Friday, May 25, 2007

Theism vs. Atheism: Moot Point

While I normally don't like taking sides in the God/No God debate, I have found a third side that makes the debate into a triangle. Whether or not there is an infinite God is a moot point.

One thing these two camps have in common is a claim that an infinite something or other exists. Theists claim the existence of an infinite God–infinitely powerful, controlling everything in the universe in some way. Scientists (not necessarily atheists) generally agree that the universe itself is infinite, without end.

In a universe without end, it follows that the possibilities are also endless, and that the world as we know it, with all of its physical laws, is but one of the possible outcomes. Furthermore, a God that is infinite encompasses everything in the universe.

But how can one infinite thing contain another? It is not possible per the very definition of infinity. Two infinites cannot share the same space; they must overlap. Not only do they overlap, but also they overlap completely, and therefore they are functionally the same thing. God and the universe are both infinite, meaning they are everything, but everything does not contain everything, everything does not come from everything, everything is everything. It is itself; God and the universe are each other.

God and the universe are the same thing: primordial existence, endless being that contains all things. For argument's sake, let us again separate these two ideas, and begin again with the premise that God is infinite.

The mathematical value of infinity contains the number zero; that is to say, everything includes no-thing. A God that is infinite therefore contains No-God as part of its everything-ness. If an infinite God exists, then we live in a world where God and No-God coexist as part of the same being, making the debate between theists and atheists moot.

If we begin instead with the premise that the universe is infinite, then God and No-God must both fit somewhere in that infinity. Even the atheistic view of an infinite physical universe necessitates the existence and the non-existence of God at the same time.

Just as the number infinity continues to be infinite no matter what other numbers are added or subtracted to it, so too do human concepts fade to insignificance when compared to the concept of endlessness.

I wrote this last night in a last-minute rush to finish a portfolio for my English class. Inspiration struck me when I least expected it, and left me unconscious.

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