Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

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Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

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Post by Wootah »

Assuming the universe was created via the big bang, did the universal constants exist before the big bang or were they created at the same time as the big bang?
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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #71

Post by DrNoGods »

[Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #70]
Therefore the origin of it cannot be something we can regard as a scientific, material explanation it must - absolutely must - either be unexplained or be explained non-scientifically...
What's wrong with the "unexplained" option (or as yet unexplained)? That represents reality more than any other option because it is the present case. We simply don't know the exact mechanism for how this universe formed yet, so people are coming up with ideas.

A god creator being is just one of those ideas, but since no gods have ever been shown to exist this explanation can't be weighted any more than a potential scientific explanation. You can't claim that a scientific explanation is impossible any more than I can claim that a creator god explanation is impossible ... because we don't yet have an answer to the question. Show that gods exist, then you can proceed to propose one as a creator of the universe.
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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #72

Post by William »

DrNoGods wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 11:51 am [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #70]
Therefore the origin of it cannot be something we can regard as a scientific, material explanation it must - absolutely must - either be unexplained or be explained non-scientifically...
What's wrong with the "unexplained" option (or as yet unexplained)? That represents reality more than any other option because it is the present case. We simply don't know the exact mechanism for how this universe formed yet, so people are coming up with ideas.

A god creator being is just one of those ideas, but since no gods have ever been shown to exist this explanation can't be weighted any more than a potential scientific explanation. You can't claim that a scientific explanation is impossible any more than I can claim that a creator god explanation is impossible ... because we don't yet have an answer to the question. Show that gods exist, then you can proceed to propose one as a creator of the universe.
What I have found interesting about the idea of a being who created this universe, is that it opens up a whole lot of possibilities re answering 'why' such a universe was created and why consciousness was placed within such a universe....some of those answers move well away from the traditional religious answers, even to the point of being heretical and blasphemous.

Meanwhile the materialist world continues to crumble under the weight of its own productions...seemingly unstoppable and certain granting no respite to the curious mind which is promised only the certainty of oblivion once the individuals brain dies.

Thus, the curious mind - naturally enough - looks elsewhere...

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #73

Post by Sherlock Holmes »

DrNoGods wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 11:51 am [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #70]
Therefore the origin of it cannot be something we can regard as a scientific, material explanation it must - absolutely must - either be unexplained or be explained non-scientifically...
What's wrong with the "unexplained" option (or as yet unexplained)? That represents reality more than any other option because it is the present case. We simply don't know the exact mechanism for how this universe formed yet, so people are coming up with ideas.
By "unexplained" do you mean "we don't yet have a scientific explanation" or "there can never be a scientific explanation"?

What ideas are people "coming up with"?
DrNoGods wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 11:51 am A god creator being is just one of those ideas, but since no gods have ever been shown to exist this explanation can't be weighted any more than a potential scientific explanation.
Since the universe cannot have a scientific explanation then the fact that it is there shows that God exists.
DrNoGods wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 11:51 am You can't claim that a scientific explanation is impossible any more than I can claim that a creator god explanation is impossible ... because we don't yet have an answer to the question. Show that gods exist, then you can proceed to propose one as a creator of the universe.
You need to expose the flaw in my argument Dr. just saying "You can't claim that a scientific explanation is impossible" is hardly a rebuttal.

My prior post is a proof that the material universe's presence cannot be explained in material terms, a thing cannot be its own explanation, it never has been in science either.

Laws of physics cannot be invoked to explain why or how laws of physics exist.

I infer that God exists by showing that the presence of the universe can never have a material/scientific explanation, God is inferred, the universe is evidence for God.

This is so basic, so obvious yet I know it's hard, it took me close to a decade to just see it, dispense with my prejudice and accept it.

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #74

Post by William »

[Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #73]
I infer that God exists by showing that the presence of the universe can never have a material/scientific explanation, God is inferred, the universe is evidence for God.
As I have pointed out already, when the name/title "God" is used in argument, it is synonymous with the biblical representation of a creator-god. Is that what you are claiming? If so, I disagree that this universe is physical evidence for the existence of the biblical God.

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #75

Post by Sherlock Holmes »

William wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 12:27 pm [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #73]
I infer that God exists by showing that the presence of the universe can never have a material/scientific explanation, God is inferred, the universe is evidence for God.
As I have pointed out already, when the name/title "God" is used in argument, it is synonymous with the biblical representation of a creator-god. Is that what you are claiming? If so, I disagree that this universe is physical evidence for the existence of the biblical God.
That's a fair question, the God people perceive reflects one of many possible understandings, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Buddhist etc. and many more.

For me I ask, is there anything in history that seems compatible with the inferred "God" the thing that created the universe and might that history therefore be revelation, might it be something that's also evidence?

That's the question I asked many years ago.

It turns out there are several things in the Judeo-Christian records that do seem consistent with the inference, seem to possibly shed more light on it.

A few examples are (emphases mine)
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
This is precisely what I experienced, I infer God from what has been made, to deny that it was created by a mind is illogical - without excuse - means (to me) without a rational argument.

Then we have the very first words in the very first book:
In the beginning God created...
Again, this is consistent with what I have reasoned, for us, for me, people, the beginning of our world, universe was brought about by God, the act was "creation" that's what we infer too, something outside of material causality brought the material realm into existence.

Another thought provoking claim is:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.
This seems to be additional information, revelation if you will, information about the creation that we cannot simply infer, information that must be revealed to us. The words are also deeply profound, puzzling, make no real sense within Jewish/Israelite culture or history.

So the more I look at scripture the more I see (what seems to be) profound statements, things that don't even make clear sense but nevertheless seem authoritative.

When I do this I decouple myself from man made organizational "Christianity" I look as much as I can to the text itself, I try to avoid embellishments that are rooted in traditions and human authorities.

Because of the way God was inferred (acknowledging an alien non-deterministic agency with the power to create laws and matter) I expect further information about that to also be profound also, I expect to be intellectually challenged as I try to fathom more about it all and much of scripture, particularly the NT is littered with this.

I have studied the history of the Bible, how it came to exist, how it got translated and so on, most Christians I know don't care about it, don't know how our Bible came to exist, they just blindly accept it as the blindly accept what their leaders tell them.

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #76

Post by William »

[Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #75]

Is it your position that because some apparently revealing information came our way through a best-selling book, that this is justification that whatever that book claims about God, is to be seen as truthful?

What if it read "In the beginning MIND created..."?

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #77

Post by Sherlock Holmes »

William wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 1:27 pm [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #75]

Is it your position that because some apparently revealing information came our way through a best-selling book, that this is justification that whatever that book claims about God, is to be seen as truthful?

What if it read "In the beginning MIND created..."?
The honest answer is "no" that's not how I see or reason about this, it is more complicated, more challenging.

The material in question only became "best selling" quite recently, for the preceding 1,400 years it was faithfully copied by hand by skilled artisans with very little error it seems.

In addition there are many "extra canonical" books (rejected as inspired by a council around 325 AD) that seem to contain legitimate history too.

The entire history of all this is truly fascinating and far removed from what we see today as established Christianity, Jerome for example was a superb scholar and one of the relatively few people educated enough to translate from Hebrew and Greek into Latin.

Seriously, how we came to possess what we call the Bible is an astonishing story, part archeology, part history, part textual criticism, that fascination too does not depend on one's theological views, many noted experts are in fact agnostics and have no affiliation with any churches or anything, just dedicated scholarship.

Frankly the fact that Bible exists at all, that the quality of the copying has been so high for several thousand years, its uniqueness and so on, strike me as uncanny, part of the reason I attach significance to it and regard it as some kind of link to God the creator.

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #78

Post by William »

[Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #77]
Frankly the fact that Bible exists at all, that the quality of the copying has been so high for several thousand years, its uniqueness and so on, strike me as uncanny, part of the reason I attach significance to it and regard it as some kind of link to God the creator.
I am interested in your answer to my question "what if it read "In the beginning MIND created..."?"

Sherlock Holmes

Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #79

Post by Sherlock Holmes »

William wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 2:01 pm [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #77]
Frankly the fact that Bible exists at all, that the quality of the copying has been so high for several thousand years, its uniqueness and so on, strike me as uncanny, part of the reason I attach significance to it and regard it as some kind of link to God the creator.
I am interested in your answer to my question "what if it read "In the beginning MIND created..."?"
Well to all intents and purposes it could, after all the English word "God" has been translated from the Hebrew word אֱלֹהִ֑ים pronounced as "’ĕ·lō·hîm" which has its roots in pre-Israelite semitic tribes and languages as meaning "deity".

Inside the Bible too we find a multitude of definitions and elaborations, for example "God is spirit" so Genesis could conceivably be written "In the beginning Spirit created..." the term "spirit" too is described in various ways and in various places as being ethereal, able to influence yet not itself be influenced or comprehended, much in keeping with the mystery of the the universe's orgins.

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Re: Did the universal constants exist before the big bang?

Post #80

Post by William »

Sherlock Holmes wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 2:12 pm
William wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 2:01 pm [Replying to Sherlock Holmes in post #77]
Frankly the fact that Bible exists at all, that the quality of the copying has been so high for several thousand years, its uniqueness and so on, strike me as uncanny, part of the reason I attach significance to it and regard it as some kind of link to God the creator.
I am interested in your answer to my question "what if it read "In the beginning MIND created..."?"
Well to all intents and purposes it could, after all the English word "God" has been translated from the Hebrew word אֱלֹהִ֑ים pronounced as "’ĕ·lō·hîm" which has its roots in pre-Israelite semitic tribes and languages as meaning "deity".

Inside the Bible too we find a multitude of definitions and elaborations, for example "God is spirit" so Genesis could conceivably be written "In the beginning Spirit created..." the term "spirit" too is described in various ways and in various places as being ethereal, able to influence yet not itself be influenced or comprehended, much in keeping with the mystery of the the universe's orgins.
Yet there is the fact that a MIND can indeed be - at least influenced - and at least somewhat comprehended by other minds.

Is there any biblical documentation which can show us that the God-idea therein is capable of being influenced and comprehended?

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