No Possibility of God

[Polymath257]

You're still tring to convince me of the 13.8 billion year age of the universe. You can't. I know it's not right. The universe is closer to 250 billion years old but there is no way to determine that with a telescope from the earth.

Seeing an object that is 13.8 billion light years away just means it is 13.8 billion light years away from us. That gives you no real indication of the age of the universe.

The James Webb Telescope will not be able to see anything more than 13.8 billion light years? It will but if you're just going to throw in the rate of expansion of the universe, as if everything is moving away from us since the bb (which is all totally incorrect) then you're never going to get it right. I don't know how far the JWT can resolve but I doubt it's over 47 billion light years.

Once again, that 45 billion corresponds to a light travel time of 13.8 billion because of the expansion. So, if we focus on light travel time, as opposed to current proper distance (do you understand the difference?), there should be no problem.

There will be NOTHING that has had a light travel time over 13.8 billion years.

 

[WalterTrull]

Well, we can't be impossible as we exist right?
So your understanding of the word "impossible" must be different from mine.

I was merely expressing my view that our attempts to attribute causation to physical, seem absurd. "Different strokes" I guess.

 

[Super Universe]

Once again, that 45 billion corresponds to a light travel time of 13.8 billion because of the expansion. So, if we focus on light travel time, as opposed to current proper distance (do you understand the difference?), there should be no problem.

There will be NOTHING that has had a light travel time over 13.8 billion years.

You always think that if you just repeat the same thing over and over and over again that I will accept it. That worked on the little people. With me, that's not going to happen because the 13.8 billion light year number is wrong. It's not just wrong but very, very, very wrong.

Nothing will have a light travel time exceeding 13.8 billion years? Oh, there will be. You don't have the technology to see it but it's there. It's been there a long, long, long time, even before you were 15.

 

[Bird123]

I've bumped into God a few times. In fact I can see and hear God right now.

So I wouldn't question the fact of your experience.

However, how do you know the source of your experience is not a demon? Or perhaps a mental disorder?

People do hear/see things that we accept don't actually exist. Sure people are certain they could tell the difference. I'm not.

Do you think people could have an experience of God that is not actually God?

Clearly, you do not want to find God. Your journey has never been up to me. Further, believing has never ever been important to God so your choice is OK.

Regardless of your choices or beliefs. God does exist and you will already know God when you bump into God.

Do not allow religion to alter or corrupt your view. Clearly it has.

That's what I see. It's very clear!!

 

[Muffled]

Hawking wrote. "For me this means that there is no possibility of a creator, because there is no time for a creator to have existed in."
Stephen Hawking's Final Book Says There's 'No Possibility' of God in Our Universe | Live Science

So time didn't exist before the Big Bang?
There seems a lot of certainty that prior to the BB time did not exist at least by people certainly smarter than me.

Has science finally provided an answer to the age-old question of God's existence?
Is Hawking wrong about time?
Or, is there some workaround which allows God to exist/create in a timeless state?

In fact, according to Hawking, nothing existed prior to the Big Bang and it is perfectly ok to accept that.

It seems to me that he is making his own rules as to what can exist without time.

 

[Muffled]

Nobody real knows for sure what if anything might've existed prior to eternal inflation. Right?

I believe God knows.

 

[Muffled]

I love Hawking, but this was a stupid and overly simplistic assertion IMO.

An assertion is an a priori fallacy in logic.

 

[Nakosis]

It seems to me that he is making his own rules as to what can exist without time.

I suppose a God could exist without time or space but it doesn't seem like they could do much.

 

[sealchan]

Then it’s not the universe.

I've made the case in another thread that it may become useful to understand a local universe vs other universes with potentially different laws and constants and an underlying medium of some sort. This is something which is implicit in ideas in theoretical physics.

All you need to do is Google and you can find articles in respectable journals discussing this. So it is no longer self-evident. And saying that Universe means everything is not a useful use of a word when "everything" will do.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

I've made the case in another thread that it may become useful to understand a local universe vs other universes with potentially different laws and constants and an underlying medium of some sort. This is something which is implicit in ideas in theoretical physics.

All you need to do is Google and you can find articles in respectable journals discussing this. So it is no longer self-evident. And saying that Universe means everything is not a useful use of a word when "everything" will do.

The existence of this universe requires such fine-tuning (as has been discovered by science), that saying there are others w/ different parameters, is a non-starter.

Appreciate your input, though. Take care.

 

[Hockeycowboy]

Meaning, it has always existed *when there was time*.

"Always" would include the infinite past.

No definitive time needed.

 

[ratiocinator]

The existence of this universe requires such fine-tuning (as has been discovered by science), that saying there are others w/ different parameters, is a non-starter.

If there are multiple universes with different parameters, then any notion that those parameters are fine tuned goes away completely because intelligent observers will only ever find themselves in universes that have parameters that allow for the possibility of intelligent life (rather obviously).

 

[ratiocinator]

"Always" would include the infinite past.

No definitive time needed.

What's "definitive time"?

If time had a start (the past direction through space-time is finte) then there was no before (the word "before" doesn't refer to anything), so something can exist for all of time (throughout the extent of the time dimension) without having an infinite past.

 

[Polymath257]

"Always" would include the infinite past.

No definitive time needed.

Well, that is the point. How do you know there is an infinite past?

If time itself only goes finitely into the past, then 'always' just means 'for all time', right?

And, since time is part of the universe, if time goes infinitely into the past, so does the universe.

 

[halbhh]

Hi, and great topic! One Christian concept described by teachers such as C. S. Lewis in his book Mere Christianity is that God exists outside of time, in a dimension described by biblical authors as eternity, which is not an infinite amount of time but is instead other than time.

All of time to God, he said is like an open book where God can turn to any page and enter time as he chooses, which explains how he can hear and answer so many prayers at the same time. Since he exists outside time, he knows both the beginning and end of it, which explains his omniscience.

It's an interesting theory, and there are other theories will lay out omniscience which are different than this, some of which allow for free will to exist, though it seems possible one finagle it into this particular theory possibly. My own theory on these things involves that God intentionally has made us able to choose (at least at moments in time) in ways that He designed (either into nature (physics) or into spirit) to be truly unpredictable, in a full, total sense, so that our free will isn't just nominal, but actual. This would fit easily with omniscience, being that He can see all the past and all the present, and know where the path an individual is on will lead to, until they (if they do!) make a true change in direction. He'd be able to accomplish His plans regardless of our unpredictable actions/choices. You have then omniscience and free will, in a way that allows scriptural instructions to make sense (instead of only being decorative).

 

[Tokita]

I think for Hawkin, he felt the universe had a satisfactory explanation without adding a God into the equation.

Einstein Wrote very eloquently: "I see a pattern, but my imagination cannot picture the maker of that pattern. I see a clock, but I cannot envision the clockmaker. The human mind is unable to conceive of the four dimensions, so how can it conceive of a God, before whom a thousand years and a thousand dimensions are as one?"

 

[Nakosis]

Einstein Wrote very eloquently: "I see a pattern, but my imagination cannot picture the maker of that pattern. I see a clock, but I cannot envision the clockmaker. The human mind is unable to conceive of the four dimensions, so how can it conceive of a God, before whom a thousand years and a thousand dimensions are as one?"

Ok, then we shouldn't even try right?

God, can't be known. Maybe that was all that he was saying.

 

[PearlSeeker]

The First Cause of classical theism is often misunderstood. We usually have in mind only an accidentally ordered series of causes. If we track this series back in time we could find no beginning or an obscure beginning (t = 0).

What about the foundation of being as demonstrated in the hierarchically (essentially) ordered series of causes?

Edward Feser: Edwards on infinite causal series

 

[Muffled]

I suppose a God could exist without time or space but it doesn't seem like they could do much.

I believe doing much is largely a temporal thing. What occurs with an intelligent being is thinking. During lock down people discover what it means to be stir crazy. We have trouble coping with our own thinking but God is quite comfortable with His..

 

[Tokita]

Ok, then we shouldn't even try right?

God, can't be known. Maybe that was all that he was saying.

Emmanuel Kant said "My awe and wonder is the starry Heaven above me and the moral law within me:" St Thomas Aquinas said, "We know of God through His created universe". God manifests Himself through in many ways. Atheists depend on what is directly observable and measured. This surely does not apply to an Omnipresent God who is timeless. He is not a person of whom one can take a picture. Yet, to understand His nature, we need to look at how He presents Himself - through His prophets and mostly through Christ. Outside those, we would be speculating and guessing. In my opinion, God wants us to know Him and it is up to us to open our hearts to Him. We should always try to come to Him. However, we would need to be open-minded and willing to accept Him. We will all find out someday. In spite of all of the evidence, unfortunately, some are willing to take a chance.