Russel M. Nelson comments on big bang theory and evolution

[_mikwut]

Hello EAlussion,

If our object of causation isn't a personal entity, then it lacks the bare minimum traits necessary to call it a deity. Then your argument isn't establishing that god, as the term is normally understood and used in actual cosmological arguments, exists. You might as well as define the universe as "god," point out the universe exists, then conclude a god exists. The upshot is that you've established god exists. The downside is that this isn't what people mean by the term and the same trick could be applied to anything. If I define God as a pencil, then the fact that I'm holding a pencil in my hand proves God exists. Yay!

I believe the cosmological argument results in a necessary being. The universe has been eliminated when you allowed for practical purposes the science that demonstrates it has a beginning, or is contingent. I was making the point that a necessary being - although not directly from the cosmological arguments demonstration is conceptually identical to Christian deity - it correlates with deity, it is a creator, very powerful, self-sustaining, eternal and the cause for its own existence - traits that aren't exhaustive of Christian deity's conceptualizations but consistent with. If you want to call a necessary being a mikwutum that is fine, but a necessary being isn't the downside that you describe above - it is commensurate with a theists understanding of God without being as detailed as would otherwise might be preferred.

The problem with mikwitum is precisely that it could be applied to any situation because it tailor-defines itself to have the power to bring about whatever observation it is we are seeking to explain and thus trivializes the problem. There are real life historical examples of mikwitums. Design arguments work that way. God is a mikwitum in theistic arguments, usually. And if you tailor define God to bring about lightning, volcanoes, and morality too, that doesn't help the problem. It compounds it. Even if we grant that the universe requires a metaphysical cause, which is not a point I would grant, what you need to do establish that a personal object is more likely to be the case than a nonpersonal one. Otherwise, you've done nothing to support the existence of a deity. You fall into the simple special pleading trap that early cosmological arguments do where God, and God alone, is excepted from the causal rules the argument sets up for no good reason in particular.

As a theist I find the confluence of the creation of the universe with my religious beliefs properly warranted and obtained from a creator. I understand you reject that, but I point it out because that is merely arbitrary on your part unless you also properly provide defeaters. We have no antecedent scientific or natural principles for you to override with here, they cannot help us outside of space, time and the natural universe that has been established as contingent. We are unavoidably in a metaphysical undertaking. So a made up something isn't as powerful explanatory wise as a necessary being. God provides the best or ultimate explanation because the necessary being, is uncaused, so your further attempts at explanation of God is required only of those things that are contingent - that is, those things that if they do exist, could possibly not have existed. Just as a necessary being God is both eternal and does not depend on anything for his existence. When we determine a crime we appeal to personal agents and we reach finality when with personal explanation that appeals to intentions of an agent We don't attempt to analyze in the way you are doing of a necessary being. Applying further accounts of why persons acted as they did can be pursued but it isn't necessary. My appeal to God as an intentional agent leads to a confluence not only with my own personal religious experience but the universe itself, its order, its comprehensibility to persons, that it includes the existence of personal beings that can comprehend it. The properties of the necessary being are correlated with those of the God of religion. I don't find those things trivial and the correlation isn't as tight or even existent for your mikwutun non-personal explanation.

my regards, mikwut

[_mikwut]

Hello E,

Regarding the necessity of the universe:

The idea behind the argument Mikwut is using is that anything that's contingent (not necessary, could be otherwise) has an explanation for its existence. Since the universe's existence is contingent, it has an explanation for it being the case. God is that explanation.

Correct unless you are asserting that I am relying on Leibnizian strong principle of sufficient reason which I am not.

However, if you want to end the regress of explanation with some necessary fact, like the existence of God, you have a problem. If something is a necessary fact, then insofar as it's a sufficient explanation for some other fact, that fact too has to be necessary.

Explain. If a corporation is dependent or contingent on a government and the government is necessary for the existence of the corporation how is the corporation somehow necessary? The explanation for the corporation is found within the necessary existence of government.

In other words, if it's necessarily true that god exists with the nature he has, then it's also necessarily true that he created the universe as it is, and therefore necessarily true that the universe exists. All this gets us is that there are no contingent truths, which undermines the point of the argument.

Same question as above.

This is pointed out by a rather famous theist philosopher who, at times, is an apologist in his own right. 5 points if you can name him. Then Mikwut can lament that Thomas Aquinas hasn't heard of my, Dr. Morriston's, and mysterious Dr. X's "musings."

My guess is Van In Wagen, he is quoted as follows:

"Another way to put this point would be to say that there can be no explanation of the whole set of truthsfor the actual world is simply that possible world such that whatever is true is true in it; what makes a particular possible world the actual one is that it "contains" all the truths and none of the falsehoods. And this conclusion is not implausible. One cannot explain the fact that a given contingent proposition is a truth simply by appealing to necessary truths. Therefore, any explanation of a contingent truth must appeal to other contingent truths, and, as a consequence, the whole set of contingent truths cannot be explained because there are no contingent truths outside this set to appeal to. But then the Principle of Sufficient Reason is false." Finally, Van Inwagen repeats, "It follows that if the Principle is true, then there are no contingent propositions; if the Principle is true, every truth is a necessary truth."

Alexander Pruss has clearly shown that Van In Wagen only has a point by utilizing the strong form of the PSR. Craig thinks Van In Wagen is wrong even with the strong form, but even he doesn't utilize that premise.

Here is brief portion of Pruss' answer:

To see how an explanation of a BCCF could be given following this suggestion, suppose that there necessarily exists an essentially good God. A good God might be thought to be moved by good reasons when trying to decide what kind of a cosmos to create. This God then surveys the possible worlds. But the first thing he finds in the survey is that no world is best of all. Some worlds are better because simpler – at the head of this list is the world in which God is the only being – and others are better because more diverse. Some are better because they contain less vice and others are better because although they contain more vice they also contain the virtues that vice makes possible, such as courage in the face of persecution. In the end, for each pair of genuinely possible worlds, let us suppose, there is some consideration because of which the first is better than the second and there is another,

equal or incommensurable, consideration because of which the second is better than the first. Worlds whose values are strictly dominated by those of others will on this hypothesis be impossible. On this picture, for each world w there is a set right-wing of reasons in favor of actualizing w. These reasons might be, for instance, simplicity, complexity, balances of simplicity and complexity, and they may even be, for instance, containing the de re lovable Mr. Jones – indeed, each possible person might count as a reason in favor of creating those worlds in which she exists, if God is motivated by love. For any possible world w, then, were w actualized, the BCCF of w could be explained by some proposition of the form: (qw) God appreciated the reasons in right-wing and chose what to create. Now, the curious fact is that each of the qw is a necessary truth, since it is a necessary truth that God appreciates all the reasons there in fact are. But while each of the qw is a necessary truth, it is a contingent truth that one of the qw in fact has explanatory oomph, a contingent fact explained in turn by that very qw.

Pruss (2007-01-05). The Principle of Sufficient Reason (p. 117). Cambridge University Press. Kindle Edition.

regards, mikwut

[_gdemetz]

I think that it may be inconsistent with the available evidence as SOME INTERPRET that evidence.