Faith Required in Both Creation and Evolution.

[Aslan]

Is it not true that belief in either creation or evolution envolves using faith?

Creationists have faith in the existance of an eternal all powerful God.

Evolutionist have faith in the existance of eternal matter.

[QED]

If your credo cannot be tested for and cannot be falsified, then it is a religious creed.

That should do the trick. Why do we waste so many words when a few well-chosen ones like this can say it all?

[Aslan]

I go back to my original question. Does it not stand that you either believe in, and, because you can't prove it beyond a doubt, have faith in eternal "matter" be it pure energy, particles, etc., or you must believe in, and have faith in, an eternal being that created the "matter" that makes up our reality? Yeah or neah!

[Goat]

I go back to my original question. Does it not stand that you either believe in, and, because you can't prove it beyond a doubt, have faith in eternal "matter" be it pure energy, particles, etc., or you must believe in, and have faith in, an eternal being that created the "matter" that makes up our reality? Yeah or neah!

No, you are giving the logical fallacy of the false dicotomy. There are more choices than that.

[Aslan]

I go back to my original question. Does it not stand that you either believe in, and, because you can't prove it beyond a doubt, have faith in eternal "matter" be it pure energy, particles, etc., or you must believe in, and have faith in, an eternal being that created the "matter" that makes up our reality? Yeah or neah!

No, you are giving the logical fallacy of the false dicotomy. There are more choices than that.

Please tell me what they are, I wouldn't mind gaining another "wrinkle in the brain" today.

[micatala]

I go back to my original question. Does it not stand that you either believe in, and, because you can't prove it beyond a doubt, have faith in eternal "matter" be it pure energy, particles, etc., or you must believe in, and have faith in, an eternal being that created the "matter" that makes up our reality? Yeah or neah!

No, you are giving the logical fallacy of the false dicotomy. There are more choices than that.

Please tell me what they are, I wouldn't mind gaining another "wrinkle in the brain" today.

One might believe in an eternal God who had nothing to do with the creation of matter. In this case, one might believe that matter has existed for eternity, or that it has existed only for a finite amount of time, or one might believe neither of these (agnosticism).

One might believe in an eternal God who has coexisted with matter for an eternity.

One might believe that there is no God, but that matter has only existed for a finite amount of time.

[Aslan]

Interesting!

One might believe in an eternal God who had nothing to do with the creation of matter. In this case, one might believe that matter has existed for eternity, or that it has existed only for a finite amount of time.

So for this track of thinking the person would believe in a God that has nothing to do with creation?

If so then it where would that person get any proof of that God?

One might believe that there is no God, but that matter has only existed for a finite amount of time.

So in essence this person would believe that matter came out of nothing...ex-nihilo...and without anything giving it cause?

One might believe in an eternal God who has coexisted with matter for an eternity.

This belief does not in any way fly in the face of the Bible....I have never thought of it, but Christianity could still be true using this line of thought.

[Goat]

Interesting!

One might believe in an eternal God who had nothing to do with the creation of matter. In this case, one might believe that matter has existed for eternity, or that it has existed only for a finite amount of time.

So for this track of thinking the person would believe in a God that has nothing to do with creation?

If so then it where would that person get any proof of that God?

One might believe that there is no God, but that matter has only existed for a finite amount of time.

So in essence this person would believe that matter came out of nothing...ex-nihilo...and without anything giving it cause?

One might believe in an eternal God who has coexisted with matter for an eternity.

This belief does not in any way fly in the face of the Bible....I have never thought of it, but Christianity could still be true using this line of thought.

If you read Genesis again, you will see that God created the heavens and the earth by having his spirit go over the waters.

The waters were there already.

[QED]

Einstein felt that matter would turn out to be kinks in something more fundamental -- like geometry. Superstring and M-theory come quite close to this too. If there is a connection between logic and the material, then why should it not be eternal? I find it difficult to conceive of the fundamentals of logic not being eternal. That's not to say that the material will always take on the same forms, i.e. there will be creation-like events, but the appearance of all this to us could be highly illusory. What does size, mass and time really mean? Sure they can all hurt us! But that's because we're playing to those particular rules. An entire world might be expressed in a computer game but the entire thing might flatten into the pits and grooves on a DVD.

I too find it difficult to conceive the fundamentals of logic being only something that we humans have come up with. I believe that there is a source for that logic, and that that source is eternal. It is part of a fingerprint left on us by Him. Surely that logic is timeless.

The theologian identifies the creation of the physical world around him directly with his own capacity for creation as a sentient agency with hands driven by a mind. This means that a super-advanced Alien physicist forming our universe in a lab experiment would be mistaken for God.

I also agree that when you look at size, mass, and time that they seem somehow....oh how to put it...conditional...not permanant...or at least that there could be a reality with out them. I believe that this is because they are created things. I believe that there can be a life outside of time, and in fact that there will be.

This is the big problem I see with all the fervent religious scurrying around that goes on throughout the entire planet: I agree with you and your hunch but I can interpret it in an entirely different way. We have learnt many a lesson about drawing the wrong conclusions from the various horizons we've been presented with in the past. Rather than assume that the "world ends where it appears to do so" I think we ought to draw on our experience and always make the opposite assumption in the absence of any other information. As soon as we assume that the inception of our universe happened within some greater state-space then I think we are taking the more responsible ontological line.

However, admitting this meta-universe has dire consequences for theologians because it decouples us from all the cherished notions about benevolence and purpose. Our universe becomes contingent on many potentially random factors that none of our measurements could tell apart from a deliberate contrivance.

It seems that when it comes down to it, that we both believe in the same fundamentals. The only difference is that I belive that those fundamentals are an extension of an eternal and loving God.

That's right. Frankly I'm at a loss to trace this fine thread of love that you talk of all the way back to the cause of our universe. It seems to me to be only an imaginary line connecting a few random dots in peoples minds.

[Aslan]

This is the big problem I see with all the fervent religious scurrying around that goes on throughout the entire planet: I agree with you and your hunch but I can interpret it in an entirely different way. We have learnt many a lesson about drawing the wrong conclusions from the various horizons we've been presented with in the past. Rather than assume that the "world ends where it appears to do so" I think we ought to draw on our experience and always make the opposite assumption in the absence of any other information. As soon as we assume that the inception of our universe happened within some greater state-space then I think we are taking the more responsible ontological line.

Oh I do believe that we have merely scratch the outer layer of the surface of what is the "ends"...or answers to our universe. I definately see that our universe happened withing some greater state-space...there must be such a state. That state is where the Trinity is...or perhaps what the Trinity is.

However, admitting this meta-universe has dire consequences for theologians because it decouples us from all the cherished notions about benevolence and purpose. Our universe becomes contingent on many potentially random factors that none of our measurements could tell apart from a deliberate contrivance.

First off I should say that it does not have dire consequences for the very reasons I state above. Second of all if the universe is completely random...no order what so ever, how should we have found that it has no order? It is like if a human was born into darkness and remained there for the duration of his/her life that person would never know that it had been in darkness. It would not be until that person had taken a glimpse of light that the realization of darkness would come into being.

[QED]

This is the big problem I see with all the fervent religious scurrying around that goes on throughout the entire planet: I agree with you and your hunch but I can interpret it in an entirely different way. We have learnt many a lesson about drawing the wrong conclusions from the various horizons we've been presented with in the past. Rather than assume that the "world ends where it appears to do so" I think we ought to draw on our experience and always make the opposite assumption in the absence of any other information. As soon as we assume that the inception of our universe happened within some greater state-space then I think we are taking the more responsible ontological line.

Oh I do believe that we have merely scratch the outer layer of the surface of what is the "ends"...or answers to our universe. I definately see that our universe happened withing some greater state-space...there must be such a state. That state is where the Trinity is...or perhaps what the Trinity is.

Yes, of course it could be the Trinity out there -- but that's not all it could be! To you the Holy Trinity is an attractive explanation, one that was first revealed to man in an age of mythology. But today many Mathematicians, Physicists and Cosmologists (not to mention Philosophers ) have found solutions to the fundamental equations (mostly derived by Einstein) which extend the plasticity of space time into configurations which can best be thought of as a multiplicity of Universes. This renders the word "Universe" inadequate for its intended purpose, but that's just too bad for language.

However, admitting this meta-universe has dire consequences for theologians because it decouples us from all the cherished notions about benevolence and purpose. Our universe becomes contingent on many potentially random factors that none of our measurements could tell apart from a deliberate contrivance.

First off I should say that it does not have dire consequences for the very reasons I state above.

The reason being that it's consistent with the idea of the Holy Trinity? That it most certainly is. But the dire consequence is that consistency means little if there are many other consistent explanations for us to consider!

Second of all if the universe is completely random...no order what so ever, how should we have found that it has no order?

Who said that there was no order in the Universe? Let's say that there are just six "magic" numbers that define our Universe. The greater state-space that gave rise to our universe could be spitting out random values for each of these six parameters. The majority of these universes may well be duds but one combination could lead to the formation of our particular Universe with its apparently finely-tuned parameters and remain stable long enough for us to emerge and ponder it all.

Just in case you're unaware of the picture Cosmologists currently have of this, there are numerous ways in which new Universes could bud off from existing ones. It's easiest to imagine a foamy structure where every bubble is a Universe. The most accessible way of seeing how this sort of structure could come about might be to think of massive black holes creating new inflationary universes expanding in their own private set of dimensions (it is sometimes said that observers looking back from within this Universe would see their origin as a "white hole"). It's not the only mechanism, but I think it gives a good mental image of the sort of thing that has to be considered.

The point that I've been trying to make here is that we could very easily confuse the natural providence of this sort of Cosmic process with the deliberate efforts of some supernatural creator. Appearances of design are simply not enough to draw conclusions about the nature of the designer.