String theory and B theory of time

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how does the church see these two theories.

If they don’t say anything what is your opinion as a catholic (non catholics can give your opinion too) on this theory.

I don’t know much about the theory can someone give me the main parts of this argument, I know it usually disproves God. At-least the string theory tries to.

Wikipedia articles on these theories

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Theory_of_time

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory

thanks for any help you can give me.

I don’t think this fits under the category of evolution if it does I’m sorry
 
My physics professor in college thought strung theory was bunk, that is, pseudo science. Like most, if not all scientific theories, the church has no official opinion on either (that I’m aware of).

As regards to time though, the A-theory seems more in line with Aristotle’s thinking (and therefore, probably St. Thomas’s thought as well)
 
jetpack_joe said:
My physics professor in college thought strung theory was bunk, that is, pseudo science. Like most, if not all scientific theories, the church has no official opinion on either (that I’m aware of).

As regards to time though, the A-theory seems more in line with Aristotle’s thinking (and therefore, probably St. Thomas’s thought as well)
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it seems like if you agree to the B theory you think that our view of time, is an illusion becuase from our perspective our reality time is straight time is linear, one event causes another. Like I turned my computer on opened firefox went to catholic.com went to this thread typed what i’m typing now in the exact order it appears and now you are reading this. So if time really isn’t like we see it as to be then time is an illusion and we are somehow being tricked to believe something that really isn’t . If that’s really what the B theory implies then you would have to agree that we are being ticked in a since by time.

can someone clear up for me how string theory disproves God, it seems right now that all string theory does is try to prove that there is something smaller then quarks which they call string. I don’t see how string disproves God.
 
catholictiger said:
how does the church see these two theories.

If they don’t say anything what is your opinion as a catholic (non catholics can give your opinion too) on this theory.

I don’t know much about the theory can someone give me the main parts of this argument, I know it usually disproves God. At-least the string theory tries to.

Wikipedia articles on these theories

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Theory_of_time

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory

thanks for any help you can give me.

I don’t think this fits under the category of evolution if it does I’m sorry
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The Church doesn’t have an opinion on these theories.
 
catholictiger said:
how does the church see these two theories.

If they don’t say anything what is your opinion as a catholic (non catholics can give your opinion too) on this theory.

I don’t know much about the theory can someone give me the main parts of this argument, I know it usually disproves God. At-least the string theory tries to.

Wikipedia articles on these theories

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Theory_of_time

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory

thanks for any help you can give me.

I don’t think this fits under the category of evolution if it does I’m sorry
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String theory is not science but what might best be termed mathematical metaphysics; there is no way of confirming or denying it empirically. There’s a fine book called “Not even wrong” about string theory(after the saying of the famous physicist Pauli about a very bad paper…“it’s so bad it’s not even wrong”)…no confirmable predictions, umpteen parameters to make the theory fit…
As far as the B-theory of time, that’s what conforms to “block universe” theories, and again it’s metaphysics, not science. There are some good articles about views of time in the collection “Quantum Cosmology and the Laws of Nature” (papers presented in a series of conferences called by Pope John Paul II on scientific issues in divine intervention). Here’s a web site for that:
ctns.org/books.html
You’ll see the books and chapter sunmmaries in the right-hand frame.
 
this question was kinda addressed but id like to bring it up but does anyone here hold the view of B theory or something similar to B theory that would include a diving being in it.
 
Vince1022 said:
From what little I know about string theory, I have no problem with it. It certainly does not contradict or challenge Catholic faith.
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i think some atheist say its a theory that may disprove God but I don’t know much about it either
 
I think that both theories may be true.

From what I read on the links above, A-theorists think that only the present is real, the past is determined and fixed, and the future is indeterminate.

B-theorists believe that the past, present, and future are equally real, and that all objects have a four-dimensional configuration, with boundaries fixed by length, width, breadth, and duration.

At least from a theological perspective, both are true. A person immersed in a particular timeline experiences only one instant at a time, the past being fixed behind him and the future yet to be determined.

But a being located outside the timeline, or outside all timelines, such as God, experiences past, present, and future as equally real and simultaneous. Such an extra-temporal being is able to observe all times at once.
 
JimG said:
I think that both theories may be true.

From what I read on the links above, A-theorists think that only the present is real, the past is determined and fixed, and the future is indeterminate.

B-theorists believe that the past, present, and future are equally real, and that all objects have a four-dimensional configuration, with boundaries fixed by length, width, breadth, and duration.

At least from a theological perspective, both are true. A person immersed in a particular timeline experiences only one instant at a time, the past being fixed behind him and the future yet to be determined.

But a being located outside the timeline, or outside all timelines, such as God, **experiences past, present, and future as equally real and simultaneous. **Such an extra-temporal being is able to observe all times at once.
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Jim, do you mean by “real” predetermined? If so, that would negate free will, and something I personally would not be happy about. If you mean potentially real (but counterfactual), as in a Molinist view of what happens, then that maybe what is. In the reference cited in my post above, Sir John Polkinghorne (a Fellow of the Royal Society and an Anglican priest) gives good counter-arguments to the future being pre-determined, i.e to a world-line being a path we have to travel.
Anselm
 
Anselm33 said:
Jim, do you mean by “real” predetermined? If so, that would negate free will, and something I personally would not be happy about. If you mean potentially real (but counterfactual), as in a Molinist view of what happens, then that maybe what is. In the reference cited in my post above, Sir John Polkinghorne (a Fellow of the Royal Society and an Anglican priest) gives good counter-arguments to the future being pre-determined, i.e to a world-line being a path we have to travel.
Anselm
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No, I don’t mean pre-determined, and I don’t personally accept determinism. But from the standpoint of, say, God, seeing what we call the future does not involve determinism, but simply seeing the whole timeline from a standpoint outside of it. In the same way, what we know as the past is no longer present to us, and in that sense ‘not real,’ but to someone standing outside the timeline it is equally as present as the present or the future.
 
Anselm33 said:
Jim, do you mean by “real” predetermined? If so, that would negate free will, and something I personally would not be happy about. If you mean potentially real (but counterfactual), as in a Molinist view of what happens, then that maybe what is. In the reference cited in my post above, Sir John Polkinghorne (a Fellow of the Royal Society and an Anglican priest) gives good counter-arguments to the future being pre-determined, i.e to a world-line being a path we have to travel.
Anselm
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peter kreeft really talks about this nicely, and no its not predestination or predetermination or something. God could very well be outside of time, it is possible that he experinces all actualities at once, which is kinda great when you think about it becuase if god is outside of time looking down on it like we do a number line or something along the lines of taht he has umlimited time to spend with us to have a personal relationship with us to transform our lives. Also if God is outside of time that means that actually when we go to mass we are actually seeing Jesus passion all over again (i think) not in the since that we are forcing him to go through it but that he is sacrificing himself for all eternity so that we may have eternal life. The only way this is possible is if he is outside of time, so in a since he can be in two places at once even though from his perspective he is only in one place.

but back to the God being outside of time and not taking away our free will. Think about it like this, a author writes a book right and in this book he has charectors and a plot and a purpose and all of the stuff that goes with a book. Now lets say something happens to this charector lets take LOTR for example. Frodo is destined to take the ring and bring it to mount doom and destroy it right. But Frodo was making one of the most free decisions of his life, noone told him to take the ring it was his idea. Now yes the author meant it to be that way but still it was the most free decession of his life. This may be the way God works and when I think about it, it probably is that way, but your guess is as good as mind. But God gives us free will and gives us the power to obtain salvation with his help of course. Also God sees our lives in one actuality in one instance. He is like the reader of a good book he can flip to page 234 and read about that one time in mass or something, and he has an enterinty to look through that entire book and then he fits his will to that, but that will won’t take away our free will. Its a hard concept to rap your head around but i don’t think its condemed by the church as long as you don’t say we are predestined to go to heaven or hell, becuase we aren’t even though God knows where we will ultimately end up by our own doing.

peter kreeft on this topic
peterkreeft.com/audio/29_lotr_fated-free/peter-kreeft_fated-free.mp3
 
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