GENIUS FORUMS

It is very easy to imagine infinite nothing. If you use infinite nothing as your starting point you can logically get an image of infinity.

Here are some logical stages that allow you to visualise infinity.

1/ First imagine infinite nothing.
2/ Then tell yourself that the universe does not allow nothing to exist.
3/ Wherever there is nothing in the universe it is instantly filled with the Aether, like a hole is filled with water.

So infinite nothing is what you expect infinity to be, and because you can believe in it you can visualise it. By filling this virtual hole with the Aether instantly you get an instant Universe, a flash of light.

Therefore I think that the entire universe material was created instantly. It is only the material, not the things in the material like the planets, just the fabric of space. It happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

dejavu wrote:But you are arguing a finite past! For the universe!

Yes, but what's that got to do with my last post?

dejavu wrote:Infinity (however you want to look at it) is not beside the point.

Only certain types of infinity are relevant to my argument. For example, it's possible that space is infinite. That doesn't affect my argument against an infinite past, except for the recognition that no matter how far one travels in the infinity of space, one will never have travelled over the entire infinity.

My argument is not so much against infinities themselves, as against the (impossibility of completing the) traversing (or "counting over") of infinities.

Pincho Paxton wrote:It is very easy to imagine infinite nothing.

What you went on to describe is better termed "infinite emptiness", in my opinion. You are talking about empty space; to me "nothing" better describes the complete absence of all things, including space. Not that I'm saying that you're "wrong" in your phrasing, by the way, just that in my opinion using the word "emptiness" rather than "nothing" would be an improvement.

The only possibility for nothing is actually the future - that which has not yet been created by the expansion of time. Your Aether is actually time, as nothing can be "filled" without time actually FIRST being in that "nothingness".

People that say time is an effect are wrong. Time is a cause, observable change is an effect.

It happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

You are contradicting yourself. Outside of the instant expansion of time itself, which creates time's beginningless and endless continuum, there are no "instants" as such, just instances of observable change that have a predictable order-of-change for us to then divide into segments for our own purposes.

Seeming fluctuations of time such as object or force/casual speeds are only due to time's instantaneousness becoming increasingly buried by more powerful newer time surrounding the past and binding it.

Time is like a God endlessly shovelling sand at a set rate onto an existing sand pile of infinite size. Every so often the weight of the newly shovelled sand will cause an avalanche and expose some of the sand that was previously added to the pile. The sand pile will now have a different and non-uniform shape.

It is the exposure of the past into the present that causes thingness.

Jamesh wrote:The only possibility for nothing is actually the future - that which has not yet been created by the expansion of time. Your Aether is actually time, as nothing can be "filled" without time actually FIRST being in that "nothingness".

People that say time is an effect are wrong. Time is a cause, observable change is an effect.

It happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

You are contradicting yourself. Outside of the instant expansion of time itself, which creates time's beginningless and endless continuum, there are no "instants" as such, just instances of observable change that have a predictable order-of-change for us to then divide into segments for our own purposes.

Seeming fluctuations of time such as object or force/casual speeds are only due to time's instantaneousness becoming increasingly buried by more powerful newer time surrounding the past and binding it.

Time is like a God endlessly shovelling sand at a set rate onto an existing sand pile of infinite size. Every so often the weight of the newly shovelled sand will cause an avalanche and expose some of the sand that was previously added to the pile. The sand pile will now have a different and non-uniform shape.

It is the exposure of the past into the present that causes thingness.

There is no contradiction in my post...

It happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

That is as un-ambiguous as you can get.

You don't need time. Imagine those Russian dolls with another doll inside. You open the top doll, and the other doll was already there, it didn't require time to get there. That's like the Aether. It is inside everything, and outside everything, and is always ready to be revealed.

dejavu wrote:Your argument rests on (and is consequently overturned by) the inability of the finite to traverse infinity.

How is it overturned?

dejavu wrote:You have dismissed the logical inference of infinity in favour of the limits of experiential knowledge, for the sake of argument.

You agreed that it was a logical matter that one cannot count to infinity; now you seem to be implying that it's "experiential". What am I supposed to make of this?

dejavu wrote:

dejavu: Your argument rests on (and is consequently overturned by) the inability of the finite to traverse infinity.

Laird: How is it overturned?

By therefore not really being an argument against infinity. The finite not reaching infinity is no argument for a finite past.

That's a very good point. In his bias to reach a favourable outcome (i.e. making room for his intelligent creator god for the sake of his egotistical identity and feelings), Laird is stacking the argument by selectively comparing the limitations of the finite with the unlimitedness of the infinite - e.g. in saying that an entity travelling forward in time from the beginningless past with finite speed could never reach the present moment.

To be consistent, he should really be talking in terms of the entity travelling with infinite speed - in which case, the two infinities cancel each other out, thereby resolving the non-existent problem.

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we imagine, and pointlessly try to imagine the infinite; yet, we do not grasp that of the finite.

Gurrb wrote:we imagine, and pointlessly try to imagine the infinite; yet, we do not grasp that of the finite.

There is a lot of finite to grasp. As a collective of all scientific humans we could grasp enough to put it all in Wikipedia, and read the parts that we would be interested in eventually. But the infinite is going to be the material which is probably simpler. Like a carpet pattern is quite complex, but the weave is quite simple to see when magnified. When I imagine the infinite universe I only need to imagine the weave.

happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

That is as un-ambiguous as you can get.

So is into "no Time at all", or "less than a billionth of a second"?

You don't need time. Imagine those Russian dolls with another doll inside. You open the top doll, and the other doll was already there, it didn't require time to get there. That's like the Aether. It is inside everything, and outside everything, and is always ready to be revealed.

I could only believe that sort of thing if the universe was not an infinite entity - but I see no way that the universe could be a finite entity.

To me a universe of the type you speak about would be a uniform static entity. I see no power source, I fathom no reason why any form of differentiation would exist. I see no reason for the seemingly infinite extent of the universe.

I think your view is similar to the David's - he even uses the word God to describe the totality as if no further insight can be achieved into understanding the process of existence. To him existence is non-dualistic, thus everything just "Is", continually being reconfigured by causality. To me though Causality is not a power source. Causality is just dualism-over-time.

Causality never includes a description of an originating cause, other than the abstract totality. Time does, and is a more accurate way of viewing the creation of existence. Causality is simply the EFFECT of Time growing by expanding, it is an observation of a process, but does not get to what is the cause of the process.

Pincho Paxton wrote:

Gurrb wrote:we imagine, and pointlessly try to imagine the infinite; yet, we do not grasp that of the finite.

There is a lot of finite to grasp. As a collective of all scientific humans we could grasp enough to put it all in Wikipedia, and read the parts that we would be interested in eventually. But the infinite is going to be the material which is probably simpler. Like a carpet pattern is quite complex, but the weave is quite simple to see when magnified. When I imagine the infinite universe I only need to imagine the weave.

Good insight. Well put.

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Jamesh wrote:

happens in no time at all, it happens less than a billionth of a second, it is instant.

That is as un-ambiguous as you can get.

1/ So is into "no Time at all", or "less than a billionth of a second"?

You don't need time. Imagine those Russian dolls with another doll inside. You open the top doll, and the other doll was already there, it didn't require time to get there. That's like the Aether. It is inside everything, and outside everything, and is always ready to be revealed.

I could only believe that sort of thing if the universe was not an infinite entity - but I see no way that the universe could be a finite entity.

2/ To me a universe of the type you speak about would be a uniform static entity. I see no power source, I fathom no reason why any form of differentiation would exist. I see no reason for the seemingly infinite extent of the universe.

3/ I think your view is similar to the David's - he even uses the word God to describe the totality as if no further insight can be achieved into understanding the process of existence. To him existence is non-dualistic, thus everything just "Is", continually being reconfigured by causality. To me though Causality is not a power source. Causality is just dualism-over-time.

4/ Causality never includes a description of an originating cause, other than the abstract totality. Time does, and is a more accurate way of viewing the creation of existence. Causality is simply the EFFECT of Time growing by expanding, it is an observation of a process, but does not get to what is the cause of the process.

Well...
1/ I already made it clear, so no point answering it, and I don't know why you cut the end off my quote.
2/ The energy source is the Aether.
3/ I do use causality, but I use looped causality, which means that turning a light off turns it back on again due to the fact that off means on, and on means drain away back to off gradually.
4/ The origin is the Aether, and time doesn't exist.

dejavu wrote:The finite not reaching infinity is no argument for a finite past.

It is if that "finite" (I prefer: that "traversing present moment") would have been required to have done so by the nature of that infinity, as indeed it is when that infinity's nature is the duration of a flow of time.

dejavu wrote:I'm saying you're using the bounds of the experiential as an argument against infinity, which is really no argument at all.

I'm battling to make sense of you. How am I "using the bounds of the experiential" in my argument? Yes, time is experienced, but that's about the only connection I can see. As Ataraxia agreed, the experience of time is shared and inter-subjectively correlated. To me that implies that it has some sort of existence independent of our experience of it, so that experience is really irrelevant to the issue.

David Quinn wrote:

dejavu wrote:

dejavu: Your argument rests on (and is consequently overturned by) the inability of the finite to traverse infinity.

Laird: How is it overturned?

By therefore not really being an argument against infinity. The finite not reaching infinity is no argument for a finite past.

That's a very good point. In his bias to reach a favourable outcome (i.e. making room for his intelligent creator god for the sake of his egotistical identity and feelings), Laird is stacking the argument by selectively comparing the limitations of the finite with the unlimitedness of the infinite - e.g. in saying that an entity travelling forward in time from the beginningless past with finite speed could never reach the present moment.

Oh, good - you are capable of understanding and recognising the essence of the argument after all.

David Quinn wrote:To be consistent, he should really be talking in terms of the entity travelling with infinite speed - in which case, the two infinities cancel each other out, thereby resolving the non-existent problem.

I'll ignore the fact that referring to the "speed" of time is a circular mess, being that time is simultaneously the denominator of any speed ratio, and cut you some slack - I think I understand intuitively what you're trying to describe. I think that your proposal is based on the observation that different subjects can experience time at different "rates" - that, e.g. for a subject on hallucinogenic drugs, an hour might be experienced as a second (although it's more likely to be the other way around), and that in the limit, an hour could pass at an "infinitely fast rate".

But David, if you expect one infinity to neatly "cancel out" another infinity, then you might want to consult a mathematician. Infinities are unintuitive beasts. That, however, is the least of the problems with your proposal. Let's assume that an infinity does neatly cancel out another infinity in the way that you propose: what is the end result? It seems to me that we are left with a single, instantaneous moment. And yet this is not the case with reality: time is more than an instantaneous moment; time flows, not infinitely "fast", but at a finite "rate". Your hypothetical is plainly not true of our reality.

guest_of_logic wrote:

David Quinn wrote: That's a very good point. In his bias to reach a favourable outcome (i.e. making room for his intelligent creator god for the sake of his egotistical identity and feelings), Laird is stacking the argument by selectively comparing the limitations of the finite with the unlimitedness of the infinite - e.g. in saying that an entity travelling forward in time from the beginningless past with finite speed could never reach the present moment.

Oh, good - you are capable of understanding and recognising the essence of the argument after all.

Always have done, Laird. Both the essence of the argument and its flaws.

guest_of_logic wrote:

David Quinn wrote:To be consistent, he should really be talking in terms of the entity travelling with infinite speed - in which case, the two infinities cancel each other out, thereby resolving the non-existent problem.

I'll ignore the fact that referring to the "speed" of time is a circular mess, being that time is simultaneously the denominator of any speed ratio, and cut you some slack - I think I understand intuitively what you're trying to describe. I think that your proposal is based on the observation that different subjects can experience time at different "rates" - that, e.g. for a subject on hallucinogenic drugs, an hour might be experienced as a second (although it's more likely to be the other way around), and that in the limit, an hour could pass at an "infinitely fast rate".

That's right. And for a hypothetical absolute observer, the entire beginningless past would pass in no time at all.

But David, if you expect one infinity to neatly "cancel out" another infinity, then you might want to consult a mathematician. Infinities are unintuitive beasts. That, however, is the least of the problems with your proposal. Let's assume that an infinity does neatly cancel out another infinity in the way that you propose: what is the end result? It seems to me that we are left with a single, instantaneous moment. And yet this is not the case with reality: time is more than an instantaneous moment; time flows, not infinitely "fast", but at a finite "rate". Your hypothetical is plainly not true of our reality.

You need to learn how to think from different perspectives, and in particular, from the absolute perspective. Then you would be able to see how time is both a single, instantaneous moment and a thing flowing by.

The experience of time flowing by is something that only happens to us, as finite observers living within the world. But to a hypothetical absolute observer, infinitely large, there is only one moment and that moment is eternity.

As regards this moment of eternity, there can no before or after. To put it crudely in a metaphor, everything that we experience in each moment is identical to experiencing the very first moment of creation. It is as though the Universe has just come into existence, brand spanking new, with nothing beforehand. Or it's like living in the Garden of Eden, in which everything is so fresh and pure that it seems to come directly from God's very first thought.

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guest_of_logic wrote: As Ataraxia agreed, the experience of time is shared and inter-subjectively correlated. To me that implies that it has some sort of existence independent of our experience of it, so that experience is really irrelevant to the issue.

Given that we are all of the same species it is hardly surprising that we experience time,or any other phenomena, similarly. But it is fraught to then make ontologically 'objective' claims from that observation like you have done here..

David Quinn wrote:You need to learn how to think from different perspectives, and in particular, from the absolute perspective. Then you would be able to see how time is both a single, instantaneous moment and a thing flowing by.

The problem for your objection is that you've just admitted that time is a thing flowing by (even if it is also - or so runs your very dubious claim - a "single, instantaneous moment" "for a hypothetical absolute observer"), and so you haven't nullified my argument at all: my argument is predicated on the fact that time flows.

guest_of_logic: As Ataraxia agreed, the experience of time is shared and inter-subjectively correlated. To me that implies that it has some sort of existence independent of our experience of it, so that experience is really irrelevant to the issue.

Ataraxia: Given that we are all of the same species it is hardly surprising that we experience time,or any other phenomena, similarly. But it is fraught to then make ontologically 'objective' claims from that observation like you have done here..

You don't seem to be acknowledging the implication of the fact that we experience time similarly (I prefer the phrase "share our experience of time") - perhaps it will help to observe that the same implication applies to space, which again we share our experience of: relating to one another from apparently three dimensional locations in a three dimensional landscape that we all have corresponding mental representations of. Space might be the objective three dimensional world that it seems on the surface to be, or it might be some kind of virtual reality simulation, but whatever it is, the fact that we share our experience of it in this way (i.e. can build mental representational structures that correlate with one another) implies that it has some kind of reality independent of the mind, or at least is based in such an independent reality, even if it's to the minimal extent of a message-passing system in that external reality through which our mental representations are synchronised. Likewise for time. We relate to one another by sharing dates, keeping appointments, celebrating anniversaries, etc: that we have shared conceptions of these temporal markers indicates that, whatever time's ontology turns out to actually be, it has some kind of reality independent of the mind, or it at least is based in such an independent reality.

All of that is not even to make reference to physics, which treats time as an entity independent of the mind, and seems to have achieved a lot for itself without having to amend that principle.

guest_of_logic wrote:

David Quinn wrote:You need to learn how to think from different perspectives, and in particular, from the absolute perspective. Then you would be able to see how time is both a single, instantaneous moment and a thing flowing by.

The problem for your objection is that you've just admitted that time is a thing flowing by (even if it is also - or so runs your very dubious claim - a "single, instantaneous moment" "for a hypothetical absolute observer"), and so you haven't nullified my argument at all: my argument is predicated on the fact that time flows.

You haven't understood what I have said. To repeat:

The existence of time flowing by is purely a relative phenomenon. It only flows in relation to a finite observer within the world. It doesn't really flow in an absolute sense. Your objection to the notion of reality's timelessness rests on the error of treating time's flow as an absolute phenomenon, instead of a relative one.

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Dejuva

And since you agree with me, that the past is fixed, then how can't you see that time is of consciousness, not space?!

Depends what you mean by fixed?

I don't see the past as completely fixed, to me it is subject to causality (as in relativity) the same as the present, though it is fixed in the sense that it never becomes lesser, it does not fade into nothingness. To me time is an accumulating entity, not an entity where one moment replaces the past moment - it continuously, without any stop/start nature, adds to what Time has already occurred, thus creating infinity.

I also may not quite get what you mean by “time is of consciousness”.

Sure, all named things are of consciousness, and time is no different in that respect, and definitely it is only “of consciousness” when viewed only in the “Time is a measurement” sense. But Time in the way I see it, is just like the understanding the words “causality” or “totality”, it’s reality to me is an “a priori” understanding, one achieved by logic, not so much via particular notable experiences of change.

My “a priori” form of time is not a product of causality, but that which dictates the “speed of causality”, by providing a consistent degree of “power” to causality. Without a speed limit on causality everything would happen at once and so there would be no things in the first place. Time is what sets the base for the “order” of causality, and because it is always adding to what already is, then it provides a reason for relativity. Relativity is the key to all forms of form.

Laird is right to both ask "what creates order" and to not acknowledge David's responses as being "an adequate answer". While all things are ordered, as in all things are subject to what forms the laws of nature, as that ordered entity, different things have different speeds of change, and it is this that provides for the evolution/order of matter.

Causality acts in both an instantaneous manner and a delayed manner. As all things are interconnected, then this by default requires an underlying instantaneousness to be in play. Causality flows in a continuous stream, it is not a quantum, stop/start effect - yet there are constants in the universe, things of different forms change/move at different speeds, things of like form change/move at similar speeds.

By the inclusion of Time with causality can we observe that cause and effect also acts in a delayed manner. The explosion of a distant star, immediately changes the whole gravitational plane, but the light from this explosion does not change the form of any earthly observers senses until years later. These delays do not directly stem from causality itself, but from that which causes relativity to manifest. It is not that Time is non existent without things, but that "delayed-causality" is non-existent without things (albeit that that is a hypothetical statement, as there is nothing that is not a thing, but we can see the intent via accepting that time still exists in space empty of matter recognisable to our bodily senses).

Causality creates observable order (including Time in its measurement context) by the equalisation of "dualistic forces", but it is time that dictates the how by setting the parameters of "how long" it will take for that to occur, and it is time of differing ages that creates these so called "dualistic forces" in the first place, via creating the effect of curved space as a result of its necessary creation of inside/outside as it continuously expands. See below for an explanation of how this effect arises.

In nothing does one see timelessness, yet David and many others, refer to the totality as "timeless". What reasoning enables them to logically link the non-timelessness of all form, to an opposing timelessness of the totality.

Well, it is true that the content (or forces within) of what exists cannot be removed from the totality, so in that sense yes the totality is timeless, and, unfortunately in regards my argument here, one can also derive that "if there is no removal of content from the totality, then there is probably no existence creation in the totality either", but it still leaves the paradoxes of why the universe is differentiated, why it is spatially infinite, or why causality actually works/exists in the first place (as in what is its continuous power source).

David's philosophy never explains why such things exist, and I am seeking those answers. Without such answers, I would have to assume the universe is of a godlike nature, as in it just has the above multiple uncaused attributes, and I am unwilling to suddenly cease applying cause and effect in that manner. At least with Time as the basis, there is really only one question that relies on something uncaused - the question of "What Causes Time To Expand", and like them I can only say "that is just its nature" - but importantly it is a singular nature. I can also see how its rate of expansion is dependent entirely on its former self and not anything else. I can also partly see how relativity and differentiation arises merely from this expansion, and envisage that at some time a person with the right philosophical, mathematical and physics knowledge will be able to explain this in a scientific way.

Time is the only singular thing that must have an infinite nature – nothing else fits the bill, except the totality - but it has a dualistic nature (otherwise it would have no internal differentiation). If time is the content of all things, then there is no paradox for the necessary infinity of all aspects of the totality. In my view only something that continually grows, not just internally reconfigures can be viewed as being truly infinite. Only with Time, can the universe be the “totality of all there is, with no outside”, and yet a moment later be a different, larger “totality of all there is, still with no outside”. The difference between the universe then and now is what provides causality with its endless power to cause change, it creates the dualistic forces that in concert we call "causality", so ultimately it is the endless growth of time that allows change, not change that allows for time.


Curved Space

Times expansion I guess might be expressed by a formula something like, T (aka the present) = (T+T1 aka Space) = (T+T1+T2 aka "a thing") = (T+T1+T2+T3) ~, in which T1 is inside (T+T1) and (T+T1) is inside the set of (T+T1+T2) etc).

Now that formula assumes a quantum expansion, which Time is intrinsically not. These "sets" are pseudo-sets, at no point is there any disconnection from one to another, they remain interconnected, they are more like an imaginary average of the power of time in a spatial area. Effect-wise, the way in which time expands is more akin to a infinite circular colour spectrum with a clear centre but as one moves from the centre outward it gradually morphs to shades of grey, then colours, then jet black at the imaginary circumference. In this allegory, increasing colour darkness is created by increasing degress of resistence to expansion.

As Time expands from every T "point", then at some point the total expansionary power of time growing on the inside, will become greater than the reverse power of time expanding inward from the outside, and a "quantum flux" will occur wherein the inside breaks apart the outside and causes older time to mix with newer time, and hence "disorder" is created . Eg. The time "age" T ~ T2378 now finds itself most directly relative to time age T ~ T443, whereas time T ~ T53 becomes most relative to T~T88266645. The outcome of this is differentiation.

When using numbers then this automatically implies a finite beginning, but in Time's case the beginning is simply the prior "moment" in Time's already infinite spectrum (which is why there is always a "vicinity"). Base Time, T is existent "everywhere" (albeit a non-spatial everywhere, and thus it is the only true "point" that exists), and all growth sets have this same T as the starting point of its growth (hence entanglement exists).

Another effect is gravity, wherein as the expansionary power of T ~ T53 for example is less than that of say T~T88266645, then T~T88266645 will follow the path of least expansionary resistance and surround and merge with all older "sets" of time in the "vicinity". T+T1 (Space) holds almost no expansionary resistance to older sets of disordered time, and for a complex thing like light the level of resistance is measured as being the speed of light. On the other hand T alone is totally non-divisible, it can only expand, thus has absolute resistance. What this ultimately means is that time has an arrow - it expands in one direction only, and T as in the holistic Present cannot reverse (time cannot flow backwards). As time cannot flow backwards it, and thus the universe is continually expanding in size.

dejavu wrote:When is a particular 'duration' of time ever equal to the nature of infinity?! Try never!

And there you have my argument in a nutshell.

dejavu: I'm saying you're using the bounds of the experiential as an argument against infinity, which is really no argument at all.

Laird: I'm battling to make sense of you. How am I "using the bounds of the experiential" in my argument? Yes, time is experienced, but that's about the only connection I can see.

dejavu: How? I've told you that already! -By dismissing the logical inference of infinity.

And how is infinity inferred logically? If what followed was supposed to describe that inference, then it failed to convince me. I'll take your statements one by one:

dejavu wrote:Finite existence is only ever differentiated from infinity consciously.

That's an assumption of infinity, not an inference of it.

dejavu wrote:The universe exists inherently. It never began, there is nothing else from which it could begin.

My essay proposed a way in which it is possible for the universe (or at least the temporal universe) to begin: what in particular do you reject about that proposal?

dejavu wrote:It goes without saying that it will never end.

On what basis do you make that claim? It seems like merely a second assumption.

Laird: As Ataraxia agreed, the experience of time is shared and inter-subjectively correlated. To me that implies that it has some sort of existence independent of our experience of it, so that experience is really irrelevant to the issue.

dejavu: Unlike space, time belongs only to consciousness.

There's no point in stating an opposing position without either refuting my arguments or providing arguments of your own.

dejavu wrote:The question is asked-- then how is motion to be accounted for? The answer is infinity.

I like your allusory writing style a lot, but this is too vague for me to understand.

David Quinn wrote:

guest_of_logic wrote:

David Quinn wrote:You need to learn how to think from different perspectives, and in particular, from the absolute perspective. Then you would be able to see how time is both a single, instantaneous moment and a thing flowing by.

The problem for your objection is that you've just admitted that time is a thing flowing by (even if it is also - or so runs your very dubious claim - a "single, instantaneous moment" "for a hypothetical absolute observer"), and so you haven't nullified my argument at all: my argument is predicated on the fact that time flows.

You haven't understood what I have said. To repeat:

The existence of time flowing by is purely a relative phenomenon. It only flows in relation to a finite observer within the world. It doesn't really flow in an absolute sense. Your objection to the notion of reality's timelessness rests on the error of treating time's flow as an absolute phenomenon, instead of a relative one.

It doesn't matter what "relative" rate time flows at: so long as it flows at all (which it obviously does), it is logically impossible for it to traverse an infinity.

The only way around it is to grant your (mathematically highly dubious) speculation that an infinity of time can be traversed - if flowing infinitely fast - in an instant, but here's the thing: even if that were possible, then from that perspective, time would no longer be beginningless: it would be but an instant. An instant has a beginning and an end (and they are identical). Time would not even exist! And yet it does.

When talking of situationa apart from time we have to make sure we use
*tenseless* words.
This would mean that if the univerese had another dimension not made of time it would have its own "verbs" that aply to it and are sort of analogous to real (time implying) verbs as we understand them.
A translation in space would be a space_verb .I beleive spave_verbs can mean something even without the context of time because of the tenseless way i am using the word translation.
(Height would be a space_verb though that is not obviouse.)

If we were to say "create" that is a time_verb and so requires duration, but an x_verb for a x dimension would not require duration ,it would require a translation along its "lenght" (again this does not imply space just as "translation" as i use it does not imply time).

Since (they say) god can exist outside time, and since i beleive that existance can only make sense within a dimensional context, he must exist in other non spacial and non temporal dimensions.

Now each of these dimensions would have a word that is to them what the word duration is to the time dimension and so would have a word that is to them what the word create would be to the time dimension.

Using these ideas we could see how god could "create" time simply by translating (an x_verb) along an X dimension , removing all temporal connotations from the word create and translation.

Existance only requires translation over a dimension and so does "action" in its broadest meaning.

I beleive in a time_0 from which it is impossible to speak of a before.
I also beleive time has always existed.
To clarify:

If i say , "that hat has always been red" i am establishing a 1 to 1 correspondence between the state (colour) of the hat and the moments of time.
I have in fact been saying that as long as theres been time that hat has been red.

Now if i say time has always been there , all i have said is that there is a 1 to 1 correspondance between all the moments of time an all the moments of time.
I said that as long as theres been time , theres been time.
Not much.
(a tautology)

I have not said anything about the number of moments ,or even if they are infinite.so time has always existed.

Also this does not mean something from nothing because (by there merefact of saying time_0 is time_0) there never was a *time* when there was nothing.
If there was a time when there was nothing then there would be no *time* (which is something) for there to be nothing.

A bunch of alchemy with vencher

(3 at 3:00)

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Let's now answer this question: would this particle have decayed by now?

Because an infinite amount of time has passed prior to the present moment, and because the particle decays within an infinite amount of time, the answer must be "Yes".
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That does not have to hold true.
If you throw a coin an infinite number of times that does not garauntee a heads.
You could have an infinite number of tails.

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Infinity is preceded by infinity, which is nonsensical.
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There are also different "sizes" of infinity. I'm not sure if you are aware of this.

guest_of_logic wrote:

David Quinn wrote:You haven't understood what I have said. To repeat:

The existence of time flowing by is purely a relative phenomenon. It only flows in relation to a finite observer within the world. It doesn't really flow in an absolute sense. Your objection to the notion of reality's timelessness rests on the error of treating time's flow as an absolute phenomenon, instead of a relative one.

It doesn't matter what "relative" rate time flows at: so long as it flows at all (which it obviously does), it is logically impossible for it to traverse an infinity.

Again, you're not listening. This is an absolute issue, which means that the evidence to be called upon needs to be absolute in nature. You're trying to call upon evidence of a relative nature. I believe academics call this a "category error".

The only way around it is to grant your (mathematically highly dubious) speculation that an infinity of time can be traversed - if flowing infinitely fast - in an instant, but here's the thing: even if that were possible, then from that perspective, time would no longer be beginningless: it would be but an instant. An instant has a beginning and an end (and they are identical). Time would not even exist! And yet it does.

It only exists in a relative manner, not in an absolute manner. That is why Nature is said to be timeless, even though the flow of time is experienced by entities within Nature.

It seems that you have no idea of how to see things from the "absolute perspective" - which is a shame, as it is a critical philosophic tool.

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In other words, we have no way of distinguishing one value from

another. At any given moment, any and all values should be displayed on

the counter, because the same amount of time precedes them: an infinite

amount. Given an infinite past, this counter's display is

indeterminate. This is a paradox that the proponents of the possibility

of an infinite past need to find a way to resolve.
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If we appeal to the principle of "the identity of indescernables" you

have proved that every moment should be the same moment , but there is

the rest of the universe (matter) which is arranged differently for

each moment so the moments really are not identical because they are

associated with different events.

This does not prove that time cannot be infinite in extent as much as

it proves that time cannot exist without motion (events) and matter.

I'm not sure about this but, jamesh could you address this issue since

i (think) it goes counter to your claims.

David:

Is my understanding of your views right?
I take it you say without minds nothing can exist ,which would mean that time did not exist before humans did.
But when they did exist the past appeared to them through logical infferences ,so these appearences *now* cause the past to exist.

Again are you saying "nothing" *can* exist , as long as there are no minds?

taken from an insight from this sentence:

"nothing can exist without minds"

If it can then how do minds come into being ie how "something from nothing" can happen.