Infinite Being

Devans99

Infinite existence within time… is it possible? Most of those who believe in infinity and presentism say yes. For example they often hold the view that matter/energy has existed ‘forever’.

A thought experiment is to examine the characteristics of an infinite being to see if it’s viable being or not. If an infinite being is not viable then maybe the infinite existence of the universe is not viable either?

So some characteristics of an infinite being:

1. No birth/coming into being event (obviously).

2. An infinite personal history.

3. At birth certain innate attributes are established permanently (like eye colour). For an infinite being, there is no time at which these attributes could have been established (cannot have been established infinity long ago as all events effecting the being must of taken place at finite period of time ago to class as an event).

4. The being would never be young: going back a billion years is just an infinitesimally small period of time compared to its infinite life span. No matter what finite period you go back in time, the being is not young.

5. The being has always experienced events. No matter how far we go back in time, the being experienced events. So it must have experienced some events greater than any number of years ago. Which is a contradiction (can’t be a number and greater than any number at the same time).

6. Everything it remembers would have happened a finite time ago (if it remembers an event, it would remember when the event occurred, IE some finite time ago). But some things are infinitely memorable (first sex etc…). Remembering the first of something would contradict its status as an infinite being - it would remember that it first had sex X years ago - meaning it must of had a finite life span after all.

7. In fact the first of everything is always memorable so its a general problem for an infinite being. More to the point, it would never have taken a first breath. Nor a second breath either, nor third, no breathing at all in fact.

By these considerations, an infinite being seems untenable. What does that imply for infinite time?

hachit

We humans think of things needing a beginning and an end. However you can always go back this leads to the idea of an infinite regress. Personally I think infinite regress is possible but not for matter. Thus is such a being dose exist it is not composed of matter.

Devans99

↪hachit

A counter argument:

A. An infinite regress has no initial cause (start).
B. That implies cause and effect don’t hold
C. So spontaneous matter/energy creation happens (eg by quantum fluctuations / Big Bangs).
D. So with infinite time, that implies we’d reach infinite matter/energy density everywhere in the universe.
E. So an infinite regress is not possible.

Also point 5 in the OP is a different argument against an infinite regress.

hachit

↪Devans99

ok, I miss that in point 5 my mistake.

C. So spontaneous matter/energy creation happens (eg by quantum fluctuations / Big Bangs)

Whenever this comes up there is always a question in my mind though, we're is all the negative mass. Yes spontaneous matter/energy creation happens but there is always positive and negative side.

Devans99

↪hachit

Quantum fluctuations on their own are meant to respect the conservation of energy, but its theorised that they can cause processes like eternal inflation / big bangs that generate matter/energy (in exchange for something else).

In the theory of eternal inflation, (positive) matter/energy is created in exchange for (negative) gravitational energy. So they say the universe has a (close to) net zero energy balance:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-energy_universe

fishfry

A. An infinite regress has no initial cause (start).
B. That implies cause and effect don’t hold — Devans99

No this is simply false. As usual, consider the order type of the integers:

..., -4, -3, -2, -1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, ...

Suppose each integer stands for a cause. so that event n causes event n + 1.

You now have a universe in which every single event, without exception, has a cause. There's simply no first cause. This example is standard in the literature.

Again:

* Every event has a cause; and

* There is no first cause.

What say you?

Rank Amateur

↪fishfry

So if I use your number line above . . . -4, -3, -2, -1, 0, +1, +2, +3, +4

Lets set the big bang at 0, and call it T0. So right now there is near unanimous scientific consensus for everything that has happened since literally a very small fraction of a second after T0.

Before that fraction of a second before T0, there is more fractured support, but still the overwhelming scientific view right now is the Universe is finite, there was nothing ( please lets not have 25 comments of what nothing is), there were no negative numbers. There is zero scientific consensus that i am aware of that on what the initial cause was.

But right now, in 2019, the existing science is the universe is finite, it had a beginning , and we don't know what caused the beginning.

And everything one would propose, no matter how scientific sounding it is, that says anything else - is an argument against the best current existing science.

tim wood

Infinite existence within time… is it possible? Most of those who believe in infinity and presentism say yes. — Devans99

Is it the infinite they believe in or the unbounded? Makes a difference. Do you know the difference?

Devans99

You now have a universe in which every single event, without exception, has a cause. — fishfry

I agree each event has a cause, the problem is the infinite regress as a whole has no cause. So it makes logical sense when viewed as a series of individual events but no sense when viewed as a whole system. Plus as I mentioned above, there is also this argument against an infinite regress:

The being has always experienced events. No matter how far we go back in time, the being experienced events. So it must have experienced some events greater than any number of years ago. Which is a contradiction (can’t be a number and greater than any number at the same time). — Devans99

Devans99

Is it the infinite they believe in or the unbounded? Makes a difference. Do you know the difference? — tim wood

We are talking about time so the being is:

- Actually infinite in the past (IE it stretches back forever) and potentially infinite (=finite but unbounded) in the future if you believe in presentism.
- Or actually infinite in both directions (if you believe in eternalism).

It's the past that is relevant for my arguments, so actual infinity is what I'm referring to.

tim wood

- Actually infinite in the past (IE it stretches back forever) — Devans99

How many times can you travel around a circle until you get to the end? Is that an infinite path?

matt

Do you think matter is finite? Because if matter is infinite that is all you need to grant the possibility of infinite being. Are we exhaustively reduced to mere matter? Because also if we say there is no infinite being than something must have come from nothing and that puts you in the position of rationalizing something from nothing.

Devans99

↪tim wood

Travelling around circle can be regarded as an example of potential infinity (/unbounded). But it's not really an infinite path: starting at 0˚, once 360˚ is reached, it is the same path being traversed again.

Devans99

↪matt

I think you can divide possible models of the universe into 4 basic classes:

1. 'Can’t get something from nothing' & 'Infinite Time' - for me this fails because an infinite regress seems impossible and infinite being seems impossible.

2. 'Can get something from nothing' & 'Infinite Time' - fails because I don't believe in spontaneous/natural matter creation and anyway even if that happened, it would lead to infinite matter density (when combined with infinite time).

3. 'Can’t get something from nothing' & 'Finite Time' - This model seems possible and is compatible with the Big Bang theory.

4. 'Can get something from nothing' & 'Finite Time' - This model seems unlikely as there would not be enough time for all the matter to be generated naturally from nothing.

tim wood

Travelling around circle can be regarded as an example of potential infinity (/unbounded). But it's not really an infinite path: starting at 0˚, once 360˚ is reached, it is the same path being traversed again. — Devans99

What do you mean "not really"? It is or it isn't, isn't it? Indeed, it's a conjecture of Hawking's that space-time is unbounded in just such a way, substituting a 4-D sphere for the circle, and space-time for Euclidian plane.

And there is the concept of a Poincare recurrence, which means that a system that has a finite number of states eventually "resets." That is, the universe, arguably and apparently having a finite entropy, resets. But how would anyone know? There's no marker for it.

Devans99

↪tim wood

What I mean is that the path on the circle (/its topology) is finite. You can carry on going around the loop potentially infinite times but the path itself is finite in extent.

Indeed, it's a conjecture of Hawking's that space-time is unbounded — tim wood

'This absence of boundaries means that the laws of physics would determine the state of the universe uniquely, in imaginary time. But if one knows the state of the universe in imaginary time, one can calculate the state of the universe in real time. One would still expect some sort of Big Bang singularity in real time. So real time would still have a beginning. But one wouldn't have to appeal to something outside the universe, to determine how the universe began. Instead, the way the universe started out at the Big Bang would be determined by the state of the universe in imaginary time. Thus, the universe would be a completely self-contained system. It would not be determined by anything outside the physical universe, that we observe. '

http://www.hawking.org.uk/the-beginning-of-time.html

Interesting stuff. I will do some more reading. Sounds like a finite time model to me.

Poincare recurrence theorem is usually referred to in the context of infinite time... entropy resets are required for some infinite time models but a Big Crunch seems a much more probable way of achieving it than recurrence?

coolguy8472

5. The being has always experienced events. No matter how far we go back in time, the being experienced events. So it must have experienced some events greater than any number of years ago. Which is a contradiction (can’t be a number and greater than any number at the same time). — Devans99

When following your reasoning people may agree with "So it must have experienced some events greater than any number of years ago." because they think you're saying this "So it must have experienced some events greater than any number [you select] of years ago.". Which is just a restatement of "No matter how far we go back in time, the being experienced events." There's a double meaning there. Granting this: "So it must have experienced some events greater than any number [you select] of years ago." is not implying the existence of a number greater than all numbers.

Devans99

Granting this: "So it must have experienced some events greater than any number [you select] of years ago." is not implying the existence of a number greater than all numbers. — coolguy8472

But how many events has the being experienced? If it always true that it is 'greater than any number we select', then we can conclude that 'the number of events the being has experienced is greater than any number'.

Unless we say that there is no number of event that the being has experienced because the being has no temporal start. But we know the being has experienced events so there must be a (total) number of events. Goes to show how things without starts don't make any sense.

Frank Apisa

↪Devans99

But we know the being has experienced events so there must be a (total) number of events. Goes to show how things without starts don't make any sense. — Devans99

So...NOTHING exists...right?

Things without starts make no sense to you...and you are saying that everything must have a start...so NOTHING can exist.

Unless, of course, you are making an exception to that "things without starts don't make any sense" thingy.

And if you are making an exception...

...why not make the exception be...

...EVERYTHING?

Devans99

↪Frank Apisa

Everything that exists in time needs a temporal start point. Things that exist outside of time don't.

Frank Apisa

↪Frank Apisa
Everything that exists in time needs a temporal start point. Things that exist outside of time don't. — Devans99

See my comment above.

nsmith

I feel that it is possible for an infinite being to exist, but this depends strongly on whether or not you believe that an infinite being can have a beginning, I think that its very possible for someone who would be considered a God to have been mortal and to have been born of mortal parents and to have achieved immortality and eternal life later in life.

Infinite Being

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