William Lane Craig Temporal God

[STT]

If “god” requires time to act, is not actual God (big G). Your “god” is constrained by time and thus requires a prior cause (to create time) and thus cannot be actual God (big G).

You cannot resolve the problem by changing g to G. I am arguing that the act of creation is logically impossible.

 

[STT]

Let’s see the argument for that assertion, please.

What do you want me to prove? That eternal universe does not need a creator? I think that is obvious by definition.

 

[Aquinas11]

I am arguing that the act of creation is logically impossible.

No you’re arguing that an act of creation outside of time is logically impossible.

Which means you’re arguing time itself is the unmoved mover or first cause. Which is impossible since time is limited and finite and thus had to have a prior cause.

 

[STT]

No you’re arguing that an act of creation outside of time is logically impossible.

I am arguing that the act of creation which is assigned to God, the timeless creator, is logically impossible.

Which means you’re arguing time itself is the unmoved mover or first cause.

No. I just follows that there is a regress.

Which is impossible since time is limited and finite and thus had to have a prior cause.

If you accept that time is limited then you fall in a regress. That is another important point.

 

[HarryStotle]

We have proper capacity to understand when something is logically possible and when some other thing is logically impossible. Any act is temporal.

And who, precisely, can determine how “proper” or complete our understanding is?

To know that some particular eventuality is logically possible or impossible might be determinable with our capacities, but your claim implies that we have the capacity to assess whether every possibility is logically possible or impossible. Such a claim you would need to demonstrate and not merely assert.

You will also need to demonstrate that “Any act is temporal” rather than merely assert as much. A mere assertion is nothing more than a presumption.

What reason do we have thinking that assertion in unquestionably true besides that you have styled yourself to be the final arbiter of all logical possibilities and impossibilities?

We might throw a little wrench into your self-assurance regarding time by conceiving of our current time stream as a one-dimensional line, a la CS Lewis.

Suppose we imagine that the time signature we are constrained to, within our current universe, is akin to following a “line” or sequence of moments along a path from the past into the future. Your claim is that all of reality, including God, is equally constrained by that notion of time.

Continued…

 

[HarryStotle]

Yet, if CS Lewis is correct, it may be that time, for God, is not “linear,” in that sense but more like an infinitely radiant, three-dimensional spatial “time” within which our linear time is merely one finite line segment.

From CS Lewis’ Mere Christianity, Chapter 3, Time and Beyond Time …

A man put it to me by saying, ‘I can believe in God…but what I cannot swallow is the idea of him attending to several million human beings who are all addressing Him at the same moment’…what is really at the back of this difficulty is the idea of God having to fit too many things into one moment of time.
…
Almost certainly God is not in Time. His life does not consist of moments following one another. If a million people are praying to Him at ten-thirty tonight, He need not listen to them all in that one little snippet which we call ten-thirty. Ten-thirty…is always the Present for Him.
…
I write ‘Mary laid down her work; next moment came a knock at the door!’ For Mary, who has to live in the imaginary time of my story, there is no interval between putting down the work and hearing the knock. But I, who am Mary’s maker, do not live in that imaginary time at all. Between writing the first half of that sentence and the second, I might sit for three hours and think steadily about Mary…the hours I spent in doing so would not appear in Mary’s time (the time inside the story) at all.
If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn. We come to the parts of the line one by one: we have to leave A behind before we get to B, and cannot reach C until we leave B behind. God, from above or outside or all round, contains the whole line, and sees it all.
…
…what we call ‘tomorrow’ is visible to Him in just the same way as what we call ‘today’. All the days are ‘Now’ for Him. He does not remember you doing things yesterday; He simply sees you doing them, because, though you have lost yesterday, He has not. He does not ‘foresee’ you doing things tomorrow; He simply sees you doing them: because, though tomorrow is not yet there for you, it is for Him…He knows your tomorrow’s actions…because He is already in tomorrow and can simply watch you…the moment at which you have done it is already ‘Now’ for Him.

 

[Aquinas11]

I am arguing that the act of creation which is assigned to God, the timeless creator, is logically impossible.

Right because you are claiming time is the first cause, and nothing exists outside of time.

If you accept that time is limited then you fall in a regress

If you’re denying time is limited, you’re denying Science. Einstein’s relativity demonstrates that time must obey certain mathematical relationships which include the speed of light c and velocity. Who chose these particular characteristics of time? Why does time depend on velocity, instead of some other parameter?

Thus, time had to have a cause that chose these particular characteristics of time. And since time had a cause, an act of creation (of time) was beyond time.

 

[STT]

And who, precisely, can determine how “proper” or complete our understanding is?

We can make it. I can take you there if you are patient with me.

To know that some particular eventuality is logically possible or impossible might be determinable with our capacities, but your claim implies that we have the capacity to assess whether every possibility is logically possible or impossible. Such a claim you would need to demonstrate and not merely assert.

You will also need to demonstrate that “Any act is temporal” rather than merely assert as much. A mere assertion is nothing more than a presumption.

That I demonstrate it in post #30 for the act of creation but I can argue it for any act. Any act at least contains two different states since we are dealing with a minimal change. Moreover, we always go from the first state to the second state otherwise no change can take place. This is a very definition of act which is temporal. It is temporal because there are at least two states one comes after another.

What reason do we have thinking that assertion in unquestionably true besides that you have styled yourself to be the final arbiter of all logical possibilities and impossibilities?

One you are there then you become sure too.

 

[STT]

Right because you are claiming time is the first cause, and nothing exists outside of time.

No. I am arguing that the first cause, the timeless act of creation, is contrary since any act is temporal. I also claim that there is a dilemma of beginning of time.

If you’re denying time is limited, you’re denying Science. Einstein’s relativity demonstrates that time must obey certain mathematical relationships which include the speed of light c and velocity. Who chose these particular characteristics of time? Why does time depend on velocity, instead of some other parameter?

Thus, time had to have a cause that chose these particular characteristics of time. And since time had a cause, an act of creation (of time) was beyond time.

Any change including Big Bang whether God was behind it or not requires time. We are dealing with a dilemma whether we accept that time is finitie or infinite.

 

[STT]

Right because you are claiming time is the first cause, and nothing exists outside of time.

No. I am arguing that the first cause, the timeless act of creation, is contrary since any act is temporal. I also claim that there is a dilemma of the beginning of time.

If you’re denying time is limited, you’re denying Science. Einstein’s relativity demonstrates that time must obey certain mathematical relationships which include the speed of light c and velocity. Who chose these particular characteristics of time? Why does time depend on velocity, instead of some other parameter?

Thus, time had to have a cause that chose these particular characteristics of time. And since time had a cause, an act of creation (of time) was beyond time.

Any change including Big Bang whether God was behind it or not requires time. We are dealing with a dilemma whether we accept that time is finitie or infinite.

 

[Aquinas11]

No

So you deny that nothing exists outside time

any act is temporal.

And then contradict yourself by saying every act is temporal , which can’t be true if things can exist outside time

Any change including Big Bang whether God was behind it or not requires time

Back to the question: why does time have its particular characteristics? Where did they come from? What caused time to be dependent on velocity? Speed of light? Why not some other parameter? Why is time linear? You can’t answer because these questions demonstrate time had a cause and thus disprove your thesis that time is the uncaused cause

 

[Gorgias]

What do you want me to prove? That eternal universe does not need a creator?

Yes. You need to show how a contingent entity (the universe) does not require a creator who gives rise to it.

 

[STT]

So you deny that nothing exists outside time

I deny that the first cause can be timeless.

And then contradict yourself by saying every act is temporal , which can’t be true if things can exist outside time

Things can exist outside the time but they cannot cause anything since any act is temporal.

Back to the question: why does time have its particular characteristics? Where did they come from? What caused time to be dependent on velocity? Speed of light? Why not some other parameter? Why is time linear? You can’t answer because these questions demonstrate time had a cause and thus disprove your thesis that time is the uncaused cause

I didn’t say that time is uncaused cause. I said that time is required for causation. For regard to how things started I have a theory which explain two times can comes of nothing. These two time cancel each other in origin and sustain each other afterward. Like Yin and Yang. Time to me is a substance. I don’t know why speed of light is constant, why time is linear, etc.

 

[STT]

Yes. You need to show how a contingent entity (the universe) does not require a creator who gives rise to it.

Things have different and opposite properties. These properties can cancel each other out in origin so we have nothing in origin and something afterward. So basically you don’t need a creator.

 

[Aquinas11]

I didn’t say that time is uncaused cause. I said that time is required for causation

If time is required for causation, time is the uncaused cause since it itself can’t be caused (per your theory, act of causing time requires time) and is necessary for first act of causation

I don’t know why speed of light is constant, why time is linear, etc.

This disproves your theory that time is uncaused cause since we know time had to have a cause which caused its characteristics (linear, dependence on velocity and speed light, etc)

I have a theory which explain two times can comes of nothing. These two time cancel each other in origin and sustain each other afterward. Like Yin and Yang.

Another contradiction. Per your theory, time is required for causation thus time can’t “come of nothing” since that violates your theory time required for causation

 

[Gorgias]

Things have different and opposite properties. These properties can cancel each other out in origin so we have nothing in origin and something afterward. So basically you don’t need a creator.

Pardon? The notion that physical entities have accidental properties is your proof that contingent entities don’t need a creator?

Umm… no.

Not even sure how “these properties can cancel each other out in origin” makes sense or is relevant here.

 

[whatistrue]

That I demonstrate it in post #30

You actually didn’t demonstrate anything in that post. You made several assertions based on a prior assumption that

any act is temporal

which you have also not demonstrated. Saying it is not demonstrating it. I am the first one to say that I am nowhere near an expert in philosophy or classical logic, but even I can see the large holes in these arguments.

 

[PuerAzaelis]

Article 2: Whether God is eternal?

On the contrary, Athanasius says in his Creed: “The Father is eternal, the Son is eternal, the Holy Ghost is eternal.”
I answer that, The idea of eternity follows immutability, as the idea of time follows movement, as appears from the preceding article. Hence, as God is supremely immutable, it supremely belongs to Him to be eternal. Nor is He eternal only; but He is His own eternity; whereas, no other being is its own duration, as no other is its own being. Now God is His own uniform being; and hence as He is His own essence, so He is His own eternity.

https://aquinas101.thomisticinstitute.org/st-ia-q-10#FPQ10A2THEP1

 

[STT]

Pardon? The notion that physical entities have accidental properties is your proof that contingent entities don’t need a creator?

Umm… no.

Not even sure how “these properties can cancel each other out in origin” makes sense or is relevant here.

Do you know that at each moment particles and anti-particles are created and then destroyed? The idea of the beginning is the same. This is, however, off topic. In regards to this thread I only need to show that the act of creation is impossible.

 

[STT]

You actually didn’t demonstrate anything in that post. You made several assertions based on a prior assumption that

Which part you are not convinced?

which you have also not demonstrated. Saying it is not demonstrating it. I am the first one to say that I am nowhere near an expert in philosophy or classical logic, but even I can see the large holes in these arguments.

Where is the hole?