Atheist Universe: Not Impossible

[Chesterton]

Hmmmm... that's a little bit like claiming that both believing in gnomes and NOT believing in gnomes are examples of superstition, as both of these positions need to take an unscientific leap in determining whether these metaphysical beings exist or not.

Can you see why that is not a very valid argument?

Superstition though, has a specific, separate meaning. Taking an unscientific leap is not the same thing as being superstitous. You can be an atheist or a theist without being superstitous, and you can believe in gnomes without being superstitous (although you'd probably be mistaken).

As a side note, superstition is forbidden by Christianity, and the reason is plain. If God is in control of the cosmos, walking under a ladder or breaking a mirror is of no consequence whatsoever; His will concerning me will be done whether I do or don't do those things. And of course the atheist, for a different reason, also believes those things are of no consequence (although I used to know a strong atheist who always used a "lucky" card protector when playing in poker tournaments; that seemed odd to me. ) Anyway, at least we should have that in common.

 

[tcampen]

Superstition though, has a specific, separate meaning. Taking an unscientific leap is not the same thing as being superstitous. You can be an atheist or a theist without being superstitous, and you can believe in gnomes without being superstitous (although you'd probably be mistaken).

As a side note, superstition is forbidden by Christianity, and the reason is plain. If God is in control of the cosmos, walking under a ladder or breaking a mirror is of no consequence whatsoever; His will concerning me will be done whether I do or don't do those things. And of course the atheist, for a different reason, also believes those things are of no consequence (although I used to know a strong atheist who always used a "lucky" card protector when playing in poker tournaments; that seemed odd to me. ) Anyway, at least we should have that in common.

Superstition:
1 a: a belief or practice resulting from ignorance, fear of the unknown, trust in magic or chance, or a false conception of causation b: an irrational abject attitude of mind toward the supernatural, nature, or God resulting from superstition
2: a notion maintained despite evidence to the contrary

I think it depends on the particular issue, but I would definitely think that, for example, Young Earth Creationism would be a prime example of superstition, according to Webster's definition. Perhaps you're saying Christainity forbids such a belief, but I don't see this happening.

 

[Belk]

But laws (including laws of logic) only disallow things because they allow other things. Think about what a "law" is: every law, whether real or imagined, is an "if/then" statement - "If there is an action, then there is an equal and opposite reaction". "If you steal money, then you'll spend time in jail." "If something can go wrong, then it will go wrong." (Murphy's Law). But if there's no "if thing" to effect a "then result", then there can be no result.

While this is true within the current framework of the universe I believe PB has a valid point. If you remove the framework of our universe and have a true Nothing on which you are starting the If/Then nature of the laws we are familiar with no longer applies.

 

[Polycarp_fan]

... And to me, it seems, very probable.

BEFORE YOU READ:

I realize that this theory / hypothesis / concept / whatever is not going to be the end-all creationism vs. atheism debate. This is just an idea I found interesting and wanted to see what everybody here thought about it.

ON TO THE SUBJECT:

I just had this sort of thought bouncing around in my head, and I think I had an epiphany. That or my brain exploded. Okay, consider this:

Before the universe existed, there were no laws. Of anything. No physics, no logic, no nothing.

If such a blank nothingness existed without laws, literally anything could happen.

In the infinite amount of time that the nothingness existed, it is infinitely probable for anything and everything to be created. Since there is an infinite amount of time and no binding guidelines, literally every possibility must be fulfilled.

This includes the spontaneous creation of our universe.

----------------------


Put that in your pipe and smoke it, creationists.

Sounds very God to me.

A lot better than nothing to mud to monkeys to man from the 0 x 0 = the universe offering from nongodianism.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

... And to me, it seems, very probable.

BEFORE YOU READ:

I realize that this theory / hypothesis / concept / whatever is not going to be the end-all creationism vs. atheism debate. This is just an idea I found interesting and wanted to see what everybody here thought about it.

ON TO THE SUBJECT:

I just had this sort of thought bouncing around in my head, and I think I had an epiphany. That or my brain exploded. Okay, consider this:

Before the universe existed, there were no laws. Of anything. No physics, no logic, no nothing.

If such a blank nothingness existed without laws, literally anything could happen.

In the infinite amount of time that the nothingness existed, it is infinitely probable for anything and everything to be created. Since there is an infinite amount of time and no binding guidelines, literally every possibility must be fulfilled.

This includes the spontaneous creation of our universe.

----------------------


Put that in your pipe and smoke it, creationists.

That's the same thing I came up with myself a while ago Great minds think alike, eh?

 

[PhilosophicalBluster]

That's the same thing I came up with myself a while ago Great minds think alike, eh?

Interesting

Thank you for bumping this thread, I think it's a good one, myself.

 

[Wyzaard]

But then that means there was some sort of energy/influence that caused things to happen in this lawless state.

No... the lawless state itself would be the cause, of every possible thing that could happen.

I'd argue that literally nothing could happen. If things were ever in a state of utter non-existence,

He wasn't taling about utter-non-existence... whatever that is(n't).

then they would still be this way now. If there is one certain law about our universe it's that everything has some sort of source.

Explain.

 

[Stormy]

... And to me, it seems, very probable.

BEFORE YOU READ:

I realize that this theory / hypothesis / concept / whatever is not going to be the end-all creationism vs. atheism debate. This is just an idea I found interesting and wanted to see what everybody here thought about it.

ON TO THE SUBJECT:

I just had this sort of thought bouncing around in my head, and I think I had an epiphany. That or my brain exploded. Okay, consider this:

Before the universe existed, there were no laws. Of anything. No physics, no logic, no nothing.

If such a blank nothingness existed without laws, literally anything could happen.

In the infinite amount of time that the nothingness existed, it is infinitely probable for anything and everything to be created. Since there is an infinite amount of time and no binding guidelines, literally every possibility must be fulfilled.

This includes the spontaneous creation of our universe.

----------------------


Put that in your pipe and smoke it, creationists.

The problem is that you are not talking about nothing. You are actually talking about an empty space. Its really hard for our minds to phantom nothing. How can we imagine what is not? We are creatures of matter and substance, so we think of everything in those terms. When there is nothing we see an empty space. But nothing is not simply an emptiness.. it is not a vast space waiting to be filled... for that would be something. Its not an energy source waiting to produce something. Nothing is simply nothing. Nothing can only be nothing. For if its something other than nothing... its not really nothing.

So even if an Atheist thinks he has an explanation for everything, he still cannot explain why there was never a pure nothing... why there was always something.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

The problem is that you are not talking about nothing. You are actually talking about an empty space.

Erm - no. Empty space would be something. What we're talking is a singularity. Chaos. Tohu va Bohu. Infinite possibility. No-space. No-time. Everything, compressed into nothingness. The point that's not a point, where all opposites become one - and none. Up is down, hot is cold, now is then, and never.

Its really hard for our minds to phantom nothing. How can we imagine what is not? We are creatures of matter and substance, so we think of everything in those terms. When there is nothing we see an empty space. But nothing is not simply an emptiness.. it is not a vast space waiting to be filled... for that would be something. Its not an energy source waiting to produce something. Nothing is simply nothing. Nothing can only be nothing. For if its something other than nothing... its not really nothing.

So even if an Atheist thinks he has an explanation for everything, he still cannot explain why there was never a pure nothing... why there was always something.

Well, you see, and that's where you are wrong: I have yet to meet atheists who think that they can explain everything - as opposed to some theists, who believe that they have all the answers, contained in the pages of an anthology of myths composed in the late bronze age. In fact, I'd go so far as to claim that most atheists became such because they realized that the answers provided by their original religion were too shallow, too simplistic, too altogether convenient and human.

The driving force behind science is the admittance of ignorance - and the desire to fill in the blanks.
The driving force behind religion, on the other hand, is the illusion of knowledge - and the desire to cling to it.

As for singularities and such like: present-day physics is a discipline that conceives of things few people can fathom, based on mathematical models that can be tested for accuracy. Ten-dimensional space curving in upon itself. Super-strings. Quantum mechanics. Gluons. And, yes, singularities.
*I* don't pretend to understand it all, having at best a cursory knowledge of such matters.
But even the most obscure mathematical novel still makes a billion times more sense to me than "The Great Celestial Artist hand-crafted the Universe". Why? Because that's as if a species of sentient dogs believed that dinosaur fossils came to be in the ground because the Dog From Heaven put them there. It's thinking within altogether human categories that leads people to imagine a creator. And to me, it's just a supremely silly idea, and one that solves none of the mysteries surrounding the fabric of space-time. Quite the contrary, you end up with a super-being that just existed, but whose deeds, thoughts and motivations are strangely reminiscent of our own species.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

The problem is that you are not talking about nothing. You are actually talking about an empty space.

Actually, he made it clear that he's talking about the philosophical nothing (the complete and total absence of any thing), not the scientific vacuum (which, as Jane_the_Bane said, is not truly empty).

Its really hard for our minds to phantom nothing.

It's impossible to conceive absolute nothingness.

But nothing is not simply an emptiness.. it is not a vast space waiting to be filled... for that would be something. Its not an energy source waiting to produce something. Nothing is simply nothing.

Agreed.

Nothing can only be nothing.

Disagreed. Nothingness is not something that can 'only be', for it cannot 'be' at all. Nothingness is only the absence of any thing, and thus ceases to 'be' as soon as something exists (though English is poorly equipped to deal with such concepts).

For if its something other than nothing... its not really nothing.

That's the whole point: nothingness becomes somethingness, and thus ceases (in any meaningful sense) to be nothingness. As soon as some thing exists, nothingness no longer exists (inasmuch as it ever 'exists').

Now, something can arise 'from' nothingness because there is (quite literally) nothing to stop it doing otherwise. We know that things can spontaneously pop into existence in our spacetime continuum, so imagine what can arise when there are no restraints. There is no space, so everything would come into existence at the same point (insofar as there is only one, zero-dimensional point) and at the same time (inasmuch as time now exists at all). Thereafter, things obey their usual rules.

That's how something can come from nothing, and can come about in a specific way.

 

[daniel777]

ok, first... stop saying "nothing becomes something" because nothing cannot "do" anything, therefore nothing cannot "become". what you're really talking about here is complete randomness, and "nothingness" as the conditions necessary for randomness to exist.

the problem with all this is if nothing exist (or if nothing does not exist), randomness cannot exist inclusive to "nothing", or inclusive to the concept of nothing.

what you're doing is giving "action" to randomness and saying that randomness is either nothing or a property intrinsic to nothing. neither makes any sense at all.

also, to the OP, you can't apply possibility or probability to "nothing".... because, by definition, "nothing" is "possible" or "probable" when all you have to work with is "nothing".

 

[b&wpac4]

None of us have a frame of reference for "nothing" or to concepts like "infinity". We can pretend that we do, but we always either fill that "nothing" with something or we compress "infinity" somehow. We simply cannot comprehend them.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

ok, first... stop saying "nothing becomes something" because nothing cannot "do" anything, therefore nothing cannot "become". what you're really talking about here is complete randomness, and "nothingness" as the conditions necessary for randomness to exist.

the problem with all this is if nothing exist (or if nothing does not exist), randomness cannot exist inclusive to "nothing", or inclusive to the concept of nothing.

what you're doing is giving "action" to randomness and saying that randomness is either nothing or a property intrinsic to nothing. neither makes any sense at all.

also, to the OP, you can't apply possibility or probability to "nothing".... because, by definition, "nothing" is neither "possible" nor "probable" when all you have to work with is "nothing".

Please, just read some introductory article on singularities, like the Wikipedia article I linked here. It may clear up some of your misconceptions.

 

[daniel777]

dble got me...

 

[daniel777]

None of us have a frame of reference for "nothing" or to concepts like "infinity". We can pretend that we do, but we always either fill that "nothing" with something or we compress "infinity" somehow. We simply cannot comprehend them.

absolutely agreed, and i agree with wc on everything in his last post except for his last two responses.

Please, just read some introductory article on singularities, like the Wikipedia article I linked here. It may clear up some of your misconceptions.

why don't you just tell me? btw, i read the article, and i don't see what you mean. i don't see what any of that has to do with "nothing" either.... um, pun not intended.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

ok, first... stop saying "nothing becomes something" because nothing cannot "do" anything, therefore nothing cannot "become". what you're really talking about here is complete randomness, and "nothingness" as the conditions necessary for randomness to exist.

Assuming you're talking to me... I'm not. I made it clear that nothingness cannot 'be' anything, that time doesn't apply to nothingness, because it is not something that has properties: it is an absence, inasmuch as it 'is' anything at all.

The point that, as an absence, it lacks any restraints. We know things can pop into existence, the only hindrance being what already exists (an electron can't spontaneously exist in an occupied state, for instance). So if there's no hindrance, there's no reason why something can't pop into existence. If nothing exists, then there is nothing to augment probabilities. Since nothing exists, the only possible event is the spontaneous creation of something. Since nothing exists, including time and space, the only possible outcome will occur. And lo! it does.

In short, the point of nothingness is that there is nothing to stop something from spontaneously existing. You need to give up common sense notions of causality.

the problem with all this is if nothing exist (or if nothing does not exist), randomness cannot exist inclusive to "nothing", or inclusive to the concept of nothing.

On the contrary, randomness is a property that exists in the absence of hindrance.

what you're doing is giving "action" to randomness and saying that randomness is either nothing or a property intrinsic to nothing. neither makes any sense at all.

also, to the OP, you can't apply possibility or probability to "nothing".... because, by definition, "nothing" is "possible" or "probable" when all you have to work with is "nothing".

And nothing does the job, inasmuch as it 'does' anything.

 

[daniel777]

The point that, as an absence, it lacks any restraints.

i disagree with that. if nothing exists (or does not exists) it exist (or does not exist) as something necessary to itself. if it exists as something necessary to itself then it is itself, which is nothing. if nothing is nothing, then it cannot not be nothing, otherwise it would never have been nothing. restraints do exist, but these restraints aren't imposed by us, or any definition we can conceive, these restraints are in the necessary being (or non-being) of nothingness.

what you're attempting to do here is define nothing inversely as the result of your world and what you understand to "be"... you have to define nothing by itself, which is unknowable. in other words, if "nothing" is an actual state, it has to remain nothing lest it was never nothing. the restrictions for nothing lie in the intrinsic nature of itself in that it "does not" exist.... but if it were ever an actual state, it could never become unrestricted on its own.

nothing is undefinable, but if you're going to hold nothing as an actual state (or not an actual state), you have to hold it as necessary to itself since by definition, it can't rely on anything else. if you hold it as necessary, you have to realize that it has restrictions, basically that it is nothing, and cannot act to become other than nothing.

In short, the point of nothingness is that there is nothing to stop something from spontaneously existing. You need to give up common sense notions of causality.

nothing stops nothing from becoming something. . . . . because it is nothing.
^it's important that you use the same def. for both "nothings" in the above sentence.

On the contrary, randomness is a property that exists in the absence of hindrance.

possibly, but not intrinsic to nothing.

And nothing does the job, inasmuch as it 'does' anything.

nothing does not "do" or "does" because nothing isn't.

 

[PhilosophicalBluster]

i disagree with that. if nothing exists (or does not exists) it exist (or does not exist) as something necessary to itself. if it exists as something necessary to itself then it is itself, which is nothing. if nothing is nothing, then it cannot not be nothing, otherwise it would never have been nothing. restraints do exist, but these restraints aren't imposed by us, or any definition we can conceive, these restraints are in the necessary being (or non-being) of nothingness.

what you're attempting to do here is define nothing inversely as the result of your world and what you understand to "be"... you have to define nothing by itself, which is unknowable. in other words, if "nothing" is an actual state, it has to remain nothing lest it was never nothing. the restrictions for nothing lie in the intrinsic nature of itself in that it "does not" exist.... but if it were ever an actual state, it could never become unrestricted on its own.

nothing is undefinable, but if you're going to hold nothing as an actual state (or not an actual state), you have to hold it as necessary to itself since by definition, it can't rely on anything else. if you hold it as necessary, you have to realize that it has restrictions, basically that it is nothing, and cannot act to become other than nothing.

nothing stops nothing from becoming something. . . . . because it is nothing.
^it's important that you use the same def. for both "nothings" in the above sentence.

possibly, but not intrinsic to nothing.



nothing does not "do" or "does" because nothing isn't.

Your not thinking outside of the box. What you are saying is correct in the sense of the 'nothingness' in our own universe, like a vacuum. I am talking about a different nothingness, that is not just the absence of matter and energy, but the absence of space, the universe, the laws of logic, physics, time, and whatever else. The Greek idea of chaos, not just the lack of something. If there are no laws to dictate what this total nothingness or chaos does, then why can't it spontaneously generate a universe?

 

[Mystman]

I'd like to repeat my position that the idea as proposed in the OP is really pretty weak.

"Without rules, everything is possible"

Why then, does all evidence point towards a big-bang type of event, where all energy/matter was located in a pretty small volume?

"Well, it's possible!"

Sure, but if we're going for the 'anything can happen' angle, wouldn't a more random distribution of matter and energy be more logical? Like one second there is absolute nothingness, and the next second matter/energy is scattered all over the place, and not just confined in one small area?

For a "well, everything can happen!" scenario, a neatly ordered blob of pure energy is a bit... boring.

For that matter, with the "well, everything can happen!" defense, it's also possible that the universe was created last thursday by random chance.

 

[daniel777]

Your not thinking outside of the box. What you are saying is correct in the sense of the 'nothingness' in our own universe, like a vacuum. I am talking about a different nothingness, that is not just the absence of matter and energy, but the absence of space, the universe, the laws of logic, physics, time, and whatever else. The Greek idea of chaos, not just the lack of something. If there are no laws to dictate what this total nothingness or chaos does, then why can't it spontaneously generate a universe?

that is the nothingness i am referring too.


basically, nothing can't act because nothingness is restricted by the fact that it is nothing.

here is the premise of my argument:
nothing is nothing

here is the premise of your argument:
nothing is not nothing.

nothing is restricted from becoming something because it is nothing. these aren't outside restrictions, but these are restrictions placed in the existence (or non-existence) of nothing.