critical thinking made ez

False conclusion. Weak premise.

The only conclusion one could come to given premises 1 & 2 is
"3. Therefore something exists which was caused by something which wasn't caused."

This is assuming that premise 1 is proven true, which you did not do. Nor do we have reason to believe it is true.

[ February 23, 2002: Message edited by: critical thinking made ez ]</p>

critical thinking made ez

Media-1, it sounds like the argument you are trying to make is:

1. We have no reason to believe that the Universe has always existed.
2. We have solid reason to believe that God has always existed.

So far this is all you have attempted to claim. Where is the proof or even an argument to support your claims?

HRG

As far as we know, thought is a process running on material hardware (neurons, dendrites, synapses ...).
AFAIWK, yes. A process without an underlying material hardware is like a grin without the corresponding Cheshire cat - or, if you want to, like wind in a vacuum.

Regards,
HRG.

HRG

Your eyes do not have a purpose per se, they just do something (they absorb photons and fire nerve cells). It is you who interprets this action as purposeful - which is quite understandable from your PoV, of course

We should not confuse action with function, or function with purpose.

Regards,
HRG.

LinuxPup

I'd like to change the wording around a bit for the cosmological argument:

1. Everything that has a beginning has a cause.
2. The universe has a beginning.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Basic syllogism form.

Now in order to disprove this syllogism, one must show that a) Not everything that has a beginning has a cause or b) The universe does not have a beginning.

Proposition 2 has been made clear in modern astronomy for the greather part of a century. Pretty much everyone: atheist, theist, pantheist, polytheist, agnostic, etc. tends to agree with this proposition. Now, I'm going to assume, for this argument that the universe does indeed have a beginning, which was about 14 billion +/- 0.5 billion years ago.

Now to disprove proposition 1, I would be interested in seeing either a) an instance where something that has a beginning has no cause, AND b) how this instance came about. I have not seen anyone give a reasonable explanation to this problem other than the syllogism is true. I don't want to jump ahead yet and say "The cause is God" yet, but rather I just want to see if the atheists will admit that the universe has a cause. Whether the cause is personal or not can be talked about later.

[ February 23, 2002: Message edited by: LinuxPup ]

[ February 23, 2002: Message edited by: LinuxPup ]</p>

bgponder

LinuxPup:

My Webster's Unabridged defines "beginning" thus:
1. act or circumstance of entering upon an action or state.
2. the point of time or space at which anything begins: the beginning of the Christian era.
3. Often, beginnings. the first part or initial stage of anything: the beginning of a book; the beginnings of science.
4. origin; source; first cause: a misunderstanding was the beginning of their quarrel.

It seems to me in the special case of the beginning of the universe, by any of these definitions, you will be tending toward infinite regress. Further, since questions of existence are matters of facts, it is merely true or false as to whether the universe's beginning had a prior state, and that unobservable; therefore factually speaking, it is mere speculation. Logically speaking, while I readily admit a limited philosophical education, I am aware of no apriori conditions of causality, but that we may infer that certain events follow others--not that this is logically necessary.

All critique and comment welcomed.

Peace and universal cornbread, Barry

[ February 23, 2002: Message edited by: bgponder ]</p>

Dr. Retard

</strong>

It would indeed be weird if something were to have a beginning and yet lack a cause. But I think Big Bang cosmology commits us to accept one weird thing or another. Here's my argument:

1. If the universe has a cause, then either (i) that cause exists outside of time itself, or (ii) that cause comes into existence simultaneously with its effect.
2. If the universe has no cause, then something with a beginning lacks a cause.
3. Either the universe has a cause or has no cause.
4. Therefore, either (i) a cause exists outside of time itself, (ii) a cause comes into existence simultaneously with its effect, or (iii) something with a beginning lacks a cause.

I'm not sure which weird consequence to accept. I certainly don't think that one is better than the others.

HRG

Well, actually it would be your task to show that the premises are true, not your opponents' task to show that they are false.
I think a good argument can be made that 1. is false, and 2. is unproven.
[quote]

Proposition 2 has been made clear in modern astronomy for the greather part of a century. Pretty much everyone: atheist, theist, pantheist, polytheist, agnostic, etc. tends to agree with this proposition.
[quote]
Not at all. The proposition which all tend to agree with is quite different:

"The part of the universe where our well-established theories are valid had a beginning".

IOW, for describing the universe outside this patch, we need better theories (superstrings? M-branes ? topological quantum gravity ?). Several conjectures in this direction have already been made.

When a pi-meson decay results in an electron (+ other stuff), the electron is uncaused since it could as well have been a muon (+ other stuff).
I haven't seen yet your argument that the premises are true. "Disprove me" is not an argument.

Regards,
HRG.

David Gould

With regad to the Bible quote, if God does not change in any way then he cannot respond to stimuli. He cannot answer prayers, he cannot even sense prayer or anything around him

It is more likely that this quote is referring to essential attributes, rather than an unchanging state of being. For example, God can think and react but he is always good, just, merciful, et cetera. Thus, his essential attributes do not change but he can act and react.


With regard to the temporal dimension meaning that God cannot affect us, it simply eliminates him as a possible cause of our universe as causes require temporal primacy to their effects and it is impossible (and meaningless to ask) to determine if an event in one timeline occurred before an event in another.