The "something can't come from nothing" argument

[metis]

Your article is abound unbounded finites not true infinites. Circles are the same thing. They have no end but do have a finite circumference.

I can settle this, provide one actual infinite for every hundred finites I can, and you will have 1/100th of a justification.

It's really not a "circle" in any conventional sense of the word. Also, the reality is that you can't "settle this" largely because there simply is not enough information one way or anther, so all you are doing is elevating your beliefs to form "facts", and that's not science, and maybe not even good theology.

As Confucius supposedly taught (paraphrased), "the more you know, the more you know you really don't know".

 

[1robin]

Many people have fun with probability calculations. Here are two:
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/abinazir/2011/06/15/what-are-chances-you-would-be-born/
The chances of you existing

The second estimates that ten generations ago the chance of you being born was at most 1 in 6000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 000000000000000000000000000000000000. This is your proof that there is such a thing as a designer and creator. Not only that but it shows that this designer/creator must be constantly micromanaging his creation and be personally responsible for the existence of the DNA of every organism that exists or has ever existed.

Once again I see what is actually going on here I snot understood. Evolution is not one improbability winner. It is a series of trillions of them. I will make an analogy hoping it will make this clear. If a man wins a lottery everyone thinks well it was improbably but someone was going to win and he has as much chance as anyone. However if that same man won a thousand lotteries in a row not one sane human in history would doubt intent was behind it. Evolutions seems to defy odds in every detail and does so over and over and over. That like the lottery winner a thousand times in a row does not have a rational chance answer but makes intent almost necessary.

I have other problems with your analogy. What am I in that calculation? What probability can you assign to any specific I and before hand how would there by an I to examine? If there was no specific I to make predictions about then that probability becomes pretty much 100% someone would be born and that someone would be called me if it was another me altogether. Regardless the mathematics involved has virtually nothing to do with evolution anyway. It also would be better explained by agency or intent regardless. I have a reasons things keep defying the odds in life's favor but naturalism does not. Improbabilities are not a challenge to my views but to atheistic ones.

 

[1robin]

It's really not a "circle" in any conventional sense of the word. Also, the reality is that you can't "settle this" largely because there simply is not enough information one way or anther, so all you are doing is elevating your beliefs to form "facts", and that's not science, and maybe not even good theology.

As Confucius supposedly taught (paraphrased), "the more you know, the more you know you really don't know".

I did not suggest it was a circle. It is similar to a circle that it is not finite yet has no end. It is an unbounded finite. That is even if it is true. It is quite bizarre to me that every change to theism comes shrouded in the most ambiguous end of science every single time. Never arithmetic, geometry, algebra, calculus, etc...... it is always in the least understood deep end of speculative academia.

I did not suggest my faith is proven fact (objectively) this is a complete distortion of my claims. I constantly have to point out faith claims, and in fact most claims of any kind are best explanations or fits, not certainties. Seems no matter how emphatically I point that out or how many times I do then next person suggests that lack of absolute certainty equals uselessness.

 

[1robin]

Me again ...

If you want some interesting sites - try plugging this phrase from Bill Gates ito your favourite search engine -

Human DNA is like a computer program but far, far more advanced than any software ever created

Have a good one!

I have known about that quote for quite some time and have found it informative. Here are a few more.

Fred Hoyle (British astrophysicist): "A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question." (2)

George Ellis (British astrophysicist): "Amazing fine tuning occurs in the laws that make this [complexity] possible. Realization of the complexity of what is accomplished makes it very difficult not to use the word 'miraculous' without taking a stand as to the ontological status of the word." (3)

Paul Davies (British astrophysicist): "There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all....It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the Universe....The impression of design is overwhelming". (4)

Paul Davies: "The laws [of physics] ... seem to be the product of exceedingly ingenious design... The universe must have a purpose". (5)

Alan Sandage (winner of the Crawford prize in astronomy): "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." (6)

John O'Keefe (astronomer at NASA): "We are, by astronomical standards, a pampered, cosseted, cherished group of creatures.. .. If the Universe had not been made with the most exacting precision we could never have come into existence. It is my view that these circumstances indicate the universe was created for man to live in." (7)

George Greenstein (astronomer): "As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency - or, rather, Agency - must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?" (8)

Arthur Eddington (astrophysicist): "The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory." (9)

Arno Penzias (Nobel prize in physics): "Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say 'supernatural') plan." (10)

Roger Penrose (mathematician and author): "I would say the universe has a purpose. It's not there just somehow by chance." (11)

Tony Rothman (physicist): "When confronted with the order and beauty of the universe and the strange coincidences of nature, it's very tempting to take the leap of faith from science into religion. I am sure many physicists want to. I only wish they would admit it." (12)

Vera Kistiakowsky (MIT physicist): "The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." (13)

Robert Jastrow (self-proclaimed agnostic): "For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries." (14)

Stephen Hawking (British astrophysicist): "Then we shall… be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason - for then we would know the mind of God." (15)

Frank Tipler (Professor of Mathematical Physics): "When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics." (16) Note: Tipler since has actually converted to Christianity, hence his latest book, The Physics of ChristianityThe Physics of Christianity.

Alexander Polyakov (Soviet mathematician): "We know that nature is described by the best of all possible mathematics because God created it."(17)

Ed Harrison (cosmologist): "Here is the cosmological proof of the existence of God – the design argument of Paley – updated and refurbished. The fine tuning of the universe provides prima facie evidence of deistic design. Take your choice: blind chance that requires multitudes of universes or design that requires only one.... Many scientists, when they admit their views, incline toward the teleological or design argument." (18)

Edward Milne (British cosmologist): "As to the cause of the Universe, in context of expansion, that is left for the reader to insert, but our picture is incomplete without Him [God]." (19)

Barry Parker (cosmologist): "Who created these laws? There is no question but that a God will always be needed." (20)

Drs. Zehavi, and Dekel (cosmologists): "This type of universe, however, seems to require a degree of fine tuning of the initial conditions that is in apparent conflict with 'common wisdom'." (21)

Arthur L. Schawlow (Professor of Physics at Stanford University, 1981 Nobel Prize in physics): "It seems to me that when confronted with the marvels of life and the universe, one must ask why and not just how. The only possible answers are religious. . . . I find a need for God in the universe and in my own life." (22)

Henry "Fritz" Schaefer (Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry and director of the Center for Computational Quantum Chemistry at the University of Georgia): "The significance and joy in my science comes in those occasional moments of discovering something new and saying to myself, 'So that's how God did it.' My goal is to understand a little corner of God's plan." (23)

Wernher von Braun (Pioneer rocket engineer) "I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science." (24)

Carl Woese (microbiologist from the University of Illinois) "Life in Universe - rare or unique? I walk both sides of that street. One day I can say that given the 100 billion stars in our galaxy and the 100 billion or more galaxies, there have to be some planets that formed and evolved in ways very, very like the Earth has, and so would contain microbial life at least. There are other days when I say that the anthropic principal, which makes this universe a special one out of an unaccountably large number of universes, may not apply only to that aspect of nature we define in the realm of physics, but may extend to chemistry and biology. In that case life on Earth could be entirely unique." (25)

There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind. Antony Flew (Professor of Philosophy, former atheist, author, and debater) "It now seems to me that the findings of more than fifty years of DNA research have provided materials for a new and enormously powerful argument to design." (26)

Frank Tipler (Professor of Mathematical Physics): "From the perspective of the latest physical theories, Christianity is not a mere religion, but an experimentally testable science." (27)
Quotes from Scientists Regarding Design of the Universe

I would never expect atheists to do something as crazy as agree with these brilliant men, but their acting like there is nothing to what motivates these claims is intellectually bankrupt.

 

[1robin]

Playing devil's advocate here I would say that God being all powerful as he is can do whatever he likes. Including creating everything from nothing.
God said let there be light and poof the sun was born out of thin air...

takes a bigger leap of faith if you ask me.

Which one takes a bigger leap of faith, something created everything or nothing created it? The unconscious produced consciousness, the amoral produced morality, the irrational created a rational universe, non-life created life, or non intentional agents produced the most complex arrangement of matter in the universe by accident?

 

[Shad]

Once again I see what is actually going on here I snot understood. Evolution is not one improbability winner. It is a series of trillions of them. I will make an analogy hoping it will make this clear. If a man wins a lottery everyone thinks well it was improbably but someone was going to win and he has as much chance as anyone. However if that same man won a thousand lotteries in a row not one sane human in history would doubt intent was behind it. Evolutions seems to defy odds in every detail and does so over and over and over. That like the lottery winner a thousand times in a row does not have a rational chance answer but makes intent almost necessary.

False analogy as you clearly acknowledge evolution is a series of trillions(more) of events(lottery). Yet you confine your analogy to a single individual in a series of single event lottery games. You are attempting to use this example to steer toward your presupposition nothing more.

We have X amount of organisms with X being the total amount of organisms including multicellular organisms such as humans alive at a given instant. Each organism is playing an individual lottery while also playing other lotteries with other organism, group lotteries(species) and competition lotteries. These other lotteries are in the forms of resource competition, breeding, life expectancy, premature death, environmental, etc. In some of these forms one organism can cause another to lose be it one consuming the other, one competing to consume a 3rd organism but robbing a 2nd of the 3rd for it's own needs. Also one must consider lotteries will vary in pace, magnitude and results; fast reproduction, multiple births, single birth, slow reproduction, etc. I could carry on but I hope that I have made my point.

The same can be applied to chemical reaction which believed to have started life.

 

[ArtieE]

Once again I see what is actually going on here I snot understood. Evolution is not one improbability winner. It is a series of trillions of them. I will make an analogy hoping it will make this clear. If a man wins a lottery everyone thinks well it was improbably but someone was going to win and he has as much chance as anyone. However if that same man won a thousand lotteries in a row not one sane human in history would doubt intent was behind it.

So are you then saying that if that same man won a thousand lotteries in a row a god made him fill in the correct numbers every time or did this god make the lottery machine come up with his numbers every time or what exactly happened?

 

[1robin]

False analogy as you clearly acknowledge evolution is a series of trillions(more) of events(lottery). Yet you confine your analogy to a single individual in a series of single event lottery games. You are attempting to use this example to steer toward your presupposition nothing more.

The exact opposite is the case. Every one of these lotteries, evolution wins. That was the whole point. That is exactly why that analogy works. You might as well have claimed being tall is an impediment to dunking a basketball.

A universe without intent does not care about evolution yet seems to work everything out in it's favor. Out of the zero chance of getting any universe to occur in it gets one anyway. Out of the infinite possible universe it gets one in the infetesinmally small range that can support any theoretical life at all. Then it gets just the right gravity, just the right expansion, the right nuclear forces, etc... times a trillion. We have an almost infinity sided dice hear and it comes up evolution trillions of times in a row. No rational human would see that and think chance explains it. My analogy is correct.

We have X amount of organisms with X being the total amount of organisms including multicellular organisms such as humans alive at a given instant. Each organism is playing an individual lottery while also playing other lotteries with other organism, group lotteries(species) and competition lotteries. These other lotteries are in the forms of resource competition, breeding, life expectancy, premature death, environmental, etc. In some of these forms one organism can cause another to lose be it one consuming the other, one competing to consume a 3rd organism but robbing a 2nd of the 3rd for it's own needs. Also one must consider lotteries will vary in pace, magnitude and results; fast reproduction, multiple births, single birth, slow reproduction, etc. I could carry on but I hope that I have made my point.

You have but it proved mine. Your not getting me. You getting any human and claiming it was equally unlikely but that is not true because any human would do. Just the same as any single lottery winner would do until it occurred more than once. That is why multiplicative probabilities take unlikely things to absurdly impossible things almost instantly. How much probability have you had? I had three semesters on it aloe and many hour son using it in other fields of math.

The same can be applied to chemical reaction which believed to have started life.

That is funny. The chances that proper or beneficial bonds break apart is vastly greater than the chances they hold together in the proper positions until all necessary sequences are in place. An analogy here is a 1000 piece puzzle set broken up and thrown into a bag. It is shaken. At tikes you get lower than equilibrium complexity. 2 or 3 pieces for correctly but they always come apart before many more can fall into place because of probability. The only fault of that analogy is it not even fractionally as improbable a chemicals producing life.

 

[1robin]

So are you then saying that if that same man won a thousand lotteries in a row a god made him fill in the correct numbers every time or did this god make the lottery machine come up with his numbers every time or what exactly happened?

No I am saying if a man won a thousand lottery's in a row no one in history would think chance explained it. There would be riots, talk shows, and indictments. And every one of them would claim there was an intelligent agent behind it. Nature is exactly the same. It appears some intelligent source is behind these trillions of improbabilities that all have one winner. Man not God, is the best candidate for rigging a lottery, but God is the best candidate for rigging the universe.

 

[ArtieE]

A universe without intent does not care about evolution yet seems to work everything out in it's favor. Out of the zero chance of getting any universe to occur in it gets one anyway. Out of the infinite possible universe it gets one in the infetesinmally small range that can support any theoretical life at all. Then it gets just the right gravity, just the right expansion, the right nuclear forces, etc... times a trillion. We have an almost infinity sided dice hear and it comes up evolution trillions of times in a row. No rational human would see that and think chance explains it. My analogy is correct.

So now you are claiming that a god specifically made this universe so evolution could take place?

 

[1robin]

So now you are claiming that a god specifically made this universe so evolution could take place?

I would not know how to go about accounting for this astronomically fine tuned universe without God. Do you know a thousand years before the first evolutionist crawled out of the muck of science many great thinkers like Maimonides for example had, just from reading Genesis, allowed for evolution and long spans of time. They were only compelled by scripture, no science existed about it. Not only that but monks were among the first to posit evolution it's self. Evolution is only inconsistent with a God who has limited time or resources. I do not think evolution can begin to account for reality alone but I definitely include it.

 

[metis]

Common sense says that in order to know that a single "god" created our universe, one would have had to be there in order to witness such a thing since there are other possibilities. For example, several "gods" could have collaborated in creating our universe. Or that energy forms may go back into infinity?

Secondly, even if there was a single "god" that created our universe, how could one possibly know this single "god" was anything like the God of the Bible?

I prefer the "I don't know" approach.

 

[Thief]

Common sense says that in order to know that a single "god" created our universe, one would have had to be there in order to witness such a thing since there are other possibilities. For example, several "gods" could have collaborated in creating our universe. Or that energy forms may go back into infinity?

Secondly, even if there was a single "god" that created our universe, how could one possibly know this single "god" was anything like the God of the Bible?

I prefer the "I don't know" approach.

I prefer the straight forward......Someone had to be First.

 

[Yerda]

I prefer the straight forward......Someone had to be First.

But being straightforward and being true (or even valid) are not the same.

 

[metis]

I prefer the straight forward......Someone had to be First.

How about if that "Someone" maybe is named "Infinity"? Or maybe "Gods"? How could you possibly know?

 

[1robin]

Common sense says that in order to know that a single "god" created our universe, one would have had to be there in order to witness such a thing since there are other possibilities. For example, several "gods" could have collaborated in creating our universe. Or that energy forms may go back into infinity?

That is why I did not say I know it. Why is faith instantly and always turned into a certainty then proclamations about it's less than certainty turned into less that justification? I must have said and argument in dozens of ways a hundred times my argument is that a God like being creating the universe is the best explanation not the only possible one. My knowing a God exists makes that even more probably but still less than certain.

Why is certainty demanded of faith and only faith or mere possibility demanded for science? This is completely backwards.

Secondly, even if there was a single "god" that created our universe, how could one possibly know this single "god" was anything like the God of the Bible?

Again it is not a certainty but the biblical God meets every single characteristic given by the principle of sufficient causation. He must me non material, he must extremely powerful, extremely intelligent, independent of space and time, etc... God is an exact match in every way.

I prefer the "I don't know" approach.

Using the same criteria then virtually everything is unknown then. Science is out, almost all of math is out. What exactly is certain besides that we think? I don't care what standard you use as long as it is consistent and does not bind me.

 

[idav]

Using the same criteria then virtually everything is unknown then. Science is out, almost all of math is out. What exactly is certain besides that we think? I don't care what standard you use as long as it is consistent and does not bind me.

Process of elimination is the best we have. If we can't figure what something is the least we can do is figure out what something is not. Besides all knowledge is merely referential. Most knowledge doesn't make any difference in knowing it, just knowledge for the sake of a description. We are certain things exist but don't normally agree on descriptions, there are hundreds of ways to describe just one aspect of something. Knowledge of the use of intent is useful information, used to arrive at a desired outcome but even that desired outcome is merely a personal descriptor which would mean little to anyone else without such desires.

 

[Shad]

The exact opposite is the case. Every one of these lotteries, evolution wins. That was the whole point. That is exactly why that analogy works. You might as well have claimed being tall is an impediment to dunking a basketball.

Evolution is the lottery, it is the player, organisms, which win or lose. This is evident by the amount of extinct species there are. You have presented another false analogy by switching the game with the player. The player is an objects(form) so it logically follows since organisms are objects (form) these are the players. A lottery is not an object (form) neither is evolution. It is a conceptualized process upon a form.

A universe without intent does not care about evolution yet seems to work everything out in it's favor. Out of the zero chance of getting any universe to occur in it gets one anyway. Out of the infinite possible universe it gets one in the infetesinmally small range that can support any theoretical life at all. Then it gets just the right gravity, just the right expansion, the right nuclear forces, etc... times a trillion. We have an almost infinity sided dice hear and it comes up evolution trillions of times in a row. No rational human would see that and think chance explains it. My analogy is correct.

Non-sequitur, fallacy of composition, argument from incredibility, problem of induction.

Evolution is a false comparison to the universe. This does not follow from the comment about evolution. You are omitting the rolls which lost, the life forms which never rolled again. Just within our solar system alone life has failed to be observed on 8 planets, 4 dwarf-planet, dozens of moons and millions of small objects. Also take into account there is no observed life in the neighboring systems. We have found only a few planets within the habitation zone but can not observe life on these either. We also can only observe about 5% of the universe itself and are completely restricted to interplanetary travel. So far life in contained to one tiny planet in one average galaxy. I see not intent what so ever.

You have but it proved mine. Your not getting me. You getting any human and claiming it was equally unlikely but that is not true because any human would do. Just the same as any single lottery winner would do until it occurred more than once. That is why multiplicative probabilities take unlikely things to absurdly impossible things almost instantly. How much probability have you had? I had three semesters on it aloe and many hour son using it in other fields of math.

Doesn't matter what you took when you confine probability to a single case rather than multiple cases. You are hedging you bets to arrive at your presupposition. Also have argument ridden with fallacies doesn't help either.

That is funny. The chances that proper or beneficial bonds break apart is vastly greater than the chances they hold together in the proper positions until all necessary sequences are in place. An analogy here is a 1000 piece puzzle set broken up and thrown into a bag. It is shaken. At tikes you get lower than equilibrium complexity. 2 or 3 pieces for correctly but they always come apart before many more can fall into place because of probability. The only fault of that analogy is it not even fractionally as improbable a chemicals producing life.

Multiple puzzles with multiple people. Also as per the Millar-Urey experiment and later experiments animo acid (organic) can be created with just chemical materials. There is also Jeffrey Badawork confirming Millar-Urey and his own work on exobiology and prebiotic chemistry.

 

[metis]

That is why I did not say I know it. Why is faith instantly and always turned into a certainty then proclamations about it's less than certainty turned into less that justification? I must have said and argument in dozens of ways a hundred times my argument is that a God like being creating the universe is the best explanation not the only possible one. My knowing a God exists makes that even more probably but still less than certain.

Why is certainty demanded of faith and only faith or mere possibility demanded for science? This is completely backwards.

Again it is not a certainty but the biblical God meets every single characteristic given by the principle of sufficient causation. He must me non material, he must extremely powerful, extremely intelligent, independent of space and time, etc... God is an exact match in every way.

Using the same criteria then virtually everything is unknown then. Science is out, almost all of math is out. What exactly is certain besides that we think? I don't care what standard you use as long as it is consistent and does not bind me.

You are posting a false equivalency between science and religious faith. Religious beliefs are mostly unfalsifiable but scientific deductions can be found to be false. The process is very different, and no religion uses the scientific method, which is the required approach in science.

Nor can one logically claim that their religious concept of origins is "probable". In order to make that deduction, one would have to know all the possibilities and then weigh them on some criteria that has proven value. We do not have any such criteria, nor do we know all the possibilities of causation.

You say "He must me non material, he must extremely powerful, extremely intelligent, independent of space and time, etc... God is an exact match in every way", but look at all of the assumptions you've made. You say there can be only one, which is logically questionable. You say he's "non-material", but how could one possibly deduce that? You say He must be "extremely powerful", and yet a relatively insignificant change can sometimes lead to more significant changes down the road. "Intelligent", the same thing. "Independent of time and space" is actually illogical since everything we seemingly experience is dependent on other factors. And "God is an exact match in every way" is only based on your jumping to all sorts of conclusions unmatched by any evidence whatsoever-- sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But let's say your belief in a creator-god is correct. So? Does this mean that this is the God of the Bible? Just because one may really like the Bible and that it means something to them doesn't mean that it's accurate. I like the Bhagavad Gita, and it means something to me, but that doesn't mean that the events depicted in it are accurate.

So, what do I propose? Glad you asked. What I suggest is to read the Bible, listen to sermons, read other scriptures, read scientific articles, listen to scientists, contemplate on it all plus some more, and see what helps you. Whatever happened in the past, happened. We don't have to have positive verification of every detail in order for us to function today. If the Bible is meaningful to you, as I know it is, that's perfectly fine. You don't have to prove everything is right within it to get a sense of direction out of it.

And then realize that others will do the same, along with the doubts I think we all have, and they can function much like you can function. It's not that you have to accept what they believe as being equal to what you believe, so I'm not suggesting any false equivalency that you supposedly must follow.

You see me posting "I don't know" a lot, which is because I know that I'm only seeing in my life of 69 years the tip of the iceberg and not the whole enchilada (which I'm having for dinner today-- the enchilada, not the iceberg). However, "I don't know" doesn't stop me from having values and morals that I believe are important, nor should it with anyone else.

 

[ArtieE]

I would not know how to go about accounting for this astronomically fine tuned universe without God.

Fine tuned for what exactly? Please describe exactly what the universe is supposed to be fine tuned for.