Time for an Augustine thread.
His position on time is pretty fascinating, as is his conception of changing and unchanging reality. Did you know past and future don't really exist?
>Did you know past and future don't really exist?
Obviously
Yes, I did, at least I know Christian doctrine maintains this (I'm personally an eternalist: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternalism_%28philosophy_of_time%29).Which is why I think it would be impossible for God to know the future, since that would be knowing what isn't, which is impossible. He could know all possible futures, he could know possibilities, but to know the future concretely doesn't make sense. I think that's actually more consistent with the Christian notion of free will.
>>6333617
>Did you know past and future don't really exist?
What about like the birth of jesus and stuff?
>>6333676
Never happened.
We're free it all
was heblack?
>>6333708
Indian.
>>6333676
That exists eternally present, just like this very second, and the second that comes after it.
It's connected to the notion that God sees all of time in an instant. To God, who stands outside of the universe, all of history exists at once.
Catholicism does some interesting things with this: for example, the Liturgy of the Eucharist is said to happen simultaneously with the actual Last Supper, every time it's celebrated, in a supratemporal way. Since to God, who is Christ, they ARE simultaneous.
>>6333754
>To God, who stands outside of the universe, all of history exists at once.
Which is inconsistent with Augustine's assertion of the unreality of past and future, since God's perspective would obviously be the objective one. It would just mean humans can only process time one moment at a time, but God's perspective would be the "objectively true" one.
>>6333773
How is it inconsistent? History is eternally present to God, but humans, who exist in time, can't look at it from the outside. Time is our way of perceiving the change in things.
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