• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

The universe and knowledge

Do you know what the universe is?

  • I know and I am religious

    Votes: 1 12.5%
  • I don't know and I am religious

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • I know and I am not religious

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • I don't know and I am not religious

    Votes: 3 37.5%
  • I don't care and I am religious

    Votes: 2 25.0%
  • I don't care and I am not religious

    Votes: 2 25.0%

  • Total voters
    8

mikkel_the_dane

My own religion
In short do you know what the universe is?
Examples: I know that the universe is material. I know the universe is made by God.
In general it is about metaphysics as a division of philosophy that is concerned with the fundamental nature of reality and being and that includes ontology, cosmology, and often epistemology. The universe as the whole body of things and phenomena observed or postulated. Knowledge as a fact with evidence, truth and/or proof.
As for debate, is it possible to know what the universe is?
 

wellwisher

Well-Known Member
Science primarily deals with a space-time universe, where space and time are tethered together like two people in a three legged race. Through relativity we can bend and/or curve space-time. Like in a three legged race, this tethering requires both space and time act one thing. This places coordinating limits that we call the laws of Physics. Photons, for example, have wavelength (space) and frequency (time) tethered in such a way to be proportional to the speed of light, which is the upper speed limit for the inertial universe. Speed connects space and time as d/t=v=c.

Theoretically, there should also be untethered space-time where both space and time act as independent variables. This would be like removing the tether of the three legged race, allowing more freedom for each variable to act alone and apart.This allows more options and would not be limited to the speed of light since it is untethered. For example, if you could move in space apart from time you could be omnipresent, which is a classic attribute of God. The ancients understood this, but did not have space-time physics to help contrast the difference.

Proof of untethered space and time, was done by the German Physicist and Nobel Laureate Werner Heisenberg in 1927, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle states that we cannot know both the position and speed of a particle, such as a photon or electron, with perfect accuracy; the more we nail down the particle's position, the less we know about its speed and vice versa.

If these particles, at the quantum level, had been connected or tethered via space-time, if we knew position=space we should also know any time based variable, such as speed due to this tethered assumption. The fact was these variables were not observed to be tethered, but rather both variables appeared to have a mind of their own; inverse relationship, implicit of them being untethered. It was not originally interpreted that way, until I developed the new concept and saw this was my proof from the Golden Age of Science.

What the concept of separated space and separated time brings to the table is a way to address the phenomena of the universe that we call life and consciousness. Human consciousness, via the imagination can manipulate information in ways that are not part of material reality and space-time. I can imagine flying tø the moon by flapping my arms. This cannot physically occur in space-time, since it would violate a number of laws of physics. However, there is no such limits that forbid my imagination from imagining and putting things we can observed in space-time in new order, since space and time can become untethered, from the material reality of space-time.

The iPhone, for example is not a natural result of the laws of physics. We would never find these growing on trees or coming fully assembled out of mines like diamonds. These began in the mind of humans, while looking outside the box of known reality. It also required enhancing material reality with new material via consciousness; R&D, until it became whole and part of tethered space-time; real in material form.

This concept can also be extrapolated to the limited and applied to universal consciousness that is often described as God. It is even possible to start at separated space and separated time and create our space-time universe from a void, without energy, by simply adding the tether to some of separated space and time, so physical limits are created; primordial atom. The full range from separated space and time to connected space-time has room for both the metaphysical and the physical. We can also add where the two realms overlap; quantum state, as was observed by Heisenberg. This adds some variability to material reality beyond just space-time.
 

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
In short do you know what the universe is?
Examples: I know that the universe is material. I know the universe is made by God.
In general it is about metaphysics as a division of philosophy that is concerned with the fundamental nature of reality and being and that includes ontology, cosmology, and often epistemology. The universe as the whole body of things and phenomena observed or postulated. Knowledge as a fact with evidence, truth and/or proof.
As for debate, is it possible to know what the universe is?

To me, the universe appears to be a collection of planets, stars, galaxies, and other such celestial bodies moving at great speeds. It's a pretty big place; I don't think anyone knows how far it goes. No indication of how it was made or who or what might have made it.

I don't see how anyone can know that the universe is made by God. This implies knowledge that, in my opinion, can't really be known by humans. It would seem to me that if someone knows that God created the universe, then that would imply knowledge of how God did it (beyond simply saying "Let there be light"). Some people seem to be satisfied with the notion "God did it," but they don't really know how, nor do they even seem to care. God's power is viewed as something unknowable, mysterious, and magical, but if we can't really know the nuts and bolts of how it all works, then what can we really know about anything?
 

mikkel_the_dane

My own religion
To me, the universe appears to be a collection of planets, stars, galaxies, and other such celestial bodies moving at great speeds. It's a pretty big place; I don't think anyone knows how far it goes. No indication of how it was made or who or what might have made it.

I don't see how anyone can know that the universe is made by God. This implies knowledge that, in my opinion, can't really be known by humans. It would seem to me that if someone knows that God created the universe, then that would imply knowledge of how God did it (beyond simply saying "Let there be light"). Some people seem to be satisfied with the notion "God did it," but they don't really know how, nor do they even seem to care. God's power is viewed as something unknowable, mysterious, and magical, but if we can't really know the nuts and bolts of how it all works, then what can we really know about anything?

Are you a part of the universe?
 

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
Are you a part of the universe?

Well, as far as I can tell, my existence is the product of a marriage made in hell, but that's another topic. But still, I'm biologically human, part of the human species, which evolved here on this planet, which is part of a solar system we call "The Solar System," which is part of the galaxy we call "The Milky Way." (Our galaxy is named after a candy bar. We gotta come up with better names.)

But to answer your question, I consider myself "part" of the universe in that sense. However, I'm also aware of my own identity and thought process.

Another point I consider is that, from all indications, we are confined here to this planet. In that sense, we may not be a "part" of the universe as much as in a state of confinement - isolated and separated from the rest of the vastness of the cosmos. So, if there is a God who made all of this, then maybe He decided to put us in a kind of prison.
 

mikkel_the_dane

My own religion
Well, as far as I can tell, my existence is the product of a marriage made in hell, but that's another topic. But still, I'm biologically human, part of the human species, which evolved here on this planet, which is part of a solar system we call "The Solar System," which is part of the galaxy we call "The Milky Way." (Our galaxy is named after a candy bar. We gotta come up with better names.)

But to answer your question, I consider myself "part" of the universe in that sense. However, I'm also aware of my own identity and thought process.

Another point I consider is that, from all indications, we are confined here to this planet. In that sense, we may not be a "part" of the universe as much as in a state of confinement - isolated and separated from the rest of the vastness of the cosmos. So, if there is a God who made all of this, then maybe He decided to put us in a kind of prison.

So if I try to aviod ontological dualism, I still have to state that the universe is not just not me, but also in part me. As for there being a hard problem of consciousness or not, that is also related to what the universe is.
 

Quintessence

Consults with Trees
Staff member
Premium Member
None of the poll options really quite fit where my brain settles on this, but the closest was "I don't care and I am religious." There can be no dispute that I am deeply religious and have been for a long time. But the first bit asking about knowledge of the universe?

I went with "I don't care" because my religious tradition is a reconstruction of indigenous ways of being religious. That is to say, I focus almost exclusively on what is immediately and directly around me in day-to-day life and living; it is a tradition grounded in the land and the specific character of my local area and the relationships I develop with other-than-human persons that inhabit the lands I experience.

There's nothing particularly local or immediate about "the universe." As such, it's just not something my tradition cares about. For similar reasons, my religious tradition doesn't much care about cosmology either as the question is simply irrelevant to what is immediately and directly around me in daily life and experience. Stories about these far remote and distant things are only important insofar as they inform the present and the immediate.

But it's also misleading to say that I do or don't know what "the universe" is. Because I do, and I don't. Both of those are also true, in addition to me pretty much just not caring. So my answer in the poll should be: "I know, I don't know, I don't care, and I am religious." I understand I know some things, that I don't know some other things, and that I don't particularly care since it's not an important question in my religion.
 

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
So if I try to aviod ontological dualism, I still have to state that the universe is not just not me, but also in part me. As for there being a hard problem of consciousness or not, that is also related to what the universe is.

All I can really tell is that I'm in a place I'm not entirely sure about, but whether I'm a part of that place, I'm equally unsure. We are in a place which most people would refer to as "the universe," but just being in it may not imply being part of it. If you're sitting an empty room, does that make you part of the room?
 

mikkel_the_dane

My own religion
None of the poll options really quite fit where my brain settles on this, but the closest was "I don't care and I am religious." There can be no dispute that I am deeply religious and have been for a long time. But the first bit asking about knowledge of the universe?

I went with "I don't care" because my religious tradition is a reconstruction of indigenous ways of being religious. That is to say, I focus almost exclusively on what is immediately and directly around me in day-to-day life and living; it is a tradition grounded in the land and the specific character of my local area and the relationships I develop with other-than-human persons that inhabit the lands I experience.

There's nothing particularly local or immediate about "the universe." As such, it's just not something my tradition cares about. For similar reasons, my religious tradition doesn't much care about cosmology either as the question is simply irrelevant to what is immediately and directly around me in daily life and experience. Stories about these far remote and distant things are only important insofar as they inform the present and the immediate.

But it's also misleading to say that I do or don't know what "the universe" is. Because I do, and I don't. Both of those are also true, in addition to me pretty much just not caring. So my answer in the poll should be: "I know, I don't know, I don't care, and I am religious." I understand I know some things, that I don't know some other things, and that I don't particularly care since it's not an important question in my religion.

I like it.
Now I am more of a "everything is something that should be asked as to whether it can be known or not" kind of human.
 

mikkel_the_dane

My own religion
All I can really tell is that I'm in a place I'm not entirely sure about, but whether I'm a part of that place, I'm equally unsure. We are in a place which most people would refer to as "the universe," but just being in it may not imply being part of it. If you're sitting an empty room, does that make you part of the room?

Well, if you are in a room, it is not empty, as I understand the words and how they appear to correspond with the universe.
 

Jimmy

King Phenomenon
Infinite space with the living lord Jesus in spirit at the center imo.
 
Last edited:
Top