A rejection of god(s).

Posted: Sun Sep 27, 2009 11:39 am

Malleus Dei wrote:

It is established but yet again a non-sequitor to claim that it accounts for spontaneous creation without any "creator".

That's what the pros have been saying for years.

Quote:

Physicists also claimed that the universe was eternal at one point, oops guess they were wrong. It is foolish to claim that our current understanding is the be all end of all of knowledge or that current theories wont be radically altered or even discarded.

But a number of theories or views have already been around for many decades which, in an age of accelerating advancement of knowledge, certainly suggests permanence. In many cases, new discoveries strengthen existing theories.

Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 5:02 pm

Kronos wrote:

Premise 1: Nothing can cause its own creation or beginning.

Premise 2: Nothing can happen without a cause.

Premise 3: The Universe had a beginning.

Okay, naturally I have to ask you, if nothing can be without a cause, then what caused God?

Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 11:35 pm

Sol_Invictus wrote:

Okay, naturally I have to ask you, if nothing can be without a cause, then what caused God?

Everything material, and contingent needs a cause. Eventually you get to the end of this chain of causes and events, i.e creation. This therefore necessitates a being, energy, force or whatever of 'necessary' life. This means it is independent, eternal, and has no beginning nor end. The Classical Theist belief would be God.

Btw, i'm an agnostic not a theist. I just did philosophy at college, thought i'd contribute Smile

Black Brigade Major Joined: 01 May 2009 Posts: 256

The idea there needs to be a beginning isn't necessary, GB; it's as likely god started the chain of events as they've always occurred, ad naseum.

Posted: Sat Jan 23, 2010 4:49 pm

Pragmatic wrote:

The idea there needs to be a beginning isn't necessary, GB; it's as likely god started the chain of events as they've always occurred, ad naseum.

That would be the infinite regress theory, which I think Bertrand Russell was in favour of, and as was the early Richard Dawkins. But from experience and scientific reasoning, we can see that all contingent things in the world have both beginning and an end. Reason therefore suggests the universe, being material, would need a beginning.

I agree, however, this argument will continue forever with no real answer.

Black Brigade Major Joined: 01 May 2009 Posts: 256

The fact that everything has a beginning and an end to its form doesn't necessitate that everything has a beginning or an end, i.e. mass/energy, being known to neither be created or destroyed but merely change in it's form, does not follow the same laws as that of the forms it takes.

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 11:39 pm

Commander GB wrote:

Sol_Invictus wrote:

Okay, naturally I have to ask you, if nothing can be without a cause, then what caused God?

Everything material, and contingent needs a cause. Eventually you get to the end of this chain of causes and events, i.e creation. This therefore necessitates a being, energy, force or whatever of 'necessary' life. This means it is independent, eternal, and has no beginning nor end. The Classical Theist belief would be God.

Btw, i'm an agnostic not a theist. I just did philosophy at college, thought i'd contribute :)

Would you believe I actually studied this myself? I was merely interested in Kronos' answer.And yes you're right, the creation of the universe does require energy. But that's all, it doesn't require a being to say "Hey, I want to begin time and space now". That's just silly, because for the being there would be no "now" for it to decide to create, hell, if it exists outside time and space, which it naturally must, it wouldn't even be capable of decision making as we know it. Furthermore, this being would either never ever directly intervene in our time and space, or the very existance of time and space is the result of this being willing it into existance.

As an agnostic atheist my position is that I do not believe in this being, but if it were to reach into our universe and say; punch me in the balls as direct evidence of its existance, then I'd have to accept it. And that would be pretty rad. But it's probably never going to happen.