A paradox about timeless God who sustains creation

[Ghosty]

The only reasonable definition of time that Ive ever seen is that time is the measure of change. Where there is no change in states there is no time.

We can look at it from all different angles, but getting into quarks and neutrinos and such just distracts us from actual time, and instead gets us lost in the details of how time looks on a very micro level. Time is not a “thing”, but rather an axis of measure. Properly speaking there is no “now” or moment, at least in the universe.

A person can’t even jump into the same lake once, let alone twice, because the particles of the leg and lake will have changed or even had contradictory states in that moment. Far from being a more precise measure of time, physics can only describe the states of things as they change, but that is merely the recognition of time as a true process. It requires sound metaphysics to actually explain the nature of time itself, and it is relatively simple.

Problem is that we have lost much of the metaphysical foundation of science, and so our answers are dull and limited most of the time.

Quarks and neutrinos are toys for physicists. The real mysteries of the universe can be seen in the growth of an apple, or the rotting of fall leaves. If we can’t define something as fundamental as time using basic everyday experience, then our definitions are overly complex and hyperspecific.

Peace and God bless!

 

[frangiuliano115]

Bahman;
The scenario you describe could have come from the unique thesis that I’ve posted on several occasion, a thesis that only one or two others took the time to understand.

I think that you, by dumb luck, stumbled on the nature of reality at the implicate level, or the ground of reality at which level God creates and sustains, while we dummies experience and science describes the results at the explicate level.

The NOW you imagined can only be described as the cosmic configuration of quarks and electrons (and here I am withholding the true nature of those elementary point particles to avoid confusion). In a NOW, as I describe it, there is no energy, color, light, qualia, sound, forces of any kind, and any other of science’s contrived abstractions, and especially there is no time. The time I am referring to is the the time that is associated with the change in position of those quarks and electrons as measured against other local configuration we call clocks, the only time we experience. Let’s call it cosmological time. The configuration of the point particles was arranged by God, who then increments the whole cosmic configuration to a new configuration called the NEXT. The change from NOW to NEXT occurs through the impetus provided by God. And so it continues NOW-NEXT-NEXT-NEXT… and so on. Now we should see cosmological time passing as the cosmological clocks advance, we should observe energy as the local configuration that represents matter change positions, etc, etc and objective reality appears just like a film passing through a projector is manifested as motion on the screen or like real sharp programmers effect real life simulations in 2D in the cinema or on the computer screen; surely God could do it in 3D.

What about God who is creating new forms of matter by altering the NEXT configuration when necessary and moving every thing along with the cosmic impetus. Surely God must be thinking as new thoughts appear in His mind, sequence of thoughts constitutes train of thought that can be considered as a passage of time, ontological time. Ontological time that is formed in pure of spirit transcends and subsumes the cosmological time that is formed in matter. We cannot perceive ontological time.

Thanks Bahman for the great opening, I am sure you didn’t mean to.

Yppop

.

Really interesting. You must be a physicist. My niece is studying physics and I don’t know what she’s talking about most of the time.

But here’s how I understand it. Can we understand eternity? No. We only think we can.
We can only also understand time in the limited way that our brains can grasp it. We had to invent a clock to be able to speak to each other and know when to meet on the street corner. But, of course, that doesn’t explain time - as it apparent from your knowledgeable post.

So no matter how you explain it, it’ll never be understood. Einstein proved relativity because it was provable. I don’t believe time, in the way God created it, can be provable or even understood.

In other words, I think it’s impressive how physicists think and what they know - but I don’t think they could ‘know’ or understand God or they’d be God. Simply put in my simple words: It’s like an ant trying to understand a human.

Fran

 

[meltzerboy]

Really interesting. You must be a physicist. My niece is studying physics and I don’t know what she’s talking about most of the time.

But here’s how I understand it. Can we understand eternity? No. We only think we can.
We can only also understand time in the limited way that our brains can grasp it. We had to invent a clock to be able to speak to each other and know when to meet on the street corner. But, of course, that doesn’t explain time - as it apparent from your knowledgeable post.

So no matter how you explain it, it’ll never be understood. Einstein proved relativity because it was provable. I don’t believe time, in the way God created it, can be provable or even understood.

In other words, I think it’s impressive how physicists think and what they know - but I don’t think they could ‘know’ or understand God or they’d be God. Simply put in my simple words: It’s like an ant trying to understand a human.

Fran

Or it’s similar to one human trying to understand another, or themselves.

 

[Ghosty]

The physicist can explain the atoms, and the physician can explain the valves and the blood and the electrical pulses, but only I can explain why my heart beats a certain way when I look at my wife and kids sleeping after saying my evening prayers and handing them fully back to God.

Science is a set of microscopes and the world is a neverending lab. Brilliant devices getting better all the time, but trained on their subject of inquiry…which is always in the lab.

Peace and God bless!

 

[frangiuliano115]

The physicist can explain the atoms, and the physician can explain the valves and the blood and the electrical pulses, but only I can explain why my heart beats a certain way when I look at my wife and kids sleeping after saying my evening prayers and handing them fully back to God.

Science is a set of microscopes and the world is a neverending lab. Brilliant devices getting better all the time, but trained on their subject of inquiry…which is always in the lab.

Peace and God bless!

The world is an ever-ending lab. And maybe IF we ever figure it out, it’ll be the end.

 

[frangiuliano115]

Or it’s similar to one human trying to understand another, or themselves.

No, it’s not the same.

You misunderstood what I said. It’s impossible for an ant to understand a human - it’s not impossible for a human to understand another human or oneself.

I’m saying that it’s impossible to understand time in the way that God created it because we cannot understand everything He did, created, or is.

Fran

 

[Ghosty]

The world is an ever-ending lab. And maybe IF we ever figure it out, it’ll be the end.

Nah. At the end of time, when the Blessed receive God’s eyes, creation stops being a lab and becomes a playground. We aren’t mature enough yet to truly be God’s children in His playhouse.

He’s working on us, though. Peace and God bless!

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

Yes and that is what is the problem: How God could know the states creation at now and be timeless/changeless since time changes and the knowledge related to it which is contrary to idea of changeless God.

Because He is in more dimensions.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

Reading book at my stage is a waste of time. I already spent decent amount of time on philosophical topics.

By the way what is your objection related to this thread?

Dear Mr Bahman,

• whether you read a book or internet posts is not the point. Why ask questions if you don’t want to read the answers?
• one of my own main questions to you is what is wrong with paradoxes? Admit that you wouldn’t breathe or have a paying livelihood without paradoxes!

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

… which explain you didn’t even spent time to understand my argument truly.

Your OP was about an apparent paradox implying that you were eliciting background information.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

I don’t understand how first cause is related to topic of this thread! The core idea as it was explain in OP was that a changeless God does not know the current time, now, hence he could not sustain creation. Could you please read the OP more carefully?

It’s because He is in all dimensions, far more than we know. It’s as if He is taking the road through the villages, and the main bypass road both at the same “time”. And has an endlless convoy of vehicles so that He’s always at all points.

You can use your visual thinking to map out this concept.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

What is that about? We either understand God by following a useful debate or we cannot. This is necessary since leave the concept of God full of paradoxes.

A repeat of my previous question which you haven’t answered yet - is that a complaint !!! :extrahappy:

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

…

Further, I believe that physicists debate the very existence of time and its passage in a linear sense. The question concerning the existence of time, however, may be different from our physical and psychological perception of time.

I think you are onto something here. This is because of the limitations of our senses, memory, tools for investigating, etc.

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

How the states of creation can be traced back without a reference point?

By hypotheses.

I personally believe we should use a multi-theory hypothesis which I also call multi-hypothesis theory. This means that no hypothesis is swept off the table by another. All are kept on the table in parallel and relative strengths and weaknesses provisionally noted. Not only do the lists of relative strengths and weaknesses grow longer but it is often plausible to combine, dovetail or coordinate hypotheses.

Scientists should clearly define delimitations to their range of data so that their provisional findings can be understood in their own terms.

With intelligent interpretation, one can tentatively build up working hypotheses.

Examples are the intelligent guesses about the age of the earth and rocks, the nature of the deep inside of the earth, nature and distance of stars.

Calculations performed may not answer the question fully but they give us an example of what might be the case. It’s something we can work with.

Both the now that we have and remains of past states help scientists extrapolate a possible course of events.

 

[meltzerboy]

No, it’s not the same.

You misunderstood what I said. It’s impossible for an ant to understand a human - it’s not impossible for a human to understand another human or oneself.

I’m saying that it’s impossible to understand time in the way that God created it because we cannot understand everything He did, created, or is.

Fran

No, I did not misunderstand your remark, which I agree with. What I meant is that it is even challenging (not impossible) for us to understand one another or even ourselves completely, so that it is so much more so for another creature, such as an ant (wise as it is in its own way), to understand us. And we do not understand ourselves as well as G-d does, so how can we understand G-d on His level.

 

[frangiuliano115]

Timeless God was invented to allow foreknowledge. God is however claimed to sustain creation in his eternal now. Lets consider all state of creation as a series snapshot only one of them is actual in the moment so called now. This however requires the knowledge of current time which is changing hence the act of sustaining creation is impossible by a timeless God.

Your thought.

In reading your posts, I maybe understand your paradox.

Are you saying that time changes and God does not change because He’s changeless and thus He cannot sustain creation?

If this is what you mean, I’d stop worrying about it.

However, if you do get the answer you could work on the following next:

The Holy Trinity
The Hypostatic Union
Free Will vs. God’s Providence
The Source of Evil (I mean the original cause)

Give it up Bahman. You could come to believe in God through reason, but you’ll never understand everything about God through reason. Also, at some point faith kicks in. Faith makes us able to accept things which could NOT be understood by our intellect.

You’re right that it’s good to debate some ideas - but this is not debating; this is conjecture. It won’t help us to understand your paradox any better.

Fran

 

[yppop]

Really interesting. You must be a physicist. My niece is studying physics and I don’t know what she’s talking about most of the time.

But here’s how I understand it. Can we understand eternity? No. We only think we can.
We can only also understand time in the limited way that our brains can grasp it. We had to invent a clock to be able to speak to each other and know when to meet on the street corner. But, of course, that doesn’t explain time - as it apparent from your knowledgeable post.

So no matter how you explain it, it’ll never be understood. Einstein proved relativity because it was provable. I don’t believe time, in the way God created it, can be provable or even understood.

In other words, I think it’s impressive how physicists think and what they know - but I don’t think they could ‘know’ or understand God or they’d be God. Simply put in my simple words: It’s like an ant trying to understand a human.

Fran

Hi Fran

Here are two from a long list of Catholic dogma that seem to approve of the application of reason to the mystery of God and from what I’ve read in encyclicals such as Fides et ratio, reasoning is encouraged as long as it stays within the limits of our Faith.

*1. God, our Creator and Lord, can be known with certainty, by the natural light of reason from created things. (De fide.)

1. Our natural knowledge of God in this world is not as immediate, intuitive cognition, but a mediate, abstractive knowledge, because it is attained through the knowledge of creatures. (Sent. certa.) *

One of the reasons we have trouble imagining time is that we believe it to be a smooth, continuous, flow. It ain’t! It is incremental, meaning it jumps along in little bits and our minds create the continuity. When the mind grasps the incremental nature of time the relationship of time to change becomes easier to understand. What it means is that the nature of motion as we think of it is wrong, there is no motion only incrementation, just as there is no flowing motion of your cursor on your computer screen. What is happening is a sequential activation of pixels in the direction that you move your cursor.We see it as smooth motion, but it isn’t!!

Zeno proved that: “if space is continuous there can be no motion and if there is motion space is not continuous”. And here is where we run into the nature of infinity and I am going to bed.

Yppop

 

[frangiuliano115]

Hi Fran

Here are two from a long list of Catholic dogma that seem to approve of the application of reason to the mystery of God and from what I’ve read in encyclicals such as Fides et ratio, reasoning is encouraged as long as it stays within the limits of our Faith.

*1. God, our Creator and Lord, can be known with certainty, by the natural light of reason from created things. (De fide.)

1. Our natural knowledge of God in this world is not as immediate, intuitive cognition, but a mediate, abstractive knowledge, because it is attained through the knowledge of creatures. (Sent. certa.) *

One of the reasons we have trouble imagining time is that we believe it to be a smooth, continuous, flow. It ain’t! It is incremental, meaning it jumps along in little bits and our minds create the continuity. When the mind grasps the incremental nature of time the relationship of time to change becomes easier to understand. What it means is that the nature of motion as we think of it is wrong, there is no motion only incrementation, just as there is no flowing motion of your cursor on your computer screen. What is happening is a sequential activation of pixels in the direction that you move your cursor.We see it as smooth motion, but it isn’t!!

Zeno proved that: “if space is continuous there can be no motion and if there is motion space is not continuous”. And here is where we run into the nature of infinity and I am going to bed.

Yppop

Well, Yppop, I just woke up and my brain is not even functioning yet and here we are talking about time and infinity!

I understood a little bit about the cursor example. I’m afraid my brain will explode if I think too much on what you understand well!

Of course, I agree with your numbers 1 and 2.

1 comes straight out of the beginning of the book of Romans.

They make my point exactly. We can know about God, but we cannot know everything about God. Jesus is the best we can do. Many concepts just have to be accepted. For instance the ones in my post above to Bahman.

For example, no matter how you try to explain the Trinity to catechism kids - the triangle, water (liquid, solid, gas), you always risk explaining 3 different Gods.

Maybe we could use some physicists for catechism!

Yeah. Wish I understood this stuff more, but I’ll be happy with what I’ve got.

Have a good day
Fran