CCC 32 What does it mean?

[Dan_Defender]

When the world is created it moves, as it develops it becomes.

Yes, an important concept. In contrast, if at some point the universe stops moving, there is no change, and therefore time ceases to exist.

 

[tafan2]

I know what you meant. But to give SST credit, without understanding that God is eternal, and what that means, the proofs don’t work. If there was a time when only God existed, then God is subject to time.

 

[STT]

Not entirely true. Subatomic particles pop into existence from zero point energy due to quantum fluctuations.

And what is the zero point energy?

So they don’t truly pop into exist from nothing. Also, as to your point about the uncaused cause being a contradiction since it exists in time, Edward Feser has this to say:
“Where creation is concerned, then, God is “first” cause not in the sense of coming before second, third, or fourth causes, but rather in the sense of being absolutely fundamental. That apart from which nothing could cause (because nothing could exist) at all.”

Ok, I will read that post and discuss it later.

 

[STT]

No, no, no, no. You do not understand. How do I define creation? The beginning. There was no point at which it didn’t exist, there was no moment before it existed, there was no “nothing and then something”. There was a beginning.

So the universe has always existed? What is the need for the creator if it is so?

 

[STT]

Do you mean “point” in a temporal way?

No. A point is only a point. You have temporality when you have a succession of points each following another.

The question to ask is whether God existed prior to the created universe. The answer there is “yes”.

Cool. That was all I wanted to hear. God becomes subjected to time then since there is a point afterward that God and creation exist together.

Only if you presume a standard for measure that would incorporate that “point”. So… what’s that “point” mean?

Point is point in a mathematical sense.

 

[STT]

Actually, this is wrong, there is no prior to creation. There is eternity, outside of creation, with no time. But your other points are on point

What is eternity? Is it one point so called now?

 

[STT]

Metaphysically prior, not temporally prior.

What is metaphysically prior?

 

[Tom7]

Can’t state it better than Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI

The many answers (to the question what is the ground of all being) produced by history can finally be reduced to two basic possibilities. (1) The first and most obvious would run something like this: Everything we encounter is in the last analysis stuff, matter; this is the only thing that always remains as demonstrable reality and, consequently, represents the real being of all that exists—the materialistic solution. (2)The other possibility points in the opposite direction. It says: Whoever looks thoroughly at matter will discover that it is being-thought, objectivized thought. So it cannot be the ultimate. On the contrary, before it comes thinking, the idea; all being is ultimately being-thought and can be traced back to mind as the original reality; this is the “idealistic” solution. To reach a verdict (one which one is true) we must ask still more precisely: What is matter, really? And what is mind? Abbreviating drastically, we could say that we call “matter” a being that does not itself comprehend being, that “is” but does not understand itself. The reduction of all being to matter as the primary form of reality consequently implies that the beginning and ground of all being is constituted by a form of being that does not itself understand being; this also means that the understanding of being only arises as a secondary, chance product during the course of development. This at the same time also gives us the definition of “mind”: it can be described as being that understands itself, as being that is present to itself. The idealistic solution to the problem of being accordingly signifies the idea that all being is the being-thought by one single consciousness. The unity of being consists in the identity of the one consciousness, whose impulses constitute the many things that are.

Someone else said:
Modern Science is based on the principle “gives us one free miracle (the appearance of all the matter, energy and laws that govern it from nothing at the Big Bang) and we will explain the rest.

Peace and Love

 

[tafan2]

It does not have a history of infinity backwards in time. It had a beginning. Did it always exist? Well, if we use the word “always” simply related to time, then by definition the answer is yes. There was never a time when the universe did not exist. But it had a beginning.

 

[tafan2]

No, it is not one point in the so called now. We cannot really define what it would be like. We know these things about it:

1. it had not beginning and it has no end.
2. it has no time
3. it is unchanging
4. It is not part of the universe

 

[tafan2]

Point is point in a mathematical sense.

Yes, we understood that part of your argument. So it is a location/coordinate, on some sort of plane, line, etc. Now, in the real world that can either be a point in time or a point in space. So if time is part of the universe, can you not understand that there was no point when the universe did not exist. Its like looking at a line segment drawn and saying: find me a point on the line where the line does not exist. It makes no sense.

 

[Tom7]

You are spot on. That’s why the catechism states we can know the existence of God (with some thought) with certainty.

 

[Gorgias]

No. A point is only a point. You have temporality when you have a succession of points each following another.

By that reasoning, you could say “ok… here’s one point in which the universe doesn’t exist and only God exists. And, here’s another. Voila! TEMPORALITY!”

No. It doesn’t work that way.

Cool. That was all I wanted to hear. God becomes subjected to time then since there is a point afterward that God and creation exist together.

Yep. Pretty predictable next step. See what I mean?

And my answer is: No. There’s no “point” there. There is God’s existence, but that’s all.

Point is point in a mathematical sense.

Then definitely we don’t have a point, since you’re talking about something that exists in a physical plane! There was no physical universe, so there’s no “point”.

What is metaphysically prior?

Temporal priority speaks to a temporal sequence. This morning I got up, I made coffee, I sat down at the computer. I can say that coffee was “after” waking up, and and “before” computer work.

Metaphysical priority speaks to grounding, not temporal sequence. So, God is metaphysically prior to the universe, even though there’s no temporal framework which encompasses them both such that we could directly compare the two as if they were “points” in a shared space/time context.

 

[Joe_5859]

There has been an unfortunate tendency to play down Thomas Aquinas is recent years.

That’s not really the case with the Catechism, though, The only theologian cited more than Aquinas is Augustine. The Summa alone is cited almost 50 times in the Catechism.

 

[SPBlitz]

And what is the zero point energy?

Zero point energy is the energy that every point in space (even ‘empty’ space) has due to Hisenbergs Uncertainty Principle. Basically, since any point’s location is definitely known, that point’s energy is uncertain - meaning that it might be zero, but it also has a non-zero probability of being some other value. This energy is what gives rise to subatomic particles popping into existence from ‘empty’ space. Although it isnt really empty - it has energy. So the particle is coming from something, which is different from the idea of creation ex nihilo- where nothing literally means nothing - no zero point energy, no space, no laws of physics. Nothing.

 

[IWantGod]

Can you prove that?

It’s a contradiction for something to come from absolutely nothing by itself. It is evident in the fact that we are talking about nothing, and since it is nothing it cannot bring itself into reality by a power that it fundamentally lacks in the first-place.

 

[IWantGod]

This makes uncaused-cause subject to time.

This is an assumption. You are assuming that a thing cannot be a cause without being subject to time. But we do not have to prove that it can, since existence is fundamental to any possibility and nothing is the complete absence of such. The word nothing is meaningless except in reference to what could possibly be and is not, and more importantly something is making things possible. Possibilities have no meaning at all if there is absolutely nothing since there is certainly nothing to make anything possible because it is nothing at all. Therefore it must be possible for the uncaused cause to cause time, since the alternative is ontologically impossible and meaningless.

 

[STT]

It does not have a history of infinity backwards in time. It had a beginning. Did it always exist? Well, if we use the word “always” simply related to time, then by definition the answer is yes. There was never a time when the universe did not exist. But it had a beginning.

If the universe has existed since the beginning of time then the act of creation, ex nihilo, is impossible. There should be a state in which only God existed otherwise you cannot have creation ex nihilo.

 

[STT]

No, it is not one point in the so called now. We cannot really define what it would be like. We know these things about it:

1. it had not beginning and it has no end.
2. it has no time
3. it is unchanging
4. It is not part of the universe

If eternity has no time, no beginning and end, unchanging, then it is one point.

 

[STT]

Yes, we understood that part of your argument. So it is a location/coordinate, on some sort of plane, line, etc.

No. A point can exist on its own without need to be part of line, plane, etc.