> It's good to see that a scientific journal is at least admitting that
> there are "huge problems trying to work out how the Universe got
> going"!
Why? Has any scientist suggested the problems would be less than huge?
> But by "satisfying...alternatives" they mean satisfying to a
> materialist- naturalist whole holds the apriori philosophy that
> "matter is all there is" (materialism) and that "nature is a closed
> system of cause and effect which cannot be influenced by anything
> outside it" (naturalism). Accordingly, any "alternatives that are
> not "satisfying" to one who holds that apriori philosophy (such as
> creation ex-nihilo by an omnipotent, omniscient Creator) are rejected
> out-of-hand without even being considered.
Just how much detailed consideration can such a claim be given? Try
this contrived conversation.
A: How was the universe created?
B: An omnipotent, omniscient Creator created the universe out of
nothing.
A: How?
B: We don't know.
A: What do we know about this Creator?
B: That this Creator created the Universe out of nothing.
A: How do we know that?
B: The Universe is here, isn't it? How else could it have come into
existence?
A: How did the Creator come into existence?
B: The Creator didn't "come into existence". The Creator has always
existed.
A: I see. It's OK for the Creator to have always existed, but not OK for
the "seed" of the Universe to have always existed.
B: Well ......
A: Do we know anything else about the Creator?
B: No. We can't actually say that we KNOW anything else. Many people
believe many things about the Creator, but these beliefs are frequently
incompatible with one another, often mutually exclusive, and lack
sufficient objective evidence to be testable by scientific
methodologies.
A: So there isn't any intrinsic difference between "An omnipotent,
omniscient Creator created the universe." and "We don't have any
reliable knowledge as to how the Universe started".
Do you see the point I am trying to make here? When someone claims, "An
omnipotent, omniscient Creator created the universe.", do we actually
KNOW anything more (in a scientific sense) about the creation of the
Universe after we hear the claim than before it? Of course we don't!
> GC>Gott and his colleague Li-Xin Li say it's possible that a branch
> >of spacetime could loop backwards to rejoin the tree trunk. "Such
> >a thing is possible because Einstein's general theory of
> >relativity permits closed time-like curves--loops of time," says
> >Gott.
> >
> >Gott and Li found that a time loop could have existed before the
> >big bang without violating any laws of physics.
>
> The universe popping into existence last Tuesday, complete with 5
> billion human beings and an apparent history, does not violate any
> laws of physics either. In any event, one must first explain where
> these "laws of physics" came from. Maybe its "laws of physics all
> the way down", like the turtles in the story that the cosmologists
> Fred Hoyle & Chandra Wickramasinghe tell:
Fred and Chandra aren't the only one's. Check out the opening paragraph
of Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time".
And, while "turtles all the way down" is a bit silly, I would need to be
convinced that "laws of physics all the way down" is unreasonable.
I would also suggest that the only significant difference between "laws
of physics all the way down" and "An omnipotent, omniscient Creator" is
a large and arguably unnecessary dose of anthropomorphism.
> GC>Space would have been in a loop of time, perpetually re-creating
> itself.
> >If so, the Universe could be viewed as having given birth to itself.
>
> This is a prime example of verbal self-deception. Nothing can
> recreate itself. If something needs to be created it cannot exist.
> If it already exists, it can't be created. For the space to create
> itself it must exist and not exist at the same time, which is
> absurd. Sproul puts it well:
>
> "For something to come from nothing it must, in effect, create itself.
>
> Self-creation is a logical and rational impossibility...For something
> to
> create itself, it must have the ability to be and not be at the same
> time
> and in the same relationship. For something to create itself it must
> be
> before it is. This is impossible. It is impossible for solids,
> liquids, and
> gasses. It is impossible for atoms and subatomic particles. It is
> impossible for light and heat. It is impossible for God. Nothing
> anywhere, anytime, can create itself. A being can be self-existent
> without violating logic, but it cannot be self-created." (Sproul R.C.,
>
> "Not a Chance", 1994, p12)
If a being can be self-existent, why not the entity that went BANG (as
in Big Bang)?
> GC>Gott says that asking what the first event in the Universe was
> >becomes meaningless. "Every event in the Universe could have an
> >event preceding it," he says.
>
> It seems to me that if an effect can be its own cause, anything would
> be possible, and science would be impossible.
I'm inclined to agree with you here. I think that someone has mistaken
mathematical consistency with potential reality.
> I regard this as yet
> another desperate attempt to avoid what is plain to all men (Rom
> 1:19-20, that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the
> earth." (Genesis 1:1).
It isn't "plain to all men" at all! It isn't plain to Muslims or Jews at
all. (Don't tell me that God, Allah and Jehovah are the same, because
they're not. Allah and Jehovah are one-in-one's - God is a three-in-one.
Allah and Jehovah don't have a son either.)
Nor is it plain to Hindus, Buddhists, or the followers of other eastern
religions.
It is obviously not plain to agnostics and atheists.
Now for the real stinger - it is not even plain to many modernist or
post-modernist Christians. Don Cupitt's "After God" is worth a read if
you want to see how far it is possible to take Christianity once the
supernatural component has been acknowledged as fictional and what's
left has been subject to careful historical and literary analysis.
> GC>One consequence of the idea is a natural explanation for the
> >so-called arrow of time. Theories of general relativity and
> >electromagnetism do not rule out the idea that waves can affect
> >events that occurred in the past. For instance, they do not forbid
> >light from travelling back in time.
> >
> >Yet in our Universe light always travels with us into the future.
> >The reason, say Gott and Li, has to do with what would happen to
> >waves that regressed in time in the kind of universe they
> >envisage. "They would travel back to the epoch of the time loop
> >and circle forever, constantly reinforcing each other," says Gott.
> >Such a universe could not exist, Gott concludes, because the time
> >loop would quickly become unstable.
>
> What is this saying? Time could run backwards but the only universe
> that are stable have time running the way we observe it to be
> running? So must we also add to this hypothesis, auxiliary hypotheses
> of multimple-universe ensembles and the anthropic principle for good
> measure?
It isn't good enough, is it? I'm deeply suspicious of any hypothesis
that relies to any extent on either the weak or strong anthropic
principle. It appears too much like "effects constraining causes".
> If so, the words of physicist-priest John Polkinghorne
> concerning the many-worlds hyothesis apply here too:
>
> "Let us recognize these speculations for what they are. They are not
> physics but, in the strictest sense, metaphysics.
I don't quite agree. The only thing, that separates these hypotheses
from metaphysics is mathematical consistency. This doesn't mean that
these hypotheses are credible, however. But metaphysics is not even
constrained by mathematics.
> There is no purely
> scientific reason to believe in an ensemble of universes. By
> construction these other worlds are unknowable by us. A possible
> explanation of equal intellectual respectability - and to my mind
> greater economy and elegance would be that this one world is the
> way it is because it is the creation of the will of a Creator who
> purposes that it should be so." (Polkinghorne J., "One World: The
> Interaction of Science and Theology", 1987 SPCK: London, p80)
"Will of a Creator"! What objective evidence do we have that the
creation of the Universe involved an act of will? Is this not just as
speculative as Gott's ideas.
> GC>"This whole area of cosmology is incredibly speculative," comments
> >Astronomer Royal Martin Rees at the University of Cambridge. "But
> >I think this is a fascinating contribution."
>
> It seems these days one can publish anything "incredibly speculative"
> on the origin of the universe, except the possibility that God might
> have brought it into being!
You could publish that, too, if only you could tell us HOW? Otherwise,
it's no more than any 7-year old child at Sunday School could tell me.
> GC>Gott and Li say that they have only begun to explore their idea
> >and much more work needs to be done....New Scientist, 24 January 1998
>
> I can't help thinking that a major reason for ignoring the God
> hypothesis, is that such "incredibly speculative" theories generate
> scientific "work", which keeps cosmologists' kids fed and the
> mortgage paid!
Cheap shot! Many people in the "God" industry have kids to feed and
mortgages to pay, too. Some of the more visible ones are very
conspicuous gatherers and consumers of wealth.
Also, there are very few (or no) "incredibly speculative" theories -
there are lots of "incredibly speculative" hypotheses. Few
non-scientists understand the difference. Remember the sequence that
underpins scientific methodology: observations/facts -> hypotheses ->
experiments -> laws -> theories.
And how would you demonstrate to an unbeliever that almost all of the
beliefs on which Christianity is founded are more than "incredibly
speculative"?
--RegardsDerek
-----------------------------------------------------| Derek McLarnen | dmclarne@pcug.org.au || Melba ACT | dmclarne@nccdcfsg.telecom.com.au || Australia | | -----------------------------------------------------