(October 17, 2016 at 12:15 pm)bennyboy Wrote: Causality applies to THINGS IN our world. You do not know that the Universe itself was ever caused to come into existence. If you are going to say, "Well, everything is caused, but something may be uncaused," then this is special pleading-- and if you want to do that, why not hypothesize that the Universe is eternal and uncreated, instead of inventing a Sky Daddy to fulfill that role?
The Prime Mover and First Cause demonstrations take no stand with respect to whether the physical universe had a beginning or if it is eternal. The idea that the Big-Bang justifies either demonstration is a modern misconception.
Secondly, the debate takes for granted a modern notion of causality that has become problematic, i.e. that cause-effect relationships are based solely on temporally successive events. Just as embodied objects appear solid, but are not actually so, the idea of prior events are the 'cause' of later 'effects' creates an infinite regress of intermediate causes.
