God, the Universe and the Nature of an "Explanation"

Zillah

I was thinking about the nature of an explanation. An explanation, in scientific terms, is something that provides an understanding of the causational factors of a given phenomenon. For example, many diseases are explained in terms of a virus or bacterium that causes them, or the movements of the planets are caused by the functioning of gravity.

This crops up a lot when discussing God, Dawkins is particularily fond of it. Believers look at the universe and say "Something must have made all that is", but they also understand that for that to be a causal factor, it must not be part of the universe. Dawkins explains that such a God requires an even greater explanation than the known universe, and so is not an explanation at all.

But something occured to me. First of all, lets define the universe: All that is. Or all that was and will be depending on how we're using it. Secondly, lets define an explanation: Something that provides an understanding of something in regards to something else(the "else" being the causational factor). Which leads us to a paradox. How to explain "everything that is" in regards to something "else"?

Dawkins seems quite confident that we will some day be able to explain the forces that caused the universe to be, but how can we possibly do that if it is a paradox by definition?

Excellent, managed to type that before the 3AM shut down ^_^

Fallen Seraph

I think the solution to your paradox is that you're assuming that the universe as it is "all that there is", when it's not necessarily. What about the possibility of it being turtles all the way down, in a universes within universes sense?

Although my favourite "explanation" for our universe (in the conventional sense) is to assume that cause and effect is just a property of our universe in the same way that the 3 spatial dimensions are. One can then assume that not all "universes" need have this property. And from this it follows that our big bang could have literally just happened.

Zombrex

Zillah wrote:

I was thinking about the nature of an explanation. An explanation, in scientific terms, is something that provides an understanding of the causational factors of a given phenomenon. For example, many diseases are explained in terms of a virus or bacterium that causes them, or the movements of the planets are caused by the functioning of gravity.

This crops up a lot when discussing God, Dawkins is particularily fond of it. Believers look at the universe and say "Something must have made all that is", but they also understand that for that to be a causal factor, it must not be part of the universe. Dawkins explains that such a God requires an even greater explanation than the known universe, and so is not an explanation at all.

But something occured to me. First of all, lets define the universe: All that is. Or all that was and will be depending on how we're using it. Secondly, lets define an explanation: Something that provides an understanding of something in regards to something else(the "else" being the causational factor). Which leads us to a paradox. How to explain "everything that is" in regards to something "else"?

Dawkins seems quite confident that we will some day be able to explain the forces that caused the universe to be, but how can we possibly do that if it is a paradox by definition?

You seem to be drawing a few unnecessary conclusions there

If one thinks of the Big Bang as the other side (our side) of a change in state of "something" into what we now call the "universe," then the explanation for the Big Bang is the explanation for the change in state.

Therefore the term "universe" still describes everything (or at least everything from our perspective), because the "something" no longer exists, it changed into the "universe". There is no long a paradox.

Scofflaw

I think the general expanation here, whether we're talking about a single Big Bang or a cosmic fireball generator, is that what the universe springs from doesn't have to obey the rules of this Universe. As Seraph says, causality may be a local phenomenon.

cordially,
Scofflaw

pinksoir

Also, at a sub-atomic level, things pop in and out of existence all the time. If you take into account that the universe started off as something extremely small, and then expanded, it could be argued that it just popped into existence (though I would never argue this!). It's also worth noting that we'll probably never know how the universe came to be as we can only ever measure or calculate in relation to the properties of the current universe.

Dawkins argues that it was probably something very simple that 'caused' the universe if you accept that it was at one time infinitely dense and infinitley small. Personally I would go for the idea of the multiverse, though this also raises questions such as 'what lies outside that', and it eventually becomes a pain in the head. Our minds are just not evolved to comprehend a state without boundaries of time or space....

robindch

Zillah wrote:

First of all, lets define the universe: All that is. Or all that was and will be depending on how we're using it. Secondly, lets define an explanation: Something that provides an understanding of something in regards to something else(the "else" being the causational factor). Which leads us to a paradox. How to explain "everything that is" in regards to something "else"?

You're playing language games with yourself. Be careful, you may go blind.

If you start off defining the universe as everything, then require that everything must have a cause which isn't itself, then your paradox follows logically from your axioms. Therefore at least one of your axioms must be wrong and I'd suggest that your 'explanation' needs the greater amount of work.

Think about it in terms of a dictionary -- is it a list of words which define each other in terms of themselves, or do the words have any external meaning?

Red Hand

I can't say that an "explanation" as you define it, is valid here, Zillah, in that it seems (as I read your defination of an explanation) that you need an opposite to define something. For eg (and this is a poor example!) "explaining" what a dog is (as I read your interpretation of an explanation) as being everything that a dog is not-a dichotomie?

Zillah

Fallen Seraph wrote:

I think the solution to your paradox is that you're assuming that the universe as it is "all that there is", when it's not necessarily. What about the possibility of it being turtles all the way down, in a universes within universes sense?

Then all those so called "universes" are just part of the universe.

Although my favourite "explanation" for our universe (in the conventional sense) is to assume that cause and effect is just a property of our universe in the same way that the 3 spatial dimensions are. One can then assume that not all "universes" need have this property. And from this it follows that our big bang could have literally just happened.

Yes, I'm aware of this notion, but its not an "explanation", its a cop out, we can't do anything with that.

Wicknight wrote:

You seem to be drawing a few unnecessary conclusions there

If one thinks of the Big Bang as the other side (our side) of a change in state of "something" into what we now call the "universe," then the explanation for the Big Bang is the explanation for the change in state.

Therefore the term "universe" still describes everything (or at least everything from our perspective), because the "something" no longer exists, it changed into the "universe". There is no long a paradox.

Yeah, thats possible, but its unfalsifiable, it can never be an explanation, because we can never prove it, so its no use again. Besides, where did the previous "something" come from? Its just moving it back a step, like the God answer.

Scofflaw wrote:

I think the general expanation here, whether we're talking about a single Big Bang or a cosmic fireball generator, is that what the universe springs from doesn't have to obey the rules of this Universe. As Seraph says, causality may be a local phenomenon.

Which again, means we can't actually explain it. The most we can do is say "I think this might have happened" and it can never go any further.

pinksoir wrote:

Our minds are just not evolved to comprehend a state without boundaries of time or space....

Which is kind of my point, we can't ever really explain the origin of the universe.

robindch wrote:

If you start off defining the universe as everything, then require that everything must have a cause which isn't itself, then your paradox follows logically from your axioms. Therefore at least one of your axioms must be wrong and I'd suggest that your 'explanation' needs the greater amount of work.

I'm not stating that everything needs a cause other than itself, I am saying that our ability to explain things is limited to things that have causes other than themselves.

Think about it in terms of a dictionary -- is it a list of words which define each other in terms of themselves, or do the words have any external meaning?

I fail to see the applicability of the metaphor.

Jeremiah 16:1 wrote:

I can't say that an "explanation" as you define it, is valid here, Zillah, in that it seems (as I read your defination of an explanation) that you need an opposite to define something. For eg (and this is a poor example!) "explaining" what a dog is (as I read your interpretation of an explanation) as being everything that a dog is not-a dichotomie?

No. The best explanation for a dog we have at the moment is that of chemical interaction caused by genes, shaped by evolution, possibly began with abiogenesis.

Scofflaw

Something that strikes me here - I would find a completely explicable Universe very disturbing.

It goes well beyond the Anthropic Principle - that we should be here at all is staggering, but that everything should be explicable is just weird. It would genuinely suggest design to me...

cordially,
Scofflaw

pinksoir

Here's a link to a lecture by Dawkins (amusingly entitled 'jaw-dropping') which covers some of what you're looking for. Pretty interesting, it is a bit of an expansion on his ideas of our evolution in the 'middle' or 'macro' world that he discussed in....the blind watchmaker, I think.

Zillah

Great link there Pink. Get some internet skills

EDIT: Although I think I've seen the one you're talking about before. The "middle world" notion is excellent.

robindch

zillah wrote:

I'm not stating that everything needs a cause other than itself, I am saying that our ability to explain things is limited to things that have causes other than themselves.

I don't really see any difference between the two, unless you're saying that an explanation is only possible if the thing being explained has a cause external to itself. Which doesn't make sense either, if you think of something like the ability to have kids -- that's something that's caused by itself (in your definition, as far as I can see), but has a perfectly good, not to say enjoyable, reason.

bonkey

Zillah wrote:

I'm not stating that everything needs a cause other than itself, I am saying that our ability to explain things is limited to things that have causes other than themselves.

Actually, you're saying that our ability to explain things is limited to things where causality applies. You have defined your term ('explanation') as "a description of the causality'.

As Son Goku has pointed out elsewhere, current science says that as we get to the high-density, high-energy state shortly after the posited Big Bang, causality begins to seriously break down. In such a case, the ability to explain seriously breaks down.

As robindch suggested, we must therefore first rethink our concept of "explanation" so that it is not bound to causality before we are able to explain events which are not necessarily bound by same.

pinksoir

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6308228560462155344

Yeah, I'm gonna take a crash course in that intro-web this weekend...

on a side note, a grituitous jab if you will, the lecture is called "the universe:queerer than we can suppose". I wonder if dawkins was being sensationalist with that title?

Fallen Seraph

Zillah wrote:

Then all those so called "universes" are just part of the universe.

Fair enough, but for your paradox to hold ground there still needs to be a start. It's unpleasant, counter-intuitive and still requires explaining if the
"universe" has always existed, but if this is so then the explanation need not be external.

Zillah wrote:

Yes, I'm aware of this notion, but its not an "explanation", its a cop out, we can't do anything with that.

I don't understand considering it a cop out? I mean I'm optimistic that science will come up with a more satisfactory explanation, but do you consider vacuum fluctuations a cop out? I don't really see much of a difference, conceptually, to virtual particles appearing from nothing and the universe doing the same.

I remember reading something on the possibility that quantum mechanics says that "reverse causality" is possible and that someone was trying to verify such a thing in the lab. If it were so it (might) open the possibility that no external cause for the universe is necessary. (Although time paradox-wise the situation is hardly improved too much..)

Zombrex

Zillah wrote:

Yeah, thats possible, but its unfalsifiable, it can never be an explanation, because we can never prove it, so its no use again.

Well we don't know that. If the history of science has taught us nothing it is that we should not be so quick to predict what science can or cannot do in the future. That holds to Dawkins as well.

Zillah wrote:

Besides, where did the previous "something" come from? Its just moving it back a step, like the God answer.

Again we don't have enough information to state that the previous something had to come from anywhere. Time appears to be a property of this universe, or the current state of this universe. Therefore we don't have a frame of reference to explain "time" before the big bang. We might some day, but then again we might never.

Zillah wrote:

Which is kind of my point, we can't ever really explain the origin of the universe.

We can't at the moment, but stating we can never do that is as misguided a prediction as Dawkins stating that we will be able to.