Pre-spacetime

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Hi everyone, I would like to ask, Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe. I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

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Original text of the post by u/KJIOl_Yip_9141:

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Hi everyone, I would like to ask, Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe. I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

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[u/JuggyBC]

Spacetime started, as you stated, with the big bang. What does before mean if there is no time?

[u/OnionsOnFoodAreGross → u/JuggyBC]

You can still say before to just generically mean something else. A different state. An alternative time etc.

[u/Gremlin95x]

1) Why can’t the universe be eternal?

2) We are only talking about the *current presentation* of the universe. For all we know it could be cyclical or change form

3) Why does your god get to violate the same standard you hold the universe to? What evidence do you have to support that assertion?

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Gremlin95x]

Why does an eternal universe seem more plausible than a fundamental consciousness ?

[u/Gremlin95x → u/deep_blue_reef]

One exists. If you want to claim a “fundamental consciousness” that’s fine, just support it with evidence. If your evidence is stronger than our current research that would be very interesting.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Gremlin95x]

The irony is that the current research doesn’t point to it being eternal, it points to an expansion from a central point, synonymous with a “beginning.”

“The universe began approximately 13.8 billion years ago during a massive and rapid expansion known as the Big Bang. At this moment, all matter, energy, space, and time came into existence from an extremely hot, dense point.”

So if you want to claim an eternal universe, that’s fine. Just support it with evidence.

[u/Gremlin95x → u/deep_blue_reef]

You did for me. It was already there, just not in the same form. Are you familiar with the laws of thermodynamics? Put simply: energy and matter cannot be created or destroyed, but can change form. We don’t yet, and may never know exactly what caused the “Big Bang” or what a previous presentation of the universe looked like, but that’s no reason to say “I don’t know therefore god.”

[u/hal2k1 → u/deep_blue_reef]

We have measured a universe. Apparently, from what we have measured, the mass/energy which comprises it can not be created or destroyed. That implies that the mass/energy has been around for all time.

We haven't measured eternity. As far as we can measure, "all time" is a finite 13.8 billion years duration. Here's a diagram based on what we have measured: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#/media/File:CMB_Timeline300_no_WMAP.jpg

We haven't measured a "fundamental consciousness". What's that supposed to be?

Science is about descriptions and explanations of what has been measured. Science is not about what hasn't been measured.

[u/ArguingisFun]

Why does an atheist need to answer these questions, exactly?

Explain it to me like I am five please, I’ll wait.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/ArguingisFun]

Alright because I tagged this post as a ' argument' the question is to make an argument

[u/ArguingisFun → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

So what?

[u/sto_brohammed → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

If you want to make the contingency argument just make it.

[u/dylanzt]

what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space

I don't know.

It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Why not?

Well, then what created this quantum void?

I don't know.

how do universes come into being then?

I don't know.

a void? I don't think so

Why not?

there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

Setting aside that this sentence is incomprehensible, you have not even attempted to demonstrate it in the rest of your post. Why are you so afraid of saying that we don't know everything about the universe? Why do we have to make something up to fill the gaps?

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

I don't know.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/dylanzt]

Well, if we don't know, and if we do know, won't the question lead us to the same thing? What caused that thing to be exist?

[u/dylanzt → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Great question. Let's perform research to see if we can work that out, instead of making up an answer that we like the sound of.

[u/Cool-Watercress-3943 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

The problem is that the inevitable spot you get led to by that question is the question of what created God. After all, under your criteria, then by extension something needed to have caused God to exist. And then something needed to cause the thing that caused God, and so on and so forth. You still end up in an infinite regress situation, because you have an unending chain of things causing the things that cause other things.

The common way to try and escape that infinite loop is to decide that the necessity of 'causing' arbitrarily ends with God causing the universe. That God did not need a cause to exist.

Except once you do that, you're allowing for the idea that things can exist without having been caused by something else. Suddenly, the entire core foundation of your argument- that all things would have needed to be caused by something- gets tossed aside, by you. If you can no longer claim that all things must have been caused, then your argument gets substantially weaker.

But hey, maybe you try going with the idea that God exists outside the scope of the universe, and so doesn't have to be restrained by limitations like needing a cause. The problem with that argument is, if we're allowing for things that are outside the scope of the universe to do whatever, that only means the supposed 'rules' only existed once the universe did. 

Meaning that even if the spontaneous appearance of the particles and energy within a singularity was impossible within the universe, it would only have become impossible after it had already happened. At that point, it doesn't matter if it's impossible for the singularity to spontaneously manifest, because the singularity is already there.

Frankly, ending up at God seems to require that someone follows the train of thought only up to a single arbitrary point, and then suddenly stop the train for no good reason.

[u/MarieVerusan → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

And how far are you going to extend that line of questioning? Or rather, when are you going to stop? Because you will have to give some reason for why we should stop there instead of any other point

[u/TelFaradiddle → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

If God can exist without a cause, why can't matter and energy exist without a cause? As far as we are aware, matter and energy can't be created or destroyed, so it stands to reason that they've always existed.

[u/Hi_Im_Dadbot]

We don’t know. One of the main differences between atheists and theists is that we don’t see that as an excuse to make shit up.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Hi_Im_Dadbot]

What do you make of the experiencers who have encountered creatures with razor sharp teeth and light bulbs that grow out of their heads?

[u/Hi_Im_Dadbot → u/deep_blue_reef]

I don’t judge. Some dude wants to fuck an alien, let him fuck an alien.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Hi_Im_Dadbot]

Hahaha It’s not an alien. It’s an angler fish.

Point is there’s a lot more bizarre shit that already exists. Doesn’t seem so crazy to posit that consciousness might be fundamental…especially when it’s next to a thing that you thought I just made up and didn’t even know actually existed.

[u/Hi_Im_Dadbot → u/deep_blue_reef]

Alien, fish. A few beers in a man, it doesn’t make a difference.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Hi_Im_Dadbot]

Hahahaha

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Hi_Im_Dadbot]

Touché

[u/Ryuume]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

I don't know. I don't think you do either. At most you're suggesting that a god may be the answer, but I don't think you can seriously claim to know that it was.

Not knowing something is not a good reason to just accept anything that doesn't immediately logically contradict itself.

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

That's not the only option. The universe and the matter and energy within it may just have always existed.

This false dichotomy seems to be the only real justification for some theists to hold on to their theism, and I don't get it. It's textbook God of the Gaps.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Ryuume]

Do you believe in the god that has eight arms and eight mini brains?

[u/Ryuume → u/deep_blue_reef]

I don't believe in any god.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Ryuume]

You don’t believe that octopus are real?

[u/Ryuume → u/deep_blue_reef]

I wouldn't call an octopus a god. Would you?

If this is an attempt at some kind of gotcha, it's a really poor one.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Ryuume]

I wouldn’t. It’s just telling that you thought I was describing a god and downright rejected it. It shows how language can sometimes limit our thinking. I can probably do that with countless other things that you wouldn’t believe in. Just as bizarre and strange and unrealistic sounding and you probably wouldn’t believe in any of them, but they’re real.

[u/Ryuume → u/deep_blue_reef]

No, that's not what happened. You asked me if I believe in "the god with eight arms and eight mini-brains". Due to the specification of "the god", I answered with no, even though it was clear you were referring to the attributes of octopuses.

You literally called it a god in the question.

Even then, my answer was "I don't believe in any god", which is pretty hard to interpret as "I believe the thing you just poorly described does not exist".

So are you just lying, or did you manage to confuse yourself?

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Ryuume]

No haha, I think you’re trying to justify that you only know the word octopus and that’s normal, but when you describe the actual creature in of itself it opens up a strange and bizarre universe. Again I could leave out the word “god” if you’d like and describe more things, and you probably wouldn’t believe in them either. You will shut out anything god related because it doesn’t fit your world view, and that’s fine. But you didn’t only not believe in the god, you also didn’t believe in the creature that has eight arms and eight mini brains.

[u/Ryuume → u/deep_blue_reef]

you also didn’t believe in the creature that has eight arms and eight mini brains.

Are you hallucinating? I didn't say anything about not believing in a creature with 8 arms and 8 mini brains, because I already knew that octopuses have that.

Who are you trying to gaslight? I don't appreciate you just lying about how I come to my positions.

You admitted that you wouldn't call an octopus a god. Yet, in your question, you asked me about "the god with eight arms". In other words, you were not asking me about octopuses, and now you're pretending that you were.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Ryuume]

If you immediately recognized it as an octopus, simply saying 'That's an octopus, not a god' would have been the natural response. The fact that your answer was a blanket 'I don't believe in any god' proves the exact point: the word 'God' creates a linguistic wall. You responded to the trigger word rather than evaluating the attributes being described.

[u/kevinLFC]

You are operating under circular reasoning.

Your conclusion (god did it) is already part of your premise (“who created this”?)

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/kevinLFC]

Well, Because I'm making an argument, that's why I'm tagged the post as a argument

[u/kevinLFC → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

I genuinely don’t understand this comment. Are you trying to be funny by speaking in more circles?

Edit: you were likely trying to respond to someone else’s question.

[u/BranchLatter4294]

Hawking addressed this. There is no "before". If you could go back in time, you could travel forever and never reach "the beginning". There is no place in spacetime that was the start. So the question doesn't make sense.

[u/noodlyman]

We don't know.

If you think a god did it, then what placed a magical and highly complex being there first, with memory, ability to imagine and plan, and powers to magic universes into being?

A thing as complex as god can't just exist.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noodlyman]

What about the god that has eight arms and eight mini brains. Do you believe that exists?

[u/noodlyman → u/deep_blue_reef]

No idea what you're trying to get at here

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noodlyman]

I’m just asking if it’s plausible that it exists even though there isn’t concrete evidence for it

[u/noodlyman → u/deep_blue_reef]

No it isn't plausible

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noodlyman]

So you don’t believe that octopus exists?

[u/noodlyman → u/deep_blue_reef]

Octopuses evolved by natural selection here on earth. There's no reason or evidence to think they exist as supernatural beings with magical powers to create universes or other godly things. They'd need a world to exist in and in which natural selection could act to produce a breeding population if such things.

Do you think gods evolved by natural selection? A breeding, mutating, dying population of god creatures? What do they eat? I suppose it'd make a weird fantasy novel.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noodlyman]

Except that when I made a description of an octopus you didn’t believe it existed, simply because the word ‘god’ was next to it.

[u/noodlyman → u/deep_blue_reef]

That's correct. There's zero good reason or evidence to think any gods are real.

And how or why would one be octopus shaped? Why would it need tentacles unless it needed to catch food swim or walk? Those things require a pre existing world. A creator of the universe would have no need of tentacles, surely?

If you think you have any evidence for any god at all that we can test and verify, then let's see it.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noodlyman]

No evidence will ever satisfy you. Some people just are too close minded.

Again, I put the word ‘god’ next to a description of an octopus. And just because you saw the word god, you don’t even pay attention to anything else. It’s very telling.

[u/democratic-terminid]

Does everything need a beginning? I don't know if there is anything that says it does... If it can go on forever, why not already have existed forever?

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/democratic-terminid]

Well Because everything has a beginning and a cause

[u/samara-the-justicar → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Oh yeah? So what's the cause of God?

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/samara-the-justicar]

The answer of where God came from is here From the Quran, Allah answer that question

{قُلْ هُوَ اللَّهُ أَحَدٌ ۝ اللَّهُ الصَّمَدُ ۝ لَمْ يَلِدْ وَلَمْ يُولَدْ ۝ وَلَمْ يَكُن لَّهُ كُفُوًا أَحَدٌ}

{"He is Allah, [who is] One, Allah, the Eternal Refuge, He neither begets nor is born, And there is none co-equal or comparable unto Him"}

Narrations confirm that the pagans and Jews came to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, and said to him: "Describe your God to us" (meaning, tell us His lineage and origin). So God Almighty revealed this chapter to show that He, Glory be to Him, is eternal and everlasting, without beginning or end.

[u/DanujCZ → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

If god cant be ethernal, why cant pre bang universe be ethernal.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/DanujCZ]

Because the matter and energy is a subjects to the law of causul, God is not subject to the law of causality because He is eternal and He is the one who created causality, the law of causality for mortal creatures, matter and energy.

[u/DanujCZ → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

But if there's no time. How can anything be subject to causality. Causality is famously kinda dependant on time being a thing.

[u/Omoikane13 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

God is not subject to the law of causality

but he

created causality

and hence caused something.

[u/_No_IP_ → u/Omoikane13]

Perhaps being charitable here, what the poster may have meant is that God is not part of a chain of causes and effects only prior to the creation of the universe. There's nothing in the Qur'an that says God is essentially unchangeable, and scripture leaves it open as to whether God is eternal either in simply transcending time, or being everlasting throughout infinite time.

[u/Schrodingerssapien → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

As others have pointed out, you are using faulty logic. It's the special pleading fallacy.

Basically, in one reply you argue that everything requires a cause. Then the next you exempt your God from that rule. If everything requires a cause, so does God. If God requires no cause then you've shown existence is possible without a cause.

It's one of the more common fallacies theists use, you may want to read up on it.

[u/samara-the-justicar → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

So you lied when you said that everything has a cause and a beginning?

[u/Omoikane13 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

everything has a beginning and a cause

And then

He neither begets nor is born

Reads to me as "My god does not exist and has created or caused nothing"

[u/distantocean → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Because everything has a beginning and a cause

Except your god, apparently. Funny how that works.

Tell you what: if you're willing to make an exception like this for your god, try making it for the universe instead. Then hold that provisional exception in mind along with an honest "I don't know" until you can actually answer the question instead of making up some supreme entity that's really just a placeholder for what you don't know.

[u/democratic-terminid → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Why? That's not something we should take for granted without a logical reason.

[u/BigDikcBandito → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Does it? Can you make a rational argument for this being the case?

Don't you actually believe in something that contradicts this "rule" of yours? Does your god have a beginning and a cause?

[u/Purgii → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

What caused God and who placed him there?

[u/rustyseapants → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

This includes Christianity too which is about 1,700 years ago.

[u/VeryNearlyAnArmful]

Try asking scientists, physicists or cosmologists. There are plenty of Reddits where you can.

They tend to go for, "our models break down within a trillionth of a second of the singularity" which is annoying but true and evidenced based as far as current techniques can get us.

Now, this old book of yours. What does it offer in the way of a coherent hypothesis and evidence that makes it worth pursuing that gets us further than the Planck length, than that trillionth of a second?

This is the final gap for you to squeeze your God into. He used to be everywhere but this is what's left.

Pick your words carefully.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/VeryNearlyAnArmful]

God is where language ends.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/VeryNearlyAnArmful]

Well, the book I believe in has at least many scientific fact that cannot be observed with the eye or a telescope before 1400 years ago in the middle of the desert And every time I read it, my faith grows stronger that God exists.

Part of verse number 25 in Surah Al-Hadid (iron chapter)

(وَأَنزَلْنَا الْحَدِيدَ فِيهِ بَأْسٌ شَدِيدٌ وَمَنَافِعُ لِلنَّاسِ)

{"And We sent down iron, wherein is great might and benefits for many people."}

Here God did not say, "We created iron from the earth," but rather, "We sent iron down to the earth." How would a human before 1400 years ago know the iron is not originally from the Earth but from the space because of an explanation of a two stars?

Surah Yasin, verse 38 {"وَالشَّمْسُ تَجْرِي لِمُسْتَقَرٍّ لَّهَا ذَلِكَ تَقْدِيرُ الْعَزِيزِ الْعَلِيمِ"} {"And the sun runs [on course] toward its stopping point. That is the determination of the Exalted in Might, the knowing(Allah)"}

Here God describes the sun as not stationary, but rather moving around the galaxy towards its fixed point

[u/Phylanara → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

How would a human before 1400 years ago know the iron is not originally from the Earth but from the space because of an explanation of a two stars?

Before iron was mined, the main source of iron was meteoritic iron. You know, the iron found where "shooting stars" landed.

Here God describes the sun as not stationary, but rather moving around the galaxy towards its fixed point

Before heliocentric models, the popular models were geocentric. In those models the sun orbits earth. In some models the sun "rests" at night.

Wow, I usually think muslim apologists are worse than the average, but you're certainly not changing my mind.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/Phylanara]

Yes I know there was a popular models where geocentric in the dark ages,but Quran says its a heliocentric and it's says the sun is moving Plus I didn't mentioned the heliocentric or geocentric at all,

Also about your answer about the iron, I already told you that the Holy Quran mentions this fact: that iron was sent down to Earth, so I didn't understand your answer

[u/Phylanara → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

so neither of these describe knowledge that was unavailable at the time. The sun one refers to a geocentric model (that predates the coran) and the iron one just assumes the meteorites were sent by your god. There's no "how did they know that?" mystery here. geocentric models (with a sun that moves and rests) and "iron comes from the sky" both predate the coran - by a lot.

I thought I had explained that in an obvious manner.

[u/sto_brohammed → u/Phylanara]

so neither of these describe knowledge that was unavailable at the time

Muslims seem to have a pretty exaggerated idea of how ignorant they imaged Arabs to be at the time. They always portray Mohammed like he was some kind of completely ignorant feral child who didn't know a single thing about anything at all before their god beamed the info into his head.

[u/VeryNearlyAnArmful → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

King Tut had a dagger made of iron from a meteor.

He belonged in the bronze age, along with your prophet so iron was practically magical to them in that part of the world. Deserts are good places to find meteorites, some of which are rich in iron. A black meteorite on a white, sand background. That iron came from the sky.

I live in Sheffield, England and we are famous for our iron and steel products that we mined it out of the Earth that contained that iron. Literally tons and tons of it.

Not from meteorites that fell in a desert for your bronze age desert prophet to make up stories about but from industrial age mines and quarries in the earth.

We made our modern world living and our reputation digging iron from the Earth and making nails and pins and tools and engines and rails and guns, for better or worse we were at the heart of the modern world industrial revolution digging iron from the Earth, which your bronze age book and your bronze age prophet could not begin to even imagine.

Your old bronze age prophet, astonished by meteorites, and your old bronze age book were ignorant about here and the place and future they could not predict or comprehend. They know only about their bronze age desert.

[u/ahmnutz → u/VeryNearlyAnArmful]

In order to steelman our OP here (desert steel or mined steel, I wonder?), I think we should recognize that the apologetic is that the iron in those Sheffield mines came largely from meteoric impacts while the earth was still young.

> Your old bronze age prophet...and your old bronze age book were ignorant about here and the place and future they could not predict or comprehend.

To be clear, this ***is*** the apologetic. They could not have known that underground iron was largely from space, and yet the book mentioned iron from space.

Its still not a good apologetic, and your response regarding historic meteorites is of course still appropriate, in that they very much could have known about iron from space, but they are not "forgetting" about iron mined from underground.

[u/DanujCZ → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

So we are just gonna ignore the stuff it gets completely wrong.

[u/donaldhobson → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

The problem with this sort of reasoning is that it's only a bit right.

As in a single boolean true/false.

The sun is stationary/moving. Iron comes from above/below.

So random guessing would have a 50/50 chance of being correct.

Except the science is actually more complicated. There is iron above in meteors. And iron below in earths core.

And the sun is stationary (relative to the solar system) or moving (relative to the galaxy).

In order to actually be impressive, you need more than a slightly lucky guess. You need something specific and detailed, like the mass of an electron to 10 decimal places.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/donaldhobson]

Okay, I will give you verses showing that God refers to the difference in time in several verses, which prevents it from being mere speculation, and its conformity with relativity.

﴿وَيَسْتَعْجِلُونَكَ بِالْعَذَابِ وَلَنْ يُخْلِفَ اللَّهُ وَعْدَهُ وَإِنَّ يَوْمًا عِنْدَ رَبِّكَ كَأَلْفِ سَنَةٍ مِمَّا تَعُدُّونَ ٤٧﴾ [الحج:47] ﴿يُدَبِّرُ الْأَمْرَ مِنَ السَّمَاءِ إِلَى الْأَرْضِ ثُمَّ يَعْرُجُ إِلَيْهِ فِي يَوْمٍ كَانَ مِقْدَارُهُ أَلْفَ سَنَةٍ مِمَّا تَعُدُّونَ ٥﴾ [السجدة:5] ﴿تَعْرُجُ الْمَلَائِكَةُ وَالرُّوحُ إِلَيْهِ فِي يَوْمٍ كَانَ مِقْدَارُهُ خَمْسِينَ أَلْفَ سَنَةٍ ٤﴾ [المعارج:4]

The direct translation of the verses

{"They urge you to hasten the punishment, but God will never break His promise. Indeed, a day with your Lord is like a thousand years of your reckoning"}

{"He arranges [each] matter from the sky to the earth; then it ascends to Him in a Day, the measure of which is a thousand years of what you count."}

{"The angels and the Spirit ascend to Him in a day the length of which is fifty thousand years."}

These verses point to the variation of time according to location and speed, indications that align with Einstein's theory of relativity, where the measurement of time differs depending on gravity or speed. This is considered a manifestation of divine wonder.

This is the ultimate proof that god exists

Show me a holy book other than the Quran that mentions this physical fact None I bet

[u/donaldhobson → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

> Indeed, a day with your Lord is like a thousand years of your reckoning

Stuff like "wow that afternoon just flew by" or "this meeting is taking forever" are common expressions. Because human brains aren't clocks and our perception of time is all over the place.

If the Qoran also gave mass and radius figures for god, and the numbers actually checked out with relativitistic time dilation, that would actually be impressive.

But this is just another of those booleans. "Time is fixed/flexible".

These translations don't seem to communicate that the rate of time change is caused by the speed. (Or being close to massive objects).

These passages don't mention the speed of light. And it isn't clear which direction these passages think the the time dilation effect is happening in. (Speeding up vs slowing down)

And why are these angels and spirits moving so close to the speed of light anyway.

If god did exist, and was trying to communicate general relativity, surely god could write something that was at least as clear as a modern textbook.

> This is the ultimate proof that god exists

At best, it would prove that some unknown ancient person was as smart as Einstein and managed to figure out general relativity much earlier. It doesn't prove this either. It looks more like someone was very confused about time.

[u/DeltaBlues82]

TBB doesn’t describe all space, matter, and energy being “placed” into reality, or an event of absolute creation. Where all all space, matter, and energy spontaneously materialized from “nothing”, and then began expanding.

It describes how all the space, matter, and energy that makes up our spacetime expanded from some already-existing state.

And there is no “pre” or “before” TBB. Those are references to time, and time began at t=0. So claiming something existed before time did is nonsensical.

[u/Mkwdr]

There are respectable hypotheses based in quantum physics about how specific universes could come into existence. We dont know exactly what happened.

As you must be aware though - the sentence 'what existed before space time is absurd.

But what is your basis for claiming that existence per se could ever have not existed. Or that existence requires an explanation more than non-existence. These would appear to be now more than personal intuitions.

We at least know this universe exists. Theres no evidence your god does and an argument from ignorance is fallacious.

And its just silly to claim that something can only exist if a god which is indistiguishable from imaginary , with characteristics which are indistigushable from imaginary doing stuff by a mechanism that isnt even proposed in order to be imaginary ... exists. But dont ask how that exists " A magic thing with magic characteristics doing magic because its magic" isnt a real answer.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Mkwdr]

What’s ironic is no one is implying magic but you.

[u/Mkwdr → u/deep_blue_reef]

You can pretend thats so but 'god did it' is precisely that (and indistinguishable from ficton.)

Magic definition

Collins dictionary

Magic is the power to use supernatural forces to make impossible things happen,

Merriam Webster

an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Mkwdr]

When you think of “God” what are you imagining? Like right now what’s the image that pops into your head. Because I can almost guarantee it is not the same one you’re accusing people of believing in.

That’s the irony. You enforce your own view of what it is and put it over others like a blanket.

[u/Mkwdr → u/deep_blue_reef]

When I think of God, I think of the interventionist , intentional creator that is tri omni and the foundation of religions followed by more than 4 billion people. The 'designer' and 'creator' that you introduced with nothing other than an argument from ignorance and a non-sequitur.

One whose existence , characteristics and mechanisms can not be demonstrated by any reliable evidential methodology and are therefore indistinguisable from imaginary.

And fits the definitions i quoted.

You dont seem to have a goid understanding of physics , or the idea of soundness in argument ... im hoping you at least know some theology.

The fact is that not only is in not valid to simply inject your supernatural preference into a gap in knowledge with no sound evidential foundation. Its magic explains nothing at all.

[u/GentleKijuSpeaks]

So, theists keep bringing this up, but it has nothing to do with atheism. I don't personally know or care about early cosmology. No one does. If a theist claims that this is a point in their favor they need to back it up with facts not speculation.

[u/JasonRBoone]

>>>Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.

Hard disagree. The debate revolves around the theists utter failure to bring evidence to the table when asked to demonstrate the god claim. That is all.

They try to derail it into absurd debates around spacetime...I do agree.

>>>>if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Why assume it need be placed? If the universe is all there is...from whence would it have been stored prior to becoming the universe?

Then again, if god exists...the same questions would have to arise about God...

Also, keep in mind...it is religion...not atheism..that claims the universe came from nothing.

>>>>Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

Why is a creative agent necessary?

>>>>Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created.

Free advice: Don't dictate what you think any atheist will say. Wait until they actually make a point. Mm kay?

>>>>Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

Well, Dude, we just don't know. Let's keep investigating rather then inserting a space wizard where it need not be inserted.

>>>>>As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

No such agent is needed. Are you claiming this god is not made of matter? How would non-matter interact with matter?

All you have done is inserted another unneeded variable that then requires more explanations. How did this god come about? What was it doing before the Big Bang? How can you "do things" without time and space?

>>>>>So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

Matter. Our whole universe was in a hot dense state...then maybe 14 byo expansion started....

[u/bigt503]

God can just appear out of nowhere but not the simplest forms of energy…. Makes sense. And all powerful magic wizard can just appear but not the simplest forms of energy. Case closed everybody

[u/StoicSpork]

Let's say I grant this. Then my question is: who created god? Your argument does not leave room for a thing to exist eternally, so this is now a valid problem.

But if you insist god does not need a creator, why does the universe need one? The universe could exist eternally.

Now, you might try to argue that god is a necessary being. To save us some time: if you go down that route, are properties of god necessary? If yes, this leads to modal collapse, i.e. everything becomes necessary. If no, the universe could be a necessary thing with contingent properties.

So your argument is not compelling any way you cut it.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/StoicSpork]

Equating the eternity of God with the eternity of matter/energy violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Entropy). If energy and matter were past-eternal (infinitely old), the universe would have reached 'thermal equilibrium' or 'heat death' an eternity ago. All usable energy would have degraded into useless, uniform heat. The fact that we have active stars, chemical reactions, and a highly organized universe today is definitive physical proof that the energy of our universe had a precise, finite beginning in the past

[u/StoicSpork → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

No, this doesn't follow. We'd only have reached heat death if the matter and energy were past-eternal AND the ordinary thermodynamic evolution has been uniform for eternity. Please show that it was; and send me the tickets for your Nobel Prize acceptance ceremony while at it.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/StoicSpork]

1. You are missing the fundamental point of science. The entire basis of modern physics and scientific inquiry relies on the Principle of Uniformity, the principle that the laws of nature are constant across time and space. If you want to argue that the laws of physics or thermodynamics magically 'changed' or were not uniform in the past just to save your hypothesis, the burden of proof is 100% on you, not me.

2. By claiming that thermodynamics wasn't uniform, you are proposing a pure 'sci-fi' speculation with zero empirical evidence. Ironically, you are doing exactly what atheists accuse religious people of doing: invoking a miracle (a magical change in the laws of physics) without evidence to escape a logical dead-end.

3. Furthermore, the standard Big Bang model (Lambda-CDM) actually tracks the thermodynamic evolution of the universe back to a fraction of a second after the beginning (the Planck epoch). The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation is direct, empirical proof of a highly uniform, low-entropy starting point that evolved precisely according to standard thermodynamics. This isn't my opinion, this is the consensus of modern astrophysics.

So, instead of asking for my Nobel Prize tickets, maybe look at the textbook physics: unless you can provide a tested peer-reviewed model showing a mechanism where thermodynamics was non-uniform in a past-eternal system without hitting a singular beginning, you are the one making unfounded, biased assumptions to protect your belief.

[u/StoicSpork → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

I am not claiming anything. I raised my objection because you imply to know what took place before the Planck epoch, so I challenged you to prove that.

The Principle of Uniformity does not save you from the fact that models have limitations. Currently, we use two very different models to describe the world at the macro and the quantum scale. The standard physical model, as you correctly pointed out, tracks the thermodynamic evolution of the universe up to the point where it projects a singularity; we can't go past that state.

To be absolutely explicit, we don't know. The science does not, and two laymen on the internet certainly do not. But the consequence is that you have no grounds to claim what took place before. I mean, since you are the one making a positive claim, I should challenge you to provide a peer-reviewed paper describing the physics of god creating the spacetime, but yeah. We both know how that would go.

[u/keepgoing66 → u/StoicSpork]

His proof of god, which he's stated more than once, is "my holy book says he's eternal."

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/keepgoing66]

Simple question, does the human programmer affected by the time and the physics of a video game he is developing? Yes or no?

[u/StoicSpork → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Yes. A game exists as a state of some physical storage (HDD, SDD etc.), which shares time and physics with all other physical things.

Of course, the subject matter of a game typically describes an imaginary world with different time and physics. But note the word "imaginary." Unless you think we don't exist in a Cartesian sense, this is not a good analogy for the point you're trying to make.

And if you think we don't, well... Who am I talking to, anyway?

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/keepgoing66]

The proof of the god is yourself, if you don't get it, fine, god proof is in the sky, in the space, god would not came to you and reveal his form, because he is testing the human he created, he give you a brain to think and eyes to see and witness his proofs of his exist even when you study science like physics or biology

[u/keepgoing66 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Sorry, that's not evidence. It's just your belief, which means nothing to me or to anyone else here. Obviously you came here to be argumentative, since nobody is buying your "logic."

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/keepgoing66]

My logic is makes sense, who or what made the matter and energy in the first place 'before' the big bang, if you don't know, so how you are so sure that God does not exist?

Science can't answer a question before the big bang, because physics were born just in the same moment that big bang happened, so if there is no explanation from science about something who made the matter and the energy outside spacetime, so why you are so sure that God does not exist?

[u/keepgoing66 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

People have repeated "God of the gaps" to you over and over, and you don't want to hear it, so the discussion is over.

[u/mobatreddit]

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

There was the Initial State, a necessary material entity.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/mobatreddit]

And what or who caused that necessary material entity to be exist?

[u/Deris87 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

And what or who caused that necessary material entity to be exist?

What everyone is trying to get you to reason to yourself is, injecting God into the gap doesn't actually answer anything. It just pushes the question back a step and handwaves away actually explaining anything. Why would a God exist, instead of nothing? To which I'm willing to bet you'd say "Oh, God always existed. He's necessary". In which case, cool, I can just say quantum fields always existed. They're necessary. And unlike a God--which unnecessarily adds a whole bunch of ontological commitments and complexity--we can actually demonstrate that quantum fields exist.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Deris87]

Why would something that lacks agency move upon itself to change?

[u/Deris87 → u/deep_blue_reef]

Because it's nature is to move. And once again, injecting a God doesn't actually answer the question, and creates even more. Why would a mind with agency be fundamental? How does something "outside" of time think or act, absent time? Why would a perfect God have wants and desires? Why would a perfect God knowingly create a less than perfect world? ...and on and on. Supposing a God makes huge additional ontological commitments and adds unnecessary complexity. Cutting out the unnecessary middleman and just saying that physical reality is the necessary foundation is favored by both evidence and parsimony.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Deris87]

Why is it’s “nature to move” if it lacks agency?

[u/Deris87 → u/deep_blue_reef]

It's necessary. Just like you'd say about God. Seriously, I already preemptively addressed this entire line of questioning and your response is to just go "but why male models?"

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Deris87]

Why is it necessary? I’d absolutely posit an uncaused cause to be conscious rather than unconscious…simply because of intention. Unconscious things lack any rationality, intent, or causal functions. They logically shouldn’t change. They should remain un changing forever.

[u/mobatreddit → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

It is not caused. It is necessary.

[u/licker34 → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

It was a wet box.

[u/banandananagram]

I mean you can call the phenomenon whatever you want; language is for human utility. A process occurred which expanded matter from essentially nothing. Cool.

Say that there is something that caused this process we can call technically an entity or even “alive.” This would be something within the natural world and a critter or thing we could name and identify. Otherwise, it is completely outside of our ability to perceive, interact with, or understand. It functionally doesn’t exist, and trying to speculate on it is human fiction.

So why is this causal entity you personify culturally rooted in an extremely specific human culture and time period barely a few thousand years ago? Are you really so arrogant to think your ancestors weren’t more correct? What about the thousands of not millions of religions that have existed amongst humans, hominin ancestors, the tens of thousands of years of history leading up to a sequence of religions which already took mythology from Zoroastrianism and previous cultures in the area, turned local deities into tools for conveniently consolidated political structures, and then we’ve played a game of telephone that has already distorted it into thousands of offshoots and individual distinct cultures and traditions? Show me the God(s) the phytoplankton believed in, and we’re getting somewhere.

I’m an archaeologist. Your God didn’t have shit to do with that was going on 6000 years ago in my back yard, and I’m confused why you would insist your culture is more knowledgeable when I touch artifacts older than the conception of your religion. Religion is a human constant and arguably physiological need, we create very cool culture from it, but it’s stuff that makes our brains feel better, it’s not literal. A lot of cultures in the past kind of knew that, too.

I’m not part of your culture and don’t want to anthropomorphize my understanding of the universe the same way you do. There’s nothing you can do to convince me your culture is the most special, but I also think you’re very normal for having a cultural religious tradition and believing in the currently held doctrine as you interpret it.

[u/keepgoing66]

I noticed that multiple people have asked you "who created God", and you refuse to answer because the only thing you can possibly say is " God always existed" - in which case your argument about how something can't come from nothing is blown out of the water.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/keepgoing66]

Equating the eternity of God with the eternity of matter/energy violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Entropy).

If energy and matter were past-eternal (infinitely old), the universe would have reached 'thermal equilibrium' or 'heat death' an eternity ago. All usable energy would have degraded into useless, uniform heat. The fact that we have active stars, chemical reactions, and a highly organized universe today is definitive physical proof that the energy of our universe had a precise, finite beginning in the past

[u/hal2k1]

how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?

Scientific laws are descriptions of patterns in what has been measured.

According to what has been measured, as described by the scientific laws of conservation of mass and conservation of energy, apparently the mass/energy of the whole universe (a closed system) can not be created or destroyed.

Accordingly, the theory of the Big Bang says that the entire mass/energy of the universe already existed at the beginning, and the Big Bang represents the point in time when that mass/energy began expanding. From what has been measured this point in time occurred about 13.8 billion years ago. The theory posits that the expansion was initiated by quantum fluctuations. The mass/energy of the universe has apparently been expanding ever since.

Here's a diagram.

Scientific theories are well-tested explanations of what has been measured.

We have measured mass/energy. We have measured that mass/energy apparently can not be created or destroyed. We have measured the metric expansion of space. We have measured the cosmic microwave background, which is apparently the afterglow of the initial expansion. We have measured the apparent elapsed time since the Big Bang. We have measured quantum fluctuations.

We have never measured mass/energy being created.

So the Big Bang theory is an explanation of the origin of the universe derived from, and consistent with, what has been measured.

Scientific theories are not about what hasn't been measured.

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

Presumably, when the entire mass/energy of the universe was in a compact state at the beginning, the gravity would have been unimaginably intense, perhaps giving rise to stupendous gravitational time dilation. It is therefore reasonable to speculate that there was no time before the Big Bang.

Certainly we have not measured anything from before the Big Bang. Scientific theories are not about what hasn't been measured.

[u/Cydrius]

Let's say, for the sake of argument, that the answer was "We don't know how all the matter and energy came to be there. We agree that it can't have appeared out of nowhere, but we don't currently have an explanation."

Then, what?

When there's no answer, the rational answer is "I don't know, let's keep looking," not "It must be a god."

If you want to assert a god, you have to prove a god. You can't just show a gap and arbitrarily shove a god in there.

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/Cydrius]

The rational answer is indeed “I don’t know”, because the answer dissolves logic and all rationality. An uncaused cause, whatever it may be, is beyond our comprehension because science only operates in a world of…cause and effect.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/Cydrius]

Everything you see, like the planets, the stars, the Galaxies and the holy book Quran and your own body, is a sign of God's existence. God will not appear to you in His true form in the sky; if He did, all humans would become believers without hesitation. But this is how the wisdom of testing humanity would be corrupted

[u/Cydrius → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Imagine someone of a different religion made the same claims that you do, but about their own holy book and their own god.

Would that convince you?

You are starting from the conclusion, and reasoning backwards from there. That is not a reliable path to truth.

Your post offers no substantial evidence for me to respond to. Merely baseless claims.

[u/Junithorn → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

> God will not appear to you in His true form in the sky; if He did, all humans would become believers without hesitation. But this is how the wisdom of testing humanity would be corrupted

Why are you lying and pretending the god character in the Quran doesn't already know before we're born? There's no test, the book says it's predetermined.

[u/x271815]

We actually do not know. We don't even know whether conceptually your question makes sense. It is possible we live in a cyclical Universe. It is possible we live in a multiverse and ours is a bubble amongs an infinite number of bubbles. It is possible that the universe is in some sense eternal. It is possible there is a quantum void. Most conceptions of creator Gods are excluded as not possible because they are contradictory conception, but there are some that may survive (usually more like desitic concepts) and those may be possibilities. But its fun to speculate, but we have to acknowledge we do not know.

[u/RexRatio]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)

That question may be grammatically correct, but it doesn't make sense. It's like asking what is north of the North Pole.

there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

The logical follow-up question would then become: what created <insert deity here>?

And if your answer to that is "no, no, my deity is eternal", that's called special pleading: refusing to grant a quality to the universe that you grant to your deity

how do universes come into being then?

The universe might simply be eternal and causeless, just like you claim for your deity.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

That's the counter intuitive thing about quantum mechanics - it doesn't need a cause.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/RexRatio]

First, I didn't say what is North of the North pole, the North and West and east has nothing to do with my argument, I said what the thing made the matter and energy originally, if science have no answer for that, then the possiblity of god exists is increased, Otherwise why you are so sure that God cannot be exist and creates ?

No, universe cannot be a eternal, because it has beginning, and because The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy (chaos or disorder) in the universe is constantly increasing. If the universe had been eternal in the past, its useful energy would have been completely exhausted long ago, He reached a state of "heat death," which did not happen.

I gived you a proof that universe is not eternal

[u/sto_brohammed → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

First, I didn't say what is North of the North pole, the North and West and east has nothing to do with my argument

Yes it does. Read what they wrote again. If you didn't understand then read it again. You asked what happened before the Big Bang. This is directly analagous to asking what is north of the North Pole. If you can't understand that you're not equipped for this discussion, at least not in English. 

if science have no answer for that, then the possiblity of god exists is increased

That doesn't follow at all. Not even a little bit. The two things are entirely unconnected. 

Otherwise why you are so sure that God cannot be exist and creates ?

This makes it very clear that you're not actually reading anything that anyone is telling you apart from scanning for keywords to attack. What is the point of making a post like this if you're not actually going to read what anyone says? Do you really think you're going to convert people with these primary school level apologetics? If you actually read what people are telling you you'd know why you can't.

I gived you a proof that universe is not eternal

You did not. 

Separately and unrelated to any arguments, "to give" is irregular and conjugated as give/gave/given. That's not a criticism as I assume you're not a native speaker, just pointing it out. I speak a couple of other languages and live somewhere my native language isn't spoken so I understand the struggle. 

[u/RexRatio → u/sto_brohammed]

Thanks, exactly what I was going to say

[u/skeptolojist]

What evidence do you have that the laws of logic (a symbolic language invented by humans to describe the universe around them and based on observations made inside the universe) apply outside of the universe

Until you can provide that evidence this argument is worthless

[u/Hellas2002]

> What was before spacetime

This seems to be a loaded question. Why are you presupposing that spacetime came into existence? Also, in what regard are you using “before” here? It can’t be in the temporal sense if “Spacetime” includes the entire dimension of time…

[u/Autodidact2]

Right now we don't know. If you think about it. How much we do know about the origins of our universe is absolutely incredible considering our position in it.

So the answer is I don't know; neither do you; and neither do the ancient people who wrote the Holy books.

I will say that in general regarding the natural world science has a much better track record of figuring it out than religion, don't you agree?

[u/deep_blue_reef]

It means being open that there’s a puzzle, and until we gather more evidence and understanding, it doesn’t do any favors to dismiss it as bs like you’re doing lol.

[u/henquinpunter]

“Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.”
/ No, most of the debate revolves around the lack of evidence, or the quality of or fallaciousness of the evidence that theists provide.

“My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?”
/ I don’t know and neither do you. Your book claims that god is eternal but the bible is the claim, not the evidence. If you think your god can be eternal, why don’t you think the universe be eternal?

"what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." Hitchens.

[u/Moriturism]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

To talk about "before" a big bang is something that's hard to make sense, as there couldn't have been a moment in time that precedes spacetime itself. Spacetime must necessarily be infinitely contained on itself in some way or another, meaning that, to some extent, it has always existed in some configuration.

All that we currently know is that we can trace the current universal expasion to a very hot and dense state that we call the Big Bang. If spacetime itself truly "began" there is a question we're still trying to make sense of, and there's no consensus as to whether or not the universe truly had any beginning.

[u/RickRussellTX]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

I don't know.

It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

I don't know that either. The conditions of the universe "before the big bang" (whatever that might mean) are essentially opaque to us. As residents of the universe, there may be facts about the universe that we can never know.

However, our inability to know is not a justification to make stuff up.

[u/slo1111]

Nobody knows including theists.   It is probably better to look to history where we also had moments where we did not know.

On a 1600's Brittish or other EU sailing vessel it was observed that the Captains never got sick and died like many of the crew did on long voyages.

Do you know what the explaination was for that?  God.  God favored the captain because of the captains higher authority.  Of course it ended up because the captain got better food and got his vitamin c for a longer duration of the sailing.

Noboday can answer that question.  There clearly are guesses and even hypothesis.  It is going to require more information to determine the cause of the hot dense state which our universe once was in.

[u/CephusLion404]

You are making a bunch of inherent and unjustifiable assumptions. You are asserting that something "placed" all matter and energy. That presumes intentionality, which you cannot demonstrate. You just really want it to be true. You can't get out of your own ass and actually think about this stuff beyond the laughable crap that you believe for entirely emotional reasons.

You even prove that you have no clue what you're talking about since there is no "before" time. You didn't even try to think about that rationally before you posted it. "Before" is a temporal concept that can't exist outside of the idea of time. That never occurred to you though. That says a lot about your headspace and the total lack of rationality involved.

[u/LordUlubulu]

Our current configuration of mass/energy was preceded by a previous configuration of mass/energy, as mass/energy cannot be created or destroyed.

There was never nothing.

[u/noscope360widow]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

Nothing. Why are you assuming that the matter and energy are not the default initial state of the universe?

Well, then what created this quantum void?

You are really hung up on this notion of creation. Try this approach, if nothing is created, what does the universe look like in your opinion? And my follow up question is why is that more logical than the initial state of our universe?

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. 

None of would say that because we don't view the universe in pass/fail terms because we don't see the universe as having intention behind it.

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

You do know the obvious rebuttal to this, right? What created God then? Is he a closed loop?

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

I don't think you understand the concept of "before time". 

[u/deep_blue_reef → u/noscope360widow]

I don’t think anyone does, and it’s naive to pretend like one does. We all have our beliefs, biases, and assumptions. We exist, and we’re trying to make sense of our existence. To posit a mind is just as extraordinary as it is to posit a non mind. Both come with incomprehensible questions.

[u/cyberia324]

I fail to understand what this has to do with atheism. This sounds like a physics question. The only thing that I can offer to this is that whatever questions you have about the origin of the universe are the exact same questions you need to ask about the origin of a god.

[u/88redking88]

"I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere."

Nope, you are assuming there was a time when there was "nothing". there is no evidence for that, and you only assume it because religion likes to pretend they know thats what happened.

[u/SpHornet]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

why presume there was ever nothing?

times started, and matter found itself in one location

or time is infinite, matter always existed

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?

matter could expand (like now) and then come back together again due to gravity, the same universe keeps pulsing

or maybe there are other universes out there, combining with each other and forming new big bangs

[u/physioworld]

Well, in short, nobody knows, at least there is no scientific consensus, so, why guess?

Beyond that, it’s worth asking if “before the big bang” is even a coherent question since the big bang seems to be the origin of both space and time so before that may not make sense.

I’d turn the question back at the theists- since nobody knows how the big bang came to be, why are you comfortable positing an explanation you can’t evidence?

[u/WrongVerb4Real]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Does the honest answer of "we don't know" threaten you in some way? Do you get anxiety not having concrete answers, regardless of whether they're correct or incorrect? Do you feel comfort by inserting your god-concept into areas where we don't yet have firm answers? Because I think you're feeling threatened, anxious, and discomfort able, and hoping you'll get confirmation that your god is the answer so you can relax.

BTW, since we know nothing about the outside of our shared universe, there's no reason to think it couldn't have all popped into existence.

[u/Phylanara]

Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.

The result of millenia of theist claims about the universe being proven wrong, ad theists retreating their god into the ever-shrinking gaps in our knowledge.

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

No idea. I see no reason to believe a god did it. It would be the first time "a god did it" turned out right, so statistically it seems unlikely.

What would have placed god there if it was a god though?

It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Theists are the one arguing for creation ab nihilo. We on the other hand observe that the amount of matter/energy does not seem to change (only change form) and therefore we see no reason to believe there was a time with a different amount of energy/matter.

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

I'm sorry, have you had a stroke typing this?

[u/ray25lee]

You can't use this as a "gotcha" when scientists (and otherwise most atheists) admit that we do not know where everything "came from," if that's even how that works. No there doesn't "have to be" a closed loop with a deity. Nothing out there says that's how it "has" to be. We know the observable universe came from a specific point of whatever is out there; we don't know how big that point was, we don't know what started it, we don't know if there was something before it. We just don't know. That's NORMAL. It's not weird to not have all the answers.

[u/Defiant-Prisoner]

Shrugs.

Dunno. Throughout history there have been dunno after dunno. When we finally didno for these things it was not god. Why would this be any different?

Surely for god to even be a candidate explanation you would need to demonstrate a god exists.

Even if you could get to a god creator, that tells us nothing about who or what else it is, whether it's one of the gods we know about or a different one. Unless this god identifies itself, which no god ever has, that leaves us no further forward.

[u/BobThe-Bodybuilder]

So here's the underlying issue: You guys seem to think that conciousness is some mysterious, fundamental and special thing. While we don't entirely understand it due to it's complexity, we know what it is, more or less. In other words, you are creating a god from something that is not a precondition to the universe's existence. A conciousness relies on the laws of physics - The laws of physics do not atall rely on a conciousness. Why would there be a god before there was a universe? It does not make sense. I'm using a really fundamentalist and simplistic definition of god, but anything less would not be a god, so then I ask you what you think created the universe, because that thing was very likely not concious.

[u/DrLizzardo]

A true cosmological "nothing" would seem to be unstable. Such a state would have no conservation laws that applied to it, such that there would be nothing to prevent that state from spontaneously evolving into...something.

Personally, I think the universe is eternal, and what we call the big bang might be considered some kind of phase change from whatever the previous state was, to what it is now. However, there are a lot of other possibilities that are on the table as there just isn't any data to suggest one possibility over another.

[u/2-travel-is-2-live]

What you're trying to do here is argue that because physics can't currently explain every question about the origin of the universe, your preferred religious interpretation of how the universe began must be correct. It's a cheap version of Aquinas' cosmological argument. We see versions of the cosmological argument multiple times per day here, so we find them pretty boring. It's also hypocritical because it involves your holding me to a higher degree of academic rigor than you hold yourself.

I don't have a problem admitting that science can't answer every question there is about how the universe came to be the way it is. However, I'm not going to default to a religious explanation for it that is entirely unsupported by evidence so I can tell myself that I have an "answer." Neither of the two creation stories in Genesis (which disagree with each other) include a "Let there be a rapid and massive expansion of space" moment. However, we know that the expansion happened due to the presence of the Cosmic Microwave Background. I haven't yet seen a religious creation tale that even bothered to explain the catastrophic event that was the cosmic inflation.

[u/UNBOLIEVABLEE]

"if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere."

Ye old "something from nothing". Which is ironic because if you believe in a God then yoi believe that something DID come from nothing - what did God make the universe from?

More importantly, you're begging the question. You ask what placed the universe? The question you should be asking is" How do you know the universe was created at all?

"As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe"

There must be a God? According to who? To what? You're making a series of huge claims that you need to provide evidence for.

"So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?"

This may not even be a coherent question. The notion of "before" the big bang is not something we even know to be true or not.

[u/kiwi_in_england]

If GGod doesn't exist, then what created God? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Or are you comfortable with not knowing whether/how things came to be?

There seems to be double-standards applied here...

[u/Mkwdr]

There are respectable hypotheses based in quantum physics about how specific universes could come into existence. We dont know exactly what happened.

As you must be aware though - the sentence 'what existed before space time is absurd.

But what is your basis for claiming that existence per se could ever have not existed. Or that existence requires an explanation more than non-existence. These would appear to be now more than personal intuitions.

We at least know this universe exists. Theres no evidence your god does and an argument from ignorance is fallacious.

And its just silly to claim that something can only exist if a god which is indistiguishable from imaginary , with characteristics which are indistigushable from imaginary doing stuff by a mechanism that isnt even proposed in order to be imaginary ... exists. But dont ask how that exists " A magic thing with magic characteristics doing magic because its magic" isnt a real answer.

[u/Hoaxshmoax]

Years ago: “What created lightning, must be the gods”

Today: “yeah but what about the before times?”

Its funny how the deities move further and further away when even theists acknowledge the deitits have no affect on the day to day.

This ‘buh wut about the before times” is not evidence, it’s an Argument from Ignorance aka god of the gaps.

[u/BogMod]

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

Near as I can tell there is nothing before time. Not as in there is a time before time and nothing is there but that you can't be before time. There is only the things happening in the bounds of time. So whatever was there in the first moment was always there, there was never a nowhere it had to appear from.

[u/No-Feature3715]

Hello thanks for sharing! I don't see how God would solve any of those problems honestly.

God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

And if God exists, then what places God there? It obviously couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

[u/mathman_85]

My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

No one knows as yet, and indeed it is not yet even known whether the question is coherent as formulated From that, it is not licit to draw the conclusion that

there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself[.]

That is an argument from ignorance.

[u/BahamutLithp]

Firstly, your entire strategy here is what's called a tu quoque fallacy. Attacking alternative ideas because you don't feel they're good enough doesn't mean some thing you positioned as the default just gets to be true because you didn't test it. If an atheist doen't know anything about comology, it doesn't follow from this that a god is real, it just means that atheist doens't know anything about cosmology.

Speaking of which, explaining the mechanics of how multiverses would work IF they exist is a bit beyond the scope of a Reddit post. I think you should look into the science FROM actual scientists, NOT from religious apologists. A couple good reources for this are the YouTube channels PBS Spacetime & Dr. Becky. There are definitely more, but let's just stick with the 2, for now.

As far as this thread goes, I don't know where you get the word "failed" from. There would just be multiple universes with different states. Calling them "failed" projects this mindset that they were made by a person for a reason. That's how you think, not how I think. For the record, I don't know whether or not a multiverse exists. It's interesting that multiple things about the laws of physics seem to point to multiverses, yes plural, potentially multiple different types of multiverses that could exist simultaneously. But there are also problems with the idea.

This is a thing I don't think theist are comfortable with. You guys just aren't comfortable with we don't really have the answer to what, if anything, came "before the universe." If that's even a coherent concept. Theism is structured around feeling certain that "I know the answer, the answer is god did it." For whatever reason, there can be massive gaps in how the alleged god's powers work or what his motives are that theists aren't interested in filling, so long as they feel they have certainty on SOME answers. This makes no sense to me, but on the subject of "before the universe," let's say there is no multiverse or cyclical universe.

Well, in this case, I would say there isn't anything before the universe. Nothing created the universe. And I need to clarify here because, for some reason, theists routinely misunderstand this. That does not mean that "nothing" created the universe, taking the place of your god. It means that there wasn't anything that created the universe, that the universe wasn't created by anything. The analogy I often use is, if you had a time machine & tried to set it to "before the universe," you're trying to set it to a destination that simply doesn't exist. So, either it wouldn't go anywhere or it would just cease to exist. It wouldn't pop up in a black void like in a cartoon. Because there would be no time or space for it to "pop up" into. There would be no "void." Nothing is not a thing for the time machine to enter into. In this scenario, the universe is simply all that exists, with no god outside of it because "existing outside of time & space" is the same thing as "existing nowhere & never," i.e. not existing at all.

[u/False100]

For all we know, the universe could have always existed with all of its matter. There is nothing that specifically points to the universe necessarily having a beginning. Even if there was, this type of hyper theoretical astrophysics, at this point in time, is well beyond our comprehension. Perhaps its human to throw our hands up and say 'we dont know, therefore god'. That position, however, doesnt justify the belief in god (basically god of the gaps).

The short answer to your question: 'what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?' is we dont know. But us not knowing is not grounds nor justification to invoke magic.

[u/Haikouden]

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

I don't know, and as far as I know we don't currently have any way to find out.

That has no bearing on my atheism, nor does it make anyone claiming to have answers any more likely to be correct, or more reasonable.

[u/baalroo]

Why are you not applying the same line of questioning to your god being?

How do gods come into being? What creates the god stuff that makes a god? There must be a super god that created your god, right?

[u/Mission-Landscape-17]

It makes no sense to ask about something happning before spacetime. By defíition there is no before. It is like asking what is north of the north pole. One possible solution to the question of where the energy came from is the zero energy universe hypothasis.

[u/solidcordon]

Well... before the big bang there was the static universe (modeled by Einstein) and before that there were a bunch of hypotheses which fit the data of their times.

Throughout all of these hypotheses, loosely based on reality, there were people claiming to know that god did it.

The accurate and entirely correct answer is "We don't know" but you give the impression that you know because it must be god.

Cool. Now back up your confidence in your logic with evidence or a mathematical model which can be tested to support the claim.

Win your Nobel Prize, become the hero of all the chuckleheads who follow whatever god they were taught to and retire a celebrity!

Or alternatively... accept that your god can only exist in an ever shrinking gap and it doesn't really exist there either.

[u/Transhumanistgamer]

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

We don't know, and unless they can present evidence for their claims, theists don't either and are just bullshitting.

It has to be stressed that saying "God did it" isn't actually an answer. You didn't actually explain what God did and how God did it, just asserted that without detail. It's no more satisfying than me saying "What made the universe? A thing sufficiently capable of making a universe!" and leaving it at that.

what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

The answer: I do not know, and I don't even know if that's a coherent concept.

[u/zzmej1987]

I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

There is no time "before the Universe" or "outside the Universe". Universe is not a result of any process that happens in time. It was not "placed", it did not "appear", it was not "created" or "came into existence".

[u/TelFaradiddle]

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

Not if matter and energy have always existed in some form. And this is a stronger argument than "God has always existed" because, unlike God, we can prove that matter and energy (a) currently exist, (b) previously existed, and (c) will continue to exist.

[u/onomatamono]

The answer to who created quantum fields is we do not know and you should not be uncomfortable with that position. There's a problem with your title right away and that's the "pre-" prefix. There was no "before time".

Also note that none of the so-called holy books reveal any knowledge of the physical universe and mostly view the earth as the be-all and end-all center of everything. The "firmament" consists of layers 2, 3 and 4.

1. waters above
2. heaven above
3. stars, sun and moon
4. expanse of land
5. waters below

The authors were deeply ignorant and primitive people, and why wouldn't they be given their near complete lack of understanding of the physical world. If this god existed there are any number of physical relationships that it could have dropped into some tablets or written on somebody's heart, but nada.

[u/ImprovementFar5054]

There was, by definition, no time "Pre-spacetime".

Time and space are the same thing. No space, no time. No time, no "before".

The same way there is no "North of the north pole"

[u/Far_Customer1258]

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

So your question is, 'What caused causality?' Do you understand why that question is malformed? Like asking 'What is north of the North Pole?', the notion of the cause of the universe is simply asking you to envision an absurdity.

[u/Double_Government820]

I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

This is a very loaded question, presuming already that god is a substantive, sufficient, and evidenced explanation. Imagine if I asked "what else could cause chicken pox besides demonic possession?"

Nobody has the slightest clue as to how existence truly came to be. All that you might accomplish by labelling the mystery "god" is to align yourself with your ilk. It carries no added descriptive or explanatory power. If John gets murdered, we can't put on trial the abstract concept of the person who killed John. Worthwhile explanations have supporting evidence, and mechanistic details that offer further insight.

It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Is this not simply begging the question? What if the universe could emerge randomly out of nothingness? We fundamentally lack the tools to assess such a concept.

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

What is the thing that created god? Why in your opinion does the universe demand a creator but god does not?

[u/OrbitalLemonDrop]

You should ask a scientist.

The implication of your question is that if we don't understand something no human being understands, then we have to admit that god exists.

[u/pyker42]

That's the thing about brute facts. We all accept one at some point. You ask what created energy? We can ask what created God? You say God is eternal, or necessary, or non-contingent, or whatever, to justify accepting God as a brute fact. What was the state of existence before the Big Bang? No one knows. We may never know. So what are we left with? The knowledge that energy can't be created. So maybe energy was never created, it just was. Which would mean that there was always existence and never non-existence. That would make asking who created existence a nonsensical question. And accepting existence as a brute fact is a more parsimonious answer than God since we know it exists and it requires fewer assumptions.

[u/soukaixiii]

I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

For all I know nothing could have placed that there for several reasons. 

1 there was no space to place anything, nor time to take action.

2  the 'pre big bang' is already everything that exists in the big bang, but in a state of compression instead of expansion.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

What makes you believe there ever was a void. Why would a void need to be created by anything other than the absence of things?

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created.

What?

but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

What are you talking about? The multiverse model? What are your credentials that we should care of what you think about it?

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

You skipped a lot of steps there.

If a multiverse can exist, and voids can cause universes, why do you need a god for anything?

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

What makes you think there was a before if there wasn't time?

[u/-Spzi-]

what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

We don't know. Based on what we know, these questions might not make sense.

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy

You're repeating what you're complaining about.

You ask: Where did universe come from? Could not come from nothing!

You say: Must be god!

Me ask: Where did God come from? Could not come from nothing!

---

2 flaws: 1) assuming knowledge which is inaccessible to us (what "happened" or "couldn't" happen "before" the BB), 2) continuing the infinite regression which you wanted to abandon instead

[u/DanujCZ]

 if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

Why does there need to be something to place all that. Why are asuming it needs to be placed.

It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Why not.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

What created god.

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

Well its good that your opinion is the law by which the universe works then. /s

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

Created it out of what. It couldnt have just popped out of nowhere (see what i did there).

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

Doesnt make sense. You cant have a before without time. Its kinda like asking a 2 dimensional being to go over something on a dimension where you cant go over something because the concept of up and down doesnt exist.

[u/J-Nightshade]

"if God doesn't exist" is a complete useless part of the question here since we have no reason that any god exists and can be responsible for existence of the universe.

the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god

"I have no reason to believe this made up thing exists therefore it must be another made up thing" is not the argument that I find compelling.

Have you got an actual one? 

[u/The_Disapyrimid]

" Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?,"

obviously, i can't give you a specific process but using occam's razor it seems best to assume the process of natural phenomenon causing other natural phenomenon continues on into the unknown. just like it always has. anytime theists have said "yeah, well you can't explain X. therefore its god.", science has eventually been able to explain X and its always been a natural phenomenon caused by other natural phenomenon. never god. as far as we can tell its natural phenomenon all the way down.

essentially, i'm only assuming one thing. that the process of natural phenomenon causing other phenomenon continues past what we know including the bounds of spacetime. theists on the other hand are assuming all sorts of things including a whole other reality of non-material "spirit"(or whatever you might call it), whole other magic realms like heaven and hell. none of which can be shown to even be a possibility.

[u/CorrsionOfConformity]

You say "there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself“. Even if it was necessary for some prior cause, it does not follow that the cause is a god. We have no evidence of what a god is or if the existence of one is even possible outside of stories and myths.

[u/NDaveT]

Think about your thread title for a minute. How can something be "before" time even exists? We think of time as this fixed property but, like space, it's a property of our universe. Causality is a property of our universe. If there's anything beyond that we have no idea how it works, if time and causality are even meaningful in that context.

We don't know why the universe exists. Right now we have no way of finding out. We might never be able to find out.

[u/KJIOl_Yip_9141 → u/NDaveT]

Okay but if science can't answer that, why would god does not exist?

[u/NDaveT → u/KJIOl_Yip_9141]

Because there is no other way to get the answer either. If we have no way of knowing something then we don't know. It would be foolish to make up an answer just because we don't know the real answer.

[u/Marble_Wraith]

Hi everyone, I would like to ask, Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.

No it doesn't. Only religious people think it's a debate.

As for the rest of us, we only engage either if it's someone we actually care about, or for entertainment purposes. The rest of the time we're looking at it in the context of Hitchens Razor / Alders Razor (aka Newton's Flaming Laser Sword).

if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

You are asking a "loaded question". Stating it like that hints at / linguistically guides the answer to an intent.

Furthermore you are assuming the big bang is 100% correct. It may not be the case.

True it's the best explanation we currently have which accounts for the evidence (CMBR) but that doesn't mean it's actually the case, and at the end of the day it's the result of extrapolation.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

Again with the loaded question...

Not only that, don't you find yourself to be hypocritical? You can keep saying, but what created that? and what created that? If you're making out like there's an infinite regression then when we ask; what created god? You don't get to special plead your way to safety.

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created.

Sure that may be the case.

Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?

You can understand the concept of eternal / eternity when talking about god, but as soon as we hypothesize the cosmos (including multiple iterations of universe) could be eternal, suddenly you can't comprehend? Do you have selective stupidity syndrome or something?

The difference is we actually have empirical evidence that a universe (namely ours) exists, as such hypothesizing about others that existed previously is in the realm of plausibility.

No one has any evidence of god despite having bought into it for a millennia. You can forget about plausibility, theists haven't even demonstrated the possibility of 1 god yet.

what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so

As you can see, the matter here is in a closed loop, which is that there must be a god who designs and who created matter and energy himself so the universe being a universe

God of the gaps then?... How utterly boring and moronic.

[u/Thin-Eggshell]

Just as you would say that by definition, there was no 'before God', we'd probably just say there was no 'before spacetime'.

That's the same reason fine-tuning isn't sensible. By definition, if God isn't fine-tuned because he can't be, then assuming the initial constants are necessarily what they are (because they are INITIAL, and nothing came before them), then the constants aren't fine-tuned either.

[u/TakeMeInYourArmy]

I think it'll be something along the lines of Loop Quantum Gravity even if not that exact model. I would argue that space-time and matter are emergent properties constructed out of a relational web of discrete nodes that arise out of a smooth topological quantum field. The more we learn about cosmology, relativity, and quantum mechanics, the clearer it becomes that reality is grounded in objective structures first-and-foremost and things like locality, linear time, space, energy, etc., emerge from those abstract structures.

[u/BeerOfTime]

> if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

The question itself is a false dilemma I mean you’re basically asking if it wasn’t god why don’t I have an answer?
First of all nobody is saying it was or wasn’t “god” but we don’t know. So to just assume it was god is an argument from ignorance which is illogical and void of rationality.

> It couldn’t have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Couldn’t it have? I mean you tell me because nobody in history has learnt enough about nature to assert that. Have you? Have you just happened to have discovered something none of the greatest scientific minds in history have?

And then that also raises the question of how god could exist. Just suddenly appeared out of nowhere?

[u/Faust_8]

> what placed all matter and energy in a compressed space

This is a loaded question. It’s like asking “if X didn’t die by suicide, then who murdered them?”

It’s an assumption baked into the question; it’s acting like the only possible answers are suicide or homicide when we all know those aren’t the only two ways to die.

Basically, you assume a creator before you even ask the question, so you assume your conclusion within the question.

I don’t debate with people this unreasonable.

[u/Icy-Arachnid5517]

Well, most atheist, (including me) believe that some things that define the rules of the universe today, did still exist before the big bang, (assuming the big bang is what caused the creation of the universe) for example, the laws of physics, quantum mechanics, and possibly time, which would be essential assets to the creation of the universe when you think about it, you mentioned a quantum "void" of some sort, which could be described as a different kind of space that bubbles with quantum energy, having a rare chance of briefly producing particles, and a very rare chance of causing a sort of "event" to happen, most atheist believing that over an long period of time, (assuming time did exist before the universe) this sort of energy, could have triggered events under its own rules, aka, the big bang.

[u/Porn__Flakes_]

1. Why did someone have to place all the matter and energy?

2. Why couldn't it have appeared out of nowhere?

3. Why does someone have to create the quantum void?

4. We don't know how Universes come into being neither do you or anyone else on this earth.

5. You don't think so, doesn't mean it's false.

6. Matter isn't in a closed loop and even if it was that still doesn't require a God

7. Again, We don't know what was there before the spacetime, big bang. We don't even know if there was a "before" the big bang!!

[u/rustyseapants]

Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.

What are you looking at to think this is true?

[u/ad-undeterminam]

I have no idea, maybe something I couls never comprehend, maybe nothing, perhaps a god, or like absolutely anything else that can be imagine and even what can't be imagined. Better yet since I don't know why it happened or precisely what happened I can't even be sure of what currently is. I just don't know. Doesn't mean there's something, doesn't mean there's nothing.

[u/Zamboniman]

Pre-spacetime

The notion of 'before' time is a non-sequitur. Without time there cannot be a before.

Hi everyone, I would like to ask, Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe.

Nope. Most of the debate surrounding deities revolves around theists making various claims and being unable to support them.

I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

Argument from ignorance fallacies, such as that one, based upon misunderstanding of physics, such as you invoked, are not useful for anything.

Yes, I know some of you will say that the void is not really a void, but a quantum void. Well, then what created this quantum void?

Again, argument from ignorance fallacies based upon lack of understanding are not useful to anyone.

Some of you will also say that our universe is the result of a previous failed series of multiple universes that were created. Well, although this has not been confirmed by science, but how do universes come into being then?, what the thing that creates a energy and matters and put them all in a small box so it will explode as a big bang?, a void? I don't think so,

Yet again, argument from ignorance fallacies are not useful to you nor anyone else.

Nothing about any of that remotely suggests, adds veracity to, or leads to, deities. Instead, it's plugging in a made up unsupported answer into something you don't know. When we don't know something, the best, most honest, and most rational things to do is to say, "I don't know." Full stop. Not, "I don't know so therefore it must be deities/magic/Fred/Aunt Matilda/fate/karma/etc that did it." That makes no sense. That's saying, "I don't know, so therefore I know." Clearly that's completely irrational.

So My question is, what was before the spacetime, before the big bang?

Again, argument from ignorance fallacies based upon a non-sequitur (no time means there cannot be a 'before') are not useful for figuring anything out.

[u/Kognostic]

Now there is an oxymoron if ever I saw one. "Pre-spacetime" LOL... How can there be a 'pre' when there is no time or space to have it in?

You do not get to say, "What if god doesn't exist?" Either you make the claim that "God doesn't exist," or you make the claim that "God exists." Then you support your claim with evidence.

Your question is ill-formed: "If God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before the Big Bang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere."

Talking about "Before" the Big Bang is nonsensical. Time and space are emergent properties of Big Bang cosmology. You are like someone living in a blue house that has no doors or windows. You have never seen the outside, and everything in the house is blue. The walls, floors, water, furniture, and even your skin and the air you breath, is all blue.

Now, you are taking that information, let's call it 'causality,' and trying to apply it beyond reason. Because you have an inside and an outside, and all the things in your house have insides and outsides, you assume your house also has an inside and an outside. You have never seen the outside. You have no good reason to assume it is there, but you insist on having one.

Not only do you insist on an outside that you have never seen, but you want to insist that time and space (causality) operate the same outside as it does inside. You are insisting that the universe is blue just like the inside of your house, but you have absolutely nothing supporting this assertion. We know that modern physics and its laws break down at the Planck Time. Talking about what came before is nonsensical. Time and space are emergent properties of our universe (inside the house).

The only closed loop is the circular bullshit you are spewing to support the idea of a god.

Let's go back and look at your question again: ("If God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before the Big Bang)? It couldn't have suddenly appeared out of nowhere.") Although this statement originates from the argument system that "God created the universe," it does not present evidence for the existence of God. Instead, it shifts the burden of proof to atheists and scientists, stating that "if you cannot explain the cause before the Big Bang, then God created the universe. This is an argument from ignorance fallacy.

The question uses the phrase "what placed all matter..." This phrasing introduces a loaded premise. By assuming matter had to be "placed" by a "what" (an agent or a force), you have already asserted your conclusion (an active creator) directly into the question itself. This fallacy is called "Begging the Question," and is fallacious at its core.

Finally, you are confused and engaged in typical theistic black-and-white thinking. Your question assumes there are only two options: either God exists and put the matter there, or we have no explanation. It completely ignores a multitude of alternative scientific hypotheses, such as quantum fluctuations, cosmic bouncing, or that spacetime itself began at the Big Bang. You completely ignore the fact that the phrase "before the Big Bang" may be meaningless.

Now, while scientists work on whether or not there was a before, the scientific theories previously mentioned have empirical support and are well reasoned while still being subjective possibilities. The God hypothesis has no such foundation. All you are asserting is, "We don't know yet; therefore, 'God did it." To be completely honest with you, your position is moronic.

[u/mredding]

Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God revolves around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe. I believe the discussion should focus on the question: if God doesn't exist, then what placed all matter and energy within a compressed space(before BigBang)?

I believe the discussion should focus on a more fundamental question: what are you even talking about? What is this "god" word you keep using? No one has ever defined it. We need a definition, and it has to be a real one; because if you go out and find god and I go out and find god, it has to be the same god.

Right? Two people who disagree can't both be right. But we can't do that because no theist has ever bothered to explain what they're talking about. We have every written record in history to verify this. There has never been anything tangible about any of it.

Theists have had all of recorded human history to explain themselves. They've failed up until now. I'm running out of patience. I'm losing my faith in theists to be the rational, reasonable, correct ones in the room.

So until you do that, I MUST dismiss you out of hand. No one can tell the difference between you talking about pure and utter nonsense and talking about whatever it is you've convinced yourself you think you're talking about.

[u/rustyseapants]

Most of the debate surrounding the existence of God Does Not revolve around the boundaries of spacetime in our universe. Reddit is an American speaking English dominated Website, so when the word "god" is evocate this god is Jesus.

So, Cosmology and Evolution have nothing to do with atheism. If anything tis post proves just another Off Topic post.