Is infinity impossible in light of the past having a beginning?

[Alan McDougall]

Time linear or otherwise have always fascinated and well as baffled me over the years

 

Is infinity impossible in light of the past having a beginning?

 

Without a beginning we could never reach the present?

 

What ever approach to infinity, we take, like our universe not really been the beginning of time, all we do is push the enigma further back.

 

Eternity and time are "impossible facts an oxymoron of sorts" or do you have a better explanation?

[StringJunky]

Time may have started with the BB but it doesn't necessarily mean to say the universe started with the BB - Time as we understand it may not have been a functional property of the universe pre-BB. You have to comprehend this in the context of being , as an observer, inescapably bound within the confines of the universe and as such bound by the prevailing natural laws that existed within it pre-BB. By this, I mean it's no good imagining yourself outside the universe observing it with your own clock ticking normally whilst imagining it. The universe could have been around forever but the clock only started ticking 13.7 billion years ago.

Edited December 31, 2013 by StringJunky

[Alan McDougall]

Time may have started with the BB but it doesn't necessarily mean to say the universe started with the BB - Time as we understand it may not have been a functional property of the universe pre-BB. You have to comprehend this in the context of being , as an observer, inescapably bound within the confines of the universe and as such bound by the prevailing natural laws that existed within it pre-BB. By this, I mean it's no good imagining yourself outside the universe observing it with your own clock ticking normally whilst imagining it. The universe could have been around forever but the clock only started ticking 13.7 billion years ago.

 

I don't get your point, "the universe could have been around forever, but the clock only started 13.7 billion years ago" please explain a little further what you mean?

 

What I am suggesting is that our universe indeed, had a beginning some 14 billion years ago and the "arrow of time" began then leading to the present. However, the universe might not be "everything" it could be part born out of a greater reality, in which there is no real beginning, call that reality 'Existence" if you like.

 

The concept of infinity also extends to the multiverse hypothesis, which, when explained by astrophysicists such as Michio Kaku, posits that there are an infinite number and variety of universes. He links this with Superstring Theory.

Edited January 1, 2014 by Alan McDougall

[StringJunky]

What I meant was, prior to the BB, time as we know it may not have been a measurable parameter in the way we understand it. Look it at it like this: if everything was once very close together such that there was no space, and time is interlocked with space, how could it exist without space until space started to form? As counter-intuitive as it first appears the universe could have evolved up to the BB through many phases without time being a parameter in them. You could look at, as you wish, that it existed for all time or, strictly speaking, no time before the BB ie temporal properties weren't part of the universe then. Like you say there was probably a different kind of reality but I speculate time was possibly latent and not expressed Pre-BB. This way, I think, you can talk about what happened before the BB without invoking time and the problem of infinite time. We should not assume the pre-BB universe evolved in the familiar temporally linear fashion. These are just my thoughts by the way.

[Alan McDougall]

What I meant was, prior to the BB, time as we know it may not have been a measurable parameter in the way we understand it. Look it at it like this: if everything was once very close together such that there was no space, and time is interlocked with space, how could it exist without space until space started to form? As counter-intuitive as it first appears the universe could have evolved up to the BB through many phases without time being a parameter in them. You could look at, as you wish, that it existed for all time or, strictly speaking, no time before the BB ie temporal properties weren't part of the universe then. Like you say there was probably a different kind of reality but I speculate time was possibly latent and not expressed Pre-BB. This way, I think, you can talk about what happened before the BB without invoking time and the problem of infinite time. We should not assume the pre-BB universe evolved in the familiar temporally linear fashion. These are just my thoughts by the way.

 

Good thoughts at that!

[Popcorn Sutton]

Time linear or otherwise have always fascinated and well as baffled me over the years

 

Is infinity impossible in light of the past having a beginning?

 

Without a beginning we could never reach the present?

 

What ever approach to infinity, we take, like our universe not really been the beginning of time, all we do is push the enigma further back.

 

Eternity and time are "impossible facts an oxymoron of sorts" or do you have a better explanation?

 

Time is one of the most fascinating subjects for me because it is one of the only things, if not THE only thing, that doesn't seem to be physical. I do have my own speculations about it. But, with regards to infinity, I HIGHLY suggest that you do not appeal to it for one reason, it's unobservable. I think that an appeal to infinity should be regarded as a logical fallacy. It's like saying "I give up". Saying something like "language is infinite" (as Chomsky often states), or saying that "it goes on to infinity" or that "there are an infinite number of universes", implies, at least to me, that one has thrown in the towel on the subject. They've lost the willingness to be puzzled. Chomsky himself says that it's a very important thing to cultivate. (but he also condemns people who have my type of interests into the category of "unwilling to be puzzled")

Edited January 1, 2014 by Popcorn Sutton

[Alan McDougall]

 

Time is one of the most fascinating subjects for me because it is one of the only things, if not THE only thing, that doesn't seem to be physical. I do have my own speculations about it. But, with regards to infinity, I HIGHLY suggest that you do not appeal to it for one reason, it's unobservable. I think that an appeal to infinity should be regarded as a logical fallacy. It's like saying "I give up". Saying something like "language is infinite" (as Chomsky often states), or saying that "it goes on to infinity" or that "there are an infinite number of universes", implies, at least to me, that one has thrown in the towel on the subject. They've lost the willingness to be puzzled. Chomsky himself says that it's a very important thing to cultivate. (but he also condemns people who have my type of interests into the category of "unwilling to be puzzled")

 

Well I see myself much like you in that I enjoy being puzzled, I am curious and that is why I am a member of the forum, where I meet people who might satisfy my curiosity with intelligent, interesting dialogue and hopefully some real answers.

[michel123456]

Time linear or otherwise have always fascinated and well as baffled me over the years

 

Is infinity impossible in light of the past having a beginning?

 

Without a beginning we could never reach the present?

 

What ever approach to infinity, we take, like our universe not really been the beginning of time, all we do is push the enigma further back.

 

Eternity and time are "impossible facts an oxymoron of sorts" or do you have a better explanation?

In Euclidian geometry, a line is infinite. A segment (a line with a cut) is also infinite.

 

Time linear is baffling because time alone does not exist. The thing that "exists" is spacetime.

Space does not exist alone and Time does not exist alone.

The above statement is not less baffling but at least it explains that space could not be there without time.

If indeed space was sooo small at the Big Bang, then time was soo small too,wathever it means( if that makes any sense). And if space is considered as part of the physical reality, then space is not an illusion and as a matter of consequence time is not an illusion too.

[Dekan]

"Infinite" means "endless". And "Infinity" means "Endlessness", or going on without end.

 

I think the trouble is that the word "Infinity" looks, to modern English-speakers who don't know Latin, like a noun for a specific thing. Like "Mile" or "Kilometre"

 

But really it's just an abstract concept. Something that goes on "to infinity" just goes on endlessly - there's no "infinity" to be arrived at.

[StringJunky]

Alan McDougall, on 01 Jan 2014 - 09:08 AM, said:

 

Good thoughts at that!

Thank you.

[Alan McDougall]

In Euclidian geometry, a line is infinite. A segment (a line with a cut) is also infinite.

 

Time linear is baffling because time alone does not exist. The thing that "exists" is spacetime.

Space does not exist alone and Time does not exist alone.

The above statement is not less baffling but at least it explains that space could not be there without time.

If indeed space was sooo small at the Big Bang, then time was soo small too,wathever it means( if that makes any sense). And if space is considered as part of the physical reality, then space is not an illusion and as a matter of consequence time is not an illusion too.

 

Can time be cut into smaller and smaller secrete moments much like a string or is the no such reality as a "moment in time"?

 

I also sometimes visualize time as a "sort of elastic string", which can be stretched or shrunk, as you approach the speed of light, in an object, shrinking in the direction in which your are traveling (Your destination) and stretching increasingly as you travel away from your starting point .

Time Time

>................................................>..............> (As the object approaches the speed of light 186,000miles/second)

>......................................................................................>.......>

 

Time could be a localized phenomenon, whereby we measure how things move relative to us and one to another. Time could also be thought of as a river, taking objects flouting on it from the past, to the present and into a finite or even infinite future, Thus time might be a localized illusion and there was never a moment when time emerged out of the Big Bang, relative to the entire universe?

Edited January 2, 2014 by Alan McDougall

[Alan McDougall]

Below is a link to a BBC program on infinity that I found both enjoyable and informative, hope you like it also?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtMwAUaftSU