Topics Time

Question I am puzzled about questions that ask if a Creator can create Itself. Look at a circle <I>after</I> it is drawn: at that point, it has no beginning and no end. Look at a circle <I>while</I> it is being drawn: during its construction, you can see it does have a temporary beginning. Only after construction is complete, does its beginning seems to disappear. If time is cyclical, then why couldn't a similar analogy apply? Maybe I'm not expressing myself as clearly as I could, I hope someone here can upgrade the quality of my observation to get at its essence and not be stuck with the poor quality of my language choices.

Accepted:
August 22, 2016

Comments

Speaking of recurrence (!),

Speaking of recurrence (!), this topic has come up rather often on this site in recent months. My own answers appear at Question 25260 and Question 25648 .

In reply to Question 25260, I conceded that we can tell a story featuring a causal loop in which -- allegedly -- X creates Y in 1900, with Y already having created X in 1800. However, because Y already existed (indeed, Y created something) in 1800, I can't see how X can create Y in 1900: I can't see how X can create something that already existed (indeed, something that existed even before X did). Instead, I'm inclined to describe the story as one in which X and Y come into existence for no reason at all, and not because either of them creates the other.

As I interpret it, your analogy to drawing a circle is meant to suggest that the story might have an actual, unique starting point that we can no longer identify because the story has now come "full circle": the drawn circle is now closed. But that suggestion, I think, misunderstands the nature of the imagined causal loop. The causal loop is a depiction of events that unfold in time. But the loop, the depiction, doesn't itself unfold in time; it exists timelessly. The loop doesn't start open and later become closed. The loop is timelessly closed, so it can't possibly have a starting point, not even a temporary one.

I hope that helps.