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

First and foremost, I want to thank KRF for this debate about the existence of God - it's been highly enjoyable and informative; hopefully we can have another debate in the near future. ===================== P1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence. ===================== "The fact that such great thinkers could oppose its legitimacy yet be forced to accept its rational necessity favors my cause." ----> When dealing with philosophic issues, there is little to no use in citing the beliefs of prominent philosophers if you're trying to prove or even give suitable support for a premise. Unless the focus of study you are dealing with is the history of philosophy or advancing an interpretation of someone's theory -- in which quoting a philosopher is obviously paramount -- there really isn't a point otherwise. I could probably also find many prominent philosophers who believe that it is legitimate to believe that nothing can come out of nothing, but it's a fruitless endeavor. Furthermore, your example of science is an equivocation. I agree that science more or less primarily relies on the casual principle, but to say that is the only thing science can tolerate is absurd. To accept the premise that nothing can come out of nothing is NOT THE SAME as saying nothing always comes out of something -- it is indeed a phenomena that does not always happen. "If there is no cause, then there is nothing left to test or explore." ----> Is not randomness inherent in the universe as says the Copenhagen interpretation[1]? If so, then you submit that randomness can exist, and thus science can't explain such phenomena insofar they can't explain every detail of it's causality -- given there is a randomness factor to it. And yet, the vast majority of physicists are not only comfortable with this but delighted; there is nothing unscientific about indeterminism. "Certainly my opponent would not stand for it if I were to conveniently deny the causal principle when arguing for miracles." ----> I have never heard of an argument justifying miracles on the basis they happened from acausal means. Furthermore, if you do attempt to do so then all I need to do is ask for some experimental documentation. After all, even if such a phenomena happened there can still be documentation on it. "The causal principle is consistently verified and appealed to in our daily experience." ----> This is your biggest problem here; just because we always experience your causal principle does NOT mean we are allowed to then say it's an universal principle -- especially since it's a metaphysical principle. It's interesting to note that this is Hume's territory, in which he talks of the problem of induction. Does our daily experience of the world see randomness happen? No, and yet we know it exists in the quantum world. Interestingly enough, we don't see randomness in the macro world; though a discussion for why this is so is best served in another debate. My point is, just because you see your causal premise in work in our daily experiences does not mean it's exceptions are excluded. "So, it's not that a perfect vacuum doesn't exist; it's merely that such a thing is not discoverable via scientific method." ----> No, it's more like science is saying there is no such thing as a perfect vacuum because energy/matter always existed. The reason there is no perfect vacuum is because of the ground state[2], in which even the lowest state has some energy in it. "My opponent can say the causal principle is incoherent all day long, but his inability to present an observable exception speaks with much greater authority." ----> Well that's just disingenuous, I gave you an entire article that cites examples of creation ex nihilo. Here it is again[3]. Sure, you could say that it still presumes energy and matter still exist, which brings us to the question of whether or not it's sensible that matter has always existed -- and indeed, I'd argue there's no reason to believe this is not the case. You say I'm reasoning in a circular fashion...but by refuting P1 in arguing that P2 is improbable? This is in no way circular; it's obvious that there's an obvious dependent relationship between P1 and P2 for the validity of P1 or P2 affects the other. The problem is that you have yet to supply any scientific or philosophic reason to believe in your casual premise. The only rationale you use is that it's been confirmed by our daily experience and that there is no dis-confirming instances of it. The first reason fails because by the same reasoning randomness wouldn't exist, and the latter crumbles since I have done such. ===================== P2. The universe began to exist. ===================== "TheSkeptic calls Guth's inflationary universe model "well supported"...Yet, I have shown that these SAME men have shown those very SAME models to be neither supportable nor compelling." ----> Before I begin, I want to point this out: where in the world does this appear? The three men may reject an infinite-past universe, but not model's such as the inflationary universe model. In fact, more than anything they should accept it -- especially with things such as the direct results from the first Cosmic Background Explorer in 2006[4]. My opponent misses the entire point of our discussion in this section. As I stated before, the competition between scientific theories supporting a finite universe or an infinite universe doesn't really matter to me since they all are plausible WITHOUT a God in the picture. So let's assume the universe had an origin and go along with that: He states that my discussion of the B-theory of time is interesting but a red herring...what? Your premise that an infinite-past universe is contingent on accepting the A-theory. If I can show that this is false, then the fuel behind your argument is gone. So even if I were to let you assume the universe had an origin, if I can show that this can arise from purely physical means, have always existed, or simply came out of nothing then there is no room for God. All probable explanations are ATHEISTIC. His responses to the B-theory once again hinges on the alleged impossibility of an actual infinity. Yes, it seems compelling this is true but what we are talking about is an ACTUAL infinity, not an actual infinite number of real things. For example, do we not have an infinite future? Furthermore, he has stated before that Zeno's paradoxes do not give an adequate answer...but shows no reason why this is so. I'd argue it's a brilliant counterexample -- the movement between point A and point B takes an infinite amount of finite events (spatial and temporal) by the simple virtue of division, which I'd argue shows the feasibility of actual infinites. Given the B-theory we don't have to worry about an infinite-past DUE TO IT'S CONCLUSIONS. Given there is no flow of time, B-theory isn't distraught with the same problems concerning infinities; it escapes it. ====================== Conclusion ====================== I want to clarify that the reason it seems that I am shift with my position on cosmological theories is that it doesn't matter for the purpose of the debate. Because ultimately, it's the case that all probable explanations of the universe' origin are ATHEISTIC -- they are not written with problems that my opponent so alleges. All cosmological theories, whether infinite-past or not do not have a theistic element. Assuming there was a singularity, the problem of past infinity is no trouble given the acceptance of the B-theory of time. If both pillars are gone, what foundation does the theist have for this argument at all? None. The last two premises are, to be honest, riddled with philosophical holes but that best serves for another debate. Even granting their validity, this debate boils down to P1 and P2. ---References--- See comment sections.