The Cause of the Universe is Plausibly Personal if the KCA is True

DefinitionsFirst Cause: The aggregate of all first causesIntroductionsI thank Illegalcombatant (Con hereafter) for his willingness to debate this topic. This debate will concern the content discussed in this forum over the last couple of posts,http://debate.org...Con tried to put forth the strange notion of a non-personal timeless cause of the universe if the Cosmological Argument is true. Burden of ProofsNote the resolution says that if the Kalam Cosmological Argument (KCA) is true, then, by conceptual analysis of the very nature of the case of a transcendent cause, it is more plausibly personal. That's the resolution, thus we're taking for granted that the KCA is true, and that the universe, all of space and time, in fact has a transcendent cause of it's creation. This means that by the very nature of the case the transcendent cause must be spaceless, timeless, unimaginably powerful. And the only contention between Con and Pro is that this cause is also personal (or not). With that said, I affirm that the transcendent cause of the universe is more plausibly personal, since a will or volition is required to change from a timeless state into a consequential state of being in time. It must, in effect, choose to change states, if we understand what a timeless state is. Thus my BoP to bear is to show, by conceptual analysis of a transcendent cause, that the cause more plausibly has volition, and is therefore personal. This will be easy to do. Also I must refute or rebut Con's case. Con on the other hand has a remarkable BoP to bear, he must show that it is somehow more plausible that a transcendent cause of the universe is more plausibly non-personal, that is, natural; that a natural transcendent cause of the universe was necessary and sufficient to bring about a change from a timeless state to a state of being in time and space and matter and energy, etc. This seems like an impossible task, but not only that, Con must also refute or rebut my case. Let's reason together. Why The Cause Is PersonalPersonal Over Scientific ExplanationIf you walk into your kitchen as ask, "why is the kettle boiling?" two types of explanations can be given but only one is sufficient - the first type is a scientific explanation: that the water is heated to a point where atoms speed up their collisions, etc. But the second explanation is a personal one in terms of will or volition, "I wanted to make you tea." (Want some?)In some contexts it would be inappropriate to give one explanation over the other. Now the universe can't be given a scientific explanation since it's the cause of space and time we're talking about here, there's no spatio-temporal thing before or beyond space and time so it couldn't be accounted for in terms of laws operating on initial conditions. It can only be accounted for in terms of personal explanation in terms of volition, a personal explanation.[1]Timelessness & ImmaterialityThe only entities we know of which can possess such properties as timelessness and immateriality are either minds or abstract objects like numbers. But by definition abstract objects cannot cause anything.[2][3] Numbers and sets can't cause anything for abstract means causally impotent! Therefore, in the question of which came first, the mind or the matter- if matter is what began, then mind must have caused it. Origin of a Temporal Effect from a Timeless CauseFree agency accounts for the origin of a first temporal effect from a changeless cause. The cause is in some sense eternal, and the effect which it produced is not eternal but began to exist a finite time ago. If the necessary and sufficient conditions for the production of the effect are eternal, then why isn't the effect eternal? How can all the causal conditions sufficient for the effect be changelessly existent and yet the effect not also be existent along with the cause? How can the cause exist without the effect?There must be an absolutely first event, before which there was no change, no previous event. Why is not the effect co-eternal with the cause? The best way out of this dilemma is of course agent causation. Where the agent freely brings about some event in the absence of proper determining conditions. Collective Properties of the Universe The First Cause is an entity that has produced a universe apparently fine-tuned for life, containing beauty and creatures attuned to beauty, containing moral obligations and creatures aware of them, a universe containing conscious beings with free will, a universe some of whose contents have objective functions (eyes are for seeing, and so on). Thus the First Cause is more plausibly a highly intelligent and very powerful person acting purposively is highly plausible given all this data.[4] Why the Cause Is Not Non-personalWithout Coherence Con wants to say that the candidate for a transcendent cause is a non personal timeless cause. That is, the transcendent cause of all things we consider natural, is, well, natural. Clearly this seems contradictory. Nevertheless it at least seems that this position is less plausible, if not impossible. For one there are no potentialities of a timeless non-personal entity which would constrain what it can (or can't) cause. Also, without a volition to will another state other than the one it's in, namely, a timeless state, it seems inexplicable why a universe would be the only thing, if anything at all, is what is somehow chosen to pop into being a finite time ago. What's so special about universes that has this natural timeless entity creating it? Surely this seems metaphysically absurd! Con therefore faces the dilemma spoken of under, "Origin of a Temporal Effect from a Timeless Cause." He therefore owes us a third alternative other than a mind. Without ContentThe notion of a non-personal cause of time and space, which is itself timeless, is as yet without content, we can surmise no matters of fact about such a timeless non-personal immaterial and extremely powerful cause other that why it should be a mind instead. Simply, a timeless non-personal entity can't logically cause from a timeless state since that would require volition or a will to do so. For by the very nature of the case, a timeless non-personal cause has no potentialities to cause successive events. A will on the other hand, does. Without PotentialitiesFurthermore, as mentioned before, there's nothing qualifying what potentialities a non-personal timeless cause has. If Con honestly wants to say a natural, non-personal being causes a change of states from one state to another so that time comes into being; he's got to show us how such a notion can be accomplished without a will. Unless and until he does that, then I think it's more plausible that a transcendent cause of time willed time from a timeless state.ConclusionI'll await Illegalcombatant's reply, but so far we've seen four good reasons for thinking a transcendent cause of the universe is personal, and we've also seen three good reasons for thinking it isn't natural or non-personal. Citations1. Richard Swineburne, The Existnece of God, rev. ed. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1991), 32-48. 2. http://plato.stanford.edu...;3. Craig, Copan, Creation Out of Nothing: A Biblical, Philosophical, and Scientific Exploration (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 2004), p.168-70.4. Alexander R. Pruss, Cosmological Arguments, https://bearspace.baylor.edu...