Cosmologic philosophy: Egnor on Big Bang, etc. (Introduction)

by dhw, Saturday, September 25, 2021, 07:16 (1155 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: George Ellis steps in:
https://iai.tv/articles/the-philosophical-problems-of-cosmology-auid-1883?_auid=2020

ELLIS: We can say nothing about what existed before the start of the universe, if it did have a start.

dhw: I agree. Therefore it is absurd to state that there was no before and that there was no time before the start of our universe.

ELLIS: The concept of “before the beginning” does not even make sense, for there was no “before” then – indeed there was not even a “then” then!

dhw: That depends on what beginning you are referring to. If you believe there has only been one universe (hence “the” universe) and that the one universe had a beginning, then of course the concept makes no sense. But if you argue that our universe may be just one in a series of universes (whether created by God or not), then clearly it makes perfect sense to say that there could have been a “before” the beginning of our universe.

DAVID: Please note Ellis is a major authority and he is a believer in God, not noticeable here in how he presents issues.

dhw: I do not think there is any such person as a major authority on what might have happened before our BB, and I would have thought that anyone who believes in God would refrain from making assumptions about what their God did or did not do before creating our universe.

DAVID: A believer in God can make all the assumptions about God he wishes.

That’s true, we are all free to make any assumptions we wish about anything, no matter how far-fetched. I withdraw my statement.

DAVID: Ellis is a very prominent cosmologist has presented philosophical discussions of cosmology before and presented here. Ellis is simply telling us we can imagine but we have no way of knowing anything about 'prior' to our BB. Especially since our 'time' starts at our BB.

And I agree. It still doesn’t mean that he is a major authority on what happened before our BB, but I’m delighted to see that a prominent cosmologist and I share the same view: namely that we have no way of knowing anything about ‘prior’ to our BB, in which case it is manifestly absurd to claim, as you did two months ago, that “there is no before before the BB. Time did not exist. This was proven by Guth […] presented by my books and here.” The fact that our time starts at our BB has nothing to do with what may or may not have happened before our BB. I’m relieved to see that you have now stopped trying to defend your earlier statement, and hope we can now close this thread.