A QUESTION FOR ATHEISTS

[RustyWalker]

No. The inflation of the universe began 13.8 billion years ago, but energy existed and nothing currently suggests it "came into being" or "was caused" by anything and we don't know any other conditions that may - or may not - have been present. Physics isn't currently able to work that out.
Cosmologists are exploring quantum explanations to see if they might have spontaneously brought the universe into being, but it's early days for that research.

[otto_tomo]

These people be reading posts from facebook and be thinkin they Steven Hawkins now

[arcticpangolin]

First off, science doesn’t say that the universe had a beginning. This is highly disputed with many scientists, if not most, holding to a form of eternal universe model. Second when hawking talked about the earliest points of existence he made it abundantly clear he doesn’t think this could have been caused by something, he in fact affirms a form of eternal universe. This can be seen through him likening the question about “before the universe” to “north of the north pole.” This shows he holds to the position that there was no time before the universe, that the universe always existed, at all times. Thirdly, logic doesn’t tell us that everything which began to exist has an explanation/cause. This is the claim of the kalam and is, almost exclusively, merely claimed and never substantiated. And then you throw on more traits and more claims you can’t back up.

The kalam isn’t a good argument for god. I’ve only talked about some of its many failings. I think it’s only as popular as it is because people think WLC is a great thinker and debater and haven’t really put that much effort into thinking about his horrible arguments. But can’t expect much from someone who reduces their epistemological standards for god and has admitted to doing so and then lied about this admission to save face.

[maxkordon]

Bro got his degree from “I don’t know what I’m talking about” university lmao

[HeyHeyHarmonicaLuke]

Hello! Friendly atheist here.
1) That the universe began to exist is one speculative pre-big bang hypothesis among many. It's beyond the evidence and not part of the well supported big bang theory.
2) Logic does not tell us that anything which began to exist has a cause, that's a non sequitur.
3) If the universe had a cause, that doesn't mean it was spaceless and timeless. Consider how a material TV is built in a material factory. The cause of something doesn't need to lack all the properties of that thing. If you aren't convinced yet, I have an analogy. Space is something within the universe, so it cannot exist outside the universe and the cause was non-spatial. Right? Okay, well according to that reasoning, intelligence is something within the universe, so it cannot exist outside the universe and the cause was non-intelligent.

[MrGeorgewf]

Where did God come from?
He always was?
Well we say the universe always was.

[JustaJackalope]

I saw a video, in said video a person talked about basically every subject, technology, scnience, and math. At the end he connected every single one to theology. He proved that everything is connected to God.

[doubriewotsit]

Anyone convinced by the Kalam, my question is what does it mean to begin to exist and does the following not better fit reality…
P1: Everything that begins to exist is a rearrangement of pre-existing matter and energy.
P2: The universe began to exist
C: Therefore the universe is a rearrangement of pre-existing matter and energy.

[HeyHeyHarmonicaLuke]

Universe[1] = all of space and time (and it's contents).
Universe[2] = Only the space and time (and it's contents) _that is connected to us._

If there's a multiverse, the first definition would refer to the whole thing, but the second definition would only refer to our local universe.

For your first premise, Big Bang astrophysicists are only speaking about the local universe having a beginning, universe[2]. However by the time you get to your conclusion, you need them to have been much grander statements about all of space and time, universe[1]. _That's_ what would make the cause of 'the universe' spaceless and timeless.

This makes the argument logically invalid, and one must equivocate between these two senses of 'universe' in order to make it seem valid.

[lucyferos]

Atheist here. "Has a beginning" and "began to exist" are actually completely different. There is a first point in time, but that doesn't mean that time itself began to exist. I think the problem is that you're thinking of time as a causality rather than a dimension, but even then you can't cause causality since causes require causality to already exist.

[kundo]

Im not atheist or religious but i think thes a creator but not the one religion talks about, like i dont believe in Jesus, Mohammad or any religious figure but i still believe there's a crestor.

[forestranger]

Modern science doesn't say that universe had a beginning, it just ain't.

[Marlered]

We describe it as something we don’t know and that we don’t need to get quick with answers without factual evidence

[nantsingonyama-qox]

If God can exist without a creator, then we can believe the inverse exists without a creator.

[zut_]

when two atoms love eachother very much they run into eachother at extremely fast speeds and a big explosion happens and a univers gets made

[R_o_o_k_i_n_g_t_o_n]

2 things to your first question... firstly, atheism is not a religion or monolith or anything even close to being akin to 'a group of people who share a set of beliefs' but instead is more a statement about a persons mental state with that being their opinion on the question of 'are you convinced by any of the god claims that have been presented to you as of yet?' with the answer being no or in other words, not necessarily making the claim to KNOW there are no gods but simply a statement that they have yet to be convinced there are any. secondly, while we are not a monolith, many do accept a lot of similar things because guess what, when you dont have a religion from thousands of years ago telling you to believe outdated science or telling you modern science is wrong, your free to follow the evidence where it ACTUALLY leads and with that, many just follow the evidence and come to similar conclusions with i for example, accept the scientific concensus.

beyond that, the big bang which you are likely refering to IS NOT the beginning of the universe but is acutally just the furthers back point in time we can study as in, our understanding of physics breaks down at the point of the big bang because out current model of physics only works well on the size of the LARGE things and not the VERY SMALL things which is instead the realm of quantum physics which we need to understand better to investigate more.

[brettguy]

"Logic tells us that anything that began to exist had to have a cause".

By the phrase "logic tell us", does that mean that you have a logical argument that concludes this?

If so, what specifically is this logical argument?

[dominiccoffey]

Though you are right and there is no “accepted” scientific theory about what caused the beginning, there are still theories. Also, what created God? Adding an extra step is completely illogical. If you say god didn’t need to be created I could just as easily say the universe didn’t need to be created 😂. There is no actual reason to add a god, it just makes things even more complicated. Humans naturally create religion to counter their immense fear of death.

[rayvela]

Spaceless and timeless. In other words, it doesn't exist anywhere or any time.

[GrFullyDead]

This is a common misconception about the beginning out our universe because our brains aren’t good at thinking in these grand ways. The Big Bang describes the universe expanding out of a singularity, however we don’t actually know what or if there was anything before that, just that everything in the universe that we see now, was once in that singularity. Since it’s the beginning of the expansion of time and space, there might not had been a time before that. So in essence, the universe could have actually been eternal. We don’t have any positive data for that yet though, so often don’t posit that as an answer we have for the beginning of the universe. All you’ve done is make a special pleading fallacy as to why your god doesn’t have to follow the rules you set up. You’ve also described your god as; spaceless, timeless, and immaterial, which is pretty much the definition of something that doesn’t exist. We don’t know if there even is an outside to our universe, so to assume that the universe had a cause, and assume that there is an outside of our universe for this cause to inhabit, then assume that it’s a sentient deity, then assume it’s your specific deity from your specific sect of your specific religion, is a completely unfounded idea which you haven’t demonstrated at all thus far.