[Nobody]

I have to disagree with your view of "God."

As Albert Einstein put it: "The difference between past, present and future is an illusion." There would be no need for "God" to evolve/mutate because the furthest future is the same as the furthest past - the last effect can be the first cause.

Relatively speaking though, the egg has to come first.

[Mr. Nobody]

Humanbydefault:
I fully agree. Please note the difference between Mr. Nobody and Nobody. Nobody objects, Mr. Nobody concures, lol

I want to expand your view of "It": I agree with you, that we are alone, not because we are special, but because reality exists within bubbles, cut off from other bubbles due to the effects of space-time dilation across vast distances (in accordance with a finite speed of light). I want to go a step further and proclaim self awareness a cancer of IT. I view all matter (including intelligent matter) as organization in response to increasing entropy. There is no "goal" of "IT", other than to exist. We prescribe meaning to something meaningless (IT), because our minds, our societies and cultures evolved within a birth and a death and therefore we interpret everything in finite terms. With finiteness comes intention and reason. It is our mind that is unable to comprehend the cold logic of infinity coupled with the anthropic principle, evolution and entropy
I view existence to be neither finite nor with reason:
Matter is just another manifestation of energy, life is another phase of matter, therefore life is a form of energy, an emergent quality of reorganization pursuant to the evolution of the laws of nature.
The "Infinite Good", a God, the "Infinite Evil", the Devil do not exist since they were created by our minds in order to sustain a culture in accordance with our evolutionary path.

Once I embraced the above and came to terms with its meaning(less), life shed the weight and burdon of judgement and became liberating. I understood the power of action and started to behave in agreemant with the universe, nature, truth and harmony

See related thread:
http://www.toequest.com/forum/intell...ghlight=reason

[Mr. Nobody]

To loop back to the intent of the post I am repeating my call for opinions and restate my standpoint, that
purely random behaviour evolved into what we deem reality which can be described using mathematics.
Behaviour first, laws second (as a tool of description and nothing else).

Let me emphasize the following and distill the deeper meaining of my view:
Random behaviour comes first, and excludes intention, a superior intelligence, intent, meaning or other willfull acts outside an observer's mind

[Mr. Nobody]

The mind needs to ascribe a meaning in order to sustain itself, to fulfill its function of being a productive member and constituent of society in accordance with the evolutionary path the human animal took.
I am devloping a view whereas I do not consider the individual being as the apex of evolution but sense that the culture, the group, the society that suports us has attributes consistant with progressing order (life). As we consist of billions of cells, our society consists of separate human entities. The need of the society overrides the need of the individual as nationalities assume the role of identities not unlike we assume an identity out of our cells.
Wars and the sacrifice of lives (counter to the supreme survival instinct) for an idea and the propagation of the winning culture presents evolution's next step.
So I rephrase the question to
The Roost, the Chicken or the Egg

[baudrunner]

It has been said that the chicken is just an egg's way of making another egg.

I very definitely lean toward the idea of random determination over time. If one does the research one will discover that by our best estimates it took approximately two billion years for single celled life with a few nucleotide sequences in them to evolve into eukaryotes, or single celled life with a nucleus and a DNA molecule. If that doesn't scream random determination I don't know what does.

Elsewhere in this post you said:

"I am atheist by deduction.."

By this you mean of course that there is no sentient creator of the Universe who existed before it. That is a very practical truth, of course. It is absurd for it to be otherwise. But that does not rule out the existence of the God of lore. I maintain that He does exist, and that He no more wants to make a claim to having created the Universe than do you or I. But I will tell you this, He has an eye and an ear for your intelligent insight, mr. nobody.

You also said:

"..an expandable universe is an impossibility."

Scientists tell us that a photon from the first phase of Universal history has increased in wavelength from about two centimeters originally to a wavelength of about twenty one centimeters today.

Take a ruler and snip and trim an elastic band so that it is exactly six inches long with a reference point (the sun) drawn at the two-inch mark and a point (a near star) drawn at the one-inch mark and another point (a farther star) at the five-inch mark. Now stretch the elastic band uniformly to twice its length. This reveals, oddly enough, that the farther star point has travelled three times as fast away from our reference point than has the near star point.

An expandable Universe is not impossible if it is one which continues to create itself at the periphery. The leavings are left to decay in the time of an infinitely expanding Universe. Order from chaos by way of random determination based on favor.

[Lloyd Gillespie]

I absolutely agree, Mr. Nobody.

regards,

Originally Posted by Mr. Nobody

Random behaviour comes first, and excludes intention, a superior intelligence, intent, meaning or other willfull acts outside an observer's mind

[Mr. Nobody]

Baudruner, are you sure it was not "Nobody" who said "an expandable universe is an impossibility". I know sooner or later the handle "Nobody" and "Mr. Nobody" would cause confusion.

[baudrunner]

Early morning absentmindedness I guess.

Suffice it to say that my response to that quote is my stock answer to anyone who would declare the same.

whew!

[Aiya-Oba]

Between Chicken and Egg, is Equator of Chicken and Egg:Nuclear Logic. -Aiya-Oba.

[protheory]

I've not posted in this thread for a long time but here's my answer to this question on video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2G8ywk5g5Y

Here's my original answer from my website http://www.protheory.com/The%20chick...0the%20egg.htm