God and Reality (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Friday, June 21, 2013, 18:27 (3955 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Is the speculation that he might have created an infinite number of other universes so outrageous that you can't contemplate it? If you are prepared to contemplate it, then why shouldn't atheists also contemplate the possibility that eternal first-cause unconscious energy was active before the Big Bang, producing an infinite number of universes? Then the odds do indeed shorten.
 
DAVID: If first cause conscious energy (FCEE) is eternal, and it must be, then it has created other universes in the past, for our current evidence is that FCCE makes universes, and more than likely human beings. This is the only scenario we know.-dhw: So if an atheist thinks there must be other universes, it's an excuse to avoid the designer theory, but as a theist you think there must be other universes. This doesn't strike you as illogical?-DAVID: I don't follow. I think the multiverse is poppycock.-I have suggested an infinite number of universes before the big bang. I am not talking specifically about the multiverse theory, if by that you mean parallel universes existing in the present (though I'd have thought infinite and eternal first-cause energy would be capable of that too). You say with far more certainty than I can muster that your first-cause conscious energy "has created other universes in the past". With eternity and infinity to play with, there is no limit to the number it may have created. An atheist can argue that non-conscious first-cause energy may also have created a limitless number of universes, thereby slashing the odds against chance coming up with life. You seem to have no doubt that there have been other universes, but if an atheist says so, he is trying to avoid the designer theory!
 
dhw: Your two answers reinforce the point I was making: every attack launched by theists upon atheism can be used by atheists against theism, and vice versa. It's all speculation, and that includes your conscious, first-cause, tough-love energy, for which there is not a smidgen of proof either.-DAVID: What we see requires intelligence to create it. You invent your intelligence one way, I another. But we both agree on the agency of intelligence being involved and required.-I have not invented any form of intelligence. I can only speculate on possible forms that others have proposed, and explain why I do not believe in any of them: 1) your God; 2) a panpsychist form that evolved within changing matter; 3) a chance combination (after an endless history of combinations) that gave rise to organic life, prior to which there was no intelligence.