3.5billion yrs

[10CC]

For 3'5billion years life has existed on this rock we call earth.
For 3.5billion years every single one of those lives has DIED (sans current).
2000yrs ago according to some people everything changed, some don't die.
For the last 2000yrs every living thing has still died.
Which reality are you prepared to accept?
That is the question.

[AdHoc]

Ahhh, ok so we agree atheists believe 0+0+0+0+...= everything

You may need to explain to this atheist how you came to the conclusion of your mathemagics and why you believe an atheist (me) would agree with it?

10CC you are too late. I've had the boots put to me over this already. What I know now is that it is fruitless to try and answer that question because no one can know the answer and it doesn't affect our daily lives.

If I heard this correctly, atheists do not claim one way or the other that anything caused the universe but if anything did cause the universe it was not a personal God.

[unfogged]

[Replying to AdHoc]

If I heard this correctly, atheists do not claim one way or the other that anything caused the universe but if anything did cause the universe it was not a personal God.

I can't speak for any other atheists but in my case it'd be more correct to say that there is no evidence for a personal god. It doesn't make any sense to me to posit a god, let alone one with all the attributes given to a personal god, before we have found a reason to do so. Not knowing the cause, or even if one is needed, is not justification for making assumptions about it.

[AdHoc]

[Replying to AdHoc]

If I heard this correctly, atheists do not claim one way or the other that anything caused the universe but if anything did cause the universe it was not a personal God.

I can't speak for any other atheists but in my case it'd be more correct to say that there is no evidence for a personal god. It doesn't make any sense to me to posit a god, let alone one with all the attributes given to a personal god, before we have found a reason to do so. Not knowing the cause, or even if one is needed, is not justification for making assumptions about it.

Right, I kind of skipped that part. An atheist would likely say there is no God because there is no evidence for God. If God existed there would most certainly be evidence. There is no evidence therefore there is no God.

[Filthy Tugboat]

I think you got me there. It's the kind of question that won't affect your day to day life but strikes you suddenly when you're sitting by a campfire and your eyes follow the sparks flying upwards into the starry sky. There are others too.

Even then it's not that thought provoking, I don't even know where to start when contemplating the start.

[connermt]

[Replying to post 29 by AdHoc]

Is it just me or are you being really evasive?

It's you

...your position on whether something or nothing caused everything?

That was never my position. You're making up things

I have to tell you I feel like I'm being tied in knots by you and it isn't much fun.

That's your own fault.

If that's your opinion I am dying to hear more about it.

It's not

[lao tzu]

Thanks for the thoughtful response Jesse,
The quantum world and manifold branes of the multiverse are the usual answer to that question and I appreciate you answering it.

You're entirely welcome, AdHoc,

Now what is this?!

Manifold branes? An answer to something from nothing? Ouch, AdHoc! Please. Noli turbare toplogios meos! (With apologies to Archimedes). Don't step on my toplogies!

A "manifold brane" is "wet water," obsurantism couched in mathematics I find it difficult to credit to your understanding. Rule 1 of the internet: There's always someone reading your posts who knows whereof you speak, and can spot the double-talk, even if we don't usually spend the time to make a correction.

A manifold is just a topological n-space that's locally Euclidean. That is, any neighborhood can be coordinatized using the real numbers, , e.g., (x1, x2, ..., xn). It has nothing to do with something from nothing. A brane, short for membrane, is just a manifold in which not all dimensions are relevant to physical calculations, which is how strung-out physorcerers explain gravity functioning via an inverse square law even in 10 or 11 Euclidean dimensions, where instead it should operate via an inverse 9-th or 10-th power law owing to the surface area of the respective n-balls.

Likewise, the multiverse " a physical theory with little if any support " does not signify something from nothing. At best it makes out our local zero-time something other than an absolute minimum time. We don't need a multiverse for that either. Hawking famously proposed the alternative of a closed world-line, analogous to suggesting that, like the real numbers, the negatives lead to zero as well, and extend back to the same infinity as the positives. This principle occurs quite naturally in projective geometries, by the way. One of the more trivial theories of projective geometry is that every Euclidean geometry can be embedded in a projective geometry by including the horizon line.

Thank you for the compliment, I sometimes wonder if I'm pushing the envelope with some of my comments but they are always well-intentioned in a spirit of respect.

You're right I haven't been addressing the OP I guess because I don't believe any of us will live forever in this world.

That's just what I'd expect a communist to say.

(ba-dum tish)

At the end of this I have come away with a sense that maybe atheists and christians have something in common and that's a good thing.

AdHoc

If that was ever a serious concern for you, allow to relieve you completely. As it turns out, we have nearly everything in common. We are all human.

As ever, Jesse

[JohnA]

[Replying to connermt]

Haha and if atheism said 0+0+0+0+... = coconuts and spiders and everything else... Pardon? What's that you say?

APPARENTLY that is what atheism says.

Ok I need to come up with something more ridiculous to make my point... I'll let you know if I think of something.

An atheist has a lack of belief in one more god than you. Clearly you lack a belief in one less god than an atheist, which makes you an atheist towards the gods you reject.

Because I don't believe in Zeus I'm an atheist? An atheist is someone who believes there is no god or has no belief in any god. Oh and I believe in Zeus by the way but in my belief he is a stone statue.

Based on this, you are apparently the one claiming that 0+0+0+0+... = coconuts and spiders and everything else.

How bizarre of you to offer illogical claims. Is that why you hold a belief in a god?
Is that why you offer: 1=2:
1 (your god) + 0 (nothing) = 1 (your god) + 1 (everything).
rewritten as: 0=1
1 (your god) - 1 (your god) = 1 (everything).
Clearly you are arguing that your god is nothing (0). And that nothing created everything.

Sink me the man thinks I'm a mathemagician. Tell me this, why did you only attribute a 1 to God? Isn't He infinite?

Can you tell us how something (your god) could exist inside/outside nothing before this something created everything from nothing ~13.7 billion years ago?

Well you are begging the question that He created the universe 13.7 billion years ago but no I cannot explain that as you cannot explain how matter can also exist with no beginning and suddenly via an uncaused event turn into an incredible universe that includes yes... Spiders and coconuts.

Imagine a year for a moment and then a thousand years and then a thousand thousand years and then a thousand thousand thousand years. Now multiply that by 13.7.

Thats a big number isn't it?... No its not. Its a blink of a eye compared to an infinite amount of years. Before the big bang there would've been an infinite amount of years an infinite amount of billions of years. On an infinite timeline that 13.7 billion years quickly becomes an infintitely small flash in the pan.

Two questions immediately rise when you consider that. The first is why did the big bang occur at that moment? What caused it to happen at that random moment in time? The second is more difficult, If there were an infinite amount of moments before the big bang we could never reach the end of an infinite amount of moments to ever arrive at the moment when the big bang occurred. Ahh so there must be a t=0 and what or who caused time to begin? It must be a cause that exists outside of time to create time and a cause that exists outside of matter to create matter.

Either that or 0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+ 0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0 +0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+ 0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+0+...= everthing

Oxford Dictionary defines atheist as:
noun
a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.

So, if you lack a belief in the existence of Zeus then you are an atheist towards the god Zeus.

You can substitute any number, if you do not like the 1 previously used for your deity:

Is that why you offer: X=X+ everything:
X (your god) + 0 (nothing) = X (your god) + (everything).
rewritten as: 0 = everything
X (your god) - X (your god) = 1 (everything).
Clearly you are arguing that your god is nothing (0). And that nothing created everything.

The Kalam argues that infinity can not exist. If you accept that, and the notion that the omni- attributes of your god is infinite and not your god, then it would be an error to say your god is infinite. Your claim is that your god has infinite evil, infinite love, infinite power; the infinite refers to a qualifier for the attributes of your god. To argue that your god is infinite is admit you have no understanding of your god, and clearly reject logic (infinite is a qualifier for a concept / object, not the concept/object itself).

Even if we use infinite (=your god), you are still left with a contradiction:

inf (your god) + 0 (nothing) = inf (your god) + (everything).
rewritten as: 0 = everything
inf (your god) - inf (your god) = 1 (everything). --- if inf - inf = 0
Clearly you are arguing that your god is nothing (0). And that nothing created everything.

inf (your god) + 0 (nothing) = inf (your god) + (everything).
rewritten as: 0 = everything
inf (your god) - inf (your god) = 1 (everything). --- if inf - inf = inf
Clearly you are arguing that your god is inf (begging the question, rejecting logic). And that everything if infinite.

Either way (inf-inf = 0 or inf - inf = inf), how can this be logical what you claim?

I do see later you claim infinity is impossible. Yet you say keep on asserting your god is infinite. That is a special pleading fallacy.
Also, to say that everything has a cause except for your god is fallacious spacial pleading again.
How can everything (the universe) have a cause at t=0? You need an event to cause something, hence you need time in order for this change to happen. Where did you god find time to cause everything into existence from nothing if you god is timeless and t=0 at creation?



Can you tell us how something (your god) could exist inside/outside nothing before this something created everything from nothing ~13.7 billion years ago?

The above holds true even if the 13.7 billion years is substituted for 6000 or 10000, or any X.

Can you tell us how something (your god) could exist inside/outside nothing before this something created everything from nothing X years ago?


So, you admit: you can not tell us how the above is possible.

Do you think it is logical to claim that something can exist inside/outside nothing?

If yes, then you admit that you need to reject logic, be illogical in order to claim / hold a belief your god existed inside/outside nothing before something created everything without having time to do this.
If no, then you admit your claim/belief in your god is illogical and is a statement of rejection of logic.
If you say you do not know, then you reject binary logic, and you admit you can not know if your god exist / existed inside/outside before it everything; making your belief that it it illogical.

This is basic rational reasoning.

Can you now answer me:

Do you think it is logical to claim that something can exist inside/outside nothing?

[AdHoc]

Thanks for the thoughtful response Jesse,
The quantum world and manifold branes of the multiverse are the usual answer to that question and I appreciate you answering it.

You're entirely welcome, AdHoc,

Now what is this?!

Manifold branes? An answer to something from nothing? Ouch, AdHoc! Please. Noli turbare toplogios meos! (With apologies to Archimedes). Don't step on my toplogies!

A "manifold brane" is "wet water," obsurantism couched in mathematics I find it difficult to credit to your understanding. Rule 1 of the internet: There's always someone reading your posts who knows whereof you speak, and can spot the double-talk, even if we don't usually spend the time to make a correction.

A manifold is just a topological n-space that's locally Euclidean. That is, any neighborhood can be coordinatized using the real numbers, , e.g., (x1, x2, ..., xn). It has nothing to do with something from nothing. A brane, short for membrane, is just a manifold in which not all dimensions are relevant to physical calculations, which is how strung-out physorcerers explain gravity functioning via an inverse square law even in 10 or 11 Euclidean dimensions, where instead it should operate via an inverse 9-th or 10-th power law owing to the surface area of the respective n-balls.

Likewise, the multiverse " a physical theory with little if any support " does not signify something from nothing. At best it makes out our local zero-time something other than an absolute minimum time. We don't need a multiverse for that either. Hawking famously proposed the alternative of a closed world-line, analogous to suggesting that, like the real numbers, the negatives lead to zero as well, and extend back to the same infinity as the positives. This principle occurs quite naturally in projective geometries, by the way. One of the more trivial theories of projective geometry is that every Euclidean geometry can be embedded in a projective geometry by including the horizon line.

Thank you for the compliment, I sometimes wonder if I'm pushing the envelope with some of my comments but they are always well-intentioned in a spirit of respect.

You're right I haven't been addressing the OP I guess because I don't believe any of us will live forever in this world.

That's just what I'd expect a communist to say.

(ba-dum tish)

At the end of this I have come away with a sense that maybe atheists and christians have something in common and that's a good thing.

AdHoc

If that was ever a serious concern for you, allow to relieve you completely. As it turns out, we have nearly everything in common. We are all human.

As ever, Jesse

You win. I know very little about quantum physics or string theory but I really appreciate your explanation. I had to read your post a few times and I would need to read up on some of it to understand it more.

The communist joke went right over my head too.

[JohnA]

[Replying to post 48 by AdHoc]

Can you now answer me:

Do you think it is logical to claim that something can exist inside/outside nothing?

http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 648#604648

Thank you.

[lao tzu]

The communist joke went right over my head too.

Hello again, AdHoc,

These kids! To be fair, it's a rather dated reference, and U.S.-centric. It refers to McCarthyism, eponymous with Senator Joseph McCarthy.

Senator Joseph McCarthy, Mr. "I have a list," was the most infamous exploiter of the "red scare" of the 1950s. He used his position to attack a long line of his personal enemies via smears and accusations of either communism, or if that charge was too outrageous, communist-sympathy.

"Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the communist party?" he would ask. Denials were answered rhetorically with, "That's just what I'd expect a communist to say." Using this tactic, any denial can be treated as an admission of guilt, and all modern use of the phrase references this tactic.

As ever, Jesse



Please note the weekend is done, and with it my available time for responses. Until we pass each other again, fare well.