Stump the Christian?

[Randy Carson]

Incidentally, the physicists you quote don't agree with you: in a debate with William Lane Craig, who also misuses the same scientists that you do, Sean Carroll anticipated this argument and asked Alan Guth for his view. His response was unambiguous: "I don't know whether the universe had a beginning. I suspect that it did not have a beginning." So, who is misinterpreting the paper: the person who wrote it, or the non-physicist attempting to bend science to his biases?

Vilenkin doesn't like what you're selling either, Randy; in his 2006 book, "Many worlds in one," he has this to say about theologians attempting to hold up his work as proof of god:

Theologians have often welcomed any evidence for the beginning of the universe, regarding it as evidence for the existence of God … So what do we make of a proof that the beginning is unavoidable? Is it a proof of the existence of God? This view would be far too simplistic. Anyone who attempts to understand the origin of the universe should be prepared to address its logical paradoxes. In this regard, the theorem that I proved with my colleagues does not give much of an advantage to the theologian over the scientist.

It is obvious that you have spent far more time on this topic than I care to or need to. And you are right to a degree, it IS all beyond my grasp...not because I couldn't sit down and plow through it all, but because I have not sought to grasp it. However, there are knowledgeable theists who have and do stay current on these issues, and thankfully, I can read their responses. I've not come across anything yet which suggests that anyone is terribly nervous about these points.

However, I know my limitations, and I am neither a cosmologist nor a philosopher. So, while it's all very impressive that you HAVE read the paper which I have not read, so what? The fact that I am not able to respond to you on a subject about which I freely admit little or no expertise does not mean that NO ONE could. You can find such discussions on YouTube readily enough.

Now, you have taken quite a bit of time addressing the paper, but you have not really addressed the point behind my reason for quoting it in the first place: science points to the beginning of the universe, and this can be more helpful to the theologian than Vilenkin cares to admit perhaps in the passage you quoted.

I have promised Neimenovic that I will take a look at the threads that he was kind enough to bring to my attention.

That said, you may have the last word.