The existence of God argued rationally

[lethalmiko]

This is a question I have long pondered but not settled yet. Any Rand's position was that God does not exist because it has not (and cannot) be proven. Believers in God have argued that the very existence of the universe proves God exists. When asked how she explained the existence of the universe, Rand argued that it has always been there and here is where I have a serious issue with her beliefs.

If the universe has always existed, then it had no beginning which means an infinite amount of time has elapsed up to now. In Thermodynamics, the Law of Entropy states that in any closed system, entropy increases with time (it goes into a state of maximum disorder). The universe is a closed system (there is no external input of energy) which means that with enough time, matter and energy in the universe degrade to an ultimate state of inert uniformity (i.e. the universe dies). Thermodynamics laws also state that heat always moves from a higher temperature to a lower one and energy therefore degrades from the highest form (nuclear) to the lowest form (internal energy). You cannot reverse this process without an external input of energy which once exhausted means it will no longer be possible to do any work. So if the universe has always been there, we should not be having this debate right now.

The big bang theory which is derived from the doppler effect (clearly visible in the expansion of the universe which we observe using telescopes) shows there was a beginning of the universe about 15 billion years ago in which all matter was compressed into an infinitesimal speck (called a "singularity") that had infinite density. The singularity exploded, producing gargantuan amounts of energy, some of which formed matter and produced the universe as we know it. Questions:

1. Where did the singularity come from? Did it have a beginning? If not, then why did it stay as a singularity for an inifinite amount of time only to explode apparently without cause?

3. Does the universe support infinite existence or does everything have a beginning?

4. If God exists, did he/she have a beginnning? Who made him/her? And before him/her, an infinite regress of creational causality?

Creationists argue that life is too complex to have been a product of either chance or evolution. Ayn Rand talked about everything having an identity but she never explained WHY things are the way they are. To merely say "things are they way they are because of their nature" still begs the question. Why do we have two eyes at the front of our heads or such big brains or a spinal column that has several vertebrae (rather than one long bone)? Everything is just too perfect to have been a collection of random events, it is argued. Even a cell in the body is so complex and so efficient a machine that it appears to have all the characteristics of being designed by a designer (never mind a "simple" amoeba). As has been argued before, imagine finding a complex flying vehicle (car) on the planet Pluto and concluding that it is not possible that someone designed it.

I once read of some scientists that attempted to prove evolution as the explanation for the complexity of species by breeding insects exposed to radiation which multiplied the incidence of genetic mutations significantly (about one thousand times). The first generation had deformities (less wings, more legs, etc.) but by the fourth to fifth generation, the genetic code had repaired itself and there were healthy insects. Two people with a genetic defect can produce a perfect child. Evolution (natural selection) also does not seem to satisfactorily explain how a fish can turn into an elephant. There can be minor changes in the genetic code (e.g. skin colour) but a complete changing from one type of organism to another has never been proved, even by fossil evidence. e.g. to my knowledge, there has never been discovered a fossil of a giraffe with a shorter neck than the ones alive today and neither has any fossil been found of a human with half the brain size we have.

In any case, the Law of Entropy prevents evolution from one species into another via genetic mutations. Entropy produces chaos and not order. It requires intelligent energy input to produce a new speciess like the ones we make using genetic engineering or cross breeding. Just to produce a cross between a lion and a tiger took ten years of research and the best brains.

So, can we conclusively say God does not exist (and therefore did NOT create the universe) without running into contradictions?

[Zip]

I always thought the universe was cyclical. There is only so much matter/energy and that is recycled through a sequence as follows.

*NB I am not a scientist but this makes sense to me...

Singularity ->Becomes unstable -> Big Bang ("creation" of the universe) -> expansion (the stage we are in right now) -> entropy -> collapse (Matter is drawn together by gravity) -> Singularity... Lather-rinse-repeat...

If I'm not right off my rocker with this it seems to me that it is a closed system but one which has a life cycle. The saying is that nature abhors a vacuum, I think it also hates stagnation.

Edited June 25, 2009 by Zip

[The Wrath]

There is one argument for the existence of God that I think is more or less rationally constructed: the Cosmological argument. This is the argument in lethalmiko's post about "what caused the singularity, etc." I say it is rationally constructed, because its basic premise is correct and there is a logical train which does actually make rational sense. The premise I'm thinking of is "all events in the physical world have causes." IMO, this argument has two primary failings which allow me to dismiss it:

1.) It doesn't solve the mystery of existence. It just pushes it back another step, from the universe to God. When you point this out, the theist will usually say, "God doesn't need a cause." My response to that is, "Then why not just save a step and say 'the universe doesn't need a cause' instead?"

2.) It violates Occam's Razor by multiplying entities beyond necessity.

The other main arguments for God's existence (Teleological and Ontological) are not even remotely rational. The Teleological argument (argument from design) is essentially a tautology. It starts by assuming that there is design in the universe, and then concludes that there must be a designer. The theist is gonna have a tough time proving that he is right in his perception of "design," and his attempts to do so will invariably not stand up to scrutiny. Then there's the extremely rationalistic Ontological argument, which basically consists of thinking yourself into a pretzel of twisted logic with no referents in the physical world.

When I come across a theist who uses the Cosmological argument, I am much more inclined to have a conversation with him and treat his beliefs with more respect than I typically will when trying to debate a religious person. I have so little respect for the other 2 arguments, that I usually won't even bother to debate with people who use them.

[JMeganSnow]

If the universe has always existed, then it had no beginning which means an infinite amount of time has elapsed up to now.

No it doesn't. It means that there was no time before the universe--time being an attribute *of* the universe. They don't call it "space-time" for nothing.

Most of this stuff is academic and/or arbitrary until physics as a science is considerably more advanced, and thus the argument for the existence of god relying on any of those points is rightly dismissed by Objectivists as "not even wrong"--that is, having no relation to any information that would enable a proof to even be conducted. That's Rand's Razor--the arbitrary must be thrown out utterly. It is equally wrong to say "god created the universe" as to say it spontaneously came into being due to some massive intergalactic sneeze.

Intergalactic Sneeze Theory would make a great name for a band, though.

[D'kian]

Two quick points:

1) We don't know wether the Unvierse is a closed system or not.

2) Lack of knowledge is not an indication that God exists. Lack of knowledge only indicates lack of knowledge.

[lethalmiko]

I always thought the universe was cyclical. There is only so much matter/energy and that is recycled through a sequence as follows.... Singularity ->Becomes unstable -> Big Bang ("creation" of the universe) -> expansion (the stage we are in right now) -> entropy -> collapse (Matter is drawn together by gravity) -> Singularity... Lather-rinse-repeat...

This contradicts the Law of Entropy. Once the energy in the universe is spent, gravitational forces pulling matter together will not be able to recreate the energy. Although I am not certain, the end result of a "Big Crunch" is probably a super-duper-hyper-massive black hole. Secondly, why and how did the singularity become unstable?

..."Then why not just save a step and say 'the universe doesn't need a cause' instead?"

If the universe has a beginning (Big Bang), then it MUST have a cause. How do you have a Big Bang without an antecedent event?

It violates Occam's Razor by multiplying entities beyond necessity.

This principle, according to Wikipedia is summaried as "Of several acceptable explanations for a phenomenon, the simplest is preferable." Occam's Razor is merely a principle that can hardly be taken as irrefutable Gospel truth.

The other main arguments for God's existence (Teleological and Ontological) are not even remotely rational. The Teleological argument (argument from design) is essentially a tautology. It starts by assuming that there is design in the universe, and then concludes that there must be a designer.

What do you understand by "design"? How do you refute the "design in the universe" assumption? Is the fact that owls have soft feathers that are upturned at the end (perfect for stealth flight) a mere coincidence of nature? Why are they apparently so well adapted to aerodynamics?

No it doesn't. It means that there was no time before the universe--time being an attribute *of* the universe. They don't call it "space-time" for nothing.

Your statement still does not address the point. Time "before the universe" is meaningless since the universe had no beginning according to the original premise by Ayn Rand. If the universe had no beginning, then rewinding backwards in time goes to infinity. You cannot quantify the time that has elapsed up to this point in time (today). Therefore infinite time has elapsed which means all the energy in the universe should have run out by now. If you argue that the universe had a beginning, then we are back to what caused its beginning.

Most of this stuff is academic and/or arbitrary until physics as a science is considerably more advanced, and thus the argument for the existence of god relying on any of those points is rightly dismissed by Objectivists as "not even wrong"--that is, having no relation to any information that would enable a proof to even be conducted.

I disagree. What is the point of scientific knowledge if we endlessly doubt it until some infinite time in the future? Will we ever know everything that can be known? When science establishes an irrefutable law, it is valid everywhere in the universe and cannot just be dismissed as arbitrary. Is the Law of Entropy merely arbitrary and invalid? Are you saying we can make no logical deductions about the universe by using this law?

It is equally wrong to say "god created the universe" as to say it spontaneously came into being due to some massive intergalactic sneeze.

So what is the right thing to say with respect to how the universe came into being?

[Zip]

This contradicts the Law of Entropy. Once the energy in the universe is spent, gravitational forces pulling matter together will not be able to recreate the energy. Although I am not certain, the end result of a "Big Crunch" is probably a super-duper-hyper-massive black hole. Secondly, why and how did the singularity become unstable?

Energy can neither be created nor destroyed.

With my previous caveat firmly in mind do we know that the result of a super massive black hole isn't a singularity?

Are singularities stable?

[Q.E.D.]

In my experience, a lot of people don't understand the 'mechanics' of evolution. How can 'random' mutations inevitably drive the generation of species? It is for the same reason that random hands of cards net casinos substantial profits. There's a bias. In the genetic case the bias is towards that which fits the environment. One doesn't look at the probability of every event in history having happened and remark that because the probability of history having happened is very small that history must not have happened. That is a paradoxical insanity that must be purged from human thought. However, I'd go a step further to argue that the eye is evidence for a NON intelligent designer.

Why does the existence of the eye contradict the principle of intelligent design? If you look at the eyes of all the different species on earth you'll start to notice fundamental similarities. Obviously, many creatures have eyes very similar to our own, and nearly as obviously the exact makeup of their eyes differ in classifiable ways. The animals evolutionarily similar to us also tend to have eyes similar to ours. Coincidence? Of course not. It seems that the blandness and homogeneity of observed nature contradicts the theory that the universe has a conscious, creative, intelligent creator. I mean really, how lazy do religious people permit their god to be before they realize he hasn't showed up for work?

Entropy actually implies the creation of new species. If there are more species, the system is less ordered. It takes more information to describe the system, so there's more entropy. In theory, entropy can be measured and represented in bytes (its just really complex).

EDIT:

"Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!' This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it's still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything's going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for." ~ Douglas Adams

Edited June 25, 2009 by Q.E.D.

[lethalmiko]

1) We don't know wether the Unvierse is a closed system or not.

2) Lack of knowledge is not an indication that God exists. Lack of knowledge only indicates lack of knowledge.

Does it make sense to talk of an energy source "outside" the universe? All energy is in the universe so it is a closed system and even if there is some other source of energy outside the universe, the sum total of the universe and this source is still a closed system. You cannot have an infinite series of outside energy sources.

Energy can neither be created nor destroyed. With my previous caveat firmly in mind do we know that the result of a super massive black hole isn't a singularity? Are singularities stable?

Yes but energy once spent on doing some work cannot be reclaimed without another energy input. As I earlier said, energy ultimately degrades to internal energy inside molecules. So all the energy in the unverse will ultimately end up like that. It will not be destroyed. Only stored in the lowest form. Instability of singularities still requires causes to produce effects.

How can 'random' mutations inevitably drive the generation of species?... There's a bias. In the genetic case the bias is towards that which fits the environment.

You can't easily prove the last statement.

Why does the existence of the eye contradict the principle of intelligent design? If you look at the eyes of all the different species on earth you'll start to notice fundamental similarities... It seems that the blandness and homogeneity of observed nature contradicts the theory that the universe has a conscious, creative, intelligent creator.

Similarities in eye design for many species does not disprove intelligent design. Creationists claim they were all designed by God who had to make sure eyes fit into nature. If eyes were designed any differently they simply would not work and it would not be possible to see.

Entropy actually implies the creation of new species. If there are more species, the system is less ordered. It takes more information to describe the system, so there's more entropy.

There are two things. "Species entropy" and "earth entropy". Even if it is true that more species mean more "earth entropy", the entropy in the DNA of a specific species is not affectedd by how many other species there are.

Edited June 25, 2009 by lethalmiko

[KendallJ]

The big bang theory which is derived from the doppler effect (clearly visible in the expansion of the universe which we observe using telescopes) shows there was a beginning of the universe about 15 billion years ago in which all matter was compressed into an infinitesimal speck (called a "singularity") that had infinite density. The singularity exploded, producing gargantuan amounts of energy, some of which formed matter and produced the universe as we know it. Questions:

To me this is an example of extrapolating beyond knowns. Similar to saying the earth is flat by measuring an acre of land (which is the mistake that early predictors of such things made).

The doppler effect certainly shows that matter is expanding. It also would indicate that matter was closer together than it is today, at some point in the past. Beyond that, what it exactly was and whether it had a specific beginning or not, I'm sure is not explained by the observed data. It could also suggest that other factors outside the current regimes become signficant and are not yet accounted for. That woudl call into question, all of your other questions.

When someone asserts that something exists with infinite density, one starts to question the assertion. Infinity is not a property of entities. There is no basis for asserting it is. If of course you demand that it can be, then you also wipe out the objection to God, but you've got no more evidence to assert that, than to assert God.

Infinity does not represtent a property of something. It represents no specific property. That would be anti-axiomatic.

Your representation of Rand's position is not correct as I understand it. This thread really shows a misunderstanding of what Rand means by axiomatic.

Edited June 25, 2009 by KendallJ

[brian0918]

Time is a measure of the motion of objects. Without objects, there is no motion, and hence no time. It is thus nonsensical to talk about "before there were objects", or "before there was a universe".

[Zip]

Yes but energy once spent on doing some work cannot be reclaimed without another energy input. As I earlier said, energy ultimately degrades to internal energy inside molecules. So all the energy in the unverse will ultimately end up like that. It will not be destroyed. Only stored in the lowest form. Instability of singularities still requires causes to produce effects.

Are you claiming that the energy contained internally inside molecules can never again be released? Haven't we dumb humans already discovered how to release the energy of the Atom? These molecules are not sitting around in isolation after all.

With regard to the singularity requiring a cause to produce effects, if the singularity is by its nature unstable isn't that a cause? Besides, the theory that there is a singularity could be done away with, eliminate it completely and you have...

Super Massive Black Hole -> Big Bang (presuming there is a limit to the size/amount of matter a black hole can compress) -> Expansion -> Collapse -> Super Massive Black Hole...

[Greebo]

Two points:

1) The law of entropy may be incorrect. It's not as if we can actually prove it for all scales.

2) The expansion of the universe as proved by the Doppler effect ONLY shows that the universe we can *see* is expanding. It's conceivable that beyond our own "light barrier" of 15.5 or so billion light years is a continuing expanse of space that is orders of magnitude larger than the area we can see.

What if the universe is actually many universes larger than what we are aware of, and there are "universe sized" black holes that, when they hit a certain point, become so unstable that they explode, creating a shock wave that expands outwards stopping all light from beyond from penetrating it until it reaches a certain level of diffusion - say 20b ly in radius? In such a case, we could very well be inside of an expanding blast radius that has 5 or so B LY to go before any outside light can get in, making it seem like we're totally alone. Sort of like a ripple from a large rock thrown in a big pond. There are other ripples, but for a certain radius, they don't get past the primary splash for a while...

I'm no physicist - I'm not positing this as *likely* - but hey - try to disprove it. It certainly sounds more rational than "a supernatural being that defies reality made reality'.

[nanite1018]

I despise seeing science misused and so this will most likely be a lengthy post.

1) Life can evolve and grow more complex because the Earth is not a closed system. In case you haven't noticed, there is a big ball of nuclear fire that lights about half of the Earth at a time. That input of energy is the origin for all the energy in all living systems on Earth (excluding the chemosynthetic organisms at the bottom of the ocean).

2) The universe may in fact "bounce", meaning that it expands from a singularity in a Big Bang then comes back and contracts producing a new singularity which then rebounds and expands to produce another universe, and on and on and on. It is true that if this process had occurred for infinite time than the universe would be flat and even. However, quantum effects will likely prevent that from happening (random differences in the initial distribution of energy in the singularity would likely prevent that smoothing out from occurring). Even if it did however, there is point 3.

3) Our universe is, according to most theories, a part of a much larger and older multiverse. Now, I imagine that entropy might hold in this larger arena as well, but I'm not certain. Even if it did, there are a number of ways to get around it. One is the idea that the multiverse is infinite in size, which would mean there is infinite usable energy, meaning that even after an infinite amount of time, there would still be an infinite amount of usable energy (infinity's are fun, aren't they?). Another is that the multiverse (or perhaps the universe) was self-starting, meaning that if you were to go back in time you would eventually hit a loop, right at the beginning, in which time has been bent into a partial circle, and the universe actually created itself (that one is a theoretical model created by J. Richard Gott).

4) As for the whole "what made the singularity unstable" business, that has been shown to be one way of looking at the problem in string theory. Basically the theory states that at the beginning of the universe there was a perfectly even distribution of matter and energy, in a 10 (or 11) dimensional space-time. There is an infinitesimal (literally) chance that this will "break" spontaneously, producing two universes, one which is 4 dimensions (ours) and another which shriveled up as our expanded which is 6 or 7 dimensions.

5) The final theory I'll put out for demonstration is that the universe has zero net energy. Namely, that gravity and the negative energy in the universe combined exactly counteract the total amount of matter energy in the universe (this does not seem to be the case in the visible universe, but all the evidence suggests that the universe as a whole is far far larger (orders of magnitude) than the visible universe, leaving open the possibility that our visible region is an aberration from the norm). If that is the case, than given an infinite space and time devoid of matter-energy, it could spontaneously be created and it would violate no physical law whatsoever.

My point is physics does not know exactly what created the universe, but there are a number of theories. None of those theories have a problem explaining the universe's present condition in the face of entropy. Also, the position that the universe is all that exists and that speaking of anything "outside" it is nonsense is a valid (though perhaps unsatisfying) position both philosophically and scientifically. As a result, the arguments in the OP and those given later are refuted by every single scientific theory we have (even if they are still effectively arbitrary).

[The Wrath]

I suspect other people have already responded to this, but I'm doing it anyway.

If the universe has a beginning (Big Bang), then it MUST have a cause. How do you have a Big Bang without an antecedent event?

As Megan already pointed out, time is part of the universe. This has been scientifically proved using applications of general relativity. Since the universe itself began at the Big Bang, it makes no sense to ask what came before it. And since cause and effect require time (i.e. the cause comes before the effect), then the universe is, by definition, uncaused. However unsatisfying the explanation of an uncaused universe may be, it isn't any more satisfying to posit an uncaused God.

This principle, according to Wikipedia is summaried as "Of several acceptable explanations for a phenomenon, the simplest is preferable." Occam's Razor is merely a principle that can hardly be taken as irrefutable Gospel truth.

Properly stated, Occam's Razaor says "do not multiply entities beyond necessity." Taken from Wikipedia:

Occam's razor, also Ockham's razor,[1] is the principle that "entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily."

This is a more accurate definition than saying "the simplest explanation tends to be the right one," because anything can be made to sound more or less complicated, depending on how you phrase it. Occam's Razor, instead, tells you that you shouldn't posit 3 entities, where 2 offer a perfectly satisfactory explanation. We know the universe exists and, no matter how much trouble we have explaining why, it's silly to posit an additional entity (God), when doing so does not further the answer to the question of existence.

What do you understand by "design"? How do you refute the "design in the universe" assumption? Is the fact that owls have soft feathers that are upturned at the end (perfect for stealth flight) a mere coincidence of nature? Why are they apparently so well adapted to aerodynamics?

You refute the assumption by showing that there is no evidence of a designer. Saying that the universe has design means, by definition, you are saying that it has a designer, because design cannot exist without a designer. So you're basically saying "we know the universe has a designer because it has a designer." I'm not going to explain the theory of evolution to you, but the questions that you're asking about it show that you don't have a grasp on its basic principles. Evolution works by means of natural selection, not coincidence.

Why does the existence of the eye contradict the principle of intelligent design? If you look at the eyes of all the different species on earth you'll start to notice fundamental similarities. Obviously, many creatures have eyes very similar to our own, and nearly as obviously the exact makeup of their eyes differ in classifiable ways. The animals evolutionarily similar to us also tend to have eyes similar to ours. Coincidence? Of course not. It seems that the blandness and homogeneity of observed nature contradicts the theory that the universe has a conscious, creative, intelligent creator. I mean really, how lazy do religious people permit their god to be before they realize he hasn't showed up for work.

When it comes to the creationist argument about our eyes, my response is usually to point out that our eyes pretty much suck, when you consider the whole range of electromagnetic waves. We are able to see only a minute fraction of the possible wavelengths that a more advanced eye would be able to see.

Edited June 25, 2009 by The Wrath

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

Ayn Rand's assessment of the non-existence of God does not come from the inability to prove His existence, but rather the idea that there is a God in the Christian sense contradicts everything we know about reality. In order to show that there is a God (onus of proof being on he who asserts the positive) requires you to show the evidence that there is a God.

As to the first cause, part of the problem with your reasoning is that you are taking the approach: Why is there something rather than nothing? I forget the name of the philosopher who came up with that, but he is already violating the existence exists axiom. Existence exists and only existence exists; and causation does not mean that one thing acted on another getting that other to move or change in a certain way. So, one cannot make an appeal to causation to claim that the universe had to be created -- especially created out of nothing ex nihilo.

There are many problems with the Big Bang Theory, one of which is the assumption that light doesn't change (spread out) even after traveling through billions of light years of space. The correlation between "faster motion" and "longer distances" can be accounted for if one assumes that light does change as it travels; so there is no real need for all of this "expansion" of the universe, since there are other theories out there accounting for the evidence.

There is no evidence there is a God and there can never be any evidence for a non-specific entity in our universe; and to claim that God is infinite in every respect is to say he has no identity, which means He doesn't exist.

[JMeganSnow]

Your statement still does not address the point. Time "before the universe" is meaningless since the universe had no beginning according to the original premise by Ayn Rand. If the universe had no beginning, then rewinding backwards in time goes to infinity. You cannot quantify the time that has elapsed up to this point in time (today). Therefore infinite time has elapsed which means all the energy in the universe should have run out by now. If you argue that the universe had a beginning, then we are back to what caused its beginning.

No, you just don't *understand* the point. As others have said, time without universe is a meaningless term. There could very easily have passed a finite amount of time in the universe without the universe having a "before" and thus a distinguishable "beginning". For something to begin existing, there has to be a TIME at which it DID NOT EXIST. There's no time in which the universe did not exist because time exists *within* the universe. It has to do with the nature of time which is a great deal more complex than people think or understand.

Eternal does not mean "infinite". It means "existing for all the time there is or will be".

[lethalmiko]

The doppler effect certainly shows that matter is expanding. It also would indicate that matter was closer together than it is today, at some point in the past. Beyond that, what it exactly was and whether it had a specific beginning or not, I'm sure is not explained by the observed data. It could also suggest that other factors outside the current regimes become signficant and are not yet accounted for... Infinity is not a property of entities. Infinity does not represtent a property of something. It represents no specific property....Your representation of Rand's position is not correct as I understand it. This thread really shows a misunderstanding of what Rand means by axiomatic.

So how close was the matter initially? If it occupied a certain volume X, why could it not be smaller and small until it is infinitesimal? Your statement "I'm sure is not explained by the observed data" is a bit too confident for someone expressing doubt about the whole theory. As for your argument about infinity, please read about singularities at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_singularity. The singularity has infinite density because it has no volume (density is mass divided by volume). Secondly, how big is the universe? Is it finite in volume? By the way, how have I misrepresented Ayn Rand?

Time is a measure of the motion of objects. Without objects, there is no motion, and hence no time. It is thus nonsensical to talk about "before there were objects", or "before there was a universe".

So if there was one asteroid in the entire universe that was completely stationary, are you saying there is no time?

Are you claiming that the energy contained internally inside molecules can never again be released? Haven't we dumb humans already discovered how to release the energy of the Atom? These molecules are not sitting around in isolation after all. With regard to the singularity requiring a cause to produce effects, if the singularity is by its nature unstable isn't that a cause? Besides, the theory that there is a singularity could be done away with, eliminate it completely and you have...Super Massive Black Hole -> Big Bang (presuming there is a limit to the size/amount of matter a black hole can compress) -> Expansion -> Collapse -> Super Massive Black Hole...

Internal energy is NOT the same as nuclear energy. The former is what you get when you heat up air for example. To release nuclear energy from atoms requires an energy input unless you use a naturally radioactive element like Plutonium or Uranium which do not exist either in a singularity or black hole. Black holes do NOT explode into Big Bangs. In the Wikipedia article mentioned above, it says:

"Before Stephen Hawking came up with the concept of Hawking radiation, the question of black holes having entropy was avoided. However, this concept demonstrates that black holes can radiate energy, which conserves entropy and solves the incompatibility problems with the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy, however, implies heat and therefore temperature. The loss of energy also suggests that black holes do not last forever, but rather "evaporate" slowly. Small black holes tend to be hotter whereas larger ones tend to be colder. All known black holes are so large that their temperature is far below that of the cosmic background radiation, so they are all gaining energy. They will not begin to lose energy until a cosmological redshift of more than a million is reached, rather than the thousand or so since the background radiation formed."

The universe is always losing energy even from the super massive black hole phase. In the expansion phase, light and heat emmited outwards from the center of the universe (especially in the fringes) is lost forever. So with each succesive Big-Bang-Big-Crunch cycle, there is less energy in the universe left over. Extrapolate over zillions of years and the result is energy in the universe runs out in every scenario you can think of.

The law of entropy may be incorrect. It's not as if we can actually prove it for all scales.

Apply that argument to any other scientific law and the logical conclusion is absurd. What does scale have to do with anything?

The expansion of the universe as proved by the Doppler effect ONLY shows that the universe we can *see* is expanding. It's conceivable that beyond our own "light barrier" of 15.5 or so billion light years is a continuing expanse of space that is orders of magnitude larger than the area we can see. What if the universe is actually many universes larger than what we are aware of, and there are "universe sized" black holes that, when they hit a certain point, become so unstable that they explode, creating a shock wave that expands outwards stopping all light from beyond from penetrating it until it reaches a certain level of diffusion - say 20b ly in radius?

The total mass and energy in the universe is a constant and physicists have already estimated this quantity, including even "Dark Matter". I am not sure how they calculated it but I presume they are not using observable matter (otherwise how would they have known about Dark Matter?). Your "multiverse theory" is not tenable.

1) Life can evolve and grow more complex because the Earth is not a closed system.

No it does not follow that putting energy into the earth necessarily leads to more complexity in organisms. I already said you need what I call "intelligent energy input". You need to rearrange DNA structures intelligently which randon energy from the sun cannot do and besides, the genetic code repairs itself.

2) The universe may in fact "bounce", meaning that it expands from a singularity in a Big Bang then comes back and contracts producing a new singularity which then rebounds and expands to produce another universe, and on and on and on.

There would be no energy left in the universe by now as shown above.

...One is the idea that the multiverse is infinite in size, which would mean there is infinite usable energy, meaning that even after an infinite amount of time, there would still be an infinite amount of usable energy (infinity's are fun, aren't they?).

Totally ridiculous!! Energy has specific sources (stars). It is not just flying around out in open space. Are you saying there is an infinite number of stars in the universe?

Another is that the multiverse (or perhaps the universe) was self-starting, meaning that if you were to go back in time you would eventually hit a loop, right at the beginning, in which time has been bent into a partial circle, and the universe actually created itself (that one is a theoretical model created by J. Richard Gott).

As far as I know, time is linear and never circular. Even in black holes, the curvature of space does not bend time.

4) As for the whole "what made the singularity unstable" business, that has been shown to be one way of looking at the problem in string theory. Basically the theory states that at the beginning of the universe there was a perfectly even distribution of matter and energy, in a 10 (or 11) dimensional space-time.

Still does not explain why the universe remained in an inert state as a singularity for a infinite time.

5) The final theory I'll put out for demonstration is that the universe has zero net energy. Namely, that gravity and the negative energy in the universe combined exactly counteract the total amount of matter energy in the universe (this does not seem to be the case in the visible universe, but all the evidence suggests that the universe as a whole is far far larger (orders of magnitude) than the visible universe, leaving open the possibility that our visible region is an aberration from the norm). If that is the case, than given an infinite space and time devoid of matter-energy, it could spontaneously be created and it would violate no physical law whatsoever.

Matter and energy are interchangeable but CANNOT be created nor destroyed. And what on earth is "negative energy"? Is there such a thing as "negative heat" or "negative electricity"? Does gravity affect energy in any way?

My point is physics does not know exactly what created the universe, but there are a number of theories. None of those theories have a problem explaining the universe's present condition in the face of entropy. Also, the position that the universe is all that exists and that speaking of anything "outside" it is nonsense is a valid (though perhaps unsatisfying) position both philosophically and scientifically. As a result, the arguments in the OP and those given later are refuted by every single scientific theory we have (even if they are still effectively arbitrary).

I have already demonstrated that what you might think are satisfying explanation for the orgins of the universe are full of holes. Scientific thoeries may to an extent be arbitrary but scientific laws are not.

[lethalmiko]

As Megan already pointed out, time is part of the universe. This has been scientifically proved using applications of general relativity. Since the universe itself began at the Big Bang, it makes no sense to ask what came before it. And since cause and effect require time (i.e. the cause comes before the effect), then the universe is, by definition, uncaused. However unsatisfying the explanation of an uncaused universe may be, it isn't any more satisfying to posit an uncaused God.

Your arguments contain a false premise. Namely that there was no universe before the Big Bang. If you accept that the Big Bang came from a singularity, then you must accept that the singularity existed as a sole entity and the universe at that time consisted of "empty space" plus the singularity sitting in the middle of it. The singularity existed for some time before exploding and therefore causality still applies.

Properly stated, Occam's Razaor says "do not multiply entities beyond necessity." Taken from Wikipedia: This is a more accurate definition than saying "the simplest explanation tends to be the right one," because anything can be made to sound more or less complicated, depending on how you phrase it. Occam's Razor, instead, tells you that you shouldn't posit 3 entities, where 2 offer a perfectly satisfactory explanation. We know the universe exists and, no matter how much trouble we have explaining why, it's silly to posit an additional entity (God), when doing so does not further the answer to the question of existence.

What I quoted for you is the paraphrased explanation of the pinciple (which I also got from Wikipedia by the way). No one has a problem with the fact that the universe exists. The problem is HOW did the the universe come into being without God? The explanations so far are NOT satisfatory.

You refute the assumption by showing that there is no evidence of a designer. Saying that the universe has design means, by definition, you are saying that it has a designer, because design cannot exist without a designer. So you're basically saying "we know the universe has a designer because it has a designer."

A design and a designer are two separate issues that you are wrongly equating. A house plan for example cannot just appear out of nowhere. The plan and the architect are not the same thing. When you see the plan, you immediately know it came from an intelligent mind. Apply the same logic to the universe in all its incalculably greater complexity.

I'm not going to explain the theory of evolution to you, but the questions that you're asking about it show that you don't have a grasp on its basic principles. Evolution works by means of natural selection, not coincidence.

Natural selection simply means the weaker organisms are eliminated leaving stronger ones. That does NOT mean a fish can therefore turn into an elephant. It means weaker fish die out.

When it comes to the creationist argument about our eyes, my response is usually to point out that our eyes pretty much suck, when you consider the whole range of electromagnetic waves. We are able to see only a minute fraction of the possible wavelengths that a more advanced eye would be able to see.

This still does not disprove a creator designing these "inferior eyes".

Ayn Rand's assessment of the non-existence of God does not come from the inability to prove His existence, but rather the idea that there is a God in the Christian sense contradicts everything we know about reality. In order to show that there is a God (onus of proof being on he who asserts the positive) requires you to show the evidence that there is a God.

Ayn Rand confidently said there is no God even when she was confronted with the fact that she was not omniscient and that it is possible that in future God's existence may be proved scientifically (e.g. we might discover he lives in another dimension that requires certain knowledge to access. We may then end up meeting him). If you don't believe me, go watch her interviews on YouTube (with Phil Donahue I think). I personally disagree with certain things that religious people attribute to God (e.g. omnipotence) but I cannot (yet) confidently say, "there is no God".

As to the first cause, part of the problem with your reasoning is that you are taking the approach: Why is there something rather than nothing? I forget the name of the philosopher who came up with that, but he is already violating the existence exists axiom. Existence exists and only existence exists; and causation does not mean that one thing acted on another getting that other to move or change in a certain way. So, one cannot make an appeal to causation to claim that the universe had to be created -- especially created out of nothing ex nihilo.

So the logical conclusion of your position is that the universe had no beginning since nothing "caused" it right? If that is true, then you need to explain the contradictions with the Entropy Law. If you argue that the universe infact had a beginning, then it did not exist before this beginning? If that is true, you are back to square one with the Existence Axiom.

There are many problems with the Big Bang Theory, one of which is the assumption that light doesn't change (spread out) even after traveling through billions of light years of space. The correlation between "faster motion" and "longer distances" can be accounted for if one assumes that light does change as it travels; so there is no real need for all of this "expansion" of the universe, since there are other theories out there accounting for the evidence.

False. The speed of light is a constant anywhere in the universe as Einstein proved. It is NOT an assumption.

There is no evidence there is a God and there can never be any evidence for a non-specific entity in our universe; and to claim that God is infinite in every respect is to say he has no identity, which means He doesn't exist.

Even if I agree that no one has proved God's existence, you cannot say it can never be done, anymore than people in the 19th century could confidently claim that atoms did not exist. Lack of proof of existence does not constitute proof of non-existence.

...time without universe is a meaningless term. For something to begin existing, there has to be a TIME at which it DID NOT EXIST. There's no time in which the universe did not exist because time exists *within* the universe. It has to do with the nature of time which is a great deal more complex than people think or understand. Eternal does not mean "infinite". It means "existing for all the time there is or will be".

What is "the universe"? Suppose we remove all matter and energy in the universe (including dark matter and anti-matter), would there be a universe? Would time exist? How would you prove there was a universe or time?

I may be wrong, but time seems to be exactly the same as distance. Distance does not exist and is merely a way to measure how far apart two points are. Similarly, time is a measure of the change between two fixed events. It does not exist and can therefore be applied to a "before the universe" scanario since the creation of the universe is one point and God acting to create it is the other.

Eternal does not mean "infinite". It means "existing for all the time there is or will be".

If something is "eternal" can you put a number to it?

I need you to explain more fully what you mean by your statement: 'There could very easily have passed a finite amount of time in the universe without the universe having a "before" and thus a distinguishable "beginning".'

[lethalmiko]

I just realised a weakness in my argument against infinite energy in the universe. Not all energy comes from stars since at the Big Bang there were no stars. In any case, you still cannot have infinite energy. A reduction of the total available energy cannot still leave an infinite amount. Infinity minus one cannot still be infinity. Besides, how can you contain an infinite amount of energy into a singularity? Energy requires space just like matter (the two are equivalent) and infinite energy means it fills up the entire universe which means it would be hot everywhere in the universe.

[Thomas M. Miovas Jr.]

I just realized a weakness in my argument against infinite energy in the universe.

You basically haven't heard a word we have said against your position that there had to be a God. One cannot take a position that "We don't know what happened or can explain what happened, and therefore there must be a God" and still claim to be taking a rational approach. Not knowing something or not being able to explain it does not imply that a supernatural being was involved. Everything you have brought up can be explained by means of reason and nature; not the supernatural. There is no evidence for the existence of God and there never can be any evidence for the supernatural. The term "supernatural" means beyond nature, which means beyond that which exists -- and there is no thing that exists beyond that which exists. Your stance is self-contradictory.

[Maximus]

I'm still waiting for the rational argument for god.

[lethalmiko]

You basically haven't heard a word we have said against your position that there had to be a God...

Firstly you are misrepresenting my position. I never said there has to be a God. From the beginning I said I am yet to make up my mind on the issue. I presented the arguments of Creationists to find out the counter arguments and counter proposals which are full of holes. Everyone here believes in science and has used it to prove things but when confronted with scientific facts that contradict your position on the universe, you seem to be discarding science.

Do you think it is a "rational approach" for anyone to make claims that are in direct contradiction with the Laws of Physics? I agree that lack of explanation does not necessarily imply God is the answer, but you confidently dismiss the "God explanation" and yet you cannot prove it is any worse than the theories thrown around on this forum, some of which are patently absurd and woefully ignorant.

You even go as far as to say "there never can be any evidence for the supernatural". How can you say that with 100% certainty? Are you omniscient? What is "nature" after all? Does it consist entirely of physical things? What about things like magic, hypnosis, telepathy, telekinesis, etc. Are they "natural" or "supernatural". Can they be explained in purely physical terms? Is your mind physical? Can you confidently say that our entire existence is totally physical (atoms, molecules, energy, etc.)?

Everything you have brought up can be explained by means of reason and nature; not the supernatural. There is no evidence for the existence of God....

The entropy problem has not been explained by anyone including you. You can only take one of two positions. The universe either has a beginning or it does not. The latter is false as I have shown using the Laws of Thermodynamics and the Big Bang theory. So you are left with the former which means you have to address the questions it presents with respect to the creation theory.

There is no evidence for the existence of God....

I am not sure that is necessarily true which is why we are having this debate. Even if it were true, this does not imply that there can NEVER be found evidence to prove God. I should hasten to say that you should not confuse some things religious people attribute to God with the concept of God the creator. They say God is omnipotent which you and I reject but that does not mean he cannot exist as a creator.

[The Wrath]

Your arguments contain a false premise. Namely that there was no universe before the Big Bang. If you accept that the Big Bang came from a singularity, then you must accept that the singularity existed as a sole entity and the universe at that time consisted of "empty space" plus the singularity sitting in the middle of it. The singularity existed for some time before exploding and therefore causality still applies.

You're splitting hairs. The Big Bang emerged from a singularity that existed for a tiny fraction of a second. There was nothing before that tiny fraction of a second. Or, more properly stated, there was no before that tiny fraction of a second.

What I quoted for you is the paraphrased explanation of the pinciple (which I also got from Wikipedia by the way). No one has a problem with the fact that the universe exists. The problem is HOW did the the universe come into being without God? The explanations so far are NOT satisfatory.

And your paraphrased explanation is wrong. That is a common misquoting of Occam's Razor. Occam's Razor is not about the "simplest" explanation. It's about the one that contains the least "entities." In this case, Occam's Razor requires us to choose the explanation that does not involve an omnipotent creator, since he is not necessary.

And so what if the explanations aren't satisfactory? That somehow proves that God was involved? Human civilization is less than 10,000 years old. Modern science is less than 300 years old. Let's give ourselves some more time before we throw up our hands and proclaim that we will never be able to answer the enigma of the origin of the universe.

A design and a designer are two separate issues that you are wrongly equating. A house plan for example cannot just appear out of nowhere. The plan and the architect are not the same thing. When you see the plan, you immediately know it came from an intelligent mind. Apply the same logic to the universe in all its incalculably greater complexity.

You missed the point. Go back and read the post again. The universe is undoubtedly complex, but that does not imply that it was designed. If you see a house you can conclude that someone built it, because there are no natural processes which allow lumber, metal, mortar, etc. to come together to form a house, without prodding by some intelligent being. The same is not true of the universe. We understand why the earth moves around the sun. We understand the galaxies rotate. We understand why the diversity of life arose. We understand these based off of the laws of nature and, therefore, do not need to posit a supernatural creator.

Natural selection simply means the weaker organisms are eliminated leaving stronger ones. That does NOT mean a fish can therefore turn into an elephant. It means weaker fish die out.

I don't know anyone who believes that fish can turn into elephants. Your understanding of evolution is poor enough that you really have no business trying to discuss it. Your first sentence gives an example of microevolution...the same kind of evolution that differentiates the different breeds of cats and dogs, as well as the different races of the human species. The only difference between microevolution and macroevolution (i.e. the differentiation of species) is one of timescale. Saying that you believe in microevolution by not macroevolution is roughly the equivalent of saying "it is possible for me to walk to the kitchen, but walking to the mall is physically impossible." Credit to thunderf00t (from YouTube) for the metaphor.

This still does not disprove a creator designing these "inferior eyes".

Negatives can't be proved anyway. The purpose of that argument is to point out that our eyes are not so "OMG AMAZING" as to prove that they were designed. They're actually quite feeble things, when you consider how much better they could be.

Edited June 26, 2009 by The Wrath

[bluey]

You even go as far as to say "there never can be any evidence for the supernatural". How can you say that with 100% certainty? Are you omniscient? What is "nature" after all? Does it consist entirely of physical things? What about things like magic, hypnosis, telepathy, telekinesis, etc. Are they "natural" or "supernatural". Can they be explained in purely physical terms? Is your mind physical? Can you confidently say that our entire existence is totally physical (atoms, molecules, energy, etc.)?

"Natural" means the entire set of things which exist. "Supernatural" means something outside of the set of things which exist. Something "supernatural" is by definition something which does not exist. It doesn't matter if it's "physical" or observable with current technology. You are literally saying that something may exist which doesn't exist but we just don't know about it yet. God either exists - is something specific - or does not. Supernatural does not mean merely "outside of the scale or range of human observation" as you suggest in the above quote. That is why we can confidently say that there is nothing supernatural - because nothing exists which doesn't exist.

If you want to use "supernatural" to mean "something outside the scale or range of human observation", then you're going to run into a problem if you call this supposedly potential being "God". It's then definitely not the god that is indicated by the Bible, the Torah, the Qur'an, or any other religious imagining. It's basically an alien. Just another individual in a universe of x number of individuals plus you. If the god of the Bible turned out to be some jerk of an alien from another dimension, would you still imagine you have some obligation to obey him? If not, then who cares if he exists or not? Who cares if he "created" the human race at some point in the past? Would that knowledge really give you a reason to sign your life on earth over to it/him? If not then ... who cares if it exists or not?

The reason why anyone cares whether god exists, is that there's a big threat riding over their heads if he does and they feel that the threat of eternal torture is worse than the certainty of a wasted existence in the present. Yet for all speculation of "life after death" (despite the fact that every part of you that is currently engaged in living will at that point still exist but by observably buried or destroyed, leaving it unclear in what sense you could possibly be "living") we have no - zero - evidence or reason to think that anything like that actually happens. We have lots of people imagining that it's possible. Surely you can see the difference between "imaginable" and "possible", never mind "probable".

So that's why we can comfortably say that the concepts of "god", "life after death", etc. do not refer to actual existents. Because we know, concretely, that these concepts came not from observation of reality but from human imagination. We can show the historical development and evolution of these concepts, where they came from and how they have changed. We can show that none of the changes in the concepts of the supernatural came from observation of the supernatural, but only from increased knowledge of the natural world that slowly squeezed and constricted the concept of god from the idea of real, physical entities in literal control of natural events to today's vague "something, somewhere, that does something, that we just don't know the details of yet". I know that god doesn't exist because I can introspect about back when I believed that he did and can recognize that I simply chose to believe in something I created in my own imagination, not in something I could observe or learn about in any sense. That's the same method I used to stop being afraid of the dark when I was four.

The entropy problem has not been explained by anyone including you. You can only take one of two positions. The universe either has a beginning or it does not. The latter is false as I have shown using the Laws of Thermodynamics and the Big Bang theory. So you are left with the former which means you have to address the questions it presents with respect to the creation theory.

You're saying here that either we demonstrate that the universe has no beginning, or we have to give you a better explanation for how it began than "god did it". Well, of course we don't know anything about the origins of the universe because we weren't there and haven't yet been able to replicate the model in a laboratory. But we do know that it wasn't god. How? Because the universe is the location of the set of things which exist. The universe is the container of nature, in its entirety. That's what the concept refers to. If god exists, then it exists within the universe. If you want to say that some being that you're calling "god" created the part of the universe that is known to human observation, then that's a different claim. It's not supernatural, it's not religious, and it's not at all relevant to the topic of atheism vs. agnosticism. Atheists are agnostic about the existence of aliens, for the most part. It's a different claim altogether and if there are aliens, we wouldn't worship them.

I am not sure that is necessarily true which is why we are having this debate. Even if it were true, this does not imply that there can NEVER be found evidence to prove God. I should hasten to say that you should not confuse some things religious people attribute to God with the concept of God the creator. They say God is omnipotent which you and I reject but that does not mean he cannot exist as a creator.

Then you're not talking about god, you're talking about aliens. Go do some science and bring something back that we can talk about. You shouldn't confuse the religious concept of god with simply another life form in the universe. Atheists are atheistic about a specifically omnipotent (omniscient, etc.) being. If you take away the infinite stuff, then you're not talking about god anymore, you're just taking a lazy approach to a question about reality. Go find a way to observe (or demonstrate the existence of) other dimensions. Go do some laboratory research on telekinesis, telepathy, etc. and let us know what you find. You're just going to end up frustrated if you expect the products of your wild imagination to be given serious consideration on this board.