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Can't we just talk about it without the maths? Guys?
(mander.xyz)
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this post was submitted on 16 Nov 2023
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If God can exist without being created by something, why can't the universe?
The argument I've heard is "It must stop somewhere, and whatever it stops at, we'll call that god". It's not a good argument, because it then hopes that you conflate the Judeo-Christian deity with that label and make a whole bunch of assumptions.
It's often paired with woo that falls down to simply asking "Why?", such as "Nothing could possibly be simpler than my deity"
What is this stop business? I have it on good authority that it's turtles all the way down.
It’s just the one turtle flying through space, the Great A'Tuin
So if it stops at the universe, the universe itself is called 'God'?
To which I would ask, "Why are you using the word 'god'?"
Everybody asks what is god, why is god... Nobody asks how is god.
...and it's pronounced "jod" BTW.
Yeah exactly, though then you'd generally get arguments pushing you towards "But it's actually totes Jesus".
Furthermore, what does he need with a starship?
Agreed, the big issue with their argument here is that "god" implies sentience, which isn't something we have any reason to assume exists for whatever's at the "stop somewhere" point. If energy was the starting point for example, I doubt these people would be down with calling heat a god
Reject deities; return to sun worship.
On the contrary, I’d argue energy mostly meets many of the philosophical criteria for God.
Omnipotence: It literally is what drives stuff to happen.
Omnipresence: It is present to some degree in all things everywhere for all time, though you could argue about vacuum.
Omniscience: See omnipresence, although having knowledge implies some level of consciousness, which is pretty debatable. My psychedelic phase tells me that it’s totally a thing, but I’ll be the first to admit that’s not a rational argument.
Omnibenevolence: I don’t understand why God needs to be good.
I mean your argument stumbles at the exact point of my original comment. We have no reason to think it has any form of consciousness, and therefore no reason to believe it's omniscient. On top of that, even if it was conscious, arguing it's omniscient because it's omnipresent assumes that it isn't a collection of distinct consciousnesses and is instead one giant being, which we also have no reason to believe one possibility over the other.
Unless we adopt conscious realism, which holds that conscious agents are what the universe is made of, and matter and energy are fake
It's also a bad argument, because the concept of things being 'created' is an entirely human one. It's us who decided that if a pile of pre-existing atoms are moved into the shape of a chair, we'll say that chair was 'created'.
Aside from this conceptual creation, nothing is ever created in the universe, as far as we know. Atoms don't ever just pop into existence out of thin air.
I have heard the argument that the universe was just as well 'created' in the conceptual sense, so everything existed beforehand, it was just moved into a shape that we recognize as 'universe' today.
But that would still mean there's no argument for a creator and of course, this is simply not what most people mean when they talk about the creation of the universe.
If I remember correctly from my hazy years of school philosophy classes, it was Thomas Aquinas who suggested it. Who was a friar, so that's why the assumption of the religion.
Also, I understood the core idea being that God isn't what IS the beginning, but that the point where human mind can't comprehend beyond is God. Which, back then, and even now, I considered to be a lazy copout for a philosopher, as the point of a philosopher is to test the limits of our understanding.
Then again, for friar to state that the end solution is not god for their thinkings, at that time and place, would've probably result in being positioned as a centerpiece of a bonfire.
Not my argument but causality is a principle of the universe and may not be applicable to entities which exist outside of it.
The universe is bound by physical rules but something which exists outside of it may not be. Of course this is pure conjecture but you can find interesting theological arguments beyond creationists.