Why Was Richard Dawkins Unable To Explaint The Origin Of The Universe?

[Ouroboros]

Dawkins had no plausible explanation.

Simply because Dawkins is not a philosopher nor is he a physicist or astronomer. He's a biologist.

[Ouroboros]

Dawkins's answer is no less filled with pixey dust and fairly tales.

Because he's the wrong person to ask.

 

I could ask you for the price of tea in China. If you don't know, then we have to assume that you're wrong about everything you say or know.

[florduh]

And this guy wonders why we get angry. 

 

 

He can't possibly be at fault, so we must therefore be angry at his nonexistent god. To True Believers, God is axiomatic to the thinking (!) and arguments. They can't conceive of true non-belief. The way we act, we must be mad at God!

 

It's like when a guy gets fired for coming in late three days in a row, sleeping on the job, and stealing office supplies. His response is, "You fired me because I'm black!" No, sometimes people are just assholes and can't attribute their treatment to their race or deflect it to their gods. There is no god to hate, but believers have a made up one that's hateful in concept, and they carry out its imagined commands.

[Ravenstar]

 

Right.  But if Dawkins had said that an Invisible Pink Unicorn had made the universe using magic words then that would have been a proper explanation.  No wait, it's only a proper explanation if Yahweh did it using magic words.

 

Science starts with "I don't know" and if we still don't know there is no shame in admitting that.

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered.  I find it fascinating that people just skirt over this question, as if it has no relevance.  Again, I'm not asking folks to believe in God.  I'm just trying to get them to think about why they really believe evolution and whether there is any proof to support its ultimate origins.   

 

No, it doesn't ..... Evolution is how biological things change... NOT the origin of the universe. That's cosmology. The ORIGIN of life is ABIOGENESIS. Not evolution.

 

Evolution is a fact.. it happens, we can observe it, we can make working predictions based on it (know that FLU SHOT you get every year? - that's evolutionary theory in practice in the real world - biologists couldn't do that without Evolutionary Theory being correct). It doesn't matter if we don't know exactly how it all started.. we DO know how it works now.

 

We do not have a scientific theory for abiogenesis, but we have several hypothesis and the science is getting closer all the time. We do have a theory for the origins of the universe... what the state of the universe was BEFORE the expansion is an unknown at this time, because physics breaks down at the point of the singularity. String Theory is a good hypothesis though... as is the multiverse hypothesis. NO scientist EVER asserted that something came from nothing - do you people just make this shit up? Read some Stephen Hawking for goodness sake.

 

Your science knowledge is pitiful. Geez, and I thought I was  scientifically illiterate.

 

I don't know the answer to this question.. the scientists don't either (at least they have the balls to admit when they are ignorant) - but they are working on it

 

However you don't know the answer either. Hint, it wasn't magic.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

 

 

 

I'm asking you to think at this very moment.   

 

 

The irony is rich with this one.

[Ouroboros]

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered.

Whether you know it or not, it doesn't. Evolution is not based on astronomy or physics. The evidence for Evolution stands on its own. We know the age of our world and how things have unfolded. Evolution fits perfectly with Deism for instance, which assumes a God who caused Big Bang. So the beginning of Big Bang doesn't change the fact of Evolution.

 

 I find it fascinating that people just skirt over this question, as if it has no relevance.

I find it fascinating that people just are so ignorant and incapable of making coherent reasoning. It's a non sequitor you're making above.

 

Again, I'm not asking folks to believe in God.  I'm just trying to get them to think about why they really believe evolution and whether there is any proof to support its ultimate origins.

The reason I believe in Evolution is because I took some biological anthropology classes and labs. I actually did learn about the evidence for evolution, and had to look at, measure, etc. It was amazing! It didn't even scratch the surface of all the things that supports it. So I read some books after that. The amount of evidence is enormous. Only an person who chooses to cover his eyes and refuse to listen won't see it.

[sdelsolray]

 

I recently watched a debate involving Richard Dawkins and a Roman Catholic priest

…

Dawkins said, … “I’m not qualified to answer the question."

…

/Thread

[sandiego4me]

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered. 

 

You cannot possibly really be this stupid. Please, tell me that you are not and that you are simply trolling. At this point, I would prefer that you were a troll than a complete idiot.

 

 

It's common sense.  Evolution preaches that the contents inside the building move and change.  However, it has no explanation for the existence of the building itselt.  Until you can explain the origin of the building, any discussion of evolution is secondary.   

[sandiego4me]

 

 

Right.  But if Dawkins had said that an Invisible Pink Unicorn had made the universe using magic words then that would have been a proper explanation.  No wait, it's only a proper explanation if Yahweh did it using magic words.

 

Science starts with "I don't know" and if we still don't know there is no shame in admitting that.

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered.  I find it fascinating that people just skirt over this question, as if it has no relevance.  Again, I'm not asking folks to believe in God.  I'm just trying to get them to think about why they really believe evolution and whether there is any proof to support its ultimate origins.   

 

No, it doesn't ..... Evolution is how biological things change... NOT the origin of the universe. That's cosmology. The ORIGIN of life is ABIOGENESIS. Not evolution.

 

Evolution is a fact.. it happens, we can observe it, we can make working predictions based on it (know that FLU SHOT you get every year? - that's evolutionary theory in practice in the real world - biologists couldn't do that without Evolutionary Theory being correct). It doesn't matter if we don't know exactly how it all started.. we DO know how it works now.

 

We do not have a scientific theory for abiogenesis, but we have several hypothesis and the science is getting closer all the time. We do have a theory for the origins of the universe... what the state of the universe was BEFORE the expansion is an unknown at this time, because physics breaks down at the point of the singularity. String Theory is a good hypothesis though... as is the multiverse hypothesis. NO scientist EVER asserted that something came from nothing - do you people just make this shit up? Read some Stephen Hawking for goodness sake.

 

Your science knowledge is pitiful. Geez, and I thought I was  scientifically illiterate.

 

I don't know the answer to this question.. the scientists don't either (at least they have the balls to admit when they are ignorant) - but they are working on it

 

However you don't know the answer either. Hint, it wasn't magic.

 

 Abiogenesis is directly reliant upon the origin of the universe, in the same sense that floors 2-10 in a building are dependent upon the first floor.  You can talk all you want about floors 2-10, but fully explaining these floors does nothing to explain the floor that holds the entire thing together.  

[mymistake]

So SandTroll, if you can't explain the origin of the universe you can't go to the bathroom?  You can't make yourself breakfast?  You can't pay your bills?  You can't own a home?  You can't dress yourself?  Common sense is to work with the things you can understand even if you can't explain the origins of the universe.  And you are just as ignorant about the origin of the universe as everyone else.

 

You are using special pleading against evolution.  It's a fallacy.  This gambit of yours is childish.

[mymistake]

 

Abiogenesis is directly reliant upon the origin of the universe, in the same sense that floors 2-10 in a building are dependent upon the first floor.  You can talk all you want about floors 2-10, but fully explaining these floors does nothing to explain the floor that holds the entire thing together.  

 

 

Abiogenesis relies upon the origin of the universe as much as you trolling the interwebs relies upon the origin of the universe.  How can you post questions here if you do not have objective evidence that proves the origin of the universe?

 

Special pleading.

[florduh]

Evolution preaches that the contents inside the building move and change.  However, it has no explanation for the existence of the building itselt.  Until you can explain the origin of the building, any discussion of evolution is secondary. 

 

First, evolution doesn't preach, you do. Second, the study of evolution will never address abiogenesis as that is a different subject. Evolution, hotly disputed by those with blind faith in the Bible and Koran, has mountains of evidence proving its validity. Abiogenesis is much more difficult to observe and test. We may never have all the answers, but the faithful will continue to claim they do even with nothing but the word of Bronze Age goat herders to go on.

 

Again, the soundly demonstrated and proven fact of the evolutionary process is an entirely separate study from abiogenesis. Lack of definitive proof in any area of inquiry does not mean "God did it." It simply means we don't know yet.

 

Please stop beating this dead horse. We get it. Many of us held the same blind beliefs you currently hold. We changed our views due to education and logic, and we stopped being afraid to think.

[Ouroboros]

 

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered.

 

You cannot possibly really be this stupid. Please, tell me that you are not and that you are simply trolling. At this point, I would prefer that you were a troll than a complete idiot.

 

 

It's common sense.  Evolution preaches that the contents inside the building move and change.  However, it has no explanation for the existence of the building itselt.  Until you can explain the origin of the building, any discussion of evolution is secondary.

 

Currently, I'm taking a class in 2D design. We're learning how to mix colors and some fundamental color theory. We've learned that one pigment is Phtahlo Blue. I have no clue at all, and we don't have to learn it either, what this chemical pigment really is or how its made. We still can learn how to paint and do 2D designs. We learn about all the elements, categories, words, etc. And we learn how to mix colors, paint, draw, etc. But we don't have to know where the pigments come from or how they're made.

 

According to you, that's impossible to do.

 

Your argument is obviously flawed. It's called a non sequitor, and you do it a lot.

 

Using your argument, the construction workers must know quantum mechanics before they can drive a nail in. They can't use a hammer unless they understand Newton's formulas. It's a stupid argument you're making. A chef doesn't have to know how to grow pepper corns to make a good dinner.

 

I think the only problem here is that you need to sit down and use your brain a little bit before you start making arguments, because that does follow. Use your brain before making arguments.

[◊ crazyguy123 ◊]

 

Right.  But if Dawkins had said that an Invisible Pink Unicorn had made the universe using magic words then that would have been a proper explanation.  No wait, it's only a proper explanation if Yahweh did it using magic words.

 

Science starts with "I don't know" and if we still don't know there is no shame in admitting that.

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered.  I find it fascinating that people just skirt over this question, as if it has no relevance.  Again, I'm not asking folks to believe in God.  I'm just trying to get them to think about why they really believe evolution and whether there is any proof to support its ultimate origins.   

 

 

Evolution and the origins of the universe have nothing to do with each other. Evolution just explains how organisms have changed through time after there were already organisms in existence. An explanation for how the universe came into existence is something completely different.

 

A person can accept evolution, without knowing how the universe came to be. There are even theists who accept evolution, while still thinking that a god is responsible for creating the universe. I don't know why, after all this time, you are still acting as if evolution is supposed to explain how life came to be in the first place. It doesn't and it never has.

[♦ ficino ♦]

 

I recently watched a debate involving Richard Dawkins and a Roman Catholic priest (

).  During the debate, Dawkins was asked to explain how the universe came out of nothing (Starting at 21:00 of the debate).  Dawkins had no plausible explanation.  

 

(snipped)

 

    Since there is no scientific explanation for the origin of the universe, what is that most of you believe started the universe?

 

Your question needs to be made more precise, because "how" in this context is vague.  Do you mean, by what mechanism or process?  If that's what you mean, "God created it out of nothing" is not an answer to that question.  "God created it" says nothing about mechanism or process except perhaps to pull in other metaphors like "by the Word of his mouth".  It's not a scientific explanation.  So everyone is in the same boat.

 

On the other hand, if you mean "what cause outside of the universe 'started' the universe?" there are several possible directions of answer:  

the universe is eternal and has no starting point

the multiverse theory

one god

many gods

we can never know

etc

 

Some of the above might eventually point toward a scientific explanation.  Others by definition cannot.

 

You have concluded apparently in your OP that there is no scientific explanation.  You are therefore asking what is known in philosophy as a pseudo-question - i.e. a question, the answer to which in principle cannot admit of falsification.

[sdelsolray]

 Abiogenesis is directly reliant upon the origin of the universe, in the same sense that floors 2-10 in a building are dependent upon the first floor.  You can talk all you want about floors 2-10, but fully explaining these floors does nothing to explain the floor that holds the entire thing together.  

 

 

The accounting office on the second floor and the pet store on the third floor are not dependent at all on the clothing store on the first floor.

[Fernweh]

SD4M, you keep posting the same old tired and stupid arguments used by Christians since the advent of rational thinking. I get it. Most of us get it. I used to think and say the same things thinking I was being very clever. Blind faith can make an otherwise intelligent person ignore a lot of information explaining the world around us. You're not going to change anyone's mind with these stupid arguments. We've heard them many times and they are easily refuted. We don't consider things like evolution an opinion to be agreed or disagreed with; we consider evolution a fact. You don't think evolution is a fact? Fine, you are being willfully ignorant of the subject. That's your own problem you should work out. You aren't going to win any converts to credulity here.

[sdelsolray]

 

 

Whether you know it or not, the entire foundation for evolution requires this question to be answered. 

 

You cannot possibly really be this stupid. Please, tell me that you are not and that you are simply trolling. At this point, I would prefer that you were a troll than a complete idiot.

 

 

It's common sense.  Evolution preaches that the contents inside the building move and change.  However, it has no explanation for the existence of the building itselt.  Until you can explain the origin of the building, any discussion of evolution is secondary.   

 

To you, perhaps.  Not to the folks how actually work in the field of evolutionary biology.  To them that is primary and abiogenesis and cosmology (separate scientific disciplines) are secondary.

[Kris]

You are asking a question to be answered that you know there is no absolute answer for.  In your mind, you insert the "God did it" explanation.  But science is not that simple.  You are expecting people to be able to consisely explain something that happened over billions of years.  We probably don't even have the technology to do this yet-- but in a few hundred years, we may.  There are some very sound theories out there that do not require god at all that could be plausible.  One has to do with energy and black holes-- and that there are many older galaxies that have materials that are used to form newer galaxies-- it is all fascinating stuff and well above my pay-grade to try to understand. 

 

You want us all to drop everything and say that god did it-- we won't do this simply because that can't be proven either.  You can assert that god is real, but what is your proof?  The bible?  How do you account for the flaws?  The israelites?  Archeology shows that many of them believed in multiple gods, and if you look that the bible objectively, you can see how every time they began to interact with other civilizations, they adopted a number of their beliefs into their own.  Have you ever considered that god never needed a son until the Israelites ran into the Greek and Roman beliefs?  See, everything can be a question-- and perhaps not all the answers are easily found.  But you are not any more right or wrong than we are.  Except that science admits that it does not have all the answers. 

[Ouroboros]

Abiogenesis is directly reliant upon the origin of the universe,

Yes and no. Only superficially. Abiogenesis is reliant on an origin of the universe since it must have happened within a universe. It's a physical dependence, or dependent on its existence, or it couldn't have happened to being with. But the explanation for abiogenesis is not dependent on the explanation for the beginning of the universe.

 

in the same sense that floors 2-10 in a building are dependent upon the first floor.

No. It's not analogous.

 

God could have created the universe to give life through abiogenesis. It could have been God's will. Of course it would be a different kind of God than the God you believe in, but it doesn't change the fact that this is an alternative explanation. There are many kinds of God-types. God could have come into existence through Big Bang and then created life. Or God could be the result of another abiogenesis. Or ... None of them require a specific other one of the explanations to be true for one to be true.

 

 You can talk all you want about floors 2-10, but fully explaining these floors does nothing to explain the floor that holds the entire thing together.

It's not the same thing. If it was, it means that God is the foundation of the building, and you have to explain where the foundation came from. Where did God come from? If you can't answer that, then you are providing an unsatisfactory explanation yourself.

[florduh]

[Ravenstar]

^^^  OMG!  yes, that's it!  LOL

[Ouroboros]

9148130.jpg

Yup.

 

Aliens of the gap theory.

 

It's the same mindset.

[◊ crazyguy123 ◊]

 

 You can talk all you want about floors 2-10, but fully explaining these floors does nothing to explain the floor that holds the entire thing together.

It's not the same thing. If it was, it means that God is the foundation of the building, and you have to explain where the foundation came from. Where did God come from? If you can't answer that, then you are providing an unsatisfactory explanation yourself.

 

Maybe God was born from Super Goddess after Super God and Super Goddess had sex with each other. When the super gods wouldn't let God rule over Earth like he wanted to, he retrieved a super god killing sword from Super God's closet. He then killed his parents, went to the Israelites, and said, "I am God, now worship me and only me, or else!" 

 

Is that a good answer for where God came from?

[flockoff]

I'm not going to sit through this whole thread just to get caught up because I know what it consists of and a cursory glance confirms that others have already had to repeat ad nauseum what I was going to say, but I'll post it anyway:

 

To suggest that the theory of evolution is flawed because it doesn't explain the origin of the universe or the origin of life on earth is like saying the field of mathematics is flawed because it can't justify the statehood of Kansas. You are expecting an area of science to do something it never claimed to do and saying it fails to be true because it doesn't do that thing.

 

And you said something in your op about how you didn't want to hear profanity-laced diatribes and just wanted the facts. I've never seen anyone give you a profanity-laced diatribe. Strong statements, yes, but I don't know what else you expect when you keep asking the same questions and ignoring the answers. It looks like you are more interested in being a martyr than getting any answers, which is why you aren't hearing them.

 

That you're allowed to come here and do this for four pages says the people here are not intolerant. If you like, you can go to a Christian forum where the nonbelievers aren't even allowed to post in the off topic sections and have to pretty much stay in a cyber leper colony with one nonbeliever per thread asking questions and getting banned if the questions aren't easy enough.