The KCA is Sound

Introduction My last round only used 6,500 characters! If one counts the characters in the pictures, it only numbers a measly 1k characters over the limit, that's two short paragraphs to make up for the technical difficulties experienced in R2. Yet Con spends his whole round avoiding the kCA and dropping arguments? This is an embarrassing a last ditch effort to win cheap conduct points made obvious by the overly dramatic tone of his last round (I'm no where near 17,903 charaters!). But again we see no real objections to the kCA from Con! He merely spends his last round ranting against the logistics of the debate in hopes of scoring conduct points. But I violated no predetermined conduct since pictures are allowed.Moreover it was strange that Con never responded to my answers of his earlier clarification points, nor did he attempt to formulate these clarifications into objections. His two points were, 1) that the cosmos has always existed in time, so there's no temporally prior cause. Here I showed that's not a problem since the kCA argues for a causally prior state, not a temporally prior state. Con's second clarification point was; 2) his confusion on how the cause is free, but there I gave 4 arguments for thinking the cause is a mind or agent endowed with free will. In his last round, Con merely brings up one clarification point and then uses most of his round as an emotional tirade on the logistics of the debate, namely with my use of pictures. We'll look at these both first under "modal argument" and then the tirade under "conclusion." Argument Outline P1, The cosmos beganThis is where Con agrees yet complains that there can be no temporally prior state and so the cosmos always was in time. However the kCA shows that a causally prior state is the cause, not a temporally prior state, he even admits his position is circular in the form of a tautology. [extend arguments] P2, If the cosmos began, then it has a transcendent cause Here Con never responds to the Prima Facie warrant that the causal principle enjoys apart from any empirical defeaters. He does, however, express confusion on my third argument - Modal ArgumentClarification point: Recall the basic premises of the modal argument for the fact that for anything which could have a cause, does have a cause; the cosmos could have a cause; therefore it does have a cause. Since I've already defined contingency into the ground for Con, the only word possibly requiring definition is "indiscernible." This evokes what's known as Leibniz's Law, which simply states that "no two distinct substances exactly resemble each other." [16] Note that a world that has only indistinguishable substances would be a maximally specific world by definition. Thus, if there's a world in which caused contingent things lack distinct substances, then such things can also obtain in worlds without distinct substances. Therefore, the causal principle holds true for all worlds for all contingent facts, including the actual world if it is contingent. [extend arguments]-Resolution affirmed Theistic ImplicationsConceptual Analysis of a First Cause Ultramundanity[extend arguments]Personal[extend arguments]Here it was shown that the collective properties of the cosmos (embodied moral agents, beauty, reliable regularity, etc) strongly disconfirmed a nonsentient cause over a sentient one. The cosmos could have been many different ways that make a non-sentient cause more probable. If, say certain features like the cosmological constant had been altered, or if the the initial conditions put in as boundary conditions within the Planck era, if any of these had been very slightly different not only would life be impossible, but so would the regularity and reliability of that regularity that science demands. In fact it’s namely intentional action that requires this reliable regularity. But more importantly it also requires our implicit assuming its regularity, our cognitive faculties therefore must somehow be adequated to this particular reality. And it makes no sense to say this adequation to reality arose by chance since evolution selects for survival and not for true beliefs. Therefore, the statistical success of the adequation of our intellect to this reality strongly disconfirms non-sentient creation over what theists have always affirmed, that God is mindful of man, and that mind comes from Mind. Secondly, Con never responded to the fact that agent causation, a person freely causing, is the only alternative to a cause arising from a timeless and changeless state. For event causing events would mean that the effect would have to be coeternal with the cause, and the same goes for states causing other states. Therefore, the only way out of this dilemma is to admit agent causation wherein a free person creates something new from a timeless state. Third (and forth), Con never responds to the cause requiring a personal explanation over a scientific one, nor does he even address the fact that only a mind can cause from a timeless and immaterial state since abstract objects are causally impotent. ConclusionNow I used over 6500 characters in my previous round but counting the characters in pictures adds about 2500 more equalling roughly 9k worth of characters to have to read, that's barely two paragraphs over the limit that I had to make up for in my last round anyhow due to technical difficulties. In any professional debate this would have been allowed. Plus this round I have 1500 characters that I planned on forfeiting remaining in all fairness anyway, note Dakota's PM - So in essence poor Con must respond to 2 short paragraphs over what he normally would have.. and this is what causes Con to spend his whole round pleading for conduct points rather than deal with my arguments? Even if pictures count as characters, my average count would even out since I only used a few words this round and in my round 2 due to technical difficulties. But in fact, pictures don't count as characters and so no conduct violation has occurred! Power-point presentations are used in many debates outside DDO with standards much rigorous- do PPT's therefore count against an opponent's allotted time just because it conveys more information than the debater otherwise would verbally say? But leave that aside, not only do I have more sources in terms of quality and quantity, but I easily gave more convincing arguments than Con to show that the kCA is sound. Indeed I went out of my way to clarify the argument for Con, whose approach basically consisted of, "I don't get it.. therefore I win." Because of all this, I declare victory!Citations16. http://plato.stanford.edu...