The Kalam Cosmological Argument Debunked

[Richard Amiel McGough]

The ludicrous folly of William Lane Craig and other incoherent psuedo-philosophical psuedo-scientistific Christian and Muslim apologists is soundly debunked in this video.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baZUCc5m8sE&list=TLsNCFULJi2iRtti57DKo233I fl4b-BQXw

[Richard Amiel McGough]

One of the best things about this video is that it exposes the blatant selection bias the apologists use to force their false conclusions and deceive their audience. For example, on the one hand Craig argues that an "actual infinity" is impossible, while on the other hand he appeals to the infinite singularity predicted by General Relativity as proof that the universe had a beginning. He selectively quotes from Borde, Guth, and Vilenkin when they say something he can use for his argument, but then totally ignores them when they directly and explicitly contradict the way he misused their words.

[Richard Amiel McGough]

This one is very technical. It decisively refutes Craig on many points.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KvZGauAmo8&list=TLumV78u76go-MF8teb_7w6v4cATEXK7RT

[Gambini]

On the one hand Craig argues that an "actual infinity" is impossible, while on the other hand he appeals to the infinite singularity predicted by General Relativity as proof that the universe had a beginning.


You sound like you have no idea what you're even talking about. First of all, it's not "Craig's cosmological argument". Second, Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist. In fact, he's arguing FOR an actual infinite (namely, God). DUH!!! What he's arguing, as other philosophers and mathematicians have, is that there cannot be an actual infinite amount OF FINITE THINGS. The singularity isn't an infinite amount of finite things. Further, the singularity isn't even an actual infinite to begin with. When cosmologists talk about the "infinite density" of the singularity, it's just a scientific term representing the point at which all physical measurements break down. The big bang is the BIRTH (the APPEARANCE) of time, space, matter and energy. In fact, "infinite density" = NOTHINGNESS!!! Hence, the singularity represents the BIRTH of time, space, matter and energy from NOTHINGNESS.


Your assertion that Craig is claiming "proof" is also false. There is no "proof" for premise 2 in kalam. There is *EVIDENCE* for premise 2 (evidence from philosophy AND empirical evidence from science), whereas there is *ZERO* evidence that contradicts it. This is why your "god of the gaps" charge is patently false because the real arguments for God are syllogistically deduced from premises with supporting *EVIDENCE* (either from science or logic).




He selectively quotes from Borde, Guth, and Vilenkin when they say something he can use for his argument, but then totally ignores them when they directly and explicitly contradict the way he misused their words.


Bullshit. Vikenkin COMMENDED Dr Craig for ACCURATELY representing his theorem in an email exchange that Craig revealed PUBLICLY on his own freaking site. Have you even read it??? Meanwhile, Lawrence Krauss was caught RED HANDED quote mining Vikenkin in a separate email during a debate with Craig. Did you miss that too???


Bottom-line: Craig is 100% CORRECT (as Vilenkin HIMSELF acknowledged in their email exchange) in saying the BVG theorem states that ANY universe with a positive expansion rate is NECESSARILY finite in the past. Furthermore, there isn't a SINGLE big bang model that either doesn't escape the BVG theorem OR that isn't plagued with OTHER problems. And lastly, Aron Wall's recent paper now provides *EVIDENCE* (there's that word again) that EVEN UNDER A QUANTUM GRAVITY MODEL, the universe would STILL require a definite beginning in the finite past.



Btw, check out the YouTuber RandomCity912. He has a 9 part series entitled "Is William Lane Craig dishonest?" where he utterly annihilates this video you posted (he starts dissecting this video beginning with part 5 if I remember correctly). And get this, when this chick put up this video back in 2011, SHE WOULDN'T EVEN ACCEPT HIS VIDEO RESPONSE LOL!!! How's that for censorship? Either she thought her subscribers were too dumb to follow the written format in his video series OR she didn't want them to see her video get smashed point by point. I'm pretty sure it was the latter.



BINI

[Richard Amiel McGough]

You sound like you have no idea what you're even talking about. First of all, it's not "Craig's cosmological argument". Second, Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist.

Wow. Wow, wow, wow. You don't merely "sound like you have no idea what you're even talking about" - you've proven it beyond all doubt! The WHOLE POINT of Craig's version of the Kalam argument is that actual infinites cannot exist because they lead to absurdities. He uses this to argue that the past must be finite since otherwise there would be an "actual infinity of past events." Here is his formulation of his argument posted on his site:

The Existence of God and the Beginning of the Universe (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe)
This argument, which I have called the kalam cosmological argument, can be exhibited as follows:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
2.1 Argument based on the impossibility of an actual infinite.
2.11 An actual infinite cannot exist.
2.12 An infinite temporal regress of events is an actual infinite.
2.13 Therefore, an infinite temporal regress of events cannot exist.
2.2 Argument based on the impossibility of the formation of an actual infinite by successive addition.
2.21 A collection formed by successive addition cannot be actually infinite.
2.22 The temporal series of past events is a collection formed by successive addition.
2.23 Therefore, the temporal series of past events cannot be actually infinite.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.
He then expands upon point 2.1 as follows:
In order to understand (2.1), we need to understand the difference between a potential infinite and an actual infinite. Crudely put, a potential infinite is a collection which is increasing toward infinity as a limit, but never gets there. Such a collection is really indefinite, not infinite. The sign of this sort of infinity, which is used in calculus, is ¥. An actual infinite is a collection in which the number of members really is infinite. The collection is not growing toward infinity; it is infinite, it is "complete." The sign of this sort of infinity, which is used in set theory to designate sets which have an infinite number of members, such as {1, 2, 3, . . .}, is À0. Now (2.11) maintains, not that a potentially infinite number of things cannot exist, but that an actually infinite number of things cannot exist. For if an actually infinite number of things could exist, this would spawn all sorts of absurdities.
He then gives his favorite example of Hilbert's Hotel and concludes by saying "These sorts of absurdities illustrate the impossibility of the existence of an actually infinite number of things."

Your assertion that "Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist" is the most idiotic thing you have ever posted on this forum. Nothing could be more absurd. It is total bullshit. It proves that you don't have a clue what you are talking about.



Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist. In fact, he's arguing FOR an actual infinite (namely, God). DUH!!!

Wow! Another blazing demonstration of your rank ignorance. Craig has written extensively on how there is an apparent contradiction between his assertion that "actual infinities cannot exist" and the infinity of God. He explains it away by making a distinction between "quantitative" vs. "qualitative" infinities. After writing a pile of his pseudo-philosophical gibberish, he concludes by saying "denying that God is actually infinite in the quantitative sense in no way implies that God is finite. This inference does not follow, since the quantitative sense of infinity may be simply inapplicable to God." Blah, blah, blah. What a freaking hack. You can read his twisted morass of meaningless mish-mash here: Is God an Actual Infinite? (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/is-god-actually-infinite)



Your assertion that Craig is claiming "proof" is also false. There is no "proof" for premise 2 in kalam. There is *EVIDENCE* for premise 2 (evidence from philosophy AND empirical evidence from science), whereas there is *ZERO* evidence that contradicts it. This is why your "god of the gaps" charge is patently false because the real arguments for God are syllogistically deduced from premises with supporting *EVIDENCE* (either from science or logic).

I used "proof" in common sense of "evidence." Obviously, I was not talking about "proof" in the mathematical sense. Here's the first definition Google presents when you search for the definition:

proof: evidence or argument establishing or helping to establish a fact or the truth of a statement.

And there is no evidence of any kind for premise 2. Craig's arguments are ludicrous and reveal his utter ignorance of basic mathematical concepts. For example, he uses the idea of subtracting an infinite number of coins as an example of the impossibility of an actual infinite. He shows that you can get different results when subtracting infinity from infinity, and then says:

For this reason inverse operations like subtraction and division are simply prohibited in transfinite arithmetic. But in the real world such a convention has no sway; obviously you can give away whatever coins you want!

Oh really now?! How much room would those infinite number of coins take up? How long would it take you to subtract an infinite number of coins? If anything is obvious, it is that IN REALITY it would be impossible to subtract an infinite number of coins even if you had them. William Lane Craig is freaking DUNCE!



Btw, check out the YouTuber RandomCity912. He has a 9 part series entitled "Is William Lane Craig dishonest?" where he utterly annihilates this video you posted (he starts dissecting this video beginning with part 5 if I remember correctly).

Thanks! I'll check it out.

[Richard Amiel McGough]

Btw, check out the YouTuber RandomCity912. He has a 9 part series entitled "Is William Lane Craig dishonest?" where he utterly annihilates this video you posted (he starts dissecting this video beginning with part 5 if I remember correctly).
I watched a couple of his videos "debunking" the video I posted by skydivephil. I didn't see any significant challenge to anything she said. His first attack was on her assertion that Genesis 1:1 is nothing like modern cosmology. He simply denied her assertion and declared that Genesis 1:1 was a "perfect description" of the Big Bang! What a freaking maroon.

And his videos suck because all they are is scrolling text with annoying music in the background.

[Gambini]

Your assertion that "Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist" is the most idiotic thing you have ever posted on this forum.


Dude, you're clueless. You just ACKNOWLEDGED that Craig ISN'T saying there cannot be an actual infinite when you pointed out his distinction between a QUANTITATIVE infinity and a QUALITATIVE infinity. When he says "there cannot be an actual infinite", he's talking about a QUANTITATIVE infinity. And he's 100% correct about that. For example, if there were an ACTUAL infinite amount of events before now, then BY DEFINITION, no more events could be added to those events. But new events are being added to the number of past events in the universe every single second! So OBVIOUSLY, the number of past events in the universe is FINITE (hence, time itself has an absolute origination point). If you're going to argue that our experience of linear time is an "illusion", then the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate that (since our experience of linear time is a universally self evident experience). Further, it would be hypocritical for you to play that card because you've previously argued that God can't create the universe outside of a linear chain of causation. It is perfectly consistent on my part to say God created the universe through a simultaneous cause/effect event because if the universe was born ex nihilo (which is supported by *EVIDENCE*), then it LOGICALLY follows that it was caused into being AND it NECESSARILY follows that this cause/effect event did NOT entail a linear chain of time between the cause and effect. The original cause/effect event is what BIRTHED our experience of linear time.


So Craig is NOT saying there cannot be ANY actual infinite. He's saying there cannot be an actual infinite in a QUANTITATIVE sense. NEVER has traditional theism treated God as a QUANTITATIVE infinite. The infinite knowledge of God exists as a SINGLE intuition of all reality that can be broken up into propositional bits (much like our vision exists as an unbroken visual field that can be broken up into pixels). And the singularity is NOT an actual infinite anyways (in the sense that it is some existing reality). The term "infinite density" simply points to the fact that the singularity represents the BIRTH of time, space, matter and energy. If anything, it demonstrates the omnipotence behind the original cause/effect event (since the unbroken gap between something and nothing = INFINITY).


BOTTOM-LINE: A QUANTITATIVE infinity of physically finite things or linear events is logically IMPOSSIBLE. NOTHING about the nature of God entails physically finite things or linear events.



BINI

[Richard Amiel McGough]

Your assertion that "Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist" is the most idiotic thing you have ever posted on this forum.

Dude, you're clueless. You just ACKNOWLEDGED that Craig ISN'T saying there cannot be an actual infinite when you pointed out his distinction between a QUANTITATIVE infinity and a QUALITATIVE infinity. When he says "there cannot be an actual infinite", he's talking about a QUANTITATIVE infinity.

Wow. Wow wow wow! You are displaying your total, absolute, and utter ignorance of Craig's own argument! He explicitly defines an "actual infinite" as a "quantitative infinite" in contrast to a "qualitative infinite." Here is what he says in his article that I cited in my previous post Is God Actually Infinite? (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/is-god-actually-infinite):

[T]he key to your question is to understand that the mathematical notion of an actual infinite is a quantitative concept. It concerns a collection of definite and discrete elements that are members of the collection. But when theologians speak of the infinity of God, they are not using the word in a mathematical sense to refer to an aggregate of an infinite number of elements. God's infinity is, as it were, qualitative, not quantitative. It means that God is metaphysically necessary, morally perfect, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal, and so on. ...

Craig goes on to explain that that the doctrine of God's infinity "involves no commitment to an actual infinity of things." This is why Craig formulated his argument by stating that "an actual infinite cannot exist." He already specified that a "qualitative infinite" is not an "actual infinite."

And worse, your response is a total non sequitur because I never said Craig wasn't talking about quantitative infinity. Your response has nothing to do with anything I wrote. And it is absurd in light of the fact that Craig explicitly formulated his argument using the assertion that "an actual infinity cannot exist." Let me remind you of the conversation we have had:

Richard: Craig argues that an "actual infinity" is impossible

Gambini: Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist.

Bill Craig: An actual infinite cannot exist.

Gambini: Dude, you're clueless! When he says "there cannot be an actual infinite", he's talking about a QUANTITATIVE infinity.

Look at that! You totally contradicted yourself. First you denied he said it, and then you admitted he said it. And worse, your comment is meaningless because Craig explicitly defined an "actual infinite" as a "quantitative infinite" so he couldn't have been talking about anything else.

So there you go. You obviously had ZERO COMPREHENSION of Craig's own argument. My statements stand unrefuted.



And he's 100% correct about that. For example, if there were an ACTUAL infinite amount of events before now, then BY DEFINITION, no more events could be added to those events. But new events are being added to the number of past events in the universe every single second! So OBVIOUSLY, the number of past events in the universe is FINITE (hence, time itself has an absolute origination point).

Typical half-baked pseudo-philosophical bullshit. What constitutes an "event"? Neither you nor your pseudo-philosophical hack-hero Craig has bothered to define that term! Does an "event" necessarily span a finite amount of time or is it defined as the physical configuration at a single instant of time? If the latter, then there would be an infinity of "events" between any two events, just as there are an infinity of numbers between zero and one and so Craig's argument fails. Is it even coherent to talk of a continuous sequence of distinct events when they obviously overlap and so are not well defined as distinct? Can an event that spans a finite amount of time be subdivided into smaller events? If so, then there are necessarily an infinite number of events between any two events unless you want to try to save Craig's argument by speculating about quantized time. There are ten thousand problems with your silly assertions. It is obvious that neither you nor Craig have given any serious thought to this question. Indeed, if anything is OBVIOUS it is that you spew out utterly unsupported bombastic assertions of "100% correct" without having given the topic any meaningful analysis at all. I see this in nearly all your posts.



It is perfectly consistent on my part to say God created the universe through a simultaneous cause/effect event because if the universe was born ex nihilo (which is supported by *EVIDENCE*), then it LOGICALLY follows that it was caused into being AND it NECESSARILY follows that this cause/effect event did NOT entail a linear chain of time between the cause and effect. The original cause/effect event is what BIRTHED our experience of linear time.

First, your assertion that there is "evidence" that the universe was "born ex nihilo" is false. There is no evidence of any kind for that assertion.

Second, you assertion that a timeless God created the universe "ex nihilo" is incoherent for two reasons: 1) You assert that the universe was created by the command of an existing God which is not "nothing." 2) Any act, including the act of the creation of time, entails that time already existed. A timeless being cannot "act" in any way at all. Calling it "simultaneous" entails time and so contradicts your assumption that there was no time. Your philosophy is radically incoherent. It is truly stunning to see you assert such blatant bullshit as if it were incontrovertible fact.



So Craig is NOT saying there cannot be ANY actual infinite. He's saying there cannot be an actual infinite in a QUANTITATIVE sense.

Yes he is. His whole defense of God's infinity is to differentiate between an "actual infinite" (which he defines as "quantitative") and a "qualitative" infinite. He never refers to a quantitative infinite as an "actual infinite." And for good reason, since if he did that he would be contradicting himself like you.

[Richard Amiel McGough]

Yo! Gambini! I do believe you have some unfinished business here.


:pop2:

[Gambini]

Wow. Wow wow wow! You are displaying your total, absolute, and utter ignorance of Craig's own argument! He explicitly defines an "actual infinite" as a "quantitative infinite" in contrast to a "qualitative infinite."


Dude, what in the world are you talking about??? You just quoted Craig where he is saying he's talking about a *QUANTITATIVE* infinity (when he says there cannot be an actual infinite amount of finite things), WHICH IS MY WHOLE POINT! HELLO??? NOTHING about God entails "an infinite amount of finite things". Further, NOTHING in reality consists of an ACTUAL infinite amount of finite things (nor CAN anything consist of an ACTUAL infinite amount of finite things, as opposed to a POTENTIAL infinite, because such an idea is logically impossible in the same way that a square circle is logically impossible).




Here is what he says in his article that I cited in my previous post Is God Actually Infinite? (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/is-god-actually-infinite):

[T]he key to your question is to understand that the mathematical notion of an actual infinite is a quantitative concept. It concerns a collection of definite and discrete elements that are members of the collection. But when theologians speak of the infinity of God, they are not using the word in a mathematical sense to refer to an aggregate of an infinite number of elements. God's infinity is, as it were, qualitative, not quantitative. It means that God is metaphysically necessary, morally perfect, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal, and so on.


Umm ... Thank you for quoting Craig where he says EXACTLY WHAT I'M SAYING! Notice he said "God's infinity is, as it were, QUALITATIVE". That's my whole freaking point, dude!!! Craig is saying there cannot be an ACTUAL infinity in a QUANTITATIVE sense and he's right. He's OBVIOUSLY not saying there cannot be ANY infinite because he just told you right there that God's attributes ARE infinite (in a QUALITATIVE sense).




Craig goes on to explain that the doctrine of God's infinity "involves no commitment to an actual infinity of things."


Yea ... An actual infinity IN A *QUANTITATIVE* SENSE! That's exactly what I'm saying. NOTHING about God entails a *QUANTITATIVE* infinity (a quantitative infinite would be an ACTUAL infinite amount of finite things).




Let me remind you of the conversation we have had:

Richard: Craig argues that an "actual infinity" is impossible

Gambini: Craig never said an actual infinite can't exist.

Bill Craig: An actual infinite cannot exist.

Gambini: Dude, you're clueless! When he says "there cannot be an actual infinite", he's talking about a QUANTITATIVE infinity.

Look at that! You totally contradicted yourself. First you denied he said it, and then you admitted he said it.


There is no contradiction. When I said Craig never said there cannot be an actual infinite, I meant ANY infinite at all. I wasn't talking about a QUANTITATIVE infinite. Craig AFFIRMS the infinity of God's attributes in a QUALITATIVE sense. Maybe you misunderstood me. Again, NOTHING about the nature of God entails any QUANTITATIVE infinite (since the ultimate nature of God does not entail any summation of parts and he is not made of what he made).




Typical half-baked pseudo-philosophical bullshit. What constitutes an "event"? Neither you nor your pseudo-philosophical hack-hero Craig has bothered to define that term!


You don't like "event"? Fine. We'll use linear time (ALL time is linear and there isn't a SHRED of evidence of ANY "time" that isn't linear). There CANNOT be an ACTUAL infinite amount of days PRIOR to the present day we are currently experiencing. For if there WERE an ACTUAL infinite amount of days PRIOR to this day, then no more days could be ADDED. If you can ADD a finite number of days *TO* an ACTUAL infinite (not a POTENTIAL infinite) number of days, then the past number of days cannot be ACTUAL. Notice we're dealing with LINEAR TIME (if you're going to argue for a nonlinear view of time and that our universal experience of time is an illusion, then the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate that). Hence, there CANNOT be any ACTUAL infinite amount of ANY linear sequence of time prior to now. Hence, the universe CANNOT be eternal because the universe *IS* time, space and matter. No infinity of time in the past = No infinity of the universe in the past (that is, unless you can demonstrate that linear time is an illusion AND that you can have a naturalistic universe WITHOUT linear time).


Another argument against an eternal universe shows that EVEN IF THERE COULD BE AN ACTUAL INFINITE NUMBER OF DAYS, such a sequence COULD NEVER BE TRAVERSED to reach the present moment. For example, if you asked me for a dollar, and I told you I had to borrow it from someone, who had to borrow it from someone else and down to INFINITY, would you ever get your dollar??? No. An ACTUAL infinite amount of linear time can NEVER be traversed to reach the present moment. And again, no linear time = NO TIME AT ALL (unless you can demonstrate our universal experience of linear time is an illusion).




Your assertion that there is "evidence" that the universe was "born ex nihilo" is false. There is no evidence of any kind for that assertion.


BULLSHIT!!! The BVG theorem = *EVIDENCE* that time, and hence the universe (or even an imaginary "multiverse"), is FINITE in the past. Again, the universe *IS* time, space and matter (an origin of time = An origin of space and matter as well). Craig is NOT misrepresenting Vilenkin. In fact, Vilenkin COMMENDED Craig in an email (which Craig made public on his website) for his ACCURATE representation of his paper! WHOOPS!!! Hell, Vilenkin actually calls the BVG theorem a *PROOF* against a past-eternal universe in his own book Many Worlds In One (page 176)!!!


At the 2012 state of the universe conference honoring Stephen Hawking's 70th birthday (with Hawking in the building), Vilenkin said "ALL THE EVIDENCE WE HAVE SAYS THAT THE UNIVERSE HAD A BEGINNING". Notice he used the word *EVIDENCE*. And a New Scientist editorial on the conference ("In the Beginning", New Scientist, 14 January 2012, page 3) commented ...

"Cosmologists ... Have tried on SEVERAL different models of the universe that DODGE the NEED for a beginning while still requiring a big bang. BUT RECENT RESEARCH HAS SHOT THEM FULL OF HOLES. It now seems *CERTAIN* that the universe had a beginning. WITHOUT AN ESCAPE CLAUSE, physicists and philosophers must FINALLY answer a problem that has been nagging at them for the best part of 50 years: How do you get a universe, complete with the laws of physics, OUT OF NOTHING".


UNQUOTE.


So your assertion that there is no evidence for the literal birth of the universe OUT OF NOTHING is a flat out LIE. Even Alan Guth doesn't deny the evidence favors a beginning. He's on record as saying the universe is "probably" eternal, but he doesn't deny the *EVIDENCE* favors a beginning. He's simply HOPING for some future discovery that would override the *EVIDENCE* we have now (most likely because he realizes the metaphysical implications of an ultimate beginning). And even Krauss admitted the universe most likely had a beginning during his debate with Craig.


Btw, according to a 2013 paper by Aron C. Wall, we now have *EVIDENCE* that the universe requires a beginning EVEN UNDER A COMPLETE THEORY OF QUANTUM GRAVITY. WHOOPS!!!




Your assertion that a timeless God created the universe "ex nihilo" is incoherent for two reasons: 1) You assert that the universe was created by the command of an existing God which is not "nothing".


What are you talking about??? Nobody is saying God is nothing. The argument is God created the universe OUT OF NOTHING (through the causal power of his being). YOU are the one who is left with the idea that nothing created everything, which is LITERALLY the most absurd proposition imaginable.




2) Any act, including the act of the creation of time, entails that time already existed. A timeless being cannot "act" in any way at all. Calling it "simultaneous" entails time and so contradicts your assumption that there was no time.


BULLSHIT!!!


1) Quantum mechanics DEMONSTRATES that THINGS THAT EXIST (notice I said THINGS THAT EXIST) can have seemingly "bizarre" properties. If the universe ITSELF has seemingly "bizarre" properties, then it's only logical that the SOURCE of the universe (God) would have seemingly "bizarre" properties (given our finite understanding). NOTHING demonstrates that nonbeing can give birth to being. THAT is a logical impossibility.

2) There are TRILLIONS of examples where there is NO FLOW OF TIME *BETWEEN* THE CAUSE AND THE EFFECT (where both exist INSTANTLY). One example is a chandelier. Again, THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS NONLINEAR "TIME". NONLINEAR "TIME" = NO FREAKING TIME (unless you can demonstrate linear time is an illusion). If the causal relationship *BETWEEN* the cause and the effect is INSTANT (as in a chandelier), then there is NO TIME between them.

3) The very fact that the *EVIDENCE* points to a literal beginning of time, space and matter IS ITSELF *EVIDENCE* that the universe was born through an instantaneous cause/effect event ...



A) Nothing BY DEFINITION cannot do anything.

B) If nothing can give rise to something, then why do we never observe pink giraffes appearing out of nowhere? We should be seeing all sorts of bizarre entities appearing from nothing since nothingness has no properties that would cause it to discriminate with regards to what it brings into being (nor can it be constrained by anything since there is nothing to be constrained!).

C) If everything was ultimately born out of nothing, then we should be seeing things DISAPPEARING out of thin air. Why? Because there would be NOTHING holding it in being. There are no laws entailed in nothingness that would proscribe for something to STAY in existence.

D) We have TRILLIONS of examples of effects requiring a cause whereas we have ZERO verifiable evidence of an effect without a cause. In fact, science ITSELF would be dead if a true example of an effect with no cause could be clearly demonstrated. The entire scientific enterprise is about searching for causes.



BINI

[Richard Amiel McGough]

You don't like "event"? Fine. We'll use linear time (ALL time is linear and there isn't a SHRED of evidence of ANY "time" that isn't linear). There CANNOT be an ACTUAL infinite amount of days PRIOR to the present day we are currently experiencing. For if there WERE an ACTUAL infinite amount of days PRIOR to this day, then no more days could be ADDED. If you can ADD a finite number of days *TO* an ACTUAL infinite (not a POTENTIAL infinite) number of days, then the past number of days cannot be ACTUAL. Notice we're dealing with LINEAR TIME (if you're going to argue for a nonlinear view of time and that our universal experience of time is an illusion, then the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate that). Hence, there CANNOT be any ACTUAL infinite amount of ANY linear sequence of time prior to now. Hence, the universe CANNOT be eternal because the universe *IS* time, space and matter. No infinity of time in the past = No infinity of the universe in the past (that is, unless you can demonstrate that linear time is an illusion AND that you can have a naturalistic universe WITHOUT linear time).

Three problems:

1) The past does not exist as an "actuality." So the set of past days is not "actual" whether it is finite or infinite, so no problem exists.

2) Your assertion implies that time cannot be continuous because if time is continuous, then there are an infinite number of moments between any two points in time and a second would represent an actual infinity of moments.

3) Your arguments are highly speculative and prove nothing. They are obviously self-serving. The only reason you push them is because you think they support what you want to believe. You would be arguing the opposite if you thought it supported your case for God.



Another argument against an eternal universe shows that EVEN IF THERE COULD BE AN ACTUAL INFINITE NUMBER OF DAYS, such a sequence COULD NEVER BE TRAVERSED to reach the present moment. For example, if you asked me for a dollar, and I told you I had to borrow it from someone, who had to borrow it from someone else and down to INFINITY, would you ever get your dollar??? No. An ACTUAL infinite amount of linear time can NEVER be traversed to reach the present moment. And again, no linear time = NO TIME AT ALL (unless you can demonstrate our universal experience of linear time is an illusion).

And I can create any number of paradoxes with your concept of an "eternal, unchanging, timeless, person" you call God. So again, we see you invent arguments to support what you want to believe. It's nothing but an exercise in cognitive bias. It is obvious you are not open to dealing with real logic and facts. You begin with absolutely unsupportable religious dogmas and invent pseudo-logic to support them. Your bias is palpable.



BULLSHIT!!! The BVG theorem = *EVIDENCE* that time, and hence the universe (or even an imaginary "multiverse"), is FINITE in the past.

No it doesn't. It only applies to the tiny little "observable universe" in which we find ourselves. And it applies only if that universe has been in a constant state of expansion (on average). It says nothing about the universe and/or natural laws that gave rise to this universe.



Again, the universe *IS* time, space and matter (an origin of time = An origin of space and matter as well). Craig is NOT misrepresenting Vilenkin. In fact, Vilenkin COMMENDED Craig in an email (which Craig made public on his website) for his ACCURATE representation of his paper! WHOOPS!!! Hell, Vilenkin actually calls the BVG theorem a *PROOF* against a past-eternal universe in his own book Many Worlds In One (page 176)!!!

There you go again. Your triple exclamations reveal your irrational and hysterical state of mind. I can't count the number of times you made demonstrably false and absurd assertions followed by three exclamation points.

Here is what Velenkin said ON THE SAME PAGE of the same book that Craig and you quoted:
Theologians have often welcomed any evidence for the beginning of the universe, regarding it as evidence for the existence of God… So what do we make of a proof that the beginning is unavoidable? Is it a proof of the existence of God? This view would be far too simplistic. Anyone who attempts to understand the origin of the universe should be prepared to address its logical paradoxes. In this regard, the theorem that I proved with my colleagues does not give much of an advantage to the theologian over the scientist. As evidenced by Jinasena’s remarks earlier in this chapter, religion is not immune to the paradoxes of Creation.
And what were Jinasena's remarks? Here they are in part (from his 9th century writings):
The doctrine that the world was created is ill-advised, and should be rejected.

If God created the world, where was he before creation? …

How could God have made the world without any raw material? If you say he made this first, and then the world, you are faced with an endless regression…

Thus the doctrine that the world was created by God makes no sense at all
To think that this kind of speculative philosophy could "prove" or even give "evidence" for a "God" is simply absurd. Philosophers cannot even agree about simple things like morality, epistemology, reality. To think that you could prove the ludicrously ignorant iron age religious dogmas about some gawd that went about abusing women to punish a man is absurd beyond description. The biblegawd acts like a primate who displays power by sexually abusing the women "owned" by the man. In effect, biblegawd was "raping" David in this verse:
Thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbour, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun.
This is why it is so absurd to try to prove the existence of the modern sanitized God of philosophy as if it had anything to do with the biblegawd.



At the 2012 state of the universe conference honoring Stephen Hawking's 70th birthday (with Hawking in the building), Vilenkin said "ALL THE EVIDENCE WE HAVE SAYS THAT THE UNIVERSE HAD A BEGINNING". Notice he used the word *EVIDENCE*. And a New Scientist editorial on the conference ("In the Beginning", New Scientist, 14 January 2012, page 3) commented ...

Again, that refers only to the tiny little "observable universe" in which we find ourselves. It is absurd in the extreme to draw conclusions about the ultimate origin of everything from our current ignorance. We know almost nothing. But curiously, one thing we do know for sure is that if there is a God, it can't be the immoral and incoherent biblegawd.




Your assertion that a timeless God created the universe "ex nihilo" is incoherent for two reasons: 1) You assert that the universe was created by the command of an existing God which is not "nothing".
What are you talking about??? Nobody is saying God is nothing. The argument is God created the universe OUT OF NOTHING (through the causal power of his being). YOU are the one who is left with the idea that nothing created everything, which is LITERALLY the most absurd proposition imaginable.

You missed my point. The "causal power of his being" is not "nothing" so you assertion that God created "out of nothing" is false. Your assertion that God "created out of nothing" means only that he did not create out of previously existing physical material, but rather, he created out of his own power, which is not "nothing."

Why do you even bother with this pseudo-philosophy? Your language and thinking are much too sloppy and you constantly LEAP to conclusions in an entirely unwarranted fashion. You are not a careful thinker.





2) Any act, including the act of the creation of time, entails that time already existed. A timeless being cannot "act" in any way at all. Calling it "simultaneous" entails time and so contradicts your assumption that there was no time.

BULLSHIT!!!

1) Quantum mechanics DEMONSTRATES that THINGS THAT EXIST (notice I said THINGS THAT EXIST) can have seemingly "bizarre" properties. If the universe ITSELF has seemingly "bizarre" properties, then it's only logical that the SOURCE of the universe (God) would have seemingly "bizarre" properties (given our finite understanding). NOTHING demonstrates that nonbeing can give birth to being. THAT is a logical impossibility.

This exemplifies the ludicrous sophistry of Christian apologists. When asking the question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" God must be put on the side of "something" and so his existence demands an explanation every bit as much as everything else. I've known this since I was a child, when I used to enjoy imagining a piece of paper with a line down the middle. On the left was the word "Nothing" and on the right the word "Everything" like this:

NOTHING () vs. SOMETHING (cars, trees, me, TV, God, etc., etc., etc.)

That's the real question. It used to give me a very strange tingling sensation in my brain to contemplate it (at age 7 or so).

But legitimate philosophical questions like that are of no interest (or use) to apologists like you or Craig, so he changed the question to create the ludicrous "Kalam Cosmological Argument" which begins with the blatantly contrived assertion "Whatever begins to exist has a cause." What a freaking BRAIN DEAD MORONIC MOVE! It's so obvious he was trying to remove the question of God's existence from the real question of "Why is there something rather than nothing?" Any answer to that question would have to include an answer to why God exists. But no one has an answer to that question. The existence of God must be taken as a brute fact. But then people see the same could be said of reality itself, and that wouldn't serve your purposes to prove your primitive ignorant immoral and absurd Iron Age tribal war gawd.



2) There are TRILLIONS of examples where there is NO FLOW OF TIME *BETWEEN* THE CAUSE AND THE EFFECT (where both exist INSTANTLY). One example is a chandelier. Again, THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS NONLINEAR "TIME". NONLINEAR "TIME" = NO FREAKING TIME (unless you can demonstrate linear time is an illusion). If the causal relationship *BETWEEN* the cause and the effect is INSTANT (as in a chandelier), then there is NO TIME between them.

Philosophers have been terribly confused about the meaning of "causality" for millennia and there is no consensus on the matter. So once again, we see you appealing to speculative and unknowable philosophy in your vain effort to prove your biblegawd. Give it up already. It is an absurd approach that will never convince anyone but those who have chosen to believe without evidence in the first place.

Richard