We are here debating the Kalam Cosmological Argument from a deistic rather than theistic perspective. Carlo Alvaro is taking the affirmative; Richard Carrier the negative. See our initial entry for all the details, including an index to all entries yet published.
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I. Validity vs. Soundness
Dr. Alvaro now opens by arguing I was incorrect to claim his Kalam argument was invalid. But I affirmed it was valid.[1] Rather, I claimed his argument is unsound. The entire first section of Alvaro’s latest reply is thus moot. It does not respond to my first section. In the formal terms of debate, this is called a drop.[2]
My argument was, instead, with respect to his P1: if it is false that all clowns own lizards then the premise “Clowns own lizards” is false and therefore the conclusion “Therefore Joey [the clown] owns a lizard” is false (or at least unproved). Alvaro cannot rescue this by rewording that premise to “Some clowns own lizards” while leaving the rest the same, because then the argument would become invalid. To then restore validity he would also have to reword the conclusion as “Therefore it is possible Joey owns a lizard.” But “It is possible the universe came into existence by something else” is a failure to prove that it did. All the same can be said of P2.
This is why Alvaro needs to prove his P1 and P2 are (at least probably) always true. If sometimes they are false, then sometimes his conclusion is also false (or unproved). Alvaro has produced no valid or sound syllogism establishing P1 or P2 to be, or even likely to be, logically necessary truths. Which means, so far as we know, they are only contingently true, which entails sometimes (in some possible worlds) they are false. This alone establishes the Kalam is unsound and therefore does not prove its conclusion.
I do not have to present any further argument or evidence to establish this. It is self-establishing: if the premises are only, so far as we know, contingently true (something else has to produce them), then, so far as we know, sometimes they are false, which means the conclusion is not proved. Just as we have not proved Joey owns a lizard. This is a consequence of Alvaro’s decision to use deductive logic. As I explained, he could attempt an inductive argument (an argument to a probability), but he has not done so (the formula for which is fundamentally different). I await a formal inductive argument. Until I see one, I have to judge the argument as presented.
II. That the Premises Are Also False
I then went on to demonstrate that conditions exist when P1 and P2 are false. So I did not merely demonstrate the Kalam’s premises are unknown to be true and therefore its conclusion is unknown to be true (which alone defeats it). I also demonstrated that P1 and P2 are false: they are false under realizable conditions, which happen to be precisely the conditions that will logically necessarily obtain before anything produced P1 and P2 as governing conditions. Therefore P1 and P2 are false precisely where and when they have to be true in order for P3 to be proved by them. P3, therefore, not only is not proved by these premises, it cannot be proved by these premises.
P1 only obtains when causal systems exist. That is why we do not see it violated in our world: our world is a contingent causal system. But if that system has to be produced by something else (per P1), then that something else cannot already have been governed by P1. Because it produced P1. Therefore, it cannot have obeyed P1. P1 is therefore false in all conditions required for P3 to be proved by it.
P2 only obtains when some contingent thing prevents actual infinite sets. Such as on current physics, where a fingernail is divided by measurement limits (not physical limits) into a finite number of units equal to approximately 10^35th of a meter.[3] That is a contingent fact of the universe produced, and that we therefore now inhabit. But there is no fact (none whatsoever) preventing those 10^35ths of a meter from each spanning an actually infinite number of geometric points (as modern calculus has proved they do). The same can be said of P2.
The only way to negate these conclusions is to prove P1 or P2 (at least probably) logically necessary—and therefore always true, and therefore true even in the conditions I’ve described. Otherwise, these conditions remain not only possible, but will always be realized in the very conditions required for proving P3: before any contingent reality, and hence before P1 and P2, are produced. Before that, logically necessary things can and will still exist (and therefore the alternative is not “absolutely nothing”).[4] But those things will not be governed by P1 or P2.
Alvaro has not disproved this, or even shown it to be unlikely. It is, to the contrary, self-evident that the state of things before P1 and P2 have been contingently produced will not be governed by P1 and P2.
III. Miscellaneous Problems
Let’s review:
- I have presented the evidence P1 and P2 are not always true.
- None of the evidence Alvaro has presented even pertains to establishing P1 or P2 are always true. Observations in this world are irrelevant to conditions before or outside of it.
- None of Alvaro’s claims about infinite sets make them impossible; most aren’t even true.[5]
- Alvaro’s claim that accepting P1 and P2 are sometimes false entails accepting that we are brains in a vat. It does not.[6] Alvaro is confusing deductive with inductive arguments. I have already warned him about that.
- Alvaro keeps repeating the false dichotomy that either absolutely nothing started reality or a deity did. But there are countless possibilities in between, including substantively causal nothing-states and physical, unintelligent first causes.[again, 4]
- Every infinite set can be physically instantiated by a one-to-one substitution of its elements in physical form; therefore every actual infinity is physically possible; and all experts on cosmological science and transfinite mathematics agree with me on this.[7]
- I have thus refuted Alvaro’s staircase example, with expert citations.
- I have thus proved my fingernail example, with expert citations.
- And I proved Dr. Alvaro’s understanding of Big Bang theory to be thirty years out of date and now false, with expert citations.[8] Pointing this out is not an ad hominem.
IV. Conclusion
Alvaro’s Kalam cannot prove its conclusion. But that doesn’t mean its conclusion is false. It is always trivially true—there is always a first something (whether ontologically, for a past-infinite timeline,[9] or temporally, for a past-finite timeline [10]). The only question that separates atheists from theists (and deists) is whether that first-order thing is in any way intelligent (rather than just a first or fundamental physical fact).[11] And Alvaro has not even argued his proposed first-order thing is intelligent, and therefore a deity. So atheism remains more probable.[again, 11]
Endnotes
[1] “Dr. Alvaro’s argument is indeed formally valid,” Dr. Carrier’s First Reply to Alvaro.
[2] Glossary of Key Debate Terms, p. 4.
[3] See the Wikipedia entry on Planck Length.
[4] As I’ve explained in What If We Reimagine ‘Nothing’ as a Field-State? and (for more substantial initial conditions) The Argument from Uniformities.
[5] See the “fingernail” and “stairway” sections of Dr. Carrier’s Second Reply to Alvaro; and Section III, “Actual Infinities Are Logically Possible,” in Dr. Carrier’s First Reply to Alvaro.
[6] See We Are Probably Not in a Simulation (which contains an example of how to structure an inductive, rather than a deductive, argument).
[7] I already cited the expert literature refuting Alvaro on this in my previous replies. See Note 5 in my First Reply, “See the videos Physicists & Philosophers Debunk the Kalam Cosmological Argument (featuring Penrose, Hawking, and Guth, among others) and Physicists and Philosophers Strike Back; and as well my discussion and citations in the cosmological section of the Carrier-Marshall Debate,” and Note 6 in my Second Reply, “See, for example, Proof of Infinite Geometric Series Formula at Khan Academy. See also the Wikipedia entries for “Fundamental Theorem of Calculus” and “infinitesimal” and this example and these examples.” The former also referenced my demonstrations in the Carrier-Marshall debate regarding A Past Eternal Existence which cited published, peer-reviewed science establishing past-eternal cosmologies, including “[5] Ahmed Farag Ali and Saurya Das, “Cosmology from Quantum Potential,” Physics Letters B 741 (4 February 2015): 276–79” and “[6] C. Wetterich, “Eternal Universe,” Physical Review D 90.4 (2 April 2, 2014),” and “[7] Leonard Susskind, “Was There a Beginning?” MIT Technology Review (27 April 2012); and see, again, the interview with Alex Vilenkin in “Before the Big Bang 9” (particularly timestamp 21:07ff.),” and “[10] Indeed Hilbert’s position [reg. Hilbert’s Hotel] is refuted in the very introduction to the collection of essays Dr. Marshall cites, as co-written by the renowned mathematician and philosopher Hilary Putnam (see Philosophy of Mathematics, pp. 6-11; Hilbert’s essay therein is an old speech from 1925 included only as a foil),” and “[11] Current mathematical opinion: Rudy Rucker, Infinity and the Mind: The Science and Philosophy of the Infinite (1982), e.g., p. 296; N. Ya. Vilenkin, In Search of Infinity (1995), e.g., pp. 50-69; quotation and demonstrations: Bertrand Russell, The Principles of Mathematics, 2nd ed. (1938), esp. § 3.23 and all of § 5 (e.g. 5.43). And I have cited even more than this:
- As cited in endnote 6 to my first reply in the Carrier-Wanchick debate: “Is there really such a thing as infinity?” from the University of Toronto Mathematics Network; “Infinity” from the History of Mathematics Archive; and “The Infinite” from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy and “Continuity and Infinitesimals” from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.”
- I further discuss these expert sources in The Carrier-Marshall Debate: My Third Reply, and in The Carrier-Marshall Debate: My Fourth Reply, including, in both, quotations of email correspondence with a professional mathematician (Dr. Herb Silverman).
- In the latter I add even more expert references: “[2] This is well explained by Louis J. Swingrover in his position paper “Difficulties With William Lane Craig’s Arguments for Finitism.” See also Wes Morriston, “Craig on the Actual Infinite,” Religious Studies 38.2 (2002): 147-66; Landon Hedrick, “Heartbreak at Hilbert’s Hotel,” Religious Studies 50.1 (2014): 27-46; Graham Oppy, “Inverse Operations with Transfinite Numbers and the Kalam Cosmological Argument,” International Philosophical Quarterly 35.2 (1995): 219-21,” and “[3] Oppy, “Inverse Operations,” op. cit. Even in the very book Marshall quotes, Oppy goes on to challenge that [claimed absurdities] are absurdities, not agree they are: Philosophical Perspectives on Infinity (2009), pp. 48-275.”
- And again in my Final Reply to Marshall, citing again “[4] Graham Oppy, Philosophical Perspectives on Infinity (2009), pp. 59-63, 116-22, 223-30, 285-89.”
[8] See Ethan Siegel (an actual astrophysicist), “Surprise: The Big Bang Isn’t the Beginning of the Universe Anymore,” Big Think (18 October 2021). That summarizes what I already cited in Note 2 and Note 5 in my First Reply, “[2] See the Wikipedia entry on the Hawking-Penrose Singularity Theorems and see Leah Crane, “Quantum Effects Cloak Impossible Singularities with Black Holes,” New Scientist (2017),” and “[5] See the videos Physicists & Philosophers Debunk the Kalam Cosmological Argument (featuring Penrose, Hawking, and Guth, among others) and Physicists and Philosophers Strike Back.”
[9] See my discussion of this scenario in The Argument to the Ontological Whatsit.
[10] See my discussion of this scenario in The Argument from Uniformities.
[11] See Naturalism Is Not an Axiom of the Sciences but a Conclusion of Them and The Argument from Specified Complexity against Supernaturalism. See also, for an example of a complete godless cosmological ontology, Superstring Theory as Metaphysical Atheism.
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Dr. Carrier wrote:
I’m a bit disappointed that in the spirit of honest debate, Dr. Alvardo seems to just ignore your evidence (with expert citations) supporting your position on this. It is central to the debate and discussion you are having.
He doesn’t respond with any specific citations in the field of cosmology backing up his claims about what the field currently holds true (consensus) about the Big Bang. He doesn’t attempt to make any real attempts to argue or disagree with anything specific in the article you have cited, and hasn’t responded with an article (citation) of his own that might contrdict that.
All we get from him is his assurance that he follows research in the field of cosmology and regularly converses with some physicists at his university. If we take what he says at face value then it shouldn’t be too much trouble for him to come up with something concrete (an actual citation) of some kind for us to review and consider.
If he can’t seem to locate any such thing on his own, then how much trouble would it be for him to reach out to one of his coleagues who he has had such in depth and relevant discussions on this topic and ask them to point him in the right direction. If he is simply not able to do so (and that is what I’m left to assume until I see otherwise) than that is telling in of itself (IMO).
So until then, his failure to do so reminds me of the author of Luke where (as you’ve pointed out) says “My information comes from good sources”, but never actually reveals any such sources.
You’ve well stated it. I am perplexed as well that this is what is happening.
So far, all versions of the Kalam, Dr. Alvaro’s included, are simply variations of the Underpants Gnomes business plan:
Phase 1. Collect underpants.
Phase 2. ?
Phase 3. Profit!
In this case:
Step 1. Assert the universe had a beginning due to a prior cause that itself was uncaused.
Step 2. ?
Step 3. God!
Maybe the existence of the universe had a discrete beginning with a prior cause and maybe it didn’t. Dr. Alvaro certainly hasn’t demonstrated that this must necessarily be the case (seemingly because he is making assertions without a full awareness of the state of current physics and cosmology; I’m curious if he will catch up a bit and make some adjustments to his out-of-date assumptions). But saying that the Big Bang possibly or even probably had a cause is not controversial and in no way contradicts atheism. The problem is in Step 2: the mysterious, inexplicable, and unsupported leap from a speculated prior cause to an uncaused intentional being capable of creating universes.
As a psychologist, I believe that what’s happening here is a common error of intuition steeped in social learning. Dr. Alvaro has certainly been frequently exposed in his lifetime to the constant descriptions of God as an all-powerful, eternal being that is the author of all things and so subject to no rules other than those of his own making. Thus, Dr. Alvaro has the socially-learned “understanding” that this is what God is—an uncaused being capable of willing universes into existence.
This is why he assumes that the Kalam supports the existence of such a being without recognizing that this assertion is putting the cart before the horse. Because of course this conception of God is utterly without empirical or logical grounding. There isn’t a single known aspect of consciousness that suggests an intentional being could somehow be non-contingent, eternal, self-sustaining, and capable of creating universes—in fact, as far as we can see, consciousness only arises in the context of finite, metabolic collections of chemicals. Further, consciousness is a process, not a power or force, meaning that conscious self-awareness itself doesn’t DO anything (similar to what Carrier has written about elsewhere, consciousness being able to do stuff by itself is a good description of “magic” or supernaturalism, both of which are fictional constructs). All of which means that even were Dr. Alvaro’s conclusion true, he would still be starting at a deficit in demonstrating that any possible cosmic cause is probably (much less necessarily) an intentional, magical being. I’m disappointed that he hasn’t yet acknowledged this.
That’s not quite what Alvaro is presenting (yet). He has yet to state whether a god even follows from this argument or why or what it is.
Hence I keep pointing out his argument is not proved by its premises, and yet even if the conclusion is still true (for other reasons) it is too trivial a statement to even argue against atheism.
He has yet to respond to this point.
But you might otherwise be right. Maybe what you describe is what he thinks he is doing.
But as he hasn’t done it yet, I have nothing to respond to.
For example, if his deity is conscious, that runs afoul of The Argument from Specified Complexity against Supernaturalism and the fact that Naturalism Is Not an Axiom of the Sciences but a Conclusion of Them, among other things.
As a specific example, if a god can exist and think without a physical brain, then why did he have to make our ability to think dependent on a brain? That contradicts everything Alvaro has said about his god (albeit still not in this debate), and runs afoul of his own Argument from Heaven and any sound Bayesian Argument from Consciousness Against God.
And that makes his theory simply a bad hypothesis, by any empirical standard.
Dr. Carrier makes a fatal error in assuming that “P1 only obtains when causal systems exist.” Let’s see why.
Everything that exists does so either by itself or by another.
If something exists by itself, it exists necessarily, meaning it always exists and does not begin to exist.
If something exists because of another, it exists contingently, meaning it does not always exist and begins to exist. In other words: if something begins to exist, it exists because of another, that is, it has a cause.
This principle, known as the principle of sufficient reason, is not true only in a causal universe but in all universes.
If we inquire into how many possible universes there are according to the causal order they adopt, we will see that we can only conceive of two clearly and distinctly: either a universe where the first cause leads to second causes and these to second effects, as happens in ours, or a universe where there are no second causes and all effects depend solely on the first cause. We can call the first model a “causal universe” and the second a “miraculous universe.” Well, even in a miraculous universe, it would be true that everything that begins to exist has a cause.
It is not difficult to conclude that there can be no more universes. Thus, there cannot be a universe in which what begins to exist causes itself, since it would entail a contradiction (to exist by another insofar as it does not always exist and to exist by itself insofar as it is self-caused), nor a universe in which what begins to exist is caused by nothing, since nothing, by its very notion, can do nothing.
In other terms, the universe is either causal or acausal.
If it is acausal, it is necessary that none of its events begin to exist, so it will exclude change and will be an immutable universe where the principle of sufficient reason is neither affirmed nor denied, as happens in the order of eternal ideas or in God Himself. This does not detract an iota of validity from the principle of sufficient reason, which maintains its truth value in the same way that the proposition “all bachelors are unmarried” is true even if no bachelor exists.
If it is causal, it will have a single cause or multiple causes. If single, it will be a miraculous universe in which every effect hangs on a single reason that is inexplicable in itself. If multiple, it will be a causal universe. We cannot suppose more universes, except as a mix of these two, namely, a universe that is sometimes causal and sometimes miraculous.
Therefore, whether it is a universe in which every effect is subordinate to its cause, or another in which every effect is exclusively subordinate to the first cause, the principle of sufficient reason always governs.
We’ve been over all this already.
Waiting for a formal proof (valid and sound syllogism).
Still none.
You are wasting everyone’s time here.
I.
Every causal relationship requires at least two elements, namely, cause and effect. Then, where there is no multiplicity, causality does not occur.
If something exists by itself, it is not composite, since the composite exists by its parts.
Therefore, if something is not composite, it is not multiple and cannot maintain a causal relationship with itself. That is, it will not be neither cause nor effect of itself.
Now, what exists by itself is not composite. Consequently, what exists by itself cannot maintain a causal relationship with itself.
II.
Let’s suppose that the universe is an infinite succession of causes and effects. In it, either the aggregate of all effects has a cause, or it does not.
If the aggregate of all effects does not have a cause, there will not be an infinite succession of causes and effects.
If the aggregate of all effects has a cause, such cause will be cause and effect of itself or it will not be an effect. The former is impossible, thus the latter. Consequently, it will be an uncaused cause. And if not all causes are caused, there will not be an infinite succession of causes and effects.
Since both possibilities exclude the assumption of an infinite succession of causes and effects, such assumption must be deemed false.
Those are not formal syllogisms. There is no valid argument construct. And all the sentences are just undefended assertions.
Last chance:
Produce a formally valid and sound syllogism or GTFO.
Cosmologists have proposed models in which this is not true – where every event has a cause, there is no first cause and yet the universe is finite into the past – see: “Can the Universe Create Itself?,” Phys. Rev. D58 (1998).
That would be “the universe is itself the first something.” So it is still a trivial instantiation of P3.
But be aware, that possibility came up in my discussion of Bogardus; it just never came up in my debate with Alvaro.