Bible Contradictions 2.0

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

Logically it’s not possible. I can argue freewill but not with the existence of foreknowledge. If I know you are going to go to the store and get strawberry ice cream, you simply could not do otherwise. My foreknowledge prevents you from doing that.
There are only a few ways to resolve the conflict.

  • Accept it’s a paradox and move on.
  • Take time out of the equation. Which makes sense to a point because choice is a metaphysical construct and metaphysical constructs do not exist in time, but we do. However, if you take time and stand it on it’s end, everything happens simultaneously. Perhaps God looks at it this way.
  • Or God could simply choose not to know. He decided to give us freewill, he can decide against having foreknowledge.

The third one actually solves the problem, but we simply don’t know. I not sure it’s knowable. God doesn’t give us much clue into internal workings of his mind.

The unmoved-mover was Aristotle’s concept, which is actually more interesting because he was scarcely aware of hebrews or monotheism. Kant took the ontological form and made a cosmological argument from the point of ontology (he would deny it). Hume was fabulous. He spent most of his time trying to debunk cosmology, while he failed at doing that, he did succeed in bringing a far greater and more detailed of causation than anybody before him.

P.S. Tirib, ^ this is how you make a counter arguement. Ironsmithy not only disagreed with me, but managed to make an actaul arguement and managed not to insult me at the same time…Learn from him[/quote]

Your knowledge of someone going to the store to get strawberry ice cream has nothing to do with them making the choice. They would do so regardless of whether you knew about it or not. Your knowledge is completely irrelevant.
[/quote]

If I had said foreknowledge, could you choose to do otherwise? If so, explain how?[/quote]

If you had foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

If you lacked foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

Hence, foreknowledge is irrelevant.
[/quote]

Not correct, foreknowledge constricts freewill. If I knew everything you would ever do in life before you did it or knew about it, you could not break the bonds.

If you had foreknowledge, you could not choose otherwise. If I lacked it, you could…Whether you would is not relevant, it’s could that matters.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/

[/quote]

Your foreknowledge, or the lack of it, has nothing whatsoever to do with what I could or couldn’t do. Knowing that I’m going to make a certain choice doesn’t mean I wasn’t free to make that choice. I was perfectly free to make it, you just knew me so well that you understood what choice I would make. Step back for a second and think about it logically. How in the world could your foreknowledge impact my choice? It’s impossible.

If I’m omniscient, and I know for a fact that the sun will rise tomorrow, does my knowledge influence the rising of the sun? Obviously not. I simply know the sun is going to rise. Whether I know it or not, it is a fact that the sun will rise.

Don’t confuse omniscience with predestination. Knowing all things doesn’t imply responsibility for all things.

[/quote]

Look it up, it is a paradox, you cannot foreknow and have choice to do otherwise. It’s simply impossible.[/quote]

It’s not a paradox. It’s only a paradox in a human’s perception of time.

[quote]pat wrote:
<<< Your simply being dishonest here. You pronounced multiple times that we (Chris and I, or all Catholics) are on a strait shot to hell. >>>[/quote]I defy you right now to quote me even once ever saying such a thing. Find it. I dare ya. I will convert to Catholicism on the spot if you can. You are either the one being totally dishonest or you are under a spirit of strong delusion. I will never again respond to another thing you post until you either demonstrate this outrageous accusation by quoting my own words or you admit that you were wrong in making that statement. Show everybody where Tiribulus either said or implied “that you (Chris and Pat, or all Catholics) are on a strait shot to hell”. Let’s see it.

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
<<< The difference between the division in our Church (which I include you in because you are baptized a Catholic) and the rest of the division through Christianity is that we don’t pretend it is okay. [/quote]We don’t pretend it’s okay. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< but to say your faith is true and my faith is true when they do not complete match is up is incorrect. There is one truth. One faith. >>>[/quote]See how much divsion you find here http://forums.catholic.com/ What an education that place has been. You may even find some my posts. (if you haven’t already) It’s also not okay that true believers sin all the time (which they do), but it IS a reality while we still dwell in this sinful flesh. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:Yes and we remember (or we participate) in that feast, as well as, Christ’s sacrifice from dawn til dusk all over the world.[/quote]Foot washing is not commanded and I was saying nothing further than we are willing to serve each other and our Lord despite our differences.

Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]Excerpt from Msgr. Charles Pope:
We have discussed before that an important principle of the Christian moral vision is to understand that it is essentially received, not achieved. Holiness is a work of God. The human being acting out the power of his flesh alone cannot keep, and surely not fulfill, the Law. The experience of God’s people in the Old Testament bears this out. True holiness (and not mere ethical rule keeping) is possible only by and through God’s grace.

In this sense we must understand the moral vision given by Jesus as a description rather than a mere prescription. Notice what the text says here: I have come not to abolish but to fulfill [the Law]. It is Jesus who fulfills the Law. And we, who are more and more in him, and He in us do what He does. It is His work.[/quote]OK, On it’s face and if I’m reading this guy correctly, this is quite a reformed statement. If your view of morality and holiness stopped right there and the rest of your soteriology brought consistently into line, you would have reformation protestantism.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]Excerpt from Msgr. Charles Pope:
We have discussed before that an important principle of the Christian moral vision is to understand that it is essentially received, not achieved. Holiness is a work of God. The human being acting out the power of his flesh alone cannot keep, and surely not fulfill, the Law. The experience of God’s people in the Old Testament bears this out. True holiness (and not mere ethical rule keeping) is possible only by and through God’s grace.

In this sense we must understand the moral vision given by Jesus as a description rather than a mere prescription. Notice what the text says here: I have come not to abolish but to fulfill [the Law]. It is Jesus who fulfills the Law. And we, who are more and more in him, and He in us do what He does. It is His work.[/quote]OK, On it’s face and if I’m reading this guy correctly, this is quite a reformed statement. If your view of morality and holiness stopped right there and the rest of your soteriology brought consistently into line, you would have reformation protestantism.
[/quote]
I said almost exactly this with quotes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church and you liked it remember. The above does not lead to divine monergism as you say. It is in fact Catholicism plain and true. We are participants and thus something is required of us to participate.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
<<< Your simply being dishonest here. You pronounced multiple times that we (Chris and I, or all Catholics) are on a strait shot to hell. >>>[/quote]I defy you right now to quote me even once ever saying such a thing. Find it. I dare ya. I will convert to Catholicism on the spot if you can. You are either the one being totally dishonest or you are under a spirit of strong delusion. I will never again respond to another thing you post until you either demonstrate this outrageous accusation by quoting my own words or you admit that you were wrong in making that statement. Show everybody where Tiribulus either said or implied “that you (Chris and Pat, or all Catholics) are on a strait shot to hell”. Let’s see it.

[/quote]

You did it in these three threads many times just to name a few:

http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/world_news_war/catholic_q_a?id=4262621&pageNo=0

http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/world_news_war/protestants_qa

http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/world_news_war/bible_contradictions

Are you really trying to tell me, that you didn’t say things like ‘if any Catholics make it to heaven it’s would only because of the extreme mercy of God’

Give me your address and I will send you a leather bound Catechism, and give you a local RCIA program in your area.

Let me make you cringe some more, not only am I Catholic, I teach it to teenagers too. Had a great talk on St. Mary tonight.

[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

Logically it’s not possible. I can argue freewill but not with the existence of foreknowledge. If I know you are going to go to the store and get strawberry ice cream, you simply could not do otherwise. My foreknowledge prevents you from doing that.
There are only a few ways to resolve the conflict.

  • Accept it’s a paradox and move on.
  • Take time out of the equation. Which makes sense to a point because choice is a metaphysical construct and metaphysical constructs do not exist in time, but we do. However, if you take time and stand it on it’s end, everything happens simultaneously. Perhaps God looks at it this way.
  • Or God could simply choose not to know. He decided to give us freewill, he can decide against having foreknowledge.

The third one actually solves the problem, but we simply don’t know. I not sure it’s knowable. God doesn’t give us much clue into internal workings of his mind.

The unmoved-mover was Aristotle’s concept, which is actually more interesting because he was scarcely aware of hebrews or monotheism. Kant took the ontological form and made a cosmological argument from the point of ontology (he would deny it). Hume was fabulous. He spent most of his time trying to debunk cosmology, while he failed at doing that, he did succeed in bringing a far greater and more detailed of causation than anybody before him.

P.S. Tirib, ^ this is how you make a counter arguement. Ironsmithy not only disagreed with me, but managed to make an actaul arguement and managed not to insult me at the same time…Learn from him[/quote]

Your knowledge of someone going to the store to get strawberry ice cream has nothing to do with them making the choice. They would do so regardless of whether you knew about it or not. Your knowledge is completely irrelevant.
[/quote]

If I had said foreknowledge, could you choose to do otherwise? If so, explain how?[/quote]

If you had foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

If you lacked foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

Hence, foreknowledge is irrelevant.
[/quote]

Not correct, foreknowledge constricts freewill. If I knew everything you would ever do in life before you did it or knew about it, you could not break the bonds.

If you had foreknowledge, you could not choose otherwise. If I lacked it, you could…Whether you would is not relevant, it’s could that matters.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/

[/quote]

Sorry, I’m coming into this late but I disagree with the above. The above is “trapped” in our concept of time. If you’re standing outside time, which would be necessary to have foreknowledge, then you are not affecting time - and your knowledge has no causative or restrictive effect upon the actor. In other words, you’re seeing another person’s life in a blink of an eye, and in more clear terms - you are seeing what they have already done, not are about to do. You are seeing beginning to end, so “foreknowledge” might be a bit of a misnomer. [/quote]

Correct. Outside of time, in which most of this actually occurs, there is no foreknowledge for there is no time.

[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]CappedAndPlanIt wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

The unmoved-mover[/quote]

[/quote]

The universe can’t move itself, we already established this. Even if the universe was eternal (which it is not it is only 13.5 billion years), it would have slowed down already.[/quote]

Given that we do not yet (and may never) understand the physics of the universe, we cannot state its age or whether it’s eternal or not. We cannot even state with certainty whether our perception of the universe is even correct and whether there is one, or many. [/quote]

The argument they were making is that matter and energy have always existed. Which may be true, but I was arguing that even if it is, we can only know the about it via the age of the universe which is somewhere between 13 - 15 billions years old. Hence we have no evidence beyond that. We have to rely on math and logic for the rest.

[quote]TheBodyGuard wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

Logically it’s not possible. I can argue freewill but not with the existence of foreknowledge. If I know you are going to go to the store and get strawberry ice cream, you simply could not do otherwise. My foreknowledge prevents you from doing that.
There are only a few ways to resolve the conflict.

  • Accept it’s a paradox and move on.
  • Take time out of the equation. Which makes sense to a point because choice is a metaphysical construct and metaphysical constructs do not exist in time, but we do. However, if you take time and stand it on it’s end, everything happens simultaneously. Perhaps God looks at it this way.
  • Or God could simply choose not to know. He decided to give us freewill, he can decide against having foreknowledge.

The third one actually solves the problem, but we simply don’t know. I not sure it’s knowable. God doesn’t give us much clue into internal workings of his mind.

The unmoved-mover was Aristotle’s concept, which is actually more interesting because he was scarcely aware of hebrews or monotheism. Kant took the ontological form and made a cosmological argument from the point of ontology (he would deny it). Hume was fabulous. He spent most of his time trying to debunk cosmology, while he failed at doing that, he did succeed in bringing a far greater and more detailed of causation than anybody before him.

P.S. Tirib, ^ this is how you make a counter arguement. Ironsmithy not only disagreed with me, but managed to make an actaul arguement and managed not to insult me at the same time…Learn from him[/quote]

Your knowledge of someone going to the store to get strawberry ice cream has nothing to do with them making the choice. They would do so regardless of whether you knew about it or not. Your knowledge is completely irrelevant.
[/quote]

If I had said foreknowledge, could you choose to do otherwise? If so, explain how?[/quote]

If you had foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

If you lacked foreknowledge, I wouldn’t choose otherwise.

Hence, foreknowledge is irrelevant.
[/quote]

Not correct, foreknowledge constricts freewill. If I knew everything you would ever do in life before you did it or knew about it, you could not break the bonds.

If you had foreknowledge, you could not choose otherwise. If I lacked it, you could…Whether you would is not relevant, it’s could that matters.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/freewill/

[/quote]

Your foreknowledge, or the lack of it, has nothing whatsoever to do with what I could or couldn’t do. Knowing that I’m going to make a certain choice doesn’t mean I wasn’t free to make that choice. I was perfectly free to make it, you just knew me so well that you understood what choice I would make. Step back for a second and think about it logically. How in the world could your foreknowledge impact my choice? It’s impossible.

If I’m omniscient, and I know for a fact that the sun will rise tomorrow, does my knowledge influence the rising of the sun? Obviously not. I simply know the sun is going to rise. Whether I know it or not, it is a fact that the sun will rise.

Don’t confuse omniscience with predestination. Knowing all things doesn’t imply responsibility for all things.

[/quote]

Look it up, it is a paradox, you cannot foreknow and have choice to do otherwise. It’s simply impossible.[/quote]

It’s not a paradox. It’s only a paradox in a human’s perception of time. [/quote]

The question is foreknowledge versus choice. Foreknowledge presupposes time and therefore if you can foreknow something, you cannot have a choice. That would be paradoxical.
I agree that time muddies the waters here. I am not totally sure we can eliminate it as a variable. Except that choices are metaphysical constructs and there is no time in metaphysics but we access it in the scope of time.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
<<< The difference between the division in our Church (which I include you in because you are baptized a Catholic) and the rest of the division through Christianity is that we don’t pretend it is okay. [/quote]We don’t pretend it’s okay. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< but to say your faith is true and my faith is true when they do not complete match is up is incorrect. There is one truth. One faith. >>>[/quote]See how much divsion you find here http://forums.catholic.com/ What an education that place has been. You may even find some my posts. (if you haven’t already) It’s also not okay that true believers sin all the time (which they do), but it IS a reality while we still dwell in this sinful flesh. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:Yes and we remember (or we participate) in that feast, as well as, Christ’s sacrifice from dawn til dusk all over the world.[/quote]Foot washing is not commanded and I was saying nothing further than we are willing to serve each other and our Lord despite our differences.
[/quote]

Uh, how many protestant sects are there? I hear 30,000 kicked around quite a bit. We are one unified church, but we’re not robots. We’re going to disagree, but we are still one. You’re one of 30,000. It takes balls to call us divided in that respect. I personally would be more worried if every catholic agreed all the time as that would indicate brain washing.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:
Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]Excerpt from Msgr. Charles Pope:
We have discussed before that an important principle of the Christian moral vision is to understand that it is essentially received, not achieved. Holiness is a work of God. The human being acting out the power of his flesh alone cannot keep, and surely not fulfill, the Law. The experience of God’s people in the Old Testament bears this out. True holiness (and not mere ethical rule keeping) is possible only by and through God’s grace.

In this sense we must understand the moral vision given by Jesus as a description rather than a mere prescription. Notice what the text says here: I have come not to abolish but to fulfill [the Law]. It is Jesus who fulfills the Law. And we, who are more and more in him, and He in us do what He does. It is His work.[/quote]OK, On it’s face and if I’m reading this guy correctly, this is quite a reformed statement. If your view of morality and holiness stopped right there and the rest of your soteriology brought consistently into line, you would have reformation protestantism.
[/quote]

Incorrect, it’s just more proof you do not know what the hell you are talking about with respect to Catholicism. You hate because you were told to, or because you believe lies about it. Considering the very few, utter false, made up examples of our evil one of the two things are aforementioned must be the case.

And considering you go attacking the faith in even catholic forums, me thinks the problem is you not us.
Shall you not ‘remove the plank from your eye’ before you try to ‘remove the spec’ from ours. I find this obsessive hatred a little creepy actually. Especially since you cannot even remotely answer challenges.

I am far from perfect, but my faith isn’t the problem.

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
You been up all night? I have, but I got hooked into working…Still working actually. I am stupid tired, but I can still make rational arguments.[/quote]

No, I just do the whole Opus Dei kind of morning, woke up at 5:15 and kneel facing the east, kiss the floor, and say “serviam” then do my morning offering and head to perpetual adoration and do my spiritual reading in front of the Holy Eucharist.[/quote]

And you bring your laptop?[/quote]

No it’s 8:40 here.[/quote]
Ha! The only way I see 5:15 AM is if I stay up all night, or I got up to take a wizz.

[quote]pat wrote:<<< You did it in these three threads many times just to name a few: >>>[/quote]Where are the quotes of me saying that I am pronouncing final judgement on you, Chris or all Catholics? You say I’ve constantly said this. Should be no trouble finding one example. Go ahead.
For now, I said to Chris on 11-18-10[quote]For the record, nobody goes to hell because they’re catholic. They go to hell because they’re not saved. There are people in my church who will go to hell.[/quote]http://tnation.T-Nation.com/free_online_forum/world_news_war/guaranteed_cure_for_racism;jsessionid=21B466BD1CD009BD91B9BF8A182F0258-he.hydra?pageNo=19 Once again. What does this, that I said last night mean?:

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
<<< The difference between the division in our Church (which I include you in because you are baptized a Catholic) and the rest of the division through Christianity is that we don’t pretend it is okay. [/quote]We don’t pretend it’s okay. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:<<< but to say your faith is true and my faith is true when they do not complete match is up is incorrect. There is one truth. One faith. >>>[/quote]See how much divsion you find here http://forums.catholic.com/ What an education that place has been. You may even find some my posts. (if you haven’t already) It’s also not okay that true believers sin all the time (which they do), but it IS a reality while we still dwell in this sinful flesh. [quote]Brother Chris wrote:Yes and we remember (or we participate) in that feast, as well as, Christ’s sacrifice from dawn til dusk all over the world.[/quote]Foot washing is not commanded and I was saying nothing further than we are willing to serve each other and our Lord despite our differences.
[/quote]

Yes, there is division, that doesn’t mean they are all right about everything, most likely you can blame it on bad catechesis, I am not into understanding why people don’t know their faith, I am more into learning the faith myself at this point. I suppose I can’t really say, but I’d bet a large wager towards the bad catechesis. People stop learning their faith.

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:
You been up all night? I have, but I got hooked into working…Still working actually. I am stupid tired, but I can still make rational arguments.[/quote]

No, I just do the whole Opus Dei kind of morning, woke up at 5:15 and kneel facing the east, kiss the floor, and say “serviam” then do my morning offering and head to perpetual adoration and do my spiritual reading in front of the Holy Eucharist.[/quote]

And you bring your laptop?[/quote]

No it’s 8:40 here.[/quote]
Ha! The only way I see 5:15 AM is if I stay up all night, or I got up to take a wizz.
[/quote]

Yeah, insomniac comes with the territory of ballooning up 70 lbs, I think I developed sleep apnea as well.

[quote]Tiribulus wrote:

[/quote]

“by the grace of God.” Every time a Catholic says anything about works or faith, just put the quote somewhere in his sentence when you read it. We have a different view of our relationship (I am presuming) so every time we say, faith and works it is presumed to be accompanied by “by the grace of God.” Everything is by the grace of God. We are alive because of the grace of God. But it gets tiring writing by the grace of God, and we figure people understand what we’re talking about. However, we still have the free will to make the choice to do those works (which I presume you do not believe), but our strength comes by the grace of God. I’m going to put “by the grace of God” in everything from now on and it will be a lot and repetitive.

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
<<< Yes, there is division, >>>[/quote]Oh indeed there is and not just among the uncatechized laity. I know you know that too. I’m not even faulting Rome for that. It’s impossible that it could be otherwise in this life even if she WERE the one true most holy apostolic church. The trouble I have is with this demonstrably false claim of universal oneness.

Lemme me ask you this. Are there any people of the over one billion Catholics in this world who would go to hell if they either died this minute or if Jesus returned right now? I already know the answer to this because you’ve said, but are there any non Catholics who would go to heaven? I’m simply asking honest questions.

Also, to be clear, I have maybe 150 posts or something in those Catholic forums and there was exactly one where I even mentioned your church, though that one was not flattering. I did not go there on the attack. That is your house and it would not speak well of the gospel I preach if I showed up there blasting Rome. I went there looking for info and got drawn in by the story of a man calling himself Tucdoc who’s family was/is being ripped apart (long story, you can find it if you look). He has gotten advice that ranged from utterly useless to flat down unholy and idiotic from his alleged brethren over there. (Some pretty good too)

He’s another one. I have cried out to the Lord on behalf of this man and his family until it hurt. You guys think us Westminster folks are hard hearted monsters. You couldn’t possibly be more wrong.

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
Pat, you can’t logically argue that everything must be caused on one hand, only to violate that very principle by stating that an uncaused cause exists. The very idea of an uncaused cause contradicts the argument that everything has a cause. Therefore, it is a logically false argument.

Now, if you want to argue that almost everything has a cause that’s fine. But then you must admit that you don’t know what has a cause and what doesn’t. As I’ve argued, it’s perfectly possible that matter and energy have always existed. You can’t prove they have a cause. In fact, the idea that something can be created out of nothing violates everything we know about the laws of conservation.[/quote]

We’re going in circles. I can logically argue the case of the Uncaused-causer because it must necessarily be true for the argument to work. If you look at the function of regression, you either end up with something or nothing, nothing violates logic, infinite regress is fallacious, there is one one answer. It’s very much like algebra in the sense that you may have unknown variables, but the answer is still true. for instance:
(w + 6)3 = 3w + 18 ← We don’t what what ‘w’ is, but this answer is correct and true.

I would argue that while it may appear to violate what we know about the laws of conservation, we don’t actually know everything about conservation.[/quote]

But Pat, your uncaused cause violates logic because it has no cause itself. Your uncaused cause is fallacious because it requires an infinite regress. You’re claiming this uncaused cause had no beginning, but insist it’s impossible for matter and energy to have had no beginning. I’m just asking for the same logical standards to be applied, whether talking about god or about matter and energy. You can’t insist matter and energy had a beginning, while claiming god had no beginning. If one theory is possible, so is the other.[/quote]

Casual relationships with infinite regression begs the question, but what moved that? Something would have to be the first mover that itself didn’t need to be moved.[/quote]

Why couldn’t that something be matter and energy?[/quote]
Can you make an argument for matter /energy being both causal and uncaused? [/quote]

Sure, but my position doesn’t require that to be true.

For example, what if some matter and energy exist in a timeless state? We’ve already talked about how that may be the case for light. And what if some matter and energy are time bound? You therefore have matter and energy that is both caused and uncaused. I wonder if it’s possible to move from one state to the other. If you accelerate matter enough, would it enter a timeless state?[/quote]

Time is a function of matter and energy, but matter and energy are governed by laws and necessarily bound to them. Therefore, already the dependency removes it’s ability to ‘uncaused’. With out the laws and principles M & E function by, they cease being M & E.

I am probably wasting my time, but it’s all in here:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/
[/quote]

You’ve said several times that you believe natural laws can change, or that they can operate differently under different conditions. For example, you support the laws of conservation, but believe that matter and energy can be created from nothing, or can be destroyed in black holes. You don’t believe these laws are the same in a timeless condition than in a timebound condition. Given that, why not acknowledge the possibility that matter and energy can exist independently of time?

Didn’t you say a while back that you believe light exists independently of time? Therefore, it’s certainly possible that energy has always existed, and energy is just a different form of matter.

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:

[quote]pat wrote:

[quote]forlife wrote:
Pat, you can’t logically argue that everything must be caused on one hand, only to violate that very principle by stating that an uncaused cause exists. The very idea of an uncaused cause contradicts the argument that everything has a cause. Therefore, it is a logically false argument.

Now, if you want to argue that almost everything has a cause that’s fine. But then you must admit that you don’t know what has a cause and what doesn’t. As I’ve argued, it’s perfectly possible that matter and energy have always existed. You can’t prove they have a cause. In fact, the idea that something can be created out of nothing violates everything we know about the laws of conservation.[/quote]

We’re going in circles. I can logically argue the case of the Uncaused-causer because it must necessarily be true for the argument to work. If you look at the function of regression, you either end up with something or nothing, nothing violates logic, infinite regress is fallacious, there is one one answer. It’s very much like algebra in the sense that you may have unknown variables, but the answer is still true. for instance:
(w + 6)3 = 3w + 18 ← We don’t what what ‘w’ is, but this answer is correct and true.

I would argue that while it may appear to violate what we know about the laws of conservation, we don’t actually know everything about conservation.[/quote]

But Pat, your uncaused cause violates logic because it has no cause itself. Your uncaused cause is fallacious because it requires an infinite regress. You’re claiming this uncaused cause had no beginning, but insist it’s impossible for matter and energy to have had no beginning. I’m just asking for the same logical standards to be applied, whether talking about god or about matter and energy. You can’t insist matter and energy had a beginning, while claiming god had no beginning. If one theory is possible, so is the other.[/quote]

Casual relationships with infinite regression begs the question, but what moved that? Something would have to be the first mover that itself didn’t need to be moved.[/quote]

Why couldn’t that something be matter and energy?[/quote]

Perhaps it is, but have you seen matter move on it’s own power without something else moving it?[/quote]

Yes, I saw the sun rise this morning based on nothing more than natural laws… Again, the natural laws of the universe don’t require intelligence or intent to move matter.[/quote]

Natural laws? Didn’t know the sun was moved by moral laws. :wink:

I presume you mean laws of nature, well that begs the question what moves laws of nature? Something still tends to stay still.[/quote]

Where’d the laws come from and what drives them? I am insufferable.[/quote]

Not insufferable at all, you’re just a truth seeker like me :slight_smile:

I would argue that the laws of nature have always existed, since nature has always existed. If you have matter and energy, that matter and energy has qualities, and our description of those qualities is what we call the laws of nature.
[/quote]

Correct, but that does not remove their contingency. If you pull apart the laws, they cease being the same law. The laws are based on something…
All metaphysical obejects are eternal. They never change and they never age or move.[/quote]

Or, they reflect an underlying universal law that acts differently depending on the circumstances, like the general theory of relativity. Why don’t quantum mechanics operate at our level of granularity? It’s not like quantum laws cease to operate, but they only observably apply in certain extreme conditions.

That doesn’t mean these laws don’t exist, nor does it imply any actual intelligence or intent. Gravity isn’t intelligent; it’s simply an expression of how objects naturally interact with one another.