First Cause

[David T]

Not necessarily. It’s perfectly possible that the physical laws within the universe (such as cause and effect) don’t apply to the universe itself. The whole thing is very difficult to even think about given were talking about concepts like “before time” and “everywhere in the same place”. Ultimately, nobody knows though in the scope and scale of our lives, I’m not convinced that fake makes any difference.

Agreed.
A little difficult to define reality scientifically since science requires separation from The topic for objective validity. If science cannot create realistic separation from the topic then scientific statements about the topic are darts at best. You can't be both the car engine and create an objective external schematic of the car engine at the same time that's impossible. Although everyone lives to pretend!!!!!

 

[David T]

In the beginning the universe was formed by expansion. Simultaneously space began when the movement began. Would not movement have started cause and effect?

Last I checked the cosmos is larger than my cranium. I mean a simple reality check would make that clear like breathe. . Cosmos big brain small. The cosmos laughs at the absurdity, nature alive or extinction now that's real. Oh wait we have science ce to save us.

 

[HonestJoe]

Cause and effect, in English, are nouns. If they can be the same thing, then they are the same thing. You need a new noun to define it. For now how about the phrase, not cause-effect.

Not at all. “John”, “Mr Smith”, “brother” and “manager” are all nouns but they can refer to the same individual. Anyway, the whole idea we’re talking about is that everything is in a constant chain of cause and effect, where every effect itself causes further effects to happen and so on. Pretty much everything that we’re aware of is both cause and effect, many times over. The key question here is how (if at all) that chain of events started.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Not at all. “John”, “Mr Smith”, “brother” and “manager” are all nouns but they can refer to the same individual. Anyway, the whole idea we’re talking about is that everything is in a constant chain of cause and effect, where every effect itself causes further effects to happen and so on. Pretty much everything that we’re aware of is both cause and effect, many times over. The key question here is how (if at all) that chain of events started.

My position is that the chain of events started when movement started. This "not cause-effect" was movement. The expanding of the universe is where cause and effect operates.
If cause is "a" and effect is "b" there needs to be an "a" and a "b" first. This happened in the expanding universe. Before that there was no "a" or "b".

 

[HonestJoe]

My position is that the chain of events started when movement started.

Sorry, but I don’t think that makes any sense. Movement is an effect and really a property of some object rather than a thing in itself. I doubt standard physical terms like “movement” can really be applied to the unique environment that was the very beginnings of our universe at all and I’m not convinced whatever concept you’re thinking of necessarily fits that simple word.

For example, if we’re assuming the universe expanding from some form of singularity, which is a popular form of hypothesis, you could call that expansion the “first cause”, since from it would come everything else, including time itself. I’d say it’s hard to call whatever caused time to come in to existence anything other than “first”. Unfortunately, there will always be the question of where that singularity came from. It’s almost as if every answer is causing the effect of another question.

 

[ChristineM]

In the beginning the universe was formed by expansion. Simultaneously space began when the movement began. Would not movement have started cause and effect?

The laws of thermodynamics as applied to this universe did not (could not) exist until some time after the initial event.

My understanding is these laws, including causality did not begin to resolve until 10^-32 of a second after moment 0 and did not fully resolve until 10^-20

 

[columbus]

My position is that the chain of events started when movement started. This "not cause-effect" was movement.

What is this position based on?
It appears to me that it's based on your intuition.

There's a bunch of stuff about reality that I find so counter-intuitive I have trouble grasping it. Why can't anything exceed the speed of light?
That doesn't make any sense because everything I have ever experienced can go a little faster if a little more energy comes to bear. But I don't much care either, it doesn't matter to my life. So I have faith in science, and the scientific method and scientists, to be honest about it.

That faith is based on my experience of science being generally correct, and having mechanisms to identify and discard incorrect beliefs. Religion doesn't have that. It commonly teaches things that are obviously wrong to most educated people and has no mechanisms to identify and discard falsehoods.

Tom

 

[sandy whitelinger]

What is this position based on?

In order to have distinctions like cause and effect there needs to be more than one thing. When movement happened distinctions started, then and now, here and there, this and that. Before that there was only the one.

 

[columbus]

In order to have distinctions like cause and effect there needs to be more than one thing. When movement happened distinctions started, then and now, here and there, this and that. Before that there was only the one.

As long as a vehicle keeps applying thrust it will keep accelerating.
Right?
Tom

 

[Jumi]

I'm offering that movement created cause and effect.

What could have caused the movement?

Cause could not have caused the first cause. Otherwise it would not have been first.

That's why I said there might not have been a first cause.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Sorry, but I don’t think that makes any sense. Movement is an effect and really a property of some object rather than a thing in itself. I doubt standard physical terms like “movement” can really be applied to the unique environment that was the very beginnings of our universe at all and I’m not convinced whatever concept you’re thinking of necessarily fits that simple word.

For example, if we’re assuming the universe expanding from some form of singularity, which is a popular form of hypothesis, you could call that expansion the “first cause”, since from it would come everything else, including time itself. I’d say it’s hard to call whatever caused time to come in to existence anything other than “first”. Unfortunately, there will always be the question of where that singularity came from. It’s almost as if every answer is causing the effect of another question.

I think it's clear that the laws of physics do not apply to the singularity only to the universe. Only when the singularity stopped being a singularity and separation started ie. movement did other things begin to happen.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

What could have caused the movement?

There was no cause before movement.

 

[Nakosis]

In the beginning the universe was formed by expansion. Simultaneously space began when the movement began. Would not movement have started cause and effect?

Change, something existing that was not there before.

We from our experience see a series of events occur. We are given to assume what came before to be the cause of what came after. Some of that is just assumption. I mean sometimes we assume the cause of an event without any verification.

We watch an event occur many many times and gain some certainty that X causes Y. Even then, lacking complete information, basically we are not omniscient, we could be wrong.

While our human concept of cause and effect has shown itself to be reliable enough, it is still a human concept of how the universe works.

I don't know that the universe has any necessity to actually work according to our concepts.

Regardless, something changed from its original state. We assume there was an identifiable cause.

So the first change, we assume there was a cause for it.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

As long as a vehicle keeps applying thrust it will keep accelerating.
Right?
Tom

Not my vehicle.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Change, something existing that was not there before.

We from our experience see a series of events occur. We are given to assume what came before to be the cause of what came after. Some of that is just assumption. I mean sometimes we assume the cause of an event without any verification.

We watch an event occur many many times and gain some certainty that X causes Y. Even then, lacking complete information, basically we are not omniscient, we could be wrong.

While our human concept of cause and effect has shown itself to be reliable enough, it is still a human concept of how the universe works.

I don't know that the universe has any necessity to actually work according to our concepts.

Regardless, something changed from its original state. We assume there was an identifiable cause.

So the first change, we assume there was a cause for it.

I'm saying cause and effect began at the same time.

 

[Nakosis]

I'm saying cause and effect began at the same time.

As a concept, maybe. I mean some intelligence, human supposedly created the concept, so in that sense, the idea of cause and effect were born together.

However if we assume the this is the actuality of how the universe works. The cause would have to have existed prior to the effect. So they could not have existed simultaneously.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

As a concept, maybe. I mean some intelligence, human supposedly created the concept, so in that sense, the idea of cause and effect were born together.

However if we assume the this is the actuality of how the universe works. The cause would have to have existed prior to the effect. So they could not have existed simultaneously.

Cause and effect existed before we came up with the idea from observing it.

Now, why could they have not existed simultaneously? Everything else did at the singularity.

 

[Nakosis]

Cause and effect existed before we came up with the idea from observing it.

Now, why could they have not existed simultaneously? Everything else did at the singularity.

It's not the way the concept works. If two things occur at the same time, how can you say one caused the other? If event A "movement" and event B "space" happen at the same time, how can you say movement caused space or the inverse, space caused movement?

 

[sandy whitelinger]

It's not the way the concept works. If two things occur at the same time, how can you say one caused the other? If event A "movement" and event B "space" happen at the same time, how can you say movement caused space or the inverse, space caused movement?

Perhaps they didn't like each other and decided to separate.

Now, as movement began and two things moved away from each other there was "space" between them. Only the could differentiation begin. Cause and effect did not begin until there was separation. The impetus for movement happened before the separation.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

It's not the way the concept works. If two things occur at the same time, how can you say one caused the other? If event A "movement" and event B "space" happen at the same time, how can you say movement caused space or the inverse, space caused movement?

Both "a" and "b" have the ability to both exhibit cause and effect.