This post was originally published on “The Christian Post” on September 7, 2013. Mike Keas, Ph.D, is Senior Fellow of Discovery Institute (http://www.discovery.org/csc), Professor of History & Philosophy of Science (College at Southwestern http://college.swbts.edu), & teaches at Biola (http://www.biola.edu/scienceandreligion)
In a comment on my last blog Hraefn refers to this statement from me: “God, if he exists, is the ultimate uncaused cause (self-existent being).” Hraefn responds (emphasis mine):
Why must the creator of the universe, if such exists, be uncaused? By demanding that “God” be uncaused by definition, you are simply raising the (wholly unmet) burden of proof on yourself. I would suspect that few, if any, atheists would accept theist definitions as in any way binding on themselves or view the demand that we reject an uncaused universe, but blindly accept an uncaused creator of the universe, as anything other than a form of special pleading. If God can be uncaused then why can’t the universe? Admitedly, a pantheist would likely look at all of this, smirk and say God is the universe, so why are you arguing which is uncaused (which would most likely offend both theist and atheist).
I aim to understand the views of those with whom I disagree, and this includes understanding the way that these folks define the basic terms of their theory. If I’m going to critique a theory, I ought to first grasp it as it is articulcated by its well credentialed proponents. I hope that critics of theism would extend the same generosity and mutual respect. In this spirit I wrote “God, if he exists, is the ultimate uncaused cause (self-existent being).” No thought-control demands are operating here, just an offer to get a crucial idea on the table for critical examination. One can understand the terms of an opponent’s theory (even using terms as defined by the other guy), but then disagree respectfully with that theory. It’s a free world. Hopefully we can remain civil in our discussion of competing theories about the meaning of life.
Defining divinity as the “ultimate uncaused cause (self-existent being)” has been mainstream in the history of philosophy since Aristotle. No special pleading or idiosyncratic definitions lurk here. A Christian theist further argues:
- Claim #1: God as depicted in the Bible is the uncaused cause of everything except himself.
Others have argued for alternative viewpoints on this most fundamental issue. Those alternative views take the general form:
- Claim #2: X is the uncaused cause of everything except itself.
Fill “X” in with whatever you please. Some might say, matter-energy within space-time. Perhaps others would say a multiverse-generating mechanism (perhaps lurking in an eternal quantum vacuum, or whatver … use your imagination here). In my attempt to save Hawking from self-refutation (see my last post), I suggested that X for Hawking might be the ancient Pythagorean notion of mathematical reality as the source for everything else. This is a non-materialist version of naturalism: Naturalistic idealism. Interesting.
One of the main points I hope to impress on you is this: Whatever you insert for the variable X (go ahead put yours in now), that entity functions as a deity for you, whether a personal one you worship or whether an impersonal one that does not give a rip about your personal existence (and so worship might seem inappropriate). Note, I’m not “demanding” that anyone “reject an uncaused universe” (as Hraefn expressed it above). I’m not demanding anything whatsover. Rather, I’m inviting my blog buddies to think critically about this most fundamental question concerning reality. I, and many other philosophers, have found something like what I’ve outlined above as a helpful way to think about it. You’ve got an alternative proposal for defining terms and debating the issues. Great, put it on the table for review.
Regarding burden of proof, the one making a claim shoulders that burden. So, note, again the two claims above:
- Claim #1: God as depicted in the Bible is the uncaused cause of everything except himself.
- Claim #2: X is the uncaused cause of everything except itself.
So, when an atheist dialogues with a Christian about ultimate reality, both share the burden of proof. The Christian bears the burden of claim #1, and the atheist the burden of claim #2 (with X filled in with something). Do you feel the love? Let’s share the burden together, oh atheist blog-comment friends.
I wish to thank those who came to my talk today in Dallas at the Confident Christianity Conference. We discussed everything above, and more. See my last blog for the main points of my Dallas talk. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Hraefn for the interesting comment above. The folks in Dallas benefitted from this discussion. Peace.
See my more recent blogs that address some of the comments below this blog:
- How Theists and Atheists Share the “Burden of Support”
- Russell’s Teapot: How Theists and Atheists Share the “Burden of Support.”
Since those are two definitionally equivalent statements, the implied difference regards the unstated nature of the left side of the equation as it follow from the right side of the equation. That is, we recognize that the uncaused cause is necessarily personal and others deny that the uncaused cause could be personal. The side with the epistemological problem is the impersonal side precisely because an impersonal uncaused cause could never reveal whether or not it was impersonal. A personal uncaused cause might reveal himself, and we suggest that he has done precisely that. So we refer to him as God.
I have to admit: when I read this I’m reminded of how human language, and especially human logic, has a tendency to only work well in describing reductive logic. Inferential logic feels essentially suspect. And axiomatic claims by their nature form the boundary from whence the reductive logic commences.
Or said a little differently: as long as the starting box of axioms is the grounds for argumentation, it is essentially about whether or not to include an unbounded God into the field of reductive reasoning. Science clearly rejects that as a proposition. And one could argue that Science is generally better because of that restriction in the sense that it forces scientists to consider evidence rather than theological speculation as a basis for understanding and discovery. It surprises me not at all that an atheist would want to start with the same set of axioms.
Here’s the key: human reason doesn’t bound God’s “actuality”. We’re as dependent on revelation to understand any aspect of his being as we are on revelation to understand more than the rough outlines of either “natural law” or his “inherent character”. (Quotes to contain concepts that we throw around colloquially as if they mean something independently.) So lacking revelation, most of our reasoning about God is entirely speculative which is to say it often is pure fiction. As is speculation by the other side about him. It isn’t QUITE as bad as Pascal’s rather flimsy wager which boils down existential assumptions about God’s existence to essentially an economic decision for a human being with clear benefits should he choose well but no apparent relationship with the Almighty for doing so.
Not that God cannot and does not start with us making a commitment like that. He does. But it is a fairly sterile way to meet a God who has chosen to reveal himself.
It is difficult to know how to respond to a post which isn’t really saying anything. I expected… more. Even so, there are a few places that can be nibbled.
An early mistake is made by assuming the two options presented are the only ones available. Either there was a personal uncaused cause or an impersonal uncaused cause. A further assumption is made that theists belong in the personal camp and atheists in the impersonal. Keas seems to concede that theists have a burden of proof but also argues that atheists have a burden to prove the impersonal claim. Aside from a few additional silly equivocations (“demand” vs “invite”, for instance), that seems to be all this post is arguing, and it merely serves to demonstrate the author’s problem with assumptions.
The theistic position is positive, forceful, and clear: nothing created God, and God created everything. He is the personal, self-existent uncaused cause.
Contrary to Keas assumption, the atheist position is neutral and necessarily muddy. Namely: .
Catch that? I’ll restate it in case repetition helps to clear things up: .
One final restatement: we don’t know. We have hints, we have ideas, we have pointers (here’s a powerful pointer: so far everything we’ve discovered in science has a naturalistic explanation. This doesn’t guarantee that all the unknowns will also have naturalistic explanations, but it does reveal a certain trend for the cosmos), but we do not know. We know roughly the age of the universe, we know how things proceeded from the moments after the big bang, we know an awful lot about how life emerged from all of that. But we don’t know what preceded the big bang (if such a concept is even possible, given spacetime; that depends in part on whether or not there was a singularity) or what caused all that initial stuff to begin with, if anything. We have figured out a lot about quantum mechanics, but much remains unknown and because of the unknown, this limits even the assumptions we can make. Keas’ initial set of possibilities are themselves predicated by assumptions about causality, but we just don’t know how things work at that point. We’re not even sure what assumptions we can make.
This means, of course, that science cannot prove that God did not create everything. God is still an option on the table. But so are giant space frogs or trans-dimensional children who created the universe with space chalk. We will be wiped out when one of them throws a tantrum. Just because an option has not been explicitly ruled out doesn’t mean we should believe it. I cannot prove God did not create the world, but that’s not how this game is played. The burden of proof remains squarely in the Christian camp: if you want me to believe in God, then prove him. Don’t play games with terms or with burden of proof, that only reveals the vacuity of your position (it is telling that one of the few apologetics posts ever to appear at Voices is trying to play fast and loose with burden of proof).
In the meantime, we will let scientists do their thing. One day they may even figure it out (though there are scenarios in which we will never be able to figure it out). My money is on a purely naturalistic cause, in keeping with what we’ve always found elsewhere in the universe.
I am usually a lurker, reading posts and comments. You are clearly an intelligent, as well as intellectual individual (the two do not always go hand in hand). Having said that, you, along with every other Atheist/Agnostic always seem to avoid the most basic, fundamental principal that Christianity is founded on… faith. You ask for proof of God, but if such proof existed, then that would contradict the very foundation of Christianity (or any other credible religion for that matter). If science could literally prove the existence of God, then would you believe? Assuming science could prove beyond any doubt that God does exist and did create the universe, then the new argument that would present itself is… which God? Is it the God of the Bible? If it is the God of the Bible, is God triune? Is it Buddah? Is it Krishna? Science would still be far from solving or proving anything.
We Christians are often accused of presenting a circular argument… I believe in God, or more specifically Jesus Christ, because the Bible says so. Romans 10:17 tells us that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God, which is again refuted as a circular argument. This is not a circular argument, because there is an entry point to the argument, and that entry point is faith. The evidence of God is most clearly seen when one comes to the cross through humble repentance, and the regenerated life that follows when one places their faith in Christ. There are only three possibilities for the creation of the universe, including everything in the universe, and they are as follows:
1) The universe has always existed.
The idea that the universe has always existed has been wholly rejected by the scientific community. Numerous discoveries prove that the universe hasn’t always existed, such as galactic motion, background radiation echo, and the 2nd law of thermodynamics, to name a few. Science has proven beyond any reasonable doubt that the universe had a beginning.
2) The universe created itself.
The idea that the universe created itself is philosophically impossible. In other words, if the universe created itself, then it would have pre-existed it’s own creation or it wouldn’t have been around to create itself. This idea defies all logic and reason.
3) Someone or something external to the universe created the universe.
We are left with only one other option, that the universe had a creator. Who is that creator? Science will never be able to prove who it is, and so one must rely on faith. So then what, or who, do we place our faith in? I think that a creator would want to reveal itself to it’s creation, and I personally choose to believe that He has revealed Himself in the Bible, and more specifically in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Others have chosen different religions or beliefs, and yet although I consider their lack of faith in Christ to be condemning, they still recognize that there is a creator.
All of that to say that regardless of how intellectual one is, that intellect is flawed because humans are flawed. To try and define an eternal and infinitely holy God with flawed human intellect is an exercise in futility, and the only option left is faith. In your post you defined your position as follows…
“the atheist position is neutral and necessarily muddy. Namely: .”
If this were true, then you wouldn’t waste your time debating Christians who argue for the existence of their “grown up version of Santa Claus”. You have a position, and it is far more than “.” Your position is not neutral, it is the typical pseudo-intellectual, contrarian position that argues from a belief of absolutes, while opposing Christians with a different belief of absolutes. It takes just as much faith to be an Atheist as it does to be a Christian, but the difference is that deep down inside you hope that you are right, whereas the truly faithful Christian, who has seen and felt the regeneration that comes from faith in Christ knows that they are right, and yet cannot prove it to someone who chooses to forgo the very essential element required for the very evidence that you claim to require… faith.
Your first paragraph is excellent, a wonderful look at the problem. Even if one could prove God, that doesn’t mean we should worship him nor does it tell us which God is the right one.
But then you go downhill.
Faith is a non-answer for several reasons. First and foremost: why faith? Why doesn’t God just reveal himself? Yes, I know the next non-answer, “God has already revealed himself to everyone.” That answer is thoroughly irrational and doesn’t deal with the fact that even though the Bible still talks quite a bit about faith in what people have not seen (despite claiming that God has revealed himself to all).
I have heard people say God doesn’t reveal himself because he respects our free will. How does that make sense? I chose to marry my wife even though I was able to see her – sight did not diminish desire (might have even helped a bit). So I’ve also heard that if we could see God, we would see just how amazing he is and would choose him automatically, thus diminishing free will. That’s also ridiculous. It’s still a free-will choice, even if I’m presented with something highly desirable. Then there’s the notion that no one can see God and live – a very convenient theological position which still doesn’t solve the problem since there remain a myriad of ways God could clearly show himself right here, right now. “You can’t put God to the test!” someone might say. Fine, I won’t. But nor will I worship an imaginary being that I’m supposed to believe in by faith contrary to all the evidence.
John 16:33, I’m glad that you see the same three possibilities that I see. All naturalistic explanations of the origin of our universe fit under your number 1 (involving infinite regress of the chain of cause and effect) and number 2 (which Jack refuted with “ex nihilo, nihil fit” — out of nothing comes nothing. Numbers 1 and 2 are logically impossible. Because all naturalistic explanations of the origin of our universe are logically impossible, we can use a disjunctive syllogism (modus tollendo ponens — mode that by denying affirms) to logically make our point.
1. There must either be a naturalistic or a supernatural origin of the universe.
2. There is not a naturalistic origin of the universe.
3. Therefore, there is a supernatural origin of the universe.
This is commonly known as the process of elimination.
Oops! John16:33, I see now that you actually have four options. Sorry that I missed that.
Chris,
You wrote: “so far everything we’ve discovered in science has a naturalistic explanation.”
What other kind of explanation would science be able to provide for anything? Is this not a bit self-selective?
By the way, that is not exactly correct. There is, for example, no “naturalistic” explanation for what happened before the Big Bang, but science still discusses this.
Science, and scientists, talk about metaphysical issues on a regular basis. Some of the most exacting metaphysicists are working physicists.
I think one can confuse a “scientific description” for a “scientific explanation.” For example: naturalists offer descriptions such as the Heisenberg Theory of Indeterminacy, but there is not “naturalistic explanation” of how this is the case, and certainly no naturalistic expression of “why” this is the case.
Interestingly, one can construct experiments on the duality of light in regard to Bohr’s Copenhagen Interpretation showing light to be either a particle or a wave, but not both in the same way at the same time. I cannot think of a better term to describe that as “a mystery.”
Also, in the statement above you cannot assume that since science has given a “naturalistic explanation” to many things that it has given a “naturalistic explanation” to every thing.
There is still much that falls outside of scientific naturalism.
It is of course fair to say that we do not yet have a naturalistic explanation for the big bang – we just don’t know. It’s an active problem.
“but not both in the same way at the same time.”
I’m not sure what your point is here? Just an interesting science trivia item? Or pointing to another realm of science in which our knowledge is incomplete? But with quantum mechanics, we are learning new things all the time and despite the fact that much of quantum mechanics is contrary to what we might expect from our personal experience with the universe, we have thus far found quantum mechanics to be just another set of naturalistic processes.
Bart,
A fair point, but there is another possibility: we could hit issue after issue about which science has no answer. We could be left throwing up our hands again and again. Instead, we find in almost every instance that we can in fact figure out how it works. The remaining question marks are the issues on the frontier of science – new issues that have arisen as we’ve wrestled past old problems.
One might say, “Of course science can find an explanation, God created an orderly universe!” If that were true, then at the very least the theist should concede that God made it difficult to figure out that he is real. The Psalmist tells us that the heavens declare the glory of God, but when we study the Heavens, we realize that if the Psalmist was right, then God must be nothing more than the laws of the universe. Perhaps Einstein was right on that point after all!
In other words, I’m suggesting that where science cannot find naturalistic answers (How did consciousness come to be? Why are human beings nearly universally religious by instinct?) it either declares that it is still waiting to find a naturalistic answer, or it ignores the field and moves on.
Thus, it is hardly surprising that science provides naturalistic answers for all of the questions that it considers. But then, when it chases those questions to their ends, it seems always to run into those questions that prove resistant to naturalistic explanation (Where did the information come from in DNA? What exists before/outside of spacetime?). That’s the bone over which we were barking a while back.
So Chris’ claim reduces essentially to this: “So far, in accepting only naturalistic explanations to scientific questions, every scientific question that we have answered has been answered naturalistically.”
In the middle of painting a house so I can’t answer other comments at the moment, but I can give a brief response to this. Tweaking your summary to be, well, accurate:
“So far, for every question that has provided us with a fairly definitive answer, the answer has been naturalistic.”
In other words, the things we know (as opposed to guess or assume, which is what religion does) have proven to be naturalistic. And considering how much we now know, that covers a huge amount of territory.
“where science cannot find naturalistic answers (How did consciousness come to be? Why are human beings nearly universally religious by instinct?) it either declares that it is still waiting to find a naturalistic answer, or it ignores the field and moves on.”
Setting aside the fact that of your two examples, “one of these is not like the other”, it’s worth noting that consciousness is another active field. Yes, we are still looking, and there are tantalizing hints with research progressing (I’ve mentioned Marvin Minsky before on this) but it remains unclear. I suspect we won’t have to wait too many more years before we reach at least a basic understanding of the phenomena behind consciousness.
As for the “instinct for religion” as you call it, this is not a question that leads to testable theory so I don’t see that it fits the discussion. Even so, there already are ideas about where religion fits in with evolutionary psychology. I can understand why you would not accept those ideas, but some of the propositions out there strike me as quite plausible.
“Where did the information come from in DNA? What exists before/outside of spacetime?”
I’m not sure what you mean by the first question, but DNA has been a recent fascination of mine. For the last several months I’ve been doing an on-again-off-again deep-dive into DNA (much of it blogged about on my site) with the ultimate goal of understanding current theories regarding the origins and evolution of DNA. I still have work to do to even begin to understand the ideas out there, but what I know of it is fascinating stuff. Rest assured science is at work in this area.
You may say that every time science reaches an origin point, it gets halted. I think you misunderstand the nature of the problem. Instead, what keeps happening is every time it reaches what it thought was an origin point, it realizes it wasn’t the origin point. More steps are found, pushing “origin” further back. Only in somewhat recent times have we hit our current limits. But let’s remember: science has hit stymieing problems before. Progress may have stalled for a time, but then a breakthrough is made and things progress. The further back we push, the harder the problem. What should amaze us is how far and how quickly we’ve been able to push in the modern era, but we are now facing problems far more sophisticated than those of former days.
Consider particle physics. The Large Hadron Collider is 17 miles in diameter. Its budget is nine billion dollars. It was approved in 1995 and wasn’t ready for operation until 2008 – when it broke and had to be further delayed until 2010 with active use in 2011.
Astronomers and cosmologists have a slew of telescopes they want and need to continue their work. These things take time and cost a lot of money which tends to get hampered by people who trust unsubstantiated ancient paper over the work of modern science.
Neuroscientists are hampered by a nasty thing called ethics; there is only so much you can do with a living human brain.
The list could go on, but perhaps you get the point. These aren’t just difficult problems, they require fantastically complex tools and run against difficult ethical quandaries.
Meanwhile, who think they know better than scientists need nothing more than ancient pieces of paper to think they can declare victory over science.
Chris, you mentioned that you are not sure about a singularity. Would you agree that only two alternatives for the universe exist if no supernatural Creator exists?
1. An infinite cause and effect chain leading up to the present moment
2. Spontaneous creation from nothing (involving a singularity)
Mike,
As someone who is not a trained theoretical physicist, I would be reluctant to take a firm position, period. But your two options share the same problems as Keas two options: we just do not know. There are various theories – I have a very basic understanding of some of them – and there are mathematical models behind those theories. The models all check out, but that doesn’t mean they correspond with the real world. But this marks another difference between religious speculation and scientific hypotheses: scientists can put pen to paper and show you, using mathematics and our current knowledge of physics, why they think their model may be true. But even most cosmologists hedge their bets. I tend to pay a lot of attention to Sean Carroll, theoretical physicist and cosmologist extraordinaire, and even he happily admits that he doesn’t know if any of his ideas and models are true – and he is sure that some of his models, though mathematically sound, are not true. At the same time, he is quick to note where apologists try to impose assumptions and gaps on the discussion. He did this in his cosmology debate with William Lane Craig.
The creationist strategy is simple enough: present their position, present a straw man, claim the straw man is the only possible alternative position, and attempt to dismantle the straw man. What is missing is actual evidence for their own position, only speculative argument not backed by any kind of scientific rigor.
So back to your question: in part I can definitely say no, those are not the only two options, since other plausible options come to mind. But even if I were to list a few more known possibilities, I still couldn’t agree that the list is exhaustive because in this area we do not yet know what we do not yet know. The universe may yet have some complete surprises in store.
In apologetics, when it comes to God Christians like to claim that we fall short of his knowledge and wisdom so there are some things we simply cannot understand (such as the contradiction between divine sovereignty and human fallibility). But when it comes to science, Christians often like to act as if we already have enough knowledge to set definitive parameters about unsettled area. There is much we know and we can set definitive parameters in those areas. But when talking cosmology, enough uncertainty remains that we cannot say, “Well it can only be X or Y” – especially when the people making that claim are not even remotely qualified to evaluate theoretical physics. A philosophy degree does not a physicist make, and in the world of quantum physics, not even our philosophical assumptions will always hold up.
Interesting and boring at the same time, because it shuts out any other way of considering the issues. Begin with the fact (?) that there is no God whatsoever, begin where the child begins, being the center of his or her existence. Follow on with the denial of things we consider necessary for a happy healthy childhood. How could there be a God who denies the basic needs to a helpless being? Eventually, the feeling of alienation and loneliness in a maelstrom of existence leads to denial that there could even possibly be a Being who meets any understanding of God as we might think of such today. Then the Being of all beings shows up, and His very presence mocks all thoughts one had had of denying His/Her existence (the His/Her is but a reflection of the source of the genders masculine and feminine, the reality beyond genders and yet the source of them). When that Being shows us in a way that reflects the so-called biblical account (a tip of the hat to skepticism), it has a shock value, one that awakens the person to a reality greater than can be imagined. The shock and awe of modern war, for example, doesn’t even get into the ball park with the manifestation of such Presence. It is, after all, quite overwhelming. Quite. And since it is along biblical lines, that raises even more interesting reflections, reflections which last a lifetime, reflections confirmed by the logical coherence of the Book, reflections buttressed by the supralogical (I would call it the synthetical)(some call it suprarational). The Bible simply tells us that God is eternal, everlasting, forever, obviously the cause of all things. Having been encountered by this Being, one responds with thinking, thinking, thinking, learning that the simple and the complex are poles that are involved in the reality of God. Hence, the synthetical (note the difference that I make between synthetic, artificial, and synthetical, two things considered together, two things that set up a positive and a negative pole to constitute a field of tension in thought that enables one to be balanced, flexible, creative, constant, and magnetic, evidence of the reality of Divinity.
It is that transforming power that takes man in his broken, fallen, helpless, horizontal state and begins the process of making him or her whole, mending the shattered pieces, lifting up from being fallen, helping the helpless to stand on their own feet, making him or her vertical, bring the dead to life. Some fellow was once saying there was no God, and a little girl said, “Please don’t tell my daddy, cause ever since he claims to have met him he doesn’t get drunk any more and he takes care of us and our home.” I read that long ago, and I cannot vouch for it. However, I can vouch for a madman ceasing to drink and to threaten mayhem on loved ones, who also became so noted among his former drinking buddies as the one in the community that they were sure would make Heaven. His family also thought so. I dare say, there are plenty of stories around, true ones, without any need to falsify to make one’s case, but experiences which reflect the impression of a Being who is beyond Aristotle’s unmoved Mover to the self-moved Mover, a point I made in Graduate School at the University of South Carolina and again at the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary when it was the most liberal seminary in the Southern Baptist Convention. Based upon Paul Halmos’ The Faith of Counsellors, and his theory of creative dissonance (sort of like Festinger’s cognitive dissonance), along with my six years of research in church history concerning the nature and the effect of ideas which led to the realization of what I call crisontological ideology, that is, how God intends for the truths He has revealed to effect and affect human behavior. All of this ties in with the digital, 01, simple/complex, positive/negative, which creates a field with a tension in the human mind which enables a person to respond appropriately to any given situation. Halmos illustrated by reference to the scientific, objective method and the subjective, affirming one of unconditional love. Thus, the situation is not one of either/or; it is a both/and. Perhaps, the best summary was given by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize in December, 1964, when he declared: “I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today’s mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow.” I would add: Try a millennium of generations, about 1,000,000 years and mankind’s spread to the stars, settling quadrillions of planets, in peace, in unity, in agape love, the greatest force and power there is or could ever be.
Chris, please list those other options that come to mind. It seems to me that without a supernatural Creator, either there is an infinite chain of causes and effects before the present point in time, or things arose spontaneously from nothing. Would not all your options fit under one of those two possibilities?
Your options are two possibilities, but three other options come to mind:
1. God. As I mentioned in my original comment, some sort of divine intelligence remains an option of the table – we just have no reason to believe this option is true, and there are various problems unique to this option.
2. An eternal, self-existent something (perhaps the singularity, perhaps not) that at some point explodes into the universe. The difference between this and your #2 is that this doesn’t necessitate spontaneous generation (the “something” always existed rather than popping into existence), though it leaves the tricky problem of what disrupted its equilibrium and caused the bang, but I’ll note more on that in a moment.
3. An eternal, self-existent something that spins off new universes (this would be close to the “impersonal” uncaused cause mentioned by Keas) – something that always existed, had no cause, was not intelligent or personal, but was the cause of all things (this differs from your #1 by starting with an uncaused cause rather than just an endless system of cause and effect).
The biggest monkey wrench in all of this is relativity. As far as I know, we simply have no idea what time looks like outside of spacetime (again note my lack of theoretical physicist credentials – there may be hypotheses out there beyond my ken). Does “eternal” even mean anything in such a system?
Christian theology is familiar with this dilemma – Augustine and others referred to God as being in the eternal “now” rather than within time. God, we are told, exists outside of time. Likewise, *anything* not part of this universe would exist outside of time, at least as we understand it. So if there was some sort of something that existed before the big bang, I don’t know that we even yet know how to talk about it since its temporal situation would be very different from anything we currently know and understand.
This is my main reason for stressing that we don’t know what we don’t know, and we don’t know what other options may be on the table. We are frequently trapped into thinking about these things in terms of our experience, but we are talking about phenomena that are potentially fundamentally different than our experience.
(One example of things different than our experience: relativity tells us that nothing travels faster than the speed of light, yet we have good reason to believe that the very early universe expanded much faster than the speed of light. This does not violate relativity because relativity applies to things within spacetime whereas at inflation it was spacetime itself that was moving faster than light.)
This is also why I think my #2 above remains an option on the table – one might argue that an eternal equilibrium suddenly getting upset implies an external cause, leading to the old quip, “Well maybe the universe was caused by the big bang, but who made the big bang go bang?” But we don’t know what “eternal” looks like outside of spacetime. (Side note: this is also one reason why the Kalam argument is not convincing.)
And because I can’t beat this dead horse enough, let me again note that this gap in our knowledge is not evidence for God. Just because we don’t know something doesn’t mean we need to find a way to fit God into the explanation. God is an option. If you want to claim that he is not just an option but is actually the answer, you need to defend that claim – not just by presenting what may look like a logically coherent argument but by showing that this argument actually corresponds with reality as demonstrated by the evidence. Otherwise we’re back in the realm of the cosmological models of theoretical physics: lots of models, no definite evidence yet which concludes that one or the other of them is true.
Chris, I am relieved that you still believe that God possibly exists and created the universe. I noticed that you listed two other possibilities that both involve an eternal, self-existent something.
The first possibility you described was that of an eternal equilibrium that was upset. I guess you mean that an infinitely-old equilibrium at a point in time was upset. Please clarify if I have misunderstood you. Wouldn’t you run into the same problem here that exists with an infinite chain of causes and effects leading to the present point in time? Can an infinitely long time period be crossed to reach a point in time?
The second possibility you mentioned was an eternal something that spins off new universes (the multiverse?). Again, can the infinite chain of causes and effects be avoided?
Let me know what you think about this quote:
“Given the reality of temporal progression, if reaching the present required traversing an infinite temporal past, the present would never have been reached; but the present (obviously) has been reached, therefore the temporal past is not infinite.”
Bruce Gordon, “Balloons on a String: A Critique of Multiverse Cosmology,” in The Nature of Nature: Examining the Role of Naturalism in Science, eds. Bruce Gordon and William Dembski (Wilmington, DE: Intercollegiate Studies Institute Books, 2011), 562.
Mike,
Before you get too excited, keep in mind that I put God on the same level as space frogs and trans-dimensional children.
Based on the rest of your comment, I wonder if you read the rest of my comment? I already addressed that issue. It’s a variant of the Kalam cosmological argument and suffers from a few assumptions of its own.
P.S.: Perhaps it would be helpful if you described the eternal equilibrium in more detail. Do you mean nothingness, as Hawking describes, or do you mean some type of energy in equilibrium?
P.P.S.: I know you mentioned an eternal something, but some people regard nothingness as something that can produce a universe.
Chris, would you not agree that an “uncaused cause” has little substantive difference from God? Would this simply be a “rose by any other name?”
Singularity, Something, God. Are these not merely different names for the same Entity?
There are formidable issues with trying to accommodate contingent beings without some necessary “being.” Simply accounting for P1 by P2 and P2 by P3 infinitely becomes a logical absurdity, commonly referred to as an infinite regress.
This harkens back to Zeno’s paradoxes trying to show that “motion” (contingency) is an illusion. To paraphrase Zeno: “that arrow just won’t fly.”
Also, the result of relativity is not to support an infinite universe, but to have struck a blow to the head of steady state theory. I do believe that the answer, to whatever degree it is comprehensible, will be related to gravity. The three other fundamental forces play well together, until gravity shows up.
The more we understand gravity, the more light we can shed on what (I would say, Who) exists outside of time and space.
I apologize for not shedding more light and proving what existed before the Planck moment. I studied string theory for three years in preparation for my Master’s Thesis.
When I was finished, my ignorance had increased infinitely.
Jack,
God implies personhood, intelligence, more than is implied by just “uncaused cause”.
Zeno’s paradox, while clever, has a rather simple resolution and is overcome regularly in mathematics. Just like I’m no theoretical physicist, I’m also no mathematician, but an infinite series is a staple of mathematics and gets used in a whole range of everyday applications. The terms of an infinite series may be infinite, but the series itself can still be worked with as a whole and any given individual term can be examined. Apologists can get away with arguments like yours or the Kalam because on the surface they seem like very reasonable gotchas, but the world has grown more sophisticated, as have the tools of science and mathematics. An infinite series is no match for a mathematician with pen and paper (and perhaps a calculator).
I’m surprised that you say relativity struck a blow to steady state; while Einstein didn’t hold to steady state, per se, his early work did focus on a static universe, leading to his famous cosmological constant. Only with the work of Hubble did he realize the universe was expanding. The Hubble constant put steady state in the grave. No one in this discussion has even hinted at steady state as an option. As for gravity (the weakest of the forces), I’m curious what you think it might prove about things outside time and space. Perhaps you mean dark matter?
What was your master’s degree?
Chris, you responded to Jack’s statement about an infinite regress being an absurdity with this statement: “An infinite series is no match for a mathematician with pen and paper (and perhaps a calculator).”
I guessing that you consider Hawking to be a pretty fair mathematician. He, like Jack, understands the absurdity of an infinite regress. Thus, he now believes that something came from nothing.
Those are the only two possibilities: an infinite regress or something coming from nothing. If you cannot prove one or the other, then a supernatural Creator is the only explanation for our universe.
“If you cannot prove one or the other, then a supernatural Creator is the only explanation for our universe.”
Even if you were right that an infinite regress creates an absurdity, your conclusion amounts to special pleading: it absolutely can’t be the possible conclusions you don’t like, but it must be the conclusion you do like, because reasons. What reasons? Because! Yes, but wha… Because! But as I’ve noted once or twice already, the universe is a wild and weird place full of things we now understood but once never anticipated. Considering there is no evidence for God, you cannot insist that he must be the answer to a problem we have not solved.
Your approach is akin to a student who solves a math problem without showing his work. “Your answer is wrong,” the teacher says. “No it isn’t,” says the student, “your assumptions in the problem were wrong!” “Well fine,” says the teacher, “then show me why your answer is valid.” “Because it’s the only possible answer!” says the petulant creationist. But you haven’t shown your work. You have asserted that the alternative options you’ve presented cannot be true (while ignoring what I’ve said on the matter), but you have done nothing to prove that your answer must be true. You’ve filled in the blank without showing your work. And because you have no work to show for your answer, I have even less reason to accept your argument than the arguments of cosmologists backed by actual, falsifiable models.
Chris, I agree that Zeno’s paradoxes have answers but they require a complicated scheme of mathematics and even in the end they cannot explain how “fire” is real, and the number represented by the symbol “4” are real in a way that will not violate the long-held law of non-contradiction.
Einstein did in fact hold to a steady-state theory of the universe until he came up with his theory of relativity that sent his mind into a state of uncertainty.
He lived his entire life after the 20’s trying to figure out what exactly was “real” in regard to his theory versus quantum mechanics. He never accepted the theory of quantum mechanics as complete or, what he called, “beautiful.”
I am not saying I can “prove” anything. In fact, the word “prove” has little or no use in discussions of philosophy, nor even science. All anyone can do is to offer reasons for the belief (or non-belief) that one holds. As I told my philosophy students today, “I will guarantee you that for every answer you can give, someone can come up with another question.” Many atheists assume, incorrectly in my opinion, that at the fact they can offer “questions” to a faith perspective means they have offered evidence for their position. I would find that unacceptable.
This is one reason that equipollence arose as a philosophical perspective in the Renaissance Period. When you compare God to “space frogs” your language suggests that your investigation is not an honest one (though that does not mean you yourself are not an honest person). Atheism is not an “intellectual” position, and certainly not an old position in philosophy. It is a moral response.
So, while I can appreciate your ability to question the idea of creationism, I do not submit that the arguments you offer are substantial enough to overcome the common sense perspective “ex nihilo, nihil fit.”
I also must state that the fideistic skepticism that arose during the Renaissance Period in which theology, the Queen of the Sciences, was divorced from philosophy, Her Handmaiden, does not fit my understanding of how a Christian should approach learning.
Jack,
Einstein took issue with some of the findings of quantum physics. In this area, Einstein has been proven wrong. I’m not sure what point you wish to make by Einstein’s uncertainty except perhaps to note that even very smart people can be fallible. This is why the rules and tools and methods of science are so important – to keep us on track even when we don’t like where the track is taking us. The problem with creationists is many of them jumped ship long ago, as soon as science began to poke holes into this or that holy book of choice.
“””In this area, Einstein has been proven wrong. “””
Einstein has not been proven wrong in this area. Gravity (his contribution) has still not been unified with the other fundamental forces.
Also, Einstein took issue with the quantum theory as a whole, not just particular parts; though, he did debate and speculate on certain aspects. He and Bohr (nor Planck) came to see eye-eye.
Also, I’m not sure about your hubris of “science punching holes in this or that holy book.” That simply is not a accurate statement. For example, the Bible describes the spherical nature of the earth long before it became an established part of scientific dogma.
It is a common myth propagated by anti-Christians that the Bible is full of scientific errors. This is simply a straw man argument with no basis in fact for any serious student (believer or otherwise) of the Bible.
Also, just for clarity, I did not say Einstein’s theory was wrong, nor did I say that quantum theory is wrong. You interjected that perhaps without realizing it.
Dear Chris: I call your attention to the fact that God has revealed Himself in the created order: such order, complexity, and design demands a source equal to the fact, one that is commensurate with the perceived reality. And then there is the matter of Revelation, His Revelation of Himself in history in the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth. If you would like to read a beautiful behavioral summary of the man of Galilee which clearly points to something beyond this world, I suggest that you consider I Corinthians 13:4-8a. Both Liberal and Conservative scholars agree that Paul must have based this behavioral pattern on the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth as a revelation of the nature involvement of God in the universe. As a historian (I trust that I can call myself such as a result of a life time of study in the subject along with the degrees and the recognition that goes with it, i.e., Phi Alpha Theta: The International Honor Society of Historians), one has to face the reality of this unique person who made such an indelible impression on people then and throughout the centuries since. There is a simplicity and a subtlety and a historicity and a harmony and an expression of something in the Being we call God that is unexpected, namely, agape love. As Dr. King said in his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize which I have stated elsewhere on this blog: “Unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.” It reminds me of the lady who died who pointed at the wall and her eyes sparkled before she fell back dead. There are many more, people who saw their loved ones, people who saw Jesus, people who saw Heaven coming. There is a greatness, something wonderful about what the influence of the one who claimed to be the Son of God (and rightly so) can do in the lives of those filled with despair). Strange is it not that this person, Jesus of Nazareth, should have such ennobling, uplifting, inspiring, and transforming effect on people some 2000 years later (as well as in all the years since)? You might want to explain that in your considerations of the evidences for God.
Chris, you have said that there are more than two possibilities, but the ones you have named fit neatly under infinite regress and/or something coming from nothing (depending on how you define “eternal something.” You are again pleading ignorance of other unknown possibilities in the “wild and weird” universe. You cannot base a logical argument on unknown discoveries in the future. Logically, if you are looking for a natural rather than a supernatural explanation, you must choose an infinite regress or something coming from nothing. Every theory advanced so far fits under one of those two categories. If both are incorrect, then the only alternative explanation is a supernatural Creator.
I continue to pray for you. I have some atheist friends, all of whom grew up in a Christian culture. They thought they were Christians at one time, but none of them actually surrendered to Christ in repentance and faith. None of them actually experienced forgiveness of sin. They at one time intellectually believed in Christ, but they had not experienced true conversion. One of them is a seminary graduate. Another one met me for lunch almost every Friday for two years. He would continually bring new objections/supposed inconsistencies to the Bible to my attention. I did my best to answer his concerns. After two years of this pattern, I finally asked him this: If you were smart enough to understand everything in the Bible and you finally believed it was completely true, would you then surrender your life to Christ in repentance and faith? He refused to answer, and his silence told me that his intellectual objections were not the main issue. He realized that something was missing in his life spiritually; that is why he continually approached me and attended Christian events. He had grown comfortable, however, in the life he was now living, and he did not want to change. Chris, maybe the reason you continue posting here is that you realize that something is missing spiritually in your life and that you might find real Christianity here, not what you experienced in the past. I will continue to pray that intellectual barriers to Christianity will be removed in your life and that you will have a divine appointment very soon.
“You cannot base a logical argument on unknown discoveries in the future.”
I don’t, this is why I’m not trying to prove to you how the universe came to be. I don’t know how it came to be. You, on the other hand, are trying to argue how the universe came to be. Thus far, you have presented no evidence. All you have done is attempted to knock down other possibilities, then asserting that yours must be the correct answer despite the fact that you cannot know that there are no other possibilities (and despite having failed to disprove the other options).
As for the rest of your comment, now you’ve devolved into sheer silliness. The Christian love of shoehorning people into predefined boxes continues unabated. Your theology will not allow you to consider “used to be Christian” as an actual thing, so of course those who “claimed” to be Christian couldn’t have actually been Christian. I will grant you, however, that I never did encounter Christ – it is difficult to encounter a being that does not exist (whether or not Jesus of Nazareth was once a real person, he isn’t around today).
I can say that some sort of God remains an option on the table for the universe. There is no reason to think it is the correct option, but who knows, maybe we’ll yet discover something that points to God. I doubt it. But I am confident the Christian God is a farce, a fable, and no one has encountered him. The Christian Bible is sufficient to disprove the God it claims to proclaim. And rest assured I am familiar with the answers to the inconsistencies – once upon a time, it was me who met with the doubters to try and help them with what they thought were inconsistencies. Knowing the answers, I know how far they fall short. More special pleading, more straw men, more slight of hand, all of it folly.
It is my hope that one day you – and all others here – will realize that the time you devote in service to God is wasted. May you realize this before it is too late to do something of real value with your life. I am grateful to have seen Christianity for what it is while still relatively young, but even so, I have many regrets over all the time and money I wasted on the church, on seminary, on pastoring, etc. I had so many good opportunities and I squandered them all in service to a mirage. May it not happen to anyone else.
Chris, I think I can speak for the majority if not all of those who post here and say that we love you and wish you the best. You are obviously very intelligent, and I will continue to pray that you will see that there are only two possibilities for natural explanations. Either there is an infinite regress, or there’s not. If there’s not, and if something did not come from nothing, then by the logical process of elimination, a supernatural Creator does indeed exist.
Except you still haven’t demonstrated why it has to be a supernatural creator (by which I assume you mean has to be an intelligent, personal entity) instead of some other natural, self-existent possibility. Don’t just give me your answer – I already know that – show me your work.
If you are referring to a “natural, self-existent” universe, then you are returning to an infinite regress. The natural universe is constantly changing; the supernatural Creator does not change. An impersonal force that is not omniscient would be incapable of creating the universe. Geisler’s version of the cosmological argument is appropriate here:
“(1) Some things undeniably exist (e.g., I cannot deny my own existence).
(2) My nonexistence is possible.
(3) Whatever has the possibility not to exist is currently caused to exist by another.
(4) There cannot be an infinite regress of current causes of existence.
(5) Therefore, a first uncaused cause of my current existence exists.
(6) This uncaused cause must be infinite, unchanging, all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-perfect.
(7) This infinitely perfect Being is appropriately called ‘God.’
(8) Therefore, God exists.
(9) This God who exists is identical to the God described in the Christian Scriptures.
(10) Therefore, the God described in the Bible exists.”
Norman Geisler, Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1976), 238-239.
Craig’s version is also good:
“The kal?m cosmological argument originated in the attempts of Christian thinkers to rebut Aristotle’s doctrine of the eternity of the universe and was developed by medieval Islamic theologians into an argument for the existence of God. Let’s look at the formulation of this argument by al-Gh?zal? (1058-1111). He reasons, ‘Every being which begins has a cause for its beginning.’ . . . The second premise is that the world, or the universe, began to exist. In support of this premise Gh?zal? argues that it is impossible that there should be an infinite regress of events in time, that is to say, that the series of past events should be beginningless. He gives several reasons for this conclusion. For one thing, the series of past events comes to an end in the present—but the infinite cannot come to an end. . . . But Gh?zal?’s point may be that if the regress of past events were infinite, then it would be impossible for the present moment to arrive. For it is impossible to cross the infinite to get to today. So today could never arrive, which is absurd, for here we are! . . . It therefore follows that there must be a cause of its beginning, which Gh?zal? identifies with God, the Eternal.”
(William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith, 96-97)
Mike,
“If you are referring to a “natural, self-existent” universe, then you are returning to an infinite regress.”
Nope, I’m not limiting myself to that, as I’ve explained several times in my comments.
Your modified Geisler is rife with unsubstantiated leaps. Surely you don’t take them seriously. We’ve already noted some of the problems throughout the discussion but this introduces several with serious problems. Please tell me I don’t have to point them out.
At any rate, his syllogism doesn’t come close to proving your claim that the self-existent cause must be omniscient. See my option #3. I’ve already explained why this does not fit within either of your options. The uncaused cause of my #3 differs from “God” in only two ways: (1) many created universes instead of just 1 (though I should note that such a hypothetical thing could perhaps spin off just one and done, or 10, or 100, or 500 trillion), and (2) it is not a personal, intelligent being. Since you are hung up on infinite regress, we can focus on my #3. Since it does not have a cause, it has nothing to regress to. Your problem of infinite regress is avoided. And if it is spinning off multiple universes, we have also nicely dealt with teleological arguments.
I have no idea whether or not my option #3 is actual. I do know it strikes me as possible – at the very least, it is as much of a possibility as a self-existent eternal intelligence. I understand why you do not want this to be so, but you have yet to prove otherwise, nor have you even begun to demonstrate why the uncaused cause must be omniscient.
As for Kalam, here again I’ve already mentioned it several times.
One suspects you have a pre-packaged set of responses to certain particular triggers and you pull them out of a hat without considering all that has been said. You certainly haven’t done much in the way of interacting with the fullness of my comments, only the bits you wish to shoehorn.
All of that aside, I appreciate the chuckle from the modification of Geisler’s syllogism. While I don’t have a great deal of respect for Geisler’s powers of reason, nonetheless I would hope and assume his original syllogism was at least a wee bit more complete than that.
Chris, you said:
“The uncaused cause of my #3 differs from ‘God in only two ways: (1) many created universes instead of just 1 (though I should note that such a hypothetical thing could perhaps spin off just one and done, or 10, or 100, or 500 trillion), and (2) it is not a personal, intelligent being.”
Okay, let’s reexamine your #3:
“3. An eternal, self-existent something that spins off new universes (this would be close to the ‘impersonal’ uncaused cause mentioned by Keas) – something that always existed, had no cause, was not intelligent or personal, but was the cause of all things (this differs from your #1 by starting with an uncaused cause rather than just an endless system of cause and effect).”
If your #3 is natural rather than supernatural, then we know this about it:
1. It changes over time. This factor necessarily brings back the infinite chain of cause and effect. The “eternal something” that you mention is not now the same something that it used to be. This, of course, is an additional difference with God that you can add to your list. If there is no unchanging, absolute standard, then you are ultimately left with Nihilism, which springs from naturalism. Consider what Nietzsche said: “One knows my demand of philosophers that they place themselves beyond good and evil–and that they have the illusion of moral judgment beneath them. This demand follows from an insight formulated by me: that there are no moral facts whatever.” (Nietzsche, “The ‘Improvers’ of Mankind”)
2. It is not omniscient. You have admitted that it is not intelligent. Thus, for such a complicated universe to exist, you need a mechanism such as natural selection (the macroevolution variety), which Richard Dawkins calls the “blind watchmaker.” The problem with this, however, is that irreducibly complex things cannot come into existence through a series of gradual steps. Darwin admitted: “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” (Darwin, On the Origin of the Species by Natural Selection, 1859, page 189)
3. If it is not personal, then you are left with an impersonal force, out of which a universe spontaneously pops. You are thus using a variation of something coming from nothing. Instead of nothingness, something spontaneously comes from a fluctuating, changing impersonal force. If there is something there, whether described as a force or energy, then you are back to an infinite regress. Hawking (a mathematician that I assume is respected by you) understood the absurdity of an infinite regress. He said that the universe “would quite literally be created out of nothing: not just out of the vacuum, but out of absolutely nothing at all, because there is nothing outside of the universe.” (Hawking and Penrose, The Nature of Space and Time, 2010, page 85)
To sum up, all theories of origins (e.g., oscillating, steady state, vacuum fluctuation, quantum gravity, string theory, young earth creationism, old earth creationism) presented so far fit under three possibilities:
1. Supernatural Creation from nothing
2. Infinite Regress of the chain of cause and effect
3. Spontaneous generation from nothing
Numbers 2 and 3 are logically impossible; thus, number 1 is the only logical possibility. Chris, all of your proposed theories fit within numbers 2 and 3. I understand your frustration.
Mike,
I’m not sure what to tell you that I haven’t already said. You are trying to win an argument by fiat. You are declaring What You Think Must Be but, as I said before, you have not shown your work. We have before us five distinct options for origins – and those are just the ones we’ve come up with in the course of this discussion. However inconvenient it may be for your argument, the positions I’ve presented cannot be shoehorned into your convenient straw men.
Chris, I did my best to understand the “eternal somethings” that you posited, but you did not provide any more detail when asked for it. With that degree of vagueness and lack of detail, your theories could be “shoehorned” into a number of places. If you want accuracy in my analysis of your theories, please provide details. It’s not too late to do so.
Mike,
I provided sufficient detail. What I did not do was concede “God”. Therefore, you shoehorned.
Chris, do you understand that by using the term “eternal something” to describe a naturalistic origin you have admitted the existence of an infinite regress? Anything natural changes with time. It is part of spacetime, stuck on the timeline, and therefore part of the chain of cause and effect. By using the term “eternal,” you have made it an infinite chain of cause and effect (the infinite regress that is logically impossible).
Mike,
“Anything natural changes with time.”
Two quick thoughts:
1. You keep saying that, but have not yet defended it. Why do you insist that anything natural changes with time? How do you know that every natural thing changes with time?
2. As far as change goes, God (as found in the Bible) changes. It is a peculiarity of Christian theology to claim that God does not change, but the claim doesn’t stand up under scrutiny. Here’s a basic example. Consider:
Today I don’t have a shirt.
Tomorrow I buy a shirt.
Something about me changes. I go from shirtless to shirted.
You claim God is eternal but the universe isn’t.
God didn’t have the universe (hadn’t created it yet).
Then God had a universe.
God changed.
A host of similar problems could be raised regarding God and his ways, even if we try to shift away from observing God from within our time reference.
If you want to claim that my eternal something cannot be because of change, then you have similarly eliminated God. The only kind of change in the hypothetical entity I propose is the same kind of change experienced by God.
(As an aside, it is perhaps worth noting that in the Bible, the declaration that God does not change appears to have more to do with his mind, his thoughts, his decrees, etc, rather than some sort of ontological change. He will not change his ways (even though he does, frequently); he will not change his position (even though he does), he will not change his decrees (even though he does), etc. It doesn’t seem to indicate that ontological state-changes are ruled out.)
Chris,
Regarding proof of change for natural things, note what Ronald Brown, professor of physics at Cal Poly said:
“All natural processes occur in such a way that the total entropy of the universe increases.”
Entropy implies change. As you know the Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to the entire universe. The universe is considered to be a closed system, and everything in the universe is affected.
In regard to God changing, I’m sure you know that we consider God to be both transcendent and immanent, living in eternity. This topic has been discussed in atheism.about.com. You seem to believe that God changed when the universe was created:
“God didn’t have the universe (hadn’t created it yet). Then God had a universe.
God changed.”
Hawking answered your objection: “As we shall see, the concept of time has no meaning before the beginning of the universe. This was first pointed out by St. Augustine.”
Hawking, A Brief History of Time, page 8.
By definition, God is omniscient. Nothing surprises Him. Nothing changes Him.
Mike,
On change for natural things, no doubt the good professor was speaking with reference to things within the universe. I doubt very much that general statement was meant as a comprehensive definition of all possible natural things.
Now we see more equivocation. If you say God was changeless because he existed out of time, then my eternal something was also changeless because it too exists out of time. It creates spacetime, it doesn’t live within it.
An additional point I meant to note: the way you attempt to worm around the problem of God changing reflects something I observed much earlier – namely, we have difficulty even understanding what “before time” means. You want to claim that only a self-existent intelligence (for whom we have no evidence – you still haven’t shown the work) could exist outside of time, though we don’t even know enough to know what could or could not be possible in such a circumstance.
In this context, “natural” by definition indicates something in nature, something in a universe, not outside of it. Thus, “all possible natural things” occur in a universe, not outside of one. If your “eternal something” exists outside of a universe and thus is not a “natural” creator, then it must be a supernatural creator, correct?
Mike,
You’re stretching even more than usual this time.
Chris, if you are an atheist rather than an agnostic, then you obviously believe that God does not exist and you believe that you have logical reasons for that belief that can be presented in this forum. As a Christian I obviously believe that God exists, and I believe that I have logical reasons for that belief by using the process of elimination (disjunctive syllogism). The burden of proof is shared by both of us. I believe that I can put every naturalistic theory of origins under the two categories that are logically impossible. We disagree about your naturalistic “eternal something,” and if nothing else is proposed, we are stuck there.
Mike,
When it comes to my atheism, it means that I do not believe in God. You do believe in God. The burden of proof is on you, not both of us.
When it comes to the Christian God, I believe he clearly does not exist. That puts me under a burden of proof. But this post has been a bit more general: whether or not God exists. As I have had to repeatedly explain, the burden is on the person who believes, not the person who does not believe, just as the person who believes in big foot must prove he is real; the burden is not on the person who does not believe in big foot.
Christian attempts to shift the burden of proof are a tacit admission of defeat: knowing they cannot sustain their burden, they try to shift the playing field.
Good night, everyone!
Dear brothers in Christ,
I fail to see the need to prove anything, as if God can be proved naturalistically.
The Bible doesn’t ‘prove’ God, it presupposes Him.
You can’t argue someone [for example: Chris Roberts] into salvation.
So what is the point?
If the point is only to show that such an argument can kind of be made, oh good…
We read from Romans 1:
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools…
And in another place we are told that the fool says from his heart, that there is no God.
So what is the point of the debate? Can a few logical, or illogical, or whatever, premises overcome the darkened heart? Can such reasoning change someone who is futile in their thinking?
No and No.
Sorry brothers, but I think you are just performing useless intellectual exercises.
For it is quite obvious that Chris R. [and those he represents] have no need to prove anything. They are deniers of truth, rebellious against truth, content to bask in the lie. The knowledge they need to overcome the ignorance that is in them can ONLY be supplied by God Himself.
Many blessings to you in the Lord,
mike
Furthermore,
Scientists seek to find the origins of the universe but are just chasing their tails. Science can never find any proof of the supernatural. If all the now known scientific experiments were used to examine the water Jesus turned into wine, all the would find is wine. The multiple loaves and fish: just bread and fish. Examining the scene after the red sea came back together: just drowned Egyptians.
The supernatural can not be discovered by scientific methods. Thus if you believe that God created the world and universe from nothing, then science can never prove [or disprove] that belief.
Likewise, arguments from logic, can only take you so far. They cannot prove anything. God is only grasped by faith until such a time that He chooses to reveal Himself. [Like at the End.]
One more thing:
Everything is made up of something.
But every time we figure out the smallest thing that seems to make up everything else, we find something smaller that makes up that.
Likewise, the outer limits of the universe will never be found.
To one with understanding, we see these as evidences of the greatness of the Almighty God. But to the hardhearted and ignorant, they keep looking for answers anyplace but where they are.
“Christian attempts to shift the burden of proof are a tacit admission of defeat: knowing they cannot sustain their burden, they try to shift the playing field.”
Brothers,
Who makes up these rules?
And why do you act as if they are important [the rules that is]?
God is only known by faith. Our faith is the evidence. To us.
By embracing the idea that our faith is all we have, we fling ourselves upon the Lord, and in doing so, cut the ties of the world. Those ties bind us to worldly ways of thinking and understanding.
Now if God, in His most wonderful Word, chose not to prove Himself to those who read it, except by the combination of it and the Holy Spirit, why do you gentlemen desire to embark on proving Him with your own words, which pale in wisdom and understanding when compared to His Word?
Let the unbeliever mock us.
Let the atheist deride our faith.
We need not their approval to have peace or esteem.
Mike,
Faith doesn’t work. Believe me, I know this from my former days as a faithful and faith-filled Christian.
Chris R.,
You have created a paradox where none is necessary. God given faith does work, man generated faith never works. Your testimony is clearly a reality of man generated faith. So, when you say “Faith doesn’t work”…that is your testimony, …yet not one faith-filled Christian would have the testimony you depend upon.
You have been very clear on those points since you started interacting with this site, but you continue to be confused on what faith is, and who believers are. You are persistent though!
Chris,
Begging the question (“God given faith”) does nothing to resolve the problem.
As for when I started interacting on this site, you might recall that I started coming here several years ago, back when I was still a Christian – and a pastor, to boot!
Chris R, no question begging necessary. You are wrong, God is right. End of story. The faith that God gives is evidential and substantive. The writer to the Hebrews makes that abundantly clear; history bears it well.
The confusion you have about faith and belief does not beg any question.
God is never mocked, even in the instance that your mind deems him absent, or none existent.
As far as the pastor thing,… history is replete with pastors that “were Christian”. That is nothing new my friend.
“You are wrong, God is right. End of story.”
The ultimate example of someone throwing in the towel. “I can’t prove my case so I’ll just declare it and close the door.”
Chris R.,
“…back when I was still a Christian…”
You keep saying that yet no one here will ever agree. As one who denies the God of the bible and his holy word, you simply don’t get to define the terms of Christianity. You never were a Christian. Curiously, why do you like to say you were? According to your belief system, that makes you look like a complete idiot, right?
Les,
No doubt no one here will ever agree. And no doubt you will never convince me that I was any less a Christian than you are right now – or, conversely, you are no more born again and Spirit filled now than I was then.
Chris R,. You still don’t get it. No one here is trying to convince you. It is your confession alone that bears out the truth about which faith is alive in you, and it is by your testimony that it is you and you alone. If I could persuade you to receive the other faith,…by all means I would try. Yet, my mission is to try to tell you the truth,….not attempt to convince you that your testimony is false.
Chris,
Then why are you trying to convince me?
Chris R, I’ll type more slowly this time…. I am trying to tell you the truth. Convincing takes too much debate. I certainly can’t convince you to have faith. Telling you what is true is better for both of us.
Chris,
There you go again, trying to convince me.
Chris R.,
If God does indeed save you some day it will be fun to look back over these comment streams.
Les,
Indeed.
Chris R.,
Oh come on, you’re smarter than that.
You know perfectly well that whatever you subjectively felt when you were professing Christianity does not have to be what anyone else is feeling.
I wish you would quit being so hypocritical. One moment disdaining anything but what can be proven scientifically, and then the next, judging everyone else by what you yourself felt.
These guys are being so patient with you, and do you know why?
Because, just like you, they know that they too were losers, and still would be, except by the grace of God. And just like you, we know that we would be lost and condemned, except by the grace and mercy of the Lord.
May His grace and mercy lift you to the Rock that is higher than you,
mike
Yes Mike, that’s right.
If one BY THE SPIRIT truly has faith in Jesus – and is a real “faith filled Christian” it always sticks.
Notice our resident blasphemer spoke of “faith” and never spoke of the Spirit – “no man comes on that’s the Spirit calls him.”
This blasphemer is a prime example that one cannot “intellectualize” themselves to God – he is right about one thing at least – THAT doesn’t work.
Tarheel,
You realize, of course, that no matter how I express my former faith, you or someone will find some way to nitpick it to try and make it appear it was all fake. One could do the same with any statement you make about your relationship with Christ (or apparent lack thereof).
“You realize, of course, that no matter how I express my former faith, you or someone will find some way to nitpick it to try and make it appear it was all fake.”
Oh – We don’t have to “make it appear” anything – the proof is obvious for all to see.
Despite that reality – I continue to pray that you will soon repent and believe.
Chris,
Just an observation, and it’s related to the article, if you’re former faith was genuine then you have a basis to discern the nature of the genuine faith of others. If, on the other hand, you didn’t have genuine faith, then you don’t have a basis for judging the nature of the genuine faith of others. At this point someone who doesn’t have genuine faith could only hold genuine faith to be subjective. However, for someone with genuine faith, the Bible gives us objective categories for assurance of faith.
How does this relate to the article? The proof is in the proverbial pudding. It can only be subjective to the unbeliever because he denies the object, whereas it’s objective to the believer because he affirms the object. And this object is God who determines these things.
At this it can be observed that the believer’s appeal to the objective will never convince a devout unbeliever and the unbeliever’s appeal to the subjective will never convince the believer. What is required for recognition of the objective is a work of the Holy Spirit.
Jim,
Your position is essentially begging the question and somewhat circular: genuine faith proves that faith is real. But if there is no Spirit, no regeneration, no God at work in the ways described by the Bible, then there is no such thing as genuine faith and all of those subjective experiences which you attribute to the Spirit turn out to be psychological phenomena after all.
“…the believer’s appeal to the objective will never convince a devout unbeliever and the unbeliever’s appeal to the subjective will never convince the believer. What is required for recognition of the objective is a work of the Holy Spirit.”
I think you have the subjective/objective terms mixed up a little. What I appeal to are the objective tools of science. What you appeal to are subjective experiences that you attribute to the Holy Spirit. There is no objective measurement to show the Spirit at work. Even if you can show me a person whose life has been radically changed, you can in no way prove that this change was brought about by a divine force – particularly since similar life changes can be demonstrated in people of other religions and people of no religion. All of the evidences claimed by Christianity turn up all over the world in a whole host of disconnected contexts. So, again, there is no objective objective recognition of the Spirit.
You want what is classically formulated in Christianity: “have faith in order to understand.” This sets the stage for confirmation bias: let your guard down, be ready to accept the claims of religion, don’t be a skeptic but trust by faith that the things of God are true. From that standpoint, it become superficially simple to rationalize pretty much any belief you wish, from UFO’s to ghosts to vaccine-induced autism to Area 51 to God. When you know without evidence that your belief is true, when you accept uncritically (by faith), anything at all can be grabbed and claimed as justification for belief. Christianity is not alone in doing this. We all have this tendency to some degree or another. What differentiates the scientist from the Christian is the willingness (ideally) to set bias aside. I say ideally because, again, people are people and scientists have the same tendency toward confirmation bias but then the tools and methods of science come into play to help protect conclusions from biases. I just recently watched a brief Neil DeGrasse Tyson clip on this very thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mIfmeHzdQc
‘You want what is classically formulated in Christianity: “have faith in order to understand.”’
I didn’t tell you what I want. Whether your statement is true or not, you must assume something you don’t know.
“What I appeal to are the objective tools of science. “
You assume naturalistic monism without proof.
“There is no objective measurement to show the Spirit at work.”
I predicted objectively that you would argue like this and gave the reason why. My argument stands.
“Believe me, I know this from my former days as a faithful and faith-filled Christian.”
And then there’s this:
“Although hypocrites and other unregenerate men may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions of being in the favor of God, and estate of salvation (which hope of theirs shall perish): yet such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love him in sincerity, endeavoring to walk in all good conscience before him, may, in this life, be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace, and may rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, which hope shall never make them ashamed.”
Les,
All I can say about your comment is Amen!
As usual – Les nails it.
Monkees theology.
No really, a little humor here.
Posted on Facebook:
>>>My girlfriend said she was leaving me due to my obsession with the Monkees. I didn’t believe her…
Til I saw her face. <<<
Remember how the song goes…
When I saw her face, Now I'm a believer.
I couldn't leave her if I tried…
The theology part?
2nd Cor. 4
3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. 4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Once we were blinded by sin, enemies of God, then we saw His face, the glory of God in the face of Jesus. Whoever sees the glory of God in the face of Jesus is then a believer, and could never deny seeing Him.
Whoever claims to have seen the glory of God in the face of Jesus and then denies there is a God or that Jesus is God is a liar, and the truth was never in him.
I saw His face,and now I am a believer, and I couldn't leave Him if I tried.