Time need not necessarily have a beginning: Philosophy Forums

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Time need not necessarily have a beginning

Time need not necessarily have a beginning

mich84
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Posted 03/21/08 - 06:38 PM: Subject: Time need not necessarily have a beginning	#1
It is widely accepted that time begun at some point in the past due to the fact that, to get this very moment in time, we would nonsensically have had to reach the end of eternity. However, the presumption is made that the applicability of logic has always existed. Consider trying to rationalise a state in which simple mathematics, such as s=d/t, may not apply. One of the implications is that logic may or may not apply. If logic may not apply to a state of timelessness, then nothing can be attributed to a state of timelessness � one cannot even be sure that time doesn�t exist in a state of timelessness (to suggest that time doesn�t exist in a state of timelessness is to apply logic to a state in which logic need not necessarily apply). Isn�t it better to say that at some point in the past logic may or may not have come into existence? Regards Mich

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Posted 03/22/08 - 01:24 PM:	#2
Existence is eternal. Time is a part of existence so there could not have been time before existence. Time is within existence because time is a measurement of change which need not be arbitrary (it just is: a second is a conception of the Earth's rotation or a swing of pendulum, which could differ elsewhere in the galaxy). Being that time is a measure of change, logic began with time; that is, when entities emerged that possessed properties and were able to change. Time before the Big Bang was not as it is now because the exact nature of interactions between entities from then is unknown, as it is very possible that an entirely different system of physical laws and possibly mathematics was the case. But time is not timeless, logic is not timeless. Existence is timeless because ex nihilo nihil fit.
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Posted 03/22/08 - 07:10 PM:	#3
The act of "beginning" is time-dependent. Thus, the idea of "the beginning of time" is non-nonsensical. It implies that there was a time without time. Nonetheless, space and time and most other ideas refer to relative states of existence--time being, as The_Rational_Animal say, a "measure of change" in that dimension, space is a measurement of relationships between different aspects of the other three. (Of course, it generally seems that space and time cannot conceptually exist independent of each other.) Of course, these relative states would, at least in a way, not exist in a singularity, which may have been what big banged (if you will), but it is nearly impossible to imagine or discuss because existence as we know it would not have existed in a singularity. Language and our understanding requires the use of concepts which are based on 'thinghood' (if you will), and singularity has no things.
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Posted 03/22/08 - 07:28 PM:	#4
Just to deal with the title of the thread. All measurements are concepts used to gauge existent reality. Time is such a concept. Concepts are abstracted from observing the nature of existent reality. Concepts have no beginning, or end. They are observed (abstracted), or not. One thing is for sure; they are often incorrectly defined.
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Posted 04/08/08 - 10:11 PM:	#5
You are completely wrong. Time needs a beginning in order to make sense. Our conception of beginning and end did not condense without reason.

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Posted 04/09/08 - 06:01 AM:	#6
The_Rational_Animal wrote: Existence is timeless because ex nihilo nihil fit. This is what we in the philosophy business call "begging the question".
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Posted 04/09/08 - 06:52 AM:	#7
Time is an experience, and only exists when it is experienced.
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Posted 04/09/08 - 07:31 AM:	#8
The Escapist wrote: Time is an experience, and only exists when it is experienced. _____________________________________________________________________ Putting someone else's smart arsed quote into your signature does not make you any smarter. - D.K One line quotes with no argumentation or justification are pretty crap too. (just like this one)
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Posted 04/09/08 - 02:24 PM:	#9
Klingsor's goldfish wrote: [quote=The Escapist] One line quotes with no argumentation or justification are pretty crap too. (just like this one) What I wrote isn't a "quote" and it is an argument and justification in miniature, if you have the good will to look for it. If time is an experience, then time begins when experience begins. Therefore time has a beginning, Q.E.D.
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Posted 04/09/08 - 03:07 PM:	#10
ugx2000 wrote: Time is such a concept. Concepts are abstracted from observing the nature of existent reality. Concepts have no beginning, or end. They are observed (abstracted), or not. One thing is for sure; they are often incorrectly defined. All quite true, but that amounts to sayng we can never prove the existance of a beginning of time. It is plausable to say that time is finite and infinite. We precieve it as finite in our lifetimes. It has definable points or events along its course, whereas something infinite would be so wildly incomprehansable and seems almost futile filling in event in an infinite tide of time. We can say that time as a concept might have a one stage not existed, say a time of absolutley no movement, no change, if it were or is possible. But us attempting to precieve this will still inherantly involve time in our imagination. I personally think it does have a begining in the sense of a universe which goes through phases of existance and non existance -eternally, with time begining and ending with each 'existance' phase of the universe. :P But that is all something that i dont think im educated in enough to post and argue here.

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Posted 04/09/08 - 03:14 PM:	#11
The Escapist wrote: What I wrote isn't a "quote" and it is an argument and justification in miniature, if you have the good will to look for it. If time is an experience, then time begins when experience begins. Therefore time has a beginning, Q.E.D. But you didn't say 'if''. You asserted, without justification etc. My counterargument, then, is that time is not an experience, therefore has no beginning. But I am happy for you to prove to me that the first 13,900,000,000 years were 'experienced'. BTW the 'just like this one' was self-referential, not aimed at your one-liner.
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Posted 04/10/08 - 02:47 PM:	#12
But you didn't say 'if''. You asserted, without justification etc. My counterargument, then, is that time is not an experience, therefore has no beginning. But I am happy for you to prove to me that the first 13,900,000,000 years were 'experienced'. BTW the 'just like this one' was self-referential, not aimed at your one-liner. So you're saying you wrote a message to this discussion solely to condemn that very same message, your own message? But anyway, where were we: prove that the first 13,900,000,000 years were experienced. Well, I don't know when experience started, it might not have been 13,900,000,000 years ago. I don't know what qualifies as experience sufficient to bring time and space into existence, I don't know how often it has happened. Try to have an open mind to the underlying idea? Surely you can accept that some aspects of "time" could be described as "an experience"? Then think about a "time" when nothing was there experiencing it. Those aspects of what we call "time" that are an experience, would not then be happening. To that extent, time would not be happening. I want to suggest that that element of time is really what time is. Edited by The Escapist on 04/11/08 - 05:23 AM
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Posted 04/10/08 - 07:08 PM:	#13
curiouschild wrote: You are completely wrong. Time needs a beginning in order to make sense. Our conception of beginning and end did not condense without reason. Context. A measurement has a start and a finish.* * More to this, but have no time.
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Posted 04/16/08 - 03:07 AM:	#14
Time seems to be a linear process that always moves forward and never backward. "Guaging change" is a good rationalization of time. But Einstein's theory of general relativity seems to show that spacetime is effected by gravity and accelerated speed. Example: a clock keeps slower time when the clock is moving than it does when sitting still on a desk. He also theorized that the presence of energy and matter or objects causes a curvature in time/space. Imo, spacetime is infinite, with no beginning or end (see symbol for infinity) and existed before the big bang(s). As a side, a new theory is emerging that there may have been two consective big bangs that occured within milliseconds of each other. Regarding the OPs statement: "Isn't it better to say that at some point in the past logic may or may not have come into existence? " Yes, I would have to say it is better considering that spacetime existed before man's logic and will likely exist long after man's logic ceases to exist. Edited by Gaia on 04/16/08 - 03:25 AM

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Posted 05/02/08 - 01:01 PM:	#15
Substances, which need nothing other than themselves in order to exist, are eternal. They persist over time and, through their combinations, explain everything that we observe. But if space-time is a substance, neither space nor time refer to anything that exists.

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Posted 05/03/08 - 03:13 PM:	#16
Kwalish Kid wrote: This is what we in the philosophy business call "begging the question". I'm sorry, what is fallacious about "nothing comes from nothing"? Isn't that an obvious deductive truth? And the logical implication of "nothing comes from nothing" is that "something cannot come from nothing". Existence is something, nonexistence is nothing, so existence cannot have come from non-existence to existence at some point in time T, thus making existence timeless. To claim otherwise is to commit an equally deadly fallacy, the reification of zero. And since you claim (with the pronoun 'we') to be in the philosophy business, at one point in time or another, your philosophy/logic instructors should have told you to give justification for your claims, when in rational discussion.
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Posted 05/03/08 - 07:13 PM:	#17
I don't think Time exists as a metaphysical reality but rather it is an interpreatation of how reality changes. Thus beggining and end are only chronological terms we use to categorize events and experience. It is nonsensical to say that time, as a metaphysical component, must have have beggining itself because due to our epistemological and empirical limits we are unable to verify when the beggining is. We have not experienced or have proof that there is an event that is an ultimate beggining, and it is equally nonesense to do the same with the end. Thus beggining and end cannot be measured or verified beyond our subjective experience, we can't apply the method on the universe accurately enough. So I conclude the chronological term "Beggining" and "End" are relative, there is no absolutes on "Beggining" and "End" for all form of existence. Every individual mind vary in their chronological experience, so much so that it is impossible to find the absolutes of "Beggining" in all of them. So, I conclude that "Beggining" is a time-relative term.

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Posted 05/04/08 - 06:55 AM:	#18
The suggestion that time had a "beginning" is as non-sensical as the suggestion that space has an "edge".
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Posted 05/07/08 - 07:00 AM:	#19
Time the concept has no beginning nor end. The current system of how we use to measure and gauge time is the only thing that has the beginning.. because it is a human method to measure time. Even if all things were unmoving, time would still exist, simply put it would just be that nothing would know it, so take it for what it is, because we weren't alive before we were born or before humanity began to measure time anyways.. There is always an infinitely long past and and infinitely long future.

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Posted 05/12/08 - 12:44 AM:	#20
Time is a measurement of change. If change exists, then it stands to reason that time would also. Science can now accurately determine the age of the universe by measuring the heat of microwaves from the decayed light that originated from a big bang. So if time is a measurement of change since the big bang's first trillionth of a second of existence, then it would seem to have some sort of an atomic beginning. However logic says that space and time existed before the big bang. I think one of the latest theories to explain that, is that time and gravity are looped or that they loop in and out of big bang like events. In that way, time could be infinite. Edited by Gaia on 05/12/08 - 01:29 AM

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