Why is there anything? (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, April 02, 2012, 01:11 (4619 days ago) @ xeno6696


> Here's the kicker: There's no such thing as being "outside" the universe. The universe IS existence. The only alternative to existence is non-existence. -Of course the universe is existence, as WE see it. The universe is expanding, into what? Complete nothingness, non-existence; agreed
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> > > Nonexistence, is literally "non-being" which is where the real dilemma begins. The short of it is: "Being" is the only possible state of the universe. -Again agreed. Within an expanding universe.-> 
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> > > When you bring God into it--as David does--this complicates things. A panentheistic God literally IS the universe, because at a minimum, the universe is contained within it. -By my definition and Judaism God has always existed and is eternal, and with my self-taught philosophic finding, God is also the'first cause' as in Christian theology.-> > > 
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> A mind... IS something. A universal mind *is* something. So, either you agree with Blackmore that mind is a delusion, or a mind *is* something. You can't have this both ways.-I don't have it both ways. You know my feeling about Blakemore, intellectually dishonest from my reading of her book, Dying to Live.
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> [EDITED]
> The corollary is then, you can shift the question from "What created the Universe?" to "What created God? All the same argumentative absurdities still apply.-No, God is eternal. God is energy as a mind. Energy is eternal. -
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> 1) The traditional Judeo-Christian notion that God is a completely separate and transcendent existence that is entirely separate from the universe. This rejects panentheism by definition. -As I wrote elsewhere on this site, I can make up my own theology, all religions do. My God is both within and without the unvierse and by definition that is panentheism.
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> 2) If the universe *is* existence, then the universe includes God. God is not separate from the universe, God is *part of* the universe. This encompasses both panentheism AND Vedic notions of God. (Pantheism.)-Yes!!! 
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> In the case of panentheism, you try to state that the universe exists *within* God. Here's the problem. If mind exists, mind is also part of the universe. So the boundary between a universal mind and the universe is false, because they both exist. (The universe is all *existence.*) To me, this argues that panentheism is a false notion. -It is a screwed up argument. We exist in the mind of God. Why do you think quantum mechanics and theory is like it is?
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> So in this case, being "outside" the universe means... entering nonexistence. "outside" the universe literally means passing into complete nonexistence, literally, beyond God.-Yes!!!
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> [FURTHER EDIT]
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> So now we have the question: "Why something rather than nothing?" This is a question that only has any meaning, if you follow the Judeo-Christian notion of God. -you can see I don't.-> Otherwise, our only choices are existence, or nonexistence. In panentheism [and pantheism], our universe is as old as God, because in both cases... God is the universe. Same for pantheism. Only in the Judeo-Christian notion do you gain a cosmogony where that question is valid. That's the only one that can truly start with "void" and end with "something."-Again yes. One asks the question and answers with my theology. Religions are human inventions, not a God-given requirement. I try not to give God a anthropomorphic personality. He is a person like no other person, per Adler.