God is a hat? Sorry, we’re full up on odd Gods at the moment.
How much have you read of quantum theory? Because if you demand physics at that level “makes sense” from your macro perspective, you are barking up the wrong try. And equations that “don’t make sense” accurately predict the results of experiments - very accurately in fact.
If we live in a singularity, then we by definition will never know what went on “before” it was created - before in quotes because if time is created along with the singularity, there is no before.
There is no faith. There is either speculation, labeled as such, or predictions which can be checked. Remember, the theory of the Big Bang made a prediction about cosmic background radiation which was verified. Inflation made a prediction about the lumpiness of the universe which was verified. Now, isn’t it more reasonable to give the speculations of those who made those correct predictions credence rather than those who predicted we’d find evidence of creation?
A bit too complicated for a science fair. I’ve always thought it more likely that we were someone’s dissertation research. Though when my daughter did gene sequencing in freshman bio I figured it might be Physics 101 lab. Our creator probably got an F.
I dunno about that. He/she/it would have a big bang, then just follow the results. The universe might be inside one big test tube. Or maybe the big bang was the project, and we’ve since been discarded.
Then we all act according to our own self-interests and half the responsibilities that we have would disappear. Is that your ideal world?
Irrelevant. The world is what it is, and we figure it out by evidence. What we want it to be is utterly and completely irrelevant.
Well, if it’s insanity-inducing at worst, and counter-intuitive at best, then what’s your problem with the best-case scenario? (I have no trouble believing something can be both counter-intuitive and true; do you?)
As for the assertion that something cannot come from nothing – cite? I mean, I like Lemur866’s answer as much as the next guy, but I don’t like yours.
Is that true. Did Thomas Edison discover the light bulb by accident. Most scientists would have given up long before he did given the relatively poor results he was obtaining.
Pedantic nitpick - he didn’t ‘discover’ the light bulb - he “invented” it - and yes, many of our ‘great discoveries’ are by accident - if nothing else - we spend alot of time discovering what does not work.
And do not confuse inventors with scientists - two very different, but sometimes related, fields.
More like trial and error – Edison tried over 1,000 types of filaments before discovering one that actually worked.
Excluded middle. God made the universe but it was also an accident. Remember, coitus interruptus is not a reliable form of birth control.
Ah, the old “if you aren’t religious you have to be a psychopath” garbage. No, religion doesn’t make you a better person, nor do people need religious to justify not being amoral.
And as already pointed out the truth is what it is regardless of whether or not it’s ideal. God will not exist not matter how hard you clap your hands and believe.
But we do all act according to our own self-interests, as we perceive that self-interest to be at the time we act. We do not always perceive it correctly, or perceive what’s truly “best”, however.
How is acting in your own interests in an uncaring universe different than acting in your own interests in a theistic universe.
In other words, suppose there is a God. Also, let’s supposed that if you don’t worship It, you’re going to be punished by an eternal afterlife of torture. Wouldn’t it be in your self-interest to worship such a God?
So if Christians worship God because they are afraid of going to Hell, and look forward to heaven, aren’t they acting in their own self interest?
The problem is, suppose there’s an entity that created the universe, and also created humanity. And this entity declares a certain set of rules to live by, and calls those rules “good”. And human beings take a look at those rules, and agree that the rules are good. Except, how would we know? Imagine instead of God created some always Chaotic Evil humanoids, let’s call them Orcs. And God tells the Orcs that murder is good, torture is good, cannibalism is good, and so on. And the Orcs, being Chaotic Evil, agree. Except the Orc’s opinion on good an evil is wrong according to us, because we can see that the Orcs are evil and think that good is evil and evil is good. The Orcs are wrong, but they will never know they’re wrong, because their nature is evil.
So how do we know that we aren’t the Orcs? How do we know that helping a little old lady across the street is good, and shooting children in the face is evil? Maybe if we were truly moral, we’d abhor the things we now think are good, and embrace what we now mistakenly think is evil.
The point is, the notion that there is some abstract absolute morality outside of human opinion doesn’t do us any good, because being imperfect creatures how can we know what that absolute morality is? And if our natural moral intuitions were wrong, how could we behave according to the correct morality any better than the Orcs could?
The problem with nothing is that we cannot study it. Even the most void and empty region of space does not qualify as nothing because it is constantly being traversed by EM and has at least the most minimally measurably gravitational gradient. Nothing, in reality does not exist, and if it did, it would be nearly impossible to study it without making it not-nothing. So, to say that all this could not have come from nothing is entirely unsupportable by any measure of knowledge.
Nothing is greater than god. Much, much greater. Upon reflection, nothing is really awesome, I have great respect for not-it.
Nothing IS God. I bow down to nothing every day.
Listen, a few months ago, some guy came onto this forum (he was the reason why I joined), with a theory called “The Theory of Everything.” Clearly, he was the intelligent being that created everything, and it was not an accident.
His all knowing intelligence just dried up a lot between creation and posting that thread.
I actually think these sorts of questions come from presupposing a presentist ontology onto time. I do not think this is correct: one, it doesn’t seem to square with relativity. Two, the problems you bring up are not problems for other ontologies of time.
If you accept that it is impossible for something to come from nothing, then there is an infinite progression i.e. the Universe, that which came before, that which came before…and so on. The Bible starts with God and never delves into how God was created. The Universe makes sense if God always existed.
Time is perhaps the wrong way to look at it. Some prerequisites are even more fundamental than mere causality and the notion of ordering.
For instance, some say that the universe can indeed create itself through quantum fluctuations and thus there is no need for a prime mover. This is acceptable as far as it goes. But, why are the laws under which this happened how they are? Why not different laws entirely?
Similarly, if there is a deity who created the Universe, one can easily presuppose that said deity is eternal, and thus did not need to be created, and that is also fine as far as it goes (although, of course, there is absolutely no evidence for such a deity.) But, how can said deity exist in the first place? Why is the universe not set up so that deities cannot exist?