Bad News for Creationists: Plausible Abiogenesis Path Found

[_EAllusion]

Our consciousness, creative abilities, rational faculties, our unique sense of moralty/altruism, our advanced intelligence, etc. We are clearly the pinnacle of creation. [emphasis added]

Wow. When you read your own words back, they don't smack you as being even a little pretentious? There's this entire universe out there, billions of galaxies, each containing billions of stars, with possibly billions of planets out there inhabited by various forms of life. And yet homo sapiens is clearly the pinnacle of creation?

I don't think this is at all clear. I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask for some good evidence that homo sapiens is clearly the pinnacle of creation.

I think Kevin's case is more problematic than him just having the unmeetable burden of demonstrating we are the most intelligent species in the universe. He also has to show why his criteria for what constitutes the pinnacle is objectively meaningful. Why can't the blue whale be called the pinnacle of creation for having the largest penis or the lemur for having the coolest prehensile tail? Sure, we have good reasons to prefer rational faculties, but is there any reason to believe this is the pinnacle that exists outside of our own desire for them?

[_Tarski]

I don't think this question is childish, I just think it misses the point. It is reasonable to ask for the source of the universe because we know the universe has a beginning

Is an all powerful being (who happens to love us) the only answer you can think of to this question?
Perhaps something less than all powerful and less than all-knowing is responsible. There are an infinite number of ways to be a creepy super intelligent entity. Why do you jump all the way to all-powerful and all-knowing? Those absolute notions lead to paradox so aren't very attractive anyway.
Perhps intelligence is just the coolest thing we humans can think of but will turn out to be a rather quaint anthropomorphic notion compared whatever is really at the root of it all (I am still rooting for something like Penrose's neoplatonic world of mathematical neccessity).


Also, current cosmology only says that this connected component of spacetime had a begining. There is no known law that says that others can't exists. Why wouldn't they?

If a model that gives the universe an infinite past beomes popular again (say an oscillating universe with repeated big bangs) will you then drop the idea that since ther was a begining something intelligent had to start it?
What if the philosophical and theoretical arguments for an infinitude of parallel initial condidtions (multiverses) continues to gain steam. Perhaps, we will be able to show that the denial of such leads to mathematical absurdities. Will your ideas change then?

[_Calculus Crusader]

Arguing that physical universe we know is contingent isn't to say there aren't modally necessary metaphysical rules leading to it.

Are you prepared to argue for these "modally necessary metaphysical rules leading to it?" It is possible that a future theory will overturn what we know about the Big Bang but you can't bank on that. What we know now points to the universe arising ex nihilo without any "modally necessary metaphysical" strings attached.

[_EAllusion]

[quote="Kevin Graham"

So what? How does this change the fact that you flat out lied by saying over and over again that I'm simply repeating verbatim from creationist sources? You put phrases into quotations like "what good is half a wing"? to reinforce your theory that I am merely borrowing creationist arguments, but I have never uysed that phrase.[/quote]

Huh? I didn't put it in quotes to suggest you were quoting it. I put it in quotes because that's a standard grammatical construction. It's the colloquial name of the argument. Jeeze.

You quoted from creationist sources when you pulled out your quotemines. That much is obvious, and was already established in that thread. I reread it just to make sure. Kevin, there's no way you read those sources first hand, and it's no coincidence that the specific dishonest representation of them you repeated can be exclusively found among creationist sources when tracing them.

You're being disingenuous. My challenges to Evolution theory were not designed to refute it, but to make the point that many people accept it and its various aspects on just as much faith as some religious people do.

If, in the process of making this argument, you suggest that evolutionary theory lacks sufficient rational foundation, then you are attempting to refute it. Saying, "I'm not attempting to refute evolutionary theory, I'm just showing that it is full of problems that render belief in it a matter of baseless faith" is a distinction without a difference.

You're not addressing the fallacy of your argument. It doesn't matter if creatonists had used Hoyle's analogy as an argument. The fact is it doesn't mean everyone who subsequently uses it, including Hoyle, must be associated with creatonism.

An argument that takes the form of abiogenesis being unlikely because of Hoyle's tornado in a junkyard, therefore design, is a creationist argument by definition. And this one has the benefit of not being particularly obscure, since it was at the forefront of creationist apologetics for a substantial period of time.

You say a creationist is someone who argues that there is scientific evidence for God. That is not what defines a creationist at all. That is your self-serving construction for well-poisoning purposes.

I didn't say that. I said creationism is the position that there is scientific evidence that life or some aspect of it was designed by a creator, and I typically will qualify that by pointing out a specific emphasis on organismic design arguments and a relationship with antievolutionism.

Creationism is the belief that humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe were created in their original form by a deity (often the Abrahamic God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam) or deities. In relation to the creation-evolution controversy the term creationism is commonly used to refer to religiously motivated rejection of evolution as an explanation of origins.

Creationism in the West is usually based on a literal reading of Genesis 1-2, and in its broad sense covers a wide range of beliefs and interpretations. Through the 19th century the term most commonly referred to direct creation of individual souls, in contrast to traducianism. However, by 1929 in the United States the term became particularly associated with Christian fundamentalist opposition to human evolution and belief in a young Earth

You know how wiki sometimes is poorly written and sourced? This is one of those times, though it isn't that bad. (Wiki's never good when the topic is a subject of intense controversy. Too many biased, motivated editors). After all, creationism is associated with the things it said it is. In any case, there still are lots of old earth creationists out there. Hugh Ross comes to mind as a prominent example. Most used to call themselves that, but a lot have switched over to the "ID" label. The notion that species, the earth, the universe was created in its present form is more aptly called special creationism.

Since you are so high up on reading books, I have referenced Dr. Larson's history of creationism several times. It is the definitive history of creationism in America. You can start with the new material in his most recent edition where he discusses the Intelligent Design-Creationist movement.

And speakng of Hoyle's analogy, you must be really naïve if you think the atheist apologists have refuted it.

Atheists and theists Kevin. Atheists and theists. And yes, Hoyle's reasoning is awful and over time the term "torndado in a junkyard" has taken on the connotation of "wrong" for a reason.

I've read the so called "refutations" and the primary objection is that the tornado takes place in one event whereas evolution takes place in gradual steps over the course of thousands of years. Well, no analogy is perfect, but to neutralize this objection a simple modification can be made. So instead of one tornado in one event producing a Boeing 747, lets say a million tornados over a thousand years. You still wouldn't get a Jumbo Jet.

Awesome. Hoyle's calculations are illegitimate for a variety of reasons. I'd describe the most significant one being a mistaken assumption of equiprobable ("random") chance for the formation biological polymers, since that is guided by nonrandom physical chemistry. But yes, assuming single, linear trials is a mistake since in reality there is a very large number of simultaneous trials in a realistic scenario. There are others related to the attempted target. You think Hoyle's tornado in a junkyard rocks. I think that suffices for me.

Likewise, I suppose you think Paley has been refuted too? Well of course.

Yeah. For quite some time in fact. Again, by atheists and theists.

Talkorigins has written all kinds of crap responses, but that doesn't make them refutations. You seem to think that when I don't respond to every article you cut and paste, that you've somehow "dismantled" me.

I have a pretty good mix of original writing and sources, -lay and academic, so neither the suggestion that I blitz with cut and pastes and rely on that or the suggestion that I don't refer to sources is going to hold water.

But ultimately if you can't appreciate what my Elliot Sober cut and paste is saying and why that does refute Paley even after I explain it, that's just a flat impasse.

Oh they "might" now? So now I'm a creationist based on arguing something that you think a creationist "might" argue as well?

Some creationists explicitly say this, some don't. Apparently you do.

To wit:

The fact is panspermia is a cop-out by some atherists who accept the basic design arguments but don't want to give in.

Well, no.

So what? It is an associaton fallacy to say anyone using this argument, created by an atheist, must be associated with creationism. If an atheist can come up with it without being a creationists, then why not other theists? I keep nailing you with this point but you continue to evade it:

Hoyle's argument against abiogenesis is bad in of itself. It isn't creationist until secondary conclusion to design is added on to make it so. You conveniently keep forgetting that part.

So I must insist there are no problems at all with Evolution theory? That is a religious, fundamentalist position if there ever was one.

Uh, when the "problems" with evolutionary theory you see undermine its rational soundness, then yeah, that's antievolution. You, of course, are free to see these problems all you want if you have no problem being wrong.

I brought up Karl Popper (who is apparently a genius only when used by atheists) who had to do some mental gymnastics to make evolution fit into the paradigm of science. He believed in it, but he was bothered that it couldn't be considered "science" by the standard scientific method of the day. So instead of concluding it wasn't science, just change the scientific paradigm to make it fit the theory.

Well, there's a lot wrong with this, but I can't keep up with your epic shotgunning of bad assertions.

Yes, and that doesn't prevent it from being evolution. Evolution is a process by which life as we know it, evolved into what it is. Science cannot dictate that this process had no designer behind it. It doesn't even pretend to. The closest thing to this is when it says evolution has no purpose.

This is a misunderstanding. It is perfectly true that one cannot eliminate God being behind evolution anymore than one can eliminate God being behind salt dissolving in water. A diety may or may not be behind mutation, natural selection, drift, etc. God can be the ultimate cause behind proximate causes. However, evolutionary theory does refer to the sufficiency of certain causes to explain biodiversity, just as electron cloud theory is sufficient to account for salt dissolving. If you are to argue against this, you are arguing against evolutionary theory. If you say natural selection, mutation, drift, and so on does not account for biodiversity, you are saying evolutionary biology, at its very core, is wrong.

Sure, you can say you believe in evolution in the sense of change in organisms over time guided by a mysterious designer doing mysterious things. That's why I said it depends on what is meant by "evolution." In the case of Behe, most of the time he's cool with evolutionary processes doing their thing. Every now and then he sees a biological structure he denies evolutionary processes can reasonably explain and instead "explains" it with a poof of creation. Call that what you will.

Do you really think that Kenneth Miller, a Catholic, doesn't believe God created the process of evolution and that God is intelligent?

I don't know Kevin. Perhaps you could read this thread where I weigh in on this subject.

That is fallacious reasoning. I know you realize it, but I guess you turned out to be one of those posters who is just too proud to admit being wrong, especially when it is obvious.

If creationists are defined as those who believe in arguments for creationism, as I would contend they reasonably should be, then his can't possibly be fallacious reasoning. I think you are attempting to suggest I'm saying that if you endorse any thoughts a creationist might have, that makes you a creationist. That would be a rather silly reading of what I said. I'm saying that if you endorse arguments for creationism, that makes you a creationist, even if you arrived at your creationist views independent of the influence of other creationists.

Questions about various modes of travel, diverse respiratory systems, etc are natural questons to any explanation based on natural selection and random mutation. More than 1600 scientists have expressed doubts that these mechanisms can explain all the diversity we see in life, so are they all creationists as well?

Did the DI's "Dissent from Darwinism" list get a lot bigger or something? My hunch is that is what you are referring to, but the number is too big (and many people on that list aren't actually scientists, much less scientists in a relevant discipline). Anyway, on that roughly 6 to 700 person list, the vast majority of those legitimately there are creationists. But obviously being opposed to evolutionary theory, in of itself, does not indicate creationism. There has to be some complimentary creation conclusion.

I have extensively replied to your arguments in the past.

Oh, where you abandoned the discussion after citing pages and pages of articles from the online atheist's arsenal, talkorigins? Add hypocritical to your character flaws.

If you are referring to the thread I referred to in this thread, that didn't happen.

Here it is again.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=7243&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=126

In that thread, I do a fair amount of original writing and a fair amount of linking to articles, most written by relevant academic professionals, some by others. I don't link to talkorigins once as best I can tell.

I didn't see myself as abandoning any discussion there, though I'm open to dropping out of these epic, point by point exchanges on account of not being mentally ill. I accused you of something more specific in the event you are trying to say I'm a hypocrite if I don't try to get in the last word each time.

Browsing through Talkorigins I see the same infatuation with creationists and you're constantly quoting that website.

Lol. Talkorigins is a website whose specific mission is to counter creationist apologetics. Shocking that they are infatuated with creationists there. Man, that Signature books is just obsessed with Mormonism, don't you think?

Again, you don't know what creationism is. It is whatever you need it to be, but the fact is Kenneth Miller must also be a creationist since he believes God is intelligent and is responsible for all that is.

I already explicitly argued against this. Tell me, does Kenneth Miller think there is empirical evidence that life was designed by employing teleological arguments? No? Oh, then I guess he isn't a creationist.

So you can believe in God. You can believe he is intellgent, all powerful, responsible for our reality, etc. But as long as you keep your mouth shut about this, you won't be accused of being a creationist? How slick.

Creationism isn't the only way people argue belief in God is rationally warranted. So long as one's basis for belief isn't that, they aren't a creationist. It's as though you can't imagine a person being a theist for any other reasoning that your pet design arguments. Which really plays into the hands of atheists, since that's one of the more heavily written about, academically reviled, and easily refuted attempts at theistic justification.

Do you really think this gambit is going to work here? Think again. Your favorite source includes Evolutionary Theists like Kenneth Miller, as a subset of Creationism:

Some people define creationism as the belief life was created. I'm not a fan of that definition, and neither are you, so I guess we don't need to go over reasons to disagree with it.

That said, when the heck did talkorigins become my favorite source? Moreover, talkorigins is a collection of articles written by a variety of people, not a hivemind. While I regard it as a good website and occasionally refer to it, all in all I rarely quote from talkorigins. If anything is my favorite source on this subject as far as quoting online goes is going to be closer to certain Pandas Thumb's contributers (Wilkins, Reuland, etc.), the NSE, and Elliot Sober.

But I guess you don't need to call him a creationist because you're not debating him.

Wow Kevin, just wow.

[_EAllusion]

Are you prepared to argue for these "modally necessary metaphysical rules leading to it?" It is possible that a future theory will overturn what we know about the Big Bang but you can't bank on that. What we know now points to the universe arising ex nihilo without any "modally necessary metaphysical" strings attached.

I'm not talking about anything that would overturn Big Bang theory.

1) Big Bang theory does not establish creation ex nihilo.

(Speaking of Dr. Morriston: http://www.philoonline.org/library/morriston_5_1.htm)

But let's say it did. The more important point is

2) Necessary metaphysical strings are not contradictory to big bang theory and are, to some extent, required to make sense of it just as the same as if you argue a personal cause outside of time caused the Big Bang. The regularity of reality, for instance, is modally necessary because there is no possible world in which it is not true and rationality is coherent. That's true regardless of whether God, the universe-causer, exists or not. God is constrained by logic in order for the concept of "God" to be coherent, and that means logical rules exist metaphysically prior to God.

You're saying the universe, meaning space-time that exists post Big Bang, is contingent. Ok. Contingent on what though? It need not be a personal cause. At least no one has been able to establish that. All I pointed out is that some rules that guide how reality will play out can cause the big bang to be as it is. This merely needs to be possible in order for it to be alive option. And that's true if God exists as a metaphysical go-between in any case. This doesn't contradict Big Bang theory in any way. The universe qua the aggregate of all things, which includes God in the event it exists, already can be an ultimate cause of the Big Bang in precisely the way you would be trying to use God. So the mere existence of the Big Bang can't argue for the specific existence of God since there's no reason to preference that kind of cause over any other.

The linchpin of contingency arguments is establishing the necessity (or even likelihood) of a personal cause, and suffice to say they are not successful at that point.

[_mikwut]

Tarski stated,

I take it that when you look at the wonderfulness of the world and the universe you feel that there must be a wonderful source for it all outside of what is being considered.

Then when you consider the wonderfulness of God, do you likewise ask for a source for that, for God?

Often theists will try to disarm this question or try to embarrass the questioner by saying something like "oh that's just the old child's question".

This will not do because the question is a good one and is continually brought up by the most intelligent of people (it's even in Hawking's books).

A child could understand Fermat's lemma too but it took hundreds of years to answer it.
The child's question of why the sky is blue requires quantum mechanics for the explanation.

That fact that a child my be able to ask a question of that a question is an old one does not solve any problem of allow us to ignore the question.

The question is very good one and all the more so given how quickly it comes to the thoughtful mind and how long we have been waiting for an answer that isn't one that we could have just as well used on the universe itself. (You say God just is? Well, why not "The wonderful universe just is"???)

And of course reality beyond our universe very well might be "just is", Tarski. But, this question reveals your inattentiveness to the present formulation of the argument. The present argument based on Big Bang Cosmology is, as I understand it:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.The first premise does not state Whatever exists has a cause, but rather Whatever begins to exist has a cause.

Being cannot come from nonbeing. God, since He never began to exist, would not require a cause (he is not contingent), for He never came into being. This isn't as you claim special pleading for God, since this is exactly what the atheist has always claimed about the universe: that it is eternal and uncaused. The problem is that the atheist's claim is now rendered untenable in light of the beginning of the universe that we understand from Big Bang Cosmology.

my regards, mikwut

[_mikwut]

Kevin,

Thank you for the reply. You stated,

I believe our reality is best explained as the product of an intelligent source. What or who that source is, I have no idea. But I am confortable callng it God. There are a wide variety of reasons I think reality points to God, but at the top of the list would be the fine-tuned universe, the uniqueness of mankind, the human consciousness and then at the bottom of the list would be personal experiences.

I think I would I find agreement here. I of course would put personal experiences either on top or on par with the other elements of your list. To me we perceive certain aspects of reality, we have no veritable reliability of that simple perception. When that perception is verisimilitudinous or corresponds to reality that perception gains evidential structure regarding the reliability of those very perceptions. Have you read any Polanyi? I hate to sound that of a high school cheerleader regarding him but my ideas were very similar to yours prior to my reading of Polanyi. John Polkinghorne uses the term, 'motivated belief' for the apprehensions of for example, the fine tuning found in the universe as well as our perception of design in the wonderment of science and the universe = a motivated belief, he is who introduced me to Polanyi. I find that intellectually satisfying.

But the thing is, I have never tried to convert atheists to theism. After listening to these guys ramble on and on, you might be under the impression that it is I who has been trying to zealously convert my opponents. Or that I am the bigot who doesn't tolerate their lack of belief. But the record will show that I have always engaged these discussion in self-defense. Most of the earlier threads were created by atheists who were looking to slam theists, calling us stupid, illogical, irrational, etc. I finally decided to break my silence on this topic, and the result is obvious. The same people who once congratulated me frequently for being reasonable, now attack me for being stupid. What changed? Only one thing: I didn't convert to the dark side of atheism as some had presumed.

I am not judging the personal side of things. I like you, I like your tenacity and spunk, I also like the "enlightened ones" as well, I just like the dialogue. In the end, the pychological aspects of theism and atheism are salient for sure but left individually our heads and pillows. If the theist or the atheist denies this, well, their in denial. We all individually have to wrestle with that aspect of our cognitive structure and intellectual integrity.

The fact is I have laid out my reasons for being a theist on too many occassons to count. I have gone into greater detail in some cases. But they only ask so they can try "dismantling" my reasons wthin a narrow "science" framework that I don't accept. Then they get upset because their arguments don't work for me. At this point they resort to name-calling and schoolyard bullying tactics. Frequently they indulge straw man arguments and exhibit a tendency to misrepresent me and my positions to the point that I don't even find it worth the effort anymore. This is why I have disengaged these conversations in the past.

Just like a good Mormon in dialogue is hard to find so's a good atheist, and darn it so's a good theist. I enjoy talking to EA, and its unfortunate that your discourse has become less amicable, but maybe not maybe that brings out the best in both of you. I draw conclusions from dialogue such as Mr. Mill's often funny, often entertaining and often juvenile and immature statements which reflect thoughts and experiences I have had and I am able to reflect on what was my motive and desire when I was attempting for the simple zinger of my "opponent" rather than the scope of what I could personally be enhanced by out of the dialogue. It can be frustrating as well as educating. No camp is isolated as guilty or non, theistic or non theistic.

In a nutshell I believe the more we learn about the cosmos, the more an intelligent designer makes sense. I don't believe in a strictly random mechanistic universe, and modern science is moving away from that out dated model. There appears to be a tremendous level of order, and we know the universe is governed by laws that were written to serve specific functions. As an example... Science cannot explain why the nuclear forces are as they are. They just are! But if they were different by a fraction of a degree, we know what kind of universe we would exist. A lifeless one. Why? Because the only elements that could exist would be helium or hydrogen. That's it!

This is where we slightly could find disagreement. If that interpretation is motivated primarily from a consonance of perception rather than strict inference - the atheists arguments aren't as poignant. For example I often think how amazing our minds our when surely for survival it is fitting that science would "work" but that our minds understand curved space time in the vast cosmos and the tiny subatomic quantum world?, rather than just benign everyday living? - that is salient to me on a intellectual and spiritual level, and although atheists can offer discourse regarding the wonderment it never reaches a satisfying intellectual and personal level with me. So is this thought and intellectual impressions inference or perception? I do tend to agree with EA that a strict teleological interpretation can end up being problematic. Outside of reasoning that I find agreement with EA on regarding this is my theological and theistic acceptance that God can't be an inference of this magnitude because it would interfere with our freedom to make ourselves here. This isn't to say there are no signs of God's existence, I hardly believe that. I just don't think they are axiomatic or to be found in a strict inference, at least not in an unambiguous one. I think EA is searching for those inferential points that can seemingly be presented as axiomatic from you and attacking, I don't think your intent is quite of such an evidential magnitude though.

kindest regards, mikwut

[_Tarski]

Tarski stated,

I take it that when you look at the wonderfulness of the world and the universe you feel that there must be a wonderful source for it all outside of what is being considered.

Then when you consider the wonderfulness of God, do you likewise ask for a source for that, for God?

Often theists will try to disarm this question or try to embarrass the questioner by saying something like "oh that's just the old child's question".

This will not do because the question is a good one and is continually brought up by the most intelligent of people (it's even in Hawking's books).

A child could understand Fermat's lemma too but it took hundreds of years to answer it.
The child's question of why the sky is blue requires quantum mechanics for the explanation.

That fact that a child my be able to ask a question of that a question is an old one does not solve any problem of allow us to ignore the question.

The question is very good one and all the more so given how quickly it comes to the thoughtful mind and how long we have been waiting for an answer that isn't one that we could have just as well used on the universe itself. (You say God just is? Well, why not "The wonderful universe just is"???)

And of course reality beyond our universe very well might be "just is", Tarski. But, this question reveals your inattentiveness to the present formulation of the argument. The present argument based on Big Bang Cosmology is, as I understand it:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.The first premise does not state Whatever exists has a cause, but rather Whatever begins to exist has a cause.

Being cannot come from nonbeing. God, since He never began to exist, would not require a cause (he is not contingent), for He never came into being. This isn't as you claim special pleading for God, since this is exactly what the atheist has always claimed about the universe: that it is eternal and uncaused. The problem is that the atheist's claim is now rendered untenable in light of the beginning of the universe that we understand from Big Bang Cosmology.

my regards, mikwut

First, the universe in the sense of "all that exists" (let's call it the Universe with an unpper case U) need not have had a begining in time and talking that way about our universe is dubious anyway. In fact, time itself is now on equal footing with space and from within that "block universe" theoretical framework, we can see that causality is a feature of the structure of matter/field distributions *in* our connected component of spacetime (in the sense of Lorentz manifolds).
The idea that causality applies to the our Universe as a whole is a stretch. The universe is not just another object or event within the universe and so why should our ordinary notions of causality or "sufficient reason" even apply to it?
It's like asking, "if 45 degrees is before 90 degrees then what is before the circle?".
Or
"If 5 comes before 6 then what comes before the integers?" (nonsense!)
A categrory mistake has created a question that may have no sense.
In modern basic cosmology (forget about p-branes etc) there is no "before" the big bang and so the notion of a thing prior causing loses sense. It's like asking what land is south of the south pole.

The block-universe (our Lorentz manifold) is composed of events (not locations). As a manifold supporting some fields, there is not any event whose existence needs a creator more than any other. If God is outside of time then from that perspective, the event of my having typed the letter "t" at 11:53 today is in need of atemporal divine support no more or no less than the event of the big bang.

In short, I do not buy the 3 step argument you gave and of course I have heard it a million times. It draws on common sensical notions of causality which should be limited to objects and ordinary events within a universe and not to the Universe itself.

Another example: A certain kind of ant lives on a mountain. These ants have developed by experience the incorrigible intuition that for every place on the mountain the is a higher place. But what they cannot understand is that there is a higher point (too cold for any of them to have experienced). The insist that a point of ground which has no higher ground right by it is illogical. But it isn't illogical, just counter intuitive to them.


The idea that there was no time before 14 billion years ago (actually not even a "before") is not illogical at all.
Even if the Hartle-Hawking model isn't correct it is at least logically sound which proves that there is no logical necessity to the 1-2-3 argument you gave.
In fact, ordinary big bang theory shows it just as well since although a singularity is unnerving, it isn't illogical.

Part of the causality thing is tied up with energy conservation. But this again applies in the universe, not to the universe. If you want to get into the thermdynamics of the big bang I suggest first reading http://www.astrosociety.org/pubs/mercur ... thing.html

For our discussion what matters is not which model will turn out to be true, but which are logically consistent (you are attemting something like an a priori argument after all).

[_mikwut]

Hello Tarski,

I hope I didn't sound too presumptuous. I don't accept the 1, 2, 3 as absolutely axiomatic (as I stated above in my post to Kevin) but I don't think a proponent of it need to be placed in the irrational category, it deserves respect for its logical structure and it does respond to your presentation of a child's precocious inquiry. Alternatives for attacking the elements are, as in any argument, always present.

The idea that causality applies to the our Universe as a whole is a stretch. The universe is not just another object or event within the universe and so why should our ordinary notions of causality or "sufficient reason" even apply to it?
It's like asking, "if 45 degrees is before 90 degrees then what is before the circle?".
Or
"If 5 comes before 6 then what comes before the integers?" (nonsense!)
A categrory mistake has created a question that may have no sense.
In modern basic cosmology (forget about p-branes etc) there is no "before" the big bang and so the notion of a thing prior causing loses sense. It's like asking what land is south of the south pole.

The Quantum Gravity Universe theory if interpreted realistically, still involves an absolute origin of the universe, even if the universe does not begin in a so-called singularity, as it does in the standard Big Bang theory. In sum, according to Hawking, “Almost everyone now believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning at the Big Bang.” Many causes and effects are simultaneous. Thus, the theistic interpretations could include among others that moment of God's causing the Big Bang just is the moment of the occurrence of the Big Bang. We can then say that God existing alone without the universe is either before the Big Bang, not in physical time, but in an undifferentiated metaphysical time or else strictly timeless, but that He enters into time at the moment of creation. I am not aware of any incoherence in those interpretations. And finally, if causality is incoherent then any attempt at reasoned understanding breaks down and you and theist are in common ground, neither one with inference on reality to rely on.

my regards, mikwut

[_Calculus Crusader]

First, the universe in the sense of "all that exists" (let's call it the Universe with an unpper case U) need not have had a begining in time and talking that way about our universe is dubious anyway. In fact, time itself is now on equal footing with space and from within that "block universe" theoretical framework, we can see that causality is a feature of the structure of matter/field distributions *in* our connected component of spacetime (in the sense of Lorentz manifolds).
The idea that causality applies to the our Universe as a whole is a stretch. The universe is not just another object or event within the universe and so why should our ordinary notions of causality or "sufficient reason" even apply to it?
It's like asking, "if 45 degrees is before 90 degrees then what is before the circle?".
Or
"If 5 comes before 6 then what comes before the integers?" (nonsense!)
A categrory mistake has created a question that may have no sense.
In modern basic cosmology (forget about p-branes etc) there is no "before" the big bang and so the notion of a thing prior causing loses sense. It's like asking what land is south of the south pole.

The block-universe (our Lorentz manifold) is composed of events (not locations). As a manifold supporting some fields, there is not any event whose existence needs a creator more than any other. If God is outside of time then from that perspective, the event of my having typed the letter "t" at 11:53 today is in need of atemporal divine support no more or no less than the event of the big bang.

In short, I do not buy the 3 step argument you gave and of course I have heard it a million times. It draws on common sensical notions of causality which should be limited to objects and ordinary events within a universe and not to the Universe itself.

Another example: A certain kind of ant lives on a mountain. These ants have developed by experience the incorrigible intuition that for every place on the mountain the is a higher place. But what they cannot understand is that there is a higher point (too cold for any of them to have experienced). The insist that a point of ground which has no higher ground right by it is illogical. But it isn't illogical, just counter intuitive to them.


The idea that there was no time before 14 billion years ago (actually not even a "before") is not illogical at all.
Even if the Hartle-Hawking model isn't correct it is at least logically sound which proves that there is no logical necessity to the 1-2-3 argument you gave.
In fact, ordinary big bang theory shows it just as well since although a singularity is unnerving, it isn't illogical.

Part of the causality thing is tied up with energy conservation. But this again applies in the universe, not to the universe. If you want to get into the thermdynamics of the big bang I suggest first reading http://www.astrosociety.org/pubs/mercur ... thing.html

For our discussion what matters is not which model will turn out to be true, but which are logically consistent (you are attemting something like an a priori argument after all).

What say you about the following excerpt, professor?

"To adopt a realist reading of the Hawking theory would be to suppose that the theory is designed to tell us how the universe really was. But to view the theory in this manner, as aimed towards truth, invites the question as to whether or not we should believe that it succeeds in accurately describing the early universe. It is hard to answer this question positively. Insofar as Hawking's theory implies the spatialization of time, it is open to a range of metaphysical objections from those philosophers who have argued for the distinctness of time and space.29 But even without consideration of meta physical issues, we may ask whether or not the theory has achieved anything like the degree of empirical success which would warrant belief in it. Hawking himself (at least in one of his technical papers), far from claiming empirical adequacy for his theory, notes that the wave-function of the universe which
it describes 'does not correspond to the quantum state of the Universe that we live in'.30 An alternative (and more promising) approach is to adopt an anti-realist view of the Hawking theory. To interpret the theory along anti-realist lines is to view it as a mathematical tool, useful for calculation, but without ontological import. It is common practice, in science, to transform variables into other forms which make mathematical puzzles more tractable, and it is in this way that the anti-realist will advocate viewing Hawking's 'space-like imaginary time' proposal. Anti-realism about the Hawking theory looks plausible, but, if adopted, neutralizes its power to say anything about the origins of the universe. According to the anti-realist interpretation, Hawking has not given grounds to deny God his place as a first cause, for the success of the theory is of instrumental significance only. The postulation of space-like time may, or may not, prove to be of value as a mathematical tool, but to adopt an anti realist interpretation of the theory is precisely to deny that the theory's success should be viewed as evidence that it correctly describes real cosmo logical history, and hence to deny that, in any sense, the theory precludes the possibility of a super-natural first cause. It is not insignificant that those who work their way through his most confusing book, find Hawking equivocating between realist and anti-realist interpretations of his theory. In places, he makes statements which amount to a commitment to scientific realism, as, for example, when he states that science aims at the provision of a theory which describes the entire universe, 31 and that we may reasonably suppose that science is progressing towards a description of the laws that govern our universe.32 Yet in other places, he informs us that science aims no higher than at the construction of theories to describe observations, and even expresses doubts about the meaningfulness of supposing that theoretical terms refer to real entities. At this point, the philosopher of science may justly suspect an incipient positivism in Hawking's thought.33 Anyone who wishes to take seriously Hawking's quip about his theory removing the place for God must face the issues raised by the debate over scientific realism. In the same manner that Big Bang Cosmology cannot establish an absolute beginning to the universe unless a realist interpretation of the theory can be justified, Hawking's theory only has substantial meta physical implications if it can be given a realist interpretation. But since metaphysical and scientific considerations make an anti-realist reading much more tenable, I conclude that Hawking's theory offers no support for an argument from origins to no-creator." (John Taylor, A Swift Argument from Origins to First Cause?, Religious Studies, Vol. 33, No. 2)