Thursday, March 17, 2011

The First Cause

Intellifundies like to argue that since there must have been a first cause, therefore God exists. Let's grant that there could be a first cause (in reality, this is a leap of logic / faith).

So what do we know about the first cause? Let's see:

1. The first cause caused the universe to be. Or more precisely, the first cause caused the big bang to be. Or possibly, the first cause caused the multiverse to be. Unclear.

2. The first cause has no prior cause. This pretty much makes the first cause incomprehensible to us, since we can't really understand how something could have no cause, but ok.

3. The first cause has the kind of ability that can create universes (or at least our universe). Or possibly the ability to create multiverses. Or maybe just big bangs and the rest is up to chance.

Now let's analyze what WE don't know about the first cause.

1. Is the first cause one or many? Could there be multiple first causes? Seems strange to say yes, but then that's no stranger than saying the first cause had no prior cause.

2. Is the first cause "spiritual"? This question has no meaning. All we know about (for sure) is our universe. The first cause being outside the universe could be anything, from quantum soup to the flying spaghetti monster. And actually, we don't really even know what our universe is made of anyway, so the whole question doesn't even start.

3. Is the first cause "good"? Well the universe is kinda cool, but then 10,000 people just got killed so that's not so nice. I guess you could call the first cause "powerful", at least relative to us, but that's about it.

So what can we say about the first cause?

It's an incomprehensible something (or maybe somethings) which has the " powerful" ability to cause a universe, or a multiverse (maybe), or at the very least a big bang (or maybe something that in turn can cause a big bang somewhere down the line).

And don't forget, in reality, the argument for a first cause is actually completely flawed, because if something can exist with no prior cause then so can the big bang (or the multiverse or whatever caused the big bang).





1 comments:

Atheism vs Theism said...

There appears to be a necessity for a first cause of dynamic physical reality (whether universe or multiverse).
i) The BGV theorm predicts a space time beginning of universe or multiverse.
ii) Big Bang observations confirm space time beginning of our detectable universe.

Further more, assuming a multiverse exists which spawned our universe, from a mathematical perspective if physical processes (i.e. the multiverse) never had a beginning - than they would have existed for an eternity - which would predict that our universe, steming from a multiverse model, should be infinitately old by now, which is not the case, and in fact in possible.

Now - what was the nature of this first cause becomes the problem.

To avoid an eternal reqress a first cause must be necessary (never caused), yet have abilities to cause things (eg. multiverse, or universe). The first cause must also have an ability to select a moment by which to start physical processes.

We don't know of anything that alone has this power. This sounds alot like God, but that is the only explanation we know of - hence it stands at the moment as the best explanation.

A random quantum fluctuation could not have started physical processes, as quantum fluctuations presuppose time in order to operate, and there was no space-time prior to space time.