Uncaused first cause

[Kenny]

As for the matter of the Hubble Expansion Rate: It's the rate at which the universe expands. If I remember correctly, if the expansion rate is above 0, then the universe had a beginnin'. Guess what? The expansion rate is above 0. ;3

To be more precise, it is the average Hubble expansion rate > 0, which would also cover oscillating universes that theoretically can expand, contract, and expand again. So long as their average Hubble expansion rate is > 0, as per the BVG theorem, they cannot be past eternal.

The other side of the coin is that for a universe to be anthropic (supporting life, any kind of life, not just intelligent or even carbon based) it must have an average expansion rate > 0.

In other words, no expansion, no universe, and by extension no life of any kind. But with expansion comes no past eternality. That's what science is telling us folks.

Nobody is disputing the Universe is expanding at a rate greater than 0. My question is, how can we conclude the matter (singular) that expanded to become the Universe didn't always exist? Science does not claim there was a point in history when absolutely nothing existed, and they don't claim an intelligent creator as responsible for anything either.

Ken

[Kenny]

If the universe had no beginning and has an infinite amount of past events how did we ever get to this one, we would have to wait an infinite amount of time to get here and because an infinite number has no end we never ever get to today. It is a logical contradiction that there is an infinite amount of past events. Think about it if there is no beginning to something then there it has no way of getting to where we are now.

If the singular/matter that expanded to become the Universe had an infinite amount of past events, and there are an infinite amount of possibile events that could happen, it is just a matter of time before we get to this event. And what about the possibility of this event happening before?

As others have pointed out, science back this up with the Hubble expansion rate and all the other stuff Byblos said that I don't understand. Lol

Science does not claim the expansion rate of the Universe leads to an intelligent creator.

Ken

[Kenny]

Kenny

You said

Second, if you are going to claim everything that exists must have a cause, then you have to apply that to your God as well if you are going to claim he exist. If you are going to present an exception for your God, then I will present an exception for that vast majority of the Universe that we have no clue about.

God does have cause or more appropriately an explanation - he exists by necessity.

That is the religious view. Science does not claim an intelligent creator exit as a necessity. I am not a religious person so even though I will respect the fact that you will believe this, you can't expect me to unless you can bring something more to the table than religious faith.

Ken

[Kenny]

Wait a minute, you need to explain this Hubble expansion rate and why it prevents the possibility of the universe constantly expanding and contracting

Who said it prevents it? But then again, who said that an expanding/contracting universe is not subject to the average expansion rate as well? See my previous post.

How did you conclude that if matter has always existed, we would not be here right now? Please explain

Because you would have a very hard time explaining why it arbitrarily decided to expand 13.5 billion years ago. Why did the expansion not start from eternity past? Expansion is change and change does not simply just decide to expand from dormant eternity, it needs an agent of causation.

First of all, what we know about the Universe is very limited. We barely know everything that goes on with planet Earth let alone all those trillions of stars trillions of light years away! To assume what little bit of the Universe we have been able to test, analyze, & study; and assume it applies to every inch of the Universe is akin to a person going to a library for the first time,picking up the first book he sees which happens to be a Dr Seuss children’s book; studying that book then assuming the entire library consists of children’s books.

We know a whole lot more than you're giving us credit for. But wait a minute, before, in a different thread, I gave you the choice of two main topics, metaphysics and science. You had chosen science (I presume because of your inexperience in metaphysics but I could be wrong). Now you seem to undermine even science. Is there anything we can actually use to convince you? I rather doubt it.

Do you have anything outside religion that backs this up?

Huh? Who is using religion? What on earth are you talking about? I, for one, have not one single time referred to anything religious or scriptural. All, I repeat, ALL my arguments have been either metaphysical (proof from pure reason) or scientific (evidence from).

You need to start actually paying attention and stop formulating excuses.

Byblos
Because you would have a very hard time explaining why it arbitrarily decided to expand 13.5 billion years ago. Why did the expansion not start from eternity past? Expansion is change and change does not simply just decide to expand from dormant eternity, it needs an agent of

Ken
I didn’t claim the singular was in a constant state of singular, I said it could have been in a constant state of motion or expanding and contracting.

Byblos
We know a whole lot more than you're giving us credit for. But wait a minute, before, in a different thread, I gave you the choice of two main topics, metaphysics and science. You had chosen science (I presume because of your inexperience in metaphysics but I could be wrong). Now you seem to undermine even science. Is there anything we can actually use to convince you? I rather doubt it.

Ken
You are asking me a lot of questions I don’t have any answers to, and that science does not have any answers to. But just because I don’t have any answers doesn’t mean yours is true! Remember I am not the one trying to convince anyone of how the Universe began, you guys are doing that. Finding flaws in my guess doesn’t make a case for your claims; it just disproves my guesses. If you want to convince me, provide something backed up by science.

Byblos
Huh? Who is using religion? What on earth are you talking about? I, for one, have not one single time referred to anything religious or scriptural. All, I repeat, ALL my arguments have been either metaphysical (proof from pure reason) or scientific (evidence from).

You need to start actually paying attention and stop formulating excuses.

Ken
So you don’t claim an intelligent creator had anything to do with the Universe? My mistake, maybe I got you mixed up with the plethora of other people I am responding to.

[Danieltwotwenty]

If the singular/matter that expanded to become the Universe had an infinite amount of past events, and there are an infinite amount of possibile events that could happen, it is just a matter of time before we get to this event. And what about the possibility of this event happening before?

Kenny. Infinite means without end, if there are past events without end we can never end up here as we have to first go through never ending past events. It's a contradiction, plain and simple.
If you don't believe it is then I want you to start counting at one and tell me when you get to the end of infinity.

Science does not claim the expansion rate of the Universe leads to an intelligent creator.

I never said it did, I said it says that there is a finite beginning to our universe, therefore if it began it must have a cause. An intelligent creator is the next argument and the most logically coherent argument.

[FlawedIntellect]

Ken, you're being very dense here. Your mistake is that you're assuming that claiming the existence of an intelligent creator responsible for the existence of the universe somehow automatically equals religion. However, this is false. There is a worldview known as "deism" which acknowledges the necessity of an intelligent creator God, but does not subscribe to any religious beliefs or traditions. Albert Einstein was a deist. He was convinced that there had to be some kind of God as a result of his own mathematical equations involving physics and the nature of the universe.

Also, science is limited in terms of what it can do. By definition, science is not capable of addressing the metaphysical. However, philosophy as a whole is able to deal with the matter of the metaphysical. (Science is itself a more narrowly-focused form of philosophy, which is concerned with the mechanistic nature of the way reality operates.)

Your "responses" only serve to illustrate how ignorant you are on the matters that these people are talking about. You only keep saying that you "disagree with" them and never really provide a sound reason to disagree with them. You're disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing, rather than submitting good reasons to reject their claims. And when you do put things on the table for them to examine, you ignore their criticisms and keep insisting that they're wrong [without even bothering to provide reasons for why.].

As for the matter of an oscillating universe that you propose, well... there's a couple problems with that. Namely, every time the universe oscillates, it will lose some heat and energy into the next expansion, and also the matter of what appears to be the expansion rate of the universe increasing as galaxies spread further and further apart. Cosmologists are guessing that the reason for this rapid expansion in the present is due to a repulsive gravity force that is referred to as "dark energy". Because of this, it appears that some trillions of years from now, the universe will achieve maximum entropy.

In any case, everyone else has been trying to provide you scientific evidence that implies the existence of an intelligent creator, which is what you asked of them, and they even try to bring up philosophic reasons on the matter of why an intelligent creator would exist. Yet you dismiss it offhandly because "it doesn't say that he exists." So what if it doesn't outright explicitly state that? It's implied by nature! Science can only do so much, and go so far! When will you realize that science can't explain everything, and is limited by the tools we have available to test and explore it?

No one knows if an effective cure for cancer will be discovered tomorrow, or if some new quirk of the laws of physics gets realized and ways of exploiting it are discovered, or if some breakthrough will fundamentally change our understanding of biology and the evolutionary process on life. A crazy discovery can happen at any moment, potentially shattering many previously established claims.

Science is not perfect. It can only do so much. Reality itself doesn't change in how it operates, but how we understand it most certainly will change as time moves on.

Even so, the bottomline is that you're not taking seriously what people here are trying to tell you.

[Kenny]

Kenny. Infinite means without end, if there are past events without end we can never end up here as we have to first go through never ending past events. It's a contradiction, plain and simple.
If you don't believe it is then I want you to start counting at one and tell me when you get to the end of infinity.

There could be an infinite number of times intelligent life has developed and died over infinity, and we are just one of the never ending cycle of life beginning and ending.

I never said it did, I said it says that there is a finite beginning to our universe, therefore if it began it must have a cause. An intelligent creator is the next argument and the most logically coherent argument.

Do you know everything there is to know about the Universe? Of course not. How do you know among this vast knowledge that you are unaware of, there isn't an explanation that is forign to you? What I hear you saying is because you are unable to think of a better explanation, your idea of God/intelligent creator is the default position. I don't see your creator/God as a default position and I don't think you are qualified to say there are no better expalantions.

Ken

[Kenny]

FlawedIntellectKen, you're being very dense here. Your mistake is that you're assuming that claiming the existence of an intelligent creator responsible for the existence of the universe somehow automatically equals religion. However, this is false. There is a worldview known as "deism" which acknowledges the necessity of an intelligent creator God, but does not subscribe to any religious beliefs or traditions. Albert Einstein was a deist. He was convinced that there had to be some kind of God as a result of his own mathematical equations involving physics and the nature of the universe.

Ken
Are you a deist? Or are you a Christian.. I am not talking to Albert Einstine and what he believes, I'm talking to you and about what you believe.

Flawedintellect
Also, science is limited in terms of what it can do. By definition, science is not capable of addressing the metaphysical. However, philosophy as a whole is able to deal with the matter of the metaphysical. (Science is itself a more narrowly-focused form of philosophy, which is concerned with the mechanistic nature of the way reality operates.)

Ken
What does metaphysics have to do with Cosmology?



Flawedintellect
Your "responses" only serve to illustrate how ignorant you are on the matters that these people are talking about. You only keep saying that you "disagree with" them and never really provide a sound reason to disagree with them. You're disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing, rather than submitting good reasons to reject their claims. And when you do put things on the table for them to examine, you ignore their criticisms and keep insisting that they're wrong [without even bothering to provide reasons for why.].

Ken
The reason I disagree with them is because what I hear them saying is because they can’t think of a better explanation; God did it! (they may not say God, they’ll say creator instead; but from my experience, when a Christian says creator, what they really mean is the God of the Bible) That makes no sense to me. There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it, first you have to prove the existence of said Creator/God then you have to show evidence that he is responsible for creation. Theists have been trying to prove the existence of God for thousands of years and thus far nobody has succeeded, I doubt any of you guys will either.


Flawedintellect
In any case, everyone else has been trying to provide you scientific evidence that implies the existence of an intelligent creator, which is what you asked of them, and they even try to bring up philosophic reasons on the matter of why an intelligent creator would exist.


Ken
This conversation is about cosmology, not philosophy. You need to show me something from cosmologist that points to your creator; thus far nobody has done that


Flawedintellect
Yet you dismiss it offhandly because "it doesn't say that he exists." So what if it doesn't outright explicitly state that? It's implied by nature! Science can only do so much, and go so far! When will you realize that science can't explain everything, and is limited by the tools we have available to test and explore it?

Ken
Are you suggesting you know more about the Universe than cosmologists?

[FlawedIntellect]

Flawedintellect
Also, science is limited in terms of what it can do. By definition, science is not capable of addressing the metaphysical. However, philosophy as a whole is able to deal with the matter of the metaphysical. (Science is itself a more narrowly-focused form of philosophy, which is concerned with the mechanistic nature of the way reality operates.)

Ken
What does metaphysics have to do with Cosmology?

This entire topic is partly about cosmology and partly a bout metaphysics. You do realize that the question of the original post is about the apparent need for an uncaused firsts cause?

Flawedintellect
Your "responses" only serve to illustrate how ignorant you are on the matters that these people are talking about. You only keep saying that you "disagree with" them and never really provide a sound reason to disagree with them. You're disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing, rather than submitting good reasons to reject their claims. And when you do put things on the table for them to examine, you ignore their criticisms and keep insisting that they're wrong [without even bothering to provide reasons for why.].
Ken
The reason I disagree with them is because what I hear them saying is because they can’t think of a better explanation; God did it! (they may not say God, they’ll say creator instead; but from my experience, when a Christian says creator, what they really mean is the God of the Bible) That makes no sense to me. There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it, first you have to prove the existence of said Creator/God then you have to show evidence that he is responsible for creation. Theists have been trying to prove the existence of God for thousands of years and thus far nobody has succeeded, I doubt any of you guys will either.

In other words, you're assuming that God doesn't exist, therefore the cause of the universe can't be God. That's circular reasoning. "Because they can't think of a better explanation"? Really? You call that a refutation? That's a worthless response, since it doesn't explain any reason on why God ought not be the explanation. Their explanation is the better one, since you've failed to actually provide an explanation that stands to scrutiny, and you never even pointed out any flaws in their position. You're working from your biases. So what if you disagree? Doesn't matter if you're not going to back it up.

Have you been paying any attention to a single thing that's been said to you and given it any serious thought? Nope. You've been smacking your fingers against the keyboard coming up with "responses" that don't even deal with the subject matter.

Flawedintellect
In any case, everyone else has been trying to provide you scientific evidence that implies the existence of an intelligent creator, which is what you asked of them, and they even try to bring up philosophic reasons on the matter of why an intelligent creator would exist.

Ken
This conversation is about cosmology, not philosophy. You need to show me something from cosmologist that points to your creator; thus far nobody has done that

No, the original post of this thread was concerned with both cosmology and philosophy.
Um, yes we have done that. You've just been ignoring it. The Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Extreme Fine Tuning.

You've also ignored what's been said about the problems with what you've proposed. The impossibility of an eternal singularity spontaneously forming the Big Bang. The problem with an oscillating universe model. (Namely the problem that the universe's entropy will increase with each oscillation and not reset.)

I'm pretty sure someone earlier pointed out that you're "moving the goalposts", which basically means that you're arbitrarily changing the standard and demanding more evidence than what has already been given, and casually dismissing the evidence you've already been given. [Nevermind that you haven't provided any reasons or explanations as to why the evidence doesn't work. From the look of things, it appears that you just dismiss it because you don't like it.] Your position has already been shown to not be scientifically sound, and yet you still act like everyone else's position on the matter is inferior to yours, even going so far as to deny that the evidence implicitly supports the position that you "disagree with", even though it's already been shown how the evidence implies this position.

Flawedintellect
Yet you dismiss it offhandly because "it doesn't say that he exists." So what if it doesn't outright explicitly state that? It's implied by nature! Science can only do so much, and go so far! When will you realize that science can't explain everything, and is limited by the tools we have available to test and explore it?

Ken
Are you suggesting you know more about the Universe than cosmologists?

I am not suggesting that I know more about the universe than cosmologists. Instead, the entire time, people here have been pointing out what cosmologists have to say on the matter. Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Fine Tuning of the laws of physics.

You clearly have no clue what you're talking about. Your "objections" are nothing more than your personal, biased opinion, which matters nothing since you can't even provide any rational explanations on why you reject their position. All you've said is that you "disagree with it because it says God bla bla bla." So what? Get serious.

[1over137]

There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it

So, Kenny, tell us, what we are unaware of that you are aware of?

[Danieltwotwenty]

There could be an infinite number of times intelligent life has developed and died over infinity, and we are just one of the never ending cycle of life beginning and ending.

Kenny your not thinking about what I am saying, if you have point A and you want to go to point B but there is an infinite amount of events between point A and point B then you can never get to point B. Therefore a universe with an infinite amount of past events is illogical and we should never have gotten to point B. If you can actually make a logical argument of how you would get from point A to point B with an infinite amount of events between the two points then I am all ears. Until that time I reject your statement above as breaking the laws of logic and class it as fallacious.

Do you know everything there is to know about the Universe? Of course not. How do you know among this vast knowledge that you are unaware of, there isn't an explanation that is forign to you? What I hear you saying is because you are unable to think of a better explanation, your idea of God/intelligent creator is the default position. I don't see your creator/God as a default position and I don't think you are qualified to say there are no better expalantions.

Well if you can provide a better explanation that follows logic and reason and is not fallacious then I am all ears, until that time I reject you line of reasoning and will continue with my own.

Or if you can actually refute anything that has been said (which you have failed to do time and again) without falling back to a position of I don't know or I just don't agree and actually form a proper argument using a logical syllogism I would be more than happy to continue with this conversation.

[Kenny]

Flawedintellect
Also, science is limited in terms of what it can do. By definition, science is not capable of addressing the metaphysical. However, philosophy as a whole is able to deal with the matter of the metaphysical. (Science is itself a more narrowly-focused form of philosophy, which is concerned with the mechanistic nature of the way reality operates.)

Ken
What does metaphysics have to do with Cosmology?

This entire topic is partly about cosmology and partly a bout metaphysics. You do realize that the question of the original post is about the apparent need for an uncaused firsts cause?

Flawedintellect
Your "responses" only serve to illustrate how ignorant you are on the matters that these people are talking about. You only keep saying that you "disagree with" them and never really provide a sound reason to disagree with them. You're disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing, rather than submitting good reasons to reject their claims. And when you do put things on the table for them to examine, you ignore their criticisms and keep insisting that they're wrong [without even bothering to provide reasons for why.].
Ken
The reason I disagree with them is because what I hear them saying is because they can’t think of a better explanation; God did it! (they may not say God, they’ll say creator instead; but from my experience, when a Christian says creator, what they really mean is the God of the Bible) That makes no sense to me. There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it, first you have to prove the existence of said Creator/God then you have to show evidence that he is responsible for creation. Theists have been trying to prove the existence of God for thousands of years and thus far nobody has succeeded, I doubt any of you guys will either.

In other words, you're assuming that God doesn't exist, therefore the cause of the universe can't be God. That's circular reasoning. "Because they can't think of a better explanation"? Really? You call that a refutation? That's a worthless response, since it doesn't explain any reason on why God ought not be the explanation. Their explanation is the better one, since you've failed to actually provide an explanation that stands to scrutiny, and you never even pointed out any flaws in their position. You're working from your biases. So what if you disagree? Doesn't matter if you're not going to back it up.

Have you been paying any attention to a single thing that's been said to you and given it any serious thought? Nope. You've been smacking your fingers against the keyboard coming up with "responses" that don't even deal with the subject matter.

Flawedintellect
In any case, everyone else has been trying to provide you scientific evidence that implies the existence of an intelligent creator, which is what you asked of them, and they even try to bring up philosophic reasons on the matter of why an intelligent creator would exist.

Ken
This conversation is about cosmology, not philosophy. You need to show me something from cosmologist that points to your creator; thus far nobody has done that

No, the original post of this thread was concerned with both cosmology and philosophy.
Um, yes we have done that. You've just been ignoring it. The Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Extreme Fine Tuning.

You've also ignored what's been said about the problems with what you've proposed. The impossibility of an eternal singularity spontaneously forming the Big Bang. The problem with an oscillating universe model. (Namely the problem that the universe's entropy will increase with each oscillation and not reset.)

I'm pretty sure someone earlier pointed out that you're "moving the goalposts", which basically means that you're arbitrarily changing the standard and demanding more evidence than what has already been given, and casually dismissing the evidence you've already been given. [Nevermind that you haven't provided any reasons or explanations as to why the evidence doesn't work. From the look of things, it appears that you just dismiss it because you don't like it.] Your position has already been shown to not be scientifically sound, and yet you still act like everyone else's position on the matter is inferior to yours, even going so far as to deny that the evidence implicitly supports the position that you "disagree with", even though it's already been shown how the evidence implies this position.

Flawedintellect
Yet you dismiss it offhandly because "it doesn't say that he exists." So what if it doesn't outright explicitly state that? It's implied by nature! Science can only do so much, and go so far! When will you realize that science can't explain everything, and is limited by the tools we have available to test and explore it?

Ken
Are you suggesting you know more about the Universe than cosmologists?

I am not suggesting that I know more about the universe than cosmologists. Instead, the entire time, people here have been pointing out what cosmologists have to say on the matter. Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Fine Tuning of the laws of physics.

You clearly have no clue what you're talking about. Your "objections" are nothing more than your personal, biased opinion, which matters nothing since you can't even provide any rational explanations on why you reject their position. All you've said is that you "disagree with it because it says God bla bla bla." So what? Get serious.

Flawed intellect
In other words, you're assuming that God doesn't exist, therefore the cause of the universe can't be God. That's circular reasoning.

Ken
My reasons for believing God does not exist is because I see more evidence for his non-existence than I see for his existence. Therefore, if you are going to insert God into the picture, you need to provide evidence that he exists. That is not circular, it starts with you bring evidence of God to the table.

Flawed intellect
"Because they can't think of a better explanation"? Really? You call that a refutation? That's a worthless response, since it doesn't explain any reason on why God ought not be the explanation.

Ken
Modern cosmologists spend their lives studying the Universe and they do not see any evidence that leads to your idea of God. In order for your God to be an explanation, there has to be evidence that leads there. What evidence do you have that they don’t?

Flawed intellect
Their explanation is the better one, since you've failed to actually provide an explanation that stands to scrutiny, and you never even pointed out any flaws in their position. You're working from your biases. So what if you disagree? Doesn't matter if you're not going to back it up.

Ken
I have said countless times I don’t have an answer; I provided guesses. You guys act as if you have the answers, and act as if by refuting my guesses it somehow confirms your claims! It does not. Your claims need to stand on their own and thus far they have not presented any cosmological evidence that leads to their idea of God. If you want be to believe you, quit asking me questions I don’t have answers to and provide cosmological evidence that confirms your POV


Flawed intellect
Have you been paying any attention to a single thing that's been said to you and given it any serious thought? Nope. You've been smacking your fingers against the keyboard coming up with "responses" that don't even deal with the subject matter.

Ken
I’ve responded to each point you guys made, line by line. You just don’t like my responses.

Flawed Intellect:
No, the original post of this thread was concerned with both cosmology and philosophy.
Um, yes we have done that. You've just been ignoring it. The Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Extreme Fine Tuning.

Ken
Big bang, cosmic expansion, dark energy, etc. I have no problem with that because there is evidence that leads there. When you bring your creator into the picture, you need to bring evidence that leads there as well and thus far you have not.

Flawed Intellect:

You've also ignored what's been said about the problems with what you've proposed. The impossibility of an eternal singularity spontaneously forming the Big Bang. The problem with an oscillating universe model. (Namely the problem that the universe's entropy will increase with each oscillation and not reset.)

Ken
I’ve said countless times I do not have answers to what happened prior to the singular that led to the big bang; cosmologists don’t either! If you guys are gonna claim to have all the answers, you need to quit refuting my guesses and present evidence that confirms your claims.

Flawed Intellect:

I'm pretty sure someone earlier pointed out that you're "moving the goalposts", which basically means that you're arbitrarily changing the standard and demanding more evidence than what has already been given, and casually dismissing the evidence you've already been given.

Ken
I haven’t dismissed evidence; I’ve dismissed claims presented without evidence.

Flawed Intellect
[Nevermind that you haven't provided any reasons or explanations as to why the evidence doesn't work. From the look of things, it appears that you just dismiss it because you don't like it.]

Ken:
See above

Flawed Intellect:
Your position has already been shown to not be scientifically sound, and yet you still act like everyone else's position on the matter is inferior to yours, even going so far as to deny that the evidence implicitly supports the position that you "disagree with", even though it's already been shown how the evidence implies this position.

Ken
Do you have an example of me doing this?


Flawed Intellect:
I am not suggesting that I know more about the universe than cosmologists. Instead, the entire time, people here have been pointing out what cosmologists have to say on the matter. Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Fine Tuning of the laws of physics.

Ken
But they also bring stuff to the table cosmologists DONNOT say on the matter, such as a creator; that is what I take issue with.

Flawed Intellect
You clearly have no clue what you're talking about. Your "objections" are nothing more than your personal, biased opinion, which matters nothing since you can't even provide any rational explanations on why you reject their position. All you've said is that you "disagree with it because it says God bla bla bla." So what? Get serious.

Ken
You obviously have not been listening to what I have been saying.

[Kenny]

There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it

So, Kenny, tell us, what we are unaware of that you are aware of?

I am aware there is a lot about the Universe that nobody knows. In order to say "there is no better explanation than God" you have to know all the other possible explanations; otherwise you are not qualified to make such a statement. Nobody knows all the other possible explanations; cosmologists don't know, I don't know, nobody knows! Not even you guys.

Ken

[Kenny]

There could be an infinite number of times intelligent life has developed and died over infinity, and we are just one of the never ending cycle of life beginning and ending.

Kenny your not thinking about what I am saying, if you have point A and you want to go to point B but there is an infinite amount of events between point A and point B then you can never get to point B. Therefore a universe with an infinite amount of past events is illogical and we should never have gotten to point B. If you can actually make a logical argument of how you would get from point A to point B with an infinite amount of events between the two points then I am all ears. Until that time I reject your statement above as breaking the laws of logic and class it as fallacious.

Do you know everything there is to know about the Universe? Of course not. How do you know among this vast knowledge that you are unaware of, there isn't an explanation that is forign to you? What I hear you saying is because you are unable to think of a better explanation, your idea of God/intelligent creator is the default position. I don't see your creator/God as a default position and I don't think you are qualified to say there are no better expalantions.

Well if you can provide a better explanation that follows logic and reason and is not fallacious then I am all ears, until that time I reject you line of reasoning and will continue with my own.

Or if you can actually refute anything that has been said (which you have failed to do time and again) without falling back to a position of I don't know or I just don't agree and actually form a proper argument using a logical syllogism I would be more than happy to continue with this conversation.

Daniel
Kenny your not thinking about what I am saying, if you have point A and you want to go to point B but there is an infinite amount of events between point A and point B then you can never get to point B .Therefore a universe with an infinite amount of past events is illogical and we should never have gotten to point B. If you can actually make a logical argument of how you would get from point A to point B with an infinite amount of events between the two points then I am all ears. Until that time I reject your statement above as breaking the laws of logic and class it as fallacious.

Ken:
Is there an infinite amount of space between point A & B if they were a part of a circle? I never claimed there was an infinite amount of events between point A and point B.


Daniel:
Well if you can provide a better explanation that follows logic and reason and is not fallacious then I am all ears, until that time I reject you line of reasoning and will continue with my own.
Or if you can actually refute anything that has been said (which you have failed to do time and again) without falling back to a position of I don't know or I just don't agree and actually form a proper argument using a logical syllogism I would be more than happy to continue with this conversation


Ken
If you are going to continue with your line of reasoning, that is perfectly fine! I am not trying to convince you of anything, I am simply stating why I disagree with your line of reasoning. You keep bringing a Creator to the table but you haven’t provided any evidence that leads to this creator; that’s why I reject it.

[FlawedIntellect]

Flawed intellect
In other words, you're assuming that God doesn't exist, therefore the cause of the universe can't be God. That's circular reasoning.

Ken
My reasons for believing God does not exist is because I see more evidence for his non-existence than I see for his existence. Therefore, if you are going to insert God into the picture, you need to provide evidence that he exists. That is not circular, it starts with you bring evidence of God to the table.

That's nonsense and you know it. There's no such evidence for his "nonexistence." I already pointed out that people have provided evidence in this thread, and I'm pretty sure the others have already pointed out that you're "moving the goalposts."

Flawed intellect
"Because they can't think of a better explanation"? Really? You call that a refutation? That's a worthless response, since it doesn't explain any reason on why God ought not be the explanation.

Ken
Modern cosmologists spend their lives studying the Universe and they do not see any evidence that leads to your idea of God. In order for your God to be an explanation, there has to be evidence that leads there. What evidence do you have that they don’t?

Again, you're moving the goalposts. ¬_¬
You're also completely missing the point.

Flawed intellect
Their explanation is the better one, since you've failed to actually provide an explanation that stands to scrutiny, and you never even pointed out any flaws in their position. You're working from your biases. So what if you disagree? Doesn't matter if you're not going to back it up.

Ken
I have said countless times I don’t have an answer; I provided guesses. You guys act as if you have the answers, and act as if by refuting my guesses it somehow confirms your claims! It does not. Your claims need to stand on their own and thus far they have not presented any cosmological evidence that leads to their idea of God. If you want be to believe you, quit asking me questions I don’t have answers to and provide cosmological evidence that confirms your POV

This is PHILOSOPHY here, Ken! You can't respond with "oh, I don't know" and still try to argue against other peoples' positions! That's arguing from ignorance! And what do you mean that the cosmological evidence doesn't lead to God? It necessitates a first cause and pokes holes in alternate explanations. There's not many other options than "God exists", Ken. Go back and reread. And stop moving the goalposts.

Flawed intellect
Have you been paying any attention to a single thing that's been said to you and given it any serious thought? Nope. You've been smacking your fingers against the keyboard coming up with "responses" that don't even deal with the subject matter.

Ken
I’ve responded to each point you guys made, line by line. You just don’t like my responses.

Your responses were a parade of logical fallacies and ignorance.
We're not rejecting your responses because of disliking them. We're rejecting your responses because they don't even provide anything logically sound. There's a huge difference.

Flawed Intellect:
No, the original post of this thread was concerned with both cosmology and philosophy.
Um, yes we have done that. You've just been ignoring it. The Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Extreme Fine Tuning.

Ken
Big bang, cosmic expansion, dark energy, etc. I have no problem with that because there is evidence that leads there. When you bring your creator into the picture, you need to bring evidence that leads there as well and thus far you have not.

Again, moving the goalposts. Go back and reread.

Flawed Intellect:

You've also ignored what's been said about the problems with what you've proposed. The impossibility of an eternal singularity spontaneously forming the Big Bang. The problem with an oscillating universe model. (Namely the problem that the universe's entropy will increase with each oscillation and not reset.)

Ken
I’ve said countless times I do not have answers to what happened prior to the singular that led to the big bang; cosmologists don’t either! If you guys are gonna claim to have all the answers, you need to quit refuting my guesses and present evidence that confirms your claims.

... Moving the goalposts. Again. Evidence has been provided. You're just arbitrarily dismissing it and demanding more of it.
And the refutations of your guesses aren't even the main event! They're the frosting on the cake! They're the side-dish to the dinner plate! These are delivered alongside the evidence, and they strengthen the main point.

Flawed Intellect:

I'm pretty sure someone earlier pointed out that you're "moving the goalposts", which basically means that you're arbitrarily changing the standard and demanding more evidence than what has already been given, and casually dismissing the evidence you've already been given.

Ken
I haven’t dismissed evidence; I’ve dismissed claims presented without evidence.

Uh, yes you /have/ dismissed evidence. People in this thread have presented cosmological evidence that strongly implies the existence of a creator.

Flawed Intellect
[Nevermind that you haven't provided any reasons or explanations as to why the evidence doesn't work. From the look of things, it appears that you just dismiss it because you don't like it.]

Ken:
See above

Why? There's nothing to see there.

Flawed Intellect:
Your position has already been shown to not be scientifically sound, and yet you still act like everyone else's position on the matter is inferior to yours, even going so far as to deny that the evidence implicitly supports the position that you "disagree with", even though it's already been shown how the evidence implies this position.

Ken
Do you have an example of me doing this?

... How about every single page of every single thread you've ever posted in? Is that enough evidence for you?
I'm dead serious.

Flawed Intellect:
I am not suggesting that I know more about the universe than cosmologists. Instead, the entire time, people here have been pointing out what cosmologists have to say on the matter. Big Bang. Cosmic Expansion. Dark Energy. Fine Tuning of the laws of physics.

Ken
But they also bring stuff to the table cosmologists DONNOT say on the matter, such as a creator; that is what I take issue with.

In other words, you've got a personal bias on this matter and are deliberately choosing to not be rational.
They're pointing out that the stuff Cosmologists put on the table strongly implies a Creator. It's not a tremendous leap in logic. It's just the next logical step.

Or would you like a series of quotes from cosmologists on the likeliness of God's existence?

Flawed Intellect
You clearly have no clue what you're talking about. Your "objections" are nothing more than your personal, biased opinion, which matters nothing since you can't even provide any rational explanations on why you reject their position. All you've said is that you "disagree with it because it says God bla bla bla." So what? Get serious.

Ken
You obviously have not been listening to what I have been saying.

I've read through your every word. Everyone in this thread has.
You've been shown repeatedly that you're making serious errors and that you're not playing by the rules of this sort of discussion.

You've been attacking everyone else's claims with pure nonsense in almost every single post you've made on this forum. Don't believe me? Go back and reread EVERYTHING you've posted.

Why should WE jump through hoops for someone who can't even get serious on the subject matter?

There is so much about the Universe that you guys are unaware of I don’t think any of you guys are qualified to claim a better explanation does not exist, If you wanna say God did it

So, Kenny, tell us, what we are unaware of that you are aware of?

I am aware there is a lot about the Universe that nobody knows. In order to say "there is no better explanation than God" you have to know all the other possible explanations; otherwise you are not qualified to make such a statement. Nobody knows all the other possible explanations; cosmologists don't know, I don't know, nobody knows! Not even you guys.

Ken

Kenny, you're arguing from ignorance here. And you're moving the goalposts again.
So what if there's much about the universe that no one knows? We know it exists, and we know that it's comprehensible. And we know enough about the universe to state that it implies the existence of a creator.

What more do we need than:
The Big Bang makes it almost completely clear that the universe has a beginning.
The laws of physics are extremely precise and minor deviations could mean that we wouldn't be here. (Fine Tuning.) The universe is constantly expanding, and such is necessary for the existence of life. (Thank-you, Byblos, for correcting me and clarifying that the Average Hubble Expansion Rate of the Universe needs to be greater than 0 for there to be a beginning.)
There appears to be a repulsive gravity force called "Dark Energy" that is responsible for accelerating the expansion of the universe to the point where it appears that some trillions of years from now, the universe will succumb to maximum entropy. (Meaning that it's very unlikely for there to be a "big crunch" and a subsequent oscillation.)

With evidence pointing to the universe having a beginning, the laws of physics being just what they need to be for us to even exist, the expansion of the universe, and dark energy, which makes it unlikely that the universe will oscillate, it's pretty clear that the majority of other models for the existence of the universe fall flat because most of them contradict the evidence or even logic itself.

The evidence leaves very little room for other options and God simply appears to be the most likely explanation.

Oh, by the way: the mention of God or a Creator does not automatically render all evidence null, like you pretend it to be. Evidence has been provided. You're just denying that it fits because you don't like it.
Everyone else has been trying to be extremely patient with you and try to show you what's wrong with what you're saying, but you won't listen and you keep resorting to the same exact logical fallacies over and over and over and over and over again, making the entire thing a futile exercise.

I must ask you, what's your purpose in being here, if you're not even going to discuss this seriously?