Do you believe the universe came from nothing

Zillah

karlog wrote: »

What like your beliefs? Go on tell me what they are. You never know i might find them to be better:rolleyes:

Rolleyes aside, I shall indulge you. I'm going to use the word 'belief' both to refer to objective things that are well supported by evidence, and for subjective things that are opinions. I trust you can distinguish them. This is probably going to go on for much longer than one might imagine.

I believe that human beings are perfectly capable of creating a fair and functional society through a combination of empathy and education. I believe that the natural world is a wonderful and glorious thing, and that any given person has the potential to be absolutely amazing. I believe all of these things are cheapened, lessened, and subjugated by belief in God, for we would serve merely at his whim and his purpose. I believe there is no afterlife, so we need to make sure we get the most out of what we have here on our little blue marble.

I believe religion has and will continue to be a source of division, superstition and ignorance and that our species and our culture will be better for discarding it. I believe in facts, whether I like them or not. I believe in rationality and logic, and I believe in a cultural market place where we should exchange ideas, fight our corner and have the truth win out. I believe there is no good evidence for any sort of God or any of the many supernatural phantasms that ignorance has conjured. I believe in honesty and foresightedness, even if it causes offense.

And I believe that you sir, are wrong.

karlog

Zillah wrote: »

Rolleyes aside, I shall indulge you. I'm going to use the word 'belief' both to refer to objective things that are well supported by evidence, and for subjective things that are opinions. I trust you can distinguish them. This is probably going to go on for much longer than one might imagine.

I believe that human beings are perfectly capable of creating a fair and functional society through a combination of empathy and education. I believe that the natural world is a wonderful and glorious thing, and that any given person has the potential to be absolutely amazing. I believe all of these things are cheapened, lessened, and subjugated by belief in God, for we would serve merely at his whim and his purpose. I believe there is no afterlife, so we need to make sure we get the most out of what we have here on our little blue marble.

I believe religion has and will continue to be a source of division, superstition and ignorance and that our species and our culture will be better for discarding it. I believe in facts, whether I like them or not. I believe in rationality and logic, and I believe in a cultural market place where we should exchange ideas, fight our corner and have the truth win out. I believe there is no good evidence for any sort of God or any of the many supernatural phantasms that ignorance has conjured. I believe in honesty and foresightedness, even if it causes offense.

And I believe that you sir, are wrong.

and i respect your belief. oh and dont worry this isn't going to go on for long i'm done posting on this thread.

Zillah

karlog wrote: »

and i respect your belief

That's because it's respectable :pac:

Flamed Diving

karlog wrote: »

Not really that's just a bit of biography of einstein which i overlooked. As for the origion of the universe there is no evidence. If your looking for evidence on how the universe is here, good luck on that wild goose chase pal.

The only pattern emerging here pointless post's being shot back and forward with no real points being made.

Read over this thread and you will see my stance on the issue, er, pal...

I see, like many believers before you, that you are storming out.

Toodle-ooo!

Turtwig

karlog wrote: »

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Scientists like Newton and Einstein believed in existence of God. Stephen Hawkins has also accepted that concept of something like a God is necessary to explain the ultimate origin of the Universe. They cant prove it. Thats just what they believe.

Whenever i have a conversation with someone who trys to convince me God doesn't exist i always just say prove it. They never give a good enough reason.

I've said this before, but as I love saying things so much, I might as well say it again only this time even better!! [Sorry I just in one of those weird moods:o]

To someone who doesn't believe in God there is no reason to prove that she/he/it doesn't exist?After all, how logical does it sound in me providing proof of a non-existent shurcty when shurcty doesn't exist? The onus is on the believer to provide proof!

Also, when Physicists refer to GOD they are usually referring to something very DIFFERENT from a personal God. Now, I hate to do this but hey this is the A & A thread, and I love the reasoning

Physics is processes of the World - Humankind Didn't know about physics so humankind "created" God.

Actually, I said it worse:o
I'll get my coat..

karlog

Flamed Diving wrote: »

Read over this thread and you will see my stance on the issue, er, pal...

I see, like many believers before you, that you are storming out.

Toodle-ooo!

Oh you clearly want the last word in, ok ill let you have it.

Turtwig

karlog wrote: »

Oh you clearly want the last word in, ok ill let you have it.

Eh? If we're discussing how the universe came from nothing, don't you think we should also discuss what it's last words will be (sorry couldn't resist).
Ahem, I mean, don't you think we should debate whether it will become nothing (whatever that actually is) again??

Dades

I actually don't see a lot of disagreement between you guys about stuff.
Not sure where the current dance off came from...

ChocolateSauce

karlog wrote: »

Scientists like Newton and Einstein believed in existence of God. Stephen Hawkins has also accepted that concept of something like a God is necessary to explain the ultimate origin of the Universe. They cant prove it. Thats just what they believe.

I don't normally say things with this degree of certainty, but this is total bull and is all the proof I need to make the assumption that you don't know a damn thing about this subject.

and i respect your belief.

You should check out the thread about respect for a deeper insight into the rationale behind some of our opinions....

Sam Vimes

karlog wrote: »

Oh you clearly want the last word in, ok ill let you have it.

Ah, an accusation of "having to have the last word". The last ditch attempt at an ad hominem attack from a defeated man :pac:

studiorat

Doctor DooM wrote: »

"I don't know" does me fine.

There's a huge number of options covered with "I don't know" which aren't a god, btw.

I don't know either. Maybe we should start a religion.

But if I had to speculate (just for fun), I'd say maybe the universe was here all along and it just looked different.

Sam Vimes wrote: »

The last ditch attempt at an ad hominem attack from a defeated man :pac:

I'm not proud. I'd have the last word anyway way I can.

xoxyx

We have no definite answers as to how things came about, whether we believe in God or not. All we can trust in is blind faith or lack of knowledge. While we think we're making leaps and bounds in technology etc., the fact that we still can't figure out where we came from shows a huge gap in what we know. Plus, the amount of time we've been around on this earth, let alone this universe, is negligible, so who are we to assume that we should know the answers to everything?!?
However, I did come across this interesting theory under the predestination paradox. This paradox covers time travel, and basically says that, if we travelled to the past and changed anything, the change we made would be predestined, and would only ensure that the future continued as it should have in the first place.
For example, - a person discovers how to travel back in time and decides to kill Hitler. He goes back and finds the newborn baby of Hitler’s parents and kills him. He feels great and goes back home to find everything unchanged.
What happened was that, after the dead baby was discovered, the nurse took another baby from a mother who had died. She gave that baby to the original Hitler family, and, in putting that baby in a better family situation than it would have been, the baby, through its own nature, and its new family's nurture, became the Hitler that we all know.
So - re. the beginning of the universe – imagine if in many years to come, when time travel has been perfected, an expedition is manned to travel back to pre-Big Bang time, just to see what happened. In travelling back to that time, which was previously a big pile of nothingness, our time explorers set off a chain of events which resulted in the universe being created. We exist because of it; it exists because of us.
Ok - it's only a theory, but, at least it's an answer!

shabbyalonso

z_topaz wrote: »

For example, - a person discovers how to travel back in time and decides to kill Hitler. He goes back and finds the newborn baby of Hitler’s parents and kills him. He feels great and goes back home to find everything unchanged.[/FONT][/COLOR]
What happened was that, after the dead baby was discovered, the nurse took another baby from a mother who had died. She gave that baby to the original Hitler family, and, in putting that baby in a better family situation than it would have been, the baby, through its own nature, and its new family's nurture, became the Hitler that we all know.

I'm only tagging on here however I'm a bit puzzled by this one? Someone goes back in time and takes out the "original" Hitler (baby). Then a nurse gives another random baby to "Hitlers" parents. Why then, would we have the return/onset of Hitler? They would be different people/babies? Maybe I've misinterpreted but do you mean that Hitler (in the future so to speak) would be the same Hitler or that someone else, given human nature, would take up the role of Hitler? If one baby was out of the picture and another brought up by the same parents, then they couldn't possibly be the same person or follow the same path? They would have completely different make-ups?

Turtwig

z_topaz wrote: »

We have no definite answers as to how things came about, whether we believe in God or not. All we can trust in is blind faith or lack of knowledge. While we think we're making leaps and bounds in technology etc., the fact that we still can't figure out where we came from shows a huge gap in what we know. Plus, the amount of time we've been around on this earth, let alone this universe, is negligible, so who are we to assume that we should know the answers to everything?!?
However, I did come across this interesting theory under the predestination paradox. This paradox covers time travel, and basically says that, if we travelled to the past and changed anything, the change we made would be predestined, and would only ensure that the future continued as it should have in the first place.
For example, - a person discovers how to travel back in time and decides to kill Hitler. He goes back and finds the newborn baby of Hitler’s parents and kills him. He feels great and goes back home to find everything unchanged.
What happened was that, after the dead baby was discovered, the nurse took another baby from a mother who had died. She gave that baby to the original Hitler family, and, in putting that baby in a better family situation than it would have been, the baby, through its own nature, and its new family's nurture, became the Hitler that we all know.
So - re. the beginning of the universe – imagine if in many years to come, when time travel has been perfected, an expedition is manned to travel back to pre-Big Bang time, just to see what happened. In travelling back to that time, which was previously a big pile of nothingness, our time explorers set off a chain of events which resulted in the universe being created. We exist because of it; it exists because of us.
Ok - it's only a theory, but, at least it's an answer!

Errr???

If we travelled back to the time of the Big Bang we would most likely die instantly. Unless of course we figure out a way to build suits that withstand different finestructure Alphas:rolleyes:

I'm betting on 138:)

Zillah

z_topaz wrote: »

Ok - it's only a theory, but, at least it's an answer!

Ugh.

Dades

shabbyalonso wrote: »

If one baby was out of the picture and another brought up by the same parents, then they couldn't possibly be the same person or follow the same path? They would have completely different make-ups?

I think the idea is that the second baby was Hitler all along, and that someone would appear to kill the first baby was already (and always had been) in the timeline.

Love sci-fi dealing with time-travel, I do!

xoxyx

shabbyalonso wrote: »

z_topaz wrote: »

For example, - a person discovers how to travel back in time and decides to kill Hitler. He goes back and finds the newborn baby of Hitler’s parents and kills him. He feels great and goes back home to find everything unchanged.[/font][/color]
What happened was that, after the dead baby was discovered, the nurse took another baby from a mother who had died. She gave that baby to the original Hitler family, and, in putting that baby in a better family situation than it would have been, the baby, through its own nature, and its new family's nurture, became the Hitler that we all know.

I'm only tagging on here however I'm a bit puzzled by this one? Someone goes back in time and takes out the "original" Hitler (baby). Then a nurse gives another random baby to "Hitlers" parents. Why then, would we have the return/onset of Hitler? They would be different people/babies? Maybe I've misinterpreted but do you mean that Hitler (in the future so to speak) would be the same Hitler or that someone else, given human nature, would take up the role of Hitler? If one baby was out of the picture and another brought up by the same parents, then they couldn't possibly be the same person or follow the same path? They would have completely different make-ups?

No - you're missing the point. The logic behind the predestination paradox is that, if one were to go back in time and change something, it would be that change that ensured that the future would run as it was supposed to.
It's like a loop. The Hitler that we know is the baby that was unknowingly adopted because the original baby was killed by a well meaning time traveller. This is the paradox. If a future person hadn't gone back in time to try and change history by killing who he thought was Hitler, then the Hilter we know would never have come into being.
I hope this makes sense now - I've typed "Hitler" more times than I ever thought I would need to!

xoxyx

Malty_T wrote: »

Errr???

If we travelled back to the time of the Big Bang we would most likely die instantly. Unless of course we figure out a way to build suits that withstand different finestructure Alphas:rolleyes:

I'm betting on 138:)

Well, why shouldn't we build such suits? Try telling the people of 1,000 years ago that we'd be able to communicate with each other using "mobile phones", regardless of how far away we are, and I'm sure a few eyebrows would be raised.
What we do now is like magic to previous generations. Who knows what magic is yet to come.

Zillah

z_topaz wrote: »

the original baby was killed by a well meaning time traveller

Only on this forum...


Anyway how is it a paradox exactly? Surely it is just a principle: Any attempt to alter the timeline using time travel will have no impact, the actions used in the attempt were in fact always part of the timeline. I see no paradox.

Captain Chaos

Ah, but there is. From what you are saying is that the future event must have happened first for that past event to exist which is emplying that the future existed before the past. The sequence of events must have started somewhere so it cannot be a loop, someone could make a loop form a branch though.

xoxyx

Zillah wrote: »

Only on this forum...


Anyway how is it a paradox exactly? Surely it is just a principle: Any attempt to alter the timeline using time travel will have no impact, the actions used in the attempt were in fact always part of the timeline. I see no paradox.

Any attempt to alter the timeline using time travel will have no impact

You're answering your own question. It's not the case that an attempt to alter the timeline will have no impact in this hypothetical scenario. It's the opposite. The paradox lies in the fact that by taking an existing situation and travelling backwards in time to try and avoid it, the time traveller inadvertently sets in motion the very thing that he is trying to obliterate.

It’s called the “predestination paradox” for a reason. “Predestination” because, no matter what we may do to change the path that life is on, we can’t. Under this theory every contingent has been taken into account, so even going back in time has already been considered and it’s consequences weighed up.

It’s a paradox because, if we did managed to travel back in time and change something that lead to life being as it is now, then life as it is now is only possible because we travelled back in time to change something.

Which means that, at the time of the change that the time traveller effected, then there must still have been a time traveller effecting change.

Which means that without going back in time to effect a change, our world would be different. But it can’t be – because we are here living it right now… &c.

xoxyx

Captain Chaos wrote: »

Ah, but there is. From what you are saying is that the future event must have happened first for that past event to exist which is emplying that the future existed before the past. The sequence of events must have started somewhere so it cannot be a loop, someone could make a loop form a branch though.

I was more going for a series of sequential events. But of course, I don't know where it started. Where did the branch come from that was made into a loop?

ChocolateSauce

Zillah wrote: »

Only on this forum...


Anyway how is it a paradox exactly? Surely it is just a principle: Any attempt to alter the timeline using time travel will have no impact, the actions used in the attempt were in fact always part of the timeline. I see no paradox.

If you accept the possibilities of disjointed time bubbles, such paradoxes can conceivably be explained.

Turtwig

Time travel isn't possible until we figure out what 'time' actually is.
Any takers?:)

Data_Quest

Little Mickey wrote: »

Who believes in the end of the world, or the end of the human race?

Just finished reading a book by Neal Stephonson called QuickSilver: in 1666 a lot of people in London really believed that the end of the world was at hand as God had sent the Black Plague followed by the Great Fire of London. More than 100,000 people perished.

My point is that you don't have to "believe" in the end of the world it could happen in the not too distant future through any number of catastrophic natural disasters.

For example, a meteor with a 1 km diameter impacts the Earth every 500,000 years on average. Large collisions with five kilometer objects happen approximately once every ten million years. Asteroids with diameters of 5-10 m impact the Earth's atmosphere approximately once per year, but break up and most of the material is vaporized in the upper atmosphere. Objects of diameters of over 50 meters strike the Earth approximately once every thousand years. This is probably what happened in Siberia in 1908. One theory for the demise of the dinosaurs is a large impact event that caused catastrophic and quick environmental changes.

No-one can convince me that God has a hand in all of this.

Turtwig

Data_Quest wrote: »

a meteor with a 1 km diameter impacts the Earth every 500,000 years on average. Large collisions with five kilometer objects happen approximately once every ten million years. Asteroids with diameters of 5-10 m impact the Earth's atmosphere approximately once per year, but break up and most of the material is vaporized in the upper atmosphere. Objects of diameters of over 50 meters strike the Earth approximately once every thousand years. This is probably what happened in Siberia in 1908. One theory for the demise of the dinosaurs is a large impact event that caused catastrophic and quick environmental changes.

Isn't there some statistic about 99% of all known species being extinct or something?

No-one can convince me that a God has a hand in all of this.

Fear the wrath of Apophis!!

Data_Quest

Zillah wrote: »

Er, according to more recent measurements, Dark Energy is causing the universe to accelerate it's expansion, which would imply that it is never going to stop.

As for time travel, some models suggest it is possible, but that it requires extraordinary amounts of energy. I suspect that to travel back in time to the point of the Big Bang you would need more energy than exists in the universe. But we'll need to roll out Professor Hawking for a detailed response. But basically we don't know until we have a so-called theory of everything, one grand model that incorporates General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics.

We may never travel back in time but we can see back in time. For example, the Hubble telescope can see back to a time within 500 million years of the Big Bang. Bigger and better telescopes will see even further back in time (the James Webb Space Telescope is set to launch in 2013 which will be about 3 times the size of Hubble). As previous posters have stated we will not be able to see outside our Universe (i.e. outside our frame of reference) beyond the confines of what was created in the Big Bang. Makes sense to me anyway?

Turtwig

Data_Quest wrote: »

As previous posters have stated we will not be able to see outside our Universe (i.e. outside our frame of reference) beyond the confines of what was created in the Big Bang. Makes sense to me anyway?

I have faith (can I say that here?) that someday we will indeed be able to see beyond that crumpy singularity. Definitely, our bodies will never see that frontier but our instruments should...somehow...someday.:)

Zillah

I don't think anyone is qualified to make any concrete predictions about the ultimate limit of technology. The vast majority of what we have we have developed in a couple hundred years. We went from digging in the dirt for berries to international spacestations in just a few thousand years. Who's to say what can occur after a million years of technological development? Even a million years is a drop in the ocean of space-time. Ten million years from now entities descended from humanity could be playing interdimensional tag, hiding inside blackholes and flinging space-time paradoxes at each other.

Fun to think about it, better get my brain frozen to have a hope of seeing it.

karlog

Zillah wrote: »

I don't think anyone is qualified to make any concrete predictions about the ultimate limit of technology. The vast majority of what we have we have developed in a couple hundred years. We went from digging in the dirt for berries to international spacestations in just a few thousand years. Who's to say what can occur after a million years of technological development? Even a million years is a drop in the ocean of space-time. Ten million years from now entities descended from humanity could be playing interdimensional tag, hiding inside blackholes and flinging space-time paradoxes at each other.

Fun to think about it, better get my brain frozen to have a hope of seeing it.

Dont worry you'll see it in the next life;)