For your perusal.

Yeah, just watched that. As if the Kalam Cosmological Argument didn't have enough holes in it already.. rofl

Tf00t is better arguing with less well educated peeps.

Not that he is wrong or anything, but he doesn't have the knock out punch with WLC that he has with PCS or Nephie.

Onyx8 wrote:Tf00t is better arguing with less well educated peeps.

Not that he is wrong or anything, but he doesn't have the knock out punch with WLC that he has with PCS or Nephie.

That is in part due to the fact that WLC is so slimy that it is very difficult to get a solid hit on him.

There is something wrong with his analogy of argument. The comparison isn't a good one.

Onyx8 wrote:There is something wrong with his analogy of argument. The comparison isn't a good one.

Indeed, I got the impression he made a bit of a straw-man, rather than addressing WLC more directly he focussed on his own 'deduction based on false premisses'.

I believe he used the analogy to highlight the problem with the first axiom of Dr. Craig's kalam cosmological argument through reductio ad absurdum. The fact that "everything that begins to exist has a cause" is nothing more than a general observation of what we know within our universe based on our intuitions, it is not that "everything that begins to exist MUST have a cause".

Premise 1: "Objects pushed forward move faster"

This is just a general observation based on our intuitions and everyday experiences. It is not a rule that says "objects pushed forward MUST move faster". A more accurate premise would be:

Premise 1: "Objects pushed forward move faster with the exception that it can't travel faster than light"

In the same way, "everything that begins to exist has a cause" is nothing more than a general observation based on our intuitions. It is not "everything that begins to exist MUST have a cause". There's no reason to believe the first axiom is true at all, especially once we get into something as unique as the beginning of the universe and as random as quantum mechanics. We also have scientists, experts in the field, like Stephen Hawking who claim that the universe "can and will create itself from nothing".

tl;dr version - The first axiom of the kalam cosmological argument does not stand because it's based solely on intuition,and I think thunderf00t did well in illustrating how this kind of reasoning is flawed by reducing it to absurdities.

And lastly, even allowing the premises to be true for sake of discussion, this would be at best an argument for deism, in no way would it prove that the creator of the universe is one who listens to your prayers, forgive sins, intervene with miracles, etc.

He has pt 2 coming remember.

I like Thunderfoot's rebuttal . People get so obsessed with taking WLC on philosophically in debates and such. But the fundamental problem with his arguments, are of course his premises - that don't stack up in reality. They are based on intuition (not empirical evidence), which is extremely problematic. His spam example demonstrates this effect well.

Fair enough, and thank you.

Actually, I think people are over-estimating WLC's argument; Kol19's spot on.

Everything in the universe is a set. If we ascribe a property to everything in the universe, then that's one thing. But it's fallacious to extend that to the universe itself, which is not included in the set of things in the universe and so does not necessarily have a property like things inside the universe.

Even if it's true (which it's not) that everything in the universe that begins to exist has a cause, it has precisely zero bearing on the existence of the universe itself.

It's a standard compositional fallacy.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacie ... ition.html

The fallacy of Composition is committed when a conclusion is drawn about a whole based on the features of its constituents when, in fact, no justification provided for the inference.

As Spearthrower explains the video is fine, because it highlights the fundamental problem with Craig's argument: It's based on intuition. In other words, Craig thinks his common sense is sufficient to elucidate the workings of the cosmos at both the subatomic and astronomic scales. Quite frankly, quantum mechanics and relativity has shown that to be wrong. Craig's intuition is utterly worthless.
For an even better exposition on the subject, check my signature and the related videos. Truly, Craig get schooled.

Oh look.... A response video by someone else.. who disabled ratings...

Wuffy wrote:Oh look.... A response video by someone else.. who disabled ratings...

The only thing more irritating than a cretinist spout logical fallacies is a cretinist spout logical fallacies in a condescending tone.

First of all, the Kalam wankery fails because, as I've demonstrated on several occasions, just because your pseudo-argument happens to take the same form as a structure in formal logic, doesn't mean that your pseudo-argument bears any relation to reality, even if the resulting propositional structure happens to be logically true. I can construct an infinite number of material conditionals sensu Quine, all of which are logically true, but which no sane person would ever consider to be applicable to the real world. For example, if I insert into the material condition (p ⊂ q), the following propositional atoms:

p = "I am a purple banana"
q = "Mars is made of blancmange"

then the resulting material conditional is logically true (because when p and q are both false, (p ⊂ q) is true), but no one outside of a funny farm would consider the existence of purple human bananas, or planets made from blancmange, to be anything other than wholly absurd. One of the problems Craig has with his Kalam wankery is that he thinks all he has to do, is construct some piece of apologetic horseshit that happens to conform to the rules of the propositional calculus, and this will automatically convert his apologetics into established real world fact, when, as the above example demonstrates, it doesn't. Formal logic is a useful tool, in that it tells us what sort of inferences are valid to erect once certain initial postulates are established to be true, but it doesn't have anything to say about the atomic postulates represented by truth-functional variables, an elementary lesson than anyone calling himself a 'philosopher' should have learned at an early stage of the game. However, Craig isn't a philosopher, he's a pedlar of made up shit, erected to delude himself and his gullible fanboys into thinking that the sad little myths invented by piss-stained Middle Eastern nomads constitute established fact.

Another basic problem with the Kalam wankery, is that with respect to the initial premise, about things 'beginning to exist', all the real world evidence we have with respect to this, consists of evidence of transformation of matter and energy into a new arrangement thereof. We don't have any evidence for entities magically poofing into existence from nothing. Which means that the whole Kalam wankery is based upon a bait and switch. It takes evidence of transformation of matter and energy, and tries to use that to support the idea that a magic man magically poofed the universe into existence. First of all, evidence of testable natural processes at work does not support assertions about supernatural entities in any way, shape or form, and attempts to force them to do this are at best incompetent, and at worst discoursively dishonest. Second, even if the universe, however one wishes to define 'universe' for the purpose of discourse, had a 'beginning', that doesn't mean that his particular favourite magic man was responsible. Indeed, given that all the evidence of things 'beginning to exist' involves testable natural processes, it is far more reasonable, in the genuine sense of the word, to postulate that other testable natural processes were at work with respect to the 'beginning' of the universe.

Calilasseia wrote:Second, even if the universe, however one wishes to define 'universe' for the purpose of discourse, had a 'beginning', that doesn't mean that his particular favourite magic man was responsible. Indeed, given that all the evidence of things 'beginning to exist' involves testable natural processes, it is far more reasonable, in the genuine sense of the word, to postulate that other testable natural processes were at work with respect to the 'beginning' of the universe.

Observation: Anything which begins to exist has a cause.

Observation: The universe began to exist.

Deduction: The origin of the universe has a cause.

So far, so good. But what was the exact cause? What caused this cause? Well, we cannot have an infinite regression of causes unless we postulate a time of infinite duration prior to the birth of our universe. But, indeed, time and space did not even exist before our universe came into being but were themselves created with it. Therefore, whatever caused the universe must have transcended both time and space, and therefore be changeless and immaterial. It must not itself be caused but rather uncaused and beginningless (i.e. eternal). It must have set everything in motion and yet itself be unmoved (Aristotle's argument). Because of the cause of the origin of the universe does not require its own cause since it never began to exist but always existed.

Now this cause is not necessarily a "god" but it is very close to any definition of a divine being. The Kalam argument stipulates that the causal agency must be free to act according to its own will or else the effect of the cause must also be eternal. Thus, we can have a finite universe and an eternal God so long as the latter is a freely acting causal agency.

Atheistoclast wrote:
Observation: The universe began to exist.

When the fuck did you observe that?

Atheistoclast wrote:
Because of the cause of the origin of the universe does not require its own cause since it never began to exist but always existed.

Says who? Says you. A classic case of special pleading, fuckwittery, idiotic wibble, woo and twatbastardly nonsense. Thank you for playing. Please collect your fail certificate on your way out.

Blackadder wrote:[
When the fuck did you observe that?

We have observed the hiss of the Big Bang which set the universe in motion from a single point.

Says who? Says you. A classic case of special pleading, fuckwittery, idiotic wibble, woo and twatbastardly nonsense. Thank you for playing. Please collect your fail certificate on your way out.

Basic logic.

Atheistoclast wrote:

Blackadder wrote:
When the fuck did you observe that?

We have observed the hiss of the Big Bang which set the universe in motion from a single point.

The hiss? What the fuck are you talking about? It's called Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation. And Big Bang theory does not show that the "universe began to exist" only that it expanded from a very small beginning. Your scientific illiteracy extends to cosmology as well, it seems.

Atheistoclast wrote:

Blackadder wrote:Says who? Says you. A classic case of special pleading, fuckwittery, idiotic wibble, woo and twatbastardly nonsense. Thank you for playing. Please collect your fail certificate on your way out.

Basic logic.

You and basic logic are complete strangers. You blithely assert that the universe began to exist and then blithely assert that its cause did not begin to exist, for neither of which statements have you any supporting evidence or logical consistency. Keep pulling those assertions out of your arse. It's funny.

Why can't the universe be the infinite object rather than speculating further that 'the cause' of the universe being infinite. Why presume an infinite cause beyond the current inferred, unobservable* object?

Secondly, the speculation of a cause beyond the universe in no way implies a intelligent cause. If we do determine that the universe was caused, that would tell us only of a pre-existing state/entity.

But Blackadder has said it more consisely and precisely.


* As I understand it, we only inferring the existence of the universe from our local observations not from a total observation. We don't know what lies beyond the material expanding from the Big Bang