@ GN- Yes I was tossing a monkey wrench into the discussion of creation. (Which I probably shouldn't have done in this thread)
A 'cheeky' monkey wrench is always welcome.
I read the following arguments.
(1) God is eternal and created the universe.
(2) God created the Big Bang which created the universe.
(3) The Big Bang created the universe without divine intervention.
So I contemplate:
(4) The Big Bang created God.
And I respond to your arguments and raise you five! (Or is it show? I was never any good at cards ... and me a saint!)
@ COT- Sure ppl can disagree. But I am basing my comments on what is written in the Bible. It's right there.
Hmm ... that there's fighting' talk, podner! (If we knew each other, I'd say 'Then fill your hand, you sonovabitch!', but you'd know that's one of my favourite lines from the movies, John Wayne in
True Grit!)
OK ... seriously:
(1) God is eternal and created the universe.
Which isn't ...
or is it?
(2) God created the Big Bang which created the universe.
The Big Bank was first proposed by a Catholic priest, so I can live with that.
(3) The Big Bang created the universe without divine intervention.
But not that ... if not God ... what?
So I contemplate:
(4) The Big Bang created God.
I would says that's putting the cart before the horse, based on (1) and (2).
I find (3) philosophically unsatisfactory, as every event, indeed everything, would seem to have a cause, bar God which, philosophically, exists within a category of its own.
I would add however, that most people seem to assume one can argue 'God' from within the Aristotelian categories, ignoring the fact that God is, for Aristotle and the Western Philosophical Tradition generally, a category of its own ...
I would have also said "
Voila! En garde, mon ami!" except that here in the UK, we have an 'updated retelling' of Victor Hugo's "
The Three Musketeers" on Saturday night prime-time TV which is truly, IMHO, terrible!
Some here, who share my interest in the history of the samurai, perhaps might have expected me to respond with the more polite (but more devastating) "Apologies, but I'm going to cut you down," attributed to Tsukahara Bokuden, a famous swordsman of samurai era (1489 - March 6, 1571).
From a rather inexact memory of the tale, Bokuden was crossing a lake on a ferry-boat when one of his followers got in a fight with an ill-mannered samurai. A bit problematic for the passengers on a small boat. Someone, perhaps the servant, complained when they reached the shore, that Bokuden should have intervened, being the responsible party, the row being about his skill and all, to which he replied, "That's a pity, because then I will be obliged to cut that man down for his intemperate words, and cut you down (to the servant) for your impertinence in dragging my good name and the name of my school into your stupid argument."
From my knowledge of the reputation of the man, I doubt he cut either of them, but I think he frit the daylights out of 'em both!
Another telling says the impudent and ignorant samurai was ridiculing Bokuden's style of 'the Sword of No-Sword'. "I'll show you, you muppet!" Bokuden said, then directed the ferryman to take them to a sandbank a little way offshore. The samurai, not to be taken by surprise, jumped onto the sandbank as the boat approached, ran to his spot, drew his sword and adopted his kamae ('fighting stance'). Bokuden picked up an oar, pushed the boat off, and left the man stranded. "There," he called across the widening gap as they left the man stranded on the islet. "That's the Sword of No Sword, you wazzock!" (Or words to that effect.)
