Depending on God: the argument from contingency
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- Опубліковано 7 лют 2025
- Weekly Meeting 4/4/2024
The fact that there is something rather than nothing poses an interesting challenge to
any worldview, but Theism is able to give a compelling answer.
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Very nice
2+2=4 is not necessary according to the given definition. in fact no example of a necessary entity was given, the closest you got was the equivocation in defining the universe as "whatever could have failed to exist"
Math is real 😎
that's debatable and, fortunately, irrelevant. 2+2=4 is definitionally contingent on 1+1=2, 3+1=4 and associativity of the R field
I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this, but I find myself unconvinced.
One fundamental part of the argument is simply not compelling and fallacious in my eyes. And that is the idea that the universe (which I'll define here as the whole of spacetime) is contingent or needs an external cause.
This is for two reasons:
1. It seems like a composition fallacy. Everything within the universe appears to have a cause (aside from quantum particles, but for the sake of the argument I'm willing to cede that they have a cause that is yet unknown). It does not follow necessarily that the universe itself has a cause. A wall made of hundreds of bricks that are 5"x3"x2" each does not yield a wall with those same dimensions. Same with water molecules. Each molecule on its own is not wet, but when you gather enough of them you gain the property of wetness. I know you didn't specifically lay out the ontological argument, but you came close and this is my usual objection to it.
2. Cause and effect are inherently temporal in nature. An effect can only be caused by something that preceded it in time. The universe is all of space AND time. It's logically incoherent to say that time itself has a cause. Since that would mean that time would need to have a cause that preceded it in time, a thing that does not exist in this scenario.
Personally, I believe that the universe began 14.8ish billion years ago and nothing preceded it because nothing can precede time itself.
And as for the question of "why is there a universe rather than no universe?" I can honestly say I don't know. But I'm also not convinced that nothingness is the default state of reality. Even if there was a god that created the universe, I don't believe that there would simply be nothingness in the absence of said god.
As far as I'm aware, the "default state of reality" is something we have no reliable way of observing at the moment, so I remain agnostic to most, if not all, ideas in that realm.
If I missed a point or there's a flaw in my reasoning, I'd love to hear about it. I want to know as many true things and as few false things as possible.
Cheers!
These are stock objections to the first-cause or “kalam” argument which was not presented here. So, it’s unclear to me which premise(s) you’re objecting to. Can you review the premises at 25:04 and clarify which one(s) you’re targeting?
Ah, thank you. I listened to this in the car and just now saw the premises written out.
I wouldn't object to any of those premises, but I would object to the claim that the universe (spacetime) is dependent. We simply don't know. It could be a brute fact of reality or, in other words, independent.
If you're merely claiming that all dependent things rely on an external independent thing, I don't see the fault in that logic based on how it's defined and laid out.
If that's all there was, then my apologies for the misunderstanding. If the intent was to get closer to demonstrating the existence of an independent entity known as a god, I suppose I'm with you, but only if you define spacetime as "god". Applying Occam's razor, I don't see why an additional entity is necessary.
Maybe I need to go back and listen if I missed it, but I don't recall any argument as to why any type of independent god (a sentient, powerful entity, eg) is more probable or logical than spacetime being independent in itself.
@@Blyron1What do you think of the arguments at the 16 minute mark and the 39 minute mark against the possibility of spacetime being independent?
@whatsinaname691
The construction problem feels like the composition fallacy yet again. The universe consisting of dependent things does not mean that universe itself cannot be independent. And when I say "the universe" I mean spacetime and the whole of matter and energy. All of the dependent things within the universe are dependent on spacetime existing.
One cannot drive an engine, a muffler, or a steering wheel, but when they come together with some other components, the entity as a whole, the car, CAN be driven. So there's no reason, based on construction/composition ALONE, to make the deduction that the universe can't be independent.
That argument has not ruled out the possibility of the singularity being a brute, independent fact of reality and the expansion of our local presentation of the universe following, dependently, from there.
I'm also failing to see how an entity called a "god" could solve this problem (without simply calling spacetime "god").
As for the failures of the priory monists, I'm not a theoretical physicist and I haven't looked into the likelihoods (or even the possibility) of other universes. From what I understand, there is only one universe that we know of and we have no idea if it's even possible for any of its parameters to be different than what they currently are. I don't know if it's possible for the universe to not have existed.
The argument seems to stem from the idea that there were different possible universes that could have happened and/or that the universe could not have existed at all. I'm unconvinced of those ideas and thus unconvinced by the argument.
@@Blyron1 The video cited Einstein’s field equations and the consensus of theoretical physicists that these equations describe physical possibilities. Do you disagree with the way physicists interpret Einstein’s field equations?
On composition, is it not logically incoherent to argue that a composite object created by its constituent parts is independent of its constituent parts? Certainly most philosophers would agree. The priority monist can sidestep this issue by arguing that the whole is prior to the parts, but it seems like that’s conceding that there is no composition fallacy involved