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PostPosted: Sat Nov 23, 2002 3:09 pm 
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On 2002-11-23 13:56, The Goldstandard wrote:
Evil is something that can only be ascribed to humans. You cannot call a rock evil or a deer evil, so evil started when humans started to exist. As for knowledge about this stuff not being possible due to our lack of omnicience, that is absurd. We can infer from what we do see what we think might have happened, it is just more difficult that way.

I do not agree with the big bang theory because I do not believe that something can come from nothing. It is irrational and scientists still haven't realized that yet. I think the only rational explanation for the universes existence is that the universe never had to be created and always existed.

It is a far less absurd explanation than the others.


Dear god, please don't tell me you're in favor of the steady-state model. Those people are only slightly better than creationists.

The big bang has at least as much proof behind it as evolution. The universe is expanding right now. It makes sense that if it's getting larger and larger by the day, the further we go into the past the more compact it would have been. Go far enough into the past and the entire universe is squeezed into an area smaller than a proton.

Also, you don't necessarily have to believe that matter was created from nothing. There are theories out there that say that the universe existed before the big bang, collapsed in on itself, and then expanded again. Not that I personally believe those theories, but they're not totally improbable (unlike creationism and steady-state).

Also, you're assuming that the law of conservation of matter is a fundamental law of the universe. It isn't. As Pyro explained somewhere in these forums, not only can matter be converted to energy, but, on a subatomic level, particles are coming into and passing out of existence all the time. Holding the Law of Conservation of Mass as an unshakable tenet of faith is almost as absurd as believing the Bible is literally true.


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PostPosted: Sat Nov 23, 2002 9:02 pm 
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Well, if you think that I believe that the universe always existed in the <i>same</i> state then you are mistaken. All I said is that I think the universe always existed, but since apparently I wasn't clear enough let me add that I think it changes state over time. I know this part of the universe is expanding, I just don't believe that it was a big explosion of matter from nothing.

I have heard of that theory about the universe expanding and contracting on itself, but that depends on whether or not there is enough matter to counteract the expansion and pull the universe back in on itself again. I don't think the scientists have found evidence that there is enough matter, so that is doubtful to me. All I am asking is what makes you think that the universe absolutely <i>had</i> to be created in the first place? Isn't that playing into the hands of the creationists, by conceding to them half their argument already that the universe had to be created? If you do that the argument turns into a debate over whether god made the universe or if the universe just appeared for no reason at all. Both of those ideas are equally dubious to me.


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PostPosted: Sat Nov 23, 2002 11:57 pm 
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On 2002-11-23 20:02, The Goldstandard wrote:
All I am asking is what makes you think that the universe absolutely <i>had</i> to be created in the first place?


Science.


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PostPosted: Sun Nov 24, 2002 12:14 pm 
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I'm actually of the opinion that all worlds are simulations of varying degrees of detail. It's impossible for a denizen of the simulation to truly understand the simulation himself, hence there is no way to understand where the universe came from, or the meaning of life, or anything. Is the world just an elaborate game? Is there some jackass 12-year old boy watching the mayhem and pointing and laughing?

And you really can't prove or disprove anything using science, you can only establish relationships. Just blankly stating "science" is not good enough to disprove the steady state model. I BELIEVE that the universe was created at some point, but I don't have the reasons of how or why yet. The theory of evolution is just that - a theory. So is the big bang theory. We don't have sufficient resources to prove them yet, if ever. You can attempt to prove steady-state wrong by giving data that conflicts with what it predicts, but it's impossible to "prove" anything using science, or indeed, the scientific method. We cannot simply say that steady-state theory is false because of science - we must use the scientific method to "disprove" it.

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PostPosted: Sun Nov 24, 2002 3:31 pm 
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On 2002-11-24 11:14, veritron wrote:
I'm actually of the opinion that all worlds are simulations of varying degrees of detail. It's impossible for a denizen of the simulation to truly understand the simulation himself, hence there is no way to understand where the universe came from, or the meaning of life, or anything. Is the world just an elaborate game? Is there some jackass 12-year old boy watching the mayhem and pointing and laughing?


Or perhaps this is just a piece of online fiction controlled by a bunch of stupid fanboys who like to call themselves "watchers"? (Anyone who doesn't get what I just said: read the Road Trip thread in the RP section.)

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And you really can't prove or disprove anything using science, you can only establish relationships. Just blankly stating "science" is not good enough to disprove the steady state model. I BELIEVE that the universe was created at some point, but I don't have the reasons of how or why yet. The theory of evolution is just that - a theory. So is the big bang theory. We don't have sufficient resources to prove them yet, if ever. You can attempt to prove steady-state wrong by giving data that conflicts with what it predicts, but it's impossible to "prove" anything using science, or indeed, the scientific method. We cannot simply say that steady-state theory is false because of science - we must use the scientific method to "disprove" it.


I hate it when people (usually creationists) say "but evolution is only a THEORY!" Evolution is a theory, the big bang is a theory, the idea that we're made of atoms is a theory, the idea that the Earth is round is a theory. See, in scientific terms (as opposed to popular usage), "theory" doesn't mean "an unestablished idea". It actually means quite the opposite - a well-established idea, one that is generally backed up by a good amount of empirical evidence.

Sure, theories are still not absolutely proven and definite, but when you get right down to it nothing is. We know absolutely nothing for certain about anything. After all, we're getting all our information through our senses, which for all we know could be dead wrong. You can't prove anything for certain. However, there are some things that educated people accept as given since (for now at least) they're by far the best explanations we have. This includes atomic theory, Newton's laws, the big bang, and evolution.

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<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: IcyMonkey on 2002-11-24 14:34 ]</font>


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PostPosted: Sun Nov 24, 2002 4:58 pm 
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I agree, I was just being anal.

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PostPosted: Sun Nov 24, 2002 5:23 pm 
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Big Bang is not a theory in that sense of the word, Icy.

Problems arise with it (in the theoretical physics of it) in which that at some point you must compress and infinite amount of matter into an infinitely small space. The BB theory is not mathematically consistant in that sense.

BB theory is just the best we have. Strings/Quantum theory draws (as Kaku put it) 'a screen of modesty' around the time of the big bang that make it so that we don't really have to bother with those inifinities. But the theory in its entiredy is not all that widely accepted. Just too many mathematical holes.


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PostPosted: Tue Dec 10, 2002 2:38 am 
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Sorry to revive a slightly dead hole, but back to what Icy said about subatomic particles popping in and out of existence randomly, I believe one of the current BB theories is that those particles sometimes create Big-Bang effects. No, I don't know the science behind it, so don't ask.
Additionally, this will probably be one of those things where people in the future will look back at us as Creationists, because we haven't yet disproven it (abiogenesis for 4000 years, anyone?). And given the exponentially excellerated progress we are experiencing in science, it's likely that, unlike abiogenesis, the Big Bang theory will be proven within our lifetimes.

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PostPosted: Thu Dec 12, 2002 1:54 am 
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Yes, that's called vacuum genesis. I wrote a couple posts about it in one of the other religious bickering threads.

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