The "something can't come from nothing" argument

[metis]

The concept of dark energy is relatively new, and needed to explain the shspe of the universe. Let me give some thoughts about dark matter and dark energy:

Dark matter - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dark energy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Note, the universe is approx. 68-73% dark energy. Here is an explanation for the dark energy:

"The existence of dark energy, in whatever form, is needed to reconcile the measured geometry of space with the total amount of matter in the universe. Measurements of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropies indicate that the universe is close to flat. For the shape of the universe to be flat, the mass/energy density of the universe must be equal to the critical density. The total amount of matter in the universe (including baryons and dark matter), as measured from the CMB spectrum, accounts for only about 30% of the critical density. This implies the existence of an additional form of energy to account for the remaining 70%.[15] The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) spacecraft seven-year analysis estimated a universe made up of 72.8% dark energy, 22.7% dark matter and 4.5% ordinary matter.[4] Work done in 2013 based on the Planck spacecraft observations of the CMB gave a more accurate estimate of 68.3% of dark energy, 26.8% of dark matter and 4.9% of ordinary matter.[18]"

The minute I saw "dark energy" and "dark matter" above, I knew where you were coming from, so thanks for the clarification. BTW, I agree with you.

 

[1robin]

Where can I read these eyewitness accounts?

They are in the Gospels and Paul's writings. Was Paul not a sworn enemy of Christianity when he met Christ? I will assume that providing what was asked for made no difference what so ever.

 

[1robin]

I thought that's what a vacuum of space was.



In fact they do the quantum experiments in the vacuum otherwise there would be unknown variable from free floating particles.

Are we redefining nothing now?

Yes the only nothing cannot mean currently is the absence of being (which is what it actually does mean). Modern scientists have transformed nothing to mean any something. It is a semantic punt.

 

[1robin]

What's interesting is that mathematical formulas point in the direction that dark matter is more prevalent than all other matter, and yet we can't find the #*%$_@&_) stuff! Maybe what we call "space" may be more occupied than what we think.

That was my point. No longer is empty space considered nothing. For one it is space not nothing, two it contains energy fluctuations, three it may contain dark matter or dark energy. However none of this helps in getting a universe because even space was on-existent to begin with.

 

[1robin]

Then what are you talking about?

Non-existence.

 

[1robin]

Is there such thing as nothing ?.

Aristotle said it was what rocks dream about. If there is no such thing as nothing the greatest scholars for every century sure wasted a lot of time. Nothing is lack of being. It is an abstract concept not a material object, no less valid than numbers.

 

[SkepticThinker]

They are in the Gospels and Paul's writings. Was Paul not a sworn enemy of Christianity when he met Christ? I will assume that providing what was asked for made no difference what so ever.

Where are the eyewitness accounts? Who are these other enemies that Jesus appeared before and where can I read their eyewitness accounts?

And if they do actually exist, what reason do we have to believe they are accurate, given that we know how faulty the human memory can be?

Paul saw a light and heard a voice. Maybe he simply had a seizure or something.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I have no idea whether you mentioned the enlighten or events associated with it or not. I had previously mentioned names that had no connection with the enlightenment. I later mentioned the enlightenment. I thought you were saying my names were not associated with the enlightenment. That is because they were never intended to be. If you were referring to something else my names and claims still stand but I have no idea what you meant.

You said this:

Christians on the basis of faith have added more to scientific knowledge than any other cultural group. You ever heard of Newton, Faraday, Da Vinci, Maxwell, Kepler, Bacon, Galileo, Descartes, Bacon, Boyle, Planck, etc. In fact if you include the scientific contributions of people who had faith in God it would dwarf what was produced by those that did not.

To which I responded that Christianity was the only game in town for a very long time so it's not all that surprising that these people identified themselves as Christians.

Then you said:

Christianity was not only not the only game in town originally, it was persecuted by the most powerful empire on earth and even their by their own countrymen. Unlike Islam it did not grow based on power, loot, raiding caravans, and force in those early decades. It only had the strength of it's message to overcome the world, and did so astonishingly well. Your referring to a time long afterwards when that message had converted the empire that had tried so many times to destroy it. Yet even then it was not the only game in town. What I mentioned happened mostly during the enlightenment. Which was not as commonly thought a push back against faith, it was a push back against corrupt church domination of intellectualism. Even during the enlightenment it was Christians making the most progress. At that time less than 30% of humanity was Christian, yet most of the science came from that 30%.

So then I pointed out that many of the people in the list you gave where dead before the Enlightenmnent occurred. To which you replied:

Those names were not connected to the enlightenment.

So yeah, I'm a bit confused as to what you're trying to say. With good reason, I think.

I am sure that occurred. I am also quite sure it does not have any meaningful effect of Christians contributions to science since many of them were in direct confrontation with stupid church traditions. At best it would balance out and be a wash. It is however very hard to fake actual faith.

It's not that hard if you fear being murdered for expressing any other belief.

You can do so without my responding or reading them as well. There is no point to doing that and no justification can be made for it. If you want to waste your time do not expect me to do so as well. Honor alone should prevent you from placing words in another's mouth but as you said you may do it anyway.

Well gee, it certainly sounds like you think their contributions were insignificant to me:

In my ten years of higher education not one Chinese or Muslim was ever even mentioned in the history of my academic disciplines. They of course existed but were not necessary to establish the development of science.

You've stated several times that you've never heard of any scientists from China or the Middle East. What's the point in saying that if not to diminish their contributions to science?

Again with assuming my motivations which you have no access to nor knowledge of. I have debated Islamic scientific contributions quite a lot. Look in the Muhammad is great thread and you will find dozens of them in made in detail. Of course minor fluctuations occur in the make up of most groups. That however does not even begin to explain why Christians dominated science in it's greatest days for so very long. For instance it did not have any effect on Chinese, Japanese, south American, Pacific rim, or even African science for huge swaths of time yet all together they did not equal Christians contributions.

How have I assumed your motivations with what I said there??

You're going to attribute the fact that most modern day scientists identify as non-religious to the fact that minor fluctuations occur in the makeup of most groups? I don't know if I'd say that's a minor fluctuation. What do you think is motivating modern day scientists, since it's obviously not religious faith?

Do not think I ma discounting gene decoding, medical advancements, nor space exploration. I am saying that all those are based on breakthroughs made by Christians and in fields they pioneered. Almost all of science has value and is helpful but most of what is necessary is Egyptian, Greek, and Christian. The only completely new and independent modern science is the quantum. Let me put it another way, if the goal was to damage scientific progress as much as possible by removing the contributions of a single cultural group, Christianity is the obvious choice.

Many nonreligious and non-Christian scientists were pioneers in many scientific fields as well. Minimize then if you like. We could very easily say that Christians were just building on the earlier work of the Greeks, as you pointed out when talking about Muslim scientists, if that's the way you want to play it.

I was given a full education on what or who allowed the development of science as we know it, or at least was crucial to it. Not one name on that list was even mentioned. I am talking about relative value here not the existence of absolute value.

So what?
I've heard of them. So where does that leave us?

I am not a medical student but I just watched "something the Lord made" which covered medicines greats including surgery. His name was not mentioned.

His Encyclopedia of Medicine was apparently considered standard reference material throughout the Islamic and European world for over 500 years. He also invented some surgical instruments that are still in use today. So I don't know why your extensive education didn't cover him. Maybe you didn't go to medical school?

Maybe the film didn't mention him because it's about Alfred Blalock and Vivien Thomas.

That being said Islam's greatest advancement was in medicine. I am aware of several greats that were Muslims. I thought we were discussing physics, chemistry, mathematics, cosmology, genetics, biology, etc... the classic sciences. Medicine is kind of it's own thing and I do not claim Christian superiority in it but if investigated I believe I would find it there as well.

We're discussing science. Why would medicine not fall under that category?

What are you doing? I never said 100% of all scientific inventions are Christian. I have constantly said that is not the case. The list of people who made progress that are not Christian is endless but still not as impressive as Christianity when compared to any other single group.
Since I never even hinted no science exists outside of Christian Europe this was not necessary.

You said the vast majority of scientific inventions and breakthroughs were made by Christians and downplayed the contributions of scientists from other parts of the world.
You said this:
Never heard of half of them. I was never ever taught about a single one in ten years of college, I never saw them in a single text book, even in the history of mathematics and physics classes. I have read about a few of them on my own and they are scientists but not among the Newton and Da Vinci type. Did you think I claimed you cannot find dozens of names of scientists in other cultures or something. Was a single one of them the father of a academic field?
So I gave you an example of a Muslim scientist who was a father of an academic field.

Here is something that is not so meaningless. I typed in 100 of histories greatest scientists and picked the first link. I did not even look at it beyond the first 4 or 5. You look at it and tell me which cultural group has the most members on that list. I will even bet there are 10 theistic names for every atheist name but that is just guessing.
100 Scientists Who Shaped World History

I think I missed a couple, but my count comes to something like:

Non-religious/Atheist/Agnostic = 25
Unknown = 24
Jewish = 14
Other = 2
Deist = 2
Christian = 29

As long as you agree that the facts back up my opinion.

I don't know that they do.

Continued ...

 

[SkepticThinker]

I have thought about this a little. I do not think that the general scientific fields would suffer to much if all atheistic contributions were removed. Some specific areas of study would but not the fields themselves. At the level I was educated to I do not see much loss at all, but that level does not include the most modern areas of science. I end at partial differential equations, light based physics, and circuit analysis.

Just judging from the list you gave me, I'm not so sure you're right.

If I can get through 10 years of school with never hearing their names how essential could they be? I was not given a single name in the essential history of all the higher math I had and the calculus based physics. I even studied secondary mathematical education and they covered more history still and not one of those names was mentioned. Constant mention was made of Newton, Planck, and those other Christians I mentioned because any history of science must.

So what? I went to school for many years also and never once discussed Stephen Hawking, for example. Know why? Because I studied neuroscience and so he didn't come up much. Maybe since you didn't study every single field of science during your years of schooling, you probably don't know the names of every scientist who ever lived. There's no shame in that.

I have read and watched many documentaries on the enlightenment and claim that what I stated is consistent with more or the evidence than your version of it but it really is not important either. The only thing that needs to be established is the fact that it was a revolt by atheists against Christian ignorance is pathetically ridiculous. There was an over abundance of both Christian ignorance and oppression but it was not primarily an atheist rebellion against them, it was a Christian revolt against them.

I've read and watched a lot too. You're not the only person in the world who does such things.

I'm pretty sure I didn't state anywhere that the enlightenment was a "revolt by atheists against Christian ignorance." I"m not sure where you came up with that.

 

[psychoslice]

Aristotle said it was what rocks dream about. If there is no such thing as nothing the greatest scholars for every century sure wasted a lot of time. Nothing is lack of being. It is an abstract concept not a material object, no less valid than numbers.

Yes thank you, that is what I thought more or less.

 

[Thief]

Aristotle said it was what rocks dream about. If there is no such thing as nothing the greatest scholars for every century sure wasted a lot of time. Nothing is lack of being. It is an abstract concept not a material object, no less valid than numbers.

And numbers are a cognitive construct existing only in the mind of Man.
Valid?.....sure......as long as you don't say they are substance or force.

 

[Avi1001]

The minute I saw "dark energy" and "dark matter" above, I knew where you were coming from, so thanks for the clarification. BTW, I agree with you.

I need to give this issue some more thought. The statement "something coming from nothing" can have multiple meanings. The more popular interpretation, that has been discussed a lot, is that the universe could have been created without the need to invoke a G-d. However, the way I interpret it, that something could come from nothing is much less clear. It seems to me, that by considering matter and anti-matter, energy and dark energy, that something could have come from nothing. But I think I need to look at these mass and energy balances more deeply.

For example, I think there are issues related to free energy, enthalpy and entropy.

Has anyone considered these ?

 

[shawn001]

Lawrence Krauss: The Flavors of Nothing (YouTube Geek Week!)

Theoretical Physicist Lawrence Krauss explains the different types of nothing. Or something.

"Transcript--
when you think about nothing you have to be a little more careful than you normally are because, in fact, nothing is a physical concept because it's the absence of something, and something is a physical concept. And what we've learned over the last hundred years is that nothing is much more complicated than we would've imagined otherwise.

For example, the simplest kind of nothing is the kind of nothing of the Bible. Say an infinite empty space, an infinite dark void of the Bible. You know, nothing in it, no particles, no radiation, nothing. Well, that kind of nothing turns out to be full of stuff in a way or at least much more complicated than you might have imagined because due to the laws of quantum mechanics and relativity, we now know that empty space is a boiling bubbling brew of virtual particles that are popping in and out of existence at every moment."

[youtube]UemhCsaeGgc[/youtube]
Lawrence Krauss: The Flavors of Nothing (YouTube Geek Week!) - YouTube

This goes into it some more detail.

I know Robin wants to use the the cosmological argument for some God, of course in Robins case, its based on personal religious beliefs. It would be something if it wasn't the "God" Robin, believed in personally.

You can use the same argument aliens in another universe created this universe or pick any God you might want to use.

 

[Thief]

I need to give this issue some more thought. The statement "something coming from nothing" can have multiple meanings. The more popular interpretation, that has been discussed a lot, is that the universe could have been created without the need to invoke a G-d. However, the way I interpret it, that something could come from nothing is much less clear. It seems to me, that by considering matter and anti-matter, energy and dark energy, that something could have come from nothing. But I think I need to look at these mass and energy balances more deeply.

For example, I think there are issues related to free energy, enthalpy and entropy.

Has anyone considered these ?

An object at rest will remain at rest...until 'Something' moves it.
Motion is then what?

Force with an existence prior to substance?
I might call that....Spirit.

 

[metis]

That was my point. No longer is empty space considered nothing. For one it is space not nothing, two it contains energy fluctuations, three it may contain dark matter or dark energy. However none of this helps in getting a universe because even space was on-existent to begin with.

That may depend on how one defines "space". Within an atom, the volume involved is mostly "space" (although probably not impermeable), and if cosmologists are correct with their mathematical models that our universe prior to the BB was a highly condensed area even smaller than a present-day atom, then there probably was "space", but extremely minute.

 

[metis]

An object at rest will remain at rest...until 'Something' moves it.
Motion is then what?

Force with an existence prior to substance?
I might call that....Spirit.

Who says force was "prior to substance"?

 

[Thief]

Who says force was "prior to substance"?

If to the contrary.....substance can move without something to move it.
That would be very...unscientific.

 

[FranklinMichaelV.3]

Who says force was "prior to substance"?

Don't go Down that rabbit hole man....

 

[metis]

I need to give this issue some more thought. The statement "something coming from nothing" can have multiple meanings. The more popular interpretation, that has been discussed a lot, is that the universe could have been created without the need to invoke a G-d. However, the way I interpret it, that something could come from nothing is much less clear. It seems to me, that by considering matter and anti-matter, energy and dark energy, that something could have come from nothing. But I think I need to look at these mass and energy balances more deeply.

For example, I think there are issues related to free energy, enthalpy and entropy.

Has anyone considered these ?

Yes, the concept of our universe popping out from nothing is a hypothesis that some cosmologists think might be possible, but most of them that I have read don't believe it's likely. A couple of them have written that a majority of their ilk drift in the direction that sub-atomic particles, or charges that make these particles such as "strings" (string theory), may go back into infinity, which is slightly older than I am.

Secondly, in quantum physics, we have to remember that some sub-atomic particles can seemingly disappear, only to show up somewhere else. Electrons, for example, will sometimes do that. Is it possible that this could account for our minute universe maybe to just seemingly pop out of nothing?

I know, but I ain't telling you. But if you send me enough $...

 

[Avi1001]

I know, but I ain't telling you. But if you send me enough $...

This post is in the wrong thread, it should be here:

.......> http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/science-technology/159204-entreprenuership-thread.html.