Why do you not believe in God?

[Whateverist]

Even if morality is proven not to be eternal, it could be that 'morality is not separate from consciousness' and that therefore 'if morality is eternal, so is consciousness'.

If morality is not eternal, and consciousness is necessary for morality, then consciousness isn't eternal.
I understand that the argument is sound. I don't care, because it can't be said that morality is eternal affirmatively, and is thus useless to make conversation about.

So I think I agree with Skepsis here. If morality should somehow prove to be eternal then I should be shocked. Why would anything having to with the feeling of mutuality and tender feelings of creatures like us already exist ahead of us? How would that work?

Same goes for consciousness. Disembrained consciousness has always struck me as more than a little creepy and weird.

[Mystic]

Well Skepsis, if your being honest to yourself about that, then that's fine.

The important thing is to be honest with yourself and that's all we can really do.

[jerNYC]

So what KCA is attempting to do, is tie the first two premises with beginning to exist. The issue is, when you introduce the "begin to exist" condition, you automatically imply that some things DO NOT begin to exist. Hence the question begging, because you are attempting to prove that some cause, which does not begin to exist, is THE CAUSE, or god, or whatever else your argument is trying to prove.

I agree with both you and CliveStaples. The original post was poorly phrased. Had it been phrased like the argument below, it would have been a pretty simple argument and I would agree with CliveStaples' formal proof.

1. All momentum has an initial action
2. The universe has momentum
3. Therefore the universe had an initial action which set it into momentum

For this argument to be valid, it has to be true that the universe has momentum. I assumed when the original post stated (Big Bang) that he meant the universe has momentum, since it's expanding from a single point in space. The argument is valid.

But the wording in the original post could be interpreted as begging the question. It all depends on how you define terms like "cause" and "begin to exist."

[Mystic]

Something to be mentioned, is that the things in the universe is always in movement. Things attract to each other, gravity is at work, light moves, etc. But science has shown an infinite past is not possible or the universe would be in a different state with no planets, no stars, etc.. The thing is, it doesn't make sense to say things were at one point all still and motionless and then began to have motion. What we know of the universe, is that it's always in a state of change by the very nature of it's parts.

[jerNYC]

Something to be mentioned, is that the things in the universe is always in movement. Things attract to each other, gravity is at work, light moves, etc. But science has shown an infinite past is not possible or the universe would be in a different state with no planets, no stars, etc.. The thing is, it doesn't make sense to say things were at one point all still and motionless and then began to have motion. What we know of the universe, is that it's always in a state of change by the very nature of it's parts.

This is actually not at all correct. Singularities have zero volume and infinite density, so space and time cease to exist. Nothing can "move" or "change" inside a singularity.

[Cyberman]

The thing is, it doesn't make sense to say things were at one point all still and motionless and then began to have motion.

It does if everything which will become all the matter in the Universe was contained in one single point. Not a point somewhere in space and time, of course, since neither existed yet.

[Mystic]

Something to be mentioned, is that the things in the universe is always in movement. Things attract to each other, gravity is at work, light moves, etc. But science has shown an infinite past is not possible or the universe would be in a different state with no planets, no stars, etc.. The thing is, it doesn't make sense to say things were at one point all still and motionless and then began to have motion. What we know of the universe, is that it's always in a state of change by the very nature of it's parts.

This is actually not at all correct. Singularities have zero volume and infinite density, so space and time cease to exist. Nothing can "move" or "change" inside a singularity.

If nothing can move or change, then how did it change and get set it to motion later? Btw - what is this singularity, like no space at all...zero space? does that make sense? Also what is the quantity in that singularity? Why not less, why not more? Is is just random what it is?

[The Grand Nudger]

You're still trying to talk about sense? I'm still wondering how you go from science to magic. That really is a fairly important hurdle to your posts.

[jerNYC]

If nothing can move or change, then how did it change and get set it to motion later? Btw - what is this singularity, like no space at all...zero space? does that make sense?

Singularity is a location where mass continues to collapse into itself to some theoretical point of infinite gravity (like black holes). No one knows what can cause a singularity to expand. That’s why theists can use it as evidence for their gods.

[Angrboda]

Kalaam has never been a particularly compelling argument, for many of the reasons previously given, but now it faces an even more damning problem. Science has produced plausible hypotheses for how the universe can exist without the prior existence of a creator god. Even if none of these hypotheses is yet proven, or even ever proven, they introduce into the set of explanations as to how the universe exists a set of explanations which does not require the existence of a creator god. In that transition, God moves from being the only explanation for the existence of the universe into being merely one possible explanation among several. With that move, the conclusion of Kalaam ceases to be a necessary truth and instead becomes only a contingent one. If the existence of God, given Kalaam, is only contingent, the argument is no longer useful to the theist. It ceases to have any value in proving the existence of God, even if you could fix its problems.

A number of additional premises are hidden in the first premise, some of which need to be broken out for clarity.

1. uniformitarianism. (possible, but unlikely)
2. everything that began to exist has a cause. (assumed, but highly questionable given modern physics)
3. everything that exists began to exist. (again, questionable, especially at boundary conditions, e.g. Hawking-Hartle)

Oh, and Mystic, you need to stop telling people how the universe works. My observation of you is that you haven't the first clue how the universe works. FYI.