I'm sorry but I don't understand. How does a "circle of life" solve the problem? That just means there were infinite cycles in the past but that still leaves us with the problem that IF those cycles were infinite we would still never have reached this moment to be discussing it. Sorry, I'm not much of a philosopher so maybe I just don't get it?
@cloud4509: well, to put it as simple as possible, if you take a circle (or ring, etc), you can start at one point and go round the circle/ring, but you'll end up in the same place eventually. So the same type of events happen for all eternity and we've had this conversation an infinite amount of times already. At least, that's one explanation. What VFX was talking about, is starting from now, + infinite, to reach a point in the future. I start with the present and can go past and future.
That has some rather worrying side effects don't you think? That means that I do not have any real choices since what happened before must happen again. Not to mention that this idea does not have any evidence from science to support it. However, that our universe did have a definitive beginning does. This just does not seem to solve the problem for me but rather create even bigger problems.
@cloud4509: not necessarily. The realities don't have to be exactly the same, just similar. That is to say, choices made can differ, laws of nature may be slightly different and so on, but the big picture stays the same: universe expands, lots of events happen, universe shrinks again and we have another big bang, etc. Still, don't take it all too serious as this is just theoretical.
Also note that the Big Bang isn't a definite beginning. Energy, by nature, always existed.
Good point there when you said that you can't have matter without time and space otherwise where and when would you put it. So this means that time and space created matter? I am not really good with cosomology or phyics.
@HonestTechnoAtheist: No, all matter is basically the "solid" form of energy. When energy gets below some temperature, it can make basic atoms through Strong Force, Weak Force and Electro-Magnetism. The most common ones are Hydrogen and Helium, which uses the least amount of energy. Anyway, in order for something to exist, it has to occupy some space and exist at some point in time, no matter how small these are. Energy, space and time are all eternal, for there is no existence otherwise.
@PJDesseyn I agree but then how come some people think that the BB was when time and space and matter came into existence? And what about the 2nd law of thermodynamics if matter is eternal.
@HonestTechnoAtheist: because people can't conceive of something without a beginning, without resorting to religion, or are simply misinformed about what the Big Bang actually is and represents. Also note that matter isn't eternal, but energy is. The Second Law of Thermodynamics, simply states that the total amount of energy will try to be evenly distributed among the total space. This effect gets somewhat countered by gravity and such, which form galaxies and the likes. It's a complex universe.
That's because that doesn't happen. The brain is still alive, but the body isn't. That's why it's called a NEAR death experience. Those who have had a death experience, haven't come back to tell us about it. (no, not even Jesus of Nazareth) Also, they don't hallucinate outside of their body. The hallucination makes them believe they're outside of the body, while it's all in their head. If it doesn't make sense, try checking scientific sources and learn from them.
The fact that they've never seen an object before. If you were born with seeing black , and all of suddend you can see trees, you'll know the difference
There's this thing called "imagination". Strange thing. Makes you see things that aren't there or makes you see things without being able to see. Same with "hallucinations", like the ones caused by the brain in a NDE.
They can't see anything, they simply have a hallucination. For conclusive means, we need a person who has been blind from birth to tell us about it.
God is real, rather you can proof he exist or not. Why do you guys based everything on scientific evidence? If you can't proof it scientifically, than it doesn't exist right. What about blind people, blind from birth, who have a near death experience and when their spirit leaves their body, they can see clearly.
God isn't real and never existed. God is imaginary, made up by cave-men who wanted to explain things away. Just think of the thousands of gods there are. Zeus, Thor, Ra, Ba'al, Vishnu, Izanagi, Quetzalcoatl, thousands of gods. Your god is no different than all those others, which you deny, based on rational thought. As for those blind people, they can't see clearly and they don't have any spirit leaving their bodies. They hallucinate all of it.
Of course you'll never be able to prove God's existence in a scientific way. He simply doesn't exist. You can't prove the existence of the non-existing.
We know the bible has historical facts, but we also know that the mythical claims are based off of ignorance. For example, where it speaks of people getting unnatural ages (100+, 600+, 900+), that's all fiction. When it speaks about God causing things, that's all fiction. (the events probably happened, but not by God) When it talks about talking animals, it's fiction.
I think the main problem with VFs & others argument is that in the example you have a begining, i.e. when you ask if you want the chocolate bar etc, therefore from this assumed beginning any argument you make from this point will result in time being finite. The argument is then circular, i.e "given a starting point, infinite time can't be reached, therefore time is finite and must have had a starting point " As you show remove the begining and things are fine.
The thing is simply: there can't be an infinite amount of time between 2 points. This doesn't mean time can't be infinite though...as long as at least one of those points isn't a border, time can be infinite. So lets say point A is the beginning and point B is further in time, but isn't the end, then time can go on to infinity. The reverse, however, is something I can't explain right now. But mathematically possible.
Your right, my comment should read that time is shown to be finite in the past tense, i.e. there cannot be an infinite amount of time between the two events, now and the 'begining'. My comment suggests that time can only be shown to have been finite in this manner, IF one assumes a beginning and so therefore it is circular to use this to show there was a begininng.
This whole theistic argument irks me. First of all, they are basically saying that if something is infinite, that no event can happen in its existence ever. Then, they state that their god has always been there and did not come into existence. But he still created the universe.
Faced with these glaring contradictions, they assign attributes and gleefully pluck their entity from the very rules they claim; saying their god doesn't count in this.
And, of course, no other thing is allowed to have this exception. They summarily forget that time was formed in the Big Bang; so whatever existed before this event would logically be outside the parameters of time.
The truth is, no one knows what happened before the Big Bang. Theists claim to know, but really, therein lies their dishonesty. They really can't know. Lack of knowledge in something is injected with theistic opinions stated as factual.
indeed. I'd like to get some kind of coalition or something going, with our own site and helping each other out, etc. ah well, maybe when I'm more popular.
Another thing is that mathematicians are in a debacle when it comes handing and manipulates issues involving infinity. The reason being is that infinity in purely mathematical form is still a concept. Take the case of your argument that infinite time has passed by (or time has passed by in infinity) how would that be handled. Would we try to manipulate to find out how much infinity has passed by? I mean would we do infinity - infinity to find this out? What would be the result of this?
take a big circle. put your finger on a spot and lets assume that's the present. now follow the circle with your finger one way or another. one way is going to the future and another to the past. now, do you ever reach the end of the circle or can you keep going forever in either direction?
that's the point I'm trying to make. we can point out some events, but can never reach the end/beginning of time. even before the big bang, there was something. we just don't know what.
...have yet to happen. Again the big flaw in this model is that how do we define future and how do we define past if the circle keeps on going on forever. And this applied going in either direction.
the future is the path yet to be travelled and the past is the path already travelled. the past is history. but the point is, both are infinite. you can go into the future infinitely and into the past aswell.
The premise you have to remember is that you are going in circles. So there goes the idea of path "yet to be traveled". Now about the past, if we have can get to the past then this brings us right smack back to the premise that what we are saying is there are infinite events in history of past. Just chew on that for a while. Its been nice discussion.
although it's a circle, the path continuously changes because of the discissions we make. for example, we can't know what path will be travelled in the future. one can only guess. however, we CAN see what path is travelled in the past. (up until the big bang)
another example that might make it more clearly: take some ropes and twist them together. the ends are unraffled. go to one side to put it together and the other end will unraffle some more. so yes, an infinite event has past. get it?
There is a one thing that needs to be pointed out. How can we say that infinite amount of time has passed by? I mean in order for it to pass by would should be able to measure it. For example I watched your video for 2:55 but lets say if time was infinite how would I be able to tell how much has time passed in watching your video?
Not to mention, that the whole infinite time argument assumes that time is linear (which I think you covered), which may or may not be true.
Time is a human construct meant to refer to changes in the universe. If you think about it, time is only invoked to describe a change. The reason the Big Bang is refered to as the beginning of time is becase that was the point of the first "change" we're aware of.
Even if the argument were valid, it is still proof of nothing. Anyone with an ounce of creativity could come up with many explanations as equally likely as "god did it."
I'm sorry but I don't understand. How does a "circle of life" solve the problem? That just means there were infinite cycles in the past but that still leaves us with the problem that IF those cycles were infinite we would still never have reached this moment to be discussing it. Sorry, I'm not much of a philosopher so maybe I just don't get it?
cloud4509 1 year ago
@cloud4509: well, to put it as simple as possible, if you take a circle (or ring, etc), you can start at one point and go round the circle/ring, but you'll end up in the same place eventually. So the same type of events happen for all eternity and we've had this conversation an infinite amount of times already. At least, that's one explanation. What VFX was talking about, is starting from now, + infinite, to reach a point in the future. I start with the present and can go past and future.
PJDesseyn 1 year ago
@PJDesseyn
That has some rather worrying side effects don't you think? That means that I do not have any real choices since what happened before must happen again. Not to mention that this idea does not have any evidence from science to support it. However, that our universe did have a definitive beginning does. This just does not seem to solve the problem for me but rather create even bigger problems.
cloud4509 1 year ago
@cloud4509: not necessarily. The realities don't have to be exactly the same, just similar. That is to say, choices made can differ, laws of nature may be slightly different and so on, but the big picture stays the same: universe expands, lots of events happen, universe shrinks again and we have another big bang, etc. Still, don't take it all too serious as this is just theoretical.
Also note that the Big Bang isn't a definite beginning. Energy, by nature, always existed.
PJDesseyn 1 year ago
Good point there when you said that you can't have matter without time and space otherwise where and when would you put it. So this means that time and space created matter? I am not really good with cosomology or phyics.
HonestTechnoAtheist 1 year ago
@HonestTechnoAtheist: No, all matter is basically the "solid" form of energy. When energy gets below some temperature, it can make basic atoms through Strong Force, Weak Force and Electro-Magnetism. The most common ones are Hydrogen and Helium, which uses the least amount of energy. Anyway, in order for something to exist, it has to occupy some space and exist at some point in time, no matter how small these are. Energy, space and time are all eternal, for there is no existence otherwise.
PJDesseyn 1 year ago
@PJDesseyn I agree but then how come some people think that the BB was when time and space and matter came into existence? And what about the 2nd law of thermodynamics if matter is eternal.
HonestTechnoAtheist 1 year ago
@HonestTechnoAtheist: because people can't conceive of something without a beginning, without resorting to religion, or are simply misinformed about what the Big Bang actually is and represents. Also note that matter isn't eternal, but energy is. The Second Law of Thermodynamics, simply states that the total amount of energy will try to be evenly distributed among the total space. This effect gets somewhat countered by gravity and such, which form galaxies and the likes. It's a complex universe.
PJDesseyn 1 year ago
How can the brian, when it's dead, still cause someone to hallucinate outside of their body? That doesn't make sense to me.
ManicDepressive101 2 years ago
That's because that doesn't happen. The brain is still alive, but the body isn't. That's why it's called a NEAR death experience. Those who have had a death experience, haven't come back to tell us about it. (no, not even Jesus of Nazareth) Also, they don't hallucinate outside of their body. The hallucination makes them believe they're outside of the body, while it's all in their head. If it doesn't make sense, try checking scientific sources and learn from them.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
How would a person, blind from birth, be able to recognize what the experience of 'sight' is actually like?
todore00 2 years ago
The fact that they've never seen an object before. If you were born with seeing black , and all of suddend you can see trees, you'll know the difference
ManicDepressive101 2 years ago
There's this thing called "imagination". Strange thing. Makes you see things that aren't there or makes you see things without being able to see. Same with "hallucinations", like the ones caused by the brain in a NDE.
They can't see anything, they simply have a hallucination. For conclusive means, we need a person who has been blind from birth to tell us about it.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
God is real, rather you can proof he exist or not. Why do you guys based everything on scientific evidence? If you can't proof it scientifically, than it doesn't exist right. What about blind people, blind from birth, who have a near death experience and when their spirit leaves their body, they can see clearly.
ManicDepressive101 2 years ago
God isn't real and never existed. God is imaginary, made up by cave-men who wanted to explain things away. Just think of the thousands of gods there are. Zeus, Thor, Ra, Ba'al, Vishnu, Izanagi, Quetzalcoatl, thousands of gods. Your god is no different than all those others, which you deny, based on rational thought. As for those blind people, they can't see clearly and they don't have any spirit leaving their bodies. They hallucinate all of it.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
Yea right,
ManicDepressive101 2 years ago
Yeah, I know I'm right.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
You will never be able to prove God in a scientific way. I suppose some theist come can close.
ManicDepressive101 2 years ago
Of course you'll never be able to prove God's existence in a scientific way. He simply doesn't exist. You can't prove the existence of the non-existing.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
We know the bible has historical facts, but we also know that the mythical claims are based off of ignorance. For example, where it speaks of people getting unnatural ages (100+, 600+, 900+), that's all fiction. When it speaks about God causing things, that's all fiction. (the events probably happened, but not by God) When it talks about talking animals, it's fiction.
The bible is about 50-50 real-fiction
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
I think the main problem with VFs & others argument is that in the example you have a begining, i.e. when you ask if you want the chocolate bar etc, therefore from this assumed beginning any argument you make from this point will result in time being finite. The argument is then circular, i.e "given a starting point, infinite time can't be reached, therefore time is finite and must have had a starting point " As you show remove the begining and things are fine.
jatherobot 2 years ago
The thing is simply: there can't be an infinite amount of time between 2 points. This doesn't mean time can't be infinite though...as long as at least one of those points isn't a border, time can be infinite. So lets say point A is the beginning and point B is further in time, but isn't the end, then time can go on to infinity. The reverse, however, is something I can't explain right now. But mathematically possible.
PJDesseyn 2 years ago
Your right, my comment should read that time is shown to be finite in the past tense, i.e. there cannot be an infinite amount of time between the two events, now and the 'begining'. My comment suggests that time can only be shown to have been finite in this manner, IF one assumes a beginning and so therefore it is circular to use this to show there was a begininng.
jatherobot 2 years ago
This whole theistic argument irks me. First of all, they are basically saying that if something is infinite, that no event can happen in its existence ever. Then, they state that their god has always been there and did not come into existence. But he still created the universe.
Faced with these glaring contradictions, they assign attributes and gleefully pluck their entity from the very rules they claim; saying their god doesn't count in this.
Beauwrath 3 years ago
And, of course, no other thing is allowed to have this exception. They summarily forget that time was formed in the Big Bang; so whatever existed before this event would logically be outside the parameters of time.
The truth is, no one knows what happened before the Big Bang. Theists claim to know, but really, therein lies their dishonesty. They really can't know. Lack of knowledge in something is injected with theistic opinions stated as factual.
Beauwrath 3 years ago
good point indeed. I know I could've done better in most videos, but hey, we all have to start somewhere, right? ;)
PJDesseyn 3 years ago
You've done a good job. Fighting thousands of years of ignorance is a hefty task.
Beauwrath 3 years ago
indeed. I'd like to get some kind of coalition or something going, with our own site and helping each other out, etc. ah well, maybe when I'm more popular.
PJDesseyn 3 years ago
Another thing is that mathematicians are in a debacle when it comes handing and manipulates issues involving infinity. The reason being is that infinity in purely mathematical form is still a concept. Take the case of your argument that infinite time has passed by (or time has passed by in infinity) how would that be handled. Would we try to manipulate to find out how much infinity has passed by? I mean would we do infinity - infinity to find this out? What would be the result of this?
ahmarsidd 3 years ago
take a big circle. put your finger on a spot and lets assume that's the present. now follow the circle with your finger one way or another. one way is going to the future and another to the past. now, do you ever reach the end of the circle or can you keep going forever in either direction?
that's the point I'm trying to make. we can point out some events, but can never reach the end/beginning of time. even before the big bang, there was something. we just don't know what.
PJDesseyn 3 years ago
...have yet to happen. Again the big flaw in this model is that how do we define future and how do we define past if the circle keeps on going on forever. And this applied going in either direction.
ahmarsidd 3 years ago
the future is the path yet to be travelled and the past is the path already travelled. the past is history. but the point is, both are infinite. you can go into the future infinitely and into the past aswell.
PJDesseyn 3 years ago
The premise you have to remember is that you are going in circles. So there goes the idea of path "yet to be traveled". Now about the past, if we have can get to the past then this brings us right smack back to the premise that what we are saying is there are infinite events in history of past. Just chew on that for a while. Its been nice discussion.
ahmarsidd 3 years ago
although it's a circle, the path continuously changes because of the discissions we make. for example, we can't know what path will be travelled in the future. one can only guess. however, we CAN see what path is travelled in the past. (up until the big bang)
another example that might make it more clearly: take some ropes and twist them together. the ends are unraffled. go to one side to put it together and the other end will unraffle some more. so yes, an infinite event has past. get it?
PJDesseyn 3 years ago
There is a one thing that needs to be pointed out. How can we say that infinite amount of time has passed by? I mean in order for it to pass by would should be able to measure it. For example I watched your video for 2:55 but lets say if time was infinite how would I be able to tell how much has time passed in watching your video?
ahmarsidd 3 years ago
Not to mention, that the whole infinite time argument assumes that time is linear (which I think you covered), which may or may not be true.
Time is a human construct meant to refer to changes in the universe. If you think about it, time is only invoked to describe a change. The reason the Big Bang is refered to as the beginning of time is becase that was the point of the first "change" we're aware of.
mtambors 3 years ago
Even if the argument were valid, it is still proof of nothing. Anyone with an ounce of creativity could come up with many explanations as equally likely as "god did it."
mtambors 3 years ago