The Following Arguments for the Existence of God are Valid - 1K

I thank KRF for accepting this open debate - our previous one was very enjoyable, so my expectations of this one are high :). I'm also pleased that my opponent has decided to use Kalam's cosmological argument (KCA) for the very fact that it brings a diversity to our religious discussion - it can get sometimes get monotonous when rehashing the same issue over and over. I accept my opponent's definition of the Christian god, and am quite surprised by the burden he has placed upon himself. I will not concentrate on his defense of the Christian god, but rather the generic definition of God that the KCA can only demonstrate to exist. I will leave my remarks concerning my opponent's defense of the Christina conception in a separate section towards the end. Before that, my criticism of KCA: ====================== Notes on my opponent's syllogism ====================== P1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence. P2. The universe began to exist. C1. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence. P3. The first cause must be eternal. P4. All eternal causes of temporal effects must be personal. C2. The universe was caused by a personal creator. P5. Given a personal creator, miracles are logically possible. P6. The personal creator probably intervened in this universe by resurrecting Christ .: The personal creator of this universe is probably the Christian God. The above was my opponent's argument. He has conveniently supplied me with a clear and intricate argument, and I will take this opportunity to organize certain group of points per section and attack them there. So here we go: ==================== Criticism of P1, P2, and C1 -- Concerning the empirical information surrounding the universe's existence ==================== P1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence. My opponent Craig confidently state that the premise "something can't come out of nothing" is obviously true. There are several problems with such a claim, both philosophical and scientific: First, what reason do we have to believe such a claim is true? If we take the stronger interpretation of it and read it to mean that anything that begins to exist MUST have a cause then we are bankrupt for any reason why this is so. It's not obviously not self-evident since even famous theists such as Richard Swinburne (and many others) understand it very well and yet reject it - for a self-evident claim is one if and only if most people who understand it accept it. Neither is there any scientific principle that negates it; I'd welcome my opponent to find one. However, if we are to be more charitable and grant the weaker interpretation, then it would read then there is a scientific generalization that things that begin to exist have a cause. However, even this claim is absurd - for what COMES into existence? Nothing we know of does such a thing; the universe is predicated by change only. Humans do not come into existence, they are simply a reorganization of molecules. The universe did not come into existence, the matter contained always existed. Indeed, there have been growing excitement among theoretical physicists, particularly in quantum gravity, about proposals for the origin of the universe. A popular one is the universal wave function[1], advocated by the likes of James Hartle and Stephen Hawkings. Among have several instances of confirmed observational evidence, it solves the question of how the universe began uncaused - Hawings "supposes that there is a timeless space, a four-dimensional hypersphere, near the beginning of the universe. It is smaller than the nucleus of an atom. It is smaller than 10^-33 centimeters in radius. Since it was timeless, it no more needs a cause than the timeless god of theism[2]." There is very good reason to believe the universe began without being caused; at the very least, this theory has more support than the theist counterpart. P2. The universe began to exist. My opponent states that it is "impossible to have an actual infinite of something". By definition, an actual infinite[3] is a completed set with an infinite amount of elements in it. To add on to this, my opponent reminds us that "if a set is infinite...it cannot be modified". My opponent's claim here suffers on the basis of philosophy of and of set theory. An important German mathematician by the name of Georg Cantor demonstrated that there can be something larger than infinity...namely another infinity[4][5]! While seeming counterintuitive and scathingly rejected at first, it has been lauded as a ground mark discovery - refer to my details for a full explanation. This discovery in mathematics would seem to undermine my opponent's notion of infinity. However, the bigger problem is the age old groups of Zeno's paradox - which were known even during Aristotle's time. According to Zeno, things such as MOTION ITSELF did not exist on the basis that actual infinities can't exist. Take his example of the runners[6]: if the distance between point A and point B were 10 meters, anyone walking along this path would first have to come across point C, which is the midway point between A and B (thus being 5 meters from point A). However, before one gets to point C they must embark on point D, which is the midway point between A and C (thus being 2.5 meters from point A), and so on. As you can see, we have a common day example of an actual infinite - so does motion not exist? Of course not, actual infinites can exist in reality and I'll be glad to explore it more with my opponent. C1. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence. This would work if my opponent's premises were valid, but since they aren't... ==================== Criticism of P3, P4, and C2 -- Concerning the nature of the first cause ==================== P3. The first cause must be eternal. This premise is once again invalidated, since it relies on the premise that an actual infinite can't exist - which DOES. P4. All eternal causes of temporal effects must be personal. Not only does this premise also rely on the idea of there having to be an eternal cause (which also relies on the premise about actual infinites), my opponent uses a frankly shaky reductio argument to show that a personal creator is viable. First, what part of an object being "dead" means it is not in "equilibrium"? Secondly, if your characteristic of the cause is correct - that no change is possible - then you submit that said cause CAN'T MAKE DECISIONS. C2. The universe was caused by a personal creator. As is with all conclusions, if the premises are unsupported than so is the conclusion. ==================== Criticism of P5, P6, and C3 -- Concerning the Christian God ==================== The odd thing about my opponent's attempt to prove that the cause of the universe was the Christian God is that he doesn't use KCA but others, such as historical reliability - which is fine, but is another argument. This is why alone, KCA fails to prove that the Christian God is the creator of the universe as opposed to the infinite amount of other possible gods. Nonetheless, I will gladly allow him to have this point. After all, even if he shows that Christianity fits best with KCA, if I demonstrate that the KCA is unsound to begin with then there's no foundation for my opponent's argument. ==================== Conclusion ==================== My opponent's argument is practically LITTERED with scientific and philosophical holes. Ranging from developments in quantum gravity, mathematics, philosophy of time, and general contradictions. While Craig's a reformulation of KCA is admirable, he does little to show it's merit. As the philosopher Quentin Smith remarks, the most reasonable belief is that we came from nothing, by nothing, and for nothing. ---References--- See comment section