Originally posted by 1Way
Attention – As to 1 – Thanks kindly.
2 – But that is not at all in agreement with what I said. You are granting the opposite of what I said, that God exists outside of time is a notion that I do not grant. But I see that you are doing this to build up to a latter point.
Well you put the finger indeed on the weak spot, because in all discussion about this hypothetical entity, it becomes never entiterely clear as to what God is and what not, where and when he is, and in what form. It's a kind of peek-a-boo game, if you go detemine it in one way, it follows it is in directly the other way (also if you would have started at first in that direction).
I already stated and declared here, that there is no other place for God then a phenomena of our consciousness itself, and God can not exist outside of that.
So, please take a position, if you want to defeat that. If God is outside of the mind itself, then God needs to be somewhere at some time, else God would not exist.
But then you go too far. I posited, and you agreed, that time is eternal, I do not believe the exact same thing about the universe, and I am not sure about space. I understand space as including infinity, just like time in the expression of eternity, they are unending, so “perhaps” space is also eternal, but I’m not at all certain.
Spacetime is infinite, indeed.
But certainly I do not believe that this created universe existed prior to God’s creation of it. Now, I do believe that the natural laws of the universe, one might say, of reality, along with God’s morality and righteousness and love etc., that they all existed from eternity past. But I do not believe that the created material universe has existed from eternity past, but I do imagine that something of this world’s form and nature was in the mind of creator God at some point prior to creation.
Where does your notion comes from that matter itself (and not just material existence forms, which are always existing in a finite spatiotemporal extend) is not eternal?
When did you see matter coming from nothing and nowhere, or going to nothing or nowhere?
I would say it this way, God supercedes (is over, is beyond, transcends) all of His creation, necessarily, just as any creator is necessarily greater and transcends his creation.
God is indeed transedential, in the sense that the human mind "invented" this Deity at some point, and also disinvented this same Deity, which all by all is not a neutral action, but one which lead to increase in knowledge and understanding.
Let me explain what I mean.
First we have started to explore the material world, and our first conclusion from observation is that everything that exists, exists in a finite spatiotemporal form.
We then try the assumption that all of existence, the universe in total, would need to be in a finite spatiotemporal domain.
This then leads to the concept of a begin of time. A problem, since from nothing we will never get something.
So we inventend the Deity, to "transcend" a nothing to something. But this Deity can in no way be finite itself, since this Deity then must have existed always, and was uncaused. Otherwise we would have to start again, for inventing a cause for this Deity. Therefore the Deity must have existed eternally and be infinite. However, we can not assume that anything exists outside of time, matter and space.
This then leads to the contradiction, which only can be solved, by reconsidering our first assumption, that matter was finite in spatiotemporal extend.
Our conclusion is then: matter is not finite but infinite in spatiotemporal extend.
As can be shown in the above, in which at some point of the argument we assume God, only to see in later instance that we have to remove that assumption, that the end result is NOT the existence of God, but it's non-existence.
However, the reasoning can not be said to have not lead to new knowledge and insight, since we altered the initial assumption of a finite extend of the natural world, the universe, to that of an infinite extend. An (infinite) large step!
In fact the reasoning is a form of dialectical reasoning.
This has the following form:
1. Thesis
2. Anti-thesis
3. Syntesis
This is known as the negation of the negation. The anti-thesis is the negation of the Thesis, and the Synthese is the anti-thesis of the Anti-thesis, which is the negation of the negation of the original Thesis. What we get back is the original Thesis, but with a richer and enhanced content.
In the previous example this would have the following form.
[1] Thesis:
The universe is finite in spatiotemporal extend.
[2] Anti-Thesis:
God has caused all of space, time and matter.
But God can not have itself a cause, therefore God must be infinite and eternal.
[3] Synthesis:
Outside of matter, space and time, nothing can exist, which means God can not exist. Therefore: the universe must be infinite in spatiotemporal extend.
The dialectical law of the negation of the negation, is the general law that describes any form of development.
Take for example this example of a dialectical process, describing how in general reproduction occurs in nature.
[1] Thesis
A seed of a plant
[2] Anti-Thesis
Out of the seed grows a plant, which destroyes (negates) the seed.
[3] Synthesis
The plant grows new seeds, which is the source of new plants which grow even when the original plant has died.
We get back with what we started, but not in the exact same form, but in a new form, which involves quantitative and qualitative changes!
Instead of one seed, we get as result several seeds. And those seeds are not exact copies of the original seed, but slight changes occured in DNA of the seed.
This is how evolution can be understood as a dialectical process.
All proceses in nature as well as in consciousness, are in last instance dialectical.
The only choices we have are that
- the universe has always existed, which is in denial of all known hard science that there is no such thing as a perpetual motion machine, and that entropy is a state that moves from order to disorder, not the opposition direction.
- The universe created itself from nothing, pure impossibility.
- Or a capable creator created the universe.
Those are the only three options for the origin of the universe, either it has no origin in that it is eternal (a perfectly unscientific notion), or it created itself from nothing (just as ludicrous), or a capable transcendent creator created the universe, there are no other options.
For my reasoning for the eternal infinite uncreated universe, see my previous argument.
You appearantly have a problem in the notion of an eternal and infinite existing universe, as you make references to the second law arguments.
So, your notion is that everything becomes more disorganised? That there is no progressive development?
Man, haven't you read any history? Everything that happened in history just proofs to the contrary. Man itself has develop from an ape like existence into a well organised societal form. Please disproof that one. We have invented more and more complex things. All that proofs that things realy went progressively, into more order, instead of more disorder.
Aren't you able of seeing those facts?
Comparing to the state of the universe shortly after the Big Bang, after that atoms formed, I would for sure state that the current form of the universe is more organised.
The second law is applicable ONLY to closed and finite thermodynamic systems. How can you put the whole universe in a laboratory sized system? You can't. And you can't proof that the universe is a closed system, other then assuming it. Built your argument, starting with a real closed TD system, and add systems to it, that could form a larger closed TD system, untill you have covered the entire universe. But this you can never complete, because either you end up with an open system, or you have not come to completely include the whole universe.
Further. Let us just assume the universe WAS a real closed TD system. This would apply to both the first and second law then.
From the first law we would need to state that the amount of matter and energy must have remained the same, throughout all of time. From the second law we obtain the conclusion that the amount of useuable energy would have to run down.
Conclusion: the universe would have already run out of useuable energy. Contradiction: we observe that the sun still shines.
How can you resolve this contradiction, without removing the unwarranted assumption that the universe is a closed TD system.
You can't, without raising even deeper and profounder contradictions, which you also need to solve.
Conclusion: in no possible way can the universe be a closed TD system. The terms open and closed don't even apply to the universe, since it is an infinite system.
As to No, that is what atheists have tried to relegate the truth about God, that He is only a concept in the mind, He is not real. However, if you were truthful about the existence of anything, you know that either it had to have existed from eternity past, or it created it’self without a transcendent creator, or it was created by a transcendent creator, there are no other options.
Matter exist in the form of eternal motion and is infinite.
No doubt about that.
If you give this concept just a few minuets of honest consideration, it is only reasonable to assume that a transcendent God created all of creation, to suggest otherwise is to deny all we certainly know about the universe (no perpetual motion machine, and nothing can create itself) and what it means for a creator to be beyond it’s creation. In short, it’s to ditch all reason and logic and assert in its place that which is to opposite of reason and logic. And for what reason do mere humans do this tremendous breach of logic and reason? The do it just to try to ease their conscience about the truth of a living and just and righteous God, who they would otherwise have to be accountable to for eternal judgment.
I have given the "concept" already an infinite amount of considerations, and in no possible way it would work or could defeat my point of view and that of materialism.
I have seriously tried! I'm sorry!
Perhaps you should try the other option. Not God, but matter exists in primary instance, and which was neither created or destroyed, is infinite and eternal.
A lot of societal phenomena can also be explained at the basis of materialism. As for instance historical materialism, explains why the society changes, what forces are working in society, etc.
Talk about a blind faith and a determination to be willfully ignorant, just so that one’s immorality might be eternally ignored. The atheist is like a sick man who says that the terminal disease that infects him does not exist, he is not sick and when he dies according to all the known predictions of accumulated medical science and understanding, he will have died because of the disease despite his unbelief of the truth in reality. He could have been set free from the false belief and given life more fully, but some just cant stand the notion that they desperately need a physician’s help.
I don't hold this things for any argument. In my mind, they are the theists that the the most immoral beings that exists.
And we have some historic records to back that claim up!
Your claim that God is just in the mind is like saying that all terminal diseases do not exist and so you neglect the medical care that may have saved your life, all for the unscientific and contradictory notion that the terminal disease only exists in the mind and not in reality, even though all hard science and medical understanding is clear that terminal diseases exist.
Ok. Then let us assume that God is not a concept of the mind, but exists in reality.
Then it is to you the burden of proof that God exists in an objective way, and can provide hard evidence for God.
Go ahead!
