Atheist, got a question for you?

Question

I am asking you specifically because I was thinking about it, and. Personal beliefs aside how can we exist without a causeless cause? We acknowledge the big bang, but what caused it. Things don't just explode from nothingness right? There is a theory that says the universe expands and contracts, but what made the universe to begin with? and what was that stuff made out of? and so on and so forth.

I kind of have a similar question about atoms, how do we know it doesn't get any smaller? I have not been able to locate so much as one "real" picture of an atom because they are all representations.

kent, no one is listening to you because your very abrasive when you talk. You need to learn how to interact socially ad well as the power of influence.

Answer 1

I'm going to play an atheist here... okay... here goes...

Durr, the universe is eternal... durr... I are smarter than you... durr... evolution is true... durr...

That probably sums up the answers you will get.

God bless!

Answer 2

The Big Bang theory doesn't discuss somethingness exploding from nothingness, merely that at some point, all four of the forces (strong, weak, gravity, electro-magnetic) were unified into one force until it could no longer be contained and then it "exploded." Though that's not fully accurate. In any case, it doesn't really get into what happened before the Big Bang and how that tiny, dense point got there in the first place, let alone how much big, empty space there is. We're still working on Planck's Epoch, so let's not get ahead of ourselves. Many physicists assume that the universe has always existed, that there's no "beginning" nor "ending." The problem with being a finite being is that we assume everything is "born" and "dies" and our only basis for that assumption is that we're born and we die.

Super String Theory does offer explanations beyond the Big Bang. In fact, it offers the unification theory that can explain a lot of things. The problem with String theory is that it's based on bands of energy that are too small. A string would be the size of the average middle-aged tree if an atom were the size of our solar system. Our technology can't do anything with it; so, for now, string theory exists mathematically, not scientifically.

As for how do we know atoms don't get smaller? Actually, we do. We've found the particles. We've found even smaller things we call quarks. They're the basis of quantum mechanics. We think there are smaller things still, we just don't know what they are. The reason you can't google up a pic of teeny tiny particles and molecules, etc., is that there are other, far more effective means of empirically testing the atomic world than through sight. We don't see the atoms, but we can split them. Otherwise, why would we care about anyone possessing nuclear weapons?

Answer 3

What if the universe has always been around, meaning it is infinitely old. It never had a beginning or a creation, it has always been. The big bang could be a number of things, just the most recent birth or a part of much larger universe that we can never see.

And as for anything smaller than the atom. Think about this...what if everything in our universe to the farthest galaxy is nothing more than a closed electron in an limitless universe of electrons. In our universe there are galaxies, stars, planets, life and electrons. And in those electrons are galaxies, stars... an infinite regress forwards and back.

Now if you believe that god did all this, you must ask the next logical question since you said the "causeless cause" where did god come from? God couldn't have always been, he had to have been created as well. And in this cause, god was created by humans.

Answer 4

1. "Personal beliefs aside how can we exist without a causeless cause?" No offense, but you weave your own personal beliefs into the foundation of this question. If you believe you/we were "cause," great. No one's saying you're wrong; but there's no proof you're right.

2. "Things don't just explode from nothingness right?" I've yet to see a Christian who has bothered to try to understand the big bang theory, and I tire of repeating (because it seems no one borthers to read): the big bang (assuming it happened) was not necessarily tpreceded by "nothingness;" but we have no way to estimate what (if anything) existed prior to that, based upon the rules of physics as we have observed them. It'd be like trying to guess what was on a chalkboard three weeks ago, when that chalkboard gets thoroughly used and erased over and over again every day.

3. "There is a theory that says the universe expands and contracts, but what made the universe to begin with?" Good question. We don't know if anything "made" it, or it "made" itself. There is no evidence either way, at present.

4. "and what was that stuff made out of?" depends on which stuff - but most likely out of matter and/or energy, whatever you are referring to.

5. "how do we know it doesn't get any smaller?" It does. There are many kinds of subatomic particles we have only been exploring in recent decades.

6. "I have not been able to locate so much as one "real" picture of an atom because they are all representations." We never see anything. We only see the light reflected off of things. At tha atomic and subatomic level, light is not a good medium to describe what one measures, just as if we all suddenly lived in a cave and had no lights, but for some reason had a radar, that radar would be the best tool to describe our surroundings. Scientists use particle beams to measure at small levels of reality.

Answer 5

Don't worry about this uncaused cause thing. In fact events like virtual particles happen all the time without a 'cause'. And fissionable atoms go pop without a cause.

The quantum world is governed by probability, and things occur according to their likelihood, not because something sets them off.

This mechanism alone could account for the Big Bang: as with virtual particles, the probability of the initial singularity, though very small, may simply have randomly risen to 1. These things are happening all around you on a tiny scale. Bigger things just take longer.

It helps that there was no time before the BB. Perhaps 'Nothing' just decays.

CD

Answer 6

Science does not claim to understand the physical universe prior to the instant after the Big Bang (which can still be seen and heard), and it does not recklessly speculate.

No one (theists included) ‘knows’ what came before. Almost certainly, however, the answer does not involve invisible supernatural beings that have never been seen or heard by any human, and have never left a single piece of empirical evidence that would suggest their existence.

According to Christine lore, 2000 years ago their god was a miracle-making machine. Why has he gone dormant? Why can’t any holy person (or all of them combined) get their god to make an appearance or perform some trick that even Penn & Teller could not accomplish?

Answer 7

1.) Because the Universe really is nothing. Yes it's energy (slow moving energy is called matter) and empty space but essentially it's nothing. The only reason the Universe is something is because us humans and other 'living' things are here to put our own spin on it, bound by the limitations of our own senses (ie, how we interpret the universe).

2.) Atoms are not the smallest of the small, they too are made up of even smaller parts known as subatomic particles, it's just that we, as humans with our limited senses) placed a label on atoms as the smallest thing that we still consider something (matter). But it doesn't really mean anything, it's just a classification system that humans invented and without humans it, like the Universe, is arbitrary.

3.) Our 'existence' too is nothing, because even though we think we feel and understand it, we are limited by it. Humans feel that "cogito ergo sum" sums up the why of our lives, why we're better or important, because we think. But really the higher one's brain capacity the more we put our own spin on the Universe. Therefore, the great conundrum of life remains, only the simplest life-forms perceive the Universe as close to what it actually is, and yet, because they are so simple they can not understand it.

4.) Theists very easily accept that god always was and always will be, so why then can't this principle apply to the universe.

Best

Answer 8

Well, contrary to the popular belief, we are not all math and science wiz's. No one of us little insignificant beings on this speck in the universe will ever have the all the answers, and it will never be without a doubt. I just believe and know that deities are not real, and I trust science more because it actually LOOKS for answers. Even if some things are only a hint of what a real answer might be, even if something isn't 100% accurate at first, they still research to find what ultimately is the answer. And from that point I will make my own determination if it seems likely. Likewise with other 'methods' of being...I do not find deities and easy answers out of one book, with which people never even try to find answers to our world beyond some ancient outdated text, I find those things to be rather unlikely.

Answer 9

I think it's reasonable to just accept that the origin of the universe is a very complex subject, and that we as humans should not feel obligated to imaging everything is the result of an act of God. I simply accept that there are some things that we may never totally know the answer to. We cannot be omniscient; I think that's why most people believe in God...because they're trying to find those answers that science cannot give them.

Answer 10

Belief in god does not solve the "primary cause" riddle. It simply begs the question of what caused (created) god.

The big bang assumes the universe started from the simplest singularity, where time, matter, energy and space were one. I find this more logically compelling than imagining the universe was created by something that was already very complex (supernatural force-god).

As for your second question, we can now see atoms-with scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM), in which a beam of electrons scans atoms and we record how electrons scatter off the nuclei.

Answer 11

Google "M Theory" if you want to see what some physicists think. They suggest that the cause is a collision in the underlying framework of other universes.

Look I think the stuff was always here in some form. Putting a god there just delays the question because now you can ask what caused that god. And you got new questions, what is god made out of and what did HE make the universe out of. You said yourself that you can't get something from nothing. You just added complexity to the whole question with no evidence to do it.