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We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

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Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#451

Post by Kerrick »

SiempreViernes wrote: post #415
Kerrick wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The oceans used to seem really big to us too, but each rising tide wasn’t destined to continue rising—the tides turned out to be cyclical, even though we couldn’t imagine anything but gods or magic to be powerful enough to cause the change. Perhaps we’re in a similar trough of understanding here?

I'm not sure I get your point, are you saying the moon and the sun, the things we now know cause the tides, are small things?

My point is that you could replace a couple words in your comment to get the following, and it would've been conceivable for a person to say a thousand years ago on their first day at the ocean. And yet it wouldn't have been accurate.

> The reason tides always rising is plausible if we see tides rising now is simply that's it's far more plausible nothing so special ever happened as to change the motion of the entire ocean.

> The ocean is not a little trickle of water down the wall in the bathroom you can easily redirect with your little finger, the ocean is really big, so you need something equally big to make it change behaviour.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#452

Post by al_mandi »

eis wrote: post #396
al_mandi wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he then turns around and just claims religion can give you the correct answer which clearly it can't because there are different religions His point is that experimental science is not in the domain of answering "why" in that sense. It's a metaphysical problem outside the realm of science. The question of finding which religion is true is a separate issue. You don't want to fall in the genetic fallacy when making s…

> His point is that experimental science is not in the domain of answering "why" in that sense. It's a metaphysical problem outside the realm of science. The question of finding which religion is true is a separate issue. You don't want to fall in the genetic fallacy when making such an argument. That is a wild claim. Science is very much in the domain of answering "why". Science is selfcontious enough to know it can…

I think we keep talking past each other.

> Once more: that science cannot explain something is NOT evidence for any other random unprovable explanation like the existance of a god.

Which is why in Islam we have three sources of truth: observations, logic, and the honest news. We have established that Muhammad, Prayers of God be upon him, existed, and the Quran is preserved, and the authentic Hadiths are preserved. He performed miracles, and foretold events, some of which only came true in the past couple of decades (more at www.provingislam.com). As such, we trust what he brought forth to us.

> I would btw like to ask you: would you agree that some parts of Islam might be wrong or do you believe it is 100% correct?

I believe Islam is 100% correct. If I don't, then by definition I am not a Muslim. We don't get to pick and choose what we like and don't like. Of course, you're going to have to mention exactly what you mean by "some parts of Islam", that's quite a vague term.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#453

Post by [deleted] »

qsdf38100 wrote: post #421
mxkopy wrote: post #111

John Wheeler popularized the term "it from bit" and the idea of a participatory universe. The limits of human observation aside, it could be that the universe itself doesn't really know how it began. If a superheated plasma is indifferent to being in a 5 dimensional black hole as opposed to a state where only space exists, then, in a sense, there isn't any difference between the two explanations (given that the plasm…

The origin can’t be explained, because if it was explained it wouldn’t be the origin anymore. So the question of the origin is ill-posed. Yet there has to be an origin because an infinite history makes no sense. In the end, nothing makes sense. God must be laughing at us.

[deleted]

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#454

Post by tsol »

eis wrote: post #140
mef wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found it interesting as an early example of a similar line of reasoning with a similar conclusion. The Wikipedia link mentions that: “Astronomer Carl Sagan quoted it in discussing India's "tradition of skeptical questioning and unselfconscious humility before the great cosmic mysteries."”

I don't think the line of reasoning is similar at all. The quoted text just says "We don't know. Hypothetical beings higher than us don't know because they came after the initial origin. A hypothetical creator might or might not know." I agree with the first sentence but it doesn't give any insight really. The reasoning regarding Gods coming after creation so they wouldn't know doesn't check out. Maybe they are great…

The truth is, that's all you can say with certainty. That we don't know. Anything else is conjecture. Sometimes it's more wise to know that you don't know

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#455

Post by al_mandi »

eis wrote: post #439
judah wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Where's the proof that a universe can't cause itself" What we observe in nature. Everything in nature that begins to exist was caused by something else. (Some have suggested quantum exceptions to this rule, but even those claims are tenuous at best.) The best observable evidence we have is that everything that begins to exist must be caused. While atheist philosophers like Bertrand Russel once believed the univers…

> What we observe in nature. Everything in nature that begins to exist was caused by something else. (Some have suggested quantum exceptions to this rule, but even those claims are tenuous at best.) > The best observable evidence we have is that everything that begins to exist must be caused. Inside our observable universe? Yea most likely. We can't deduce that the same hold true outside the universe. Einstein explai…

> Inside our observable universe? Yea most likely. We can't deduce that the same hold true outside the universe.

Which is why we rely on the honest news. Prophets like Muhammad, Jesus, and Moses Prayers of God be upon them all proved that they came with a message. They performed miracles, and their character is well known. It's basically an inductive proof.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#456

Post by tsol »

Fezzik wrote: post #291
ratsmack wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>religious babble Why is religion held in such contempt when there is so much science that is just as much "babble", but held in high regard?

Because the whole premise and foundation of religion is that you ought to believe things absent evidence and without good reasons (that’s what faith is). If you have good reasons to believe something you give the reason; religion does not and should not, especially with its centuries-long history of malice and suppression towards free and scientific thought, deserve any credibility when it comes to matters of facts.

I don't know why people do this so often on the (english)internet. People will write off all religion, while obviously speaking from the perspective of Christianity only. People have bad experiences with Christianity, and then decide that Buddhism, Jainism, Daoism, and Shinto are all a scam. It's a strange fallacy that people should know better by now, it's just straight up a sweeping generalization.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#457

Post by eis »

tsol wrote: post #454
eis wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the line of reasoning is similar at all. The quoted text just says "We don't know. Hypothetical beings higher than us don't know because they came after the initial origin. A hypothetical creator might or might not know." I agree with the first sentence but it doesn't give any insight really. The reasoning regarding Gods coming after creation so they wouldn't know doesn't check out. Maybe they are great…

The truth is, that's all you can say with certainty. That we don't know. Anything else is conjecture. Sometimes it's more wise to know that you don't know

Fully agreed.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#458

Post by tsol »

e3bc54b2 wrote: post #333
barrysteve wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument always depends on what kinds of evidence you accept and trust as valid for faith. One big test for that is trusting any of the holy books as evidence for something faithful. It's really weird to watch science and science-like ideas grow out of faith and religion, then the faith be blamed for 'persecuting' science after a certain philosophy took over in the late 19th century.

> It's really weird to watch science and science-like ideas grow out of faith and religion While there are certain events that can be filed under this category, more often than not its the other way around. That is, the ideas come outside the religion, run contradictory until proven unquestionably, and then the religious texts are found to be retroactively always been proving the science that was found later.

This is a totally western-centric view of history. Islam had a golden age during which algebra was created in addition to many other great scientific achievments. And it came it hand in hand with religion. In fact algebra was created to help do the complex math involved in Islamic inheritance laws.

And honestly it isn't even very accurate there. The dark ages were called so not because Christianity persecuted science, it was called that because we have few records from that time. The few records we do have, are from the religious clergy.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#459

Post by tsol »

eis wrote: post #288
al_mandi wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are believes that relate to supernatural beings and sprituality. They cannot be proven or disproven. That's not 100% true. There can (and is) proof and evidence for validating religious claims. You're conflating belief in the unseen (with evidence) with blind faith without evidence, those are two different things. > I am not a religious person but I do have morals. He mentions that non-religious people can hav…

> That's not 100% true. There can (and is) proof and evidence for validating religious claims. You're conflating belief in the unseen (with evidence) with blind faith without evidence, those are two different things. Any religion who claims there is a God does not have proof of such. If there was real experimentally testable and unambigous proof than scientists would need to accept that. What does belief in the unsee…

>Any religion who claims there is a God does not have proof of such.

Anyone who claims God does not exist does not have proof of such.

Re: We don't know how the universe began, and we will never know

#460

Post by eis »

al_mandi wrote: post #444
eis wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Erm, what? I disproved his point. He claims because us being in this unlikely universe is proof for a design. No, it's a logical fallacy as I outlined in the example of flipping coins. The video presenter is the guy who flipped 10 times heads and claims "See! God made this happen!" Can you please point to the exact time in the video where he mentions multiple tries? That would contradict his own point about the low c…

> Can you please point to the exact time in the video where he mentions multiple tries? I was referring to what you wrote. You said that there's no reason that there weren't multiple tries to get the universe just right to support life. I'm saying that's a metaphysical claim you just made, which is outside the realm of science, which is the point the presenter was making.

I can actually use his own logic to prove the opposite point of his claim. Since his reasoning only works if there was one (or very few) tries wouldn't it be very unlikely to have had few tries compared to a much high number of possibly inifite tries? That means his case is in fact the unlikely case (few tries and hence likely design).

What I am saying is that we have no reason to assume and certainly no proof for ANY number of tries so we can't deduce what he claims. But if you follow his reasoning then he actually would need to come to the opposite conclusion that he came to.

I am not making the metaphysical claim, he is making it. I am only showing that his own logic works against him. Anyone who claims god exists is in the realm of metaphysical.

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