Hawking says there are no gods

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GDon said:
But how can an outside-the-universe factor result in free-will? Wouldn't that outside-the-universe factor have its own rules by which 'free-will' is defined? And therefore it still isn't 'free-will' because it is based on another set of rules.
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I have explained many times how free will can't exist if this universe with its "fixed laws of nature" are all there is. Just as water doesn't flow uphill, humans can't think or act contrary to the dictates of the universe. That doesn't mean that I know the nature of this "outside-the-universe factor" and that lack of knowledge doesn't invalidate my argument.

If you believe that free will can exist in a deterministic universe then it is up to you to explain how (without redefining "deterministic").
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Now if someone would find one of the dozen 'free will' debate threads we could get back to the discussion here as to why one need not prove there are no gods in order to conclude with a fair degree of certainly that there are none.
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Why can we re-discuss whether gods exist in this thread but not the other consequences of Hawking's argument?

The question is whether Hawking's argument is scientifically valid and not whether gods/free will/consciousness/sentience/self awareness actually exist. I'm just pointing out that none of these things can exist if Hawking's argument is valid.
 
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JoeMorgue said:
That just assumes a sight unseen "better environment" for life to develop in.

Right now we have a random sample of... one as to a planet we know life developed on. Assuming it has to be a deviation from the norm and inventing a fix for that deviation when we have absolutely zero data on life developing anywhere else seems premature to me.
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The thing is that I don't think anyone has made that presumption, but there's nothing wrong with exploring the idea either. It may turn out to be wrong, but it also might not. If some scientists interested in the ideas of panspermia can think of some way of testing it, then cool.
 
psionl0 said:
I have explained many times how free will can't exist if this universe with its "fixed laws of nature" are all there is. Just as water doesn't flow uphill, humans can't think or act contrary to the dictates of the universe. That doesn't mean that I know the nature of this "outside-the-universe factor" and that lack of knowledge doesn't invalidate my argument.
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I don't know one way or the other if free will is an illusion or not. But clearly there are ways to insert randomness into the mix and free will might very well account for said randomness within a probability set.

psionl0 said:
If you believe that free will can exist in a deterministic universe then it is up to you to explain how (without redefining "deterministic").
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Or not. :rolleyes:
 
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GDon said:
I wasn't making an argument, I was making an observation.
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Huh?:confused:


You are using your own ideas about God (which you don't believe in) to argue with someone else's idea of God. I can think of nothing more pointless.

As I wrote earlier, it is perfectly valid to point to two statements within a belief system and argue that they are contradictory and inconsistent. But my point is that this is NOT what you are doing.
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I have done this many times if you take notice and can give you many more examples also if you wish.


Haha, true enough for Dawkins and Harris. Not so true for Hitchens and Dennett though. The latter two argued the point from the perspective of the religion or philosophy they were critiquing. You are nowhere near arguing like Hitchens. But certainly you argue like Dawkins and Harris, from what I've seen, if that is any comfort to you.
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A short excerpt from Hitchens for you:

God did not create man in his own image. Evidently, it was the other way about, which is the painless explanation for the profusion of gods and religions, and the fratricide both between and among faiths, that we see all about us and that has so retarded the development of civilization. Past and present religious atrocities have occurred not because we are evil, but because it is a fact of nature that the human species is, biologically, only partly rational. Evolution has meant that our prefrontal lobes are too small, our adrenal glands are too big, and our reproductive organs apparently designed by committee;.........
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I have and do argue in a similar vein at times.

No, I've offered no rebuttals, just observations. I felt compelled to jump in when epeeist posted to you:

"I enjoy discussion and argument. I do get frustrated that you seem to in many instances have an incorrect understanding of Catholicism, but I can sympathize that given your beliefs it's probably not worth a detailed course of study to you."

I've felt the same frustrations when reading your 'arguments', so I thought I'd let him know that he was not alone in feeling the way he was feeling.

But it was slightly rude of me, and not conducive to any useful argument, which is even worse. I apologise. I'll restrain myself in future.
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Epeeist jumped ship so I don't know how much comfort he gained from your support.

If you would be more upfront about your own religious beliefs, then perhaps we could have a fruitful discussion about them, where I could point out the blemishes evident on the god of yours that I don't believe in.:D
 
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psionl0 said:
Why can we re-discuss whether gods exist in this thread but not the other consequences of Hawking's argument?

The question is whether Hawking's argument is scientifically valid and not whether gods/free will/consciousness/sentience/self awareness actually exist. I'm just pointing out that none of these things can exist if Hawking's argument is valid.
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You can go off on any sidetrack you want. I haven't reported any posts.

Personally I don't see how anyone has tied the free will argument to the god argument given free will, under either natural laws or magical god laws, presents the same arguments.

Just like turtles all the way down, inserting the god factor only begs the question, how did god get here in the universe?
 
kellyb said:
I'm not seeing what you mean. Can you elaborate?
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If you flip a penny repeatedly you will get an average of 50:50 heads:tails. But you won't get that result over the short run.

Even if you use a mechanical flipper with consistency in the flipping action you get the same results.

Ergo, it demonstrates that even with known probabilities there is random variation. I'm suggesting free will is more evidence of random variation. I'm not destined to become a murderer, that much might be fixed. But there is still significant variation I can exercise with my free will.

Beyond that, I find this a useless thing to debate.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
I don't know one way or the other if free will is an illusion or not. But clearly there are ways to insert randomness into the mix and free will might very well account for said randomness within a probability set.
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If you could insert "randomness" (whatever magic that might be) then it would mean that for any given state of the universe, there could be more than one possible outcome. IE the laws of nature would not be fixed.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
If you flip a penny repeatedly you will get an average of 50:50 heads:tails. But you won't get that result over the short run.

Even if you use a mechanical flipper with consistency in the flipping action you get the same results.

Ergo, it demonstrates that even with known probabilities there is random variation. I'm suggesting free will is more evidence of random variation. I'm not destined to become a murderer, that much might be fixed. But there is still significant variation I can exercise with my free will.

Beyond that, I find this a useless thing to debate.
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You have to demonstrate that something exists before it can be evidence of anything, right? It seems like a "flying saucers are evidence of alien visitation" argument to me.

Also, I don't think true randomness exists except on the quantum level. When it comes to the "newtonian" world of atoms and molecules, etc, there is no actual randomness.

I've never been able to wrap my mind around the truth of this, though:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem

I'm not very "mathy" on randomness questions, I guess. lol
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
I don't know one way or the other if free will is an illusion or not. But clearly there are ways to insert randomness into the mix and free will might very well account for said randomness within a probability set.
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We don't need free will to account for it, we already understand how randomness works without free will, so there's no need for free will to "account for said randomness".

The mathematics of probability distributions is pretty well understood and that understanding doesn't include free will as some necessary ingredient.
 
I don't have to do anything kellyB, because I'm not interested in this debate. Sorry.

I thought I was making that clear. This thread is about the existence of gods. You can all carry on with the other debates that you find related.
 
To Hawking and many like-minded scientists, the combined laws of gravity, relativity, quantum physics and a few other rules could explain everything that ever happened or ever will happen in our known universe.
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Pretty sure he would have included our thoughts in that.

Because the universe also began as a singularity, time itself could not have existed before the Big Bang. Hawking's answer, then, to what happened before the Big Bang is, "there was no time before the Big Bang."
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"We have finally found something that doesn’t have a cause, because there was no time for a cause to exist in," Hawking wrote. "For me this means that there is no possibility of a creator, because there is no time for a creator to have existed in."
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I don't think the concept of there being no cause will ever stop being weird to me. I guess the "something that doesn't have a cause" is technically the "blip" in the quantum foam thought to have sparked the big bang?
 
JoeMorgue said:
And see this is what always happens. Saying there isn't some magical "Fairy in my head" philosophical version of free will doesn't take away the practical, day to day sense of personal volition.

We aren't reduced to choosing between "I can magically make stuff happen in my head without causes" and "I'm gonna drive the wrong way down the interstate at rush hour but it's not my fault because I don't have free will."
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You are the only one who insists on referring to free will as magic.
 
dann said:
You are the only one who insists on referring to free will as magic.
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No, the belief in free will is a form of magical thinking. It assumes a causation that is not there. Magical thinking is if you strip away the particulars, a case of a claim of causation, which is not there.


Now for the general test, compare these:
It doesn't make sense if there is no God.
It doesn't make sense if there is no free will.

We know that there is no positive evidence for a god(s). It is always in the end that people believe in a god(s).
We know that there is no positive evidence for free will. It is always in the end that people believe in free will.
 
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