I’ve heard many Christians use the argument that something can’t come from nothing to support their assertion that a God exists. This means they believe all “somethings” must have come from other “somethings” as opposed to coming from a “nothing”. However, this suggests they believe that what humans and the universe came from is classified as a “something” and not a “nothing”. Since Christians believe everything came from God (the “something” they are referring to), then their argument defines God as a “something”. But they are quick to contradict themselves by saying that God did not have a creator, meaning they believe God did not come from something.
Maybe God is something that came out of the Big Bang… ya know … that happened when there was no there there and no when then or no then then… pre-big bang
I can reconcile this apparent conundrum, although I am not a Christian. Does that count?
There are actually two separate arguments in this post. The first, that something cannot come from nothing is more a matter of common sense, just like the eye cannot see itself or the finger feel itself. If anyone cannot see this, then it is useless to go further with that.
The other, that God must have had a Creator is a bit more tricky. All Gods have been created - by the ones that “know” what God is and what “He” wants. We each create God in our own image because we know of no other. That’s why He has a human form as opposed to the form of a spider(say). Even Atheists create a form of God in that invariably they choose the Christian God as the form to rail against.
If one wants a “God” that has no attributes of one created by one’s imagination, then look no further than all individual consciousnesses summed together into a sort of Gestalt.
Consciousness exists and everything is created from and by, that consciousness.
As far as answering the question, “then where did consciousness come from?”, one must accept that existence itself is completely unfathomable. Questions about where or why existence, will never be answered. One either has to accept that existence is magical, miraculous, or one must continue one’s search for answers to the unanswerable.
I agree, Stoic. We need to reason things out in our own minds to try to have an explanation for things to make sense, because we are not comfortable without “answers”. But the best answer is rejected by men, because it is hard to understand. “In the beginning…God.”
Well said. What we think we know now will be completely different from what we know later. Even our concepts of nothing and something. People once were positive the earth was flat. You would be laughed at these days making such a claim. We think we are so smart now but the truth is we know very very little. I believe in God, a Grand Architect who designed everything in existence, but I have no idea where “he” came from, nor do I believe it is very important to know such a thing. When we are ready to comprehend such matters they will be revealed to us. But I do think we all already know everything, we just haven’t remembered it all yet
You will never get your answers from “this is what I think”. What does God think? You have to read His Word to get your answers, not create in your own mind how you think it should be. If people read their Bible, they would have known that the earth is round. Isaiah 40:22 = “he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth…” Does the clay have the right to say to the potter, “why did you make me this way?” “Why is it like this and not like that?” Jeremiah 29:13 = “And you will seek me and find me, when you search for me with your whole heart.” You are right, it does not matter where God came from, only believe that He is and He is Good.
I don’t respond to Mutcer’s posts any more because too many times when I have responded, Mutcer has failed to answer me. And its not just me. Look at the threads he has started and you will see numerous examples of his selective, inconsistent, sporadic pattern of responding to posters. I hypothesize that he likes to throw this stuff out there but he really is not interested in dialogue. So, while the content of his message is antithetical to dogmatic, Christian fundamentalism, his communicative process is exactly like those who proselytize for it, i.e. strictly a one way street.
