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Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

Polymath257

Think & Care
Staff member
Premium Member
Yeah, you are doing the magical trick of doing definitions and treating them like facts.
No, I am pointing out important differences in the models of the singularities at the BB and for BHs.
The problem of a definition is that we can do cognitive gymnastics in our brains about those, but that doesn't turn the definition into a fact.finition
If that was the case, there would be a God. It is simple; the definition of God is the creator of the universe would mean that it is a fact, that God is the creator of the universe.
Now if you define time as X, it doesn't mean that it is a fact. It means you have defined as X and as long as you can't observe X, X is not a fact.
Whether BH exist or not is a matter of observation. What it means to be a BH is a mater of definition.
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
The conclusion based on the following remains that there is absolutely no evidence of a definable beginning of our universe or our physical existence., and it remains a possibility that our physical existence is eternal, infinite or simply in the nothingness of a Quantum existence.. We cannot conclude that our universe 'began as a singularity.
We have not yet arrived at any conclusion. Why are you talking about that? Yeah, one of the two things, eternal or out of absolute nothing. In both cases, we need to find out why even if it take a century or ten. Singularity is naming something that we do not know. Who has arrived at a conclusion?
 

URAVIP2ME

Veteran Member
.............. I'm curious as to what theists would expect to see in a godless universe, and how a godless universe would differ from one in which a god existed. What would you expect this universe to look like if no gods existed, and how would that be different from the current universe?
To me a god-less universe would Not exist because I believe the universe had a beginning creation start.
The current universe will keep on existing.
Without a resurrection hope there would be No point to anything.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
We have not yet arrived at any conclusion. Why are you talking about that? Yeah, one of the two things, eternal or out of absolute nothing. In both cases, we need to find out why even if it take a century or ten. Singularity is naming something that we do not know. Who has arrived at a conclusion?
The scientists, not I, in physics and cosmology describe the singularity as a point of infinite density theoretically described as being in Black Holes including the theoretical singularity that expanded to form our universe as a result of the Pentose-Hawking Theorem.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
I do not know. It could even be 'absolute nothing'. :D

The problem of necessary evidence has been brought up several times before as what some stated as required in one way or another it necessary as what we 'see' including directly detect in various ways. In the science of 'singularities' either inside our universe, outside as in a multiverse, or the singularity that our universe expanded from there is no direct objective evidence as to what we see or detect. The cutting edge of physics and cosmology at present is going beyond the traditional concept of evidence. Nonetheless the science and math of Penrose and Hawking concerning their theorem is sound including predictive properties of Black Holes.

Hawking argues for the Penrose-Hawking Theorem in the following:


Source: Physicists Debate Hawking’s Idea That the Universe Had No Beginning | Quanta Magazine


Physicists Debate Hawking’s Idea That the Universe Had No Beginning

A recent challenge to Stephen Hawking’s biggest idea — about how the universe might have come from nothing — has cosmologists choosing sides.

Mike Zeng for Quanta Maga
ByNatalie Wolchover
Senior Editor



June 6, 2019

In 1981, many of the world’s leading cosmologists gathered at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, a vestige of the coupled lineages of science and theology located in an elegant villa in the gardens of the Vatican. Stephen Hawking chose the august setting to present what he would later regard as his most important idea: a proposal about how the universe could have arisen from nothing.

Before Hawking’s talk, all cosmological origin stories, scientific or theological, had invited the rejoinder, “What happened before that?” The Big Bang theory, for instance — pioneered 50 years before Hawking’s lecture by the Belgian physicist and Catholic priest Georges Lemaître, who later served as president of the Vatican’s academy of sciences — rewinds the expansion of the universe back to a hot, dense bundle of energy. But where did the initial energy come from?

The Big Bang theory had other problems. Physicists understood that an expanding bundle of energy would grow into a crumpled mess rather than the huge, smooth cosmos that modern astronomers observe. In 1980, the year before Hawking’s talk, the cosmologist Alan Guth realized that the Big Bang’s problems could be fixed with an add-on: an initial, exponential growth spurt known as cosmic inflation, which would have rendered the universe huge, smooth and flat before gravity had a chance to wreck it. Inflation quickly became the leading theory of our cosmic origins. Yet the issue of initial conditions remained: What was the source of the minuscule patch that allegedly ballooned into our cosmos, and of the potential energy that inflated it?
Asking what came before the Big Bang … would be like asking what lies south of the South Pole.

Stephen Hawking

Hawking, in his brilliance, saw a way to end the interminable groping backward in time: He proposed that there’s no end, or beginning, at all. According to the record of the Vatican conference, the Cambridge physicist, then 39 and still able to speak with his own voice, told the crowd, “There ought to be something very special about the boundary conditions of the universe, and what can be more special than the condition that there is no boundary?”

The “no-boundary proposal,” which Hawking and his frequent collaborator, James Hartle, fully formulated in a 1983 paper, envisions the cosmos having the shape of a shuttlecock. Just as a shuttlecock has a diameter of zero at its bottommost point and gradually widens on the way up, the universe, according to the no-boundary proposal, smoothly expanded from a point of zero size. Hartle and Hawking derived a formula describing the whole shuttlecock — the so-called “wave function of the universe” that encompasses the entire past, present and future at once — making moot all contemplation of seeds of creation, a creator, or any transition from a time before.

“Asking what came before the Big Bang is meaningless, according to the no-boundary proposal, because there is no notion of time available to refer to,” Hawking said in another lecture at the Pontifical Academy in 2016, a year and a half before his death. “It would be like asking what lies south of the South Pole.”
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
To me a god-less universe would Not exist because I believe the universe had a beginning creation start.
The current universe will keep on existing.
Without a resurrection hope there would be No point to anything.

The problem here is the perspective of the scriptures of ancient tribal religions that lacked science. They described our universe and its origins from that perspective. There is simply no evidence for the Biblical view of the nature and origin of our universe including the existence of Creation 'start.'
By the objective evidence the universe God Created would look no different from the universe science 'sees' today.
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
Well, if the universe had no beginning, then the idea of existence of God, soul, is redundant.
However, let us wait to see if there is no universe beyond Hawking, Hartle, Penrose and Guth.
Pontifical Science Conference! Oh, what an oxymoron.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
This thread has evolved to a consideration of how the present knowledge of physics and cosmology. Not, but interesting, and more to come.
 

halbhh

The wonder and awe of "all things".
Considering all of those happened on Earth, it may not be so easy to destroy life once it got going.

That I don't see as being so unlikely. I see it as more unlikely that a technological race will fail to destroy itself within a thousand years or so of developing nukes.
A very interesting view!

(I'll leave aside for now why it is (from astronomy articles) I'm expecting that natural phenomena would routinely sterilize planets of life)

So, in view of your idea...then you'd then expect that say...within 100 or 300 ly from here, we could one day (many centuries from now perhaps) find ruins of ancient civilizations?

I think it dangerous to assume such. I think we are on our own and should expect to be on our own. That means we need to learn to protect ourselves.

We definitely agree on "we need to learn to protect" life on Earth, civilization...

A new thought just now....if you think that civilizations arise and then destroy themselves in war, is it then you think they never manage to become star faring, or so very rarely it doesn't matter? I'm asking because the logic of being star faring is that a remnant will survive a home planet being sterilized, of course....and so aliens might then be all around, logically. Just curious of your thoughts on what you seem to be implying.
 
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halbhh

The wonder and awe of "all things".
Well, if the universe had no beginning,
That would merely make the Universe itself 'Eternal' and then...well, perhap you just merely then have 'God by another name'.
And we could imagine other possibilities, like having some advanced civilization that survives the cycles or seeds through them, etc.

If the Universe turns out to be Eternal (thus necessarily it seems then oscillating (*see note))....

This possibility has already been thought on a long while in physics. The Oscillating (or Bouncing or "Big Bounce") Universe is already an old idea in physics, and earlier versions of that had problems (with entropy), and the newest version seems to imply an initial beginning:

from Phys.org:

"In trying to understand the nature of the cosmos, some theorists propose that the universe expands and contracts in endless cycles.

Because this behavior is hypothesized to be perpetual, the universe should have no beginning and no end—only eternal cycles of growing and shrinking that extend forever into the future, and forever into the past.

It's an appealing concept in part because it removes the need for a state called a singularity that corresponds to "beginning of time" in other models.

But a new study by University at Buffalo physicists Will Kinney and Nina Stein highlights one way that cyclic or "bouncing" cosmologies fall flat.

The research shows that the latest version of this theory—a cyclic model that resolves long-standing concerns about entropy—introduces a new problem (or rather, returns to an old one). Cyclic universes described under this model must have a beginning, Kinney and Stein conclude.

...
==========
*note -- since the Universe is expanding, then it follows that it either must have had a beginning or else be oscillating (but that also may mean it had a beginning!)...
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Our physical existence is possibly always eternally and infinitely existed as a Quantum world whether Created by God or not.
Does the quantum world play out in an arena? In some models can't we be sure that at least space and maybe time had a beginning?
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
Does the quantum world play out in an arena? In some models can't we be sure that at least space and maybe time had a beginning?

Probably not. It would be contradiction if our universe expanded from a singularity where in the beginning before expansion there was no rime nor space based on Quantum Mechanics, all the present models demonstrate the singularity formed from preexisting matter and energy the same way black hole singularities form in out universe. The nothingness of the Quantum Word has no beginning not end.
 
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osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
Probably not. It would be contradiction if our universe expanded from a singularity where in the beginning before expansion there was no rime nor space based on Quantum Mechanics, all the present models demonstrate the singularity formed from preexisting matter and energy the same way black hole singularities form in out universe. The nothingness of the Quantum Word has no beginning not end.
If matter and energy, than time and space too seems appropriate. Matter and energy without space and time is a contradiction.

However I seen a Closer to Truth documentary where a scientist explained that space and time could be emergent properties.


Later videos this scientist goes as far as to say spacetime is doomed.
 

shunyadragon

shunyadragon
Premium Member
If matter and energy, than time and space too seems appropriate. Matter and energy without space and time is a contradiction.

However I seen a Closer to Truth documentary where a scientist explained that space and time could be emergent properties.


Later videos this scientist goes as far as to say spacetime is doomed.

At the Quantum scale it has been demonstrated that matter and energy can exist at zero state, ie Penrose-Hawking Theorem. -The singularity is infinitely dense matter and energy at zero state. Space/time begins at the moment of the expansion of the singularity.

He is describing Quantum emergent space/time from the Quantum scale in terms of string theory, and explaining the singularity itself

There is the concept of time at the Quantum scale level, but it is momentary time of a Quantum event (plank time) and not the continuous time in three dimensional universe.

Space time is 'doomed' is a rather layman meaningless statement. I do not believe he proposed any specific beginning in terms of the singularity and Quantum Mechanics.

I believe what is stated in this video agrees with my view.
 
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LuisDantas

Aura of atheification
Premium Member
This still doesn't answer the question of why the universe goes to all the trouble of existing in the first place. Just to say 'It is therefore it is', and leave it at that, is to take a philosophical position which begs some justification. And doesn't the fact the universe can be understood in terms of universal laws, itself require some explanation?
I am just not seeing any of that.

What do you mean with "trouble of existing"?

Why should anyone feel a duty to justify the simple constatation that there is existence?

Which universal laws would those be that are so formidable that you see some sort of need for explaining them?
 

Polymath257

Think & Care
Staff member
Premium Member
A very interesting view!

(I'll leave aside for now why it is (from astronomy articles) I'm expecting that natural phenomena would routinely sterilize planets of life)
I'm not as concerned about asteroid collisions, for example. They happened in our solar system, but life managed to survive in spite of them.

Bombardment in an early system will be common, but life would start after the main period of bombardments (like it did on Earth). And, in fact, the bombardments might well be necessary to ensure the relevant chemicals are present for life to begin.

One-off events like supernova would likely be far enough away to not destroy life in most places. They might seed the system with good elements, though.

My main concern would be planetary migration. This seems to be fairly common in the systems we know about. The problem is that we know about them because they have large planets close to their stars. In other words, there is a selection bias towards those systems with migration.

So, in view of your idea...then you'd then expect that say...within 100 or 300 ly from here, we could one day (many centuries from now perhaps) find ruins of ancient civilizations?
That seems optimistic. Given that advanced civilizations could not have appeared until the second generation of stars, I'm guessing there haven't been such before the last 5 billion years or so. We don't know how often life manages to leap from single celled to multi-celled. This was a slow step on Earth and there is good reason to think it fairly rare. Once multicellular life occurs, my guess is that it is hard to eliminate. There have been extinction events on Earth that eliminated 99% of species at the time.

But going from muti-cellular to a civilization with, say, radio, is quite a leap. it took 500million to a billion years on Earth.

My biggest fear is that advanced civilizations are likely to self-destruct in some way (viruses are yet another route). If you think that we obtained agriculture only 10,000 years ago and nukes last century, how much longer do you expect us to survive?

Anyway, I (of course) don't know, but I would *guess* that there have been around 10-100 advanced civilizations in our galaxy so far. Most would be in the galactic arms and not towards the core. So, maybe every 1000 ly or so?
We definitely agree on "we need to learn to protect" life on Earth, civilization...

A new thought just now....if you think that civilizations arise and then destroy themselves in war, is it then you think they never manage to become star faring, or so very rarely it doesn't matter?
That is correct. And they don't have to destroy themselves via war. Environmental degradation would also be effective.

Part of the difficulty is the economics of interstellar travel. The use of resources alone would require a concerted effort and I just don't see that happening in the majority of cases (too many problems closer to home). Sending self-replicating robots would be a risky adventure and unlikely to succeed, especially at first. Sci-fi significantly under-estimates the risks of long distance travel, I think.

So it would be a race between those few trying to get into space and the self-destruction for lack of wisdom (which is probably common due to the way evolution happens). I'm guessing lack-of-wisdom wins out. It usually does.
I'm asking because the logic of being star faring is that a remnant will survive a home planet being sterilized, of course....and so aliens might then be all around, logically. Just curious of your thoughts on what you seem to be implying.
The number that can make it to the stars is minuscule. The risks are huge. The distances are immense. And the economics is poor. I just don't see it working well in the vast majority of cases. Maybe a few probes that are likely to get lost in the depths of space (Voyager, for example) and become undetectable after a hundred years or so.
 

halbhh

The wonder and awe of "all things".
I'm not as concerned about asteroid collisions, for example. They happened in our solar system, but life managed to survive in spite of them.
Why is that you think? After all, there are many bodies in our solar system big enough, > 60miles in diameter.

This is old stuff for me from decades ago, and you might know it, but it's because we have Jupiter and Saturn to help vacuum up comets of the kind that would tend to intersect Earth's orbit....and they have helped make the odds a lot better, far better than then Earth would have had without them...


But...it's also something I learned many years ago that such gas giants cause planetary migration on smaller planets.... (we see planets where they could not have formed naturally we understand, meaning they migrated to their current location).

So, such deadly migration of an orbit is much more likely when a large gas giant can tug on a small rocky world...like Jupiter on Earth -- it would cause the orbit of the smaller planet to migrate, on the scale of only tens of millions of years or less -- freezing or broiling any emerging life on that planet, or just sending the planet off into space or into the star....

But not in our system....because we have a configuration of gas giants that together on the whole tend to cancel such resonances out, wonderfully, allowing Earth to have a stable orbit for billions of years.

And there is more:

End life on Earth with a planet?

If a planet had formed between Mars and Jupiter, where the asteroid belt now reigns, it might have meant the end of life on Earth. That’s the conclusion of a researcher at the University of California, Riverside, who said on March 7, 2023, that he has now looked closely at this realm of our solar system. He said his computer simulations suggest that an Earth-like planet – orbiting between Mars and Jupiter – would have pushed Earth out of the solar system and wiped out life on this planet.

Just to let you know, I've read I recently estimated near the order of 10,000 astronomy news and research reports and articles, so I tend to have a lot of information to base my posts on, see, and when I suggested to you above that commonly life would be wiped out on most planets before it got too far along (on Earth it took billions of years to get complex to even get to complex animals of any kind -- I'm not just guessing or imagining, but conveying things I've read about see. Earlier I listed several things that are both commonplace (that's not a guess, but based on observations), and also can wipe out life on a planet it's thought. This was not just wild speculation, this list, and it was not complete, either.

A more likely idea than your apparent view that interstellar travel is not economic (it certainly is not for us right now...) -- that conclusion would seem to be based on assuming we won't have amazing breakthroughs in physics and technology -- which isn't a good bet. More likely: future technology centuries from now might be like today's technology compared to 200 years ago; that's more plausible than imagining we are near exhausting what physics can find and already nearing some limit on what new technologies we might be able to make in time....

...so, a more likely reason we don't have contact with advanced civilizations outside our own I think is that none exist near enough to us. not that it's 'uneconomic'.

Since a civilization can spread over time (and being on multiple planets makes extinction a lot less likely...), that 'near enough' may be a very large distance, even perhaps tens or hundreds of thousands of ly. given a civilization that is tens or even hundreds of millions of years old.

And we might be able to see signs of them also through telescopes on distances like 1000-10,000 ly even if they aren't in closer proximity.
 
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Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
.. within 100 or 300 ly from here, we could one day (many centuries from now perhaps) find ruins of ancient civilizations?
.. if you think that civilizations arise and then destroy themselves in war, ..
I do not think humans are ever going to go any farther than Mars.
Sure. That is the lesson of history. Civilizations, religions, Gods; come and go.
 

halbhh

The wonder and awe of "all things".
I do not think humans are ever going to go any farther than Mars.
Sure. That is the lesson of history. Civilizations, religions, Gods; come and go.
Ah pessimistic there. While Mars actually seems marginal today, perhaps with some very radical process of increasing the atmosphere (redirecting comets to impact Mars might be one useful thing), it could become more interesting. But also we seem likely to have breakthroughs in physics and technology that would make what seems impossible today in space travel to become possible. While today we could get to Mars, perhaps in 200 years we would be quite well able to travel to nearby stars in a generational (one way) ship.

Now, the only reason I think that will not happen is because Christ will return before then, and we won't need to build such a ship.... :)
 

Aupmanyav

Be your own guru
This possibility has already been thought on a long while in physics. The Oscillating (or Bouncing or "Big Bounce") Universe is already an old idea in physics, and earlier versions of that had problems (with entropy), and the newest version seems to imply an initial beginning:
I am not a votary of cyclic universe. Science has guesses but no confirmation beyond 'inflation'. I stop at what science says.
As far as my thinking goes, the universe has to have a reason, whether it began at any time or is eternal.
Now, the only reason I think that will not happen is because Christ will return before then, and we won't need to build such a ship.... :)
Good that you added a smiley. For me, it is a funny statement.
 
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