A question to atheists.

[6days]

I think if you really apply that principle to your 'eternal energy' you hypothesized, you would follow the evidence to an omnipotent and omniscient Creator.

You might perhaps but I see no particular reason to suppose that any man made doctrine based gods are likely to be true.*

Neither would I suppose such a thing. But, if you think evidence suggests there may be an eternal energy, then you should likely be open to evidence suggesting an energy source with intelligence, and creative power.

Andrew Flew, who at one time was the worlds most prominent atheist followed the evidence, even though it lead him where he did not want to go. He said*"I now believe there is a God...I now think it [the evidence] does point to a creative Intelligence almost entirely because of the DNA investigations. What I think the DNA material has done is that it has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which which are needed to produce*life, that intelligence must have been involved in getting these extraordinarily diverse elements to work together.”

Good for Andrew Flew then but becoming a deist late in life is one thing while adopting Christianity is something else never mind a literal adherence to Genesis.

Alwight...... it seems you are trying to move goalposts rather than address the actual argument. I didn't mention Christianity or Genesis in this argument. *Anthony Flew was an atheist who followed evidence to a supreme being.*

 

[Tyrathca]

There is no evidence of such a thing. However there is evidence and logic that says an uncaused cause, caused everything. And there is lots of evidence that suggests the cause had unlimited power and intelligence.*

Hmmmmm nope. There may or may not be a uncaused cause, if there is one we know nothing else about it. Anything you do say about it is no better than my suggestion it wears a tutu (except humour, mine is obviously funnier).

You could even prove intelligent design and it wouldn't necessarily mean that the designer was the uncaused cause.

Stop feeling so ashamed of of your faith :thumb:

 

[Tyrathca]

Musterion I don't understand your argument, or I do and it is unfathomably stupid.

It sounds like you expect us to not make assumptions based on observations made from within the universe ("the box") and applying them to beyond the universe ("outside the box") except when except when those assumptions suggest god in which case we should stop being anti-science and make more assumptions?

Could you clear this up a little?

 

[6days]

There may or may not be a uncaused cause...

Experience...logic....science all suggest that everything which begins to exist has a cause. If you believe otherwise, you have a blind faith, not based on logic or experience.

...*if there is one we know nothing else about it.

If you can accept that there is an uncaused cause, then we can know something about it. We can look for evidence of intelligence. If things appear intelligently designed, then there may be an intelligent designer.*

 

[6days]

It sounds like you expect us to not make assumptions based on observations .....

you seem more than willing to make assumptions....up until the point your faith get challenged. You seem to cover your eyes and ears saying 'don't know / can't know' when it comes to making assumptions that lead to an intelligent eternal energy.

 

[Tyrathca]

Experience...logic....science all suggest that everything which begins to exist has a cause. If you believe otherwise, you have a blind faith, not based on logic or experience.

First of all quantum physics is a well established science where not everything that exists has a cause, I notice no theist has done anything other than hand-wave this fact away and given the early life of the universe was thought to be largely dominated by quantum affects we can strike science out as saying everything needs a cause. Experience is a stupid thing to rely on since our experience is very narrow and only of within this universe and even then only a very small range of conditions, we have no experiences of universes or time itself "starting". Logic would say that we can not assume that the rules which apply to things within space-time and which are dependent on time (i.e cause-effect) can be applied to the state itself.

6days, what is north of the north pole?

If you can accept that there is an uncaused cause, then we can know something about it.

No, we can predict things about it but unless you have a rigorous hypothesis from which you can make specific predictions you can test for you can not know anything.

We can look for evidence of intelligence. If things appear intelligently designed, then there may be an intelligent designer.*

I'm not getting into the intelligent design debate here - there are other threads for that. But even if you are right and there is evidence of an intelligent designer what reason do we have to assume that the intelligent designer wasn't directly/indirectly caused by the first cause? Why assume that they are the same thing?

you seem more than willing to make assumptions....up until the point your faith get challenged. You seem to cover your eyes and ears saying 'don't know / can't know' when it comes to making assumptions that lead to an intelligent eternal energy.

No, I make no assumptions about the origin of the universe - that's the point. Every option I've thrown around is merely to show that there are alternate equally unsupported ideas about the universes origin so there is no reason to assume any one of them (eg. god) is the right one. It's OK to say I don't know when you really don't know and there is no obvious way to know, it's faith and intellectual laziness to then just pick an answer anyway.

So far the arguments in this thread for god rely on god being the only possible answer in order to be effective. Until someone can show that there ALL other explanations (regardless of how comical they may sound) are impossible then the arguments crumble to nothing but faith on the part of the theist.If you have something more to bring to the table but so far you've added nothing extra.

 

[6days]

Experience...logic....science all suggest that everything which begins to exist has a cause. If you believe otherwise, you have a blind faith, not based on logic or experience.

First of all quantum physics is a well established science where not everything that exists has a cause

Not knowing there is a root cause to quantum physics may be bliss for atheists. There god if the gaps argument here is nothing did it. And..... the real answer seems to be energy is the cause.


Anyway.... you attempted to sidestep the argument which is...everything which begins to exist has a cause. What do you think had a beginning, without a cause?

6days, what is north of the north pole?

*
Turtles?

Is God so powerful He can create a stone *too heavy for him to lift?
(We both can ask illogical questions.)

If you can accept that there is an uncaused cause, then we can know something about it.

No, we can predict things about it but unless you have a rigorous hypothesis from which you can make specific predictions you can test for you can not know anything.

*
False.

Its funny but evolutionists have a history of claiming to know things... but science later shows us it was a simply a false belief. *

We can know things from experience and logic. We don't need a rigorous hypothesis to know jellybeans come in different colors and taste good.*

Also, consider statements from the likes of .....*Frank Tipler, Prof. Mathematical Physics says "When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics"

We can look for evidence of intelligence. If things appear intelligently designed, then there may be an intelligent designer.

I'm not getting into the intelligent design debate here - there are other threads for that. But even*if*you are right and there is evidence of an intelligent designer what reason do we have to assume that the intelligent designer wasn't directly/indirectly caused by the first cause? Why assume that they are the same thing?

You are making a 'turtles all the way down' argument. And it does not change the argument that if things appear intelligently designed, there may be an intelligent designer. *

you seem more than willing to make assumptions....up until the point your faith get challenged. You seem to cover your eyes and ears saying 'don't know / can't know' when it comes to making assumptions that lead to an intelligent eternal energy.

No, I make no assumptions about the origin of the universe - that's the point.

Of course you do. You assume there is no designer and only consider explanations that fit your beliefs. You assume lots of things...For example you assume that life originated from non life. (Likewise, I too make assumptions, but based on the evidence of divinely inspired scripture)

 

[Tyrathca]

Not knowing there is a root cause to quantum physics may be bliss for atheists. There god if the gaps argument here is nothing did it. And..... the real answer seems to be energy is the cause.

Anyway.... you attempted to sidestep the argument which is...everything which begins to exist has a cause. What do you think had a beginning, without a cause?

Virtual particles, at present there doesn't seem to be a cause for their appearance. Now if you can show that they must be caused then go pick up your Nobel prize but until then I don't think we can say with absolute confidence that EVERYTHING has a cause.

Is God so powerful He can create a stone *too heavy for him to lift?
(We both can ask illogical questions.)

Wow, I'm actually impressed you understood at least part of that! :BRAVO:

Now can we agree that what happened before time is as equally illogical question?

We can know things from experience and logic. We don't need a rigorous hypothesis to know jellybeans come in different colors and taste good.*

Thank you for admitting that your beliefs about the fundamental nature and origin of the universe are not rigorous. I'll be sure to quote mine you on that in the future.

Also, consider statements from the likes of .....*Frank Tipler, Prof. Mathematical Physics says "When I began my career as a cosmologist some twenty years ago, I was a convinced atheist. I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be writing a book purporting to show that the central claims of Judeo-Christian theology are in fact true, that these claims are straightforward deductions of the laws of physics as we now understand them. I have been forced into these conclusions by the inexorable logic of my own special branch of physics"

What makes you care what some random professor thinks? His name isn't even Steve!

You are making a 'turtles all the way down' argument. And it does not change the argument that if things appear intelligently designed, there may be an intelligent designer.

No I'm making the "don't claim to know things you have no way of knowing" argument.

I know you want to debate whether there is or isn't an intelligent designer (your favourite topic it seems) but I don't want to argue that here - there are other threads for that. What I'm arguing is assuming you are right there is an intelligent designer there is (so far) no reason to assume that it is the same as the first cause.

Of course you do. You assume there is no designer and only consider explanations that fit your beliefs. You assume lots of things...For example you assume that life originated from non life. (Likewise, I too make assumptions, but based on the evidence of divinely inspired scripture)

No I acknowledge there is a practically infinite number of possible explanations for the origins for the universe (some serious, some seemingly ridiculous, some down right mind bending, and some having varying degrees of intelligence) but given we don't have a reason to assume one over another. Thus the odds of any one option being right out of an infinite selection is practically zero, so I shrug my shoulders and move on with my life as if it has no significance (since I can't act on it) and argue with people who presume to know based on faith.

If that sounds too confusing to you or makes your head hurt then I'm sorry for your cognitive limitations.

 

[alwight]

Neither would I suppose such a thing. But, if you think evidence suggests there may be an eternal energy, then you should likely be open to evidence suggesting an energy source with intelligence, and creative power.

The difference between us is that I don't pretend to know either way, never mind conclude that a very specific creator did it and that I should adhere to an ancient scripture.
I simply don't know and neither do you so I suggest that you stop the mindless YEC nonsense, but by all means believe away that a deity of some kind exists if you want to or if you just feel that there is such a being. You may be surprised that I do myself sometimes, but unlike you I try to incorporate it with some falsifiable scientific reality rather than pretending that I do.
My own more usual feeling though is that there is no such intelligent supernatural being running the show, it just doesn't seem rational in an apparently hostile, natural, often cruel and harsh world/universe. However I also accept that I don't actually know and that I could be wrong.
However the likelihood of any human based religion being correct seems so vanishingly small to me that Earthly religions can all be disregarded as equally ignorant and pretentious, pending specific evidence otherwise of course whatever the ultimate truth is.
If otoh a supernatural creator were somehow implied from astrophysics and hard logic then believing in the inerrancy of a particular ancient scripture isn't.

Alwight...... it seems you are trying to move goalposts rather than address the actual argument. I didn't mention Christianity or Genesis in this argument. *Anthony Flew was an atheist who followed evidence to a supreme being.*

You don't have an argument 6days, Flew was an old man when he saw some comfort in deism at the end, I see nothing wrong with that. One thing he didn't become was a mindless adherent to a literal Genesis and YECism.
If anyone else wants a similar perhaps comforting belief in a supreme being/deity of some kind then you won't hear me complaining, but please take away all the stupid stuff like spontaneous creation 6000 years ago, lakes of fire, eternal torment, original sin, vicarious redemption, a global flood that evidentially never happened and all the bald arrogant assertions of people who claim that they do know when clearly they do not. lain:

 

[MichaelCadry]

If energy cannot be created nor destroyed, how did energy come into existence?

Dear jzeidler,

Of course energy can be created!! God created it. Of course, He did create it so that it cannot die. It either goes to Heaven or Hell. In other words, a beautiful place called Heaven, or else a place very awful, called Hell, and then, the Lake of Fire, which is even hotter. Hell will be thrown into the Lake of Fire {our Sun} at the end of the 2nd Death {see Rev. 20:13 KJV}. Hell is the bottomless pit, which is the center of our Earth, where it is hot with lava and molten magma, etc. It is bottomless because it has a center and a top, but no bottom. Symbolically it has no bottom because of gravity. Everyone thinks they are on the top of the Earth. Thus, the center of the Earth is the bottomless pit. But Hell and Death shall be cast into the Lake of Fire in the end. Hell shall deliver up the souls in her and they will be judged according to their works. Most will get forgiven because their sins have not nearly been as great as ours now. And ours will be forgiven because God is gracious and loving. So few will go to the lake of fire. But it does say that the beast, the Antichrist, and the false prophet will be thrown into the lake of fire {see Rev. 19:20 KJV}. I could tell you who those were, but then I would have to go into detail and I don't want to do that now. This is already enough. By the way, the lake of fire {our Sun} is hotter than Hell {the center of our Earth}. And lightning is 5 or 8 times hotter than our Sun. Can you believe it?!! Okay. Will close.

God Be With You & Yours!!

Michael

:cloud9: :angel: :angel: :angel: :cloud9: :guitar: :singer:
​

 

[Tyrathca]

Of course energy can be created!! God created it. Of course, He did create it so that it cannot die. It either goes to Heaven or Hell.

Do you mean that energy literally goes to heaven & hell? Is this happening now or will it only happen at Armageddon?