Evidence for God from Science

Paul, even energy curves spacetime.
And having curved spacetime it effects e.g. light passing by, which is energy and not "solid" mass.

You have gravity even without "solid" mass.

Einstein's equation for gravity looks like this:

Bunch of terms for spacetime curvature = bunch of terms consisting of mass, energy, pressure.

PaulSacramento wrote:

All the things that were caused were caused. That aint profound.

The Buick plainly has a cause. I dont think you or anyone can demonstrate that physical laws do, nor that they "came into existence".

Careful with your tone.

Um ok, where did i tonalize?

Yes, it does seem profound because it took all these pages for you to admit that little nugget of common sense on t his thread and the other one as well, so...

nonsense, I never denied it. I dont really know what that was ever misunderstood.

Name me one physical Law that has existed since the creation of the universe AND that you can PROVE EXISTED.

So irrelevant even if I could. I guess I dont get where you you draw a line between "created" and "uncaused". God is uncaused and everything else is caused?

At most we can state that the physical laws that seem to govern the universe COULD have been that way all along BUT we do NOT know that for sure.

Well, there is a point of agreement. Whatever "all along" might mean, to being who dont know really what time is.

I am sure that gravity, for example, probably did NOT exist, as it applies to sold mass, UNTIL solid mass came to be.

Got me there, Im not a physicist.


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God is uncaused and everything else is caused?

God is existence. There are 'things' that have always existed with existence, and things that come from it due to Its will and then design.

1over137 wrote:Paul, even energy curves spacetime.
And having curved spacetime it effects e.g. light passing by, which is energy and not "solid" mass.

You have gravity even without "solid" mass.

Einstein's equation for gravity looks like this:

Bunch of terms for spacetime curvature = bunch of terms consisting of mass, energy, pressure.

I didn't mean to imply that gravity only exists with solid mass, what I meant was that we don't know how gravity MAY have been BEFORE things like planets came to be OR how any laws that we have NOW may have been before.
What we call "laws" are just observations of nature within our known solar system as we can observe them NOW.

Mallz wrote:

God is uncaused and everything else is caused?

God is existence. There are 'things' that have always existed with existence, and things that come from it due to Its will and then design.

That may well be, but to me it is just words, I've no idea what it means to say those things.

Paul,
I think that is a great point. I'm not a physicist and not claiming to have any expert knowledge.
But, it's been challenged, how do we know the laws of nature aren't eternal?

My first thought was whether this is a valid question. Is gravity a thing in and of itself?
I would think not. The question implies it is a thing. If there is an argument for this, I'd be interested in hearing. I've certainly been wrong.
I would think that what we refer to as 'laws' are our best descriptions of the forces that uniformly govern the universe. The conclusion being that the 'laws' do not transcend the cosmos. If the universe (space, time, matter) has existed forever, then the laws have existed forever. If the universe has a beginning, then the laws have a beginning. Interested to hear from 1over on this subject.

how do we know the laws of nature aren't eternal?

Just some of my thoughts..
I'd guess many people would agree that we look for laws because we are tying to figure out what governs what is happening, right?
And I think that is a proper way to look at what a law is. But think of it in terms of the El-Shaddai. His 'laws' and why they exist are because they are the governing of existence itself. Which is why He cannot go against His nature.
There are laws in our cosmos that are not in effect outside of it. But those laws are based off of laws outside of it, and some of the laws outside of it still apply inside of it (the cosmos). Our universe hasn't necessarily existed forever, but the governing 'laws', or really, God's nature has always existed for our universe to be expressed.

That may well be, but to me it is just words, I've no idea what it means to say those things.

If I can think of a way to demonstrate it to you, I will.

jlay wrote:Paul,
I think that is a great point. I'm not a physicist and not claiming to have any expert knowledge.
But, it's been challenged, how do we know the laws of nature aren't eternal?

My first thought was whether this is a valid question. Is gravity a thing in and of itself?
I would think not. The question implies it is a thing. If there is an argument for this, I'd be interested in hearing. I've certainly been wrong.
I would think that what we refer to as 'laws' are our best descriptions of the forces that uniformly govern the universe. The conclusion being that the 'laws' do not transcend the cosmos. If the universe (space, time, matter) has existed forever, then the laws have existed forever. If the universe has a beginning, then the laws have a beginning. Interested to hear from 1over on this subject.

Laws, by definition, are descriptive, and as such cannot precede what they describe. I found this blog post by Edward Feser to be very helpful on the subject (and other related subjects we've been dicussing as of late).

Byblos wrote:

jlay wrote:Paul,
I think that is a great point. I'm not a physicist and not claiming to have any expert knowledge.
But, it's been challenged, how do we know the laws of nature aren't eternal?

My first thought was whether this is a valid question. Is gravity a thing in and of itself?
I would think not. The question implies it is a thing. If there is an argument for this, I'd be interested in hearing. I've certainly been wrong.
I would think that what we refer to as 'laws' are our best descriptions of the forces that uniformly govern the universe. The conclusion being that the 'laws' do not transcend the cosmos. If the universe (space, time, matter) has existed forever, then the laws have existed forever. If the universe has a beginning, then the laws have a beginning. Interested to hear from 1over on this subject.

Laws, by definition, are descriptive, and as such cannot precede what they describe. I found this blog post by Edward Feser to be very helpful on the subject (and other related subjects we've been dicussing as of late).

laws are of course, a human construct, and some turn out to be wrong. None can ever be proved.

Whether the laws "existed" in form before they were detected is I think unanswerable.
Same with math. We dont create it but....

Audie wrote:

Byblos wrote:

jlay wrote:Paul,
I think that is a great point. I'm not a physicist and not claiming to have any expert knowledge.
But, it's been challenged, how do we know the laws of nature aren't eternal?

My first thought was whether this is a valid question. Is gravity a thing in and of itself?
I would think not. The question implies it is a thing. If there is an argument for this, I'd be interested in hearing. I've certainly been wrong.
I would think that what we refer to as 'laws' are our best descriptions of the forces that uniformly govern the universe. The conclusion being that the 'laws' do not transcend the cosmos. If the universe (space, time, matter) has existed forever, then the laws have existed forever. If the universe has a beginning, then the laws have a beginning. Interested to hear from 1over on this subject.

Laws, by definition, are descriptive, and as such cannot precede what they describe. I found this blog post by Edward Feser to be very helpful on the subject (and other related subjects we've been dicussing as of late).

laws are of course, a human construct, and some turn out to be wrong. None can ever be proved.

Whether the laws "existed" in form before they were detected is I think unanswerable.
Same with math. We dont create it but....

Fair enough, but that really isn't the question. In fact, you are asking a question that you think, by your own admission, is unanswerable. And by your own admission is a human construct. So, the question, 'can you prove that the laws of nature have a cause,' doesn't really follow from your own view. But that isn't how you have phrased the question. You've asked the question as if it is the weak link that undermines the CA. At least that has been my take away. You say existed in form, but the burden of proof is on you do demonstrate that laws exist in form. There is no scientist I know of (and I have 3 phd level research scientists in my immediate family) that rejects uniformity of nature. This means that these laws act, have acted, and will act the same regardless of whether anyone is, was or ever will be there to detect them. That is a fundamental philosophical presupposition of science.

Let's also keep in mind that science doesn't prove anything. But that doesn't mean the laws can't be known and demonstrated to be true. Also, can you provide an example of an accepted scientific law that has turned out wrong? I'm simply not familiar with this.

Audie wrote:laws are of course, a human construct, and some turn out to be wrong. None can ever be proved.

Whether the laws "existed" in form before they were detected is I think unanswerable.
Same with math. We dont create it but....

If laws are human constructs then how could they possibly "exist" in form before they are "detected"? That's a flat-out contradiction for if they are indeed human constructs then they can neither exist nor be detected, only merely thought of.

Its a tricky question of course.
I mean, gravity is what happens when something exerts force on something else ( layman terms).
Gravity:
the force that attracts a body toward the center of the earth, or toward any other physical body having mass. For most purposes Newton's laws of gravity apply, with minor modifications to take the general theory of relativity into account.

or:
Gravitation or gravity is a natural phenomenon by which all physical bodies attract each other. Gravity gives weight to physical objects and causes them to fall toward the ground when dropped.

In modern physics, gravitation is most accurately described by the general theory of relativity (proposed by Einstein) which describes gravitation as a consequence of the curvature of spacetime. For most situations gravity is well approximated by Newton's law of universal gravitation, which postulates that the gravitational force of two bodies of mass is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.

In pursuit of a theory of everything, the merging of general relativity and quantum mechanics (or quantum field theory) into a more general theory of quantum gravity has become an area of active research. It is hypothesised that the gravitational force is mediated by a massless spin-2 particle called the graviton, and that gravity would have separated from the electronuclear force during the grand unification epoch.

Gravity is the weakest of the four fundamental forces of nature. The gravitational force is approximately 10−38 times the strength of the strong force (i.e. gravity is 38 orders of magnitude weaker), 10−36 times the strength of the electromagnetic force, and 10−29 times the strength of the weak force. As a consequence, gravity has a negligible influence on the behavior of sub-atomic particles, and plays no role in determining the internal properties of everyday matter. On the other hand, gravity is the dominant force at the macroscopic scale, that is the cause of the formation, shape, and trajectory (orbit) of astronomical bodies, including those of asteroids, comets, planets, stars, and galaxies. It is responsible for causing the Earth and the other planets to orbit the Sun; for causing the Moon to orbit the Earth; for the formation of tides; for natural convection, by which fluid flow occurs under the influence of a density gradient and gravity; for heating the interiors of forming stars and planets to very high temperatures; for solar system, galaxy, stellar formation and evolution; and for various other phenomena observed on Earth and throughout the universe. This is the case for several reasons: gravity is the only force acting on all particles with mass; it has an infinite range; it is always attractive and never repulsive; and it cannot be absorbed, transformed, or shielded against. Even though electromagnetism is far stronger than gravity, electromagnetism is not relevant to astronomical objects, since such bodies have an equal number of protons and electrons that cancel out (i.e., a net electric charge of zero).

So, gravity can NOT exist without physical bodies/particles.

So, one can argue, gravity itself has a cause and is also a cause.

Byblos wrote:

Audie wrote:laws are of course, a human construct, and some turn out to be wrong. None can ever be proved.

Whether the laws "existed" in form before they were detected is I think unanswerable.
Same with math. We dont create it but....

If laws are human constructs then how could they possibly "exist" in form before they are "detected"? That's a flat-out contradiction for if they are indeed human constructs then they can neither exist nor be detected, only merely thought of.

Its not a contradiction at all. A law is a construct in the sense that people make observations and then come up with general statements about the observations.

Collecting data on dog bites we run the numbers and notice that:

"Black dogs are always mean". If all observations around the world confirm this,
and no exception is found, it could be codified as a "law".

Dogs were biting before the observations started getting tabulated.

Audie wrote: A law is a construct in the sense that people make observations and then come up with general statements about the observations.

In other words a law is a consistent description of certain behaviors, no argument there. That's hardly a human construct, though, considering, in most cases, the behaviors (and by extension, the law) predate humans.

Audie wrote:Collecting data on dog bites we run the numbers and notice that:

"Black dogs are always mean". If all observations around the world confirm this,
and no exception is found, it could be codified as a "law".

The consistent behavior was already there, we merely observed it. That's a far cry from constructing it.

Audie wrote:Dogs were biting before the observations started getting tabulated.

Precisely why the "law" could not have been a human construct.