We are descended from an ancient worm

[Teluog]

All we know is that Mossy was the first.

[pancreasman]

I don't know what a "First Cause Argument" is, sorry. I just want to know where stuff came from in order to produce life.

And yes, "beats me" isn't an acceptable answer when we are dealing with creation and evolution.

Oh sorry, I thought you were being 'cute' and purposely slowly drawing out a First Cause argument. First Cause arguments are quite reasonable and many theists use them.

http://www.existence-of-god.com/firs...-argument.html

Another familiar form of it is the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kal%C4%...gical_argument

Like all philosophical arguments there are objections and rebuttals. The above link outlines some.

[pancreasman]

I don't know what a "First Cause Argument" is, sorry. I just want to know where stuff came from in order to produce life.

And yes, "beats me" isn't an acceptable answer when we are dealing with creation and evolution.

AND, there are different levels of confidence we can have based on evidence for all kinds of things. For example, I think it would be fair to say that the vast majority of practicing biologists are quite confident that the evolution explains the variety of species based on a lot of evidence. Similarly, the vast majority of geologists are quite confident the earth is older than 6000 years. The origin of the universe is a lot further back in time and physical evidence for how it occurred in scarce (but not non-existent). On this basis, until more data becomes available, I'm more comfortable saying I don't know where the universe came from (but there are some interesting ideas) but that I'm reasonably confident evolution explains the variation of life.

[USIncognito]

More evolutionary science: A sterile puddle of goop in a sterile environment came alive and turned into everything which turned to everything else by means of a mechanism which invented itself in a universe which invented itself and operates by laws which invented themselves.

Unless you're a TE in which case Goddidit.

Yep, just like a bunch of words you just typed evolved into a straw man.

[mossrose]

Oh sorry, I thought you were being 'cute' and purposely slowly drawing out a First Cause argument. First Cause arguments are quite reasonable and many theists use them.

http://www.existence-of-god.com/firs...-argument.html

Another familiar form of it is the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kal%C4%...gical_argument

Like all philosophical arguments there are objections and rebuttals. The above link outlines some.

I was only being semi-serious. Don't have the energy or the concern to really get into it with anybody. Thanks for the link!

[Xru]

infinite

Oh Shuny . . . infinity as a concept only has meaning in a mathematical context. I know you know this and are just pulling our leg.

[shunyadragon]

Oh Shuny . . . infinity as a concept only has meaning in a mathematical context. I know you know this and are just pulling our leg.

Actually no, the infinite and eternal concepts have been used to describe cosmology since at least Lucretius in 1st century BCE Rome, and Isaac Newton defined 'Absolute time.' Absolute time fell out of favor with the advent of Einstein' theories of relativity, but is back again describing the Quantum world independent of the relative space/time nature of our universe.

Math is the tool of physics and cosmology only and in of itself does not define the contest of cosmology and physics.

[Xru]

Actually no, the infinite and eternal concepts have been used to describe cosmology since at least Lucretius in 1st century BCE Rome, and Isaac Newton defined 'Absolute time.' Absolute time fell out of favor with the advent of Einstein' theories of relativity, but is back again describing the Quantum world independent of the relative space/time nature of our universe.

Math is the tool of physics and cosmology only and in of itself does not define the contest of cosmology and physics.

Drat yo - I thought for sure I had ya on that one. Well there's always tomorrow.

BTW, anyone ever tell you that you look like Gandalf. Can you discharge bolts of blue lightning out the end of that phone thing?

Come up with any new fireworks lately other than verbal fireworks, he he.

[Jedidiah]

The natural environment? We let's cut to the chase based on the evidence at hand. Our universe, and all possible universes formed from an infinite and eternal zero-state quantum field. At present we have absolutely no evidence of any other source or cause of anything outside our physical existence.

And we have no evidence of your eternal zero-state quantum field.

[DuraGizer]

kurgan-highlander.jpg

I ... am a worm.

[shunyadragon]

And we have no evidence of your eternal zero-state quantum field.

No evidence?

such assertions should come with citations of competent physicists and cosmologists. I will begin with some summary descriptions of the evidence and also provide specific reference to follow. There is indeed evidence. Is it complete and conclusive,no. In quantum physics and cosmology incompleteness of evidence is the rule not the exception and this will likely be the case for the foreseeable future.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy

In ordinary quantum mechanics, the zero-point energy is the energy associated with the ground state of the system. The professional physics literature tends to measure frequency, as denoted by above, using angular frequency, denoted with and defined by = . This leads to a convention of writing Planck's constant with a bar through its top to denote the quantity /. In those terms, the most famous such example of zero-point energy is associated with the ground state of the quantum harmonic oscillator. In quantum mechanical terms, the zero-point energy is the expectation value of the Hamiltonian of the system in the ground state.

In quantum field theory, the fabric of space is visualized as consisting of fields, with the field at every point in space and time being a quantum harmonic oscillator, with neighboring oscillators interacting. In this case, one has a contribution of from every point in space, resulting in a calculation of infinite zero-point energy in any finite volume; this is one reason renormalization is needed to make sense of quantum field theories. The zero-point energy is again the expectation value of the Hamiltonian; here, however, the phrase vacuum expectation value is more commonly used, and the energy is called the vacuum energy.

© source where applicable

Next post a bit more, because of the limits of forum rules.

[shunyadragon]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy

A phenomenon that is commonly presented as evidence for the existence of zero-point energy in vacuum is the Casimir effect, proposed in 1948 by Dutch physicist Hendrik B. G. Casimir (Philips Research), who considered the quantized electromagnetic field between a pair of grounded, neutral metal plates. The vacuum energy contains contributions from all wavelengths, except those excluded by the spacing between plates. As the plates draw together, more wavelengths are excluded and the vacuum energy decreases. The decrease in energy means there must be a force doing work on the plates as they move. This force has been measured and found to be in good agreement with the theory. However, there is still some debate on whether vacuum energy is necessary to explain the Casimir effect. Robert Jaffe of MIT argues that the Casimir force should not be considered evidence for vacuum energy, since it can be derived in QED without reference to vacuum energy by considering charge-current interactions (the radiation-reaction picture).[6]

The experimentally measured Lamb shift has been argued to be, in part, a zero-point energy effect.[7]

© source where applicable

Is there controversy and disagreement over the present level of knowledge, of course, that is how science works in an open and skeptical peer review manner.

The over arcing issue is there is absolutely no objective evidence, nor adequate argument in modern math, physics and cosmology that our physical existence is temporal or finite.

This in reality not the subject of this thread, and I will post a separate thread to deal with the issue.

[Jedidiah]

Interesting definition, Shuni, but definitely not evidence. I don't question the validity of quantum physics, or the action of quantum fluctuations. But where is the evidence of an "eternal" zero-state quantum field? That is one existing before our universe and without any time or space. It is pure, or almost pure, speculation.

[shunyadragon]

Interesting definition, Shuni, but definitely not evidence. I don't question the validity of quantum physics, or the action of quantum fluctuations. But where is the evidence of an "eternal" zero-state quantum field? That is one existing before our universe and without any time or space. It is pure, or almost pure, speculation.

Well, I added to the post an 'off topic' issue of this venture. I propose another thread to deal with this issue. It would be interesting if in the thread you could cite scientists who consider this pure speculation and not the opinion of biased laymen theists with a religious agenda.

The question came up for 'What is the scientific view of what the first cause would be?' and I responded.