Why is there anything?

To most this does not appear to be sensible question but to me it is very meaningful.  There does appear to be something here.  Now my senses may delude me but it would be difficult to dismiss what I perceive as this reality.  So something is here.

My question would it not be much more easy to understand if simply nothing existed.  If so nothing would need a creation story.  There would be no philosophical questioning of any morality since none would exist. It would be simple.

Since this is not the case then one wants explanation of where "stuff" began.   Was there a time when there was nothing and something was created (as I choose to believe as a Christian) or in an infinite regress did "stuff" always exist?  Of course the infinite regress also applies to God.

Yet, for creation to occur then time must exist.  However, time may only be a dimension in our universe and I understand many believe time was created when the universe began.  Before that neither time nor space existed.  In that case there really was nothing in the absolute sense of the word.   Yet, I also understand that there likely was something that triggered the Big Bang related to multiple universes.  But then the question is how did they begin.

It seems to me that this suggests there is more to existence than can be explained by the scientific method. This seems to indicate a metaphysical sphere that so far has mostly been avoided except for the fringes and religions.    As a result I choose to believe that God does exist as the creator although I do not know how much he or she chooses to interfere with the physics of the universe.

Wealth in the US

According to Ron Paul's website:
Top 1% own 38.1%
Top 96-99% own 21.3%
Top 90-95% own 11.5%
Bottom 40% of population has 0.2% of all wealth

These figures indicate that 10% of the US population own 70.9% of the wealth.  At present time our political system supports and is facilitating this income distribution.

While I am definitely not a socialist, what does this say about our society?   I hear it often that the poor just are people who do not want to work.  There are jobs out there.  If they would just go to work for McDonald's they would do better.  However, these statistics indicate that the wealth of this country is already taken and the rest of us have to share in the remaining 29.1%.

Politically, I don't understand the 90% of the population who are so supportive of the policies facilitating this distribution of wealth.  If I were to believe in conspiracy type theories, I would wonder of the media has somehow taken control of our minds.  It does not make sense to me that these individuals would be so supportive of those who have seized the wealth of the nation.  Wall Street manipulators, responsibile for the recent financial crisis, for example have done quite well in the past few years while most in the US have struggled to pay their bills.  It would seem to me that if anything our policies would want to err on the side of the poor.  Even if we would increase their wealth by say 500%, they would then only have 1.0% of the overall wealth, hardly a number that would threaten the wealthy.

Washington is concerned about the national debt.  You would think they would focused on those who have the most resources to address this debt.  Yet, they instead turn to we, the 90%, who can least afford it.  Even if the government took the entire wealth of the lowest 40% it would not solve the problem.  They simply do not have enough.

I guess I just don't get it.  I am clueless.

Parents, Children, and God

I have great respect for those who choose to accept the responsibility of bringing a person into existence.  That is the greatest responsibility I can imagine.  Before your action, this person simply did not exist in this reality and  as a result of  your decision, either plan or unplanned, a person has been created.  Whatever this individual experiences, your choice allow him or her to exist.  I have always been a much too selfish person to accept such responsibility.

What a burden this responsibility must be for someone who believes in a literal hell complete with God's Damnation.  Even parents with the best intentions may discover problems when raising a child.  Certainly, good parenting skills set the odds in favor that the child will be socialized in an acceptable manner but part of the maturation process is revolt against the old paradigm.  This revolt could lead to a unacceptable lifestyle with the resulting heretical beliefs and thus possible damnation.  It would seem to me if a parent believe his child had died and gone to hell then this parent would never be free from guilt.   He or she is ultimately responsible since it was their choice to bring this person into existence.

If God is the creator then this scenario would also seem to apply.  For if one chooses to create does that not imply responsibility for the creation.   Let's say I create a robot and program it to have various independent choices of behaviors.  If one of these choices resulted in behavior that  harmed or killed someone who would be to blame, the robot or the creator.  I would imagine a court of law would hold the creator liable.    If I gave the robot even more freedom and then declared this robot as a free agent, would this change anything?  I would still be liable in a court of law for his actions.

It would seem God would also share this liability.   As the story goes, God created everything.  He created the very physics which operates in a precise fashion that allow atoms to exists.  He created gravity to allow for the formation of galaxies and solar systems.  He create life and the resulting creatures.  As a result he is ultimately responsible for everything and whatever happens to you or me is a result of God's action to create.

I choose to believe we have free will limited by the realities of our existence.   We are subject to the laws of physics and to various societal mores.  We are also limited by the programming we received during the socialization process.  God on the other hand apparently had complete free will and his intervention into creating our reality was fully his choice and thus the resulting responsibility for this creation is his alone.  Both the good and the bad would not exist if had not acted.

I choose to believe there is an overall purpose to this existence.  I do not have the slightest idea what my part is other than I feel it is best for me to live a somewhat moral life.  I say somewhat since that is the way I have lived.  I don't choose to confess my shortcomings at this time but simply admit that at times I have acted in ways upon later reflection I do not approve.   Why do I believe this morality?  One of the main reason for my belief is it makes me feel good to believe in a purpose rather than in meaninglessness (is that a word?) universe.  Maybe not the only reason but one that does seem to work for me.  I wish I could say I have had some great revelation verifying these ideas but I continue to await such an experience.  Meanwhile, I just do the best I can.

My Problem with Atheism

If I understand the idea, Atheist believe that there is no type of universal intelligence in the background of the universe.  Plato's forms exists only in Plato's imagination.  The only metaphysical aspect to the universe is some mistaken phenomena that science has yet to address and which will ultimately be explained in strictly materialistic terms.

One can not address this question with empiricism.  I have found no scientific methodology offered which would adequately explore this issue.  So the answer to the question of the existence of God is ultimately one of subjective opinion.  It seems this leave you with a 50/50 odds of having the correct assumption.

I point this out to reach my problem with atheism.  If God does not exist in any form then I can not see how there can be such a thing as morality.  Morality would require some organizing universal principal operating in this reality.  Now I am not addressing any specific aspects of that morality or how that morality operates, just the fact for morality to exist there must be something generating the principals.   It would seem to me this organization would require some type of intelligent consciousness.  If God does not exist then morality is simply the subjective and relative opinion of the individual.

This would mean "right or wrong" would only exist in the sense of my personal goals related to my survival.  I might add others to my morality since it would be helpful to me for others to survive, but morality would only exist as an agreement which facilitated my group's survival enhancing my personal survival.  It would simple be an evolutionary function.

While I believe you could make an argument for this viewpoint I disagree.  I feel there are at least some behaviors that are simple wrong.  I could give examples of such behaviors and could easily fill this page with actions I feel are just simply "wrong".  These "wrongs" have nothing to do with survival and in some cases would not facilitate survival of the group.

I also feel there is a "right" way to live one's life.  There are some basic laws which facilitate a "good" life.  These laws go beyond survival and add to a higher "purpose".  If there is no God then this is a ridiculous statement.  There would be no purpose to this life other than living it.  Atheist say this is enough, just to live a your materialistic life.  I disagree, if living this life simply means completing the biological processes of life and making various survival choices along the way with no higher purpose than survival then in my opinion life is not worth living.   You are born, you live, you die, you are no different from an amoeba other than you have a few more behavioral options.   I choose to believe there is such a thing as the "good life" and there is an overall purpose to this existence.  I do not see how this could be true without some type of  organizing principal to the universe.   I refer to this as God.

Now, the nature of God is for the next book.

My Political Bias

My political bias tends to create an internal conflict between wanting the government to err on the side of those who need assistance and freedom of the individual.  I feel in a civilized society various segments of the population should be protected, i.e. the very young and the very old.   I also feel that individuals in a free society should have the right to make poor choices and be responsible for those poor choices.   However, society should be protected from these poor choices if they have a negative impact on others.  For example a person should be able it ingest whatever substance he chooses but others should be protected from his diminished capacities such as in operating a vehicle.    A person should be free to choose to not wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle; however, in the case of a resulting severe head injury society should not bear the medical costs should he survive.

I feel government should ensure children have the basic needs,  food, safety, and shelter.  Education should be a basic right of everyone and everyone should have the opportunity to obtain at least a Bachelor's Degree or some technical equivalent.   Time should be spent in the educational system evaluating students and preparing them for appropriate directions for their future careers.  This requires guidance given to students as to their realistic abilities and how to best develop these.  One should be free to choose their path but they should be provided good information to aid them in their decisions.  I know during my education I had no guidance as to what options I should  consider.  

I feel medical care should be a basic right; however, it should be administered with some limitations.  Children should be given priority.   Beyond this there are some very difficult questions.  These involves one's rights in a free society.  If one chooses to overindulge in alcohol over a period of time, then this should be the responsibility of the individual rather than the society.   Society would not have the responsibility for the medical costs resulting from such activity.  The question of whose bears the cost is simple but the administration of such a policy would be very difficult.  How do you determine if the person drank too much or had some type of liver defect?  These would present many such problems and there is always danger in a free society with anyone having such decision making powers.

There is another very difficult question that we as a society will have to address at some point.  This relates to end of life issues.   Most people spent more on medical costs during the last six months than they do during the rest of the lives.    These procedures are very expensive and in most cases only serve to extend a poor quality of life a few months.    How should our society address such issues?   As for myself, in my present state of mind I prefer to let nature take its course.  However, if and when I have to address that issue I may indeed become very greedy and not care about the cost to society.  I may simply want to extend my life as long as possible.   However, at some point this issue will bankrupt our medical system.

My main complaint of our political system at this time is that politicians seem to have one major issue: reelection.  This seems to dominate both parties and I no longer care to listen to politicians speak.  Depending on their party, you already know what they are going to say because they always use the sound bytes of their particularly party.  It seems to be a sin for a politician to have an original thought.   Of course, this may have always been true but in the past there seemed to be more statesmen, more concerned about their country than their election results.

Why Is There Anything?

It seems it would have been a lot easier if the universe simply never existed.  There would be neither good nor bad, no wars would have been fought, and sickness and death would not be an issue.  For Christians Jesus would not have had to die, God would not have had to be upset with Adam and Eve nor Noah's generation, and would have avoided all the problems he had with the Jews.

When you think about it a lot exists.  The universe is large, much larger than one can imagine.  Our Milky Way galaxy has billions of stars and there are billions of these galaxies.  Now that is big.  Some physicists says there are multiple universes so this means even our entire universe is relatively insignificantly in the overall scheme of things.  Now doesn't that make me feel little.

This stuff has either existed forever or else was created.  Well, it is not even that simple.  Because time only begins to exist inside a particular universe when it is created.  Before it is created then as physics indicates time does not exist.  I know, what does that mean?  That means if time does not exist then cause and effect does not exist and so even the notion of creation is illogical.  Something can not be created unless time flows.  What happened before our universe existed?  For our universe the answer is literally nothing in the most literal sense, no stuff, no space, no time, no nothing.  Then the Big Bang and stuff existed including time, so from our perspective inside the universe time began from nothing.  Does that make any sense?

So things do apparently exist.  We can not be absolutely sure about the nature of this existence because we can only judge things through our five senses which are then filtered through our individual biases based on our experiences.   Yet, it does appear things  exist and it appears that I exist.  It even appears that you exist too.  You could be a figment of my imagination but that would be very narcissistic of me.

This is where the subjective, less than logical side of me awakens and says there must be more than just what my simplistic empiricism indicates.   If this must I can perceive with my limited view then what must I be missing in the larger picture.  I am limited by my five senses, by my entrapment in the this 3D universe, and my extremely short life span.  What other realities must I be missing?

Human Knowledge

We humans think we know a lot.  We have computers and advanced electronics.  We can travel across the globe.  Yet, in the realm of actual knowledge of reality we have major gulfs of ignorance.

I read various philosophers and theologians and enjoy their elaborate theories on everything.  Yet, when I ask, "What is the validity of this particular ideal?" I am left empty.  Usually, the answer is because I said so.  Of course, then you read the next philosopher who rejects his predecessor's ideals and presents his own contradictory message the answer is again the same.  My theory is correct because I say so.  This seems to be true for both philosophical and theological ideas.  Of course, the theological ones also have the claim for metaphysical revelation as their validity.

It seems there is a vast gulf between objective and subjective statements of knowledge.  Objective knowledge such as obtained from scientific methodology gives what I call empirical data.  Data that can be verified by some type of experimental data that is repeatable.  Of course, our objective experience is subject to our filters of reality, our five senses and their entrapment in this three dimensional space.  Subjective experience which may be valid can only be experienced by the reporting individual.  Even when there is more than one person reporting the same experience the evidence continues to be located only in the consciousness of the reporting individual or individuals.   Thus both types of knowledge create problems but the fact that empirical knowledge can be experience by third person seems to add to his validity.

We humans are born into this reality, exist for a short span of time and then cease to exist.  Most individual's history are forgotten in a century or less.   Some suggest we have histories before we are born and others say that death is the beginning of a future existence.   The problem is we have no empirical evidence supporting such theories.  In fact there is a lack of evidence for either proposition; whether we exist before or after physical death.  We have many theories but these are all without empirical evidence and are based on subjective statements most of which originates from what people have believed in the past through various religious teachings.  These theories are many and often contradict each other even within the same system of thought.   Some theology is older, much more developed and complex but all suffer from the same deficit, lack of empirical evidence.

I am not saying this as a negative reflection on philosophy or theology.  I have my own subjective belief system.  I give it only as an example of the failure of our knowledge system to address such questions.  Is there a metaphysical dimension?  Is there no creative scientist who can design a method to study these type questions?  So far it seems to be the answer is no.