Explain How and Why the Universe Exists

a reply to: contextual

There will always be questions and no matter how advanced our science, we'll never be able to extrapolate past where the evidence no longer exists. I just think the question is unanswerable. Now where science is awesome is giving us a better, closer understanding of the universe we're in and how to successfully function within it.

I see no real advantage to religion that isn't either outweighed by or nullified by the disadvantages.

That does not change that neither can really answer the question. Science is better though because it doesn't pretent to. It might hypothesize, but without proof that's as far as it goes. Meanwhile religion institutions lie to people, and pretends it has answers to influence and gain power and influence over the fearful and gullible.

a reply to: NorEaster

Let me know when you've reached the state of mind that is willing to answer any of my questions to you when responding to my commentary.

Sometimes, a simple yes or no will suffice, saves you some time.

a reply to: andy06shake

The Yuga cycles are very real. Thats what I mean you dont understand what you are reading. This is done on purpose to deny you your true self. Just like money and power. Your spiritual history is kept hidden from you.

I will put a thread up about it soon. If you like I can send you a PM so you can have a read. I will supply evidence and show peeps what they are linked too.

All the best.

a reply to: purplemer

I'm sure your thread will be of interest, anything to do with ancient history is generally up my street.

There are different levels of understanding i suppose.

All the best to you also.

TzarChasm; why Creationism vs Evolution (debatable) ad nauseam? Clearing this up: why not BOTH happened at the same instant?

originally posted by: whereislogic
a reply to: NorEaster

Let me know when you've reached the state of mind that is willing to answer any of my questions to you when responding to my commentary.

Sometimes, a simple yes or no will suffice, saves you some time.

It was obviously a leading question, so I simply moved ahead to answer the inevitable question that your post was leading us both toward; that being the logic validity of any claim of infinite/beginningless physical existence and any claim of that which is inherently eternal possessing an ability to author the physical realm that we inhabit. It wasn't a stretch to fully understand your position after reading your other posts within this one thread, so I cut to the chase and addressed your larger question. In fact, I fully answered that question. A "yes/no" answer would not have answered that question fully, since there are necessary elaborations required when addressing that question.

I spent years examining that very specific question, as it is likely the most important initial question a Natural Philosophy theorist is presented with. And as a result of that work, what I discovered completely upended my own personal view of what can and cannot be actual. To be honest about it, it took quite a while to get past the painful requirement to bury all my favorite gods once they'd been revealed to be no more than cultural abstractions; allegorical constructs that serve as theoretical placeholders in the same manner as our modern secular inventions like The Big Bang and "singularities" serve cosmology's Einsteinian mythological paradigm.

Basically, you tossed me a very loaded question, and I did my best to fully address it. I assumed that you did want to know since you did ask.

a reply to: NorEaster
I just wanted to take this 1 step at a time before addressing the question that was raised in the article I was quoting from.

I still don't know if you agree with the obvious conclusion from the first question I asked to you:

If something or someone was brought into existence, then that would mean it or that person hasn't always existed, right?

That's right, isn't it? But more importantly, or what I was more curious about, and this is not a leading question (the other question or statement was meant to lead in this question):

Is that an obvious logical consequence to you?

So is it or not?

It's a matter of honesty, can you be honest about this? Are you willing to acknowledge the obvious and that it is obvious?

Since that has implications for your motive regarding your standardized and the common question:

'Oh yeah, then who created God?' (as if that's somehow a clever question regarding what one already realizes to be proposed as an eternal God before asking that question*, one doesn't need to be deliberately obtuse about this, one can just admit to themselves that it's a dumb question to ask regarding an eternal God, showing one's unwillingness to even contemplate an eternal God, making that an invalid question if one has thought it through; the answer is already a given when one is willing to consider an eternal God: no one, cause an eternal God cannot have been created, otherwise it wouldn't be eternal. This should be obvious to anyone willing to give it some serious thought rather than come up with a supposedly 'good' challenge that they've heard somewhere and tickled their ears as if it actually was a clever challenge or even relevant to talk about)

*: something that can be gleaned from your commentary now, that you were fully aware of this. Yet, you still ask the dumb question as if you were not and as if it's a valid question regarding an eternal God. The original question from the article is about a Creator btw, because the article talks about creation, engineering and design concepts. It is not about God being eternal, that subject has only come up because some people can't help but ask dumb questions about what they know is proposed as an eternal God. But since apparently some people like to keep asking dumb questions about it, to demonstrate they don't really want to give it any thought, I guess it's going to be hard to get them to admit that it's a dumb question (cause then they can't fall into the same pattern of deliberate obtuseness for cheap effects on those who haven't realized yet how dumb this question is).

Just making sure that everyone is aware that I'm not calling it a dumb question for the effect mentioned below, like Patrick's motive in this scene:

In this case, it really is a stupid question. And I suspect many people who ask it are fully aware of that, but feigning ignorance or obtuseness. So they can continue asking this stupid question for its cheap effects on other people who haven't caught on yet and think of it as a clever challenge or relevant question in response to the evidence for creation and purposeful design.

Just hoping to encourage you to rethink and reformulate your question. In order for you even to be willing to do that, you must first be willing to acknowledge at least to yourself, that it's a dumb question the way it's asked now. And if one continues to ask the same question in the future, it might indicate that one is playing dumb and possibly even deliberately pushing buttons and triggering people who are not aware why this is a dumb question, those who possibly even think it's a clever response to the argument of induction regarding creation and a minimum of 1 creator. Which could lead to possible considerations regarding 1 specific Creator, also known as God (the one in the Bible being proposed as having always existed), if one is willing to go that far in their thinking (path, line of thought, the firgurative road one is on). And some people don't want others to get that far into the subject. They prefer people to stay on the surface asking dumb questions, causing their view of this subject to remain superficial.

The “understanding heart is one that searches for knowledge”; it is not satisfied with a mere superficial view but seeks to get the full picture. (Pr 15:14)

There is someone out there pulling the strings of people to make sure that true understanding regarding this subject (or these subjects) remains elusive for as many people as possible. A good trick to do that is encouraging them to ask dumb questions while making them think they're being clever about it*, or that they have a legitimate challenge about it that first needs to be answered before giving it any more thought. And even though the answer to their dumb question should be obvious to them, they are either unwilling or incapable of noticing the obvious, or acknowledging that it is obvious. After all, if one acknowledges the answer to their question, one can't use it anymore as an excuse not to give the initial matter of evidence for creation and purposeful design some more thought, and trying to think of some actual relevant questions regarding that subject.

*: many famous atheists, agnostics and philosophical naturalists use this trick, and they are using exactly this dumb question about who or what created God (asked regarding an eternal God, but they obviously won't spell that out in the question cause that would show the obvious answer to more people if these people give it any serious thought). Anyone who repeats this question about an eternal God, shows that they have been affected by these “profitless talkers” and “deceivers of the mind”. (Titus 1:10) They have been fooled, tricked by those who would like to ‘delude us with persuasive arguments.’ (Colossians 2:4) They don't want you to think through them. Cause it shows that they have nothing sensible to offer regarding this subject, and who's going to invite a philosopher to a debate or talkshow who's got nothing useful/beneficial to offer regarding a particular subject. Or who will watch their discussions about the subject and buy the books they're selling about it (such as Richard Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker and The God Delusion). Of course, hiding behind their feigned obtuseness still is working well, most people buy their books and philosophical product in spite of them having nothing useful/beneficial to offer. In demonstration of 2 Timothy 4:3,4:

For there will be a period of time when they will not put up with the wholesome* [Or “healthful; beneficial.”] teaching, but according to their own desires, they will surround themselves with teachers to have their ears tickled.* [Or “to tell them what they want to hear.”] 4 They will turn away from listening to the truth and give attention to false stories.

Getting your ears tickled is like having your buttons pushed. In this case, one's desire not to give the possible existence of an eternal Creator some serious thought.

Thank you for your responses - All worth something.


Queston one at the beginning of this thread was:

"Explain How and Why the Universe Exists"



Now for question two we will ask:

"Explain How and Why the Universe might not Exist"



Now if you believe it is not possible for the universe not to exist - Then you have the answer to question one.
But if you believe it is possible for there to be a non-existent state - Please explain what is a non-existent state








“We can speak and think only of what exists. And what exists is uncreated and imperishable for it is whole and unchanging and complete. It was not or nor shall be different since it is now, all at once, one and continuous.”
― Parmenides



“The stars up there at night are closer than you think.” ― Doug Dillon

a reply to: whereislogic

Wow, I clearly touched a nerve here, and I’m sorry that my dogged adherence to logical ramification caused you to become upset. I didn’t intend for that, but I’m not surprised that restricting this exchange to the OP’s thread request, “Explain How and Why the Universe Exists” might’ve caused me to inaccurately presented my own reality view as I defended the fundamental requirement of physical emergence against the intellectual abstraction of infinite/beginning-less physical existence. This happens to me often when engaging with others, although it’s more common for materialists to become incensed with me over my embrace of non-material actors and agencies within discussions concerning physics versus metaphysics and the plausibility of what our culture has labeled paranormal.

I wouldn’t ask that question: “Who created God?” because I’m thoroughly convinced that there is no such being [God] as its been described by theologists or spiritualists; infinitely existent, infinitely powerful, infinitely aware, infinitely cognizant, and responsible for the creation and design of our universe. I can certainly believe that there is a human manifestation that can convince the members of our little species of its inherent superiority [or divinity], but the issue of beginning-less physical existence can never be resolved if simple logic is being used as the conceptual yardstick within that examination. Being eternal, once initially brought into physical existence, is one thing, but the claim of a physically existent something requiring no emergence cause or initiation whatsoever is just a logical nonstarter. And that’s not something that I’m imposing here. I live under the very same restrictions. That doesn’t mean that I am to be lumped in with so many others that will resist the request to open their minds to the plausibility of an infinitely existent creator god.

I’m not a materialist. Not by any means whatsoever. I have worked out the physics that not only allow, but require, the physical existence of non-material reality as a direct ramification of energy, matter, and what comprises the Material Realm [basically, the realm of raw and managed change]. That non-material substrate allows and requires what our science examines as actual [observable interplay between material structures], as it serves the Identity Survival pursuit of each environmental whole that contributes to the macro-system whole that is the relationship matrix that we refer to as Physical Reality. For lack of any existent terminology, I’ve taken to referring to this non-material substrate as Information, and this is due to the fact that most of it is residual factual representations [Residual Fact Sets and RFS continuums] of change/event units that comprise change/event trajectories [no more than entangled manifestations of progressing change quanta].

That said, there also exists a wide variety of entangled masses of what I refer to as Dynamic Information burst sets [the change/Information hybrid net ramification of material brains actively translating DNA survival directives into true dynamic action items in service of the survival of whatever corporeal whole it is that said brain exists to serve]. You might refer to one of these Dynamic Information hybrid masses as a “spirit” if the brain that brought it into existence was human in its capacity for intellectual abstraction; perhaps as an “inhuman spirit” if that specific hybrid mass did not originate here on our planet or from the brain of a fellow Homo Sapiens hominid.

Imagine a strict materialist trying to contain his/her indignation when being confronted with an entire substrate [the Informational Realm] that he/she has been taught to reject out-of-hand as the antithesis of reason and rationality; especially when it’s been presented as ramification physics with an entire arrangement of logical requirements for its actual existence.

Sometimes I don’t know who to feel worse for; me as I get pilloried by them for my lack of intellectual discipline or them as they subconsciously struggle with what are existential dilemmas that are simply not ever addressed or acknowledged within the confines of modern science and its ruling paradigm. The cognitive dissonance is likely significant for those whose biases aren’t sufficiently steeled against such challenges if those challenges have been carefully considered and thoroughly supported by raw logic and the necessary ramification structure that emerges as deductive inferences begin piling up.

I don’t expect you or anyone else to embrace what I’ve discovered for myself [and proven to my own satisfaction], but I didn’t want you to misunderstand me as someone who refuses to acknowledge that there is more to physical reality than energy [spatial change], the resistance to that energy [mass/matter], and the relationships that develop between material structures [fields]. There’s an entire substrate that allows and requires how energy, mass/matter, and fields create the predictable ramification structures that our scientific culture examines and declares to be the whole of reality.

That said, there are things that I believe concerning what you’ve clearly embraced as real [as evident by your quoted sources] that you might have a problem with: [you'll have to progress to next post, due to space limitations]

in continuance: NorEaster

• I believe that there are post-corporeal humans that are more than happy to be viewed by corporeal and post-corporeal Homo Sapiens humans as angels, demons, non-human spirits, gods, transcendent beings, spirit masters, and whatever other labels we might invent to present them with either elevated “spiritual” status or to confer upon them extraordinary capacities; either benevolent or malevolent, or a blend of both.
  
  
• I also believe that there are those post-corporeal humans that have retained their devotion to power and rank [no one actually changes as a result of tossing off the corpse when all is said and done] and that regardless of which planet their corporeal phase of development played out on, the common drive for ascent would be enough to inspire these kinds of folks to create isolatable realms of perception based on philosophical and/or theological precepts that can be offered as inspiration to cultures and societies of corporeally-ensconced humans [Home Sapiens on our own planet, for instance] as they progress through what is essentially a 2nd stage of physical gestation [what we here refer to as “life”].
  
  
• I believe that these inspired views of larger reality [religions, theologies, philosophies] will serve to mold an emerging perception foundation that will [once the affected human has transitioned to the eternal/informational realm] base that human’s fundamental “real” and create the conceptual parameters of that human’s capacity for ongoing perception. Of course, this brings all of those with similarly preconditioned perceptions together as one unified post-corporeal community, which is then [naturally] vulnerable to the benevolent [or not] dominion of the human being [presenting itself as a god or as an agent of same] that purposely designed that sphere of perception with the goal pursued being that of a community of devoted adherents.
  
  
• Lastly, I believe that there is no inherent value beyond the focused devotion of humanity, since it is the human being that determines value as a direct result of what it cares about and focuses its devotion upon. This inherent value is the impetus for pretty much everything we’ve ever been presented with as holy, transcendent, mystical, good, evil, and inherently supernatural. Basically, it’s a battle between communities of adherents over the masses of human beings [on our own planet and on others] that have yet to transition from the Material Realm to the Informational Realm upon the death of their brains. The more devoted adherents, the more inherent value achieved by the “god” or whatever title the realm’s author has taken for itself. This motive and how its realization is achieved is easily recognizable if one simply realizes that the human being [regardless of where it originated] is recognizably human and that no one changes [their needs, wants, intentions] as a result of moving beyond the material phase of their physical gestation.
  

Yes, this means that I see religions and mystical philosophical constructs as pre-conditioning efforts that have been introduced to our species of gestating human beings as divine knowledge with each battling the others for what numbers of adherents that can be gathered as post-corporeal devotees. I would imagine that this was not how you viewed my definition of reality, and while I certainly don’t expect you to embrace it, I do expect you to not lump me in with so many other secular realists that reject non-material reality out-of-hand. That said, the fundamental substrate that is logic does not allow me to accept the pre-existence of any infinite/beginning-less creator being, even if I do acknowledge the existence of human beings that could easily convince most folks that they’re highly elevated spiritual entities; some – perhaps – even capable of presenting as godlike.

originally posted by: whereislogic
In view of the evidence​...​would it not be logical at least to consider the possibility of the existence of a Creator?

The reference to a Creator in that question from the article I was quoting from is a reference to God (hence the capitalization of the C in Creator, the full article makes that even more obvious). Your response was:

originally posted by: NorEaster
So, basically, your answer to the OP's question is that a god of some sort brought the whole of physical reality into actual existence.

Okay.

So, what brought that god [or whatever it is] into actual existence?

So you understood the reference to be about God and that's a form of the question:

'Oh yeah, then who or what created God?' (paraphrasing) or 'Who or what brought God into actual existence?' (to stay a little closer to your way of phrasing things)

So yes, you did ask a dumb question about what you know is proposed as an eternal* God (*: evidenced by your later commentary that brings up the term "eternally existent creator" before I mentioned the word "eternal", so you knew what the subject was, not just any god of some sort, but an eternal God, a God that has always existed). I'm not upset about it, just letting you know it's a dumb question that demonstrates you have not given the idea of an eternal God any thought cause that would make the answer a given, and one wouldn't have to ask that question to someone else.

I asked 2 different questions to you though, which you are still dodging. First by bringing up slightly irrelevant things such as infinite regress. This isn't a conversation, you're just going on about things of which you now say:

I don’t expect you or anyone else to embrace what I’ve discovered for myself ...

Then why waste so much time on dodging my simple 'yes or no'-questions in favor of explaining what you have "discovered" (regardless of any possible misunderstandings on my part about that subject instead)?

If you respond to my comment to someone else by asking a question about the subject in my comment, it seems to suggest you want a conversation about it, rather than merely plug your own philosophies. Your subsequent commentary though suggests the latter motive and purpose for your commentary.

What is this? How to dodge a question 101?

It's not upsetting and I'm not in any way angry about it, it's actually getting mildly funny. But most of all, it's telling regarding your motive for asking that dumb question. It's not to get an answer (that you already could have figured out before asking about it and without any help from anyone), you do not want an answer to your question. It is weird and mildly funny to ask questions for which one doesn't want an answer, but using the question as a reason not to give the idea of an eternal God or the evidence for creation and purposeful design any serious consideration, yet still pretending one wants to have a conversation about it by responding to it and asking questions about it.

Kindergarten is over now though, I'm done with trying to pull teeth. It's like you're deliberately trying to avoid answering my questions to you, the only thing in my initial response to your response to my comment. And that's not a real conversation. There was nothing else in my comment to respond to other than the 2 questions (can also be seen as 1 question with 2 aspects to it):

If something or someone was brought into existence, then that would mean it or that person hasn't always existed, right?

Is that an obvious logical consequence to you?

Yet you respond anyway, without answering the questions. Without even saying anything truly relevant about these 2 questions. Then I expressed again my curiosity regarding what you think of these 2 questions, and whether you are willing to answer them, again you respond in the same manner. And so on, and so on. These are not controversial questions that require this much talk about it, they can be answered with a simple yes or no without any further elaboration regarding what you supposedly have discovered. That way, you can have a conversation. In the meantime, I've also answered your question (multiple times if you count different ways of phrasing the same answer). Just to show it's not that hard to do, actually responding to a question someone asks when responding to their commentary, especially if that comment only contains 2 questions (one of the reasons I limited my response to only those 2 questions, to encourage a response to those 2 questions and nothing else that might distract or detract from them; also the reason I keep repeating them and reminding you that you haven't answered them yet, with a clear yes or no*, at least).

*: it's bit like an IQ-test that uses 'true or false'-type questions (or multiple choice where you have only 1 answer that is correct/true, and perhaps 3 or more that are false/incorrect)

The whole exercise was also a test whether or not we can find any agreement on the subject in my questions. Which should be a simple matter to agree on. But it seems something is getting in the way.

2 Timothy 3:1-5

But know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here. 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, haughty, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, disloyal, 3 having no natural affection, not open to any agreement, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, without love of goodness, 4 betrayers, headstrong, puffed up with pride, lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God, 5 having an appearance of godliness but proving false to its power; and from these turn away.

originally posted by: whereislogic
In view of the evidence...would it not be logical at least to consider the possibility of the existence of a Creator?
The reference to a Creator in that question from the article I was quoting from is a reference to God (hence the capitalization of the C in Creator, the full article makes that even more obvious). Your response was:

originally posted by: NorEaster
So, basically, your answer to the OP's question is that a god of some sort brought the whole of physical reality into actual existence.

Okay.

So, what brought that god [or whatever it is] into actual existence?

My response was definitely relevant to the OP's original question. In suggesting that the possibility of a creator god is a valid consideration, you are presenting a completely illogical premise as being a logical determination, so I challenged the validity of that presentation. I didn't ask "Who created God?", since that's not a logically valid question at all [a dumb question, as you correctly noted]. "What brought that god [or whatever it is] into actual existence?" is a very different question, since it does not presuppose or suggest the presence of infinite regress [the classic statement; "turtles all the way down" is another way of describing it, I suppose]. Of course, you can't answer that question, and we both know that you can't. And, that's because there's no answer that can be offered, since there's never been a creator god in the first place.

So you understood the reference to be about God and that's a form of the question:

'Oh yeah, then who or what created God?' (paraphrasing) or 'Who or what brought God into actual existence?' (to stay a little closer to your way of phrasing things)

Sometimes phrasing is everything. I learned that on this very forum.

So yes, you did ask a dumb question about what you know is proposed as an eternal* God . . .

I did not ask the question you responded to. The question you addressed [which you rephrased to serve as the straw man in this exchange] was a dumb question, but that wasn't my question. My question centered on your lack of an actual initiating event; simply pushing the question off to a theoretical placeholder. Secular cosmology theorists offer similar theoretical placeholders [Big Bangs, muliverses, quantum foam, black holes, and the like] and I have just as much disdain for those constructs as I do for traditional wisdom placeholders.

I asked 2 different questions to you though, which you are still dodging. First by bringing up slightly irrelevant things such as infinite regress. This isn't a conversation, you're just going on about things of which you now say:

I don’t expect you or anyone else to embrace what I’ve discovered for myself ...

Then why waste so much time on dodging my simple 'yes or no'-questions in favor of explaining what you have "discovered" (regardless of any possible misunderstandings on my part about that subject instead)?

If you respond to my comment to someone else by asking a question about the subject in my comment, it seems to suggest you want a conversation about it, rather than merely plug your own philosophies. Your subsequent commentary though suggests the latter motive and purpose for your commentary.

I'm explaining why it is that I don't agree with you concerning my own [or anyone else's] need to be open to the idea of an eternally existent creator god, or any other theoretical placeholder in reference to the OP’s original question. Apparently, that's not clear to you. I do not believe that the infinite existence of anything at all is logically possible [conceptually, anything is possible, but in actuality, only what is logically allowed is possible]. Explaining to you why I see things that way was actually done more in respect to your own tendency [at least in this thread] to fully answer each response with voluminous passages, both original and quoted from other sources, than in an effort to evangelize my own perspective on the OP’s question. Perhaps I was being a bit candid there, but that’s not a sin; not in the realm of perspective that I inhabit anyway.

What is this? How to dodge a question 101?

Never dodged your question. That said, I won't be lead around any exchange by anyone's requirement that I limit my answers to yes/no responses. I'm not on the stand here.

It is weird and mildly funny to ask questions for which one doesn't want an answer, but using the question as a reason not to give the idea of an eternal God or the evidence for creation and purposeful design any serious consideration, yet still pretending one wants to have a conversation about it by responding to it and asking questions about it.

The idea of an infinitely existent creator god and/or of whatever inferential evidence there may or may not be of [what is widely considered to be] Intelligent Design is a tired beaten horse that keeps coming back from the dead as a result of the strident demands of people with a religious agenda and pretty much anyone who's ever examined this "question" honestly [or rationally] from strictly logical perspective has already reached a satisfactory conclusion concerning the validity of that specific pair of assertions. That battle stalled decades ago, with ID adherents retreating to their barricades after mounting a very aggressive campaign. I still see no value in re-litigating that controversy; especially since [as I did explain] there is a much more readily associable mechanism by which the progressive development of our universe can be explained without violating any logical restrictions.

Kindergarten is over now though, I'm done with trying to pull teeth. It's like you're deliberately trying to avoid answering my questions to you, the only thing in my initial response to your response to my comment. And that's not a real conversation. There was nothing else in my comment to respond to other than the 2 questions (can also be seen as 1 question with 2 aspects to it):

"If something or someone was brought into existence, then that would mean it or that person hasn't always existed, right?

Is that an obvious logical consequence to you?'

Of course that is an obvious logical consequence, to me and to anyone steeped in simple logic, but I already knew that you knew that. I moved past that very simple question, since the answer to that question is apparent to anyone with a fundamental introductory knowledge of logic. It was a leading question, and we both know it. I simply moved past it to the more fundamental premise and addressed that.

[post limitations require a follow-on post . . .

[continued from above]

[originally posted by: whereislogic] The whole exercise was also a test whether or not we can find any agreement on the subject in my questions. Which should be a simple matter to agree on. But it seems something is getting in the way.

We can't, but what I have also been answering is the OP's original question; even as I wade through your battery of insults and quoted religious texts. This thread is [well, it was until it got hijacked] about "How and Why the Universe Exists". It's not [or shouldn't have been] about ones embrace or rejection of only one explanation concerning how this universe came into existence. Sure, I'll indulge anyone that asks me what I think is true and why, but don't expect me to play along with a thread hijacking. Screw that. I liked the OP's original question. That's the only reason I bothered posting in this thread. I have absolutely no interest in debating a thin ideological construct that was already roundly discredited decades ago.

I believe the universe exists around us and in us as a gift many of us received in childhood, elevation really is a priceless gift. We received this gift through the medium of sight which triggered a chemical reaction in our brain as we came to our own individual understanding of our roles in the universe which determines who here on earth is the Sun's, the moons, the stars, the planets, the black holes and the space junk. As above so below as below so above.

originally posted by: NorEaster
a reply to: whereislogic

Wow, I clearly touched a nerve here, and I’m sorry that my dogged adherence to logical ramification caused you to become upset. I didn’t intend for that, but I’m not surprised that restricting this exchange to the OP’s thread request, “Explain How and Why the Universe Exists” might’ve caused me to inaccurately presented my own reality view as I defended the fundamental requirement of physical emergence against the intellectual abstraction of infinite/beginning-less physical existence. This happens to me often when engaging with others, although it’s more common for materialists to become incensed with me over my embrace of non-material actors and agencies within discussions concerning physics versus metaphysics and the plausibility of what our culture has labeled paranormal.

I wouldn’t ask that question: “Who created God?” because I’m thoroughly convinced that there is no such being [God] as its been described by theologists or spiritualists; infinitely existent, infinitely powerful, infinitely aware, infinitely cognizant, and responsible for the creation and design of our universe. I can certainly believe that there is a human manifestation that can convince the members of our little species of its inherent superiority [or divinity], but the issue of beginning-less physical existence can never be resolved if simple logic is being used as the conceptual yardstick within that examination. Being eternal, once initially brought into physical existence, is one thing, but the claim of a physically existent something requiring no emergence cause or initiation whatsoever is just a logical nonstarter. And that’s not something that I’m imposing here. I live under the very same restrictions. That doesn’t mean that I am to be lumped in with so many others that will resist the request to open their minds to the plausibility of an infinitely existent creator god.

I’m not a materialist. Not by any means whatsoever. I have worked out the physics that not only allow, but require, the physical existence of non-material reality as a direct ramification of energy, matter, and what comprises the Material Realm [basically, the realm of raw and managed change]. That non-material substrate allows and requires what our science examines as actual [observable interplay between material structures], as it serves the Identity Survival pursuit of each environmental whole that contributes to the macro-system whole that is the relationship matrix that we refer to as Physical Reality. For lack of any existent terminology, I’ve taken to referring to this non-material substrate as Information, and this is due to the fact that most of it is residual factual representations [Residual Fact Sets and RFS continuums] of change/event units that comprise change/event trajectories [no more than entangled manifestations of progressing change quanta].

That said, there also exists a wide variety of entangled masses of what I refer to as Dynamic Information burst sets [the change/Information hybrid net ramification of material brains actively translating DNA survival directives into true dynamic action items in service of the survival of whatever corporeal whole it is that said brain exists to serve]. You might refer to one of these Dynamic Information hybrid masses as a “spirit” if the brain that brought it into existence was human in its capacity for intellectual abstraction; perhaps as an “inhuman spirit” if that specific hybrid mass did not originate here on our planet or from the brain of a fellow Homo Sapiens hominid.

Imagine a strict materialist trying to contain his/her indignation when being confronted with an entire substrate [the Informational Realm] that he/she has been taught to reject out-of-hand as the antithesis of reason and rationality; especially when it’s been presented as ramification physics with an entire arrangement of logical requirements for its actual existence.

Sometimes I don’t know who to feel worse for; me as I get pilloried by them for my lack of intellectual discipline or them as they subconsciously struggle with what are existential dilemmas that are simply not ever addressed or acknowledged within the confines of modern science and its ruling paradigm. The cognitive dissonance is likely significant for those whose biases aren’t sufficiently steeled against such challenges if those challenges have been carefully considered and thoroughly supported by raw logic and the necessary ramification structure that emerges as deductive inferences begin piling up.

I don’t expect you or anyone else to embrace what I’ve discovered for myself [and proven to my own satisfaction], but I didn’t want you to misunderstand me as someone who refuses to acknowledge that there is more to physical reality than energy [spatial change], the resistance to that energy [mass/matter], and the relationships that develop between material structures [fields]. There’s an entire substrate that allows and requires how energy, mass/matter, and fields create the predictable ramification structures that our scientific culture examines and declares to be the whole of reality.

That said, there are things that I believe concerning what you’ve clearly embraced as real [as evident by your quoted sources] that you might have a problem with: [you'll have to progress to next post, due to space limitations]

For what it's worth, you are doing a much better job than I did trying to offer some rational counter point to the spiritual dogma. Your efforts are not in vain.

I have a story about this.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

That story has since been updated, but only the latter portion. Will supply if requested.

Tl;dr

There was

N O T H I N G

Not even space or darkness.

It's a bit of a logical leap, I'll admit, but one which I think any sensible mind will make unless they kid themselves: that nothingness breeds possibility. That possibility itself assumes consciousness. The "nothingness" in which it resides, by fact of its residence is now space and darkness, Also assumes consciousness. Now we have polarity. Creation and destruction. Possibility simply MUST create, or be destroyed. So here we are.

originally posted by: TzarChasm

For what it's worth, you are doing a much better job than I did trying to offer some rational counter point to the spiritual dogma. Your efforts are not in vain.

Thanks. I appreciate that. This is hard stuff regardless of which side you've embraced. It can certainly become difficult to remain emotionally detached, since most of us have been raised to view this question in terms that transcend mere intellectual abstraction or conceptual adventurism; defining it morally in many cases.

I try hard to appreciate that - for some - when I defend my rejection of a traditional genesis narrative it's akin to promoting evil as righteousness. For some this isn't just an examination of logical inference and ramification structure. Not always that easy to remember.

Physical reality is no more real than your realest lucid dream.

Next time you fall asleep, try to take a microscope and look closely at the matter that makes up your dream. Or better yet, try to take a telescope and look up at the night sky. Tell us what you find. You will see the depths of your mind.

It's no different from today's science. It's a measure of depth of scientist's minds.

It's interesting to see one support the concept of "nothingness" and proclaim "everything" originated from it including themselves. You can't start from zero and get to one, let alone more than a billion trillion ones.

Perhaps there was always one thing, and it was divided into more than a billion trillion pieces. Perhaps you are that one thing, and you divided yourself into pieces. Perhaps you are an accumulation of simple concepts, ideas, and thoughts, which don't require any physical thing to exist for it to exist. So you are both nothing and everything in terms of a physical reality.

a reply to: More1ThanAny1
Someone took something and watched their body split into fragments which spread out and covered the entire scene/landscape.
So yes.... I agree with your post.

There is also an artist which did a self portrait and it was what was appearing.... the scene from where the artist was seeing from... the landscape as it were. I wish I could find it to show you... it was not the face of a human, it was what was seen.

The potential for the Universe to exist, existed before the universe did.