The Kalam Cosmological Argument Is Sound

I once again thank Con for his argument. As per the rules, this will be my final round of argumentation.Premise 1 -- Everything that begins to exist has a cause.=Con has still failed to respond to my first two points from round one (if something can come into being from nothing, then it becomes inexplicable why just anything or everything doesn't come into being from nothing, and something cannot come from nothing). For this fact alone, premise one should be considered by the voters as affirmed. It would not be fair for Con to finally address them in this argument, as I will not have a chance to respond to it.But let's look at the rest of his argument.Con admits it's true that our experience confirms that things that begin to exist has causes. It's not an unjustified leap of faith to claim that everything that begins to exist has a cause. While it may not prove the first premise, it is evidence for it, and makes it more likely than its negation (that not everything that begins to exist has a cause).1a. A Priori SupportMy use of Aristotelian causality is not a fallacious red-herring; Con continues to insist on equivocating on the term "cause," which is truly fallacious. It doesn't matter how Con wants to use the term, it matters how the term is used in the argument, itself. Con's source does not justify his argument that Aristotelian causes must be thought of in terms of "necessary" or "sufficient" causation. Even if we do, we can see that the cause of the universe is both necessary and sufficient. An intelligent, all-powerful cause would be sufficient to create the universe from nothing, and in order for something to come from nothing requires an intelligent, all-powerful cause. Therefore, an intelligent, all-powerful cause would also be necessary for the universe to come from nothing.Additionally, it is possible for something to be caused without necessary or sufficient causation. Con is mistaken that ex nihilo nihil fit can be true while the first premise is false; in fact, it's absurd to even say that, since they're both saying the same things. Non-deterministic causation is still real causation. Consider the following example: Bob pulls the trigger of a gun, which randomly (ontically) either fires a bullet or not each time. Imagine, then, that at one instance, Bob pulls the trigger and the gun fires a bullet. Surely Bob's pulling of the trigger caused the bullet to fire? But this is a case of nondeterministic causation, then, and so the pulling of the trigger is not sufficient.My case is not self-refuting (a self-refuting statement is one that fails to live up to its own criteria for truth). Con actually means my case is contradictory. But it's not that, either. First, Con's appealing to a pregnant is a false analogy; Con should be appealing to fertilization, which is the process that causes a pregnancy (or perhaps the sex act, which sets the pregnancy in motion). Second, all of the conditions need not be met for Aristotelian causality if some of the conditions logically can't be met (such as the material cause not being met, since the universe had to begin and it began from nothing). Some conditions are required in Aristotelian causation (such as the efficient and final cause), but the material cause is not required in the case of the universe, since the universe was created from nothing. As William Lane Craig has once stated, this may be puzzling, but it's less puzzling than a universe without either a material or efficient cause.Con states that there is nothing logically incoherent about something coming into existence from something else uncaused, but this is simply mistaken. Con has not shown how something can come from nothing uncaused, and he has not offered any true examples of something that can.Con seems confused by my statement about the dent not coming into existence, but his confusion is puzzling. The dent is a change in the paper -- it is not a separate entity beginning to exist. It is a property of the paper, just like the message in the sand is a property of the sand. And my response to his "dent in the paper" from last round stands, as he has not responded to it.1b. A Posteriori SupportQuantum mechanics is not a counter-example to the KCA. Even if we can't infer from the micro level what is true at the macro level (even though, as I argued earlier, it is evidence in support of it), quantum mechanics does not prove the KCA wrong. Quantum mechanics only shows that something can come from something (the quantum vacuum, which is not "nothing"), but it doesn't show that it is uncaused. The Copenhagen interpretation is only one of many, and many are indeterministic as well as deterministic.Premise 1 stands affirmed. Con has not given sufficient reason to reject it, and on top of that, he has failed to respond to two of my points from the original argument. For that reason alone, premise 1 stands affirmed.Premise 2 -- the universe began to exist.Con's use of the quote was still an ad populum fallacy, since it adds nothing to his argument. If he was trying to use it to bolster his argument (even though not his main argument), then it is a fallacy because that doesn't speak one way or the other toward the truth of his argument.I am not committing the fallacy of presumption in my analogy of being conceived. If Con's assertion is correct, then my parents could not have done otherwise than to have conceived me on that day. So I'm guessing Con does not believe in free will, since his position entails that one is not free to do other than what exists on the "block" of time. This is not an argument to debate free will, but free will is generally understood to entail that one is free to do otherwise than that which they do. My parents certainly could have decided not to have sex on that night, thereby not conceiving me. My parents had the free will not to conceive me. But then again, if Con does not believe in free will, then why is here debating the KCA with me, since I and the readers will believe or not believe the KCA is sound apart from any of the arguments given here.As to my contention that the universe would still require a cause, I do understand (at least as far as a layman can) the metaphysics of time. But Con simply does not seem to understand the philosophy of it. Thomas Aquinas has argued that even if the universe exists eternally, it would still require a First Mover, since everything that moves needs someone to initiate the movement. However, even the KCA would still work because as I needed to be conceived to exist now, an intelligent cause was needed to begin the universe, even if time exists "tenselessly."Even philosophers agree that the A-Theory of time is the commonsense view of time. Only philosophers believe in the B-Theory of time, which reminds me of something G.K. Chesterton once wrote: "Without education, we are in a horrible and deadly danger of taking educated of taking educated people seriously." Intelligent people can argue themselves into and out of anything. But it would be irrational, despite being unable to prove it, to believe that the universe doesn't exist, that it is only an illusion. It seems equally irrational to believe that time passing is only an "illusion." After all, we witness ourselves growing older, we speak of time passing, and we die. We can only travel one way along this "time block," forward, and not backward. Con has actually misunderstood the Grim Reaper paradox. He completely misunderstands the Grim Reaper (GR) argument here. The GR argument does not depend on tense, but on related causal actions (ie. the GRs overlap causally). The absurdities of the Grim Reapers do not arrive because of the paradoxical nature of transfinite arithmetic, that's a different argument.I am out of space. Premise 2 has been affirmed, so the conclusion stands.