God Must Exist: Infinite Regression is Impossible

[We_Are_VENOM]

.

First off, by "universe", I mean all physical reality govern by natural law. This would include universes that we know/don’t know about.

1. If God does not exist, then the universe is past eternal.

Justification: We know that the universe exist, and if there is no transcendent supernatural cause, then either

A. the universe either popped into being, uncaused, out of nothing.
B. OR, it has existed for eternity.

I think we can safely remove posit A from the equation (unless there is someone who thinks it is a plausible explanation).

Let’s focus on posit B.

Based on posit B, we need not provide any naturalistic explanation as to the cause of our universe, considering the fact that the term “universe” applies (as mentioned earlier) to all physical reality, which means that any naturalistic explanation one provides is already accounted for as “eternal”.

And if God does not exist, then physical reality (the universe) is all there is, and thus must be eternal.

2. If the universe is not past eternal, then God exists.

Justification: If the universe (all physical reality) is NOT eternal, then it had a beginning.

Since natural law (mother nature) cannot logically be used to explain the origin of its own domain, then an external, supernatural cause is necessary.

If “nature” had a beginning, one cannot logically use nature to explain the origin of nature, and to do so is fallacious.

So, where nature stops, supernatural begins.

3. The universe is not past eternal.

Justification: If the universe is past eternal, then the causal chain of events (cause and effect) within the universe is infinite. But this is impossible, because infinity cannot be traversed or “reached”.

If the past is eternal, that would mean that there are an infinite amount of “days” which lead to today. But in order for us to have “arrived” to today, an infinite amount of days would have to be traversed (one by one), which is impossible, because infinite cannot be “reached”.

Consider thought analogy..

Sandman analogy: Imagine there is a man who is standing above a bottomless hole. By “bottomless”, of course if one was to fall into the hole, he would fall forever and ever and ever.

Now, imagine the man is surrounded by an infinite amount of sand, which is at his disposal.

Imagine if the man has been shoveling sand into this hole for an infinite amount of time (he never began shoveling, or he never stopped shoveling, he has been shoveling forever).

Imagine if the man’s plan was to shovel sand into the hole until he successfully filled the sand from the bottom, all the way to the top of the hole.

How long will it take him to accomplish this? Will he ever accomplish this task? No. Why? Because the sand is bottomless, so no matter how fast he shoveled, or how long he shoveled, the sand will never reach the top.

So lets put it all together…

The sand falling: Represents time travel, and the trajectory of the sand falling south of the top represents time traveling into the past, which is synonymous with past eternity.

The man shoveling: Represents the “present”, as the man is presently shoveling without halt. This is synonymous with our present causal reality. We are presently in a state of constant change, without halt.

Conclusion: If the sand cannot reach the bottom of the hole (because of no boundary/foundation) and it can’t be filled from the bottom-up to the present (man), then how, if there is no past boundary to precedent days, how could we have possibly reached the present day…if there is/was no beginning foundation (day).

However, lets say a gazillion miles down the hole, there is a foundation…then the hole will be filled in a finite amount of time, and it will be filled from the bottom-up.

But ONLY if there is a foundation.

Likewise, we can only reach today if and ONLY IF there is a beginning point of reference, a foundation in the distant past.

4. Therefore, an Uncaused Cause (UCC) must exist: As explained, infinite regression is impossible, so an uncaused cause is absolutely necessary.

This UCC cannot logically be a product of any precedent cause or conditions, thus, it exists necessarily (supplementing the Modal Ontological Argument).

This UCC cannot logically depend on any external entity for it’s existence (supplementing the Modal Ontological Argument).

This UCC is the foundation for any/everything which began to exist, which included by not limited to all physical reality…but mainly, the universe an everything in it.

This UCC would also have to have free will, which explains why the universe began at X point instead of Y point...and the reason is; it began at that point because that is when the UCC decided it should begin...and only a being with free will can decide to do anything.

This UCC would have to have the power to create from nothing (as there was no preexisting physical matter to create from, before it was created).

So, based on the truth value of the argument, what can we conclude of the UCC?

1. It is a supernatural, metaphysically necessary being
2. A being of whom has existed for eternity and can never cease existing
3. A being with the greatest power imaginable (being able to create from nothing)
4. A being with free will, thus, a being with a mind

This being in question is what theists have traditionally recognized as God. God exists.

In closing, I predict the whole "well, based on your argument, God cannot be infinite".

My response to that for now is; first admit the validity of the presented argument, and THEN we will discuss why the objection raised doesn't apply to God.

[Paul of Tarsus]

In an infinite set there is no last element so counting the elements in the set is impossible.

The set of negative numbers has a last element - zero, instead it has no first element.

Zero is not a negative number, and neither does the set of negative numbers have a "last" element.

You're making one error after another. Let me then lower the bar for you a bit. Instead of calculus, you should benefit from studying algebra. Try Schaum's Outline of College Algebra, 4th Edition. The book is inexpensive and includes a good explanation of both finite and infinite sets.

[Kenisaw]

Statement A is inaccurate. The universe is not "out of nothing". The universe, to be mathematically specific, IS nothing. All the positive and negative charges in the universe equal nothing. Add up all the rotation in the universe and you get zero. Take all the positive energy (light, mass kinetic, heat, etc) and subtract the negative energy (gravity) and you get zero. The universe adds up to zero.

A visual example of this would be 1+1-1-1=0. If "0" means nothing, then you can see that both sides equal nothing. The left side (the 1+1-1-1 side) is just a different representation of nothing. Our universe is still nothing, but it is a nothing that is broken up into offsetting pieces.

Makes no sense...and in a sense, it is nonsense. No sense is being made here. None, whatsoever.

That's fine if you think it makes no sense. Why? What specifically about it is illogical?

I can't speak for Eddie, but it seems to me that your argument here is equivocating a bit on the term 'nothing'.

Saying that two things offset each other is not the same as saying that there is no thing.

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more. If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine, as long as you always then accept that something can come from nothing. Because the universe is nothing when you add it all up together.

[JoeyKnothead]

From the OP:

Except for direct quotes, I'll be using my own terms as emphasis...

Infinite regression is impossible

Okay.

So we look at the available data.

There sits the universe. Pretty and ugly, and almost as big as the pretty thing's hindquarters, but don't tell her I said that last part there, cause I was sposed to bushhog the back, but spent the day building a dam down at the creek, only don't it beat all, Godzilla came and kicked it down and flooded the town down stream, and aw lawd what a tragedy.

In considering currently popular scientific thinking, there is some evidence to conclude the universe started from an initial point (or size) such that it's a whole bunch bigger now, than it was before. Some folks refer to this notion as 'The before and after the wedding' hypothesis.

Then there's the 'God mustadunnit' hypothesis. I find such lacking because it disregards that god's nature. That God must be sentient enough to think, "I'm gonna make me this universe, cause Miss god's gone to fetch groceries, and I ain't got me nothing better to do". It also puts on that God the property of having a force / power, such that kinda just thinking something makes it happen. But it fails to address that all current evidence indicates that sentience is the product of a physical brain, and if by just thinking it, pretty thing there wouldn't get mad for me putting my feet up on the coffee table I bought, in the house I bought, but don't tell her that last part there.

So the 'Godmustadunnit' hypothesis fails to, or refuses to, consider how that god's properties came about.

In this argument, the infinite regression stops at, "There's ol God there, and I'm here to tell you what, he's as uptown as they get!"

From where did this god arise?

"He was always there."

Is no better an answer than saying the universe was always there, if in one form or the other'n. Only in this case, we don't have to imagine Sasquatch's involvement in any of it.


Infinite regression?

Such is mere speculation, an interesting, and fun mental exercise (with pologizies to physicasists and the pretty thing,cause it's been long enough now, I gotta be me treading mud with er for something).

As for me, I see no reason to conclude religious proponents have them a better speculator in this regard.

[historia]

I can't speak for Eddie, but it seems to me that your argument here is equivocating a bit on the term 'nothing'.

Saying that two things offset each other is not the same as saying that there is no thing.

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more.

Okay, but to even draw this distinction between the state of the universe as it exists now versus it be being "gone" or "no more" is precisely the distinction between "something" versus "nothing," as those terms are normally used.

So, to then say that the universe as it exists now is also "nothing" is to use that term in a non-standard way.

If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine

I should hope so, since if the "pieces of the universe" are not "something," then what is?

as long as you always then accept that something can come from nothing.

Considering that Christian theologians have, for nearly 2,000 years, maintained that God created the universe ex nihilo, "out of nothing," I don't think that's the contentious issue here. The key clause in Statement A from the OP is that it would also have to have done so "uncaused."

[Kenisaw]

I can't speak for Eddie, but it seems to me that your argument here is equivocating a bit on the term 'nothing'.

Saying that two things offset each other is not the same as saying that there is no thing.

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more.

Okay, but to even draw this distinction between the state of the universe as it exists now versus it be being "gone" or "no more" is precisely the distinction between "something" versus "nothing," as those terms are normally used.

So, to then say that the universe as it exists now is also "nothing" is to use that term in a non-standard way.

I wasn't using the word in a standard way. I was using it in a mathematical way, a point that was made abundantly clear in my original post on the topic. Like I said last post, if you want to call the pieces of this universe "something", then you must also admit that mathematically speaking something can come from nothing.

If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine

I should hope so, since if the "pieces of the universe" are not "something," then what is?

The universe is something if you'd like, and that "something" is just another state of nothing. Mathematically true, and an accurate description of the reality of the universe.

as long as you always then accept that something can come from nothing.

Considering that Christian theologians have, for nearly 2,000 years, maintained that God created the universe ex nihilo, "out of nothing," I don't think that's the contentious issue here. The key clause in Statement A from the OP is that it would also have to have done so "uncaused."

Therein lies the rub, as they say. No one can answer the question of statement A. No one, as far as I am aware, even knows how to go about figuring out how to answer that question.

Did the universe appear as an effect of a cause? Dunno. Did the universe appear uncaused? Dunno. Does there need to be a cause for a universe to appear? Dunno. Can true "nothingness" even actually exist? Dunno (because, if it can't, then you can't have something coming from nothing because nothing is not an actual state in reality). Although we live in a cause and effect universe (thanks to entropy), we have no way of knowing what the rules were before the universe. If entropy is unique to our universe then the idea of cause and effect doesn't mean much, because when the universe appeared it did so under a different set of rules that we know nothing about. Which is why any attempt to "logic" a god into existence is silly, because there is too much missing data on the matter.

Not that the logic of the ontological argument, or Kalam, is good anyway. People in this thread have ironically objected to an always existing universe, yet think of nothing of an always existing god being (or the other way around). People in this thread think something as complex as a god can just happen, whereas something simpler like a universe cannot. There is plenty of bad logic to go around.

[We_Are_VENOM]

This seems to be the typical response when faced with something that defeats your argument.

LOL.

Are you saying you don't understand that breaking something into pieces means that the sum of the pieces adds up to the original total? Or you don't understand that positive and negative charges are attracted to each other and when equal cancel each other out? Seems like pretty basic stuff.

This is what I am saying..

"The universe, to be mathematically specific, IS nothing." <---is nonsense.

[We_Are_VENOM]

It depends on how many days we go back. If we go back one hundred days for instance, then we've waited one hundred days to get to the present.

What? Soo, we just completely ignore the infinite amount of days which lead up to the one hundred days to get to the present day?

Any duration must have a beginning and an end in time, and so all durations are finite. So the idea of duration or "traversing days" only makes sense if it is applied to a duration. An eternity cannot be traversed because there is no end and possibly no beginning either. So logically speaking we did not and cannot traverse an infinite number of days to get to the present. We did not need to traverse an infinite number of days. The present is just another point in time out of an infinite number of such points. We just happen to be at that point now.

"We did not need to traverse an infinite number of days".

contradicts...

"The present is just another point in time out of an infinite number of such points".

That is a blatant contradiction if I've ever seen one.

So I think your main error here is your assumption that if the past is eternal, then we would have traversed an infinite number of days to get to the present. There is no and can be no such traversing. If the past is eternal, traversing it does not apply. The past simply extends back with no upper limit to how far we can go back.

Taxi cab fallacy.

I assume you agree that yesterday was traversed to get to today....yet, you want to suddenly get off of the taxi once this same logic is applied to an eternal past...when the same exact logic applies.

There were an infinite amount of "yesterdays", which would have had to be traversed to arrive at "today".

No way around this, yet, we are here having this discussion.

Blows my mind.

That's the age of the universe, not how old it can possibly be. It is possible that there is a physical limit to how old our cosmos or any cosmos can be, but as I have demonstrated, there is no logical limit to how old it can be.

If the past is eternal, why did the universe begin to exist only 14.7 billion years ago? Why not sooner, why not later?

You see, that is all part of the absurdity; the universe had an infinite amount of time to begin to exist, yet it only began to exist a finite time ago.

Do you not see the problem with that?

Tell the truth, now. I said I was done with your refusing to post straight answers to my questions. Back on post 20 you said:

In closing, move along to another thread, knowing that this one belongs to VENOM.

"I said I was done.." <---you admitted that you said this.

So again, you said you were done, not I.

[We_Are_VENOM]

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more. If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine, as long as you always then accept that something can come from nothing. Because the universe is nothing when you add it all up together.

Regardless of whether you call it something, or nothing. The question is; where did it come from and why did it only begin to exist some 14.7 billion years ago and not sooner or later.

Either way, if it was just one single event on an infinitely long chain of cause/effect relations...or if it popped into being out of nothing.....both are equally absurd.

[Kenisaw]

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more. If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine, as long as you always then accept that something can come from nothing. Because the universe is nothing when you add it all up together.

Regardless of whether you call it something, or nothing. The question is; where did it come from and why did it only begin to exist some 14.7 billion years ago and not sooner or later.

Either way, if it was just one single event on an infinitely long chain of cause/effect relations...or if it popped into being out of nothing.....both are equally absurd.

I would agree it is absurd that the universe is infinite. That is just as absurd as a god creature being infinite. The idea that anything infinite could reach a point in its existence that gave rise to this universe is irrational to the core.

Given that the data, and the math, show that this universe did have a beginning, the real question then becomes how did that beginning happen. I replied to Historia earlier today about this. Allow me to copy and past part of that here:

Did the universe appear as an effect of a cause? Dunno. Did the universe appear uncaused? Dunno. Does there need to be a cause for a universe to appear? Dunno. Can true "nothingness" even actually exist? Dunno (because, if it can't, then you can't have something coming from nothing because nothing is not an actual state in reality). Although we live in a cause and effect universe (thanks to entropy), we have no way of knowing what the rules were before the universe. If entropy is unique to our universe then the idea of cause and effect doesn't mean much, because when the universe appeared it did so under a different set of rules that we know nothing about. Which is why any attempt to "logic" a god into existence is silly, because there is too much missing data on the matter.

Not that the logic of the ontological argument, or Kalam, is good anyway. People in this thread have ironically objected to an always existing universe, yet think of nothing of an always existing god being (or the other way around). People in this thread think something as complex as a god can just happen, whereas something simpler like a universe cannot. There is plenty of bad logic to go around".

The problem with calling the universe popping out of "nothing" absurd is that we don't actually know that it is absurd. No one knows the rules before the universe began, and no one knows what is and isn't possible. On top of that there are mathematics that show not only is it not absurd, it should be possible for a universe to begin abruptly. Quantum mechanics doesn't have a problem with it. At the same time however, in the interest of intellectual honesty, there is so much we DON'T know that we have no ability to put a level of confidence on all this.

[historia]

I can't speak for Eddie, but it seems to me that your argument here is equivocating a bit on the term 'nothing'.

Saying that two things offset each other is not the same as saying that there is no thing.

This isn't a sleight of hand trick, Historia. It is the literal truth of the reality of the universe. If you brought the entire universe together, it could cancel itself out. Poof. Gone. No more.

Okay, but to even draw this distinction between the state of the universe as it exists now versus it be being "gone" or "no more" is precisely the distinction between "something" versus "nothing," as those terms are normally used.

So, to then say that the universe as it exists now is also "nothing" is to use that term in a non-standard way.

I wasn't using the word in a standard way. I was using it in a mathematical way, a point that was made abundantly clear in my original post on the topic.

I appreciate that fact. But this is precisely the point I made in my initial reply. You're using the term "nothing" in a different sense from how it is being used in Statement A in the OP, and so you are equivocating on the term "nothing."

If you were just making a casual observation about the total energy in a closed universe, that would be one thing. But, as you will recall, you used this observation to support the assertion that Statement A in the OP is "inaccurate." But, since you're equivocating on the term "nothing," your observation here, no matter how mathematically precise it may be, simply cannot logically substantiate that assertion.

If you want to call the pieces of the universe "something", that's fine

I should hope so, since if the "pieces of the universe" are not "something," then what is?

The universe is something if you'd like, and that "something" is just another state of nothing. Mathematically true, and an accurate description of the reality of the universe.

But this is really just an awkward way of saying that there are two states of existence: either a thing exists, in which case we call it "something," or it does not exist, in which case it is "nothing."

Did the universe appear as an effect of a cause? Dunno. Did the universe appear uncaused? Dunno. Does there need to be a cause for a universe to appear? Dunno. Can true "nothingness" even actually exist? Dunno (because, if it can't, then you can't have something coming from nothing because nothing is not an actual state in reality). Although we live in a cause and effect universe (thanks to entropy), we have no way of knowing what the rules were before the universe. If entropy is unique to our universe then the idea of cause and effect doesn't mean much, because when the universe appeared it did so under a different set of rules that we know nothing about. Which is why any attempt to "logic" a god into existence is silly, because there is too much missing data on the matter.

First, resorting to atheist sloganeering, like "logic a god into existence," does little except weaken your argument, in my opinion.

Second, there is a conceptual difference between God and a god, so using the latter here in an attempt to score some rhetorical points just distracts from whatever point you are trying to make.

Finally, and more substantially, you're veering into a straw man argument here.

I appreciate the fact that certain message board symbiotes are likely overstating their argument in this thread, but prominent Christian proponents of these (and other) arguments, like William Lane Craig, are not arguing that we can be certain about how the universe came into existence or whether God ultimate exists. If you imagine they are, then you haven't read them carefully enough.

In the kalam argument, for example, Craig is not setting out to "prove" (in some absolute sense) that God is the cause of the universe. For starters, the argument is supported in large part by an inductive argument from accepted cosmogenic theories, and so his conclusion that the universe has a cause is, at best, only probably true. So too, Craig's concluding conceptual analysis, from which he derives several properties of the cause of the universe (which Venom borrows in the OP), is also clearly an inference to the best explanation, and so does not "prove" the cause is God.