An Estimate for no ‘God’

PoeticUniverse

‘God’ cannot be shown or known, so ‘God’ is but wished for and hoped for, which is called ‘faith’, in short. ‘No God’ is also an unknown. The positions are not necessarily equiprobable.

There needs to be a Fundamental capability for all that is, no matter the ‘how’ of it, whether supposed as spontaneous, from ‘Nothing’, permanent stuff or energy, or whatnot. If it had an opposite state, there wouldn’t be anything, and so the capability is of necessity; it cannot not be. As the ground of determination, it is the source of us, and thus there is an ultimateness about it that led to the religious thinking of it as ‘God’, which it could be, or not.

It is not a factor herein that the Biblical and thus necessarily fundamentalist ‘God’ has been demolished by evolutionary science, cosmology, and self-contradiction, leaving no ‘Divine Inspiration’ in Genesis, because it still remains for us to size up what’s left for a ‘God’ who is still a Person-like Mind/Being as the basis of All or is All, with the Biblical myth-takes no longer being relevant.

I will begin posting some points toward ‘no God’, but not all at once.

An Estimate for no ‘God’

1a. All that we observe proceed from the simplest realm of tiny events/things/processes to the larger composite to the more and complex, where we exist, which cascade can continue into the future, where/when we can expect beings higher than ourselves to become.

1b. The unlikely polar opposite of (1a) is an ultra complex system of mind of a ‘God’ being First as Fundamental; however systems have parts, this totally going against the fundamental arts.

2. (1) gets worse, for ‘God’ being, given that there can be no input for any specific direction going into the necessary Fundamental Eternal Capability—the basis of all, this bedrock having to be causeless, with random effects, due to no information able to come in to what has no beginning. It thus appears that it could be everything possible, although not anything in particular, which is also the way it shows, in its constant transmutation at every instant, this according to what we call the laws of nature.

3. So, (2) indicates that there is no ultimate meaning, not that a built-in meaning would be great, for it would be quite restrictive, but at least, as ‘liberating’, there’s anything and everything possible that could have become from the basic eternal state of not anything in particular—our present Earthly life path being one that is being lived now after 13.57 billion years, much of which progression can be accounted for by science.

4. On top of the preceding unlikelihoods, and given that obviously that no Designer made everything instantly, but is curiously constrained to doing exactly what nature could do on its own (and why so slowly?), it is unlikely that all eventualities could have been foreseen by a Deity in starting a universe suitable for life. It seems more like we were fine-tuned to the Earth.

alcontali

The positions are not necessarily equiprobable. — PoeticUniverse

You cannot use probability theory for this problem. It just does not work like that. The following would be a probabilistic argument:

Imagine we have a set of universes. Some universes have a God. Other universes have no God. If we randomly pick a universe from that set, will it have a God or not?

What you are doing, however, is not probability theory at all.

Probability theory only works within the strict confines of set theory. It only concerns the cardinality of sets and subsets. Furthermore, you must demonstrate that the setup of your problem satisfies the Kolmogorov axioms or Cox' theorem.

Otherwise, what you are doing, has simply nothing to do with probability.

Furthermore, if you consider a statement P and its very opposite ~P to be equiprobable, it is just a way of saying that you do not understand the problem. It does not mean that they really are equiprobable. Of course not. It just means that you know absolutely nothing about the problem.

3017amen

"So, (2) indicates that there is no ultimate meaning,"

↪PoeticUniverse

Hey Poetic, wanted to give you some love over here.

Couple quick thoughts on meaning:

1. I think of meaning as a deterministic cosmic computer [our brains] that transcends its own capabilities. Meaning its not binary, its both A and B working simultaneously. That idea, in effect, would cause the computer to crash or lock-up. In effect then, we have thus fallen and can't get up LOL. So in an anthropomorphic way, we are barred from 'perfect' knowledge. We can build computers; not humans with a conscious mind. Lack of that 'complete' meaning and knowledge then leaves us with a sense of wonder.

2. Wonderment. What is that ? Why do we wonder? For example, why does science insist on saying: all events must have a cause?

So two points; how does consciousness work, and how does wonderment distinguish us from lower life forms (?)

PoeticUniverse

consciousness — 3017amen

wonderment — 3017amen

We are naturally curious and so we are now in the process of asking nature about this complex feat accomplished over a long time. Once there was little or no consciousness in creatures and now it is full blown in us. Since, as in all developments, it wasn't instant, this stands against an All-Might doing it.

This leaves us but with the prospect of a Deity with only the means to start something going that might be workable, it stuttering along through five near extinctions unto our precarious present condition tottering upon a sixth possible extinction from a four degree centigrade global warming rise projected.

5a. It’s still that the religious might then suppose a ‘God’ Deity who is like a scientist who throws a bunch of stuff together that is balanced and energetically reactive enough, but not too much so that it races along too fast, etc., to make for something livable coming out of it, but, again, really, what is a fully formed person-like being doing sitting around beforehand, this also being all the more of a quandary that ever enlarges the question rather than answering it.

5b. But, if it is supposed that life has to come from a Larger Life, then a regress ensues, making this not to be a good template. As for a Deity trying to put workable stuff together, this is much like the idea of a multiverse. We continue to estimate no 'God'.

god must be atheist

You cannot use probability theory for this problem. — alcontali

Actulally, he can.

There are two subsets: "God exists" and "God does not exist". Together they form the superset, "Making statements at god's actual existence".

Please note that both subsets at the same time and at the same respect are proper subsets of the superset, and together they do not negate the superset, although one is the negation of the other. This only means that the subsets are obviously not overlapping, but that's just a side-issue.

The probability of "God exists" is the event that god exists/(god exists + god does not exist) and the probability of "god does not exist" is the event that god does not exist/(god exists + god does not exist).

In the lack of any other information, the two events are therefore equiprobable.

Consider this with the experiment of tossing a flat coin which has a head and tail. the probability that the coin will show a head, or a tail, is
shows a tail / (shows a tail + shows a head) and
shows a head / (shows a tail + shows a head).

Although my operational symbols and conceptual descriptions of the sets are far from the symbols of standard set theory, I hope you see the parallel and agree that the probability of god existing, without any other consideration, is the same as the probability of god not existing.

And more importantly, I hope you agree that the problem or question or whatever CAN be expressed in terms of probability relying on set theory etc.

It just depends how you word it.

PoeticUniverse

It just depends how you word it. — god must be atheist

It's also whatever people do to weigh the balance either way with their guestimations. I don't think we need to sidetrack into math, set theory, probability theory, and truth tables. We have to estimate about what can't be known for sure.

alcontali

Actulally, he can.

There are two subsets: "God exists" and "God does not exist". Together they form the superset, "Making statements at god's actual existence". — god must be atheist

Well, no, the bureaucracy will throw up another hurdle there.

According to the paperwork factory, his setup must either satisfy Kolmogorov's axioms or Cox' theorem. So, he has to produce all kinds of paperwork that extensively demonstrates that everything is properly stamped, signed, and certified. Otherwise, the official clerk, who works from nine to five, with a thirty-minute break at lunch, will declare the proposal to be irreceivable.

Mathematics is just some kind of extensive bureaucracy of excruciatingly annoying formalisms, not particularly much different from other such obnoxious bureaucracies:

The Dispute Tribunal should also have power to make interim orders, including orders for the suspension of action in any case where there is a good prima facie case and the award of compensation or damages would be inadequate and power to summarily dismiss matters that are clearly irreceivable or are frivolous or vexatious.

PoeticUniverse

Please only attend to the OP propositions and their continuations directly.

alcontali

Please only attend to the OP propositions and their continuations directly. — PoeticUniverse

Either you reason within a system, or else you reason about a system, because in all other cases, you are just system-less bullshitting.

So, you spout 175 different baseless system-less claims, of which I pick just one.

You refer to probability theory, which is a real system, and which obviously does not belong somewhere in the middle of system-less bullshit. Hence, I ask, what the hell is that serious principle doing in that complete mess of 175 nonsensical declarations?

What you cannot do, is to arbitrarily appropriate the credibility of real systems in order to make your own system-less bullshit sound better.

God is a basic belief in a system of beliefs. There are several such mainstream belief systems that incorporate that basic belief. It is a system-wide premise amongst several other system-wide beliefs. You cannot just lift that one premise out of its particular system and start spouting system-less nonsense about it.

Furthermore, it is a basic belief, meaning that it is part of the construction logic of such system. It is necessarily unexplained, because otherwise it would not be part of the construction logic. Why don't you question why there is an unexplained, basic belief in arithmetic concerning the existence of a successor function? Why don't you call that "equiprobable" with something else? If you want to reject axioms in a system, why don't you pick something like arithmetic? It is full of axioms.

I have never heard anybody say that an axiom would be "equiprobable" with some other axiom ...

god must be atheist

According to the paperwork factory, his setup must either satisfy Kolmogorov's axioms or Cox' theorem. — alcontali

Cox wanted his system to satisfy the following conditions:

Divisibility and comparability – The plausibility of a proposition is a real number and is dependent on information we have related to the proposition.
Common sense – Plausibilities should vary sensibly with the assessment of plausibilities in the model.
Consistency – If the plausibility of a proposition can be derived in many ways, all the results must be equal. — Arnborg and Sjödin

According to this, your demand has been satisfied. There are two states, or two subsets:
- god exists
- god does not exist
And they are mutually exclusive
it is plausible that they have equal probability to be true while they are mutually exclusive
Consistency: If there are more gods, or the possibility of more than one god, then the probabilities get divided into more subsets. That is, (There are no 5 gods), (there are no 5938 gods), their opposite (non-existence of gods) grew to be an equal number of subsets (Five gods don't exist,) (5938 gods don't exist).

I am sorry, @alcontali, but this is not a dissatisfactory application of Cox's theorem.

Equally, I could prove that the system also satisfies Kolmogorov's Axioms, if i were only better equipped to use math symbols on the keyboard. Let this suffice for the time being:

The axioms of Kolmogorov. Let S denote a sample space with a probability
measure P defined over it, such that probability of any event A ⊂ S is given by
P(A). Then, the probability measure obeys the following axioms:
(1) P(A) ≥ 0,
(2) P(S)=1,
(3) If {A1, A2,...Aj ,...} is a sequence of mutually exclusive events such that
Ai ∩Aj = ∅ for all i, j, then P(A1 ∪A2 ∪···∪Aj ∪···) = P(A1)+P(A2)+
··· + P(Aj ) + ···.
The axioms are supplemented by two definitions:
(4) The conditional probability of A given B is defined by
P(A|B) = P(A ∩ B)
P(B) ,
(5) The events A, B are said to be statistically independent if
P(A ∩ B) = P(A)P(B).
This set of axioms was provided by Kolmogorov in 1936. — undetermined

Here, A is "god exists" and B is "god does not exist".

Also, if you talk about more gods, then
A is "X number of gods exist" and B is "X number of gods do not exist."

alcontali

t is plausible that they have equal probability to be true while they are mutually exclusive
Consistency: If there are more gods, or the possibility of more than one god, then the probabilities get divided into more subsets. That is, (There are no 5 gods), (there are no 5938 gods), their opposite (non-existence of gods) grew to be an equal number of subsets (Five gods don't exist,) (5938 gods don't exist). — god must be atheist

I am not sure that it can work like that. For the number of gods, you assume a set that looks like this: {0,1}. You do not assume, for example, {0,1,2,3,4,5}. Therefore, you implicitly use information that you do not mention, something like, "There is only one God".

You clearly know more about the problem than you disclose.

In that implicitly-assumed information, you undoubtedly already assume the existence of God. How else do you know it it is just one?

Therefore, you use the assumption that God exists to argue that he possibly does not exist.

If you do not want to use that particular information, then you can perfectly assume any arbitrary set of possibilities {0,1,2,..., k}, with k any natural number. In that case, you cannot assign equal probabilities 1/k to each possibility, because every possible value of k is equally probable. You will simply not succeed in fixing k. Therefore, in my opinion, your proposal does not satisfy Cox' consistency requirement.

god must be atheist

I am not sure that it can work like that. For the number of gods, you assume a set that looks like this: {0,1}. You do not assume, for example, {0,1,2,3,4,5}. Therefore, you implicitly use information that you do not mention, something like, "There is only one God". — alcontali

I addressed this already. Assuming {1,2,3,4,5} gods, has the counter assumption of not having {1,2,3,4,5} gods. Together they form the probability of 1, that is, the union of the two mutually exclusive sets has the probability of 1.

You can go from here. Everything else falls into place if you look at this this way.

alcontali

I addressed this already. Assuming {0,1,2,3,4,5} gods, has the counter assumption of not having {0,1,2,3,4,5} gods.

Go from here. — god must be atheist

What is the difference between "having 0 gods" and "not having {1,2,3,4,5} gods"? Isn't that the same possibility?

god must be atheist

What is the difference between "having 0 gods" and "not having {1,2,3,4,5} gods"? Isn't that the same possibility? — alcontali

There is a difference. Maybe I used the wrong shorthand for the set. There is not a denying by an atheist of multiple sets of different numbers of gods. The theist has to decide first how many gods there are, and the set must include one specific number, for instance, 4565 in case of Greco-Roman worship.

Then the equal probability is that there are zero gods.

But if you say (there are either 324 gods, or 32 gods, or 7 gods), then negating this will not always yield zero; but zero will always negate this. In other words, if multiple sets of gods can exist at the same time, then the probability of their existing is meaningless, as gods are not a thing that can exist and not exist at the same time and in the same respect by any religion.

alcontali

The theist has to decide first how many gods there are, and the set must include one specific number, for instance, 4565 in case of Greco-Roman worship. — god must be atheist

So, this whole exercise just depends on what theists say and not on what objectively the possibilities would be? So, if I get it right, you have no way of determining the number of gods, except by listening to theists. Hence, these probabilities are not fixed, because different theists could report different numbers. Again, Cox' theorem does not allow for that:

Consistency – If the plausibility of a proposition can be derived in many ways, all the results must be equal.

god must be atheist

You're right, Alcontali.

The fact that there is one god, is negated not only by the claim that there are zero gods, but also by the different claim, that there are 4 gods. Or that there are 6094 gods.

In fact, there could be one number of god or gods; it could be 0, or 1, or 2, or 3... and they all have infinite number of negations.

In fact, if one god has a certain probability of existing, and x number of gods have a certain probability of existing; and if you consider the likely fact, that each distinct number of god has the same probability as the existence of a different distinct number of gods... then the probability of having X number of gods is 1 out of the total number of different number of gods that can exist.

Please consider that any distinct integer will be a valid number of gods in existence to believe. Each distinct number of gods will have the same probability as any one of a different distinct number of gods.

If you consider that there are an infinite number of integers, then the believer must conisder that the probability of his belief in X number of gods is the probability of 1/(the sum of all distinct possibilies of numbers of gods in existence to believe), or 1/(the sum of 1 count for all different integer numbers), or 1/(1+1+1+1+ infinite times) which is 1/(infinity) which is not defined, but its limit approaches zero,

Therefore the only valid conclusion you can have is that it is impossible to determine which number of gods to beleive in, as in believing in any ONE given number of gods (for instance, in 1 god) is a near-impossible to impossible proposition.

Of course this can be negated in one fell swoop, by saying that the bible is the absolute authority on god count, or the Koran, or the Kama Sutra, etc.

PoeticUniverse

6. Existence/capability has no alternative, given that nonexistence has no being as a source and that there is indeed something, and so existence of something/capability is mandatory, there not being any choice to it. It’s a given; no magic required. Still, it could operate almost as what is called ‘God’, except that it’s not a Mind.

7a. We see that the One of Totality continually transitions/transmutes, never being able to remain as anything particular, which matches its nature supposed due to no information being able to come into the Eternal in the first place that never was, for the One Fundamental Eterne has to be ungenerated and deathless if it is so. But how can there be a finite absolute One with an impossible None outside it?

7b. Or all could be relative if there are no absolutes, for Totality can’t have anything outside it. So then Totality must be relative to itself.

7c. Of course, either way, the capability remains, as necessity, with no alternative, without needing any cause for it to be. It is the Ground of Determination — G.O.D. It has no opposite and so it is not remarkable.

8. Aside from the trivial definition of free will being that without coercion the will is free to operate, and the useless definition of the harmful random will equaling ‘freedom’, the deeper notion of ‘free’ as being original and free of the brain will is of a currency never being able to be stated and cashed in on, leaving ‘determined’ to continue to be the opposite of ‘undetermined’. This stands against a ‘God’.

While eternalism can’t yet be told apart from presentism, the message from both is of a transient ‘now’, whether pre-determined or determined as it goes along. All hope then, is crushed, both for us and the Great Wheel itself having any potency. This is the great humility; all hubris is gone.

It is enough, then, that we have the benefit of experiencing and living life well, sometimes, much more so given this modern age, although still with sweat, tears, and aversive substrates of emotions that those of the future might consider to be barbaric. The early days of humankind were horrendous.

Gnomon

‘God’ cannot be shown or known, so ‘God’ is but wished for and hoped for, which is called ‘faith’, in short. ‘No God’ is also an unknown. — PoeticUniverse

I don't have the formal philosophical background to follow all of your Against God arguments. Yet I generally agree with the assertion that "there is no God" (as defined in Polytheistic and Monotheistic traditions).

However, I have concluded from scientific evidence and rational analysis, that there should be a First Cause or Prime Mover or Cosmic Principle (poetically imagined as The Tao, or Brahman, or Logos, or G*D). These philosophical entities are not presumed to be real, but ideal, not beings, but principles. And they are not to be objects of faith & hope, or worshiped as Lords, but merely accepted as universal concepts and logical necessities.

given that obviously that no Designer made everything instantly, but is curiously constrained to doing exactly what nature could do on its own (and why so slowly?), it is unlikely that all eventualities could have been foreseen by a Deity in starting a universe suitable for life. It seems more like we were fine-tuned to the Earth. — PoeticUniverse

I agree that the world was obviously not designed instantaneously, but perhaps it was programmed to evolve gradually over eons, via natural processes. The Laws of Nature are G*D-given "constraints" on Chaos. Natural Selection "fine-tunes" creatures to fit their niche, according to the programmer's criteria.

The hypothetical Programmer would not be creating a playground for bored immortals, or a domain for war-games with Satan, but an ongoing experiment in logical and statistical possibilities that must play-out within the constraints of Logic. Nature is what the program looks like from the inside. When viewed as a Darwinian program, the heuristic course of Nature makes sense. This is not a fact -- it's just a Way of thinking.

I apologize for interrupting your thread, but I just couldn't resist offering an alternative to the perennial God/No-God debate, in the form of my BothAnd G*D. :smile:

THE WAY
The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.
― Lao Tse, Tao Te Ching

THE PROGRAM
The G*D that is known is not the eternal Nerd
Inscrutable is the un-named Omniscient
Omnipotential is the Cause of Cosmos & Eardth
___Gnomon

Evolutionary Programming : http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page13.html
G*D : not the name of a deity, but a job-title : http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page13.html

PoeticUniverse

perhaps it was programmed to evolve gradually over eons, via natural processes. — Gnomon

I think the eternal first cause needs to be simple and operate at a tiny level, as near-nothing, to qualify as fundamental, and of course would still be doing its eternal thing now, such as with the quantum fluctuations at the base point energy level. (They actually call it the zero point energy; however, the energy doesn't seem to be zero.)

Virtual particles get produced in pairs, probably because the first cause, not able to halt and be still, has to jiggle/divide something into haves that it then has to put back into the base, and so forth, with these two effects always having to both occur, one ever after the other.

Somehow the pair's virtual particles were driven apart (inflation?) and so became separated and real faster than they could annihilate and return the energy.

The above is sketchy, but once we have some particles persisting a bit, the real 'programming'/'coding' would be done at each new level, such as quarks coding for protons and neutrons, those then coding for atoms, the atoms coding for molecules, molecules for cells, etc.

So, rather than all being coded at once, it occurs in stages, at each stable or semi-stable level.

It's kind of like the way language works. The sentence has its own level of rules and comprehension, as well as still being based on the lower levels of phrases, words, grammar, phonemes, letters, and strokes, and such too for its parts if they need to be attended to at their own level.

Can't really have a full-blown Programmer just sitting around as First, it never having been put together from even more fundamental parts.

I apologize for interrupting your thread — Gnomon

No problem, but, thanks, actually, for it is about the first response addressing a proposition in the OP.

deletedusercb

Although my operational symbols and conceptual descriptions of the sets are far from the symbols of standard set theory, I hope you see the parallel and agree that the probability of god existing, without any other consideration, is the same as the probability of god not existing. — god must be atheist

So, from our limited perspective, according to this, there is a 50% probability God exists?

Gnomon

Here's a slightly different perspective on what you're saying, from my novel frame-of-reference, and using other metaphors :

I think the eternal first cause needs to be simple and operate at a tiny level — PoeticUniverse

Zero Point Energy (ZPE) is about as basic as it gets in the physical universe : the lowest possible energy of a quantum vacuum. That's as close to nothing as you can imagine. But it's still a Materialistic Space-Time concept that can't explain its own existence. And the notion of powerful nothingness evolved from ancient (Chaos) and 19th century (Aether) theories of emptiness-with-potential. Metaphorically, it's similar to my notion of EnFormAction, But, EFA is not the First Cause, it's merely an ongoing wave of causation, which was in-turn motivated by the Intention of eternal omnipotential BEING or G*D.

A true First Cause (wave origin) would have to precede space-time and matter-energy where the ripples propagate. It would have to be more than a simple accidental quantum fluctuation though. It would have to "program" the Big Bang Singularity with all the information necessary to create a world from scratch. In my thesis, the equivalent to your ZPE was eternal Chaos (random potential), which was enformed by Intention into the organization of our Cosmos.

Virtual particles get produced in pairs — PoeticUniverse

The original Singularity functioned like an egg : once fertilized by Intention, it divides into the "ten thousand things". Each new division necessarily creates pairs. World Creation is division of The ALL (eternity-infinity) from One into Two, and so on, but the whole is still Unitary.

Note : what we call the physical "Universe" was originally presumed to be eternal-infinite, but was recently found to be bounded in space & time, hence not really the Uni-Vers (all encompassing).

Somehow the pair's virtual particles were driven apart — PoeticUniverse

Since, by the law of Logic, no two things in reality can exist in the same space-time, they are necessarily polarized and repel each other.

the real 'programming'/'coding' would be done at each new level, — PoeticUniverse

The "programming" of Old into New is accomplished by transfer of Information. The new thing inherits some of the data of the old, but then becomes unique by absorbing novel information from each interaction with other things.

So, rather than all being coded at once, it occurs in stages, at each stable or semi-stable level. — PoeticUniverse

Yes. But a program begins with the original input of a kernel of information (operating system), which is amplified by each iteration of the process into manifold threads of novelty. The hypothetical Singularity was the operating system for calculation of random potential into actual space-time-matter-energy.

Can't really have a full-blown Programmer just sitting around as First, it never having been put together from even more fundamental parts. — PoeticUniverse

In space-time that is true. That's why I assume that the Programmer must exist eternally as infinite Potential until Intention causes a chain of change. A human programmer is outside the operating system he creates. So why not the Programmer of our Cosmic System?

The EnFormAction Hypothesis : http://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

The Tao that refers to here can never be the true tao.
The Name that is used here to designate is not a true name.
The Tao that is unnameable is the Source of the Heaven and the Earth.
The name, once introduced, becomes the Mother of the Ten Thousand Things.
. . . . .
Tao gives birth to one,
One gives birth to two,
Two gives birth to three,
Three gives birth to ten thousand beings.
___Lao Tse, Tao Te Ching

Possibility

It is not a factor herein that the Biblical and thus necessarily fundamentalist ‘God’ has been demolished by evolutionary science, cosmology, and self-contradiction, leaving no ‘Divine Inspiration’ in Genesis, because it still remains for us to size up what’s left for a ‘God’ who is still a Person-like Mind/Being as the basis of All or is All, with the Biblical myth-takes no longer being relevant. — PoeticUniverse

Personally, I doubt that God must be a ‘person-like mind/being’ of necessity. A mind must experience, a being must be in time. Both of these descriptors create problems in relation to limitations for God, as much as they help us to cement the existence of such a concept in our understanding of what exists. I recognise that to strip these away (or abandon them as attempts at reduction) leaves us with even less to hang our hat on, so to speak. But I don’t think it removes the possibility of existence entirely, so perhaps it’s worth considering.

1a. All that we observe proceed from the simplest realm of tiny events/things/processes to the larger composite to the more and complex, where we exist, which cascade can continue into the future, where/when we can expect beings higher than ourselves to become.

1b. The unlikely polar opposite of (1a) is an ultra complex system of mind of a ‘God’ being First as Fundamental; however systems have parts, this totally going against the fundamental arts.

2. (1) gets worse, for ‘God’ being, given that there can be no input for any specific direction going into the necessary Fundamental Eternal Capability—the basis of all, this bedrock having to be causeless, with random effects, due to no information able to come in to what has no beginning. It thus appears that it could be everything possible, although not anything in particular, which is also the way it shows, in its constant transmutation at every instant, this according to what we call the laws of nature. — PoeticUniverse

How might a necessary-fundamental-eternal-capability begin to develop a system of mind? How might it gain awareness of itself? And what is information, but a manifestation of the most basic awareness-relation-meaning?

PoeticUniverse

How might a necessary-fundamental-eternal-capability begin to develop a system of mind? — Possibility

It wouldn't have a little mind from which to intend to develop a larger system of mind.

Possibility

It wouldn't have a little mind from which to intend to develop a larger system of mind. — PoeticUniverse

I suppose that depends on how you define ‘mind’ at its most fundamental:

attention; will or determination to achieve something

PoeticUniverse

attention; will or determination to achieve something — Possibility

Still the same; it's too simple and small.

PoeticUniverse

But it's still a Materialistic Space-Time concept that can't explain its own existence. — Gnomon

No alternative to it.

motivated by the Intention of eternal omnipotential BEING or G*D — Gnomon

Too complex to be fundamental.

In my thesis, the equivalent to your ZPE was eternal Chaos (random potential), which was enformed by Intention into the organization of our Cosmos. — Gnomon

Yes, necessarily random, having no input.

Since, by the law of Logic, no two things in reality can exist in the same space-time, they are necessarily polarized and repel each other. — Gnomon

Perhaps like one is a positive field lump and the other its a negative field lump (trough).

A human programmer — Gnomon

I was a programmer at IBM for 31 years; have now been retired for near 20 years.

Possibility

↪PoeticUniverse

Fair call.

It wouldn't have a little mind from which to intend to develop a larger system of mind. — PoeticUniverse

Must it intend to develop a larger system of mind, though? What if its intention is simply to be aware, to achieve...something? What if - from this most basic of minds, from the faintest and vaguest attention and will or determination to achieve something - an entire universe can come into being?

PoeticUniverse

What if its intention — Possibility

Too fundamental for 'intention'. Minds are billions of years into the future.

Possibility

Too fundamental for 'intention'. Minds are billions of years into the future. — PoeticUniverse

You’re dismissing this on the assumption that ‘mind’ is necessarily a complex system, when in fact you have no idea what mind is.

It’s all speculation, and there is enough information available and certainly plenty of reasonable speculation that mind, attention and will are more fundamental than the simplest of brain systems - even more fundamental than life itself.

I didn’t expect this level of closed-mindedness from you, PU. It’s disappointing, I must say.

PoeticUniverse

10. It doesn’t seem like a God’s world, and so fundamentalist literalist Biblical ‘reasons’ cannot apply here, about a ‘fall’, for those already went away. The pride of being special and deserving of reward and avoiding punishment is still a nice wish, though, for us electro-chemical-bio organisms who appear be be as organic as anything else that grows in nature. Hope grants comfort.

11. God’s operations, curiously restricted to be the same as nature’s has us not being able to tell them apart from nature’s, but which is more likely, the natural or the supernatural? Earth is just where it ought to be, in the Goldilocks zone, and not impossibly out near Neptune.

12. And why must there be a truly distinct transcendent, immaterial, intangible, super realm when it would still have to give and take energy in the physical material language, talking its talk and walking its walk? Dubious, plus the speculation of an invisible realm goes nowhere toward it being so, it tending toward making excuses for what ought to be everywhere.

13. So, we can sit on a fence and go to church half the time or estimate the probability either way, but note that there can be no blame for not knowing what can’t be shown for sure. It’s all in what it does for you.

Let us have wine, lovers, song, and laughter—
Water, chastity, prayer the day after.
Such we’ll alternate the rest of our days—
Thus, on the average, we’ll make Hereafter!

Gnomon

No alternative to it. — PoeticUniverse

That is indeed the assumption of the Materialist worldview. Most people have difficulty imagining Eternity and Infinity, so they simply expand on their sensory experience : eternity is a long, long time, and infinity is a really far distance. But Philosophers (and Poets and Mathematicians) have been imagining Eternity (timelessness) and Infinity (spacelessness) for millennia. Of course these notions are not physical realities, but they are useful in thinking about metaphysical idealities. The key to understanding those abstruse concepts is to realize what Aristotle was talking about in his second volume of the Physics : not Magic, but Mind, not Spiritualism, but Ontology.
Meta-Physics : http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page14.html

Too complex to be fundamental. — PoeticUniverse

Eternity-Infinity is as simple as it gets : Unbounded Potential, Wholeness with no divisions. Only in Space-Time are there boundaries between things. BEING is simple; beings are complex. The potential for existence (power to be) is as fundamental as it gets.

Yes, necessarily random, having no input. — PoeticUniverse

Chaos is randomness, like the noise on your TV screen, but also infinite Potential upon which unlimited images may be inscribed. Chaos is Formless, but also infinitely enformable, like a lump of clay. The "input" is Intention, which is simply the power to cause change. In space-time we call it Energy. In Virtual Reality we call it Potential. Potential is not Real, but the power to actualize..

Perhaps like one is a positive field lump and the other its a negative field lump (trough). — PoeticUniverse

Prior to space-time there was only one lump : BEING, an infinite Aristotelian "substance" (blank slate) with the potential to be anything. Once holistic Infinity divides there exists a "difference" : Information is the difference (change) that makes a difference (meaning).

I was a programmer — PoeticUniverse

You, of all people, should be aware that the programmer is not "in" the program physically, but is "in" the program mentally and meta-physically. You put something of yourself into the program : not a piece of your physical body, but a piece of your metaphysical mind.

The G*D or BEING or First Cause or Creator of my thesis is not a theistic person in Heaven or Olympus, but the Principle of Causation that, like a Programmer, is both "in" and "external to" the running program. One term for such a concept is PanEnDeism.
PanEnDeism : http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page16.html

Law of Metaphysics :
Since the mechanical laws of physics don’t explain the emergence of metaphysical Life & Mind & Qualia, we must assume that the program for our evolving world includes algorithms for the immaterial aspects of reality. Exactly what those “laws” might be, remain to be discovered. But, like the regulations of physics they are probably mathematical and proportional in nature.

An Estimate for no ‘God’

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