Is this a God - one of a religion?

[TPG]

There's a question that has been on my mind and I'd like some opinions on it.

Let's look at the creation or start of the universe. Either the universe has always been around, something created it, or whatever other belief you have that you'd like to insert here. All of these have one thing in common - something exists that has no cause, something has come from nothing.

In the case of the universe always existing, it has no cause because it has always existed. In the belief of a God or gods, the God or gods tend to have no cause (as for the ones that are said to be created by something else, if you look at their creator or their creator's creator - if you go back far enough there is a first thing that has no cause). For every possible scenario I could think of, there is something that has no cause, whether it be a supreme being, an atom, or the universe itself.

Something that has come from nothing is supernatural. I believe in this supernatural event because I, along with the universe, exist. One part of a rough definition of a religion is the belief in the supernatural - does my belief in this supernatural event make me a religious person? Can I call this first thing, the universe, the atom, whatever fits into the scenario God since it is a supernatural force?

 

[liberal1]

Yes, though whether your belief fits into an existing religion is yet to be decided. Certainly, contemporary religions will shun you away if this is the limit of your beliefs as there is no inbetween, either you accept us to force feed you manufactured philosophy and save your eternal soul, or you're simply a heathen. By contemporary religion, I simply mean Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Shinto etc. as it is interpreted today.

 

[Static]

There's a question that has been on my mind and I'd like some opinions on it.

Let's look at the creation or start of the universe. Either the universe has always been around, something created it, or whatever other belief you have that you'd like to insert here. All of these have one thing in common - something exists that has no cause, something has come from nothing.

In the case of the universe always existing, it has no cause because it has always existed. In the belief of a God or gods, the God or gods tend to have no cause (as for the ones that are said to be created by something else, if you look at their creator or their creator's creator - if you go back far enough there is a first thing that has no cause). For every possible scenario I could think of, there is something that has no cause, whether it be a supreme being, an atom, or the universe itself.

Something that has come from nothing is supernatural. I believe in this supernatural event because I, along with the universe, exist. One part of a rough definition of a religion is the belief in the supernatural - does my belief in this supernatural event make me a religious person? Can I call this first thing, the universe, the atom, whatever fits into the scenario God since it is a supernatural force?

Philosophy 101...

So, you want me to afirm that there is a prime mover unmoved right? Yes, there is, it's God. He is the exception that disproves determanism, where by everything has a cause. If everything has a cause then what caused God? Nothing, therefore God must be the only prime mover unmoved. You have always exsisted, as far back as the creation of the universe by God. You were changed when you were born in to what you are now, but no part of you came from nothing.

The law of conservation of energy states that matter can not be created or destroyed, only changed. Therefore, as humans, we can not create anything new. We can not crush anything so small as to cause it to cease to exist, therefore everything that exists must have always existed, or was created by a force outside of our realm. This conclusion doesn't require there to be a cause for God, it only afirms the laws of conservation of energy by The conclusion is that these things must exsist because of something outside of our realm of influence.

One problem with your statement is that you can't be sure that ANYTHING outside of your mind actually exists. Descatres said that the only certanty is that you think, therefore you exist. All matter is just a collection of perceptions, and since all our perceptions can be tricked, are relitive, and can change, the only thing that is true is our mind. You could be halucinating everything else, or being tricked by a deamon (descartes again). Logic also dictates that if you were making it up you would be able to choose what you see, bearing in mind that you are capible of full conciousness of your surroundings. This disproves the theory that when an object is not percieved by a human that it ceses to exist. If a tree falls in the woods and no one sees it it still makes a sound because it is being percieved by the infinite mind which is God. Everything was created in God's mind, therefore everything is being percieved at all times by him, which explains why you can't choose what you see when you open your eyes.

This is just the tip of the iceburg... Want to continue anyone?

adamkirk.blogspot.com

p.s. Just because something has always existed doesn't mean it doesn't have a cause, it just means that the cause can be traced back into infinity. It WOULD mean that there is no prime mover who is unmoved.

 

[jfuh]

There's a question that has been on my mind and I'd like some opinions on it.

Let's look at the creation or start of the universe. Either the universe has always been around, something created it, or whatever other belief you have that you'd like to insert here. All of these have one thing in common - something exists that has no cause, something has come from nothing.

In the case of the universe always existing, it has no cause because it has always existed. In the belief of a God or gods, the God or gods tend to have no cause (as for the ones that are said to be created by something else, if you look at their creator or their creator's creator - if you go back far enough there is a first thing that has no cause). For every possible scenario I could think of, there is something that has no cause, whether it be a supreme being, an atom, or the universe itself.

Something that has come from nothing is supernatural. I believe in this supernatural event because I, along with the universe, exist. One part of a rough definition of a religion is the belief in the supernatural - does my belief in this supernatural event make me a religious person? Can I call this first thing, the universe, the atom, whatever fits into the scenario God since it is a supernatural force?

The underlying premise itself is based on the principle that time is linear. However, time is not linear in that time coexists only with the Universe, yes, there was no time before the dawn of the universe. There is no something or start before the universe - there is no before.
The universe did not emerge from nothing, the universe which you seem to be hinting at is the material universe or that which has mass. Yet before such there was only energy and from said energy emerged matter. The origin of this energy? To answer this question you must answer what is energy itself?

 

[TPG]

The underlying premise itself is based on the principle that time is linear. However, time is not linear in that time coexists only with the Universe, yes, there was no time before the dawn of the universe. There is no something or start before the universe - there is no before.
The universe did not emerge from nothing, the universe which you seem to be hinting at is the material universe or that which has mass. Yet before such there was only energy and from said energy emerged matter. The origin of this energy? To answer this question you must answer what is energy itself?

The point of my post was to remove any limit to what God is beyond it being involved in a supernatural event. My premise is the very first thing or things to exist is or are God - if it was energy, then energy is God. This may be a dumb question, but why wouldn't time be linear because isn't it used to quantify a duration?

Just because something has always existed doesn't mean it doesn't have a cause, it just means that the cause can be traced back into infinity. It WOULD mean that there is no prime mover who is unmoved.

If something has always existed doesn't that mean it has no cause? For example, if everything has always existed, doesn't that, by my definition, make everything God?

One problem with your statement is that you can't be sure that ANYTHING outside of your mind actually exists. Descatres said that the only certanty is that you think, therefore you exist. All matter is just a collection of perceptions, and since all our perceptions can be tricked, are relitive, and can change, the only thing that is true is our mind.

In that case, I will edit my premise to dealing with the God of this dream, this reality, whatever it is that I currently believe I am in.

 

[jfuh]

The point of my post was to remove any limit to what God is beyond it being involved in a supernatural event. My premise is the very first thing or things to exist is or are God - if it was energy, then energy is God. This may be a dumb question, but why wouldn't time be linear because isn't it used to quantify a duration?

The premise itself then involves a circular logic.
In that the existance of anything requires first the existance of the supernatural. Yet then you can see how that loops back in that the pre-requisit of which would be the existance of another supernatural and so on and so forth. Thus the premise itself is invalid.

AS for time. Were time a fixed constant, then general relativity falls apart.
Yet if we placed a clock on an object moving very very fast, say at the speed of light, and then placed another clock that was stationary relative to. Upon return of the "fast" clock to the point of origin we would observe that it's several times "slower" then that of the stationary clock.
Yet if time were linear, said effect would not be observed. This has been experimentally prooven with cesium clocks in orbit vs that on the ground.
Hence, time is not linear, it is not a constant.

 

[FallingPianos]

I remember this line from a movie where this guy is talking to God:

"So, what did you do before creating the universe?"
"Dont be rediculous! Time didn't exist then."

but to answer you're question, I've always assumed that we can never know. Nothing indicates to me that God is the answer. I'm content not knowing.

 

[CoffeeSaint]

One problem with your statement is that you can't be sure that ANYTHING outside of your mind actually exists. Descatres said that the only certanty is that you think, therefore you exist. All matter is just a collection of perceptions, and since all our perceptions can be tricked, are relitive, and can change, the only thing that is true is our mind. You could be halucinating everything else, or being tricked by a deamon (descartes again). Logic also dictates that if you were making it up you would be able to choose what you see, bearing in mind that you are capible of full conciousness of your surroundings. This disproves the theory that when an object is not percieved by a human that it ceses to exist. If a tree falls in the woods and no one sees it it still makes a sound because it is being percieved by the infinite mind which is God. Everything was created in God's mind, therefore everything is being percieved at all times by him, which explains why you can't choose what you see when you open your eyes.

The only certainty is that I think, therefore I exist; that only means I can't know what is actually outside of my mind. It doesn't mean that there isn't anything outside of my mind, or that matter is nothing but perception. IF matter is nothing but perception, then that would argue for the existence of god as the ultimate perceiver, as you say; but if there is an objective reality, then there is no need for god to perceive it, and so the argument falls apart. Though it cannot be proven, in either case, since we have no way to measure objective reality that does not get filtered by our senses. So basically, when star said:

but to answer you're question, I've always assumed that we can never know. Nothing indicates to me that God is the answer. I'm content not knowing.

That's about as close to truth as we can get.

 

[tecoyah]

The point of my post was to remove any limit to what God is beyond it being involved in a supernatural event. My premise is the very first thing or things to exist is or are God - if it was energy, then energy is God. This may be a dumb question, but why wouldn't time be linear because isn't it used to quantify a duration?

I would ask what place the word "God" has in this statement.....energy would certainly suffice. It would seem you are trying to make a case for a supernatural being, where none is required.


If something has always existed doesn't that mean it has no cause? For example, if everything has always existed, doesn't that, by my definition, make everything God?

No, it simply indicates we have yet to answer many questions the Science/Philosophy combination forces us to ponder.


In that case, I will edit my premise to dealing with the God of this dream, this reality, whatever it is that I currently believe I am in.

A wise alternative to limiting understanding by placing parameters on the possibilities. Do not throw "God" away, simply take it as one theory of many.

 

[justone]

This may be a dumb question, but why wouldn't time be linear because isn't it used to quantify a duration?
.

I always liked dumb questions, - to hear and to ask.

If you shoot light from A to B, it will go in a straight line in empty space and it will take so much light-time to reach B. If there is a gravity-mass somewhere near the path of the light, the straight line-path of the light between A an B will curve towards the gravity-mass, and it will take a longer distance=light-time to reach B. Since all the space is full of gravities-masses all the lines are curved and we are talking about curvature of space-time and the field of space-time (similar to the electromagnetic field). As one of the results – you see 2 different distances in our example for the light to travel – the straight one (expected) and the curved one (real) – we can represent light-time as a distance, and gravity-mass as a distance of the deviation of the light from the straight line. We can simplify all the math counting time, mass and distance in centimeters, - and we have a conversion table to convert centimeters-time back into hours-time. That is general relativity.

When you ride a horse and shoot a bullet I see that the speed of the bullet is speed of the horse plus the speed of the bullet. You see the speed of the bullet only. We look from different reference frames. If you shoot the light instead of the bullet we both see the same speed of the light, because I cannot add the speed of the horse to the speed of the light – because the speed of the light is an absolute – nothing can beat it according to our faith. Distance=Speed x Time, - if the Speed stays the same and the Distance of the shooting stays the same – the Time of the travel of the light-bullet has to change. Your time on the horse would extend in relation to my time, or my time would contract in relation to you time – this is special relativity.

The dumb question I’d like to ask is – what the curvature of space-time has to do to the original question? So far, - nothing, in my view. jfuh knows…
Maybe in a few more pages we would talk about timing of events depending on the observer.. and run into the ultimate observer again… but pour Einstein…

What happens, - people take physics and math and make popular science fictions, - then you don’t know where there is real physics and where there is a popular science fiction. Twins paradox is one of the examples often causing me to ask damp questions…

BTW, speed of light is a religious absolute – it is not a law, but our belief. It is an assumption (postulate) made by A.E. It is weird and comes like from nowhere, - but it has been happening that it works very well. I just see how A.E is turning in his grave looking at my simplifications. OK, I will let him try to put everything in a few sentences…BTW in the end AE gave up on his field= space-time idea. I am not sure why, I gave up on all those things long before him…. The only difficulty with space-time field and light is the dialectical materialism of Marx-Lenin – the dominating philosophy of our society imposed on us from everywhere, starting from our first school year. Or may be AE had a midlife crisis.

BTW nobody knows where gravity (existing in the universe as a grid of lines-distances, curved in space-time, as a field) - comes from (what does induce it). One of popular hypothesizes is that it is supernatural – it does not come from our universe, it does not come from the reality observed by us, but it comes from an unobserved source, some like to call it “another universe”, an unknown and unobserved universe vs. our known and observed universe. Again we run into an entity “out of our world”.

to be continued

 

[justone]

The law of conservation of energy states that matter can not be created or destroyed, only changed..

This claim of ancient physics is very entertaining. My dumb question is: when did we decide that energy ever existed? So far in no field of physics I see the existence of energy – ready to be changed into matter and back in energy and all over again. I may be far behind in my knowledge, but in my time they always were talking about the differential of energy, about energy only as a result produced (consumed) in a motion between state A and state B, the differential between the absolute zero and whatever. In order to observe electricity you need + and -, in order to observe heat you need difference in temperatures, water has to fall – difference in levels, steam (gas) has to expand – difference in volumes etc…. The universe is expanding due to the differential observed by a certain observer, but not due of an original existence of energy. Wherever we go, we run into the original cause, observer. Somebody had to make the difference. Somebody had to make ''a volume'' for expansion.

You can change A into B, but you cannot change B back into A – this is the universal reality of the universe. In the ‘’known to us and observed by us”’ a.k.a. “closed’’ universe energy dissipates, all processes are irreversible. At the point of the thermodynamic death of the universe there is a predicted big ‘’ nothing”’ (rewriting the 3rd time: “nothing” is not 100% nothing – but only how we can imagine it as an absence of any difference, “nothing” = no difference.)The universe expands and it is loosing its energy = equalizing the differentials, - when all differentials are equalized there will be no energy; - unless a supernatural (unobserved, non-existing in the known universe) entity is involved in the process ( call it whatever – another universe, dimensions (where nothing is something, - it is not observed and it does not live according to our laws) . One runs into the entity again. (in terms of quantum mechanics the picture would be a lot more complicated – but the general meaning is the same, again we run into a cause of fluctuation…. Big Bang points that there was a beginning when things started from some kind of “nothing”)

So my next dumb question is: if to imagine the universe where there is no movement on any level (unresolved and symmetrical quantum fluctuations or no difference=no energy in the predicted end of our universe) – does time still exist? When there is “’nothing”’ does time still flows? – If there is the ‘’third observer’’ of the “nothing”.

God created the Universe. Who did create G-d? Another G-d. Who did create another
G-d? Another G-d….Does it makes sense? No. The conclusion is: there is no G-d who created the Universe. My dumb question is – how is it possible to arrive to such a conclusion? 5<6 is enough. 5<6=6=6=6=6 does not make sense. G-d created the Universe. G-d is more than U. There is a difference between G-d and U. 6-5=1. There is no difference between G-d and another G-d. There is no sense of saying that another G-d created G-d. If there was such a difference or if it was possible or imaginable or observable it would be also possible to look for G-d#2 who created G-d#1. The property of the Biblical G-d, who created everything and the Universe and who is indefinite and eternal does not let us to imagine that there may be another G-d whose properties may be different and may be more than the properties of the Biblical G-d. (Another G-d may be equal and co-existent but he cannot not be a Creator of the Creator of Everything and the Universe.) U<G=G=G=G…. Or simply U<G. Period. End of story, unless one enjoys piling nonsense. There is no possibility to find another G1 whose properties may be different from G. There is no G1 who created G. There is no need to go beyond of what make sense. There is no need for nonsense. On other hand god of the sun, or god of healing or god of war and all other gods allow existence of G-d who created them in the Universe, because they have different properties….and there is the essential difference between any of them and the G-d who created everything and the Universe.

Why are we still asking all dumb questions, searching in the dark of our ignorance, inventing home made answers?....There is nothing new in what we are talking about… Thomas Aquinas, Isaac Newton, Gottfried Leibniz, Galileo Galilei, George Berkeley, Nicole Oresme – the most powerfull minds were discussing all these things including relativity and dualism of time..and big bang.. – long time ago . It turns out that in our upbringing and in our education and in our general TV mass media enviroment these giants of human thoughts have been cut out from our minds by the dull grey iron cirtain of atheism/dialectical materialism. Spinoza may be OK, but Leibniz is –no,no, even if you study math…Aristotle is OK, but Newton is–no,no… only if you want to critisize and tell us that Newton is uneducated and mistaken if to compare to our knowledge.In our studies we are not allowed to look to their side, any human thought leading to their ideas has been banned or, at least, ridiculed in our education... you would not get a degree in biology, if you look there …our minds are in chains, we cannot doubt the strange idea called godforsuredoesnotexist—we are encouraged to go in this direction only if we promise to bring back the conclusion that godisamythwhichdoesnotexist…and thereisnoindicationofgod… I have no reason to believe that human mind would be tolerating these chains and limitations for too long…
In my homemade reasoning, I feel like a little idiot , so ignorant and uneducated, - if to compare to Newton. I have so many questions to ask him, but I am always running of time, taking care of everyday things. Still, in spite of the bloody traces of the chains on my mind I feel that I have been saved. The brain damage could be a lot worse, if I did not open the Bible once and didn’t find out Who was that supernatural being out of our world.
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Religion is the sign of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
Karl Marx
Matter is a philosophical category designating the objective reality which is given to man by his sensations, and which is copied, photographed and reflected by our sensations, while existing independently of them."
V. I. Lenin.