What is wrong with the Kalam Cosmological Argument?

[Rational Agnostic]

In my experience atheists tend to dance around the KCA but they usually don't explain with clear words their point of disagreement.

1. 
   In this context "universe" means " all phisical reality" (including time) universe simply means all the natural world.

1. 
   The claim is that regardless if there was something before the big bang or not , there was an absolute begining at some point in the past.

So what is wrong with the KCA? Do you agree with premise 1? Do you agree with premise 2? Does the conclusion follows from the premises?

What exactly do you think is wrong with the argument? Please try to provide direct and clear answers.

There are only 3 alternatives

1 the universe (the physical/ natural world) came from nothing (literally nothing)

2 the universe has always existed, it is eternal

3 the universe has a cause (which by definition would have to be a supernatural cause)

So which one of these 3 alternatives do you pick? Or perhaps there is a fourth option that I haven't thought about.

Of course Kalam is a valid argument but that doesn't mean it is sound. By that I mean, if all the premises are true, then the conclusion would be true. The premise I question is "whatever begins to exist has a cause." I don't see why this would have to be true. I also don't know whether the universe had a beginning or not (although I think it probably did have a beginning). Current science tends to support this view, but it could change. But even if the universe does have a beginning AND a cause, there is no reason to suspect that this cause is the god of any particular religion. It could be an entirely impersonal creative force or some unknown law of physics or multiverse, etc. Bottom line is, when it comes to the origin of the universe, none of us really have any idea. Kalam is a cute argument, but doesn't really have any weight given how little we know.

 

[Rational Agnostic]

Are you familiar with the notion advanced by some mathematicians and others that the laws of mathematics are in some sense real, eternal, and efficacious? Those folks say the universe may have emanated from the laws of mathematics. I myself am neither for nor against such a proposition, but I find it both interesting and a possibility.

The laws of physics, perhaps. I don't see how mathematics, which is a subset of logic (in my understanding) could have brought anything physical into existence.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

In my experience atheists tend to dance around the KCA but they usually don't explain with clear words their point of disagreement.
[*]Whatever begins to exist has a cause;
[*]The universe began to exist;
Therefore:The universe has a cause.

What's there to dance around there? Are you calling this an argument for a creator god? If so, this god didn't even make it into the argument, much less into its conclusion.

Have you seen William Lane Craig's version? He adds these two lines:

4. “If the universe has a cause of its existence, then an uncaused, personal Creator of the universe exists, who sans creation is beginningless, changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, and enormously powerful and intelligent.”
5. “Therefore, an uncaused, personal Creator of the universe exists, who sans creation is “beginningless,” changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, and enormously powerful and intelligent.”

That's some pretty wretched logic there - jumping from the universe has a cause to specifying in so much detail what the characteristics of that cause must be. His conclusions don't follow from what preceded them (non sequitur fallacy). What happened to the multiverse hypothesis? How did that get ruled out except by faulty logic?

 

[Nakosis]

In my experience atheists tend to dance around the KCA but they usually don't explain with clear words their point of disagreement.

1. 
   In this context "universe" means " all phisical reality" (including time) universe simply means all the natural world.

1. 
   The claim is that regardless if there was something before the big bang or not , there was an absolute begining at some point in the past.

So what is wrong with the KCA? Do you agree with premise 1? Do you agree with premise 2? Does the conclusion follows from the premises?

What exactly do you think is wrong with the argument? Please try to provide direct and clear answers.

There are only 3 alternatives

1 the universe (the physical/ natural world) came from nothing (literally nothing)

2 the universe has always existed, it is eternal

3 the universe has a cause (which by definition would have to be a supernatural cause)

So which one of these 3 alternatives do you pick? Or perhaps there is a fourth option that I haven't thought about.

Generally I go with 2 as most likely as 1 and 3 would require non scientific, likely improbable explanations. While you could make up some explanation for 1 and 3, these would most likely be non-logical, nonsensical and could be anything one might pull from their backside.

Something from nothing and or supernatural? Trying to make an argument for either is really creating something from nothing.

 

[columbus]

I wouldn't even say that Kalaam even supports a deistic god. All it asserts is a cause, period.

I understand what you're saying.
It's kinda just a semantics issue, due to the extreme vagueness of the word "god". If you just call "the reason that there is something, rather than nothing" god, without adding unsupported assertions, it's god. But it's not a deity. At least, that's a distinction that I find useful.
But the real problem is the lack of a definition for the word "god".
Tom

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I understand what you're saying.
It's kinda just a semantics issue, due to the extreme vagueness of the word "god". If you just call "the reason that there is something, rather than nothing" god, without adding unsupported assertions, it's god.

And if you call a ham sandwich "god," then you don't even need Kalaam. You could just carry a god around in a cooler and if someone asks for a demonstration of the existence of gods, you could just pull out the sandwich, point to it, and say "see?"

But it's not a deity. At least, that's a distinction that I find useful.

And that's a distinction I find useless, since "deity" is a synonym for "god." Saying that something is a dog but not a deity makes as much sense to me as saying that an animal is a dog but not a canine.

But the real problem is the lack of a definition for the word "god".
Tom

That's not a problem at all. The author of the Kalaam Cosmological Argument could have added a term at the beginning that defined the term "god" however he wanted; he didn't. The argument makes no references to any gods at all. To say that it has anything to do with gods is to add material that isn't actually in the argument.

 

[columbus]

And if you call a ham sandwich "god," then you don't even need Kalaam.

And if you confuse your ham sandwich with "the reason that there is something, rather than nothing" then I won't take any of your other thoughts and opinions too seriously.
Tom

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

And if you confuse your ham sandwich with "the reason that there is something, rather than nothing" then I won't take any of your other thoughts and opinions too seriously.
Tom

I'm not. Remember how you just explained how there's "extreme vagueness" around the word "god?"

 

[Brickjectivity]

The premise of the thread mistakenly presumes people are either Muslims or atheists, and the Kalam Cosmological idea doesn't deserve attention in the presence of such a wrongful presumption.

 

[leroy]

What is wrong with the argument? That it is still used. since it is very easy to knock down. Well, for sure it shows its age, since it can make some sense only if we use very old physics. And I do not dance around dead horses, usually.

Both premises, and their combination, are not necessarily true. For instance (just a few)

1) "Begin to exist" assumes a time context. Unless you can define "begin" without "time". Time is not objective, as we learned from relativity, so it is not even clear what premise 1) means. Especially since you include time into the set of things that began to exist, which is clearly nonsensical. More importantly, "begin" assumes a time arrow as well (going from past to future passing through present), and the direction of time is a macroscopic phenomenon. A statistical one (Boltzmann, Rovelli). That is, it requires already an Universe in thermal imbalance to make sense.

2) That everything that begins to exists has a cause (assuming it makes sense despite 1)), is an empirical observation. We observe that in our universe. Extending it to the whole Universe (the context in which observations take place) is at danger of committing the composition fallacy. That is, properties applicable to the contained cannot be extended to the container, in general.

3) Since the fact that time has a direction is a macroscopical effect, it is definitely not applicable to the fundamental world. Microscopically, causality vanishes (cannot say what the cause or the effect is) since all directions of time are equivalent (unless we borrow the one of our lab, which is again macroscopic). Therefore, when the Universe "was" at fundamental level (and there were no labs around), saying that the alleged cause of the Universe, if any, was not an effect thereof instead, is question begging.

And so on and so on.

But let's analyze your alternatives:

1 the universe (the physical/ natural world) came from nothing (literally nothing)
--> You are using a tense verb (came) and a "from". You are assuming a time and space context in which space time contexts can come from. This is obviously meaningless (and circular).

2 the universe has always existed, it is eternal
-> This is not only possible but likely. All we have to do is to use a relativistic ontology of time (B-series), and come to the conclusion that our Universe is a block Universe. Actually, most of modern science has eliminated time from physics. Not all physicists agree, but many think that the block Universe (leading to eternalism) best corresponds to what we learned from Einstein (Rovelli, Greene). In that case, the Universe would be eternal (and unchanging, necessarily). The Big Bang and all the rest would then be events on an immutable spacetime surface. Existing eternally. This seems to be the case also if we include QM (Wheeler, de Witt).

3 the universe has a cause (which by definition would have to be a supernatural cause)
--> Assuming that the universe has a cause (despite all open points above), it is not necessarily a supernatural one. For instance, there are theories that postulate that the Universe spawned from another Universe that reached global equilibrium (see Carroll). Not to talk of eternal inflation, baby Universe sprouting out all of the "time", etc.
True, none of these theories are proved, but they are on the table, like your supernatural ones, so you have first to be sure that all naturalistic explanations are false, before having necessity of supernaturalism. Good luck with that. Probably, you think eternal and infinite regress is impossible, good luck with that too. I still have to see an argument that shows logical contradictions with infinite regress, even if our Universe is not the product of infinite regress.

Talking of infinite regress: it is even possible to have infinite regress that takes finite time. Ergo, an infinite chain of causality and yet a finite age. In that case, everything that began to exist has a cause and a bounded age, while there is no initial uncaused cause.

But I stop here. Listing all possible independent rebuttals of Kalam would turn this into a monster post.

Ciao

- viole

Really ? Why is it so hard for atheist to provide direct answers?

Which alternative do you afirm is the best ?

1 the universe came in to being without a cause

2 the universe has always existed

3 the universe has a cause

---
I obviously believe that 3 is the best (most plausible) alternative, so you are suppose to select ether 1 or 2 and explain which is it a better alternative than "3"

 

[viole]

Really ? Why is it so hard for atheist to provide direct answers?

Which alternative do you afirm is the best ?

1 the universe came in to being without a cause

2 the universe has always existed

3 the universe has a cause

---
I obviously believe that 3 is the best (most plausible) alternative, so you are suppose to select ether 1 or 2 and explain which is it a better alternative than "3"

I think i responded exhaustively. I assume you did not read my post.

Ciao

- viole

 

[columbus]

Really ? Why is it so hard for atheist to provide direct answers?

You got a bunch of answers far more direct and sophisticated than the KCA itself.
The problem doesn't appear to be the answers, but rather your unwillingness to process them.
Tom

 

[blü 2]

Really ? Why is it so hard for atheist to provide direct answers

Who do you say has failed to respond directly to the OP?

Which alternative do you afirm is the best ?

1 the universe came in to being without a cause

2 the universe has always existed

3 the universe has a cause

---
I obviously believe that 3 is the best (most plausible) alternative, so you are suppose to select ether 1 or 2 and explain which is it a better alternative than "3"

Now you're moving the goal-posts. Your OP instead asks,

So which one of these 3 alternatives do you pick? Or perhaps there is a fourth option that I haven't thought about.
​

And all the responses here have accorded with that.

 

[leroy]

Who do you say has failed to respond directly to the OP?
Now you're moving the goal-posts. Your OP instead asks,

So which one of these 3 alternatives do you pick? Or perhaps there is a fourth option that I haven't thought about.
​

And all the responses here have accorded with that.

I am not move by the goal post.just answer which alternative do you think is the best ? (According to the evidence that we have to date)

 

[leroy]

You got a bunch of answers far more direct and sophisticated than the KCA itself.
The problem doesn't appear to be the answers, but rather your unwillingness to process them.
Tom

While the answers where sophisticated, they where not direct.

For example non of you claimed (nor denied) that the universe is eternal. You just keapt the answer vague and ambiguous.

 

[columbus]

While the answers where sophisticated, they where not direct.

Because the question is vague and primitive.
What you got were answers better than the question.

For example non of you claimed (nor denied) that the universe is eternal. You just keapt the answer vague and ambiguous.

Because nobody actually knows if the word "eternal" has meaning in this context.
Tom

 

[columbus]

The premise of the thread mistakenly presumes people are either Muslims or atheists, and the Kalam Cosmological idea doesn't deserve attention in the presence of such a wrongful presumption.

But it's still fun to point out it's many primitive flaws.
Tom

 

[leroy]

Because the question is vague and primitive.
What you got were answers better than the question.

Because nobody actually knows if the word "eternal" has meaning in this context.
Tom

I am just asking which of these 3 posibities do you find more plausible given the evidence that we have to date

1 the universe came in to existance without a cause

2 the universe has always existed

3 the universe has a cause.

But for some reason 90% of atheist won't answer clearly and unabigously

 

[columbus]

But for some reason 90% of atheist won't answer clearly and unabigously

You got a ton of answers.

You just don't like them.
Apparently you don't feel up to the reality.
OK, fine. But don't say you didn't get answers when you did.
Tom

 

[leroy]

You got a ton of answers.

You just don't like them.
Apparently you don't feel up to the reality.
OK, fine. But don't say you didn't get answers when you did.
Tom

Aja, quote me 1 single direct answer ...

You can't

Because you know that non of the answers where clear and direct .