Denial of the world’s pre-existence

Are you sure you understand your question?
There was no point in time when the world was not. Therefore, anyone who says that the world was not always there has no idea what he is talking about.
And this whole line of thinking that you are pointing to is blind. The mind cannot accept a situation in which something was created full of something.

Point, why do you write a strong and often ridiculous response to almost every question? Here, for example, you disagree with almost all physicists (I assume you understand). It's not worth it

Regardless of the criticism of the decisiveness, as for your comment itself, many physicists actually think so. The accepted argument is that the timeline (and space) was created in the bang.

R’ Saadia Gaon claims in beliefs and opinions that it is impossible for the world to have existed back in time to infinity, because a continuous passage of events that occur one after the other will always be finite (if someone starts counting from 0 to infinity, he will never finish counting) and therefore it is impossible for such an infinite sequence of events to have reached us.

In any case, it seems that if the universe were infinite in time, evolution would have ended long ago (because it requires less than infinite time) and everything that is physically possible to happen would already be behind us. But it is a fact that World War III, for example, has not yet happened (not to mention the war of Zechariah, Gog and Magog, etc.). I heard Aristotle argue for this reason that it is necessary to say that from time to time some catastrophe occurs that returns things to an earlier period.

In any case, even if the Big Bang cannot be used as cosmological evidence (known as “Kalam”), it seems to lend further support to the claim that the universe is contingent. If everything began from a singular point but now there is no singularity, then the singularity itself is contingent, as is the universe that evolved from it, since what is not contingent necessarily and eternally exists. From here the path is short to recognizing the necessity of the necessary – the ’I will be that I will be’.

And if it turns out that that point is all there is and everything you read evolved from, it's a kind of quantum illusion of consciousness. Will you start praying to that point?
Or, will you never pray to someone who is not like you.

Period,

The whole point of inferring that the world began from such a point rests on the assumption that the state of objects perceived in the post-bang world reflects objective properties in those objects themselves, and not just something in our minds. Otherwise I would argue that just as the expansion of the universe (for example) is an illusion, so too is the extrapolation that consciousness makes from it (the Big Bang), and all that remains is an illusory self. Even if I were to give it any reasonable chance, I still would have no reason to think that the self or its perceptions necessarily exist, because its non-existence does not seem to constitute a contradiction, especially since its perceptions are known to change (and a necessary entity is immutable), and therefore an external entity must account for its existence just as we assume axiomatically about every other inherent contingent property.

In any case, suppose I were to accept that the entire universe is nothing but an eternal singularity, there is still no contradiction in there being zero, two, or trillions of such singular points, especially since apparently the most popular hypothesis put forward by skeptics to explain the precise orientation of the universe is a multiverse, and it does not seem that it can be seriously refuted by claiming logical impossibility, and we have not seen anyone trying to go in such a far-fetched direction. But it is enough that some essential characteristic *can* or *might* be realized in more than one entity (even if not actually) to determine that the thing is not God. That which is necessary to exist cannot exist if it does not exist. Possible-reality which is necessary-reality is not a coherent concept.

Even if you say that what is actually there is a necessary being, but this is interpreted in our perception as a singular point, this still means that the thing perceived is not the necessary being itself, but an imagination created in us as a result of it, and we will again have to engage in natural theology regarding what arises from its nature and arrive at those attributes that theologians have determined.

Copenhagen,
As a rule, the claims about infinity in early literature are questionable, since they did not really understand the concept of infinity as we understand it today.
For example, the formulation you brought in the name of Ras”g is meaningless and absurd. When they say that the world is infinite, they do not mean to say that there was some moment when the world was at minus infinity and since then it began to advance towards us. There is no such point. They mean to say that looking back from today on the time axis, there is no far end to the axis. In other words: it is as long as you want. But the starting point in talking about infinity is always the side that has an end, not the ”far” side.
The claim about evolution is also incorrect. The evolutionary process began from the moment the first protein chain was formed, and this happened a finite time ago even for methods that the world is ancient.
There is also room for disagreement regarding the contingency of the world, since it is possible that the structure of the entire timeline, in which there is nothing at first and then a universe is created, is entirely necessary.
Finally, the argument against the pre-existence of the world because of the problem of infinity can also be directed towards the pre-existence of God.

To the Rabbi,
I agree that the Kalam argument is not strong enough (and in any case it is built on a concept A of time that I am not sure about). A cosmological view in the Rambamist/Thomist style that does not rely on the question of predestination is preferable to me in all sorts of ways. Nowadays there is a Christian apologist named Craig who promotes it (I think his doctoral thesis was on it) and he probably has better defenses of things than I do.

When one says of some infinite axis “as long as you like” they mean that it is potentially infinite, and perhaps one should distinguish it from actual infinity – the former does not produce paradoxes like the latter. For example, Hilbert's hotel paradox, regarding a hotel with an infinite number of actual rooms at full occupancy, where any additional customer can be admitted by moving every person in room n to room n+1, and putting him in the first room, and so on for an unlimited number of additional customers. If there was an infinite past, then the number of events that had to happen would be actually infinite, and perhaps in such a situation it is not excusable that a consistent description can be given by observation from the side that has an edge.

Regarding the first protein, it seems that there is some finite chance of its random formation (for the sake of discussion 1 times 10 to the billionth power). So let's assume that the first protein on planet Earth was formed x years ago. We can ask why such a protein did not happen to be formed somewhere in the universe x plus 1 times 10 to the billionth power (plus or minus some number). There is a much greater a priori chance that we were one of the civilizations that formed from one of these ancient proteins, similar to Boltzmann's brain paradox, and therefore that we find ourselves in a civilization much more advanced than it is. Then comes the Aristotelian answer, that it is likely that it did form, a civilization developed, and in the meantime the planet on which it happened was destroyed by some black hole that swallowed several regional galaxies. I am not sure if this is a good answer.

I do not find in the concept of a “timeline where initially there is nothing and then the universe is created” anything more necessary than I find in the concept of a peach. When I look at a peach, it is clear to me beyond any reasonable doubt that its existence is contingent and that there is no contradiction in its non-existence. This is why there is a dimension of surprise in its existence. Either way, if the universe were necessary, this would mean that there are no possible worlds and therefore no free choice (or moral responsibility) and that it is also incorrect to say sentences like “if the scientist had chosen not to perform the experiment, Schrödinger’s cat would still be in superposition.”

In God, there cannot be an infinite number of consecutive events since He is unchanging by definition.

Regarding the distinction between potential and concrete infinity (and Hilbert's hotel), see my second notebook.
What I meant here was precisely that when you say that the world is ancient, it means that the number of events that occurred in it is infinite in a potential sense (i.e., as large as you want). If you want to offer this as an explanation, it is not enough, and I argued for that in the notebook.
Regarding the protein, you are talking about a rate and not about a chance. But here you have returned to the previous problem of contingency. Here I was only commenting on your argument regarding evolution that it does not refute the claim of an ancient world. You can of course ask why this has not happened by now, but this is true for every event including the bang. We have already discussed this, and I explained that there can be necessity for the entire complex.
And regarding necessity in this sense, you are equivalent to a perplexity. But you are looking at the wrong concept. Instead of looking at the universe and asking whether it is necessary or contingent, you should look at the whole that includes a vacuum and then a universe.
And finally, when you talked about the infinity of the timeline, you were not talking about the number of events but about the number of moments. This is also relevant in relation to God who exists for an infinite number of moments. So how did he come to us (even if in his form without changing, he has to come from minus infinity to us)?

The questioner (the rabbi) will come up with an explanation: How is it possible to accept any existence if God exists for an infinite number of moments?
This proves that there is a creation of something from absolute nothingness. Only with absence does this problem not exist.

I don't understand. Is there a question for me here?

Yes, if God exists for an infinite number of moments, then this is a concrete infinity, so how did he “reach” the present moment from minus infinity? After all, it is impossible to get out of minus infinity (if it is even defined).

No. He exists in a potential infinity of moments. That is, the meaning of the claim that he always exists is this: When I look back in time there is no moment in time when God does not exist. Therefore, it is impossible to talk about the path he takes from minus infinity to us, just as I explained to Copenhagen.

Doesn't this feel like a play on words to the Rabbi?
After all, both of these definitions agree that God has always existed. Only the perspective between them is opposite – from top to bottom or from bottom to top. But nevertheless, both express the same idea.

So if one of the two definitions seems impossible and problematic, isn't it correct to see the other as such as well. Even if the second definition somehow manages to evade the question.
Finally, the fundamental question of how a primordial entity (God) arrived at the present moment when there were an infinite number of previous moments remains the same.

Absolutely not. I don't know how familiar you are with mathematics, but to those who are familiar with it, it's obvious. It's not a play on words, but rather the replacement of a meaningless expression with a well-defined one. That's precisely why the two expressions are not equivalent (contrary to your assumption).

To the Rabbi,

I didn't understand. Let's assume that the universe goes back in time endlessly, meaning there is no big bang as a boundary point. The universe is supposed to produce protein randomly every so many years. The vast majority of the primary proteins that have been created so far have given rise to much more advanced civilizations. It seems that in such a universe, regardless of whether it is contingent or necessary, we would expect a priori to find ourselves in one of these civilizations, and I didn't get to know the Rabbi what the connection is to contingency (alternatively, can a solution be provided to Boltzmann's brain problem through such a connection?).

The question does not arise regarding the bang because physicists like to explain that space and time itself were born with it. For those who reject the insight that the universe is contingent, necessity in the entire complex does not mean the cancellation of the conclusions that arise from knowledge of the laws of nature, but only the claim that the universe as a whole is the necessary being and no further explanation is needed (transcendent necessity is found).

What is meant by a universe plus vacuum? Is there (quantum) energy in the vacuum that preceded the explosion? If so, it probably has some properties or other that can in principle be assigned a number. Whenever it is possible to talk about some numbered property, it is conceivable that the thing existed with exactly this property plus or minus 1 (or some other number) without contradiction, and then it turns out that its existence is not necessary. Even if it is an absolute void, I still have no reason to think that a contingent universe plus a vacuum can create the miracle of converting something from contingent to necessary. The combination of two elements, one contingent and the other necessary, is itself still contingent (beyond the fact that it is not clear what could be necessary in an absolute void). In principle, it seems that any combination of two distinct elements cannot have a necessary existence because one of the concepts can always be conceived without the other without contradiction.

Regarding Kalam, I will try to formulate some clear thought on the subject and maybe I will respond after Shabbat.

Copenhagen,
Indeed. It is I who said that we should talk about rate (=chance per unit of time) and not about chance. The average time that will pass (since when?) until the creation of a protein is 1 part of the rate.
What I commented about the protein is that even according to early believers, evolution itself began a few million years ago and therefore only reached where it did. The question you raised now, how evolution did not begin earlier, is asked about any event (including the big bang), and not specifically about evolution. That is what I commented on your words.
I wrote that it is similar to the question of contingency, in the sense that I will now explain. I argued that the universe + creation is all that is necessary. Therefore, the formation of a universe at some specific time and its absence before does not necessarily mean that the universe is contingent. Consider a process described by a time-dependent function (f(t). Its state (=values of the function) of course changes with time. You could think that a certain state that occurs at some time t0 is contingent because it did not exist before. What I am arguing is that it is not necessary to look at this state in isolation, but rather to look at the entire process, that is, the entire function along the entire time axis. My argument is that it is possible that it is all necessary (it could not have been otherwise). If you look at creation as a function of time, I argue that it is possible that the entire process is necessary even though the universe did not exist until time t0 (=the bang) and was created only after it.
As I have already written, you are right that it is common to think that time was created with the bang (although as we know there are arguments about this). But I argue that your principled claim that what did not exist at some time is contingent is not necessary.
And this is what I am arguing in relation to your second question about evolution. You asked how it did not begin before, and to that I answered that you should not look at evolution in isolation, but at the entire process (which evolution It is only the last part, which began at t1 - the moment of formation of the first protein). This is similar to my answer above about the contingency of the universe.

So the Rabbi thinks that the universe is its own cause? (Not contingent)
Then why does the Rabbi mention the cosmological and the physio-theological view in the notebook?!?

Where did I say that he is his own cause? What I wrote is that the argument raised here in favor of the contingency of the universe is not an argument. Incidentally, even within the framework of the possibility I presented (to show lack of necessity) I did not write that the universe is not contingent, but that the entire complex (including God) is not so.

I understand.
Speaking of the subject, does the Rabbi have a good reason to assume that the universe as a whole is not its own cause?
If you say that matter is usually not its own cause, then you can excuse yourself and say that matter is energy. And energy is its own cause. Due to the laws of conservation of energy-mass.
B. If we assume that the creation of something from absolute nothingness (without God) is possible and logical. Then such a creation would always be called contingent?

Yes. Everything I know about the universe is not its own cause, and it is unlikely in my opinion that the whole is so. As I wrote here, the universe itself is certainly not its own cause, since it was created 14 billion years ago. At most, the entire process (the vacuum + universe) is necessary, but even if that is the case, something stands behind it (and is the true necessity), and that is God.

I did not understand question B. I do not understand where this assumption comes from, and why, if it is true, then creation is contingent.

Thank you.
Does the Rabbi think that this assumption comes from a purely general intuition? Or is it an assumption with a stronger basis?

B. The assumption comes in the wake of the claims of many atheists (I encountered this mainly on YouTube from America) that the most reasonable and obvious thing to assume is the creation of something from absolute nothingness. So I ask, according to their view, is it possible for such a creation to create a reality that is the necessity of reality? And thus, according to their view, they will benefit from being able to hold onto two horns of faith against the cosmological and theological physics 😉

Yes. What do we have except intuition?
I didn't understand the question. If the universe was created, then it is not a necessity of reality (because it didn't exist before). Maybe the whole process is necessary. But I don't really understand the necessity of this digression. An atheist can also decide that the world is contingent and still just came into being out of nothing. If you are looking for possible options even if they are unlikely, you don't have to go far.

One can assume that the universe is necessary, and our perception of it is contingent.
And yet he who works the universe works for it.

Rabbi,
The opposite of a contingent universe is the necessity of reality or its own cause.
Because I meant whether it is possible that the world created by the creation of something out of nothing is its own cause. And not necessarily the necessity of reality. We are talking about whether the universe should be primordial or not.

Point being, isn't our perception necessary as we are part of the entirety of the universe?
Or do you mean only at the subjective level of perception and not the actual objective one.

Copenhagen, through verbal magic, deceives many good people.
He uses the words necessary and contingent as if they were real things in reality. When they are only concepts that he has in his mind and nothing more. The universe does not have Copenhagen's mental properties. The projection of mental properties onto the perception of the universe is a purely instinctive action. The instinct wants to take control of perception. Over the universe as the mind perceives it through the mediation of the instincts. So it shapes the universe in its own image. It is all imagination and nothing more.
Science has managed to free this primitive instinctive worldview by using mathematics on the one hand and measuring instruments on the other. But there are those who are still in an instinctive worldview.

Copenhagen is invited to invent a measuring instrument that measures necessity in reality. The result will be that Copenhagen himself is the measuring instrument…

To the Rabbi,

If, according to the majority view (apparently), time began with the Big Bang, then the question does not arise about it. In any case, the whole matter is based on an Aristotelian view of a universe without a beginning (in which time is also constant and does not converge).

The main insight that things in the physical universe (and the entire universe) are contingent comes from the fact that when we perceive their essence, we do not see anything from which a necessary existence can be deduced. On the contrary, there are things in it such as numerical properties that indicate a contingent existence. Talking about the beginning of the existence of objects or their future destruction is intended mainly for illustrative purposes and I have no problem disclaiming it if necessary.

It seems that the claim that one should look at the function along the entire time axis and then perhaps it can be argued that it is necessary may sound correct in the sense of physical necessity but not as a logical necessity in the broad sense, on which the claim of contingency is based. There is nothing in the definition of such a function from which one can derive a necessary existence or any progress in solving the problem of why it exists any more than one can do so for the object itself. In any case, the concept of a 'process' presupposes the existence of some concrete objects as a basis on which (or because of) it occurs, and then the question arises of what exactly compels these objects to exist.

In general, if it were reasonable to say of functions of this kind that they might be necessary in the broad logical sense, we could look at any conceivable possible world, for example one in which there is only a single peach appearing out of nothing, and argue that the function describing the process on the time axis might be necessary, and therefore there is no wonder why it exists. But this seems to me to be an ad hoc argument. It also turns out that there is not much rationality in the zero chance I give to the possibility that a green flying elephant will suddenly appear on my balcony out of nowhere, since there is no way for me to know that the function describing its creation on the timeline is not necessary.

Copenhagen,
1. I'm not sure you're right either for the method that time began with the bang. Even if you don't use time terms, there's still room to ask why the universe was created then (when”then” does not indicate time).
I actually think that time was not created with the bang, but perhaps the time of our terms. There are two timelines, one of which has always existed. See here briefly:
https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%97%D7%99%D7%A6%D7%95-%D7%A9%D7%9C- %D7%96%D7%99%D7%A0%D7%95%D7%9F-%D7%95%D7%94%D7%A4%D7%99%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%A7%D7%94-%D7%94%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%93%D7%A8%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%AA1/
2. I completely agree that from a perspective the universe appears to be contingent, and I even wrote this above. The argument was about the argument based on creation at some point in time.
3. I don't see how you can observe such a function and determine whether it is contingent or not. It is not something that is given to your experience. You experience its specific values, not the function itself.
4. I do agree that if one claims that such a function is not contingent, it is likely that there is some object behind it that is necessary and that undergoes “contingent” changes (i.e., each of its states separately is contingent). This is God. Others can of course say that the material stream (i.e., the collection of objects that undergoes constant change. The subject of the changes) is the necessary object. This sounds less likely to me, but it is a possibility.
5. This ad hoc argument is indeed possible also with respect to the peach. I also agree that it is an ad hoc argument, and yet those who see the existence of God as a pressing argument will be willing to adopt ad hoc arguments in order to escape it. I am not one of them, and therefore ad hoc arguments really seem less acceptable to me.

1. I will look into this later

2. An argument based on creation is intended to prove that *the created thing itself* is contingent. That which has a necessary existence cannot *not exist*, and cannot *can exist if it does not exist*. But anything created does not exist before it was created, and it *can exist when it (yet) did not (was) existing*, and therefore does not necessarily exist. The question of whether it is reasonable to hypothesize that there is another entity, called a ‘process’, that is not contingent does not concern this proof, and can be discussed separately.

3. It seems to me that the ability to determine whether any entity is contingent is not related to any sensory experience but to the intellectual ability to understand the concept (I expressed this somewhat in the new question I opened), and I find it difficult to see a strong reason to think that it is fundamentally different in this respect with respect to functions. If one wants to claim that a certain function has a necessary concrete existence (if that makes sense), one must show or at least give direction to the question of how the property of necessary existence derives from the properties of the function, or how the properties of the function derive from necessary existence. When classical theologians discussed the subject, they came to conclusions such as: from necessary existence, one can derive immutability, independence from time and space, lack of complexity, negation of adjectives, and so on’ but I agree that there are attributes that require discussion to what extent the process of derivation is proven and to what extent it derives from the aspiration to create a synthesis between the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and the God of the philosophers.

I will have to think about 4 and there is agreement on 5

From your answer I understand that the explanation for the pre-existence of the world is ” material objects are usually not eternal and have a reason that created them. ”

A. But if it is only “usually not eternal” then why is there no exception that it is eternal?

Is there proof that material objects are not eternal?

B. Are there additional explanations for the claim of the pre-existence of the world?

C. You wrote “In general, I don't think that belief in the pre-existence of the world is that serious from a faith perspective.”
Why - after all, it is hidden from the Book of Genesis?

A. This is how you can ask about any scientific generalization. Why is it always true and has no exceptions? This is the assumption until proven otherwise. There is no proof for anything factual on earth.
B. The Big Bang. Beyond that, I explained in the third notebook that a primordial world also requires a reason (even if not a reason).
C. The Book of Genesis can describe creation from a certain stage onwards, or be interpreted as a parable whose purpose is to convey a message rather than a historical description (as the Ramban writes in Chapter 1 of Genesis). For example, the Ramban in Chapter 3 of his commentary on the Shia (attributed to him) writes, as Plato believed, that the world was created from primordial matter.

Point being, the concepts of “necessary” and ”contingent” do not exist “only” in our minds, even for the simple fact that they have a clear definition. You could say that the concept of “beautiful” is only found in the mind, but “necessary” is a well-defined concept.