Coming from nothing

[FireDragon76]

What evidence do you have that this is true?

Anselm's ontological argument.

The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.

 

[PsychoSarah]

Anselm's ontological argument.

The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.

The Christian god is still a specific idea. There is no reason it couldn't be a different deity or multiple ones.

 

[Davian]

1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.

Full discussion of the problems with actual infinities is beyond my pay grade and deals with transfinite mathematics and other subjects.

2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity. Reason is supposedly the playing field I meet the atheist on, so I'm sure you can understand my appeal to causality vs. absurdity?

I understand it, but do not see its validity. Why should the cosmos comply with human reason?

"Is Nature Unnatural? Decades of confounding experiments have physicists considering a startling possibility: The universe might not make sense."

Complications in Physics Lend Support to Multiverse Hypothesis | Simons Foundation

3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.

You have still not explained why it needs to be a god. Why not a multiverse equivalent of a toaster oven that pops out a cosmos at some undetermined interval?

And, can you tell us what it is, rather than what it is not?

 

[Loudmouth]

Anselm's ontological argument.

The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.

God causes lightning?

 

[Davian]

God causes lightning?

"God is why we can have flush toilets." - unknown

 

[ToddNotTodd]

Anselm's ontological argument.

The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.

Anselm's argument is rubbish. Trying to define something into existence is simply linguistic mumbo jumbo. I can just as easily define myself as the most perfect being...

 

[Nibru]

1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.

Full discussion of the problems with actual infinities is beyond my pay grade and deals with transfinite mathematics and other subjects.

2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity. Reason is supposedly the playing field I meet the atheist on, so I'm sure you can understand my appeal to causality vs. absurdity?

3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.

1. I do agree with you.

2. The universe does demand a cause, though I wouldn't use the word 'demand' to fully explain this. The universe is a thing, right? Just like everything else. So what caused it? If we would to say "nothing", it would be absurd and is considered a supernatural event (that is, an event that doesn't listen to logic, scientific laws, or reasoning). And so if the possibility of a supernatural event has happened, this gives us the possibility of triggering a supernatural event. But even so, if we would to assume this why would the universe decide to break its own laws whenever it wants to? The same thing goes for God. But even so, if God surely exists he really doesn't like us questioning his existence and origins, we go into too many loops and doesn't make any sense. "He just is" is not something I would agree on, especially when this God has his own view of what's right and wrong when it's purely a subjective thing and punishes people for not agreeing with him.

And yes, God must be immaterial and incorporeal, but anything, really, can also replace God that created the universe.

 

[Dave Ellis]

The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.

That's not an explanation at all. That's a bald faced assertion without evidence. How do you know he's a necessary being?

It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.

God is something we do not see, so therefore he can't be used as the explanation for things we do not see.

Besides, the two examples you gave do not require a god in any sense to explain.

 

[Dave Ellis]

An infinite regress of causes cannot actually exist, so therefore there must be a first cause that is itself uncaused.

There's two problems with your statement:

1) You haven't demonstrated there is an infinite regress
2) Even if you can show there's an infinite regress, you have absolutely no justification to label your "first cause" as an all powerful, all knowing intelligent being. That's a gigantic leap to make.

 

[Dave Ellis]

Anselm's ontological argument.

The ontological argument is laughably fallacious.

 

[Eudaimonist]

1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.

Agreed. This satisfies my rational intuition, anyway.

(Edited to add: there may be first causes. Plural.)

2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity.

Not agreed.

This is not at all absurd, since our experience of causes is within the universe, and long after any hypothetical beginning of change (and therefore of causes). It is not at all clear that the universe as a whole requires a cause, since that may run afowl of the fallacy of composition.

3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.

Not agreed. There is no such requirement.

It is not even clear that anything can even be "caused into existence". Causes involve interactions between (or within) pre-existing entities that change the entities in question. Nothing is created, only changed in some way. It is also not clear that "nothing" can be subject to change in order to become something, since nothing is not itself an entity, and causes pertain to entities.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[KCfromNC]

The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.

No she isn't.

Gee, proof through assertion is easy.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.

It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.

This reeks of God-of-the-gaps thinking.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

Really? Then atheists cannot cling to the multiverse explanation, since it exists outside the universe. You are left with no explanation why there is something rather than nothing. It "just is". How anti-intellectual.

It "just is" is what theists say about God - he "just is." Are you saying that's anti-intellectual?

 

[FireDragon76]

This reeks of God-of-the-gaps thinking.

My faith is not dependent on "God-as-explanation", but I find it useful to talk about it nonetheless to demonstrate the appeal of such a belief.

I am a Christian who believes in God because I believe Jesus Christ rose from the dead after being crucified... that is the basis of my faith.

 

[Dave Ellis]

My faith is not dependent on "God-as-explanation", but I find it useful to talk about it nonetheless to demonstrate the appeal of such a belief.

I am a Christian who believes in God because I believe Jesus Christ rose from the dead after being crucified... that is the basis of my faith.

And what's your reasoning for believing Jesus rose from the dead?

 

[Eudaimonist]

The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.

This is begging the question. Some aspect of the universe -- the fabric of "spacetime" perhaps -- could be necessary being.

And you can't really call that an explanation. An explanation of the existence of something involves identifying the causes of that something. If that something exists without cause, it exists without explanation. Saying that it is necessary being is another way of saying that it has no explanation.

Now, that may be fine. Perhaps some entities or aspects of entities really do exist without explanation. Let's just not pretend that one has explained anything.

It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.

Discredit? Not likely. Materialist worldviews have explained those in naturalistic terms. The only thing that is discredited is that those things are some kind of mystical ESP powers.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[FireDragon76]

And what's your reasoning for believing Jesus rose from the dead?

The witness of the saints.

 

[FireDragon76]

Discredit? Not likely. Materialist worldviews have explained those in naturalistic terms. The only thing that is discredited is that those things are some kind of mystical ESP powers.

If you are satisfied with such gruel, then I pity you.

 

[Archaeopteryx]

The witness of the saints.

Strictly speaking, no saints witnessed the resurrection.