Atheist Universe: Not Impossible

[PhilosophicalBluster]

It does rule out God; for how can God exist when nothing exists? Also if we use the logic of the creationists then a purple pasta God is also possible!

Let's stick to science for the time being and leave faith to the realms of religion.

Now yall have a nice day

Well I've always thought of the concept as not being tangible. Just by the premise of an omnipotent figure, this figure can do whatever he wants, including having himself exist simultaneously with the complete lack of existence.
In other words, an omnipotent figure doesn't have to obey the laws of logic any more than lack of existence does.

 

[Luddite]

Well I've always thought of the concept as not being tangible. Just by the premise of an omnipotent figure, this figure can do whatever he wants, including having himself exist simultaneously with the complete lack of existence.
In other words, an omnipotent figure doesn't have to obey the laws of logic any more than lack of existence does.

No. Omnipotence means the ability to actualize any potency. It is not a possibility (potency) to create a self-contradiction, not because of any lack of power to actualise it in omnipotence, but because the thing is not itself actually a potency. A self-contradiction makes no sense, is not actually a potentiality. If creating logical impossibilities was simply a matter of how much power you have, then it would not be a logical impossibility to begin with, but simply something hard to do. But the point is exactly a logical contradiction is more than just "hard to do"; it's simply meaningless. The inability to be actualised does not lie in Gods power, but is contingent on the nature of the thing itself as a non-potency.

That a non-potency cannot be actualised is not a contradiction of "the ability to actualize any potency", which is the definition of omnipotence.

 

[salida]

Mr. Buster:

Put this in your pipe! Biblical prophecies and math will slam dunk any anticreationist. Since there is proof of the bible and creation is in it- you smoke this!

I will name a couple mathematicians as there are more. Yes, mathematicians can be wrong-there is always a possibility. Again, pink and green elephants flying around in a room is possible but not probable.This is why I use statistics because nothing can be proved with 100% accuracy. We arn't sure the sun will come up tomorrow 100%.
Henry M. Morris, PhD is Engineering and Math wrote an article on The Bible and Modern Science.

In this article is a mathematican named Peter Stoner, a PhD in CA. Each class member was assigned a particular Messianic prophecy for study with the purpose of determining the statistical chance that a particular event could have been predicted without supernatural inspiration. For example, the prophecy in Micah 5:2 says that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Thus, the probability of chance fulfillment would be one divided by the number of towns in Israel at the time. The probabilities of fulfillment were determined for each of 48 Messianic prophecies-as each student was assigned a prophecy.

The probability of several chance occurrences independent of each other - is like playing power ball but even more remote because power ball doesn't have 48 numbers in it. This conclusion with the professor of all 48 possibilities occurring at the same time was one in with one with 181 zeros.

Go to the: www.TheBibleProofBook.com to look at these prophecies because there are so many of them. No, this isn't the same as Nostradmus as he was very vague-I can show you this too if you want.

 

[tanzanos]

It doesn't rule God out that nothing conceivable exists. For God is in ousia in se no thing; as I've repeated, only in essentia ad extra is he something.

Then how does that reconcile with "He created man unto his image and likeness". If nothing existed and God created everything then how on earth did a human like being exist in the first place?

Believe what you like; just don't try to impose it on science. Science and religion do not mix!

 

[Luddite]

Then how does that reconcile with "He created man unto his image and likeness". If nothing existed and God created everything then how on earth did a human like being exist in the first place?

A human like being did not exist. God is not human-like. It's the other way around. God created humans in his likeness. And not in likeness to his essence in se (which is wholly transcendent), but to his being in hypostasis/person, since it is the hypostases who have the essence, but it is in their energies and operations that the divine likeness in man lies.

Believe what you like; just don't try to impose it on science. Science and religion do not mix!

What is wrong with you? This has nothing to do with a dichotomy between science and religion. You asked a theological question. If you have something against religon or theology, then don't ask theological questions on a forum for Christians!

 

[Wiccan_Child]

I didn't intend to be arrogant. Sorry if that's the way it came out.

And what you are saying is a completely valid way to look at negative theology.

I was just wanted to point out that there are also many negative theologians who believe God transcends even existence, such as the Cappadocian Fathers.

I don't doubt that there are. There are Buddhists who take the principle of the Middle Path to its extremes, positing even a middle ground between existence and non-existence.

But, with all due respect to such philosophers, I reject those ideas as logically incoherent. Rejecting the law of excluded middle is... daft .

 

[Luddite]

I don't doubt that there are. There are Buddhists who take the principle of the Middle Path to its extremes, positing even a middle ground between existence and non-existence.

But, with all due respect to such philosophers, I reject those ideas as logically incoherent. Rejecting the law of excluded middle is... daft .

I agree that a denial of the laws of logic on which such a denial is based is incoherent and selfrefuting. But this is a bit different.

Their (the Cappadocians) point is not incoherent as long as it's merely a rejection of the notion that the human conception of "existence" is prescribing or exhausting for the divine essence. It is "beyond" existence.

But I think to say that it exists in a sense is fine as well, since what the Cappadocians are trying to do is simply to say that "existence" does not exhaust or presribe divinity, not that it doesn't reflect any truth about it at all.

 

[quatona]

No, I never spoke of "nothingness". You are simply twisting my words now.

I responded to the question "Why can´t God be nothingness", and you responded to my response.

 

[Luddite]

I responded to the question "Why can´t God be nothingness", and you responded to my response.

But I didn't respond that God was nothingness.

 

[quatona]

But I didn't respond that God was nothingness.

And I didn´t say you did.
Feel free to explain how your post related to the post of mine that you quoted.

 

[Luddite]

And I didn´t say you did.
Feel free to explain how your post related to the post of mine that you quoted.

It was a meditation on the same subject (whether God is something or nothing).

 

[Wiccan_Child]

I agree that a denial of the laws of logic on which such a denial is based is incoherent and selfrefuting. But this is a bit different.

Their (the Cappadocians) point is not incoherent as long as it's merely a rejection of the notion that the human conception of "existence" is prescribing or exhausting for the divine essence. It is "beyond" existence.

Which makes no sense. Something is either red, or it isn't. There is no 'beyond' red. The choices aren't 'A', '¬A', and 'beyondA'.

I could see what you mean about a 'beyond' option if the scenario were overly restricted. It is possible that you are beyond either option when asked "Are you blind or deaf?", or "Are you from 2001 or 2002?". But I don't think this applies here.

But I think to say that it exists in a sense is fine as well, since what the Cappadocians are trying to do is simply to say that "existence" does not exhaust or presribe divinity, not that it doesn't reflect any truth about it at all.

Still, it sounded like you were saying that some theists believed God didn't exist.

 

[Luddite]

Which makes no sense. Something is either red, or it isn't. There is no 'beyond' red. The choices aren't 'A', '¬A', and 'beyondA'.

Don't take such heavy note on "beyond". Beyond in this context, would simply mean that you could not say that "existence" describes Gods essence, and hence, it is true to say that it does not exist.

I could see what you mean about a 'beyond' option if the scenario were overly restricted.

But what you fail to see is that theists believe Gods essence is incomprehensible, inexhaustible, transcendent, and noncomposite, such that any human conceptualisation about Gods essence is, in fact, overly restricted no matter what.

Still, it sounded like you were saying that some theists believed God didn't exist.

And the apophatic theists (most of the Church Fathers) do, in the strict sense. But again, it is about the essence in se, and does not deny that God exists in his energies, it just denies that his essence can be described in such a manner.

 

[catzrfluffy]

"why can't this 'nothingness' be God?" I didn't mean God was nothing.
There is no such thing as 'nothing', because if 'nothing' existed, it would no longer be nothing, because then it would exist. It would be 'something'.
I meant the way 'nothingness' was described, as making anything possible, and having no outside rules imposed upon it, couldn't this describe God?
God is described as being immortal, eternal and invisible, whatever has these qualities, therefore must be God.
How can lawlessness create something with laws? Surely it has to contain within itself lawfulness to create laws. How can something which doesn't exist create something which does exist? Surely it has to be in existence itself before it can do so.
How can something come from nothing? It doesn't make sense.
If the universe has always existed, and will never end, that would make the universe ,or, more the forces holding it together, God, because then they would be immortal and eternal and invisible, if the universe had always existed. I thought it was expanding. Therefore, the universe must be created.
We learn about Him from what He has created, in a sense.

 

[azmurath]

"why can't this 'nothingness' be God?" I didn't mean God was nothing.
There is no such thing as 'nothing', because if 'nothing' existed, it would no longer be nothing, because then it would exist. It would be 'something'.
I meant the way 'nothingness' was described, as making anything possible, and having no outside rules imposed upon it, couldn't this describe God?
God is described as being immortal, eternal and invisible, whatever has these qualities, therefore must be God.
How can lawlessness create something with laws? Surely it has to contain within itself lawfulness to create laws. How can something which doesn't exist create something which does exist? Surely it has to be in existence itself before it can do so.
How can something come from nothing? It doesn't make sense.
If the universe has always existed, and will never end, that would make the universe ,or, more the forces holding it together, God, because then they would be immortal and eternal and invisible, if the universe had always existed. I thought it was expanding. Therefore, the universe must be created.
We learn about Him from what He has created, in a sense.

Just because the universe is currently expanding doesn't mean it was created. For all we know, it oscillates, expanding and contracting, or it could be part of a multiverse.

 

[Luddite]

Just because the universe is currently expanding doesn't mean it was created. For all we know, it oscillates, expanding and contracting, or it could be part of a multiverse.

What we do know is that it is expanding. All the latter things are things we do not know.

So please, stop presenting what is fact as dubious, and what is speculation as fact.

 

[azmurath]

What we do know is that it is expanding. All the latter things are things we do not know.

So please, stop presenting what is fact as dubious, and what is speculation as fact.

I never presented it as fact.

Please read the whole thing, and comprehend it before you attack.

 

[Luddite]

I never presented it as fact.

Please read the whole thing, and comprehend it before you attack.

Whether the universe is expanding or not has nothing to do with whether it was created or not, anyway. That is a bad mix up of physics/cosmology with theology. The term "creation" cannot be understood in physics/cosmological terms, and nor does physics have any relevance to the concerns of theology, which is not the specifics of how creation works. In Augustines phrase, the faith and sciptures is not about how the heavens go, but about how to heaven to go.

 

[azmurath]

Whether the universe is expanding or not has nothing to do with whether it was created or not, anyway.

The post I was responding to said

" I thought it was expanding. Therefore, the universe must be created."

I was showing how THAT piece was flawed.

 

[Luddite]

The post I was responding to said

" I thought it was expanding. Therefore, the universe must be created."

I was showing how THAT piece was flawed.

Then I apologize.