The Astronomers--an inspiration to Pandeism

Astronomy has always had a role to play in theological discourse. From the time of the earliest records of the ancients, it was supposed that the lights in the night sky represented mystical forces. And, once it was understood that there were distinct forms of objects beyond our horizon, elaborate systems were imagined to explain their significance, and their supposed influence on human affairs.

Ptolemy of Alexandria devised a model of the sun and planets which placed the Earth at the center of our Universe, orbited by the Moon, then Mercury and Venus, then the sun and the rest of the known planets: Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. All of this, in the Ptolomeic model, was surrounded by a moving sphere of fixed stars. We now know that Ptolomy's model was wrong, but not for any lack of intellect on Ptolomy's part. Instead, it was a well-thought out model that largely accounted for what could be observed in that age, and with the prevailing theological supposition, of our Earth sitting at the center of our Universe.

Nicolaus Copernicus pioneered the next great leap in astronomical knowledge. Copernicus published his heliocentric theory, placing the Sun at the center of our Universe, shortly before his death. This was necessary due to the prevailing religious sentiments of the time. Although we now know the heliocentric model to be true, the monolithic Christianity of the era required the Earth to be at the center of the Universe, and so, truth was suppressed in the name of religion.

Following the work of Copernicus, Galileo Galilei determined, as well, that the Sun, and not the Earth, was the central point for the planets. His work was based on the most practical level of research, improving the design of telescopes and then observing the sun, moon, and planets through them, and reporting his observations. For his discoveries, he was condemned by the Church, which famously declared the theory that the Earth orbits the sun to be "false and contrary to Scripture." But, it is not so widely remembered that he was equally condemned for discovering spots on the sun, craters on the moon, other moons circling other planets, and that the planets themselves were not perfect orbs, as the church required. Under threat of of torture by religious officials, Galileo recanted -- but, naturally, recanting what is a true has never worked to make it untrue.

Johannes Kepler, lived in the same era as Galileo, but in a place less dominated by religious oppression. Working in the observatory of another great astronomer, Tycho Brahe, Kepler sought to solve the riddle of the apparent retrograde motion of Mars -- that is, the tendency of Mars to sometimes appear to move backwards in its orbit. In doing so, Kepler hit upon another great discovery, that the planets did not orbit the Sun at a uniform speed, or in perfect circles, or with the Sun at the exact center, as the religious leaders required. The planets instead orbited in a-centric ellipses, with orbital speed changing in conjunction with the distance from the Sun, which was simply a focal point, and not at the exact center of their orbit.

Sir Isaac Newton's theory of gravity was initially set forth in great measure to explain the means by which bodies in orbit were maintained in that way. It paved the way for the theological theory of deism by demonstrating that the constant hand of the Creator was not at all needed to explain the motions of the planets, but that celestial bodies could instead be maintained in their angular momentum entirely by the clockwork operation of celestial mechanics.

It was astronomers who, centuries later, insured the upending of Newtonian physics when they confirmed Einstein's theory of relativity by observing the predicted gravitational lensing of light passing distant stars. It was astronomers who gave us the key to the age of our Universe. Edwin Hubble discovered that ours was not the only galaxy, and by examining the redshift of other galaxies moving in relation to our own, that the Universe was expanding. It is somewhat remarkable in itself that up until 1925, it was not known that a single other galaxy existed, and after that date, that countless numbers of them did.

Hubble's discovery of universal expansion was disturbing to those who, for both scientific and theological reasons, believed the Universe to have existed forever, in much the same state. Astronomer Fred Hoyle was among those who developed the steady state theory, which proposed that the expansion of our Universe was fueled by a constant infusion of new material from some central point, so that it had always appeared, and would always appear, much as it does today. But this theory was disproved with the discovery of very old quasars and similar very old and very distant structures, which are not found in the neighborhood of younger galaxies which are farther along from the point of the initial expansion. It is somewhat ironic today that the Big Bang proponents were largely religious, championing the theory in part for its assignment of a point of origin to the Universe which accorded with Creation mythology, while the steady state proponents tended to be atheistic.

Once the Big Bang theory was confirmed, this knowledge, refined over time, allowed man to at last pinpoint the age of our Universe to approximately thirteen billion seven hundred and thirty million years. Later astronomers like Carl Sagan, Paul Davies, and Timothy Ferris would continue to do more and more to not only advance our understanding of our Universe, and the continuum of physics governing objects within it, but to profoundly effect the validity of theological models as well, making it impossible to rationally believe in a Creator for whom human beings were at the center of our Universe.

As astronomical discoveries have taken us farther and farther away from our initial imagined posture in the center of our Universe, theological systems have reacted in different ways. Some have simply shifted the vanity and self-centeredness that led us to believe ourselves to be the center of a perfectly ordered Universe away from the astronomical realm, insisting that even as we are seen to occupy an insignificant position in space, we remain the object of adoration for the Creator of that vast space, so richly occupied in places beyond our very imagination. Other theological models have strengthened in their grasp of a theology in line with astronomical reality. Pandeism is one such theory, demanding that any theological explanation must accord with the nature of our observed Universe. And so, the astronomers, in their generations of work advancing our understanding of our place within our Universe, have provided an inspiration to pandeism, and to all theological theories recognizing the grandness of a Universe in which we are so privileged to play even the most minute role.

Inspirations to Pandeism I

Pandeism Fish

So what, exactly, is a Pandeism Fish? I've received that question a fair share of times, one for which I surely ought to answer. And so here, by way of a roundabout essay is the explanation behind the Pandeism Fish....

Symbology:

Symbology is important to any school of thought as it provides an abbreviated way to convey affiliation, as well as in some instances to communicate a shorthand glimpse of the doctrine itself.

One such symbol is the fish. Now this might bring to mind a particular belief system in these particular times, but in fact the use of a sparse, fish-reminiscent pair of curved lines, just touching at one end and surpassing an intersection at the other, dates back over three-thousand years, pre-originating even the assignment of Pisces to the Zodiac.

The Christian adoption of the fish-as-symbol, the icthys, may raise an eyebrow. There was already, after all, the cross. And, though miracles or parables involving fish come as readily in the Bible as in the formative texts of, for example, Buddhism or Hinduism, the fish is not shown in any of these traditions to be a particularly venerated class of creature. And yet.... well, there is something about that shape which makes it especially appropriate as a symbol for Pandeism -- and if the pandeistic model is true, this would even go so far as to explain why members of theistic faiths (including, yes, Christianity) have subconsciously gravitated to a symbol greatly explicatory of Pandeism!!

The Pandeistic Model:

Consider, first, the pandeistic model; the Creator becomes the Creation; in the beginning (before our physical Universe exists, there is one entity, of substantial (but abstract) intellect, and having substantial capacity to control its own unformed energy. It is not infinite, but neither is it necessarily bounded -- one might describe it as "open-ended" in its creative capacity. This entity, for purposes of acquiring certain knowledge incapable of being generated for its current form, transforms itself, compresses all that it is into a singularity and then bursts forth into a new form, an unconscious will supporting the continued existence of a physical Universe, guided by laws of physics set forth in that very moment of Creation, with a grand unknown outcome but with governing dynamics designed to bring about complexity, culminating in the products of self-accelerating intelligent life (which, in turn, is capable of discovering those governing dynamics, those laws of physics and mathematics, and using them to build mightily upon the capacities delivered to it by nature)....

Anyone who has seen the map of the cosmic background radiation will note the rather oval shape assigned to it by the instruments reading it (though this oval is the product of an illusion, the true shape of the Universe likely being more spherical). Another sort of "oval" can be generated by envisioning our Universe is bursting forth from a singularity, and then experiencing a long period of expansion (perhaps hundreds of billions of years), reaching an apogee of sorts, a point of maximum expansion, from which it draws back in much the same way, returning to a point of singularity. Such expansion and contraction need not even occur in the three physical dimensions common to our observation, but may occur at higher dimensions, possessed of a curvature which exceeds our present observational capacity.

The Pandeism Fish:

And so, if we combine these ideas -- the pre-Universe Creator condensing and collapsing itself into a singularity, envisioned as an open-ended triangle pointing towards the moment of Creation; leading into the oval of our Universe as it is, or as it presents itself to us physically, and as it may operate on a larger cosmological sense, we find ourselves presented with a not unfamiliar shape:

______________________________________________________________
|MMMMMMMMWMMMWMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
|MMMMMMMMMWMMWMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
|MMMMMMMMMMWMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMW*****^O""'`o^****MMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
 ..MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMX*** ** *0* * ** * **_****XMMMMMMMMM|
 `..MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMZ* **~**o** ** *`*_**~*** ****~***MMMMM|
` .. @MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMX** **--*-* **** - -* **.... ` ` * **~*MM|
 )@ ~@ .w@MMMMMMP*****o* ** ** ** ** * *** * * * * ** ** ***MM|
 `~@ @ ..@`..@%F#.r{}*** *** *~**. .-. .* *** *// *** * ***..#)
` ) ` ) ` ) }+{ ` ` ` ` *` ` ` ` * ` ` ` ` ` ` * *` ` ` * `  }+ ???
 ,@ /@./-@/@#H%..**o-*** * *~*** *.. .. ....** **** *~** * */#)
 / ,? @ @MMMMMMMb** * *O* * * * o**~* *'** *** ** *O* ** * **M|
 @ ~,/@MMMMMMMMMMMM* * ** ** ** ** *o** _** *** ** * * ***MMMM|
, /MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM*o***~// * * * *o * * ** ** * *XMMMMMM|
 /MMMMMMMMWMMMWMMMMMMMMMMX** ** * * * ** * *0 * * *ZMMMMMMMMMM|
|MMMMMWMMMMMMMWMMMMMWMMMMMMMMX* *** * * **// * *MMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
|MMMMMMMMMMMWWWWMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMX&-x_,-/-XMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
|MMMMMMWWWWWWWWWWWWMMMMWWMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM|
|WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW|

Now here's where things get really interesting, conceptually. Recall that pandeism accounts for all theistic phenomena -- from all faiths -- as encounters between the limited human mind and the unconscious experience of our Creator underlying the continued sustenance of our Universe. All revelations received and miracles observed can be so explained, without resort to incongruent beliefs in things such as "evil spirits" being permitted to provide "false" revelations to some, while others are permitted to receive "true" revelations. And this accounts, as well, for the human predilection to grasp blindly towards the underlying metaphysical explanation, dressed up though it may become by human biases, fears and aspirations.

Synthesis:

Consider, again, that this fish-shaped device symbolises no petty miracle or mediocre allegory, but instead models an explanation for all observed reality, an explanation which, should the pandeistic model be true, would resonate in the unconscious mind underlying our continued existence, and through that channel into the subconscious mind of humanity. And so it could be said that the adoption by many faiths of the vague outline of a fish -- of the pandeism fish -- indicates this true underlying nature of our Universe, one which accounts for all the graspings of those very faiths!!

A fly in the Ontological Ointment

The Ontological Argument proposes that if God is "that than which no greater can be conceived," then God must exist, because something that does exist is greater than something that does not, and so existence is necessarily bundled up into "that than which no greater can be conceived." Though Immanuel Kant's refutation, denying existence itself as a quality, goes to the heart of such a claim of existence being tautological, he is applying that, I think, to a purported conception which itself never exists in the first place. For, in fact, it is impossible for something approaching "perfection" in any capacity to actually be conceived.

The Ontological Argument requires us to first conceive something which is perfect, as a step towards requiring the actualisation of this perfection on the basis of existence itself being a higher state of perfection. A simple, devastating blow to this argument can be laid down by a confrontation with the liberties which the first requirement takes with the very nature of conception itself. As the first step in the argument is to define "God" as "that than which no greater can be conceived," we must consider: what exactly is it which we are capable of conceiving?

Picture, for a moment, an infinitely long piece of string. Try and get that image in your head. Well, really, whatever you've thought of, it is a certainty that you are not actually picturing something "infinite" -- perhaps you imagine infinity by picturing that string trailing off into the distance, to the point where we can no longer see it at all, but (we tell ourselves) it continues on forever outside of our view, or ability to picture. Or, you may picture a string running straight across a horizon, your image pulling back from it as your field of view expands by orders of magnitude.

We do these things in place of undertaking the impossible task of picturing such a string as it actually goes on, forever. To contemplate an actualisable infinite string, we would need to spend an infinite amount of time on the thought itself. And so it is this way, in which we imagine perfection, by modeling an actually imperfect mental construct that comes as close to perfection as our minds are able to contemplate, but does not in fact achieve the conceptual step prerequisite to actualisation. Seeking a more abstract conception, consider the greatest or most perfect piece of music composable. The phrase "the greatest piece of music composable" is not, itself, utterly devoid of meaning, as we can imagine that such a thing might be -- but there is no means to conceptualise the actual tune for which that description would be universally true. We can not hum a few bars and know our conceptualisation to be objectively correct.

Simply put, perfection -- being "the greatest conceivable" in any field -- is a form of infinity, a projection that is infinite along the lines of perfectness. And, since we really can't truly conceive of an infinite, no conception actually exists to require this illusory conceived infinite be perfected along some tautological additional dimension of actual existence. Not only can we not conceive the infinite, we are, in fact (indeed, by definition) unable to truly fully conceive of things that are merely incomprehensibly large. For example, we can look at a book's worth of pictures of Jupiter and descriptions of its characteristics, but we can no more construct a fully accurate mental image of the sheer vastness of that planet than we can circumnavigate it by crawling naked for the length of the Jovian equator.

Reflecting upon the limitations of the human mind to do anything more than model limited versions of abstract infinites, we can see the impossibility of actually conceiving "that than which no greater can be conceived." Where David Hume, in the previous node, says the ideal can exist only in the human mind, he has already gone a step too far, for it is only model of the ideal that can therein persist. And, anticipating one remaining possible challenge, if we remove this humanistic consideration, then the Ontological Argument itself ceases to exist, for it is only a construct of human thought. As an absolute premise, the argument requires the human reader giving it consideration to first conceive the perfection suggested -- to suppose that God must exist because God would be able to conceive God is to beg the question.

Noah's Snowball

If the rains described in the story of Noah's Ark had ever really happened, modern meteorology informs us that the result would have been plunging the Earth into a deep freeze -- a Snowball Earth -- from which it would not have recovered for millions of years.... here is the evidence....



"Noah's Snowball -- a PanDeism Channel Presentation"

Conscious energy? Pandeism says yes!!

Can energy unbounded by a "physical form" be conscious? Pandeism says yes!! The physicality of our brains, after all, is merely the illusion of energy bound up and appearing to be solid stuff.

Pandeism explains the stars and galaxies

Pandeism explains the size of the Universe, and the vast number of stars and galaxies....