eternity made simple....

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….But I explained before that all this does is dig one hole to fill another. Because you then have yet another brute fact C that DETERMINES that brute fact B IS AS IT IS.
Brute fact C cannot be said to be the way it is for any REASON whatsoever ,so it logically follows that this is passed on by default to brute fact B as well
..… (my emphas ...[text shortened]... ay it is -all brute fact C is that couldn’t have been different from the way it is -that is all![/b]

I understand what you are saying. I agree. What I didn't understand is why you thought it relevant to invoke yet another brute fact to try and say that the laws of physics were not the way they were by chance. It seemed to me to have stalled the problem but not solved it. A bit like the infinite regress of causes solves nothing.

Originally posted by knightmeister
I understand what you are saying. I agree. What I didn't understand is why you thought it relevant to invoke yet another brute fact to try and say that the laws of physics were not the way they were by chance. It seemed to me to have stalled the problem but not solved it. A bit like the infinite regress of causes solves nothing.

….What I didn't understand is why you thought it relevant to invoke yet another brute fact to try and say that the laws of physics were not the way they were by chance.
..… (my emphasis)

This is why:

Either

(1) the laws of physics were NOT the way they were by chance

Or

(2) the laws of physics WERE the way they were by chance

What would our premise be that (2) is more probable than (1) or visa versa?
After all, as far as I can personally judge, one makes no more unqualified assumptions than the other -perhaps (1) assumes that it is a brute fact C that the laws of physics couldn’t have been any other way (but without explaining why so) while (2) might assume, say, the existence of some kind of randomising physical mechanism that somehow randomly set the laws of physics! And such a assumption would be unnecessary for (1) although you may still decide you must assume brute fact C for (1) -so, out of (1) or (2), which overall makes the most unqualified assumptions or is the most complex hypothesis? -I think it is hard to say which, which is why I see no obvious reason at the present time to think one is more likely than the other although perhaps someday we will discover such a reason?

I don’t think we actually disagree on much here.

Originally posted by Andrew Hamilton
[b]….What I didn't understand is why you thought it relevant to invoke yet another brute fact to try and say that the laws of physics were not the way they were by chance.
..… (my emphasis)

This is why:

Either

(1) the laws of physics were NOT the way they were by chance

Or

(2) the laws of physics WERE the way they were by chance ...[text shortened]... aps someday we will discover such a reason?

I don’t think we actually disagree on much here.[/b]

I think we are basically in some broad agreement apart from the odd nuance or two.

My feeling is that ultimately the laws of physics either must

1)exist for a reason or
2)exist for no reason.

Invoking a brute fact C does mean that the laws of physics exist for a reason. The difficulty is that if that reason exists for no reason then the chance element is ultimately passed on to the laws of physics anyway.

If the whole of existence exists for no reason or cause then it could be said to be existing by chance randomly?