The Cosmological Argument and Free Will

[Diablo]

In normal analytical thought, a premise would fail if it was shown to be false or unreasonable. If we declared everything about which we are not certain a 'fail', then pretty much every scholarly adventure (including science) is going to pretty much collapse.

But I'm interested: what data is contrary to the idea that the universe had a beginning? My knowledge is perhaps a little out of date. I heard Sir Roger Penrose talk of the possibility of a cycling universe (maximum entropy creating a new singularity which triggers a new universe) a few years back, but back then he said there was no data to support such a view but he had a few ideas of what might be measure. But you say that not all data is in line with the universe having a beginning, so it sounds like something might have changed?

Here you go:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bounce

It's important to realise that projecting back, we find not a point but a singularity. The maths breaks down there so we don't know what happens. The big bang may have come from a beginning event or from the collapse of a previous universe.