Q#1 - Draygomb's paradox

[Smalcald]

To those who don't know me, you can read my thread in Worthy Welcome.

I'll start with a paradox that has resisted for a long time and hasn't been broken yet - to my knowledge. It's called Draygomb's Paradox, from the nickname of the poster who thought it up. The guidelines do not allow me to link to the original forum.

I have thought about it a great deal but I could never figure out how to break it. So I thought maybe it's my bias and I should ask some believers to try break it; it's much more natural if I, an atheist, am the one who defends it. As things are now, it seems too easy because if it can't be broken then that paradox breaks all the religions that define their god as the Conscious First Cause, but I can only say it's valid

Oh when I write "god" -- not capitalized -- I mean any god of any religion. Don't take it as disrespect.

Ok let's go on. Here is the paradox, letter by letter as it was posted on "that forum". It isn't copyrighted.

Draygomb's paradox

Without Time God didn't have enough Time to decide to create Time.

God is defined as The Conscious First Cause -

The First Cause is That which caused Time.

Consciousness is that which lets one make a decision.

A Decision is the action of changing ones mind from undecided to decided.

Time is the measure of change.

Premises:

Something which is caused can't be required by that which causes it.

Conclusions:

Time is required for Change.

A Decision is a Change.

Decisions require Time.

Consciousness can't let one make a decision without Time.

Consciousness requires Time.

God is Conscious.

God requires Time.

God can't be the cause of Time if God requires Time.

God isn't the cause of Time.

God isn't The First Cause.

If God isn't The Conscious First Cause then God doesn't exist.

God doesn't exist.

Scope

Here Draygomb defines god in a way that is maybe a little unusual. We see all the time refutations based on incompatibilities between, say, omnipotence and omniscience so in a discussion we usually talk about God or other gods that have those properties. However Draygomb's paradox is about consciousness and time, so all he needs is the minimal definition of a god: the Conscious First Cause (CFC from now on). This guarantees that the paradox will work on, well, all the religions that count. It doesn't disprove the Greek religon or statements like "Pizza is god!!" () but that's it. In any case, it's obvious that any god that doesn't fit the definition given by Draygomb is not affected.

Additional info

Just in case you have missed it, there are a few assumptions hidden in plain sight here and there.

- God created ex nihilo

- Time had a beginning

- Time requires change, not the other way around - time is defined as a measure of change

They may or may not help you to break the paradox. They didn't help me.

Draygomb also posted this, which may or may not help you:

Common Rebuttals And Why They Fail

God Isn?t Conscious

Why Worship Something That Can?t Even Know You Exist

God Isn?t TFC

Why Worship A Fellow Caused Being

TFC Doesn?t Exist ie Time Has Always Existed

Infinite Causal Regression has been disproved

That leaves us with Finite Looping Time

Which Means All Of Time Has Always Existed

Thus Nothing Could Have Been Created

No Creation = No Creator

God Transcends Logic

Which Is Just A Fancy Way Of Saying God Is Illogical And Can?t Exist

Change Doesn?t Require Time

Change Does Require Time Go Look It Up

God Doesn?t Need To Change To Make The Conscious Decision To Create Time

If God Doesn?t Change When Making A Decision Then No Decision Was Really Made

Our Time Is An Offshoot Of God?s Time

Then The Real First Cause Of Our Time Is TFC Of God?s Time

God Transcends Time

If God is Always aware of every Moment of Time Then All Of Time Has Always Existed

Thus Nothing Could Have Been Created

No Creation = No Creator

I don't know why he capitalizes everything, I hate it.

Well, that's it. Let the chair throwing commence

Hi, I think it shows an elementary misunderstanding of time. We know from astrophysics that time is essentially relative; it is neither static nor fixed. We know that time can be actually running backward in some parts of the universe, that it is possible that time itself may not have existed or does not exist in other dimensions. We have multiple dimensions which exist at the same time, so in one dimension you may be 1000 years old in another you may not be born yet, in another existence does not yet exist. So relying on any sort of constraint of God which would depend on God being dependant on a time constraint, would not follow modern physics. God created time; time is just in a way just a human crutch to help us describe a complex existence.

[sweetycakes]

Good news, Q

Will you also answer the question: Have you tasted?

For obvious reasons, here I will answer only to posts pertaining to the topic at hand - indeed this is the last off-topic post I'm answering. If someone invites me somewhere else I'll be glad to accept

That's fair enough, Q

I have a habit of clutting up threads with unrelated posts, I'm afraid

I wish you well in your search.

[ayin jade]

You make an assumption that God is limited to our 3 dimensions. You try and define what God can and cant do based on what people can and cant do in a 3 dimensional world. Our perceptions of Him is limited to 3 dimensional view. Therefore you cannot explain Him logically within the limits of our world.

The addition of one or more dimensions breaks the paradox. That's actually the first thing that came to my mind when I started thinking about it. The problem is that it breaks it in an imaginary universe where those additional dimensions exist. How do I show that that imaginary universe is the same as the real one? In other words, where's evidence for other dimensions in this universe? I've beaten my head against this kind of obstacles several times before realizing a possible refutation is not necessarily a valid one

Science accepts that there are other dimensions. It does not break the paradox. You cannot adequately define some one who transcends our 3rd dimension by the limits of our dimension.

[sweetycakes]

To those who don't know me, you can read my thread in Worthy Welcome.

I'll start with a paradox that has resisted for a long time and hasn't been broken yet - to my knowledge. It's called Draygomb's Paradox, from the nickname of the poster who thought it up. The guidelines do not allow me to link to the original forum.

I have thought about it a great deal but I could never figure out how to break it. So I thought maybe it's my bias and I should ask some believers to try break it; it's much more natural if I, an atheist, am the one who defends it. As things are now, it seems too easy because if it can't be broken then that paradox breaks all the religions that define their god as the Conscious First Cause, but I can only say it's valid

Oh when I write "god" -- not capitalized -- I mean any god of any religion. Don't take it as disrespect.

Ok let's go on. Here is the paradox, letter by letter as it was posted on "that forum". It isn't copyrighted.

Draygomb's paradox

Without Time God didn't have enough Time to decide to create Time.

God is defined as The Conscious First Cause -

The First Cause is That which caused Time.

Consciousness is that which lets one make a decision.

A Decision is the action of changing ones mind from undecided to decided.

Time is the measure of change.

Premises:

Something which is caused can't be required by that which causes it.

Conclusions:

Time is required for Change.

A Decision is a Change.

Decisions require Time.

Consciousness can't let one make a decision without Time.

Consciousness requires Time.

God is Conscious.

God requires Time.

God can't be the cause of Time if God requires Time.

God isn't the cause of Time.

God isn't The First Cause.

If God isn't The Conscious First Cause then God doesn't exist.

God doesn't exist.

Scope

Here Draygomb defines god in a way that is maybe a little unusual. We see all the time refutations based on incompatibilities between, say, omnipotence and omniscience so in a discussion we usually talk about God or other gods that have those properties. However Draygomb's paradox is about consciousness and time, so all he needs is the minimal definition of a god: the Conscious First Cause (CFC from now on). This guarantees that the paradox will work on, well, all the religions that count. It doesn't disprove the Greek religon or statements like "Pizza is god!!" () but that's it. In any case, it's obvious that any god that doesn't fit the definition given by Draygomb is not affected.

Additional info

Just in case you have missed it, there are a few assumptions hidden in plain sight here and there.

- God created ex nihilo

- Time had a beginning

- Time requires change, not the other way around - time is defined as a measure of change

They may or may not help you to break the paradox. They didn't help me.

Draygomb also posted this, which may or may not help you:

Common Rebuttals And Why They Fail

God Isn?t Conscious

Why Worship Something That Can?t Even Know You Exist

God Isn?t TFC

Why Worship A Fellow Caused Being

TFC Doesn?t Exist ie Time Has Always Existed

Infinite Causal Regression has been disproved

That leaves us with Finite Looping Time

Which Means All Of Time Has Always Existed

Thus Nothing Could Have Been Created

No Creation = No Creator

God Transcends Logic

Which Is Just A Fancy Way Of Saying God Is Illogical And Can?t Exist

Change Doesn?t Require Time

Change Does Require Time Go Look It Up

God Doesn?t Need To Change To Make The Conscious Decision To Create Time

If God Doesn?t Change When Making A Decision Then No Decision Was Really Made

Our Time Is An Offshoot Of God?s Time

Then The Real First Cause Of Our Time Is TFC Of God?s Time

God Transcends Time

If God is Always aware of every Moment of Time Then All Of Time Has Always Existed

Thus Nothing Could Have Been Created

No Creation = No Creator

I don't know why he capitalizes everything, I hate it.

Well, that's it. Let the chair throwing commence

Hi, I think it shows an elementary misunderstanding of time. We know from astrophysics that time is essentially relative; it is neither static nor fixed. We know that time can be actually running backward in some parts of the universe, that it is possible that time itself may not have existed or does not exist in other dimensions. We have multiple dimensions which exist at the same time, so in one dimension you may be 1000 years old in another you may not be born yet, in another existence does not yet exist. So relying on any sort of constraint of God which would depend on God being dependant on a time constraint, would not follow modern physics. God created time; time is just in a way just a human crutch to help us describe a complex existence.

Can't agree with you on that one, Smalcald - with the multi-dimensional universe thing.

That is not what I understand from the bible - a bizarre scenario where we are multi-faceted beings, each aspect being displayed in a different dimension or different universe. God is not the author of confusion.

The 'multiverse', as it is known, is merely an attempt by nonbelievers to explain away the unresolved questions we find from the observeable universe.

[Questioner]

You can break this parodox by simply turning away from it. But as a athiast you have no where to turn so it is ever before you.

I assume people care about this kind of things but I realize it's not always the case

If you want to realy break Draygomb's paradox and prove it can be broken it would require you to unbelieve everything you believe, and in faith reach out to what you can not see, what you can not touch, or understand in your mind.

If it means what I think it means -- i.e., God does not follow logic -- there's nothing to say about it. Either you mean that God is impossible to understand, which makes you an agnostic theist and immune from the paradox, or you mean that God is above logic, which makes Him illogical and therefore nonexistent.

[Questioner]

Hi, I think it shows an elementary misunderstanding of time. We know from astrophysics that time is essentially relative; it is neither static nor fixed. We know that time can be actually running backward in some parts of the universe, that it is possible that time itself may not have existed or does not exist in other dimensions. We have multiple dimensions which exist at the same time, so in one dimension you may be 1000 years old in another you may not be born yet, in another existence does not yet exist. So relying on any sort of constraint of God which would depend on God being dependant on a time constraint, would not follow modern physics. God created time; time is just in a way just a human crutch to help us describe a complex existence.

The part about dimensions etc would require some backing up, if you don't mind

Anyway, it isn't God that depends on time, but the act of making a decision. A decision is a change and change can only be defined in ways that require time. You could say that the paradox doesn't disprove God directly, it disproves the idea that the FC could have been conscious and then, from that, it follows that the FC isn't God.

That said, you described a universe where time behaves strangely. It doesn't follow, however, that the paradox is invalid because all the paradox relies on is the assumption that time had a beginning. So whatever the behaviour of time in our universe, if it came into being caused by something then the paradox applies and that "something" cannot be conscious.

[child_of_iam]

Interesting post, Questioner. Thank you.

Logic holds that every cause has an effect, and every effect requires a cause. Nothing can just pop into existence, ex nihilo.

So Christians get around God's cause-lessness, as EricH has done:

The problem with the paradox is that God did not decide at a point in time to create. His purposes are eternal

...by saying that God is eternal. If he has always been there, he doesn't need a cause.

The only problem is that this "eternal presence" explanation could be used to defend anything abstract, not just God, much less the Christian one. It is just a way to escape the need for a cause, and thus escape rationality, but it certainly doesn't prove or even explain God and his presence.

Anyway, I think Draygomb's paradox just points to the cause-lessness of time and God's decision. So, as expected, the Christians justify his causeless time and purposes as "eternal." This is not an explanation, of course, just an escape from logic. The claim that God and/or any of his properties are eternal simply prevents us from "zooming out" past God and evaluating his causes, which have not and cannot be explained.

Sorry runners high you qouted the law of cause and effect wrong. The Law simply states; "every effect must have a cause" This law works backwords to the origional cause. The origional cause being "self existant". The origional Self-exestant cause does not require an effect because it is self-exestant and therefore exist outside the realm of time and matter because time and mater is an effect of the original self-existing cause.

anyway, when tomarow comes, what happens if you find out that everything you know to be true and everything you know to be untrue is not true at all? That what you so believe is the absolute truth has infact decieved you. What happens if one day you find yourself standing before The most Holy God who aloud his son, Jesus, who knew no sin to become sin on your part so that you would have an escape frome Judgement and you rejected him.

It was once said there will be no sinners in hell, there will be no athist in hell. There will only be thoes who rejected the Lamb of God.

[Questioner]

The three dimensions of "space".

Oh ok. I believe there's more then one way to define time. Draygomb assumes time and space are impossible to separate so he can define time as a measure of change. Let's go on.

In relativity, time is actually dictated by spatial properties, such as relative velocity, etc, and not the other way around. A "time line" is not strictly a correct way of thinking of time, since time itself is subject to changes in gravity and velocity, at least according to relativity.

But it still had a beginning. That's all the paradox needs. See my answer to Smalclad, #29.

Anyway, the point is the definition of time and change given in this supposed paradox is not even what physicists use, so you and its inventor sort of don't have a foot to stand on.

How is it incorrect to define time as a measure of change? It is completely consistent with the fact that space and time are impossible to separate. I don't see how the things you posted change anything, maybe instead of talking about basic relativity you should focus on explaining how the definition of time given by Draygomb is incorrect - if I am to have any hope to understand you, that is I can be quite dense at times. In particular, Draygomb doesn't assume anything about the behaviour of time, indeed the paradox applies as long as time had a beginning. If time has always existed then space has always existed too so there's nothing to create. How do you break out of that?

[sweetycakes]

Can't agree with you on that one, Smalcald - with the multi-dimensional universe thing.

That is not what I understand from the bible - a bizarre scenario where we are multi-faceted beings, each aspect being displayed in a different dimension or different universe. God is not the author of confusion.

The 'multiverse', as it is known, is merely an attempt by nonbelievers to explain away the unresolved questions we find from the observeable universe.

Exactly, it is there attempt to explain the universe without the "need" for God, at least as they see it.

In their minds, if they can assume that all possible universes exist, and that all possibilities exist for all possible universes, then it would not be surprising that one universe "somewhere" would have the properties of this universe.

My rebutal of the infinite multiverse theory is this:

If there are infintely possible universes with infinite possibilities per universe, then that means there must be universes where there are no laws of physics at all, or where the laws might even be constantly changing for no apparant reason etc.

Infinite possibilities per universe eh? how can that be if the universe is naturalistic and ordered?

if the initial conditions are known, and the laws of physcis are also known, then there is only one possibility, and it can be calculated if every variable is known and you have a sufficiently powerful computer. Any other proposed possibilities are not really possibilities at all, but are merely conjecture, and not a real possibility. So if the laws of the universe are known, and the initial conditions are known, there is only one "possibility" of what the universe will look like for any given instant.

A universe, by definition, must be a closed, isolated system.

The following argument is made under the assumption of a purely naturalistic universe, that is, assuming God does not intervene. Yes, I know he does intervene, but I'm just playing along with the atheists for the moment, to show them how they have actually out done themselves with this infinite multiverse mumbo-jumbo.

The simplest system in which any interaction takes place involves two electrically neutral particles, with mass, which are a short distance apart, and initially at rest relative to one another. Assuming there is nothing else in the system, but the laws are the same as for the real universe, then in the hypothetical system we know exactly what will happen: the two particles will be attracted towards one another until they eventually collide. If we assume they were initially one meter apart, and we assume they each have mass of one kilogram, then we can calculate the exact instant they will collide using Newton's theory of gravity. There is only one possibility, they MUST collide, and at exactly that instant, assuming intial time is T=0.

There is no possibility that they will randomly fly off in some other direction, and there is no possibility that they will miss each other. The initial conditions are known, the laws are known, the outcome is inescapable.

If such an alternate possibility existed, it would be impossible to determine the laws of physics to begin with, because every observation might record a different possibility for the law itself than the previous observation was measuring. Which would be true chaos, and not order at all.

So in short, the concept of "infinite multiverse" or any multiverse for that matter, contradicts the classical notion of naturalistic physics. You have in essence proposed the existence of a "god of chaos".

Ah....I see where you are coming from now, and I agree totally

[Questioner]

Science accepts that there are other dimensions.

Can you back that up? As far as it's just about science linking is allowed (I think).

It does not break the paradox.

What doesn't break it? Did you mean "it does break the paradox"?

But I see I had misunderstood you earlier. I thught you were saying something along the lines of "God has His own additional time axis". Now that I read again I think I got it:

You cannot adequately define some one who transcends our 3rd dimension by the limits of our dimension.

Nowhere the paradox implies that God is bound to our dimensions, indeed it states that the FC, conscious or not, has the ability to create time, therefore it is somehow outside of time and space as we know them. That means exactly what you say, that the FC is not bound to our dimensions. This is consistent both with creationism and with the various scientific theories about the origin of the universe, except the one about the universe having gone from a previous state to the one we know. However the paradox clearly shows that the FC cannot be conscious.