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Author | Topic: Hawking Comes Clean | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Stile Member Posts: 4295 From: Ontario, Canada Joined: |
''Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.''
-Stephen Hawking "THE Big Bang was the result of the inevitable laws of physics and did not need God to spark the creation of the universe, Stephen Hawking has concluded."-Article Sounds to me like Mr. Hawking has grown tired of trying to stay politically correct and pander to the religious in his public views on the beginnings of the universe. This is all from his new book "The Grand Design". Truth on his views?Or simply advertising propaganda? What do you think? I think that, sure, it's just his say-so. But, when that "some guy" is, arguably, the smartest guy on the planet... it tends to carry a little weight
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Hyroglyphx Inactive Member |
First Cause arguments seem pointless because it's an infinite loop of semantics and where no evidence from either side can be given. The net result is a philosophical argument with smatterings of science.
"Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it" -- Thomas Paine
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jar Member (Idle past 394 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
It's pretty much what George Lematre wrote to the Pope back in the late 1920s.
Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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nwr Member Posts: 6408 From: Geneva, Illinois Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
Hyro writes:
I completely agree. First Cause arguments seem pointless because it's an infinite loop of semantics and where no evidence from either side can be given. This kind of argument is no more convincing when it comes from Hawking than when it comes from a religious apologist. Jesus was a liberal hippie
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Rahvin Member Posts: 4032 Joined: Member Rating: 9.2 |
''Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.'' -Stephen Hawking "THE Big Bang was the result of the inevitable laws of physics and did not need God to spark the creation of the universe, Stephen Hawking has concluded."-Article Sounds to me like Mr. Hawking has grown tired of trying to stay politically correct and pander to the religious in his public views on the beginnings of the universe. This is all from his new book "The Grand Design". Truth on his views?Or simply advertising propaganda? What do you think? I think that, sure, it's just his say-so. But, when that "some guy" is, arguably, the smartest guy on the planet... it tends to carry a little weight I think that, as usual, it's just a matter of Occam's Razor. If an unfalsified model for the existence of the Universe exists without including a god, simple probability dictates that it is more likely that the Universe formed without divine intervention. If physics research does in fact show a path consistent with available evidence through which the Universe is the result of natural processes, there's simply no need to include a god-term. It doesn't prove that no gods exist. But all things being equal, A is always more likely than A AND B. He's being more clear now because his words, like those of Einstein and any number of physicists and other scientists, have ever been taken out of their intended context.
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Taq Member Posts: 9972 Joined: Member Rating: 5.5
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Truth on his views? Or simply advertising propaganda? What do you think? As an atheist I have no problem with saying that Stephen is going overboard. I love the guy, but he is stating certainties that are at best speculations. Stevey would be much better of by discussing human curiousity. We WANT to know how universes come about. If we decide to settle on an answer just because it makes us comfortable then we have thrown human curiosity out the window. What we have to do is assume that we can find the answer, and the only tool we have for determing when we have found the right answer is science. If the answer to how universes are created is never found because it was a supernatural act then so what. The very journey of trying to find that answer was a very enjoyable and worthwhile effort. Just think of how little we would now know if Hubble (or anyone after him) never reported his findings on galactic redshift.
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Granny Magda Member Posts: 2462 From: UK Joined: Member Rating: 4.0 |
Hi jar,
It's pretty much what Laplace said to Napoleon! Mutate and Survive
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jar Member (Idle past 394 days) Posts: 34026 From: Texas!! Joined: |
Yup.
The only significant difference I would mention is of course Lematre's profession. Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!
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cavediver Member (Idle past 3643 days) Posts: 4129 From: UK Joined:
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This kind of argument is no more convincing when it comes from Hawking than when it comes from a religious apologist. Huh? We are talking of the guy who first (with Jim Hartle) managed to produce a semi-realistic model of a universe that is temporally finite yet without first cause. Hawking is stating the point that I have tried to explain countless times here that the Big Bang is not a point that is caused, not a point of creation. It will always leave the question of "why this and not something else", but gets us away from the need to think causally about existence. Causality is an internal part of existence, not something to which existence is tied. We have models extrapolated from the most successful theories known to mankind. Their suggestions are not guaranteed to be correct, but they are infinitely more convincing than religious apologetics.
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cavediver Member (Idle past 3643 days) Posts: 4129 From: UK Joined: |
I love the guy, but he is stating certainties that are at best speculations. What? The "speculation" that physics suggests that the Universe exists independent of any divine prime mover? I spent 15 years as a Christian who regarded God as not necessary to the Universe
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nwr Member Posts: 6408 From: Geneva, Illinois Joined: Member Rating: 5.1 |
He is dabbling in metaphysics, but there is no basis for reaching any metaphysical conclusions.
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Taq Member Posts: 9972 Joined: Member Rating: 5.5
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quote: "THE Big Bang was the result of the inevitable laws of physics and did not need God to spark the creation of the universe, Stephen Hawking has concluded." Althought this quote is second hand, I think it more than fair to point out that we don't even know what these inevitable laws are. I think we can both agree that supersymmetry is probably right, but I don't think we can state this with certainty. We know even less about how universes come about than we do about how universes develop in those very early time periods such as the era that witnessed supersymmetry (possibly). While I would wholeheartedly agree that we have no reason to think that a deity was involved I also disagree with stating that we are certain that no deity was involved.
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Theodoric Member Posts: 9076 From: Northwest, WI, USA Joined: Member Rating: 3.7 |
While I would wholeheartedly agree that we have no reason to think that a deity was involved I also disagree with stating that we are certain that no deity was involved. Where does the quote say that?
quote: You seem to be reading something into it that is not there.
quote: I am not sure what Hawking is actually saying but the provided quote does not say at all that there was definitely no deity involved. Al it is saying is that no deity was necessary. Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts
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Aware Wolf Member (Idle past 1419 days) Posts: 156 From: New Hampshire, USA Joined: |
Rahvin writes: But all things being equal, A is always more likely than A AND B. This doesn't seem to be quite right. Or maybe it misses the point. A is given (the universe). Then, the question is: which is more likely: B or not B (God). I don't think simple probability can tell us that A AND NOT B is more likely than A AND B, without knowing something about B. "In short, [he] was one of those people with lots of intelligence and no brains, and everyone knew it except those who soon found it out." - Joseph Heller, Catch-22
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cavediver Member (Idle past 3643 days) Posts: 4129 From: UK Joined: |
He is dabbling in metaphysics The causal structure of space-time in semi-classical quantum gravity is not "metaphysics". If I observe that an applied force of 10N accelerates a mass of 1kg at 10ms-2, then I think I can state, without being accused of involving metaphysics, that I have no need for a "god" to explain this observation, nor indeed anything else outside Newtonian mechanics.
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