Infinite Past

[untermensche]

It takes an understanding of the differences between the imaginary world of numbers and the actual world of time.

Some get lost because they think that what you can do with imaginary entities, like a point with no dimension, you can also do with something real with dimension.

I can have infinite imaginary entities between 2 imaginary points.

That in no way implies that an infinite amount of something with dimension could exist between any two real locations.

I think something just clicked.

If we think about time as just another dimension, we can give it the x axis and a spatial dimension on the y axis. So when I think about a guy Bob who tries to walk forever at 1 meter per second, I see that his path will exist simply as a line at a 45 degree angle extending as far as he decides to walk. Let's say Bob is a robot programmed to never stop walking. You may see him at the 500th meter, but because he is programmed to never stop walking, we would know that his walk is never going to end like infinity. I know what you're thinking, but hold on there's more.

If the distance dimension never ends, and the time dimension never ends, then wouldn't his path also never end? This could be interpreted as Bob is walking a never ending walk. He doesn't finish, but the endlessness property of his program is like the endlessness property of infinity.

The distance he will walk does not end. Outside of our frame of reference, these 2 dimensions on a graph don't wait; they are already there infinitely long or they aren't. They will either exist forever along with Bob's path or they won't; both options are instantaneous because nothing is waiting; there is no reference.

Now I am willing to say that from Bob's reference/point of view (or any reference for this matter), he will never finish. But somehow he can finish when there is no reference, like in the case of the whole universe that already exists as 4 dimensions.

Will you agree to that?

I don't understand what you're trying to say.

Infinite steps is steps without end. Infinite time is time without end. We do not need to bring in any talk of reference to say that.

Trying to describe time is difficult and any description is an abstraction.

But time and space exist together.

The three dimensions can form a solid object. Add space and you have something the solid can move around in. Add time and you have the freedom to move.

 

[untermensche]

You are missing the point.

It can't have passed from anywhere. It can never pass. Infinite time is time that never finishes passing.

It cannot have finished passing at some present moment.

And at any given moment the past is complete.

Therefore it could not have been infinite.

Why not? It doesn't have to be "finished" at all. It might be forever moving on, and still its past is complete but its future is not.

If we stop time at some moment, infinite time in the past means time without end in the past.

At a present moment the past is complete. To say the past is infinite is to say something without end has ended.

Since the past is growing you can claim the past is MOVING TOWARDS infinity. You cannot say it IS infinite.

 

[abaddon]

To say the past is infinite is to say something without end has ended.

You're imagining "infinity" as a mathematical line. Forget lines. There is no line. There's just the "passing" moment, which isn't passing anything at all, that's just one of the many old metaphors in language.

The past isn't growing, it's not a line or thing and has no size. The past cannot "move" let alone "move towards infinity" as that'd make infinity a distinct place within your metaphor.

 

[untermensche]

To say the past is infinite is to say something without end has ended.

Not "ended" in the past. You're imagining "infinity" as an abstract line. Forget lines. There is no line. There's just the "passing" moment, which isn't passing anything at all, that's just one of the great many old metaphors in language.

The past isn't growing, it's not a line or thing and has no size.

You're hung up on figures of speech.

We don't have to quibble about what "passing" time means. It means the present moments are changing. They are not the same thing. The old moments have passed out of view.

We can just say "time is passing" and everybody understands. Time is not a thing that can be touched. It is a "freedom". A freedom to move within space. There really is no past time but there are past configurations of the universe.

And I am specifically avoiding confusing time with an imaginary line.

If we talk about past time we are really talking about past configurations that existed but do not exist anymore.

So before any present configuration, present moment, there could not have been infinite configurations.

 

[abaddon]

So before any present configuration, present moment, there could not have been infinite configurations.

Why not? Say once more, briefly, just to be sure I get the images in your head (aka "argument").

 

[untermensche]

So before any present configuration, present moment, there could not have been infinite configurations.

Why not? Say once more, briefly, just to be sure I get the images in your head (aka "argument").

Because infinite configurations are configurations without end.

Configurations without end cannot have ended at the present configuration.

 

[DBT]

Nobody is really giving any kind of logical rebuttal to untermenche's argument.

Not so. As I pointed out, if Presentism is true (not to say that it is ) there is no past or future only an ever changing present where a conscious subject may measure rates of change (being relative) and call these rates of change ''time.''

 

[untermensche]

Nobody is really giving any kind of logical rebuttal to untermenche's argument.

Not so. As I pointed out, if Presentism is true (not to say that it is ) there is no past or future only an ever changing present where a conscious subject may measure rates of change (being relative) and call these rates of change ''time.''

"Presentism" does not eliminate the past or the future because the present is constantly a different configuration.

The past are configurations that existed but no longer exist.

You cannot pretend it is nothing.

 

[DBT]

Not so. As I pointed out, if Presentism is true (not to say that it is ) there is no past or future only an ever changing present where a conscious subject may measure rates of change (being relative) and call these rates of change ''time.''

"Presentism" does not eliminate the past or the future because the present is constantly a different configuration.

The past are configurations that existed but no longer exist.

You cannot pretend it is nothing.

This just shows that you haven't even grasped the basic idea of presentism. The very term and concept of 'Presentism' negates the past and the future. If you are able to imagine the distinction between events that have occurred and vanished as not being 'in the past' but the events simply no longer exist, then you may get some idea of presentism....which is the opposite of the concept of block time/eternalism. Try to think about it without the filter of your own assumptions and convictions.

 

[untermensche]

This just shows that you haven't even grasped the basic idea of presentism. The very term and concept of 'Presentism' negates the past and the future. If you are able to imagine the distinction between events that have occurred and vanished as not being 'in the past' but the events simply no longer exist, then you may get some idea of presentism....which is the opposite of the concept of block time/eternalism. Try to think about it without the filter of your own assumptions and convictions.

You cannot think away the past configurations of the universe that existed but no longer exist.

They are something, not nothing.

The past is something, not nothing.

Claiming that the past can be wiped away by the "basic idea" of anything is nonsense.

 

[bilby]

Not "ended" in the past. You're imagining "infinity" as an abstract line. Forget lines. There is no line. There's just the "passing" moment, which isn't passing anything at all, that's just one of the great many old metaphors in language.

The past isn't growing, it's not a line or thing and has no size.

You're hung up on figures of speech.

For fuck's sake, someone could be badly injured by bits of irony meter flying about. Not to mention the replacement cost.

If you really can't avoid blowing the crap out of one, the least you could do is give us a warning.

 

[DBT]

This just shows that you haven't even grasped the basic idea of presentism. The very term and concept of 'Presentism' negates the past and the future. If you are able to imagine the distinction between events that have occurred and vanished as not being 'in the past' but the events simply no longer exist, then you may get some idea of presentism....which is the opposite of the concept of block time/eternalism. Try to think about it without the filter of your own assumptions and convictions.

You cannot think away the past configurations of the universe that existed but no longer exist.

They are something, not nothing.

The past is something, not nothing.

Claiming that the past can be wiped away by the "basic idea" of anything is nonsense.

No such claim was made until you made it. The past being 'wiped away' does not apply to the concept of Presentism.

 

[untermensche]

You're hung up on figures of speech.

For fuck's sake, someone could be badly injured by bits of irony meter flying about. Not to mention the replacement cost.

If you really can't avoid blowing the crap out of one, the least you could do is give us a warning.

Your stupidity is noted.

Again.

 

[untermensche]

You cannot think away the past configurations of the universe that existed but no longer exist.

They are something, not nothing.

The past is something, not nothing.

Claiming that the past can be wiped away by the "basic idea" of anything is nonsense.

No such claim was made until you made it. The past being 'wiped away' does not apply to the concept of Presentism.

Your position is simply wishing the past away.

It is nonsense.

No matter the magic spell you think you can cast you can't turn the past into a nothing.

 

[DBT]

No such claim was made until you made it. The past being 'wiped away' does not apply to the concept of Presentism.

Your position is simply wishing the past away.

It is nonsense.

No matter the magic spell you think you can cast you can't turn the past into a nothing.

So you don't understand the basics of the concept of Presentism and won't make the slightest effort to do so. I'm not surprised.

 

[4321lynx]

This thread is struggling with the different philosophical/semantic descriptions/definitions/opinions of how we perceivetime. It tries to understand time. Philosophy fails and has failed for centuries. Its failure can be sad, as here in this thread, or it can be splendid, as in the poets and semi-poets: "We ourselves are time, in as much as we live" (Spengler); "And time remembered is grief forgotten" and "Time turns the old days to derision", (both by Swinburne); "The moving finger writes and having writ, moves on..." etc, etc... Or philosophy can be peudoscientific: A and B "theories" etc etc...

But time is a property of the universe and can be described and measured accurately:

Radioactive decay is a stochastic (i.e. random) process at the level of single atoms, in that, according to quantum theory, it is impossible to predict when a particular atom will decay,[1][2][3] regardless of how long the atom has existed. However, for a collection of atoms, the collection's expected decay rate is characterized in terms of their measured decay constants or half-lives. This is the basis of radiometric dating. The half-lives of radioactive atoms have no known upper limit, spanning a time range of over 55 orders of magnitude, from nearly instantaneous to far longer than the age of the universe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_decay

and see also, if you need to

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

How each individual perceives time varies not only with the individual but also with time acting upon that individual. Hence phillosophy and psychology and threads such as this.

My apologies if this is a derail.

 

[Kharakov]

For fuck's sake, someone could be badly injured by bits of irony meter flying about. Not to mention the replacement cost.

If you really can't avoid blowing the crap out of one, the least you could do is give us a warning.

Your stupidity is noted.

Again.

I think I'm finally beginning to understand irony.

 

[Speakpigeon]

This thread is struggling with the different philosophical/semantic descriptions/definitions/opinions of how we perceivetime. It tries to understand time. Philosophy fails and has failed for centuries. Its failure can be sad, as here in this thread, or it can be splendid, as in the poets and semi-poets: "We ourselves are time, in as much as we live" (Spengler); "And time remembered is grief forgotten" and "Time turns the old days to derision", (both by Swinburne); "The moving finger writes and having writ, moves on..." etc, etc... Or philosophy can be peudoscientific: A and B "theories" etc etc...

But time is a property of the universe and can be described and measured accurately:

Radioactive decay is a stochastic (i.e. random) process at the level of single atoms, in that, according to quantum theory, it is impossible to predict when a particular atom will decay,[1][2][3] regardless of how long the atom has existed. However, for a collection of atoms, the collection's expected decay rate is characterized in terms of their measured decay constants or half-lives. This is the basis of radiometric dating. The half-lives of radioactive atoms have no known upper limit, spanning a time range of over 55 orders of magnitude, from nearly instantaneous to far longer than the age of the universe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_decay

and see also, if you need to

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

How each individual perceives time varies not only with the individual but also with time acting upon that individual. Hence phillosophy and psychology and threads such as this.

My apologies if this is a derail.

Well, it certainly is a derail. The question raised here is not what time actually is, but whether the idea of an infinite past is or is not logically impossible. The reality of time is therefore irrelevant in this context.

Your comment is not entirely irrelevant but only in that posters may have their own pet theory of time and science may have something to say there.

However, you seem to be missing an important point. We all have a certain perception of time and we can assume that this perception is not a reliable guide as to the reality of time. This much you clearly understand. But then you seem to believe that just because science has a certain perspective on time then this tells us something substantial about the reality of time. You don't actually articulate this but it sort of transpires from your post. Yet, all that science can show us is the result of measurements and how time can be usefully represented in physics. This, however, does not tell us the reality of time. It is because we don't know what time is that we can only speculate. Thus, we have the A and B theories and I'm sure many others. These are clearly not scientific (nor are they pseudo-scientific) but they are legitimate precisely because we have no good reason to think we already know what time is. And the only way it seems we can assess the value of our speculations is by disputing the logical validity of our arguments and the logical consistence of our concepts of time. Hence this thread.
EB

 

[fromderinside]

Time passes, time arrives. Different only is perspective. Reality, for humans time is.

I never reject science just because I'm posting on a philosophical forum. Given evedience that our existence is determined by our ancestor's success and their genes, our time past has much greater history than does our time future. Our pass on of genes becomes part of someone other's time future and continues some of our time past. Given those presumptions time past is much more likely to be infinite than is time future.

 

[ryan]

Where'd the image of a guy walking an infinitely long line or path come from?

What do you mean where did it come from?

The "journey" isn't made by a person (whatever the person is supposed to be a stand-in for). It's time that makes this "journey", and not on a path or it'd be a case of time trying to keep up with time. Wherever time is is always Right Now, so it has no catching up with infinity to do. Whether time never started and just was always walking, or started its walk, it's always Now.

Not if time exists in the future and past like a spatial dimension. If time is already determined into the future (QM says it's not, but let's assume it is) then it is not just now but the past, now and the future.

So where does the notion that anything must traverse an infinitely long line, I guess to get to the "end" of the line (which I guess is the present moment) come from in this discussion?

It is all in my post. Just think of time as a spatial dimension, and you will know what I was saying.