My eyes opened with that November 1995 issue of the WT as well.
Good luck.
Posts by Perry
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36Gorby says goodbye
by Gorbatchov inmy eyes for ttatt opened in 1995 with the generation change and the wt magazine stated "some witness thought that the generation started in 1914".
since 1997, with internet at low speed, i followed h2o hourglass, www.xjw.com and later on www.jehovahs-witness.net.. did a bachelor and post bachelor since then.. now, nearly completed with fading, i feel it's time to go on with my life and do some other things, spending more time with my wife abd children instead of thinking about jw topics in my head.
goal is being a better person and less grumpy at 45.... everything what could be said is already said.
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My brother died last night
by LisaRose ini found out this morning that my brother died last night, he was also an ex jw, 73 years old and died of heart disease and kidney failure.
it was not totally unexpected, as he had been in poor health, but it's a blow, especially as i just lost another brother two years ago.
there were six of us, now only four.
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Perry
Very sorry for your loss. -
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
an hour ago
xainhippe,
As previously discussed, the fact that the universe is expanding, is strong evidence (with much scientific support) that not only did the universe have a beginning, but that an Agent or first cause existing outside of the space time universe must have acted upon our universe.
No it isn't.Then you are left with only magic - our space time universe beginning from nothing.
And if true, Why don't we see cereal boxes appearing from nothing? Or maybe vanilla ice cream? Since, something from nothing has never been observed, why would you adopt this as something logical?
Believing in Materialism is ultimately belief in nothing more than make-believe.
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
But Perry God can't be detected, observed, measured or proved.
xainhippe,
As previously discussed, the fact that the universe is expanding, is strong evidence (with much scientific support) that not only did the universe have a beginning, but that an Agent or first cause existing outside of the space time universe must have acted upon our universe.
Otherwise, we are left with a scenario far worse than magic - Something begins from nothing. At least with magic, you start with a magician. Materialism ignores an assumption WAY worse off than magic.
The quantum vacuum that pop philosophers try to prove that things do indeed pop up out of nothing, is in reality "a seething sea of activity that pervades the entire Universe". If is far from "no thing"
This state (of timelessness) that this First Cause must exist in can be predicted by mathematics, but I can't see how anything in this inferred state could be observed, tested, or measured .... unless something from that realm penetrated ours FIRST. Test tube style devices do not work beyond our space time universe.... for any object, let alone God. But the effects can certainly be measured, tested , etc.
If you seek Him, He will be found by you - 1 Chron. 28: 9
I can say that I have personally found this to be true. Unless God penetrates (or transcends) our space/time universe and manifests himself to us; finding, testing, & observing him is impossible, but not his effects.... those are "clearly seen"... so that "we are without excuse" when positing credit for our existence within our space time universe..... without excuse.
Heb. 11: 6 - he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
@Perry. Just out of interest how have you jumped to the god conclusion when considering the so called 'first cause'? Could the 'first cause' be materialistic?
MASH,
I think the best explanation is an intelligent cause as opposed to an unintelligent one for a number of reasons. The video below is just one argument along that line.
As you watch this video, keep in mind that the commonly accepted quantity of particles in the whole observable universe is only 10 to the 80th power. This number includes the total number of protons, neutrons and electrons. The odds of just one (and there are dozens) of the necessary balances of natural things in order for life to exist far exceeds this number by an inconceivable number of times.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpIiIaC4kRA&list=PL3gdeV4Rk9EfL-NyraEGXXwSjDNeMaRoX&index=2
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
Rebel, funny thing I've learned about "luck" over the years.... the more I believe God, the "luckier" I get.
Point well taken and thank you.
So, if the mathematics (not to mention logic) shows our universe had a beginning, then someone or some thing, from the static state of timelessness had to have acted upon our space time universe in order for it to exist.
This person or thing could rightly bear the label of a First Cause from our perspective, even as from its own perspective there is no such thing as before and after, just the eternal now.
Materialism puts people in a box and prohibits people from accepting the necessity of a state of timelessness. They don't like it .... because it is outside of their personal reality. Consider this from Discover Magazine:
The trouble with time started a century ago, when Einstein’s special and general theories of relativity demolished the idea of time as a universal constant. One consequence is that the past, present, and future are not absolutes. Einstein’s theories also opened a rift in physics because the rules of general relativity (which describe gravity and the large-scale structure of the cosmos) seem incompatible with those of quantum physics (which govern the realm of the tiny). Some four decades ago, the renowned physicist John Wheeler, then at Princeton, and the late Bryce DeWitt, then at the University of North Carolina, developed an extraordinary equation that provides a possible framework for unifying relativity and quantum mechanics. But the Wheeler-DeWitt equation has always been controversial, in part because it adds yet another, even more baffling twist to our understanding of time.
“One finds that time just disappears from the Wheeler-DeWitt equation,” says Carlo Rovelli, a physicist at the University of the Mediterranean in Marseille, France. “It is an issue that many theorists have puzzled about. It may be that the best way to think about quantum reality is to give up the notion of time—that the fundamental description of the universe must be timeless.”
No one has yet succeeded in using the Wheeler-DeWitt equation to integrate quantum theory with general relativity. Nevertheless, a sizable minority of physicists, Rovelli included, believe that any successful merger of the two great masterpieces of 20th-century physics will inevitably describe a universe in which, ultimately, there is no time.I believe that God conveyed this simple (and necessary) reality to Moses when he said:
"I AM THAT I AM"
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
I'm sure that Materialism eventually contradicts itself.... and all by itself. -
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
Great Teacher,
With all due respect, no one has ever in the history of the world provided an example of something beginning without a cause..... not to mention our brief discussion time here on this thread.
I see no logical reason to suspend belief in "cause & effect" facts as you have done.
Beginnings have causes, independent of whether or not they are convenient to our belief system.
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
Is something that exists outside of space and time supernatural? Says who?
Our space and time universe had a beginning. All known beginnings had a cause. What could be more natural than that fact?
Are we only to believe things until they violate the pre-set boundaries of our ideology? Who made up that rule that I should obey him? What kind of intellectual freedom is that?
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Beliefs About What Caused the Universe
by Perry inthe universe can be observed to be expanding.. an expanding universe must have had a beginning.
whatever begins to exist had a cause.
therefore the universe had a cause.
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Perry
Needing a Causer is very Western thought.
Great Teacher, cause and effect is believed in globally. It is not western.
God states the difference between the nature of the universe and the nature of himself clearly in Psalms 102 -
"Of old You founded the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. "Even they will perish, but You endure; And all of them will wear out like a garment; Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. "But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end"
The observable entropy of the universe is compared to the self existence of God in this passage. The universe is very big no doubt, but it is slowly running out of energy. It's cycles are not eternal.