(September 9, 2013 at 2:07 pm)MindForgedManacle Wrote: Proponents of cosmological arguments usually have a supporting argument in an argument against an infinite past. This is off the top of my head, but I think it usually goes something like this:
Quote:1) An actual infinite can not exist, because an infinite series cannot be traversed.
2) A beginningless past is an actual infinite.
3) Therefore the past is not infinite, and there was an absolute beginning.
Honestly, I'm not entirely sure I have a gripe with the argument, but I've seen more mathematically-savvy people take issue with it and its proponents. Are there problems with proposing an infinite past?
Well.....lets start with a circle - find me the beginning.
Now consider time - we are used to it flowing in one direction from an earlier point to a later one. We therefore surmise time had a beginning and we can put that at the beginning of the universe (which is known as space/time). There is no before the beginning as time itself did not exist (nothing existing - as in nothingness).
Several thoughts going on from this include:
Suppose time is circular.
Was nothingness infinite? Can nothingness be infinite?
What if (as is proposed under Quantum Physics) nothingness is inherrently unstable?
Could a universe form in those circumstances (if the net energy state of the universe is zero)?
Without outside interference?
The answer to the last 4 is......apparently.
