However, I invoke the mighty powers of the Weak Anthropic Principle! <great roll of thunder> "If conditions were other than those which give rise to our existence, we would be unable to remark upon the fact." It's all very well to say "if things were otherwise, I would not be here", but the self-evident fact is that I am here. It may be a conditional existence, but it is one which excludes all other possibilities. Of all the possible universes, and all the possible courses history could have taken, the only one which truly could have happened is the one which, in fact, did happen, and I am here as proof of that. That's as close to necessity as makes no difference. The only thing separating that which you are calling God from myself, then, is that God needs no antecedent. Being self-born, that is precisely what one would expect of Him.
But what antecedent is required for the Universe? I hold that the Universe, itself, is self-born (of course, I would, wouldn't I; I am a self-confessed pantheist, after all). Being, as I am, a consequence of the Universe, then there is a view from which I, too, have no antecedent -- I am not just this body typing these words, but am in fact the sum total of all events which occur from the beginning of the Universe until this moment at which this body types these words.
Love the joke! Here's the same one:
Want to know a Zen joke?
Look around. |
