Christian historian Dr. Wallace Marshall and I are debating whether or not enough evidence points to the existence of a god. For background and format, and Dr. Wallace’s opening statement, see entry one. For subsequent entries, see index.
For now we are still focusing on the Kalam Cosmological Argument, now in response to my fourth reply.
That the Evidence Points to God (V)
by Wallace Marshall, Ph.D.
After three rounds on the KCA (the Kalam Cosmological Argument), I will share some concluding points and let Dr. Carrier offer his and then present his first argument for atheism.
Dr. Carrier continues to blatantly beg the question in a manner I’ve never seen in debates with fellow academics. He now clarifies that when he wrote, “Causal laws cannot exist in the absence of a structural cause of such laws,” he did in fact mean, “Causal laws cannot exist in the absence of a physical cause of such laws.” But if God or even human spirits exist, such entities would obviously have causal powers, so Dr. Carrier is “begging” us to grant, not only that God does not exist, but that materialism is true! (Note that one can be an atheist and disbelieve in materialism: see, e.g., philosopher Thomas Nagel’s recently published Mind and Cosmos; or on Roger Penrose below.)
A second example of question-begging is Dr. Carrier’s repeated assertion that a thing cannot exist unless it is “in space” and “in time.” Why even debate the existence of God at all if settling the question were as simple as that? Why debate mathematical ontology?
Imagine the amusing scene if Dr. Carrier, who like me is trained as a historian, attended a philosophical conference on mathematical ontology and proclaimed, “My dear chaps, you and other philosophers who have been debating this topic since the time of Plato have been terribly confused. The solution is so simple that I can hardly believe it has escaped you all this time. Don’t you see that it is simply logically impossible for anything to exist apart from space and time, and therefore that mathematical entities have no real existence in the absence of a physical world?” (For the uninitiated, watch physicist Roger Penrose’s 10-minute interview on this question; like Nagel, Penrose is an atheist but not a materialist). [1]
Imagine further how the comedy would be compounded if Dr. Carrier proceeded with the sophistical word-game of his last reply, where time-transcendent existence is equated with “never existing,” which in turn is equated with “not existing”!
In my last reply, I noted the oddity of Dr. Carrier not informing the reader how Herb Silverman reconciled his private message to Carrier, “There might have been infinitely many big bangs and big crunches,” with Silverman’s public comment to the Secular Crusader, “The most important lesson I learned was that infinity is a theoretical construct created by humans, and that the number ‘infinity’ does not exist in reality.” [2] Dr. Carrier now attempts to atone for this omission by telling us how Silverman reconciles his private statement with his comment on infinity being “a theoretical construct created by humans”! Surely Dr. Carrier recognizes (and hopes his readers will not notice?) that the obvious phrase in need of reconciliation is “does not exist in reality”!
Dr. Carrier thinks he can avoid the absurdities entailed by the real-world instantiation of an actual infinite by observing that, “Infinity only produces paradoxes when we incorrectly assume it conforms to the axioms of finite arithmetic.” This is nonsense. Why would atheist philosopher Graham Oppy write his large tome on this “huge range of difficulties … puzzles and paradoxes” if the solution were as simple and obvious as that?
Nor has Dr. Carrier explained how it could be ‘now’ now if the time series in which we are living is past-eternal. The truism, “If there’s no beginning, then no one started adding,” does nothing to advance an answer but merely restates the problem.
The solution to Zeno’s argument against motion, as Aristotle pointed out long ago, is that a finite interval (say, the length of your driveway) is conceptually prior to any divisions we might make of it, and that Zeno’s intervals of distance are unequal (each being half of its predecessor) and therefore finite. In the case of an infinite past, however, the intervals (moments of time) are equal, and the prior conceptual line is not the finite distance of a driveway but the infinite string of moments between the present and a past that has no beginning. [3]
Regarding the scientific evidence against an infinite past, I must refer the reader again to the relevant section of my previous reply. The specific problem identified by modern cosmogony is hardly, as Carrier would have it, that we know the elementary “stuff” of the cosmos can perfectly well go on into the infinite past, and just don’t know how to describe it yet; but rather, as Vilenkin says, “We have no viable models of an eternal universe.” [4]
Are physicists “working on” or “exploring” such models? Of course. But so far there is no solution that is mathematically viable, has an adequate physical mechanism, and has been accepted by a broad range of scientists.
Dr. Carrier’s attempts to evade this clear preponderance of the evidence would invalidate virtually all of modern cosmology! One can’t reject theories merely because they may “rely on an undemonstrated assumption” (which most theories do) or because physicists don’t yet have a theory of quantum gravity. In a gathering of scientists these would be laughable positions.
All those truisms do is remind us that the results of modern cosmology are provisional. But again, what of it? This is true of virtually all science! And Vilenkin meant nothing more than this when he told Krauss that IF a quantum theory of gravity ends up invalidating classical spacetime, “we may not even know the right questions to ask.” Even there, Vilenkin added, “I suspect that the [BGV] theorem can be extended to this case, maybe with some additional assumptions. But of course there is no such thing as absolutely certainty in science.”
What if the entire cosmos is not past-eternal? Dr. Carrier proposes that if this is the case, a “seed of spacetime” or “an empty state devoid of all contents and extension” will do just as well as God for a viable cause of the universe. Bypassing the vaguery of this “seed of spacetime,” how is either option different from physical nothingness? And how then will Dr. Carrier avoid his own objection that all causes must be physical?
Both proposals reduce to a belief in the cosmos originating ex nihilo, from no cause whatsoever. Is this logically possible? Sure, but it is metaphysically absurd, and for the additional reasons given in my first entry on the Kalam, it is less plausible than the cosmos being brought into existence by a Cause which in the nature of the case must be immaterial, spacetimes, timeless, and immensely powerful, and is moreover plausibly personal
-:-
Such is Dr. Marshall’s closing response on the cosmological argument.
Continue on to Dr. Carrier’s final reply on the same.
Next we will switch roles and I’ll start in on what I call the Argument from Indifference but is popularly called the Argument from Evil.
-:-
Endnotes
[1] For Penrose’s views, in addition to the video interview linked above, see his dialogue with Alister McGrath on the U.K. radio program Unbelievable? 24 September 2010.
[2] Laura Paull, “South Carolina’s Secular Crusader,” Tablet Magazine, 21 June 2012 (Accessed 9/18/2012). I’m not in favor of introducing private correspondences into public debate, but for what it’s worth, I know Silverman personally (we live in the same town and see each other regularly) and have pressed him with this very problem and never received a direct answer.
[3] As I pointed out in the comments section of my first entry on the Kalam, Zeno’s paradox does highlight the important difference between a potential infinite and an actual infinite. A three-foot line is potentially divisible into an infinite number of points, but the argument I have given (it’s not original to me but has been around for a long time) says that you could never actually divide that three-foot line into an infinite number of points. You could go dividing and subdividing forever, each distance being shorter than the previous one, but you would never reach an infinite number of divisions. Infinity is a limit you would forever approach but never reach.
[4] Alexander Vilenkin, “The Beginning of the Universe,” Inference: International Review of Science, Vol. 1, Issue 4 (23 October 2015). Accessed 04/16/2017. See my previous entries for other quotations in a similar vein.
“and that the number ‘infinity’ does not exist in reality.”
There’s no such number because if an infinite number can’t be reached because then it wouldn’t be infinite. There’s a symbol to represent infinity. Pi is an infinite number, is it not? A circle is infinite, no beginning and no end. Word games.
Yes, there is some confusion over which definition of “number” is being used here, but generally infinity is a number (or a set of numbers, defined by cardinality), just not a “real” number, but that’s a label, not literal (it doesn’t mean other numbers aren’t real in the sense of “don’t exist”). Infinities are hyperreal numbers.
However, all numbers are human inventions. They are words for quantities. So confusing number with quantity is also going on here.
Charles,
“In reality” is the key phrase. For infinity to exist as a limit that numbers (or divisions) approach but never reach is one thing; for it to exist in reality without absurdities resulting (e.g., “The Federal Reserve has an infinite number of sequentially numbered bills,” or, “An infinite number of moments has elapsed in the history of the physical universe”) is another.
There is nothing actually absurd about either “an infinite number of moments has elapsed in the history of the physical universe” or “the Federal Reserve has an infinite number of sequentially numbered bills.” Those are simply what is logically entailed by the premises (if there is the infinite set described, that is the consequence that follows). “Not liking” or “not understanding” those consequences is not a valid reason to assert they cannot obtain.
There is a reason all published experts in transfinite mathematics alive today keep saying these supposed absurdities turn out to produce no discernible logical contradictions. And anything that is not logically contradictory is logically possible; and anything that is logically possible can exist in reality, by simply matching one-to-one all the contents of the imagined set to a real set. All mathematicians on this have shown nothing bars that matching; and that the matching can be done entails nothing bars the resulting real set from existing.
Whether any such real set does exist is a separate question. But what we know for sure is that “it can’t exist” is false. As every living peer reviewed expert on this agrees.
It seems to me that Dr. Marshall is arguing against infinity being a real thing but at the same time expects us to by into the idea of a timeless (infinite) God.
Is anyone else confused about that?
Marshall hasn’t specifically said God possesses any actual infinite properties. But yes, if he believes that God does, then he is contradicting himself by insisting actual infinities can’t exist. However, one can develop non-infinite descriptions of gods, so I haven’t raised the issue (I only would have if he did).
OU812INVU-
The question revolves around the actual existence of an infinite number of discrete entities (in the context of the Kalam argument, an infinite number of moments in the past history of the physical universe). Timeless or time-transcendent existence does not involve or entail that.
B-Theory does entail an infinite number of discrete entities (points of time; even quanta of time if time is quantized as many going theories propose). So that distinction cannot be relevant.
But do you agree that god has all the knowledge that there exists. For example he knows all the prime numbers. This is an actual infinity. On the other hand if there is a prime number that god is not aware of then he is not perfect. I just don’t see a way around this. If god has perfect knowledge actual infinity has to exist.
@Benjamin, since Dr. Craig is an anti-realist regarding abstract objects like numbers, sets, propositions, etc., it seems he would say, first, that since numbers don’t actually exist in the external world as objects, then they cannot be considered an actually infinite number of things.
Second, it appears Dr. Craig views God’s knowledge as an undifferentiated whole, rather than an infinite set of propositions. He gives the analogy of a field of vision, where everything that a person sees can be analyzed in pixels, even though what a person sees simply appears to them “all at once” in their actual field of vision.
Whew, how far we are from Occam’s Razor. I’m reminded of Andrew Bernstein’s great quote: “The tragedy of theology in its distilled essence: The employment of high-powered human intellect, of genius, of profoundly rigorous logical deduction—studying nothing.”
MCHASEWALKER-
Occam’s Razor simply postulates that we shouldn’t unnecessarily multiply explanatory entities. If the history of the physical universe isn’t past-eternal (and there are very good reasons, as I’ve shown, for believing that it likely isn’t), then the two explanatory options are the physical universe popping into existence out of nothing with no cause whatever, or it being brought into existence by a transcendent Cause. As the former is absurd, the latter is clearly the preferable option, and involves only one explanatory entity, namely divine will and power.
As for your approving quotation from Bernstein (which is compelling only if one already assumes atheism is true), have you considered the irony that Occam was himself a theist?
Even if God didn’t exist, the study of theology would hardly constitute a tragedy. There’s a large body of literature by historians of science showing how medieval study of the existence of God contributed to the rise of modern science. See, e.g., the book “Beginnings of Western Science” by the eminent historian of science David Lindberg.
“for the additional reasons given in my first entry on the Kalam, it is less plausible than the cosmos being brought into existence by a Cause which in the nature of the case must be immaterial, spaceless,…””
I realize that this isn’t about the Bible. But assuming that Dr. Marshall believes in it’s claims it would be interesting to know how he would reconcile it’s claim that man was created in the image of God when he is claiming that God is “immaterial” and “spaceless”.
I would like to know how something of those specific characteristics could have an “Image” to start with.
Probably something about souls.
And the idea that man does not have all the properties God has. Then humans would just be gods. Rather, they have some reflection of some of God’s properties.
OU812INVU-
Christian and Jewish theologians have typically said that man being “made in the image of God” refers to man’s existence as a rational, moral being. Theologians have also pointed to other human distinctives such as aesthetic sensitivities and love.
Most of this is beyond my ken to discuss in depth, but I noticed three things in Dr. Marshall’s reply that I’d love to see addressed by either Dr. Marshall or Dr. Carrier.
A) I think it’s fair to say that mathematical entities do not in fact, have any *real existence. They are abstract concepts. The number four does not actually exist – it is an abstract concept used to describe the amount of a thing. So that somewhat mocking paragraph doesn’t seem to hold up in my opinion.
B) How is “time transcendent existence” to be defined? The only thing that can be said to exist apart from space and time, would be abstract concepts (and technically those require the existence in space-time of a conceptualizer), and abstract concepts do not effect physical cause directly upon energy or matter. Thus it would seem that to suggest an entity existing transcendent of time, necessitates (by our current knowledge) that such an entity could be no more than an abstract concept and ergo could not have a causal effect on or toward the metaphysical existence of objective reality.
C) The arguments against an infinite past apply just as forcefully to a conjecture of an infinite entity. If it is impossible to go into an infinite past due to mathematical absurdities, then it is ipso facto also impossible to have an infinite entity for the same reason because that very entity necessitates the same regression of infinite past only more complex, even if we allow for “time transcendent existence.” Just because the infinity goes from one of time past to one of nonsensical timeless past, doesn’t remove the infinite entity from the infinite past problem. An infinite entity still leaves us with the infinite past problem, but tries to skirt that by moving it outside of the time dimension to make the infinite entity “untouchable” while hammering against the notion of an infinite past time, which seems a little bit intellectually dishonest.
As I said though, this is deeper water than I normally go into, so I’m open to hearing responses and seeing where I may be right or where I may be wrong in my assessments.
Those are also good points, I agree.
I didn’t have room to raise them in my own entry, but I’d like to see them addressed, too.
JASONR-
Good questions. It is certainly fair to ARGUE that mathematical entities have no real existence, but one can’t simply “say” or ASSERT it, as there is a huge body of philosophical literature on both sides of the question. Some physicists think that mathematical entities are the ultimate reality and that physical things are simply derivative. Have you watched the 10-minute Roger Penrose interview I linked above? If not, I’d encourage you to do so, as it’s an excellent introduction to the topic. Or just read some of Plato’s writings.
But whatever position one takes on mathematical ontology, my point is that it’s illegitimate to try to reject the existence of God “out of the gate” by claiming, without argument, that nothing exists outside space and time.
Moreover, even if one believed mathematical entities have no real existence, it wouldn’t follow that God has no real existence. If you want to listen to something really lucid and fascinating on this topic, see William Lane Craig’s two brief podcasts on the Roger Penrose interview linked above:
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/reasonable-faith-podcast/roger-penrose-interview-part-1/
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/reasonable-faith-podcast/roger-penrose-interview-part-2/
As for defining time-transcendent existence: time is a relation between objects that are apprehended in an order of succession or that objectively exist in such an order. God’s existence, prior to the creation of the world at least (and perhaps after–that is debatable) would involve no such succession, as God is unchanging and absolute, and his knowledge is non-discursive, and there is nothing physical existing. For more, see William Lane Craig, “God, Time and Eternity” (https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/scholarly-writings/divine-eternity/god-time-and-eternity/).
Finally, to your question about whether “arguments against an infinite past apply just as forcefully to a conjecture of an infinite entity [God],” they would not because divine infinity is a qualitative, not a quantitative, notion. Applied to God, “infinite” simply means that he is unlimited, not that he is, say, composed of an infinite number of atoms (in which case the argument would apply; but it doesn’t because, as Jesus put it long ago, “God is spirit”).
I appreciate your thoughtful engagement.
Thank you Dr. Marshall for the thoughtful reply and for offering your explanations and counterpoints. I do appreciate that. I do however have a few responses. I know your time is limited, so I’ll *try not to be too verbose here.
I think that’s a fair point but the “no real existence” assertion is less a conjectural postulate and more based on the current body of knowledge regarding the unlikelihood of real existence of mathematical entities verses their function as a concept. While there are hypothetical possibilities of the real existence of mathematical entities, I believe the weight of the current understanding more soundly supports the assertion that they have no real existence.
Given that I’ve only dipped my toe into mathematical ontology however, I’ll be sure to watch the Penrose interview and while I’m familiar with many of WLC’s positions, I’ll get to those podcasts as time permits.
I have a couple of problems with this statement. First, we’re still looking to establish the existence of god and how such existence would cohesively fit within our current understanding of physics and the universe. So to assign such properties as god’s state prior to the creation of the world, or that his existence “would involve no such succession, as God is unchanging and absolute, and his knowledge is non-discursive” is adding several suppositions to the argument that cannot be supportive of his existence as they themselves are unsubstantiated. To throw in the mix that “God is unchanging and absolute, and his knowledge is non-discursive” moves away from explaining and supporting the argument for his existence, to defining the nature of his existence. This is getting the cart before the horse and also seems to be pointing to the supposition to support itself.
In regard to the phrase “there is nothing physical existing,” I think we’re back to a problem of defining existence. Saying “nothing physical existing” is essentially saying “no thing existing” because as our current knowledge and understanding of existence stands, only abstract concepts/thoughts exist as non-physical entities, whereas all *things that exist are physical, consisting of energy/matter. If I told you unicorns absolutely exist, but then proceeded to explain that there is nothing physical of their existence whatsoever, nothing measurable or demonstrable in any way, the only logical conclusion is that they only exist as an abstract concept (i.e., figment of thought/imagination) or that I used an unnecessarily odd way to state that they don’t actually exist. But to assign god unsubstantiated special attributes (of his nature/existence) prior to demonstrating a convincing possibility of his existence, in order to exempt him from the demonstrable criteria of existence, seems to be special pleading him into existence as an unjustified exemption.
In regard to these statements, I think you’ve moved into special pleading territory again. This argument seeks to insert a new type infinity, “divine infinity,” with its own special definition that allows you to wiggle the problem of infinity for god out into a “safe zone.” I don’t find that justified though. Again, the nature of his existence is being presupposed to support the assertion of his existence which is fallacious, and then “infinite” is being used in a special way so that when applied to god, it carries a different weight and meaning – in other words, a bit of special pleading. And to say that “infinite” when applied to god “simply means that he is unlimited” is somewhat disingenuous and has moved the question of his infinite existence from existing in eternal past/future, to one of merely an ambiguous idea of limitlessness, which can be in regard to size, power, nature, or anything one wishes to ascribe to god. This seems a lot like moving the goalpost, e.g., an infinite god becomes entangled in the same arguments against an infinite past, so let’s just move god to a special infinity and make his infinite quality one of limit and not actual existence. And as far as “God is spirit,” we open a new can of worms where we now need to define what spirit is and what it consists of, how it is measured, detected, verified, etc. I’ll avoid that rabbit hole for now, but I don’t think it would help your argument.
While I understand the point you’re trying to make, and I appreciate your sincerity and kindness in elaborating it, I just don’t see a lot of this as sound argument. If nothing else, I find it unconvincing. Perhaps I’m still short on some understanding, which I’m more than happy to correct. I’m interested in watching the Penrose interview and digging more into mathematical ontology to see if that helps tie together your position a bit better, though I want to see your points presented with as little special pleading as possible (preferably none). But again, I appreciate your engagement on these questions/counterpoints and for taking the time to specifically address my comments.
That’s not true if he is omniscient. Either god possesses knowledge of all true propositions and therefore his mind contains an actual infinity of propositions; or there are propositions that are true that his mind cannot know because it can’t contain all propositions. But that then means some of us could know those extra propositions and therefore know things God does not; therefore God cannot by any definition be omniscient.
I’m fine with a god being proved to exist who is not literally omniscient though, so this is no problem for my entertaining arguments for the existence of God. It’s only those theists who are inexplicably insistent on denying their God might be anything short of omniscient I find peculiar. Likewise those theists who insist actual infinities cannot exist and their God has infinite quantities of knowledge.
Dr. Craig’s take: Possibly, God knows all truth as an undifferentiated whole rather than as an infinite set of propositions. Analogy: one’s field of vision is an undifferentiated whole that can be analyzed as composed of pixels. God’s knowing an infinite number of propositions is the extent of his knowledge, but not the mode of his knowledge.
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/does-god-know-an-actually-infinite-number-of-things
That does not avoid the problem. An actual infinity is an actual infinity. Calling it an “extent” rather than a “mode” doesn’t make the infinity go away.
Going with the analogy, it appears he would say that God’s knowledge is not an actual infinity, though, any more than a field of vision is an actual set of pixels. The fact that it may be analyzed in propositions doesn’t seem to entail that his knowledge itself is propositional in nature. And if his knowledge is not propositional in nature, then it doesn’t seem that omniscience necessarily entails knowing an actually infinite number of things, right?
Maths is a human invention līk morality.
Whot’s Penrōs on about?
He sounds līk J Lennox or Billy Craig as delt with at
http://bahnsenburner.blogspot.com/2015/03/craigs-eight-arguments-for-god-part-iv.html
Since there’s bit of an impasse ie
Theist: God ixists without a wher or when.
Atheist: ixisting no wher and no when = not ixisting at all = madness t believ such &c
An idea:
Why dusn’t Wollis actually demunstrāt God in space n tīm?
Here’s how (ber with me):
Adam sin’d and got kickt out by Jesus – as we did, by proxy. And we are in a fallen wurld, breathing fallen air etc
But hold on: Jesus the secund Adam, IN space n tīm, paid the sin det, setl’d the account, and unsin’d thru his cross wurk in histry. Ther can be no mor claim on us by sin.
All Wollis need demunstrāt is that physically he is now as pre-fallen man was, thanks tu Christ’s intervention in Spacetīm.
ie Wollis can demunstrāt that he dusn’t go t the toilit, nor get ill, nor get old and nor undrg program’d cell deth (apoptosis) with 70bn cells dying in his body each day. All these are consequences of the fall.
And indeed NO wun shud be subjict t the consequences of the Fall since IN actual historical fact, owing t Christ’s wurk the till has rung, the transaction is cumplēt…. UBJECTIVLY.
This Regardless of whether I accept or reject Christ in histry – just as no wun askt me whether I accept or reject Adam’s sin, and just as it’s irrelevant for me t accept or deny the fact that a light has been switcht on.
Uđrwise, Wollis’ god seems t be the Emprur’s Nū Clōz.
Sorry, none of that is intelligible. I have no idea what you are saying.
The KCA depends on an outside of matter cause. It comes to the presupposition of a God being that cause.
Science says that energy cannot be created, or destroyed, but it can change states.
A) God created the universe.
B) The universe was created by energy transmuting into simple matter. This matter got more complex over time as a result of natural laws of a physical universe.
Why would option A be a better evidenced answer over B? Wouldn’t answer A be equivalent to the ancients attributing lightning to Zeus?
Answer B is the logical conclusion untill we get more answers, or when answer A is in evidence (which it is not). Answer A is an emotional necessity. We now know what causes lightning, and one day we will know what caused our universe.
The question about B is why does the energy exist at all, what caused it to exist, and to have all those properties, that would produce all those results.
There are many possible and viable answers (much more plausible ones than fantastical super-ghosts that just exist for no reason), but the idea is that you need to get to the very first cause, that has the fewest properties and thus is most likely to exist for no reason, given that something must exist for no reason, and it’s inherently more likely to be the simplest possible something, than something enormously elaborate that leaves far too much unexplained.
B is the first law of thermodynamics. If an appeal to a disembodied supermind always existing then why not energy as this law states? This energy goes through a natural process of creating, expanding, and contracting a universe then repeats, or is this all we got?
Saying a God created the universe then wouldn’t anything go? Why not some super civilization some past, present, or future (wether time, or universe) performed an advanced experiment? It turns out to their surprise that a universe was paradoxically destined to exist through said experiment?
Wasn’t there a concern though remote that the first nuclear test would chain reaction vaporize our whole atmosphere? If God being pushed as a cause then faith statements can be made for Ming the Merciless mind controlled Dr. Hanz Zarkov into making a superweapon which Flash Gordon sabotaged then when detonated did nothing to their present. But created the universe in the past.
Anything goes…
Actually B as you stated was considerably more than just the first law of thermodynamics; but also, that law is a late production of classical-state physics; it doesn’t hold at the quantum level (and thus not likely held at the beginning). This is what I mean by a first cause is most likely going to be something far simpler than B as described (and will be part of a completed cosmological theory that will explain why the first law of thermodynamics arose at all; and why it still holds etc.).
As to “why not aliens,” that’s a regress problem: you haven’t explained by the aliens exist, why their universe exists, etc. And we are looking for, and asking about, ultimate not proximate causes. What’s the “buck stops here” explanation of everything. Not middle explanations that leave unexplained what went before.
But one can distill what I think is your point to this: there is always going to be some unexplained ontological whatsit that underlies everything that exists, some “uncaused first cause” or foundational brute fact; Marshall wants it to be a God; physicists suggest it’s a far simpler first-empty-state (or a past eternal multiverse). Both are equally foundational and unexplained (they exist “for no reason” other than simply existing). So the debate is really about: which is more likely to be the actual one? Which ontological whatsit, from the grab back of all possible ontological whatsits, underlies all reality? And to answer that (insofar as we even can answer it to any probability) we have to look at the evidence and see which it corresponds best with. This is what I explain in my opening statement to this debate.
ROBW-
Yes, it is a law of science that energy cannot be created or destroyed from other (physical) energy. Rather, energy simply changes states.
However, the clear preponderance of modern cosmology (to say nothing of the philosophical arguments against an infinite past) is that energy cannot be past-eternal. One of the key reasons for this is the second law of thermodynamics, which says that entropy is always increasing in a closed system. If this is so, it would seem the universe can’t have existed forever, because if it did, it would already be in state of thermal equilibrium (dead stars and the same temperature everywhere), which of course it isn’t.
That’s not true at the quantum level. The First Law of Thermodynamics is regularly violated below the Planck scale. Virtual particles can spontaneously form and thus increase spontaneously the amount of energy in a system, as long as they dissolve before the passing of a whole Planck time, leaving the net energy of the resulting macro-system the same. This is actually a key component of many quantum cosmological theories, and of the Inflationary Big Bang Theory itself (e.g. “the fact that energy is not conserved in an expanding universe is absolutely central to getting the predictions of primordial nucleosynthesis correct”).
This is also true of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Which is why if the universe ever shrank below the Planck scale (as all cosmic bounce theories propose it has), the Second Law no longer applies to what then follows, and thus does not foreclose a past eternal sequence of bounce-states. As numerous cosmologists I’ve cited point out, including Vilenkin himself.
For anyone who wants more instruction on this, here is a video full of cosmological scientists explaining it:
The Story of Loop Quantum Gravity – From the Big Bounce to Black Holes
If you are short on time you can skip within it right to Has the universe always existed?, Why was the big bang such low entropy?, and Are contracting universes unstable and so what if they are?, which all illustrate points I’ve already made before in this debate.
Dr. Marshall,
Way back in your first post on the subject, you stated that you held “Ex nihilo, nihil fit to be a self-evident axiom of metaphysics.” What I think you’ve done is reworked this metaphysical axiom into the first premise of your KCA. I see “nothing cannot be a cause of the existence of something that begins to exist” as being functionally equivalent to “everything must have a cause for its existence if it begins to exist”
If this is indeed what you have done, then the conclusion of your KCA is so because you have axiomatically defined it as such. But suppose I arrived to the conversation unwilling to grant your premise one or ex nihilo, nihil fit. How would you convince me that it’s true? And if I don’t aceept it as true, why should I accept the conclusion of your KCA as true?
Also, and this is more for my own general curiosity than because I hope to make an actual point on it. But have you ever asked a cosmologist or any kind of physicist at all what they think about the cosmological argument? What was their response? Were they persuadded by it? Why or why not? Why do you suppose it is that physicists are the group of scientists least likely to believe in a god?
Benjamin,
Part of the support for the first premise of the Kalam, “If the universe began to exist, the universe has a cause” (or, “Whatever begins to exist has a cause”), is my claim that “ex nihilo nihil fit” is a self-evident axiom of metaphysics.
But I also gave (https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/15276) three other reasons why we shouldn’t think being should arise from non-being. What do you think of those reasons?
To your “curiosity” question: There are many reasons why people believe or disbelieve in God. In my experience they are usually aesthetic rather than intellectual. I have yet to meet a single atheist who wished God existed. I don’t know if you’re an atheist, but if so, do you? There are also powerful sociological reasons that are operative.
If you read the writings, or listen to interviews of, cosmologists who are atheists, the reasons they give for their atheism are usually philosophical rather than scientific. And most scientists today have no training in philosophy, so their expertise does not extend to that discipline. So we have to be wary of the “halo” effect (a basic psychological error where people naturally extend a person’s expertise, fame, etc.) beyond the area of that person’s expertise.
One of the things I like about Vilenkin is that he is humble enough to recognize this. He specifically states that his expertise extends to the question of whether the universe had a beginning, but that when it comes to the question of what philosophical or theological implications should be drawn from that, he has no expertise.
As for the intellectual dynamic itself, I think one of the founders of modern science, Francis Bacon, summed it up best: “A little philosophy inclineth a man’s mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth him about to religion, and a Deity.”
Bacon was talking about “natural philosophy” (what people called science back then), and his point was that an understanding of natural laws gives people an explanatory framework that, without further consideration, can seem complete. But further consideration (“depth in philosophy”) shows that the complex of natural laws is only part of, and not the whole, picture.
“And most scientists today have no training in philosophy, so their expertise does not extend to that discipline.”
Philosophy is speculation. It’s two people sitting in a bar shooting the shit. Anyone can wonder and that’s all that’s going on here in this forum. You need a trained, educated mind for that? A scientist can speculate as well with a little bit more knowledge to go on than a ‘fool’osopher. A scientist, at times, can also produce facts to back up their speculation or hunches. Philosophers only wonder “what if.” 🙂
Charles, do note that there is a lot more to philosophy as a knowledge discipline than that, and it is possible for inexperience in it to impair one’s ability to correctly reason and judge matters in its sphere.
Everything is a subdivision of philosophy though.
Science is really just philosophy with better data (see my analysis in Is Philosophy Stupid?). So subdivisions of specific subjects will be better understood by scientists in those fields.
Hence, for example, cosmologists know cosmology and mathematicians mathematics, and philosophers can’t trump them in that. One cannot claim philosophers understand cosmological questions better than cosmologists do or mathematical questions better than mathematicians do. But they can (possibly) claim better understanding in other things outside those fields and perhaps even foundational to them (e.g. philosophy of science, philosophy of mathematics), because they’ve studied those things more.
So whether a lack of expertise in a specific philosophical subject matters, depends on what precisely we’re talking about as a subject.
Charles,
Philosophy is vital to a wide range of human inquiry, including science. There is a HUGE body of scholarly literature on the historical relationship between philosophy and science. Read the debates between Leibniz and Newton and you’ll see philosophy all over the place.
For a short, modern article on the relevance of philosophy to science, see NYU philosopher Tim Maudlin’s “Why Physics Needs Philosophy” (https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/physics-needs-philosophy/). Maudlin himself has a deep education in physics.
Thinkers who reject philosophy will invariably end up doing philosophy when they write. The problem is that they’ll be doing it without thinking about it at all, and thus they will make any number of elementary philosophical blunders.
That.
Spot on.
Dr. Marshall,
Apologies for the delay. It seems that my first response was swallowed by the forums somehow. I’ll work my response backwards from the ‘curiosity’ portion and then address your three reasons to accept ex nihilo, nihil fit.
Forgive me for misunderstanding if you have, but it doesn’t seem as if you have asked any cosmologists for their take on your version of the KCA. I’m not sure why not; if I was attempting to argue something so far outside my wheelhouse as cutting-edge, before-the-Big-Bang cosmology, I would at least want to run my theories and conclusions past someone in the field before I went and argued for the position I’d arrived at.
Regardless, I’m not sure how the halo effect explains the non-belief among physicists. If there was a halo effect happening, wouldn’t it be more or less consistent across all branches of science? But chemists and biologists seem more willing to believe in a god than physicists, and I don’t know if a halo effect satisfactorily explains that. In any case, you did volunteer your ‘off-the-cuff’ insights, so I appreciate that. Thank you.
You also said “I have yet to meet a single atheist who wished God existed. I don’t know if you’re an atheist, but if so, do you?” I am an atheist, and if you really have never met one that wished god existed, it pleases me to be the first. This is not my blog, and my thoughts and opinions aren’t really at the core of the debate between you and Dr. Carrier, so I won’t elaborate on that point further here. I’ll just say that regardless of whether or not I wish there was a god, I don’t believe in doxastic voluntarism, so it doesn’t really matter what we want to be true, except insofar as out biases and wishes suppress our ability to critically examine evidence and argument.
Now then, your three reasons to accept ex nihilo, nihil fit.
1) It is a universally verified, and never falsified, principle of experience.
But it isn’t. We have a universally verified series of observations that whenever anything begins to exist, it does so because of a re-arrangement of previously existing matter and energy. As I said in other responses and comments, we have never seen nothing do anything, or fail to do anything. If you have, could you please point nothing out to me? Where does nothing exist? And how many times have you witnessed it do something or fail to do something?
And while we’re on the subject, what does it mean for nothing to exist? Non-being is, as I understand it, devoid of all properties. Which would include existence, n’est pas? So how can it meaningfully be said to exist or not to exist? But even if we were to grant that existence is the one property we can ascribe to a state of non-being (which is still an assertion, given my previous paragraph, because I am not convinced that we have ever observed non-being anywhere), what would prevent it from producing stuff? Isn’t the ability or inability to produce stuff yet another property we’re putting on a state devoid of properties?
I can’t accept 1) because insofar as it’s even sensible, it hasn’t been demonstrated, merely asserted.
That brings us to:
2) If something can come from nothing, it’s inexplicable why just everything and anything doesn’t pop into existence out of nothing. Why is “nothing” so discriminatory about what it “turns into” and when it does so?
And I have largely the same questions and objections. How many observations have we made about non-being to determine what it can and can’t turn into? And is it not sort of begging the question within the context of the KCA. If one is going to say that they see no reason why stuff can’t pop into existence out of nothing, responding by saying “Then absolutely everything could have popped into existence”. Well. Yeah. And?
This may just be a fault in my own logic, but arguing “nothing can’t produce stuff because if it did the universe could have come into existence from nothing” is quite literally petitio principia.
3) As the late philosopher of science Bernulf Kanitscheider pointed out, a denial of the causal principle would put us “in head-on collision with the most successful ontological commitment” in the history of science, “a metaphysical hypothesis which has proved so fruitful in every corner of science.”
But isn’t that just shifting the burden of proof? I am not denying A . I’m simply saying that I don’t see sufficient reason to accept A because, as I stated above, insofar as it’s actually cogent, it’s undemonstrated.
Benjamin,
Thanks for your reply. I’ll start with the aside we were discussing on wishful thinking.
Of course wishful thinking doesn’t mean one’s wishes are true. Most theists want God to exist, most atheists don’t, which is why the common “wishful thinking” objection (whether used by theists or atheists) is pointless. That sword cuts both ways.
Why do you wish God existed, though? (And please say something more substantive than you’d like to just have another life after this one.) And if the God you wished existed did in fact exist, what would he be like?
You seem to have misunderstood my point about the halo effect, which was simply that the question of God’s existence is a philosophical one, and as such, the expertise of scientists doesn’t extend to it. Vilenkin humbly acknowledges this, as I pointed out.
That said, there are plenty of scientists, eminent ones, who believe in God. George Ellis, who is among the most eminent living cosmologists, is a case in point. Two of the most learned younger cosmologists, Aron Wall and Luke Barnes, are two other examples. One of the most eminent molecular biologists in the world, James Tour, is another example. Not to mention some of the greatest scientists in history: Boyle, Newton, Faraday, and even Einstein!
There are good sociological reasons why modern scientists may not believe in God. And Francis Bacon’s classic line that I quoted above is a trenchant psychological explanation.
To your engagement of the three additional reasons I provided for believing in “ex nihilo nihil fit”:
Re. (1), you seem to have completely missed the point, which is simply that whenever we see things coming into existence, we see them doing so from some prior cause. What could be a simpler observation?
You ask what it would mean for “nothing to exist.” Obviously it is the equivalent of saying, “I had nothing for lunch”—which means, not that you had SOMETHING for lunch, and that that SOMETHING was NOTHING, but rather, “I didn’t have anything for lunch.” A state of absolutely nothingness is not a state of existence; it’s not even a state. Philosophically, nothingness is simply a universal negation, a state of affairs in which nothing whatever exists.
Re. (2): You say you have the same question (“If being can arise from non-being, why doesn’t anything and everything pop into existence out of nothing”), but then you mystifyingly reply, “So what?”
Well, to spell out what I think would be obvious to a man of your intelligence, if (1) we DON’T IN FACT see things popping into existence out of nothing, and (2) we moreover see no logical reason why, if things COULD pop into existence out of nothing, they WOULDN’T do so quite frequently or even all the time,
[notice your confusingly substituting for this an absurd statement which I did not make, “nothing can’t produce stuff because if it did the universe could have come into existence from nothing”]—
then it obviously follows, by the basic principles of empiricism and reason, that (3) there’s very good reason to suppose that things CAN’T actually come into existence from nothing and no cause.
Re. (3)–[the Bernulf Kanitscheider 3], of course it’s not “shifting the burden of proof.” It’s simply providing another reason why we should believe “ex nihilo nihil fit,” namely that it has been such an fruitful concept in adding to what we all agree is a substantial body of knowledge (indeed, many atheists think science is the ONLY body of knowledge!).
The “fruitfulness” concept is absolutely pervasive in the scientific enterprise. Of course it’s not meant to be an axiomatic “demonstration,” but what of it? That’s an absurd epistemological standard to apply here.
This is false. Physicists have demonstrated that we have a very empirically established reason why we don’t observe it happening frequently: the things you usually mean (e.g. rabbits, universes) are extraordinarily complex and therefore their spontaneous appearance is extraordinarily improbable—which by definition means extraordinarily infrequent. Whereas things simple enough to spontaneously appear “frequently,” we actually observe do! This is the virtual particle field of quantum theory, which has produced confirmed predictions in observation.
Thus, for example, look at the probability calculation in the Carroll-Chen paper I cited and linked to: that is the very real frequency that “Big Bangs” will just spontaneously happen uncaused, entailed by established quantum mechanics. That frequency is so small we cannot expect to see one in even a trillion trillion trillion trillion…trillion years. And yet it is still a nonzero frequency. Let the universe coast in heat death for a trillion trillion trillion trillion…trillion years and inevitably a Big Bang will occur. Uncaused. The probability is actually effectively 100%. Because as a timeline approaches infinity, all nonzero probabilities approach 1.
What one need ask instead is what constrains the possible outcomes in the ways we’ve observed, namely, why are the only particles spontaneously formed and dissolved at the quantum scale those we’ve catalogued (or inferred) into what we now call the Standard Model? Why not weird other particles, that are nevertheless super-simple and thus able to arise uncaused frequently enough for us to observe them (or their effects)?
Answering that question is actually the purpose of the fundamental physics being explored now in two camps known as M-Theory and QLG Theory, i.e. Superstring and Loop theories. Both have amassed abundant evidence to suspect the reason is precisely that spacetime’s shape (or the structure of bound loops) geometrically constrains what can manifest inside it; change the spacetime shape (e.g. add more open or closed dimensions), and you change what particles (and thus what things) can arise within a given spacetime uncaused. Outside spacetime however, i.e. before any spacetime exists to constrain what can arise within it, there cannot be any such constraints. Because something must exist to constrain what can spontaneously appear. And when nothing exists, no such constraints exist either.
Ergo, our observation of how our local spacetime constrains what can happen, has zero relevance to what would constrain the possible outcomes without a fixed spacetime manifold.
In other words, before spacetime takes a definite shape, no constraints exist on what shape it can or will take (because there is nothing “outside” of spacetime forcing it to take only one shape and no other). Multiverses follow, as I and several cosmologists have argued.
In my example (in Merdae Fit), we start with a single point of infinitely dimensioned spacetime (i.e. spacetime that has no fixed limit on which dimensionalities can become extended). Its inherent instability will spontaneously produce a virtual infinity of bubbles of differently constrained spacetime—some regions of millions of dimensions; some regions of only four; some regions of only two; and so on. Nothing exists to stop this. By definition. For if something existed to stop it, that would mean something preceded all that exists, which is logically impossible (“existence” cannot predate “existence”).
Dr. Marshall,
I’m sure Dr. Carrier will give his input and make the relevant comments in his next reply, but for now I wanted to add my two cents and ask a few questions. I’m also sure you are very busy (as Dr. Carrier noted at the beginning), so I apologize if this is too much to respond to at this time. But I’ve been following this debate for the last few weeks, and your repeated defense of the KCA has prompted me to make some, IMO, relevant comments. Specifically, I want to focus on the question of infinities and whether they can actually exist. This has been a major point of contention between the two of you, and while I believe Dr. Carrier has done an adequate job of explaining why infinities can exist without logical paradoxes, there are two follow ups I want to explore, one a request for clarification, and another regarding a contradiction in your argument. (Also, if at any point you feel I’ve misrepresented your arguments or position in any way, I apologize for that, and will be happy to amend my points if I’m truly in error. I also apologize if others have already raised similar points in previous comments. I admit I’ve only skimmed them, wanting to focus on the main posts by you and Dr. Carrier.)
Much of the dispute regarding whether or not actual infinities can exist seems to rest on the idea of “adding on” to a series, and whether this is possible in such a set. Specifically, you have disputed the notion that there could have been an infinite series of events in the past, since this implies we’ve traversed an infinite series of events already, meaning we would never have reached “now.” But the issue it seems is whether adding an “event” to a series has the same ontology as, say, adding another dollar to an ever-increasing bank account. Because unlike things like dollars, which have an obvious and defined set of qualities, an “event” seems to be nothing more than an arbitrary human construct with no set definition. For example, a stick of dynamite exploding can take mere milliseconds, whereas someone jumping over a sizable pit could take several seconds. Yet both could reasonably be labeled an “event.”
I would therefore like you to clarify what exactly you mean by “event” when you say we could never have traversed an infinite series of them. Because as far as I can tell, events do not appear to have the same ontology you seem to think creates paradoxes for adding on to a series.
On the B-theory of time (which most physicists and philosophers agree is the correct view), all events, past, present, and future, equally occupy existence, and so there does not appear to be any problem with so-called events occurring over an infinite series.
In short, please define what you mean by “event,” (i.e. specify its ontology), and why “adding on” them creates the problems you perceive to be true.
Even if we grant your position that it is impossible to traverse an infinite number of events in order to reach “now,” I believe there is an inherent contradiction between this and your own theistic view. Specifically with regards to your view of God. You’re own view posits God as an eternal entity (in your first post you describe God as an “eternal mind”). As such, you believe he has existed eternally into both the past and will in the future.Thus, God himself is infinite. But if God is truly an eternal mind, this would entail he has had an infinite number of thoughts. If so, how would the universe have ever been created in the first place?
In other words, one of God’s thoughts would had to have been the one where he decided to create the universe. But if he’s had an infinite number of thoughts then, by your own reasoning, he could never have traversed an infinite number of thoughts to arrive at the thought to create the universe. And thus, he could never have created the universe.
If God does exist, I have no problem accepting the idea he could exist eternally. But this is simply because I have no problem accepting that the universe could be eternal as well. Therefore, I would like you to explain how you can reconcile your position that an infinite series of events cannot be traversed to get to “now,” but how God presumably could traverse an infinite number of thoughts to arrive at the thought to create the universe.
As I said, I’m sure you’re busy and do not expect you to make my comment your top priority, but I felt this was all “food for thought” for perhaps future discussions on this issue. And again, I apologize for any misrepresentations of your position, if I’ve made any, and will be happy to correct them.
Wishing you well,
—Adam
Adam–
Thanks for your thoughtful questions here and below. I’ll respond to the above first (may have to respond to your below later, as it’s getting quite late!).
You point out that an “event” can take up different intervals of time. Of course: but whatever time-interval one wants to use, there is still (on the supposition of a past-eternal universe) an infinite number of them that has taken place. It doesn’t matter whether it is seconds, milliseconds, minutes, hours, days, etc.
You question whether “whether adding an ‘event’ to a series has the same ontology as, say, adding another dollar to an ever-increasing bank account.” You are combining my two separate arguments here.
One has to do with absurdities that seem to result from the supposition of an infinite number of things existing (say, the Federal Reserve having an infinite number of sequentially numbered bills). The other has to do with the impossibility of completing an infinite series by adding one member after another (in this case, the infinite series of moments between “now and past infinity).
The absurdities you get from the first argument generally revolve around thought experiments that involve, not ADDING to the infinite series, but SUBTRACTING different amounts (vastly different amounts, even) and coming up with contradictory answers. One can run the same problems with division. That is why, in standard transfinite set theory, inverse operations like subtraction and division are prohibited. But in the real world, no one could “stop” the Fed from giving away whatever number of bills it wanted to.
Re. the implication of my anti-infinity argument for God’s thoughts, theologians have never held God’s knowledge to be discrete and discursive, much less sequential, in the way you seem to imagine. Rather, the doctrine of divine omniscience is that God’s knowledge is absolute and entire, a single whole (unlike you and me, who, even if we may know a whole lot of things, must constantly be calling up various pieces of knowledge to our consciousness as the moment requires; or again, in thinking through an argument, proceed sequentially through the steps).
The B-theory of time, which holds that past, present and future are simply a static block and that temporal becoming is illusory, may indeed a way of escaping the Kalam (some philosophers think the Kalam can work even on a B theory, but I’m not sure).
Yes, many scientists (physicists, to be precise) embrace the B-theory, but that is because it is what they are usually taught, and they mistakenly infer that Einstein’s theory of general relativity requires it, when in fact that was just Minkowski’s interpretation of Einstein’s theory, and Lorentz gave a mathematically equivalent interpretation on the A-theory (see this 15-minute podcast for a discussion: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/media/reasonable-faith-podcast/science-and-the-a-theory-of-time/).
Interestingly, I recently finished reading the book “Time Reborn” by theoretical physicist Lee Smolin (who happens to be an atheist), and he argues that while the A and B theories are mathematically equivalent, the B theory has been an obstacle to progress in physics.
However that may be, there are a number of good philosophical reasons to subscribe to an A-theory. One is what philosophers call the “inerraticability” of tense from human thought and language. As philosopher D.H. Mellor writes, “Tense is so striking an aspect of reality that only the most compelling argument justifies denying it.”
Another is that we experience the present AS PRESENT, as becoming and then passing away. The B-theory also has bizarre implications for personal identity.
So I would just say, if science doesn’t require the B-theory (and if Smolin is right, may even hinder scientific progress), and if there are all these problematic issues with B-theory, we’d need to have some very good reasons to accept B over A—certainly a better reason than just trying to find a way to escape the Kalam! (I’m not saying that’s you, but I do come across the B-theory objection frequently from people who have obviously never weighted A vs. B and probably wouldn’t even know there was a B-theory if not for reading about the Kalam).
Note for those interested these arguments for A Theory are refuted in my book Sense and Goodness without God (index, “time, theory of”).
And the reason science does require B-Theory now is that we have verified in observation that there is no fixed simultaneity of events (which means there is no unified single moment of time as A-Theory requires), and some things can move more slowly through time than others and yet still collide subsequently in a common moment, which is logically impossible on A-Theory. And that two event’s distance from each other in time is relative to the observer (and thus not a singular fixed amount) is only possible in B-Theory. See my discussion.
This is not a correct understanding of transfinite set theory. Operations are not arbitrarily disallowed, as if when a model were made real suddenly they’d be allowed. That’s not how this works. Rather, the model itself entails their effects differ from other models, and therefore those effects would differ even when the model were made real. In other words, it’s not that mathematicians throw their hands up and just say “well, we just won’t do that” and then when the model becomes real suddenly “we can do that.” Rather, the model entails “doing that” has different effects on the model than it does on other models; ergo those differences will transfer to the real world. Not be removed by the real world.
To illustrate what I mean, let’s take the example Marshall references here, and now I’ll quote him from earlier:
Marshall has simply not stated the outcome correctly. He has mistakenly used the phrase “identical number” in the meaning only applicable to finite numbers, i.e. numbers located on a number line. As infinite quantities are not located on a number line, it is false to say they are “identically numbered” in the sense of having the same location on a number line. They don’t.
Infinities can share cardinality; they do not share location on a number line. We can say one infinity is “identical” to another in cardinality, but that does not mean they will share all the same features or contents.
To say the Federal Reserve has “uncountably many bills” in both cases is simply true. That therefore cannot be used as a reason to claim it is impossible. That taking different amounts of bills out of the bank does not leave countably many bills left over is simply what happens. It is not an impossible outcome. It’s the actual outcome.
This is simply how infinite quantities behave. No logical contradiction is produced by it. As has been shown countless times to now. Ergo, what happens in the model conceptually will simply happen in the model in reality. I’ve cited a dozen sources on this. Marshall has cited not even one (as not even the long-deceased Hilbert concluded his paradoxes were logically impossible; and Marshall’s own cited text on Hilbert contains a modern introduction making this very point!).
I’d also just like to add one point specifically in regards to this post. Again, I’m sure Dr. Carrier will make the relevant comments and defend his position, but I want to draw attention to your criticism of his description of the ontology of infinities. You describe Dr. Carrier’s explanation of infinities having different properties from finite sets as “nonsense,” but he’s hardly alone in thinking so. For example, according to mathematician James East:
“If actual infinite collections were to exist, then they would naturally have properties that were not shared by finite collections. […] [J]ust knowing that an infinite subcollection has been removed from an infinite collection of objects does not allow one to determine how many objects remain. But this property itself does not entail that actual infinite collections are impossible.” –James East, “Infinity Minus Infinity,” Faith and Philosophy 30 (4):429-433 (2013).
And it’s also worth noting that even other Christians recognize this, such as physicist Aron Wall:
“t= –∞ is not a time, rather it is the limit of a sequence of arbitrarily early times. There are (not necessarily) any actual ‘objects’ or ‘things’ existing at t= –∞, rather things exist at finite values of time. So I would answer the objection you raise by saying that no actual entities ever existed which would still need to ‘traverse’ an infinite amount of time. (Just as objects can exist at arbitrarily late moments, in the other time direction.) No two actually existing times differ by a[n] infinite amount of duration.” –Aron Wall, quoted in Jonathan Pearce, Did God Create the Universe from Nothing? (Onus Books, 2016), p. 55.
Furthermore, Christian cosmologist Don Page agrees we do not know if the universe had a beginning, and that it could be eternal.
“We simply do not know whether or not our universe had a beginning[…] I myself have also favored a bounce model in which there is something like a quantum superposition of semiclassical spacetimes […] in most of which the universe contracts from past infinite time and then has a bounce to expand forever.” –Don Page http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2015/03/20/guest-post-don-page-on-god-and-cosmology/
I second the question raised by Benjamin above. How many physicists and cosmologists have you talked to about this? You may truly believe an actual infinite is impossible, but we should explore why you realize this, while they do not.
Dr. Marhsall Wrote:
“I have yet to meet a single atheist who wished God existed.”
Likewise I don’t supposed that most skeptics that lack a belief in Bigfoot or unicorns wish those things were true. They simply lack a belief in such things. Which admittedly begs the question, why do those skeptics hate Bigfoot and unicorns? Because certainly it is not for the reason that evidence doesn’t support their existence .
Actually, I am an atheist who wishes a god existed…one that was actually a good person. That would be wonderful. There would be vastly less injustice and misery in the world and we could all live forever in good company and learning. But alas, we can plainly see, no such god exists. And that’s sad.
Marshall is confusing atheists who don’t want the horrific brutal monster of the Old and New Testaments to exist because that would be terrifyingly miserable—the kind of brute that would allow so much injustice and misery in the world and do nothing about it and not even explain why, and that would actually even tolerate there being any kind of eternal hell—with not wanting any god to exist. Those aren’t the same things.
A genuinely good god would be great! There just isn’t one. Meanwhile the one Christians believe exists is an alien horror.
I find the proposition that most atheists wouldn’t prefer it if some type of (kind) god or life force existed extremely implausible. I don’t see why that’d be any different for a great variety of fictional species. Or are you looking for a stronger reaction than that it would probably be neat if there were unicorns on the steppes of wherever?
Indeed, Christians are so blind to what’s going on here, they continually mistake “Your God is horrific” as “God would be horrific.” And thus think when atheists talk about how horrible it would be if the Christian monster existed, Christians incorrectly “hear” atheists saying they don’t want “any” god to exist. Because unlike Christians, atheists can imagine far better gods than the Christian god; indeed, once you can imagine that, you pretty much become an atheist. That is, indeed, a major reason why we are atheists.
I discuss this delusional disconnect among Christians a bit from a different angle in Randal Rauser on Treating Atheists Like People.
Dr Marshall
You probably believe that P1 of the Kalam argument is a metaphysical principle which is not created by god but is derived from him (like all logical, mathematical, ethical, etc principles). But that makes your argument somewhat circular. Because if god does not exist then such principle does not need to exists as a necessary metaphysical principle.
On your P2, after reading your argument and responses I still have difficulty understanding why you insist that universe had a beginning when most cosmologists admit that they don’t know the answer. Kalam argument is based on the A-theory of time. If you adopt this, then a past event is no longer exists; thereby infinite past does not mean an actual infinity. In principle we can label the past events with numbers and then argue that subtraction does not work on infinity. But you can also label the future events (they exists in gods mind because he knows the future) and run into similar problems.