Kalaam: The cosmological argument for Gods existence

The cosmological argument for Gods existence

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence

The universe cannot be past eternal
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-kalaam-cosmological-argument#5124

The cause of the universe must be personal
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5326

Nothing is the thing that stones think of
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2817-nothing-is-the-thing-that-stones-think-of

The philosophical cosmological argument of Gods existence
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5455

The Kalam Cosmological Argument
1. Everything that has a beginning of its existence has a cause of its existence.
2. The universe has a beginning of its existence.
3. The universe has a cause of its existence.
4. If the universe has a cause of its existence then that cause is God.
5. God exists.

The first principles of ontology per the imperatives of logic manifestly evince that God must be.   Only the abandonment of rationality imagines that it makes sense to conclude that existence can arise from nonexistence, that an infinite regress of causative events is possible, that actual infinities are possible or that the effect of a mechanical cause is not given from eternity.  

1. Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.
2. The universe had a beginning, therefore, it had a cause.
3. The present moment cannot be reached by adding individual events together from eternity.
4. The second law of thermodynamics refutes the hypothesis of an eternal universe.
5. Therefore an eternal & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence.
6. An agent endowed with free will can have a determination in a timeless dimension to operate causally at a (first) moment of time and thereby to produce a temporally first effect.

1. Contingent or non-necessary beings depend on an external cause that made them come into existence - the physical universe – is also contingent.
2. Since that external cause has to be outside the whole aggregate of contingent things, it cannot itself be contingent. So it is necessary.
3. Hey presto, we’ve demonstrated that there is a necessarily existent, uncreated, non-contingent being which causes all other things! And this, of course, is God.

The Thomistic Cosmological Argument
There are dependent beings.
If something is a dependent being, then its continued existence must be sustained by something else.
If a dependent being is sustained by something else, then either the chain of sustained beings regresses infinitely or terminates in an independent being that is not itself sustained.
The chain of sustained beings cannot regress infinitely.
Therefore, the chain of sustained beings must terminate in an independent being that is not itself sustained.

1. The universe is either eternal, or it had a beginning. Most probably it had a beginning, based on philosophical and scientific considerations. 
2. Everything which has a beginning has a cause.
3. Therefore, the Universe had a cause.

1. the Universe is eternal; it always has existed and always will exist;
2. the Universe is not eternal; rather, it created itself out of nothing; or
3. the Universe is not eternal and did not create itself out of nothing, but instead was created by something (or Someone) outside of, and superior to, itself.

1. Existence can be divided into two basic categories: physical ( energy/matter, space and time), and mind ( consciousness, intelligence )
2. Since something cannot come from nothing, but we exist, then something has always existed. That must have been either the mind, physical things, or both together. 
3. The physical universe had to have a beginning, therefore it is not eternal. 
4. Thus, the mind must be eternal.

By deductive reasoning, we can come to the conclusion that the God of the Bible most probably exists. Following argument requires no theology nor science which must be true based uniquely on deductive reasoning. 

1. Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.
2. The present moment cannot be reached by adding individual events together from eternity.
3. Therefore, the universe must have had a beginning of time, therefore, it had a cause.
4. Therefore a non-physical, eternal, non-created & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence.
5. An agent endowed with free will can have a determination in a timeless dimension to operate causally at a (first) moment of time and thereby to produce a temporally first effect.
6. That cause must be supernatural in nature, (as He exists outside of His creation), Incredibly powerful (to have created all that is known), Eternal (self-existent, as He exists outside of time and space), Omnipresent (He created space and is not limited by it), Timeless and changeless (He created time),  Immaterial (because He transcends space), Personal (the impersonal can’t create personality), Necessary (as everything else depends on Him), Infinite and singular (as you cannot have two infinites),  Diverse yet has unity (as all multiplicity implies a prior singularity),  Intelligent (supremely, to create everything), Purposeful (as He deliberately created everything), Moral (no moral law can exist without a lawgiver), Caring (or no moral laws would have been given)

1. Contingent (dependent) beings exist.
2. Contingent beings require a necessary, self-existent being in order to exist.
3. Therefore, an eternal, non-created, self-existent being must exist ( modus ponens: The rule of logic stating that if a conditional statement (“if p then q ”) is accepted, and the antecedent ( p ) holds, then the consequent ( q ) may be inferred. ) Dependent beings cannot exist independently.



5 Easy Steps to refute naturalism
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1877-easy-steps-to-refute-naturalism

Either the cosmos
(1) had no beginning, or
(2) it had a beginning.
(1) If the cosmos had no beginning, then there must be an infinite series of past events. However, it is impossible to traverse an actual infinite. Therefore, the universe cannot be infinitely old. Besides that, If the cosmos was infinitely old, it would have reached maximum entropy a long, long, time ago. Since it has not reached maximum entropy, it cannot be infinitely old without violating the second law of thermodynamics.
(2) If the cosmos had a beginning, then it must have come from (A) nothing or (B) something.
2.A. Although physicists such as Krauss and Hawking talk about "the universe creating itself from nothing," they are using the word "nothing" to mean the vacuum energy, which is not a true nothing. To be more precise, being cannot emerge from non-being.
2.B. If the entire cosmos came from something, that thing must transcend our cosmos, that is, it must exist beyond the limits of our space/time continuum. We may call it the First Cause.

The universe and/or quantum effect potentials cannot be past eternal

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5124

The universe had a beginning, therefore a cause
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9UMDiiE0kY&t=75s

9:35  Scientific reasons to conclude that the universe has a beginning
16:32 Further scientific evidence why the universe cannot be past eternal
18:35 Philosophical reasons why the universe nor quantum effect potentials cannot be past eternal

Regarding the law of causality (cause and effect), finite nature is “needy” in that it needs a infinite cause to bring it into existence. By this fact, we know that since something exists, It’s a MUST that something has always existed, because finite nature (time/space/matter) came into existence by a pre-existing cause and HASN’T always existed. That means the cause of finite nature (our infinite supernatural prime mover/uncaused first cause/G0D) existed, does exist and obviously existed before finite nature (time/space/matter) was brought into existence by our infinite supernatural G0D. G0D NEEDS NOTHING and thus, G0D ALONE is the only rational possible source of EVERYTHING, including needy finite creation. The non-needy infinite creator of the finite needy CANNOT BE finite and needy also, BECAUSE it would again need a creator to create it. And then that needy creator would also need a cause/creator to create it - on and on ad infinitum, which is an impossibility. Because no chain of events can exist if all the links are ‘needy.” At some point, there must be an “prime mover/ infinite uncaused first cause/G0D to start the chain of existence.

The impossibility of infinite regress proves our infinite GOD:

Infinite regress (a creator who needs a creator who needs a creator who needs a creator who needs a creator who needs a creator - ad infinitum), like an infinite chain of toppling dominoes, is an IMPOSSIBILITY. Because you can’t have a chain of only “needy” finite effects. There must be a “non-needy” prime mover to start the chain of creator/created – cause and effect.

Philosophical reasons why the universe nor quantum effect potentials cannot be past eternal  

Stephen C.Meyer: The return of the God hypothesis, page 81
If the past is infinitely old, then getting from the past to the present would be like trying to climb to the surface of the earth from a hole infinitely deep—from a bottomless pit. As one contemporary philosopher has characterized the problem, “one could get no foothold in . . . [an infinite temporal] series to even get started, for to get to any point, one already has to have crossed infinity.”8

If we are starting to count from now. Whenever we stop counting and look back, there is always a finite number that was counted. If we stop counting after one million, it is a finite number. A trillion. Finite. it is impossible to complete an infinite series by addition. The series of past events is complete. The same is with time. If we start counting from now, whenever we stop, a finite timespan has passed. We realize that we can never get to an infinite period of time in the future by adding individual events together. Now, today, this point of time in the present is a point of time future to all past.  Correct?  In other words, we are future to yesterday, and the day before that.  Some have suggested that the universe is eternal.  That it has existed forever.  But that is not possible for precisely that reason. 

This point in time is actually the future with reference to all of the past.  We cannot say that any particular point in the future will accomplish an actual infinite as events are added one to another.  Therefore, this present moment in time can't represent an actually infinite number of events added one to another proceeding from the past.  Time has proceeded forward from the past as one event is added to another to get us to today.  But we know that whenever you pause in the count as we've done today, that you can't have an infinite number of events.  This means that there is not an infinite number of events that go backward from this point in time.  Only a finite number of events.  Which means the universe is not eternal. This means the universe has not existed forever and ever with no beginning, but it in fact had a beginning.

Virtual particles:
It is claimed that Virtual particles are indeed real particles. Quantum theory predicts that every particle spends some time as a combination of other particles in all possible ways. Quantum mechanics allows, and indeed requires, temporary violations of conservation of energy. So they are in time, in space, and require a quantum vacuum, in the lowest state of energy. So we have to ask: What caused the energy, space, and time in which these particles pop up?

Imagine that you see dominoes falling, one knocking over the next, as this series of falling dominoes comes into your room. As a person can never finish counting to infinity, an actual infinite number of dominoes could never finish falling. Therefore, if an actual infinite number of dominoes had to fall before getting to your door, then the falling dominoes would never reach your door. In the same way, if an actual infinite number of minutes had to take place before yesterday, time would have never reached yesterday, much less today. Therefore, just as there had to be a finite number of falling dominoes, there also had to be a finite—not infinite—amount of time before today. An infinite past is impossible. Time must have a beginning. And if time had a beginning it must have had a cause.
http://stayontargetstayontarget.blogspot.com/2012/05/universe-caused-self-caused-or-uncaused.html

Working from the assumption that if a thing is in motion then it has been caused to be in motion by another thing, an infinite chain of things-in-motion and things-causing-things-to-be-in-motion is impossible. If an infinite chain or regression existed among things-in-motion and things-causing-things-to-be-in-motion then we could not account for the motion we observe. If we move backward from the things we observe in motion to their cause, and then to that cause of motion within those things that caused-motion, and so on, then we could continue moving backward ad infinitum. It would be like trying to count all of the points in a line segment, moving from point B to point A. We would never get to point A. Yet point A must exist as we know there is a line segment. Similarly, if the cause-and-effect chain did not have a starting point then we could not account for the motion we observe around us. Since there is motion, the cause and effect chain (accounting for motion) must have had a starting point.
https://www.qcc.cuny.edu/SocialSciences/ppecorino/INTRO_TEXT/Chapter%203%20Religion/Cosmological.htm?fbclid=IwAR1ED86OISvFNiAgqivLR4_dFdaqUvqFzrf3AJ24oNLjy5HpdMV3cKgiktU

The 2nd law of thermodynamics Refutes the Eternal Universe
The Second Law points to: (1) a beginning when, for the first time, the Universe was in a state where all energy was available for use; and (2) an end in the future when no more energy will be available (referred to by scientists as a “heat death”), thus causing the Universe to “die.” In other words, the Universe is like a giant watch that has been wound up, but that now is winding down. The conclusion to be drawn from the scientific data is inescapable—the Universe is not eternal. 
http://apologeticspress.org/pdfs/courses_pdf/hsc0102.pdf

As entropy increases, less and less energy in the universe is available to do work. Eventually, all fuels will be exhausted, all temperatures will equalize, and it will be impossible for heat engines to function, or for work to be done. Entropy increases in a closed system, such as the universe.  But in terms of the universe, and the very long-term, very large-scale picture, the entropy of the universe is increasing, and so the availability of energy to do work is constantly decreasing. Eventually, when all stars have died, all forms of potential energy have been utilized, and all temperatures have equalized (depending on the mass of the universe, either at a very high temperature following a universal contraction, or a very low one, just before all activity ceases) there will be no possibility of doing work.
https://opentextbc.ca/physicstestbook2/chapter/entropy-and-the-second-law-of-thermodynamics-disorder-and-the-unavailability-of-energy/

Under the orthodox view presented in physics texts and widely accepted among philosophers of physics, it is claimed to explain the laws of thermodynamics, such as the second law, which holds that the entropy of a system will increase towards its maximum with overwhelming probability.

A scientific evidence that the universe had a beginning comes to the 2nd law of thermodynamics or the law of entropy.  This law says that in a closed universe the finite amount of energy is winding down, moving towards a time when all energy will be expended.   If we spin a ball on a table what we find is that it has a finite or limited amount of energy that was applied to spin the ball.  The spinning ball will soon stop; it has run out of energy.  In a similar fashion, the universe with its limited amount of energy is going to wind down to where there is no energy left.

Another illustration of the 2nd law of thermodynamics utilizes a hot cup of coffee.   Over time the coffee cools and the heat moves outward into the room.  Soon the temperature of the coffee and the room will be equal.  The same goes for the universe.  Heat is moving outward from stars and is being uniformly distributed throughout the universe. Eventually, the limited amount of heat energy of the stars throughout the universe will run out and suffer what is called, “Heat death.”  L. Barnet said this, “The universe is progressing toward an ultimate heat death or, as it is technically defined, a condition of maximum entropy.  When the universe reaches this state some billions of years from now, all the processes of nature will cease.  All space will be the same temperature… There will be no light, no life, no warmth–nothing but perpetual and irrevocable stagnation…and there is no way of avoiding this destiny!”

If the universe was eternal, all the heat energy would have been utilized an infinite amount of time ago.  If this is true then we should currently be at heat death.  All the energy should have been used up an eternity ago. Since energy exists today we can conclude the universe is not eternal.  If the universe is not eternal, it must have had a beginning. Both the big bang and 2nd law of thermodynamics refute an eternal universe.





We cannot reach the present moment from an eternal past
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2049-we-cannot-reach-the-present-moment-from-an-eternal-past


Is it possible for actually infinite numbers of entities to be realized in the actual world?

http://crossexamined.org/philosophical-arguments-universe-beginning/

One of the greatest mathematicians of all-time, David Hilbert, certainly didn’t think so: “the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality. It neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought.“ Georg Cantor established a mathematically rigorous way of dealing with the concept of infinity that is very useful for mathematical and scientific calculations. Although Hilbert defended Cantor’s work, he argued that infinities couldn’t exist in the actual world or they would lead to absurdities.

Some readers may be thinking that if it is mathematically possible it has to be physically possible. But not everything used in mathematics necessarily implies a direct correspondence with physical ontology (nature of being). Infinitesimals are mathematically feasible and highly useful in calculus, but modern physics holds that everything is quantized. Mathematical consistency and coherence doesn’t necessarily imply physical realization – there are abstract mathematical systems that can be constructed that are coherent but not all of them are necessarily realized anywhere in physics. In computer science we often choose between multiple mathematically equivalent but quite different ways of computing things – they can’t all correspond to physical ontology because they entail fundamentally different ways of modeling reality. Infinities that show up in physics equations are considered problematic unless and until some type of renormalization can be performed.

So if we can show that absurdities result if actual infinites exist, then we have good reasons for rejecting the possibility of an actually infinite number of past events – even if it is mathematically feasible. Here is how philosopher Peter S Williams makes this argument to a lay audience:

Suppose I ask you to loan me a certain book, but you say: ‘I don’t have it right now, but I’ll ask my friend to lend me his copy and then I’ll lend it to you.’

Suppose your friend says the same thing and so on…
If the process of asking to borrow the book goes on forever, I’ll never get the book
If I get the book, the process that led to me getting it can’t have gone on forever
Somewhere down the line of requests to borrow the book, someone had the book without having to borrow it. It’s easy to see how this analogy applies to the Kalam – if the arrival of the current event/book required infinitely many prior events, it would have never arrived. You cannot traverse an actual infinity. If the current event/book did arrive, the process that led to it couldn’t have gone on forever.

Another example of the physical impossibility of an actually infinite number of items is the following. Suppose that there is one particle of some type for every positive whole number (integer) – we can think of these as comprising a mathematical set in which we’ve numbered the particles. The number of particles is aleph null and represents a so-called countable infinity. Suppose this type of particle is not stable and thus half of the particles decay in some time interval. One could think of the number of particles in this set as now consisting of the even integers. But one can also reach a contradictory answer that the number of particles is the same as the original by proving mathematically that the number of even, positive integers is the same as the number of positive integers.

This mathematical proof is quite simply done by showing a one-to-one correspondence between the elements in the set. For every integer in the original set, there is one integer in the set of even integers (2,4,6, …) obtained by just doubling the original value. Thus, the number of particles in each set is mathematically identical even though half of the original particles underwent decay. After we wait another half-life, half of the remaining particles have now decayed so the set would consist of particles (4,8,12, …). However it can also be mathematically proven that the number of positive integers that are multiples of 4 is identical to the number of positive integers. Have the number of particles been reduced or not? We reach contradictory results – no matter how many half-lifes we wait, the number of particles is the unchanged and has been reduced as per the usual physics equation. Thus, dealing with the actually infinite in reality would violate the laws of physics.

Philosopher Alexander Pruss offers at 6 arguments in support of premise 2 of the Kalam – that there couldn’t have been an infinite number of past events. Although he thinks actual infinities might be possible in general, he doesn’t think an infinite causal chain is possible. “This strengthens the Kalaam argument by showing that the premises can be weakened: the Kalaam argument only needs the kind of causal anti-infinitism that I now cautiously accept.”

Infinite regress is impossible 1

A potential infinite is a collection which is increasing toward infinity as a limit, but never gets there. An actual infinite is a collection in which the number of members really is infinite. The collection is not growing toward infinity; it is infinite, it is "complete." The sign of this sort of infinity, which is used in set theory to designate sets which have an infinite number of members, such as {1, 2, 3, . . .}, is À0. Now (2.11) maintains, not that a potentially infinite number of things cannot exist, but that an actually infinite number of things cannot exist.

2.1 Argument based on the impossibility of an actual infinite.

2.11 An actual infinite cannot exist.
2.12 An infinite temporal regress of events is an actual infinite.
2.13 Therefore, an infinite temporal regress of events cannot exist.

2.2 Argument based on the impossibility of the formation of an actual infinite by successive addition.

2.21 A collection formed by successive addition cannot be actually infinite.
2.22 The temporal series of past events is a collection formed by successive addition.
2.23 Therefore, the temporal series of past events cannot be actually infinite.


Objection: The cosmos isn’t eternal it gets caused by eternal quantum effects.
Response: The idea is from this paper: Cosmology from quantum potential
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370269314009381
Response: Wikipedia states:
In particle physics, an event refers to the results just after a fundamental interaction took place between subatomic particles, occurring in a very short time span, at a well-localized region of space.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Event_(particle_physics)

Following link discusses the paper: The Time Problem in Cosmology from quantum potential 
https://milliern.com/2015/02/17/the-time-problem-in-cosmology-from-quantum-potential/
A world whose temporal domain, which stretches back infinitely far, implies that the moment/instant of now, could never come to be, because the infinitude of time that precedes the now is inexhaustible, by definition of Aristotelian actual infinity.

Philosophical  reasons why the universe cannot be past eternal 
We realize that we can never get to an infinite period of time in the future by adding individual events together. 2  But today, this point of time in the present, is a point of time future to all past.  Correct?  In other words, we are future to yesterday, and the day before that.  Now, some have suggested that the universe is eternal.  That it has existed forever.  But it is not possible that it has existed forever.  Here is the application.  This point in time is actually future with reference to all of the past.  We just agreed that you cannot say that any particular point in the future will accomplish an actual infinite as events are added one to another.  Therefore, this present moment in time can't represent an actual infinite number of events added one to another proceeding from the past.  Time has proceeded forward from the past as one event is added onto another to get us to today.  But we know that whenever you pause in the count as we've done today, that you can't have an infinite number of events.  Which means that there is not an infinite number of events that goes backward from this point in time.  Only a finite number of events.  Which means the universe is not eternal.  Which means the universe has not existed forever and ever with no beginning, but it in fact had a beginning.

We cannot reach the present moment from an eternal past
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2049-we-cannot-reach-the-present-moment-from-an-eternal-past




1. http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe#ixzz4jEcNSl00

More:
https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com.br/2011/07/so-you-think-you-understand.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20071014175411/http://qsmithwmu.com/infinity_and_the_past.htm

The cause of the universe must be personal

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5326

Objection: God creating a universe out of nothing is magic
Response: Magic without a magician makes way less sense. Its actually impossible, since something from absolutely nothing is impossible, since the absence of any being, cannot produce being.

The Kalaam leads to the God of the Bible
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOcACl_tJ2c&t=142s

1:08 Properties of the first cause
5:11 Event causation or Agent causation?
8:00   How can a mind exist in a timeless dimension, trigger a  Transition from timelessness to time?
13:12 How can a mind exist without a body beyond the universe?
15:06 How could God have created the universe without time? 
16:11 Is claiming that God is eternal,  special pleading? 
18:06 Properties of the first cause
30:29 Philosophical and scientific considerations match with the biblical account  about the origin of the Universe
30:53 End notes

The universe had a cause. That cause is either personal or impersonal. 
There are different types of causal relations.  

Paul Davies: We know that time is linked inseparably to space, and that space-time is as much a part of the physical universe as matter.
My comment: The mind exists in a spaceless realm. Therefore it is also not bound to time.  We can dream, and be in a realm without space and time. So could God have existed mentally in a dimension above and beyond space-time, and through his will instantiated the physical realm, the universe.

In event/event causation, one event causes another. In that case, another contingent physical cause would have had to trigger the Big Bang or further back, a cosmos, multiverses, etc, leading to an infinite regress.  If it were impersonal, it would have to be of physical substance, space, time, and matter, or abstract numbers and math. There could be no physical being beyond our universe or a greater Cosmos.

In state/state causation one state of affairs causes another state of affairs to exist. It faces the same problem.  This causation is like a frozen pond where there would be a tree trunk resting on the top of that pond, and the frozen pond is causing the rest of the tree trunk, but that could not trigger a change from one state into another but would remain static, from eternity. And a state - state causation would also have to be physical.  

In state-event causation, the cause is a timeless state but an effect is an event that occurred at a specific moment in the finite past. The cause of the universe’s beginning would be a personal agent, an unembodied mind who freely chose to create a universe. That is state-event causation, or agent causation, which has to go from a state of timeless mental being to will an event of a transition, from a non-physical to a physical state of being, therefore the only explanation of what triggered the universe or cosmos is intelligent causation based on non-physical, mental will and power. Since that cause created matter, space, and time,  It had to be immaterial and exist in a timeless dimension. The only immaterial things we know of being able to cause something into being are conscient minds who are able to make decisions.   Therefore, the cause must be personal. So there must have been a decision to cause the beginning of the universe's beginning. We know by experience that the mind can cause action solely based on will. An eternal & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence. Only a mind can cause an effect without pre-existing physical conditions.

Stephen C.Meyer: The return of the God hypothesis, page 65
The necessary first cause of the universe must transcend the physical universe (since a cause is necessarily separate from its effects) and must be personal (since only a personal agent can act discretely to initiate a new line of causation without its action being caused by a prior set of necessary and sufficient material conditions).

Why is the cause of the Universe personal?  A live chat with Paul Cammish
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1slen1cLl0&t=13s


How could a mind exist in a timeless dimension, and trigger a transition from timelessness to time? 
Time is a huge topic in philosophy. What is time? We all know intuitively what it is, but when asked to formulate and define time, we soon perceive the difficulty. When we go to sleep at night and wake up in the morning, on average 6 to 8 hours did pass. But we did not perceive time passing. If we were asked but had no watch to check, we would probably not know how much time we slept. If we have a very deep and good sleep, it's almost when we wake up as if we did not perceive any lapse of time. But during this time, we are conscient and dream, there are sequential events in a dream, there is action, but we do not perceive time like when we are awake. What does that mean? Two things: Time is bound to physical action. That's why there cannot be time if there is no matter, energy, and space. Where there is no action and physical reality, there is no time. And secondly: Even IF there would be time, space, and matter, and action, but no mind and conscience, there is no entity to PERCEIVE it. 

So in order to have a sense and perception of time, the following is necessary: Space, matter and energy, physical action, and that the mind is in a relationship with external physical reality in action. Then time can be perceived. Some have questioned: How can God exist BEYOND the universe sans the universe, and sans time?  If we can dream and perceive a sequence of events in our mind but without EXPERIENCING time, while we can perceive that sequence in our mind, so can God exist timeless beyond the universe, have various mental states and experience sequential events consciously and be aware of, but not EXPERIENCING time. Time is only something that MINDS EXPERIENCE, upon the perception of physical activity. In dreams, there are external actors. Often in a dream, we just passively OBSERVE events, and in many cases, we REACT. We want to do things during our dreams. For example, I often dream that I pedal, and while pedaling I float, rise and fly. When I stop, and when I do not pedal strong enough, I don't rise. So I can exercise will during my dream. 

When we have nightmare dreams, we experience awfully horrific events, which we have no idea, where they came from, and are in real panic. What is the reaction? We try at all costs to flee that event and wake up in panic. So there is an event occurring in your mind, which provokes a PHYSICAL EVENT. We wake up. Decisions can have physical consequences. I can decide to type the letter a. That mental decision provokes a physical event, where I move my arm, my fingers, and type on the keyboard the letter a. I don't know HOW that occurs. Nobody knows how this interaction can take place, but it does. 

God CAN have existed in a timeless dimension sans creation, and DECIDED to create the physical cosmos, and provoked its creation upon his mental power, will and decision. There is nothing absurd about it. I can decide to write the letter a, and in an instant, AT THE SAME TIME that I take the decision, type the letter a. So there has to be no time lapse between a decision process and a physical event. It occurs simultaneously. So God can have existed in an exclusively mental dimension with sequential events, but experiencing no time, then he took the decision to create the universe, and simultaneously to his decision, made it all start, and time begin with the advent of physical reality.

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5326

Nothing is the thing that stones think of

"Since being cannot come from non-being, being has always been"
Atheist: How you do know this? Evidence, please.
Existence is the opposite of non-existence. Being the opposite of non-being. Something the opposite of nothing.
Since non-being is BY DEFINITION the absence of anything, no demonstration is needed to demonstrate that being cannot come from non-being.
The law of cause and effect is the most fundamental of all laws and has never been violated.

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2817-nothing-is-the-thing-that-stones-think-of

Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.

ex nihilo nihil fit

"Nothingness" is a philosophical term that denotes the general state of nonexistence 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing

Nothing comes from nothing (Latin: ex nihilo nihil fit) is a philosophical expression of a thesis first argued by Parmenides. It is associated with ancient Greek cosmology, such as is presented not just in the works of Homer and Hesiod, but also in virtually every internal system—there is no break in-between a world that did not exist and one that did, since it could not be created ex nihilo in the first place.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_comes_from_nothing

Nothing can be made from nothing—once we see that's so, Already we are on the way to what we want to know.
Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, 1.148–156

Argument: The argument that something cannot come into existence from absolutely no thing. is an assertion, you need to demonstrate this, I don't know for a fact that something cannot come from nothing. You assert without demonstrating that something cannot come from nothing, how do you know this? How can we test this?
Response:  Absolutely nothing, as the absence of anything, can't do something. It has no potentialities, it is the contrary of being: Non-being. 0 x 0 = 0.  That is inductive reasoning which does not require empirical demonstration and testing. Nothing has no ontological value to be taken seriously as a possible explanation of anything, since, its the absence of any being, it cannot produce being. This is obviously true, self evident,  and can be taken for granted without the need to be demonstrated. 

It's easy to demonstrate that everything comes from something (and it does!). I can demonstrate you that nothing can't produce anything simply by giving you an empty box and telling you to wait 50 years to see if anything is born out of nothing; there's your demonstration for you! 

If there is is no logical contradiction contained within the concept of 'nothing' then it could, in principles, and in fact, exist. The state of non-being could be. But then , we would not be here to talk about non-being. And since we ARE here, non-being has never been, but being has always been. In time, and in eternity. An eternal being without beginning, and without end, exists. Fits perfectly with the one that named himself " I AM".  I don't know of any other deity calling himself " I AM".  That should be telling.

The Law of Cause and Effect is the most universal and most certain of all laws. Every material effect must have an adequate cause.

Per definition: 
Being - can do something
Non-being - can't do something

Being can create being
Non-being can't create being

Something can do something
Nothing can't do something

Causes can cause things
No causes can't cause things

Something can exist somewhere
Nothing can't exist somewhere

Something can be sometimes
Absolutely nothing can't be sometimes

Existence can create existence
Non-existence can't create existence

Consciousness can create consciousness
Non-consciousness can't create consciousness

If there was nothing, there would still be nothing. 
Since there IS something, there must always have been something. 

Something cannot come out of nothing. 
Hence, any argument for the principle is apt to be less obvious than the principle itself. Even the great skeptic David Hume admitted that he never asserted so absurd a proposition as that something might come into existence without a cause; he only denied that one could prove the obviously true causal principle. With regard to the universe, if originally there were absolutely nothing-no God, no space, no time-, then how could the universe possibly come to exist? The truth of the principle ex nihilo, nihil fit is so obvious that I think we are justified in foregoing an elaborate defense of the argument's first premiss. 1

So, what is nothingness anyway?
If nothingness exists, only then is existence truly absurd. It is definable only by comparison: nothing is the opposite of anything. No matter, no dimensions, no space, no thought, no scale, no direction, no speed, no time and, most important: nothing to be defined exists in nothingness. If, say, before the Big Bang there was nothing, it can only mean that nothingness has a property which makes is create a Big Bang but that is contradictory because there is no something in nothing to create anything from. We need to be clear on nothing. Nothing is no thing. Nothing is not emptiness, because emptiness contains the borders of itself. To define something as empty you need to explicitly define a cavity. Nothing is not absence, because absence is limited by its object, while nothingness is unlimited. In absence only the named absent is not. In nothingness nothing is. Nothingness is not void because void contains space. Nothing contains nothing, not even empty space. Empty space, aside from the fact it isn’t really empty, is still something, space, so at least one degree removed from nothing. Nothingness is dimensionless too simply because there is no space. No space, no dimensions. Death is not nothingness either. Death is non-existence, for both us and all other living things all over this universe. Unless we’re alone, in the entire infinite universe, which raises a lot of hope. But hope always bears disillusionment, so let’s not hope 2 Infinity is far more plausible than nothingness So, now the big question, if there has always been something from which everything happened, what is it?

“What is the sense of ‘possibility’  if the universe began to exist, and must have had a cause?”  
The answer is “metaphysical possibility.”  This is a modality in between physical possibility and strict logical possibility and is often called “broad logical possibility” by contemporary philosophers.  To illustrate, it is strictly logically possible that “The Prime Minister is a prime number” (there is no logical contradiction here); but, notwithstanding, such a thing is metaphysically impossible (incapable of actualization).  There are all sorts of truths—like “Everything that has a shape has a size,” “Nothing can be red all over and green all over,” “No event precedes itself,” etc.—which are not strictly logically necessary but are, I think, metaphysically necessary.  I think that the first premiss of the kalam argument is a metaphysically necessary truth. 3

1. http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe#ixzz4dSaS084s
2. https://medium.com/@andraganescu/you-cant-make-something-out-of-nothing-c9b95a1beb66
3. https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/causal-premiss-of-the-kalam-argument/
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing

The net energy of the universe is zero
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t2011-the-net-energy-of-the-universe-is-zero

The philosophical cosmological argument of Gods existence

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-cosmological-argument-for-gods-existence#5455

which requires no theology nor science to come to an informed conclusion which must be true based uniquely on deductive reasoning. 

1. Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.
2. The present moment cannot be reached by adding individual events together from eternity.
3. Therefore, the universe must have had a beginning of time, therefore, it had a cause.
5. Therefore a non-physical, eternal, non-created & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence.
6. An agent endowed with free will can have a determination in a timeless dimension to operate causally at a (first) moment of time and thereby to produce a temporally first effect.
7. That cause must be supernatural in nature, (as He exists outside of His creation), Incredibly powerful (to have created all that is known), Eternal (self-existent, as He exists outside of time and space), Omnipresent (He created space and is not limited by it), Timeless and changeless (He created time),  Immaterial (because He transcends space), Personal (the impersonal can’t create personality), Necessary (as everything else depends on Him), Infinite and singular (as you cannot have two infinites),  Diverse yet has unity (as all multiplicity implies a prior singularity),  Intelligent (supremely, to create everything), Purposeful (as He deliberately created everything), Moral (no moral law can exist without a lawgiver), Caring (or no moral laws would have been given)

Only the God of the Bible is described with the above-described characteristics.

God is omnipresent (Psalm 139:7-12; Jeremiah 23:24)
God is omniscient (Psalm 147:4-5)
God is omnipotent (Jeremiah 32:17; Psalm 135:6)
God is Spirit (John 4:24)
God is in a league of His own (Isaiah 46:9)
God is immortal and invisible (1 Timothy 1:17)
God is the Creator (Genesis 1:1; Colossians 1:16)
God is unchanging (Malachi 3:6)
God is sovereign (Psalm 115:3)
God is One, yet He exists in three persons (Matthew 3:16-17; 28:19; 2 Corinthians 13:14)
God is loving (John 3:16; 1 John 4:8 )
God is gracious and merciful (Jonah 4:2; Deuteronomy 4:31)
God is righteous (Psalm 11:7)
God is holy (Leviticus 19:2; 1 Peter 1:16)
God is just (Deuteronomy 32:4; Isaiah 30:18)
God is forgiving (1 John 1:9)
God is compassionate (James 5:11)

Non-being - can't do something
Non-being can't create being
Nothing can't do something
No causes can't cause things
Nothing can't exist somewhere
Absolutely nothing can't be sometimes
Non-existence can't create existence
Since there IS something, there must always have been something. 

We are justified entirely on deductive reasoning, that nothing, having no ontological status, cannot be the cause of anything. This inference and conclusion require no empirical testing and attempts of falsification.  Chance of chance doing *anything* is ZERO. It has no ontological status; it can do *nothing*. Chance is not a "thing". It's just a number to describe probabilities.

What makes more sense:
1. To believe that God used his eternal power ( energy ), and his word ( John 1.1), information, and created a finely tuned and balanced universe based on mathematical principles, space, time and the Higgs field, which gave rise to matter, or

2. that either

a) absolutely nothing which is the absence of ANYTHING magically started our Universe or a Multiverse, which by trial and error created ours, or oscillating Universes, or that it suddenly created a vacuum, upon which virtual particles began to pop up, and somehow, for no reason created quarks, up's and down's, and an electric charge of the proton which is exactly equal and the opposite of the electric charge on the electron, despite the proton being nearly 2000 times more massive? and then finely tuned gravity and dark energy to a precision of one out of 10^123, and provided the exactly correct expansion rate of the universe, to permit a universe to expand, but at the same time to clump gas to form stars, planets, and life? Or

b) that there was an eternal universe, which defies logic, since if it was eternal, we would/could not reach this moment in time?

“It’s a whole lot easier to believe Genesis 1:1: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. and made the physical universe and life, rather than it is to believe that nothing took nothing and made everything.”

A well-known scientist named Herbert Spencer died in 1903. He discovered that all reality, all reality, all that exists in the universe can be contained in five categories...time, force, action, space and matter. Herbert Spencer said everything that exists, exists in one of those categories...time, force, action, space, and matter.

Now think about that. Time, force, action, space and matter. That is a logical sequence. And then with that in your mind, listen to Genesis 1:1. "In the beginning," that's time..."God," that's force, "created," that's action, "the heavens," that's space, "and the earth," that's matter. Everything that could be said about everything that exists is said in that first verse.

The sentence can be divided in two categories: the physical universe: time, matter, and space
And the second:
God = the cause
action = the creation event.

Everything that BEGINS TO EXIST ( action ), has a cause. ( God ).

Once this is compared with the scientific evidence, theological and philosophical considerations, it provides an intellectually SATISFACTORY explanation of our origins.

Objection: The famed atheist Bertrand Russell notoriously said: “If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause.”
Response: But it’s not true that everything must have a cause. Only that which begins to exist must have a cause. And herein God is perched up in a category of His own.

Objection: Attributing eternity to God special pleading
Response: “All lemons are citrus. Mushrooms are not citrus.”
This isn’t special pleading because there is a category difference. God is not in the same category as the creation. God is in a league of His own. He is… the great I AM.

If logic does not account for justifiable special pleading then such logic is clearly flawed. Of course, an Infinite Creator Who created everything would involve a justifiable special pleading. Such Creator would not be like the rest of us. It is as simple as seeing the difference between an Infinite Being (notice I didn't say "existence") and billions of "finite beings."
The One Infinite Being is clearly different. The One Infinite Being Who created all existence is quite different than those finite beings who are created by such Being.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument - Debunked (The First Cause Argument - Refuted) - Really ? 

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1333-kalaam-the-kalaam-cosmological-argument#6650

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EVGkl7lj_4

(1) Everything that has a beginning of its existence has a cause of its existence.
(2) The universe has a beginning of its existence.
Therefore:
(3) The universe has a cause of its existence.
(4) If the universe has a cause of its existence then that cause is God.
Therefore:
(5) God exists.

Claim:
even if it was valid it wouldn't prove that a first cause existed

Response:
Thats a baseless claim

Claim:
certainly wouldn't indicate that the cause of the universe was the Abrahamic God

Response:
Only the God of the Bible is described with the following characteristics:
• Supernatural in nature (as He exists outside of His creation)
• Incredibly powerful (to have created all that is known)
• Eternal (self-existent, as He exists outside of time and space)
• Omnipresent (He created space and is not limited by it)
• Timeless and changeless (He created time)
• Immaterial (because He transcends space)
• Personal (the impersonal can’t create personality)
• Necessary (as everything else depends on Him)
• Infinite and singular (as you cannot have two infinites)
• Diverse yet has unity (as all multiplicity implies a prior singularity)
• Intelligent (supremely, to create everything)
• Purposeful (as He deliberately created everything)
• Moral (no moral law can exist without a lawgiver)
• Caring (or no moral laws would have been given)

Claim:
we have no evidence whatsoever to suggest that the universe as defined by science was created from absolutely nothing and hence the extraordinary claim that something can come from nothing requires extraordinary evidence and yet the best response the proponents of this argument have offered so far is the assertion that absolutely everything began to exist at the Big Bang which again simply isn't what the evidence suggests

Response:
The universe most probably had a beginning
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1297-the-universe-most-probably-had-a-beginning

Arno Penzias, Cosmos, Bios, and Theos: 
‘Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the right conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say ‘supernatural’) plan.’
Margenau and Varghese eds, La Salle, IL, Open Court, 1992, p. 83

Mithani, and  Vilenkin: Did the universe have a beginning?:
At this point, it seems that the answer to this question is probably yes. Here we have addressed three scenarios which seemed to offer a way to avoid a beginning, and have found that none of them can actually be eternal in the past.
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1204.4658v1.pdf


Claim:
yet another two feet and floor that the proponents of this argument come in but not a flaw that the argument itself commits is a special pleading fallacy as already stated the Kalam cosmological argument by itself only asserts that the universe had a cause but the proponents of this argument go a step further they assert that the cause of the universe didn't begin to exist and therefore it didn't have a cause without adequately justifying why this cause is an exception in general 

Response:
Is attributing eternity to God special pleading? 
https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1539-is-attributing-eternity-to-god-special-pleading

“All lemons are citrus. Mushrooms are not citrus.”
This isn’t special pleading because there is a category difference. God is not in the same category as the creation. God is in a league of His own. He is… the great I AM.

If logic does not account for justifiable special pleading then such logic is clearly flawed. Of course, an Infinite Creator Who created everything would involve a justifiable special pleading. Such Creator would not be like the rest of us. It is as simple as seeing the difference between an Infinite Being (notice I didn't say "existence") and billions of "finite beings."
The One Infinite Being is clearly different. The One Infinite Being Who created all existence is quite different than those finite beings who are created by such Being.
It is as easy as seeing the difference between "those who have a beginning" who are finite verses an "Infinite Creator" Who has no beginning and alone possesses the attribute of Aseity.
In theology there are several (what we call) incommunicable attributes of God. 1. would be omniscience. 2. omnipresence. 3. omnisapience 4. Asiety 5. immutability 6. I would include omnitemporal being. There are others. You see, only God is infinite everywhere. Only God is the Creator of the universe. Everyone else is different.
This is why we have something as basic as justifiable special pleading to account for this every clear difference between an Infinite Creator Who created everything.... and all other finite existences.

P1. Regarding causation, two possible options are
(A) everything needs a cause, or
(B) everything that begins to exist needs a cause.

P2. Option-A: If Option-A is true then ALL things (all beings) are Contingent Beings. There is NO First-Cause. And there is NO Necessary Being that is the cause of all contingent beings. As a result, you are forced to an infinite regress of Contingent Beings (an infinite sequence of causes).

P3. However, an infinite regress cannot be crossed.

..................................................
C1. Therefore, Option-A is a square-circle impossibility.

C2. And it is Irrational for an atheist to insist that Option-A is necessarily true (in order to avoid the existence of God).
..................................................

P4, Consider Option-B. Everything that begins to exist needs a cause.

P5. This (P4) does NOT violate any rule of logic or rationality. Therefore it is NOT illogical or Irrational. Therefore, it IS logical and Rational.

P6. AND, this (P4) avoids an infinite regress.

..................................................
C3. Therefore, Option-B is NOT a square-circle impossibility.

C4. Therefore, it is RATIONAL and LOGICAL to subscribe to the truth of Option-B (particularly given that Option-A has been shown to be Impossible).

C5. Therefore, it is True that "Everything that begins to exist needs a cause".
..................................................

P7. The rest of the Kalam Cosmological Argument then applies, to point us to the existence of an Uncaused First Cause that is Necessary Being.

P8. Everything that begins to exist needs a cause (from C5).

..................................................
P9. The Universe began to exist

Reason A - If it did not begin to exist, it must have crossed an infinity of past moments to get to the present moment. It is impossible to cross an infinity by enumeration. Therefore, the universe must have begun to exist.

Reason B - The big bang has been confirmed to be true by a vast body of scientific evidence. The big-bang indicates that the universe began to exist.

..................................................
P10. The Big Bang indicates that that First Cause cannot be Matter-energy, space or time (MEST) since the scientific evidence indicates (prima facie) that all MEST came into being at the big bang.

..................................................
C6. This indicates that the the First Cause is a NON-material or IMMaterial Entity that is NOT MEST, and that has the ability to design and create the entire physical universe.
..................................................

P11. Immaterial entities are (a) abstract objects, or (b) MINDS.

P12. Abstract objects (numbers, laws of logic) do NOT have the ability to create something. MINDS do have the power to create things.

..................................................
C7. This indicates that this First-Cause is an incredibly intelligent and incredibly powerful MIND (that designed and created the physical universe).

C8. We call this Mind God.
..................................................

We know the universe began to exist. That fact is agreed upon by the majority of theists and atheists alike. But what else can we know from that fact? By conceding that the universe has a beginning, does that give us proof of the Christian God? Not really, but it gets us closer than you may initially realize.

The first thing one can infer is whatever it is that caused the universe to exist (I will refer to this as the Cause with a capital C) must itself exist beyond the universe. This means that since the Cause created all matter, it must itself immaterial. If the Cause is made of matter, then it isn't an explanation of the universe, it is part of the universe.

Since time is also a part of the created universe, the cause of the universe's existence must be at least initially timeless. It must exist in a state of timelessness beyond any creative act.

If the Cause existed in a timeless dimension, then why all of a sudden start creating?
There are two types of causes that we have observed through all of history. The first are causes that are the result of a certain set of circumstances. The 35th domino in a line of dominoes falling will cause the 36th domino to fall. Similarly, heat will cause fuel and oxygen to ignite into fire. These causes create an effect that follows inevitably from the laws of nature. They are what I would call mechanical and they are contingent upon the universe being the way it is. Given the chemical properties of heat, the effect must occur if the causal conditions are met.

But such causes require other things to already be in existence. The 35th domino wouldn't have fallen had the 34th domino not fallen. The force of gravity must exist (lining up dominos in the International Space Station is much harder to do and won't give you the same effect.) Molecules must be able to share electrons in a certain way before the vinegar can react with the baking soda. There is, therefore, no mechanical cause that can jump-start the whole process.

The other type of cause is a personal cause. Personal causes can act spontaneously. If I have a desire to raise my arm, I simply raise it. There needs to be no preceding event that makes me want to raise my arm. The effect is triggered by my mind. While some desires or intentions may stem from external stimuli (such as wanting to raise my arm because it is tired, it aches, or I want to answer a question the teacher posed), such a prior cause is not required. I'm not compelled to answer a question the teacher posed, I may simply want to contribute to the discussion. I may simply have a desire to answer and I then intend to answer by causing the effect of putting up my hand.

Desired from Eternity Past
Of the two types of causes we know, which would be better at explaining the cause of the universe? The first one can't do so because it requires something to exist already. Some try to argue about the laws of gravity creating the universe, but such arguments fail to take into account what's required before any law, including gravity, can work. These kinds of causes don't answer the question of beginnings, they simply push it back a step and imagine a universe-making machine. The obvious question is "what made the machine?"

The second kind of cause makes more sense. But intentions and desires don't exist on their own; they are the products of a mind. A mind is not a physical thing, like a brain. It is fundamentally different and because thoughts, intentions, and desires are themselves immaterial, they can be present in an immaterial mind.

So, we have a Cause that is immaterial, timeless and shows desire to create. That means the cause is personal; it has a mind. You may at this point say, "But wait! How can a timeless mind have a desire? If there is a change in the Cause where a desire is created, that means such a Cause is not timeless." This is true. However, it isn't necessary that a desire come into being. Some intentions or desires can always be there. Think about the desire to survive, for example. All humans have it, even if they never have to exercise it. The desire for life exists since birth, but only when we are threatened do we act upon it.

It is reasonable, then, to have a timeless, immaterial, personal Cause for the universe that desired to create (and create us) from the eternal past. While that doesn't specifically argue for the Christian God, it comes pretty close and excludes a whole lot of other contenders. 2


If the beginning of the universe was caused, that cause is either personal or impersonal. Since that cause created matter, space, and time, It had to be immaterial and exist in a timeless dimension. The only immaterial things we know of being able to cause something into being are conscient minds which are able to make decisions. Therefore, the cause must be personal. So there must have been a decision to cause the beginning of the universe's beginning.

Here a bit more technical explanation:
If the beginning of the universe was caused, that cause is either personal or impersonal. The cause must be personal, because if the cause was impersonal, the necessary and sufficient conditions to cause the beginning of the universe always existed and there was no other factor involved in triggering the cause, making it become effective, and therefore the universe would always have existed as well. But this is impossible. So there must have been a change in the necessary and sufficient conditions to cause the beginning, and that change would have to have been a decision to cause the universe's beginning, and only personal beings make decisions.

How do humans constitute evidence for God?
Because they are personal agents. In philosophical terminology, personal does not mean warm and friendly. A personal being is a conscious agent with the capacity to think, feel, choose, and act—in contrast to an unconscious principle or substance that operates by blind, automatic forces (such as the forces of nature).
The existence of personal beings constitutes evidence that they were created by a personal God, not by any non-personal cause. We’ll discuss the details of this argument in later chapters, but the gist is clear: Because humans are capable of knowing, the first cause that produced them must have a mind. Because humans are capable of choosing, the first cause must have a will. And so on.
Philosopher Étienne Gilson captures the argument neatly: because a human is a someone and not a something, the source of human life must be also a Someone.


If the cause was physical, it would be continually (not just 14 BYA) producing an effect (the universe). Some might object that a quantum state decayed 14 BYA. But if that state had existed from past eternity, it would have decayed in past eternity (or eternity +n, if you like) and we would observe an infinitely old universe. The way to avoid this problem is with a personal explanation that decided to bring about a universe with its own time clock we can observe.

From the nature of the case involved, that cause must have transcended space and time (at least sans the universe) and therefore be uncaused, changeless, eternal, immaterial, and enormously powerful. Moreover, as I have argued elsewhere [Craig (1979), pp. 149-153; (1991), pp. 104-108], the cause is most plausibly construed to be personal. For the only way in which a temporal effect could originate from an eternal, changeless cause would seem to be if the cause is a personal agent who eternally chooses to create an effect in time. A changeless, mechanically operating cause would produce either an immemorial effect or none at all; but an agent endowed with free will can have an eternal determination to operate causally at a (first) moment of time and thereby to produce a temporally first effect. Therefore, the cause of the universe is plausibly regarded as personal. This conclusion receives confirmation from the incredible complexity of the initial conditions given in the early universe, which bespeak intelligent design [Leslie (1990)]. These attributes are some of the core properties of what theists mean by "God."

if the cause of water's being frozen is the temperature's being below zero degrees, then if the temperature were below zero degrees from eternity, then any water present would be frozen from eternity. The only way to have an eternal cause but a temporal effect would seem to be if the cause is a personal agent who freely chooses to create an effect in time. For example, a man sitting from eternity may will to stand up; hence, a temporal effect may arise from an eternally existing agent. Indeed, the agent may will from eternity to create a temporal effect, so that no change in the agent need be conceived. Thus, we are brought not merely to the first cause of the universe, but to its personal Creator.
http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/docs/creation.html


This Being exhibits characteristics very similar to the God of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, which interestingly enough, are the only core faiths left standing after atheism and pantheism have been eliminated. Note also that one of the big questions in life (origins) is now answered: we know where we came from.


A proponent of the Big Bang theory, at least if he is an atheist, must believe that the universe came from nothing and by nothing." But surely that doesn't make sense! Out of nothing, nothing comes. So why does the universe exist instead of just nothing? Where did it come from? There must have been a cause which brought the universe into being.

From the very nature of the case, this cause must be an uncaused, changeless, timeless, and immaterial being which created the universe. It must be uncaused because we've seen that there cannot be an infinite regress of causes. It must be timeless and therefore changeless—at least without the universe—because it created time. Because it also created space, it must transcend space as well and therefore be immaterial, not physical.

Moreover, I would argue, it must also be personal. For how else could a timeless cause give rise to a temporal effect like the universe? If the cause were a mechanically operating set of necessary and sufficient conditions, then the cause could never exist without the effect. For example, the cause of water's freezing is the temperature's being below 0˚ Centigrade. If the temperature were below 0˚ from eternity past, then any water that was around would be frozen from eternity. It would be impossible for the water to begin to freeze just a finite time ago. So if the cause is permanently present, then the effect should be permanently present as well. The only way for the cause to be timeless and the effect to begin in time is for the cause to be a personal agent who freely chooses to create an effect in time without any prior determining conditions. For example, a man sitting from eternity could freely will to stand up. Thus, we are brought, not merely to a transcendent cause of the universe, but to its personal Creator.

W.L.Craig writes:

God must be causally, but not temporally, prior to the Big Bang. With the creation of the universe, time began, and God entered into time at the moment of creation in virtue of His real relations with the created order. It follows that God must, therefore, be timeless without the universe and temporal with the universe.
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/timelessness-and-omnitemporality#ixzz4lILYz3mz

I agree that there must have been a point or transition from a timeless dimension, to a dimension in time. What I always struggled with, is to think that this transition happened when God created the physical universe. If it were so, he would have had to create the reality of heaven, and the heavenly creatures at the same time - since, even in a higher, different, or another dimension, as soon as there is action, movement, motion, there is time.

But in Romans 8.29 we read:
Even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.

Ephesians 1.4:
According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:

To me, it seems more realistic to think of another "timeline", that is:

- God in a timeless dimension, where he existed alone
- God got into time, creating heaven, and the heavenly creatures
- God created the physical universe
- This universe will be destroyed and replaced by a new one, which will be eternal

============================================================================================================================================

1. http://biblicalworldviewacademy.org/establishing-god-as-creator-part-17/
2. http://apologetics-notes.comereason.org/2015/01/the-cause-of-universe-must-be.html

http://www.leaderu.com/truth/3truth11.html
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1204.4658v1.pdf
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe
http://www.str.org/articles/you-will-not-live-an-eternity#.VF1ZbMlLktM

https://www.facebook.com/JuiceMY/videos/10155278672372714/?hc_ref=ARSjvKqlje2ME0GANXJq4wijBUcy2Qkn48TSMzVjt3Ezk0WKD2N_mddQ7ULMyx4k85E

1h 29min 35sec:

Braxton:
what you brought tonight is philosophy and history and I think philosophy does reliably get us two answers and I've given you philosophical arguments but I haven't heard and it's not that you haven't said things about them you have and I've enjoyed it but I don't think you've said anything substantive to really deal with especially the Kalam cosmological argument  so or the case that begins with the Kalam

Matt
oh I did the substantive thing is that even if you concluded that the universe that next one it must have an explanation for its existence or must have a cause for its existence what do you know about that cause and how do you know it and whenever when you or anybody else has presented the case it is a list of assertions

Braxton:
well can I answer so if it's if it's the cause of all nature coming into existence then that would be if nature is space-time matter then the cause would have to be if your nature can't come before nature to cause nature

Matt
how do you know that

Braxton
well because it's nature that we're trying to explain

Matt
okay how do you know it's not a different nature

Braxton
well it could be but then you have I said all contiguous physical reality so what we would have is you would still have to have a cause for that nature coming into existence it would just mean you haven't gone back far enough yeah so what I would say then is the cause would have is you would still have to have a cause for that nature coming into existence it would just mean you haven't gone back far enough yeah so what I would say then is the cause would have to be a spaceless timeless non material cause  what requires and how is that an assertion so I'm sorry it's your question

Matt
the fact that I'm fine with the notion that people intuitively reach the conclusion that whatever caused the universe is apart from the universe but actually that sure apart from our local presentation of the universe Sagan use the word cosmos because the universe is a terrible word when you're talking about multiverse is else and even attendant conflict so the cosmos is everything there is ever was irrespective of time or anything else so if the local presentation of the universe had to have some cause then the only thing that I can that I can know about that is that it seems to be the case that it couldn't have been our universe it caused itself so there must be something else yeah what that something else is or needs to be I have no idea because I have no way to investigate it I have no other universes to compare this to you

Braxton
'll notice that in my opening statements I specified that I'm talking about our local representation multiverses vacuum models whatever you want to bring up and it can't be past infinite for reasons that I'm happy to defend and I know you say oh I just don't think we can know and I'm saying whatever comes before all of that that we can call Sagan's Cosmos which is a Greek word that means the world but Sagan's Cosmos all of that whatever comes before isn't that but I see

Matt
what's the case that it needs to be an agent

Braxton
so there's a couple of reasons why it has to be an agent, first of all, an agent would have causal powers now that doesn't that's not the insistence that's not necessary but that's not the end of the story also you have types of causation right so event event causation would be if I took this water ball model and threw it at the moderator and the microphone fell out of his hand that's an event that caused another event and I won't do that but then there's State State causation which is like a frozen pond where you have a log resting on the top of that pond this stay is causing this other state what you would have with the beginning of the universe is state event causation you would go from a state of timeless nothingness to an events the beginning of the universe the only thing that makes sense of that is agent causation 

Matt
okay just an assertion that that's the only thing you can think of

Braxton
it's not the only it's not just that it's the only thing I can think of and lastly I'll say this it would have to have libertarian free will and the reason would and the reason it would is because there was no prior determinism to lead to that event and what sorts of things have liberty and freedom agents do all right well one thing I am certain of obvious it's obvious that intellect causes people to lose their hair and all the brain food just makes the hair go away give a give a round of applause to our presenters when they'll be a great job







5 Easy Steps to refute naturalism

https://reasonandscience.catsboard.com/t1877-easy-steps-to-refute-naturalism

Either the cosmos
(1) had no beginning, or
(2) it had a beginning.
(1) If the cosmos had no beginning, then there must be an infinite series of past events. However, it is impossible to traverse an actual infinite. Therefore, the universe cannot be infinitely old. Besides that, If the cosmos was infinitely old, it would have reached maximum entropy a long, long, time ago. Since it has not reached maximum entropy, it cannot be infinitely old without violating the second law of thermodynamics.
(2) If the cosmos had a beginning, then it must have come from (A) nothing or (B) something.
2.A. Although physicists such as Krauss and Hawking talk about "the universe creating itself from nothing," they are using the word "nothing" to mean the vacuum energy, which is not a true nothing. To be more precise, being cannot emerge from non-being. 
2.B. If the entire cosmos came from something, that thing must transcend our cosmos, that is, it must exist beyond the limits of our space/time continuum. We may call it the First Cause.

There are things that come into existence.
Everything that begins to exist is caused to come into being by something else.
There can not be an endless series of past causes.
You cannot reach now by making one addition to time after another from eternity.
Nor can something come to exist from absolutely nothing
Therefore there is a necessary first cause that did not come into existence.
In other words, the first cause has always existed.


The scientific and philosophical evidence that we do possess speaks loudly and clearly to the existence of an independent, eternal, self-existent Mind that created this Universe and everything within it.

The first principles of ontology per the imperatives of logic manifestly evince that God must be.   Only the abandonment of rationality imagines that it makes sense to conclude that existence can arise from nonexistence, that an infinite regress of causative events is possible, that actual infinities are possible or that the effect of a mechanical cause is not given from eternity.  

1. Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.
2. The universe had a beginning, therefore, it had a cause.
3. The present moment cannot be reached by adding individual events together from eternity.
4. The second law of thermodynamics refutes the hypothesis of an eternal universe.
5. Therefore an eternal & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence.
6. An agent endowed with free will can have a determination in a timeless dimension to operate causally at a (first) moment of time and thereby to produce a temporally first effect.

If the beginning of the universe was caused, that cause is either personal or impersonal. Since that cause created matter, space, and time,  It had to be immaterial and exist in a timeless dimension. The only immaterial things we know of being able to cause something into being are conscient minds which are able to make decisions.   Therefore, the cause must be personal. So there must have been a decision to cause the beginning of the universe's beginning. 

Only the God of the Bible is described with the following characteristics:
• Supernatural in nature (as He exists outside of His creation)
• Incredibly powerful (to have created all that is known)
• Eternal (self-existent, as He exists outside of time and space)
• Omnipresent (He created space and is not limited by it)
• Timeless and changeless (He created time)
• Immaterial (because He transcends space)
• Personal (the impersonal can’t create personality)
• Necessary (as everything else depends on Him)
• Infinite and singular (as you cannot have two infinites)
• Diverse yet has unity (as all multiplicity implies a prior singularity)
• Intelligent (supremely, to create everything)
• Purposeful (as He deliberately created everything)
• Moral (no moral law can exist without a lawgiver)
• Caring (or no moral laws would have been given)

Chance of chance doing *anything* is ZERO. It has no ontological status; it can do *nothing*. Chance is not a "thing". Its just a number to describe probabilities.

What makes more sense:
1. To believe that God used his eternal power ( energy ), created the universe, space, time and the Higgs field, which gave rise to matter, or
2. that absolutely nothing which is the absence of ANYTHING magically started our Universe or a Multiverse, which by trial and error created ours, or oscillating Universes, or that it suddenly created a vacuum, upon which virtual particles began to pop up, and somehow, for no reason created quarks, up's and down's, and an electric charge of the proton which is exactly equal and the opposite of the electric charge on the electron, despite the proton being nearly 2000 times more massive? and then finely tuned gravity and dark energy to a precision of one out of 10^123, and provided the exactly correct expansion rate of the universe, to permit a universe to expand, but at the same time to clump gas to form stars, planets, and life?

“It’s a whole lot easier to believe Genesis 1:1: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. and made the physical universe and life, rather  than it is to believe that nothing took nothing and made everything.”

The famed atheist Bertrand Russell notoriously said:
“If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause.” But it’s not true that everything must have a cause. Only that which begins to exist must have a cause. And herein God is perched up in a category of His own.

Some try to substitute God as first cause by claiming that energy was always there, eternally, stored in a singularity, and caused the universe into being by a quantum fluctuation event. Planck regarded matter/energy as derivative from consciousness. What would be the contrary? Consciousness derivative from energy. If it were so, over an unknown length of time, energy would have become cognitive and self-aware, even learning the how's and why's of becoming other perceivable forms. It would gain  perception, thinking, free will, moral judgment, and memory.  Einstein recognized the absurdity of this claim. He  described the "gulf' that logically separates the concrete world of hard objects on the one hand from the abstract world of ideas on the other. A small part of the materialists problem is that hard objects are never observed spontaneously to transform themselves (on their own recognizance) into abstract ideas.

W.L.Craig writes : 
The only way to have an eternal cause but a temporal effect would seem to be if the cause is a personal agent who freely chooses to create an effect in time.


The universe requires a cause because it had a beginning … God, unlike the universe, had no beginning, so doesn’t need a cause. In addition, Einstein’s general relativity, which has much experimental support, shows that time is linked to matter and space. So time itself would have begun along with matter and space. Since God, by definition, is the creator of the whole universe, he is the creator of time. Therefore He is not limited by the time dimension He created, so has no beginning in time.

Therefore, The God of the Bible fits the description of the cause and infers that He exists and is the best explanation of the cause of the universe.

https://www.gotquestions.org/correct-religion.html
Everything that has a beginning must have a cause; therefore, the universe had a cause and is not eternal. Because the only two sources of eternality are an eternal universe (denied by all current empirical evidence) or an eternal Creator, the only logical conclusion is that God exists. Answering the question of God’s existence in the affirmative rules out atheism as a valid belief system.

Now, this conclusion says nothing about what kind of God exists, but amazingly enough, it does do one sweeping thing—it rules out all pantheistic religions. All pantheistic worldviews say that the universe is God and is eternal. And this assertion is false. So, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and all other pantheistic religions are ruled out as valid belief systems.

Something cannot come into existence from absolutely nothing.
The universe had a beginning, therefore, it had a cause.
The present moment cannot be reached by adding individual events together from eternity.
The second law of thermodynamics refutes the hypothesis of an eternal universe.
Therefore an eternal & necessary first cause is the best explanation of our existence.

Premiss one of the Kalaam cosmological argument  strikes me as relatively non-controversial. It is based on the metaphysical intuition that something cannot come out of nothing. Hence, any argument for the principle is apt to be less obvious than the principle itself. Even the great skeptic David Hume admitted that he never asserted so absurd a proposition as that something might come into existence without a cause; he only denied that one could prove the obviously true causal principle.29 With regard to the universe, if originally there were absolutely nothing-no God, no space, no time-, then how could the universe possibly come to exist? The truth of the principle ex nihilo, nihil fit is so obvious that I think we are justified in foregoing an elaborate defense of the argument's first premiss.

Nevertheless, some thinkers, exercised to avoid the theism implicit in this premiss within the present context, have felt driven to deny its truth. In order to avoid its theistic implications, Davies presents a scenario which, he confesses, "should not be taken too seriously," but which seems to have a powerful attraction for Davies.30 He has reference to a quantum theory of gravity according to which spacetime itself could spring uncaused into being out of absolutely nothing. While admitting that there is "still no satisfactory theory of quantum gravity," such a theory "would allow spacetime to be created and destroyed spontaneously and uncaused in the same way that particles are created and destroyed spontaneously and uncaused. The theory would entail a certain mathematically determined probability that, for instance, a blob of space would appear where none existed before. Thus, spacetime could pop out of nothingness as the result of a causeless quantum transition."31

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe#ixzz4iUnHzkBy



It is based on the metaphysical intuition that something cannot come out of anything. Hence, any argument for the principle is apt to be less obvious than the principle itself. Even the great skeptic David Hume admitted that he never asserted so absurd a proposition as that something might come into existence without a cause; he only denied that one could prove the obviously true causal principle.29 With regard to the universe, if originally there were absolutely nothing-no God, no space, no time-, then how could the universe possibly come to exist? The truth of the principle ex nihilo, nihil fit is so obvious that I think we are justified in foregoing an elaborate defense of the argument's first premiss.

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-existence-of-god-and-the-beginning-of-the-universe#ixzz4qEioKrXD


W.L.Craig: This, I think, makes good sense of the relationship of God and time. God is timeless without creation and temporal subsequent to creation. Having entered into time, He is not dependent upon finite velocity light signals or clock synchronization procedures for knowing what time it is. Rather, existing in absolute time, God is, as Newton proclaimed, the Lord God of dominion of His universe. In the words of St. Jude: "To the only God our savior through Jesus Christ, our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority before all time and now and forever."
https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/existence-nature-of-god/god-time-and-eternity1/

God must be causally, but not temporally, prior to the Big Bang. With the creation of the universe, time began, and God entered into time at the moment of creation in virtue of His real relations with the created order. It follows that God must, therefore, be timelesswithout the universe and temporal with the universe. 1
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/timelessness-and-omnitemporality#ixzz4lILYz3mz

Is God Outside of Time? Not according to the Bible. 1
Most Christian theologians join countless philosophers of the last 2,500 years in saying that God is outside of time. However, if the Scriptures teach that God Himself experiences change in sequence, that would indicate that God exists in time, in the present, with a past, and looking forward to a future. This would demonstrate that atemporality, that is, timelessness, is not a necessary attribute of deity. So here is an example of a biblical proof demonstrating that God has a "past" and therefore falsifying the claim that God is outside of time:

Before the foundation of the world (as the Bible puts it), God the Son was not also the Son of Man; but then He "became" flesh as "the Son of Man", and so God the Son remains eternally "the Man Jesus Christ" (1 Tim 2:5).

1. http://kgov.com/is-god-outside-of-time

God is a necessary being
Why is there something (rather than nothing)?
Because, If there is Now, an eternal necessary Being, God must exists
Why does God exist, rather than not exist?
A necessary explanation:
Only One necessary being can logically exist.
Only a single necessary Being, could possibly exist and explain, the existence of itself, and our contingent material universe logically.
The impossibility of God's nonexistence is a logically sufficient condition of God's existence.
This is not something new. All major Greek philosophers using logic and rational thinking, accepted and supported the necessity of a single eternal Being we Christians call today God.
Is logically absurd to seek an external or more fundamental explanation for a necessary being.
By its nature, no physical (or material) entity or collection of physical entities could ever be self-explanatorily ultimate, while God, a logically necessary being, is a complete ultimate, and only logical, rational, and scientific explanation of the mental, abstract, and physical reality we live in.
Since the existence of the universe is contingent, an external cause is logically necessary.
Even if we find a unified theory of everything in physics, God is logically necessary, nothing is contradictory or inconsistent, with God, asa Creator and a cause of the physical universe.
All existent world-views cannot explain anything rationally in the world, without assuming the miracle of screation of the universe and life. The truth is exclusive by nature and independent of our will Or desires.
In order to falsify theism, the non theists, need to examine all known types of explanation (logical, rational, philosophical...) and then prove that theism fits none of these categories; they also have to show that no other types of legitimate explanation exist.
Most of the explanations we use in everyday life are not scientific ones, and most explanations in many academic fields such as history, economics... are not, strictly speaking, scientific explanations.
We can use a couple of Models of Explanation, to demonstrate the existence of God:
- Using a Necessity model (logical), and a
- Unification model of explanation, we can easily see, why God is a necessary Being, and a necessary Cause, and why It's existence is absolutely necessary to logically explain reality as a whole.
- We can also use a deductive-nomological or "covering law" model, to explain God by showing that is logically deduced from the laws of Logic, Rationality, and even the laws of Science, starting with initial conditions, (state) of the universe.
- At last, we can use the Personalistic explanation ("intentionalistic explanation") to explain the universe by proving that God's (Jesus) character, powers, knowledge, and purposes or reasons, freely created the universe.
A personalistic explanation is generally an intellectually superior explanation when
a) the person cited exists (God must exist)
b) the person possesses the character, powers, beliefs, and desires cited, and
c) the reasons cited are good reasons.
If something exists now, a necessary eternal Being must exist. We, are not necessary beings (we are contingent) and nothing material is, including the universe.
God is both logically and ontologically necessary since our minds exists and we are logical and rational beings. We are aware atheism denies the mind and logic, because they believe in randomness.
Conclusions:
Rational thinking, Science, and Logic are proving the universe must have been caused by Gthe personalod, and that, the universe cannot create itself from nothing, or be an uncaused effect, self created, that started from nothing and, explains everything else inside it, but is excluding itself, and remains unexplained.
The impossibility of God's nonexistence. Van Inwagen is right: Surely
(This is a matter of pure logic.)
God as a necessary being contains within itself all the sufficient condition of its own existence.
Peter van Inwagen in his textbook Metaphysics