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Which existed first "something" or "nothing"?
- Thread starter paarsurrey
- Start date
A common mistake in such discussions is the assumption that one of 2 unintelligible brute facts must be true: either the Big Bang was created from nothing by an eternal Supreme Being or some sort of matter/ energy continuum always exists for no reason whatsoever. For me, the last assumption is intuitively absurd, though the theistic alternative can't be expressed in a compelling syllogism because meaningful terms for the syllogism can't be identified and clearly defined without begging the question. Thus, the answer to the question "What existed before the Big Bang?" is meaningless because the phrase "existed before" presumes existence in time, and the Big Bang actually creates the time/ space continuum.
The common mistake of such discussions is the assumption that the theistic explanation postulates a Supreme Being. But if, as many theologians argue, "God" is the ground of all being rather than a supreme being, then it is a category mistake to postulate God as the Supreme Being among countless other beings. In the other words, we must then discuss God who is not a "being" and thus does not "exist." The notion of God as the ground of being rather than a Supreme Being underlies the biblical claim in Acts 17 that "in God we live and move and have our being." Further analysis faces the impasse that "the ground of all being" is impossible to clarify with any specificity. In my view, the closest we can come to getting anywhere is to conceive of the ground of all being as universal consciousness that transcends the space-time continuum and therefore can't be reduced to an existent "thing" in a context of matter/energy of any form. Many who have experienced NDEs claim that their experience is utterly ineffable because it happened in a realm with no time, and this realm must be distorted by linear descriptions of what happened. Does their experience of "no time" hold the clue to how we might understand universal consciousness as the ground of all being?
The common mistake of such discussions is the assumption that the theistic explanation postulates a Supreme Being. But if, as many theologians argue, "God" is the ground of all being rather than a supreme being, then it is a category mistake to postulate God as the Supreme Being among countless other beings. In the other words, we must then discuss God who is not a "being" and thus does not "exist." The notion of God as the ground of being rather than a Supreme Being underlies the biblical claim in Acts 17 that "in God we live and move and have our being." Further analysis faces the impasse that "the ground of all being" is impossible to clarify with any specificity. In my view, the closest we can come to getting anywhere is to conceive of the ground of all being as universal consciousness that transcends the space-time continuum and therefore can't be reduced to an existent "thing" in a context of matter/energy of any form. Many who have experienced NDEs claim that their experience is utterly ineffable because it happened in a realm with no time, and this realm must be distorted by linear descriptions of what happened. Does their experience of "no time" hold the clue to how we might understand universal consciousness as the ground of all being?
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
Ok...what is absurd is your belief the some sort of matter/ energy existence always existed for no reason whatever. There is a very logical reason why universal existence always existed and that is because it actually exists in the here and now and any and there is no credible attempt by anyone to explain how a single iota of it can be made to cease existing. And there never will be because eternity is all there is.... So until you can reasonably imagine in your own mind how it is possible to uncreate any part of the underlying essence of the matter/ energy continuum....then it sane to accept an eternal universe..
A feeling is something.Nothing is something. Nothing is a feeling. Nothing is a feeling of emptiness.
*raises hand* That's not actually a logical reason why the universe exists.
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
Haha...matter/ energy of the universe exists....that is a given....the matter/ energy of the universe can not be made to not exist...that also is a given...why is it not logical to conclude that the universe is eternal? Iow, the logical reason the universe exists is that it exists... it is not a logical reason that the universe exists due to non-existence...
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Because matter/energy isn't the be-all-to-end-all of the universe? There is more of the universe that is meaningful to humanity than there is matter and energy combined.
That's a tautology.Iow, the logical reason the universe exists is that it exists... it is not a logical reason that the universe exists due to non-existence...
AndromedaRXJ
Active Member
Like what? I would think matter and energy is all there physically is.
Read what I wrote again.
AndromedaRXJ
Active Member
That doesn't really... *sigh* never mind. I see you're debating with ben d anyway and I don't want to seem like I'm siding with him.
I'm not a materialist. I prefer the label idealist, meaning of or about the idea. The world is reducible to what we each, individually, can know about it.
The world is comprised of all the things about the world, more of which are things in regard to it than things that are material.
(Edit: "Physical" is an idea.)
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Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
No one said it was the be-all-to end-all of the universe...that was the expression used by the poster I addressed. However it is still appropriate to use the expression to explain that universal essence can never be made to cease existing..
So what...it emphasizes the absurdity of proposing a beginning to existence...crying 'tautology' is a feeble attempt to obscure the logic of the existence of an eternal universe..
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
So what..dematerialization does not imply the mass of the demateriaized matter has been removed from the universe.....materialization and dematerialization are eternal processes of the universe...from stars to microbes... No mass though is ever being added to or removed from the universe....it is eternally infinite for the reasons I explained..
Ben, as a starting point to answer your question, please watch this YouTube video in which biologist Rupert Sheldrake refutes your claim in his book, "The Science Delusion," which is retitled "Science Set Free" in its American edition. I'd greatly appreciate your perspective on this ground-breaking thinker, whose other books are important for my ADC and NDE thread:
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?...AA21FE9DCC1C0EA2100FAA21FE9DCC1C0EA&FORM=VIRE
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?...AA21FE9DCC1C0EA2100FAA21FE9DCC1C0EA&FORM=VIRE
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
Yes....good video....but what does it have to do with your belief that there once was nothing in existence?
Palehorse
Active Member
I always try to get something for nothing. Maybe I should turn my life around and start getting nothing for something.
In the video Sheldrake formulates a thoughtful challenge of the universal assumption that the amount of matter/ energy in the universe remains constant.
Ben Dhyan
Veteran Member
I did not see that.. I got the part that G constant, C constant, and universal constants appear to vary in time....but that is due to science not yet fully understanding the universe.....not that the universal essence is actually changing... It can't for the reasons I have given....nothing can be added to of from the universe.Transitions of dark energy to dark matter, and from dark matter to ordinary matter and back again...from the quantum vacuum zpe to virtual particles and back again...these changes do not alter the sum total of universal essence... If you claim that actual mass can be added to or removed from the universe...from whence does it come and to where does it go?
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