The questions of whether the universe had a beginning in time and whether it is limited in space were later extensively examined by the philosopher Immanuel Kant in his monumental(and very obscure) work Critique of Pure Reason, published in1781. He called these questions antinomies (that is, contradictions) of pure reason because he felt that there were equally compelling arguments for believing the thesis, that the universe had a beginning, and the antithesis , that it had existed forever. His argument for the thesis was that if the universe did not have a beginning, there would be an infinite period of time before any event, which he considered absurd. The argument for the antithesis was that if the universe had a beginning, there would be an infinite period of time before it, so why should the universe begin at any one particular time?
In fact, his cases for both the thesis and the antithesis are really the same argument. They are both based on his unspoken assumption that time continues back forever, whether or not the universe had existed forever. As we shall see, the concept of time has no meaning before the beginning of the universe. This was first pointed out by St. Augustine. When asked: “What did God do before he created the universe?”
Augustine didn’t reply: “He was preparing Hell for people who asked such questions.” Instead, he said that time was a property of the universe that God created, and that time did not exist before the beginning of the universe.
Obscure 模糊的
Antithesis 对立面
1781年，哲学家伊曼努尔·康德发表了里程碑般的（也是非常模糊的）著作——《纯粹理性批判》，在这本中，他深入地考察了关于宇宙在时间上是否有开端、空间上是否有极限的问题。他称这些问题为纯粹理性的二律背反（也就是矛盾）。因为他感到存在同样令人信服的论据，来证明宇宙有开端的正命题，以及宇宙已经存在无限久的反命题。他对正命题的论证是：如果宇宙没有一个开端，则任何事件之前必有无限的时间。他认为这是荒谬的。他对反命题的论证是：如果宇宙有一开端，在它之前必有无限的时间，为何宇宙必须在某一特定的时刻开始呢？
事实上，他对正命题和反命题用了同样的论证。它们都是基于他的隐含的假设，即不管宇宙是否存在了无限久，时间均可无限地倒溯回去。我们将会看到，在宇宙开端之前时间概念是没有意义的。这一点是圣·奥古斯丁首先指出的。当他被问及：上帝在创造宇宙之前做什么？
奥古斯丁没有这样地回答：他正为问这类问题的人准备地狱。而是说：时间是上帝所创造的宇宙的一个性质，在宇宙开端之前不存在。
閱讀更多 讀書看劇記單詞 的文章
