new visitor with a logic question

I am new to the site, and much like a good book, I have been unable to stop reading here since I started.. anyway, I found this site from a link on one of the threads here... http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7273/GodExists.htmlI've read through this, and I know that some of you more capable minds can help me with this. Postulate 4 and 5 really bother me,Quote"4. History has its end in the present. (The future is not history.) So if the past was of infinite duration, an infinity came to its end. But this is a self-contradiction.".Basically he's saying that an infinity as a concept is a paradox. He has a diagram of a timeline in his expansion of premise 4 that shows a timeline with 0 at present and infinity in the past and he says if we have an infinite past we can never reach the present. What are the fallacies of this argument, there is obviously at least one.To me it seems as though he is attempting to grasp the concept of infinity, which is in fact uncomprehendable. anyway, just looking for some input to help me understand why this is wrong.

Well that's a silly argument.The negative integers end at -1 (everything greater than zero is positive, and zero is usually counted as positive).If the argument is correct then it must follow that there are only a finite number of negative integers.Since we know that there are an infinite number of negative integers the assertion that infinities cannot end is false. Infinities can in fact have *one* end.

History doesn't end in the present since the present itself is not static and probably an illusion anyway.[This message has been edited by sidelined, 10-10-2003]

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History has its end in the present.

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Why do you say that?If you walk from the kitchen to the living room, does the living room not exist before your reach it?

4 doesn't follow, and 5 doesn't imply 6. Finally, even if the argument worked it would not demonstrate the existence of a god as we generally understood it, merely of a 'universe-creator', that may or may not be supernatural, and may or may not, be divine.

There's nothing "uncomprehendable" (incomprehensible is the word you're looking for, btw) about infinity. It's simply the name for the phenomoneon that there's no largest or smallest number.Anyway if cosmology is to be believed there's no infinite past. The universe has non-infinite age. We know thi must be so, in fact, because (as John pointed out once) if the universe was infinitely large or old, it would be so large that there would be a star at some distance at every point in the night sky, and the night sky would be blindingly bright as an infinite number stars shone infinite light onto the earth.

crash.. I don't understadn this statement"if the universe was infinitely large or old, it would be so large that there would be a star at some distance at every point in the night sky, and the night sky would be blindingly bright as an infinite number stars shone infinite light onto the earth."If the universe were infinite, does that necessarily mean that it must be filled with mass in the form of stars, and by the same token if the universe is infinite, we would never see most of the stars or matter, or whatever is out there because it would take an infinite amount of time for the light to reach us. That is a parallel to premise 4 of the argument in my first post. I'm playing devils advocate because I want someone to explain why this doesn't hold water.

Yes, but if the universe is infinitely old, then that's not a problem - we'd see an infinite amount of light coming from an infinite number of stars, for an infinite amount of time, in every direction.Basically imagine sight-lines extending from your eyes out into the universe. There's no direction you can direct your gaze where your sight-line doesn't intersect with a star - with an infinite number of stars behind it.The idea of an infinite, eternal universe is fun but it's contrary to observation. So one of several possibilities must be true:1) The universe is infinite but not eternal; it has a terminus at both ends of time.2) The universe is infinite and eternal in the future only - the universe will always exist though it has not always existed.3) The universe is finite in both time and space, but unbounded in the three spacial dimensions we percieve (so that it's not possible to travel to the "edge" of the universe).I favor the last one, myself. I don't think infinity is actually a thing that can exist in any physical sense.[This message has been edited by crashfrog, 10-10-2003]

What I reckon this person is doing is using the concept of actual as opposed to potential infinites.Potential infinity being more like a process e.g like the counting numbers.Actual infinity is a concept that I haven't really heard outside of a theological or philosophical framework (can't say I ever came across it in the Maths I studied, but then you don't need to study Cantor for a Physics degree). Think of infinity as a number. That's pretty much your actual infinity.Having made up this concept, the argument runs "can actual infinities exist in our own universe?" to which the answer is "can't really think of any".Although.....if the Universe were eternal, then time itself would count as an actual infinite.There are some properties of actual infinity which can be derived, although I've been loathe to look at this in any depth. It is, I'm told, impossible to traverse an actual infinite, meaning that you'd never be able to say "this is now!". You can definitely say "this is now!", therefore the Universe is not itself an actual infinite in terms of time and therefore cannot be eternal.Myself, I prefer to look at the evidence.PE

baileyr250 writes:

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anyway, just looking for some input to help me understand why this is wrong.

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It's because he doesn't understand infinity.His basic error is, essentially, "one cannot count to infinity."Well, actually, you can.Here's a thought experiment from my second-year calculus class as we got into infinite sequences and series and fundamental concepts of mathematics.For this thought experiment, you will need to assume a few things:1) Superman and Captain Marvel both exist and can move any positive amount of distance in any positive amount of time.
2) An infinite number of coconuts are in a pile, each numbered, starting with #1 and going on.
3) A pit exists next to the pile capable of holding all the coconuts.OK, here we go.Superman and Captain Marvel are having lunch one day when they decide to play a game with this infinite pile of coconuts. Superman throws coconuts #1 and #2 into the pit and at precisely 12:00 noon Captain Marvel flies in, grabs coconut #1, and tosses it out.They then sit around for half an hour, talking about the various ways they've saved the world, eating their lunch, etc. Superman throws in coconuts #3 and #4 and at precisely 12:30 pm, Captain Marvel flies in, grabs coconut #2, and tosses it out.This time, they sit around for fifteen minutes and in go #5 and #6 and precisely at 12:45 pm, out comes #3.They repeat this process, always halving the amount of time they wait around.Question: When 1:00 pm comes around, and 1:00 pm always comes around, how many coconuts are in the pit?Answer: None. For every coconut you wish to name, I can give you a precise time when it got thrown out of the pit. The first one came out at noon. Then #2 came out at 12:30 pm. #3 was at 12:45. #4 was at 12:52:30. And so on and so forth.There...you just counted to infinity and it only took you an hour.For an interesting twist, they play the game again the next day but reverse roles and change the rules:Captain Marvel throws in #1 and #2 and at precisely 12:00 noon, Superman flies in, grabs #1, and tosses it out. After half an hour, CM throws in #3 and #4 and Supes grabs #3 and tosses it out. After fifteen minutes, #5 and #6 go in and #5 comes out.Question: When 1:00 pm comes around, and 1:00 pm always comes around, how many coconuts are in the pit?Answer: An infinite number. All the even-numbered ones, to be exact.How very strange.As crash says, infinity is not incomprehensible. You just need to be careful about how you go about handling it.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

The gentleman at this website needs to explain the following for his own sanity.If God is in the present then by the same arguement God would have to have a beginning which means we enter into what created God... Ad Nauseum.

I certainly *can* understand infinity to the extent that in a slight of flesh and body and evolutionist with a mite of Hume knowledge may with a feeling for a certain reading of the time of atomism halve this magnitude per time where extinction does not occurr -1/2 eternity of the future. This may be why after I failed to be brought in the fold the sheep of elite academic chairs simply herded me out. Provine was warm to me at first in this marathon. I also think I DO understand it relative to Fourier Series and some kind of clock that would need to be built to syn man-made electromagnetisms and biokinematics but it is alsways best not to get my raw thoughts rather than some scientific analysis as it is likely to be used when applied to a "debate". If the finite of this is found than it could easily be misused by some other attempt to put some logic on a never ending potential. Change is only never ending in so far as something actually changes.[This message has been edited by Brad McFall, 10-14-2003]

I must say this is THE worst argument for the existence of God that I have ever encountered.Suppose that the world IS indeed eternal, without end or beginning in time (for the sake of the argument), would that mean that there can't be a "present moment" in it where the "past ends"?? Does that mean an eternal universe cannot have time? If an eternal universe cannot have time, then in what sense is it eternal? That would make the word "eternal" meaningless.That's on top of the fact that "past" and "present" are subjective, not objective, constructs.Logikal

Objection Number 2:What does "the past ended in the present" mean? Does "present" refer to the time the argument was written? If so, then the argument is false, since the argument itself is now in the past.Or does the past end .. NOW? Oops.. you missed it... try again... NOW... oops you missed it... etc.The "past" is subjectively continuing. It is extending and extending and hasn't ended. Today will be the past tomorrow, and tomorrow will be the past after tomorrow. So the claim that the "past ends now" make it seem like the past has multiple ends, which is absurd. It has no end. It will end only when time itself ends, if ever.Logikal

Objection Number 3:Assume that the past ends now. Why does that have to mean that the world has to be infinite on both ends? Maybe it has infinitely existed in the past but will end sometime.Don't Christians believe in the immortality of the soul? They think that a human being has a beginning, but has no end. A human is born one day, but will live forever in Heaven (or hell). Wouldn't that be just as contradictory?Logikal