If I thought it would make a real difference, I’d burn myself out to do it.
My ETA posted after I saw your last. Paying attention to Magge’s factual account should be refreshing to a Christian.
I came to faith, not through emotion, but intellectual pursuit. There was no religious influence in my conversion from agnostic to theist. I studied enough arguments to believe. I found some truth in many denominations, but ultimately threw them all out. I’ve not had any emotional experience lead me anywhere but trouble. I suspect that is where you and I differ.
I am not interested in appeals to emotion. The stories of those who found God when they were at rock bottom. Good for them. I hope it is true and not them reading into life what they want to see.
There was a story I heard, about a guy who got really drunk at a party. In the morning he was supposed to travel home with some friends in the back of their car. But he was too hung over to get up and go that early, telling them he’ll find another way home later.
The car he was supposed to be in got rear-ended by a truck. He would have died.
Was it God? Or was it beer that saved his life?
What was God doing 400 Trillion years ago?
How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
ETA: A believist can acknowledge Christian doctrines as true or admirable and affirm them, but what matters is the heart and the heart’s desires, not the intellect alone.
- Assume legitimate Christian faith on the part of other people, unless they identify otherwise. The purpose of discussions here is not to judge the legitimacy or efficacy of anyone’s faith or lack of faith.
(See: FAQ - The BioLogos Forum)
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- Time in physics is operationally defined as “what a clock reads”.[6][13][14]
- The universe is filled with “clocks”, literally and metaphorically. In fact, the universe is a clock. Ergo, anyone who thinks “God is not in Time” appears to believe that God is not “in” the universe, or may be manifesting schizophasia, or both.
- The fact that there are so many clocks, literally and metaphorically, in the universe, and the fact that physics denies Absolute Time appears to be the reason that there is no “Absolute Now” in the universe, which may go a long way toward explaining why the universe is “Godless”.
- P.S.
- Neo-Lorentzian Relativity and the Beginning of the Universe, Daniel Linford (September 20, 2021). Abstract:
- Many physicists have thought that absolute time became otiose with the introduction of Special Relativity. William Lane Craig disagrees. Craig argues that although relativity is empirically adequate within a domain of application, relativity is literally false and should be supplanted by a Neo-Lorentzian alternative that allows for absolute time. Meanwhile, Craig and co-author James Sinclair have argued that physical cosmology supports the conclusion that physical reality began to exist at a finite time in the past. However, on their view, the beginning of physical reality requires the objective passage of absolute time, so that the beginning of physical reality stands or falls with Craig’s Neo-Lorentzian metaphysics. Here, I raise doubts about whether, given Craig’s NeoLorentzian metaphysics, physical cosmology could adequately support a beginning of physical reality within the finite past. Craig and Sinclair’s conception of the beginning of the universe requires a past boundary to the universe. A past boundary to the universe cannot be directly observed and so must be inferred from the
observed matter-energy distribution in conjunction with auxilary hypotheses drawn from a substantive physical theory. Craig’s brand of Neo-lorentzianism has not been sufficiently well specified so as to infer either that there is a past boundary or that the boundary is located in the finite past. Consequently, Neo Lorentzianism implicitly introduces a form of skepticism that removes the ability that we might have otherwise had to infer a beginning of the universe. Furthermore, in analyzing traditional big bang models, I develop criteria that Neo-Lorentzians should deploy in thinking about the direction and duration of time in cosmological models generally. For my last task, I apply the same criteria to bounce cosmologies and show that Craig and Sinclair have been wrong to interpret bounce cosmologies as including a beginning of physical reality. - Forthcoming in the European Journal for Philosophy of Science.
- Many physicists have thought that absolute time became otiose with the introduction of Special Relativity. William Lane Craig disagrees. Craig argues that although relativity is empirically adequate within a domain of application, relativity is literally false and should be supplanted by a Neo-Lorentzian alternative that allows for absolute time. Meanwhile, Craig and co-author James Sinclair have argued that physical cosmology supports the conclusion that physical reality began to exist at a finite time in the past. However, on their view, the beginning of physical reality requires the objective passage of absolute time, so that the beginning of physical reality stands or falls with Craig’s Neo-Lorentzian metaphysics. Here, I raise doubts about whether, given Craig’s NeoLorentzian metaphysics, physical cosmology could adequately support a beginning of physical reality within the finite past. Craig and Sinclair’s conception of the beginning of the universe requires a past boundary to the universe. A past boundary to the universe cannot be directly observed and so must be inferred from the
- Neo-Lorentzian Relativity and the Beginning of the Universe, Daniel Linford (September 20, 2021). Abstract:
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Edited. We need to examine ourselves and
Dale, these judgements are not for you to be handing down:
Go and do likewise, Dale.
The rest of us are doing our own work of self-examination in whatever way the Lord leads us. YMMV.
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You have an issue with that and don’t think it’s true?
Objection! Relevance.
They’re both nonsense questions that do not need to be answered.
I guess, Dale, you could say I am “working out my own salvation with fear and trembling”. Is it supposed to be easy, come naturally, or is it hard and quite a long journey sometimes? What was simple for one to pass could be a stumbling block for another.
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I’ve been prostrate in prayer more than once.
I’m not doubting you or questioning your motivations. We’re just not on the same path right now. Maybe it links up down the road.
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In those old days it was different: then, faith was a task for one’s entire life because people assumed that the capacity to have faith was not acquired either in days or weeks. When the old man, tried and tested, approached his end, had fought the good fight and kept the faith, then his heart was youthful enough not to have forgotten that anxiety and trembling which had disciplined the youth, which the man certainly mastered, but which no person ever entirely outgrows—unless, that is, one were to succeed, the sooner the better, in going further. So, the point at which those venerable figures arrived— that is where everyone in our times begins, in order to go further.
“Preface,” Fear and Trembling, Søren Kierkegaard (Kirmmse Translation).
@Benjamin87, sorry about my bristly first encounter with you. I’ll try to keep my wits better.
I’ll probably be quoting F&T for a while. Just finished it this week, and it’ll be on my mind for a while. I’ll try not to continue to overdo it, but this piece seemed particularly relevant.
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That’s beside the point.
It pretty well stands up for itself.