Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 64 (9164 total)
4 online now:
Newest Member: ChatGPT
Post Volume: Total: 916,865 Year: 4,122/9,624 Month: 993/974 Week: 320/286 Day: 41/40 Hour: 7/6


EvC Forum ⇒ Side Orders ⇒ Coffee House ⇒

Hawking Comes Clean

Thread ▼ Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Hawking Comes Clean
Dr Jack
Member
Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
Member Rating: 8.3

Normal Thread Display
Message 45 of 148 (579978)
09-07-2010 6:52 AM 		Reply to: Message 40 by kbertsche
09-05-2010 10:19 PM

God is not simple, and explains nothing
Presumably, Hawking's metaphysical perspective would see the "laws of physics" as some sort of "inevitable," self-generating, self-sustaining, perhaps eternal, principles of the universe. The biblical perspective would see them as something metaphysically much simpler; contingent minute-by-minute on God, their consistency a direct consequence of God's consistent character.
​
(emphasis mine)
​
In what possible sense is supposing a superbeing exists behind the scenes proding the universe to make it work metaphysically simpler than supposing the mechanistic laws of the universe exist?
This message is a reply to:
 Message 40 by kbertsche, posted 09-05-2010 10:19 PM kbertsche has replied
Replies to this message:
 Message 47 by Annafan, posted 09-07-2010 9:04 AM Dr Jack has not replied
 Message 54 by kbertsche, posted 09-07-2010 9:27 PM Dr Jack has replied
  
Dr Jack
Member
Posts: 3514
From: Immigrant in the land of Deutsch
Joined: 07-14-2003
Member Rating: 8.3

Normal Thread Display
Message 134 of 148 (580516)
09-09-2010 3:00 PM 		Reply to: Message 54 by kbertsche
09-07-2010 9:27 PM

Re: Laws of physics: Two perspectives
But that's not what I claimed. I claimed that the laws of physics are metaphysically simpler in a biblical perspective than in an atheistic perspective.
​
That's rather cheating, don't you think? Aren't you essentially arguing that if we ignore this massive, complex, unproven thing that what's less is simpler? Isn't that rather like claiming that less people die of breast cancer than testicular cancer if you ignore all those women?
​
Consider an automobile. Why postulate a human designer and builder, which is much more complex than the automobile itself? Isn't it simpler to postulate that the automobile was self-caused?
​
Well, gosh, might it be because we know about automobiles and know about how they are made, and can go look at the factories and talk to the designers?
​
The biblical, theistic picture of the universe is not simply the atheistic picture with God added to the picture.
​
No, it isn't, it something massively less plausible.
This message is a reply to:
 Message 54 by kbertsche, posted 09-07-2010 9:27 PM kbertsche has seen this message but not replied
  
Date format: mm-dd-yyyy
Timezone: ET (US)
  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024