Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia; Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc.
Creation
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Big Boom!
Post 56.November 08, 2018 continued . . . .
Creation versus Big Bang Alternative Theories of Being?
Non-religious alternatives to the Big Bang Theory are rare5. Previous cosmologies proposed a self-renewing “Steady State” universe, a “Big Bounce” oscillating series of ‘verses, and an ongoing “Eternal Inflation” that produces an infinite number of multi-verses as it explores all possible variations of physical laws. Even the various Multiverse hypotheses take that sudden pop into existence for granted, as necessary to explain the expansive dynamics of our home ‘verse. They simply imagine that one-of-a kind event as a commonplace episode ─ an “eternal return” cycle of cosmic birth, death, and rebirth6. Other proposed explanations for the evidence of a beginning for space-time, include String Theory, Hologram hypothesis, and the Digital Simulation concept. But none of them explain away the strong evidence in favor of a Creation Event. So, I simply accept as a reasonable fact, that our world is not self-existent, and conclude that its birth was caused by some awesome cosmic power that existed before the beginning of space & time. The ability to create a natural world in an instant is essentially a super-natural power, and that applies to both infinite Multiverse and eternal God theories .
From that starting point, I have developed my own personal rationale to explain how we got where we are. The thesis of Enformationism begins at the beginning : assuming that the physical world is evolving from a singular super-natural start-point, and has subsequently, via natural processes, produced the meta-physical qualities of Life & Mind that allow us to observe and question what-is. Therefore, Existence includes both physical things, and non-things like self-perpetuating beings (Life) and self-perceiving systems (Mind). This includes the conscious Selves that do the living and knowing. Ironically, most scientific Theories-of-Everything ignore those intangible Qualities. As neuro-anthropologist Terrance Deacon7 sums it up, our materialistic models imply “that we don’t exist, except as collections of atoms”. Which is why I look beyond the objective Atomic Theory8 of reality for a more comprehensive explanation of existence, that includes subjective aspects of our world.
I have found what seems to be a path “less traveled” toward universal understanding in a theory unique to the Information Age9. But not in its original form as an abstract mathematical property of computers and brains. Instead, the Enformationism Theory is about the power that breathes the quality of Life into quantitative equations of phyics10. This is a 21st century alter-native to the traditional myths of ancient religions, based on their primitive notions of Energy (Spiritualism), and to the modern scientific theories, that can also be traced back to ancient secular worldviews such as Atomism (Materialism). This new theory merges incompatible elements of those older concepts, by means of a catalyst, which is commensurate with both Matter and Mind. As a pragmatic worldview, it doesn’t reveal any personal traits of the axiomatic First Cause, or answer the “why” of existence, but it does allow us to infer some of the intentions behind the design, and to guess where this cosmic chariot is heading.
End of Post 56
Alternatives to the Big Bang Theory? Physicist Bill Gaede, in a Quora answer, called Big Bang theory the “religion of mathematical physics”. But I doubt that he meant it literally. In any case, he seems to answer with a shrug, because any different answer he might offer would be patently unscientific, and would sound suspiciously religious. So, I offer my own little philosophical myth of an Enforming Deity of unknown provenance.
“In the Beginning…
The mathematicians realized that curious folk were predictably going to ask, “Well, what happened before the Big Bang?” And of course they had no answer to such a question. It sounded a lot like, “Who created God?” So they prepared a series of statements which they now memorize by rote in college and throw at the naïve layman as the need arises. Unfortunately for them, such answers don’t cut it in Science. The scientist does not ‘know’ because his job is not to ‘know’. The job of a scientist is to EXPLAIN ! If a mathematician cannot explain, he has exited the realm of Science. No more needs to be said.
1. It’s an unscientific question because we cannot test the ‘hypothesis’. We have no way of knowing what came before the Big Bang.
2. The Big Bang succeeded the Big Crunch. We live in an oscillating universe.
3. It’s a philosophical question.
4. It’s like asking what is north of the North Pole.
5. Time began with the Big Bang. So there was no time before the singularity.”
As far as I can see, the only viable answer to the “time before time” question is #4 : it’s not a scientific problem to be solved, but a philosophical question to be discussed. Of course, most of us will prefer one of the two major theories : “God did it” or “Matter did it”. My own personal BothAnd theory says “G*D enformed it”. That creative agent is not exactly the God of theism, nor the self-existent Energy of atheism, but something more like the anonymous deity of Deism.
What are some other reasonable alternatives to the Big Bang Theory? for popup click { here }
6. Eternal Return myths : Ancient alternatives to creation myths. Nietzsche said we should accept the fatalism and absurdity of our lot as pawns of pre-destination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_return
8. Atomic Theory : An ancient philosophy of Materialism, denying the existence of invisible deities, and asserting that all of reality boils down to Atoms bouncing around in Void – something in nothingness. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atomism-ancient/
9. Information Theory : “The great tragedy of formal information theory is that its very expressive power is gained through abstraction away from the very thing that it has been designed to describe”. __John Collier
10. Breath of Life : “Even if there is only one possible unified theory, it is just a set of rules and equations. What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe? The usual approach of science of constructing a mathematical model cannot answer the questions of why there should be a universe for the model to describe. Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?” —Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time
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