existence of the universe, God, and physics

[Metric]

I often see threads concerned with the existence of the universe, how physics plays into it, and how God relates to "first cause" arguments. Here I'd like to put forth my own thoughts on the matter...

The main issue as I see it is that the laws of physics cannot explain their own existence -- their own manifestation in reality. Often times I see people invoke "quantum fluctuations" to explain the existence of the universe, but this is in some sense misguided as a fundamental explanation -- for quantum fluctuations to take place, you first need a universe operating according to the rules of quantum mechanics. This is likely to be the case for ANY physical theory useful for describing what happens within the universe -- in order to invoke such a theory as an explanation for the existence of things, you first need a universe where "theory X" is already established and functioning.

As an analogy, consider your car. Suppose you go into the glove compartment and find a rough blueprint for the car. If you want, you can improve on this blueprint through exploration. With time, you can gain a better and better understanding of the car through a process vaguely similar to science. However, the question of "why is my car a Honda and not a Porsche" is not to be answered by this process. In fact, there may be some excellent reasons that the blueprints you have tend to converge more and more over time to something known as a "Honda Civic." Something dictates that Honda blueprints describe the physical reality inside your garage, while Porsche blueprints (as far as you are concerned) remain an abstract concept existing on paper only -- but that something is not on the blueprints!

So here we are in our universe, gaining better information over time about the laws of physics. This is a profound and worthwhile endeavor, but my feeling is that it is not going to be terribly useful for understanding what gives the universe its physical reality. I certainly believe that something gives the universe physical reality -- I don't see much of an alternative. But I don't think understanding that something is going to be accomplished by finding the "next order correction" to our understanding of the laws of physics. By its nature, it is likely to be a qualitatively different enterprise.

Now some definitions from this point of view: Virtually everyone believes that there is a something which grants our particular set of physical laws reality. If you believe (or assume) that this something has some properties vaguely similar to what we would call consciousness or self-awareness or personality, then you call this something God, and people call you a theist or deist. If you believe (or assume) that this something does not have consciousness or personality associated with it, then I'm not sure what you call it -- maybe just "something" for now, but in any case other people call you an atheist. But my contention is that whatever this "something" is, it is almost certainly not described by physics in the usual sense of the word, though we all believe in "it" in one way or another.

[chezlaw]

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Now some definitions from this point of view: Virtually everyone believes that there is a something which grants our particular set of physical laws reality. If you believe (or assume) that this something has some properties vaguely similar to what we would call consciousness or personality, then you call this something God, and people call you a theist or deist. If you believe (or assume) that this something does not have consciousness or personality associated with it, then I'm not sure what you call it -- maybe just "something" for now, but in any case other people call you an atheist. But my contention is that whatever this "something" is, it is almost certainly not described by physics in the usual sense of the word.

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but it just raises the question about what grants the existence of the something that grants the existence of the physical universe, we're just back at another version of the same old first cause question.

Sure its beyond current physics and almost certainly beyond finite science and reasoning but that's no excuse for those who claim reasonable belief about it.

chez

[Metric]

My post is not really an attempt to solve the "first cause" problem -- it is merely to point out that physics is not and should not be expected to be a self-contained explanation for existence. At some point, some kind of qualitative jump to "something else" is essential -- what kind of a jump it is, and what it would be based on (if not the standard scientific gathering of information) is of course totally mysterious. I was also hoping to cast the theist/atheist distinction in terms of a slightly larger-than-usual picture.

This might be trivial and something you've realized for years, but I thought I might as well put it out there...

[Borodog]

Metric,

Brilliant post. Do you have any thoughts that might help my in my "Calling BruceZ" thread?

[luckyme]

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At some point, some kind of qualitative jump to "something else" is essential

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That's the part that seems the leap to me. Given that all the progress we make reveals incrementalism at work, it seems premature to assume that a few of interesting problems we're working on require leaping. Assuming we don't consider relativity, QM or string theory any kind of leap, even though they shift the framework pretty drastically.

luckyme

[Metric]

I'm not arguing that there's anything misguided about incremetal improvements to physics model building. It's a great way to get better models. My argument is that better models don't help you with the question of why the final "100% correct" model assumes physical reality, while an alternate model just sits there on paper.

[David Sklansky]

I sure don't have a problem with your "something". I do have a problem with that something going out of its way to create almost a googol subatomic particles, over 15 billion years, in a universe octillions miles across, with quintillions of stars and planets, so that one planet, during one ten millionth of its existence, would have one out of 100 million species, for one onethousandth of its reign on earth, be eligible for special consideration if individuals would only believe a particular moronic story among hunderds that have been thrown out.

[FortunaMaximus]

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I sure don't have a problem with your "something". I do have a problem with that something going out of its way to create almost a googol subatomic particles, over 15 billion years, in a universe octillions miles across, with quintillions of stars and planets, so that one planet, during one ten millionth of its existence, would have one out of 100 million species, for one onethousandth of its reign on earth, be eligible for special consideration if individuals would only believe a particular moronic story among hunderds that have been thrown out.

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No kiddin', and I can't find the natural science to explain what Metric suggests without sounding like a kooky moron. Quantum mechanics is gonna have to do for now. From monosyllablic grunts to Latin to Romance languages. Causality is such a crock, but people are conditioned on a if this... then... basis that I give up trying most of the time.

I'll see what readin' that quantum gravity textbook does this week. Apologies in advance if I wink out of existence.

[Jasper109]

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I sure don't have a problem with your "something". I do have a problem with that something going out of its way to create almost a googol subatomic particles, over 15 billion years, in a universe octillions miles across, with quintillions of stars and planets, so that one planet, during one ten millionth of its existence, would have one out of 100 million species, for one onethousandth of its reign on earth, be eligible for special consideration if individuals would only believe a particular moronic story among hunderds that have been thrown out.

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No kiddin'

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[chezlaw]

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for special consideration if individuals would only believe a particular moronic story among hunderds that have been thrown out.

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moronic story!, finally the real reason not to believe it.

though you are becoming judgemental, you had a go at drugs for being despicable before.

chez