Philosophy Now Forum

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:33 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm
Sure. If God created what you call "the Singularity," then "the Singularity" isn't the First Cause in the causal chain: God is. "The Singularity" isn't the name of anything, either: it just means, "a single thing." So "the Singularity" isn't even an explanation of a cause, but rather just a contentless generalization.

OK, so we are back to the basics: Singularity.

I don't think we are. I have no idea what you mean when you say "Singularity." At one point, you said it was the Big Bang. Now you say it was something prior to the Big Bang. Well...what was it?

I have never said that singularity was something that existed before the Big Bang. The Big Bang refers to a point, the beginning, in which singularity existed. By singularity I mean a hot dense form of energy that everything could emerge from.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm Whether it could exists as "uncaused" will be determined by what you think the alleged "Singularity" means.

Now you know what is singularity. Couldn't it simply exist? If not, why?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm
That's not what Genesis says. And it's not what I believe. What the Bible says is that God is the First Cause of the existence of things.

The creation of the universe however is not mentioned in Genesis so we are having a problem.

Do you know what the term "the heavens" refers to? It's not the same term as what popular thought thinks "Heaven" (capital "H") means. It means the universe...all the stuff that's not Earth, all the stuff above it, like when we talk about "the stars in the heavens."

"In the beginning," reads Genesis, "God created the heavens and the earth."

So the universe came first, or contemporaneous with the creation of the Earth, not after it.

So now, you interpret Heaven as the universe. I don't think that we are living in Heaven now. Do you think?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm

But my question is whether the creation of singularity was a perfect act or not.

I still don't know what you mean by "the Singularity," so I don't know how to answer that for you. What the text says is that the Creation was "good," and "very good." It does not say "perfect." But then, I don't know what you mean by "a perfect act," either: because "perfect" can mean, "flawless," or "morally good," or "complete," or several other things.

I already explained what is the singularity in my first comment. By perfect I mean, it evolves naturally, and all things that God intended to come into existence simply emerge from the singularity. If the creation of singularity is not perfect then God has to intervene here and there to make sure that life for example emerges on Earth.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm

God does not need to intervene if the creation is perfect.

That's what the Deists used to think. The reason they wanted God to be absent after Creation is that they overestimated the possible perfection of what they were beginning to perceive as "natural laws." They imagined that perhaps science itself would be perfect, or at least would find that the universe ran entirely along invariable rules that, once put in place by the Deistic god, would no longer be subject to his interventions at all. He would then be what they called an "absentee landlord," the Creator but not the sustainer of the world. He made it, then left, they thought, and would have no further interest in his Creation once it had been created.

That's not the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible is intimately interested in His Creation, and loves especially His chief creature, man. He is not a "divine watchmaker," or "absentee landlord," who, once having made things, lost interest and moved away. He can interevene when He wishes to, although He ordinarily lets creation run according to its own internal laws. However, from the very beginning, He had a much larger and more sustained plan in view, and has never lost interest in us.

But perfect I don't mean that God has no interest in His creation.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jan 07, 2024 12:27 am

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sun Jan 07, 2024 12:14 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jan 06, 2024 10:24 pmRelevance?

The better question is...

I see.

Goethe described the formidable look with which Napoleon disposed of superfluous persons without a word. They were pierced through by his glance, and saw themselves already shot or beheaded.

Be warned …

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:22 pm

Harbal wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:08 pm I don't think it makes any difference whether God exists or not.

Then you're the only person who thinks so.

Well I do like to think of myself as an original thinker.

IC wrote:

Harbal wrote:To explain God, we need science. Starting out with the assumption of God, and what God is, will lead us nowhere.

How ironic. Historically, it's actually the opposite: if we had had no conception of God, we would never have had any science either. It's science that's the derivative, and Theism that's the source, actually.

What a bizarre claim. Did you mean to say that, or did it all just come out wrong?

Science is a method of discovery, God is just a proposed phenomenon. We use science to investigate phenomena, not the other way round.

Want proof? Ask yourself this: there are billions of very smart people in places like India, China, Subsaharan Africa, aboriginal North America...and so on. Why, then, did science appear in the West, and nowhere else?

What's that got to do with anything? I don't even think it's true.

Answer: a certain conception of God has to exist in a society before one can even conceive of natural laws, or of a systematic and rational method to predict them. One has to believe in a lawgiving kind of God, a rational God, a God of order and sequence...and then one has to have motive to discover His doings through the examination of creation. That's why the discoverer of the scientific method itself was a devout Christian, Francis Bacon. Check it out.

This, by the way, is not my own insight. It's known as "Whitehead's Thesis," invented by the philosopher of science, Alfred North Whitehead," https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/whitehead/. He was also a clergyman.

I have never heard of the man, and he was a clergyman, so two sound reasons for disregarding him.

IC wrote:

Harbal wrote:But your assumption that we are a ruby, and the rest of the stuff in the universe is just rocks, is what I think is called begging the question.

I'm simply pointing out the illogic in your own argument. You said that the abundance of the "stuff" means we should be skeptical that we have any value; I pointed out that that's not logical.

I used the beach analogy, where the Earth was just one grain of sand among countless others, which is exactly how the Earth looks in amongst the rest of the universe. So why is it illogical to be sceptical about our specialness?

I didn't try to argue we were a "ruby," just that you can't know we AREN'T one by trying to deduce it from the size of the universe.

I rather think you strongly implied it. What would even make you think of a ruby, otherwise?

So no, I didn't beg any question. I didn't, in fact, make any argument of the kind. I just pointed out that yours didn't work.

I think you did beg the question, and you did nothing to invalidate my point that, when looked at in the context of the vastness of the universe, there is no reason to think our planet is anything special.

IC wrote:

Harbal wrote:We know we are a miniscule spec in the universe, that is not a matter of dispute, but we by no means know if there is anything special about us that sets us apart from the infinitely massive quantity of other stuff that we just seem to be part of.

This was your argument...plus one more step...that you seem to think that repeatedly speaking about the amount of 'stuff' that apparently doesn't count should also count against any possiblilty of our specialness.

And it doesn't. That's the only point worth making from that.

If you know, or at least think -as the ill informed fellow who wrote Genesis thought- that there is only one of you, then you are bound to assume you are special, but when you learn you are just one among countless billions, it should at least make you question that assumption.

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:32 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:33 pm
OK, so we are back to the basics: Singularity.

I don't think we are. I have no idea what you mean when you say "Singularity." At one point, you said it was the Big Bang. Now you say it was something prior to the Big Bang. Well...what was it?

I have never said that singularity was something that existed before the Big Bang. The Big Bang refers to a point, the beginning, in which singularity existed. By singularity I mean a hot dense form of energy that everything could emerge from.

What was this "hot dense form of energy," and how did it come into existence when nothing existed?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm Whether it could exists as "uncaused" will be determined by what you think the alleged "Singularity" means.

Now you know what is singularity.

I still don't. And I see no way that, if it's a physical phenomenon, it could exist eternally. It looks like you're trying to describe an event -- why else characterize it as "singular"? And if so, it's not eternal, by definition.

But I can't make sense of your suppositions there.

So now, you interpret Heaven as the universe.

No, I don't "interpret" it as that: it is what the term "the heavens" refers to. I just point it out.

See here. I'm not alone in knowing this. https://www.christiantruthcenter.com/the-3-heavens/

By perfect I mean, it evolves naturally,

If it "evolves," then by definition, it isn't "perfect" in at least two senses of that word. First, it isn't complete: because things that are already complete do not evolve. And secondly, it isn't flawless, because things that are flawless do not need to progress to higher states, which is what Evolutionism claims is happening.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:54 pm

God does not need to intervene if the creation is perfect.

That's what the Deists used to think. The reason they wanted God to be absent after Creation is that they overestimated the possible perfection of what they were beginning to perceive as "natural laws." They imagined that perhaps science itself would be perfect, or at least would find that the universe ran entirely along invariable rules that, once put in place by the Deistic god, would no longer be subject to his interventions at all. He would then be what they called an "absentee landlord," the Creator but not the sustainer of the world. He made it, then left, they thought, and would have no further interest in his Creation once it had been created.

That's not the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible is intimately interested in His Creation, and loves especially His chief creature, man. He is not a "divine watchmaker," or "absentee landlord," who, once having made things, lost interest and moved away. He can interevene when He wishes to, although He ordinarily lets creation run according to its own internal laws. However, from the very beginning, He had a much larger and more sustained plan in view, and has never lost interest in us.

But perfect I don't mean that God has no interest in His creation.

Well, if He has interest, then that means He intervenes it in, at least occasionally. If He didn't, then it wouldn't be clear that there was any sense at all in saying He "had an interest." For that would be mere idle interest, as in watching something fail and die, without doing anything about it.

One has to believe in a lawgiving kind of God, a rational God, a God of order and sequence...and then one has to have motive to discover His doings through the examination of creation. That's why the discoverer of the scientific method itself was a devout Christian, Francis Bacon. Check it out.

Those who’ve studied ‘the history of ideas’ know some part of this to be true.

But behold! Finally we do not see before us rational ordering of existence (though order is present). And no study of nature as a discipline of science ever uncovers a rational motive in this cosmos, in our world, in biology, and certainly not in ourselves.

If once a “rational order” was proposed which also encompassed rationally connected theological concepts — all of that has been utterly exploded.

::: poof :::

Science even, having ridden so long in a carriage of vast prestige and which tromped in the world like a Colossus, might now only be able to say:

we petty men | walk under his huge legs and peep about | to find ourselves dishonorable graves

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:32 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm
I don't think we are. I have no idea what you mean when you say "Singularity." At one point, you said it was the Big Bang. Now you say it was something prior to the Big Bang. Well...what was it?

I have never said that singularity was something that existed before the Big Bang. The Big Bang refers to a point, the beginning, in which singularity existed. By singularity I mean a hot dense form of energy that everything could emerge from.

What was this "hot dense form of energy,"

You know what energy is, don't you?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm and how did it come into existence when nothing existed?

There are two options here, either the singularity comes into existence which means that God caused it or it simply existed.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm Whether it could exists as "uncaused" will be determined by what you think the alleged "Singularity" means.

Now you know what is singularity.

I still don't. And I see no way that, if it's a physical phenomenon, it could exist eternally. It looks like you're trying to describe an event -- why else characterize it as "singular"? And if so, it's not eternal, by definition.

But I can't make sense of your suppositions there.

I didn't say that the singularity exists eternally. I just said that it existed at the beginning, the Big Bang point.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm

By perfect I mean, it evolves naturally,

If it "evolves," then by definition, it isn't "perfect" in at least two senses of that word.

No, it does mean that. By perfect I mean the singularity has the potential to turn into everything that God intended. Just think of how marvelous is it: God created something, singularity, and from it, everything emerges as it evolves. The second scenario is that God created all species and destroyed some until we reach to current state of affairs.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 5:51 pm First, it isn't complete: because things that are already complete do not evolve. And secondly, it isn't flawless, because things that are flawless do not need to progress to higher states, which is what Evolutionism claims is happening.

We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution. So even, if we accept that God intervened in the process then it means that God did not or could not create a human being as exists now.

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:54 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:32 pm
I have never said that singularity was something that existed before the Big Bang. The Big Bang refers to a point, the beginning, in which singularity existed. By singularity I mean a hot dense form of energy that everything could emerge from.

What was this "hot dense form of energy,"

You know what energy is, don't you?

Yes. But energy already exists. What brings it into existence?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm and how did it come into existence when nothing existed?

There are two options here, either the singularity comes into existence which means that God caused it or it simply existed.

You said that. I responded to both.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

Now you know what is singularity.

I still don't. And I see no way that, if it's a physical phenomenon, it could exist eternally. It looks like you're trying to describe an event -- why else characterize it as "singular"? And if so, it's not eternal, by definition.

But I can't make sense of your suppositions there.

I didn't say that the singularity exists eternally. I just said that it existed at the beginning, the Big Bang point.

THEN THAT'S NOT THE BEGINNING. What we're asking is, "What was there at the beginning?"

Just think of how marvelous is it: God created something, singularity, and from it, everything emerges as it evolves. The second scenario is that God created all species and destroyed some until we reach to current state of affairs.

Except that's not what we see, of course. We see death. We see "survival of the fittest," at least in nature. We don't see evolution...we're told it's far, far too slow and lengthy for us to see. But we see countless species dying, all the time.

We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution.

We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:54 pm We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution.

We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Bahman and I definitely seem to know it, and you are the only one who doesn't seem to know it, so it seems we are ahead in this stage of the game.

Harbal wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:43 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:54 pm We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution.

We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Bahman and I definitely seem to know it,

I would say it's interesting that you both claim to "know" things without either of you having any access to sufficient evidence -- by your own admission, just shortly ago.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:54 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm
What was this "hot dense form of energy,"

You know what energy is, don't you?

Yes. But energy already exists. What brings it into existence?

The singularity that was nothing but energy could exist without a cause or it could have a cause. The problem is that we don't know which scenario is true. I am agnostic so I cannot tell which scenario is true. You are not agnostic. That means that you must have a reason why prefer one scenario over another one. Could you please tell us your reason?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm
I still don't. And I see no way that, if it's a physical phenomenon, it could exist eternally. It looks like you're trying to describe an event -- why else characterize it as "singular"? And if so, it's not eternal, by definition.

But I can't make sense of your suppositions there.

I didn't say that the singularity exists eternally. I just said that it existed at the beginning, the Big Bang point.

THEN THAT'S NOT THE BEGINNING. What we're asking is, "What was there at the beginning?"

No, that was the beginning and there was only mere energy there.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

Just think of how marvelous is it: God created something, singularity, and from it, everything emerges as it evolves. The second scenario is that God created all species and destroyed some until we reach to current state of affairs.

Except that's not what we see, of course. We see death. We see "survival of the fittest," at least in nature. We don't see evolution...we're told it's far, far too slow and lengthy for us to see. But we see countless species dying, all the time.

Yes, many species died in the past as a result that they could not fit in the condition. Some managed to surpass so they survived. But how all these varieties of species come into existence if it was not a gene mutation?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:17 pm

We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution.

We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Oh, come on. You don't want me to I leave the whole literature on the topic and believe in what the Bible says. Let's put it this way: You cannot deny the fossils that remain from all species. Can you? If not, then it means that the act of creation of humans was gradual and not spontaneous as it is declared in the Bible.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:46 pm

Harbal wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:43 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm
We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Bahman and I definitely seem to know it,

I would say it's interesting that you both claim to "know" things without either of you having any access to sufficient evidence -- by your own admission, just shortly ago.

Give us a reason to believe that what the Bible says is true. I would certainly covert. On another hand, there is a massive literature on the topic of evolution that makes perfect sense. So why should I leave the literature and believe in the Bible?

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:47 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 7:54 pm
You know what energy is, don't you?

Yes. But energy already exists. What brings it into existence?

The singularity that was nothing but energy could exist without a cause or it could have a cause. The problem is that we don't know which scenario is true. I am agnostic so I cannot tell which scenario is true. You are not agnostic. That means that you must have a reason why prefer one scenario over another one. Could you please tell us your reason?

Sure. I think the idea that an impersonal "force," like "energy" or something, would never be a plausible explanation for how the degree of complexity and interrelationship we observe every day in nature, or phenomena like mind and identity exist. I think the answer "Energy did it" would be absurdly implausible, utterly reductionistic, and entirely unhelpful. In short, I thing vast probabilities weigh against any such thing being the case.

...how all these varieties of species come into existence if it was not a gene mutation?

Design. They were made that way, by a highly creative Intelligence.

You cannot deny the fossils that remain from all species. Can you?

Well, that's obviously not the case. We do have a limited set of fossils from a limited set of species. But that's to be expected, because animals go extinct all the time. And it's of no theological consequences what timespans we decide they represent.

But as for man, which, of course, is the only species that really matters in this discussion, what we know now that we have is a history of fraudulent attempts to create 'fossil' progenitors like the Piltdown Man, the Nebraska Man, the Java Man, the Peking Man, and so on. So we can see that Evolutionists have had an ideology at work, and are desperate to create the means to support their narrative, rather than being dispassionate, objective and honest scientists just looking for truth.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

We know that human is the result of a process scientists call evolution.

We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

If you believe evolution is more speculative than what is presented by the Abrahamic religions concerning origins, then what is your account of how we today came into being from a single beginning of the universe to the present day? Did some being we call God create the first male human from clay and then the first female from his rib bone?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 9:13 pm

bahman wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:47 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm
Yes. But energy already exists. What brings it into existence?

The singularity that was nothing but energy could exist without a cause or it could have a cause. The problem is that we don't know which scenario is true. I am agnostic so I cannot tell which scenario is true. You are not agnostic. That means that you must have a reason why prefer one scenario over another one. Could you please tell us your reason?

Sure. I think the idea that an impersonal "force," like "energy" or something, would never be a plausible explanation for how the degree of complexity and interrelationship we observe every day in nature, or phenomena like mind and identity exist. I think the answer "Energy did it" would be absurdly implausible, utterly reductionistic, and entirely unhelpful. In short, I thing vast probabilities weigh against any such thing being the case.

I asked for an argument and not your opinion. Moreover, all the complexity that could be seen in nature could be described from a simple entity, namely the singularity. There is a huge literature on each topic.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm

...how all these varieties of species come into existence if it was not a gene mutation?

Design. They were made that way, by a highly creative Intelligence.

However, the gene mutation is the result of a failure to copy genetic code. How that could be a design from a highly creative intelligence if many of the mutations lead to failure? Just look at the vastness of creatures that they use to live on Earth only a small fraction managed to survive! What kind of design is this!?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 9:13 pm

You cannot deny the fossils that remain from all species. Can you?

Well, that's obviously not the case. We do have a limited set of fossils from a limited set of species. But that's to be expected, because animals go extinct all the time. And it's of no theological consequences what timespans we decide they represent.

But as for man, which, of course, is the only species that really matters in this discussion, what we know now that we have is a history of fraudulent attempts to create 'fossil' progenitors like the Piltdown Man, the Nebraska Man, the Java Man, the Peking Man, and so on. So we can see that Evolutionists have had an ideology at work, and are desperate to create the means to support their narrative, rather than being dispassionate, objective and honest scientists just looking for truth.

So you mean that scientists should leave all the literature aside and believe in a single book that they don't know who wrote it?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:46 pm

Harbal wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:43 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 8:22 pm
We certainly do not "know" that. Human Evolutionism remains in the realm of pure speculation, and has no real "science" about it. Even the most ardent Evolutionists say it's a narrative, not a set of tests or data. It's an attempt to glue fragments of things together with a story, at best.

Bahman and I definitely seem to know it,

I would say it's interesting that you both claim to "know" things without either of you having any access to sufficient evidence -- by your own admission, just shortly ago.

I don't think it unreasonable to accept what main stream science has to say about the subject. And it isn't just a matter of blind acceptance; evolutionary theory actually makes sense, whereas the Bible absolutely does not. It isn't even a matter of much controversy, it is widely accepted as factual. The trouble with Bibleism is that it tells you what to believe, but explains nothing.