Cosmologic philosophy: Egnor on Big Bang, etc. (Introduction)

by dhw, Thursday, July 29, 2021, 07:07 (996 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: The paper included a bunch of mathematical formulas I can't follow. It is fully accepted by all the cosmological theorists I know of. No negative papers ever followed. […]

dhw: … may I ask what makes you think that a bunch of mathematical formulas you don’t understand can prove something that nobody can possibly know about (i.e. what happened before the BB, if the BB happened)?

DAVID: I wish I could help you. It is a complex article, but the conclusion is quite clear. You've ignored what I have written. There is no proof of time before the BB.

dhw: I wish you could help yourself. […] I’m afraid a clear conclusion is no guarantee of truth. Of course there is no proof of time before the BB. There is no proof of anything before the BB (if the BB happened in the first place). So why do you think a bunch of mathematical formulas you don’t understand must guarantee the truth about something nobody knows anything about? And will you please tell us the authors’ definition of time.

DAVID: They didn't give it.

So thanks to a set of mathematical formulas you don’t understand, relating to a subject that remains undefined, you accept their conclusion that there was nothing before the BB, although they can’t possibly know that. I have a magic potion here containing globypatumethulin, which will ensure that when you die you will go to heaven. It only costs a million bucks, so please send me a cheque and the potion will be yours.

dhw: If he exists and if he never thinks of anything new, then time must have existed for ever, and not merely after the BB. Your image of God is already contradictory if you say he is eternal and all his thoughts from the beginning are the same. How can there have been a beginning if he is eternal?

DAVID: He is the beginning, always eternally there.

Eternity cannot have a beginning.

dhw: If he’s been there for ever, do you think he thought of the earth and humans an eternity before he actually produced them? I wonder what made him suddenly create a BB after an eternity of thinking about BB, a universe and humans.

DAVID: Who knows how many universes He has created before ours???

Excellent question. So who knows when time began?

dhw: As for your own thoughts, one minute your God possibly/probably has thought patterns and emotions similar to ours, the next moment you are certain that we mimic him, and the next moment he is not human in any way. But I'll have to admit that I'd be very surprised if my so-called "humanized" God's thoughts swung this way and that like yours!

DAVID: I'm not on a mental swing. What you imagine I think from what I present swings wildly. And God may well have spent His eternity making universes, and He may well have attributes similar to ours mainly in the fact we both think. […]

dhw: Thank you for confirming that although yesterday your God “IS NOT HUMAN IN ANY WAY”, today once more “He may well have attributes similar to ours”. But apparently you are not on a mental swing – you just change your argument day by day. My different theistic theories present different possible human attributes (e.g. interest in experimentation, ability to learn and to get new ideas, enjoyment of creation, preference for the unexpected over the predictable) from those you believe in (e.g. total control, good intentions, single-mindedness). I note that you have ignored the other contradictions I have listed above. One problem with mental swings is that the swinger sometimes doesn’t realize he’s swinging.

DAVID: I don't change my arguments. My view of a non-human God is consistent, and as you admit above you generally humanize Him by having Him try on human attributes, bolded.

Why didn’t you bold the human attributes you have given him? You can’t possibly describe God’s nature without endowing him with human attributes, and you can’t possibly know that he doesn’t have any, or which ones he does have. All we can do is examine what might be his works and extrapolate our humanizing conclusions.

DAVID: Try imagining Him as all-knowing, all purposeful without any need for self-gratification in any way. You obviously can't or won't. Your attempt at theism are feeble compared to those who believe.

Why is it feeble to imagine God as experimenting, learning, getting new ideas, enjoying creating, being interested in what he creates etc? My different theories cover an all-knowing, all-purposeful God anyway, and as for self-gratification, I know of many believers who think God wants us to love and worship him – and even you have him wanting us to admire his work. But if you think that he is as unemotional and impersonal as a block of ice, that’s fine (though oops, I nearly forgot: you know he has good intentions).