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Broken Circle
20 years 11 months ago #7492
by Mac
Replied by Mac on topic Reply from Dan McCoin
Larry Buford,
Greetings Mac, Happy Holidays ...
<font color="yellow">Thanks and Happy Holidays to you and all others here.</font id="yellow">
quote:
[Mac] The arguement has been that we have existed for an eternity and hence were never created.
Tonto to Lone Ranger - "What do you mean 'we', pale face?"
No one here is arguing that 'we' have always existed. A slip of the tongue? Perhaps you actually do have some sort of a religion thing going on in the background?
(Nah.)
<font color="yellow">Nah is right.[
]. However, the we means the essence of existance as in a universe, not our form specifically.</font id="yellow">
quote:
[Mac] My point has been and still is that to have existed for an eternity requires that we have existed for an infinite amount of time.
I don't get it. Since a (the?) definition of 'eternity' is 'an infinite amount of time', this point seems trivially obvious. Discounting for the 'we' ambiguity, of course. I don't think anyone is arguing for a different definition.
<font color="yellow">Perhaps not except that the arguement which seperates time fromtime interval is a red herring. Where the arguement goes that time is not physical but a time interval is is flawed. It is flawed since if one accepts time as not being physical or a tangiable reality, then there could be no time interval to measure. </font id="yellow">
quote:
[Mac] Since we both agree that we cannot reach infinity that clearly shows that we have not existed for an eternity, hence must have had a point of origin.
(What IS this 'we' thing? Not the first one; the second, third and implied fourth.)
<font color="yellow">Ecplained above "we" means essance of existance of a universe, not any particular form.</font id="yellow">
Non sequiter. Of course infinity cannot be reached from a given starting point. As soon as you specify a specific starting point you are no longer talking about time. You are talking about a time interval. Time intervals are real things that have a beginning and an end. They are finite by definition. Like you are.
<font color="yellow">The problem here is that by claiming eteran existance you have already set the beginning at infinite time which is unachievable in terms of any time interval. Discounting time as being a tangiable physical enity eliiminates any time interval from existing as well. </font id="yellow">
A time interval with a stopping point of "never' can be conceptually infinite. But since it always has the temporary stopping point of 'now' it cannot 'really' be infinite.
<font color="yellow">On this we agree in theory as long as we recognize that that means an indeterminate amount of time and not necessarily infinte but unproveably has the possibility.</font id="yellow">
Only something that has always been can ever be infinitely old. You have not always been. You are not infinitely old. Time has always been. Specific time intervals have not.
<font color="yellow">There is nothing physical, such as existance, than can be infinitely old. That is error #1 which you have already agreed nothing jphuysical can achieve infinity. Saying time has always been is worse than an assumption, it is nonsensical and doesn't solve the origin issue at all. It attemps (poorely) to sweep it aside. It attemps to evade the issue rather than resolve it.</font id="yellow">
But the "stuff" that makes up the bigger "things" that makes up the still bigger "things" that ... that eventually make up the quark-pieces that form quarks, which then form protons, neutrons, etc., that make up the specific atoms that you are made of ... that "stuff" has always been. It is therefore infinitely old.
<font color="yellow">This is simply a false conclusion based on poor assumptions which logically have no basis or meaning.</font id="yellow">
===
If a thing isn't infintely old - if it hasn't always been - then it had to have been created. At some particular time. (We seem to agree more or less up to here.) From something. (But maybe not up to here.)
<font color="yellow">I agree that we disagree in part here and agree in part.</font id="yellow">
===
You seem comfortable stopping at this point. We aren't, because we realize that the existence of such a creation event means that, in reality, 'something' existed before the particular creation event being examined.
<font color="yellow">Only because you refuse to acknowledge the possiblity that existnce is only half of a bifurcated "Nothing". As difficult as that is to understand it is heads above trying to declare eternal existance without any initial enception.</font id="yellow">
Sure - it might look like there was really and truely nothing there before the creation event. But there was. We just could't see it at first. As soon as we realize this our definition of 'Universe' (ALL that exists) then automatically includes the previously unsuspected 'something' that has now been revealed.
<font color="yellow">This again is based on the (wrongful or unsupported assumption) that "Nothing" doesn't exist and can be bifurcated into two equal but opposite "Somethings".</font id="yellow">
Our inability to comprehend or even detect the next 'level" of stuff does not mean it isn't there. Logic clearly dictates that it must be there, however.
<font color="yellow">We agree with the exception that logic dictates it must be there. Logic would dictate that it isn't there and at some point, an initial form issued from "Nothing", came into existance.</font id="yellow">
All of our experience verifies this logic, and teaches us that if we keep looking, we will eventually be able to detect that next level. Only if we believe we have finally found the "smallest possible thing" and quit looking will we stop finding that the current 'smallest possible thing' is actually made of yet smaller things.
===
<font color="yellow">I can't remember for sure but I blieve it was NOrth that provided the best response for this arguement. Your samller and smaller forms extrapolated to infinity becomes "0" dimension, which could jposses no time and hence fits the description of my "N" as being the absence of time and space. Your smallest scale becomes the nothing for which the formula speaks to.</font id="yellow">
We are unable to actually reach infinity by moving 'future-ward' on the time axis from a starting point. We can always add another second. Or double the amount of time since the start of the measuring interval. But that puts us no closer to infinity than where we are now.
<font color="yellow">WQe actually agree here but unfortunately you seem to not realise the same arguement must be applied retroactively toward the enception which must have occured since it is not possible that there has been an infinite time interval in the past. Your arguement requires that infinity has been reached in the past which it can not and hence is a false claim for not having an enception of some form. </font id="yellow">
We are also unable to reach infinity (infinitessimal size) by moving 'small-ward' on the scale axis. Each time we find a new smaller thing we know that it is not the end of the road. We can always cut this new smaller thing in half.
<font color="yellow">YOu are invoking Zeno's Paradox to support your arguement. We know that Zeno's paradox is not reality other wise we could not experience motion. The s
Greetings Mac, Happy Holidays ...
<font color="yellow">Thanks and Happy Holidays to you and all others here.</font id="yellow">
quote:
[Mac] The arguement has been that we have existed for an eternity and hence were never created.
Tonto to Lone Ranger - "What do you mean 'we', pale face?"
No one here is arguing that 'we' have always existed. A slip of the tongue? Perhaps you actually do have some sort of a religion thing going on in the background?
(Nah.)
<font color="yellow">Nah is right.[
]. However, the we means the essence of existance as in a universe, not our form specifically.</font id="yellow">quote:
[Mac] My point has been and still is that to have existed for an eternity requires that we have existed for an infinite amount of time.
I don't get it. Since a (the?) definition of 'eternity' is 'an infinite amount of time', this point seems trivially obvious. Discounting for the 'we' ambiguity, of course. I don't think anyone is arguing for a different definition.
<font color="yellow">Perhaps not except that the arguement which seperates time fromtime interval is a red herring. Where the arguement goes that time is not physical but a time interval is is flawed. It is flawed since if one accepts time as not being physical or a tangiable reality, then there could be no time interval to measure. </font id="yellow">
quote:
[Mac] Since we both agree that we cannot reach infinity that clearly shows that we have not existed for an eternity, hence must have had a point of origin.
(What IS this 'we' thing? Not the first one; the second, third and implied fourth.)
<font color="yellow">Ecplained above "we" means essance of existance of a universe, not any particular form.</font id="yellow">
Non sequiter. Of course infinity cannot be reached from a given starting point. As soon as you specify a specific starting point you are no longer talking about time. You are talking about a time interval. Time intervals are real things that have a beginning and an end. They are finite by definition. Like you are.
<font color="yellow">The problem here is that by claiming eteran existance you have already set the beginning at infinite time which is unachievable in terms of any time interval. Discounting time as being a tangiable physical enity eliiminates any time interval from existing as well. </font id="yellow">
A time interval with a stopping point of "never' can be conceptually infinite. But since it always has the temporary stopping point of 'now' it cannot 'really' be infinite.
<font color="yellow">On this we agree in theory as long as we recognize that that means an indeterminate amount of time and not necessarily infinte but unproveably has the possibility.</font id="yellow">
Only something that has always been can ever be infinitely old. You have not always been. You are not infinitely old. Time has always been. Specific time intervals have not.
<font color="yellow">There is nothing physical, such as existance, than can be infinitely old. That is error #1 which you have already agreed nothing jphuysical can achieve infinity. Saying time has always been is worse than an assumption, it is nonsensical and doesn't solve the origin issue at all. It attemps (poorely) to sweep it aside. It attemps to evade the issue rather than resolve it.</font id="yellow">
But the "stuff" that makes up the bigger "things" that makes up the still bigger "things" that ... that eventually make up the quark-pieces that form quarks, which then form protons, neutrons, etc., that make up the specific atoms that you are made of ... that "stuff" has always been. It is therefore infinitely old.
<font color="yellow">This is simply a false conclusion based on poor assumptions which logically have no basis or meaning.</font id="yellow">
===
If a thing isn't infintely old - if it hasn't always been - then it had to have been created. At some particular time. (We seem to agree more or less up to here.) From something. (But maybe not up to here.)
<font color="yellow">I agree that we disagree in part here and agree in part.</font id="yellow">
===
You seem comfortable stopping at this point. We aren't, because we realize that the existence of such a creation event means that, in reality, 'something' existed before the particular creation event being examined.
<font color="yellow">Only because you refuse to acknowledge the possiblity that existnce is only half of a bifurcated "Nothing". As difficult as that is to understand it is heads above trying to declare eternal existance without any initial enception.</font id="yellow">
Sure - it might look like there was really and truely nothing there before the creation event. But there was. We just could't see it at first. As soon as we realize this our definition of 'Universe' (ALL that exists) then automatically includes the previously unsuspected 'something' that has now been revealed.
<font color="yellow">This again is based on the (wrongful or unsupported assumption) that "Nothing" doesn't exist and can be bifurcated into two equal but opposite "Somethings".</font id="yellow">
Our inability to comprehend or even detect the next 'level" of stuff does not mean it isn't there. Logic clearly dictates that it must be there, however.
<font color="yellow">We agree with the exception that logic dictates it must be there. Logic would dictate that it isn't there and at some point, an initial form issued from "Nothing", came into existance.</font id="yellow">
All of our experience verifies this logic, and teaches us that if we keep looking, we will eventually be able to detect that next level. Only if we believe we have finally found the "smallest possible thing" and quit looking will we stop finding that the current 'smallest possible thing' is actually made of yet smaller things.
===
<font color="yellow">I can't remember for sure but I blieve it was NOrth that provided the best response for this arguement. Your samller and smaller forms extrapolated to infinity becomes "0" dimension, which could jposses no time and hence fits the description of my "N" as being the absence of time and space. Your smallest scale becomes the nothing for which the formula speaks to.</font id="yellow">
We are unable to actually reach infinity by moving 'future-ward' on the time axis from a starting point. We can always add another second. Or double the amount of time since the start of the measuring interval. But that puts us no closer to infinity than where we are now.
<font color="yellow">WQe actually agree here but unfortunately you seem to not realise the same arguement must be applied retroactively toward the enception which must have occured since it is not possible that there has been an infinite time interval in the past. Your arguement requires that infinity has been reached in the past which it can not and hence is a false claim for not having an enception of some form. </font id="yellow">
We are also unable to reach infinity (infinitessimal size) by moving 'small-ward' on the scale axis. Each time we find a new smaller thing we know that it is not the end of the road. We can always cut this new smaller thing in half.
<font color="yellow">YOu are invoking Zeno's Paradox to support your arguement. We know that Zeno's paradox is not reality other wise we could not experience motion. The s
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20 years 11 months ago #7528
by Paradox
Replied by Paradox on topic Reply from
WOW mac, you wrote one long reply [] You see Messiah, i think that the universe is finite. I don't think it spans out to infinity in every direction. Big Bang, i'm not sure i believe that, but i DONT believe that the universe is just ever going. It's just at such a grand scale that it's hard for us to imagine just how big it is, thus, as far as we can see, it is infinty. But, i believe that the universe does end at a certain point and that nothingness, or possibly something else is beyond the edge of the universe. What? I don't konw, and I don't pretend to know.
] You see Messiah, i think that the universe is finite. I don't think it spans out to infinity in every direction. Big Bang, i'm not sure i believe that, but i DONT believe that the universe is just ever going. It's just at such a grand scale that it's hard for us to imagine just how big it is, thus, as far as we can see, it is infinty. But, i believe that the universe does end at a certain point and that nothingness, or possibly something else is beyond the edge of the universe. What? I don't konw, and I don't pretend to know. Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
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