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[Glen Hunter]

I'm not sure I follow. Reasoning itself had to exist in the beginning, and that is how we can conclude that the first cause and the cause of the designed universe were the same entity?

[jimwalton]

Evolution is the model where all that is came about through genetic mutation (which has been proved to almost always be, and certainly strongly in favor of depreciation, not advance) and natural selection (which is blind, so "selection" is a bit of a misnomer. One way or another one continues on and another doesn't, but the "selection" process is not based in intelligence or reason). So we have several impersonal forces at work: mere chance (in chemical collisions, material circumstances, lightning strikes, temperature and velocity happenings, whatever), genetic mutation (a blind form of informational changes, almost always deleterious), and natural selection (some continue on, some don't). None of these processes involve intelligence or reason.

Out of this picture, naturalists claim, humanity evolved. But then naturalists assure us what evolved was an organism driven by survival: food, reproduction, fight and flight. There is no notion of "truth" in this equation, only what is and what isn't.

But we have cognitive faculties: perception, reasoning, intuitions, propositional thinking, abstract thinking, sympathy, introspection, memory, beliefs and knowledge. Let's examine this: My memory, for example, is reliable only if it produces mostly true beliefs. What's the good of it if it's detrimentally faulty? What percentage of my memories have to be true for me to consider my memory to be reliable? That's a judgment call, but I assume it would have to be better than 2/3 or 3/4. What about my other cognitive capabilities? They also have to be somewhat reliable (better than 75% or so) to be worth having. As a theist, it's easy to make this connection: God has made my faculties reliable. As a naturalist, though, you stand on much shakier ground: If your brain and thought capabilities are the result of accidents, mutations, and natural selection, on what group can you assume your power to reason is for the most part reliable? In other words, if naturalism and evolution are both true, our cognitive faculties would very likely not be reliable. The probability is low that I can depend on blind, non-reasoning sources to produce reason that is reliable. In other words, naturalism and science are in serious conflict with each other.

Thomas Nagel said, "If we came to believe that our capacity for objective theory (e.g., true beliefs) were the product of natural selection, that would warrant serious skepticism about its results."

Barry Stroud: "There is an embarrassing absurdity in [naturalism] that is revealed as soon as the naturalist reflects and acknowledges that he believes his naturalistic theory of the world. … I mean he cannot it and consistently regard it as true."

Patricia Churchland: "Boiled down to essentials, a nervous system enables the organism to succeed in the four Fs: feeding, fleeing, fighting, and reproducing. The principle chore of nervous systems it to get the body parts where they should be in order that the organism may survive. … Improvements in sensorimotor control confer an evolutionary advantage: a fancier style of representing is advantageous so long as it is geared to the organism’s way of life and enhances the organism’s chances of survival. Truth, whatever that is, definitely takes the hindmost."

In other words, without God, "the principal function or purpose of our cognitive faculties is not that of producing true or near true beliefs, but instead that of contributing to survival by getting the body parts in the right place. What evolution underwrites is only (at most) that our behavior is reasonably adaptive to the circumstances in which our ancestors found themselves; hence it doesn't guarantee true or mostly true beliefs. Our beliefs might be mostly true, but there is no particular reason to think they would be: natural selection is not interested in truth, but in appropriate behavior. What Churchland therefore suggests is that naturalistic evolution—that is, the conjunction of metaphysical naturalism with the view that we and our cognitive faculties have arisen by way of the mechanisms and processes proposed by contemporary evolutionary theory—gives us reason to doubt two things: (a) that a purpose of our cognitive systems is that of serving us with true beliefs, and (b) that they do, in fact, furnish us with mostly true beliefs." (- Alvin Plantinga)

Even Darwin agreed. "With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man's mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?"

What makes more sense is reasoning (intelligence in a being) had to exist in the beginning, and that intelligence was the first cause of the design we see in the universe, which has yielded beings who also have intelligence—reasoning powers that are reliable.

[Glen Hunter]

Maybe I should be more specific.

Supposing that the first cause had to have all these qualities.

Like we can start from knowing that. Let's say we know that for sure.

My question is why we think it is the same thing that did this specific act of designing. There are many acts of design that the first cause didn't personally design, right? Tablets and swords and so on

So, it seems like whenever we look at a specific act of design, it's not necessarily the first cause that designed this specific thing.
I hope that makes my question make a little more sense. Was there some reasoning for why the first cause is responsible for the specific design of our universe?

[jimwalton]

I really do keep trying to get what you are after, but I keep missing it, I guess. I'll keep trying.

> upposing that the first cause had to have all these qualities.

OK, let's suppose that so we have a starting point.

> There are many acts of design that the first cause didn't personally design, right? Tablets and swords and so on

Correct. Some items of design were designed by those intelligent beings that the first cause designed. It's a sequence. Informational data can only come from previous informational data. But that also means those intelligent beings further down the chain also have design capabilities like the first cause.

> So, it seems like whenever we look at a specific act of design, it's not necessarily the first cause that designed this specific thing.

Correct.

> Was there some reasoning for why the first cause is responsible for the specific design of our universe?

Because at the time of the design of the universe there was not yet another intelligent being to do any designing. Since the first creative act was not the creation of a second intelligent being, all things that came between the creation of the universe and the creation of the first intelligent being were designed by the first cause.

Am I getting closer to understanding what you're after?

[Glen Hunter]

Yes, that's perfect!

I am curious now, though. Am I understanding right that the first thing the first cause did was NOT the creation of a second intelligent being, and the first creative act WAS the creation of our universe (with its 100 billion galaxies and so on)? I'm curious as to how we can know something like that.

[jimwalton]

The reasoning comes from several places.

1. Science surmises that life evolved and was not part of the universe from the first moment of the Bang. Science tells us that life was a later development in the progression of the expansion.

2. Logic would tell us that life has to have a context and an environment to be viable. If the universe began out of a dimensionless singularity where no chemical, physical, or biological processes, laws, or forces were yet at work, then life has no context for genesis or sustenance until there are conditions suitable for perpetuation.

3. The Bible tells us, in agreement with both science and logic, that the creation of matter by necessity preceded the development of life.

[Glen Hunter]

Are we thinking that this universe of 100 billion galaxies is all that was ever created? I was thinking there might have been other things created, and hey, who knows, maybe the first thing created was some intelligent being.

I mean, it doesn't seem likely, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I knew that the first thing created was or wasn't an intelligent being

[jimwalton]

It's extremely difficult, if not impossible, to have a meaningful conversation about things that are 100% speculated. When you speak of "other things created," are you thinking of parallel universes or of metaphysical (spiritual) beings? In either case, our conversation then delves into total guesswork. What is it you "think" "might have been" "maybe"?

[Glen Hunter]

I think you're saying basically what I would, really. I can't think of any way we could really know what the first thing created was. Do we know that our universe was the first thing created?

[jimwalton]

I already spoke to that a few posts ago. I'll cut and paste it here to make it easier for you to see.

1. Science surmises that life evolved and was not part of the universe from the first moment of the Bang. Science tells us that life was a later development in the progression of the expansion.

2. Logic would tell us that life has to have a context and an environment to be viable. If the universe began out of a dimensionless singularity where no chemical, physical, or biological processes, laws, or forces were yet at work, then life has no context for genesis or sustenance until there are conditions suitable for perpetuation.

3. The Bible tells us, in agreement with both science and logic, that the creation of matter by necessity preceded the development of life.