Nothing (General)

by dhw, Tuesday, December 01, 2009, 11:38 (5469 days ago) @ George Jelliss

There's been a misunderstanding, which is largely my fault. I couldn't split Stenger's sentence, and George has focused entirely on the first part ("Not only does the universe show no evidence for God...") and ignored the second ("it looks exactly as it would be expected to look if there is no God"). Consequently he has also ignored the whole of my argument, which concerns the second part! My apologies. Let's start again.-I pointed out that the same silly claim (the second part) is often applied to life and evolution. It is silly because, as I wrote, nobody has a clue "what a universe/life/evolution would look like if there is or is not a God. This is the only universe/life/evolution we know. In other words, we can't "expect" anything, because there's no precedent for us to base expectations on. Or have Stenger et al. been on mystical trips to other worlds?"-The reason why I'm "bothered by Stenger's arguments" is that I don't like silly claims, especially when they're taken seriously by intelligent people. (Jason Rosenhouse used exactly the same argument in an article recommended by Matt.) If an ID-er said the universe/life/evolution looks exactly as it would be expected to look if there is a God, you would probably have a good laugh and say "How do you know?" I'm asking the same question to both parties. Without a precedent, we have no point of reference. -As for the first part of Stenger's statement (the universe shows no evidence for God), I'd again bracket the universe with life and evolution, and that brings us back to the whole debate of chance v. design, which will run indefinitely.-My second point was: If the Big Bang really happened, and if the universe was created "ex nihilo", what went bang? -GEORGE: It is the universe, or the universe in its primordial state, that went Bang.-This is like saying that whatever existed before the bang went bang. My question is how can "nothing" go bang? The discussion on what the universe is expanding into is interesting, but that was not my question. My naïve common sense tells me that "nothing" can't go bang, notwithstanding vacuum fluctuations, potential quantum events, symmetry, broken symmetry, or the invisible, intangible, ineffable force ... though I can think of some appropriate effs ... that keeps knocking out my computer. So I still don't understand the logic of "creation ex nihilo".