Absolutely I've heard of it. I haven't, of course, witnessed that. Only God has.
Evidence, please, that God has witnessed it?
Many credible scientists affirm that the BB was the BEGINNING of space, time, and energy. You know that. You also know, deep down, that they have credible reasons for believing this. They're not idiots.
I don't doubt they have credible reasons. I am not invalidating their beliefs, or their claims, merely stating how it is currently a closed mind that fails to consider the other alternatives, especially when there is no evidence to the contrary.
I would challenge you again to really try and come to terms with the idea of an eternal universe. Why it, instead of nothing?
I can come to terms with it. It's not difficult. Why do you find it so difficult?
How could matter be in a changeless state if it has never begun?
So all eternal things need a beginning?
And you're happy for your eternal God not to?
Simple questions such as, "If the universe is eternal, why didn't this moment happen sooner?" Or, "Why hasn't the universe yet descended into it's ultimate destruction?" highlight the problems with the issue of an infinite physical world. And again: If I promised to give you something, a cookie, after an infinite amount of time, would I ever give it to you? Of course not. Yet you can believe that events are occurring now in light of an infinite past.
And if this universe constantly expands, contracts, etc? And each cycle begins with a large bang, which effectively resets reference time
T(0) and which all events in the current cycle seem to begin from?
And your question is, as I shall say again, a logical fallacy. It is not relevant and does not represent any situation being postulated. Strawman... blow hard enough and you can knock your own creation over.
The simple point is this: It makes no sense that a physical world could exist in its current state in time if there were an infinite amount of times prior in which this state could and should have occurred.
No sense to you. Argument from personal incredulity.
I find it baffling to think that the universe is here "just because."
Personal incredulity again? And a closed mind?
The whole of science is predicated on finding out causes to effects, and it is ironic that so many are willing to stop at the ultimate cause - by postulating that there is none.
It is a postulation - nothing more. Not a claim of fact. It is a possibility - and those with "open minds" would surely not close it off by saying "God did it".
So you claim "nothing did it?"
I claim it as a possibility.
"God did it" doesn't quite have the same open-ness to it, does it.
Did God do it? Maybe. There's no evidence, of course. But, like "nothing did it", it is a possibility.
As to your later sentence - I must reiterate a previous point. "It happened" is hardly rational, especially on the "scientific" mindset of finding CAUSES for happenings.
...
Science doesn't explain eternity. Naturalism fails abysmally at this point. It cannot delve into matters of timelessness, as an actual eternity would imply.
You have accepted that there is NO POSSIBILITY of going beyond the first cause / BB etc, and yet you are willing for science to look for a cause?
The ONLY rational thing to say about the first cause would be "it happened". Anything else is unsubstantiated, unevidenced confidence statement.
If you can not see this then you misunderstand what rationality is.
Please provide something more that you can say about it and then provide the evidence for it.
We are products of the eternal, Sarkus. There indeed exists an entity that has no beginning and no end - we are all privy to that knowledge. For "some reason" we have a conception of eternity - and a yearning for it - despite our utter inability to grasp how it can exist.
:yawn:
Because, if we cannot go beyond the first cause, it is because it is not physical(wherein it would not really be the first cause, because something physical exists outside of it). If it is not physical, there is a logical inference to make: to the metaphysical.
You espouse the BB as the start of time, our universe etc. Please provide evidence that the cause of the BB was not physical.
If you can not - how do you claim fact on the metaphysical?
Finally, I don't understand how your last statement, or similar statements made by atheists, are meant to have any validity on a grand scale.
Generalisation.
It is a truth that the majority of religious people follow the religion of their birth / indoctrination.
Once you account for the multitude of people like this you may realize that, although religious upbringing assuredly has an effect on the beliefs of many, the point is null as a theory for belief as a whole.
There is / was no attempt at such a theory - only a question (however flippantly put) of why people would reject any number of other possibilities and say "God did it", and with this "God" being, for the majority of people, the same God as they were indoctrinated with from birth.
An open mind may want to investigate exactly why these people(brilliant and not-so brilliant alike!) were converted - in spite of lacking your assumed predetermining factor for belief.
They might, if they were so interested. Point?
