/sci/ - Science & Math

premise: God as uncaused cause

implications: TBA


I can wait.

What makes you think there is a Creator?

stop being stupid. god doesn't exist. even if god does exist, he will not help you. now do the rational thing and be rational instead of being irrational and doing irrational things

>>4086210
answer >>4086221
please

we can't say it is not possible.

>>4086220
While we're waiting, we can all have a hearty chuckle:

http://jcu.edu/philosophy/Gensler/RE/r-b2--00.htm

>>4086230
Cerberus!

For a bit more clarification, Thomas Aquinas' argued for the existence of God through rational reduction via five (largely reductio ad absurdum) proofs / Quinque viæ:

(1) Ex motu: Aquinas said that things move, so something or someone - an unmoved mover from whom all motion proceeds - must therefore exist.

(2) The argument of the first cause (ex causa). Some things are caused by something or someone else. Therefore, there must be an uncaused cause of all caused things.

(3) The argument of contingency (ex contingentia). Many things in the universe may either exist or not exist. Such things are called contingent beings. But it is impossible for everything in the universe to be contingent, therefore there must be a necessary being whose existence is not contingent.

(4) The argument of degree (ex gradu). Various perfections may be found in varying degrees throughout the universe, which assumes the existence of the perfections themselves.

(5) The argument of design (ex fine). All designed things have a designer. The universe is designed. Therefore, the universe has a designer.

>>4086238
see: >>4086228

Read:
http://archive.installgentoo.net/sci/thread/4059729

>>4086221
I'm glad you use the word "think" here. It was a thought which bubbled into curiosity. Mere curioisty.

>troll thread about religion on /sci/
>will 404
pick one

>>4086249
Listen, I had no hope for this thread in the beginning, thus any post that is even remotely intelligible as an argument or a swipe at definition, I'll take it.

>>4086252
Then tell us what makes you think there is a Creator.

>>4086238
I love how it's separated into *5* proofs when unmoved mover, uncaused cause, in-contingent contingence, perfect thing are all the same argument. Once who accept it, you're still left with: >>4086220

>(2) The argument of the first cause (ex causa). Some things are caused by something or someone else. Therefore, there must be an uncaused cause of all caused things.

>implying Causality holds under every condition

>But it is impossible for everything in the universe to be contingent

why?

>The universe is designed

Nah bruh.

>Various perfections may be found in varying degrees throughout the universe, which assumes the existence of the perfections themselves.

Subjective.

God is the greatest version of everything. God is the greatest good, the greatest justice, the greatest faeces, the greatest evil.

>>4086257
Read:

>>4086244

aquinas' proofs are flawed, even philosophers admit that they are. if you want something heavier, try godel's

stop being a fag, think for yourself

Do not misunderstand me however.
I do believe in the Universal Architect.
I just cant prove that it exsists.

>>4086270
I've read about Godel's work, though, only his Incompleteness Theorem and his creation of the Godel Numbering System. As far as theology and Godel are concerned, I haven't read anything.

>>4086274
OP: It is just pure Faith on your end, then?

>>4086270
"God, by definition, is that for which no greater can be conceived. God exists in the understanding. If God exists in the understanding, we could imagine Him to be greater by existing in reality. Therefore, God must exist."

in other words,

>You can imagine God therefore god exists in the understanding.
Granted

>You can imagine God therefore god exists in reality.
Dubious.

>>4086275
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del's_ontological_proof

>>4086292
Oh and as always....

No implications drawn except a long list nonsequiturs

>>4086293
This is most helpful. Thanks a million.

>>4086301
>be OP
>ask for thoughts
>ignore every thought I have on these proofs

OP, I feel you are a rational man with a scientific mind. You are skeptic and you wait for evidence before calling it real.

There are many ways of seeing the world and one that is, at least to me, unnaceptable is the sheep minded people. What I mean is that, it doesn't matter what you think/feel/believe as long as you are doing it by your own means, not letting yourself go with the tide. That is because the tide is strong, but it takes multiple paths.

Amongst scientists there is a high number of atheists. If you don't much of science and is born within a religious or superstitious community, chances are you are going to be religious too. Think that the books you read affect your mindscape, they shift you towards new directions. You are reading two books that might be complementing each other towards deism.

Read other stuff too. Don't dismiss Kant or Aquina, who were brilliant men on their own. But, for instance, what I think is incredibly underrated is the mythological view of god. Jung, Campbell and others I mean.

If you are reading Kant, the discussion of god is way beyond "lol i troll u christ 1 atheist 0". Now realize what it means to call yourself a deist. You are putting yourself into one category, you are giving it a name and a definition to something that is above pure religion discussion. Strong atheism and deism have this characteristic, they are philosophical positions and not something you'd wear on a t-shirt, even if not to be confused with other idiots who use those words.

You don't have to put a name to your beliefs.

God is more than a creator or a father figure, he is a strong concept that drives us. I believe in the image of god, but not god itself. And I'm not saying this in the way of "I believe in placebo, so I take this well known sugar pills and think very hard on the medicine I wish they were", this is retarded. I think of it as a word that can be placed in our minds, for that's where that word comes from. Things like "truth" or "reality" can't be measured, they are not palpable or proven, but we are able to understand them anyway.

Taking all of that in consideration, being an atheist, to me, means more than not believing in god, but being aware of a reachable side of life, being untouched by dogmas, ignoring pure mysticism and realizing the humanist background that led people to believe in god in the first place. God is still not the old man in the clouds for anyone here and in the deepest level of metaphysics, your position towards it doesn't matter if it doesn't matter to your position towards your own life.

If god is the river, the mountain and the sky... Call it river, mountain and sky. They are sacred, but in a way most people don't see.

>>4086316
I was asking for thoughts to be posted. I don't fathom I could have ignored them, or how you could deduce that I'm "ignoring" you.

>>4086301
even though his logic is fine, the axioms themselves are not really good, if you're going to believe in god because someone else thinks so, so be it, you're no different than most religious people

>>4086318
Aquinas is actually one of the first Catholic theologians I've read, so naturally my interests would be piqued. I've read Dawkins, Hitchens, Dennett, and all the "New Atheists" whose prose I find is much too acidic to be accepted. Understood? Yes. Accepted? Maybe, but with reservation.

>>4086325
My only question is 'what do these proofs imply?' As far as I can tell, they demonstrate nothing except the idea that god exists as a word.

>>4086275
Godel's is just a circular proof in mathematical notation, nothing interesting

>>4086349
ah finally we're onto my area. What implications?

>>4086343
I would venture to say the implications of his proof are a bit more weighty than "a circular proof in mathematical notation."

All religions are bullshit, simply because there are multiple
Who created the creator? It's possible there is a creator but he did not foresee us and cares nothing for us.

>>4086343
If Godel's proofs were circular, I'm pretty sure he would have noticed it.

Using mathematical notations doesn't make a proof circular.

>>4086357
Yeah that guy was wrong. his proof isn't circular. it's axiomatic. Doesn't make it better though. :P

>>4086349
They're no more weighty than what the scholastic philosophers accomplished

>>4086357

>If Godel's proofs were circular, I'm pretty sure he would have noticed it.

And?

>Using mathematical notations doesn't make a proof circular.

Applying Mathematical Notation in a circular manner does make the proof circular.

>>4086359
yeah that makes it even worse

>>4086354
OP: Sir, it's a toss-up of what math had meant to many before him—specifically Russell and Whitehead, whose work was the spark of the proof. That any consistent system, that is a system that culminates to a solution, there will be contained truths about the natural numbers, yet they may be unprovable. You're posting, with complete confidence, that such a proof isn't significant—at the very least, more than "circular proof"?

>>4086368
I said "weighty," not "weightier" than any other scholar/mathematician/philosopher/what have you.

>>4086371

>>4086359

Is it someone else, or are you just schizophrenic ?

Anyway, too answer him
>>4086371
If Godel had noticed that his proof was circular, he wouldn't have published it.

And may someone explain me how can an axiomatic proof be worse than a circular proof ?

>>4086374
Remember that any theorem in math is axiomatic in it's nature.

>>4086388
Weighty is a relative term, so if it's no more weighty than what was accomplished nearly a thousand years ago by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholasticism , then there is no reason to call it weighty

>>4086388
Ah you're talking about the implications of godel's work––his influence on mathematics.

I was more hoping for implications of proof for the existence of god. if ontological arguments really were proof. what implications could be drawn?

>>4086393
I must be missing something here. What other sort of proof would you propose Godel have used? As far as I know, the tenets of Logic are built on Axioms, their implementation, and the derivation of truths from them.

>>4086393
it's not worse. it's the same. well circular proof may imply a level of internal consistency that isn't present in the pursuit of axioms, but not necessarily

>>4086397
I mistyped then, I wasn't relating Godel's Incompleteness Theorem to Ontology. Furthermore, I was unaware that his Ontological Proof existed until today.

>>4086402
His work was significant. Would you call it insignificant?

>>4086405
i know, it's just an arbitrary choice on my part. :p I just happen to find coherentism a bit neater

>>4086417
Sounds like we were a bit confused. I was talking about his ontological proof only, while you were talking about his incompleteness theorem and related work.

>>4086426
Then my apologies.

Once you accept that there can be no proof of god, all thats left is the question of whether you can accept it on faith. That leads us into the realm of existential philosophy and phenomenalism. Personally I find Camus more attractive than Kierkegaard. but I'm still reading. I would never be so naive as to suggest that my journey is complete.

Of course god doesn't exist, don't be ridiculous. Isn't this /sci/?

>>4086335
I completely see your point with them, but I don't think you should stick to that. Instead of looking for those trying to make a point about the existence of god, try looking for writers who are trying to understand why we think of god anyway.

Go with psychologists and anthropologists.

Also, check eastern religions. They are different from everything we know in terms of religion and philosophy and they give you a good contrast to the whole debate.

>>4086487
if you've read anything I've written in this thread it should be clear that this is what is being said. You harbour the straw man view of the atheist.

God might exist but ontological proof has zero implications, except to structure your own 'spiritual' voyage. Even if we accept God exists, a whole host of explanations are still required ranging from evolutionary theory to cosmological models

>>4086500
>You harbour the straw man view of the atheist.
Delicious sweeping generalization.

>>4086507
Well I didn't say "Of course god doesn't exist" and I would still consider myself an atheist so how else to interpret >>4086487
How can it be a sweeping generalisation if I am only judging 1 post from 1 user? Please try harder with the comebacks

>>4086507

Not really.

http://zarbi.posterous.com/why-i-am-a-straw-man-atheist

real spiritual belief is only possible with mushroom-like experiences. after that you will recognize that laws and religion are made for men living on earth by men living on earth. as it is not possible to explain physical processes within stars/universe by only observing processes on earth, it is not possible to explain god by human thoughts alone.

>>4086517
>>4086522
One reply was enough. It just sounded like you were referring to "the typical atheist", not just to one specific person.

>>4086532
mushroom like experiences?

>>4086538
we're different people. if we have the same name. we are anonymous

>>4086522

Oh good grief, please tell me this man has a learning difficulty. Or is a woman? The retardedness is quite astounding.

>>4086621

>Steves

>>4086621
>implying his bad arguments are justification for god

>>4086621
>Middle-aged ex-scientist. Now software developer, rationalist and amateur philosopher.

The ontological argument doesn't hold. It's a fun puzzle though

The original cosmological argument was "everything that exists must have a cause, therefore God." It was vulnerable to the "well then who caused God" bit

The modern version is "everything that BEGAN to exist must have had a cause. the universe began, therefore God. God doesn't need to have had a cause because he's outside time"
It's not vulnerable to the who made God question, but its premise is a lot shakier and more forced.

The strongest argument for God is the fine-tuning argument: if the fundamental constants (speed of light, electron's charge, etc) had been even the slightest bit different, stars and planets would have been different or nonexistant, and we couldn't be here. So the Universe must have been made for us.

This is vulnerable to the fact that we seem to be privileging life as the *special* improbable thing. If I roll a billion-sided die, and 399,454,792 comes up i could say "omg how unlikely it must be a plan!" An even subtler change in the Universe, that left humans here, would make iPods nonexistent, but we wouldn't think the Universe was designed for iPods.
This argument fails especially if there's a possibility of an infinite multiverse.

The "something can't come from nothing" one has the interesting rebuttal that the total mass+energy in the Universe actually comes to - exactly - zero. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ImvlS8PLIo

>>4088179

The feelings of free will, flow of time, love etc. are perfectly explainable in terms of a static, four-dimensional mechanical Universe (the reason you remember the past and not the future has to do with entropy).

Pretty much the God hypothesis is tied inseperably from the soul hypothesis. Whatever the first cause may be, if intelligence is a fundamental, simple substance, then a mind might be able to fill that role, but if intelligence is emergent from complexity, then it can't.

Consciousness itself is hard to explain (though some audacious niggers be trying), but positing souls doesn't really help, and introduces the extra difficulty of how mind can causally effect matter and vice-versa.