Author:
Ben
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Date Posted: 06/13/05 10:29pm
In reply to:
Wade A. Tisthammer
's message, "Because you aren't quite right." on 06/11/05 9:43pm
>>Well, in your counterexample, you're saying that some
>>"stuff" (in this case, a deity) has always been
>>around.
>
>No, I'm not. I'm saying the agent is atemporally
>timeless, transcending space and time as we know it.
>Like it or not, believe it or not, but it is an
>alternative possibility.
The problem I have is that your "alternative possibility" seems completely manufactured from nothing. I could propose thousands of "alternative possibilities," but that wouldn't help me unless I had some data that made me think one of those possibilities was actually _likely_. I don't see any reason to think that this "existence outside time" is likely. All I see is you saying you can't see how time could be infinite, therefore it's necessary for you to make something up. Conveniently, what you make up as a viable alternative fits the Christian worldview rather well.
I do recognize that the "existence outside time" idea is one that philosophers have proposed for ages. Nevertheless, I have never seen any reason to see it as anything but something manufactured with zero evidence. Maybe I'm missing something.
> What you said was not quite
>right because the statement:
>
>
>Since something cannot arise spontaneously from
>nothing, then we know that there must be something or
>things that have always existed.
>
>
>does not logically follow. An atemporally timeless
>agency creating the universe is another logical
>possibility.
It logically follows in my way of thinking because your "atemporally timeless agency" has no rational pull on me. I see no reason to think that it is any more likely than some other idea, such as "Maybe our universe hangs from the collar of some cat in another universe, and the Big Bang was caused by the cat falling off a building." That would logically solve the problem of how our universe began, but it is just a made-up idea to solve a problem that no one can know the answer to. Because there's no evidence for my cat theory or your "existence outside time" theory, I have no reason to think one is more or less likely than the other.
>>I agree that it's not plausible, but mainly for the
>>reason that I have never seen any evidence for this
>>"existence outside time" except in philosophical
>>arguments.
>
>But if an infinite past is metaphysically impossible,
>a finite past is the only alternative. If that is
>true, we can't have something that has "always
>existed." Hence my proposal for an atemporally
>timeless agency.
Again, I can only say at this point that there may be things about the universe at this level that we don't yet understand. To me, an "atemporally timeless agency" is at least equally as hard to believe as an infinite past, if not much more so. I know you've taken several logic classes, but I think it's important to remember that things can be logically sound and still be utter nonsense. Sometimes you seem to put logic on a level so high that it is no longer useful. I think that logic is useful for figuring out what things make sense when there is data that can be sorted through logically. When it becomes pure speculation, you can reach any conclusion you like simply by making sure your premises are sound and your conclusion naturally follows from those premises.
>>The reason I'm willing to think
>>beyond what seems logical in this case is that the
>>subject under discussion is so far into the unknown
>>that there may be many things of which I'm not aware
>>(e.g., the past can be infinite)
>
>Maybe, but why not go with what seems logical
>instead of the (evidently) metaphysically impossible?
Because it doesn't seem "logical." It seems "made up." For me, there's a big difference.
>>In my original article, I did try to make a logical
>>argument for it as best I could, but I am aware that
>>logic at some point fails us here.
>
>One of them was a non sequitur that I pointed
>out earlier. You seemed so open to the idea of what
>"beyond what seems logical" until I pointed out an
>alternative logical possibility; then you seem to
>dismiss it out of hand.
Yes, I am open to it. My problem is that you are treating is like it's a natural assumption in this argument. It isn't. If you will admit that it is pure speculation, but that it could theoretically be true if an existence outside time were somehow possible, then I will definitely grant you that. I just have never seen any evidence that leads me to think that something can exist outside time. Existence would be meaningless without a sequence of events.
>>Well, then I have to ask you to please point out the
>>beginning of a circle.
>
>If it were the universe, I'd say about the time of the
>Big Bang.
If it's a circle, in your picture the Big Bang would also be the end of the universe. Or you could pick any other point on the circle and call it a beginning and an end.
>By your own admission, you said
>
>"But in a scenario where the whole process is
>circular, the universe would have had an infinite
>amount of such beginnings in the past"
>
>Which would mean looping through an infinite number of
>times. In any case, whether time is linear, circular,
>or shaped like a pretzel; we get the same problem: the
>traversal of an infinite past.
You wouldn't make a very good Hindu.
>>Let's go to the issue you have brought up several
>>times... we need an agent that exists outside of time
>>to create. You define time basically as a progression
>>of events, if I'm not mistaken.
>>
>>Well, the obvious question is, you have this deity
>>sitting around existing outside of time, which means
>>he/she/it is not experiencing a progression of events.
>> Nevertheless, at some point in that non-time, this
>>deity chose to create.
>
>Your still thinking temporally. There is no "some
>point," since there is no change. There is only one
>point. The agent that caused the universe (and
>therefore the first event) is the provenance of
>the universe.
This just makes no sense to me. Don't you see that this agent had to decide to cause the universe to begin? And that decision would have represented an event, which would be time. How does this deity, sitting out there in all this unchanging atemporal-ness, make the decision to create? Creating is an act. It involves cause-and-effect. Time. You can't get around that. If this deity truly exists outside time and there is no progression of events, then there can be no universe. There can only be this deity, just sitting and existing and experiencing no change and no events. To me, the existence of our universe is proof that there _isn't_ such a deity existing outside time.
>
>[Agent]
> |
> |
> + - - > universe - - >
>
>
>There really isn't any "action" in the traditional
>sense of the word; since there's no past to compare
>the existecne of the universe with its non-existence;
>no time t in which the universe did not exist. The
>agent is the provenance of the universe, and the agent
>is timeless and changeless sans the universe.
This
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idea + + + + > makes no sense.
It reminds me of the idea of the Trinity... we are expected to believe that 3 = 1. I suppose once you can accept that, your mind is ready to accept anything.
I'm sorry, but I just see no reason to think that there is any being that exists outside time. Just because it is logically sound doesn't make it true, or even possible.
Ben
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