The NT Application of the Canaanite Conquest

Originally posted by LemonJello

I am making the assumption that you are 1.) upholding that the universe came from nothing is a better explanation than
2.) Someone transcendent to time and space of unlimited power brought the universe into being.

What a bizarre argument.

No. Not on your say so, its a "bizarre argument".

That doesn't follow at all. If someone claims that there exists some thing that brought all things into existence; then the obvious objection to make is that this claim is incoherent,

Your "obvious objection" is an obvious strawman argument insisting that the "something" had to be created also.

Your "obvious objection" is to me an "obvious" maneuver to, as Romans says "hold down the truth in unrighteousness".

IE. "See me hold down that God is the Creator, by subtracting out of the character of God, that God is uncreated, ever living, ever existing and transcendent to the universe."

There is nothing incoherent about saying God - transcending time and space, uncreated and eternal, of an act of will created the heavens and the earth in the beginning.

It is not incoherent, especially in the face of the fact that a large consensus of cosmologist admit that time, space, matter, energy appear to have had a beginning.

since that would entail that this thing brought itself into existence, which does not make any sense.

In order to force incoherence to the statement "God created the universe" you have to postulate a different definition of God which excludes God being ever existing, uncreated and eternal.

By placing a arbitrary limit on a definition of God which includes Him being uncreated you strawman argument your way into the objection that it is incoherent to say God created the universe.

Now you're trying to bring a structurally similar objection against the claim that nothing brought all things into existence? How does this objection go exactly?

In the case of efforts to say a quantum field seething with energy had some fluctuations taking place and virtual particles appearing from this energy field, that part of the universe.

The word "nothing" is being used, but they are sneaking in a part of time, space, matter, and energy.

That this claim is incoherent, since it would entail that this nothing brought itself, nothing, into existence? Obviously, this objection doesn't fly, since the claim does not entail that: if anything, it entails just the opposite, that nothing brought something other than nothing into existence.

Out of nothing nothing comes.
That's coherent.

Arguing "But God would have to have had a beginning and have been created too" is a forced limitation upon what is usually meant by God.

You're jury rigging the definition of God to force the concept to be as a rock, a atom, a snowball, a wave of light, or something else in the physical cosmos.

I have to count this kind of tactic as holding down the truth in unrighteousness.

The goal I think, is to deny accountability to God.
This is done by denying the goodness of God.
This is done by denying the existence of God.
This is done by assuring God is the same as all things in creation making certain that God cannot be transcendent above all creation.

Cavalier assertions that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" are "incoherent" don't move me.

Confident statements that it is more logical to believe the universe came out of nothing, by nothing, for nothing, do not impress me as more rational.

Anyway, this is another example of the equivocation I mentioned earlier. If you read "nothing brought all things into existence" as things coming about ex nihilo, then your initial dilemma is clearly a false one. If you want the initial dilemma to be exhaustive, we need to read it is saying that there exists no thing such that this thing brought all things into existence, or some such. I see nothing mysterious or puzzling about this claim, and I see no good objection against it. So what's the problem?

You seem to be offering me "help" when none is needed.

I believe it is perfectly logical for the Bible to say the eternal power and divine characteristics of God are manifest in the things created.

"God has to be created too" is just saying "God cannot exist."

Originally posted by sonship
I am making the assumption that you are 1.) upholding that the universe came from nothing is a better explanation than
2.) Someone transcendent to time and space of unlimited power brought the universe into being.

What a bizarre argument.

No. Not on your say so, its a "bizarre argument".

[quote]
That doesn't follow at all. ...[text shortened]... est in the things created.

"God has to be created too" is just saying "God cannot exist."

Removed some paragraph breaks for space:

Out of nothing nothing comes. That's coherent.

Arguing "But God would have to have had a beginning and have been created too" is a forced limitation upon what is usually meant by God. You're jury rigging the definition of God to force the concept to be as a rock, a atom, a snowball, a wave of light, or something else in the physical cosmos.

I have to count this kind of tactic as holding down the truth in unrighteousness.

LJ's argument is that if you are going to say that all things require creating this must include God. Your actual argument, it seems to me, is that there are two categories of thing, category A things which do not require creation, and category B things which do require creating and are either created by other things in category B or by things in category A. You also claim that category A has only one member which you call God. So something can't come from nothing translates into category B objects cannot come from nothing. Otherwise your nothing ex nihilo disproves God, which cannot be your intention.

Our counter-claim is something on the lines of category A may contain more than one object.

The goal I think, is to deny accountability to God.
This is done by denying the goodness of God.
This is done by denying the existence of God.
This is done by assuring God is the same as all things in creation making certain that God cannot be transcendent above all creation.

I find this Argumentum ad natis nequam quite tedious. While some people may have some of the motivations you list, to simply think that people come to their conclusions about the existence of God in order to hide is just to dismiss the beliefs of others on unwarranted grounds.

Originally posted by sonship
I am making the assumption that you are 1.) upholding that the universe came from nothing is a better explanation than
2.) Someone transcendent to time and space of unlimited power brought the universe into being.

What a bizarre argument.

No. Not on your say so, its a "bizarre argument".

[quote]
That doesn't follow at all. ...[text shortened]... est in the things created.

"God has to be created too" is just saying "God cannot exist."

There is nothing incoherent about saying God - transcending time and space, uncreated and eternal, of an act of will created the heavens and the earth in the beginning.

I disagree. That sure seems incoherent to me. What you are claiming is that an agent, God, brought something about through a creative act...whilst also being independent or beyond temporal relations. That is incoherent because a creative act is an event, and events occur in time and are subject to temporal relations. So this view is incoherent because it contains a contradiction that God is both subject to and not subject to temporal relations. As I have already asked of you in this very thread, it would be great if you could clarify your views on causation, such that it makes sense to view it as something independent of temporal relations.

At any rate, this is not identical to the view that you were espousing previously, toward which my earlier objections were aimed. What you implied before is that there exists some thing that brought all things into existence. This view is also incoherent, albeit for a different reason as already explained.

So you seem to have offered two views, both of which are incoherent.

It is not incoherent, especially in the face of the fact that a large consensus of cosmologist admit that time, space, matter, energy appear to have had a beginning.

The view is incoherent because it entails a contradiction, period.

I've already addressed the other point in a previous post. Our physical models do not show that time had a beginning. At best, they show that one can trace the history of the universe back to a singularity, where we have little choice but to stipulatively set t=0. And at any rate, even if they did show that time had a beginning, your view would still be incoherent since creative acts are subject to temporal relations.

In order to force incoherence to the statement "God created the universe" you have to postulate a different definition of God which excludes God being ever existing, uncreated and eternal.

Actually, you're the one who has tried to give content to the statement "God created the universe" in two different ways so far, and both seem incoherent.

By placing a arbitrary limit on a definition of God which includes Him being uncreated you strawman argument your way into the objection that it is incoherent to say God created the universe.

Huh? I've explained in some detail why I think both views you presented are incoherent. How about just directly addressing my actual objections?

Originally posted by LemonJello
Thanks, this is good food for thought.

How did the laws of physics come about, are they the only ones possible?

Regarding the question of whether or not they are the only ones possible: if the possibility at issue is logical possibility, then I would think the answer is no, since logical possibility is broader than nomological possibi ...[text shortened]... perty or natural propensity to exhibit certain patterns; to what extent can this be explanative?

I was thinking at the level of physics rather than logic. Although it's a bit of a spooky concept I don't think there's any overarching reason why logic should be the same in a different universe. Really it depends on what it's like. That's one of those problems for meta-logic that's a little beyond me. Certainly in arguments like the ones here it's not worth worrying about since the (im)possible world we'd be talking about wouldn't be analysable in the actual world.

Regarding your question at the end I think it's possible to introduce biases (one outcome more likely than the other) and explanation would be at that level. If all outcomes are equally likely then there's no particular explanation why one outcome rather than another happened.

Originally posted by Zahlanzi
the genocide of the canaanites doesn't get any less evil just because jesus showed a better, less abominable (this epithet is not strong enough) way.

i have an explanation: the bible is lying when it says the canaanites were slaughtered.

So, let me get this straight.

You call yourself a Christian, and yet you believe the Bible is full of lies??

Just what, exactly, do you base your faith on, then?

Originally posted by DeepThought
Although it's a bit of a spooky concept I don't think there's any overarching reason why logic should be the same in a different universe.

Logic has no dependencies on the physical universe. The rules of logic do not derive from something specific to this universe. They are necessarily universal. To claim otherwise would be illogical.
If you claim logic might be different in a different universe, then how do you know it isn't different in this one too? How do you know the rules of logic are valid here?

Originally posted by twhitehead
Logic has no dependencies on the physical universe. The rules of logic do not derive from something specific to this universe. They are necessarily universal. To claim otherwise would be illogical.
If you claim logic might be different in a different universe, then how do you know it isn't different in this one too? How do you know the rules of logic are valid here?

Logic is a formal language. There is a set of symbols and some rules for which symbol can follow the next - for example in written English (a natural language, but the principle applies) the letter T at the start of the word cannot be followed by some letters (no word starts Td). In logic there are rules for drawing valid conclusions. So modus ponens states that when A->B (if A then B) and A is true then B is true is a legitimate conclusion. There is no a priori reason to think that a parallel universe it well described by English or for that matter logic. Since our experience is that it is in this universe then there is no reason not to carry on using logic. I think my claim is that there are possible worlds that are not analysable, at least with our system of logic. I realize it comes under the heading of extreme scepticism.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Logic is a formal language. There is a set of symbols and some rules for which symbol can follow the next - for example in written English (a natural language, but the principle applies) the letter T at the start of the word cannot be followed by some letters (no word starts Td). In logic there are rules for drawing valid conclusions. So [i]modus pone ...[text shortened]... at least with our system of logic. I realize it comes under the heading of extreme scepticism.

What do you mean by the term 'analysable'?

Originally posted by bbarr
What do you mean by the term 'analysable'?

Best answered with an example, if logic doesn't apply to them then I don't see how we can say very much about them. Suppose we have some statements about them like all circles there are square, and some triangles there are circles then we wouldn't be able to draw the conclusion that some triangles there are square, because we don't know if modus ponens necessarily works there. I realise that that's gibberish, but I sort of opened the logical equivalent of Pandora's box when I posited illogical universes.

Originally posted by LemonJello

I disagree. That sure seems incoherent to me.

If "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." (Gen. 1:1) were really incoherent to you, I don't think you would be debating me over it.

Neither is a statement like - "A finite time ago a transcendent cause brought the universe into being out of nothing" incoherent to you, else I don't think you would be disagreeing with it.

What you are claiming is that an agent, God, brought something about through a creative act...

That much is clearly coherent to you. You just don't agree with it.

whilst also being independent or beyond temporal relations. That is incoherent because a creative act is an event, and events occur in time and are subject to temporal relations.

The creative acts we are familiar with are human and may be subject to such characteristics. I don't know that I can force that upon transcendent God. That "He can do what I as a human cannot do" is a limitation that I just accept, should it be true.

But there is problem to our minds. I agree. The cause of the universe cannot be AFTER the so called Big Bang since that would mean backward causation. And to think of the cause of the Big Bang being in time BEFORE the Big Bang is problematic since we ascertain (at this time) that TIME begins with the Big Bang.

The problem of God creating in the beginning is not insurmountable. Why could not God's creating of the heaven and the earth be simultaneously with the Big Bang ? The objection to temporal events being in a time BEFORE the creation of the universe is addressed if God's creating coincided in a simultaneous way with the Big Bang as a beginning of time.

I think some cosmologists do not consider the initial Big Bang singularity as in time but a boundary to time. IE some think of the event as not part of physical time but constituting a boundary to time. Nevertheless it was causally connected to the universe.

We could also consider God's timeless eternity is a boundary to time which is causally, but not temporarily, prior to the origin of the universe. God, could be thought as living changelessly alone and without Himself being ever created and enters time at the moment of the creation.

This is plausible and coherent. And since an eternal universe, by all we do know about entropy at this point, should have run down into a dissipated and frigid ruin long ago, the universe is not eternal.

I am still not clear if you propose an eternal physical universe to avoid the statement "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." . I expect a very clear indication of an eternal universe as an alternative. And if not an eternal universe that knows of no beginning, then what ELSE you say "Aha! Now THIS is coherent!"


Let me ask again. So you believe in a eternal universe ?
So then "YES", you believe in a universe which always was and is eternal with no FIRST event bringing about its existence?

Are you committing to that belief ?

So this view is incoherent because it contains a contradiction that God is both subject to and not subject to temporal relations.

I don't think you raise an insurmountable difficulty to Genesis 1:1.
There are matters which our limited minds find difficult to comprehend.
But they are not incoherent to us. They are, however, mysterious.

I find it plausible completely that we human beings are made in the image and likeness of an eternal God so that we mirror in some way by our thought, willing images in the mind into existence, God's ability to will into existence the whole material creation. But it involves the mysterious. It is a coherent belief.

I believe in at least one more "higher being" than you do.
Whereas you probably regard human beings as in some way 'higher" than bacteria, or protozoa, or mullusks, or fish, or reptiles, or other mammals and birds, I regard at least one more "higher" life than man. That is the life of God.

As atheists tell me they disbelieve in one more god than I do, I say that I believe in one more "higher" life (at least one), then they do.

God being "higher" in ability, in life, may indeed be very mysterious. But it is not incoherent. You understand it well enough. You just don't like the belief. Perhaps it stands between you and a preferred absolute autonomy that you wish humans had.

As I have already asked of you in this very thread, it would be great if you could clarify your views on causation, such that it makes sense to view it as something independent of temporal relations.

It could be conceived that given time had a beginning, God did not begin to exist with the beginning of time. He was timeless without the existence of creation and temporal subsequent to creation.

Your objection is interesting and considered but not a show stopper to Christian belief.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Logic is a formal language. There is a set of symbols and some rules for which symbol can follow the next - for example in written English (a natural language, but the principle applies) the letter T at the start of the word cannot be followed by some letters (no word starts Td). In logic there are rules for drawing valid conclusions. So [i]modus pone ...[text shortened]... at least with our system of logic. I realize it comes under the heading of extreme scepticism.

I'm not really following this one, it reads as though you are cheapening logic to be that which is an invention of humans - merely a language, which though facilitating our reasoning about the world or the abstract, could easily be usurped by another language in places which don't care about human languages (like parallel universes), and more importantly usurped by a different language that might have a "real life" manifestation. -- As opposed to the likes of myself who hold instead that this language attempts to capture a system of truths and relationships which, like mathematics, can (and I argue always has) existed in the same state regardless of our facility to specify its structure.

But anyway, if we were to suppose there could exist a parallel universe for which the "laws of logic" as we know them did not apply then how would anyone know this universe respects even rudimentary definitions of a universe? Indeed if such a universe existed, what if it didn't really exist !??? (yes I realise I'm contradicting myself there, but then, contradictions don't necessarily have meaning in such universes!)

Originally posted by DeepThought
Best answered with an example, if logic doesn't apply to them then I don't see how we can say very much about them. Suppose we have some statements about them like all circles there are square, and some triangles there are circles then we wouldn't be able to draw the conclusion that some triangles there are square, because we don't know if [i]modus pone ...[text shortened]... but I sort of opened the logical equivalent of Pandora's box when I posited illogical universes.

I guess my worry is that sentences like 'there are possible worlds where the laws of logic do not apply' do not actually express propositions and, because of this, cannot express the content of propositional attitudes like beliefs or, even, posits. If the laws of logic are, at bottom, rules of coherent thought (as Kant held), then we couldn't really think about illogical worlds, couldn't represent them to ourselves, etc.

Originally posted by Agerg
I'm not really following this one, it reads as though you are cheapening logic to be that which is an invention of humans - merely a language, which though facilitating our reasoning about the world or the abstract, could easily be usurped by another language in places which don't care about human languages (like parallel universes), and more importantly usurp ...[text shortened]... icting myself there, but then, contradictions don't necessarily have meaning in such universes!)

Yes, I think that means we've found a point of disagreement between us. I don't regard the fact that logic is a human invention as cheapening it, it just means it's a human invention. Maths is a way of describing the world. I don't think it has an existence independent of us. If aliens happen to have come up with the same mathematical theorems that is because their worlds are like our world (made of atoms and so forth) and so they'd presumably have to solve similar problems. I don't see how something that is in the realm of thoughts can be seen as independent of the thinkers.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Maths is a way of describing the world. I don't think it has an existence independent of us.

Pythagoras's Theorem was true before Pythagoras!

Surely Mathematical Theorems are discovered not invented?

I think in a very real sense Mathematics exists - with or without Man.

Originally posted by LemonJello to Sonship
What you are claiming is that an agent, God, brought something about through a creative act...whilst also being independent or beyond temporal relations. That is incoherent because a creative act is an event, and events occur in time and are subject to temporal relations. So this view is incoherent because it contains a contradiction that God is both subject to and not subject to temporal relations.

The only way out I can see for him (Sonship) is if he accepts that god
created everything throughout eternity with a single (ex-temporal) flourish.
(Like a director creating an entire film instantly rather than scene by scene)

This scenario would of course (I think) rule out free will.

It would also make existence pretty meaningless.