A Different View of the Universe

[rhonjonParticipant]

I’m not a scientist, but I have some ideas about the universe that I’d like to share just to see if it makes sense to anyone besides myself.

 

For some time now, theists have argued that the universe is an effect, and all effects must have a cause. Therefore, God had to be that cause.

 

This argument falls apart because the universe doesn’t necessarily have to be an effect. An effect is something that has a beginning. The photons, electrons, and quarks that make up the universe are in constant flux, and there is no logical reason to suppose that this was not always so.

 

When a star goes nova, it no longer exists as a star, but the elementary particles that formed that star still exist. The laws of gravity, inertia, quantum physics, dark energy, etc., cause the particles to travel elsewhere and form other stars. So, the cause and the effect are the same. No divine first cause is needed.

 

 

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

If there is no time (i.e., before the Big Bang) is there still causality?

[UnseenParticipant]

rhonjon wrote:

For some time now, theists have argued that the universe is an effect, and all effects must have a cause. Therefore, God had to be that cause.

I’ve never heard that argument made with that sort of wording, though it’s probably the First Cause argument in disguise.

Their leap of logic lies in “God is that cause.” They offer that as a supposedly inescapable conclusion though they have withheld the supporting premises. Why can’t there be a nontheistic cause like Nature? Or a different theistic deity like an actual Mother Nature or Ahura Mazda (Zoroastrianism)? Why must it be the Abrahamic deity?

BTW, it’s determinists who make the everything has a cause (sufficient condition or conditions) argument. The universe as we know it began when the initial conditions after The Big Bang were sufficient for plasma to begin to organize into atoms and atoms into molecules…yada yada. If someone wants their First Cause, there it is.

 

[PopeBeanieModerator]

Unseen wrote:

If someone wants their First Cause, there it is.

Only if The Big Bang didn’t have a cause. Multiverse consideration seems popular among cosmologists now. While yeah, whatever may have caused The Big Bang may never be knowable, at least it’s as good a reset/reboot process to assume until we learn more.

rhonjon wrote:

For some time now, theists have argued that the universe is an effect, and all effects must have a cause. Therefore, God had to be that cause.

I think that “reasoning” comes mostly from an ingrained assumption or hope that consciousness is eternal. That’s pretty much how we operate in real life, even for those of us who don’t consciously make that assumption, and that kind of behavior and assumption can kick in when adolescent hormones kick in, driving our species’ reproductive behaviors. Only further intellectual maturity from that point forward enables us to put our philosophical spins on our bigger picture of ourselves in the bigger universe we naturally try to feel a part of. And what easier place to nurture those thoughts, beliefs, and endeavors than by considering our local culture’s customs, and other, nearby people’s strong and/or insistent beliefs?

I personally believe that our ability to invent philosophies, religions, and other intellectualizations — even sophisticated science, or art — comes from unnatural mental abilities that emerged in our species only very recently in evolutionary times. These emergent mental abilities were so powerfully effective for survival, like perhaps AI will become in AI agents someday, that they transformed human culture relatively “instantly” at times on the more natural scale of millions of years of solely biological/genetic evolution.

I also believe, at least tentatively until proven otherwise, our genetic evolution took sudden leaps forward, for better and for worse (if one wants to ascribe “values” to those leaps), in social circuits of the brain that primates already had to some extent. And those social/cultural leaps occurred in aggregate and cumulative synchrony with physical adaptations like bipedalism, hand dexterity for making tools, sophisticated vocal and facial muscle adaptations that enhanced social communications. This newly evolving physical plus mental synchrony so powerfully enhanced species survival (and competition), evolution never had enough time to weed out traits that we suffer from today, like spinal disorders (think back pain), old age disorders of physical and neurological kinds (as life expectancies unnaturally extended), nutritional disorders (from relatively rapid changes in diet, e.g. from more efficient hunting and agriculture), and so on.

Holy Crap, I wrote more than I planned! In conclusion, I keep in mind how “unnatural” our genetic and cultural evolution has been, compared to the previous millions or billions of purely chemical evolution at only the genetic level. And whom among humanity actually thinks a lot about our novel evolutionary path in terms of self examination and in order to better understand each other? Regarding the current topic, it doesn’t surprise me as much as it used to how intellectually challenged humans are, and how most just want to believe in what’s easiest to believe in, elite sciences be damned.

For a couple of decades or more now, I’ve considered recent human evolution, the genetic pathways and the mental/cultural pathways combined, as synchronistically preternatural. For better and for worse.

• This reply was modified 1 month, 1 week ago by  PopeBeanie. Reason: Jebus, as always, fixing tons of typos and improving clarity

[UnseenParticipant]

PopeBeanie wrote:

Unseen wrote:

If someone wants their First Cause, there it is.

Only if The Big Bang didn’t have a cause. Multiverse consideration seems popular among cosmologists now. While yeah, whatever may have caused The Big Bang may never be knowable, at least it’s as good a reset/reboot process to assume until we learn more.

An inherently unknowable cause (if there is one) cannot be used in a reasonable argument. Quantum mechanics has shown us that causes below a certain level aren’t needed to make some sort of sense of things. Particles pop into existence constantly and we don’t really need to know if they have a cause or what that cause might be.

[rhonjonParticipant]

I lean Toward the multiverse, or rather the omniverse. Why should there be just one universe? Space is infinite. If there were a million universes, each one a billion times bigger than out own, there would still be the same amount of empty space outside. So, suppose there is no outside? Suppose the universe is an infinite number of galaxies?

I ask these questions mainly because the big bang occurred some 13-15 billion years ago. Yet the universe is 96 billion light years across. Was there a time in cosmic history when the elementary particles that make up our universe could travel faster than light—96 billion light years in 13 billion years? Or is what we call the big bang just one of many?

[Author]

Posts