The Strongest Argument for God

[Kenny]

Yes, Ken, BILLIONS of people around the planet believe in some kind of higher Power, and many of them also believe the evidences science has uncovered are so extraordinary as to think it foolish they don't ultimately have an intelligent cause. Ken, atheists and agnostics are a minority on planet earth!

Popularity is not an indicator of truth.

[Philip]

Ken, I never said popularity proved anything; I merely responded to your question by noting the billions of people who think what they see and know about the creation and have learned from science make them think atheism and agnosticism are illogical belief positions.

Ken: I have never heard of anybody believing that stuff; have your? Where are you getting this stuff?

[Kenny]

Ken, I never said popularity proved anything; I merely responded to your question by noting the billions of people who think what they see and know about the creation and have learned from science make them think atheism and agnosticism are illogical belief positions.

I asked you; who believes the Universe all of a sudden “self organized”?
You responded by telling me Theists are the majority, and Atheists are a minority. What does that response have to do with my question?

[Philip]

Ken: You responded by telling me Theists are the majority, and Atheists are a minority. What does that response have to do with my question?

Because it has everything to do with what people think it is rational to conclude, given the scientific evidences. You find a Rolex watch on the ground - you assume it was built by intelligent hands. So, when finding things far more sophisticated, applying that same common logic, it's common sense to know they were even far likelier to have been created by an intelligent agent.

Ken, what physicists universally believe about the moments and hour of the Big Bang shows great precision of many, suddenly existing, complex things immediately developing, organizing and function with tremendous interactive functionalities - the polar opposite of randomness or chaos as blind / non-intelligent things would. So, the term "Big Bang" gives many the wrong impression. But what are your choices to describe what occurred? A) SELF guiding (no intelligence involved or necessary) or B) that just the right, NON-intelligent things just happened to come into existence and immediately begin functioning with stupendous cross coordinations and interactivities.

So, Ken, how would you categorize what occurred? If those first things began organizing themselves - WITHOUT a guiding / intelligent source - then they are by definition SELF-organizing entities. So, did those first things begin organizing themselves, or did something outside of them do it? Do a great array of incredibly complex things create their own designs and cross-coordinate their complex functionalities - were they driven by / within themselves or not?

[PaulSacramento]

If I recall correctly, the argument went something like this;

1) Everything was caused (moved, changed, etc.) by something else.
2) Since you can’t have an infinite regress of prior causes, there must be something uncaused that was not caused by something else. (which contradicts the first claim)
*That uncaused cause is what you guys call God.

My objections were

* why must there be only one uncaused cause? Why not two? or ten? or a billion uncaused causes?
*If you are going to make an exception for God with #1 claiming he always existed, what’s to stop someone from making the same exception for the Universe claiming it has always existed? Or something else?

Yeah you may say because God is spirit, #1 doesn’t apply to the spiritual world, it only applies to the physical world. But how do you know #1 even applies to the physical world? Our greatest scientists admit they know less than 4% of the entire Universe! that means there is 96% of the Universe they have no clue about, so what makes anybody qualified to claim #1 applies to the entirety of the physical world?

I don’t recall getting a straight answer from any of those questions.

That is NOT the argument, the argument was never and never has been "Everything has a cause".
We have said that over and over and over again.

I was very clear an exception was made for God. The argument says everything requires a cause except God. Still disagree?

Argument DOES NOT SAY THAT.

https://philosophy.lander.edu/intro/cause

This site seems to agree with me that the argument says that only God is uncaused every thing else is caused. However feel free to provide an source that say otherwise

Can't access that link but here is what the argument says by the guy who KNOWS it:
http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2011/07 ... stand.html

in short:

What defenders of the cosmological argument do say is that what comes into existence has a cause, or that what is contingent has a cause. These claims are as different from “Everything has a cause” as “Whatever has color is extended” is different from “Everything is extended.” Defenders of the cosmological argument also provide arguments for these claims about causation. You may disagree with the claims – though if you think they are falsified by modern physics, you are sorely mistaken – but you cannot justly accuse the defender of the cosmological argument either of saying something manifestly silly or of contradicting himself when he goes on to say that God is uncaused.

[Kenny]

Ken: You responded by telling me Theists are the majority, and Atheists are a minority. What does that response have to do with my question?

Because it has everything to do with what people think it is rational to conclude, given the scientific evidences. You find a Rolex watch on the ground - you assume it was built by intelligent hands. So, when finding things far more sophisticated, applying that same common logic, it's common sense to know they were even far likelier to have been created by an intelligent agent.

Humans build lots of things that aren't complex and sophisticated ya know; why are you only equating sophisticated and complex design with intelligence?

Ken, what physicists universally believe about the moments and hour of the Big Bang shows great precision of many, suddenly existing, complex things immediately developing, organizing and function with tremendous interactive functionalities - the polar opposite of randomness or chaos as blind / non-intelligent things would. So, the term "Big Bang" gives many the wrong impression. But what are your choices to describe what occurred? A) SELF guiding (no intelligence involved or necessary) or B) that just the right, NON-intelligent things just happened to come into existence and immediately begin functioning with stupendous cross coordinations and interactivities.

What about "C" Nothing came into existence? Have you considered that an option as well?

So, Ken, how would you categorize what occurred? If those first things began organizing themselves - WITHOUT a guiding / intelligent source - then they are by definition SELF-organizing entities. So, did those first things begin organizing themselves, or did something outside of them do it? Do a great array of incredibly complex things create their own designs and cross-coordinate their complex functionalities - were they driven by / within themselves or not?

One of the common misconceptions about the Big Bang model is the belief that it was the origin of the universe. However, the Big Bang model does not comment about how the universe came into being. The current conception of the Big Bang model assumes the existence of energy, time, and space and does not comment about their origin or the cause of the dense and high-temperature initial state of the universe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang

[Kenny]

IOW I don't accept the claim that there was a time in history when things began to organize, or come into being.

[Kenny]

That is NOT the argument, the argument was never and never has been "Everything has a cause".
We have said that over and over and over again.

I was very clear an exception was made for God. The argument says everything requires a cause except God. Still disagree?

Argument DOES NOT SAY THAT.

https://philosophy.lander.edu/intro/cause

This site seems to agree with me that the argument says that only God is uncaused every thing else is caused. However feel free to provide an source that say otherwise

Can't access that link but here is what the argument says by the guy who KNOWS it:
http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2011/07 ... stand.html

in short:

What defenders of the cosmological argument do say is that what comes into existence has a cause, or that what is contingent has a cause. These claims are as different from “Everything has a cause” as “Whatever has color is extended” is different from “Everything is extended.” Defenders of the cosmological argument also provide arguments for these claims about causation. You may disagree with the claims – though if you think they are falsified by modern physics, you are sorely mistaken – but you cannot justly accuse the defender of the cosmological argument either of saying something manifestly silly or of contradicting himself when he goes on to say that God is uncaused.

Humm; let me guess... God is the only one who is not contingent thus has no cause, and God is the only one who didn't come into existence, everything else did. Is that correct? If so, how is that different from when I said an exception is made for God because he is uncaused, everything else is caused? And how does this refute the objections I mentioned?

[Philip]

Ken: IOW I don't accept the claim that there was a time in history when things began to organize, or come into being.

Then you need to stop referring to scientists or scientific evidences to make your points - because you don't believe or accept what astronomers, cosmologists and physicists say their exhaustive tests and analysis have revealed about the early universe. Really, you apparently have no basis for what you declare MIGHT be possible - just making it up as you go along, I guess.

[Kenny]

Ken: IOW I don't accept the claim that there was a time in history when things began to organize, or come into being.

Then you need to stop referring to scientists or scientific evidences to make your points - because you don't believe or accept what astronomers, cosmologists and physicists say their exhaustive tests and analysis have revealed about the early universe. Really, you apparently have no basis for what you declare MIGHT be possible - just making it up as you go along, I guess.

Are you suggesting there is an established scientific theory that supports your claim of the Universe organizing and coming into being? Which theory is this?

[Philip]

Ken: Are you suggesting there is an established scientific theory that supports your claim of the Universe organizing and coming into being? Which theory is this?

That you ask this question shows either your insincerity or cluelessness.

https://www.space.com/40370-why-should- ... -bang.html

https://www.schoolsobservatory.org/lear ... ng/bb_evid

[Kurieuo]

One of the common misconceptions about the Big Bang model is the belief that it was the origin of the universe. However, the Big Bang model does not comment about how the universe came into being. The current conception of the Big Bang model assumes the existence of energy, time, and space and does not comment about their origin or the cause of the dense and high-temperature initial state of the universe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang

And so, what do comologists (or Wikipedia) say the age of the universe is?

Do you understand how this is determined?

[Kenny]

Ken: Are you suggesting there is an established scientific theory that supports your claim of the Universe organizing and coming into being? Which theory is this?

That you ask this question shows either your insincerity or cluelessness.

https://www.space.com/40370-why-should- ... -bang.html

https://www.schoolsobservatory.org/lear ... ng/bb_evid

I don't see where the sites you listed mentioned when the singularity (the entirety of the Universe) came into being; they just mention how it expanded to what we have now.

[Kenny]

One of the common misconceptions about the Big Bang model is the belief that it was the origin of the universe. However, the Big Bang model does not comment about how the universe came into being. The current conception of the Big Bang model assumes the existence of energy, time, and space and does not comment about their origin or the cause of the dense and high-temperature initial state of the universe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang

And so, what do comologists (or Wikipedia) say the age of the universe is?

Do you understand how this is determined?

They say the Big Bang happened 13.8 billion years ago. As far as the age of the singularity before it expanded, nobody knows. If you consider the expansion of the singularity (the big bang)the beginning of the Universe, then 13.8 million years would be your answer. But it seems to me the singularity was the Universe, just in a different form.

[Kurieuo]

One of the common misconceptions about the Big Bang model is the belief that it was the origin of the universe. However, the Big Bang model does not comment about how the universe came into being. The current conception of the Big Bang model assumes the existence of energy, time, and space and does not comment about their origin or the cause of the dense and high-temperature initial state of the universe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang

And so, what do comologists (or Wikipedia) say the age of the universe is?

Do you understand how this is determined?

They say the Big Bang happened 13.8 billion years ago. As far as the age of the singularity before it expanded, nobody knows. If you consider the expansion of the singularity (the big bang)the beginning of the Universe, then 13.8 million years would be your answer. But it seems to me the singularity was the Universe, just in a different form.

Well, the irony is, I'd agree the Universe existed in a different form, albeit one of a potential form from an Actualiser who actualised such.

If an explosion happened that flung things everywhere and noone was around to see it.... but, scientists came along and were able to measure the microwave heat leftovers back to an infinitesimal point where it was hotter and more dense. Would it not be a flagrant violation of logic and reason to assume this singularity point just existed forever, rather than to believe something actualised the point into existence which then exploded outwards (or rapidly expanded)?