>>12348729Did time have a beginning? The answer to this question depends on whether you accept infinite regression as an answer or not. I do not accept infinite regression as an answer, so yes. Our timeline started with the Big Bang, let's say.
Does this have any implications concerning fate or free will? Yes, it does actually.
If our timeline began with the Big Bang, then there was no time before the Big Bang, so nothing could have physically caused the Big Bang along our timeline before the Big Bang. So to talk about "before" the Big Bang, concerning its cause, we have to go up one level, to the second dimension of time t^2. Now we're at a meta-temporal, metaphysical level of analysis.
Before the Big Bang, there was no matter, only the potential for Matter. And here we're talking about metaphysical potential, not physical potential, because physical potential only makes sense along the first dimension of time, but there was no "before" the Big Bang. Then this potential realized itself. A selection function took the potential as input and gave our universal timeline as output. That function could have chosen differently, but it didn't. And that function is externally unrestricted, therefore it has free-will. The universe has free will to self-configure its own timeline, but only across the second dimension of time. So along the second dimension of time, there are numerous universal timelines on a line as simple points. This means that along the first dimension of time, it's determined, but along the second dimension of time, the selection function can output new timelines with slight variations. Yet, we never experience those timelines, because have very specific identities connected to this timeline.
