The Kalam Cosmological Argument

So, just to be clear, my opponent is the one that actually does believe horses can - and indeed have - actually “popped” into existence at the behest of an imagined cosmic magician. He believes this not only absent any empirical evidence, but in direct opposition of all scientific evidence to the contrary. Yet he criticizes quantum mechanics which provides verifiable evidence that virtual particles are the only thing known to actually pop into existence. Do not be misdirected - there are not over 10 different interpretations that the Casimir effect itself has been observed– an effect which has been predicted since 1948 and empirically measured for the first time in 1996. [1] The best minds in science are still working on what makes the physics of extraordinarily small scales act so differently from the physics witnessed on larger scales. But this is irrelevant to my statement which stands… We have no evidence for anything [other than virtual particles] just popping into existence (such as horses) within our universe. In addition to the apparent evidence of axions I pointed to previously which helps lend credence to a multiverse theory, direct evidence of primordial gravitational waves discovered in March of this year also fits with empirical evidence we would expect to find within our universe should a multiverse actually exist outside our universe. [17] In other words, yes we are limited to observations within our universe, but if a multiverse indeed does exist, scientists can test predictions of how such external forces might have pulled and shaped our own universe during cosmic inflation and/or how those external forces might continue to interact and be detectable today. This is not to say the multiverse is a fact and all physicists are now on board. But when theoretical physicists make predictions, and those predictions begin to accumulate empirical evidence, the transition from mere hypothesis to accepted scientific theory has begun. My opponent slays straw men when attacking Hawking and mentions the Thorne-Hawking-Preskill bet. [18] It is because Hawking believes he was wrong about the existence and nature of singularities that I quoted him in the first place. Remember, my opponent argued for the actual existence of singularities, “until everything, all matter and energy gets converted into one single point, what we would call a ‘singulartity’[sic]..a point to which literally nothing existed.” I was offering one refutation of his assertion. Other physicists hypothesize black holes form a quantum bridge between universes absent singularities or imaginary time. [19] While singularities may be proven one day to actually exist, right now the trend amongst cosmologists seems to be against their reality. But my opponent who argued for actual singularities was in fact addressing an actual infinity (infinite density), at the same time arguing that actual infinities couldn’t exist. A logical contradiction. My opponent still doesn’t get it when he says, “God was timeless (atemporal) BEFORE creation.”[emphasis mine.] When you eliminate “Time”, you eliminate “before”. He literally cannot grasp this. Just saying the word “timelessness” is meaningless if you cannot explain how one event (God existing before creating the universe) preceding another event (God creates the universe) is not itself a function of time. He also postulates God creating the universe at a particular ‘exact moment’ (again requiring Time). There are no ‘moments’ without time. Absent time, all events would happen simultaneously in no order. In this event, both God and the universe would share the same beginning at the same initial instant. I will rephrase my opponent to make a point… “…theists don’t use ‘infinity’ in a real, empirical sense in reference to God, we use it in an imaginary, mythological sense…” Just substituting in the words ‘qualitative’ and ‘quantitative’ offers no substantive difference. But then, my opponent hasn’t really addressed how good Christians can live in an actual infinite heaven for all eternity with an actual eternal God that created and preexisted heaven for all of eternity and still somehow argue that actual infinities cannot be real. Makes about as much sense as monotheists worshipping a trinity. My opponent offers another straw man when he says I have “falsely concluded that an infinite set of events have been traversed…” In actuality, I have concluded nothing and believe the jury is still out. It is possible that actual infinities exist, it is possible they don’t. I listed several different hypotheses in my opening rounds, some of which may or may not depend upon infinity concepts. But unlike my opponent, I wait for evidence to accumulate before actually concluding anything. The process of science is rigorous and must be scrutinized and justified before being accepted. Quite the opposite in the case of religions where blind obedience precedes and supersedes evidence. My opponent is in error when he imagines that I propose a universe existing outside of time – I do not. If anything does exist outside our universe, I imagine it is subject to a dimension of time, much like ours. For example, let us imagine that a black hole inside our universe (with time and space as we know them) is capable of creating a bubble universe. Let’s call this new universe Junior. Junior has a space-time just like ours. Inhabitants of universe Junior would be right to point to a beginning of time from their perspective. But from our perspective, time would have pre-existed their universe. Just like human parents preexist their offspring and have a different temporal frame of reference from their children. I do not claim this is how our universe evolved for fact, I offer it merely to propose how such a thing might be possible that time could seem to have a beginning for one (the child’s perspective), while still preexisting before (the parent’s perspective). As for moving goal posts, the bible not only does not mention or explain the big bang or Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation, there is no explicit explanation of micro-organisms, covalent or ionic bonding, gravity, plate tectonics, radio waves, DNA, wave-particle duality, galaxies, virtual particles, general relativity, quantum tunneling, etc. Could it be possible that God knew nothing more than the ancient Jews and Christians who translated his word? It appears that way. Although, to be fair, knowledge does grow on trees, and the poor ancient shepherds were locked out of the Garden of Eden where the ‘knowledge fruit’ from the trees of quantum physics, organic chemistry, and evolutionary biology was denied them. (I’ve been told that the fruit of the evolutionary biology tree is terribly bitter, which is why many Christians fear it most). [20] Indeed, as my opponent points out, the bible is obviously NOT a science book. My response: So quit treating it like one! If you really want to know how something works, actually read a science book. Maybe even two or three. They can actually explain the process for how they know what they know. They are also prone to change as new evidence modifies or supplants outdated theories. They admit to being written by people, so they don’t claim to be inerrant, and the authors are actually listed right on the cover for you to verify! But, if you prefer to read a work of quasi-historical fiction, read the bible. As for, “what reasons would shepard’s [sic] living 3,000 years ago have to believe that the universe began to exist?” Perhaps because the Jews invented the same kind of mythological explanations as many other cultures who imagined how the universe might have originated. [21] My opponent transcends the absurd to embrace the truly ridiculous when he writes: “If you aren’t willing to give your life for the truth value of something, then you aren’t too sure, now are you?” So anyone that isn’t willing to jump off a cliff to demonstrate their conviction that the earth revolves around the sun isn’t really too sure? Truly ridiculous. Also, scientists in a very real sense do give their lives to discovering the truth: years and years of college, long hours week in and week out sifting through reams of data, decades of research and observation - that’s more than most people are willing to dedicate to the quest for universal truths. Finally, even if God were to actually exist, he’s not to be found in faulty syllogisms like the KCA. We can only truly know of God’s objective existence if we can test God empirically. But God has not been detected by any objective, modern means inside our universe. No observation has even accidentally discovered God (like the CMBR was accidentally discovered when initially running an experiment for something else. [22]) Every place we have searched, from the largest scales to the smallest, he’s simply nowhere to be found. God is absent. Imaginary. Illusory. An absent God is superfluous to any conjecture, indistinguishable from the non-existent, and therefore can be summarily dismissed. [God] has no place in any scientific equations, plays no role in any scientific explanations, cannot be used to predict any events, does not describe any thing or force that has yet been detected, and there are no models of the universe in which its presence is either required, productive, or useful. [23] Sources: [17] http://www.space.com... [18] http://en.wikipedia.org... [19] http://www.newscientist.com... [20] As conveyed directly to me by a talking snake. No need to prove it. Snakes talk. Just take my word for it. [21] http://www.brighthub.com... [22] http://en.wikipedia.org... [23] http://atheism.about.com...