the universe most likely didn't cause itself

Author: n8nrgmi

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#61
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@ludofl3x
@Fruit_Inspector
isn't lud guilty of special pleading by his own standard? as ram has pointed out, every theory about the beginning of the universe breaks down. yet lud says everything needs time to begin, his exception that the universe doesn't need time to begin. and he can't demonstrate his special exception. so by his standard, he's committing a fallacy. of course, the better explanation is that neither of you are special pleading.... it's legit to speculate special circumstances, because it's just speculating. it makes absolutely no sense to call something a fallacy if there's a possibility that it could be true. 
#62
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@EtrnlVw
1.) citing God as the first cause is an undistributed middle.

All A’s are C’s
All B’s are C’s

Therefore all B’s are A’s.

Or; the cause of the universe was an uncaused first cause. God is an uncaused first cause - therefore God is the cause of the universe does not distribute the properties of God - will, mind, power, divinity, interest in mankind, etc - so you can’t use it like that.

2.) You’re invalidating causality.

That’s not a bad thing, or wrong: but building up your concept of a timeless uncaused first cause invalidates causality. Causes cannot be timeless - how can something that exists at all points of time be “caused”.

What you’re really saying by an uncaused first cause, and I agree; is that the reason that the universe is here violates all known principles of causality, and cannot be fully expressed in language and terms that we have.

That’s not an issue for me; this is my whole point.

Where it is an issue for you, is that your argument depends on what you have just invalidated.

Or specifically you can’t both assert the universe definitely requires a cause; and then say the cause exists in a way that invalidates causality. 

That’s what people here are typically referring to as special pleading.

There’s really two options. Causality as we known it can be applied everywhere, or it can’t.

The former is impossible; and with the latter - all possible bets are off.

3.) Assertions about what some notional metaphysical reality is, are meaningless.

The meandering second part of your post is built up of a series of assertions and bold statements about what reality is.

Unfortunately- that is all absolutely and entirely meaningless speculation with absolutely no basis or baseline for us to even assess whether it is even possible, leave alone probable.

I do find many religious arguments revolve around pretending to know things that you don’t, and this appears to be no exception.
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@n8nrgmi
Yes, I would say that he would also be special pleading by saying time doesn't need time to do something if everything else does. And I would agree that the answer is that there is no law or principle that states that every cause must have a cause. I think that stems from a mistaken definition of the Law of Causality.
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@n8nrgmi
isn't lud guilty of special pleading by his own standard? as ram has pointed out, every theory about the beginning of the universe breaks down. yet lud says everything needs time to begin, his exception that the universe doesn't need time to begin. and he can't demonstrate his special exception. so by his standard, he's committing a fallacy. of course, the better explanation is that neither of you are special pleading.... it's legit to speculate special circumstances, because it's just speculating. it makes absolutely no sense to call something a fallacy if there's a possibility that it could be true. 
Accurately, I said everything needs time to EXIST, not to begin. But I'm not presenting a theory about what was before time, how the universe started, why the big bang happened, I'm saying I don't know. It makes no sense to think something is possible for no reason other than imagination, and all I'm asking is for the reason I should believe something that, at least as presented so far, is simply your imagination. You can use a special circumstance, but you're now departing from logic and rationale, and just asserting, not arguing. 

What if I believed the universe was at one point farted out of a giant we can't see that exists outside of space and time? Is there a reason for you to believe that, because that's what I said?
#65
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@ludofl3x
This was your statement:
Because time is required for anything to happen, and as far as we can tell time began at the big bang
I asked you how this statement makes sense and you failed to do so. Sending me on a wild goose chase to try to make sense of a nonsensical claim is not a valid argument. If you can't make sense of your own statements, it might be prudent to ease back on the sarcastic and condescending tone.
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#66
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@ludofl3x
it's not possible to seek a neutral position in this, by claiming your claim is that you dont know how the universe began. the problem, is that any explanation for how the universe began breaks down, and must be a special exception that can't be demonstrated. that means if a person has the balls to speculate a theory, they are committing a fallacy, according to you. your position isn't neutral if you call anyone speculating as committing fallacy, when all we can do is speculate. 
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Ramshutu
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@Fruit_Inspector
No it really doesn’t matter in the context of my argument:

Let me draw your attention back to the point I have raised twice now and you have ignored.

That something can exist without a cause inherently violates the principle that each thing that happens was caused by something else.

So that’s one side of your definition.



Or specifically related to notions of time; because that’s a complexity that seems to always be ignored - Cause and effect have a temporal relationship - cause precedes effect: without  the existence of time, that notion of causality as cause preceding effect doesn’t hold. A “cause” that exists outside of the concept of time can’t be a “cause” in any way we understand the word because the very nature of timelessness invalidates the inherent premise of causality.

Or more specially it’s not possible for there  a cause that exists outside of time from an effect; because causality has a temporal component. Something cannot be caused if it has existed for all time.



Now, the final possible option is that the rules of causality do not require a cause to itself have a cause - which appears to what you’re trying to sell.  

That invalidates your whole argument as you’re basically agreeing that the universe doesn’t need to be caused. This is what I meant in the part of my post you ignored when I said:

“- Is there any point in time in which this universe doesn’t exist?
If the answer is no; then it cannot be caused in any way that matches our notions of causality.”

Or to put I another way:

If Everything has a cause: then causality cannot hold.

If not everything has a cause; then the eternal option and the possibility that the universe has no cause is valid. 

All options are metaphysically and scientifically alien to us, with the exception of the “uncaused” universe - which is potentially implied by quantum physics effects without classical causes.

This is really just word play though: the real issue is that we have no basis to make any assumptions or statements about the reasonableness of the options in reality when every option breaks some convention.


The theistic argument here boils down to breaking origins into lists of option; pointing out that various options are incoherent - picking the option that moves the problem; then declaring a solution that has the same problems of coherence that you just described, but declaring your solution exempt.

That’s the special pleading element often referred to.


We have no basis to draw conclusions about he origin of our reality (the universe or whatever reality the universe exists within), because all of our ways of explaining them break down, and our notions of what is reasonable don’t really make sense.


#68
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@n8nrgmi
@Fruit_Inspector
Because time is required for anything to happen, and as far as we can tell time began at the big bang
I asked you how this statement makes sense and you failed to do so. 
Sorry, I must have missed this question. For something to HAPPEN, it has to at one point not been occurring, then it starts to occur, then either continues occurring to some indeterminate point (has been 'happening since the beginning of time', let's say), or stops occurring, and passes into the part of time we know as "the past," having happened already. None of this is at all possible without time itself, we can agree, I'm sure, as these events occur in sequence, and the span of that sequence is time passing. Seems pretty sensible, agree? WIthout time, nothing 'happens' as we define it, otherwise, everything would happen all at once, starting and ending, which doesn't make sense.

I thought you were asking me to explain how time began at the big bang, hence my citation and suggested reading. 

it's not possible to seek a neutral position in this, by claiming your claim is that you dont know how the universe began. the problem, is that any explanation for how the universe began breaks down, and must be a special exception that can't be demonstrated. that means if a person has the balls to speculate a theory, they are committing a fallacy, according to you. your position isn't neutral if you call anyone speculating as committing fallacy, when all we can do is speculate. 
I don't seek a neutral position, it's the only sensible position to take on "how did the big bang happen." It's literally something that cannot be known. Speculation isn't theorizing, it's guessing, and there's no reason your guess should be taken any more seriously than a giant's fart unless you can provide a compelling ARGUMENT supported by EVIDENCE that would move your guess in front of my guess. "All we can do is speculate" is another way to say "I don't know, we don't know, and all evidence points to that we cannot know." What's wrong with saying "I just don't know"? THat's all I am doing. I don't need to speculate my own theory to explain why anyone else's doesn't work or is, in fact, fallacious. Your speculation doesn't work because it jumps outside of logic and rationale into the realm of guesses and assertions. 
#69
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@Ramshutu
 We are following the outline of each nature (temporal vs eternal), there is no contradiction or violation of any principle, rather we are highlighting them. In post 44 I go over the nature of the universe vs the nature of God (two distinct things). Only the nature of the universe needs to fit within the parameters of cause and effect. It does not logically follow that God has to be subject to a cause and creates the problem of infinite regression. You want to deal with that problem right? problem solved, universe equals caused....God equals uncaused. And I explained how that works. Time IS only relevant to our universe (creation)....causes are only relevant to the products of the universe.  
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@zedvictor4
So who "started" the floaty about bloke of your picture book bible Mr E.
He had no "start".

I would suggest that your GOD also contradicts science.
Sure, but it is irrational to assume God, who predates science, and created science, must adhere to the laws governing his creation.

Hey.......He's just been floating about for ever.
Again, your incredulity is not a debating point.

And where did he find the raw materials?
Perhaps you aren't familiar with all the meanings of the word, "creator". God can create something out of nothing. There are verses in the Bible expounding this amazing concept.
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@EtrnlVw
First - that’s still the excluded middle fallacy.

Second, you are special pleading.

You’re declaring that things can be exempt from causality; and then unilaterally declaring that only God maybe exempt.

In this respect, you have no valid reason, of any kind; logical, metaphysical, etc: to suggest that the physical reality in which we live cannot be exempt also. 


That is one of the many unsupported assumptions and assertions that you inject in order to be able to argue for God. 
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Some of the problem in conversations about origins is equavocation on certain words. For example, when we say, "every thing has a cause", what does the word "thing" mean in that sentence?

Theists know there are only 2 "things" in existence, God, and everything else. God is not really a "thing" like creation. Natural, physical, universal laws apply to creation, not the creator. This is only logical, for the creator preceeds creation.

The atheists confusion come in when he conflates the creator and his creation, irrationally thinking that both must submit to the same laws.


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@Fruit_Inspector
Does time have a beginning?
I don't know. Why do you ask?
#74
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@Ramshutu
First - that’s still the excluded middle fallacy.

Lol, there is no fallacy when we are following clear parameters of logical thought. Perhaps you don't understand them. 

Second, you are special pleading.

No I'm not, we are following the outline of each nature (temporal vs eternal).... two distinct things. In post 44 I go over the nature of the universe vs the nature of God. Only the nature of the universe needs to fit within the parameters of cause and effect. It does not logically follow that God has to be subject to a cause, as God precedes creation which precedes the laws that follow creation.



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@Double_R
The answer doesn’t matter.

In neither case is there any point of time in which the universe does not exist -  the answer only separates whether a “cause” is unneeded, or meaningless.
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@Double_R
I ask because if time has a beginning, then it seems that time coming into existence must be a product of time. So if you believe time has a beginning, you have the same problem I do and you should reject the idea of time having a beginning.
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@ethang5
Some of the problem in conversations about origins is equavocation on certain words. For example, when we say, "every thing has a cause", what does the word "thing" mean in that sentence?

Theists know there are only 2 "things" in existence, God, and everything else. God is not really a "thing" like creation. Natural, physical, universal laws apply to creation, not the creator. This is only logical, for the creator preceeds creation.

The atheists confusion come in when he conflates the creator and his creation, irrationally thinking that both must submit to the same laws.

I agree, that's their "gotcha" card (who caused God?). It seems to go right over their heads, that God is independent of creation and precedes the principle of cause and effect associated with the beginning (creation) of the universe. There is no never-ending infinite past of who made who and who caused who. The fact they don't see the distinction is weird.
Once they finally get it, then we can move forward. 



#78
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@Ramshutu
In neither case is there any point of time in which the universe does not exist 

But there is a point in which the processes of the universe began producing things. You accept the Big Bang Theory correct? 
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@ludofl3x

Here is your original basis for the accusation of special pleading:
are there any causes that were not at one time effects? You said yes, only one thing. This is another way of saying "All causes were at one time effects, except this one special thing." That's special pleading. A universal statement that applies to everything, except one thing, and that one thing is only asserted to be special, not proven to be so.

I have not applied a criteria that all causes have a cause. I actually reject that as a rule or criteria since that is a faulty definition of the Law of Causality. My original statement would be no different than if I walked into a room and said that everyone has blue eyes except one person. I have not established a universal criteria that states everyone in the room must have blue eyes. I am simply making an observation.

Similarly, I am not forcing a criteria on you that every cause must have a cause, so it is not special pleading. You turned my simple observation into a universal rule that I reject, and then accused me of breaking that rule.


I thought you were asking me to explain how time began at the big bang, hence my citation and suggested reading.
You made a rule that "time is required for anything to happen." Then you said that time began at the Big Bang. So you broke your own rule by saying before time came into existence, it required time to do so. But time cannot exist before time exists. That is special pleading. I asked how time can require itself to come into existence before it exists. Your response was to suggest I go read book because I just don't get it.

So do you still believe that time requires time to come into existence?
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@EtrnlVw
there is no fallacy when we are following clear parameters of logical thought.
But you’re not: because you’re using an undistrubuted middle in your logic. You are making a formal error. Perhaps explain how you have managed to distribute the features of God.

No I'm not, we are following the outline of each nature (temporal vs eternal).... two distinct things. In post 44 I go over the nature of the universe vs the nature of God. Only the nature of the universe needs to fit within the parameters of cause and effect. It does not logically follow that God has to be subject to a cause, as God precedes creation which precedes the laws that follow creation.

Yes - that’s special pleading. You appear to have accidentally removed the portion of my post where I detailed how we can tell it is special pleading.

Special pleading is when say one thing can do X, but an equivalent thing Y, cannot without offering a justification.

You’re saying that if is possible for God to be eternal by definition, but that it is not possible in any way shape of form, for any aspect of nature, in any respect to be eternal in the same way.

You’re placing metaphysical constraints on one but not the other.

For example; I can posit an physical reality, which exists in way outside traditional concepts of time and space - which sits at the heart of all that exists. It’s follows unknown laws and rules that allow regions of space, time and energy to be exist, and our universe, our laws of physics and causality are emergent in that universe - and do not apply to wider existence.

That meets all the requirements of an uncaused first caused without being God.

You have no basis at all to assess or reject the validity of that solution. None. But it will be rejected as a possibility because you have any notional reason to reject, but it because you assert that only God may have those properties by definition; and normally by extending the limitations of our observed universe into any natural explanation to accomplish that - as opposed to having a coherent reason why the observations of our universe must necessarily also apply to all possible physical explanations.


The remainder, is just chaff you try and obfuscate this fundamental fallacy.


#81
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@EtrnlVw
But there is a point in which the processes of the universe began producing things. You accept the Big Bang Theory correct? 
I think your having a hard time wrapping your head around the premise; the question indicates you have missed the point.

The Big Bang is T=0

If there is no T<0 then the universe cant have been created or caused, because the universe has always existed.

Is the universe a piece of string with a defined start and end that can pointed to; or is it like the surface of a sphere; finite(?) but with no physical start or end.

In the case of the Universe, the Big Bang would be, say, the North Pole. And time is North and south.  

Notions of creation, or causation requires time before and after - at the Big Bang: there is no before. So talking about creation or causation in that context implies that there is a north of the North Pole - which is simply an incoherent premise.




#82
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@Ramshutu
The Big Bang is T=0

The BB represents the beginning of time, cause and effect. What precedes that has no relation to time, cause and effect. I'm positing that God precedes the BB. 

If there is no T<0 then the universe cant have been created or caused, because the universe has always existed.

The products within the universe have NOT always existed. We know that the products within the universe had a beginning, will have an ending. These are the things we refer to as being "created", we can observe those processes, we correlate those processes with intelligence. If you claim that the universe existed before the BB I'd be fine with that, because it's irrelevant to that which begins within that universe. If you claim the universe began at the BB, I'm fine with that too and then your claim it has always existed doesn't work. Either way, I'm associating time and cause and effect with the products WITHIN our universe after the BB, the processes involved are how we measure time.

Is the universe a piece of string with a defined start and end that can pointed to; or is it like the surface of a sphere; finite(?) but with no physical start or end.

The universe is like the fabric or backdrop to that which appears within the universe. Perhaps we can say that the universe is like a body of water per say, and then we have all that exists within that body of water. When we refer to creation, we are referring to that which appears within that body of water.

In the case of the Universe, the Big Bang would be, say, the North Pole. And time is North and south. 

I'm fine with that, it serves my point. North and South would be our measure of time. Take away the BB and there is no more North and South.

Notions of creation, or causation requires time before and after

No, this is where you don't seem to follow the logic. Time as we measure it, is only relevant to that which we can trace within the universe. Before that, there is no time, it is an illusion because it only exists if processes exist. What I'm saying is that time began the moment creation began, before that there is no linear time scale. 
I've thoroughly explained how eternity and God's existence is exempt from needing time to exist. 

- at the Big Bang: there is no before.

The Big Bang is the beginning of creation, you can speculate there is no before but just know you speculate. You can't say, because you can't observe or measure that which precedes that point. At the moment the BB occurred, is the moment time became relevant. God precedes that, which is why I keep harping that God precedes creation, hence precedes time.

So talking about creation or causation in that context implies that there is a north of the North Pole - which is simply an incoherent premise.

Let me lay this out for you....

God's existence before the BB (timeless/uncaused)
Big Bang initiated (beginning of time/caused)
Processes begin to occur (cause and effect)
Products within the universe begin to appear
The current state of our universe


#83
EtrnlVw
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@Ramshutu
Special pleading is when say one thing can do X, but an equivalent thing Y, cannot without offering a justification.

Lol, the justification was there, the explanation was clear. Creation and God's existence are not equivalent, they are two separate factors...you seem to just ignore that fact. 

You’re saying that if is possible for God to be eternal by definition, but that it is not possible in any way shape of form, for any aspect of nature, in any respect to be eternal in the same way.

What I'm saying is that eternity is not reliant on time, it is not an infinite linear time scale. It is a FIXED reality. Time only applies to events we can measure, which appears during creation. 

You’re placing metaphysical constraints on one but not the other.

If I say time is an illusion, then I make my point clearly. It only applies to certain condition...Because again, time is a measurement between a beginning and an ending. If eternity has no beginning and ending, there is no linear structure to measure. 




#84
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@Ramshutu
No it really doesn’t matter in the context of my argument:

Let me draw your attention back to the point I have raised twice now and you have ignored.

That something can exist without a cause inherently violates the principle that each thing that happens was caused by something else.
I did not ignore it. It matters because you are using a flawed definition of the Law of Causality ("Everything must have a cause") rather than the correct definition ("Every effect must have a cause.") I have explained why it is inherently true that every effect must have a cause. You have yet to explain why every cause must have a cause. There is nothing in the definition of "cause" that forces one to accept your assertion.

Please explain why a cause must have a cause.


Now, the final possible option is that the rules of causality do not require a cause to itself have a cause - which appears to what you’re trying to sell.

That invalidates your whole argument as you’re basically agreeing that the universe doesn’t need to be caused.
....
If not everything has a cause; then the eternal option and the possibility that the universe has no cause is valid.
We have circled all the way around to where we started. Here are the three categories any claim about origins falls into:
  • The universe is eternal
  • The universe came from nothing (or is self-created)
  • Something caused the universe to come into being.
Nowhere have I stated that the universe must have a cause simply because it is a cause. Nor do the above categories prohibit one from making the claim that the universe is an uncaused cause. I take no issue with someone claiming the universe is an uncaused cause. That would fall under the category of "The universe is eternal."

The only circumstance under which the universe must have a cause is if the universe is also an effect. If it is an effect, then it must have a cause because "Every effect must have a cause." If it is not an effect, then it does not need to have a cause.
#85
Ramshutu
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The products within the universe have NOT always existed. We know that the products within the universe had a beginning, will have an ending. These are the things we refer to as being "created", we can observe those processes, we correlate those processes with intelligence. If you claim that the universe existed before the BB I'd be fine with that, because it's irrelevant to that which begins within that universe. If you claim the universe began at the BB, I'm fine with that too and then your claim it has always existed doesn't work. Either way, I'm associating time and cause and effect with the products WITHIN our universe after the BB, the processes involved are how we measure time.

The universe is like the fabric or backdrop to that which appears within the universe.
Assertion.

Perhaps we can say that the universe is like a body of water per say, and then we have all that exists within that body of water. When we refer to creation, we are referring to that which appears within that body of water.

I'm fine with that, it serves my point. North and South would be our measure of time. Take away the BB and there is no more North and South.
No, this is where you don't seem to follow the logic. Time as we measure it, is only relevant to that which we can trace within the universe. Before that, there is no time, it is an illusion because it only exists if processes exist. What I'm saying is that time began the moment creation began, before that there is no linear time scale. 

The Big Bang is the beginning of creation, you can speculate there is no before but just know you speculate. You can't say, because you can't observe or measure that which precedes that point. At the moment the BB occurred, is the moment time became relevant. God precedes that, which is why I keep harping that God precedes creation, hence precedes time.

God's existence before the BB (timeless/uncaused)
Big Bang initiated (beginning of time/caused)
Processes begin to occur (cause and effect)
Products within the universe begin to appear
The current state of our universe


I’ve bolded a number of word. These are temporal words; words that require the existence of time to have any meaning.

Beginning. Requires a time Before without something - then a time after with
End. Requires a time Before with - the a time after without.
Before. Implies time prior go an event
Always. Implies all point of time.
Precedes. Implies something occurring prior to some thing else


Your problem is you are using the above worlds to bridge the gap between time existing and time not existing. The universe and God.

But the gap renders those words meaningless. 

There is no before, no preceding the Big Bang, if that the beginning of time. There can’t be, because for there to be a before, there must be time before - which you suggest there isn’t.

God can’t precede the Big Bang, nor create it, nor did time “begin” if the universe contains time - because all of those require there to be a time before the Big Bang in order for God to precede, create peace for time to “begin”.


Your whole argument makes this key error - and I strongly suspect that your obliviousness tp this error is because you haven’t fully wrapped your head round the implicof the beginning of time; and you’re trying to have your cake and eat it, by declaring that time started at the Big Bang: then building up the remainder of the argument assuming it didn’t. You can’t have it both ways.

#86
FLRW
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@Ramshutu
I think this proves your point.
Stephen Hawking saw a way to end the interminable groping backward in time: He proposed that there’s no end, or beginning, at all. According to the record of the Vatican conference, the Cambridge physicist, then 39 and still able to speak with his own voice, told the crowd, “There ought to be something very special about the boundary conditions of the universe, and what can be more special than the condition that there is no boundary?”
The “no-boundary proposal,” which Hawking and his frequent collaborator, James Hartle, fully formulated in a 1983 paper, envisions the cosmos having the shape of a shuttlecock. Just as a shuttlecock has a diameter of zero at its bottommost point and gradually widens on the way up, the universe, according to the no-boundary proposal, smoothly expanded from a point of zero size. Hartle and Hawking derived a formula describing the whole shuttlecock — the so-called “wave function of the universe” that encompasses the entire past, present and future at once — making moot all contemplation of seeds of creation, a creator, or any transition from a time before.
“Asking what came before the Big Bang is meaningless, according to the no-boundary proposal, because there is no notion of time available to refer to,” Hawking said in another lecture at the Pontifical Academy in 2016, a year and a half before his death. “It would be like asking what lies south of the South Pole.”
#87
949havoc
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@Deb-8-a-bull
I'm trying to figure out what age of anything has to do with jump-starting the universe, or that it did it itself. Who really needs to tie age to it? It happened when it happened whether yesterday, this morning,  or billions of years ago, or more.

But I'll debunk the self-start theory for the same reason as the fallacy of ex nihilo; nothing from nothing.
#88
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@Ramshutu
The position was put. You did not like how it boxed you in. You changed the assumptions - to contain your own conclusions. 

You made me smile - mainly because you rationalized it so quickly without actually realizing what you were doing. 


#89
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@Tradesecret
I objected to the assumptions, and have reasons why they cannot be assumed.

I didn’t chance any assumptions.


I was boxed in because the assumptions were deliberately engineered to manufacture God as an answer, with the assumptions themselves are completely unjustified.

In a round about way, I am pointing out that you all are begging the question...

#90
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@Ramshutu
Assertion.

WTH? are you denying that the products within the universe have no beginning?

Beginning. Requires a time Before without something - then a time after with

Are you serious right now? don't get this mixed up between two things I'm describing....a moving universe on top of a motionless backdrop. Lets say we have a body of water and that body of water represents a fixed reality (motionless backdrop). It does not begin and it does not end, now lets drop a penny into that body of water from above and we observe as it sinks to the bottom. "Time" represents the moment the penny appeared into that body of water and the measurement of time resides between that moment it appeared, and the moment it hit the bottom. Time doesn't exist as a real phenomenon, time rests on top of a fixed reality. It is simply the distance between two events, but there is no event prior to creation. God exists as a reality where there is no measurement between something that occurred and something that ended. God initiates an event and that event occurs from one point to another point, and we perceive that event as "time", but there is really nothing that is changing behind that event.

End. Requires a time Before with - the a time after without.

Yes certainly there is time before an ending, and AFTER a beginning. Time is right smack in the middle of a beginning and an ending. If we are referring to creation, which are events arising out of a fixed reality.

Before. Implies time prior go an event

No, you are conflating time with existence. Existence does not rely on time, time relies on events even though events occur within existence. There must be a succession before time can be measured. A fixed reality has no succession of events. You're getting shit mixed up here, surely before I begin any event there was "time" before it...that's because I exist within a frame structure that occurred before me. I'm talking about before creation, before events unfolded. You do understand what fixed means right?

Always. Implies all point of time.

I'm not sure you understand what time is as I've been explaining it, or eternity as I've described it. We can agree that the BB was a beginning right? and we would agree that as an expansion occurred right after that moment, is where we have a measurement of time between events? that's because as the expansion took place, events occur from one point to another point. Our measurement of time relies upon the distance between those events. Before the BB there was nothing occurring, it was a stationary, fixed existence where there was no beginning of an event and an ending of an event.

Precedes. Implies something occurring prior to some thing else

"Occurring prior to"? no...because again you're getting shit mixed up here. Obviously something occurred prior to what I just did. I'm not suggesting that something doesn't occur before something else as long as we are talking about things that occur within a time frame structure. I'm talking about that which precedes a time frame structure, which would be a measurement between two events. There is no measurement between two events in eternity, that took place the moment creation occurred where there was something occurring.
Anything I do within an occurrence between two events can be measured as time, because I myself appeared within a time frame structure and there was an event that took place prior to what I did. There were many events that preceded me, that's because my physical body resides in between the expansion of our universe. Even though that true, my existence does not rely on those events only my body that is subject to a beginning and an ending. My actual existence (soul) exists independent of such events as opposed to my physical body. The same is true for God, God's existence does not rely on anything that begins and ends.

There is no before, no preceding the Big Bang, if that the beginning of time. There can’t be, because for there to be a before, there must be time before - which you suggest there isn’t.

Time doesn't represent reality or existence, it only represents a measurement between two events. The BB represents the beginning of an event where time began. Before that event there is no measurement between any event.

God can’t precede the Big Bang

Of course God can lol. The BB is distinct from eternity. It occurs WITHIN eternity.

nor create it

Sorry, but this is stupid. The BB can certainly be initiated. I can explain that if we actually get to a point where we could move forward.

nor did time “begin” if the universe contains time - because all of those require there to be a time before the Big Bang in order for God to precede, create peace for time to “begin”.

Not at all, hopefully what I wrote above clues you in to what I'm saying.

Your whole argument makes this key error - and I strongly suspect that your obliviousness tp this error is because you haven’t fully wrapped your head round the implicof the beginning of time

Don't be so sure of yourself there Ram, I'm not as oblivious as you've assumed. I have full control over all the implications of my views. It's just a matter of you comprehending what I'm saying, which in all honestly should be pretty straight forward.

and you’re trying to have your cake and eat it, by declaring that time started at the Big Bang: then building up the remainder of the argument assuming it didn’t. You can’t have it both ways.

I can have any way that makes sense as long as logic follows, my arguments have been consistent. I am claiming that time began at the BB, as that was the moment in which events began to occur. You say nothing preceded the BB, and as such you've already admitted time began at that moment. That is true, what is not true is that you've stated nothing preceded the BB, eternity preceded the BB and is distinct from time. I've clearly stated that time is only relevant at the moment events occur. Time does not occur outside a beginning and ending. It is strictly related to those factors, God is not.