Would it be easier to imagine a universe with only one thing if that one thing were a simple, point-like object, with no spatial extension or internal structure? — Arkady

Which is, as I mentioned, very much like 'the singularity' that preceded the big bang, isn't it? Georges LeMaitre's original paper was called, I seem to recall, 'the hypothesis of the primeval atom'.

A simpleton universe could just be 'one' "thing" in it's entirety (indivisible.... — jorndoe

Something indivisible can't have dimensions.

So I'm still waiting for you to make sense of this. Can you explain how something comes into existence from absolutely nothing?

Can you explain how something comes into existence from absolutely nothing? — Metaphysician Undercover

There wouldn't be some mechanism or cause to it, would there?

Something indivisible can't have dimensions. — Wayfarer

It could be physically indivisible with dimensions. That you could imagine dividing it isn't the same thing.

No, these are the conditions of your thought experiment. When 9:31 "disappears", there is absolutely nothing. Can you explain 9:32 coming into existence from absolutely nothing?

That's where I cannot agree with your concept of "change", and I am insisting that it is not the proper concept of "change". You misunderstand "change", and resist any attempt to understand the concept of "change" in the conventional way.

Can you explain 9:32 coming into existence from absolutely nothing? — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, this is asking for a cause (otherwise explain what it's asking). But if there's no cause, one can't give a cause.

At any rate, it seems like you don't really get the fundamental concept of a thought experiment, as you're wondering how it could obtain in the real world.

It could be physically indivisible with dimensions. — Terrapin Station

If it has dimensions, then how can it be a simple unity? That is exactly what 'the atom' was supposed to be.

Can you explain how something comes into existence from absolutely nothing? — Metaphysician Undercover

A note on this from a modern Catholic philosopher

[According to Aquinas] ...the Creator does not create something out of nothing in the sense of taking some nothing and making something out of it. This is a conceptual mistake, for it treats nothing as a something. On the contrary, the Christian doctrine of Creation ex nihilo claims that God made the universe without making it out of anything. In other words, anything left entirely to itself, completely separated from the cause of its existence, would not exist—it would be absolutely nothing. The ultimate cause of the existence of anything and everything is God who creates—not out of some nothing, but from nothing at all.

Thomas Aquinas vs Intelligent Design, Michael W. Tkacz.

If it has dimensions, then how can it be a simple unity? — Wayfarer

By it being physically impossible to divide it, and by it having no smaller parts.

At any rate, it seems like you don't really get the fundamental concept of a thought experiment, as you're wondering how it could obtain in the real world. — Terrapin Station

Your thought experiment was introduced to explain how you understand "change". If it demonstrates that "change" is something which cannot obtain in the real world, then why not switch, and start to understand "change" in the conventional way? That's why philosophers had to conceive of "change" in the way that they did, to represent what happens in the real world.

Your thought experiment was introduced to explain how you understand "change". — Metaphysician Undercover

No, not at all. It was introduced to counter some odd things that you were saying.

Change can logically obtain with two events that have no causal connection to each other and that aren't states of some other thing. The thought experiment is a very simple logical case of this.

Change can logically obtain with two events that have no causal connection to each other and that aren't states of some other thing. — Terrapin Station

You're changing the subject. What was at issue was the question of whether it is necessary to assume a third thing, relative to the two different states of change. You claimed a change could be relative to itself.

So when the clock changed from 9:31 to 9:32, it was "the clock" which was that third thing. Then you replaced "the clock" with "the clock face". Then you replaced "the clock face" with "succession", assuming that there was just the numbers following each other in "succession", without the clock face.

Now you appear to want to change the subject altogether and talk about "cause". But as Aristotle demonstrated, "cause" is far to ambiguous, requiring us to distinguish many distinct usages.

You're changing the subject. — Metaphysician Undercover

It's not changing the subject. You're just not following along very well. Again, the thought experiment was a means of countering some strange tangents on your part--a service for attempting to help you focus, on the charitable interpretation that you're not just trolling. It didn't work very well for helping you to understand anything, which isn't surprising, but again, I'd not bet that you're not just trolling, either. I'm willing to maintain the attempt, though. But I don't know how arguing over whether the "subject is being changed" is going to help you understand anything.

Change can logically obtain with two events that have no causal connection to each other and that aren't states of some other thing. — Terrapin Station

I've read this about five or more times now and I still can't figure out what you're trying to say. You're talking about two events with no causal connection. Am I not correct to assume that "an event", being a happening, is itself a change? So you are talking about two distinct changes, with no causal connection to each other. I would say that each of these changes, in order that they are changes, must be related to some other thing. It is not necessary that they both be related to the same thing though, and since they are not causally related, they are probably not related to the same thing.

You're just not following along very well. — Terrapin Station

That's right, you've gone from being difficult to understand, to being extremely difficult to understand.

Am I not correct to assume that "an event", being a happening, is itself a change? — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm using "event" so that it's the same as "state of affairs."

I would say that each of these changes, in order that they are changes, must be related to some other thing. — Metaphysician Undercover

I know you think that, but I just don't know why you do . . . I'm guessing that it's something that Aristotle must have said. It doesn't seem to be something we could move you away from without a lot of work.

I know you think that, but I just don't know why you do . . . — Terrapin Station

I explained it all to you, though you refused to acknowledge. You couldn't give me an example of a change which wasn't related to some other thing. Finally, you gave me an example of something coming from nothing, but you admitted that this wasn't a "real world" change.

So I'll reiterate my claim. You simply refuse to understand "change", insisting on some fantasy notion of "change" which is does not correspond to real world changes.

It doesn't seem to be something we could move you away from without a lot of work. — Terrapin Station

I suggest that if you want to move me away from the concept of "change" which I presently understand, that you either show how it is incorrect, or you come up with a better one. I admit that the concept has some problems (which we haven't yet touched upon because you haven't gotten to the point of understanding the concept well enough to apprehend the problems). Insisting on a notion of change which doesn't at all correspond to how change actually occurs in the world is not helpful.

If you're not trolling, it's inexplicable that you got as far as you did studying philosophy while having basically zero understanding of the idea of thought experiments. Thought experiments are presenting fictional/fantasy scenarios, but they're not presenting fictional/fantasy conceptual clarification . . . although it's pretty amusing that you're (at leat pretending to be) reading it that way.

As I recall the purpose of your thought experiment was to demonstrate a change which could be occurring without being relative to something else. If such a change is fictional/fantasy, and could not be conceived of as occurring in the real world (I.e. is impossible), then what purpose does the thought experiment serve? It appears like your thought experiment is just an exercise of your imagination, a practise of fantasy. Unless you can make sense of something coming from nothing, how is that thought experiment supposed to add anything to our discussion?

My training in philosophy did not include fiction/fantasy. One could study fiction/fantasy in the department of literature.