The Kalam Cosmological Argument is unsound

Many thanks to Mr. Travieso.A brilliant defense of the KCA. One that I will now proceed to refute :DJust as a note, we both agree to the debate framework I set forth-- if any one of my refutations is successful, the resolution is affirmed. Logical ValidityCon claims that the fallacy of composition does not apply to the KCA because it is based on the notion that the universe as a whole came into existence, rather than individual objects coming into existence within it. This rebuttal could work, but it is inconsistent with his other rebuttals-- in defending the first premise, he claims that we do, indeed, see objects come into existence independently of the universe itself. Without conceding that line of argumentation, he cannot coherently mitigate this argument.Premise 1Con puts forth the example of building a shed to try showing that we can see things come into existence. However, he is falsely conflating "beginning to exist" with "transformation". Con claims that because we would not call the materials a "shed" before the shed has actually been built, the shed did not exist prior to it being built; however, what he fails to recognize is that "shed" is ultimately just a meaningless verbal label that we as humans have arbitrarily placed on anything which resembles our conception of a shed. The materials and the shed are, indeed, one and the same-- the only difference is that one has the label of "materials", and the other has the label of "shed". In reality, the shed is nothing more than a different arrangement of the materials; the shed did not begin to exist-- the materials simply underwent a change to become what we call a "shed", and whether change requires a cause has no bearing on whether beginning to exist requires a cause. Hence, my objection stands: we really haven't seen anything come into existence, so it is absurd to make broad generalizations about what is necessary for it to happen.Premise 2Con first argues that the cyclical cosmological models are supposedly nothing but speculative hypotheses that "add nothing significant to modern cosmology". In fact, cyclical models serve as much simpler and sounder alternatives to the increasingly problematic traditional conception of the big bang, and would thus actually be preferable, according to Occam's Razor (principle of logic which maintains that the simpler theory is more likely to be true). "...over the last few decades, more and more elements have had to be added to the Big Bang Theory to make it consistent with what we observe. To explain why the universe is so uniform, we had to a new feature called inflation. To explain the formation of structure, we had to add dark matter. The recent discovery that the expansion of the universe has begun to speed up has required the addition of something called dark energy. Each of these elements have been added one by one to make today"s Big Bang Theory a kind of patchwork of disconnected ideas... We wanted to see if a completely different history of the universe is possible in which all the elements fit together in a tight and natural way. Furthermore, we saw recent developments in fundamental physics -- namely, string theory -- offered a radically new view of the big bang itself -- not as a beginning but rather as a collision... Much to our surprise, we found we could use this picture to reformulate the history of the universe -- recovering all the successful predictions of the conventional Big Bang Theory." (http://www.physics.princeton.edu...)Con then argues that due to the second law of thermodynamics (constantly increasing entropy), an eternal/cyclic universe is impossible. However, he then goes on to provide a solution to the problem he just created for the cyclic universe when he states that "at the singularity, all the laws of physics would have broken down". As described last round, most cyclical cosmological models do involve big bangs, just like the traditional big bang theory, so this breach of physical laws can occur within an eternal universe as well, thus effectively solving the problem. Thanks, Con! :DPremise 3Con claims that the problem with self-causation isn't with time, but with the very nature of causation: "One cannot give what one does not have, if the universe did not exist then it cannot stand in causation to a non-existent universe, because it would have no existence to give". However, this discussion must, indeed, revolve around the issue of time. If time didn't exist, then there would be no difference, chronologically, between when the universe did exist and when it did not, and it would therefore be possible for the universe to have caused its own existence. This is especially true given that this would all have occurred within absolute nothingness, which entails a complete lack of any properties or constraints and thus allows for this sort of self-actualization* to occur, It may sound absurd, but we must remember that all our intuitions about causal relationships, which is what Con's rebuttal is based on, are meaningless, as they are wholly derived from our experience within a temporal existence. Simultaneous causation is a plausible alternative cause to God, regardless of how hard it may be for us to believe it with our oh-so-limited cognitive faculties.Conclusion-- Con has inadvertently contradicted his defense of the KCA's first premise in attempting to defend the argument's logical validity-- his defense of the first premise relies on the false conflation of 'beginning to exist' and 'undergoing a physical transformation', -- his defense of the second premise is full of faulty attempts at brushing off cyclical cosmological models-- his defense of the third premise ignores the radical implications of time's non-existence and the lack of constraints within nothingness The resolution is affirmed.Back to you, Mr. Travieso! * I do not own this term. It is the property of dylancatlow and/or Christopher Langan.