Kalam Cosmological argument

I could easily say the same thing about an atheistic point of view. Alright, then answer the questions that are listed on the first page in sequential order. If you you still feel the same way, explain to me why and how you've come up with your answers that are contrary to mine. We'll go from there. Look, none of what I said goes against what we already know to be true. The inevitability of a beginning, the lack of an actual infinity, the fact that that everything is influenced by a cause isn't mere conjecture. Life backs up those points to the point where none of those things have ever been even close to being refuted. I'd say that's nothing to scoff at. Since that's the case, for any one of you to try to put some other spin on it that circumvents the laws of physics is an obscurantist. It balks intuition and demonizes logical thought. And then the argument is turned around on me, the theologian, that I'm not scientifically minded. But I'm the one following the laws of physics, everyone else is stepping out in blind faith. Actually its the other way around. Faith transitions into confidence, at least in my own experience. What, like, love is nothing more than firing synapses in regions of the brain? Me neither, that's why I reject a purely naturalistic explanation for the universe. It defies logic... and physics.

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“Always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you.” -1st Peter 3:15

A cause? A single cause influences everything? This is a fact?What is this cause? What is the factual basis of your claim?What exactly is this influence of which you speak? What logic is being defied?What physics does a purely naturalistic explanation defy?lfen

But here's the problem: as already mentioned by others, we really DON'T know about the singularity, and the conditions before a certain point in time in the life of the early universe in general, with any certainty. All science says is it has a pretty good idea up to some point, and beyond that we simply can't handle the physics yet. It is not a new situation in science. It happens all the time. And it is overcome all the time. We KNOW we can't handle that part with current physics. We also know that those physics are probably nevertheless out there somewhere. Yet you continue to use the inadequate ones, and claim next that you are nevertheless able to extrapolate beyond out current "horizon". (that's what it comes down to)You are so damn... eager to limit yourself to the science that we know right now. You are HAPPY that there's something unexplained, or something seemingly impossible results from an extrapolation of current physics beyond a certain point, so you can call in a "Creator". Yes, you embrace emerging scientific knowledge. But it seems you pretend to yourself each time that it "won't go further than that!". This while history shows that it definitely DOES keep going further, and that sometimes (General Relativity to name one example) seemingly unsolvable stumbling blocks get elegantly eliminated in totally unexpected ways.Again, I just can't see the value of that. Do you have a problem with the concept that at one point everything would be explained in a self-consistent way without need for anything external? That seems to be a general anxiety in those who oppose evolution. I never understood why. A construction with Creators looks so clumsy and "intermediary". A fear from "don't know yets"?I asked it before: what purpose does it serve? Let's say, hypothetically, that we get to a point that it is proven beyond any doubt that at the very very beginning of everything, there WAS indeed a conscious "entity". But also that it is impossible to know anything more about that conscious entity. And thus effectively any research stops right there.Then what? Does that bring comfort to you? Are you going to feel good because you can say "I told you so!"? In what way would we be better off?Of course, the hypothesis is just nonsense. I'd imagine the eventual conclusion will rather be that we get to a point where we can no longer intellectually handle what's going on. There will be a point where we should conclude that we are too dumb to work it out further. But that will be a limit of our thought capacity. Then we might work further on increasing that part . Of course. Plus that it is pretty obvious, evolutionary speaking, why something like 'love' can/should exist.Again: maybe this kind of explanation means to you that it loses somekind of "magic" properties, but not to me. Why should "love" only keep its value as long as it escapes rational understanding?Maybe a strange comparison, but think about this: we are perfectly able to rationally understand and acknowledge that lynching is not a good way to handle crime in a society. Yet it is very hard to eventually not have those desires when for example close relatives become victim of atrocious crimes. *Others* (or the Law) might need to hold you back at that point, even though you are just as rationally capable as they are.Likewise, people who rationally understand the "why" of love, are just as much slaves of it as others in the end

returning to the OPtaking a differnet point [qs]3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its
existence.[\qs]for the debate let us assume the quote is correct ...ok so what are the possible causes ...a)there was a void and voids are unstable ??b)universes are the natural state of "everything" hence they always happen if there is not one there ..... ie the lowest stable enregy state ....c)the exsistance of the universe is cyclic .. the death / decay / collapse prompts the star tof a new cycled) the universe is a aberration and is a total fluke at the far end of a probility curve .e) some intelligence that has no pyhsical form , that is timeless , changeless and infinite , and is capabile of creating the universe , chosse to make one for some reasonf)some other explaination based on scientific knowledge we currently lack .g)the gods needed something to watch on rainy tuesday nights , and so made the universe as a reality tv style show .h)our universe was created by another universes rulers dumping their garbage into the void .PLease add any more possible causes ..... maybe we could have a vote ..oh btw if it is e) and e) is infinite where does the universe come from , as you can subtract or add to a infinity ..BUT pre creation no universe ...post creation universe ...or maybe e) is not changless hmm but change must include time so ooohhh guess e) is not a good bet

I've been over this many, many times now. Answering questions with more questions doesn't substitute for an answer. So go back to all of my posts and refute my points. I've answered all of these questions. And because I've repeated myself a number of times, I've grown dull with whole debate - the one sided debate.If you really want to be a sport, then actually engage the conversation with something more laudable than rhetoric and unending questions that have already been answered.

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“Always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you.” -1st Peter 3:15

I would say that your points have already been refuted.

You imply single causation but you don't state it definitively.Everything I can consider is the result of uncountable influences. There is no single cause. I'm not sure how a first cause would even work. Yes, I understand Aristotle and many philosophers find the notion attractive but the Buddha many centuries before the Common Era came up with the interdependency of all phenomena.As I understand one of the earlier versions of Hawking's singularity theory of the Big Bang then the first cause might be what ever breaks the symetry of the singularity so that it becomes unstable and the universe begins to expand and cool. Hawking later came out with a modified version that has an indeterminate "beginning" but I'll leave that to the physicists here as I understand that even less.I don't think cause and effect are the best approximation of the changes of the universe as anything you choose as an effect can also be discovered to be a cause and anything you choose as a cause can be seen as an effect. For system analysis it's a userful construct.Take a light switch being switched on. If the wiring is sound and there is electricity and a functioning bulb then the filaments heats sufficiently to emit photons. But was throwing the light switch the sole cause of the light coming on? Why did the organism throw the switch? Why was the circuit in place. etc.Since you give precedence to the revelations of men from apprx. 2000 years or so ago that are falsified in many respects by science I'm not sure why you leave the indeterminate security of faith and revelation and try these old philosophical arguments.I'm not reading back over this thread. Done it once and it's not that important. My questions were meant to illuminate the gaps in your presentation of your argument. You are often ambiguous or sketchy, which I realize is hard to avoid in this brief reply medium of a board, but you could have addressed some of the problems.I believe you have admitted that there is no way to prove the existence of God, or maybe that was Rob? Anyway, so far no one has advanced a proof of God that has stood the scrutiny of philosophers.lfenEdited by lfen, : removed a misplaced word

Oh N_J, it's only one-sided because you refuse to reply to my posts What's wrong? Is one ex-professional cosmologist too much of a danger to your side of the debate?I'm waiting...

Your conclusions appear to based upon the assumption that every effect has a cause. This assumption is false. Several examples:

• Nothing causes a particular atom of Uranium-238 to decay. It just happens.
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• Nothing causes a particular electron to tunnel through the barrier of a tunnel diode. It just happens.
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• Nothing causes an entangled particle's wave function to collapse to either up or down spin upon being observed. It just happens.

These are all quantum effects, of course, which possibly played a role in the original singularity.--Percy

My points haven't even been addressed, let alone refuted. All the opposition has done is asked me, "why universal law stands true." The opposition has weakly stated that just because the laws of physics have never been circumvented, doesn't mean that they could not at some point. If that's the case, then nothing is true. If nothing is true, then what are we arguing about?

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“Always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you.” -1st Peter 3:15

That's their gentle way of pointing out that you are making bare assertions, with not one iota of evidence to support your assertions.That counts as refutation in my book, particularly when you demonstrate that you can only repeat the assertions and cannot answer the questioners. The assertions on which you base the argument are not laws of physics. Perhaps they are laws of theology or laws of rhetoric, for I rarely see them used except in rhetorical presentations by theologians. Maybe they were considered natural laws at the time of Aristotle, but we are well past the mistakes of that era.Edited by nwr, : fix typo

I haven't implied single causation. All that I've ever said is that for there to be a reaction, there must first be an action to precipitate the event. In other words, for anything to happen, it needs a cause to actualize it.Lets suppose that you see a boulder on the edge of a cliff everyday on your walks through the forest. Everyday the boulder appears to be in the same position. On one particular day, the boulder before your eyes, falls off of the cliff. To you, nothing caused the boulder to fall. You didn't see anyone push it, so it must have just taken place for no reason at all. But you have not taken into consideration the effect that gravity placed on the boulder. What had actually taken place is that gravity was always acting upon the boulder, but to your eyes, the action was insensibly small. That doesn't mean that it didn't have a cause. Everything has a cause.The fact that you exist is because of multiple causes. But nonetheless, you don't just exist. You exist for a variety of reasons. Buddha was also unable to observe the universe through high-powered telescopes. But even so, Buddha would still fail to recognize that for himself to exist in a timeless, infinite universe, then he himself would timeless, because he is apart of the universe. Though I've read some of Aristotle's works, I have not read about his philosophical view concerning this topic. I presume that he understood this principle that I speak of. When we speak of the First Cause, we aren't trying to define what that first cause that set off a chain-reaction of events was. We are simply recognizing the neccessity for a beginning. I can't definitively state what the First Cause was anymore than anyone else. I'm simply taking the position that a First Cause was neccessary. Again, I have never said that an action has a sole cause. There are multiple reasons for anything that occurs, occurs. I'm simply recognizing that a cause is neccessary for anything to become actual. Since you arrogantly suppose that men of approx 2,000 years ago must have been of a lesser intelligence, perhaps the obvious eludes you. Without their inventions, we wouldn't have come to ours. Aside from the fact, that my beliefs concerning the neccessity of a beginning and a cause, is irrespective of anything other than its obvious truth. you could have addressed any of the problems. You've answered none of the questions, so for you to take the safe route by answering my questions with more questions, only gives you a false sense of security.You seem to be under the misguided notion of the universe being eternal, in which case you have to reject the Big Bang. Just answer me how, if the universe is infinite, that you can have additions and subtractions to it. That was I who said that. I meant it. I cannot empirically prove the existence of God you, all I can do is give you sound reasons for the neccessity of a Being that encompasses what God has been described as. In other words, its a form of Intelligent Design that does not seek to unmask who the Creator is, but just to recognize that one exists.

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“Always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you.” -1st Peter 3:15

Speak your mind. There is no danger in speaking to an ex-cosmologist, because any cosmologist would understand this principle that I speak of. You can start by answering my quesions and going over Dr. Craig's.

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“Always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the
hope that is in you.” -1st Peter 3:15

I did, in posts Message 32, Message 47 ,and Message 90 but you have yet to reply. Yes, and would correct you in the way I am doing.Dr Craig knows little of relativity and cosmology. And unfortunately relativity and cosmology provide a downfall for his argument. There's not much to add by reading his site...

That's an assumption you are bringing to the argument. There is no law of physics stating that everything has a cause. And there is evidence to suggest otherwise, some of it pointed out by Percy in Message 114. That's another assumption you bring to the argument. Even if it were true that everything has a cause, it would not follow that there was a necessity for a first cause.A particular event might be caused by an event that preceded it by 1/2 second. In turn, that might be caused by an event preceding it by 1/4 of a second. And that, in turn, might have been caused by and event that was 1/8 of a second earlier. We could have a whole stream of events, all occurring within a period of 1 second, each one of them caused by an earlier event (still within that 1 second), and not a single one of those causes was a first cause.