ttm...im not/the one saying...the chicken/came first...so argue it out/with..the science..

i am prepared/to walk you through it..with little/baby-steps..to help you/figure out;..you are talking through your butt/again

please..state...what laid the egg...of the first chicken..or better this first/bird...NOTE...chickens are warm blooded...snakes are cold blooded...ditto lizards/turtles...

so no need/to waste your breath..saying a reptile done it

some other things/for you to chew on.....A bird's-shell is hard because/it is made up of calcium and other minerals.

[and needs to be kept warm/..usually by sitting on it..[a reptile needs heat from the sun..or decomposing vegetable matter

The snake's shell/is rubbery..because it lacks the calcium and minerals..eggs contain inside all the needed food and moisture for the embryo to grow and develop...

However,the reptiles/rubbery shells..do not contain all the needed moisture,..and they must absorb it/from their environment.

so there are/some limitations..that come to mind..[others just off the top of my head..is bird eggs have a stringy/membrane...attatched to the yolk..[because the birds NEED to constantly turn them over

further the accretion mechanism..in the bird is nothing like/that of any reptile...[and IF>.you speculating..it COULD have been..some warm blooded dinosaur..WELL NAME NAMES...be specific...

[the arciopTRICKS...is a known fraud...it certainly isnt the so called missing link..[its feathers have been found/to belong to some modern chicken]...but then/so many of your..so called missing/links are FRAUD...[lucy...and so many others..have been rebutted

but/like i say..mr clever ttm-guy...put up..the definitive PROOF
present your faulasifyable's*...

you lot/are so adept at putting up links..that say nothing..its time you were more scientific...

stating/SPECIFICLY..this link says this/what!

but you lot/been decieved..for so long...you dont dare egsamin the proof..mainly because/you dont got none..or dont get that/you got

its interesting to note/that some...long legged wombat...replaced all the destractions..noted earlier..[ie the boney/fish..first found in late nineties/..then the pre ape ancestor...first raised ten months ago..[and god alone/knows..when...the bones..of the longlegged-wombat were first found

but..i noted only two reports..on the chicken/egg thing..6/4..the-wombat

ANYHOW...give up/some specific fact!

state definitivly..that what science/link..or scientist..says this or that..be specific....

time you put some research..into that/you take/took..on faith!
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=list+differences+between+bird+egg+and+snake+egg&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

Dear Oliver,
>>The idea of Jesus dying is to make an aspect of god human and mortal. Morality is nor anattribute of God.<<
I see now where I misunderstood you. But still, there is no contradiction, since the human nature of Jesus suffering and dying does not imply that mortality is an “attribute of God”.
My naive understanding of Incarnation is something like a father going down on his knees to play with his three year old son. In order to be better accepted by the child, the father will run around on all fours hollering woof-woof, but it does not follow that this behaviour is an attribute of the adult father.

>>Roger Penrose has raised the issue of mathematics in discribing the early universe, wherein he noted that boundary conditions do NOT lend themselves to dynamical equations (which he associates with differential calculus).<<
I do not understand what “lend themselves“ here means. From what I know, boundary conditions are needed to determine solutions of partial differential equations (PDE), dynamical equations are ordinary differential equations (that belong to calculus) by definition, a fact well known to Penrose. This is peripheral to this thread, so it does not matter, but perhaps an exact quote from Penrose would make it easier for me to understand what you had in mind.

By the way, Paul Davies has written a lot (of speculations) about the philosophical problem of physical reality and laws of physics, see e.g. http://www.ctnsstars.org/conferences/papers/The%20Problem%20of%20What%20Exists.pdf or http://www.ctnsstars.org/conferences/papers/Where%20do%20the%20laws%20of%20physics%20come%20from.doc.

Dear George,

"dynamical equations are ordinary differential equations"

Yes.

Penrose (The Emperor's New Mind, 1990, pp. 455-456:

"... The boundary conditions serve to 'start of ' the system in question, and dynamical equations take over from then on. It is one of the most important realizations in physical science that we separate the dynamical behaviour from the question of the actual contents the universe."

"I have said this separation of dynamical equations and boundary conditions has historically been of vital importance. The fact that it is pssoible to make such a separation at all is a property of the particular type of equations (differential equations) that always seem to arise in physics. But I do not believe this division is here to stay. In my opion, when ultimately comprehend the laws, or principles, that actually govern the behaviour of theuniverse - rather than the marvellous approximation thar we hace come too understand and which constitute SUPERB theories to date - we shall that his distinction between dynamical theories shall fade away."

Thanks for encourging me to refer tothe original source, wherein, as omitted by me, Penrose also sees the demarcation one day will "fade away".

The above comments were made in a Chapter on Quantum Gravity, though, I thought of Hawking-Harlte regressing space-time to a non-boundary condition, where I see no distinct initial co-ordinate (no beginning). A self-sustaining extistence.

Dear Oliver,

Thank you for the quote. I do not have “The Emperor’s New Mind”, but have to admit that Penrose is not much clearer here than what you wrote. In addition, I misread his/your reference to dynamical EQUATIONS (that, I suppose, can be anything describing the behaviour of a physical system) with (local) dynamical SYSTEMS from pure maths, e.g. associated with first order autonomous ODEs.

As far as I can understand this, Penrose speculates that some future (mathematical) models of “the behaviour of universe” will mix this distinction between the equation, i.e. “law”, and "boundary conditions". For instance, if the manifold modeling space-time has no boundary - e.g. in case of the Hartle-Hawking model, as you aptly mention - there is nothing on which to prescribe boundary conditions. Hence Hawking’s quip that to ask what was before the Big Bang (as if the Big Bang was an event on the boundary) is like asking what is to the north of the North Pole. I am not sure to what extent are these "boundary conditions" related to the problem of the "fine tuning" of the Universe.

I do not see how this - the choice of an appropriate model - has anything to do with “self-sustaining existence”, which - as I understand it - is just the EITHER option in my two alternatives stated above: EITHER the universe is self-sustaining (this is a valid world-view option irrespective of what physical/mathematical model we use/need to understand the universe), OR there is an external Agent that sustains it, and Himself/Itself is self-sustaining. An appropriate physical theory (mathematical model) might only further banish the ill-famed "God of the gaps" - who, presently seems to be justified by the fine-tuning as we see it - but it cannot lead to a universally convincing and binding conclusion that our physical world is its own cause and purpose (at least this is how I undersatnad self-sustaining).

Again, thank you for this stimulating discussion.

Dear Geroge,

Appreciate the feedback.

Agree the comment I have have been presenting have little to do with the fine tuning of the universe. That would be a different topic, wherein, we can consider whether God created the Universe and just sat back. Else, God intervenes in history. Obviously, from your world-view, you will put yor hand up for the the latter.

Having a different world-view, I do see we are left with the two key alternatives you have have presented. A matter of finding cum deciding on where to terminate retrospective regression. Is it God or the Universe that is self-sustaining. Owing to the supernatural nature of the former, spectulations cannot move much beyond metaphor or allegory, yet, with the Universe we can test our predictions. We are left not only with two cases but also two approximations of measureable agreement about the two cases.

Approximations based on our knowledge of the Universe -though incomplete- would seem to be "firmer" than our knowledge of the architecture of God would more complete than our knowledge of the Universe. We might say God has no boundaries and the Universe has no boundaries, yet, only with the latter are able to produce a workable hypothesis (es) of why/how.

Also, the God and Universe do seem to governed by rules. The Christian god is infinitely moral (cannot be bad). Likewise, if memory serves, there are restictions on n (number), regarding the number of dimensions involved in manifolds.

Regards

Dear Oliver,

Of course, I agree that investigations about the Universe can bring us further than “investigations” - whatever that would mean - about God. Speculations in both cases - i.e. whether you accept that the Universe or God are self-sustaining, as you put it - can bring you only that far: in the first case your speculations are bound by what is presently “known” (i.e. accepted by the community of scientists), in the second case your speculations are bound by the same, as well as by the context (sacred texts, tradition, authority) of your religious belief system.

The difference is not so much in “metaphors or allegory”, since - as I tried to argue - we need models to describe our mental image of both physical and numinous reality, but I agree that the difference is in the fact that science can make verifiable prediction, theology cannot.

At second thought, I should not have equated your “self-sustaining” with my “being its own cause and purpose”, since it is thinkable to believe in both a self-sustaining Universe and God, who “created it”. The theologians’ term for evolution is self-creation, so probably a self-sustaining Universe could also have a place in theology.

>>We might say God has no boundaries and the Universe has no boundaries<<
Boundary is defined precisely only in mathematics, and if you say Universe has no boundaries, you mean that the manifold used to model the Universe has no boundary (you could not “see” or “go to” that boundary). I never heard about God’s boundary, but if, it would have to be part of a theological language, model of God.

The difference is, as I said, that you could falsify a (mathematical) model, i.e. show that it leads to conclusions that disagree with observations, whereas in case of religious/theological models you cannot. The justification for e.g. the Christian model of reality is more subjective, consciousness more explicitly involved (than "observer" in physics).

Also, sorry, but there are n-dimensional manifolds, for any integer n (even infinite-dimensional) in mathematics.