Unbeliever

In a sense the universe has always existed, because the word "always" presupposes a temporal element; since time (as well as space, matter and energy) began at the big bang, it can be said that there has never been a period of time in which the universe did not exist. The argument that "because there was nothing before the big bang, there could have been no cause for the big bang" is spurious, because there simply was no "before" the big bang, just as there is nothing north of the North Pole. Does that resolve the dilemma?

Bill Snedden

Perhaps I was reading too much into the argument as stated, but it seems to me that if:

P1: the universe is everything that exists at all times in all places

and

P2: the universe began to exist

then

C1: non-existence or "nothingness" is logically prior to the universe.

is necessarily true. As I see it:

P1a: if anything exists, then the universe exists (by material implication from P1).

and

P2a: there was some point before the universe existed (by material implication from P2).

It necessarily follows that at that point before the universe existed, nothing could have been in existence. Therefore, nothingness would be logically prior to the universe.

Another way to put this would be to say that if the universe is all that exists and yet has not always existed, then there must have been some point when nothing existed.

Obviously there are issues with the premises and the conclusion, but I don't see any problems with the structure, as such.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

Bill Snedden

I don't know about "irrational", but it seems to me that the old saying, ex nihilo, nihil fit is apt indeed.

I don't know. But this is no less a dilemma for the atheist than it is for the theist. How could God decide to create a universe if there was no point in time when he hadn't already decided to create it? Causality sans time would appear to be an incoherent concept.

And I may be wrong, but I don't think Vic Stenger or any other cosmologists/physicists are saying that quantum physics demonstrates that the universe popped into existence ex nihilo. Even the probabilistic potential for existence is something.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

Autonemesis

I'm just that way.

SteveD

I agree with Bill that something cannot come from nothing.

I have stated before that I personally see no implausability in the idea that something has existed eternally. Your example of people sitting down doesn't convince me. Even if people have been sitting and standing infinitely there is still sitting and standing going on. It could be you doing the standing. Why not?

I still don't see why any of this is a problem for atheism. Atheism is the lack of belief in gods and nothing more. It doesn't have to have anything to do with the beginning of the universe.

Steve

ComestibleVenom

Originally posted by Bill Snedden
Thanks for your responses Bill. I disagree with your interpretation of the second premise. Using a definition limited by the linear temporal extent of the universe and asserting that there was a beginning does not commit us to the position that there was some point (in time?) 'before' the universe existed.

Can not a birth be relative to a life and a death? The beginning of the universe can be concieved relative to nothing but it's own doom.

Perhaps time is a purely localized phenomenon, suggested by still other theories. Does not space take upon the aspect of time at the event horizon of black holes; irreversable in direction, finite in extent?

I still insist that P2 makes no logically necessitated commitment to any logical relation to something outside the universe. This is because there are models - potentially the superior models - in which a universe as restricted by P1 would need refer to no 'nothingness' relative to which everything would be concieved.

Therefore, points at which the universe didn't exist are an addition to, not a deduction from, the notion that the universe began to exist.

We would need to add P2c: The beginning of the universe is defined with reference to a point of nothingness.

This is just the sort supressed premise that makes the argument invalid if supressed and irrelevant if explicated.

Bill's Conclusion
Even if you add P2b as the logically independent assertion it is, I still don't agree that even your argument is anywhere near clear enough to be counted as a logical deduction. That's not to say that I can't follow your reasoning, I know pretty much how you could make the argument clear and logically valid.

Then you would have an argument proving that a silly series of premises about the universe, will lead to one or more confused conclusions about it.

Mr. Aquinas' conclusion
The argument doesn't rule out the case where naturalism is true AND "nothingness" is a mere human fiction. The argument, thus stated, fails.

Doubly so, because if naturalism is the best way to go, we actually escape that dillemma and devote our energies to the many more worthy problems at hand.

It's the old philosophical dillemma. Should we be REALLY REALLY generous (and uncertain, and creative, and possibly inconsistent) in interpreting the premises, or should we simply point out that the conclusion begs a great deal more than the premises remotely suggest?

I think my rhetorical statement of the problem has suggested my own answer in this case.

Sorry if I rambled or spoke jarringly, (intoxication nis swat tit tis.)

I'll submit some minor spelling corrections tomorrow. I'm trying to install some spell check programs and am having difficulties.


Utter Lack of Disregard,
ComestibleVenom

Wyrdsmyth

You haven't really engaged what I have said. But let me try this from another angle: If it isn't rational to believe in anything we would define as a 'god,' then atheism is rational. You can't really examine the rationality of atheism 'by itself,' independent of theism, because the term atheism is entirely defined by being a negation of theism (however you want to define that). The only way to examine the rationality of atheism is to examine the rationality of theism. Theism is the positive claim, atheism is only the "I'm not buying into that story" side of it.

To put it another way, you couldn't show how aleprechaunism or apinkelephantism is irrational by raising questions about the origin of the universe, could you? You have to show why it is irrational to believe that there are no leprechauns or pink elephants, respectively. You're the one asserting the existence of the fantastic, elusive entity, if you are a theist... So, I am asking: where is it? Why should we believe in it? Tell us. I reiterate: Pointing out gaps in human science and knowledge looks, conspicuously, like you're changing the subject.

But this is all part of the old game. Instead of leading us to the burning bush that speaks with the voice of God, we get the same old, tired arguments... like First Cause, and its Thomist tack-on of "and that is what we call God." We get preaching and assertions, and fingers pointed to gaps in our science and knowledge... but no actual gods.

Lobstrosity

My am I embarrassed. I just spent a minute trying to figure out what pinkele phantism was.

On a more serious note, I concur with your post, pinkele phants and all.

99Percent

I think the main problem with this argument is stating that "the universe existed".

The universe as already stated in this thread is what exists now. The universe in past present does not exist anymore, its gone, kaput, an illusion of memory. What does exist is what is now, the present. That is why existence is, not was as in "existed".

We merely have the llusion of cause and effect because of our memory, but in reality, the universe by definition its its own cause and effect, because nothingness cannot obviously exist - its nothing.

In fact time is perceived by our ability to have memory, but it is completely relative. We perceive cause and effect in our human relative existence, but in the universe's absolute sense time is inexistant, everything, the whole universe is a puff in a instant, likewise if we were to have an absolute sense of time, everything will stand still (we will have to perceive the motion of every single particle for example), and at that moment time would have to disappear too.

ComestibleVenom

I have my reservations about the ontological supremacy of time, as depicted here. The distinction between the past and future as an absolute distinction may itself be a localized illusion of the universe.