There is a difference between this claim: "there is more that science has yet to explain"
and this claim: "there must be higher order in the universe"

The former is a quite justified given how there are meaningful questions we don't have answers to and we have a long inductive basis of science progressing and answering new things.

The latter, however, is not justified or even clear what it means. If you think the latter is the SAME statement as the former, however, I accuse you of a pernicious use of bad language.

Well, as I alluded to in my post this morning - my belief is that no matter how far science can go, there will likely always be the "unanswered" and possibly the "unanswerable" based on human limitations. However you would like to define the potential unanswerable questions is what I would call "higher order". But yea as I mentioned I am very eager to learn better theological language.

and no, I can't prove that there are any unanswerable questions so it's all speculation/meaningless/whatever.

Ah good. So you said the higher order MUST exist. Then you said there is a potential for unanswerable questions. Then you said that the unanswerable questions and the higher order meant the same thing. And then you said you can't prove there are any unanswerable questions.

So which is it? Do these unanswerable questions/higher order MUST exist or POTENTIALLY exist. You are saying different things. If the latter, I agree. If the former, justify it.

potentially exist. but I believe they do. I'm glad we finally agree . Sorry I'm new to this stuff I had never taken theology, let alone debated about it, therefore I failed to realize words like MUST would cause such an upstir . That's just how I talk when I'm hypothesizing on the spot...

The reason I push back so forcefully is that many people, particularly people new to atheism, are very tempted to use this large repository of mystical/religious sounding words like "higher order" even when they mean something quite secular by it. It is part of the English language and religious terminology is often the only terminology people think with to describe the universe. Except there is no reason to think that religion is correct, and we should not so cavalierly provide cover for it by using its terminology.

OP: If you change 'must be more' to 'might be more' you'll be on more solid ground, imo. It's my position and it's based on the reading, as a lay person, that I've done.

Here is a talk by Prof. Lawrence Krauss titled 'A Universe From Nothing' (he has also written a book by the same name):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZiXC8Yh4T0

in which Prof. Krauss quite handily explains how 'something' can arise from 'nothing' through quantum processes. At the end of it all (in the book), however, he says (in a parenthesis, heh) that 'Although to be fair, to make any scientific progress in calculating possibilities, we generally assume that certain properties, like quantum mechanics, permeate all possibilities.' To eliminate all 'nothings' and then to leave over a 'something' powerful and mysterious enough to create what is being attempted to be explained is disengenous, iyam.

Pointing at QM as an explanation for why there might be more may be attacked as a 'God of the gaps' argument so I'll mention that the universe might be as Richard Feynman imagined, an onion whose layers we get tired of peeling away, in which case there will always be a gap and that the contemplation 'the universe is queerer than we can suppose' is seriously addressed by Richard Dawkins:

http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_daw..._universe.html

Is it wrong to have beliefs about anything?

in the process of watching this now, and was just wondering what the implications of the recent discovery of 'the god particle' has on this (the first link).

bonus question if someone can answer: If what Lawrence Krauss says is true - Where did the nothing come from? :/ We still have the same problem it seems....

Of course not, why would you think so?

I think we're being sandbagged.

Where did the answer to this problem come from? This question is an infinite regress until we have something that breaks causality

Is any work currently being done to find alternatives to causality? Seems pretty fundamental to everything we've ever "understood" up til this point.

In the case that we can never break causality, do we agree with Richard Dawkins (and me) that the "universe is queerer than we can suppose", and there will always be unanswerable questions?

That's my point. The book is called 'A Universe From Nothing' but, in the end, there are the quantum processes. I'm frankly not interested in digging through the book for quotes (unless I'm pushed hard enough) but I believe that he explains the bleak future of the universe as it is destined, according to our current understanding, to return to nothing, or, as he mentions nearly in passing that some string theorists maintain that a universe like ours cannot be stable and 'will then recollapse inward to a point, returning to the quantum haze from which our own existence may have begun.'

I take from his book that, at bottom, there are the quantum processes operating out of a haze. Maybe the haze can be penetrated someday, maybe not, but, with such a thing being credited w/ all of creation of both what we see and even what we only suspect, suppose or hope may be I see room for the 'more' that you speak of.

This question seems wrongheaded. Nothingness is the absence of substance, of something. Nothingness is the most primitive state in this sense and we should only be surprised only when stuff shows up thusly. Krauss is starting from a state of nothingness and explaining the arrival of substance. Though we certainly don't understand everything there is to understand about the universe or how and why matter were generated, or even if it was all accidental or inevitable (or even intentional), it seems like we should be treating a state of nothingness as axiomatic.

Why? How can "nothing" be an axiom? "Nothing" certainly isn't a self-evident truth. How could it be?

agreed, and also why does quantum mechanics exist in the nothingness?

I don't mean to say that nothingness should be considered axiomatic in a general sense at all. I was directing it specifically to the discussion regarding quantum mechanics and substance being gestated from nothingness, per the discussion regarding Krauss and his theories. In the manner that Krauss was speaking, that is a possible scenario in which something arises from nothing via quantum mechanical processes, that nothingness is the most primitive state and should be treated axiomatically. Therefore it seemed weird to posit this question of just where the nothingness came from given the context. It seems far too susceptible to infinite regress.

FWIW, I certainly don't believe that we should assume much of anything before what we call the big bang occurred. An assumption of nothingness seems no more or less valid in general than an assumption of ever existent substance or any other number of possible theories for how and why the universe exists as it does. Outside of certain theories being invalid by either not being consistent with reality and/or lacking rigorous internal consistency, we simply don't really have the ultimate explanation for the universe at this point.

No kidding. But this talk of "nothing" or "nothingness" just seems ridiculous to me. Nothing isn't a "zero-sum" concept. It is the definition of zero. There is no -1 to oppose +1 to equal zero, there is nothing.

To even propose that something came from nothing makes no sense to me. It simply isn't possible, by any definition or theory.

There has always been something. There is no other option. So what do we call that "something"?

Who is getting axiomatic now??!!!??

I really only mean nothing in a material sense. Moreover, I am not even committing myself to a particular meaning of nothingness save for a somewhat vague discussion of what Krauss intended to communicate with regards to something coming from nothing. I haven't read his materials yet obviously, but I expect it may have something to do with virtual particles or a discussion of matter/anti-matter pairs from some energetic void, thus rendering the idea of nothingness even in the context of Krauss' discussion to be somewhat vacuous as "nothing" probably implied a void of matter and not of energy.

But again, I haven't read his stuff. But I am kinda interested now, so I might have to go do some reading.

The same thing was said about DNA. You are going to find fractals all over nature. It has to do with the way life evolves/replicates. It's interesting but far from proof of anything other than how elegant nature can be. I think you are just reading too much into it in regards to it being proof of some type of creator. It's still fascinating. I look at it this way. The laws of nature are going to dictate how things are formed without need for a creator. There are just only so many ways things can evolve so you are bound to find symmetry on occasion.

Loving all the videos!

I know what you're saying. This is all pretty subjective stuff. But given a choice of two possible "axioms":

1. There has always been something.
2. There was nothing, then there was something.

I'll take #1 all day long.

If you watch the video posted earlier ITT (and that's all Ive seen from Krauss so maybe he does address this somewhere else in his writings/videos but I doubt it), his definition of nothing includes the existence of quantum mechanics. To me, that is not nothing. It is something. If you were to define quantum mechanics on its own, would you define it as nothing?

Now as far as the potential that there has always been something, I agree that it makes more sense than something coming from nothing (truly nothing with no laws of nature/quantum mechanics), but it is still just as meaningless as theists saying "there has always been god/jesus". As pointed out earlier ITT, causality is the most basic understanding that we have about our world, and saying something "has always been" just goes against everything we think we know about the world. So if neither is a reasonable answer based on our understanding of causality and time, I'm going to go back to my point that we don't understand time at all, and the best explanation is that time is a completely made up concept that we adapted for our survival.

And to take it one step further - since the concept of time is vital to our survival - this answer is unknowable (*disclaimer* that was an opinion)

Well, as I noted earlier (though perhaps vaguely), Krauss seems more interested in positing plausible reasons for the existence of matter rather than energy of even the rules by which everything exists. Therefore it seems clear that Krauss doesn't mean "nothing" in the same sense that you do, and I think that what you say on this matter has some validity insofar as our current state of scientific ignorance is concerned. If we ever really achieve a true "theory of everything", it should have the expository power to not only explain all universal phenomena, but also its own necessity.

With regards to "time", there is a thread on SMP about whether time is real, and you might have fun checking it out. Long story short, we probably have a better understanding of time than I think you give credit for.