Challenge Vanni

[Extrafire]

Dex,
Been going back to see what I missed. This is from a ways back:

Quote:
...Carl Sagan (and someone else who’s name I have forgotten)...
probably Frank Drake
Quote:
...once calculated that there should be at least 1 million planets in our galaxy with advanced life forms, but as more and more information became available, they downgraded their estimate to the point where they said that it now appears there should be no life forms, not even us. Sounds like an argument for divine intervention.


You're misrepresenting their conclusions. It depends entirely on what assumptions you put into what's called the Drake Equation, and it is not an argument for divine intervention. All it says is that we don't have enough information to form a definitive conclusion. Divine intervention remains an assumption, not a conclusion or an argument.

It says we have enough information that we know that there should be no life in our galaxy. You’re correct that based only on this, divine intervention is an assumption. Other factors must be taken into account to move to that conclusion.

Your arguments consistently look to me like some version of one or more of the following,

1. Cosmological Argument
(1) If I say something must have a cause, it has a cause.
(2) I say the universe must have a cause.
(3) Therefore, the universe has a cause.
(4) Therefore, God exists.

Those are not anything like my arguments. Mine are more like:

1. Anything that begins to exist must have a cause.
2. The universe has a beginning.
3. Therefore the universe has a cause.

This is the Kalam argument that’s been around for more than 1000 years, and was totally ignored by conventional science of the 19th century. They believed in an infinite universe, even though that’s a mathematical impossibility.

 

[Extrafire]

Stay as long as you can, and try to convince She Who Must Be Obeyed that this is a good place, and worth your time. Lots of people would agree. But what are 1500 contrary opinions against SWMBO's?

Actually she's very good to me and the most important person in my life. I wouldn't want to screw up a good situation by pissing her off too much. :wink: It's all a matter of give and take.

You guys just aren't as important to me, but I'll stick around as long as I can.

 

[zenfisher]

Extrafire...
If anything that exists has a cause...and god exists (as you suppose)...who created god?

 

[Dexter Sinister]

You guys just aren't as important to me, but I'll stick around as long as I can.

Well, that at least makes perfect sense to me, and is one more thing we can completely agree on. My wife too is more important to me than anybody on these forums or any debate I might get involved in, and if it comes down to a choice, it's no contest. I just don't see why you should have to make such a choice, it doesn't seem reasonable to me, but I really know nothing about your life outside these forums so I'm not really entitled to an opinion.

But you're so obviously well-read, articulate, and thoughtful, I'd really hate to lose your input. I can't keep my mind sharp if I only talk to people who agree with me, there's no challenge in it.

 

[Dexter Sinister]

1. Anything that begins to exist must have a cause.
2. The universe has a beginning.
3. Therefore the universe has a cause..

Quantum theory casts strong doubt on your first proposition; there are events like radioactive decay that seem to happen for no reason at all but random probabilities. There are grounds to doubt your second proposition as well. We're fairly sure there was a Big Bang that generated the universe we now see, so it had a beginning in that sense, but quantum theory allows many possible prior circumstances and the generation of the universe from a random quantum fluctuation. Granting your first two propositions though, means your conclusion is true, that's a valid argument. Quantum theory aside, and I really don't want to get into its bizarre and counter-intuitive lessons here, that argument says nothing about what the cause was, you've simply assumed, in this thread and others, that you know what it was, on the basis of no evidence at all. You've just adopted the argument from ignorance and postulated divine intervention.

Can't you see that that doesn't explain anything usefully, that it's just avoiding a deeper explanation?

 

[Extrafire]

I just don't see why you should have to make such a choice, it doesn't seem reasonable to me, but I really know nothing about your life outside these forums so I'm not really entitled to an opinion.

It doesn't seem all that reasonable to me either, but she figures that with all the time at my job plus trying to run a company on the side to make back my meager fortune, I don't have enough time to devote to her or the grandson that we're raising, and she has a valid point.

But you're so obviously well-read, articulate, and thoughtful, I'd really hate to lose your input. I can't keep my mind sharp if I only talk to people who agree with me, there's no challenge in it.

Now you're embarassing me. But I agree with your last sentence. That's why I come on these forums once in a while. I'ts no fun without a challenge.

 

[Extrafire]

Extrafire...
If anything that exists has a cause...and god exists (as you suppose)...who created god?

You've misread me. Anything that BEGINS to exist has a cause, and the universe clearly has a beginning to it's existance. As for a creator? We have no way of knowing if it fits that criteria, or what time dimension it exists in. In ours, infinity is impossible. Eternity may be totally different. I can't make any claims for certain just what the reality is outside our universe.

 

[Extrafire]

1. Anything that begins to exist must have a cause.

Quantum theory casts strong doubt on your first proposition; there are events like radioactive decay that seem to happen for no reason at all but random probabilities.

Actually, the way I understand it, there would still be a cause, just that it would be different from any cause we are familliar with, and would to all intents and purposes appear to be without cause. But then I'm not an expert on quantum theory, and the argument was first developed about 1800 years ago and refined by the Islamic scholars during their golden age. It's pretty much a good argument, just the same.

2. The universe has a beginning.

. We're fairly sure there was a Big Bang that generated the universe we now see, so it had a beginning in that sense,

The big bang is probably one of the most tested and proven theories in the history of science so we can say with certainty that it had a beginning. I made no arguement in this statement that identified what that cause was (quantum fluctuation, deity, whatever) only that it had a beginning. This was known by mathematics (impossibility of infinity) at the time, and should have been known in later years by the fact that the night sky is dark. If the universe was infinite, there would be an infinity of light coming at us from an infinity of stars.

Granting your first two propositions though, means your conclusion is true, that's a valid argument. Quantum theory aside, and I really don't want to get into its bizarre and counter-intuitive lessons here, that argument says nothing about what the cause was, you've simply assumed, in this thread and others, that you know what it was, on the basis of no evidence at all.

I did not post the Kalam argument to identify the cause. The purpose was to demonstrate the kind of argument I like to use as opposed to the number of arguments you had posted as typical of creationist, which they may be to some fundementalists, but not to me or the people I admire.

 

[zenfisher]

Extrafire...
If anything that exists has a cause...and god exists (as you suppose)...who created god?

You've misread me. Anything that BEGINS to exist has a cause, and the universe clearly has a beginning to it's existance. As for a creator? We have no way of knowing if it fits that criteria, or what time dimension it exists in. In ours, infinity is impossible. Eternity may be totally different. I can't make any claims for certain just what the reality is outside our universe.

Your answer is a semantic copout. By your own posts,you have granted that the Universe began and therefore is not infinite. Yet for some reason this cannot be extrapolated for a supposed diety.

If the "creator" can be an entity outside our universe that got the ball rolling... Why would it not be possible for a completely natural unthinking event outside our universe equally be responsible for kicking things in gear? I think you misread me.

 

[Extrafire]

Extrafire wrote:
Quote:
Extrafire...
If anything that exists has a cause...and god exists (as you suppose)...who created god?


You've misread me. Anything that BEGINS to exist has a cause, and the universe clearly has a beginning to it's existance. As for a creator? We have no way of knowing if it fits that criteria, or what time dimension it exists in. In ours, infinity is impossible. Eternity may be totally different. I can't make any claims for certain just what the reality is outside our universe.


Your answer is a semantic copout. By your own posts,you have granted that the Universe began and therefore is not infinite. Yet for some reason this cannot be extrapolated for a supposed diety.

A semantic copout? No. The argument was posted as an example. It's not my original, and is very old. The whole of the argument follows on the point of a beginning, and does not necessarily refer to the universe, just anything that begins to exist.

If the "creator" can be an entity outside our universe that got the ball rolling... Why would it not be possible for a completely natural unthinking event outside our universe equally be responsible for kicking things in gear?

Ah, now that's what this whole thread has been about. The Kalam argument I posted was not to support the existance of a creator, nor to argue for a beginning of the universe, since that's a given, considering the scientific evidence. It was just an example of a logical argument. Why a creator and not a completely natural unthinking event for the cause? That's what many of the previous posts have debated, and you can go back to them for opinions one way or the other.

 

[zenfisher]

I have followed this debate from the beginning.

To follow the logic you have posted.
Anything that begins to exist has a cause,
Therefore for god to exist something must have caused this event.
If ,as proposed in the bible, in the beginning there was god and he had no origin before that...god cannot exist.

Whether this was your argument or not ....it was what you presented to back up your position.

 

[Extrafire]

To follow the logic you have posted.
Anything that begins to exist has a cause,

Yup

Therefore for god to exist something must have caused this event.

Nope. Never said that. I have pointed out that we can only know that a creator would have to transcend the universe and would therefore be independant of our time dimension. If a deity exists, it could well be eternal and have no beginning of it's existance and therefore no cause.

If ,as proposed in the bible, in the beginning there was god and he had no origin before that...god cannot exist.

A deity that was eternal would exist and have no origin, which is what is proposed in the bible.

Whether this was your argument or not ....it was what you presented to back up your position.

No that wasn't my argument and I did not present it to back up my position.

 

[zenfisher]

Again semantics... The sky is blue.

 

[Vanni Fucci]

Nope. Never said that. I have pointed out that we can only know that a creator would have to transcend the universe and would therefore be independant of our time dimension. If a deity exists, it could well be eternal and have no beginning of it's existance and therefore no cause.

I'll bet he has a groovy cape too... 8)

 

[Hard-Luck Henry]

:lol: And a beard, gotta have a beard.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Hey, I have a beard. If I get a cape will you guys blindly worship me?

 

[peapod]

Hey galaniomama wears the cape are poka dots involved. I like poka dots, especially on a toad lily. :wink:

 

[Jay]

Re: RE: Challenge Vanni

Hey, I have a beard. If I get a cape will you guys blindly worship me?

I thought you already had a blind following around here... :wink:

 

[Hard-Luck Henry]

Re: RE: Challenge Vanni

Hey, I have a beard. If I get a cape will you guys blindly worship me?

Wow, the Reverend's after a promotion.

 

[Vanni Fucci]

Re: RE: Challenge Vanni

Hey, I have a beard. If I get a cape will you guys blindly worship me?

Wow, the Reverend's after a promotion.

That's fine, but can he change water into beer? How about beer into rum? I'd be on board with that... 8)