Fact-checked by Grok 2 weeks ago

Eternity of the world

The eternity of the world denotes the philosophical doctrine asserting that the cosmos has no temporal origin, existing infinitely backward in time without a beginning or creation event.^[1] This view, prominently advanced by Aristotle, derives from observations of perpetual celestial motion, which he contended could neither arise from prior rest nor traverse an infinite past without contradiction, thus implying unending duration.^[2] Neoplatonist Proclus systematized defenses in his On the Eternity of the World, offering eighteen arguments against temporal creation, influencing pagan, Islamic, and Christian thinkers by linking eternity to divine immutability and the rejection of a "first now" in time.^[3] Early Christian critics like John Philoponus countered with analyses of infinite regress paradoxes, arguing that an eternal series of events or causes undermines causality and leads to absurdities, such as the impossibility of completing an infinite sequence of prior moments.^[4] Medieval figures including Thomas Aquinas examined the thesis rigorously, deeming Aristotelian proofs inconclusive and affirming a created beginning on theological grounds while allowing philosophical compatibility with eternity if willed by an omnipotent cause.^[5] The doctrine's defining tension lies in reconciling apparent logical coherence with empirical and causal challenges: modern cosmology's Big Bang model, supported by Hubble's law of expansion, the cosmic microwave background, and nucleosynthesis predictions, dates the universe to approximately 13.8 billion years, evidencing a hot, dense origin rather than infinite age.^[6]^[7] Renewed Kalām-style arguments reinforce this by positing that actual infinite regress of dependencies—whether temporal or causal—cannot obtain in concrete reality, demanding a finite commencement.^[8]

Ancient Philosophical Foundations

Pre-Socratic and Early Greek Cosmologies

The pre-Socratic philosophers, emerging in Ionia and Magna Graecia during the 6th and early 5th centuries BCE, predominantly conceptualized the cosmos as eternal, governed by unchanging principles rather than originating from a temporal creation event. This view contrasted with mythological accounts in Hesiod's Theogony (c. 700 BCE), where Chaos precedes generated deities, but aligned with a shift toward naturalistic explanations devoid of divine craftsmanship ex nihilo. Figures like Anaximander (c. 610–546 BCE) described the apeiron—an indefinite, boundless substrate—as eternal in nature, producing and absorbing worlds through ceaseless motion without a definitive starting point.^[9] Similarly, Xenophanes of Colophon (c. 570–475 BCE) was later cited by patristic authors as affirming the world's unending duration, critiquing anthropomorphic gods while positing a single, eternal divine reality.^[10] Parmenides of Elea (c. 515–450 BCE) advanced a monistic ontology where "Being" exists eternally, ungenerated and indestructible, rejecting genesis or perishing as logically impossible since non-being cannot arise. His poem On Nature argues that true reality is timeless and unchanging, influencing subsequent debates by equating eternity with the absence of temporal boundaries. Heraclitus of Ephesus (c. 535–475 BCE), in contrast, emphasized perpetual flux under the logos—an eternal rational principle manifesting as fire—where opposites coexist in unending transformation, yet the underlying structure persists without origin or end. This flux doctrine, encapsulated in fragments like "everything flows" (panta rhei), implies a self-sustaining cosmos rather than one with a discrete inception.^[10] Later pre-Socratics reconciled change with permanence through pluralistic models. Empedocles of Acragas (c. 495–435 BCE) proposed four eternal roots (earth, air, fire, water) cyclically united by Love and divided by Strife in an unending cosmic rhythm, explicitly describing the process as "eternal recurrence of the same." Anaxagoras (c. 500–428 BCE) invoked eternal ingredients mixed by Nous (mind), which organizes without creating from nothing, preserving the cosmos's pre-existence. Democritus (c. 460–370 BCE) atomized reality into indivisible, eternal particles moving in infinite void, generating worlds through mechanical collisions absent any first cause. These frameworks collectively prioritized causal continuity over absolute beginnings, laying groundwork for later eternalist arguments while relying on fragmentary testimonia preserved in Aristotle and Simplicius.^[11]^[12]

Platonic Contributions in the Timaeus

In Plato's Timaeus, the character Timaeus presents a cosmological account where the physical universe, or cosmos, is fashioned by a benevolent craftsman-god known as the Demiurge from pre-existing chaotic matter, with the goal of imposing order and goodness upon it. This creation process explicitly positions the cosmos as genetós (generated or produced), distinguishing it from the ungenerated and eternal intelligible realm of the Forms, which serves as its unchanging paradigm. The Demiurge's imitation of this eternal model ensures the cosmos achieves maximum stability and beauty within the constraints of materiality, but it remains a temporal copy rather than an atemporal original.^[13] Central to this framework is the introduction of time as a novel cosmic feature, defined at Timaeus 37d as "a moving image of eternity" (kinēsis eikōn tēs aiōnos). Prior to the cosmos's formation, eternity exists as a timeless, abiding present in the realm of Being, without past or future; the Demiurge creates time simultaneously with the heavens to mirror this eternity through measurable cycles—days, nights, months, and years—tracked by the sun, moon, and planets. This entails that the physical world has a definite temporal origin, as time's inception coincides with the ordered motions of celestial bodies, precluding an infinite regress of prior states.^[14]^[15] The cosmos's generated status underscores its imperfection relative to the eternal Forms: as a sensible, mutable entity, it cannot partake fully in timelessness but approximates eternity through perpetual duration and indestructibility, once established. Timaeus argues that the Demiurge, being wholly good, would not allow the cosmos to dissolve, rendering it aidios (everlasting) in forward time while lacking a beginning. This view contrasts with ungenerated eternity by emphasizing causal origination from divine intelligence, influencing later debates on whether creation implies temporal limits or compatibilism with unending existence. Scholarly analyses affirm that Plato's literal reading of generation here rejects sempiternal (beginningless infinite duration) for the material world, prioritizing explanatory power for observed order over absolute timelessness.^[13]^[16]

Aristotelian Arguments for Eternity

Aristotle maintained that the cosmos is eternal, lacking both beginning and end, as articulated in his Physics, On the Heavens, and Metaphysics. He rejected the notion of creation ex nihilo, arguing instead that the universe has always existed in its present form, with perpetual motion, time, and the heavens ensuring continuity without generation or corruption.^[2] This view stems from his observation that observed natural processes, such as circular celestial motion, exhibit no signs of inception or cessation, positing eternity as necessary for the observed order.^[17] A primary argument concerns the eternity of motion, detailed in Physics Book VIII. Aristotle contends that motion cannot have a temporal beginning, for if it did, a prior state of rest would require an initiating cause, leading to an infinite regress of movers or an uncaused transition, both impossible under his principles of causality and potentiality-actuality.^[18] Since time is the measure of motion, time too must be eternal, implying the cosmos as the substrate of motion has always existed to sustain it.^[19] Without eternal motion, the chain of natural actualizations would collapse, contradicting the perpetual changes in the sublunar realm balanced by unchanging supralunar cycles.^[2] In On the Heavens, Aristotle extends this to the celestial sphere, asserting it is ungenerated and indestructible, comprising eternal substance incapable of contrariety or decay. The heavens' uniform circular motion, driven by their nature toward the prime mover, precludes beginning or end, as any generation would imply a prior potential state unrealized eternally, violating necessity.^[17] Heavenly bodies lack matter subject to opposition, possessing perpetual existence as actuality without potentiality for non-being.^[18] Complementing these, Metaphysics Book XII requires eternal, imperishable substances to ground the world's continuity; if all were perishable, motion and time—observed as unending—could not persist, necessitating an unmoved, eternal prime mover as actuality pure, sustaining cosmic order without itself changing.^[19] This eternal substance ensures the cosmos' stability, as perishable elements alone cannot account for infinite duration.^[2]

Hellenistic and Late Antique Debates

Neo-Platonist Defenses of Eternal Duration

Plotinus (c. 204–270 CE), the foundational figure of Neo-Platonism, posited that the cosmos emanates eternally from the One, the ultimate principle beyond being, rendering the world without a temporal origin. In Ennead II.1, he asserts that the ordered universe, including its material extension, "has existed for ever and will for ever exist," as its generation is not a discrete event but a perpetual overflow of divine productivity.^[20] This view aligns eternity (aiōn) with the unchanging life of the Intellect (Nous), which contains all forms timelessly, while the sensible world participates in this eternity through continuous emanation rather than a punctual creation.^[21] Plotinus distinguishes eternity from time, defining the former as "the possession of life in its totality at once" and the latter as the soul's discursive motion, ensuring the cosmos endures indefinitely without beginning or end.^[22] Proclus (412–485 CE), a systematizer of Neo-Platonic thought, advanced rigorous defenses in his treatise On the Eternity of the World (De Aeternitate Mundi), comprising eighteen arguments drawn from Platonic principles. He contends that if the divine cause—eternal and unchanging—possesses perpetual efficacy and will, its effects, including the cosmos, must likewise be eternal, as a temporal beginning would imply deficiency in the cause's power.^[1] Drawing on Plato's Timaeus, Proclus argues that the world's paradigmatic forms in the Demiurge's mind are eternal, necessitating an everlasting sensible counterpart to manifest them fully, lest divine providence remain incomplete.^[23] He further refutes temporal origination by noting that matter, as receptive of form, participates eternally in the chain of procession (prohodos) from the One, without requiring a first moment.^[3] These arguments emphasize causal necessity over voluntaristic creation, positing the world's eternity as harmonious with the hierarchical emanation from unity to multiplicity. Plotinus and Proclus thus preserved Platonic cosmology against emerging creationist critiques, influencing subsequent Hellenistic and medieval debates by framing eternity as intrinsic to divine perfection rather than contingent upon a divine act.^[24]

John Philoponus' Causal and Temporal Critiques

John Philoponus, a sixth-century Alexandrian Christian philosopher active circa 490–570 CE, mounted systematic critiques against pagan defenses of the world's eternity in two key treatises: Against Proclus on the Eternity of the World (circa 529 CE) and On the Eternity of the World against Aristotle (circa 530–534 CE).^[25] In the former, he systematically refutes the eighteen arguments advanced by the Neoplatonist Proclus (circa 410–485 CE) for an uncreated, timeless cosmos emanating eternally from the One, employing Proclus' own Platonist framework to argue instead for a temporally finite universe brought into being by divine will.^[25] The latter work targets Aristotle's (384–322 BCE) physics, particularly the eternal circular motion of the heavens as evidence of unending duration, positing that such motion presupposes rather than proves eternity and ultimately requires a transcendent creator.^[25] Philoponus' causal critiques emphasize the necessity of a first cause to account for the world's existence and persistence, rejecting infinite causal regresses as metaphysically incoherent. Against Aristotle's unmoved mover as an eternal sustainer within a self-perpetuating cosmos, Philoponus contends that any series of generators or movers—whether of matter, motion, or celestial bodies—cannot extend infinitely backward without lacking an originating principle, as each dependent cause demands a prior actualizer.^[25] He invokes the principle that existence from non-existence (creatio ex nihilo) is not precluded by natural limitations, since divine power surpasses Aristotelian nature: even if nature never produces from absolute nothing, God, as omnipotent, can initiate the universe without preexisting substrate or eternal potency.^[25] This causal dependency undermines emanationist models like Proclus', where the world flows eternally from divine intellect without temporal beginning, by insisting that potentiality requires actualization by an extrinsic agent not bound by temporal chains.^[26] Complementing these, Philoponus' temporal critiques target the logical absurdity of an actual infinite past, arguing that the present moment could not be reached if time extended infinitely backward. Central is the "traversal argument": supposing an eternal past, every instant would represent the completion of infinitely many prior intervals or celestial revolutions, yet completing an actual infinite series of successive events is impossible, as it would entail traversing what by definition has no end.^[27] He extends this to physics, noting that the finite dunamis (potency or power) of the universe—a composite of limited matter and movers—cannot sustain infinite duration, as eternal motion would demand unbounded capacity, contradicting observed finitude in sublunary changes and even heavenly spheres.^[25] Against Proclus' claim that time is an eternal image of eternity, Philoponus retorts that time's successive nature precludes infinite regress, aligning with scriptural creation while refuting pagan assumptions via their own logic of potency and act.^[25] These arguments, though framed philosophically, presuppose Christian theology's finite cosmos without relying solely on revelation, influencing later debates by prioritizing causal origination and temporal boundedness over self-subsistent eternity.^[26]

Medieval Synthesis and Conflicts

Islamic Peripatetic Views on Emanation and Eternity

Islamic Peripatetic philosophers, drawing on Aristotelian and Neoplatonic sources, developed a cosmology wherein the universe emanates eternally from the divine essence, reconciling apparent tensions with Islamic doctrines of creation through the concept of perpetual origination (huduth) without a temporal inception. Al-Farabi (c. 870–950 CE), often termed the "Second Teacher" after Aristotle, introduced a hierarchical emanation scheme in works such as The Virtuous City and On the Intellect, positing that the First Cause—identified with God—eternally emanates the First Intelligence, which in turn produces subsequent intellects, souls, and celestial spheres in a necessary, timeless overflow (fayd). This process ensures the world's eternity a parte ante, as divine knowledge and causation are unchanging and eternal, precluding any "before" devoid of emanation; natural phenomena remain contingent, dependent on this chain for their existence.^[28]^[29] Avicenna (Ibn Sina, 980–1037 CE) systematized this framework in his Healing (al-Shifa) and Pointers and Reminders (al-Isharat), distinguishing the Necessary Existent (God) from contingent beings and arguing that emanation proceeds necessarily from divine self-sufficiency: the First Intelligence emerges timelessly, followed by nine further intellects governing the ten celestial spheres, culminating in the sublunary realm of elements and change. He defended the world's eternity through modal logic, contending that a temporal beginning would imply a potentiality in God unrealized eternally prior, contradicting divine necessity; instead, the world is eternally "originated" (muhdath), always caused anew by God without implying divine change or pre-existent matter. This view posits no absolute temporal origin, as time itself arises with the celestial motion emanated from the First Intelligence, thus aligning emanation with Quranic creation ex nihilo as ongoing divine act rather than a discrete event.^[30]^[31]^[32] Averroes (Ibn Rushd, 1126–1198 CE), critiquing excessive Neoplatonism while upholding Aristotelian principles, advanced these ideas in his Incoherence of the Incoherence (Tahafut al-Tahafut), a rebuttal to al-Ghazali's attacks on philosophers. He affirmed the world's eternity as coextensive with eternal divine motion, rejecting a finite past on grounds that commencing motion from rest necessitates an impossible transition in the eternal Unmoved Mover (God), who acts as final cause sustaining perpetual celestial rotation without temporal "start." Emanation here functions as continuous efficient causation through intermediary causes, preserving contingency: the world lacks independent eternity, deriving existence moment-to-moment from God, but possesses no "first instant" since infinite past regress in causation is coherent under divine immutability. Averroes distinguished this from emanation's more mystical variants, emphasizing empirical observation of uniform cosmic order over probabilistic kalam arguments for inception.^[33]^[34]^[35]

Jewish Rationalist Positions

Moses Maimonides (1138–1204), the preeminent Jewish rationalist, addressed the eternity of the world in his Guide for the Perplexed, integrating Aristotelian cosmology with Torah teachings on creation. He explicitly rejected Aristotle's view of an eternal universe, arguing instead for creation ex nihilo as the Mosaic doctrine, though he deemed Plato's model of creation from pre-existing matter a viable rational alternative.^[36] Maimonides contended that creation does not conform to the Aristotelian paradigm of change (something arising from something prior), positing that a perfect divine will could initiate existence without necessitating prior alteration in God.^[36] He further invoked observable celestial irregularities—such as varying speeds of heavenly spheres—as evidence of contingency rather than eternal necessity, underscoring the limits of human reason in definitively proving either position but privileging scriptural revelation for resolution.^[36] Levi ben Gershom (Gersonides, 1288–1344), building on Maimonides while advancing empirical astronomy, offered a nuanced critique of both Aristotelian eternity and strict ex nihilo creation in his Wars of the Lord (Book VI). He maintained that the universe had a temporal beginning through divine formation of eternal formless matter (geshem), aligning with a Platonic framework rather than Aristotle's fully eternal cosmos or Maimonides' emphasis on creation's rational inaccessibility.^[37] Unlike Maimonides, Gersonides asserted that such a created-yet-materially-eternal model was demonstrable via reason, drawing on astronomical data like planetary anomalies to refute unchanging eternal motion and interpreting Genesis as positing dual matter types: primordial substrate and structured forms.^[37] This position preserved divine agency and contingency, avoiding emanationist determinism while reconciling philosophy with biblical temporality.^[37] These rationalist syntheses prioritized demonstrative proofs over kalam-style atomism, subordinating Aristotelian eternity arguments—such as infinite regress of causes or perpetual motion—to Torah's finite-world imperative, though neither philosopher equated eternity's rejection solely with faith absent rational groundwork.^[36]^[37] Later Jewish thinkers, like Hasdai Crescas (1340–1410), critiqued these views for insufficiently upholding absolute creation, but Maimonides and Gersonides defined the rationalist mainstream by demanding philosophical coherence with revealed truth.

Christian Scholastic Reconciliation Attempts

Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (c. 1265–1274), systematically addressed the apparent conflict between Aristotelian demonstrations of an eternal cosmos and the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo with a temporal origin, as affirmed in Genesis. He contended that while divine revelation necessitates belief in the world's beginning, unaided reason cannot conclusively demonstrate either eternity or temporality, since an omnipotent God could instantaneously confer existence upon a sempiternal (eternally enduring) universe without temporal precedence in the divine act of creation.^[38] Aquinas distinguished creation—understood as the radical bestowal of being from nothing—from Aristotelian notions of eternal motion or emanation, arguing that the former admits no intrinsic necessity for a temporal gap between cause and effect.^[39] In his dedicated treatise De Aeternitate Mundi (c. 1270), Aquinas further reconciled the positions by refuting five primary objections to an eternal created world, including claims of infinite regress in celestial motion or impossibility of simultaneous efficient causation without duration. He posited that God's atemporal eternity, wherein all moments of creation are present to the divine intellect, permits an eternal world without implying divine passivity or limitation, as the act of creation remains voluntary and extrinsic to God's unchanging essence.^[40] This approach preserved Aristotelian physics' empirical observations of ceaseless celestial cycles while subordinating them to theological priority, allowing reason to explore possibilities without contradicting faith's historical assertion of a finite past. Earlier, Boethius (c. 480–524) provided a foundational framework in The Consolation of Philosophy (c. 524), defining eternity as "the whole and perfect possession of interminable life at once," distinct from the successive flow of time in the created order. This timeless divine perspective enabled scholastics to conceptualize how an eternal God could originate a potentially eternal world without undergoing change or sequence, influencing Aquinas by emphasizing that God's foreknowledge encompasses all temporal events in an undifferentiated "now."^[41] Such reconciliations faced internal critique, notably from Bonaventure (c. 1221–1274), who in his Commentaria in Sententias (c. 1250) advanced Augustinian arguments against eternal creation's coherence, including the impossibility of traversing an actual infinite series of past events or divine effects without implying prior non-being. Aquinas countered that eternity involves no such traversal, as simultaneous divine causation sustains all moments without successive addition, thereby upholding the logical viability of sempiternity under God's power while affirming revelation's temporality as beyond strict proof.^[42] These efforts, amid 13th-century Parisian condemnations of radical Aristotelianism (1277), underscored scholasticism's commitment to harmonizing pagan reason with scriptural causality, privileging faith where philosophy reached equipoise.^[43]

Early Modern Reassessments

Renaissance Humanist Engagements

Renaissance humanists, through philological recovery and translation of classical texts, revitalized ancient cosmological debates, particularly the tension between Plato's account of creation in the Timaeus and Aristotle's arguments for an eternal world in Physics Book VIII and On the Heavens. This engagement often prioritized interpretive reconciliation with Christian theology, viewing Aristotelian eternity as philosophically compelling but incompatible with scriptural creation ex nihilo, thereby prompting critical source analysis over dogmatic acceptance.^[44] Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), a central figure in Florentine Platonism, advanced a created cosmos in his Platonic Theology (1482), positing that prime matter originated from divine causation rather than subsisting eternally, thus countering Aristotelian unmoved matter while affirming the world's dependence on an timeless God. Ficino's framework integrated Platonic emanation with eternal divine ideas, but insisted on temporal origination to preserve causality and avoid implying uncreated necessity in physical reality.^[45] Leonardo Bruni (c. 1370–1444), an early humanist chancellor of Florence, translated Aristotle's works between 1415 and 1442 and explicitly favored Plato's creationist narrative in a letter to Pope John XXIII around 1417, critiquing eternalism as less aligned with observed change and divine will. Bruni's Histories of the Florentine People (completed 1442) reflected this by eschewing medieval providential chronologies tied to creation, instead emphasizing verifiable human events through classical models.^[44] These debates extended to historiography, as eternalist arguments implied recurrent cataclysms erasing prior civilizations, challenging biblical timelines of roughly 6,000 years. Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527), in Discourses on Livy (composed c. 1517), cited Diodorus Siculus' Library of History (translated 1449 by Poggio Bracciolini) to suggest cycles of renewal via floods spanning 20,000–25,000 years, treating eternalism as a hypothesis for explaining historical gaps without theological resolution.^[44] Such views, while not endorsing strict eternity, underscored humanists' causal realism in privileging empirical patterns over sacred annals, fostering secular narrative methods. Agostino Nifo (c. 1470–1538), blending Aristotelianism with humanist textual scrutiny, defended the world's eternity as rationally possible in commentaries, arguing it neither contradicted divine power nor required infinite regress, though he subordinated it to theological fideism amid Church pressures.^[46] This position, echoed in university disputations, highlighted the era's divide: humanists often instrumentalized ancient doctrines for ethical and political ends, wary of eternalism's implication of a self-sustaining cosmos undermining creation's contingency.

Enlightenment Skepticism and Mechanistic Alternatives

Enlightenment thinkers increasingly questioned the Aristotelian and medieval arguments for the world's eternity through empirical skepticism and critical rationalism, emphasizing the limits of human reason in resolving cosmological origins. David Hume, in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion published posthumously in 1779, advanced skepticism by arguing that causal inferences from observed phenomena cannot conclusively prove a first cause or necessitate a temporal beginning, allowing for the possibility of an uncaused, potentially eternal universe while undermining dogmatic claims on either side.^[47] Hume further contended that analogies between finite human artifacts and the cosmos fail to establish eternity or creation, as the universe's resemblance to organic processes suggests self-sustaining continuity rather than external origination.^[48] Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (1781) formalized this skepticism via the first antinomy, pitting the thesis of a world with a beginning in time—avoiding an impossible infinite regress of events—against the antithesis of an eternal world, which precludes an unexplained commencement without prior states.^[49] Kant resolved the apparent contradiction by distinguishing phenomena (structured by human intuitions of space and time) from noumena (things-in-themselves), concluding that reason alone cannot determine the world's temporal status, as such questions transcend sensory experience and lead to dialectical illusions. This critique dismantled a priori proofs for eternity, privileging empirical investigation over metaphysical speculation. Mechanistic philosophy offered alternatives by reconceptualizing the cosmos as a vast, law-governed machine, often implying a finite origin established by divine intelligence rather than eternal emanation or perpetual motion. Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica (1687) and Opticks (1704) portrayed the universe as operating via universal gravitation and inertial principles, yet Newton rejected eternity, arguing that an infinite past would lead to gravitational instabilities and stellar exhaustion without ongoing divine intervention, favoring a created order renewed periodically by God.^[50] This view aligned with deistic tendencies in the Enlightenment, where figures like Voltaire endorsed a clockwork universe initiated at a specific moment, displacing Aristotelian teleology with corpuscular mechanics that rendered eternal subsistence unnecessary and improbable under fixed physical laws.^[51] Such mechanistic frameworks shifted debates toward observable decay and uniformity in nature, foreshadowing scientific estimates of finite cosmic age.

Modern Philosophical and Scientific Intersections

Revival of Finite-Past Arguments in Analytic Philosophy

In the second half of the 20th century, analytic philosophers began reviving metaphysical arguments for the finitude of the past, emphasizing the logical incoherence of an actual infinite regress of temporal events. These arguments, often framed within the kalām cosmological tradition, contended that the universe cannot have existed eternally into the past because an infinite series of successive events cannot be traversed or completed. William Lane Craig played a pivotal role in this revival, publishing The Kalām Cosmological Argument in 1979, where he defended the premise that whatever begins to exist has a cause by arguing against the possibility of an infinite temporal regress using formal logical analysis. Craig drew on paradoxes such as David Hilbert's infinite hotel thought experiment, illustrating that actual infinities lead to absurdities like accommodating infinite guests in a fully occupied hotel without expansion, thereby undermining the metaphysical possibility of an eternal past composed of finite events.^[8] Craig's work integrated Aristotelian and medieval insights with analytic tools, positing that the present moment represents the successful traversal of all prior events, which is impossible if those events form an actual infinite set, as no infinite series can be exhausted by successive addition.^[52] He further argued that potential infinites (like the never-ending counting of natural numbers) differ from actualized ones, with the latter being purely theoretical constructs unfit for real-world temporal sequences. This revival extended to critiques of opposing views, such as those by J. J. C. Smart and Bertrand Russell, who had dismissed infinite regress concerns as outdated; Craig countered by formalizing the "successive events" model of time, where each event depends on predecessors, precluding an infinite chain. Subsequent analytic contributions built on this foundation. In a 2017 anthology edited by Paul Copan and Craig, philosophers like Alexander Pruss and Dean Zimmerman explored modal and set-theoretic objections to infinite pasts, arguing that no coherent model allows forming an actual infinite via temporal succession without violating cardinality principles or leading to equipollence paradoxes (e.g., subtracting infinite subsets yielding inconsistent results).^[53] Andrew Loke, in works from the 2010s onward, refined these arguments by addressing B-theory alternatives (eternal block universe) and defending tensed time as essential for causal realism, maintaining that even static models imply a finite effective past for observers. These efforts positioned finite-past arguments as robust within analytic metaphysics, independent of empirical data, though they faced rebuttals from figures like Wes Morriston, who questioned the traversal analogy by proposing event "bunching" in infinite models—rebuttals Craig and others refuted via probabilistic and mereological analyses.^[54] By the early 21st century, such debates had reintegrated kalām-style reasoning into mainstream analytic discussions of time and causality, influencing broader cosmological apologetics.^[55]

Empirical Cosmology: Evidence for a Temporal Beginning

The standard Lambda-CDM model of cosmology, supported by multiple observational datasets, posits that the universe originated from a hot, dense state approximately 13.8 billion years ago, implying a finite temporal extent rather than eternal existence.^[56] This model's predictions align with empirical measurements of the universe's expansion history, where the Hubble parameter describes the recession velocity of galaxies increasing with distance, extrapolated backward to a singularity-like origin.^[57] Observations from the Planck satellite, analyzing cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropies, yield an age estimate of 13.82 ± 0.02 billion years, derived from parameters including the Hubble constant (H_0 ≈ 67.4 km/s/Mpc) and matter density.^[56] These data preclude steady-state or eternal models, as the observed deceleration followed by acceleration requires an initial high-density phase incompatible with infinite past uniformity.^[57] A cornerstone of evidence is the observed expansion, first quantified by Edwin Hubble in 1929 through redshift-distance relations of galaxies, indicating a dynamic universe that was denser and hotter in the past.^[58] Modern surveys, such as those from the Hubble Space Telescope and Gaia mission, confirm this with a present-day expansion rate implying a finite backward timeline; for instance, integrating the Friedmann equation under observed densities yields an age lower bound exceeding 10 billion years, ruling out infinite-age scenarios without ad hoc adjustments.^[57] The cosmic microwave background radiation, discovered in 1965 by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, provides direct relic evidence: a uniform blackbody spectrum at 2.725 K across the sky, predicted as the cooled remnant of decoupling at redshift z ≈ 1100, about 380,000 years post-origin.^[59] Detailed mappings by COBE, WMAP, and Planck reveal acoustic peaks in the power spectrum matching inflationary Big Bang dynamics, with deviations from isotropy constraining pre-decoupling evolution to a finite, expanding plasma rather than an eternal equilibrium.^[60] Big Bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) further corroborates a temporal beginning by predicting light element abundances formed in the first few minutes after the hot phase. Theoretical calculations, based on baryon-to-photon ratio η ≈ 6 × 10^{-10} from CMB data, forecast primordial helium-4 mass fraction Y_p ≈ 0.247, deuterium abundance [D/H] ≈ 2.5 × 10^{-5}, and trace lithium-7, aligning within 1-2% of quasar absorption-line and stellar observations after correcting for astrophysical processing.^[61] Discrepancies, such as the "lithium problem" where observed ^7Li is lower than predicted by ~3-5%, do not undermine the overall finite-early-universe framework, as they may stem from nuclear reaction uncertainties or diffusion effects rather than eternal alternatives.^[62] Collectively, these pillars—expansion kinematics, CMB relic radiation, and BBN yields—converge on a universe with a definite beginning around 13.8 billion years ago, challenging purely eternal models that fail to reproduce the observed entropy, homogeneity, and elemental ratios without invoking unobserved mechanisms.^[57]

Contemporary Speculative Models and Empirical Challenges

Contemporary speculative models attempting to reconcile an eternal or quasi-eternal universe with observed expansion include cyclic cosmologies, such as the ekpyrotic model proposed by Paul Steinhardt and Neil Turok in 2001. In this framework, the universe undergoes infinite cycles of expansion and contraction, driven by collisions between higher-dimensional branes in string theory, avoiding a singular origin by transitioning smoothly between epochs without invoking inflation's fine-tuning issues.^[63] Similarly, eternal inflation posits that quantum fluctuations in an inflating scalar field perpetually generate pocket universes, with inflation continuing indefinitely in most regions while our observable universe emerges from a finite inflationary phase.^[64] These models face significant theoretical hurdles, notably the Borde-Guth-Vilenkin (BGV) theorem of 2003, which proves that any spacetime with an average expansion rate greater than zero—consistent with observations of our universe's history—is geodesically past-incomplete, implying a boundary or beginning rather than infinite past extension.^[65] The theorem applies to standard eternal inflation and many cyclic scenarios unless they incorporate prolonged contraction phases, which conflict with empirical data showing consistent expansion since the cosmic microwave background (CMB) era. Proponents of cyclic models counter by proposing entropy dilution during brane interactions, but this requires unverified mechanisms and struggles to explain the observed uniformity of the CMB without ad hoc adjustments.^[66] Empirically, the Lambda-CDM model, validated by Planck satellite measurements in 2018, yields a universe age of 13.797 billion years with high precision, supported by CMB anisotropies, big bang nucleosynthesis abundances (e.g., helium-4 at 24.5% by mass), and supernova distance-redshift relations indicating accelerating expansion from a hot, dense state. No direct evidence exists for pre-big bang cycles or eternal inflation's multiverse bubbles, as gravitational wave signatures or spectral distortions predicted by some variants remain undetected by instruments like LIGO or future CMB experiments. Thermodynamically, an eternal universe would equilibrate to maximum entropy over infinite time per the second law, yet observations reveal an improbably low-entropy initial state (quantified by Roger Penrose's Weyl curvature hypothesis at ~10^{-10^{123}} improbability), necessitating a finite past to avoid heat death paradoxes.^[67] Alexander Vilenkin, co-author of the BGV theorem, has stated that no viable past-eternal cosmological models exist, as attempts to evade the theorem via quantum gravity or null geodesics fail under classical general relativity's constraints.^[67]

References

[1]
On the Eternity of the World de Aeternitate Mundi by Proclus
His treatise On the Eternity of the World formed the basis for virtually all later arguments for the eternity of the world and for the existence of God ...
[2]
Aristotle and the Arguments for Eternity (Chapter 3)
According to maimonides, aristotle believed that the world is eternal and that it has always existed in the form in which it now exists.
[3]
Proclus: On the Eternity of the World (de Aeternitate Mundi)
Oct 19, 2002 · The pagan Neoplatonist philosopher Proclus (410-85) composed a treatise presenting 18 arguments for the eternity of the world. This work is now lost to us.
[4]
Philoponus: Against Aristotle on the Eternity of the World
Philoponus' treatise Against Aristotle on the Eternity of the World, an attack on Aristotle's astronomy and theology is concerned mainly with the eternity and ...
[5]
Did Thomas Aquinas Defend the Possibility of an Eternally Created ...
WIPPEL As is WELL KNOWN, Thomas Aquinas repeatedly found wanting all argumentation offered in support of eternity of the world. So great was his respect for ...
[6]
The big bang | Institute of Physics
The big bang theory proposes the universe began 13.8 billion years ago from a tiny, hot, dense space that then ballooned rapidly.<|control11|><|separator|>
[7]
It all started with a Big Bang – the quest to unravel the mystery ...
Oct 30, 2024 · The 14 billion year story of our universe begins with a cataclysmic explosion everywhere in space, which we call the Big Bang.
[8]
The Kalam Cosmological Argument | Popular Writings
The Kalam argument, rooted in medieval Islamic theology, argues that the universe, having a beginning, must have a cause, as nothing begins without a cause.
[9]
https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110329278.1/html
[10]
Harry Austryn Wolfson, “Patristic Arguments against the Eternity of ...
" Two pre-Socratic philosophers are mentioned by some Fathers as exponents of the belief in the eternity of the world: Xenophanes 12 by Hippolytus,13 ...
[11]
[PDF] Empedocles' Cosmic Cycle and the Pythagorean Tetractys
Dec 6, 2018 · On the cosmic level, he describes the interac- tion of the principles as an eternal recurrence of the same, i.e. as a cosmic cycle.
[12]
https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/rhiz-2016-0002/html
[13]
Plato's Timaeus - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Oct 25, 2005 · In the Timaeus Plato presents an elaborately wrought account of the formation of the universe and an explanation of its impressive order and beauty.
[14]
Plato's Cosmology: The Timaeus
Jul 25, 2015 · The cosmos cannot be eternal, as a Form is, since it comes into being. But it is as much like a Form, as close to being eternal, as it can be ( ...
[15]
[PDF] ETERNITY AND TIME IN PLATO'S TIMAEUS - PhilArchive
It focuses on the Timaeus, which is the main source used in the attempts to reconstruct Plato's theory of time and to gain insights into his understanding of ...
[16]
Time, Number, and Eternity in Plato and Aristotle - jstor
Plato contrasted it with eternity and thought of it as having a beginning, while for Aristotle the two concepts merged into one, that of everlasting time.
[17]
On the Heavens by Aristotle - The Internet Classics Archive
The heaven as a whole neither came into being nor admits of destruction, as some assert, but is one and eternal, with no end or beginning of its total duration.
[18]
On the Eternity of the World - Inters.org
It remains that mobile things, which created substances are, exist from eternity. 7. Also, it is necessary either to affirm or to deny. If, therefore, a thing's ...
[19]
Aristotle on the existence of God
### Summary of Aristotle's Arguments for Eternal Substances and Eternity of the World
[20]
https://classics.mit.edu/Plotinus/enneads.2.second.html
[21]
Neo-Platonism - Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Neoplatonism is a modern term used to designate the period of Platonic philosophy beginning with the work of Plotinus and ending with the closing of the ...
[22]
On Eternity and Time - PLOTINUS, Enneads | Loeb Classical Library
Plotinus's own view of the origin and nature of time; it is the life of the soul in the restless movement from one thing to another.Missing: cosmos | Show results with:cosmos
[23]
Proclus - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Mar 16, 2011 · Proclus of Athens (*412–485 CE) was the most authoritative philosopher of late antiquity and played a crucial role in the transmission of Platonic philosophy.
[24]
Neoplatonism - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Jan 11, 2016 · Rightly or wrongly, the Egyptian-born Plotinus (204/5–270) is commonly regarded as the founder of Neoplatonism. He was a pupil of the ...
[25]
John Philoponus - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Mar 11, 2003 · In the course of this critique, Philoponus examines and repudiates fundamental Aristotelian-Neoplatonic tenets, most prominently the doctrine of ...Introduction · Extant Philosophical... · The Critical Treatises · Theological Treatises
[26]
https://brill.com/view/journals/scri/13/1/article-p383_24.xml
[27]
[PDF] Philoponus's Traversal Argument and the Beginning of Time
This suggests that Philoponus thinks that there is an extra impossibility in traversing an infinite past. It implies that we could reject the infinity arguments ...
[28]
Al-Farabi - The Theory of Emanation and the Eternity of the World
Al-Fārābī's theory conflates God's knowledge with His will, contradicting Islamic doctrine. He posits that God's absolute knowledge necessitates the eternal ...
[29]
Chapter 23: Al-Farabi | A History of Muslim Philosophy Volume 1 ...
It is, thus, through the doctrine of the ten intelligences that al-Farabi solves the problem of movement and change. He has made use of the same theory in his ...
[30]
Metaphysics II: Cosmology | Avicenna - Oxford Academic
... Eternity of the World Avicenna's Modal Arguments for the Eternity of the World ... Avicenna's unique twist on the Neoplatonic theory of emanation. Keywords ...
[31]
Avicenna & Al-Ghazali: Causality and The Eternity of The Universe
Avicenna Avicenna, before discussing causes and effects, divides all ... Eternity of the World addFollow. close. Welcome to Academia. Sign up to get ...
[32]
Eternity in Medieval Philosophy - Oxford Academic
But Avicenna provides a new and powerful rationale for the eternity of the world ... This is very like Avicenna's picture of divine causation: divine emanation ...
[33]
[PDF] Al-Ghazali and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) on Creation and the Divine ...
Al-Ghazali and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) on Creation and the Divine Attributes up ... 3 He objects to al-Ghazali's attempt to establish the non-eternity of the.
[34]
[PDF] the tahafuts of al-ghazali and ibn rushd
Al-Ghazāli's attack on philosophy was answered nearly a hundred years later by Ibn Rushd (Averroes) on the legal as well as the philo- sophical level. Ibn ...
[35]
Aristotle and Averroes - The Postmodern Peripatetic
Feb 25, 2025 · At the time, Averroes was only a name to me. But I was quite impressed with his overall defense of reason against Ghazali's theological ...
[36]
Maimonides - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Jan 24, 2006 · His philosophic masterpiece, the Guide of the Perplexed, is a sustained treatment of Jewish thought and practice that seeks to resolve the ...
[37]
Gersonides (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
### Summary of Gersonides' Views on Eternity of the World, Creation, and Differences from Aristotle and Maimonides
[38]
Creation, Evolution, and Thomas Aquinas
Aquinas saw no contradiction in the notion of an eternal created universe. He thought that it was a matter of biblical revelation that the world is not eternal.
[39]
Aquinas and the Big Bang - First Things
Nov 1, 1999 · ... reconcile Aristotelian science and Christian revelation. The key to Aquinas' analysis is the distinction he draws between creation and change.
[40]
Thomas Aquinas on Creation (or How to Read ... - Non Sermoni Res
Since the necessary being is eternal, creation must be eternal. It follows that the necessary being does not create freely; nor could any other world have been ...
[41]
“A never-failing present”: Boethius on God's eternity | Catholic Culture
Nov 28, 2017 · Boethius immediately defines eternity as “a possession of life, a possession simultaneously entire and perfect, which has no end.” By contrast, ...
[42]
[PDF] THE PERSPECTIVES OF BONAVENTURE AND AQUINAS
6 At the heart of the differences between Bonaventure and Aquinas on this point lie their different con- ceptions of the relationship between God and the world.
[43]
Eternity of the World - Faculty of Theology and Religion
Scholastics regularly treated the question of the world's eternity and its conflict with Creation. Two philosophical theories figured in this discussion: ...
[44]
[PDF] The Eternity of the World and Renaissance Historical Thought - Gwern
Beneath their brightly colored disquisitions one can sometimes detect troubled humanist anxieties over what the ancients really thought (Allen 2007). After all, ...
[45]
natural philosophy: in the Renaissance
Apr 14, 2015 · In similar fashion, Marsilio Ficino expressly described prime matter as created and therefore not subject to generation and corruption.
[46]
The Eternity of the World and Renaissance Historical Thought
This essay suggests that the Renaissance revolution in historical thought was encouraged by contemporary debates over the Aristotelian-Averroistic doctrine ...
[47]
PART VI. - Hume Texts Online
And it must be confessed, that as the universe resembles more a human body than it does the works of human art and contrivance; if our limited analogy could ...
[48]
Hume, David: Religion | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
His third consideration is that we know of nothing else in the universe that is eternal, or at least that retains its properties and identity eternally, so it ...
[49]
Kant's Critique of Metaphysics - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Feb 29, 2004 · The first antinomy concerns the finitude or infinitude of the spatio-temporal world. The thesis argument seeks to show that the world in ...Missing: eternity | Show results with:eternity<|separator|>
[50]
Halley and the eternity of the world revisited - PMC - PubMed Central
Sep 4, 2013 · However, the one theological idiosyncrasy that there is no evidence for him ever stretching to is belief in the eternity of the world.
[51]
The Philosophy of the Enlightenment - The Atlas Society
Enlightenment Deists believed that the world had been intelligently disposed by Mind. However, such questions as "What was the nature of that mind?" "How did it ...
[52]
[PDF] The Existence of God and the Beginning of the Universe - LSE
The kalam cosmological argument, by showing that the universe began to exist, demonstrates that the world is not a necessary being and, therefore, ...Missing: analytic | Show results with:analytic
[53]
The Kalam Cosmological Argument, Volume 1
Nov 16, 2017 · This anthology on the philosophical arguments for the finitude of the past asks: Is an infinite series of past events metaphysically possible?Missing: analytic | Show results with:analytic
[54]
[PDF] The kalaml cosmological argument has two parts.
The kalaml cosmological argument has two parts. The first part attempts to show that there is a First. Cause of the universe. It can be conveniently summa-.<|control11|><|separator|>
[55]
Kalam Cosmological Argument - Bibliography - PhilPapers
The Kalam Cosmological Argument (KCA) argues that the universe's finitude suggests a first cause, which is either temporally or causally finite.
[56]
Planck reveals an almost perfect Universe - ESA
Mar 21, 2013 · The data imply that the age of the Universe is 13.82 billion years. “With the most accurate and detailed maps of the microwave sky ever made ...
[57]
[PDF] 22. Big-Bang Cosmology - Particle Data Group
May 31, 2024 · The observed expansion of the Universe [1–3] is a natural (almost inevitable) result of any homogeneous and isotropic cosmological model based ...
[58]
Planck Mission Brings Universe Into Sharp Focus
Mar 21, 2013 · The map results suggest the universe is expanding more slowly than scientists thought, and is 13.8 billion years old, 100 million years older ...
[59]
Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation - ESA
Evidence for the Big Bang. The CMB radiation was discovered by chance in 1965. Penzias and Wilson, two radio astronomers in the United States, registered a ...
[60]
WMAP Big Bang CMB Test - NASA
Feb 20, 2024 · When the visible universe was one hundredth of its present size, the cosmic microwave background was a hundred times hotter (273 degrees above ...
[61]
WMAP Big Bang Elements Test - NASA
Apr 16, 2010 · The predicted abundance of deuterium, helium and lithium depends on the density of ordinary matter in the early universe, as shown in the figure ...
[62]
[PDF] 24. Big Bang Nucleosynthesis - Particle Data Group
Aug 11, 2022 · Predictions of the abundances of the light elements, D, 3He, 4He, and 7Li, synthesized at the end of the first three minutes, are in good ...
[63]
[hep-th/0111030] A Cyclic Model of the Universe - arXiv
Nov 4, 2001 · We propose a cosmological model in which the universe undergoes an endless sequence of cosmic epochs each beginning with a bang and ending in a crunch.
[64]
The cosmological model of eternal inflation and the transition from ...
May 31, 2007 · The model of eternal inflation implies that all macroscopic histories permitted by laws of physics are repeated an infinite number of times in ...
[65]
Borde-Guth-Vilenkin theorem in extended de Sitter spaces
The Borde-Guth-Vilenkin theorem states that any spacetime with net positive expansion must be geodesically incomplete.
[66]
A Cyclic Model of the Universe | Science
We propose a cosmological model in which the universe undergoes an endless sequence of cosmic epochs that begin with a “bang” and end in a “crunch.”Missing: cosmology | Show results with:cosmology
[67]
The Beginning of the Universe | Alexander Vilenkin - Inference Review
” We have no viable models of an eternal universe. The BGV theorem gives us reason to believe that such models simply cannot be constructed. When physicists ...Missing: contemporary | Show results with:contemporary<|separator|>