Debate:Is infinite regression ever valid as a form of reasoning, or acceptable as a way the universe works, or came to be?

No. Infinite regression is a cop-out. It is closely akin to circular reasoning, except that the line of reasoning is not so much a circle as a spiral, into the infinite past or at least through an infinite number of prior steps. For example: How did life originate on earth? It didn't--it couldn't have. So where did it come from? Did God create it? No--no God-talk in scientific circles. (Francis H. Crick once wrote a nasty letter to Winston Churchill suggesting that a brothel would be just as appropriate as a chapel at Oxford University.) Therefore, life was deposited on earth from the outside. How? By a ballistic missile or a comet's tail. Where did that life come from? From another planet. But how did life arise on that other planet? It didn't--couldn't have--too much information. Did God create life on that other planet? Oh, no. Therefore life was deposited on that planet as well. Where did that life come from? From another ballistic missile. And so on, and so on, for an infinite number of steps.

Am I the only one who recognizes such a line of reasoning as absurd? And not merely absurd, but self-serving of the interests of those seeking to deny God's existence and His role as Creator. It is a very travesty of logic, and that is why I sought to classify it as a logical fallacy.

Why, then, is it not a logical fallacy? Can an infinite regression ever exist in nature? I'm waiting for the evidence.--TerryH 23:40, 6 March 2007 (EST)

Postscript: This is a special-case type of page. The "article," as such, is discussion. That's the nature of a debate topic.--TerryH 23:41, 7 March 2007 (EST)

Comment. There is no a priori reason to rule out infinite regression in all circumstances. It may seem a superficially unsatisfying explaination to state "it's turtles all the way down", but that doesn't mean that infinite regression cannot exist. Of course, if there is a finite limit to the problem at hand, such as the age of the universe in the panspermia problem, then infinite regression cannot work. Nematocyte 11:45, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Counter. That is precisely the problem. The age of the universe is limited. No reputable astronomer accepts a steady-state universe anymore. The most that anyone will accept is a cyclic universe--but Albert Einstein held that a cyclic universe is impossible, because our universe doesn't have enough mass to stop expansion and bring everything back into a clump again. Einstein was slow to realize that, of course, but in the end he yielded to the demands of logic, his own wonderfully self-consistent theory, and observations that he could not controvert.--TerryH 12:23, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Firstly, I am not arguing for a "big crush" model. I defer to the opinions of my phycist collegues who assert that a massively old and thus dilute universe could provide the conditions for new "big bangs" or useful material. If it is possible, then there is no a priori reasons to dismiss infite regression out of hand. Furthermore infinite regression relates to more than temporal regression. You will be familure with cells being explained in terms of chemicals, chemicals in terms of atoms, and so on until we reach quantum theory, or more controversially string theory. There is no a priori reason to simply assume than this line of explaination stops there, or even ever stops, although I think it probable that it does eventually stop. Nematocyte 12:30, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Please forgive me if I use inappropriate formatting for a discussion page, I'm new to wiki formatting, and I'm very open to guidance on how to use it properly.

I'd like to make a couple of comments here. Fact: All the matter, energy, space and time of this universe began at it's original Creation. As far as this universe goes, there is absolutely no naturalistic explanation for causation beyond the origin of this universe--simple logic reasoning. Any attempt to do so is by it's very nature inherently a super-natural (metaphysical) appeal. Therefore (I'm assuming it's acceptable here in discussions to make personal assertions, again correct me if I'm wrong...) let's have no further statements proclaiming 'infinite regressions' beyond the definite finite temporal bounds of this universe. It certainly is logically a priori impossible.

On the question of life: The origin of life (not any subsequent changes thereto, just the simple origin problem alone) poses an insurmountable problem to the materialist origin of life researcher. There is not the slightest possibility of any stochastic mechanism alone providing satisfactory explanation for the incredible sequence of events required to form even the simplest of living cells (particularly amidst the seriously hostile conditions which were known to exist here on earth at physical life's beginning) during the known-to-be finite timespan (and everyother-span) of this universe.

On fallacies: The preeminent fallacy committed by typical science researchers today is the idea of methodological-naturalism, I.E., You can make no appeal to any causation beyond the boundaries of observable nature. That is implicitly a biased point-of-view, and is a fundamentally flawed agenda if the actual goal is the pursuit of truth no matter where it leads--ostensibly the sovereign goal of science research itself (I know, I know...I'm probably just a naive idealist :^). All other current reasoning errors in science and philosophy research stem from this basic issue.

Finally, on the 'Bouncing-Universe': This ancient Hindu notion has pervaded much of modern philosophy, but it no longer has any real weight in science research, other than possibly as wishful thinking and longing for 'the good old days'... :^). There was a research satellite named COBE (published in 1992), which provided 2 major findings in cosmology. The most important one for this issue is that it showed definitively the universe as a whole is a "perfect black-body radiator". This is a concept from Thermodynamics. The accuracy of the initial measurements leading to this finding have since been greatly enhanced by several other instruments and research teams, and all strongly confirmed the finding--namely this: That the universe as a whole radiates all it's energy (that is, 100%). If you do a little mechanics analysis (remember E=MC^2?) then you realize- There's no energy left over to provide for a so-called 'bounce'.

Additionally, not only is the universe shown to be expanding, but it is now known that it's rate of expansion is increasing. If gravitational braking alone was the only action taking place, you would expect a decrease in it's rate, not an increase. And, even accounting for Dark Matter, the universe is far short of the critical mass-density required to gravitationally halt it's expansion, even if Dark Energy wasn't in fact the dominant factor, as it is conclusively known to be.

--Knowthetruth 18:00, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Re "do a little mechanics analysis." Go on, then. Let's see it. Tsumetai 18:48, 8 March 2007 (EST)

I'm assuming that is meant as a goad? :^) It's a simple inertia problem. If you'd like to bone up on your Inertia studies, let me in turn invite you to do a little exploration on your own: [1] --Knowthetruth 18:57, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Did it occur to you that in a collapsing Universe, precisely the phenomenon Einstein describes there leads to radiation pressure opposing that collapse?

There are good reasons to reject the old bouncing models, but this isn't one of them. Tsumetai 19:18, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Radiation left over from what... the now completely expended mass-energy after total external radiation into the black-body? Think about it for a minute. I believe this is the second strongest argument against a bouncing-universe directly after Dark Energy--Knowthetruth 19:38, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Radiation is mass-energy. And it hasn't been 'expended.' How can you expend a quantity that's (locally) conserved? Tsumetai 19:45, 8 March 2007 (EST)

You make my point (albeit unwillingly) exactly. Study the notion of the black-body in thermodynamics. The mass-energy is expended (out of this universe) by the radiation you speak of. BTW, there is a fundamental flaw in the model of collapse you mentioned previously. (It's related to the point I just made) If you integrate the radiation-pressure vectors in an enclosed volume they balance to zero. Remember the radiation is in all directions. So in your model, radiation would actually play no factor in the motion of the masses. All that would be left are the effects of Brownian-motions and gravity. In actual fact, however, the universe is not in an enclosed volume, and the radiation-pressure vectors integrated over time would actually induce interior motion of the volume towards your supposed collapse, not the reverse. The universe "leaks", and like air escaping from a balloon, the average thrust on any given particle would eventually be interior. --Knowthetruth 20:07, 8 March 2007 (EST)

'Out of this universe?' Where exactly do you think it's going? And yes, radiation is in all directions. So what? Same is true of molecular motion in an ideal gas, but that doesn't prevent them from exerting positive pressure. Tsumetai 20:22, 8 March 2007 (EST)

I think my previous comment explains where I believe the radiation to be going. Since you know of the term Ideal Gas, you may already understand the balance to zero of the radiation pressure. But it distinctly appears you are postulating what can only be described as an enclosed universe, and in a static enclosed volume radiated pressure will not exert positive pressure on the system as a whole. It will be zero in Ideal Gas. --Knowthetruth 20:29, 8 March 2007 (EST)

Outside the Universe somewhere, apparently. Well, that's thoroughly meaningless. The Universe doesn't have an outside.

I don't need to postulate an enclosed Universe (by which I assume you mean a finite, unbounded Universe). The radiation is not leaving the Universe, and so its mass-energy is not being 'expended.' It's still available, and in a collapsing Universe it'll end up increasing in temperature (not to mention increasing the temperature of the matter fields it interacts with), and producing increasing outwards pressure, just as compressing an ideal gas with a piston will produce pressure resisting that compression. Tsumetai 20:48, 8 March 2007 (EST)

"The Universe doesn't have an outside"? The simple finite nature of the universe makes it intrinsically self-evident there is reality outside this universe. And the reason engineers design pistons with cylinders and heads around them is for the simple fact that advantage can be taken of the gas resistance you mentioned to do a little work (thus reducing that system's energy quotient, BTW, think about it with me here...) The universe has no such 'cylinder-wall', and during any theoretical collapse, would eventually radiate it's energy away from itself, and any interior radiative pressure in the system would also eventually disappear. However, neither of those is the actual point. The universe is currently, right now, at this moment--a perfect black-body radiator. We don't need to theorize about some elusive universal collapse. The current universe radiates everything.

Look, I am not going to continue responding to your cyclic arguments on this matter of gas thermodynamics any further in this forum, the literature is out there as to why the COBE and WMAP and other results confirm this is the first and only expansion of the universe that will ever happen--go satisfy any lingering questions you may have on your own. The subject at hand is Infinite Regression: Valid Reasoning or No? Now do you have any meaningful comments on this subject? --Knowthetruth 01:52, 9 March 2007 (EST)