Eternal the originator of time - proof.

[Mystic]

Can you rewrite your argument such that it doesn't contain things it doesn't actually rely on? That makes it unnecessarily opaque.

I wrote the argument in a way that showed infinite regress is not possible in two ways. So if both arguments were shown to be false, then my argument would fail. And now I've written a third proof for time being finite. So all three would have to be refuted. And then there is an argument after that as to why a creator created it.

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Yes, effects don't always require a cause. 

[/quote]

Even if I were to concede for the sake of argument, than on smaller scale, effects occur without a cause (instead of saying these causes are yet unknown by science), still the over all effects in endless universe, all requires a cause, therefore the argument can be modified and seen in this light, and it would show the universe is not of infinite chain of cause and effects still.

Do you disagree with the modified argument?

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Before time, there is no 'always'.

Time started, whether we can say there is a before or not, doesn't really matter. It just couldn't have started from nothing. Physical things all require time to change and effect things or create things. Physical things could not have made time appear from nothing. Therefore it makes sense a Creator with will and power created it. To state there was no always, is to state nothingness always existed, then time began which is absurd.

[The Grand Nudger]

"Therefore" is a term usually reserved for those instances in which the preceding comments logically lead to what follows directly after it's use.  You seem to be having similar trouble with the word "proof". No need to thank me, yet another service I provide.

[bennyboy]

"Therefore" is a term usually reserved for those instances in which the preceding comments logically lead to what follows directly after it's use.  You seem to be having similar trouble with the word "proof".  No need to thank me, yet another service I provide.

ROFL

"You guys don't agree with me. . . therefore God. As I proved before, God exists because paradox makes me uncomfortable."

Word salad is fun!

[Chas]

Chas

Before time, there is no 'always'.

Time started, whether we can say there is a before or not, doesn't really matter. It just couldn't have started from nothing. Physical things all require time to change and effect things or create things. Physical things could not have made time appear from nothing. Therefore it makes sense a Creator with will and power created it. To state there was no always, is to state nothingness always existed, then time began which is absurd.

We don't know that time started.   There may have been time before the Big Bang.

You keep making a special pleading that you have a being that can act without time, but that is incoherent.

Pro tip:  Your incredulity is not an argument.

[Mystic]

We don't know that time started.   There may have been time before the Big Bang.

I've provided three arguments as to why time did start. 

[Whateverist]

A lot of people say, how do we know that infinite regress is not possible, and that there isn't an infinite chain of cause and effects.

A chain of effects is an effect.
An effect requires a cause.
A chain of effects thus requires a cause.


Now, a chain of infinite effects would be without cause right? But we know a chain of infinite effects is still a chain of effects and each of the effects requires a cause, the whole chains of effects all require a cause. Therefore it's by definition without a cause and with a cause, a contradiction, an impossibility.

Another thing is that it's as if every chain is a person in army that won't shoot unless the person next to him shoots. There being infinite people, all saying, they won't shoot unless the person next to him shoots. But there not being an actual one person who shoots without a person telling him, it would never actualize. 

Another argument is that all of time cannot be said to be eternal. That is the present of time, a lot of the time in the past, for sure is not eternal. It can also be said that no point in time is eternal. If no point in time is eternal, that it doesn't have an eternal existence. To say, "but a point of time always existed" is circular and is obviously wrong as no point of time is eternal and was the point of eternal beginning. 

Now with a beginning, there is beginning. Stating there is real no "before" the beginning, doesn't show that beginning is eternal and thus without cause. Therefore something that is eternal needs to cause the beginning. To say "what is more north then north pole" doesn't make sense, because eternalness is the utmost beginning of beginning, while a point of time, even the first, would need to come into being, and cannot cause itself. 

This shows there is an eternal cause who originated time.  But it's obvious a physical thing cannot simply create time and make the whole universe subservient to time, as it would need time to do that. 

It existing before things subject to time, is none physical being. 

Now this doesn't prove God, but this proves a Creator. And if you guys can accept a Creator to start with, perhaps, you will accept the knowledge of God and his Oneness as well.

Wait, tell me again what it is that brought about an eternal being.  If you have no problem imagining an eternal agent why can't you imagine an eternal state of affairs which is beyond our poor powers to understand?  Just because our powers of reason -which were no doubt selected for by their power to put dinner on the table and keep the enemy at bay- lead us to understand things this way doesn't mean reality has to conform to our categories of understanding.  

It is well and good to describe everything that happens as effect but that is a description.  If I was as impressed with the necessity of cause and effect as you seem to be, I'd be much more concerned with what brought about an eternal causer.  If at any point you are prepared to throw up your hands and say "well that just came from an eternal being", then you might just as well say it is beyond our reach to know what to think about all this.  I have more confidence in the world's existence as we find it than I do the necessity of the world conforming to the categories of our though processes.

[FreeTony]

This shows there is an eternal cause who originated time.  But it's obvious a physical thing cannot simply create time and make the whole universe subservient to time, as it would need time to do that. 

It existing before things subject to time, is none physical being. 

Now this doesn't prove God, but this proves a Creator.

Although the first parts of your argument would mean that you know more about the universe and time than leading physicists, the biggest problem is the above.

It is nothing more than stating "A god did it because it must have been a god that did it" through use of incredible sloppy and changing definitions.

[Mudhammam]

As an aside to mystic's failed attempts to logically validate his faith, why would anyone think that, even if the premises and conclusions were demonstrably valid and sound, we would have any obligation to this "creator" entity, or that the next rational step would be to worship it? There would be no differences as far as we are concerned between this object and our nearest star, the Sun, except that one is material and knowable as our immediate creator, and the other is immaterial, unknowable, and distantly related as cause. The Sun is for all intensive purposes directly responsible for all of our experiences. It provides the energy for life to emerge and replicate, provides us with light to perceive our surroundings, and hence, conceive of all other objects in the universe, including hypothetical entities like Poseidon and Allah and unmoved movers. Without the Sun nothing in our solar system would exist. But we don't worship it... anymore. How is mystic's stance towards his incomprehensible first cause essentially any different, i.e. less irrational, than Sun worship?

[Pizza]

The answer is because magic books say we should worship God.

The gap between generic theism and the god of Abrahamic religion or any religion is as big as the sun.

[Mystic]

As an aside to mystic's failed attempts to logically validate his faith, why would anyone think that, even if the premises and conclusions were demonstrably valid and sound, we would have any obligation to this "creator" entity, or that the next rational step would be to worship it? There would be no differences as far as we are concerned between this object and our nearest star, the Sun, except that one is material and knowable as our immediate creator, and the other is immaterial, unknowable, and distantly related as cause. The Sun is for all intensive purposes directly responsible for all of our experiences. It provides the energy for life to emerge and replicate, provides us with light to perceive our surroundings, and hence, conceive of all other objects in the universe, including hypothetical entities like Poseidon and Allah and unmoved movers. Without the Sun nothing in our solar system would exist. But we don't worship it... anymore. How is mystic's stance towards his incomprehensible first cause essentially any different, i.e. less irrational, than Sun worship?

I already stated that this a proof for a Creator, not God. However, if we were to ponder over our own nature and the world, we would see benevolent will, yet we would see a trial in a world where we are tried by good and evil, blessings and affliction. The very nature of love, goodness, and honor shows we been given opportunity to become something worthy and this is obviously not from a neutral or evil being. The honorable possible ranks we can walk through is obviously a possibility. It's not far off to see that morality was not just created from nothing but has a basis in an eternal reality, the creator himself. God himself cannot decide the nature of goodness, but he himself is rather the ultimate nature of goodness by which he has knowledge of it and the opposite of it.  When we realize the origin of goodness is God...then this is not far off to see.  It's not far off to see praise belong to God, God being the source and basis of it, and by which it get's it's reality. Seeing benevolent will in creation, it's not far off, that as humans stray off the path, become irrational, do not think and reflect properly, books reminding us of our spiritual reality, our purpose, emphasizing advice and reminders, be sent by the creator. Aside from that, it's not far off to see God help his elite friends in guiding to the truth by manifesting their leadership and appointing them as guides.  They being the most fit for leadership and having the wisdom, it's not far off to see God guide us by them.  In fact, everything becomes easy to see once you acknowledge a creator. The nature of darkness and light becomes obvious when you accept a spiritual creator to the universe, and light having infinite possible ranks points to the Creator being the utmost absolute light possessing all possible light.