I agree that scientists are the people to explain science; what I find ridiculous is those without any theological understanding seem to venture into theology and what God must or must not do, while adding to the often ridiculous statements with the all encompassing, “the evidence show so and so …”
This comment is not meant to detract from your useful response, nor imply that you are a self-made theologian.
Interesting opinion. I’m far from sure it’s well supported from any current understanding of physics or even a consiatent metaphysics but it’s certainly an opinion a person could have.
I don’t see how nothing is hard to understand. No time means nothing. 0 times 0 = 0. Nothing can be simpler.
I don’t think you quite understand how ‘zero’ works in this context. Zero is a number that has some non-common sense effects, like infinities do, as in what happens when someone tries to divide something by zero. When a dimension like ‘t’ goes to zero, or when spatial-temporal dimensions approach values of zero, the math of our physics goes “bonkers” (‘bonkers’ == undefined). It’s not like zero occupies a spot on the numberline we were taught in elementary school math. It’s that our physical theories can’t tell us what things actually happen at ‘zero’. Thus, at t=0, we don’t necessary have energy = 0 or space = 0, or anything you’ve casually assumed happen. We may not even have a coordinate like ‘t=0’ that makes sense in current theories. It’s not simple at all. What we’ve got is this spot or area where the result is ‘undefined’. And undefined is not ‘zero’. It’s we don’t know.
I think you can be a theist and even a Christian and believe this. @MarkD noted 6 different types of belief in this sort of a thing on another thread recently and the Genesis term “tohu wa bohu” (formless and void) with chaotic waters, I think, and even implies a preexistence which was with God at one point. It is something I am more comfortable with than the kalam argument.
I have looked at a lot of arguments for the existence of God. I don’t think any of them have objective validity. Many are derived from subjective reasons for believing in God and the addition of a lot of words has never managed to change those subjective reasons into something objective. Just because something is true doesn’t mean an argument or proof of this thing is valid or sound.
But few arguments are as bad as this kalam argument. Only the moral argument is more contemptible. The best argument I know of is one by Charles Sanders Pierce called, “The Neglected Argument for the Existence of God.” And I think it is because it gets a handle on the subjective nature of the choice to believe.
The kalam argument:
So, problems.
-1. This is not even an argument for the existence of God, for this is not the conclusion of the argument. Thus anybody can refute this as an argument for existence of God by suggesting a different cause for the universe as has been done many times.
-2. The first premise practically makes the argument circular. Suppose I made the following argument.
A. Everything with a name exists.
B. My imaginary friend has a name.
C. Therefore my imaginary friend exists.
Thus you can see the circularity in stating the first premise.
-3. The hidden premise in the second premise also makes the argument circular. If the universe is the only thing which exists, then the only cause could be something which no longer exists. If things exist other than the universe and the thing you want to prove is its cause, then why could those other things not be the cause of the universe? Thus when you presume that the only thing other than the universe which is exists is God, then you are introducing a circularity there.
That says it better than I could have. Thanks.
I enjoyed reading much of Pierce.
Okay, my interest is pricked but I can’t find this on the internet. Google gives me a half dozen returns and when I searched it in wiki about the same with one of them being something else you had written back in October. I wonder if this might be an article it would interest Biologos to make available as one of its resources?
Can you comment on the moral argument? Thanks.
Got it. Thanks. (My internet game is not strong.)
Well a quick once over suffices to convince me a quick once over will not do. The language is a barrier being from another time and the author seems eager to festoon the article with as many references to other works as possible, perhaps in hopes of convincing us that his own offering will reveal the same accomplishment as those he enjoys reading himself? I’m not hopeful but will try to give it another go.
There are different presentations of the moral argument and some are certainly more contemptible than others. The one by C. S. Lewis in “Mere Christianity” is probably the best and the one I see given by many university philosophy courses is so bad it could be called a strawman version. But the version most often used in practice is that God is required for there to be an absolute standard of morality and thus we are left with the choice of either believing in God or accepting that morality consists of nothing but the arbitrary dictates of society.
First the strawman university philosophy course version:
Premise 1: If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
Premise 2: Objective moral values and duties do exist.
Conclusion: Therefore, God exists.
This looks almost intentionally absurd. Few people would talk about abstractions like moral values and obligations as things that exist as objects. Of course they exists as abstractions, as does God. The question is whether God exists as other than simply an abstraction in our minds, and thus this looks like a confusion of categories. Others do a little better by changing the terminology a little calling them objective moral facts and changing the first premise to say that God is the best or only explanation for them. I suppose we can see a point made in this spectrum, that the more you try to remove the subjective element to this, the sillier the argument sounds.
The argument of C. S. Lewis if you can even call it that, is better because it frankly admits its rather highly subjective nature. It consisted largely of his feeling about how peculiar it is that we have this idea that there are things we ought to do and things we ought not to do. And thus to him it suggests that there is something influencing us to think in such a way. It sounds pretty good and as stated there is nothing particularly objectionable, but in this case I think to some degree his subjective language is hiding some of the key issues. Do absolute moral standards require a divine authority to dictate them to us? Perhaps Lewis avoids this question because he knows a claim that it does is completely unsupportable.
And that brings us to what I think is the practical effective essence of the moral argument as I stated above that absolute morality requires a supreme authority as if you can transform relative dictates of society into something absolute simply by putting more power behind it. That is why I go to the definition of the words, “relative” and “absolute,” to cut through to the heart of the issue. Sometimes we actually need rules which are nothing but the arbitrary dictates of convention because it is more important to have a rule than what the rule actually is, such as which side of the street we drive on. Is it reasonable to suggest that Americans are better because they drive on the “right” side of the road (pun very much intentional)? The only way something can be put in opposition to arbitrary convention is if there is an actual reason why one alternative is better than the other. In other words, authority is the basis for relative morality and thus any morality from such dictates must be relative to the authority from which it comes. Thus divinely given morality remains relative to the god which gives it, and the ONLY thing which can make morality absolute is when reasons are given why these are things we should or should not do.
But once reasons are given, the moral argument collapses like a house of cards, because then the reasons themselves are all that is needed for those moral issues. The best you can do is say that there may be moral issues where we do not or even cannot understand the reasons yet. But the sad reality is that such gaps arguments are highly susceptible to abuse, for they can and have been used to justify just about anything including human sacrifice. This suggests that when people cannot give sound reasons for their moral claims then it is probably better to assume there are none, for it is just as possible that we will eventually discover that there are good reasons why what they claim to be good is actually bad and what they claim to be bad is actually good. This is not far fetched because I can think of such reversals having happened, such as with regards to interfering in cases of spousal abuse.
Very good! Very well and thoroughly put. I also have had difficulty agreeing with Lewis in this case (and with Francis Collins in his book), but wonder if this is a more appealing argument to secularists. The drive to moral absolutes is probably adaptive, but misuse can certainly result in abuse, as you say so clearly. I’m going to reference this posting for future discussions, if that’s ok. Thanks
It has been many years since I waded through that text, and perhaps this is an example of something I said before about the difficulty of understanding what philosophers have said rivaling the difficulty of scientific theories. Though I frankly think this is one of the easier example by far. Nevertheless, perhaps such tasks are best left to when we are young and the neurology of our brains considerably more adaptable. So I shall summarize his argument for you…
It is in three parts, 1) the experience of person who comes to believe, 2) the observation of how many people have this experience, 3) a comparison of similarities between this experience and the scientific method.
Does this argument have objective validity? Certainly not. But then it doesn’t particularly pretend to much objectivity. As I review it today, I would particularly criticize the last part where it attempts to compare this with the scientific methodology. What it particularly lacks is the foundation of objectivity in science where there is a written procedure which gives the same results no matter what one believes. The procedure here actually requires you to believe and thus throws objectivity right out the window.
Thanks! That helps a lot. Another good rebuttal would be why there is a life changing experience across so many faith paradigms–from Islam to Christianity, Christianity to Islam, even deconverting to atheism; I’ve read of conversion experiences to Scientology that made people feel wonderful and changed their lives. It seems to be the nature of people to look for faith to change their lives. (that is neither a confirmatory nor a critical response). I appreciate your observations.
Having this experience in different theistic religion would be irrelevant to Pierce’s argument but showing that there is such an experience in non-theistic religions or even in a conversion to atheism would indeed be a very effective rebuttal.
I’m thinking this through better now. It sounds like Pierce is, if I gather right, looking for a relationship with a divine Being making a difference–sort of like Augustine’s statement that He has made us and our hearts are restless till they come to Him–only as an observational study that belief is helpful. The fact that the various faiths differ doesn’t matter to him, right? I see it better.
The only instance I’ve seen of deconversion being a relief was in the case of someone being very uncomfortable with old, severe images of God (eg total depravity and sending all to hell). In that case, his cognitive dissonance with regard to justice was relieved. That’s not as all encompassing as a relationship with a God, I think; so I’m not sure my example was very strong at all.
Thanks for your clear tutoring.
What it brought to my mind was Scott Peck’s observation in his psychiatric practice (reported in his famous books), that quite often he was most successful helping his clients when they made a transition in either direction. In other words, it was just as helpful to the well being of his clients to go from theist to atheist as it was to go from atheist to theist.
Oh, The thread has been resurrected!
i’m working on a reply!
Should the argument for God’s existence really rest on such a slender foundation as the ultimate decision of physicists about Big Bang Cosmology? Well, one thing is clear. In ages past it didn’t depend on it. Obviously, Sts. Abraham and Sarah, David and Solomon, the prophets and apostles, and all the men and women who followed in their footsteps up through the 19th century, including eminent scientists such as St. Faraday and St. Maxwell: these cannot have believed in God because of the Big Bang Theory, because—guess what?—nobody knew about it yet!
This statement begs the question. 1) The discussion of origins does not prove or disprove the existence of God, but what it does do is shed light on how God works or operates. For Christians to ignore this information would be gross negligence.
Some unbelievers try to use science to claim that God did create the universe. Christians I believe have an obligation to counter these claims based on the best information available.
It is possible that that there may be new science information that raises some real questions about how God created the universe, such as the multiverse hypothesis. Christians need to take these views seriously, even though they do not directly question the existence of God.
Christians believe in the utility of science and therefore we take science seriously. We believe that God created the universe so that the universe shows forth the Power, Wisdom, and the Love of God. We rejoice that current science, as Bro. Wall says, confirms the fact that God created the universe through the Universe out of nothing through the Big Bang.
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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