The Atheist's Dilemma

[+Link of Hyrule]

I am inferring from the available facts. I am not ashamed to admit that is all it is. Still it is a more evidence based inference than belief in a creator which is pure faith. The ultimate answer will be some variation on what I have suggested - but I really don't care since it is merely an object of curiosity - nothing depends on it for me.

Ultimately you could say they are equally probable - but one follows from the known rules of physics where as the other follows from your imagination. Thats a big difference.

Br Cornelius

My problem with your argument is that it sounds like a Sci-fi explanation based on science that has no way of providing your assertion. Don't get me wrong, some of the greatest sci-fi writers and authors through the years have been scarily accurate in their predications of the future. You may be right, but at our present knowledge I don't think we can really say. As you note, there is no way to measure what is inside a Black Hole, so in a very real sense you're suggesting that a mega black hole will reach critical mass, and explode all the building blocks of the universe back into the universe in a new Big Bang. Except you've just admitted that we can't measure inside a Black Hole, so how do you come to your conclusions? Ultimately it's a guess, an hypothesis that cannot ever be tested. Which is why it feels to me like a sci-fi attempt at explaining things.

As said, "I don't know" is a really decent response that I have no problem in accepting. I also have no problem in accepting my belief in God to be non-empirical. I won't agree that the idea of God comes only from my imagination because I've had too much personal experience to deny the existence of God It would be dishonest to myself if I were to suggest that for my life. But this evidence I've experienced is personal, not empirical, which is why I don't put it out there as justification that "God must exist", I simply accept that he does. In any case, as I said, my reason for posting you to begin with had nothing to do with proving God or saying "we don't know therefore God did it". It was simply your initial assertion that the term "God always existed" is transferable with the phrase "the universe always existed". I don't think they can, not without appealing to "I don't know" as a reason for the always-existing universe.

[Bendy Demon]

Matter is made up of energy.

Right. And what sort of energy do we speak of here? There are many different types.

There was nothing no time, no energy before the big bang. Physics says there was a big bang and it created all of the energy inn our universe. But back to the big bang since nothing existed , what caused the big bang.

Energy, be it electrical or magnetic, is needed to make particles move before enough can accumulate in order to do much of anything.

So..no energy, no bang.

P.S: "Time" is a human created concept and thus has no reality outside of the human brain.

[+Liquid Gardens]

It was simply your initial assertion that the term "God always existed" is transferable with the phrase "the universe always existed". I don't think they can, not without appealing to "I don't know" as a reason for the always-existing universe.

Do you likewise admit that the idea you thought 'untenable', that the universe could exist forever or not have a cause, is also actually phrased that you don't know? You appeal to the 'law of Causality' and assert that the universe is subject to it, but 'you don't know' that causality that you say is a product of this universe actually applies to the creation of the universe itself. Rules that are the product of something don't really apply before that something exists.

[StarMountainKid]

If I may interject, I would submit that inside the event horizon of a black hole, all the laws of physics including causality and the elapsing of time exist (although under extreme circumstances) until the singularity (if it exists) is reached. The only difference between space-time outside the event horizon and space-time inside the event horizon is the intensity of gravity. At the singularity all is speculation.

[+Link of Hyrule]

Do you likewise admit that the idea you thought 'untenable', that the universe could exist forever or not have a cause, is also actually phrased that you don't know? You appeal to the 'law of Causality' and assert that the universe is subject to it, but 'you don't know' that causality that you say is a product of this universe actually applies to the creation of the universe itself. Rules that are the product of something don't really apply before that something exists.

Absolutely true that "I don't know" is applicable to my views on the cause of the universe, though I'll also readily admit that I have had experience with "god" personally and therefore cannot dismiss a Primal Cause deity. However, based on the logic I presented in my first post (re: a "creator deity" existing independently of the laws it itself created) then at the very least one needs to account for why the universe disobeyed its own laws, while a belief in a creator deity needs no such accounting. Hence why I began my post - to point out that the phrases are NOT transferable as Br Cornelius attested. They are not at all the same.

[Quaentum]

Matter is made up of energy. Energy must have time to exist. There was nothing no time no energy before the big bang. Physics says there was a big bang and it created all of the energy inn our universe. But back to the big bang since nothing existed , what caused the big bang. l

Maybe we are in the aftermath of a explosive. How would we know.

Since energy can neither be created nor destroyed the big bang didn't create it but released it. If you notice when the scientists talk about nuclear explosions they don't refer to the creation of energy but the release of it.

[+Liquid Gardens]

However, based on the logic I presented in my first post (re: a "creator deity" existing independently of the laws it itself created) then at the very least one needs to account for why the universe disobeyed its own laws, while a belief in a creator deity needs no such accounting.

You need to show first that the 'universe disobeyed its own laws' which I don't think you've really done yet. How does causality work if there is no time? And as I asked, you stated earlier that causality is a product of this universe; if it is, why do you think causality applies when there is no universe? I am definitely not a physicist, but I'm pretty sure that the way things work in the quantum world are counter-intuitive and on appearances may seem to violate 'causality'. It seems that a few people who know more than I are asserting that energy or something appears to pop out of 'nothing' as far as we can tell, and that's within this universe I believe, so your 'law' of causality may have already been invalidated. Without that law, the hypothesis that the universe existed forever/came from 'nothing' requires no more special accounting than the God-creator hypothesis.

[White Crane Feather]

Matter is made up of energy. Energy must have time to exist. There was nothing no time no energy before the big bang. Physics says there was a big bang and it created all of the energy inn our universe. But back to the big bang since nothing existed , what caused the big bang. l

Maybe we are in the aftermath of a explosive. How would we know.

No it does not say that at all. It only says that all the energy occupied a small space. Physics says nothing about it being created though there are some theories.

[Doug1029]

In other words you're saying that you don't know how it happened. Isn't exactly what I said was a perfectly reasonable answer?

You said the universe disobeyed its own rules. But we don't know what those rules were, hence no way of knowing if that's true. But we do know what we don't know, so my statement is true.

Doug

[White Crane Feather]

Since energy can neither be created nor destroyed the big bang didn't create it but released it. If you notice when the scientists talk about nuclear explosions they don't refer to the creation of energy but the release of it.

Plenty of energy is "created" on the quantum scales. I find it ironic that your handle is quaentum. Made me chuckle a bit.

Edited August 8, 2014 by White Crane Feather

[White Crane Feather]

You need to show first that the 'universe disobeyed its own laws' which I don't think you've really done yet. How does causality work if there is no time? And as I asked, you stated earlier that causality is a product of this universe; if it is, why do you think causality applies when there is no universe? I am definitely not a physicist, but I'm pretty sure that the way things work in the quantum world are counter-intuitive and on appearances may seem to violate 'causality'. It seems that a few people who know more than I are asserting that energy or something appears to pop out of 'nothing' as far as we can tell, and that's within this universe I believe, so your 'law' of causality may have already been invalidated. Without that law, the hypothesis that the universe existed forever/came from 'nothing' requires no more special accounting than the God-creator hypothesis.

There can be causality without physical time. Nor does anyone suggest the vacuum did not exist prior to the bb. Could be lots of universes out there. Infact it was if the Higgs boson were just a little more massive we would almost have some evidence that this might be the case. Please don't ask me why, it's very complicated and beyond me at the moment. I'm just being a parrot. Nor does "time" stop in a black hole. Time dilation is caused by the gravity well and is subject to relativity. It never freezes perhaps it reaches a point where a billion years is a second and exponentially slows but the key here is that it never reaches that point. It approaches infinity but never gets there. Just because for all intents and purposes it would appear frozen if we had a magic ball to look in doesn't mean that it is. If you had a magic space suit to be in it without being shredded to your subatomic particles you would still experience time normally. Of course each second might equate to billions and billions of years outside the black hole. In fact if you fell in and your magic goggles let you look out you would witness the accelerated expansion of the universe accelerate to its demise in moments, then rebirth, or what ever is going to happen. My guess so much "time" would go by out there that you may witness the birth of another universe. If the universe collapses then you would see it all rush at you. That would be quite a sight. If the universe collapses then the "beings" that live in black holes have basically already merged with the entire universe.

It is possible that we are witnessing the other end of a black whole when we regress back to the BB. It could be a collapsed universe... In fact it would be this collapsed universe. Imagine a sock being turned inside out. Of course current evidence has it expanding forever until a heat death, but that could change one day. The mass of the Higgs boson is at a very precarious place and that place is unstable. What we recognize as "the laws of physics" might just change at any moment.

That is both troubling and exciting at the same time.

[danielost]

http://www.exploratorium.edu/origins/cern/ideas/bang.html

[StarMountainKid]

Posted Today, 11:25 AM

Quaentum, on 08 August 2014 - 09:59 AM, said:

Since energy can neither be created nor destroyed the big bang didn't create it but released it. If you notice when the scientists talk about nuclear explosions they don't refer to the creation of energy but the release of it.

Plenty of energy is "created" on the quantum scales. I find it ironic that your handle is quaentum. Made me chuckle a bit.

I'm interjecting myself into the conversation, but I'd like to know how is energy 'created' on the quantum scale?

[White Crane Feather]

I'm interjecting myself into the conversation, but I'd like to know how is energy 'created' on the quantum scale?

Well by way of virtual particles & tunneling, or virtual particles and being split up on the event horizon of a black hole ( I went into a lengthier explanation but it got erased somehow rrrrr) including the strong possibility that hawking might be wrong about this.

Technically though the amount of energy in the universe as a closed system is still zero because the anti twin still has balanced out the total energy. But effectively a new photon zipping through space while its negative twin either tunneled away or down the hatch of a black hole is about as close to creating energy from nothing as there can possibly be. In fact gravity may be this negative energy. The universe only spears to have positive energy density because we live in a region of the vacuum that just happens to have fluctuated that way. In truth there is no positive energy. Somewhere the canceling negative energy still exists.

In other words "there is no spoon"

[+Link of Hyrule]

You need to show first that the 'universe disobeyed its own laws' which I don't think you've really done yet. How does causality work if there is no time? And as I asked, you stated earlier that causality is a product of this universe; if it is, why do you think causality applies when there is no universe? I am definitely not a physicist, but I'm pretty sure that the way things work in the quantum world are counter-intuitive and on appearances may seem to violate 'causality'. It seems that a few people who know more than I are asserting that energy or something appears to pop out of 'nothing' as far as we can tell, and that's within this universe I believe, so your 'law' of causality may have already been invalidated. Without that law, the hypothesis that the universe existed forever/came from 'nothing' requires no more special accounting than the God-creator hypothesis.

I think it is a self-evident truth that everything physical came from something. I am here because my parents procreated, they were here because their parents did, back to the evolution of the modern man, back to the ape-like creatures we were, to the small rodents, eventually back to the single cell that began in the primordial waters of earth's infancy. Then from that, back to whatever came before (Big Bang, if you like that theory). Before then, it's unknowable what happened, but at that point in existence there was "nothing", how did that nothing turn into something?

As said earlier, I'm not advocating a "god of the gaps" type argument here, that's flawed logic from the get-go. All I was doing was suggesting that I do not think one can simply substitute "god always existed" for "the universe always existed". That's an opinion that I hold true, based on my logic and experience. If that logic is flawed, then so be it, it appears sound to me and that is good enough for me.

You said the universe disobeyed its own rules. But we don't know what those rules were, hence no way of knowing if that's true. But we do know what we don't know, so my statement is true.

Doug

Perhaps it is more correct then to say that at one point the universe had a different set of rules that it operated by. In which case it needs to be explained why those rules changed. Either way, based on our current level of knowledge, the answer is unknowable.

[Guest]

There can be causality without physical time. Nor does anyone suggest the vacuum did not exist prior to the bb. Could be lots of universes out there. Infact it was if the Higgs boson were just a little more massive we would almost have some evidence that this might be the case. Please don't ask me why, it's very complicated and beyond me at the moment. I'm just being a parrot. Nor does "time" stop in a black hole. Time dilation is caused by the gravity well and is subject to relativity. It never freezes perhaps it reaches a point where a billion years is a second and exponentially slows but the key here is that it never reaches that point. It approaches infinity but never gets there. Just because for all intents and purposes it would appear frozen if we had a magic ball to look in doesn't mean that it is. If you had a magic space suit to be in it without being shredded to your subatomic particles you would still experience time normally. Of course each second might equate to billions and billions of years outside the black hole. In fact if you fell in and your magic goggles let you look out you would witness the accelerated expansion of the universe accelerate to its demise in moments, then rebirth, or what ever is going to happen. My guess so much "time" would go by out there that you may witness the birth of another universe. If the universe collapses then you would see it all rush at you. That would be quite a sight. If the universe collapses then the "beings" that live in black holes have basically already merged with the entire universe.

It is possible that we are witnessing the other end of a black whole when we regress back to the BB. It could be a collapsed universe... In fact it would be this collapsed universe. Imagine a sock being turned inside out. Of course current evidence has it expanding forever until a heat death, but that could change one day. The mass of the Higgs boson is at a very precarious place and that place is unstable. What we recognize as "the laws of physics" might just change at any moment.

That is both troubling and exciting at the same time.

You are talking about the event horizon not the actual black hole itself. Time slows as you describe as we approach the event horizon, but beyond that it is pure speculation to say there is time. Time requires a change of events - but at the singularity there is nothing but pure energy andf pure energy is devoid of causal events (it only changes in response to external influences - ie it is a transmitter of events within matter - no matter = no events). At best we can agree that it is impossible to say if time exists in the singularity - but I would reiterate that physics points to it not since all physical rules and forms have degraded to pure energy.

The important thing to remember is that the event horizon is the boundary between the universe and the black hole - it is not the black hole and what can be said of it cannot be inferred to be the same within the event horizon.

Br Cornelius

Edited August 9, 2014 by Guest

[Davros of Skaro]

A super Blackhole causing time traveling matter stripped of it's electrons would be a great self cause for the Universe in my opinion.

Edited August 9, 2014 by davros of skaro

[White Crane Feather]

You are talking about the event horizon not the actual black hole itself. Time slows as you describe as we approach the event horizon, but beyond that it is pure speculation to say there is time. Time requires a change of events - but at the singularity there is nothing but pure energy andf pure energy is devoid of causal events (it only changes in response to external influences - ie it is a transmitter of events within matter - no matter = no events). At best we can agree that it is impossible to say if time exists in the singularity - but I would reiterate that physics points to it not since all physical rules and forms have degraded to pure energy.

The important thing to remember is that the event horizon is the boundary between the universe and the black hole - it is not the black hole and what can be said of it cannot be inferred to be the same within the event horizon.

Br Cornelius

Well...., the black hole is the whole phenomenon. But yes you are right it is "impossible" to know? But we have to step back here and look at two different understandings of time. You are using the definition of physical time, but yet said it can be influenced by external events..... Well it still can change. It's not frozen in "time". It's important to make these two different distinctions. The cave man may be frozen in his "time" in a block of ice but is not really frozen in TIME, some half baked teenager will eventually thaw him out accidentally one day and have a cool new friend.

If Hawking radiation turns out to be right, then quite obviously the black whole will eventually "evaporate" and it indeed did change and its constitutes were never totally frozen in TIME.

These nuances are important because to many people have a faulty understanding what some people say by no time in a black hole or no time before the bb. Indeed they repeat it to others. Then there are all kinds of wacky off shoots.

But yes I'm glad we are talking about this. To many people believe that time is some sort of dimension or force or whatever. As you explained "time" ( physical time) is only related to matter and exchange of energy. TIME on the other hand is the potential for change or maybe change itself. The constitutes of a black whole ( wherever it ended up being) are still subject to change at some point that is not gone.

[StarMountainKid]

Sometimes I think we are so involved with our own assuredness and the mimicing of convention, that we leave little room for creative and counterintuitive thinking.

[Guest]

Well...., the black hole is the whole phenomenon. But yes you are right it is "impossible" to know? But we have to step back here and look at two different understandings of time. You are using the definition of physical time, but yet said it can be influenced by external events..... Well it still can change. It's not frozen in "time". It's important to make these two different distinctions. The cave man may be frozen in his "time" in a block of ice but is not really frozen in TIME, some half baked teenager will eventually thaw him out accidentally one day and have a cool new friend.

If Hawking radiation turns out to be right, then quite obviously the black whole will eventually "evaporate" and it indeed did change and its constitutes were never totally frozen in TIME.

These nuances are important because to many people have a faulty understanding what some people say by no time in a black hole or no time before the bb. Indeed they repeat it to others. Then there are all kinds of wacky off shoots.

But yes I'm glad we are talking about this. To many people believe that time is some sort of dimension or force or whatever. As you explained "time" ( physical time) is only related to matter and exchange of energy. TIME on the other hand is the potential for change or maybe change itself. The constitutes of a black whole ( wherever it ended up being) are still subject to change at some point that is not gone.

All this is based on the assumption that we have a correct appreciation of time, which is a huge if. When time becomes so different in its meaning as postulated in a black hole it is more accurate to assume that we simply have a limited and partial understanding of the concept. However at the singularity no events take place - nothing moves into it or out of it and the singularity is infinite in that it has no dimensions.

Hawkins has postulated something which has never been demonstrated and the existence of micro-black holes is pure speculation to solve a problem of meaning (he even invokes faster than light travel to make it work - nice). I don't personally trust it and to apply these principles to a real black hole is meaningless since the effect could never be measured because it is so small and any particles would be swamped by the radiation of the destroyed matter at the event horizon. At the moment it is just an elegant theory which solves specific problems - in theory.

I am unwilling to entertain inventing a separate form of time to solve a theoretical problem which we can never decide. Time is space-time and there is no reason to suppose it is anything else. Its just more redundancy to interpose another definition for the sake of tidyness.

Br Cornelius

Edited August 9, 2014 by Guest

[Doug1029]

Perhaps it is more correct then to say that at one point the universe had a different set of rules that it operated by. In which case it needs to be explained why those rules changed. Either way, based on our current level of knowledge, the answer is unknowable.

Actually, we don't know if the rules have changed or not, but in either case the answer is not yet known.

Doug

[Grandpa Greenman]

But yes I'm glad we are talking about this.

Me, too.

[White Crane Feather]

All this is based on the assumption that we have a correct appreciation of time, which is a huge if. When time becomes so different in its meaning as postulated in a black hole it is more accurate to assume that we simply have a limited and partial understanding of the concept. However at the singularity no events take place - nothing moves into it or out of it and the singularity is infinite in that it has no dimensions.

Hawkins has postulated something which has never been demonstrated and the existence of micro-black holes is pure speculation to solve a problem of meaning (he even invokes faster than light travel to make it work - nice). I don't personally trust it and to apply these principles to a real black hole is meaningless since the effect could never be measured because it is so small and any particles would be swamped by the radiation of the destroyed matter at the event horizon. At the moment it is just an elegant theory which solves specific problems - in theory.

I am unwilling to entertain inventing a separate form of time to solve a theoretical problem which we can never decide. Time is space-time and there is no reason to suppose it is anything else. Its just more redundancy to interpose another definition for the sake of tidyness.

Br Cornelius

No you are right ... refreshingly so, I'm not inventing another form of time. I think exactly the way you do about it. It's just that the gap in definition from the physicist to the layman causes all sorts of problems. Problems like there was no time before the bb. This means something entirely different to a physicist and a layman. Maybe our universe was in a state that we cannot recognize but obviously there was a potential for change other wise it wouldn't have. I'd rather redefine "time" Change or potential to change rather than have two different kinds of time. The physics definition of time really runs counter intuitive to people's experience of it and causes much confusion. We can give interactions in space a different name. I think it's easier for somone to understand that we don't know what happens in a singularity in terms of photons and energetic interactions including that the definition of a photon and energetic reactions might not be even accurate. "Time" is a word that existed prior to physics then redifined by physicists as understanding increased. This does not mean that common use of the word will reflect what physicists have in mind, so when a physicist says "no time" the laymen hears the mysterious force that potentiates the universe while the physicist only means that our understanding of how things interacts is now gone and things will no longer interact ( if they do at all ----- if the are even things now or not) In the end we get things like time machines, misunderstandings of relativity and time dilation and all kinds of problems.

Then because "time "is part of our common reference to events" like words that reference sequence like "before" and "after" get tied up in the confusion. A sentence like

"There was no time before the Big Bang." Means two different things to two different people.

The physicist means--- there were no interactions of particles through the space between things because there was no space between the things that we are aware of.

The layman heres ----- there was no before before the Big Bang.

Which really isn't true we just can't define what that before might be or look like do to lack of understanding.

The laymen who has faith in the physisist goes on to beleieve there was no before, while the physicist means no such thing.

The physicist does not attach the word "time" to sequence. While the layman does. And it's not they laymans fault. Then when the physicist tries to explain it to the layman he uses a bunch of other words that physics as redefined or made ambiguous. The other is "space". Which he needs to exsplsplain himself. To make worse often the scientist may not even understand the standard semantics break here and continue to use the same terms for different concepts. Space and the vacuum are two different things. Yes there is no space between things that we can identify prior to the BB, but there is no evidence that there was no vacuum. The space between things has plenty of room to expand into the vacuum, but this is also a sort of empty space. So space can expand into space. The space between things can expand into empty space.

[White Crane Feather]

This might be a better way to explain. But even here he Doesn't define how he is using the physics definition of "time".

Edited August 10, 2014 by White Crane Feather

[Guest]

I am just not buying this "physics definition of time", simply because the physics definition doesn't fit with our preconceptions of what time is doesn't mean our preconceptions are correct. There is time - end off.

But thats a good vid anyway.

Br Cornelius

Edited August 10, 2014 by Guest