My refutation (which always upsets creationists): Every “cause”:we have come to understand has been as a result of natural forces. Not once have we found a divine or supernatural cause for anything, ever. These facts would seem to make naturalism the logical default for the things we don’t yet understand until some evidence for an act of divine creation is found.
@@rickdelatour5355 particularly if that supernatural being commanded praise on pain of death. But my point was more that when we discover something new, it becomes a new part of our understanding of nature. So, if we are to discover a supernatural being, we instantly make it no longer supernatural on a definitional level
There's also a fallacy of equivocation going on here. Things that we observe to "begin to exist" are just rearrangement of previously existing material. The argument uses examples of this kind of "beginning to exist (from pre-existing material)" having a cause, and then claims that the universe began to exist (from nothing) and must have a cause. The argument is equivocating between two different kinds of beginning to exist. Secondly, what are some examples of things that exist but did not begin to exist? If god is the only example for this, then the argument is circular. Because then the first premise is equivalent to "Whatever is not god has a cause", which puts god, the thing we're trying to prove, in the premises.
@ethanbenson False. There is no fallacy of equivocation in this argument. Aristotle recognized thst causes have multiple components - material, formal, efficient, and final. The universe coming into being means material came into existence ex nihilo, which as you point out, is not consistent with causes we're more familiar with which involve existing material. But of course, the material components of causes is not the only component. They're also must be an "efficient' cause - or an agent. A wooden table would have wood as the material cause, but the carpenter is the efficient cause - the one who built it. Similarly, the universe requires an EFFICIENT cause. Whether the material exists or not, something must have been the efficient cause.... the cause. If you wish to assert atheism, then you're left with no explanation for the material cause or the efficient cause. As for your question about other necessarily existing entities- platonists would argue the number 1 necessarily exists in all worlds. So that would be an example.... but even if God is the only necessary being which exists timelessly, that wouldn't mean the argument is circular.
@@QualityGuy-kp1fp False The universe is assumed to have come into existence from the expansion of a singularity, and a singularity is not nothing. The supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way is a singularity. And god fails on two counts: one is the HOW. How does a spaceless, timeless entity interact with time and space? This has to be explained. Every other creation myth has the creator god within the creation The other is that it is untestable: god is an invented cause supplied whenever current knowledge is insufficient.
@@QualityGuy-kp1fpYour argument is that the Kalam is just obfuscation to sneak a point in then? The kalam doesn't say efficient cause, it says cause which is why it's an equivication fallacy. If you want to change the meaning that's fine, but it's a different argument one where you now need to prove efficient causes and the like.
So what I find extremely frustrating is Internet atheists repeating things have been addressed hundreds of times such as the mereological nihilism objection. First of begins exist doesn't necessarily refer to creation from nothing. It refers to arrangements that bring upon new properties which is consistent with beginning to exist. Otherwise you have to omit "beginning" from your vocabulary. For example do you think that you "began" to have conscious experience? Did your conscious experience exist as your mother and father in different arrangements? No, it's absurd to say that your conscious experience never began to exist. Beginning to exist is compatible with both pre existing material and nothingness
As WC cannot prove P1 or P2 we must take them as axiomatic, and as axioms constrain the domain of discourse the argument necessarily cannot cover the whole cosmos or our universe.
One of (there are several) criticisms of Craig's Kalam argument is that it commits multiple fallacies of unwarranted assumption - the most obvious being that "something created the universe, therefore it is God." There are others however: - He states that the uncaused cause (God) is timeless as it had to exist "before time" but goes on to claim that God must be eternal. These are NOT the same thing and there is nothing to suggest one does, or even can follow the other. Even if we grant him that a "timeless God" did consciously create the universe, there is nothing to suggest it would then be capable of surviving _inside_ a universe bound by time because it is no longer timeless. - He states the same thing regarding _space_ . "God was spaceless" then translates into God is omnipresent. Nope, that is a giant unwarranted assumption. In fact, if we look at Craig's claim that "God was spaceless" then I believe we could rightfully re-state that as "God was nowhere" because there wasn't anywhere for him to exist. But it certainly doesn't automatically follow that because a creator was spaceless that it can now be "everywhere" - And lastly, he argues that the Uncaused Cause is intelligent because we, as humans, assume that creating a universe is difficult. But creating a universe might be a really easy thing to do, if you know how. In fact, the Kalam argument cannot even prove that the universe was created _on purpose_ - maybe a God did create it out of nothing but he didn't mean to - judging by the emptiness of the universe that's a far more logical assumption to make in my book!
A good effort at demolishing this ‘clever’ argument for a god. I dislike all these ‘theoretical’ arguments for a god- I want a god that interacts with us, like in the Old days, talking burning bushes, splitting the moon in two etc.
Yeah when you think about it the Bible is the same as all other myths, they get to see gods, signs and wonders, you get to hear about it twentieth-hand.
I think it's a good breakdown of the Kalam argument with some very valid points. I'd add one thing that you didn't go into. The idea that God as a first cause is timeless and spaceless (or outside of time and space) is a strange one, and I think it can be questioned whether something/someone can exist like that. We only have experience of things and beings existing within time and space, and it's hard to fully imagine the implications of existing outside of those. Can there fx be any processes (like having a thought) without time? WLC has often argued against the concept of infinity as an absurdity, but maybe there's something absurd about existence outside of time and space as well. I haven't done a full analysis or anything like that, but it seems to me that the idea that God is outside of space and time isn't just something you can slap on the table without explaining how that sort of existence would work and even be conceivable. The way people make this claim reminds me of how some say that God is immaterial when we have no experience of anything being immaterial (made of matter or the result of something made of matter). They might say God is made of spirit, but what is spirit then? And how do we know that exists?
Excellent point. I think the big thing is that even of we do grant there can be some sort of timeless cause for the universe, it’s a massive leap to then say this must be a conscious being of some sort. As you say, even explaining how something like that could possibly work seems very difficult
In "reality" ("hologramisticly") there are many "times" and many "spaces" nestled within one another like a Russian Doll or the multi-dimensional model of the "Tree of Life". i.e. each sephirot contains its own "tree". As above, so below. The system would appear to us to function like the Mandelbrot Set. Therefore the "cause" of intelligent design çan feasibly reside outside one universe and have its "effect" manifest in another. In Quantum Physics this is the observable phenomenon of "something out of nothing" which is closely related to Quantum entanglement, or, as Einstein termed it, "spooky action".
Could be something our 3-dimensional minds are incapable of grasping. But by the same token we therefore wouldn't have it as a goto when answering cosmology problems.
Craig has tried to defend against criticism of "Everything that begins to exist has a cause" against the observation that virtual particles have no cause we can find by saying that virtual particles don't begin to exist, since there is already a universe with physical laws in existence when the virtual particle appears, so it is just a fluctuation to something that already exists. So yeah... Under that argument it looks like the only thing he claims really "begins to exist" as he defines it is the universe itself, and this is very circular. Of course, that is totally inconsistent with other accounts he has given of things beginning to exist. The actual answer is that this is not a real belief, it's just an apologetic.
This Ethan Benson is so dumb that he does not even know how badly wrong are his criticisms. For something serious try something like the paper "Why the Big Bang Singularity Does Not Help the Kalām Cosmological Argument for Theism".
@@paulsmart4672Theoretical physics is Mathematical. The “virtual particles” are kludges in the equations to make the theory work. They have no existence outside of the equations. This is standard practice for instrumentalists. You’d have to interpret the mathematics through the lens of a mathematical realist to give them existence.
I think the premise 1 says something like: 1. Every thing that comes into existence is a transformation of things that previously existed. For example a banana is a transformation of biological and non-biological matter into a single material thing, a banana. A star is a transformation of waves of hydrogen and helium into a single object that works like a nuclear reactor, a consciousness arising from the activity of a brain, etc... Apparently if a thing didn't existed at a time t and begins to exist at a time t' then it came from a previously existing thing. This of course obligates us to adopt the "A" theory of time/presentism.
The first thing WLC has to explain is how anything "timeless" can be the cause of anything. Definitionally a cause requires time. The he has to explain what something "spaceless and immaterial" is, how he knows something immaterial or spaceless can exist and how he'd go about proving that.
The kalam is weak as hell they should call it kamal instead lol 1, There’s no evidence things begin to exist or even can begin to exist, if X begin to exist therefore Y begin to exist but the problem is there’s no evidence X begin to exist or that it’s even possible, therefore it falls apart. 2. Even if we had evidence things can ( begin ) to exist therefore the universe had a beginning is composition fallacy, ( one assumes that what is true for the parts must also be true for the whole. ) 3, even if we have prove the universe began to exist it’s not evidence for god rather it’s evidence that the universe had beginning 4, you want more kamal? Lol
Hahaha I like that. Good points as well. Particularly the first one. I think a major problem of the kalam which I didn’t go into properly is that it assumes that materials themselves behave the same way as composite materials. It’s just an extension of the existing composition fallacy critique, but I think an interesting one regardless.
In terms of it being weak, whilst I do agree it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, it’s one of the better arguments I’ve seen. Stands above most ontological and teleological arguments in my mind at least
@@ethanbenson The base argument, sure, though I don't know if we can talk about what "caused" the universe since we can't currently figure that out. It's more honest to say collectively we don't know yet until we can figure that out, if that is a possible action we can take. Proposing a god seems like an illogical leap for no reason. Also, it's hard to define causality when the universe is the start of causality within our universe.
@@ethanbenson With lack of evidence for the proposition, acting as though the proposition is false until provided evidence that it is true seems pretty reasonable to me.
Saying that something "exists outside of time and space" is incoherent gibberish. To say that something is outside of time and space is merely stating that it does not exist. To exist is to be somewhere in time and space. If you describe something as existing in no place and no time, you are simply proclaiming its non-existence. If applied to a "god," then it's merely a statement of atheism.
We could consider here something like the question of if numbers exist. If so, do they exist physically or non physically? If they don’t exist physically in a place, do they exist in time? There are certainly various views here, some of which will claim that numbers do not exist as independent things and are merely human constructs of the mind (and so exist within the mind whilst the mind exists), but my point is that it does seem plausible that we could conceive of something which exists outside of space and time, so I’m not sure this is the strongest objection.
@@CorneliusCorndogJr Ah, the old Get Out of Jail Free Card. . . So if you presuppose that something logically impossible and incoherent is the property of something undefinable, undescribable and unknowable, then you can make any logically impossible or incoherent, self-contradictory claim about anything. Everything just becomes a gigantic short circuit. All you are saying is "MAGIC!!! TAHDAAAH!!!!" If there's magic, you can claim anything. If there's magic, you can claim that the universe exists because an enchanted mushroom makes 2+2=5 and Richard Simmons wrote all of Shakespeare's plays. This is not reasoning. It isn't even thinking. It's just schizophrenic hallucination.
What about the analogy of the author and a novel. In the beginning, the author exists outside the timeline of his writing. While the characters experience time sequentially, the author is not bound by this timeline. Moreover, the author can jump to any part of the story; he can revise earlier chapters while writing the ending, and he could even write the entire story out of sequence. Yet, to the characters, time flows in one direction, but the author’s relationship to the story’s time is fundamentally different. Additionally, the author creates the world of the novel and sets it’s timely to motion. This is before the novel is even written. There is no timeline. The author-initiated timeline when he begins to write. That’s the point of the Kalam Cosmological Argument, God is posited as the creator who initiates the timeline of the universe. About timeless existence, while the novel’s timeline progresses from the opening page to the last page, the author’s existence is not defined to the timeline. Conceivably the author could even take a break and return to the at any point. The author’s existence is independent of the novel’s timeline. In this way the author’s existence is analogous to the concept of God’s timelessness, existing independently of the temporal order initiated at the universe’s creation. The author also has an overarching view of the entire narrative, knowing the beginning, middle, and end simultaneously. Characters in the novel perceived life events as they unfold, yet the author knows the entire story. This omniscient perspective is very much how God, exists outside of time, God has knowledge of all points in time simultaneously. The character in the novel for example could be playing chess. Against the author who knows every possible move and its outcome. The author understands all the rules and potential sequences of moves, knowing precisely how each choice affects the game's conclusion. God's middle knowledge, where God is aware of every possible decision you could make and the resulting consequences in any given circumstance. Furthermore, the author’s thoughts, ideas, and decisions that shape the material content of the novel, but the author is not materially part of the novel’s world. The influence of God on the universe is conceived as immaterial and beyond the physical constraints of the universe. I grant that it may be hard to empirically imagine timeless existence, but the analogy provides a conceptual framework. So, one can understand and authors relationship to the story without experiencing it ourselves, in this way we can conceive of God’s timeless existence. When it comes to understanding the origin of the universe, I believe certain metaphysical realities, like timelessness and spacelessness, are indispensable. Even though these concepts might be challenging to visualize, that doesn't make them logically incoherent. Just because something is outside our everyday experience doesn't mean it's impossible. These ideas provide a crucial framework for making sense of how the universe could come into existence without being limited by the very dimensions it created. In my studies of scientific works, I've come to understand that there are real limits to what we can observe and measure. For instance, in the study of black holes, I see how scientists rely on theoretical models and mathematical simulations. It seems to me that’s because we can't directly observe these phenomena. This has shown me that some questions, like the nature of the first cause of the universe, goes beyond what empirical science can address. These are philosophical issues that require us to think beyond the limits of our observations, much like how we use abstract theories to understand black holes. It's a reminder that not everything can be seen or measured, but that doesn't mean it's any less real or important. For me there are Philosophers and theologians like Augustine, Aquinas, and others have provided extensive reasoning for these attributes of God.
@@garyshepard7810False analogy! The timeline of the novel is fictional and so is the claim about the characters experiencing time sequentially. In reality the author exists in a timeline and experiences time sequentially. The universe is not fiction and nor are we fictional characters. God, if he exists, would still exist in time. Time with a beginning is incoherent as pointed out long ago by ancient greeks.
The Causation Trilemma: 1. Everything has a cause. 2. There is a cause of everything. 3. Causation does not loop. Choose at most two. All three cannot be true; so any two imply the negation of the third. If causation is linear, then either not everything has a cause, or there is no cause for everything. If everything has a cause, and there is a cause of everything, then it is caused by something that it causes, so causation loops.
@@user-tp7gy4dj4l Premise 1 is not "everything has a cause" it's "whatever begins to exist has a cause", so your entire argument is a strawman butchering.
He’s certainly someone I admire and take inspiration from, although I think a lot of the overlap between our views has more to do with having similar inspirations growing up. Both of us were brought into philosophy by way of the new atheists, with particularly Hitchens being a primary inspiration. I think though that our key difference is that my interests are more towards metaphysics whilst Alex is more interested in ethics from my understanding. I also have a huge interest in political philosophy and discuss politics more openly than Alex (which is probably wise on his part)
Bill do you have any proof that the character in the bible is older than the singularity? The singularity Is what science tell us existed, if that's even the proper term, before the universe started expanding and spacetime began, Making the singularity basically eternal. So about that evidence Bill?
Premise 1 draws on our common-sense observation that everything we see beginning to exist has a cause, and from this, it deduces that the universe itself must have a beginning. The distinction you’re attempting to make between the observable and the unobservable is important but deductive logic can apply universally, not just to what we observe. For example the impossibility of square circles isn't limited to what we can see there are no square circles anywhere even in the unobservable parts of the universe, because the principle of non-contradiction (A and ~A) holds universally. The causal principle asserts that causes logically entail their effects, meaning that if something begins to exist, it must have a cause, regardless of whether we can observe it directly.
There is no "causal principle" that requires events to be either causes or effects. There are uncaused events taking place all around us all the time, even within our own bodies. Causality is not universal. Causality is something that must be shown in each case where it is asserted. To show that an event is caused requires an explanation of the mechanisms involved, something that no one has done for the origin of the universe. If the universe began as a quantum level event it may well be uncaused. Causality is necessarily temporal and a cause must precede any of its effects from all frames of reference. If you observe A then B and assert that A caused B but another observer in another reference frame observes A and B occur simultaneously or observes B occur before A then A was not the cause of B. Either something else caused B or B was uncaused. Even the laws of logic are not inherently universal. They are derived from observation and are descriptive not prescriptive. They are axiomatic, assumed but not proven.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 "There are uncaused events taking place all around us all the time" What uncaused events are you referring to? I don't see dogs and dragons randomly popping into existence uncaused out of nothing everywhere, I don't see heart disease suddenly appearing without medical causes or my thoughts randomly appearing in my head without any reason or casual antecedents. The world looks as if the casual principle is true, not false.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 False. Causes are not necessarily temporal. Causes need not precede their effects. They can be simultaneously with their effects and structured hierarchically. For instance, consider a triangle. The fact that it has three sides and the sum of its internal angles is 180 degrees is not something that occurs in time; rather, these properties are causally grounded in the very nature or essence of what it means to be a triangle. The triangle’s existence necessarily brings about these properties simultaneously, without any temporal sequence.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 >>>Even the laws of logic are not inherently universal. They are derived from observation" So you think that it's a logical possibility that square circles can exist somewhere in unobserved parts of the universe??? Remember you're denying that the laws of logic are universal and saying that they are based on observation. It should then follow your view that square circles are possible which is absurd and shows that your view of logic is false. Also the very denial that logic is universal shows that logic is universal. For example, you would have to reason that "logic is not universal" is a coherent and valid statement. This reliance on logic to deny logic illustrates a contradiction: if logic were truly not universal, then the argument against logic would not be a valid or coherent statement, which means the denial itself wouldn’t make sense.
@@giftedtheos You are thinking on the wrong scale. Quantum level events are routinely uncaused, I did not say that causality did not exist, I said that it is not universal, because it isn't. Nothing causes quantum fields to fluctuate, it is just what they do, and they occasionally produce quantum when a fluctuation reaches the right strength at a given location. Nothing causes a particular atomic nuclei to decay or a particular free neutron to do so. Your argument from personal incredulity is not at all convincing.
Here is the real Kalam argument, and it is very old, coming from Epicurus: Definition: God is the creator of matter. That might be the only definition of god all monotheists can agree on. Who created god? Well, because he exists eternally, he cannot have a creator. Claim 1: Whatever exists eternally cannot have a creator. This claim is made by theists if you challenge them with the question of who made god. Claim 2: Nothing can come from nothing. I think that most theist argue this way. So here we have two claims that theists make all the time. The following argument comes from Epicurus: (P1) Matter can neither be created nor destroyed. This is known today as the first law of thermodynamics. Science has confirmed Epicurus. Matter/energy (in many cases interchangeable synonyms, see Einstein) can change its state. However, existence is not a state! Rather, it is the prerequisite for being able to have a state. (P2) Nothing comes from nothing - matter cannot come from nothing. This is exactly what theists always reproach us with. It is not easy to deny this, because most cosmological arguments for God, all of which have long since been refuted, are based on this premise. (C1) From this, the only logically compelling possibility is that matter/energy exists eternally. There is no other possibility. If matter/energy can only be transformed, see the first law of thermodynamics, and cannot be created out of nothing, then matter must exist eternally. It can change its form, that is clear, at the beginning of cosmic inflation (also known as the Big Bang), the matter we know did not yet exist in the current form. Now comes the next logically compelling conclusion. If you define God as the creator of matter - the only thing that monotheists generally agree on - then it follows: (C2) Since matter exists eternally, it cannot have a creator. Which means that God cannot exist. If theists say that God created everything, and you ask: Who then created God? Then you get the answer: No, he cannot have been created because he exists eternally. If God exists eternally, he cannot have had a creator! But the same applies to matter: if it exists eternally, no one could have created it "before eternity, which has no beginning".
On the "infinte regress" section you state, _"we then must naturally inquire into the cause. If we accept the Kalam, we can use the Kalam to then assume that the cause must have a cause, and so on, creating infinite regress"_ This is based on a fatal error on your part as the first premise of the Kalam doesn't say, "everything that exists has a cause". If it did then your reasoning would be correct here, but it doesn't say that. It says "everything that *BEGINS* to exist has a cause". The causal principle doesn't hold for beginningless entities.
The prime mover argument is based on a false premise, that there needs to be a first cause. Motion is the default state, it requires no cause. Photons for instance, can only move at the velocity of light, a speed they are travelling at at the time of their production. In fact, there is no such thing as stationary, negating the very notion of a prime mover. The issue with infinite regression is that it is not something that can be defined away. Simply asserting that a deity is eternal by definition does not break the infinite regression, and because all top-down origin scenarios necessarily include the infinite regression issue, they are not sensible. Agent first origins are inherently top-down scenarios. You either reject infinite regressions in objective reality and therefore reject agent first scenarios, or accept infinite regressions in objective reality and therefore accept that no specific agent can be the origin because top-down scenarios can't have finite origins.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 Not only do you confuse the Kalam cosmological argument with Aquinas's argument from motion which are two distinct arguments, you get Aquinas's argument from motion absolutely wrong. He wasn't talking about physical motion, but the metaphysical of change. He meant motion as in going from potentiality to actuality. You guys need to actually learn to read academic literature and understand the actual arguments before critiquing them
@@giftedtheos Metaphysics isn't real, just like all philosophy. These things only imagine how things might work. Any and all logical arguments for the existence of any deity commit an equivocation fallacy if they try to conclude that the deity objectively exists, rendering their logic invalid. This happens because deities must be defined, an entirely subjective act. Deities cannot be objectively described because objective description requires objective observation, something that no one has ever been able to accomplish. You simply cannot prove that anything objectively exists with philosophical argumentation. The best you can validly prove is that something exists subjectively, in the mind of the believer. To prove that something objectively exists requires verified objective empirical evidence of that thing or a overwhelming amount of verified objective empirical evidence that points exclusively and unambiguously to that thing, All of Aquinas' arguments were debunked before the ink was dry. Philosophical arguments for the "existence" of "God" also suffer from having different and often conflicting definitions of what "God" is. Agent first origin scenarios simply do not work. They all necessarily include the infinite regression issue, something that cannot be defined away. Claiming that any deity is the first anything is irrational and illogical. Even if you accept the possibility of infinite regressions in objective reality you cannot get to a specific deity as an origin, or even an agent of any sort. Infinite regressions don't allow for specific origins. If you reject the possibility of infinite regressions in objective reality then you also necessarily reject any agent first origin scenario. You cannot break an infinite regression.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 96% of what you said was completely incoherent and unintelligible. You got numerous applications of fallacious wrong, your don't understand deductive logic, you don't understand metaphysics which you said wasn't real even though all philosophers of science accept metaphysics as a real feature of reality, etc. I don't even know what you are talking about. I don't know where to begin addressing all this. I counted at least 30+ errors in your comment
@@giftedtheos "philosophers of science" are not scientists. You clearly don't understand that philosophy imagines how objective reality might work and empirical scientists show us how objective reality actually works. Philosophy is a tool that helps guide what research we do but it cannot show that anything is actually objectively real. Philosophy and metaphysics are exercises of the minds of individual humans. Subjective existence and objective existence are two entirely different things and equating them is always fallacious. The most that any philosophical argument can ever prove is subjective existence, that a believer believes and nothing more than that. If you have to define the thing you are trying to prove the "existence" of then you are engaging in an argument that is entirely subjective. Proof of objective existence requires objective evidence and definitions are inherently subjective. Even if you could come up with a complete, coherent, and non-contradictory definition of a specific "God" to use in all of your arguments (something no one has ever done), you would still only be able to prove its subjective existence. You will notice that no argument for God ever states whether the existence being proven is subjective or objective, or clarifies what they mean by "existence" in any way. Do you think that you can provide an objective description of your favorite deity? Do you think that you can provide a complete, coherent, and non-contradictory definition of your favorite deity? I am thinking a definite "no" on the former and a "you've got a lot of work to do" on the latter.
One thing you get wrong about the fallacy of composition is that NOT ALL parts to wholes reasoning is fallacious. You haven't shown that if parts of the universe begin to exist then it doesn't follow that the universe as a whole began to exist. What SPECIFICALLY makes the inference invalid? For example if a house is made completely out of red bricks it's not fallacious to infer the house as a whole is red. In fact to even accuse the Kalam of commiting the fallacy of composition you must commit the fallacy of begging the question by assuming there is a beginningless part of the Universe
I say this in the video about composition from memory. The inference isn’t necessarily invalid. But, it is an inference, making the argument no longer deductively valid (which Craig often claims is a strength of the argument). I don’t have to assume there is a beginningless part of the universe to say this. It’s a critique of the form of the argument, not a statement about what is or is not the case.
@@ethanbenson How is the argument no longer deductively valid? Inferences can be deductive, inductive and abductive 🤦♂️. Deductive inferences are known in logic as "valid inferences". Do I need to cite the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy? Yes, you are in fact assuming the universe is beginningless as that is the only way you can say premise 2 is a composition fallacy. You have to assume the causal principle is false in order to argue that the parts to whole deductive reasoning here is fallacious. This is why almost no critic of the Kalam in the philosophical literature accuses the Kalam of the composition fallacy. Only laymen on the Internet like you that don't understand basic logic and arguments.
This is my point: I think we need to suspend judgement about the inference because we cannot say with certainty if it is or is not valid. Therefore, if there is a possibility that it is not valid, we can say that the argument as a whole would not be deductively valid. By suspending our judgment here, we make the argument a matter of induction. This is relevant to your second critique as well. I’m not outright saying the premise is fallacious, just that it is not obvious that it must be true. I also don’t appreciate the needless insult, I’m trying to respond in good faith. I acknowledge I could be wrong, I’m just explaining why I made the point. I study philosophy, I understand argumentation and logic perfectly well. There’s no need to be condescending.
@@petermetcalfe6722 Ehhhh.... "Always" is a weird word for it. It is generally agreed the universe exists at all points in the past. It is not generally agreed the past is infinite. Regardless, "The universe began to exist" is a claim that can not be substantiated, as beginning to exist implies a previous time of non-existence, and there was no non-universe point in the past.
The Kalam is already dead.... and WLC has already talked for soolong that he's put his foot in his mouth and made himself a laughing stock of an apologist. Don't waste your time on this.
Excellent profile picture, I’m a big Muppets fan! But yeah, I agree. Especially when he’s defended the genocide of the Canaanites in the Bible, I think he showed himself to be at the least inconsistent. Similar actions taken by atheists would be jumped on by him
You've in no way invalidated the KCA. 1. "Everything" is NOT restricted to the known universe- it excludes nothing. The known universe is included in "eveeyrhing" as is anything potentially beyond or outside of the known universe. 2. The KCA in no way commits the fallacy of composition. The fallacy of composition would be to say that all individual cells of an elephant are light weight, therefore elephants are light weight. The KCA does not have this logical fallacy. It simply states that if something BEGINS to exist, it must have a cause for how it came into existence. This is a metaphysical truth.
@QualityGuy-kp1fp right, and my claim is that we only have knowledge of that which is within the universe. Your first point is literally my point. Your second point relates to this, as if we can only make the claim that causality is true within the universe, then we cannot be sure that “everything that begins to exist” has a cause. It seems inductively likely, I concede that, but I think some amount of scepticism is warranted, particularly if we take into account modern quantum physics and some interpretations of string theory. And then of course, if we accept the argument, we still would have our work cut out for us to say that the cause for the universe is God (specifically the Christian one it seems in your case). WLC of course does this by mounting a series of arguments, but I think it creates a lot of compounding assumptions which I think make his case somewhat weak (although I can see why he is popular for Christians).
@@giftedtheos Speaking of boring old tricks... Vaguely gesturing to some counterargument you *could* make but for some reason don't is very popular with theists.
@@giftedtheos I don't exactly deny either of them. That's not how it works. Its not good enough for the premises to be things that could be true. You need to show that both of them *are* true. You can demonstrate neither.
This is a category mistake. God, as a necessary, timeless, and immaterial being, fundamentally differs from the contingent, temporal, and material nature of the universe. Therefore, the premise that the existence of God without a beginning implies the universe could also exist without a beginning does not hold, given their different natures and the evidence we have about the universe's temporal origin.
There's no reason to think "a necessary, timeless and immaterial being" is anything other than word salad. You can't point to any such being, and from our point of view, being timeless, spaceless, and immaterial is indistinguishable from just not existing at all. We could imagine, in some vague way, that there's a reality outside of ours, but there's no way to know that it's there, or interact with it if it is.
Nice assertion. When I am making up a fictional character I can give them any atributes I want, too. "god solves all these problems" is easy to SAY. You have to prove he exists before you can posit he does anything.
@@dustinmorton942 Try positing by studying the quiet spaces in any popular religion that values humanity. People claim to meet their spiritual path in those spaces. It is annoying for materialistic thinkers that they cannot disprove these experiences. Enjoy a few good posits! How is it really necessary that you prove such matters before sampling them?
@@kateknowles8055 What good will "sampling" them do? It's just people attributing their experiences to something supernatural when they have no rational justification for doing so.
The issue with your argument started with your discussion on the first premise. You restated the argument to include “within the known universe” but that phrase is not in the argument. You missed the point of the premise. The argument is: “everything that begins to exist” has a cause. The premise is NOT: “everything in the observable universe that begins to exist has a cause”. So the premise and argument only address things that had a beginning, or in other words, only applies to things that both existed for a time and also did not exist for a time. The theist argument is that God has existed always and there never was a time where God didnt exist. That what Aristotle called the “unmoved mover”, or the “unbegan, beginner”.
I do that because if we don’t say that, we’re talking about things external to the universe and the premise becomes less clearly true. I do it to be charitable to the argument
@@ethanbenson But the whole point of the argument (or at least the theistic conclusion) is that an uncaused entity created the universe and so is necessarily outside of it. Limiting the refutation to only things in the universe seems to miss the point of the original argument.
@@bdpgarage no, my entire point is that we know causality to be a principle of that which is within the universe, the universe itself is not within the universe and so perhaps the universe itself is not caused. My point is that assuming this means God caused the universe is not necessarily true, as if we say the universe must have a cause, we are then applying a principle of that which is within the universe to the universe itself and that may or may not be the case.
@@ethanbenson I think I get what your saying. Restating: Because we humans can only confirm the law of causality within our own universe, we cannot confirm causaility outside of the universe. Therefore things outside the universe could exist eternally? (Assuming you’re not arguing that universe could cause itself)
I would restate the conclusion to be that we should be agnostic as to if the universe has a cause. Supposing it does have a cause, we also should be agnostic about what that cause is. To put it plainly, I don’t think we can know anything about things which are not within the universe.
I stopped listening as soon as you suggested that there is circular reasoning. Nonsense. Oh and then you dig a deeper irrational hole by claiming there is a fallacy of composition. You would not last a minute up against Craig.
Can you explain where I went wrong in saying these things? Also, I have no doubt I wouldn’t last a minute against Craig. He’s been a professional philosopher for quite a long time and I’m just a student at this point. This is just my attempt at discussing his argument, I think any good philosopher would not be insulted by someone discussing their work, even if that means it is criticised.
The cosmological argument is perfectly logical and still stands. And the universe is running out of energy.uou just want to be an atheist because you don't want anything or any one telling Yu what to do. do Yu want to bet your life that yr right.if your atheism is not correct then you're in a lot of trouble with the God Yu don't believe in. Challenge yr ideas about yr refusal to believe. Think seriously about it cause Yu might be in serious trouble with god
I don't see why your ilk thinks threats and fearmongering are a valid and useful way to get us to see your point of view. It shows that some of yall are childish,ignorant, and more than happy to fall prey to generalizations of a whole demographic of people,to have that sweet confirmation bias, and some (unwarranted) feelings of superioity and specialness. Some atheists used to be religious. They used scrutiny and honesty to get to their position. Some of us put thought into our position, something your lot doesn't seem to do.
No, it has never stood for evidence of g o d s. It only points to some things existing eternally. Do not be so arrogant to assume you know why people do not believe, because you do not.
My refutation (which always upsets creationists):
Every “cause”:we have come to understand has been as a result of natural forces. Not once have we found a divine or supernatural cause for anything, ever. These facts would seem to make naturalism the logical default for the things we don’t yet understand until some evidence for an act of divine creation is found.
I guess by definition, when we discover something, it becomes natural
@@ethanbenson I would think that if a supernatural being was making things in the natural world there would be evidence that we could observe.
@@rickdelatour5355 particularly if that supernatural being commanded praise on pain of death.
But my point was more that when we discover something new, it becomes a new part of our understanding of nature. So, if we are to discover a supernatural being, we instantly make it no longer supernatural on a definitional level
@@ethanbenson I mostly agree, but our creationist friends insist that their creator is outside of space and time.
@@rickdelatour5355 The argument the video is discussing IS evidence we can and do observe. That's why there's a video discussing the evidence.
There's also a fallacy of equivocation going on here. Things that we observe to "begin to exist" are just rearrangement of previously existing material. The argument uses examples of this kind of "beginning to exist (from pre-existing material)" having a cause, and then claims that the universe began to exist (from nothing) and must have a cause. The argument is equivocating between two different kinds of beginning to exist.
Secondly, what are some examples of things that exist but did not begin to exist? If god is the only example for this, then the argument is circular. Because then the first premise is equivalent to "Whatever is not god has a cause", which puts god, the thing we're trying to prove, in the premises.
Excellent points!
@ethanbenson False.
There is no fallacy of equivocation in this argument. Aristotle recognized thst causes have multiple components - material, formal, efficient, and final. The universe coming into being means material came into existence ex nihilo, which as you point out, is not consistent with causes we're more familiar with which involve existing material.
But of course, the material components of causes is not the only component. They're also must be an "efficient' cause - or an agent. A wooden table would have wood as the material cause, but the carpenter is the efficient cause - the one who built it.
Similarly, the universe requires an EFFICIENT cause. Whether the material exists or not, something must have been the efficient cause.... the cause. If you wish to assert atheism, then you're left with no explanation for the material cause or the efficient cause.
As for your question about other necessarily existing entities- platonists would argue the number 1 necessarily exists in all worlds. So that would be an example.... but even if God is the only necessary being which exists timelessly, that wouldn't mean the argument is circular.
@@QualityGuy-kp1fp False
The universe is assumed to have come into existence from the expansion of a singularity, and a singularity is not nothing. The supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way is a singularity.
And god fails on two counts: one is the HOW. How does a spaceless, timeless entity interact with time and space? This has to be explained. Every other creation myth has the creator god within the creation
The other is that it is untestable: god is an invented cause supplied whenever current knowledge is insufficient.
@@QualityGuy-kp1fpYour argument is that the Kalam is just obfuscation to sneak a point in then? The kalam doesn't say efficient cause, it says cause which is why it's an equivication fallacy. If you want to change the meaning that's fine, but it's a different argument one where you now need to prove efficient causes and the like.
So what I find extremely frustrating is Internet atheists repeating things have been addressed hundreds of times such as the mereological nihilism objection. First of begins exist doesn't necessarily refer to creation from nothing. It refers to arrangements that bring upon new properties which is consistent with beginning to exist. Otherwise you have to omit "beginning" from your vocabulary. For example do you think that you "began" to have conscious experience? Did your conscious experience exist as your mother and father in different arrangements? No, it's absurd to say that your conscious experience never began to exist. Beginning to exist is compatible with both pre existing material and nothingness
As WC cannot prove P1 or P2 we must take them as axiomatic, and as axioms constrain the domain of discourse the argument necessarily cannot cover the whole cosmos or our universe.
One of (there are several) criticisms of Craig's Kalam argument is that it commits multiple fallacies of unwarranted assumption - the most obvious being that "something created the universe, therefore it is God." There are others however:
- He states that the uncaused cause (God) is timeless as it had to exist "before time" but goes on to claim that God must be eternal. These are NOT the same thing and there is nothing to suggest one does, or even can follow the other. Even if we grant him that a "timeless God" did consciously create the universe, there is nothing to suggest it would then be capable of surviving _inside_ a universe bound by time because it is no longer timeless.
- He states the same thing regarding _space_ . "God was spaceless" then translates into God is omnipresent. Nope, that is a giant unwarranted assumption. In fact, if we look at Craig's claim that "God was spaceless" then I believe we could rightfully re-state that as "God was nowhere" because there wasn't anywhere for him to exist. But it certainly doesn't automatically follow that because a creator was spaceless that it can now be "everywhere"
- And lastly, he argues that the Uncaused Cause is intelligent because we, as humans, assume that creating a universe is difficult. But creating a universe might be a really easy thing to do, if you know how. In fact, the Kalam argument cannot even prove that the universe was created _on purpose_ - maybe a God did create it out of nothing but he didn't mean to - judging by the emptiness of the universe that's a far more logical assumption to make in my book!
WLC also assumes the A theory of time is true, not a very good thing to bet the farm on.
A good effort at demolishing this ‘clever’ argument for a god. I dislike all these ‘theoretical’ arguments for a god- I want a god that interacts with us, like in the Old days, talking burning bushes, splitting the moon in two etc.
That’s certainly a very popular argument for atheism - the hiddenness argument
@@ethanbenson You are so dumb that you do not even know that you are dumb.
Yeah when you think about it the Bible is the same as all other myths, they get to see gods, signs and wonders, you get to hear about it twentieth-hand.
72 Virgins might be 80+-year-old nuns from an obscure convent beside the FSMonster, which offers a beer volcano, is a better choice.
I think it's a good breakdown of the Kalam argument with some very valid points. I'd add one thing that you didn't go into. The idea that God as a first cause is timeless and spaceless (or outside of time and space) is a strange one, and I think it can be questioned whether something/someone can exist like that. We only have experience of things and beings existing within time and space, and it's hard to fully imagine the implications of existing outside of those. Can there fx be any processes (like having a thought) without time? WLC has often argued against the concept of infinity as an absurdity, but maybe there's something absurd about existence outside of time and space as well. I haven't done a full analysis or anything like that, but it seems to me that the idea that God is outside of space and time isn't just something you can slap on the table without explaining how that sort of existence would work and even be conceivable.
The way people make this claim reminds me of how some say that God is immaterial when we have no experience of anything being immaterial (made of matter or the result of something made of matter). They might say God is made of spirit, but what is spirit then? And how do we know that exists?
Excellent point. I think the big thing is that even of we do grant there can be some sort of timeless cause for the universe, it’s a massive leap to then say this must be a conscious being of some sort. As you say, even explaining how something like that could possibly work seems very difficult
I agree. I think something that is timeless, spaceless, and immaterial is simply nothingness
In "reality" ("hologramisticly") there are many "times" and many "spaces" nestled within one another like a Russian Doll or the multi-dimensional model of the "Tree of Life". i.e. each sephirot contains its own "tree". As above, so below. The system would appear to us to function like the Mandelbrot Set. Therefore the "cause" of intelligent design çan feasibly reside outside one universe and have its "effect" manifest in another. In Quantum Physics this is the observable phenomenon of "something out of nothing" which is closely related to Quantum entanglement, or, as Einstein termed it, "spooky action".
Could be something our 3-dimensional minds are incapable of grasping. But by the same token we therefore wouldn't have it as a goto when answering cosmology problems.
@@richardhunter132 Ah yes: god is something that's made of nothing and it exists nowhere and never. Checkmate, atheists!
Craig has tried to defend against criticism of "Everything that begins to exist has a cause" against the observation that virtual particles have no cause we can find by saying that virtual particles don't begin to exist, since there is already a universe with physical laws in existence when the virtual particle appears, so it is just a fluctuation to something that already exists.
So yeah...
Under that argument it looks like the only thing he claims really "begins to exist" as he defines it is the universe itself, and this is very circular.
Of course, that is totally inconsistent with other accounts he has given of things beginning to exist.
The actual answer is that this is not a real belief, it's just an apologetic.
This Ethan Benson is so dumb that he does not even know how badly wrong are his criticisms. For something serious try something like the paper "Why the Big Bang Singularity Does Not Help the Kalām Cosmological Argument for Theism".
Virtual particles are mathematical concepts not physical entities.
@@TBOTSS No, they are theoretical physical entities.
@@paulsmart4672Theoretical physics is Mathematical.
The “virtual particles” are kludges in the equations to make the theory work.
They have no existence outside of the equations.
This is standard practice for instrumentalists.
You’d have to interpret the mathematics through the lens of a mathematical realist to give them existence.
I think the premise 1 says something like:
1. Every thing that comes into existence is a transformation of things that previously existed.
For example a banana is a transformation of biological and non-biological matter into a single material thing, a banana. A star is a transformation of waves of hydrogen and helium into a single object that works like a nuclear reactor, a consciousness arising from the activity of a brain, etc... Apparently if a thing didn't existed at a time t and begins to exist at a time t' then it came from a previously existing thing. This of course obligates us to adopt the "A" theory of time/presentism.
The first thing WLC has to explain is how anything "timeless" can be the cause of anything. Definitionally a cause requires time.
The he has to explain what something "spaceless and immaterial" is, how he knows something immaterial or spaceless can exist and how he'd go about proving that.
The kalam is weak as hell they should call it kamal instead lol
1, There’s no evidence things begin to exist or even can begin to exist, if X begin to exist therefore Y begin to exist but the problem is there’s no evidence X begin to exist or that it’s even possible, therefore it falls apart.
2. Even if we had evidence things can ( begin ) to exist therefore the universe had a beginning is composition fallacy, ( one assumes that what is true for the
parts must also be true for the whole. )
3, even if we have prove the universe began to exist it’s not evidence for god rather it’s evidence that the universe had beginning
4, you want more kamal? Lol
Hahaha I like that. Good points as well. Particularly the first one. I think a major problem of the kalam which I didn’t go into properly is that it assumes that materials themselves behave the same way as composite materials. It’s just an extension of the existing composition fallacy critique, but I think an interesting one regardless.
In terms of it being weak, whilst I do agree it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, it’s one of the better arguments I’ve seen. Stands above most ontological and teleological arguments in my mind at least
@@ethanbenson The base argument, sure, though I don't know if we can talk about what "caused" the universe since we can't currently figure that out. It's more honest to say collectively we don't know yet until we can figure that out, if that is a possible action we can take. Proposing a god seems like an illogical leap for no reason. Also, it's hard to define causality when the universe is the start of causality within our universe.
@@TheGamingLegendsOfficial I agree. I am an agnostic (although act as if and would generally refer to myself as an atheist)
@@ethanbenson With lack of evidence for the proposition, acting as though the proposition is false until provided evidence that it is true seems pretty reasonable to me.
Saying that something "exists outside of time and space" is incoherent gibberish. To say that something is outside of time and space is merely stating that it does not exist. To exist is to be somewhere in time and space. If you describe something as existing in no place and no time, you are simply proclaiming its non-existence. If applied to a "god," then it's merely a statement of atheism.
That presupposes that you know immaterial and timeless things can’t exist. You also used physical existence which doesn’t apply to God
We could consider here something like the question of if numbers exist. If so, do they exist physically or non physically? If they don’t exist physically in a place, do they exist in time?
There are certainly various views here, some of which will claim that numbers do not exist as independent things and are merely human constructs of the mind (and so exist within the mind whilst the mind exists), but my point is that it does seem plausible that we could conceive of something which exists outside of space and time, so I’m not sure this is the strongest objection.
@@CorneliusCorndogJr Ah, the old Get Out of Jail Free Card. . . So if you presuppose that something logically impossible and incoherent is the property of something undefinable, undescribable and unknowable, then you can make any logically impossible or incoherent, self-contradictory claim about anything. Everything just becomes a gigantic short circuit. All you are saying is "MAGIC!!! TAHDAAAH!!!!" If there's magic, you can claim anything. If there's magic, you can claim that the universe exists because an enchanted mushroom makes 2+2=5 and Richard Simmons wrote all of Shakespeare's plays. This is not reasoning. It isn't even thinking. It's just schizophrenic hallucination.
What about the analogy of the author and a novel.
In the beginning, the author exists outside the timeline of his writing. While the characters experience time sequentially, the author is not bound by this timeline. Moreover, the author can jump to any part of the story; he can revise earlier chapters while writing the ending, and he could even write the entire story out of sequence. Yet, to the characters, time flows in one direction, but the author’s relationship to the story’s time is fundamentally different.
Additionally, the author creates the world of the novel and sets it’s timely to motion. This is before the novel is even written. There is no timeline. The author-initiated timeline when he begins to write. That’s the point of the Kalam Cosmological Argument, God is posited as the creator who initiates the timeline of the universe.
About timeless existence, while the novel’s timeline progresses from the opening page to the last page, the author’s existence is not defined to the timeline. Conceivably the author could even take a break and return to the at any point. The author’s existence is independent of the novel’s timeline. In this way the author’s existence is analogous to the concept of God’s timelessness, existing independently of the temporal order initiated at the universe’s creation.
The author also has an overarching view of the entire narrative, knowing the beginning, middle, and end simultaneously. Characters in the novel perceived life events as they unfold, yet the author knows the entire story. This omniscient perspective is very much how God, exists outside of time, God has knowledge of all points in time simultaneously.
The character in the novel for example could be playing chess. Against the author who knows every possible move and its outcome. The author understands all the rules and potential sequences of moves, knowing precisely how each choice affects the game's conclusion. God's middle knowledge, where God is aware of every possible decision you could make and the resulting consequences in any given circumstance.
Furthermore, the author’s thoughts, ideas, and decisions that shape the material content of the novel, but the author is not materially part of the novel’s world. The influence of God on the universe is conceived as immaterial and beyond the physical constraints of the universe.
I grant that it may be hard to empirically imagine timeless existence, but the analogy provides a conceptual framework. So, one can understand and authors relationship to the story without experiencing it ourselves, in this way we can conceive of God’s timeless existence.
When it comes to understanding the origin of the universe, I believe certain metaphysical realities, like timelessness and spacelessness, are indispensable. Even though these concepts might be challenging to visualize, that doesn't make them logically incoherent. Just because something is outside our everyday experience doesn't mean it's impossible. These ideas provide a crucial framework for making sense of how the universe could come into existence without being limited by the very dimensions it created.
In my studies of scientific works, I've come to understand that there are real limits to what we can observe and measure. For instance, in the study of black holes, I see how scientists rely on theoretical models and mathematical simulations. It seems to me that’s because we can't directly observe these phenomena. This has shown me that some questions, like the nature of the first cause of the universe, goes beyond what empirical science can address. These are philosophical issues that require us to think beyond the limits of our observations, much like how we use abstract theories to understand black holes. It's a reminder that not everything can be seen or measured, but that doesn't mean it's any less real or important.
For me there are Philosophers and theologians like Augustine, Aquinas, and others have provided extensive reasoning for these attributes of God.
@@garyshepard7810False analogy! The timeline of the novel is fictional and so is the claim about the characters experiencing time sequentially. In reality the author exists in a timeline and experiences time sequentially. The universe is not fiction and nor are we fictional characters. God, if he exists, would still exist in time. Time with a beginning is incoherent as pointed out long ago by ancient greeks.
The Causation Trilemma:
1. Everything has a cause.
2. There is a cause of everything.
3. Causation does not loop.
Choose at most two.
All three cannot be true; so any two imply the negation of the third. If causation is linear, then either not everything has a cause, or there is no cause for everything. If everything has a cause, and there is a cause of everything, then it is caused by something that it causes, so causation loops.
Yeah, I think this is a problem for all cosmological arguments
@@user-tp7gy4dj4l Premise 1 is not "everything has a cause" it's "whatever begins to exist has a cause", so your entire argument is a strawman butchering.
He's talking generally about causation, not specifically the kalam, so your entire argument is a strawman butchering
Alex O'Connor?
He’s certainly someone I admire and take inspiration from, although I think a lot of the overlap between our views has more to do with having similar inspirations growing up. Both of us were brought into philosophy by way of the new atheists, with particularly Hitchens being a primary inspiration. I think though that our key difference is that my interests are more towards metaphysics whilst Alex is more interested in ethics from my understanding. I also have a huge interest in political philosophy and discuss politics more openly than Alex (which is probably wise on his part)
Thank you for doing this. MANY aspects of WLC's presentations are flawed and we need someone as informed and articulate as you in the fight.
Bill do you have any proof that the character in the bible is older than the singularity? The singularity Is what science tell us existed, if that's even the proper term, before the universe started expanding and spacetime began, Making the singularity basically eternal.
So about that evidence Bill?
There's something about calling WLC Bill that always brings a smile to my face
Premise 1 draws on our common-sense observation that everything we see beginning to exist has a cause, and from this, it deduces that the universe itself must have a beginning. The distinction you’re attempting to make between the observable and the unobservable is important but deductive logic can apply universally, not just to what we observe. For example the impossibility of square circles isn't limited to what we can see there are no square circles anywhere even in the unobservable parts of the universe, because the principle of non-contradiction (A and ~A) holds universally. The causal principle asserts that causes logically entail their effects, meaning that if something begins to exist, it must have a cause, regardless of whether we can observe it directly.
There is no "causal principle" that requires events to be either causes or effects. There are uncaused events taking place all around us all the time, even within our own bodies. Causality is not universal. Causality is something that must be shown in each case where it is asserted. To show that an event is caused requires an explanation of the mechanisms involved, something that no one has done for the origin of the universe. If the universe began as a quantum level event it may well be uncaused.
Causality is necessarily temporal and a cause must precede any of its effects from all frames of reference. If you observe A then B and assert that A caused B but another observer in another reference frame observes A and B occur simultaneously or observes B occur before A then A was not the cause of B. Either something else caused B or B was uncaused.
Even the laws of logic are not inherently universal. They are derived from observation and are descriptive not prescriptive. They are axiomatic, assumed but not proven.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564
"There are uncaused events taking place all around us all the time"
What uncaused events are you referring to? I don't see dogs and dragons randomly popping into existence uncaused out of nothing everywhere, I don't see heart disease suddenly appearing without medical causes or my thoughts randomly appearing in my head without any reason or casual antecedents. The world looks as if the casual principle is true, not false.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 False. Causes are not necessarily temporal. Causes need not precede their effects. They can be simultaneously with their effects and structured hierarchically. For instance, consider a triangle. The fact that it has three sides and the sum of its internal angles is 180 degrees is not something that occurs in time; rather, these properties are causally grounded in the very nature or essence of what it means to be a triangle. The triangle’s existence necessarily brings about these properties simultaneously, without any temporal sequence.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564
>>>Even the laws of logic are not inherently universal. They are derived from observation"
So you think that it's a logical possibility that square circles can exist somewhere in unobserved parts of the universe??? Remember you're denying that the laws of logic are universal and saying that they are based on observation. It should then follow your view that square circles are possible which is absurd and shows that your view of logic is false. Also the very denial that logic is universal shows that logic is universal. For example, you would have to reason that "logic is not universal" is a coherent and valid statement. This reliance on logic to deny logic illustrates a contradiction: if logic were truly not universal, then the argument against logic would not be a valid or coherent statement, which means the denial itself wouldn’t make sense.
@@giftedtheos You are thinking on the wrong scale. Quantum level events are routinely uncaused,
I did not say that causality did not exist, I said that it is not universal, because it isn't.
Nothing causes quantum fields to fluctuate, it is just what they do, and they occasionally produce quantum when a fluctuation reaches the right strength at a given location. Nothing causes a particular atomic nuclei to decay or a particular free neutron to do so.
Your argument from personal incredulity is not at all convincing.
Here is the real Kalam argument, and it is very old, coming from Epicurus:
Definition: God is the creator of matter.
That might be the only definition of god all monotheists can agree on. Who created god? Well, because he exists eternally, he cannot have a creator.
Claim 1: Whatever exists eternally cannot have a creator.
This claim is made by theists if you challenge them with the question of who made god.
Claim 2: Nothing can come from nothing.
I think that most theist argue this way. So here we have two claims that theists make all the time.
The following argument comes from Epicurus:
(P1) Matter can neither be created nor destroyed.
This is known today as the first law of thermodynamics. Science has confirmed Epicurus. Matter/energy (in many cases interchangeable synonyms, see Einstein) can change its state. However, existence is not a state! Rather, it is the prerequisite for being able to have a state.
(P2) Nothing comes from nothing - matter cannot come from nothing.
This is exactly what theists always reproach us with. It is not easy to deny this, because most cosmological arguments for God, all of which have long since been refuted, are based on this premise.
(C1) From this, the only logically compelling possibility is that matter/energy exists eternally.
There is no other possibility. If matter/energy can only be transformed, see the first law of thermodynamics, and cannot be created out of nothing, then matter must exist eternally. It can change its form, that is clear, at the beginning of cosmic inflation (also known as the Big Bang), the matter we know did not yet exist in the current form.
Now comes the next logically compelling conclusion. If you define God as the creator of matter - the only thing that monotheists generally agree on - then it follows:
(C2) Since matter exists eternally, it cannot have a creator. Which means that God cannot exist.
If theists say that God created everything, and you ask: Who then created God? Then you get the answer: No, he cannot have been created because he exists eternally. If God exists eternally, he cannot have had a creator! But the same applies to matter: if it exists eternally, no one could have created it "before eternity, which has no beginning".
On the "infinte regress" section you state, _"we then must naturally inquire into the cause. If we accept the Kalam, we can use the Kalam to then assume that the cause must have a cause, and so on, creating infinite regress"_
This is based on a fatal error on your part as the first premise of the Kalam doesn't say, "everything that exists has a cause". If it did then your reasoning would be correct here, but it doesn't say that. It says "everything that *BEGINS* to exist has a cause". The causal principle doesn't hold for beginningless entities.
@@giftedtheos good point
The video thumbnail is aces, bro 👍
Thank you!
The prime mover argument is based on a false premise, that there needs to be a first cause. Motion is the default state, it requires no cause. Photons for instance, can only move at the velocity of light, a speed they are travelling at at the time of their production. In fact, there is no such thing as stationary, negating the very notion of a prime mover.
The issue with infinite regression is that it is not something that can be defined away. Simply asserting that a deity is eternal by definition does not break the infinite regression, and because all top-down origin scenarios necessarily include the infinite regression issue, they are not sensible. Agent first origins are inherently top-down scenarios. You either reject infinite regressions in objective reality and therefore reject agent first scenarios, or accept infinite regressions in objective reality and therefore accept that no specific agent can be the origin because top-down scenarios can't have finite origins.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 Not only do you confuse the Kalam cosmological argument with Aquinas's argument from motion which are two distinct arguments, you get Aquinas's argument from motion absolutely wrong. He wasn't talking about physical motion, but the metaphysical of change. He meant motion as in going from potentiality to actuality. You guys need to actually learn to read academic literature and understand the actual arguments before critiquing them
@@giftedtheos Metaphysics isn't real, just like all philosophy. These things only imagine how things might work.
Any and all logical arguments for the existence of any deity commit an equivocation fallacy if they try to conclude that the deity objectively exists, rendering their logic invalid.
This happens because deities must be defined, an entirely subjective act. Deities cannot be objectively described because objective description requires objective observation, something that no one has ever been able to accomplish.
You simply cannot prove that anything objectively exists with philosophical argumentation. The best you can validly prove is that something exists subjectively, in the mind of the believer.
To prove that something objectively exists requires verified objective empirical evidence of that thing or a overwhelming amount of verified objective empirical evidence that points exclusively and unambiguously to that thing,
All of Aquinas' arguments were debunked before the ink was dry. Philosophical arguments for the "existence" of "God" also suffer from having different and often conflicting definitions of what "God" is.
Agent first origin scenarios simply do not work. They all necessarily include the infinite regression issue, something that cannot be defined away. Claiming that any deity is the first anything is irrational and illogical. Even if you accept the possibility of infinite regressions in objective reality you cannot get to a specific deity as an origin, or even an agent of any sort. Infinite regressions don't allow for specific origins. If you reject the possibility of infinite regressions in objective reality then you also necessarily reject any agent first origin scenario. You cannot break an infinite regression.
@@letstrytouserealscienceoka3564 96% of what you said was completely incoherent and unintelligible. You got numerous applications of fallacious wrong, your don't understand deductive logic, you don't understand metaphysics which you said wasn't real even though all philosophers of science accept metaphysics as a real feature of reality, etc. I don't even know what you are talking about. I don't know where to begin addressing all this. I counted at least 30+ errors in your comment
@@giftedtheos "philosophers of science" are not scientists.
You clearly don't understand that philosophy imagines how objective reality might work and empirical scientists show us how objective reality actually works.
Philosophy is a tool that helps guide what research we do but it cannot show that anything is actually objectively real. Philosophy and metaphysics are exercises of the minds of individual humans.
Subjective existence and objective existence are two entirely different things and equating them is always fallacious. The most that any philosophical argument can ever prove is subjective existence, that a believer believes and nothing more than that. If you have to define the thing you are trying to prove the "existence" of then you are engaging in an argument that is entirely subjective. Proof of objective existence requires objective evidence and definitions are inherently subjective. Even if you could come up with a complete, coherent, and non-contradictory definition of a specific "God" to use in all of your arguments (something no one has ever done), you would still only be able to prove its subjective existence.
You will notice that no argument for God ever states whether the existence being proven is subjective or objective, or clarifies what they mean by "existence" in any way.
Do you think that you can provide an objective description of your favorite deity? Do you think that you can provide a complete, coherent, and non-contradictory definition of your favorite deity? I am thinking a definite "no" on the former and a "you've got a lot of work to do" on the latter.
Assumes the universe is a "thing" in the same way things within the universe are.
If God creates everything, and only those things, that do not create themselves, then God creates God as much as God does not create God.
Interesting point, I’ll have to think on that
One thing you get wrong about the fallacy of composition is that NOT ALL parts to wholes reasoning is fallacious. You haven't shown that if parts of the universe begin to exist then it doesn't follow that the universe as a whole began to exist. What SPECIFICALLY makes the inference invalid? For example if a house is made completely out of red bricks it's not fallacious to infer the house as a whole is red. In fact to even accuse the Kalam of commiting the fallacy of composition you must commit the fallacy of begging the question by assuming there is a beginningless part of the Universe
I say this in the video about composition from memory. The inference isn’t necessarily invalid. But, it is an inference, making the argument no longer deductively valid (which Craig often claims is a strength of the argument). I don’t have to assume there is a beginningless part of the universe to say this. It’s a critique of the form of the argument, not a statement about what is or is not the case.
@@ethanbenson How is the argument no longer deductively valid? Inferences can be deductive, inductive and abductive 🤦♂️. Deductive inferences are known in logic as "valid inferences". Do I need to cite the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy?
Yes, you are in fact assuming the universe is beginningless as that is the only way you can say premise 2 is a composition fallacy. You have to assume the causal principle is false in order to argue that the parts to whole deductive reasoning here is fallacious. This is why almost no critic of the Kalam in the philosophical literature accuses the Kalam of the composition fallacy. Only laymen on the Internet like you that don't understand basic logic and arguments.
This is my point: I think we need to suspend judgement about the inference because we cannot say with certainty if it is or is not valid. Therefore, if there is a possibility that it is not valid, we can say that the argument as a whole would not be deductively valid. By suspending our judgment here, we make the argument a matter of induction. This is relevant to your second critique as well. I’m not outright saying the premise is fallacious, just that it is not obvious that it must be true.
I also don’t appreciate the needless insult, I’m trying to respond in good faith. I acknowledge I could be wrong, I’m just explaining why I made the point. I study philosophy, I understand argumentation and logic perfectly well. There’s no need to be condescending.
I did misspeak in my initial comment on review, my bad
The scientific consensus is that the universe has always existed in some form.
@@petermetcalfe6722 Ehhhh....
"Always" is a weird word for it.
It is generally agreed the universe exists at all points in the past.
It is not generally agreed the past is infinite.
Regardless, "The universe began to exist" is a claim that can not be substantiated, as beginning to exist implies a previous time of non-existence, and there was no non-universe point in the past.
Thanks for the video enjoyed it.
Glad you liked it!
Am the only one who thinks this man argument are weak
Why do you think this?
The Kalam is already dead....
and WLC has already talked for soolong that he's put his foot in his mouth and made himself a laughing stock of an apologist.
Don't waste your time on this.
Excellent profile picture, I’m a big Muppets fan! But yeah, I agree. Especially when he’s defended the genocide of the Canaanites in the Bible, I think he showed himself to be at the least inconsistent. Similar actions taken by atheists would be jumped on by him
@ethanbenson
Don't forget his Adam and Eve were Homo Heidelbergensis nonsense.... that was top-tier level apologetic mental gymnastics.
You've in no way invalidated the KCA.
1. "Everything" is NOT restricted to the known universe- it excludes nothing. The known universe is included in "eveeyrhing" as is anything potentially beyond or outside of the known universe.
2. The KCA in no way commits the fallacy of composition. The fallacy of composition would be to say that all individual cells of an elephant are light weight, therefore elephants are light weight. The KCA does not have this logical fallacy. It simply states that if something BEGINS to exist, it must have a cause for how it came into existence. This is a metaphysical truth.
@QualityGuy-kp1fp right, and my claim is that we only have knowledge of that which is within the universe. Your first point is literally my point.
Your second point relates to this, as if we can only make the claim that causality is true within the universe, then we cannot be sure that “everything that begins to exist” has a cause. It seems inductively likely, I concede that, but I think some amount of scepticism is warranted, particularly if we take into account modern quantum physics and some interpretations of string theory.
And then of course, if we accept the argument, we still would have our work cut out for us to say that the cause for the universe is God (specifically the Christian one it seems in your case). WLC of course does this by mounting a series of arguments, but I think it creates a lot of compounding assumptions which I think make his case somewhat weak (although I can see why he is popular for Christians).
Same old boring and refuted objections addressed by William Lane Craig hundreds of times in talks and papers.
@@giftedtheos Speaking of boring old tricks...
Vaguely gesturing to some counterargument you *could* make but for some reason don't is very popular with theists.
@@paulsmart4672 Which premise of the Kalam cosmological argument do you deny?
@@giftedtheos I don't exactly deny either of them. That's not how it works.
Its not good enough for the premises to be things that could be true.
You need to show that both of them *are* true.
You can demonstrate neither.
Another "Kalam debunked" deception 😢
:(
@@ethanbenson
Someday someone will actually debunk the Kalam 🙏🏼
This is a category mistake. God, as a necessary, timeless, and immaterial being, fundamentally differs from the contingent, temporal, and material nature of the universe. Therefore, the premise that the existence of God without a beginning implies the universe could also exist without a beginning does not hold, given their different natures and the evidence we have about the universe's temporal origin.
There's no reason to think "a necessary, timeless and immaterial being" is anything other than word salad. You can't point to any such being, and from our point of view, being timeless, spaceless, and immaterial is indistinguishable from just not existing at all.
We could imagine, in some vague way, that there's a reality outside of ours, but there's no way to know that it's there, or interact with it if it is.
Nice assertion. When I am making up a fictional character I can give them any atributes I want, too. "god solves all these problems" is easy to SAY. You have to prove he exists before you can posit he does anything.
Bingo!
@@dustinmorton942 Try positing by studying the quiet spaces in any popular religion that values humanity. People claim to meet their spiritual path in those spaces. It is annoying for materialistic thinkers that they cannot disprove these experiences. Enjoy a few good posits! How is it really necessary that you prove such matters before sampling them?
@@kateknowles8055
What good will "sampling" them do? It's just people attributing their experiences to something supernatural when they have no rational justification for doing so.
The issue with your argument started with your discussion on the first premise. You restated the argument to include “within the known universe” but that phrase is not in the argument. You missed the point of the premise.
The argument is: “everything that begins to exist” has a cause. The premise is NOT: “everything in the observable universe that begins to exist has a cause”.
So the premise and argument only address things that had a beginning, or in other words, only applies to things that both existed for a time and also did not exist for a time.
The theist argument is that God has existed always and there never was a time where God didnt exist. That what Aristotle called the “unmoved mover”, or the “unbegan, beginner”.
I do that because if we don’t say that, we’re talking about things external to the universe and the premise becomes less clearly true. I do it to be charitable to the argument
@@ethanbenson But the whole point of the argument (or at least the theistic conclusion) is that an uncaused entity created the universe and so is necessarily outside of it. Limiting the refutation to only things in the universe seems to miss the point of the original argument.
@@bdpgarage no, my entire point is that we know causality to be a principle of that which is within the universe, the universe itself is not within the universe and so perhaps the universe itself is not caused. My point is that assuming this means God caused the universe is not necessarily true, as if we say the universe must have a cause, we are then applying a principle of that which is within the universe to the universe itself and that may or may not be the case.
@@ethanbenson I think I get what your saying. Restating: Because we humans can only confirm the law of causality within our own universe, we cannot confirm causaility outside of the universe. Therefore things outside the universe could exist eternally? (Assuming you’re not arguing that universe could cause itself)
I would restate the conclusion to be that we should be agnostic as to if the universe has a cause. Supposing it does have a cause, we also should be agnostic about what that cause is. To put it plainly, I don’t think we can know anything about things which are not within the universe.
I stopped listening as soon as you suggested that there is circular reasoning. Nonsense. Oh and then you dig a deeper irrational hole by claiming there is a fallacy of composition. You would not last a minute up against Craig.
Can you explain where I went wrong in saying these things?
Also, I have no doubt I wouldn’t last a minute against Craig. He’s been a professional philosopher for quite a long time and I’m just a student at this point. This is just my attempt at discussing his argument, I think any good philosopher would not be insulted by someone discussing their work, even if that means it is criticised.
Yes I bet you stuck your fingers in your ears and went 'la la la' like most Christians when faced with reasoning
In a limbo competition, nobody, including a flatworm, could go lower the W.L (Low-Bar).
The cosmological argument is perfectly logical and still stands. And the universe is running out of energy.uou just want to be an atheist because you don't want anything or any one telling Yu what to do. do Yu want to bet your life that yr right.if your atheism is not correct then you're in a lot of trouble with the God Yu don't believe in. Challenge yr ideas about yr refusal to believe. Think seriously about it cause Yu might be in serious trouble with god
I’ll take the risk
I don't see why your ilk thinks threats and fearmongering are a valid and useful way to get us to see your point of view. It shows that some of yall are childish,ignorant, and more than happy to fall prey to generalizations of a whole demographic of people,to have that sweet confirmation bias, and some (unwarranted) feelings of superioity and specialness.
Some atheists used to be religious. They used scrutiny and honesty to get to their position. Some of us put thought into our position, something your lot doesn't seem to do.
No, it has never stood for evidence of g o d s. It only points to some things existing eternally. Do not be so arrogant to assume you know why people do not believe, because you do not.