Version 2 of God argument 1

[Metacrock]

(1) The Universe is contingent upon "prior" conditions (conditions that existed "prior" to our understanding of space/time:





(2) By definition the "ultimate" origin cannot be contingent, since it would reuqire the explaination of still prior conditions (a string of infinite contingencies with no necessity is logical nonsense;the existence of contingent conditions requires the existence of necessary conditions).

(3) Therefore, the universe must have emerged from some prior condition which always existed, is self sufficient, and not dependent upon anything "higher."


(4) Naturalistic assumptions of determinism, and the arbitrary nature of naturalistic cosmology creates an arbitrary necessity; if the UEO has to produce existents automatically and/or deterministically due to naturalistic forces, the congtingencies function as necessities

(5) Therefore, since arbitrary necessities are impossible by nature of their absurdity, thus we should attribute creation to an act of the will; the eternal existent must be possessed of some ability to create at will; and thus must possess will.

Corollary:


(6) An eternal existent which creates all things and chooses to do so is compatible with the definition of "God" found in any major world religion, and therefore, can be regarded as God. Thus God must exist QED!













(a) Prior condition being space/time, or gravitational field.

Matter, energy, all physical phenomena stem from 'gravitational field' the prior condition of which is he big bang, the prior condition of which is the singularity, the prior condition of which is...we do not know.


(b)All naturalistic phenomena are empirically derived, thus they are contingent by their very nature.


As Karl Popper said, empirical facts are facts which might not have been. Everything that belongs to space time is a contingent truth because it could have been otherwise, it is dependent upon the existence of something else for its' existence going all the way back to the Big Bang, which is itself contingent upon something.(Antony Flew, Philosophical Dictionary New York: St. Martin's Press, 1979, 242.)

[Wyvern]

Actually you are the one that is saying the universe couldn't have come about without such rules and now you go even further by saying god imposed these rules.

you did say that. You said the universe could not have come about.

Well you are half right, what I said is the universe could not come about with the rules our universe operates on in place.

I on the other hand am saying that the universal rules which everything we know is based on the universe itself and to make an argument about something outside of the universe using the rules of the universe is speculative at best.

yes, that's the root of your mistake. being a mateialist you have become confussed in the distinction between abstract and contrcete and began to assume that only concrete exists. that's just fallacious. logic is relationships. Those relationships will exist if any thing exists at all. It doesn't have to be a universe. the existence of a mere structure of knoeldge of any kind necesstieis logic. The ruels of logic are our creations through our imopssion of understanding, but the thing itself is just necessitaed by any sort of being.

I bolded your statement above because this is the very basis of what I am saying but which you do not seem to understand. There is no structure of knowledge of anything outside of this universe and this is why logic which is based on this universe does not necessarily work.

Now I've proven that there must be eternal necessary being since contingency cannot be the ultimate origin. thus whatever that is necessities logic. physics is our understanding of the beahvior of the material universe and our understanding employs loigc. so lgic is prior to phsyics.

As you just stated above "the rules of logic are our creation". The laws of physics on the other hand have always been, merely waiting for humans to discover them. Sounds kinda circular to me, using a logic argument to justify the use of logic.

That's just plain silly, if you want to be technical both came into existance at the same time. Your prof's have really polluted your mind about logic. I'm not saying logic isn't useful, but it's not as all powerful as you have come under the impression of.

No they didn't. Big bang I believe was within a second prior and the universe formed in nano seconds or within I think they callculate four seconds. but the poitn is both stem from singurlity and nonly God knows what that is.

So you agree then that at best both came about at the same instant, after all you say they both came from the singularity. Face it they need each other in their particular areas and are inseparable, only thing is physics is specific to a certain subject matter and logic is more generic in that it can be applied in a number of fields.

you didn't listen. your argument only applies to Newtonian rules. It does not apply to quntum rules. it's just a straw man argument.

I'm not aware of anything within QM which allows for exceeding light speed.

get educated. conservatino of energy is no more at that level and most other Newotinin ideas. But that doesn't mean there are no rules.

First off this is an Einsteinian idea, unless you can invalidate his rules of relativity(no QM doesn't either)you will always butt your head up against the speed limit.

Since the physical laws came into being at time 0, this is not true.

fallacious assumption you are working backwards in logic. The physical laws of the Newtonian universe seem to vansih at t=0 but that does't mean there are no rules. Certianly the idea of rules vanishign at t=0 could be thought of as a rule.

You're grasping at straws, ALL rules that we know of stop working at t=0. This is what they are saying when they refer to a singularity, it is an unknowable point.

it almost seems like you are taking the biblical phrase, "in the beginning there was the word" literally, I know they did in Elizabethan times because they were required to in order to hold a college level teaching position, as you have said a number of times context my friend, context.

you are letting your prejudcies color your understanding of my words.

No this is what happens when you use a quote from someone that has no choice but to word things in a certain way in order for them to retain their position. Also though, you do this very thing all the time.

[Metacrock]

(1) I don't think you knkow enough about logic to know when you have gotten your ass kicked or when an argument has beaten you over the head with it's logical force.

(2) you have not made a specific attack on any of my assumptions so it's kind of hard to defend what is not attacked. you assert that they are no good but never say what you are talking about.

(3) I dont' think you understand loigcal thought, so you really don't know what works and what doesn't.

I don't think you know what 'getting your ass kicked' means, particularly when you haven't kicked anyones ass.

that really shows your ignoarnce. too ignorant to know when you been clobbered. I have burried all of you at one time or another in mounds of evidence and you have nothing to say. Like the 35 or so quotes O put through in answer to your stament that the Jews didnt' exepect a divine messiah and you go "what doesn't that have to with it?"

Assumptions are not things one has to prove. They are either reasonalbe orn ot. If they are reasonable assumptions we can assecess the likelyhood of the permatiers that make them up. But to say "you don't prove your assumptions" is just the hieght of ignoarnce about how argument works.

I personally have not made a specific attack on any of your assumptions, no. However, others have, and you just can't get through your head that your assumptions are unsupportable. Furrowed brow has shown the weaknesses in your primary assumptions. He also has shown that you have misrepresented your
sources too.

that's ridiculous. Furrowed brow has done the least to touch any of my arguments. all he knows how to do is to find some obscrure aspect like a foot note or the way I use a word and harp on that. He hasn't said anything about the assumptions I make. If only he would get to arguing such general things.

you have not showen any assumptions I've made that are unreasonable.

as for number 3, that is just an 'ad homenin' attack. I have to say that your use of logic is very shaky at best. It boils down to

1) Unsupported assertion a
2) Unsuppored assertion b
3) therefore god.

you are running from logic. there is nothing in world more solid than the assumtion that a contingencgy cannot be an ultiamte origin. It's a priori! don't understand that? Its' like saying a prostetute can't be virgin can't you see that. to be contingent means something comes before, a proir, that's the nature of the case. so it cannot be ultiamte.

Now what's illogical about that?

If the universe is contingent then it obviosuly something comes before. that somethng migh tbe contingent but somewhere back in the cahin of prior conditons there has to be a stopping point, if IF IFIFIFFIFIFi ICR is illogical, and I show that it is. Ist' circular reasoning.

that benig the case there cannot be a contingent origni. thus there has to be a necessary origin which in termpal terms taps out to an eternal origin. can you not see that?

Now show me where hte illogic is? Is' in your understanding becuase you only think in cleches and truisms and things ahteists tell you to believe you cannot think for yourself.

That is what every one of your 'arguement from' boils down to.

why can't you give a real argument? clearly you don't understand because instead of a real example you are just posturing. that's not an argument it's just bickering.

In this case, you are making the logical fallacy of 'special pleading' for God. You are getting out of the alledged 'infinate regression' by basically saying 'oh, there can't be an infinate regression, therefore God'.

that is not what speicial pleding is. You eally need to take logic classes becuase you do not understand loigc. Tha's actually a logically valid argument. If ICR is illogocial and contradiction then obviously ICR can't be the answer. without that there's no way to even suggest a contingency as the ultmiate answer as I just show above.

you know so little of logic you can't tell the difference in arguing by proces of elimnmation, which is totally not fallacious but totally valid, and special pleading which you apparenlty dont' understand.

It is just restating the 'first cause' arguement with a bunch of unsupported assertions.

instead of beating your chest and screaming like a bigfoot why don't you acutally say something and show how it's unsupported. I mean you are not arguing here you are merely posturing. you jsut say these words and don't back them up with even a speicific example.

what you are donig is no different than just say 'I dont liek boo that that's no goo you are no good, boo you. I hat e x, boo x."

The fact is we do not know
what the 'conditions' were that allowed the formation of the universe. Ignorance does not mean 'God did it' . You just took the 'everything has a cause' arguement, and modified with with a lot of bull. It suffers the same problem.

I've covered this bs you aren't even hinting at the arguments I made about it. I want you to write a lette to Hawking and tell him he's an idiot for suggesting sepcualative unsupporte ds. that's exactly what he did. there not one little insigificant nubmer anywhere that backs his stuff. but on one says that because comsologists do this all the time. As long as it''s lgoiclaly exptrapolated from valid known data, which y stuff and I've demonstrated that with Bib bang theiory which you don't understand, its' conseidered valid.

if you don' tbelieve me go read smoe articles about cosmolgoical theory. have you ever? I dubt it. you clealry know very little of any of this.

stop posturing stop beating your chest and say something!!!

[Furrowed Brow]

Hi Metacrock

Furrowed brow has done the least to touch any of my arguments. all he knows how to do is to find some obscrure aspect like a foot note or the way I use a word and harp on that. He hasn't said anything about the assumptions I make. If only he would get to arguing such general things.

Kind of disagree with you there old boy. When you started a second thread without your Hidden argument, I took that as a mark of deep gratitude on your behalf, after being clearly shown your error...Or were you just running away? But then I see you wrote...

you are running from logic.

So now I get it. Starting a revised argument without your hidden argument because you were getting tied up in knots over the logic is evidence of us atheist running away from your logic. Got you. Silly me. Here's the original

He hasn't said anything about the assumptions I make

Hmm. (Sound of grinding teeth!) a small review me thinks. Here are some choice moments.

Criticism Against Premise 1

Just use the old Metacrock acid test; prove to me that x could exist without the conditions that form x. That's the way to know if it's a contignency or not. Space/time can't exist wihtout space and time.

Ok Acid test. Prove space and time can't exist without space-time. If you can't your "priority" is bogus!

A Criticism of Premise 1 (b) as used in original thread. (Highlighted here because it demonstrates Metacrock's systematic failure to understand the limits of empiricism. This is a flaw that explains much of his confusion over the use of the term "contingent")

1 (b)All naturalistic phenomena are empirically derived, thus they are contingent by their very nature.

....Moreover the contingency is derived from our empirical method, not the nature of something in itself. Put another way: conclusions derived from our observations are contingent, we do not know whether everything is itself contingent per se. Here you are guilty of a subtle leap in your logic that leads you into another fallacy. The nature of how we derive something empirically being a different nature to the nature of something in itself.

1) "empirical knowledge is derived from our ability to exprapoloate probabilities based upon what we observe as regualr and consitant about the universe." OK
2) "Thus all empirical matters are matters of contingency" OK
3) "because they all dervie from causes " No. Wrong. They all derive from observations.

A criticism against Premise 2.

So your argument relies on dismissing an infinite regress as nonsense, without showing that the regress forms a formal contradiction, unless you assume an ultimate origin. But you only assume an origin because you cant make sense of an infinite regress. But that tactic fails to recognise the difference between ones inability to comprehend an infinite regress, and the regress being nonsense in itself. To prove the latter requires you demonstrate how an infinite regress forms a formal contradiction. And you cant do that without assuming an origin....and around and around in circles this goes.

Another criticism Against Premise 2

Lets consider what that might mean by way of mere nit picking:

a) a contingent prior condition is necessary for there to be a contingent condition.

b) a necessary prior condition is necessary for there to be a contingent condition.

It is obvious that a) generate an infinite regress of contingent conditions, because each condition must necessarily follow from a prior contingent condition. But Metacrock thinks such infinite regresses are "logical nonsense" (thought he is wrong about the logical bit).

But b) creates a different problem. How can a necessary/non contingent condition generate a contingent condition? To do that there must be something contingent about the necessity. But a necessary contingent condition is a contradiction. Therefore b) is logical nonsense.

So the heart of Metacrock's argument, and the point upon which everything else turns is a logical nonsense!

Criticism against Premise 3

3) Therefore, the universe must have emerged from some prior condition which always existed, is self sufficient, and not dependent upon anything "higher."

But you have not ....contemplated the alternative (Alternative) that the universe might have emerged from an absence of any ontological necessary conditions. The fact you argument makes no room for such counters means (3) takes an invalid step with its insistence on "must have".

Criticism Against Premise 5.

Even if we follow your route and arrive at an absurdity, how and why do you make the leap to an act of will? This is another non sequitur,...

The only Premise I have not had much of a go at is premise 4 . And I have largely left that alone because of its rambling incoherence, as compared to the succinct incoherence of its fellow premises. All of the above leaves out the other work I have done to criticize various point and turns in the debate.

Metacrock you may have failed to notice but your argument crumbled into dust a long time ago. My motivation for staying here is the challenge of bringing you to see that. Sadly I do expect to fail, but I'm ever hopeful.

Anyhow - if all of the above was just too much nit picking, here in broad brush general terms are its implications. - 1) Metacrock's does not understand empiricism, 2) conflates epistemological contingency with metaphysical contingency, 3) is blind to alternative possibilities that prevent him drawing the conclusions he draws, and 4) skates effortlessly over the glaring incoherences within his use of terminology, plus 5) he throws in the odd non sequitur. (And if you care to go back and review the debate over Popper and the guy from NASA - 6) misuses authoritative voices).

[Metacrock]

Hi Metacrock

Furrowed brow has done the least to touch any of my arguments. all he knows how to do is to find some obscrure aspect like a foot note or the way I use a word and harp on that. He hasn't said anything about the assumptions I make. If only he would get to arguing such general things.

Kind of disagree with you there old boy. When you started a second thread without your Hidden argument, I took that as a mark of deep gratitude on your behalf, after being clearly shown your error...Or were you just running away? But then I see you wrote...

you are running from logic.

So now I get it. Starting a revised argument without your hidden argument because you were getting tied up in knots over the logic is evidence of us atheist running away from your logic. Got you. Silly me. Here's the original

He hasn't said anything about the assumptions I make

Hmm. (Sound of grinding teeth!) a small review me thinks. Here are some choice moments.

Criticism Against Premise 1

Just use the old Metacrock acid test; prove to me that x could exist without the conditions that form x. That's the way to know if it's a contignency or not. Space/time can't exist wihtout space and time.

Ok Acid test. Prove space and time can't exist without space-time. If you can't your "priority" is bogus!

A Criticism of Premise 1 (b) as used in original thread. (Highlighted here because it demonstrates Metacrock's systematic failure to understand the limits of empiricism. This is a flaw that explains much of his confusion over the use of the term "contingent")

1 (b)All naturalistic phenomena are empirically derived, thus they are contingent by their very nature.

....Moreover the contingency is derived from our empirical method, not the nature of something in itself. Put another way: conclusions derived from our observations are contingent, we do not know whether everything is itself contingent per se. Here you are guilty of a subtle leap in your logic that leads you into another fallacy. The nature of how we derive something empirically being a different nature to the nature of something in itself.

1) "empirical knowledge is derived from our ability to exprapoloate probabilities based upon what we observe as regualr and consitant about the universe." OK
2) "Thus all empirical matters are matters of contingency" OK
3) "because they all dervie from causes " No. Wrong. They all derive from observations.

A criticism against Premise 2.

So your argument relies on dismissing an infinite regress as nonsense, without showing that the regress forms a formal contradiction, unless you assume an ultimate origin. But you only assume an origin because you cant make sense of an infinite regress. But that tactic fails to recognise the difference between ones inability to comprehend an infinite regress, and the regress being nonsense in itself. To prove the latter requires you demonstrate how an infinite regress forms a formal contradiction. And you cant do that without assuming an origin....and around and around in circles this goes.

Another criticism Against Premise 2

Lets consider what that might mean by way of mere nit picking:

a) a contingent prior condition is necessary for there to be a contingent condition.

b) a necessary prior condition is necessary for there to be a contingent condition.

It is obvious that a) generate an infinite regress of contingent conditions, because each condition must necessarily follow from a prior contingent condition. But Metacrock thinks such infinite regresses are "logical nonsense" (thought he is wrong about the logical bit).

But b) creates a different problem. How can a necessary/non contingent condition generate a contingent condition? To do that there must be something contingent about the necessity. But a necessary contingent condition is a contradiction. Therefore b) is logical nonsense.

So the heart of Metacrock's argument, and the point upon which everything else turns is a logical nonsense!

Criticism against Premise 3

3) Therefore, the universe must have emerged from some prior condition which always existed, is self sufficient, and not dependent upon anything "higher."

But you have not ....contemplated the alternative (Alternative) that the universe might have emerged from an absence of any ontological necessary conditions. The fact you argument makes no room for such counters means (3) takes an invalid step with its insistence on "must have".

Criticism Against Premise 5.

Even if we follow your route and arrive at an absurdity, how and why do you make the leap to an act of will? This is another non sequitur,...

The only Premise I have not had much of a go at is premise 4 . And I have largely left that alone because of its rambling incoherence, as compared to the succinct incoherence of its fellow premises. All of the above leaves out the other work I have done to criticize various point and turns in the debate.

Metacrock you may have failed to notice but your argument crumbled into dust a long time ago. My motivation for staying here is the challenge of bringing you to see that. Sadly I do expect to fail, but I'm ever hopeful.

Anyhow - if all of the above was just too much nit picking, here in broad brush general terms are its implications. - 1) Metacrock's does not understand empiricism, 2) conflates epistemological contingency with metaphysical contingency, 3) is blind to alternative possibilities that prevent him drawing the conclusions he draws, and 4) skates effortlessly over the glaring incoherences within his use of terminology, plus 5) he throws in the odd non sequitur. (And if you care to go back and review the debate over Popper and the guy from NASA - 6) misuses authoritative voices).

I should not have said that you have done the least. I overstated my case. The truth is you have had some good arguments and I really do feel that you are one of the most intelligent oppoents (if that's what we are) I've met at this board. Sorry I said that.