If the Universe Required a Creator ...

[Quintessence]

I understand the idea, I've heard it before. The fatal flaw is you can replace the word "God" with "the universe" or "a Cosmic Giraffe" and it works just as well.

It does? In what culture does calling a rose a potato fail to cause problems in communication or convey very different concepts?

 

[Neo Deist]

Yeah, that part not supposed to be inside the quote box:

Wrong, the universe has always existed.

Not wrong, but I have no problem believing that both God and the universe have always existed. We can't prove anything otherwise, so why not?!

 

[Demonslayer]

Not wrong, but I have no problem believing that both God and the universe have always existed.

OK good I like this. Because the usual argument that stems from this line of thought is "the universe couldn't have just always been here, nor could the universe just appear out of nothing...therefore it had to be created."

If you have no problem believing that the universe has always existed, we agree on that score. Of course this means there is no need for a "creator" to have created the universe.

 

[Demonslayer]

It does? In what culture does calling a rose a potato fail to cause problems in communication or convey very different concepts?

So let's back up a step. The argument is "the uncaused cause must be God, God does not need a cause, God has always existed."

To that I said you can replace the word "God" with the universe or a Cosmic Giraffe. Let's take the silly out and just use universe.

Why can't I say "The uncaused cause must be the universe, the universe does not need a cause, the universe has always existed."

What makes that sentence less sensible than the one where God is the uncaused cause?

 

[Neo Deist]

OK good I like this. Because the usual argument that stems from this line of thought is "the universe couldn't have just always been here, nor could the universe just appear out of nothing...therefore it had to be created."

If you have no problem believing that the universe has always existed, we agree on that score. Of course this means there is no need for a "creator" to have created the universe.

True about the Creator, and all of those creation stories are man made fabrications. It was ancient and primitive people trying to explain the world around them. Those stories copied each other as most people were nomadic and moved around.

I am a deist, so my belief in a Creator, regardless of how big or small Its creation effort is/was, comes from my personal observations of nature and the cosmos. I see design and purpose, not randomness. That is something that no one can refute.

 

[Demonslayer]

True about the Creator, and all of those creation stories are man made fabrications. It was ancient and primitive people trying to explain the world around them. Those stories copied each other as most people were nomadic and moved around.

Correct, of course.

I am a deist, so my belief in a Creator, regardless of how big or small Its creation effort is/was, comes from my personal observations of nature and the cosmos. I see design and purpose, not randomness. That is something that no one can refute.

Nor would I ever. I'm a very strong atheist but I've often said that the only sensible religious position is deism. You're not claiming anything about the Creator. You're not saying he has a big pink elephant head, that he once impregnated a human woman, or that if I ask nicely enough he'll help me find my car keys.

All you're saying is you look around and say "man, I just don't think all this stuff was always here, there must have been some genesis." And you're right, how can anyone refute such an idea? You're not really claiming anything I could refute.

I have nothing to argue with a deist. I believe the universe was always here and that there is no grand intelligence, but I can't know that for sure. I damn sure know the folk tale Gods aren't real, but how the hell do I know what happened way, way, way back? I always say "I don't know what happened, but I damn sure know some things that didn't/"

 

[George-ananda]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Super god?

My thought is that God is outside of time and time is part of the creation. Therefor the question isn't rightly put.

 

[Deathbydefault]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Super god?

Of course we joke about this a lot as there's never going to be an answer.
I assume mono-theological concepts treat god as the paradox beginning.
The original origin, the center of opposites, the instance of color.

It's fun discussion in philosophy, but in a general debate it's not really a substantial position.

 

[savagewind]

Actually, this "God" fellow is just one of many gods, each of whom plays with universes.
We know very little about their society & its origins.
But some have postulated that they were created by "Ubergod", who is one of many ubergods.
Their society & origins would be even less amenable to study.
Some even say this "turtles" all the way up.....or down.

A like for "or down". LOL

 

[savagewind]

What is so funny is the other belief that the universe had no beginning. I can believe one "thing" which isn't even physical might have always existed. But to believe everything of physics always existed is too far a stretch for me.

 

[idav]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Super god?

If the singularity was God then it didn't need creating. Something has to be default which is existence with all its godly attributes.

 

[Milton Platt]

God has always existed, plain and simple.

Trying to limit God or wrap human understanding around an infinite being is just silly.

And yet there does not seem to be any dependable evidence for it? Why make the assumption that any god exists? It does not limit a god to ask that it be demonstrated that he actually exists. If you cannot do so, then what does your belief rest on?

 

[Neo Deist]

And yet there does not seem to be any dependable evidence for it? Why make the assumption that any god exists?

Because I choose to.

It does not limit a god to ask that it be demonstrated that he actually exists. If you cannot do so, then what does your belief rest on?

My belief, as a deist, is based on personal observations in nature and the cosmos. I see and feel purpose and design, not randomness.

To quote another atheist from this forum: "it is damn near impossible to debate against a deist..."

As others have pointed out on various threads, atheists and deists are nearly identical in every aspect with the exception of the belief in God. Deists tend to believe in evolution, science, etc. and debunk the supernatural, miracles, and divine inspiration. Many atheists have respect for deists and will tell you that our belief in God is about the only credible one they can see.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Super god?

If the universe required a spontaneous natural mechanism, then who/what created that? Same apparent paradox, a wash, and a moot point, since here we are, there is a solution one way or another.

What is not even, is the capacity of creative intelligence v blind chance to create everything we see around us.

Nor does creative intelligence invoke this additional paradox; the laws of nature being created by those same laws.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Super god?

The universe never required a creator because it is eternal.....but it is absolute universal being that is responsible for the ongoing creation and destruction of material forms...from the microbe to the galaxy...

 

[fantome profane]

Per classical monotheist theology, their one-god is, by definition, the uncaused cause, or uncreated creator. With respect to that theology, this isn't really a valid question.

Theologians cannot make the question invalid just by declaring the question invalid. And they cannot make "God" uncaused just by declaring "God" uncaused. If a complicated entity like God can just exist without an explanation, then so can other complicated entities and the first cause argument is defeated. If complicated entities do require an explanation then so does God. And even William Lane Craig cannot just declare it otherwise.

 

[fantome profane]

Eh, I didn't want to defend the argument but you're misunderstanding it and I'd just like to clarify what the position actually says.

People who properly hold the position would probably take a William Lane Craig approach of saying "Everything that begins to exist has a cause", which of course would not include God. The statement "something can't come from nothing" also only applies to things that have a beginning, if God always existed, there was no point in time where there was a 'nothing' that He had to come from.

And if there is an uncaused cause, you're right it doesn't have to be a specific God, not necessarily the Christian one, but based on a series of deductions it is said to have god-like qualities, and so maybe it is a "Cosmic Giraffe" but you'd have to concede a god-like being existed and caused all things.

The universe can't be the cause because the universe doesn't cause itself, and is argued it must have had a beginning, based both on philosophy (problem of infinities going into the past) and science (current big bang cosmology supporting a definitive beginning of the known universe)

I have seen Craig's series of deductions and they utterly fail to show that a first cause must be in anyway god-like. Even if we accept the notion that there must be an uncaused cause, that uncaused cause need not be a sentient entity, it need not be a singular entity (if there can be one uncaused cause why not 3, or 10, or 1000 uncaused causes?), it need not be eternal. The uncaused cause certainly does not need to listen to prayer or pass judgment on the souls of human beings when they die.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

If the universe required a creator, and its creator was god, then who/what created god?

Here (at least some) models of modern physics/cosmology and theism agree: it is meaningless to ask what created the universe because the origins of the universe mark the beginning of time, and it is meaningless to ask what happened when there was no time for anything to happen within or what caused causation (i.e., what caused that which makes it possible for x to cause y). God serves as a name-place or term for that which allowed causal chains to exist. It is as absurd to ask what caused "God" as it is to ask what caused causality.

The classic Aristotelian argument is that there must be a first uncaused cause. There can't be an infinite line of causes going backwards, there has to be a first one.

The "first cause" argument is hardly restricted to Aristotle, and arguably Zeno's logic (which predates Aristotle) is at play in the Aristotelian "first cause" argument. There can absolutely be an infinite line of causes going backwards, because (for example) if there weren't then no physical system is capable of possessing property values of the vast majority of real numbers. More importantly:

So by definition if there must be a first cause, it must be uncaused, and so if this is God there is nothing that created Him.

If there is a cause that was uncaused, it need not be the first. Disregarding physics and empiricism entirely, one need only posit a series (perhaps infinite) of uncaused causes that existed to demonstrate that there need not be any first uncaused cause.

Wrong, the universe has always existed.

Not according to modern physics.

 

[Sultan Of Swing]

because (for example) if there weren't then no physical system is capable of possessing property values of the vast majority of real numbers.

No physical system is capable of possessing property values of the vast majority of real numbers? Sorry, what does this mean?

If there is a cause that was uncaused, it need not be the first. Disregarding physics and empiricism entirely, one need only posit a series (perhaps infinite) of uncaused causes that existed to demonstrate that there need not be any first uncaused cause.

Sure, I don't think a serious philosopher would posit one uncaused cause with 100% certainty, but would appeal to Occam's razor?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Per classical monotheist theology, their one-god is, by definition, the uncaused cause, or uncreated creator. With respect to that theology, this isn't really a valid question.

Actually, it is a valid question, because merely saying that a god is an "uncaused cause" does nothing to establish that an uncaused cause exists... or that the thing the arguer considers God is one of these uncaused causes... or even that uncaused causes can exist.

More to the point of this thread, though, there's no automatic link from "God is an uncaused cause" to "there can be only one uncaused cause".

Generally, the classical arguments for theism are illogical messes that fail in several different ways.