What Maintains the Universe?

by metatron 49 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  metatron

  Does it ever seem weird that evolutionists and creationists endlessly debate about events vastly distant in the past - without discussing what

  maintains the universe now? Clearly, electrons and protons have a certain mass, light has a particular speed and so on - why should any of

  it stay that way? Creationists will attribute all such cosmic janitorial work to God - but I'm not sure what the materialist response is exactly.

  Victor Stengler once stated that quantum effects are purely arbitrary - they "just are" - which actually sounds sort of odd, given the normal

  cause and effect thinking expected from science.

  I'm asking because I can't find anything on google - maybe the Anthropic Principle means that if physics fell apart now, none of us would ask

  the question, but that still doesn't explain coherent physics in areas outside of our solar system as shown by spectra, for example.

  Weird, ain't it?

  metatron
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  VM44

  Gravitation and inertia maintain the structure of the universe, at least over great distances.

  Also, there appears to be a vast amount of Dark Matter and Dark Energy present that might have something to due with maintaining the order of the Cosmos.

  --VM44
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  gymbob

  I DON"T KNOW....but it's fun to speculate. I personally doubt very seriously if that will be answered in our lifetime. Plus, it hurts my head to think about.

  I just try and be a nice guy to everybody and let the rest of the universe, afterlife, religious thing, etc. take care of itself. Gymbob
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  hamsterbait

  I cannot believe you mean "maintain" in the janitorial sense.

  The universe is no more maintained at present than a cup of coffee you just stirred cream into then left turning.

  I am making no reference to Deus Abscondit ideas or divine watchmakers here.

  HB
• 

  SixofNine

  "What Maintains the Universe?"

  A husband and wife team who are members of the Ypsilanti MI North congregation. They also maintain the offices of HealthKare Associates and a local bank, but are considering dropping those accounts as the universe account is taking so much time that they may have to go off of the pioneer rolls if they don't make some prayerfully considered changes.
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  metatron

  "Janitorial" is just a sort of exaggeration. Still, I think the question must have been discussed in philosophy somewhere - and I'm stuck with

  "maintenance" because it's difficult to articulate anyway. It's hard to conceive of this without some sort of reference to another dimension,

  a Matrix-movie sort of background or a kind of subspace that transcends the speed of light or time.

  Nonlocality might be invoked, too.

  Where's that Platonic shelf where the electron forms are kept?

  metatron
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  Narkissos

  If I have learnt something over the years, it is that whatever looked "permanent" or "stable" was just changing slower than what looked "unpermanent" or "unstable".
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  Nathan Natas

  Gravity and inertia may be what keeps things going, but entropy requires that nothing is being maintained - everything is moving toward a condition of lowest entropy. It is only that the universe is so vast that the inertia keeps it going far longer than we live. some have even suggested that "universal standards" like the speed of light are not constant - that light has been slowing down since the big bang.

  "it's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine."
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  Twitch

  If I have learnt something over the years, it is that whatever looked "permanent" or "stable" was just changing slower than what looked "unpermanent" or "unstable".

  Standing at the foot of a mountain, I see the crest of a single wave rippling across the land soon to be lost in the seas of time. I am but a grain of sand.
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  nvrgnbk

  I think metatron does.

  No, seriously.

  After all, he is "the knower of secrets".