2 questions about Kalam argument
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After analyzing Kalam argument, I noticed that the principle of causality is assumed to work outside of time.
They defines atemporality as timeless, changeless state.
Let's suppose the premises "Everything that begins is necessarly caused" is true.
If we climb the scale which is the causal chain, we arrive at a place where we ask "What about the Universe? has it a cause?". But we discovered there weren't a "before" for the Universe, although it has a beginning.
By using some concepts of causality, in which effect follows its cause in time; for the Universe origin,
we would imply a time before Universe, which is (as we've just seen) false (or beyond our understanding, at best).
However, Kalam argument uses another concept of causation, accordingly:
*effect "exists" as long as its cause "exists", without any delay between them both.
For theists, this very absence of delay makes it possible to use this causation concept in atemporal state.
So if this concept works, the timeless God is assumed to have caused the Universe to exist not before Universe's beginning but simultaneously to it, and is
assumed to be thus causeless.
Here is my questions: Is their concept of causation really consistent outside of time?
If it's, then can we use it to show that, in this condition, a cause for the timeless God isn't impossible?
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1. A metaphysical position is one in which there is a coherent understanding of reality. The observed universe contains a time dimension. To speak of things 'outside' of time is to evoke things we don't, and more importantly, CANNOT know about. We are restricted to time, as is the rest of the universe. To posit anything 'beyond' or 'outside' of time immediately places the argument 'outside' of coherency.
2. Why would we do that? We're atheists; we've obviously arrived at the opposite conclusion.
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He is then left with nothing but a bald claim that God always existed since his own definition of causality doesn't necessitate an uncaused God. A rather standard presuppositionalist failure...
Makes pefect sense... How bored would a supreme being be without a universe to torture?
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I agree! Except with 2.
I have already noticed this paradox in Kalam. However this only emphasis the paradox of our existence if Big Bang theory is correct. I solved the paradox the same way Kalam did. By saying there is a First Cause, I'm not saying it was "God" though. Well in a sense this First Cause IS our God!
Speaking of things outside space-time MAY BE beyond comprehension.
Theists would posit that a god in the sense of classical theism doesn't "begin to exist" therefore is not caused. But this sounds like special pleading to me.
As far as temporalness is concerned, there is not inconsistent about it. One can speak of "before" and "after" in terms of logical antecedents.
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Big Bang does not offer an explanation as to where the energy came from, only what happened once it expanded from an initial state. When we say the universe is 13 some billion years old, we are really saying that some 13 billion years ago it began expanding and cooling to the observable universe we collect data about now. It does not posit a first cause.
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And that's a very prudent position for a scientist... not to aggressively defend some exotic theory. I know it doesn't posit a first cause. I'm just guessing there is a FC using philosophy and some basic scientific laws. Like - Everything as a cause... well to my knowledge, everything does.
The Big Bang isn't really treated as a theory any more, that's why I clarified. I am not that well versed in quantum physics, but they have found things that happen without cause, so not everything has a cause. (Even if everything did, the FC would, by nature of the argument, not be first as it needs a cause itself)
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Unless the FC has some existence outside space time. Then the same rules would not apply.
Um, why wouldn't they? You think space time needs a cause, but its cause doesn't? Why one and not the other?
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If FC exists outside space time anything is possible because we don't have "realistic" models for such a reality. It's all speculation. Even a causeless FC would be possible. I'm not saying that I'm right here, it's just a possibility I believe.
I think the Big Bang poses a paradoxical problem. It would be simpler to explain the Universe with eternal existence... if it wasn't for that annoying entropy...
an atheist that disagrees with you that outside this universe and it's space time continuum it's all speculation. There will be questions raised over why space and particularly time do not exist outside of the universe. The existence of energy in this universe is a challenge given we don't know where it came from. But the same conundrum surely applies to the energy that might be described as a god. It would be nice to know what the knowable truth is. There must be one and it's likely that if we could step back far enough, the human brain could probably comprehend it - to some extent.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
But that was my original point. The Big Bang is the beginning of the Universe, as we know it. It is not an FC for all of reality, and so there is no paradox. The Big Bang presupposes an initial state, not nothingness. You keep making it out like the Big Bang model starts with nothing. This is incorrect.
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