[quote]kamui wrote:
the terms “before the universe” are meaningless.
by definition, the universe is the totality of everything that exists. space and time included.
therefore there is no “before the universe” and no “outside the universe”
[/quote]
You might find this interesting
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
Essentially, time is a natural law of the universe. You cannot apply it to things outside the universe. You cannot define the existence of the universe using internal components. If you tried to, you’d have nothing more than a circular definition.[/quote]
“You cannot apply it to things outside the universe. You cannot define the existence of the universe using internal components.”
Now that is an interesting statment…[/quote]
It’s just another way of saying that science will never be able to fully understand everything to perfection, not because of human lacking the ability to do so, but rather, the perspective.
I agree with that concept very much. (And appreciate it just as much)
What comprises space if there is no matter, antimatter, or energy present?
Isn’t it possible the unpredictability of the double slit experiment is caused by randomness rather than ignorance?
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
If nothingness is the absence of everything, we have no way of knowing what it is.
The concept of nothingness is therefore meaningless.
Infinity, well, just imagine that any point in the universe is the centre, and that’s it.
![/quote]
Ugh, ephrem! You know better than that! They have the good shit at the coffee shop?
Infinity isn’t a concept it is a reality. There are an infinite amount of numbers, infinite possibilities, infinite variations, etc. The universe, has a size, shape and origin. There is a before and there may very well be an after.
Real big doesn’t mean infinite.
Nothingness, ironically does mean something. It is the absence of existence. That is not meaningless, that is a critically important definition. [/quote]
Reading comprehension; you’re lacking it.
Nothingness is meaningless because it doesn’t exist. We can’t measure it, see it, experience it in any way.
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
It is as I thought. And it spins me out.
Fair to say that something has always existed, then?
If so, then existence is so fascinating, creepy, inspiring, and mind-boggling and I’m infinitely sad that I may never “know the answer” (is if there ever was one!)
[/quote]
Pat will contend that this something that always existed is god. But god is unnecessary here because there’s no reason to assume the universe did not always exist.
It did not exist in the form we experience it now, but that doesn’t matter.
If god does not need a cause, the universe does not need one either.
[quote]forlife wrote:
What comprises space if there is no matter, antimatter, or energy present?
Isn’t it possible the unpredictability of the double slit experiment is caused by randomness rather than ignorance?[/quote]
Within the confines of the universe there is no such thing are nothingness. There’s evidence within the Cosmic Background Radiation of states of existence prior to the BigBang: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/66525/title/Cosmic_rebirth
And even multiple universes: New Evidence that Mysterious Dark Force From Outside Tugs at Our Universe
[quote]forlife wrote:
What comprises space if there is no matter, antimatter, or energy present?
[/quote]
Why does it have to be made of something? There is a medium matter can travel through. It can be measured and manipulated. It isn’t nothing.
[quote]
Isn’t it possible the unpredictability of the double slit experiment is caused by randomness rather than ignorance?[/quote]
No, there is still a cause effect relationship, it just can’t be directly identified until after the event.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
Infinity, well, just imagine that any point in the universe is the centre, and that’s it.
![/quote]
I really like that explanation.
it’s a very old definition of God in the hermetic tradition
“Deus est sphaera infinita, cuius centrum est ubique, circumferentia nusquam”
“God is an infinite sphere, whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere”
latter, Blaise Pascal said the same thing about Nature.
[quote]swoleupinya wrote:
This is a useful definition of time for our every day dealings, but like I said it is not definitively how time is treated or viewed in terms of its effect on the physical world.
No. There are definitely things/events that will never be observable to us, not even given an infinite amount of time to attempt to observe them. The universe is expanding in all directions at increasing speeds. In order for us to be able to observe all things eventually, the universe would need to only be expanding away from us. However, we are part of that expansion.
if an object is moving away from us at more than half the speed of light, and we are moving away from that same object at more than half the speed of light… then, light will never overcome the distance between the two. Or, something like that… I can’t remember exactly what divisor of the speed of light defines this phenomenon… there is also a distance component.
The pace of time may not be absolute, but the direction of time creates absolute terms. The direction of time may in fact differ in various regions of the universe, or in differing universes in a multiverse scenario. However, the directional nature of time sets up defined behaviors/phenomena which determine how other forces (gravity, electromagnetism, etc…) behave.
Time and other forces like gravity do have relative qualities, but this does not mean that they are irrelevant or imaginary. It means that they effect the physical world relative to other forces.
[/quote]
The speed of light in a vacuum is constant relative to EVERY inertial reference frame. So imagine 2 spaceships take of from earth each going .9c in opposite directions. Relative to earth they are going .9c, but because the speed of light is constant, the spaceships would still be visible to eachother. Light would leave spaceship A at c and get to spaceship B at c. Their speed relative to eachother changes to uphold the constant speed of light so it isn’t .9c+.9c=1.8c, it is roughly .99c. This is special relativity and time dilation (time slows down as relative speeds increase).
[quote]Fezzik wrote:
[quote]swoleupinya wrote:
This is a useful definition of time for our every day dealings, but like I said it is not definitively how time is treated or viewed in terms of its effect on the physical world.
No. There are definitely things/events that will never be observable to us, not even given an infinite amount of time to attempt to observe them. The universe is expanding in all directions at increasing speeds. In order for us to be able to observe all things eventually, the universe would need to only be expanding away from us. However, we are part of that expansion.
if an object is moving away from us at more than half the speed of light, and we are moving away from that same object at more than half the speed of light… then, light will never overcome the distance between the two. Or, something like that… I can’t remember exactly what divisor of the speed of light defines this phenomenon… there is also a distance component.
The pace of time may not be absolute, but the direction of time creates absolute terms. The direction of time may in fact differ in various regions of the universe, or in differing universes in a multiverse scenario. However, the directional nature of time sets up defined behaviors/phenomena which determine how other forces (gravity, electromagnetism, etc…) behave.
Time and other forces like gravity do have relative qualities, but this does not mean that they are irrelevant or imaginary. It means that they effect the physical world relative to other forces.
[/quote]
The speed of light in a vacuum is constant relative to EVERY inertial reference frame. So imagine 2 spaceships take of from earth each going .9c in opposite directions. Relative to earth they are going .9c, but because the speed of light is constant, the spaceships would still be visible to eachother. Light would leave spaceship A at c and get to spaceship B at c. Their speed relative to eachother changes to uphold the constant speed of light so it isn’t .9c+.9c=1.8c, it is roughly .99c. This is special relativity and time dilation (time slows down as relative speeds increase).[/quote]
Yeah, this was my understanding when I studied modern physics some years back. I was wondering if there was something relating to the expansion of space itself that could pseudo violate this and 2 objects could not observe each other. There is no way I know of currently that massed bodies can move apart in a way that prevents eventual viewing. Hence why I asked if he had something to read.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
It is as I thought. And it spins me out.
Fair to say that something has always existed, then?
If so, then existence is so fascinating, creepy, inspiring, and mind-boggling and I’m infinitely sad that I may never “know the answer” (is if there ever was one!)
[/quote]
Pat will contend that this something that always existed is god. But god is unnecessary here because there’s no reason to assume the universe did not always exist.
It did not exist in the form we experience it now, but that doesn’t matter.
If god does not need a cause, the universe does not need one either.[/quote]
That’s called circular reasoning, we’ve been over that ad nauseam. Further, we have pretty good scientific proof the universe is about 13.7 billion years old. Something that has a begining is not eternal. Because the Prime Mover must necessarily be eternal doesn’t mean creation must also be eternal, one is not the other.
[quote]forlife wrote:
What comprises space if there is no matter, antimatter, or energy present?
Isn’t it possible the unpredictability of the double slit experiment is caused by randomness rather than ignorance?[/quote]
What’s unpredictable about the double slit experiment? If you shoot enough electrons at it the slits you will get a interference pattern every time with out fail…That’s pretty damn predictable.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
If nothingness is the absence of everything, we have no way of knowing what it is.
The concept of nothingness is therefore meaningless.
Infinity, well, just imagine that any point in the universe is the centre, and that’s it.
![/quote]
Ugh, ephrem! You know better than that! They have the good shit at the coffee shop?
Infinity isn’t a concept it is a reality. There are an infinite amount of numbers, infinite possibilities, infinite variations, etc. The universe, has a size, shape and origin. There is a before and there may very well be an after.
Real big doesn’t mean infinite.
Nothingness, ironically does mean something. It is the absence of existence. That is not meaningless, that is a critically important definition. [/quote]
Reading comprehension; you’re lacking it.
Nothingness is meaningless because it doesn’t exist. We can’t measure it, see it, experience it in any way. [/quote]
The definition of nothing has a meaning, and therefore is not meaningless. Sometthing meaningless has no definition. It cannot mean anything. We actually came up with a word to represent that which isn’t.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
It is as I thought. And it spins me out.
Fair to say that something has always existed, then?
If so, then existence is so fascinating, creepy, inspiring, and mind-boggling and I’m infinitely sad that I may never “know the answer” (is if there ever was one!)
[/quote]
Pat will contend that this something that always existed is god. But god is unnecessary here because there’s no reason to assume the universe did not always exist.
It did not exist in the form we experience it now, but that doesn’t matter.
If god does not need a cause, the universe does not need one either.[/quote]
That’s called circular reasoning, we’ve been over that ad nauseam. Further, we have pretty good scientific proof the universe is about 13.7 billion years old. Something that has a begining is not eternal. Because the Prime Mover must necessarily be eternal doesn’t mean creation must also be eternal, one is not the other.[/quote]
The universe changed, over time, from a singularity to our current state. Using your logic, just after the B.B. the universe did not yet exist because it did not have the same properties it has now.
The fact that the universe changed substantially, and will continue to change substantially over time, does not mean it’s not eternal.
All it means is that it changed.
For all we now, and that assumption is just as valid as a god, the universe simply expand and collapses into a singularity, and has done this for all eternity; without beginning and without end.
This scenario is just a plausible, and even more so, than your god-scenario.
[quote]Fezzik wrote:
[quote]swoleupinya wrote:
This is a useful definition of time for our every day dealings, but like I said it is not definitively how time is treated or viewed in terms of its effect on the physical world.
No. There are definitely things/events that will never be observable to us, not even given an infinite amount of time to attempt to observe them. The universe is expanding in all directions at increasing speeds. In order for us to be able to observe all things eventually, the universe would need to only be expanding away from us. However, we are part of that expansion.
if an object is moving away from us at more than half the speed of light, and we are moving away from that same object at more than half the speed of light… then, light will never overcome the distance between the two. Or, something like that… I can’t remember exactly what divisor of the speed of light defines this phenomenon… there is also a distance component.
The pace of time may not be absolute, but the direction of time creates absolute terms. The direction of time may in fact differ in various regions of the universe, or in differing universes in a multiverse scenario. However, the directional nature of time sets up defined behaviors/phenomena which determine how other forces (gravity, electromagnetism, etc…) behave.
Time and other forces like gravity do have relative qualities, but this does not mean that they are irrelevant or imaginary. It means that they effect the physical world relative to other forces.
[/quote]
The speed of light in a vacuum is constant relative to EVERY inertial reference frame. So imagine 2 spaceships take of from earth each going .9c in opposite directions. Relative to earth they are going .9c, but because the speed of light is constant, the spaceships would still be visible to eachother. Light would leave spaceship A at c and get to spaceship B at c. Their speed relative to eachother changes to uphold the constant speed of light so it isn’t .9c+.9c=1.8c, it is roughly .99c. This is special relativity and time dilation (time slows down as relative speeds increase).[/quote]
Yes, each spaceship would be visible to one another, but the last image you will have of the other space ship is when there collective speeds hit the 1c threshold. Neither spaceship will have a current image of each other.
You know now that I think about it I don’t know if that last image would stay or if it would go away.
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
If nothingness is the absence of everything, we have no way of knowing what it is.
The concept of nothingness is therefore meaningless.
Infinity, well, just imagine that any point in the universe is the centre, and that’s it.
![/quote]
Ugh, ephrem! You know better than that! They have the good shit at the coffee shop?
Infinity isn’t a concept it is a reality. There are an infinite amount of numbers, infinite possibilities, infinite variations, etc. The universe, has a size, shape and origin. There is a before and there may very well be an after.
Real big doesn’t mean infinite.
Nothingness, ironically does mean something. It is the absence of existence. That is not meaningless, that is a critically important definition. [/quote]
Reading comprehension; you’re lacking it.
Nothingness is meaningless because it doesn’t exist. We can’t measure it, see it, experience it in any way. [/quote]
The definition of nothing has a meaning, and therefore is not meaningless. Sometthing meaningless has no definition. It cannot mean anything. We actually came up with a word to represent that which isn’t.[/quote]
This is dissapointing pat.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
[quote]Fezzik wrote:
[quote]swoleupinya wrote:
This is a useful definition of time for our every day dealings, but like I said it is not definitively how time is treated or viewed in terms of its effect on the physical world.
No. There are definitely things/events that will never be observable to us, not even given an infinite amount of time to attempt to observe them. The universe is expanding in all directions at increasing speeds. In order for us to be able to observe all things eventually, the universe would need to only be expanding away from us. However, we are part of that expansion.
if an object is moving away from us at more than half the speed of light, and we are moving away from that same object at more than half the speed of light… then, light will never overcome the distance between the two. Or, something like that… I can’t remember exactly what divisor of the speed of light defines this phenomenon… there is also a distance component.
The pace of time may not be absolute, but the direction of time creates absolute terms. The direction of time may in fact differ in various regions of the universe, or in differing universes in a multiverse scenario. However, the directional nature of time sets up defined behaviors/phenomena which determine how other forces (gravity, electromagnetism, etc…) behave.
Time and other forces like gravity do have relative qualities, but this does not mean that they are irrelevant or imaginary. It means that they effect the physical world relative to other forces.
[/quote]
The speed of light in a vacuum is constant relative to EVERY inertial reference frame. So imagine 2 spaceships take of from earth each going .9c in opposite directions. Relative to earth they are going .9c, but because the speed of light is constant, the spaceships would still be visible to eachother. Light would leave spaceship A at c and get to spaceship B at c. Their speed relative to eachother changes to uphold the constant speed of light so it isn’t .9c+.9c=1.8c, it is roughly .99c. This is special relativity and time dilation (time slows down as relative speeds increase).[/quote]
Yeah, this was my understanding when I studied modern physics some years back. I was wondering if there was something relating to the expansion of space itself that could pseudo violate this and 2 objects could not observe each other. There is no way I know of currently that massed bodies can move apart in a way that prevents eventual viewing. Hence why I asked if he had something to read.[/quote]
Well, since nobody seems to have bothered to read the link I posted, here is the pertinent section:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
It is as I thought. And it spins me out.
Fair to say that something has always existed, then?
If so, then existence is so fascinating, creepy, inspiring, and mind-boggling and I’m infinitely sad that I may never “know the answer” (is if there ever was one!)
[/quote]
Pat will contend that this something that always existed is god. But god is unnecessary here because there’s no reason to assume the universe did not always exist.
It did not exist in the form we experience it now, but that doesn’t matter.
If god does not need a cause, the universe does not need one either.[/quote]
That’s called circular reasoning, we’ve been over that ad nauseam. Further, we have pretty good scientific proof the universe is about 13.7 billion years old. Something that has a begining is not eternal. Because the Prime Mover must necessarily be eternal doesn’t mean creation must also be eternal, one is not the other.[/quote]
The universe changed, over time, from a singularity to our current state. Using your logic, just after the B.B. the universe did not yet exist because it did not have the same properties it has now.
The fact that the universe changed substantially, and will continue to change substantially over time, does not mean it’s not eternal.
All it means is that it changed.
For all we now, and that assumption is just as valid as a god, the universe simply expand and collapses into a singularity, and has done this for all eternity; without beginning and without end.
This scenario is just a plausible, and even more so, than your god-scenario.
[/quote]
Where’d this singularity come from, nothing?
[quote]pat wrote:
[quote]ephrem wrote:
[quote]Magicpunch wrote:
It is as I thought. And it spins me out.
Fair to say that something has always existed, then?
If so, then existence is so fascinating, creepy, inspiring, and mind-boggling and I’m infinitely sad that I may never “know the answer” (is if there ever was one!)
[/quote]
Pat will contend that this something that always existed is god. But god is unnecessary here because there’s no reason to assume the universe did not always exist.
It did not exist in the form we experience it now, but that doesn’t matter.
If god does not need a cause, the universe does not need one either.[/quote]
That’s called circular reasoning, we’ve been over that ad nauseam. Further, we have pretty good scientific proof the universe is about 13.7 billion years old. Something that has a begining is not eternal. Because the Prime Mover must necessarily be eternal doesn’t mean creation must also be eternal, one is not the other.[/quote]
13.7 billion years old in relation to the big bang. This does not preclude the possibility that there was a previous contraction or a long period of relative entropic equilibrium before this. Also, the “age” of the universe that you’ve stated here is highly debatable, and there remain issues with objects that appear significantly older than their position warrants.
Also, at the risk of understanding Ephrem 
He was not reasoning out a proof. he was reasoning out a plausibility.