Is god the only answer for why we exist?

excellent post

 

Not impossible. There can be a first cause if the process is cyclical. There can even be no cause at all if it is infinite or eternal.

Why does the universe exist? It has always existed. Stop.

 

I guess it depends on your level of curiosity. A lot of folks are content to take it for what it is and get on with their lives, or more often accept the pat answers provided by organized religion and organized atheism. Getting on with their lives can mean a desperate pursuit of money, titles, getting laid, muscles, straight teeth, etc., with occasional spells of midlife crisis questions about what it's all about. Others, like me, find the question intriguing--like "Why is there something instead of nothing?that has occupied the time of philosophers throughout the ages. Is evolution a product of blind natural forces or does it get some guidance from some force as yet unknown? Why are we conscious? What survival function does self-awareness serve that couldn't be served as easily by zombies? Why does the universe seem fined tuned to support life? The typical non-theist reply seems to be that there's nothing necessary and compelling about things being the way they are, and if they weren't they'd be different, including the absence of intelligent life, or life at all. That's logical enough, I guess, but the universe as it is seems far too cool to be just a lucky accident. I'm willing to take the chance that there's something interesting going on and to devote time to trying to get a better handle on what it is--despite the realization that I'll probably be unsuccessful and that the problem is probably too big for us, like my dog trying to figure out why I have a cow when he shits on the rug.

 

Come on....really?

 

That's more like them. The affirmation is not really Realism.

 

Is that your answer?

 

I'd like to appeal to common sense, yes. But seriously I don't know what people are on about with fine tuning.....

Just look at the volume of the universe where you cant live, which includes
75% of our own planet. Not to mention that we have absolutely no idea exactly
which physical constants would best accommodate life.

Fine tuning is just natural selection turned on its solipsistic head.

 

There is also football

 

Biological expression has a definite purpose, to be. From the instinct for self preservation to the sense of gratitude.

 

So does that purpose exist only spontaneously as life?

 

While I'm not too excited about the "fine tuning of the big bang" issue, I can't be flip about it, either. The issue is not just a matter of finding a planet in the right place and time; it concerns numerous physical constants so finely tuned that it's a bit like throwing a pin in the air and having it land in such a way as to balance on the pointy end. I hope you follow what I mean.

At the very least, the fine tuning issue suggests to me two surprising possibilities for the origin of the universe. One, of course, is that it was created by some intelligence or intelligences. There's no reason to believe that, and it doesn't actually solve the mystery, but I include it for completeness.

The second possibility may or may not be simpler — and thus more congruent to Occam's Razor — but frankly I'm not convinced that's so. Anyway, the second possibility is that there are countless "parallel" (well, alternative) universes; I've heard estimates that are something like 10 to the power of 500 alternatives. Is this "simpler" than a creative intelligence which might have been produced by a more parsimonious process? I don't know.

It really is funny, to me, because this is the closest I've come in decades to accepting that a "creator" is possible. But at the moment I must face the logical necessity to include the possibility. That's not, of course, the same as saying I believe!

 

I don't think god is any kind of answer for why we exist.

I do think that is is a suitable placeholder for the phenomena that the harvest of life is more than rock and mineral are prone to grow.

 

thedope:

I would say overall the activity of loving!

Being, when beheld, is not beholden to anything beyond our holding that it is.

As far as we'll ever know!

 

Geck:

Techs tutor tongue go Geck.

 

Jarik:

I missed the part when the existence of the universe became a question that needs answering.

Walsh asks: Eternity?

Why not!

Since we all seem to be missing parts, maybe altogether we can give humans over to superhumanity. I think that might mean getting together. lol

To anyone who doesn't want to ask (and keep on asking) what consciousness is for:

Why?!

 

I think the question has it the wrong way around. Our existence is the only answer for why there's god.

 

What is consciousness "for"? That's a darn good question, though I suppose we'd first have to define which "consciousness" we're referring to. Is a flea conscious? How about a mouse? A dog? A newborn baby? A profoundly retarded person? Pauly Shore?

 

If we're game we could let it define itself in us. The which as a who, and the who every you. You may say I am just saying that because I want it above all. But I don't! I want it for all. Even Pauly Shore.

 

The unconscious is a who too.

 

Shhh! Let sleeping gods lie!