(July 14, 2017 at 1:17 am)Astonished Wrote: Why don't theists understand that Occam's Razor makes positing a deity as the cause an extraneous, unnecessary contingency when we have an explanation based in the natural world? Their catch-all dodge (which doesn't begin to solve the infinite regress) is no longer able to nudge its way in. The god of the gaps is fucking dead, let's cremate his ass already.
It needs to be pointed out that the beginning of the universe is not the only "infinite regress". Let's take the example of Hawking Radiation, the existence of which surrounds virtual particles, which come into existence spontaneously and then annihilate a very short time later, all within the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, unless, of course, they are on the event horizon of a black hole. Which caused these virtual particles to come into being? Now, here is where Dr. Craig likes to do a "bait & switch" -- he'll say things like the "quantum vacuum is not nothing". But, that is not the point! Did the quantum vacuum cause the virtual particles to come into existence? If so, what caused the quantum vacuum to cause the virtual particles? And, what was the cause of the cause of the quantum vacuum that caused the virtual particles, ad infinitum?
