There is no God PERIOD

[widdershins]

Two main reasons. Big bang theory is still the prevailing theory of how the universe (as we now know it) came into existence. According to that theory the universe emerged from a singularity of infinite mass contained in a single point which would be nothing like the naturalistic forces we know of. The second reason depends on if you believe time always existed without beginning as part of naturalistic forces. If it did, we'd never cross an infinity to get to this time. If you believe time didn't always exist that would be a nature we have no familiarity with.

What's interesting to note is you attempt to get around the inherent weakness of naturalistic forces by imbuing them with supernatural attributes such as always having existed. That is a divine attribute isn't it?

 

I have heard this statement before, always spoken by someone who has no idea how ignorant it is, nor how at odds with their own beliefs it is.

First, the physical problem with it.  If time were infinite, always having existed, always going to exist, and you say that, with infinite time before this point it is impossible to reach this point you are essentially saying that if time is infinite, nothing can ever happen.  That's just stupid.  With an infinity of time there is an infinity of time for things to happen in.

Second it begs the question, if God is infinite then how did he cross an infinity to get to the point of our creation?

[Mike Cl]

^^^What he said. So-called "divine attributes" aren't all that uncommon. Just look at any old white man, and you see a living divine attribute.

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There's nothing divine about the sideways eight. Besides, if the universe did have a beginning (and it appears it did), then the natural forces are not eternal anyway. They've always been because they were there from the start. History is likely finite.

You and SGOS nailed it!  And I'd add that just because this universe had a beginning does not have to mean the system that bore our universe is not infinite.  If blackholes of another universe gave birth to this universe, then this universe most likely will give birth to another or others.  This one is simply part of a system--or could be.  And 'I don't know' does not ever equate to goddidit.

[Baruch]

Humans in general, even mathematicians, have a hard time dealing with infinity.  I find no empirical evidence that time is infinite in duration, in either direction.  Go back in time and see ... or wait around long enough and see ... then lets talk ;-)

[Drew_2017]

I would disagree.  Why is it a divine attribute?

Divine or supernatural attributes are characteristics such as transcendence to the laws of physics and having always existed outside of time and so forth. Ascribing such characteristics to natural forces just redefines naturalism to mean anything.

To argue that time, infinity, or beginning is a divine attribute is convenient if one feels compelled to explain time or the absence of time, but explaining that which we don't understand is intellectually futile and intellectually dishonest.

Its intellectually dishonest to say its turtles (naturalistic forces) all the way down if its not known its true or even possible and offer no evidence in support of the claim. Remember the title of this thread is 'There is no God PERIOD'. That doesn't sound like someone uncertain of their claim.

Naturalistic forces may or may not have a weakness.  A weakness as you describe it is little more that not being able to understand something, and it is not an inherent property of the force itself.  This is due to our ignorance.  There is no reason to believe that what we don't understand must be a divine attribute.  All that we can say is that we don't understand.  Any assumptions we can make are speculative, including speculations about divine attributes.

We do understand we live in a material time dependent universe that began to exist. We are familiar with the laws of physics in great depth. The theory among naturalists is that this is all there is was and ever will be but the laws of physics and naturalism we are familiar with doesn't account for its own existence. One theory is that the universe came into existence un-caused out of nothing a super natural magic act at best. The other is much like belief in God that was never created and always existed that naturalistic forces existed without beginning. Time however had to have a beginning, if it didn't we'd have to cross an infinitude of time to arrive at today's date. 

[Drew_2017]

First, the physical problem with it.  If time were infinite, always having existed, always going to exist, and you say that, with infinite time before this point it is impossible to reach this point you are essentially saying that if time is infinite, nothing can ever happen.  That's just stupid.  With an infinity of time there is an infinity of time for things to happen in.

Second it begs the question, if God is infinite then how did he cross an infinity to get to the point of our creation?

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction. You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity. The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

[doorknob]

Any thing out side of time and physics doesn't exist as far as I'm concerned. I could claim anything out side of time and space and you couldn't prove me wrong. Supernatural just another word for magic. Natural explanations are the only explanations I accept. Anything else is tomfoolery.

[doorknob]

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction. You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity. The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

Time isn't as linear as that. In space things are a bit more fluid. Time could be a circle. Or something that we can't even perceive with our minds just yet.

[doorknob]

Also, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

I might not question it if you were to say a man shot an arrow into a target in the midst of dense fog.

If you were to say that a man shot an arrow around the world, the arrow stopped in midair, did a 90 degree turn, and pierced every tree for a mile, ending in a massive fireball, I'm likely to give that claim a little extra scrutiny.

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I wish people would stop saying that! Not extraordinary evidence just plain old regular evidence would work for me. But they can't even produce that.

[Blackleaf]

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction. You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity. The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

Hold on a sec. First you claim that infinity is a divine attribute, then you say that God isn't infinite? Which is it? Is infinite a divine characteristic or not? Seems like you're trying to have it both ways.

[fencerider]

Time however had to have a beginning, if it didn't we'd have to cross an infinitude of time to arrive at today's date.

Sorry but our calendar has an arbitrary start date, with no connection to the actual start of universal time.

[Baruch]

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction. You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity. The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

For a materialist, there is nothing transcendent ... everything is immanent.  Also you are engaged in the same kind of arguments about infinity, that Zeno of Elea tackled 2500 years ago.

[Solomon Zorn]

We do observe naturalistic forces. We have yet to observe is what caused naturalistic forces to exist and that's the question at hand. What is the naturalistic explanation that explains how naturalistic forces came into existence?

1+1=2

[Solomon Zorn]

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction. You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity. The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

"Always" is a semantic problem. Time "always" existed, because the word "always" necessitates time. There was no "before" time because that word indicates time as well. Time started when the "material" universe started. It may be infinite going forward, but not going back.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

If God is only a transcendent designer, then how did he come to be?

[widdershins]

I know its hard to imagine because our minds are more finite oriented. Try to imagine being inside a tube that extends from infinity back to infinity end. No amount of travel would get you closer to either end because there is no end in either direction.

Yeah, I get that.  If you are trying to travel to the ends, there aren't any.

You wouldn't have a beginning to start at to get closer to any point down the pike. To get to any point down the pike you would have to cross an infinity.

This is where you go off track.  You said to "imagine being inside a tube".  I'm there.  I see a point three inches away.  I have to cross an infinity when I only want to go three inches?  No, I have to cross three inches.  It is not an infinity to any point, it's an infinity in both directions.  That doesn't mean I can't travel up and down the tube, measure my travel, piss in a spot, travel away and get back to the puddle.  You are saying that because the tube extends for infinity in either direction the tube must be completely empty because, extending for an infinity, you can't imagine how you would arbitrarily pick a point in that tube.  That's just not true.

The problem is with the concept of time always having existed. For us to arrive at the time we are now, it had to have a beginning. If you still disagree I hope one of the resident atheists will stand up and admit they know what I'm speaking of.

That's a dick move.  "If you don't agree with me then, because I'm right, perhaps someone not quite as smart as me, but still much smarter than you can explain it to you."  Prove you're right and you can talk to me like that.

I don't describe God as infinite, I describe God as transcendent. This would be analogous to a scientist who causes a virtual universe to exist, the scientist is transcendent to the virtual universe.

Yes, I am aware your type describes God as being whatever is convenient for the particular day or conversation.  I describe your description of God as being an irrelevant choice of words chosen, not for their accuracy at describing your deity, but for maximum undisprovableness.

Back to the conversation of infinite time, if you imagine it correctly you can break it down to a dichotomy without it being a false dichotomy.  Either the universe has existed in some state for an infinity of time or it has not.  If it has, time is infinite and there is not necessarily anything "outside of" our universe.  I don't tend to think that is true and our current scientific understanding backs that.

If it is not true then, if our universe has not existed for an infinity of time in some state, then I don't know.  I can make claims that sound good.  I can back them with scientific theory.  But the truth is I don't know and I can't know because I cannot see outside of our universe, or detect it in any way.  I would assume that it means something exists besides our known universe.  That makes logical sense, within the rules of our universe.  But that's where we run into a problem.  Something outside of our universe would not be "within the rules of our universe".  It is entirely possible that this "thing" actually has the same rules as our universe, that there are no rules of our universe, just bleed-through from the rules this "thing" has.  It is possible that it has nothing whatsoever in our universe, the our universe the equivalent of a fleck of crud which broke off, utterly unlike the whole it departed from.  It is possible there are many universes which actually make up this "thing", like cells in a body.  All of this is speculation.  In the end, what I think is irrelevant.  It won't ever change what is.  So it's only what I can prove which I can claim to have true knowledge of.

And that's where your problem lies.  You're confusing what you "think" with what you "know".  You believe your thought process to be infallible.  You believe logical deduction can prove abstract thought about things we cannot gather evidence for.  The reality is, if you can't physical gather data, you're just having a guess.

[Drew_2017]

Any thing out side of time and physics doesn't exist as far as I'm concerned. I could claim anything out side of time and space and you couldn't prove me wrong. Supernatural just another word for magic. Natural explanations are the only explanations I accept. Anything else is tomfoolery.

What's your naturalistic explanation that accounts for how the universe came into existence and what evidence do you offer in support of that explanation? By saying you won't accept anything but naturalistic explanations just says that your mind is closed on this matter.