God Exists

The Cause of the UniverseThe universe has a temporal beginning and therefore has a cause.• The universe has a positive cosmological constant (2011 Nobel Prize)• Universes with a positive cosmological constant have a fixed space-time boundary and therefore has a temporal beginning. A multi-verse with at least one universe with positive cosmological constant will also have a fixed space-time boundary (Proof by Alan Guth and Alexander Vilenkin)This debate is not whether the universe has a cause but rather the scientific resolution of the nature of that cause. The BurdenTo prove that God is the most probable cause of the universe, the cause of the universe must be shown to be more likely exhibit consciousness than not.It may not necessarily be personal, spiritual nor benevolent as described by religion but if it created the universe and manifested consciousness, there are no other labels that suit that characteristics other than a God. I don’t understand the ad-hoc need to satisfy the presupposition of outdated philosophy that God must be omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent. These are inconsequential as measure of probable cause, however, as the source of the potent energy that created and permeated the universe and its laws, and as it is conscious that willed the creation of the universe, it follows necessarily that God exhibits potency, sagacity and benevolence. I will not be elaborating further on this and will instead focus on arguments for the conscious nature of the cause of the universe. Counter-ArgumentsThe atheist does not have burden of proof but is expected to provide counter arguments, and not simply weigh-in if the theist’s argument meet their standards.To counter God as the most probable cause of the universe, my opponent only need to show that the cause can be reasonably be attributed to chance, randomness or any natural stochastic process that are divorced from acts of consciousness or intelligence. The Futility of ReligionThis house believes that the existence of God is a scientific question divorced from human activities and the answer remains true regardless of how religion conducted itself given the ability of humans to enact free will and be able to do both good and evil, including making false and misleading claims in the name of divine authority. Simply taking Religion’s word for it is begging the question.Contradictions in multiple religions are equivalent to contradictions in implementations of modern-day democracies (including those claimed by China and North Korea) or inconsistencies among interpretations of quantum mechanics, none of which weigh-in on whether John Locke or Neils Bohr actually exists.To insist that God does not exist because Religion is wrong is equivalent to saying that because species of monkeys are misbehaving, therefore the initial conditions of the big bang are stochastic.The universe from NOTHINGIt is scientifically and academically accepted that the universe came from energy fluctuations in the quantum vacuum, although there are varied theories on the actual mechanisms.Outside of “scientific consensus” however, some argued that the universe actually came from NOTHING, but in order to come out of NOTHING, you need energy fluctuations in the quantum vacuum.This is similar to saying that the Boeing 747 came from NOTHING but to come out of NOTHING, you need human beings and raw materials.This house believes that it is more intellectually correct to simply state the universe came from energy fluctuations in the quantum vacuum, and attempts to re-define energy fluctuations as NOTHING is misdirection.The Argument - IntroductionThe energy in the quantum vacuum which pre-date the big-bang is thermodynamic in nature, and so was never created nor can be destroyed but merely transformed to be the universe that we see today. The nature of energy makes it one of the two non-contingent objects known to science.As space, matter, and time are emergent from the big bang, the energy that triggered inflation must be time-less, space-less, and “immaterial”. The Argument – Differential Information TheoryInformation theory asks two basic questions –• In a single attempt, what is the probability that a long random number generator will re-create a complete copy of the Windows operating system?• If a hard drive is found to contain an operating system, what is the probability that human programmers designed it?The methods in answering these two questions have deep applications in cryptology, telecommunications, computing, and artificial intelligence largely due to how it can successfully differentiate, measure, and detect intelligent signals from noise.Examine the hypotethical case of winning a 6-digit lottery with a 1 to 6 million odds, except that it involves a man who continuously won it 70 times in succession. The man was sued in court for rigging (intelligence) the lottery as the chance of all his wins happening is 1 to 10^500. Although there was no direct-evidence, lack of direct-evidence is not deemed as evidence of absence. Instead, we examine via Information Theory if it is reasonable to doubt that all this are due to chance. Note that Information Theory is admissible in court in cases of plagiarism and IP theft.While it is true that any outcome is possible when repeated several times, the man only had a single opportunity to accomplish his feat the same way that the big bang only happened once.It is not my intention to give a lecture, but in conclusion, it is REASONABLE beyond doubt that it is more probable that the man rigged the lottery rather than all of it happening purely by chance.The Argument – A fine-tuned universeThe “hierarchy problem” is one of the most difficult topics in the Standard Model of Physics. It established that the 28 different INDEPENDENT parameters of physics are so fine-tuned that a naturalistic explanation is elusive. The only and last attempt to explain the naturalness of these parameters is Supersymmetry (SUSY). While a topic of rigorous research for the past 3-4 decades, it had failed detection in the Large Hadron Collider and the only parameter space it is permitted are in regions where SUSY become fine-tuned itself. While research still continues, SUSY is no longer considered a valid candidate to explain the fine tuning in physics. There are also examples of fine tuning in cosmology but the hierarchy problem is scientifically and academically acknowledged.It is now well regarded and accepted that parameters are fine-tuned for the creation of the universe (slight mistuning will create a universe that will annihilate itself immediately). Examples of these fine tunings are in dark energy density, rate of inflationary expansion, relative strengths of the forces, resonant frequency of the atoms, etc, that if the permissible values are spread over the diameter of the universe, and if retuning was done just by over an inch, the universe will either cease to exist or will not be life permitting.M-String theory aims to provide a complete picture of quantum gravity. The 6-dimensional Calabi-Yau manifold that is a crucial ingredient of M-theory is fined-tuned itself but can be considered successful in quantifying the upper-limit of the parameter-space to define all possible universes – 10^500. Our universe belong to one of these possibilities, but if by chance alone, represent an EXTREME amount of luck required for our universe to be what it today.In closing, the fine-tuning was manifested during the instant of the big bang, and by virtue of information theory, it is more probable that our universe is a product of design rather than by chance. Design implies intelligence which begets consciousness and as all these are evident in the creation of the universe, it must be a characteristic of the non-contingent energy present in the quantum vacuum. I leave it to my opponent to present counter-arguments like naturalism and the multiversetheory so I can rebut appropriately in the next round.