had to start the system, else it was the
Super Ultimate Miracle of things bursting into being without cause or reason.

 

[ratiocinator]

Rain isn't a miracle, it's the condensation of water vapor
What causes that?
The sun.
What causes the sun?
Sunshine isn't a miracle but heat and photons from our nearest star
What causes photons, a miracle?
No, photons emerge from the fusion process - hydrogen to helium
What causes the fusion, a miracle?
No the power of gravity
What causes gravity, a miracle?
We aren't sure what gravity is, but most likely an explanation will soon emerge
But at the end of the chain of events, what started the first event, a miracle?
No, it was caused by .... wait, you said the FIRST EVENT? It couldn't have been
caused by anything, by definition.
So, that's a miracle then?
No, we don't believe miracles.
So how did the first event in the chain happen?
Please don't ask.

Firstly, if you postulate a god, you have exactly the same problem. What caused god? - Please don't ask.

Secondly, we don't know that everything has a cause and there are good reasons to think otherwise.

Thirdly, why only one un-caused cause anyway?

Fourthly, causality tends to depend on time, and the universe (according to general relativity) is a four-dimensional object and time is just some (observer dependant) directions within it. The object itself is timeless.

Fourthly, even if we accept all his, it isn't "don't ask", it's "we don't know".

 

[Altfish]

Okay. Science speaks to cause and effects.
This effect from that cause.

Rain isn't a miracle, it's the condensation of water vapor
What causes that?
The sun.
What causes the sun?
Sunshine isn't a miracle but heat and photons from our nearest star
What causes photons, a miracle?
No, photons emerge from the fusion process - hydrogen to helium
What causes the fusion, a miracle?
No the power of gravity
What causes gravity, a miracle?
We aren't sure what gravity is, but most likely an explanation will soon emerge
But at the end of the chain of events, what started the first event, a miracle?
No, it was caused by .... wait, you said the FIRST EVENT? It couldn't have been
caused by anything, by definition.
So, that's a miracle then?
No, we don't believe miracles.
So how did the first event in the chain happen?
Please don't ask.

 

[ratiocinator]

Someone external to the system had to start the system..

How did this "someone" come to exist? How come it's a someone, not a something?

Whatever your answer to the first question, apply it directly to the universe and simplify things...

 

[PruePhillip]

If the equation is a standard left to right equation then
what I refer to is the first formula, not something in the
middle (that's God of the Gaps stuff)
The first equation which defined the laws of physics
which caused the universe to spring into being.
Only... there were no numbers, no equations, no
physics to act upon.
The universe had no "space" and no energy and
no mass and no physical laws. Most of all, it had
no reason.

 

[PruePhillip]

How did this "someone" come to exist? How come it's a someone, not a something?

Whatever your answer to the first question, apply it directly to the universe and simplify things...

The problem with the equation is that for this discussion it is meaningless,
but it sure looks good. In the beginning there was no mathematics, no
numbers, no nothing. In ways we simply don't comprehend, mathematics
came with the universe, not before it.

 

[Altfish]

Mathematics and science did not come with the universe.
It was a human invention, a way to describe the universe.

 

[ratiocinator]

In the beginning there was no mathematics, no
numbers, no nothing. In ways we simply don't comprehend, mathematics
came with the universe, not before it.

What do you mean by "in the beginning" and how do you know that this assertion about it is correct?

 

[PruePhillip]

Mathematics and science did not come with the universe.
It was a human invention, a way to describe the universe.

Two problems
1 - we don't know if numbers just describe things or they are entities in themselves
2 - with no physical phenomenon then there's nothing to describe, hence no numbers.

How can there be pi, the ratio of circumference to diameter when no circle existed?
Is there a pi in the universe? Was there a pi before there was ever a circle? Did we
invent numbers or did we find them?

 

[Altfish]

Two problems
1 - we don't know if numbers just describe things or they are entities in themselves
2 - with no physical phenomenon then there's nothing to describe, hence no numbers.

How can there be pi, the ratio of circumference to diameter when no circle existed?
Is there a pi in the universe? Was there a pi before there was ever a circle? Did we
invent numbers or did we find them?

I said numbers were man made inventions to describe the universe.

"One" is called "Uno" in some languages, the Romans called it "Unus" (IIRC) - it doesn't matter what it is called it has the same value and is used t describe one 'item', ie one sheep. Numbers have been around ever since humans traded and probably before.
The Romans were poor at maths because they had a lousy numeral system but also because they didn't have a zero.
It wasn't until about 7th century that humans realised they needed negative numbers. Complex numbers were later still (16th C?)

Pi is again a human discovery, Archimedes (I think) is responsible. But it was only in about 17th century that we started using the term and the Greek letter

We invented numbers to describe the universe.

 

[PruePhillip]

I said numbers were man made inventions to describe the universe.

"One" is called "Uno" in some languages, the Romans called it "Unus" (IIRC) - it doesn't matter what it is called it has the same value and is used t describe one 'item', ie one sheep. Numbers have been around ever since humans traded and probably before.
The Romans were poor at maths because they had a lousy numeral system but also because they didn't have a zero.
It wasn't until about 7th century that humans realised they needed negative numbers. Complex numbers were later still (16th C?)

Pi is again a human discovery, Archimedes (I think) is responsible. But it was only in about 17th century that we started using the term and the Greek letter

We invented numbers to describe the universe.

So, if we "invented numbers" then we didn't discover them.
It gets into a messy metaphysics/philosophy issue doesn't
it. I am inclined to accept your point of view, but smarter
people than us beg to differ.
But to the point, whether invented or found, numbers did
not exist before the universe existed. Nor did physics or
physical laws. By definition, nothing existed. And yet
somehow, nothing made something - how? You are left
with either God or a miracle.

 

[Altfish]

So, if we "invented numbers" then we didn't discover them.
It gets into a messy metaphysics/philosophy issue doesn't
it. I am inclined to accept your point of view, but smarter
people than us beg to differ.
But to the point, whether invented or found, numbers did
not exist before the universe existed. Nor did physics or
physical laws. By definition, nothing existed.

I accept that.

And yet
somehow, nothing made something - how? You are left
with either God or a miracle.

Why just the two choices?
I stick with my third choice, which is neither of those...I don't know what the answer is and I happy with that.
Maybe in the future we will know...maybe it'll remain a mystery...who knows?

 

[Kangaroo Feathers]

So, if we "invented numbers" then we didn't discover them.
It gets into a messy metaphysics/philosophy issue doesn't
it. I am inclined to accept your point of view, but smarter
people than us beg to differ.
But to the point, whether invented or found, numbers did
not exist before the universe existed. Nor did physics or
physical laws. By definition, nothing existed. And yet
somehow, nothing made something - how? You are left
with either God or a miracle.

The problem is the concept of "before the universe". Time as we experience it, appears to be a dimensional aspect OF the universe, therefore in a very real sense "before the universe" is, counterintuitively, a meainingless concept. Sort of like North of the North Pole, or colder than absolute zero.

 

[PruePhillip]

The problem is the concept of "before the universe". Time as we experience it, appears to be a dimensional aspect OF the universe, therefore in a very real sense "before the universe" is, counterintuitively, a meainingless concept. Sort of like North of the North Pole, or colder than absolute zero.

True, maybe. Your answer is what many turn to.
It's like saying the universe has always existed.
I find it dodges the question.
Yet when someone starts talking about God, so
many will claim that science has the answer to
how nothing became something, and an event
happened without a cause to make it happen.

So I am happy with two scenarios, God or a
miracle. Endless loops don't count for me.

 

[Kangaroo Feathers]

True, maybe. Your answer is what many turn to.
It's like saying the universe has always existed.
I find it dodges the question.
Yet when someone starts talking about God, so
many will claim that science has the answer to
how nothing became something, and an event
happened without a cause to make it happen.

So I am happy with two scenarios, God or a
miracle. Endless loops don't count for me.

Or other options we don't easily comprehend. Hey, I believe God ultimately created the universe, I just see no reason to assume he didn't use naturalistic principles.