Kalam argument is sound

Of note, Pro never clearly defined the version of the Kalam argument they are defending. But from their opening argument, I infer it to be: P1: Whatever begins to exist has a cause. P2: The universe began to exist. C: Therefore, the universe has a cause which is necessarily spaceless, timeless, immaterial, and non-physical. To show this argument is unsound, I must either attack its form, premises, or conclusion. I intend to show that P1 and P2 depend on unwarranted assumptions, and therefore the conclusion does not necessarily follow the premises, thus rendering the argument's form flawed. == Argument == 1. We cannot assume everything that begins to exist has a cause when discussing the universe. True, we seem to observe that everything WITHIN the natural order has a cause, but we are not justified in jumping to apply that observation to the natural order as a whole. That would be a Composition Fallacy, i.e., assuming what is true of the parts is also true of the whole. For example, it is wrong to infer that because all atoms are non-living, everything made of atoms is also non-living. Same for the universe - it is wrong to assume that because everything within the universe needs a cause, so too does the universe as a whole. 2. Pro has no basis for declaring "whatever begins to exist has a cause" as a metaphysical absolute. Yes, our observations seem to confirm that's true (at least, within the natural order.... see above), but if that's all we need to declare an absolute truth then we can also find other universal observations that contradict the Kalam argument. For example: a) Material things are only caused by other material things (therefore, a cause cannot be immaterial) b) Nothing is ever caused by an entity that is not, itself, within time (therefore, a cause cannot be timeless) c) All minds are physically embodied (therefore, a mind cannot be non-physical) Any one of these examples, arrived at through the very same method Pro uses to derive P1, refutes Pro's conclusion that the universe's cause is an immaterial, timeless, non-physical mind. So, either Pro's conclusion does not follow the premises, in which case the argument form is flawed, or Pro is committing a Special Pleading fallacy by favoring one metaphysical absolute over others that are equally valid. 3. P2 is self-refuting given the Kalam argument's conclusion of a timeless cause. The universe cannot begin to exist if time itself didn't exist before the universe (i.e., Pro's "timeless cause"). This sounds merely semantic, but let me explain: The word "begin" is temporal by nature. Something can only begin to exist if there was a TIME where it didn't exist. It can be expressed thus: 1) X began to exist, if and only if X exists now and there was a time in the past where X did not exist. 2) There has never been a time in the past where the universe did not exist (because time itself began with the universe). 3) Therefore the universe did not "begin" to exist. P2 is linguistically meaningless unless Pro assumes there was a time before the universe existed which therefore allows the universe to "begin." But that is the very thing Pro is trying to disprove by concluding the universe's cause must be timeless. Therefore, P2 is self-refuting. 4. B Theory Time. Pro gave an incorrect characterization of B Theory time in Round 1. It certainly is a matter of ontology. B Theory time states that time doesn't actually exist - the passage of time is merely an illusion of human consciousness. Rather we live in a 4-dimensional universe of what Minkowski called "spacetime." In spacetime, moments do not pass from past to present to future, where the past is gone, the present is real, and the future is yet to come. Rather, all moments are equally real and exist simultaneously. The "present" is purely relative. For people living in 1850, they are the present and we are the future. For us, they are the past and we are the present. Time is not, therefore, a sequence of historical events but rather various points within the dimension of spacetime, like slices within a loaf of bread - no slice came "before" another slice, they all exist simultaneously within the loaf. In such a model, it is possible for the universe to exist without a cause because causes are impossible if there is no real passage of time. This sounds like science fiction but it's not. It is actually extremely consistent with Einstein's proven and widely accepted Theory of Special and General Relativity. We know through tireless scientific testing that the speed of light is constant [1]. Therefore, as objects travel closer to the speed of light, given that speed = distance/time, time therefore passes slower relative to an observer at rest. This phenomenon is known as Time Dilation. Since time therefore is subjective, indeed, "relative," this is strong evidence that time is merely a property of the universe just like gravity. If true, and Relativity seems to confirm it is, then that absolutely confirms time is subjective thus confirming B Theory. The Kalam argument is not compatible with B Theory, since in B Theory causality is meaningless and unnecessary. == Conclusion == P1 is a Composition Fallacy and requires us to accept Pro's metaphysical absolute based on Special Pleading. P2 cannot be true if Pro is arguing that time never existed before the universe, as their conclusion of a timeless cause suggests. The Kalam's Conclusion does not necessarily follow given the failures of the two premises. Even so, the relativity of time is strong evidence in favor of B Theory, which is incompatible with the Kalam Argument. [1]