(April 25, 2016 at 11:36 am)Time Traveler Wrote:(April 24, 2016 at 9:53 am)Jehanne Wrote: Yeah, I don't know how Steve can claim that god is "timeless" and yet claim that it is absurd to make the same claim about the Universe, that is, it is also "timeless". For if god is "timeless", then, clearly, there must have been a "time" when god decided to create the Universe (hence, time), but Steve would have us believe that god's decision to create the Universe was simultaneous with god's acting to create the Universe which was simultaneous with the Universe's actual creation. So, three events all happened at the same time -- deciding, doing and result, and that is absurd!
There is a fourth absurdity with a timeless god, and that is that god's very existence couldn't have preceded the decision, action, and creation of the universe. Thus, if the universe had a beginning, so did god. If god is eternal, so then the universe. And given that we have evidence of the universe, but zero evidence for god, Occam's razor slices the unnecessary deity out like an unwanted tumor.
Jehanne, Do you see the irony that you are objecting to God based on logic and metaphysics that you want to deny exist when convenient to you?
If timelessness is not an essential, but rather a contingent characteristic of God, God could have decided to exist timelessly in the past and then decide to create the universe and in doing so became temporal.
Regarding claiming that God can be timeless so why can't the universe be, there is at least one big difference: The universe consist of physical "stuff" that is expanding. It cannot be past eternal. see here, where Vilenkin concludes, “there are no models at this time that provide a satisfactory model for a universe without a beginning.” God does not consist of stuff that is in a state of expansion and therefore had a beginning.
So, what do you have? You really have evidence of the universe having a beginning which is evidence of a transcendent cause.
