The Kalam Argument

The Kalam argument for the existence of God is based on a short argument:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.

Let me focus on the second premise...

William Lane Craig is the leading defender of this argument. Let's take a look.

There is a distinction to be made between absolute and relative theories of time. Absolute theories entail that time exists independently of objects and the relationship between them in the physical universe. Relational theories entail that space/time is nothing but objects and the relationship between them in the physical universe. Einstein's Theories of Relativity support relational theories of time. As such, time is relative to the observer in a four dimensional framework (in addition to length, width, and height). Each physical object in space/time is an event in space/time. If no mass/energy existed, then time would not exist either. Therefore, time began with the Big Bang inside the physical universe. Craig must dispute this as a defender of absolute time, even though no scientist agrees with Craig on this point.

Craig begins his philosophical arguments by making the distinction between an actual infinite collection of things (which is numerically infinite) and a potential infinite collection of things (which is merely “indefinite,” having the potential of being numerically infinite). Using several thought experiments Craig argues that an actual infinite collection of things is impossible. In one of them Craig tries to show that an actual infinite cannot be formed by adding one number after another successively. This is impossible, he says. If someone began the task of counting in the distant past she could never count to infinity no matter how high she counted, for there would always be one number higher to count. But his argument says nothing against an immortal being counting to infinity if she has always been counting, since at no time in the past does she ever begin counting. It only shows, at best, that if someone began counting she couldn’t count to infinity, which is an uninteresting argument and off the mark if he intends to show by it that the physical universe couldn’t have always existed.

Craig’s favorite thought experiment is about Hilbert’s Hotel. This hypothetical hotel has an infinite number of guests each in their own separate rooms. Absurdities set in at this point, Craig argues. For even though we already have an infinite number of guests in the hotel, we can always add more guests by simply moving them all down one room and then adding the newest guest to room number one. By doing this over and over we could add an infinite number of new guests without the actual number of guests increasing. Furthermore, an infinite number of guests could check out of the odd numbered rooms leaving an infinite number of guests in the even numbered rooms. Craig claims this is absurd. Therefore he concludes that an actual infinite collection of things is impossible, and by analogy, there cannot be an actual infinite series of events in time either.

Contrary to Craig, an actual infinite could exist if his God had decided to eternally create the universe, for then such an eternal universe would have an actual infinite series of events. Craig doesn’t believe this, but I don’t see how he can reasonably claim that his God could not have done so, just as Aquinas saw no problem with an eternal universe and supposed it for the sake of his arguments. Unless Craig can show that this is not possible for his God to have done, there can indeed be an actual infinite series (or collection) of events in time, and his argument fails.

Craig argues that the universe had a beginning since it leads to absurdities to suppose that it didn’t. For example, if in the distant past an immortal being finished counting an infinite number of events down from negative infinity to zero (…-3, -2, -1, 0), then we could never travel back in time to see her counting, for no matter how far back we go she would already be finished. That’s absurd, Craig claims. But Craig is begging the question here. If she finished her task then we should be able to travel back in the distant past to see her still counting events, based upon his argument that an actual infinite cannot be formed by adding one number after another successively, as we just explained. According to Craig’s own logic there could only be a finite number of events between when she finished her task and today. Furthermore, Craig cannot have it both ways. He cannot have an immortal being who has always been counting events and one who never counts any at all! Either we can go back in time to find her counting or she never was counting at all!

Craig’s basic problem is that he conflates counting an infinite number of events with counting all of them. An immortal being could finish her task (…-3, -2, -1, 0) and yet not count all events (1, 2, 3…). Besides this, what reason does Craig have for supposing that the immortal being necessarily finished counting all of the events before today? It could be that the immortal being is nowhere close to finishing her count. There’s nothing absurd about this. He cannot merely say she could be finished counting, he needs to say that she must be finished counting, and that’s something he cannot say.

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41 comments:

Stan, the Half-Truth Teller said...

Non-mathematicians, or at least people who aren't well-schooled in mathematics, shouldn't debate the realm of the infinite.

Dr. Craig, according to his wiki entry, is not.

I am not either, in my own opinion, but I'd like to think I'm a lot closer than Dr. Craig -- I'll start my Junior year at CU this fall, towards a B.S. in Physics (Astrophysics), with a Ph.D. as the ultimate goal.

Credentials aside, Dr. Craig seems unable to grasp the admittedly confusing notion of infinity.

One easy definition of infinity is based on the division by zero, which, if we allow it, will reduce any statements derived from it to nonsense. This is why mathematicians are careful to make statements like "the limit as 'h' approaches zero" -- in many cases, the apparent division by zero, and the paradox it would cause, is necessary to solve higher level equations (consider a standard derivative in calculus).

Dr. Craig seems unable to live with the fact that there lie in each infinite domain infinite other domains.

Consider the set of all rational numbers. I can subdivide this into various infinitely large, non-exclusive subsets as follows:

1. Whole numbers
2. Negative numbers
3. Numbers which can be expressed as one whole number divided by another
4. Perfect squares
5. Even numbers
6. Prime numbers

Note that any conceivable subset with only one constraint is necessarily infinite. Adding additional constraints can, of course, reduce a subset to a finite set (say, all positive rational numbers wholly divisible by two, which are less than ten), but this is beside the point.

Which of these infinitely large subsets is largest? Is there even meaning in asking the question?

Yes, there is. It has been mathematically proven, for instance, that the number of irrational numbers (an infinite quantity) far exceeds the also infinite number of rational numbers (somewhat simplified link), but this poses no problem to the learned mathematician.

I am reminded of a joke my first-year Physics professor told me:

There was once a shepherd, whose herd of sheep had grown to the point that he felt the need to build a fence to contain them. Being a frugal man, but with knowledgeable friends, he enlisted their help to determine the most efficient and cost-effective method of building his fence.

First, he asked his Engineer friend, who informed him that he clearly wanted to make his fence in the shape of a circle, it being the shape which has the highest ratio of area to perimeter, and that this will minimize his expenses.

Sounded good, the shepherd thought, but he pursued the matter further.

He asked his Physicist friend, who laughed at the simple Engineer's answer, and said that yes, a circle is the most efficient shape in this scenario, but clearly he wanted an infinitely thin fence with an infinite radius, which would grant him an infinite area with minimal cost.

Sounds better, thought the shepherd, but not as practical as the Engineer's option, so he pursued the matter further.

He asked his Mathematician friend, who laughed at each of the previous answers, and said that while a circle was the most efficient shape, who wanted to build a circular fence with an infinite radius? No, he said, you should instead build a fence around yourself, and define yourself as being outside the fence...


That joke makes me laugh even as I type it...

Anyway, while even Dr. Craig would likely appreciate and understand the joke, he is not too far from being one of its characters, though I cannot decide which one exactly.

He wants to talk about infinity to make his point(s), but he is (willingly or circumstantially) ignorant of its properties and the consequences of the infinite.

Technically, an infinite being can be said to be incapable of action/motion (especially if it is also considered omnipresent) -- it has already done everything it was ever to do.

Absolute time, relative time, it doesn't matter; any eternal object is necessarily changeless. Along the same vein, an infinite being could just as easily have created an infinite universe, whose infinite age was still less than the infinite age of its creator (who is, nonetheless, changeless).

It's potentially confusing, but not too abstract to consider, and certainly it is being and has been considered by mathematicians and cosmologists alike, yet none of them seem to support Dr. Craig's hypothesis...

No, the meaninglessness which results from these arguments is actually a result of Dr. Craig's first two premises: Just because something exists, it does not necessarily follow that it needed a cause to do so, and it is pure speculation on his part to suggest that the universe "began" to exist in any sort of temporally definable way.

What I have always hated about these sorts of arguments is that they invariably jump from the notion that there is a "creator" to "the creator's favorite color is blue". Arguing the former is at least interesting, if futile. Arguing the latter is sheer arrogance.

--
Stan

Hamilcar said...

I'd actually like to attack the first premise.

Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.

If the "Everything" here is meant to include the Universe, as Craig asserts, then we don't know that this premise is true. He's simply assuming that the Universe is one of a class of such things. But, the number of universes with which we have direct experience is exactly ONE.

We cannot simply assume it (the Universe) is one of these "caused" things. In fact, it seems to be a very special thing: special in many ways. Craig would commit the fallacy of composition if he were to assume that, because things within the universe have causes, the universe itself must have a cause. This does not necessarily follow.

One of the special things about the universe is that, according to the current Big Bang Cosmological model (incorporating Einsteinian Relativity), space and time both "begin" in some sense at that singular point 13.7 billion years ago. Now, if "cause and effect" are concepts which only have meaning within a universe of space-time, how can there be any causes before the universe? How does the phrase "before the universe" even have any meaning, if time itself began at the big bang?

There are scientists who think that it makes sense to say that the universe "caused itself to exist", bringing about the big bang through the rapid expansion of the singularity.

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure but I think Alvin Plantinga has successfully refuted Craigs arguments for an infinite regress. I just stick to the equations of general relativity and the scientific evidence for the Big Bang. It seems to be powerful evidence for a Creator.

Hamilcar said...

Stan Half teh Teller o' Truth,

What I have always hated about these sorts of arguments is that they invariably jump from the notion that there is a "creator" to "the creator's favorite color is blue". Arguing the former is at least interesting, if futile. Arguing the latter is sheer arrogance.

I agree.

My thinking about these arguments is that you simply cannot define God into existence. You can't throw together a set of definitions and conclude it exists.
The definitional premises are too easy to knock down: they're speculations on things that are inscrutable or unprovable. Arguments like the Kalam or the Ontological argument (with all of their variations) are fun to pick apart, but they're really only convincing if you already hold that position.

The best you can do is gather evidences and inferences from as many sources as possible, and then decide for yourself which beliefs make the most sense. Like many people here, I agree with my Magic 8-Ball on the question "Does God Exist?"

Signs point to "NO"

Pvblivs said...

     Well, it has been proven that the number of irrational numbers exceeds the number of rational numbers. I don't believe "far exceeds" is well-defined when talking about infinite quantities. It has not been established whether there is a "number" between the whole numbers and the real numbers. By "between," I am posing the question, "Is there a set such that any attempt to place it in one-to-one correspondence with the real numbers leaves real numbers left over, while any attempt to place it in correspondence with the whole numbers leaves members of the presumed set left over?"

exapologist said...

I haven't seen this argument made explicit by Moreland or Craig, but I believe the materials for the following dilemma can be constructed by various things they say:

If a traversal of an infinite past is possible, then either the traversal requires a starting point or it doesn't. If it does, then the traversal could never get going, as one could never get a foothold in the beginningless series to begin the traversal (for there are an infinite number of moments before every day in such a past, and so to start at any point, you would have *already* had to have traversed an infinite number of moments to get to it). But if it doesn't, then the traversal should always be finished, for an infinite number of moments exist before every day in such a past, and thus one had all the time one needed to complete the traversal before every day. Therefore, either the beginningless traversal can never get going or it's always completed. But both implications are absurd. Therefore, a beginningless traversal is impossible.

But I tend to think the argument is a failure. For take the first horn of the dilemma. Obviously one couldn't traverse a beginningless past by starting at some point, for there *is* no starting point in such a past by definition -- just as there is no "starting point" in the set of negative integers {..., -3. -2, -1} . So the first point, while true, is something that nobody claims to be false.

I've just granted that a beginningless traversal, if possible, has no starting point. That brings us to the second horn of the dilemma. We've seen that Craig thinks we can rule out this possibility indirectly, via reductio: assuming the possibility of a beginningless traversal (i.e., always counting, without a starting point) leads to the contradiction that the traversal is both occuring and not occuring -- the latter because it should always be finished. But why think that it should always be finished? Craig's answer is that because there is an infinite number of moments before every day, and thus enough time to complete the traversal before every day. But this is where the argument falls down. For as Loftus points out, this is to conflate traversing infinitely many moments with traversing all the moments that are to be traversed. But the former, while necessary for completing a particular infinite traversal, is not necessarily sufficient. For one can traverse an infinite number of members of a set, and yet not finish counting them all. So, for example, suppose I were counting down the negative integers toward zero from eternity past and am now counting -3. Then I have so far counted infinitely many negative integers (viz., {..., -5, -4, -3}, and yet I have not yet finished counting them all (I still have to count -2 and -1).

In short, Craig thinks that a beginningless infinite traversal is impossible, since either it could never get going or it should always be completed. But the first disjunct is true but irrelevant, while the second is (at least so far) without sufficient justification.

kiwi said...

Any version of the cosmological argument begs the question.

"Everything that begins to exist has a cause."

Why should we accept that premise? I see no reason to. It's certainly not "intuitive", what are the things we know that began to exist? It's a meaningless premise to reach the desired conclusion.

Anonymous said...

"Why should we accept that premise? I see no reason to. It's certainly not "intuitive", what are the things we know that began to exist? It's a meaningless premise to reach the desired conclusion."

Nothing can create itself. It would have to be before it was. It would have to be and not be at the same time and in the same relationship. This is irrational. From nothing nothing comes. Nothing cannot produce anything because theres nothing there to do anything. Nothing cannot produce anything. It's nothing. So, if there was ever a time when there was absolutely nothing then that is exactly what there would be now. But there is something. Therefore there could never been a time when there was absolutely nothing. There has always had to be something. Something has always existed.

I think that many people go along with the many universe interpretation of quantum mechanics.

kiwi said...

"Nothing can create itself."

To say that something began to exist without a cause does not mean it "created itself". It simply came to be, without a cause. I see no reason to think it's impossible. Or at least, it's no more absurd than an invisible omnipotent being existing eternally.

"From nothing nothing comes."

I see no reason to think that.

"Nothing cannot produce anything because theres nothing there to do anything."

If something is uncaused, it's irrelevant if there's nothing there to do anything.

"So, if there was ever a time when there was absolutely nothing then that is exactly what there would be now."

If there was a point there was "nothing", then there was no time as well, so your sentence is not even coherent.

Anonymous said...

"To say that something began to exist without a cause does not mean it "created itself". It simply came to be, without a cause."

How else did it come to be?
Out of nothing?


Nothing is nothing it cannot do anything because there's nothing there. From nothing nothing comes.

Thanks for the correction.

If there ever was nothing then that is exactly what there would be now. Nothing. But there is something therefore there was never a time when there was absolutely nothing. There has always had to be something.

Hamilcar said...

tom2,

If there ever was nothing then that is exactly what there would be now. Nothing. But there is something therefore there was never a time when there was absolutely nothing. There has always had to be something.

The big straw man here is that anyone is actually saying that "something came from nothing". Nobody is saying that. In fact, contributors to this blog have argued that there really is no such thing as "nothing", if you get right down to the quantum nitty-gritty.

The singularity at the moment of the big bang was a point of (almost) infinite density packed into a point of (nearly) infinite smallness. That's not a nothing, it's a something.

Where did the singularity come from? We may not be able to say: it may be a true "event horizon" beyond which no meaningful information can travel. Perhaps it sprang into existence through a quantum-mechanical process. Perhaps it was the momentary compression of an entire universe of matter undergoing a Big Crunch. Perhaps it was the reaction of two Branes crashing into each other in a multi-dimensional cosmos.

And to talk further about "nothingness"... the Standard Model of modern physics says that even in the most remote voids of the universe, where there mayn't even be a single molecule in any cubic meter of space, there's still not "nothing". The whole of the universe is awash in the quantum energy field, though which particles and anti-particles constantly spring into existence and swing around to annihilate each other, returning to the field.

In short, many of us here think that it may not even be meaningful to speak of "nothingness". To argue that any of us think that the universe actually "came from nothing" is to offer up a weak straw man.

Anonymous said...

Unless I don't understand it, this argument in favor of god shoots itself in the foot with the premise
"Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence."
If god exists then this set includes him. Therefore he was caused.

If it doesn't apply to god, then its a case of special pleading, unless god doesn't exist, then the argument is irrelevant, er more irrelevant.

I agree that god was caused in the type of imagination that dreams up an argument in favor of god like this.

And as compelling as mathematics is, unless I am mistaken, there are some mathematical absurdities that can be constructed, so just because you can prove or show it likely mathematically does not mean that you have a accounted for all variables.

Proponents of string theory will tell you that it may all be mathemagic. My point in saying that is only that mathematicians understand how a mathematical proof can lead to impossible results.

Infinity may only be a construct of the mind.

kiwi said...

To talk about X coming from Y is only meaningful if X is said to be caused.

So it doesn't matter that "nothing" can't produce anything, because we are talking about an event that is uncaused!

*If* the universe had a start and is uncaused, then it came to be, for no reason, that's all. There is absolutely no reason to think it's impossible. (As I've pointed out, the "ex nihilo nihil fit" claim is meaningless).

But that's a big *if*. I actually think the universe didn't have a start.

There is no reason to posit a supernatural entity. No Christian apologist, or anyone else, has ever shown that a supernatural creator is necessary. They only rely to premises begging the question.

Anonymous said...

The singularity is the whole universe srunken down to zero volume. There's no time or quantum mechanics at the singularity. Even if there was the copenhagen interpretation is the wrong interpretation.

Whatever comes to be has a cause. If not then it either came from nothing or it created itself. But we have seen that both of these are absurd. God never came to Be.

Unknown said...

Many Thanks to John Loftus for this blog and his books. I noticed the request for donations tonight and ponied up ten clams. If all the John Loftus fans chip in a few dinars or shekels, we can help a little.

I heard a story recently. A man was walking on the beach and came upon another man who was picking up small star fish that had washed in with the tide and chunking them back into the sea. The walker asked the chunker, "The beach is littered with these stars. Why throw them back, it makes no difference?" "It makes a difference for this one." replied the chunker with faint temerity as he threw one out beyond the breakers. The next day the walker advanced down the beach and rejoined the chunker. Without a word, the walker bent down and picked up a star fish and threw it back into the sea. For the stars, there was a difference. The friends had no need to smile at each other, but they did.

Too corney, too sappy: yes. John is worth it.

Unknown said...

"The precise origin of the infinity symbol "∞" is unclear. One possibility is suggested by the name it is sometimes called—the lemniscate, from the Latin lemniscus, meaning "ribbon." One can imagine walking forever along a simple loop formed from a ribbon."

Wikipedia

kiwi said...

"Whatever comes to be has a cause. If not then it either came from nothing or it created itself. But we have seen that both of these are absurd."

An uncaused universe does not "come" from nothing, in the sense that the 'nothing' in question is not responsible for it, otherwise the universe would be caused.

Even if we grant for the sake of the argument that "nothing" can't produce anything because it's "nothing", it's irrelevant because we posit an uncaused universe. I don't see what's hard to understand.

It's unbelievable people can't conceive an uncaused, finite universe but have no problem with a 3-in-1 invisible magician(s) coexisting eternally. Sigh.

Unknown said...

Premise one is known to be false.

Quantum virtual particles exist for a limited time and space, introducing uncertainty in their energy and momentum due to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. They spontaneously appear and self-annihilate uncaused from nothing.

There are many observable physical phenomena resulting from interactions involving virtual particles. All tend to be characterized by the relatively short range of the force interaction producing them. Some of them are:

* The Coulomb force between electric charges. It is caused by exchange of virtual photons. In symmetric 3-dimensional space this exchange results in inverse square law for force.
* The so-called near field of radio antennas, where the magnetic effects of the current in the antenna wire and the charge effects of the wire's capacitive charge are detectable, but both of which effects disappear with increasing distance from the antenna much more quickly than do the influence of conventional electromagnetic waves, for which E is always equal to cB, and which are composed of real photons.
* The strong nuclear force between quarks - it is the result of interaction of virtual gluons. The residual of this force outside of quark triplets (neutron and proton) holds neutrons and protons together in nuclei, and is due to virtual mesons such as the pi meson and rho meson.
* The weak nuclear force - it is the result of exchange by virtual W bosons.
* The spontaneous emission of a photon during the decay of an excited atom or excited nucleus; such a decay is prohibited by ordinary quantum mechanics and requires the quantization of the electromagnetic field for its explanation.
* The Casimir effect, where the ground state of the quantized electromagnetic field causes attraction between a pair of electrically neutral metal plates.
* The van der Waals force, which is partly due to the Casimir effect between two atoms,
* Vacuum polarization, which involves pair production or the decay of the vacuum, which is the spontaneous production of particle-antiparticle pairs (such as electron-positron).
* Lamb shift of positions of atomic levels.
* Hawking radiation, where the gravitational field is so strong that it causes the spontaneous production of photon pairs (with black body energy distribution) and even of particle pairs.

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_particle

Premise two is also false. The notion of creation ex nihilo violates conservation of mass-energy. Additionally, loop quantum gravity crunches out a revised hypothesis of initiation of this phase of existence, a revised Big Bang. Click the link to the Science daily press release about Martin Bojowald's paper.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070702084231.htm

Bojowald's LQG predicts a quantum bounce 13.7 billion years ago rather than a singularity. The bounce occurs from a big crunch of a previous universe. This line of research looks promising.

I read Dawson Bethrick's blog today , and coincidently he was writing on a similar first cause argument. He made good points worthy of quote in reply to a poster calling herself TruthTRUTH.

"TruthTRUTH wrote:

Dawson, you make some very compelling arguments. But who created humans? The universe? Who created that very first particle that ever came into existence?

I would recommend some serious premise-checking here. Why suppose that the universe was “created”? Why suppose that “the very first particle that ever came into existence” was “created”? Why even suppose that there was a “very first particle that ever came into existence” in the first place? And why think a person (implied by the use of the interrogative pronoun ‘who’) “created” these things? What does “create” mean anyway? Why suppose that there was a time when the universe or particles or anything that exists did not exist? If we suppose that there was a “very first particle that ever came into existence” (a supposition that I would like to see argued for), why suppose there was some pre-existing person “who created” it? Your questions make assumptions which need support, but here you ask these questions apparently unaware of this fact.

The issue that is being raised here is one of starting point. I see two options here: either we start with existence, or we start with non-existence. If we start with existence (as my worldview does), then there’s no puzzle to sort out here – no need to come up with an explanation for existence. It’s only if we start with non-existence (as TruthTRUTH apparently thinks we need to do) that we need to come up with an explanation for the obvious fact that things do in fact exist."

http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/

With two failed premises, the Kalam should rather be called the Ka-Lame argument.

Hamilcar said...

tom2,

The singularity is the whole universe srunken down to zero volume.

Well, no, not really. When you run the equations of general relativity backwards you get a point of infinite density and infinite temperature. It doesn't mean that there was really infinite density, just that our best physical theory right now has equations that "break down" at such a highly compressed, energetic state. Certainly, there's nobody saying that there was "zero" volume. The most one could say, simply following the math, is that the volume was "infinitely small".

It still had some dimension, however. Perhaps the whole universe was compressed smaller than an electron. Perhaps it was compressed smaller than a quark. Perhaps it was a trillionth of a trillionth of the size of a quark. We don't really know, we just know that it's too small for general relativity to tell us the size. So, we call it "infinitely small". The physicists aren't trying to confuse you, they're just doing the best they can to explain some complicated concepts.

There's no time or quantum mechanics at the singularity.

I'm not sure where you're getting this from. We actually don't know what's "at" the singularity, that's why it's an event horizon. We do have good reason to believe, however, that a moment after the big bang we wind up with space-time and quantum mechanics in full effect. And by "moment" I mean something like 10 to the -43 seceonds.

Whatever comes to be has a cause. If not then it either came from nothing or it created itself. But we have seen that both of these are absurd. God never came to Be.

Now you're not even arguing, you're just repeating yourself. I've already shown that we have no good reason to think that the universe is one of the class of things that had to have a cause. It may not even make sense to say that it was caused, because causes happen during time and time is a product of the big bang. There would be no time before the bang during which a cause could occur. I've also already told you that it's scientifically valid to say that the universe could have "caused itself" in a sense.

A further point here, I think, is that ANY argument that you can present for God being exempt from causation (God never came to be, God is eternal, God is the necessary existent, God is defined as not needing to be caused) can just as easily, and just as justifiably, be turned around and applied to the universe as a whole. We can just as easily simply state that the universe is the kind of thing that never "came to be", but has always been, and is necessary, etc. etc. All of these arguments can just as easily be used to argue against the necessity of God as they can be used to support him. They don't help your case, Tom2.

Anonymous said...

Kiwi,

The simplest Big bang model contains a causal singularity at t=0. So, there is a first cause at the singularity of the Big Bang.

Gravitational Singularity-Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia states:

More generally, a spacetime is considered singular, if it is geodesically incomplete……The simplest Big Bang cosmological model contains a causal singularity at (t=0), where all timelike geodesics have no extensions into the past. Extrapolating bakwards to 0 results in a universe of size 0 in all spacial dimensions…


So, at the singularity 0 (the lack of space, time, matter, and energy) there’s a CAUSE.

Unknown said...

Kiwi asked: "...what are the things we know that began to exist?"

My very limited understanding is that the only things that Homo Sapiens have ever detected as beginning to exist are virtual quantum particles. These do not violate conservation of mass-energy as their momentum and quantum state are proportional to Planck's constant in accordance with Heisenburg Uncertainty. However, excepting QVPs, our species has no knowledge of anything coming into existence. Matter and energy change form and are conserved. Thus there is no reason to posit any object bigger than Planck's constant ever coming into existence ex nihilo.

Interestingly enough, William Lane Craig's arch nemesis, Quentin Smith , is a proponent of Stephan Hawking and James Hartle's "Wave Function of the Universe". As I understand, the WFU is derived from relativistic models of the inflationary big bang. The models make predictions about the Cosmic Microwave Blackbody Background and the Universe's expansion that are confirmed by observations. I found this to be very interesting and salient to the first cause argument. If the Wave Function of the Universe is correct, then existence is an uncaused natural phenomena. Of course I may be getting this all wrong. If so, I apologize. The links follow.

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/smith_18_2.html
Big Bang Cosmology and Atheism
Why the Big Bang is No Help to Theists by Quentin Smith

http://www.qsmithwmu.com/quantum_cosmology's_implication_of_atheism_(1997).htm
Quantum Cosmology's Implication of Atheism (1997) Quentin Smith

http://www.qsmithwmu.com/why_stephen_hawking's_cosmology_precludes_a_creator.htm
Why Steven Hawking's Cosmology Precludes a Creator by Quentin Smith

Hamilcar said...

tom2,

So, at the singularity 0 (the lack of space, time, matter, and energy) there’s a CAUSE.

There you go again. Even in your own muddled example, in no way do you show that there was no matter or energy. Those are things we know for sure were there. The only question is, how much space were they occupying, and was there any time in operation.

And again, yes the equations show that the spatial dimensions were zero. That's because the equations "blow up" at that point. It doesn't mean that there was literally, necessarily no space.

Anonymous said...

Let me just say that exapologist and I have been hammering out these ideas in the last few days. He has significantly help me.

Anonymous said...

Hamiclar,

The whole universe was shrunken down to zero volume. There is no time or anything physical at the singularity. The singularity transcends the physical universe. It's a causal singularity. It's the First Cause.

Unknown said...

Hilbert's Hotel, LOL!

Craig: "I IZ MATHETISHUN"

But seriously, this just makes me more convinced that religion annihilates people's imaginations.

Steven Carr said...

' If someone began the task of counting in the distant past she could never count to infinity no matter how high she counted, for there would always be one number higher to count.'


I see.

So Crai refutes the idea of an infinite past, by claiming that there was a beginning to this 'counting' process.

There's logic for you!



'1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.'

When did my libertarian freewill decisions begin to exist?

What caused them?


What is contra-causal libertarian free will?

Hamilcar said...

tom2,

You seem to be dogmatically repeating things you've pulled from physical theories you don't understand, much the same way you dogmatically repeat your Christian doctrine.

I'm willing to go quite a way towards understanding my opponent's arguments, yet you've given me no arguments to grab hold of -- just a bunch of boldly asserted statements without justification.

You also seem to be under the impression that a good argumentative tactic is to completely ignore your opponent's criticisms and keep repeating your original idea. I think it's likely that such a strategy will convince only yourself.

Unknown said...

Tom2: Greetings

Hamilcar has a point. You appear to be simply and dogmatically parroting religious distortions about classic hot big bang cosmology that have long been abandoned by Cosmology and Astrophysics. Yet there is another and more compelling reason for the Christian or theist/deist creationism believer to dump the ideas of the hot big bang. That is a reasonable person can't get from the hot big bang to the anthropic coincidences. This is because the Classic Hot Big Bang hypothesizes a state of total entropy or complete chaos during and shortly after the HBB. The Chaos and Entropy are characterized as so complete so total that it would have been categorically and in principle impossible to predict a subsequent state of affairs from the then occurring state of being. This means there could not have been any ordering exerted upon existence from outside of existence. Yet just such extra-existence ordering is what creationism asserts happened in a Hot Big Bang. This fundamental contradiction of theism/deism creationism finds its roots in the notion expressed in Kalam's 2nd premise where it is unwarrantably assumed that existence had a beginning.

Since Homo Sapiens know that we cannot ever under any circumstances aquire knowledge by faith or belief, we must acknowledge the epistemological priority of existence. That is the laws of logic, the uniformity of nature, the principle of sufficient reason all arise from the brute fact of material existence. Reality is ultimate. Using reason to guide us, we find that the lack of evidence for non-existence contrasts absolutely with the vast array of evidence for existence. We are thus justified in knowing that existence exists as ultimate reality.

Tom I respectfully suggest you give Dawson Bethrick's latest blog a read. You will find it interesting.

http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/

Best Regards

Eli said...

stan's right on. Theologians evidently have a knack for screwing up ideas about infinity - this isn't the first time I've heard this kind of silliness. What Craig needs here is "absurdity" in the sense of a logical contradiction, but what he has is "absurdity" in the sense of "I don't get it." Unfortunately for him, lots of people do get it - stan, exapologist, and myself included - so that's hardly a convincing argument.

Pvblivs, I seem to recall that there's been proofs regarding the various sizes of infinity. Try the wiki article on infinity, or cardinality, perhaps? (Or, I guess, if you're really hardcore, some math texbooks)

Shygetz said...

tom said: There is no time or anything physical at the singularity.

I have never heard this--I was taught that there was matter/energy at the singularity, and that spacetime was infinitely curved, and that density and temperature were infinite. It would be impossible for density to be infinite in the absence of matter, and impossible for temperature to be infinite in the absence of energy (denisty=mass/volume; 0/infinity = 0; similar for temperature). In order to say that the singularity had "no time or anything physical" is to make your cosmology up as you go along. Time did not regress beyond the singularity, but there were other physical quantities.

The simplest Big Bang cosmological model contains a causal singularity at (t=0)...So, at the singularity 0 (the lack of space, time, matter, and energy) there’s a CAUSE.

That is NOT what a causal singularity means. It means that the past light cone does not extend beyond the singularity, and relativity requires that causal events be in the past light cone of the effect. It neither demands nor implies a metaphysical cause for the expansion; in fact, it states that a cause for the expansion would be impossible (using the relativistic definition for cause) because the singularity has no past light cone in which to contain a cause.

robert said: My very limited understanding is that the only things that Homo Sapiens have ever detected as beginning to exist are virtual quantum particles.

I recently had this same discussion with a defender of kalam. He stated that the natural laws of the universe (e.g. QM) are a necessary cause of virtual particles; in other words, if the natural laws of the universe did not exist, then virtual particles could not exist, so virtual particles cannot be considered uncaused.

Needless to say, I had some responses to this line of argument. I would like to see everyone else's.

Hamilcar said...

Shygetz,

I recently had this same discussion with a defender of kalam. He stated that the natural laws of the universe (e.g. QM) are a necessary cause of virtual particles; in other words, if the natural laws of the universe did not exist, then virtual particles could not exist, so virtual particles cannot be considered uncaused.

It sounds as thought the person you were arguing with was equivocating on the word "cause". In the normal sense, a cause is an event that brings about a result or effect. We recognize this cause-effect relationship as causality. In his equivical sense, he's using cause as the "background conditions" which allow a certain result for effect to take place.

In my understanding, physicists are adamant that certain things in our universe are uncaused, for example, the radioactive decay of an unstable element. The decay happens within a given context, and within a certain energy fields as described by quantum theory, but the decay is fundamentally NOT caused by anything. It just happens.

Adrian said...

John,

Just looking at this argument brings up so many questions. As is typical of apologetic arguments, they appear simple until you dig in closer and start asking for precise definitions or worse, evidence.

I know you wanted to talk about infinity, so let me be brief.

Let's start at the beginning:

Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.

What's a "thing" exactly? Is it just matter, matter and energy, concepts, what? Is God a "thing"?

What does it mean to "begin to exist"? I've had discussions with people that give me examples of a baby being born, but what exactly is the thing which begins to exist. When we zoom in, we see that nothing is beginning, chemicals are just being re-arranged. If (1) is talking about the origins of matter and energy, then this becomes highly controversial and the best evidence seems to be that matter always comes into existence without a cause. (more on that later).

At the very least, when we start talking about quantum events, we need to be very precise in what we mean by "cause".

So (1) is either wrong if it is at the level of macroscopic objects, or most likely wrong if it is about quantum objects.

It gets worse, as we must rely on (1) being obviously and completely, undeniably true. So true, that evidence is no longer necessary (see (3)).


(2) The universe began to exist.

This isn't clear at all to me. I'm only a dilettante but I've heard many respected cosmologists observe that there are many descriptions which have an infinite universe and which are consistent with observation.

It seems to me that this point is highly debatable and requires some firm evidence before we should accept it. Philosophical waffle about mathematical series is grossly inadequate and only demonstrates the speaker's ignorance of cosmology and physics.


3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.

Even if we grant that all 'things' that we are able to study have a cause of their existence, it is by no means clear that this must apply to the universe itself. You cannot necessarily transfer evidence gained about one class of entities (elementary particles, say) and transfer that to a totally different class (the universe).

We need to gather evidence to demonstrate that there is a cause, and if we had this, then we wouldn't need points (1) and (2) at all!

What does it even mean to say that the universe has a 'cause'? What exactly was caused, what would this cause look like, what properties must it have?


Yet again, the high-level, philosophical waffle-ness of these points illustrates a profound ignorance of the physical world. It's a fine syllogism if you lived in a 15th century philosophy department, but it tells us absolutely nothing about the real world.



I recently had this same discussion with a defender of kalam. He stated that the natural laws of the universe (e.g. QM) are a necessary cause of virtual particles; in other words, if the natural laws of the universe did not exist, then virtual particles could not exist, so virtual particles cannot be considered uncaused.

Needless to say, I had some responses to this line of argument. I would like to see everyone else's.


Where to begin!

How do you talk serious about an issue like this? How can you begin to gather evidence to support a position either way if you need to remove yourself from the universe to do so?

It yet again raises the big question of what a 'cause' is. "Natural laws" are not entities, so how can they be a cause?

Let's say that this argument succeeds, then what? We've just established that the "cause" of our universe can be something as abstract as a cosmological law which couldn't be called a 'god' even in the wildest theology.

It's a pyrrhic victory at best - with sufficiently distorted definitions of "cause", you might win a point, but you've destroyed any case for a god.



Re Infinity:

These are a good and fun way to spend time in University but where can this get us in this argument? If there is no time before the universe, there can be no meaningful causes. If there is, then tossing in a cause or a god doesn't help, since we still have an infinite period of time before the universe was caused, so no matter how you slice it, this isn't going to help; problems apply equally to the natural and the supernatural (except 'God' invites people to shut their brain off, exactly what apologists want.)

GordonBlood said...

It may be of interest to note that Craig recently addressed this on his Q/A. I suppose the quote by Villenkin is most interesting for this discussion.

Solex Bold said...

"Contrary to Craig, an actual infinite could exist if his God had decided to eternally create the universe, for then such an eternal universe would have an actual infinite series of events. Craig doesn’t believe this, but I don’t see how he can reasonably claim that his God could not have done so, just as Aquinas saw no problem with an eternal universe and supposed it for the sake of his arguments. Unless Craig can show that this is not possible for his God to have done, there can indeed be an actual infinite series (or collection) of events in time, and his argument fails.".

I seem to remember listening to a podcast of Craig's (I think it was a "defenders" podcast) where he acknowledges that God could bring an actually infinite number of objects into being at once; but he did maintain that God could not create an actually infinite number of objects into being by successive addition. I don't know if that matters considering you're concerned with "events" rather than objects. I suppose bringing an actually infinite number of objects into being at once is a single event. Wouldn't bringing an eternal universe into being be a single event also?

Anonymous said...

Wouldn't bringing an eternal universe into being be a single event also?

There's a distinction to be made in God creating (1) an eternal universe, and God (2) eternally creating a universe.

I'm discussing (2), not (1). You're asking about (1) not (2).

However, if God did create (1) and if it truly was one event, then there is no free will since he also created all of our choices in this one event, so what's the point of having free creatures who never make any choices? And (1) also means he also created all evil (natural and moral) so he is either uncaring or incompetent, even if he's omnipotent.

Shygetz said...

It sounds as thought the person you were arguing with was equivocating on the word "cause".

He was not equivocating, he was distinguishing between sufficient causes (which is what you are referring to) and necessary causes. He was claiming that everything has a necessary cause, but that sufficient causes are not required. To take radioactive decay, it is a necessary cause that radioactive decay have a radioactive parent isotope; remove the parent isotope and radioactive decay cannot happen. So, while there is no sufficient cause, there are one or more necessary causes. In the case of virtual particles, he claimed that the natural laws of the universe are necessary causes for the appearance of virtual particles (e.g. you must have QM and you must have space to get virtual particles).

gordonblood said It may be of interest to note that Craig recently addressed this on his Q/A. I suppose the quote by Villenkin is most interesting for this discussion.

No he didn't. He may have thought he did, but he didn't. From Physics and Cosmology Prof. Anthony Aguirre, UC Santa Cruz

"A couple of brief comments, hopefully more later. First, Borde, Guth & Vilenkin did *not* prove that eternal inflation has singularities to the past. As you know, most singularity theorems prove geodesic incompleteness, and this is the case here. What all of their theorems do are (a) write out a set of conditions which they consider to correspond to eternal inflation, then (b) show that the region in which these conditions hold is geodesically incomplete. This would indeed be consistent with eternal inflation “emerging from a primordial singularity”, but it is also consistent with eternal inflation just being grafted onto some spacetime region that is not eternally inflating by their definition."

Found here.

And from Sean Carroll, Senior Research Associate in Physics at Cal Tech:

"I should also mention that the Borde/Guth/Vilenkin theorem is (1) completely classical, not quantum, of course, and (2) a little less definitive than you make it sound, as they assume an “averaged expansion condition” which certainly may be violated along some geodesics."

Found here.

Don't ask your holistic healer how to perform an appendectomy, and don't go to your local apologetics professional for physics. In both cases, you are liable to get answers that are just educated enough to sound plausible, but terribly incomplete and horribly biased for obvious professional reasons.

Shygetz said...

Oh, and hamilcar, just to be fair to the kalam supporter, we certainly do recognize the role of necessary-but-insufficient causes in the natural sciences. They play a huge role in biology, where the modality of disease is often slowly puzzled out by ennumerating various necessary causes until you reach a sufficient condition.

My response to this argument was thus:

The known universe can be divided into two exclusive categories of phenomena; matter/energy in all its forms, and the natural laws which govern their actions (which includes the existence and nature of spacetime). The fact of virtual particles proves that matter/energy can come into existence with only the prerequisite of the natural laws. Therefore, the existence of matter/energy does not require further cause--all that demands a cause are the laws of nature themselves, and given these laws the remainder of the universe can arrise spontaneously. So the kalam argument should be rewritten thusly:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
2. The natural laws began to exist.
3. Therefore, the natural laws have a cause of their existence.

Once you write the argument excluding those things that do not demand further explanation, the argument no longer seems obvious--if we count natural laws as part of "everything", then it is not obvious that everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence. It is also not obvious that natural laws began to exist; indeed, some may claim that such a statement is nonsensical as a natural law is not a metaphysical entitiy, and so cannot "begin to exist"; it can only begin to be true or false. So, the kalam argument, while sound, uses premises that are wholly unsupported and may be argued to be absurd.

What do you all think of that counterargument?

Adrian said...

shygetz,

I like the simplicity of that syllogism, especially because it gets at so many important issues. I squirm when I see words like "thing" and "cause" being bandied about and maybe this reformulation will get the Kalam proponents to feel the same squirm. Well done, I'm sure I'll have opportunity to borrow from your work :)

Hamilcar said...

Shygetz,

The fact of virtual particles proves that matter/energy can come into existence with only the prerequisite of the natural laws. Therefore, the existence of matter/energy does not require further cause--all that demands a cause are the laws of nature themselves, and given these laws the remainder of the universe can arrise spontaneously.

With regards to the virtual particles proposed by quantum theory, it's my understanding that they don't so much "come into existence" as they are converted out of the background quantum field energy. I only mention it to be clear that we're not getting "something from nothing", but that there is still conservation of mass and conservation of energy.

For example, take Hawking radiation. A pair of virtual particles appear just outside the event horizon of a black hole. Normally, the particles would swing 'round and annihilate each other, being particle and anti-particle opposites. Instead, one of the particles is captured by the black hole's gravity, and the other escapes away into the universe.

Naively, you'd think that the black hole was gaining mass through this effect. After all, it's getting a new particle that it didn't have before. But it's actually losing mass. BOTH particles are produced from the quantum background energy surrounding the black hole, which arises from the mass and energy of the black hole. One of them falls back into the 'hole, but the other escapes away. Since that escaping particle was ultimately produced from the black hole itself, it means that the 'hole is radiating, and losing mass. This is why all black holes should eventually evaporate, given enough time.

Microscopic black holes should evaporate almost instantly.

Shygetz said...

With regards to the virtual particles proposed by quantum theory, it's my understanding that they don't so much "come into existence" as they are converted out of the background quantum field energy.

Actually, the background energy is often thought of as virtual particles themselves (and their interactions). It is important to note that when this "background energy" exists at the lowest possible energy for space--that is, when it is energy inherent in space itself that cannot be reduced at all--virtual particles pop into existence, and can be thought of as temporarily borrowing from the zero-point energy so long as they stay "hidden" within the limitations of HUP. So even in the absense of "free" energy, virtual particles can and do exist--the energy itself is a function of the natural laws, and includes nothing. Since this energy is a function of space itself and not "free", I include it as part of the natural laws.

Unknown said...

I respond with parts I and II to Loftus here:

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/PageServer?pagename=message_board