Darwinism and Evolution....

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

The Big Bang is both provable and observable, as is the capability of random systems to self-organize.

 

What you're really arguing for is not "causation", but rationalization...the idea that because something happens, there must be a rationally deducible reason for it happening. The "why", rather than the "what" or "how". And the fact is, it's a fool's errand: even if you posit that "God did it", and He had a reason for doing it, you can't know what that reason is (or you think you can...and your arrogance in knowing God's will is at odds with your Christian humility.)

 

I never claimed to know God's PURPOSE, I've only expressed belief in his handiwork.

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

The Big Bang is both provable and observable, as is the capability of random systems to self-organize.

 

Has someone invented a time machine I haven't heard about? Or are you talking about observing phemomena that MIGHT point to a possible Big Bang? And again, ahs some genius somewhere caused molecules to organize to a point where it became DNA and evolved into rational thinking beings? Let me know when that happens, mmmkay?

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

But let's just assume that the biblical creation myth and the Big Bang are equally irrational. Why do you choose to believe in one, but not the other?

 

What if I believe that God caused the Big Bang?

[Gene Frenkle]

Has someone invented a time machine I haven't heard about? Or are you talking about observing phemomena that MIGHT point to a possible Big Bang? And again, ahs some genius somewhere caused molecules to organize to a point where it became DNA and evolved into rational thinking beings? Let me know when that happens, mmmkay?

Stick your fingers in your ears and stomp your feet and nobody will ever prove you wrong.

[DC Tom]

I never claimed to know God's PURPOSE, I've only expressed belief in his handiwork.

 

Actually, you're expressing DISbelief in his handiwork, given that the evidence of his handiwork is all around us and you wilfully ignore it in preference to the Bible.

 

Has someone invented a time machine I haven't heard about? Or are you talking about observing phemomena that MIGHT point to a possible Big Bang? And again, ahs some genius somewhere caused molecules to organize to a point where it became DNA and evolved into rational thinking beings? Let me know when that happens, mmmkay?

 

Again...a scientific theory's only purpose is to describe the observable universe. Given that...yes, I am talking about observing phenomena that point to the Big Bang, and to the ability of random systems to self-organize and evolve complex behavior. And both are actually pretty solid theories.

 

Neither of which denies the existence of God...but again, you're not talking about God, you're talking about your magic book.

[DrFishfinder]

The problem with this thinking is that it's a human construct: i.e. something must have created it. But if nothing can come from nothing, how did God come to exist? God created itself? You can't state that since something must have started it, it proves the existence of God, yet God didn't have to be created and was always just there. It's just as reasonable to say the laws of nature were always just there, and after 13 or so billion years, life developed to this point.

Ahhhh...

 

You bring up, I think, one of the thorniest issues. The concept that "something" has always been. Humans are very rooted in beginnings and ends. Birth and death, it's what we are. Trying to understand the possibility that something did not have a beginning, nor will come to an end, is certainly beyond me. I'm not saying it's true or not true, just saying that that concept is THE most foreign concept of all, to me.

 

And if there was nothing before the Big Bang, then exactly what was it that Banged?

[DC Tom]

And if there was nothing before the Big Bang, then exactly what was it that Banged?

 

Can't be known, at least not scientifically. Again...science describes the observable universe. The observable universe, by definition, is bounded by the Big Bang (both time- and space-wise). Ergo, "before" the Big Bang is outside the observable universe, hence is scientifically unknowable.

 

Which is not an argument for the existence of God, by the way. It's an argument for the unprovability of the existence of God.

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

Actually, you're expressing DISbelief in his handiwork, given that the evidence of his handiwork is all around us and you wilfully ignore it in preference to the Bible.

 

OK, then. NOW what you're saying makes sense. Thanks. Actually I don't think the descriptions in the Bible and scientific fact are incompatible at all. It's entirely conceivable that God initiated a Big Bang. I don't pretend to know HOW he created the universe, I believe he DID it, but don't know how.

[LeviF]

Ahhhh...

 

You bring up, I think, one of the thorniest issues. The concept that "something" has always been. Humans are very rooted in beginnings and ends. Birth and death, it's what we are. Trying to understand the possibility that something did not have a beginning, nor will come to an end, is certainly beyond me. I'm not saying it's true or not true, just saying that that concept is THE most foreign concept of all, to me.

 

And if there was nothing before the Big Bang, then exactly what was it that Banged?

There wasn't nothing. In theory, every bit of matter and energy was concentrated in one spot.

 

(This is not directed at anyone in this thread) I love it when people say, "How ridiculous! Nothing exploded and made everything? Come on!"

[DrFishfinder]

As you can tell from this board, I am a conservative (no **** Sherlock).

I have a molecular bio background and it got me riled up on the conservative board I was on because some posters would always dismiss evolution with Bible quotes and NO scientific data. What got me banned was using scientific facts in an argument. These nuts would also argue that Roman Catholics and the Pope were not Christians. The owner (its a privately owned board) also allows venomous ant-Romney and anti Mormon posts and bans people who don't treat Palin the same way that Obamabots treat the Messiah. They make Connor look like a Nobel Medicine, Physics, or Chemistry Prize winner.

 

A bunch of us conservatives who got kicked off went to a site called Darwin Central. The motto on the top of the page there is :

"Corrupting the World's Youth Since 1859."

Um.....

 

I gotta ask the obvious dumbass question here....I guess somebody has to do it and since I seem to be heading toward quasi-leadership of the "Mewling Idiots" club........ ahem.....cough.....cough....

 

Why in the world would you be on such a stunningly ignorant message board?

 

For crying out loud, isn't this one enough for you?

[DC Tom]

OK, then. NOW what you're saying makes sense. Thanks. Actually I don't think the descriptions in the Bible and scientific fact are incompatible at all. It's entirely conceivable that God initiated a Big Bang. I don't pretend to know HOW he created the universe, I believe he DID it, but don't know how.

 

THAT I can accept. Most arguments about "God vs. science" in any case come down to "God vs. my magic book, which is more accurate than any other magic book."

 

As for the idea of whether or not "God" "caused" the Big Bang; ref. my reply to Fishfinder above your post. It's simply not a knowable datum. That's where "faith" comes in - your faith is that God caused the Big Bang; mine isn't that He didn't, but that I simply can't know either way (again, my faith is in empiricism. Outside of that, I learn to live in ignorance.)

 

And arguing THAT is stupid - if I could argue that my faith were any more valid than yours, it wouldn't be faith.

[DrFishfinder]

Can't be known, at least not scientifically. Again...science describes the observable universe. The observable universe, by definition, is bounded by the Big Bang (both time- and space-wise). Ergo, "before" the Big Bang is outside the observable universe, hence is scientifically unknowable.

 

Which is not an argument for the existence of God, by the way. It's an argument for the unprovability of the existence of God.

Okay.....I'm fine with "outside the observable universe and therefore scientifically unknowable."

 

What I'm interested in..... .... is what theories people have about exactly what it was that banged. It's one thing to be forthright enough to define it as scientifically unknowable. But you sir, must have an opinion or a theory, no?

[DC Tom]

There wasn't nothing. In theory, every bit of matter and energy was concentrated in one spot.

 

(This is not directed at anyone in this thread) I love it when people say, "How ridiculous! Nothing exploded and made everything? Come on!"

 

Well, actually...

 

First off, if the net energy of the universe is zero (possible - if the gravitational attraction of all the mass in the universe precisely balances out the expansion of the universe, the net potential + kinetic energy is then zero), then one could argue the entire universe is simply a quantum vacuum fluctuation...and hence, nothing exploded and made everything. (It happens all the time, in fact: nothing suddenly becomes a particle and an anti-particle, which quickly collide and become nothing again. It's where Hawking radiation comes from, around black holes).

 

Second...without getting into the esoterica of quantun field theories, at high temperature/pressure/density/energy, physical laws as we know them start to "change" or "break down". It's entirely possible that "nothing" existed in the Big Bang singularity, simply because physical laws didn't even exist to describe the existence of "something". Very weird concept, I know...but "existence" of any particle is determined by physical observable properties (mass, spin, charge, chiriality, "colour", etc.) that aren't even definable until after the Big Bang is in process...therefore, it's not unreasonable to say "nothing" existed before the Big Bang.

[WisconsinBillzFan]

What if I believe that God caused the Big Bang?

 

They have no answer to what came before the "Big Bang". They have no clue what they are talking about.

[DrFishfinder]

There wasn't nothing. In theory, every bit of matter and energy was concentrated in one spot.

 

(This is not directed at anyone in this thread) I love it when people say, "How ridiculous! Nothing exploded and made everything? Come on!"

Okay....going along with that theory, where & what did all of that matter and energy, enough matter and energy to create the entire universe (known and yet to be known), come from? Please bear in mind the staggering magnitude of the known and yet to be know universe.

[LeviF]

Well, actually...

 

First off, if the net energy of the universe is zero (possible - if the gravitational attraction of all the mass in the universe precisely balances out the expansion of the universe, the net potential + kinetic energy is then zero), then one could argue the entire universe is simply a quantum vacuum fluctuation...and hence, nothing exploded and made everything. (It happens all the time, in fact: nothing suddenly becomes a particle and an anti-particle, which quickly collide and become nothing again. It's where Hawking radiation comes from, around black holes).

 

Second...without getting into the esoterica of quantun field theories, at high temperature/pressure/density/energy, physical laws as we know them start to "change" or "break down". It's entirely possible that "nothing" existed in the Big Bang singularity, simply because physical laws didn't even exist to describe the existence of "something". Very weird concept, I know...but "existence" of any particle is determined by physical observable properties (mass, spin, charge, chiriality, "colour", etc.) that aren't even definable until after the Big Bang is in process...therefore, it's not unreasonable to say "nothing" existed before the Big Bang.

Goddamn semantics. I know what you mean. It frustrates me to no end, but it seems to slip my mind once in a while that when physical laws no longer apply, you can't describe anything. I need to start studying physics again.

[SageAgainstTheMachine]

OK, then. NOW what you're saying makes sense. Thanks. Actually I don't think the descriptions in the Bible and scientific fact are incompatible at all. It's entirely conceivable that God initiated a Big Bang. I don't pretend to know HOW he created the universe, I believe he DID it, but don't know how.

 

Ok, this makes sense. You believe in a higher being that may or may not have created the universe in a certain way. I can buy into that.

 

But this thinking does not quite mesh with your earlier quoting of Genesis. Because if you're going to literally interpret Genesis, doesn't this also imply belief that you DO know how God created everything?

[DC Tom]

Okay.....I'm fine with "outside the observable universe and therefore scientifically unknowable."

 

What I'm interested in..... .... is what theories people have about exactly what it was that banged. It's one thing to be forthright enough to define it as scientifically unknowable. But you sir, must have an opinion or a theory, no?

 

Nope. I have no opinion or theory. It's empirically unknowable, therefore I simply accept that don't know.

 

Seriously. It's probably difficult for you to accept, or even believe, but it's the truth. I can't know, so I don't worry about it.

[LeviF]

Okay....going along with that theory, where & what did all of that matter and energy, enough matter and energy to create the entire universe (known and yet to be known), come from? Please bear in mind the staggering magnitude of the known and yet to be know universe.

That's the thing, we have no clue. Tom is right when he says that when all of that matter and energy was in that one spot, physical laws no longer applied. When physical laws don't apply, at this point, we really can't know anything graspable about it.

[SageAgainstTheMachine]

They have no answer to what came before the "Big Bang". They have no clue what they are talking about.

 

We're discussing the theoretical creation of the universe. Nobody knows what they're talking about. That's sorta the point.

 

We may have an idea, inkling, or thought...but nobody truly knows. It's really a beautiful mystery.