Timeless God cannot know the current time hence cannot sustain the creation

[wadramli]

i think the problem Bahman has not explained the problem well enough. it’s the reason we are unable to work this thing out . we should go over the problem again . a set of states of creations S1 S2 S3 … wjhat is the relation between S! S2 S3 . are they states taken at successive time intervals or something else like changes in volume intervals or density etc ?

 

[Brendan]

I think that were you who offered that premise. Do you want me to refer you your post? I could however provide an argument on that too.

Please do on both counts

Yes, and I will repeat, knowledge does not require experience. It is the knowledge that is time bound, not the knower. The creation, not the created

I could have knowledge that a sample I fabricated was radioactive without being radioactive myself, for example.

[/QUOTE]

 

[Bahman]

Please do on both counts

The only model that comes to mind is the casual model in which the state of universe in later moment, S’, is caused by another state S earlier moment by the causal operator L so called laws of nature read it S’=L(S).

Yes, and I will repeat, knowledge does not require experience.

I didn’t say so.

It is the knowledge that is time bound, not the knower. The creation, not the created

I argued that the time dependent phenomena like now, motion, etc cannot be known by timeless God.

 

[Lion_IRC]

[SIGN][/SIGN]
I don’t even understand (let alone accept

) the claim that omnipotent God is metaphysically bound or required to be either in time or outside “time”.

Surely He can pick and choose whether and when to be immanent and in what form.

Isn’t that a fundamental aspect of biblical theism and theology? That God and His amazing Grace can be as near or as far from us (in space/time) as our reciprocal love allows?

Time bound and timeless are mutually exclusive.

Well, you can set up any sort of special pleading scenario you wish wherein God has artificial limitations on His divine will.

However, in order to claim that God is unable to do something you need to modify the meaning of the word omnipotent.

My point is that if God can exercise an act of His own volition, (I assume you accept God does have personal free will,) and if He can cause a global flood on Earth, (I assume you know that biblical event,) then He is self-evidently capable of acting in time.

But you seem to be arguing that God is somehow stuck on the ‘outside looking in’ to some goldfish bowl called space/time.

 

[Lion_IRC]

…why you got pitchfork devil avatar in your signature?

 

[Pat_Albertson]

The question of what is now is very important. This in fact the second part of the argument. All future, past and now are actual yet we observe a different between now, past and future meaning that now should be treated differently. The knowledge of now is in fact necessary since that is God who sustains creation. In simple word, timeless God can know past, now and future but he cannot sustain creation since he doesn’t know what now is.

The theory of relativity says that the now is an individual thing depending on one’s state of motion and one’s position relative to the nearest gravitational well. There is no universal now, thus your entire argument is irrelevant because it ignores modern physics.

Go and read this: Slicing the spacetime loaf

Bahman, you have a lot of studying and reworking of your own basic ideas ahead of you.

 

[wadramli]

Hi bahman.

Still totally lost here . help me out here please . look here is your OP :

“Timeless God knows all states of creation. Lets consider each state as “s”, which defines creation as a set, lets call it “S”, where “S” contains all states. “S” is basically God’s knowledge of creation. So far everything is nice. The knowledge of now however needs the existence one stamp on one “s” showing that that specific “s” represent now. The now however moves as time passes. This means that position of stamp is subjected to change hence timeless God cannot know the current time. We only experience very now which means God needs to sustains now differently from past and future since “S” is actual in God perspective. This means that God needs to have a knowledge now which is impossible as it was discussed hence God cannot sustain creation.”

I can understand representing creation as distinct states measured in time even though that seems like a tall order . but I will go along . this is according to your op too. , but how did you mange to divide god’s knowledge into distinct states ? you say god knows all states of creation . I get that . but how did you get from that to a set of states of knowledge of god ? if god knows all states then he knows them all at once if he is timeless as you say . all states s are at time zero . isn’t that what timeless means … no time . zero time

what is S ? states of creation or states of gods knowledge of creation?

 

[Bookcat]

Knowledge of now brings subjectivity over time. Timeless God cannot be timeless and has the knowledge of now. This is the result a tension between timeless state and time-bound state that you cannot resolve it.
Not as a* creature*.

One does not resolve a tension that does not exist.

Again your trying to make God into a creature in time…your using your personal experience existing here in creation with its laws and experience and trying to apply that to God as if God was like you here…

Next you will be trying to apply gravity to God.

God is God – not someone created in our universe.

 

[Bahman]

Well, you can set up any sort of special pleading scenario you wish wherein God has artificial limitations on His divine will.

However, in order to claim that God is unable to do something you need to modify the meaning of the word omnipotent.

I just need to show that an act is logically impossible as it happens with the act sustaining creation.

My point is that if God can exercise an act of His own volition, (I assume you accept God does have personal free will,) and if He can cause a global flood on Earth, (I assume you know that biblical event,) then He is self-evidently capable of acting in time.

Timeless God cannot intervene in creation as it was argued in OP.

But you seem to be arguing that God is somehow stuck on the ‘outside looking in’ to some goldfish bowl called space/time.

That is correct. God can know each state of creation but it cannot intervene since intervention requires the knowledge of current know.

 

[Bahman]

…why you got pitchfork devil avatar in your signature?

I like devils.

 

[Bookcat]

Knowledge of now brings subjectivity over time. Timeless God cannot be timeless and has the knowledge of now. This is the result a tension between timeless state and time-bound state that you cannot resolve it.
Not as a* creature*.

One does not resolve a tension that does not exist.

Again your trying to make God into a creature in time…your using your personal experience existing here in creation with its laws and experience and trying to apply that to God as if God was like you here…

Next you will be trying to apply gravity to God.

God is God – not someone created in our universe.

 

[Bahman]

The theory of relativity says that the now is an individual thing depending on one’s state of motion and one’s position relative to the nearest gravitational well. There is no universal now, thus your entire argument is irrelevant because it ignores modern physics.

Go and read this: Slicing the spacetime loaf

Bahman, you have a lot of studying and reworking of your own basic ideas ahead of you.

You can define state of creation in one framework in term of time and there is one now in that given reference. The state of creation however is different from another framework as you mentioned and there is one now in the new framework too.

 

[Bahman]

One does not resolve a tension that does not exist.

Again your trying to make God into a creature in time…your using your personal experience existing here in creation with its laws and experience and trying to apply that to God as if God was like you here…

Next you will be trying to apply gravity to God.

God is God – not someone created in our universe.

Then explain me how God could know the state of creation at now meanwhile being in state of timeless.

 

[Bookcat]

Then explain me how God could know the state of creation at now meanwhile being in state of timeless.

There is no meanwhile…

God is God - not a creature in time. God is outside of time - but that is not as some “timeless being” that you might think up in your imagination. God is intimately involved with creation.

God is the creator – all that “is” is created by God. God knows all that is thus created - from the inside as it were- its very being is known to God -or it would not be.

God does not know in the same way we know.

All moments of time are present to God. Your still trying to think of God as if God were a creature in time.

“To God, all moments of time are present in their immediacy” (CCC 600)

 

[Bahman]

…“To God, all moments of time are present in their immediacy” (CCC 600)

That is exactly the problem. All moments of time are in his single now. How God could know the moment of now?

 

[Bookcat]

That is exactly the problem. All moments of time are in his single now. How God could know the moment of now?

No- there is no problem.

Again your thinking of God… “in time”. And not thinking of God.

See post above.

 

[Bookcat]

That is

If someone wishes to learn to drive a car one has to accept that his bicycle is not a car and start looking into cars. If he keeps trying to think of his car as if it was a bicycle he is going to drive himself crazy trying to find the peddles.

If that person comes to one and insists - “but show me how I make the peddles go round and round…”

One has to get them to see that it is not like a bicycle.

If they keep coming back to “but the peddles do not go round and round” …

One has to tell them - no it is not a bicycle it is a car. You are thinking as if it were a bicycle.

If they then keep saying:

“how do I make the peddles go round and round?”

One cannot show them that how they go round and round - for they do not.

One has to repeat - “your thinking as if it is a bicycle -you need to cease that line of thinking”…“the peddles do not go round and round”…

 

[Bahman]

If someone wishes to learn to drive a car one has to accept that his bicycle is not a car and start looking into cars. If he keeps trying to think of his car as if it was a bicycle he is going to drive himself crazy trying to find the peddles.

If that person comes to one and insists - “but show me how I make the peddles go round and round…”

One has to get them to see that it is not like a bicycle.

If they keep coming back to “but the peddles do not go round and round” …

One has to tell them - no it is not a bicycle it is a car. You are thinking as if it were a bicycle.

If they then keep saying:

“how do I make the peddles go round and round?”

One cannot show them that how they go round and round - for they do not.

One has to repeat - “your thinking as if it is a bicycle -you need to cease that line of thinking”…“the peddles do not go round and round”…

Look my friend, you are not making argument. All I am asking is that how God could know the very moment of now in his timeless state. I am not interested in example which doesn’t make sense.

 

[Bookcat]

Look my friend, you are not making argument. All I am asking is that how God could know the very moment of now in his timeless state. I am not interested in example which doesn’t make sense.

I have answered.

As to the last part - that is an illustration not to answer the question- but to get behind the question.

It would be good for you to be interested in that example - for it is about your difficulty in understanding these things -coming from your approach.

Until you see that your approaching God not as God but as some created creature - you will keep asking the same questions coming from the same mistaken approach.

Now that I have explained why I wrote that - please go back and read it again.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

That is exactly the problem. All moments of time are in his single now. How God could know the moment of now?

God is both inside and outside of time. He knows everything.