Tentatively Christian; looking for a reasonable discussion

[Mudhammam]

I call sock puppet.

ChadWooters is the object, sock puppet is the form.

[Lemonvariable72]

I call sock puppet.

ChadWooters is the object, sock puppet is the form.

Actually I wasn't even thinking of wooters.

[Mudhammam]

ChadWooters is the object, sock puppet is the form.

Actually I wasn't even thinking of wooters.

Mezmos = Wooters

[Esquilax]

I'm sorry, but almost everything here is absolute garbage so far as refuting the first-cause argument.

Absolutely correct. They just keep knocking down straw men. When someone points to the error of their ways (trying to translate the Scholastic tradition into the language of modern analytic philosophy), they just prop the straw men back up and start over.

I think it's very telling that the atheists all respond with lengthy critiques of the argument, while the theists can't muster anything more than a weak "you're wrong and your arguments are bad." At least have the wherewithal to attempt an argument, theists.

[robvalue]

Wooters is a panentheist now? He's dropped that Swede stuff?

[LastPoet]

All I have to say about this is that he will receive a couple of cactii shortly. It should be obvious why.

[SteelCurtain]

All I have to say about this is that he will receive a couple of cactii shortly. It should be obvious why.

A couple!? Geez, it seems the comeuppance has gotten stiffer. Or pricklier...

[Delicate]

I'm sorry, but almost everything here is absolute garbage so far as refuting the first-cause argument.

Argh... Okay, I didn't want to get into this discussion but I will make a brief post. I haven't really bothered to read through the previous posts about Kalam so I don't know if anyone has already addressed these issues.

If the argument is that everything that exists has to have a cause and the theist insists that the cause is God, this is how I would respond.

#1. For the sake of brevity, I will just accept the claim that "everything must have a cause" and avoid going down that path entirely.

#2. I will also accept the claim that the universe has a cause. However, if everything MUST have a cause, then what created God? What created the entity that created God? You get the idea. This creates an infinite regress and the only option the theist has is to claim that God didn't need a cause, which completely invalidates his entire argument. You can't claim that everything must have a cause and then say, "Oh wait, everything except...." That is special pleading. Kalam is based on a fundamentally flawed idea and is not a sound logical argument.

The claim isn't "everything must have a cause" but "everything that begins to exist must have a cause." The sets of objects under discussion are different in both propositions.

As for your second point, I think the theist would say that God, by definition, has been defined as an uncreated being, like a bachelor is, by definition, unmarried. If you're talking of a being that has all of God's properties, except it was created, then it couldn't be God (just like someone that's like a bachelor in every way except he's married, he isn't really a bachelor). If you want to attack the notion of God qua uncaused cause, your best bet would be to concede that there must be an uncaused cause, and then ask "Why must the cause be a person, as opposed to a force of some other kind."

---

Why is it garbage? Please elaborate.

It takes a lot more time to correct errors than it takes to make errors.

So I'll let you pick what you think is the strongest argument against the first cause. Or maybe even the top three, and I'll respond to them here.

In fact, if they are good objections, I'll even apologize and eat my hat.

[robvalue]

That's called special pleading. If you can just announce that some things didn't begin to exist, then how you do you know the universe began to exist?

And of course, "a cause" is not "a god". Not even close.

[Esquilax]

The claim isn't "everything must have a cause" but "everything that begins to exist must have a cause." The sets of objects under discussion are different in both propositions.

And the fact that the "begins to exist" part was a lazy workaround addition to Kalam to avoid being asked the question "who created god?" doesn't bother you because...?

As for your second point, I think the theist would say that God, by definition, has been defined as an uncreated being, like a bachelor is, by definition, unmarried.

And you think it's okay to just define things that way for no other reason than rhetorical advantage, without evidence or justification, because...?

Besides, if you actually think that's a cogent way to argue this point then an equally cogent response would be to simply define the universe as uncreated, or as self-creating, and leave it at that.

It takes a lot more time to correct errors than it takes to make errors.

Yeah, tell me about it.

So I'll let you pick what you think is the strongest argument against the first cause. Or maybe even the top three, and I'll respond to them here.

In fact, if they are good objections, I'll even apologize and eat my hat.

Is there any particular reason you've moved the goalposts so that now we're talking about a first cause in general, and not the Kalam argument itself? The former isn't particularly objectionable- though a tad unsupported, which is really all the argument we need against it- while the latter is shot through with assumptions and assertions. We were discussing the latter all up until now; is that what you'd like to keep discussing?

If that's the case, I made a post with something like three objections to Kalam in it, all of which are valid. Why not start there?