Johnny said:
Here it is again:
How much "time" did God experience before creation?
A) Infinite (eternity)
B) Finite
By definition, it can't be A, otherwise God would still be in that period of "infiniteness" before creation. Infinite doesn't end, you know. If you choose B, then you have denied that God has always existed.
If you answer anything I want an answer for this:
Which time frame is God in? Yours? Mine? The space shuttles? The particle traveling at near C? All of these are experiencing the passage of time at a different rate. Either explain to me which time frame God is in, or just go ahead and tell me that you don't believe in special relativity and general relativity. If you choose the latter option, tell me why.
How is this helping you at all? This question is thousands of years old. It's not as if you're the first to think of it. The goofy thing is that you're asking it of other believers! This is not a question that is normally asked from one believer to another but rather it is a question raised by the skeptic against the theist. Not just Open Theists mind you but all theists.
If there isn't any Open Theists able to adequately answer this question it doesn't help you any at all because the fact of the matter is that you can't answer it either!
(In case you're wondering, simply saying that God exists outside of time does not solve your problem unless you are suggesting that God exists outside
of duration which makes no sense and actually defeats our shared position (that God has always existed (i.e. endured)).
I do not know the answer to your logic puzzle about how there doesn't seem to have been enough time for an eternity to have passed but I suspect that the resolution to the problem is related to a resolution to Zeno's paradox which I personally came up with while I was a Junior in High School. :Cletegetsthebighead:
Zeno's paradox (one of them at least) is a logical proof that motion is impossible. It says that motion can't happen because in order for one to move from point A to point B you must first traverse half that distance, and before you could traverse half the distance you would first have to traverse a 4th of the distance, and before that an 8th, and so on. There is an infinite number of points one must pass in a finite period of time which you can't do. This is one of four paradoxes attributed to Zeno. It is called The Dichotomy. Here it is stated more formally...
The Dichotomy: There is no motion, because that which is moved must arrive at the middle before it arrives at the end, and so on ad infinitum.
Zeno and the Paradox of Motion
The paradox, as you will discover if you read the article that I linked to, applies not only to motion but also to time. In order to exist for any period of time one must first exists half that time and so on ad infinitum.
The solution is simple really. The paradox presumes that space can be divided into an infinite number of points. While this is certainly true when dealing with theoretical geometry it doesn't necessarily follow that what can be done theoretically can also be done in the real world. In fact, Zeno's paradox seems to prove that it does not. If space is divided into little bite sized chunks the problem is resolved. In other words if there is a shortest distance that can be traversed then the paradox is vanquished.
This idea has interesting implications in many fields of science (particularly chemistry) because if the same reasoning is applied to time, one is left with 'quantum motion' and 'quantum time' as I called it at the time, which yields a cosmic minimum speed limit above absolute motionlessness. Temperature is affected in a similar way in that heat is simply matter in motion. Absolute Zero is the point at which no motion at all is occurring within a substance. The more motion the more heat is generated thus if you have a minimum speed you therefore have a minimum temperature above absolute zero.
Now keep in mind that I practically worshiped Einstein when I came up with these ideas and so saw no conflict inherent in the idea of 'quantum time', which I now longer believe to be a possibility or even necessary in that time does not exist. The loss of this aspect does however render these ideas somewhat useless in solving the infinite past problem but I still strongly suspect that the resolution is probably related in some conceptual way to this, although I could be completely wrong on that.
I'm sure many of you won't even understand how the two problems are related but any more explanation than this would be too much off the subject and would glaze everyone's eyes over more than has already been done. The point is that according to Zeno, there is an infinite number of points to pass in a finite period of time and so motion is impossible; essentially the same problem which Johnny keeps presenting us with the eternity past problem. There are two important points to make note of...
1. That an eternity (infinite time) is not necessary in order to create this problem.
In at least a rhetorical (i.e. theoretical/metaphysical) sense time can be divided into an infinite number of smaller units. hours, minutes, seconds, deciseconds, centiseconds, milliseconds, microseconds, nanoseconds, etc ad infinitum. Thus there are an infinite number of points on the time line one must experience before experiencing any period of time thus no period of time can be experienced. So whether you are talking about an eternity or one minute, you're left with the exact same logical problem.
2. That we do in fact move from point A to point B.
Your eyes really are moving from left to right and back again as you read this. You really are capable of getting up, moving toward and making it to the bathroom. One hour after it turns three o'clock, it will turn four o'clock. Yesterday is not today and today is not tomorrow. We really do make it from point A to point B.
So logic problem or no, solution to the paradox or no, the undeniable fact is that we do move and that we have by whatever means made it to the present. Our inability to explain exactly how is irrelevant. It is a very interesting puzzle but it does no injury to Open Theism that is doesn't also do to Closed Theism and thus your entire point is moot.
Resting in Him,
Clete
