The "something can't come from nothing" argument

[Thief]

Yes and no. Wanted but could not be predicted.

Fine....but I meant the formation of body AND spirit?
(not trying to leave God out of it ...are you?)

 

[idav]

Fine....but I meant the formation of body AND spirit?
(not trying to leave God out of it ...are you?)

I dont feel like god is directly involved with procreation but our ability to create is a result of being the likeness of god as in the breath of life. This ability is within creation itself or else seemingly dead planets wouldnt be bursting with life after so long. The essence of existence is something rather than nothing so would have creator qualities.

 

[SkepticThinker]

I will give you one of countless examples. For now I will give it to you from memory but it is well documented and easily found. I will find it for you if you want but I am on my way out currently.

A women had to have a surgery that required her brain not only be non-functional but free of blood. She was technically brain dead for a time period I cannot recall. She recovered and had many stories about not only what had occurred in the operating room but also at other off site locations. In many cases I find the evidence sketchy but in this one there was great interest because of her being so without the capacity to know anything. They recorded her stories (including her doctors that did the procedure) and studied them in depth. Every single one (at least that I had heard of) was exactly accurate. They even matched nurses notes.

Another was actually from a brain specialist who was technically brain dead and is a very famous and modern case.

I even gave you articles from journals about the minds primacy to matter. Everything seems to be trending in the direction I suggested. I have to bolt but let me know if you want links.

There is even a prestigious study group which studies these events from a secular perspective. The lead researcher said he would hesitate to validate life after death but would testify that the mind can survive for at least a short period after brain death.

Can you be more specific? Do you have a name or a link or something?

The Randi Foundation has been offering a $1 million prize for demonstrations of such things for years now. Why no takers?

 

[Sapiens]

Why no takers?

'cause its all BS?

 

[SkepticThinker]

'cause its all bs?

..

 

[Thief]

I dont feel like god is directly involved with procreation but our ability to create is a result of being the likeness of god as in the breath of life. This ability is within creation itself or else seemingly dead planets wouldnt be bursting with life after so long. The essence of existence is something rather than nothing so would have creator qualities.

Ok....so He set the chemistry I motion and takes a back seat to watch what happens.

Chemistry has rules....God would hesitate to 'bend' the rules.

 

[1robin]

You haven't given a physics example of a soul existing outside of a brain. Philisophically it exists as a concept but concepts do not "exist" except within the mind. And yeah I would like a link to a credible source about someone having out of body experiences with accurate identification of events.

I have given a physics argument, but not an example. I have given testimonials as well. Exactly how much do I need? Who decided?

Make a case that non-existence is a state of existence. You can say that a concept of something is in a state of non-existence such as something not being where it should be ect, but you have not made a case of physical non-existence being existent.

This is circling the semantic drain. If you can't admit that a thing beginning to exist (which by the way has occurred in the quantum) is not a change then we will just have to disagree. I am not spinning my wheels about what words mean. BTX in addition the quantum other things begin to exist even if they are composed of stuff that pre-existed them. If my car is a thing it had never ever existed before it was built in 04. Cars are things and begin to exist as composite beings the same war stars do.

And I wholeheartedly think you are full of it when you say that.

So if I disagree I am wrong but if I agree I am full of it. Not much of a reason to justify a debate then.

If by "narrow" you mean methodologically the only successful way to obtain what is "true" about our universe rather than fluff and baseless assertions...then yeah.

Give me a break. About 75% of what it is you think you know was acquired with the scientific method. Even most of the science. In fact I would bet more that 80% of the science you think you know you acquired without running a single experiment but accepted on authority alone.

One must first make the case that the supernatural exists and has any kind of merit.

I out of three people, and many of the best minds in history thought it had enough merit to pattern their lives on it. I do not know what better attestation to it having merit could even be invented. To head off the obligatory fallacy waste time, I did not state it was true. I said it has perceived merit by those most able to distinguish that.

Exactly. We do not know what it is. But based about our knowledge of the universe and its calculations some force or matter must exist in order to create this effect. We have no idea what it is or its properties but we know it exists. This is an example of the correct way to have inductive reasoning bring you to a logical conclusion and make accurate predictions.

Exactamundo. You have faith that a thing that can't be detected exists because of it's effect or necessity on the natural world. So do I, I just have a lot more necessities and effects. However it was not faith, it was certainly that led you to claim it exists.

If you had no idea what a ball was or that there was anything on the other side of the fence and the ball warps and stands in direct contradition to everything you know to be true by every scientific standpoint... I doubt you would be able to know it was a bat. You have knowledge of bats and of balls and their function as well as the field and all these other factors. We don't know any of these factors. We live in that ball with no knowledge of what is outside. We wouldn't have the concept of the bat.

So, I do know what cause and effect is, I know what matter is, exactly what is it I don't know that I need to. Deductions are not about answers we already know are true. They are about what is likely true. That is the only thing I do not know in the equation.

This is my point almost exactly but aimed at your argument.

I can't sit around and invent a thousand ways that universe came to be that have any evidence. I only find one. However if you throw out the evidence part multiverses (which even if true are no help) and it's ilk can be coughed up from ignorance. The latter are a thousand guesses at who built the pyramids, the former a logical deduction about who created the universe.

The brilliant men brought together what we believed to be the early Earth conditions to see what would happen. Lo and behold chemicals began to form. Chemicals we know for a fact must have formed to create the first organic materials. So if we set up the experiment and let the "mindless" processes take place and find results how else would you put it?

If you mean Miller Urey.

1. They got the early conditions wrong. Or at least out of fashion with todays guess at what they were.
2. They did not even get all the building materials together much less life.

If you mean something else then give me a link and I will see how they failed to produce life.

We have early stone tools from far before homo-sapiens.

I forgot your original claim and what you responded to did not indicate it either. I am pressed for time and could not go back further.

I use the term because I think it works better in arguments than the correct word which would be phenomenon.

Technically I think "force" a thousand times worse than phenomenon. If your just throwing around placeholders I could live with it, but if being technical force is not even on the possible list unless you invent a whole inventory of equally baseless quantifiers.

Though nothing about a pre-existing phenomenon or more precisely a phenomenon external to the universe wouldn't mean that it would make an infinite universe. The said could be said with god from your logic. Forces are bound by things God is not and so you go in with a disadvantage.

My main problem is "intent". That a phenomenon that may have cause the universe wouldn't necessarily be omnipotent, intelligent or have intent.

I can rule force out technically as impossible as an explanation unless you can somehow explain what it was and what caused it which is beyond absurd IMO. A personal agent can decide to act. A force must either have always acted or been forced to by another aspect which is not accessible to you. Forces are also only associated with space time. I would be fine with dropping that last bit but that violates your own principle. Your hoist on your own petard, as it were.

 

[1robin]

The Bible suggests that you test everything? Horse pucky! Against what standard, some joke like: "subjective proof?" You don't begin to cross the line of reasonable doubt. Subjective proof: now there's an oxymoron for you.

I am not a pirate, that is me, the patch is not a permanent feature.

90% of what you know is not based on certainty. In fact technically speaking nothing beyond that you think is knowable to a certainty, so proof is not applicable to either world view. Faiths actual burden is the absence of a defeater, I raise it up a few notches to best explanation of best conclusion. Personally I have subjective proof that is 100% sufficient for personal certainty but I do not use that in a debate.

So let me summarize.
1. Nothing except that you think, is certain or provable. I have had many non-theists even deny that much. So proof is not relevant to anything especially faith. Faith precludes proof in the strictest sense.
2. So all claims of every type involve faith and have a sliding scale of certainty.
3. I claim my core beliefs are based on the best conclusion to certain evidence. Be it historical, empirical, testimonial, scientific, or philosophical. I do not have this burden but I assume it anyway.

You have adopted a part of an analogy that does not apply. You do realize analogies are not equalities and so only what was intended is necessary to be in common. No analogy has a one to one correspondence with what it is used for. I being as flexible as I can responded to it because it had no teeth either way but it has no relevance to my analogy to begin with. Court cases also have reporters, deliberation rooms, and law libraries as well. Is theology stuck with all these as well?

What theology and the court system do have in common is the need for the highest standards possible, and both justify testimonial evidence. If life and death do not discount testimony why would you do so for the Bible. Trying to stick theology with issues about gavels, black robes, and the like is avoiding the issue. The issue was personal testimony not any legally relevant aspect you wish to grab onto.

 

[idav]

Ok....so He set the chemistry I motion and takes a back seat to watch what happens.

Chemistry has rules....God would hesitate to 'bend' the rules.

How do you figure the beginning required a primary mover? Default state for existence was turned on already so that no thing had to flip the switch. If a primary mover is already moving then that is obviously the default state of existence.

 

[1robin]

Brilliant! I agree.

Intent isnt what is necessary but action is, and action doesnt necessarily mean intended.

It wasn't that brilliant. Natural (like forces) causes, either have to always have produced the effect or to never have. Or you get stuck trying to decide what the force relates to and how that works which is unknowable in this case and would set up another impossible infinite regression problem. It is in every technical way a pathetic challenger to a disembodied mind which does not have any similar restrictions.

 

[idav]

It wasn't that brilliant. Natural (like forces) causes, either have to always have produced the effect or to never have. Or you get stuck trying to decide what the force relates to and how that works which is unknowable in this case and would set up another impossible infinite regression problem. It is in every technical way a pathetic challenger to a disembodied mind which does not have any similar restrictions.

It could "always" have been when time doesnt exist to relate "when" something occurred. People are comfortable saying time didnt exist, then that would mean a beginning to everything, existence, god, any single thing.

So any way I am comfortable calling existence god whether it always existed or started itself.

If time does exist and god resides outside of time, when does god exist? Always, in every point of time that exists.

 

[1robin]

It could "always" have been when time doesnt exist to relate "when" something occurred. People are comfortable saying time didnt exist, then that would mean a beginning to everything, existence, god, any single thing.

The only thing known is that space time does not exist with out space (actually the stuff in it). Any other domain of time (and there can be any number of them) and time is right back in business.

So any way I am comfortable calling existence god whether it always existed or started itself.

You mean that in a pantheistic way? Existence is a quality an object or thing has and would make a poor word for God. It might be a property of God but not God himself as a totality.

If time does exist and god resides outside of time, when does god exist? Always, in every point of time that exists.

God may exist in time but he is independent from it. Even space time. Craig makes a weird argument that God is actually space time relevant since space time came to be but is not dependent on it. I have no need to be that exact but I would recommend looking up his writings on it.

 

[1robin]

'cause its all BS?

Well that is convenient. Anything that is not part of my arbitrary world view is BS. Yeah I like it, no need for proof, evidence, or even an argument or to actually contend with any of them. I can see it's appeal.

 

[idav]

The only thing known is that space time does not exist with out space (actually the stuff in it). Any other domain of time (and there can be any number of them) and time is right back in business.

I get the idea god gets his own time and our time is relative to it, like similar to Greenwich mean time. Time always existed at time equals zero.

You mean that in a pantheistic way? Existence is a quality an object or thing has and would make a poor word for God. It might be a property of God but not God himself as a totality.

God existing is the first step. Properties of god are a bit tougher to figure out. Whether it always existed or started its existence, those are both deity qualifiers, being the source.

God may exist in time but he is independent from it. Even space time. Craig makes a weird argument that God is actually space time relevant since space time came to be but is not dependent on it. I have no need to be that exact but I would recommend looking up his writings on it.

Yes I said god is independent of time, whatever we are trapped in is dependent on space and time. With relativity spacetime are relative so it is correct one wont exist without the other but in a relative sense. As I gain mass time slows down up to time going away. As I lose mass, and probably a bunch of weight, time gets more intense, speeds up even. I appreciate the reference to craig, I have a thread in started claiming that god is spacetime and therfore eternal. Also due to how qm works space time is also omnipresent so we start to see deity qualifiers within reality itself.

 

[1robin]

Can you be more specific? Do you have a name or a link or something?

The Randi Foundation has been offering a $1 million prize for demonstrations of such things for years now. Why no takers?

How would I pull it off? I can't have a NDE on demand, or at least would not attempt to.

Since no one has claimed the prize when libraries are full of claimants to it I will assume they have set it up where nothing can satisfy them. I can however supply links.

The lady I mentioned.
Pam Reynolds case - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
People have near-death experiences while brain dead

The Harvard Brain surgeon who had one.
Eben Alexander, Harvard Neurosurgeon, Describes Heaven After Near-Death Experience (VIDEO)

I never knew the name (or cannot remember it) for the institute who is doing secular research into them so I will give a couple which may or not be it specifically.

The Division of Perceptual Studies — School of Medicine at the University of Virginia
That one is probably not it. The one I remember was Canadian or English I think.
International Association for Near-Death Studies - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Seattle Pacific University - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Type in Near death research institution and you get 4 million hits.

That might be a start anyway. It is very hard to search for because there is a huge Non Destructive Evaluation industry that makes it hard and even an NDE research institute that is some new age site that appears all over the place.

Keep in mind that was to justify a claim about the mind being more than brain. Not a heaven or hell debate. I would use a whole series of other NDE's for that.

 

[1robin]

I get the idea god gets his own time and our time is relative to it, like similar to Greenwich mean time. Time always existed at time equals zero.

Time can be related to anything that exists. I can have my car time, tomato time, up time, bad time, or eastern and western time zones, etc..... Time is just duration. Anything that exists, endures. Space time is just the largest and most objective reference for time in the universe (we think). Space time is a little more robust and complicate than I am suggesting it is, but for my point it does not matter. If God exists there would be a God time. We are so wedded to think time is what we all perceive we forget that what we perceive does not exhaust even relatively likely reality.

God existing is the first step. Properties of god are a bit tougher to figure out. Whether it always existed or started its existence, those are both deity qualifiers, being the source.

I do not think you can derive what God is without massive assumptions. I get it through revelation. The reason it is so important is that the characteristics given to God by men ignorant of even a hint of what modern philosophy would require for the cause of the universe they got it exactly right. Everything even a secular philosopher would say a cause of the universe must have, God has.

Yes I said god is independent of time, whatever we are trapped in is dependent on space and time. With relativity spacetime are relative so it is correct one wont exist without the other but in a relative sense. As I gain mass time slows down up to time going away. As I lose mass, and probably a bunch of weight, time gets more intense, speeds up even. I appreciate the reference to craig, I have a thread in started claiming that god is spacetime and therfore eternal. Also due to how qm works space time is also omnipresent so we start to see deity qualifiers within reality itself.

The relationship won't exist, but it's components still would depending on what was missing. If space did not exist I could not suggest time would cease to or the other way around. Only space time would cease to be what we think of as time. Time would be something we would not easily recognize. I do not to step too far out on a limb concerning time. It is a subject where everyone claims to be an expert and no one actually is. In the universe of the abstract time is king. I will leave it there, any further and I might incur liabilities my capacity can't meet. The loss of the universe would end space-time but I can see no reason time it's self would cease, and if not it would be related to whatever else existed (or might) if the universe ceased.

 

[idav]

Time can be related to anything that exists. I can have my car time, tomato time, up time, bad time, or eastern and western time zones, etc..... Time is just duration. Anything that exists, endures. Space time is just the largest and most objective reference for time in the universe (we think). Space time is a little more robust and complicate than I am suggesting it is, but for my point it does not matter. If God exists there would be a God time. We are so wedded to think time is what we all perceive we forget that what we perceive does not exhaust even relatively likely reality.


I do not think you can derive what God is without massive assumptions. I get it through revelation. The reason it is so important is that the characteristics given to God by men ignorant of even a hint of what modern philosophy would require for the cause of the universe they got it exactly right. Everything even a secular philosopher would say a cause of the universe must have, God has.


The relationship won't exist, but it's components still would depending on what was missing. If space did not exist I could not suggest time would cease to or the other way around. Only space time would cease to be what we think of as time. Time would be something we would not easily recognize. I do not to step too far out on a limb concerning time. It is a subject where everyone claims to be an expert and no one actually is. In the universe of the abstract time is king. I will leave it there, any further and I might incur liabilities my capacity can't meet. The loss of the universe would end space-time but I can see no reason time it's self would cease, and if not it would be related to whatever else existed (or might) if the universe ceased.

Cool so we are in agreement.

 

[1robin]

Cool so we are in agreement.

I hope we are. I look for ways to agree. Not just because I am congenial but because it never fails to raise your credibility with others (you do not seem as dogmatic) and it makes the other guy feel like his views have worth, but I seldom have anything close enough to allow agreement without feeling I compromised something crucial and valid. However neither of those were the reasons I potentially agreed with you here.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

I have given a physics argument, but not an example. I have given testimonials as well. Exactly how much do I need? Who decided?

What physics did you use? I never saw any. And no you have not linked me to verified testimonials but anecdotal evidence of things you said you have heard of.

This is circling the semantic drain. If you can't admit that a thing beginning to exist (which by the way has occurred in the quantum) is not a change then we will just have to disagree. I am not spinning my wheels about what words mean. BTX in addition the quantum other things begin to exist even if they are composed of stuff that pre-existed them. If my car is a thing it had never ever existed before it was built in 04. Cars are things and begin to exist as composite beings the same war stars do.

Changing the shape and order in which things exist is change. We will have to disagree on "not existing" meaning "existing in a different form".

Give me a break. About 75% of what it is you think you know was acquired with the scientific method. Even most of the science. In fact I would bet more that 80% of the science you think you know you acquired without running a single experiment but accepted on authority alone.

And this is where I think you are fooling yourself. Name a good example of something I believe that is science based that is all authoritative? I can't think of a one.

I out of three people, and many of the best minds in history thought it had enough merit to pattern their lives on it. I do not know what better attestation to it having merit could even be invented. To head off the obligatory fallacy waste time, I did not state it was true. I said it has perceived merit by those most able to distinguish that.

People can pattern their life how ever they want. But they don't have evidence to back that up in any kind of scientific or truth claim. That is the root of materialism is that we must pragmatically assume that is that is there is because that is all that there is reliable evidence for.

Exactamundo. You have faith that a thing that can't be detected exists because of it's effect or necessity on the natural world. So do I, I just have a lot more necessities and effects. However it was not faith, it was certainly that led you to claim it exists.

However we don't know it to exist as a fact but we think it to exist due to actual necessity. You have yet to make the case that it should be necessary for there to be god. You have made the case that it "might be necessary".

So, I do know what cause and effect is, I know what matter is, exactly what is it I don't know that I need to. Deductions are not about answers we already know are true. They are about what is likely true. That is the only thing I do not know in the equation.

You don't know what the cause is. You don't even really know what the effect is. Another thing is that the universe didn't even necessarily "come into existence". Another way to view the big bang (and probably a more correct one) is that the singularity suddenly began to expand. What it was prior to that was exactly what it was, the singularity. Which of course we don't know anything about. The only real case you have is that god could be dark energy. Or that Dark energy is somehow "god".

If you mean Miller Urey.

1. They got the early conditions wrong. Or at least out of fashion with todays guess at what they were.
2. They did not even get all the building materials together much less life.

If you mean something else then give me a link and I will see how they failed to produce life.

If you think we have to produce life from non-living compounds to have abiogensis be the best explanation then you need to give up on your own god argument right now.

Technically I think "force" a thousand times worse than phenomenon. If your just throwing around placeholders I could live with it, but if being technical force is not even on the possible list unless you invent a whole inventory of equally baseless quantifiers.

Though nothing about a pre-existing phenomenon or more precisely a phenomenon external to the universe wouldn't mean that it would make an infinite universe. The said could be said with god from your logic. Forces are bound by things God is not and so you go in with a disadvantage.

Dark energy could be categorized as a form of force but not in the traditional sense. Though again construct the argument in which a phenomenon external to the universe MUST create an infinite universe? And then by the same reguard explain why "god" would not.

I can rule force out technically as impossible as an explanation unless you can somehow explain what it was and what caused it which is beyond absurd IMO. A personal agent can decide to act. A force must either have always acted or been forced to by another aspect which is not accessible to you. Forces are also only associated with space time. I would be fine with dropping that last bit but that violates your own principle. Your hoist on your own petard, as it were.

The whole thing goes round and round and its why we "don't know" is the best answer. Who created god? How could god be infinite? Ect. All those quests come to rise as well. Its just a convenient way of saying "these are the problems. We invent something that is excluded from these problems. Therefore it fits."

 

[1robin]

What physics did you use? I never saw any. And no you have not linked me to verified testimonials but anecdotal evidence of things you said you have heard of.

Your kind of running together with others at this point. My fault I am tired. I frequently include a reference to an article in philosophy now. It was in the section on what we know is wrong - "materialism". I have referenced it many times with links and anything else requested. That is what I was referring to. It was an article by top notch scholars citing the cream of the crop like Planck, in order to demonstrate that mind is primary and matter derivative. I do not go to much beyond that point because it is above my head and in that deep end of science I normally complain about. I usually just give it in a well there is this as well kind of context.

Changing the shape and order in which things exist is change. We will have to disagree on "not existing" meaning "existing in a different form".

I guess so but it is certainly a shame when something so obvious can't be granted.

And this is where I think you are fooling yourself. Name a good example of something I believe that is science based that is all authoritative? I can't think of a one.

I do not think that is necessary but can be done. Every ones scientific views are in large measure based on authority. We read it in a book and even if we can never test it our selves or even get it in it's entirety many times we grant it as true or probable. If you want I can lay out what views that if you hold would be on authority if you want.

People can pattern their life how ever they want. But they don't have evidence to back that up in any kind of scientific or truth claim. That is the root of materialism is that we must pragmatically assume that is that is there is because that is all that there is reliable evidence for.

That last sentence lost me. Assume that is that is there........... What?

However we don't know it to exist as a fact but we think it to exist due to actual necessity. You have yet to make the case that it should be necessary for there to be god. You have made the case that it "might be necessary".

What necessity? Anything beyond I think is a non necessity based on a non-necessity. This is also confusing given modal being. Do you mean God is not a necessary being or he is not necessary for something?

You don't know what the cause is. You don't even really know what the effect is. Another thing is that the universe didn't even necessarily "come into existence". Another way to view the big bang (and probably a more correct one) is that the singularity suddenly began to expand. What it was prior to that was exactly what it was, the singularity. Which of course we don't know anything about. The only real case you have is that god could be dark energy. Or that Dark energy is somehow "god".

For the millionth time I know I do not know. That is why my position is called faith not certainty. Again your throwing me off with the modal logic terms used in what appear to be non modal logic ways. Just give me one modal logical affirmation or denial and the context will be far clearer. A finite universe necessarily did begin to exist. Are you talking about contingency or denying the universe is finite?

If you think we have to produce life from non-living compounds to have abiogenesis be the best explanation then you need to give up on your own god argument right now.

Boy I am tired or you just did not make any sense in this post. How does this follow. You mean if God was biological or something. The failure of science to even get in the realm of life is enough to lack faith that naturalism is true. That alone will not get you to faith in God but it will leave you with few other options.

Dark energy could be categorized as a form of force but not in the traditional sense. Though again construct the argument in which a phenomenon external to the universe MUST create an infinite universe? And then by the same reguard explain why "god" would not.

Even if dark energy is a force it is not a force which can be shown to be independent of the universe nor one which can be understood at this time in the universe. It is of absolutely no use as the creating entity. How about that word "entity"? It is neither theological, necessarily personal, nor as technically meaningless as a creative explanation,as force.

thing goes round and round and its why we "don't know" is the best answer. Who created god? How could god be infinite? Ect. All those quests come to rise as well. Its just a convenient way of saying "these are the problems. We invent something that is excluded from these problems. Therefore it fits."

If disagreement was proof against logical conclusions nothing would be known as almost everything is refuted. Again my argument in opinion of so many of those most qualified to know (even on your side) is beyond dismissal and the best currently in town.