Devans99

I think there is a very plentiful supply of very depressing cosmological models. I'm a natural optimist, so I'm interested in the less talked about, m...

You could well be correct. We are fundamentally sequentially ordered creatures of time and sequentially ordered time appears insufficient to explain t...

Nice video, you are clearly very creative. Lot worse things than being human. One of the well known problems with multiple universe theories is the ne...

The initial state has to be agnostic to the laws of physics and the standard model - they must be somehow determined during the branching of worlds pr...

So QM many worlds combined with eternalism could account for everything (by definition really). When combined with the anthropic principle, it would e...

That's a good question. I am really not sure of the answer. My argument seems to lead to the need for timeless existence, but it is difficult to see h...

I see two possibilities: 1. Energy/matter was created in the BB via the zero energy universe hypothesis 2. Energy/matter existed timelessly and entere...

I’m of the view that that the Big Bang and the initial conditions of the universe are probably unnatural. The supernatural evolvement goes no further ...

Things I worry about in waking life sometimes carry over into dreams. So the simple process of thinking about something before sleep sometimes seems t...

The few dreams I remember are sometimes quite stunningly creative in content, if not always particularly logical. More creative than my waking mind. S...

Interesting. Please post if it works. Even if we cannot actually speak to different entities in our dreams, maybe it allows access to the subconscious...

Could it be that there are different classes of characters in our dreams? Some might be wooden, bit part actors added by our subconscious, others are ...

I think you should learn how to lucid dream - it sounds great - never managed it myself. Maybe other people, aliens, gods can participate in our dream...

As an ex-computer programmer, I wonder about the ultimate source of all the information in the universe. Maybe it requires random, or maybe pseudo-ran...

One thought is an eternal realm for the ‘IS’ and a temporal, presentist, realm for us poor mortals. But it seems the eternal realm must come ‘first’ a...

I'm a little confused by your comments. My point was that all time-based models for the origin of the universe ultimately fail - they result in an inf...

I find QM confusing, but I was pointed to quite a helpful document which relates to your point: https://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/0609163.pdf One of the ...

I'm not sure its completely clear cut, only parts of physics are on a fully axiomatic basis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert%27s_sixth_problem S...

I'd be grateful if you could tell me why you did not buy the explanation.

I don't think the source you are using addresses axioms in the physical sciences. Axioms are used in the physical sciences and they are testable. As I...

This is what Wikipedia says: 'An axiom or postulate is a statement that is taken to be true, to serve as a premise or starting point for further reaso...

Einstein assumed the speed of light is constant and then deduced SR from that. Any premise you assume as a basis for logical/mathematical deductions c...

I think I'm trying to work from axioms towards a logical conclusion - I guess you can call it speculation if you want. Thats an interesting idea - a f...

For example, Einstein used for SR two axioms: 1. Speed of light is constant 2. Laws of physics are the same everywhere/when Both of these axioms have ...

It is an assertion of causality and an assertion of non-causality at the same time in the original formation (IE God is the cause of himself). The poi...

The BB is a huge, suspicious looking explosion: 1. It is a singleton; natural events always come in pluralities 2. Entropy was unnaturally low at the ...

I don't think its possible to outright prove the existence of God (unless he turns up in person). It is a hobby of mine to try to arrive at a tentativ...

So do you build on your 'guesses' with the tools of logic to arrive at (provisional) conclusions? That's what I do with my 'axioms'. Possibly this is ...

There are different formulations of the PSR, for example: 1. 'Everything must have a reason' 2. 'Everything contingent must have a reason' 3. 'Everyth...

The problem then with non-eternalist models is the need for a first action - what caused the first action? When thought of in a sequential, causal, ma...

Could be. Distance is very malleable in SR for example. That's a point that is hard to tie down. It seems we need at least one permanent thing else th...

The OP on the other thread specifically addresses why things cannot have existed 'forever' in time. That leads to a model where something(s) have perm...

For those relations to be concrete without resorting to non-locality, it could show that things are connected in some sort of hidden substrate to real...

What I mean is that everything in time seems to need a temporal start. Could a matter particle exist in time if it never started existing? I think not...

I see the physical laws of the universe (conservation of energy etc...) as being distinct from the causes/reasons for things in the universe. At a mac...

I have sympathy for the presentist viewpoint - it is the natural model that agrees with our senses. But as you say, SR/GR says time does not behave in...

I think spacetime looks a lot like a creation and the fine tuning argument appears to back this up. So it appears there must be an initial reason (bec...

I can't prove that God exists, but I think he does and thats what I'm arguing for. But I have never talked with God! (as far as I'm aware). Cantor on ...

I think the terminology can get confusing. One way to avoid the confusion is to talk about: - Spacetime. The thing that came about because of the Big ...

I think you are laughing at actual infinity then. I agree: it is a laughable concept. As an atheist you should not have a problem with this - Cantor o...

Can we not treat 'reason' and 'cause' as synonyms when it comes to cosmological arguments? To have no cause is to have nothing logically/temporally pr...

Timelessness + change is a challenge for the argument I'm forwarding - things point to a timeless first cause but how exactly does that work? I agree:...

But the maths of infinity says that everything that can happen, will happen, an infinite number of times. You seem to be arguing for an infinite past ...

That's the way the logic seems to point to me - an infinite regress is not possible, infinite existence in time is not possible, but there must be som...

It's one of the ones I put trust in personally (I also like 'cause and effect', 'everything has a start' 'everything is finite'). What are your axioms...

If by random, you mean something like quantum fluctuations, an argument against those being the cause of the universe is given here: https://thephilos...

We base all our physical axioms on common experience (or should do, as you might know, I have a beef with the axiom of infinity). Our common experienc...

I think it is a better axiom that creation ex nihilo - more experimental support, but I acknowledge they are both axioms. I'd appeal to the maths of i...

Thanks Mark! Likewise you are coming over as an intelligent new contributor to the forum. We can put aside the past altercation. Retrocausation would ...

Spontaneous events that do not produce energy/matter cannot be the cause of the energy/matter in the universe so I will ignore those. There is the con...