What is the Cause of Causality?

Question

If everything has a cause, then what causes the rule: "everything has a cause"?

Answer 1

Causality...1 + 1 = 2, take away any of the causes of the 2 either of the 1's or the plus sign and the 2 ceases. Test the hypothesis and see the causality....

Why this is so is a case of seeking causality and then observing causality. Therefore the cause of causality is the action of observation. Finding and observing causality causes the rule "everything has a cause".

A Buddhist....

Answer 2

Finally, an easy question. The answer is clearly "We don't know". The Big Bang theory "only" describes the effect of the expansion of space on the energy density of the universe. Same amount of energy, more space to spread it out = the density decreases with time. It also describes what happens at critical thresholds in density. Analogy. If I fill a room with very hot water vapor, you would not see anything (as a gas, water vapor is perfectly transparent in visible light). As I drop the temperature, nothing would happen until we approach a "threshold" temperature of 100 C (212 F). The vapor would form droplets and, as long as these are very small and kept in the air by the Brownian movement of the air molecules, you would see a cloud. We keep dropping the temperature so that below 100 C, you see puddles of water forming on the floor. At another threshold (0 C = 32 F) you begin to see lines of crystalisation on the surface of the puddles. Also, the remaining vapor that keeps condensing from the air now forms crystals (ice crystals or even snow) that slowly fall to the floor. Eventually, as the temperature continues dropping below 0C, the puddles freeze and you have a skating rink covered with fresh snow. This looks very different from the beginning, and yet we have changed nothing... other than the temperature. The Big Bang theory describes how the initial energy becomes forces, then matter, then hydrogen, then a mix of hydrogen, helium and a pinch of a few light elements - each transformation has its threshold density. It is when we use the theory backwards (to see what the past COULD have been like) that we hit a wall: there comes a moment when the density was so high that we no longer understand how things work. This moment is called the Planck Time. Worst: we don't even understand how time itself flows at that density (or at higher densities). This makes it impossible (for now) to use the word "before" at the Planck Time. This does NOT mean time did not flow (although that is a possibility), it just means we do not understand how. What we do know about the Planck Time: --the energy already existed --space was already expanding --the energy density was NOT infinite. Any cause, to the existence of the initial energy or to the expansion of space, would have taken place "before" the Planck Time, therefore outside what we can understand with the Big Bang theory. The theory is very good at explaining what happens "after" the Planck Time. To go back to the analogy: Going backwards: If we turn the heat back on in our room, the ice and snow will melt, the water will evaporate, the clouds will disappear and the water vapor becomes transparent. Keep turning up the heat and you will reach a point where the water molecules break apart (the hydrogen atoms cannot remain with the oxygen atoms any more). From that point on, any theory about water stops working... because you no longer have water. (The difference is that we do understand what happens at higher temperatures in this room, because the temperature at which the breakdown of water occurs is far less than the temperature at the Planck Time)

Answer 3

You are wise, Yoda. :-)

What arises from causes, comes to cease when those causes cease to be.

The phenomenal world consists of things that arise & cease.

Bare phenomena flow on ('sudda dhamma saarati').

There is an unborn, uncreated, uncompounded. Were there not an unborn, an uncreated, an uncompounded, there would be no escape from the born, the created, the compounded.

(Nirvaana is the UN-caused).

Access to this is brought about by the cultivation / development, of the Best of the compounded.

The Noble Eightfold Path.

So the Path conditions the revelation of the rule.

The rule is / was always there, but needs 'someone' to find it out / discover it.

These things don't occur due to chance, alone... :-)

Answer 4

There is also a rule that says: "there is an exception to every rule." This rule of causality has an exception of course: the First Cause.

Aristotle understood it as the "unmoved mover." Lao Tzu called it "the Tao", the Way that cannot be truly spoken. Judaism called it "Elohim" or "El" - "God" to the western world. Hindus speak of the Brahma.

Whatever name you give it is simply a way of understanding that first, ultimate truth - the source of all truth and all existence.

Answer 5

Teacher,
Being is the prime mover in whatever way Being manifests itself.

Causality only exists in a linear time. Outside of that perspective, cause and effect are one. The fruit is in the seed.

Being begets consciousness, therefore Being is more primal than consciousness.

Being makes reality, therefore Being makes the rules.

Answer 6

ah Kalam
everything that had a beginning had a cause
2 the universe hda a beginning
3 therefore, the universe had a cause.
furthermore 1 the universe had a first cause
2 This first cause's act to create was either determined,undetermined ,or self determined.
3but it cannot be determined since there is nothing before the first cause.
4Neither can it be undetermined,since this is contrary to the principle of causality
5Hence,the act to create must have been self-dtermined.

Answer 7

Mind is the maker of rules. Consciousness is the maker of mind. Nothing needs to cause Consciousness since it IS 'prior to' any maker of rules. Thank God!

Mind is the first to ask why and how. It turns back toward it's creator, and asks..... There can be no answer.

Answer 8

Cause.

Answer 9

Enlightenment of course,. Buddha shoots a beam of light out from between his brows{third eye}. The mistake is made when one thinks they are tossed and turned by the "force" when really they are the source of the force{Buddha}. ~*~

Answer 10

ongoingness - sheer ongoingness -

maybe it is more of a momentum than a cause as such