Time scale? a very long time indeed.

[The11thDr.]

I think i saw that but i cant find it again, theres this man called nicodemus at the part I read, i found it quite amsing at the time i read it though, wasnt very perceptive.

[Facundo]

That's how much God loves us...He dies for our sins.

... To save us from his own torture. Wicked logic, isn't it?

[zoegirl]

Are you wiling to learn or would you simply like to continue to attack?

[truthman]

A very long time right? The universe must of been arround for a long time until it was just right for the galaxy and earth must be in the right place too. So creation weither with devine intervention or pure chance must of took a long time correct?

I'm pretty sure that it is only human beings that take shortcuts. So i read about these YEC people, are they nutty or something or is that an opinion? Because i dont think that god or the universe would trick us, its very very old not very very young! Where does god come into it really? Maybe that is what makes the impossible chance possible. Allthough i would still need convincing.

why create at all?

What most people, including most scientists find incredibly difficult to grapple with is the fact that time is totally relative to your point of reference. (study Einstein's special theory of relativity). The infinite Creator is timeless: that is, time means nothing to Him. He created time.
The Big Bang theory is an attempt to describe the origin of the universe using equations derived from general relativity, yet the equations fail in the form expounded today. I think one particular reason is they arbitrarily assume that the earth could not be at the centre of the universe and that the universe had to explode everywhere at once, not at one point that expanded outwards. (see the book, "Starlight and Time" by Humphreys). Another is that while based on relativity, the men using them are still thinking in terms of classical/linear time, trying to synchronize all events with an earth centred time metric. For instance, they have tried to incorporate the idea of "inflation" to allow for an expansion of the universe at a rate far exceeding the speed of light, but failing to incorporate the fact that that would cause all matter exceeding the speed of light to go backwards in time to many billions of years before the beginning, while any matter that did not experience inflation or travel away from your original point of reference at a very high rate of speed would continue at what we think of as classical geocentric time.
As to chance: beecause the Creator must be and is infinite, chance could not have been a factor. The infinite Creator has always known all of His thoughts and all details of everything He has thought and created. He is infinite in His knowledge.
Where does God come into it? Everywhere. Nothing can come from nothing. The universe could not have come from nothing. It had to come from an infinite energy source, and an infinite mind that created the laws that organised and initiated the origin of the universe and organised the orderly universe that we observe to this day.
Are YEC people nutty? Not necessarily: at least I learned enough in school to have a fair grasp of the English language including proper spelling and grammar along with a fair understanding of scientific concepts, but I suppose some of them can be just as nutty as OEC people and atheists.

[truthman]

I think you may find this article helpful to you, yes God did create over a long period of time. Does Genesis One Conflict with Science? Day-Age Interpretation

So far as why He should create. Well think of it like this, He was alone, He wanted someone to be with, someone to love and someone to converse with. Thusly He created what He wanted, and that was us. Would you like to spend an eternity alone? He made us to love Him, and He loves us with all of His heart and soul and mind. That is why He created.

The infinite Creator could never have been alone and could never lack or need anything by definition. The infinite Creator must be absolutely complete in Himself and perfect without contradiction. In His perfection He is perfectly loving (He is said to be love in 1 John) and states in Ephesians 1 that He created us so that we could be lovable (holy) and loved by Him, all glory and praise going to Him for His perfection. This perfect, infinite Creator enjoys loving and He created us so He could love us. We are then to love Him in return, but His purpose for creating us could not have been because He needed our love.

[truthman]

Thanks ill check out those links, and err FL that bible is really hard to read its like got wording 4 centuries old man, i love the bit where it says god createth evil What drama! Sounds like it means earthquakes or times of woe or something though, so its not like they are saying hes a genocidal loony.

Well im looking at your link about why we was created, the pleasure answer seems reasonable. just as the lonely answer...it kind of sounds like this god has needs, which sounds strange to me if you dont mind me saying. Where does jesus come into this? Obviously that man is pretty important to you people and what he has to say must carry some weight. What was said by jesus about god without reference to himself?

Kind of have to fit it all together myself, get a good picture I suppose.

You are correct. The infinite Creator God cannot have needs by definition. Infinity lacks or needs nothing.
As to Jesus:
God's purpose for creating the universe, the earth, and humanity encompasses all of time working to accomplish one thing: that many children be born into the family of God whom He can then love for eternity. The process of accomplishing His purpose is sort of like the conception and birth of a baby in the womb. It involves several steps and it takes time. The process required the sin and fall of the first man Adam, and for many children to be born of Adam (sort of like many eggs formed in the ovary). Then, it required for God Himself to be born of a virgin in a human body without a sin nature as Jesus and live a sinless life so that He could die and pay for all sin (corruption) and be resurrected in sinlessness and eternal life so that He could then implant His seed (like the sperm implanted in an egg) in any and all who unite with Him in true repentance from their sin and true faith (belief & trust) in Him.

[truthman]

I guess i can just burn this koran and book of mormon then, cant i? (its funney stuff )

I guess you dont run into that problem of infinite regression with a creator god then do you? Come on, you must of heard of the ultimate boeing 747 argument, a super god most of created that one...and so on. Why not a multiverse? Its a good playing field for massive amounts of chance to happen, heck somewhere there is a monkey that has just completed the complete works of shakespeare! If its possible it can happen can't it?

Infinite regression is not a problem; it is a proof for the infinite Creator God!
The universe could not have come from nothing: that is totally absurd! That being true, whatever it came from, whatever that came from, whatever that came from, etc. could never have been nothing, therefore the only answer is infinite something: period. Infinity has no beginning and no end; infinity includes everything real and lacks nothing: infinity is complete in itself.
The Creator God is that infinity and therefore by definition could not have had a creator, a father or a beginning.

[Kristoffer]

If infinite regression is not a problem, then im confused.

[truthman]

If infinite regression is not a problem, then im confused.

Infinite regression is inevitable whether one tries to argue for a less than infinite creator god, or a totally materialistic accidental origin for the universe, but in itself fails to satisfy or answer the question. However, infinite regression when followed through leads to the only possible conclusion that infinity must be the source of everything. Therefore, infinite regression is proof for infinity.

[jlay]

Time is where most of these arguments come to. The reality is we can only view time from a very limited perspective. I think many do not want to admit how limited we really are.

We seem to know the universe is expanding. I don't see how any one can make claims without knowing at what rates the universe expanded in the past. We assume it is constant, but that is impossible to know. Every age theory starts with assumptions. And if those assumptions are wrong, then the whole mess is wrong. Period. Most theories take us back to a bang. The bang stared with everything together and sudden rapid expansion of everything is different directions. That means the same matter that formed the earth could now be at the opposite side of the universe. We have no idea how fast the stars we are viewing today are actually moving away from us. We are not viewing current info. No matter how deep we look into the universe, we can not even know if any of it is really still there. Even the closest stars are so far that it is impossible. We can only monitor old images.

[dayage]

Hi Truthman,

The Big Bang theory is an attempt to describe the origin of the universe using equations derived from general relativity, yet the equations fail in the form expounded today. I think one particular reason is they arbitrarily assume that the earth could not be at the centre of the universe and that the universe had to explode everywhere at once, not at one point that expanded outwards. (see the book, "Starlight and Time" by Humphreys). Another is that while based on relativity, the men using them are still thinking in terms of classical/linear time, trying to synchronize all events with an earth centred time metric. For instance, they have tried to incorporate the idea of "inflation" to allow for an expansion of the universe at a rate far exceeding the speed of light, but failing to incorporate the fact that that would cause all matter exceeding the speed of light to go backwards in time to many billions of years before the beginning, while any matter that did not experience inflation or travel away from your original point of reference at a very high rate of speed would continue at what we think of as classical geocentric time.

Humphreys' model has been proven false by observations. There are clocks in the universe. One is supernovae. The Big Bang predicts that distant supernovae will run through their eruption phase (maximum to minimum light) about 10% slower than nearby supernovae. That is what we see, but Humphreys' model has them running through their eruption phase 100,000,000 percent faster.

Likewise, the 2df (Two Degree Deep Field) Galaxy Redshift Survey proved his model of shells wrong. There are no concentric spherical shells of galaxies surrounding the Milky Way.

As far as inflation goes, listen to this podcast, #3 (6-29-10)
http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/i-didnt ... d304509928
This response was mentioned in the podcast:
http://www.reasons.org/special-edition- ... e-universe

In inflation as well as the universe's continual expansion, it is space that expands, it is not matter accelerating. In otherwords, matter was not and is not speeding through space at faster than the speed of light.

Also read this article
http://www.reasons.org/did-universe-hyperinflate

By the way, Dr. John Hartnett (a young-earth physicist) agrees that Humphreys' model is wrong. Of course his model is full of holes as well.

[Gabrielman]

I think you may find this article helpful to you, yes God did create over a long period of time. Does Genesis One Conflict with Science? Day-Age Interpretation

So far as why He should create. Well think of it like this, He was alone, He wanted someone to be with, someone to love and someone to converse with. Thusly He created what He wanted, and that was us. Would you like to spend an eternity alone? He made us to love Him, and He loves us with all of His heart and soul and mind. That is why He created.

The infinite Creator could never have been alone and could never lack or need anything by definition. The infinite Creator must be absolutely complete in Himself and perfect without contradiction. In His perfection He is perfectly loving (He is said to be love in 1 John) and states in Ephesians 1 that He created us so that we could be lovable (holy) and loved by Him, all glory and praise going to Him for His perfection. This perfect, infinite Creator enjoys loving and He created us so He could love us. We are then to love Him in return, but His purpose for creating us could not have been because He needed our love.

Pardon me, but if God was not alone before he created other beings then who was with Him? Would you be so kind as to answer that, because as far as I can tell, there were no others before creation than Him. And yes, by definition, He was alone, or rather by Himself. He created to love and be loved. There is nothing wrong with that in a Theological stand point, so I fail to see why you had a problem with my OP.

[jlay]

Gabe, I think you are misunderstanding truthman. He is only saying that the word 'alone' does not describe god, because it implies lack. And God lacks nothing.

[Gabrielman]

Gabe, I think you are misunderstanding truthman. He is only saying that the word 'alone' does not describe god, because it implies lack. And God lacks nothing.

Jlay, I will respond to you in a bit, but I am going to move my post and start another thread on this so that this thread does not get off topic, is that okay with you? And can you move your post there as well?

[cslewislover]

Gabe, I think you are misunderstanding truthman. He is only saying that the word 'alone' does not describe god, because it implies lack. And God lacks nothing.

I don't know. Truthman said that God could never have been alone. Being alone means being the only one, it doesn't mean being lonely.

The infinite Creator could never have been alone . . .