Source: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/
1. A contingent being (a being such that if it exists, it could have not-existed or could cease to exist) exists.
2. This contingent being has a cause of or explanation[1] for its existence.
3. The cause of or explanation for its existence is something other than the contingent being itself.
4. What causes or explains the existence of this contingent being must either be solely other contingent beings or include a non-contingent (necessary) being.
5. Contingent beings alone cannot provide a completely adequate causal account or explanation for the existence of a contingent being.
6. Therefore, what causes or explains the existence of this contingent being must include a non-contingent (necessary) being.
7. Therefore, a necessary being (a being such that if it exists, it cannot not-exist) exists.
8. The universe is contingent.
9. Therefore, the necessary being is something other than the universe.
To avoid any hint of the Fallacy of Composition and to avoid its complications, Koons (1997: 198–99) formulates the argument for the contingency of the universe as a mereological argument. If something is contingent, it contains a contingent part. The whole and part overlap and, by virtue of overlapping, have a common part. Since the part in virtue of which they overlap is wholly contingent, the whole likewise must be contingent.
Kalam
1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.
4. Since no scientific explanation (in terms of physical laws) can provide a causal account of the origin (very beginning) of the universe, the cause must be personal (explanation is given in terms of a personal agent).
Finally, something needs to be said about statement 4, which asserts that the cause of the universe is personal. Defenders of the cosmological argument suggest two possible kinds of explanation.[4] Natural explanation is provided in terms of precedent events, causal laws, or necessary conditions that invoke natural existents. Personal explanation is given “in terms of the intentional action of a rational agent” (Swinburne 2004: 21; also Gale and Pruss 1999). We have seen that one cannot provide a natural causal explanation for the initial event, for there are no precedent natural events or natural existents to which the laws of physics apply. The line of scientific explanation runs out at the initial singularity, and perhaps even before we arrive at the initial singularity (at 10−3510−35 seconds). If no scientific explanation (in terms of physical laws) can provide a causal account of the origin of the universe, the explanation must be personal, that is, in terms of the intentional action of an intelligent, supernatural agent.
Craig's Additions to Kalam
5. An actual infinite cannot exist.
6. A beginningless temporal series of events is an actual infinite.
7. Therefore, a beginningless temporal series of events cannot exist.
Craig's Argument Against Temporal Actual Infinites
8. The temporal series of events is a collection formed by successive addition.
9. A collection formed by successive synthesis is not an actual infinite.
10. Therefore, the temporal series of events cannot be an actual infinite (Craig 1979: 103).
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@Radical
I think is the same thing that you have been touting now in 3 other threads that you have started.
Similar form but this goes into more depth.
The kalam argument attempts to "prove" the impossible in absence of physical, verifiable evidence. If actual proof existed you wouldn't have to resort to cleverly deceptive mind games. Waste of time.
I agree with your comments except the idea that kalam is clever. The last sentence of kalam is: And we call that being the Flying Spaghetti Monster - praise his meaty sauce.
LOL....thanks MCD, don't forget the onions and garlic as ingredients of the "meaty sauce" : )
"the cause must be personal"
Because we cannot (yet) explain or understand the beginning of the universe, therefore it must have been caused by a personal entity. You seem to have missed a few steps out of your chain of logic, or is it just a leap of faith? The ancients used exactly the same reasoning to explain lightning.
No. Read the explanation.
It's not an explanation. It's a reiteration. Either the universe was caused by precedent events, or by a personal being “in terms of the intentional action of a rational agent.” Who decided that they were the only two options?
Here's a better explanation from the same source.
"Craig argues that if the cause were an eternal, nonpersonal, mechanically operating set of conditions, then the universe would exist from eternity. Since the universe has not existed from eternity, the cause must be a personal agent who chooses freely to create an effect in time. But, notes Morriston, if the personal cause intended to create the world, and if the intention alone to create is sufficient to bring about the effect, then there is no reason to postulate a personal cause of the universe. Craig (2002) replies that it is not intention alone that must be considered, but the personal agent also employs its personal causal power to bring about the world.
Morriston responds that Craig has equivocated on two notions of eternity: eternity as timelessness and eternity as beginninglessness and endlessness of temporal duration. But the issue seems not to be one of eternity at all, but as in 11–16 above, with finitude. In one sense the universe is eternal: if time came into being with the universe, the universe has existed at every time. But since time came into existence with the universe, both time and the universe are finite in terms of the past and thus need a cause."
RadicalWhiggery:
Assuming for the sake of argument that the universe has a beginning, How do you arrive at a "personal agent" as its cause? Perhaps a component of nature, which may or may not be present in today's universe, is that necessary agent. Simply noting that the universe has a beginning does not establish that no component of it, let alone what we could call a natural agent, did not exist previously.
If you are arguing that the universe is all, then God must be a part of the universe as well. In that case, to define "God" in privileged ways is to engage in viscous, circular reasoning. If the universe is not all, then eternal natural agents are more likely than a living, highly structured mind as the first cause.
Your argument doesn`t impress me your taking a big leap from saying that god is the cause of the big bang. Just because something needs a cause to existence doesn`t relate to a so called God or Gods. We just as of this writing don`t know. So stop the nonsense!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I left the link for a reason. You can read up on the subject. This very issue is addressed in the entry on Stanford. I also addressed it after the initial formulation of the Kalam.
I know the argument that Craig is espousing very well I heard him parody the Kalam argument ever since he debated frank Zindler way back when.So it is nothing new to me, or the atheist world. what I don`t believe is your gigantic leap to a personnel God.So cut it out.
It's not a giant leap. Again, I ask you to do your research. Craig explains this multiple times as does the author of the entry. I'd start under section 6.7 in that entry.
Trying to solve a mystery with a mystery, just a waste of time.
I don't understand what you're referring to.
Sure you do, your objective is to waste people's time rehashing arguments that have been debunked for years. You think people refusing to waste their time is some kind of victory. An example in reverse, you said Ken Ham is an "imbecile." Ok now if I did what your doing I would say what are you referring to? I get you to list all the reasons that the flood story is ridiculous. I continue to ask for additional clarification until you tire of me wasting your personal time.
You're being dishonest if you're going to keep claiming my objective is to waste people's time. That's simply not true. Don't pretend you know my objectives.
Troll alert
radical your cosmological argument or the argument for design both have holes in them, only some ignorant Christians may accept it as fact, but I surely don`t.
That simply isn't an argument.
Kalam... I could not have said it better myself Justin
RadicalWhiggery:
What! Another dusty argument for us to consider? Well, I'll throw in a couple of comments.
"Craig's Additions to Kalam
5. An actual infinite cannot exist.
Suppose the universe has no boundary. Isn't that an actual infinity?
6. A beginningless temporal series of events is an actual infinite. ..."
I pointed out to you in another post that no actual point of time in the entire infinite past requires passing over an actual infinity to get to the present. No actual infinity crossed, no problem!
"4. Since no scientific explanation (in terms of physical laws) can provide a causal account of the origin (very beginning) of the universe, the cause must be personal (explanation is given in terms of a personal agent)."
Are you assuming that our scientific laws are complete? You have scarcely proven that nature has no explanation, only that we have no means of divining it at the present. So (4) boils down to an argument from ignorance. You don't know the answer, so you stick in some kind of intelligent being!
At this point I think we can safely say that your god-proof has been refuted. Yes, the Big Bang event suggests that there is a beginning to our universe, of all reality. However, nobody knows what was happening at that time since the mathematical equations for general relativity break down there. (An updated law might not break down!) No less than Dr. Guth, the discoverer of cosmic inflation, cautions against interpreting the Big Bang event as the beginning of all reality. He mentions the possibility of a "pre-history." That possible pre-history might take in something as grand as a multiverse (as speculated by at least two Nobel Laureates).
Since you have no way of knowing if our universe really began at the Big Bang event, there being a serious possibility of "pre-history," your argument collapses. Your proof, offered as a compelling argument, is hardly compelling if you can't rule out, beyond a reasonable doubt, a pre-history to the Big Bang event. Since that possible pre-history may involve time and space, you cannot say that our universe originated via something outside of time and space. Whereas the Big Bang can be traced back to the Big Bang event, allowing scientists to talk about a relative origin, there exists only rank speculation as to whether a pre-history might have a beginning--and a need for a cause.
We do get tired of these philosophical word games. Maybe you should convince your fellow philosophers before throwing all this stuff at us. If you did that, then you would certainly have something worth looking at!
"We do get tired of these philosophical word games. Maybe you should convince your fellow philosophers before throwing all this stuff at us. If you did that, then you would certainly have something worth looking at!"
RW has shown a pattern, his goal is to get people to waste personal time and claim their refusal to give away any more time debunking old (debunked) philosophical word games a victory. He is being very dishonest.
ImFree:
I don't know what his motive is, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. I do resent his implication that these old arguments are, somehow, still vital. None of them, including Craig's "Kalaam" argument are anywhere close to compelling as far as I'm concerned (and a lot of philosophers as well). Thus, they could be viewed as a waste of time. They can also be viewed as a stone for sharpening our thinking. But, until they sweep the philosophical world, we are under no real obligation to address them.
Thanks Greensnake, cosmological arguments and Craig are like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. I just grow tired of hearing about them LOL.
ImFree:
I hear you!
We can continue the issue of actual infinites in the argument from motion thread. I'm going to address your claim that the Kalam is an argument from ignorance. I think your confusing an argument from ignorance with a god of the gaps argument. An argument from ignorance is an argument in which you assume something is true because it has yet be proven false or it's false because it hasn't been proven true. The Kalam has a pretty hefty conclusion from very few premises. I still think it holds, but more premises are needed for the conclusion. I don't assume scientific laws are complete. I don't need to. I'm suggesting that science ends where spacetime begins: the big bang. In the entry they explain this in section 6.7. We do know that the big bang is where the universe began. The fact that relativity breaks down as this point is consistent with the Kalam. "At this point I think we can safely say that your god-proof has been refuted." How so? Only some string theorists are willing to claim there was space or time before the big bang. And String Theory has been completely obliterated. To refute my argument, you're forced to contradict scientific fact. "Your proof, offered as a compelling argument, is hardly compelling if you can't rule out, beyond a reasonable doubt, a pre-history to the Big Bang event." We have ruled this out. I'm not playing word games.
RadicalWhiggery:
"I'm suggesting that science ends where spacetime begins: the big bang. In the entry they explain this in section 6.7. We do know that the big bang is where the universe began. The fact that relativity breaks down as this point is consistent with the Kalam. "At this point I think we can safely say that your god-proof has been refuted." How so? Only some string theorists are willing to claim there was space or time before the big bang. And String Theory has been completely obliterated. To refute my argument, you're forced to contradict scientific fact. "Your proof, offered as a compelling argument, is hardly compelling if you can't rule out, beyond a reasonable doubt, a pre-history to the Big Bang event." We have ruled this out. I'm not playing word games."
Science does not end where our spacetime begins! Our present understanding of science ends at that point because our present laws of physics break down there (a division by 0 if I'm not mistaken). There is no particular reason to think that even our present laws would necessarily break down on the other side of the Big Bang. It's very presumptuous of you to assume that no future reformulation of the laws of physics will resolve the matter, that the concept of the Big Bang itself might not be refined in a way that eliminates the problem even for the current laws. It's also presumptuous of you to assume that all of reality began with the Big Bang, especially since a noted cosmologist feels that a "pre-history" might be involved. General philosophers, including yourself I presume, have no expertise in this area. Sean Carroll, the genius physicist/cosmologist from Caltech (who busted Craig in a debate at Oxford University) gives the only intellectually honest answer, namely that he really doesn't know whether the universe (as in all of reality) has a beginning or not.
No, you haven't ruled out a "pre-history" to the Big Bang! Are you claiming to have a better view here than Guth and Carroll? That would be very presumptuous! The god-proof has been refuted because its premise that reality has a beginning has not been established. In what way am I contradicting scientific fact when I say that your argument has been refuted?
Thanks for distinguishing between "The God-of-the-Gaps Argument" and the "Argument from Ignorance." In suggesting that since string theory (not obliterated, but with major problems) can't explain a prior existence then nothing will is dangerously close to the Argument from Ignorance as you nicely defined it.
Are you claiming to know more about cosmology than cosmologists do? Craig's Kalam argument is neither physical evidence nor established scientific theory, so the fact that it predicts (if it does) that relativity breaks down at the Big Bang moment is of no scientific interest.
Your god-proof is refuted because a universe with a beginning has not been established. Although not discussed here, neither does your argument require an omniscient mind. If we are concerned about factual evidence, we might note that an omniscient mind contradicts Einstein's special relativity which can be shown to also prohibit information traveling faster than the speed of light. Your "mind" would hardly know what's going on in the far reaches of its own universe!
I'm not being dishonest. And these arguments are not debunked. That's simply ridiculous. One would have to be ignorant of philosophy to argue that the cosmological arguments have all been debunked.
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