RE: Dr. Craig is a liar.
May 12, 2016 at 9:22 pm
(This post was last modified: May 12, 2016 at 9:25 pm by wiploc.)
(May 12, 2016 at 7:09 am)SteveII Wrote: ...
The KCA is an inductive argument. This is an important point. "Inductive reasoning (as opposed to deductive reasoning or abductive reasoning) is reasoning in which the premises are viewed as supplying strong evidence for the truth of the conclusion. While the conclusion of a deductive argument is certain, the truth of the conclusion of an inductive argument is probable, based upon the evidence given." Wikipedia
Therefore, and this is the point so many of you are missing, it is not enough to answer "you didn't prove it!!!"
It's fine with me if you prove something is more-likely-than-not instead of proving it absolutely-known-to-be-true. I'd happily settle for that. And you'll still have proved something; you'll have proved that something is more likely than not.
We just want you to produce an argument that, on the scales of logical persuasion, weighs more than zero.
Quote:The first premise was presented in the link as:
1'. If the universe began to exist, then the universe has a cause of its beginning.
Let me give three reasons in support of premiss (1'):
1. Something cannot come from nothing.
I sometimes trip up here myself. I'm not saying that you made a mistake. I'm just taking this opportunity to point out something confusing. Some conversations go like this:
Christian: "Give an example of something uncaused."
Me: "Virtual particles."
Christian: "Those don't come from nothing. There was already something in existence."
Me: "You asked for something uncaused, not about something that came from nothing."
It's easy to confuse the two.
Quote:To claim that something can come into being from nothing is worse than magic. When a magician pulls a rabbit out of a hat, at least you’ve got the magician, not to mention the hat! But if you deny premise (1'), you’ve got to think that the whole universe just appeared at some point in the past for no reason whatsoever. But nobody sincerely believes that things, say, a horse or an Eskimo village, can just pop into being without a cause.
And now we're back to cause.
I believe there are scientists who sincerely believe the universe (and therefore horses and Eskimo villages) began without a cause.
Quote:2. If something can come into being from nothing, then it becomes inexplicable why just anything or everything doesn’t come into being from nothing.
Why isn't this argument every bit as strong as yours:
"If a god can create a universe from nothing, then it becomes inexplicable that gods don't keep doing that all the time."
Quote:Think about it: why don’t bicycles and Beethoven and root beer just pop into being from nothing?
Why aren't there cosmic eggs going boom right and left as gods start up new big bangs?
If the lack of spontaneous Beethovens and root beers disproves godless creation, why doesn't the lack of created Beethovens and root beers disprove godly creation? It seems to me that these arguments are equally strong, which is to say worthless.
One could make a similar argument about quasars: They don't exist around here now; therefore, they didn't exist long ago and far away.
Quote:Why is it only universes that can come into being from nothing? What makes nothingness so discriminatory? There can’t be anything about nothingness that favors universes, for nothingness doesn’t have any properties. Nor can anything constrain nothingness, for there isn’t anything to be constrained!
Why is it only gods that exist in pre-universe nothingness? What makes nothingness so discriminatory? How does this argument work better for you than for us?
Quote:3. Common experience and scientific evidence confirm the truth of premise 1'.
If there is scientific consensus on this point, you should make that clear. Otherwise, you are simply asking us to overrule science on our own authority. Bertrand Russell forbids. He said something like, "When the experts are agreed, the layman does well not to hold the contrary opinion. When the experts are disagreed, the layman does well not to hold any opinion at all.
And as for common experience, that consistently involves one thing preceded by another. If you invoke common experience, your result is infinite regress.
Quote:The science of cosmogeny is based on the assumption that there are causal conditions for the origin of the unuiverse. So it’s hard to understand how anyone committed to modern science could deny that (1') is more plausibly true than false.
If you are committed to science, then, unless you are an expert yourself, you have to accept that the consensus view of the experts is probably true. That is, you don't claim that science proves magic, or that the universe had a cause.
You are claiming that we should be scientific while refusing to be so yourself.
Quote:Read more: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/popular-a...z48RDdCeQH
Not to change the subject, but I believe that Dr. Craig is a liar.
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