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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. 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

It is arguably possible to justify the first 3 premises using the scientific method, and even justify them up to a 5 sigma percentage. Furthermore premise 4 could arguably be justified by assigning a probability of how likely an explanation a cause God is. Would this lead to an almost scientific proof of God since it is possible to justify these premises using the scientific method?

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  • 1) says who.. what now? 2) onwards... See 1)
    – Richard
    Jan 19, 2019 at 23:18
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    I question the second premise, because while the Big Bang probably occurred, it doesn't signify the beginning of the existence of the universe. It only signifies an important event in the natural cycle of the universe.
    – Bread
    Jan 19, 2019 at 23:21
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    The argument is formally valid, but it is not sound. A sound argument requires that each of its premises be true, but we do not know the truth value of any of the four premises.
    – nwr
    Jan 19, 2019 at 23:50
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    While Bread questions the second premise, I notice that 4 premise is just a play on words: whatever the cause of existence is, it's God. It is defining God as being the cause of existence of the universe. But is the value of such concept of God?
    – rus9384
    Jan 20, 2019 at 0:08
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    @Cell Validity is a formal concept rather than a semantic concept.
    – nwr
    Jan 20, 2019 at 0:57

4 Answers 4

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(1) Everything that has a beginning of its existence has a cause of its existence.

(1) Everything that we know of, yes, it's causality

(2) The universe has a beginning of its existence.

(2) no, the universe doesnt need a beginning, we can only trace back to the big bang , but that doesnt mean the universe wasnt there before

(3) The universe has a cause of its existence.

(3) not necessarily because it may not have a beginning, see above. But let's imagine the universe had a beginning, what makes you think that causality (in point (1)) applies outside of our universe ?

(4) If the universe has a cause of its existence then that cause is God.

(4) you are free to call God whatever is the thing that may be the cause of the possible beginning of the universe. No problem. It's called "pulling a jordan Peterson"

(5) God exists

It may exist (see (4)), but considering that science can't reach there, there is absolutely nothing useful you can say about that "God", but anyways, you forgot to extend your logic:

(6)God has a beginning of its existence. Therefore:

(7) God has a cause of its existence.

And so on...

I could make the same type of argument as follow:

(1) everything that is good comes from God

(2) good sex is good

(3) good sex exists therefore

(4) God exists

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  • I didn't understand the Jordan Peterson comment.
    – user4894
    Jan 20, 2019 at 17:47
  • jordan peterson claims that the bible is true, then goes on redefining truth
    – Manu de Hanoi
    Jan 21, 2019 at 1:10
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    I never heard that about Peterson, so I looked it up. It doesn't seem to be true. He's said the Bible is foundational. That's not at all the same thing. quora.com/Does-Jordan-Peterson-believe-the-Bible-is-true. I'll stipulate that I didn't spend more than 15 seconds on my research but I'd be grateful for a reference that supports your claim.
    – user4894
    Jan 21, 2019 at 1:34
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    That's a 16 minute video. Can you at least give me the hh:mm where Peterson himself expresses the words you attribute to him? I don't have a dog in this fight, I'm just really curious since he doesn't strike me as a religious literalist, believing in flaming bushes and such.
    – user4894
    Jan 21, 2019 at 3:27
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    It's not for you to say what 16 minutes of my time is worth to me. Now if it were Peterson speaking I might have watched a bit. But to see someone talking ABOUT Peterson leaves me unmotivated to spend the time. Nor does the video's title support a claim of objectivity. It's ok if you don't like Peterson. I'm just asking for evidence of the claim that he LITERALLY believes the Bible. I would not have expected that, even if he does regard it as having moral force.
    – user4894
    Jan 21, 2019 at 3:33
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The origins of the universe is really beyond the capacity of science. Some theists may use an argument like this to support their belief that God is the creator of the universe. Some people (including both theists, agnostics, and atheists) would say that the universe is eternal, cyclic, or something else. All of these options are beyond what science can investigate. These are questions of philosophy, not science.

For some people, the Kalam Cosmological Argument is quite thought provoking, and maybe even convincing of theism. If you're someone who likes thinking about questions such as whether actual infinities are possible, then Kalam may appeal to you. Here's how Christian apologist Douglas Groothuis explains the core issue:

Whatever hesitation we may have in ruling out the actual infinite, traversing an actual infinity of moments, piece by piece, seems much more problematic. Since the kalam aims at ruling out a universe of infinite duration, the crucial premise of this argument is that the universe began to exist. If the past is an actual infinity of linear events, the present can never arrive. It is akin to "climbing a ladder of water" or "jumping out of a bottomless pit." We can also liken it to walking up a down escalator at exactly the same speed as the escalator. No progress can be made. (Christian Apologetics, page 223)

Others may dismiss it as having no advantage over the other unprovable positions such as an endless cycle of bangs and crunches. Both actually contain something eternal and uncreated, the question is whether that's a being outside the universe who created the universe, or the universe itself. The cynic in me says that many proponents for a cyclic universe may choose the cyclic universe option because of the moral implications a creator being could have on their life.

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    "The cynic in me says that many proponents for a cyclic universe may choose the cyclic universe option because of the moral implications a creator being could have on their life." Or you know, the less presumptuous alternative is that we believe strongly in the null hypothesis that given there is no empirical evidence for immaterial sentient beings and that taking a close up look at the early universe shows there is nothing but nonsentient particles, there is no reason to believe sentience suddenly existed before.
    – Cell
    Jan 21, 2019 at 3:29
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    @Cell Consciousness is neither visible to the human eye nor otherwise directly detectable with scientific instrumentation, which doesn't mean it's "immaterial". Many things exist that are neither.
    – Bread
    Jan 21, 2019 at 15:16
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This argument comes up again and again.

As Richard commented, the answer to sentence #1 is: Says who? I don't want to contradict #2 (but Bread would according to his comment), but since there is no evidence for #1, sentence #3 is unproven.

Now sentence #4 is a non-sequitur. Which means #5 is unproven. Even if sentence #3 was proven, which it isn't, sentence #4 wouldn't follow.

This is not a scientific proof. It is pseudoscientific according to modern standards.

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Iirc, premise #2 is not known to be true as we do not know anything about the universe before Planck time.

Imho there are also 2 issues with premise #1.

First I do not see why the beginning of something requires a cause - instead there is the possibility of simply coming into existence, isn't it?

In a more fundamental train of thought, assume that time comes into existence together with the universe. Wouldn't it then be meaningless to talk about a cause of the universe as causal relations imply events being ordered in time whereas the hypothesized cause cannot be ordered in time wrt the existence of the universe because there is no 'before (... the universe exists)'?

However, we cannot rule out that time came into existence with the universe.

So no proof of God.

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  • If you have references they would support the answer and give the reader a place to go for more information. For example, a reference that justifies why something beginning does not require a cause would provide support for that position. Welcome to Philosophy!
    – Frank Hubeny
    Jan 21, 2019 at 13:50
  • @FrankHubeny: Unfortunately I do not have the suggested reference, though I would think that the claim (ie. constraint) here is that something beginning does require a cause, hence I'd expect a reference to come with the Kamal reasoning.
    – collapsar
    Jan 21, 2019 at 13:57

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