[quote]pat wrote:<<< Nobody is going to come out <<<>>> better on the other side.[/quote]If I didn’t believe the Lord was edifying at least me through these conversations I wouldn’t participate. I will certainly be snickered at for saying this, but I have really grown during the last year or so. I am not sorry for having been in the middle of all this.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:<<< Could I make arguments about God, Jesus, God incarnate through Aristotelian deduction? No. I can make pretty decent correlations and inferences, but not deduction. I could make a damn good argument that the Uncaused-cause is the same as God, but not by pure deduction. For that, I am missing way to many pieces. >>>[/quote]Your assignment for tonight is to ask God with an honest, open heart and mind to show you just how soundly you made my point with this statement right here. You will not see it otherwise. [quote]pat wrote:If I had all the pieces? Maybe, or somebody could, not necessarily me. >>>[/quote]Who?[quote]pat wrote:Bottom line God is not only revealed through divine scripture, he is revealed in creation itself and reason itself. >>>[/quote]Look Chris. LOOOOOK!!! AGAIN!!! Lemme ask a favor. How bout if you two put your heads together and pretend you’re me trying to convince Pat that you believe this:[quote]The triune God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Peter, Paul, James and John is known by all men in absolutely and comprehensively every last notion and fact of existence, actual and possible, I agree.[/quote] Which I said… TO PAT… yesterday, for the one thousandth time and here he is AGAIN… chiding me for refusing to recognize God’s general revelation in everything that is. Even though I have made the strongest affirmations of exactly that over and over and over again. Would you and Pat be so very kind as to compose for me a statement that will properly convey this conviction? Clearly I am not possessed of sufficient command of the language to do so myself.
[/quote]
Write simple. You did say that, but then you said Aristotle was a pagan or something.
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
EXISTENCE AS YOU KNOW IT MUST BE CAUSED. PERIOD. WE CAN SAY NO MORE.[/quote]
Not “WE”, YOU. Don’t speak for me, I’ve done my homework. If you cannot see beyond you’re little two dimensional ‘I only know what exists by my five senses’, that ain’t my problem.
Here’s the problem, I can make a better argument for the ‘Necessary Being’ than you can about yourself. You cannot make a deductive argument for your own existence because you only know it by perception. Not only is it real, it’s more real than you are.
And look who’s shouting now Mr. Angry man…
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
And if we accept your conclusions about causation, then what caused the God you have faith in?
What is more likely? That something sprang forth from nothing? Or that it was always here, in one form or another? The former requires causation. The latter does not. And the latter is certainly beyond human comprehension.
Was God uncaused?[/quote]
By definition, he has to be, if God were caused, he wouldn’t be God. And both scenarios require causation. You need to prove how ‘stuff’ always existed uncaused. It may have always existed, but it never existed for no reason. If you argue that stuff always existed, then you must prove that it came from nowhere and occurred randomly not just in time, in spatial and it’s energy components as well, there is no other way around that problem. You can remove one component but not all. If it is not appropriate to ask ‘where, how and why’ then you must prove by definition why that is so.
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< Write simple. You did say that, but then you said Aristotle was a pagan or something.[/quote]Don’t you play dimwit with with me dear Christopher. Come on. You know exactly what I’m talkin about. Pat is not a moron. I’m not saying that at all. What I’m saying is that my clear unequivocal statements do not travel from my brain to his intact. Even forgetting about the reason for now. You can’t possibly deny that.
To revisit my illustration once more.
I say---- Canada is north of the US.
He says to somebody else---- If I believed that Canada was in Mexico I’d be messed up too. (conceptual paraphrase) As if I’d said that Canada is in Mexico and had never said, even though it’s 2 inches away from his own post, that Canada was north of the US.
I say TO PAT, with Paul in Romans 1 that God is revealed in everything. (which is not the same as saying that He IS everything, let’s keep that straight)
Pat responds by pitying me for keeping God locked up in the bible.
That’s like far out.
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
Logic fail:
We don’t yet understand how the universe behaves. We do not even understand time fully. We do not know if there is one or many universes. Our perception based on our experience in the universe is extremely limited. We know what “infinity” is, but we cannot experience it and our mind really has no reference for it.
In fact, many advanced TP math ends up with answers like “infinity” unless we play math tricks and modify the math. What we “see” and experience breaks down on the quantum level. We cannot even perceive or experience the way the universe acts.
Now, based on the illusion of that experience, we can make deductive and logical arguments that are irrefutable. And we’re going to make those arguments from the very limited perspective outlined above - with every single argument inextricably tied to our language and perception.
Yeah. Right.
If you cannot start with an absolute truth, you cannot make deductive or even logical arguments. You’re arguing the illusion of truth. Much the same way light gives objects color, what we “see” and “experience” - and therefore the entirety of our experience is an illusion. We know we experience what we believe to be causation. But there is no evidence that the universe was “caused”.
You’re being cute with the big bang. What happened prior to that? And prior to that? I asked you once is there an unbroken chain of causes going back to “infinity”? That would be “eternal” with no cause. You gave a one word answer instead of an answer.
You are stuck in the paradigm of our existence…you’re like the flatlander arguing incessantly that there is only 1 dimension and it must be so because he only perceives one dimension. He can make lovely deductive arguments supporting his position by the way. Meanwhile, we stand outside his dimension, shaking our heads, yet trapped in the same paradigm. [/quote]
BTW, the logical fallacy in which you are mired in has a name:
argumentum ad ignorantiam
Look it up. You are also asserting things I did not say, or even allude to. That’s call projection, just because you don’t know things doesn’t mean I don’t. Just because you refuse to see outside you little tiny box doesn’t mean that I haven’t.[/quote]
LOL with the labels again. Giving it a label is only impressive to the ignorant.
Anyway, you’re the one ranting and raving and stuck in a box. You have incomplete and imperfect information (the laws of the universe) and you think you can make logical deductive arguments from incomplete and imperfect information. Who is in the box?[/quote]
You are. You are trying to tell me I am wrong because of perception about something you don’t even know about. The ‘label’ is your argument. It’s a fallacy which if you knew anything at all about logic, invalidates it completely.[/quote]
Right. Because starting with an unknown and making “logical deductions” from it are valid. So, you know all the laws of the universe? You have discovered the unified theory of everything? Do tell sir. Do tell.
And, I didn’t tell you that you’re wrong. I told you I disagree with you. I read your references. I still disagree with you. And there is plenty of dissent to your references. They are not facts. [/quote]
You don’t start with an unknown, you start with a known and from there you go into the unknown, that’s how it’s typically done. That’s how your favorite theorhetical theories of the unknown came in to being. The difference is that they are trying to drawn empirical conclusions off of a deductive model. This argument is making a deductive conclusions from a deductive argument directly. I already explained to forlife that you do not have to know everything for a conclusion to be true. This is a deductive, not inferred argument. It’s the purity of the deduction, that takes perception out of it. Very much like an algebraic expression. If you take this for instance: 2x - 4y = 9 , you do not have to know what ‘x’ and ‘y’ are for this problem to deductively determine that it equals 9. Further, no matter the realm, dimension, in or out of a universe it’s still true. It does not rely on laws of physics, laws of conservation, quantum laws, etc. to be true. It exists beyond that stuff, as does the cosmological argument.
As I stated before but will elaborate more, you perceive you exist, but you cannot make a deductive argument proving it. While a deductive argument exists perception be damned. Logic exists to see beyond our senses. If it didn’t it would have little point other than to determine things we already know, or think we know.
I don’t have problem being disagreed with. I have a problem being told I am wrong with out cause or logic to back it up. I have a problem being told what I do and do not know.
Speak for yourself, make sound arguments, there is no problem.
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
Your logic has failed flatlander. [/quote]
Ok, smarty pants, explain to me how the mathematical equation ‘2+2=4’ would not be true in another universe, especially since it does not exist physically? This ought to be good.[/quote]
2 + 2 is 4 because we can perceive the numbers. They are squarely within our perception and experience.
The physics of the universe are NOT within your perception or experience. Period. You do not know by what laws the universe operates. You experience TIME, the universe may not. In fact, the human mind is ill-equipped to even imagine “eternal” or “infinity” because or our time trap and experience. Infinity to a human is no more than a mathematical principle.
You’re stuck on “causation”. Causation is inextricably linked to “time”. You are trapped in time. The universe may not be. Your viewpoint is classic anthropocentrism. You think because humans experience time, then everything experiences time. You cannot imagine a universe without it.
What if matter in one form or another always existed, but simply is always going somewhere, and always changing and the big bang you theorize started all this is just one manifestation of existing energy on it’s way somewhere, changing. If there is no beginning, and no end, there is no “time”. YOU measure time because you experience it in this lifetime - but you are no more than stardust, matter on it’s way somewhere, and soon to become something else.
When we fully understand “time”, and we do not, then you can tell me all about causation. But right now, the only causation you can tell me about is based upon your experiences here on earth with newtonian physics and your wristwatch.
Your question above is invalid.[/quote]
Causation is not linked to time. If you read the links you said you did, you would have already known that. Causation is true in or out of time. Time is really more a function of causal relationships anyway. It’s a function of what matter and energy do. How can something that makes time be bound by it?
Causes only have to necessitate their effects, not precede them.
And to go to the very fist line you wrote. Numbers are a function of ‘perception’, really? What is a number? Not what a number represents, or the symbol we use to express it, what is ‘it’? When you’ve figured that out then explain how it’s only a function of perception. The entirety of math depends on it.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:<<< Could I make arguments about God, Jesus, God incarnate through Aristotelian deduction? No. I can make pretty decent correlations and inferences, but not deduction. I could make a damn good argument that the Uncaused-cause is the same as God, but not by pure deduction. For that, I am missing way to many pieces. >>>[/quote]Your assignment for tonight is to ask God with an honest, open heart and mind to show you just how soundly you made my point with this statement right here. You will not see it otherwise.
[/quote]
What point is that? I am afraid your not being very clear. Perhaps if you deflower your language and speak plainly, I can make out what your saying. I guess I am just slow.
Yesterday you said that it is idolatry and an abomination to know God the way Aristotle did, which is by logic, which is all he had. Now your saying he exists in everything?
So I am confused by your stance, If God exists in everything that is, is it bad to know him in that way? Why? Or is that not what you are saying? I just need clarification.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< Write simple. You did say that, but then you said Aristotle was a pagan or something.[/quote]Don’t you play dimwit with with me dear Christopher. Come on. You know exactly what I’m talkin about. Pat is not a moron. I’m not saying that at all. What I’m saying is that my clear unequivocal statements do not travel from my brain to his intact. Even forgetting about the reason for now. You can’t possibly deny that.
To revisit my illustration once more.
I say---- Canada is north of the US.
He says to somebody else---- If I believed that Canada was in Mexico I’d be messed up too. (conceptual paraphrase) As if I’d said that Canada is in Mexico and had never said, even though it’s 2 inches away from his own post, that Canada was north of the US.
I say TO PAT, with Paul in Romans 1 that God is revealed in everything. (which is not the same as saying that He IS everything, let’s keep that straight)
Pat responds by pitying me for keeping God locked up in the bible.
That’s like far out.
[/quote]
I did not say he ‘is’ everything, though I am open to that possibility. I have heard arguments for both sides of that, but not very many and I don’t take a stand on that at the moment. Revealed, absolutely, at least.
Again, I think I am just confused on what you are trying to say, speak slow and use small words, limit your vocab to 5000 words and see if you can get it through my thick skull…
I just don’t see how you can say that Aristotle’s metaphysics are both right on, and an abomination and idolatry. And he wasn’t ‘right on’ but he was really, really close. And how he did it, in the world he lived in with a boob for a teacher like Plato, it’s a miracle really.
[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Don’t you play dimwit with with me dear Christopher. Come on. You know exactly what I’m talkin about.
unequivocal
[/quote]
I play one if I want, sometimes I have to pull out the dictionary just to figure out what you’re saying. There is irony in the above word.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
Pat,
Hume distinctly argued that the causality premise of the cosmological argument is inductive. Again:
You keep saying existence must be caused, without proving it. You can only induce that premise based on what we currently know about existence.
Furthermore, even if you limit your logic to induction, the laws of conservation are very clear that existence is not and never was caused. You’re confusing interaction with existence. Our best induction based on current evidence is that nothing was created, since ex nihilo violates the laws of conservation. And you can’t deduce anything because you don’t have enough context and understanding of the universe to remotely justify doing so.[/quote]
The laws of conservation do not speak to causality at all. They state the behavior of matter and energy, nothing more.
I am not confusing interaction with existence. That which exists interacts. The argument is deductive because it requires it’s premises and it requires it’s conclusion. This necessary requirement makes it deductive not inductive. Where Hume was right, that we cannot recognize what the actual cause and it’s resultant effect is. Now looking at causation more closely what we see is that all the causation is, is a modification, in event form. Why? because of what something is.
Now Leibniz postulated the ‘Principle of Sufficient Reason’ which states, if it exists, it exists for a reason. With it he was able to posit ‘relationalism with respect to space and time’, sound familiar? Keep in mind we’re talking about the 17th century here. He also theorized ‘monads’. Indivisible elementary particles that occupy every little bit of apparent space in the universe.
The criticism of Leibniz is that his principles applies to truths rather than objects. That’s just dandy for me, because that’s what I am after.
Anyhow, if it exists it exists for a reason and must have an explanation unless it can be reasonably argued the question does not apply. Matter and energy do not fit this criteria. They have necessary properties that if they were absent, the would not be what they are, they are governed by ‘laws’, in other words the properties they contain do not allow them to behave any different or be any different than they are. Therefore they cannot cause and yet be uncaused, they do not sit outside the causal chain.[/quote]
That’s incorrect. The laws of conservation clearly state that matter and energy CANNOT BE CREATED. They are about creation, not interaction.
You can’t prove that everything that exists interacts. It’s entirely possible that something could exist in a vacuum, without interacting with anything else. More importantly, your point is a straw man. Even if everything that exists interacts, that says nothing whatsoever about whether its existence was caused or uncaused. You’re using Newtonian physics, which apply to interactions, to draw unsubstantiated conclusions about existence itself, which Newtonian physics don’t address.
I know you see It as a deductive argument, but I agree with Hume that it is necessarily inductive. The causality premise is entirely induced from what we can observe in our tiny corner of the universe, and as such it is unjustified, particularly when applied to existence rather than interaction.
Your last sentence is an example of the confusion between existence and interaction. They can cause interactions, while being uncaused in their existence itself. The two are not the same.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
And if we accept your conclusions about causation, then what caused the God you have faith in?
What is more likely? That something sprang forth from nothing? Or that it was always here, in one form or another? The former requires causation. The latter does not. And the latter is certainly beyond human comprehension.
Was God uncaused?[/quote]
By definition, he has to be, if God were caused, he wouldn’t be God. And both scenarios require causation. You need to prove how ‘stuff’ always existed uncaused. It may have always existed, but it never existed for no reason. If you argue that stuff always existed, then you must prove that it came from nowhere and occurred randomly not just in time, in spatial and it’s energy components as well, there is no other way around that problem. You can remove one component but not all. If it is not appropriate to ask ‘where, how and why’ then you must prove by definition why that is so.[/quote]
This is where you keep getting confused. You don’t have to prove stuff came from nowhere and occurred randomly if it was uncaused. Something that is uncaused didn’t come from anywhere and didn’t occur randomly.
You implicitly accept that a god could be uncaused, but refuse to acknowledge that stuff could be uncaused. I don’t understand why that is.
[quote]forlife wrote:
This is where you keep getting confused. You don’t have to prove stuff came from nowhere and occurred randomly if it was uncaused. Something that is uncaused didn’t come from anywhere and didn’t occur randomly.
[/quote] Absolutely you do. You cannot just say it and ‘WHAMO!’ it’s true. That flat doesn’t work. If you want me to take your word for you, then you must grant me the same courtesy and not request proof.
Where did matter and energy come from? How did it get ‘there’? Why does it exist?
What you cannot say is that it just is and that’s it. Which is what you just said which is a MASSIVE logical fallacy of Circular Reasoning which is a big fat no-no. It doesn’t tell you anything about anything. Is cause it is, just ain’t.
If it is uncaused explain how, outside of time. Removing time doesn’t remove contingency, dependency and reason. If it is by definition, then explain how as well, or instead. How can something that is governed by laws, depends on charge, spin and dimension to exist have no other reason to exist, but to exist and do stuff, not on it’t own, but because of other forces.
The beauty of cosmology is it doesn’t necessarily rely on matter and energy to exist.
[quote]
You implicitly accept that a god could be uncaused, but refuse to acknowledge that stuff could be uncaused. I don’t understand why that is.[/quote]
I don’t implicitly accept anything, it’s simply a deductive necessity. And no I do not accept other things to be uncaused because it’s logically not possible for there to be more than one.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
This is where you keep getting confused. You don’t have to prove stuff came from nowhere and occurred randomly if it was uncaused. Something that is uncaused didn’t come from anywhere and didn’t occur randomly.
[/quote] Absolutely you do. You cannot just say it and ‘WHAMO!’ it’s true. That flat doesn’t work. If you want me to take your word for you, then you must grant me the same courtesy and not request proof.
Where did matter and energy come from? How did it get ‘there’? Why does it exist?
What you cannot say is that it just is and that’s it. Which is what you just said which is a MASSIVE logical fallacy of Circular Reasoning which is a big fat no-no. It doesn’t tell you anything about anything. Is cause it is, just ain’t.
If it is uncaused explain how, outside of time. Removing time doesn’t remove contingency, dependency and reason. If it is by definition, then explain how as well, or instead. How can something that is governed by laws, depends on charge, spin and dimension to exist have no other reason to exist, but to exist and do stuff, not on it’t own, but because of other forces.
The beauty of cosmology is it doesn’t necessarily rely on matter and energy to exist.
[quote]
You implicitly accept that a god could be uncaused, but refuse to acknowledge that stuff could be uncaused. I don’t understand why that is.[/quote]
I don’t implicitly accept anything, it’s simply a deductive necessity. And no I do not accept other things to be uncaused because it’s logically not possible for there to be more than one.[/quote]
Why do you keep asking where matter and energy came from and how it got there, when you know I’m not arguing any such thing? I’m suggesting that matter and energy is uncaused, regarding its existence. It can still interact causally, but be uncaused in its existence.
The laws governing matter and energy are also uncaused.
If you can define an uncaused god, I can similarly define uncaused matter and energy with uncaused laws describing how they behave. Your “proof” is no more compelling than mine. Since you are the one claiming energy and matter cannot be uncaused, the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate why. And the laws of thermodynamics directly contradict your contention, since they clearly state matter and energy can’t be created. If they can’t be created, their existence cannot be caused, period.
[quote]forlife wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
This is where you keep getting confused. You don’t have to prove stuff came from nowhere and occurred randomly if it was uncaused. Something that is uncaused didn’t come from anywhere and didn’t occur randomly.
[/quote] Absolutely you do. You cannot just say it and ‘WHAMO!’ it’s true. That flat doesn’t work. If you want me to take your word for you, then you must grant me the same courtesy and not request proof.
Where did matter and energy come from? How did it get ‘there’? Why does it exist?
What you cannot say is that it just is and that’s it. Which is what you just said which is a MASSIVE logical fallacy of Circular Reasoning which is a big fat no-no. It doesn’t tell you anything about anything. Is cause it is, just ain’t.
If it is uncaused explain how, outside of time. Removing time doesn’t remove contingency, dependency and reason. If it is by definition, then explain how as well, or instead. How can something that is governed by laws, depends on charge, spin and dimension to exist have no other reason to exist, but to exist and do stuff, not on it’t own, but because of other forces.
The beauty of cosmology is it doesn’t necessarily rely on matter and energy to exist.
Incorrect. They are not uncaused. Not know how they got there is not the same as being causeless. We already know that the elementary particles consist of charge, spin, energy and weight. And if string theory is right, one dimensional energy strings. If you take away any of those things, you no longer have any sort of elementary particle, it depends on all of it to exist. Huge problem with asserting it as uncaused when it is caused by energy, charge, spin and weight, at least. Therefore, elementary particles are not uncaused, but caused by a varaiety of things that if any were missing, you could still have those ‘things’ and no elementary particles, so there goes that theory. On the regression goes.
The laws of they abide by are defined by what they are. The laws don’t physically exist, but matter and energy abide by them stringently.
I cannot define God, I can only know certain things about him. He must by necessity be uncaused and sit outside the causal chain. He must have at least caused once, and this indicates something of a will. But that’s it, the only thing that you could remove and change what ‘it’ is is causation. But it would only cease to be a causer, not cease existing, we just wouldn’t be around to know or care.
You do not understand burden of proof. I submitted the argument, my stance and have defended it. You are stuck in a circular reasoning spin. Matter and energy have always existed, because they have always existed, they have no cause. Why? because they have always existed. How, because they are. ← No, this is hopelessly circular. The burden lies on your to present your argument with with out being errorred, with out affirming the consequent.
Since matter doesn’t exist with out causes, lets move to energy. What is energy? Specifically at this quantum level where you say uncaused-causation is occurring.
Pat, you’re confusing descriptive attributes with the thing itself. Matter and energy are the same stuff, expressed in different ways. If you create light and heat by burning wood, are you really creating energy? No. You’re transforming matter into energy.
You can’t hang your logical hat on the idea that elemental particles can only remain as such in order to be uncaused. The essential argument is that the stuff we call matter/energy is uncaused. Light and heat don’t have charge or spin, but they are the same stuff expressed in a different form.
You have yet to provide any compelling logic or evidence to disprove the laws of conservation, which state that MATTER/ENERGY CANNOT BE CREATED.
Please address this point. If it can’t be created, how can it’s existence be caused? It’s impossible, and the only logical conclusion is that it’s existence is uncaused. That’s not circular reasoning, it is a direct expression of scientific facts.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
Logic fail:
We don’t yet understand how the universe behaves. We do not even understand time fully. We do not know if there is one or many universes. Our perception based on our experience in the universe is extremely limited. We know what “infinity” is, but we cannot experience it and our mind really has no reference for it.
In fact, many advanced TP math ends up with answers like “infinity” unless we play math tricks and modify the math. What we “see” and experience breaks down on the quantum level. We cannot even perceive or experience the way the universe acts.
Now, based on the illusion of that experience, we can make deductive and logical arguments that are irrefutable. And we’re going to make those arguments from the very limited perspective outlined above - with every single argument inextricably tied to our language and perception.
Yeah. Right.
If you cannot start with an absolute truth, you cannot make deductive or even logical arguments. You’re arguing the illusion of truth. Much the same way light gives objects color, what we “see” and “experience” - and therefore the entirety of our experience is an illusion. We know we experience what we believe to be causation. But there is no evidence that the universe was “caused”.
You’re being cute with the big bang. What happened prior to that? And prior to that? I asked you once is there an unbroken chain of causes going back to “infinity”? That would be “eternal” with no cause. You gave a one word answer instead of an answer.
You are stuck in the paradigm of our existence…you’re like the flatlander arguing incessantly that there is only 1 dimension and it must be so because he only perceives one dimension. He can make lovely deductive arguments supporting his position by the way. Meanwhile, we stand outside his dimension, shaking our heads, yet trapped in the same paradigm. [/quote]
BTW, the logical fallacy in which you are mired in has a name:
argumentum ad ignorantiam
Look it up. You are also asserting things I did not say, or even allude to. That’s call projection, just because you don’t know things doesn’t mean I don’t. Just because you refuse to see outside you little tiny box doesn’t mean that I haven’t.[/quote]
LOL with the labels again. Giving it a label is only impressive to the ignorant.
Anyway, you’re the one ranting and raving and stuck in a box. You have incomplete and imperfect information (the laws of the universe) and you think you can make logical deductive arguments from incomplete and imperfect information. Who is in the box?[/quote]
You are. You are trying to tell me I am wrong because of perception about something you don’t even know about. The ‘label’ is your argument. It’s a fallacy which if you knew anything at all about logic, invalidates it completely.[/quote]
Right. Because starting with an unknown and making “logical deductions” from it are valid. So, you know all the laws of the universe? You have discovered the unified theory of everything? Do tell sir. Do tell.
And, I didn’t tell you that you’re wrong. I told you I disagree with you. I read your references. I still disagree with you. And there is plenty of dissent to your references. They are not facts. [/quote]
You don’t start with an unknown, you start with a known and from there you go into the unknown, that’s how it’s typically done. That’s how your favorite theorhetical theories of the unknown came in to being. The difference is that they are trying to drawn empirical conclusions off of a deductive model. This argument is making a deductive conclusions from a deductive argument directly. I already explained to forlife that you do not have to know everything for a conclusion to be true. This is a deductive, not inferred argument. It’s the purity of the deduction, that takes perception out of it. Very much like an algebraic expression. If you take this for instance: 2x - 4y = 9 , you do not have to know what ‘x’ and ‘y’ are for this problem to deductively determine that it equals 9. Further, no matter the realm, dimension, in or out of a universe it’s still true. It does not rely on laws of physics, laws of conservation, quantum laws, etc. to be true. It exists beyond that stuff, as does the cosmological argument.
As I stated before but will elaborate more, you perceive you exist, but you cannot make a deductive argument proving it. While a deductive argument exists perception be damned. Logic exists to see beyond our senses. If it didn’t it would have little point other than to determine things we already know, or think we know.
I don’t have problem being disagreed with. I have a problem being told I am wrong with out cause or logic to back it up. I have a problem being told what I do and do not know.
Speak for yourself, make sound arguments, there is no problem. [/quote]
You say it doesn’t start with an unknown. Simple question:
State the “known” you are starting from when you parrot the claims that you do.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
Your logic has failed flatlander. [/quote]
Ok, smarty pants, explain to me how the mathematical equation ‘2+2=4’ would not be true in another universe, especially since it does not exist physically? This ought to be good.[/quote]
2 + 2 is 4 because we can perceive the numbers. They are squarely within our perception and experience.
The physics of the universe are NOT within your perception or experience. Period. You do not know by what laws the universe operates. You experience TIME, the universe may not. In fact, the human mind is ill-equipped to even imagine “eternal” or “infinity” because or our time trap and experience. Infinity to a human is no more than a mathematical principle.
You’re stuck on “causation”. Causation is inextricably linked to “time”. You are trapped in time. The universe may not be. Your viewpoint is classic anthropocentrism. You think because humans experience time, then everything experiences time. You cannot imagine a universe without it.
What if matter in one form or another always existed, but simply is always going somewhere, and always changing and the big bang you theorize started all this is just one manifestation of existing energy on it’s way somewhere, changing. If there is no beginning, and no end, there is no “time”. YOU measure time because you experience it in this lifetime - but you are no more than stardust, matter on it’s way somewhere, and soon to become something else.
When we fully understand “time”, and we do not, then you can tell me all about causation. But right now, the only causation you can tell me about is based upon your experiences here on earth with newtonian physics and your wristwatch.
Your question above is invalid.[/quote]
Causation is not linked to time. If you read the links you said you did, you would have already known that. Causation is true in or out of time. Time is really more a function of causal relationships anyway. It’s a function of what matter and energy do. How can something that makes time be bound by it?
Causes only have to necessitate their effects, not precede them.
And to go to the very fist line you wrote. Numbers are a function of ‘perception’, really? What is a number? Not what a number represents, or the symbol we use to express it, what is ‘it’? When you’ve figured that out then explain how it’s only a function of perception. The entirety of math depends on it.[/quote]
You say “in or out of time”. I disagree. You cannot fathom “out of time”. None of us can. Perhaps math can address it, but you cannot imagine it to any reasonable degree. Causation IS linked to our perception of time. I kick a ball, and the ball moves - one follows the other on a time line to create the perception of “causation”. Causation breaks down on the quantum level. We do not yet understand “time”. You’re repeating theories to me, not facts sir.
If the universe is eternal, and time does not exist (only exists for us in our perception of our lives and experiences), there is no first cause. There is merely existing matter, moving and changing - forever.
Forlife, you have at it with him. I lost interest. He’s not thinking outside his own box. EVERY argument he makes relies upon his perception of man’s existence in the universe. EVERY SINGLE UTTERANCE.
I’ll return when you can get him to apply his “logical” process to religion. I want to be part of that. Until then, I have lost interest. Good day gents.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:
EXISTENCE AS YOU KNOW IT MUST BE CAUSED. PERIOD. WE CAN SAY NO MORE.[/quote]
Not “WE”, YOU. Don’t speak for me, I’ve done my homework. If you cannot see beyond you’re little two dimensional ‘I only know what exists by my five senses’, that ain’t my problem.
Here’s the problem, I can make a better argument for the ‘Necessary Being’ than you can about yourself. You cannot make a deductive argument for your own existence because you only know it by perception. Not only is it real, it’s more real than you are.
And look who’s shouting now Mr. Angry man…[/quote]
This is ironic. You’re stuck in newtownian physics and you’re claiming that I am stuck in my 5 senses - which is exactly how I feel about your arguments.