I don't often take issue with you, Dave. But it seems to me that we
simply don't/can't know that time was NOT before the Big Bang (at least
in some form). It's one popular hypothesis to be sure, but as I've
indicated before, at least in our admittedly limited experience, we
humans cannot create something that in its very essence was NOT before
we created it. We could not create "xyzzy" without knowing something
about or experiencing in some way the essentials of "xyzzy". [Anybody
recognize xyzzy?]
Now I grant you that our human knowledge of the divine is severely
limited, and perhaps God's domain just doesn't operate that way. But
even in our limited perspective, we can alternatively hypothesize that
God does in fact know or experience something essential about time, and
that knowledge/experience provides the basis for creating something in
a new configuratoin with time as a central component. That would not
violate anything that I can think of other than a more or less
traditional posit that God is "outside time" (pretty undefined at best,
in any case).
In fact, in the Jewish notion, the chaos (whatever that is!) that
existed before the Big Bang was not "nothing". The act of Creation
comprised the imposition of new form, function, and names to the
collected and reconfigured chaos (not knowing what better adjectives -
if any - would apply to chaos).
Methinks there's equal defensible validity to hypotheses (for examples)
that time might be it's own fundamental thing, resident in both
domains, or that perhaps time is a particular (dimensional?)
manifestation of something more complex (or simpler) in God's reality.
Or so it seemeth to me. Jima [Friend of ASA]
dfsiemensjr wrote:
Bernie,
You insist on putting God in time. But time BEGAN with the Big
Bang, or by whatever preceded the Big Bang as a multiverse. But there
seems to be no reasonable answer to how long the universes were
bubbling. In the usual view, on the contrary, there was no before the
Big Bang, though our language does not accommodate this thought. But
with God there is no before, no after, no change. You cannot imagine
this, so you try to deny it. The fact is that there are many things we
cannot imagine, but we can think about them. You cannot imagine a
point, but you posit that the dot you make (it necessarily has all
three dimensions) is dimensionless. You also posit that there are an
infinite number of points in a geometrical line, but that it is only
one point across anyplace on its course.
Dave (ASA)
Dave said:
“But God didn't decide.”
God didn’t decide to create the universe? Does that mean the universe
is eternal like God, or that God didn’t have a choice in the matter
(beyond his control)?
I can see someone
saying ‘we don’t know’ but you seem to be saying that you know- that
God didn’t make a decision. So I’m curious as to what you mean by that.
…Bernie
But God didn't decide. You are making him in
your image.
“You're
asserting change when there was none, Creation did not change the
deity, who is eternally (timelessly) outside of time.”
My point is that changing one’s mind is also
a change, and you said all change involves time. So how can God be
outside of time if at one point he decides something new- to make a
creation? We know he made this decision at a unique point, because
creation is not eternal. So since God decided to do something before
the big-bang happened and before our time zone was created, doesn’t
that logically prove that God is alos intime? In reality, there is more
than we know of- how God operates, his environment, and/or the universe
generator.
…Bernie
You're asserting change when there was none,
Creation did not change the deity, who is eternally (timelessly)
outside of time. Unless you posit a bubble before the Big Bang, that
is, tne Big Bang was not the real or absolute beginning, there was no
before. Time began with the Big Bang. However, I don't wonder that you
don't grasp this for it runs totally counter to all human experience.
“…but
anything that changes is in some kind of time.”
Then that means that God is in time before
the big bang, with which you would disagree.
This is because God changed before the
big-bang. There was a ‘time’ when the big-bang didn’t yet happen
(since time began with the big bang). And another time prior to the
big-bang in which God set-off the big bang. This is a change in God
(doing something) outside the creation of our time zone, yet he is
supposed to be outside of time. If the multiverse generator can be in
a different time zone, then I guess likewise God could also be. What’s
good for the goose is good for the gander- goose being multiverse and
gander being God. If God is beyond time, then maybe also the
multiverse generator is likewise.
…Bernie
The bubble may not be in our universe's time,
since they are not connected so that one can move between them, but
anything that changes is in some kind of time. So every universe that
makes up the multiverse is in its own time.
Dave said:
“As I understand it, the "bubble maker" may be a
different kind of stuff than our universe is made of, but is changing
and so must be temporal.”
In order for the bubble generator to be “temporal” it would have to be
in time, but we just said it is outside of time since time (at least
“our time” or “time as we know it”) is an emergent property of this
universe… of this universe’s big bang. The time (that we know of and
experience) did not exist prior to the big-bang. Correct?
…Bernie
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Received on Thu Sep 17 20:47:18 2009