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Thank you oh so very much for your outstanding essay-posts, dearest sister in Christ!

But of course, infinity doesn't really have so much to do with time as it does with number. It is a mathematical concept; and some physicists have complained that it is "unconstructible" in natural science.

Precisely so.

Since the 1960s forward measurements of the cosmic microwave background radiation consistently agree that the universe is expanding. This means that space and time do not pre-exist but are created as the universe expands. It also means there was a beginning of real space and real time.

That was the most theological statement to ever come out of modern science (Jastrow) – “In the beginning, God created …” (Gen 1:1)

There is no infinite past. Steady state cosmology is dead as a doornail.

So of course physical cosmologists went into high gear trying to obviate God the Creator evidently because methodological naturalism cannot allow for Creator God.

But none of the theories – cyclic, ekpyrotic, multi-verse, multi-world, imaginary time, etc. – can avoid the problem that space and time do not pre-exist.

In the absence of space, things cannot exist.

In the absence of time, events cannot occur.

Both are required for physical causation.

In other words, there can be no physical causation (energy momentum, wave fluctuation, etc.) without real space and real time.

Also, the singularity of big bang cosmology is not nothing:

Mathematically, the dimension of a space is the minimum number of coordinates (axes) necessary to identify a point within the space. A space of zero dimensions is a point; one dimension, a line, two dimensions, a plane; three, a cube, etc. That is the geometry of it. In zero dimensions, the mathematical point is indivisible.

It is not nothing. It is a spatial point. A singularity is not nothing.

In ex nihilo Creation (beginning of space/time) - the dimensions are not merely zero, they are null, dimensions do not exist at all. There is no space and no time. Period.

There is no mathematical point, no volume, no content, no scalar quantities. Ex nihilo doesn’t exist in relationship to anything else; there is no thing.

In an existing physical space, each point (e.g. particle) can be parameterized by a quantity such as mass. The parameter (e.g. a specific quantity within the range of possible quantities) is in effect another descriptor or quasi-dimension that uniquely identifies the point within the space.

Moreover, if the quantity of the parameter changes for a point, then a time dimension is invoked. For example, at one moment the point value is “0” and the next it is “1”.

Wave propagation (e.g. big bang, inflation) cannot occur in null dimensions nor can it occur in zero spatial dimensions, a mathematical point; a dimension of time is required for any fluctuation in a parameter value at a point.

Moreover, wave propagation must also have a spatial/temporal relation from cause point to effect point, i.e. physical causation.

For instance “0” at point n^t causes “1” at point n+1^t+1 which causes "0" at point n+1^t+2 etc..

Obviously, physical wave propagation (e.g. big bang/inflationary model) cannot precede space/time and physical causality.

The wise man asks: Why this instead of nothing at all?

And he realizes that only God, beyond space/time and physical causation, can be the uncaused cause of causation, the first cause, The Creator of the beginning.

Space, time and physical causation are not properties of God the Creator. They are properties of the Creation. Only God is uncaused.

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, [even] his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: - Romans 1:20

The origin of space, time and physical causation – although striking - are not the only open questions that vex scientists. There is also no explanation for the origin of information (Shannon, successful communication,) inertia, semiosis, autonomy and so on. And yet the universe is logical – if it were not, we could not understand it at all.

Order cannot arise from chaos in an unguided physical system. Period. There are always guides to the system whether one is using chaos theory, self-organizing complexity, cellular automata or whatever to analyze complexification, entropy and order.

Indeed, to me, the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics (Wigner) is God’s copyright notice on the cosmos.

Logos is the Greek word which is translated “Word” in the following passage. It is also the root for the word “Logic:”

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. – John 1:1-4

God’s Name is I AM.

My dear sisters in Christ, Betty and Alamo, I am blessed by your discussions. BB, your first response to 21st connects with where I am going with my sermon for this week, so I fastened onto it. The theme is from James 1 in which poor and rich are encouraged to acknowledge the fragility of their own existence...their morality. Instead, we are to focus on being “rich in the Lord.”

The discussion ranging from Anselm to Plato does that for me, but I especially liked the “concreteness” argument you made, that Michelangeo is not somehow imprisoned in the Sistine Chapel. It’s connection to the theme of the sermon is irrelevant to your discussion, but I do appreciate the tie-in you provided, that God is simply “outside” those things. They would not and could not move Him at all. So insignificant is gold, for example, that the streets of heaven use it for mere paving stones, and so insignificant are precious stones, that they are walls and foundations in the heavenly city.

21st century, just a bit of an encouragement that is off topic, as well. HTML. The lines you draw on the page really don’t present your arguments very well. You would do well to use italics, blockquoting, lists, etc. to set off your arguments as opposed to those you quote.

When I read your statement that readers simply weren’t understanding what was you and what wasn’t, without backtracking to your original posts and relying on these recent ones, I knew a big part of the problem could have been formatting.

Clarity in formatting is such a huge aid for those of us reading anything said by another. Perhaps you have all these html skills already and just avoided them because you were in a rush. That’s fine.

The bottom line, though, is that clarity is the responsibility of the message sender and not that of the receiver.