Showing posts with label Kalam Cosmological Argument. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kalam Cosmological Argument. Show all posts

Sunday, January 10, 2021

Why The Kalam Cosmological Argument Is Incompatible With Libertarian Free Will (Meme Edition)

I've argued before that the Kalam Cosmological Argument is incompatible with libertarian free will, but it requires a few assumptions. First it must be the case that thoughts are not merely events but are things that pop into existence. Second, to say the "agent" is the cause of its thought requires an agent to somehow be distinct from its consciousness, such that it can make decisions prior to consciousness. For example, if an agent causes its thoughts it can't do so consciously, because the cause would be prior to the thought, which is the consciousness. I fail to see how an agent can have any control over such an unconscious experience. I created this meme to illustrate the problem.

Feel free to download and share on your social media.




Something From Nothing: Why Almost Everyone Gets The Big Bang Wrong (Including Atheists) Meme Edition!

I created an infograph years ago on why almost everyone gets the big bang wrong but realized it was too big for social media, and so I created a more meme friendly version. This topic is one of my biggest pet peeves because it allows the theist to make claims that just aren't true, especially regarding cosmological arguments. Feel free to download this and upload to your social media. Spread the word!




Monday, January 15, 2018

Causality Doesn't Exist — In The Way We Typically Think It Does: A Further Explanation


I've written several blog posts on my site about how causality doesn't exist (see here and here) but now I want to explain in a bit more detail what I mean by this and also clarify some misunderstandings on what my view is.

Most importantly, my view technically is not that causality doesn't exist, it's that causality doesn't exist in the way we typically think it does. That is, my view of causality is completely different from the general every day notion of causality most people have. The naive assumption one often gets when hearing my view is that I'm saying cause and effect relationships don't exist at all, such that if you threw a brick at glass window it wouldn't shatter, or if you jumped in front of a speeding train you wouldn't get smashed to death by it. That's not what my view says at all.

On my view of causality, if you threw a brick at a glass window it would shatter, if you jumped in front of a speeding train you'd be smashed to death by it. The difference between my view of causality vs the typical view is that on my view causes do not bring their effects into existence in the sense of true ontological becoming.

In other words, on my view it is not the case that cause A exists, and effect B does not exist, and then cause A brings effect B into existence. Rather, cause A exists and so does effect B, but in a different part of spacetime. For example, imagine that a blue car skids off the road and smashes into a red stop sign, severing it and dragging it along with the car. If someone asked, "What caused the stop sign to be knocked down?" it's perfectly reasonable to say the cause was the car smashing into it. But the existence of the severed stop sign was there already, in the future direction of spacetime. That is, the effect technically exists along with the cause and is not brought into existence by it. To get a representation of this visually, take a look at the spacetime diagram below.


Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Sacerdotus Is (Even More) Stupid (Than Previously Thought) Part 4


Author's note: I know I just wrote that I'd be spending more time writing about social issues and lay off atheism for a bit, but a recent attempt to rebut my blog post on why I'm an atheist got my attention and prompted me to make a response. I'll get back to social issues when this is done.



A supposed "philosopher" who challenged me on my post Why I'm An Atheist, wrote a follow up to my follow up, and in it he claims again, that's he's refuted me and that I'm ignorant of science and philosophy. The exact opposite is true and I can easily show why. His arguments are so bad, they are laughable. And I don't mean this to be facetious, I mean this with all seriousness. He makes so many common argumentative mistakes and factual errors that I cannot take him seriously that he has a degree in philosophy and science. If he does have a degree, he should get a refund, because he apparently learned no serious critical thinking skills because of it. His arguments are on the caliber of the same old tired internet apologist, like the many wannabe William Lane Craig clones out there. Only he's at the low end of the spectrum.

If you're wondering why my posts denigrate him so harshly it's because he mocks atheists and calls atheism stupid. Here I'm just giving him a taste of his own medicine.

I continue with part 4 covering arguments 10 and 11. Starting with his response to argument 10, his words are in block quotes.


10) Euthyphro's trilemma


And now we come to the Euthypho trilemma, one of my favorite areas to debate.

I wrote that Euthyphro's dilemma works with monotheism as well as polytheism. He ignorantly writes back saying,

It actually does not. The Euthyphro dilemma originates from Greece where polytheism was the norm. Euthyphro himself was a priest of a polytheistic sect. If he were alive today, he would not understand the argument the author is making and will probably be upset at the distortion the author is giving the dilemma that bears his name. 

The argument's logic is not dependent on polytheism, and Euthyphro would recognize the argument in a monotheistic context. In fact, the argument makes more sense on monotheism, because then there is only one god in which morality could be dependent on, instead of a council of gods, who might have conflicting views. It is irrelevant that the argument got started in a polytheistic culture. That Sacerdotus doesn't know this proves he can't possibly have a degree in philosophy.

Furthermore, I did not simply state "God is good." I wrote more than the author acknowledges. We can assume why he/she does not acknowledge my refutation. He/she cannot address it. Once again, the author restates his/her faulty premise.  

Um no. Let's review what he originally wrote in his response:

In reality, the atheist is the one who has the problem. God is good. God is the fullness of goodness and love. God is love (1 John 4:8). Goodness and love do not exist as separate entities from God.

All that does is assert the same idea: "God is good." It doesn't prove any of the assertions, it just asserts it! Prove god is good. Go ahead. Go do it. Quoting the Bible doesn't prove squat. Also, explain to my why is god good. Is god good because "God is love" as you state in 1 John? Then that means love is good independently of god. If love isn't good independently of god, then the burden of proof is on Sacerdotus to show why. He needs to tell us why love is good. You see, Sacerdotus is a typically lazy internet apologist. He literally thinks he can just say "God is good" and "God is love" and think that settles it. Oh my. I guess since some internet apologist with a fake degree said god is good then that settles it! Atheism is false! How imbecilic he is. The atheist has no problem here because the theist has no evidence. They just assert a claim and think they've won. The trilemma is unavoidable. If you can't explain why god is good you can't demonstrate the claim. And you can't explain why god is good without showing goodness exists independently of god.

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Sacerdotus Is (Even More) Stupid (Than Previously Thought) Pt. 3


Author's note: I know I just wrote that I'd be spending more time writing about social issues and lay off atheism for a bit, but a recent attempt to rebut my blog post on why I'm an atheist got my attention and prompted me to make a response. I'll get back to social issues when this is done.



A supposed "philosopher" who challenged me on my post Why I'm An Atheist, wrote a follow up to my follow up, and in it he claims again, that's he's refuted me and that I'm ignorant of science and philosophy. The exact opposite is true and I can easily show why. His arguments are so bad, they are laughable. And I don't mean this to be facetious, I mean this with all seriousness. He makes so many common argumentative mistakes and factual errors that I cannot take him seriously that he has a degree in philosophy and science. If he does have a degree, he should get a refund, because he apparently learned no serious critical thinking skills because of it. His arguments are on the caliber of the same old tired internet apologist, like the many wannabe William Lane Craig clones out there. Only he's at the low end of the spectrum.


Here I continue with part 3 covering arguments 7, 8, and 9. Starting with his response to argument 7, his words are in block quotes:


7) Brute facts are unavoidable


Next he continues falsely accuses me of plagiarism, saying,

Yes, that is what the word plagarize means.  The author wrote word-for-word an article from Wikipedia. Note, Wikipedia is not a valid source.  Anyone can edit it. Universities frown upon it and automatically fail students who use it as a source. The fact that this author derives his/her content from Wikipedia shows academic sloth. 

No I didn't. I merely copied the trilemma itself from the article in order to list it, that is different from plagiarizing an article. To plagiarize is to "take (the work or an idea of someone else) and pass it off as one's own." I didn't do that, and he even admits I never stated that I tried to pass it off as my own. That means his plagiarize claim fails. Wikipedia simply lists the trilemma so that he and everyone else can understand it, since it's obvious he's ignorant of it (despite his supposed degree!). It isn't to prove the trilemma is true. Wikipedia is actually a great resource for learning philosophy. Sacerdotus would learn a lot more if he spent more time on it. It's clear he has no thirst for truth. All he does is try and defend his preexisting views, albeit, really badly.

The Munchausen’s trilemma (also known as Agrippa's trilemma which goes all the way back to Diogenes) is a well known trilemma that everyone with a philosophy degree should known about. Apparently that's not Sacerdotus. Even his former professor Dr. Pigliucci affirms it, so it's hard for me to believe he has an actual degree. He's just so ignorant of basic philosophy it can't be real. Dr. Pigliucci for example writes,

Munchausen’s trilemma is a reasonable conclusion arrived at by logical reasoning. 

In other words, the trilemma is logically unavoidable and most, if not all people who are actually familiar with philosophy are aware of this thorny problem.

Moreover, I never stated that the author discovered the trilemma. He/she is clearly lying here. Nor did I claim that he/she claims God has an immutable nature etc.  This author clearly has reading comprehension problems. I stated that the author does not understand theology and the immutable nature of God. This is why his/her argument fails. The author claims that "God's will to create this universe is not necessary.." this premise is baseless. 

I didn't say he accused me directly of discovering the trilemma. If you accuse someone of plagiarizing, which again means to take (the work or an idea of someone else) and pass it off as one's own, then this implies that I tried to pass the trilemma off on my own. Because if I didn't try to pass it off as my own, then I didn't plagiarize. That's Sacerdotus's dilemma. Either I tried to pass it off as my own and I plagiarized, or I didn't try to pass it off as my own and I didn't plagiarize. He can't accuse me of plagiarizing material while acknowledging I didn't try to pass it off as my own.

Monday, November 20, 2017

Sacerdotus Is (Even More) Stupid (Than Previously Thought) Pt. 2


Author's note: I know I just wrote that I'd be spending more time writing about social issues and lay off atheism for a bit, but a recent attempt to rebut my blog post on why I'm an atheist got my attention and prompted me to make a response. I'll get back to social issues when this is done.



A supposed "philosopher" who challenged me on my post Why I'm An Atheist, wrote a follow up to my follow up, and in it he claims again, that's he's refuted me and that I'm ignorant of science and philosophy. The exact opposite is true and I can easily show why. His arguments are so bad, they are laughable. And I don't mean this to be facetious, I mean this with all seriousness. He makes so many common argumentative mistakes and factual errors that I cannot take him seriously that he has a degree in philosophy and science. If he does have a degree, he should get a refund, because he apparently learned no serious critical thinking skills because of it. His arguments are on the caliber of the same old tired internet apologist, like the many wannabe William Lane Craig clones out there. Only he's at the low end of the spectrum.


Here I continue with part 2 covering arguments 3, 4, 5, and 6.Starting with his response to argument 3, his words are in block quotes:

3) Causality doesn't exist in the way we think it does


He writes,

Yes, the author does not understand causality.  

I understand causality way better than Sacerdotus does. Notice how he doesn't even bother to attempt to define causality. And notice that his assumption of causality presupposes presentism, which he has not ever even attempted to justify (because he's too ignorant to know he's even presupposed it!).

Yes, there is a consensus that the universe had a cause. This is taught in all cosmology, physics and astronomy courses.  Clearly, the author has never taken any of the aforementioned.

Prove it. Prove the universe had a cause. I asked him to show evidence for that in my last response post, and he still has provided no evidence. Better yet, he needs to define what he means by "causality." I defined what I mean by it, he has not. He's begging the question. This is an utter failure on Sacerdotus's part to demonstrate he's logical and knows how to debate. I've provided ample evidence for my claims, he's provided very little or none for his. Also, I took physics and astronomy courses. There was no mention of the universe having a cause. None. He's also not understanding the usage of "cause" in the colloquial sense versus what it really means to most physicists. He's confusing the colloquial cause with the scientific cause in the same way creationists confuse the colloquial "theory" with the scientific theory.

The author claims that I showed no evidence, yet in my previous post I provided the paragraph the author quoted with a hyperlink. Once again, the author misapplies the argument ad populum. The aforementioned is coined for criticism against common belief, not scientific fact. In science, a consensus is needed. This is why the peer review system exists. This is how science checks and balances itself. We see once again that this author simply is aloof to the facts.

Sacerdotus never provided any evidence that the universe had a cause, which is the thing in question. He provided a link to an article from Cern saying the universe shouldn't exist, but that's completely irrelevant. Yet another failure on his part to be logical and rational. You can't tell me I'm out of line with a consensus when you provide zero evidence for a consensus. My views are actually the mainstream view. Sacerdotus is too ignorant to realize that because all he knows is popular level apologetics.

The author then appeals to Sean Carroll in order to avoid addressing my reply. He/she does not realize that Sean Carroll is giving his personal opinion and does not even offer data or statistics to back up his claims. If you look at the pdf file linked, there is no data. It is just an essay that he wrote. Give me a break.

Carroll is just giving his opinion. He believes that events do not have purpose or causes, but does not show why. 

Wait, so when I quote a scientist, I'm just giving his "opinion," but when Sacerdotus quotes a scientist, it's somehow scientific fact? Give me a break. Look at that double standard. Carroll isn't giving his option. He's explain how, from his decades as a physicist working on cosmology and a fundamental understanding of the universe, there is no causality in the way people normally define the term. He explains this in the paper he wrote, that what we think of causes are really just

a description of the relationship between patterns and boundary conditions....If we know the state of a system at one time, and the laws governing its dynamics, we can calculate the state of the system at some later time. You might be tempted to say that the particular state at the first time “caused” the state to be what it was at the second time; but it would be just as correct to say that the second state caused the first.

Carroll further explains this in his excellent book, The Big Picture, and in his many talks and lectures. See here where I fast forwarded his talk to the relevant section on causality:



Sunday, November 19, 2017

Sacerdotus Is (Even More) Stupid (Than Previously Thought) Pt. 1


Author's note: I know I just wrote that I'd be spending more time writing about social issues and lay off atheism for a bit, but a recent attempt to rebut my blog post on why I'm an atheist got my attention and prompted me to make a response. I'll get back to social issues when this is done.


A supposed "philosopher" who challenged me on my post Why I'm An Atheist, wrote a follow up to my follow up, and in it he claims again, that's he's refuted me and that I'm ignorant of science and philosophy. The exact opposite is true and I can easily show why. His arguments are so bad, they are laughable. And I don't mean this to be facetious, I mean this with all seriousness. He makes so many common argumentative mistakes and factual errors that I cannot take him seriously that he has a degree in philosophy and science. If he does have a degree, he should get a refund, because he apparently learned no serious critical thinking skills because of it. His arguments are on the caliber of the same old tired internet apologist, like the many wannabe William Lane Craig clones out there. Only he's at the low end of the spectrum.

The supposed philosopher's pen name is Sacerdotus and he accuses me of nothing more than ad hominem attacks. This is false, and a common misunderstanding of what an ad hominem attack is. An ad hominem attack is when you attack your opponent instead of attacking their arguments. I attacked his arguments, quite successfully, in addition to attacking his character. So I made no ad hominem attacks because I addressed his sad excuses for an argument, quite successfully. The reason why I call him stupid in most post (aside from being accurate, is because he calls atheism stupid. I'm giving him a taste of his own medicine, and he calls it an ad hominem! The irony.

I'm going to refute his attempt at refuting my refutation to show how he still just doesn't get it, and is making the same mistakes over and over. His words will appear in block quotes. In the beginning of his post he writes,

As Socrates said, "When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser."  Well, we now see the loser show his/her face via ad hominem, so to speak.  He even calls me "gay," which shows he clearly is the losing party.

I called him gay because he is gay, not because it is a slander, and he's a Catholic who defends the church. I find that relevant. If you're going to defend a church that for centuries tried to destroy your existence, that is telling and relevant. If he's not actually gay, then I apologize.

Notice how his replies are just a restatement of his/her previous errors already refuted and how he/she avoids addressing my refutation directly.  I will once again re-refute his/her nonsense and show how they are false when vetted against science, philosophy, and theology just as I have before.  

The point is he didn't actually refute my original arguments. And so what I did was I just explained them further with more insight into why his responses didn't refute them. My arguments mostly went right over his head because they're too sophisticated for him, despite his supposed (and apparently useless) degree in philosophy. My arguments are the culmination of years and years debating theism and they are not entry-level arguments. They rely on a deep understanding of science and philosophy, like a deep understanding of special relativity, which Sacerdotus clearly doesn't have because he doesn't understand at all what special relativity implies for our understanding of time and causality.

So let me refute his attempt at a rebuttal one by one to show (very easily) how his arguments all completely fail. This will be done over several parts throughout this week. Starting with my first argument:

Saturday, November 11, 2017

Sacerdotus Is Stupid



A gay theist (gaytheist?) on the internet attempted to refute my recent post explaining why I'm an atheist. He claims it was "easy" and that I show a lack of understanding of science and philosophy! Ha! Nothing can be further from the truth. It's he who lacks in-depth understanding of physics, philosophy, religion, and atheism, and a refutation of his "refutation" was really easy for me, albeit just time consuming.

But since I'm off work for the next few days and I'm bored at home (it's freezing outside!) let me for the record refute his pathetic attempt at a refutation.

Here's his attempt at a refutation of my argument number 1. My original arguments can be read here.

1) The traditional notion of god isn't coherent


He responds:

The author here runs on a strawman argument. He simply does not understand the concept of God. The author assumes that God is subject to his terms or the terms of the understandings of man; that is to say, how we perceive and understand everything. He claims that theists resort to special pleading to address what he claims to be contradictions. However, he is doing exactly that. He argues that change requires times and fails to back this up. We know from cosmology that there was no time prior to cosmic inflation. Time is a product that came into existence after the "big bang." Despite this, a change did take place. If change did not take place, there would have been no "big bang" event. Moreover, the author fails to understand that God is a being, not a mere concept. This being is beyond all, transcends all. No theist, no atheist, no theologian or pope can ever truly understand God or explain Him. St. Augustine tried and experienced a vision of his angel as a young boy who was at the shore trying to put the ocean in a small hole in the sand. The boy went to and fro collecting water in a shell until St. Augustine stopped him and inquired as to what the boy was trying to do. The boy said he was trying to put the entire ocean in the hole he dug. St. Augustine brushed it off as a something that came out of a babe's mouth and explained that it was not possible for the ocean to be poured into a small hole. The boy replied that neither can he put the entirety of God into his mind.

Every time I'm told that a person has "refuted" atheism I'm sadly disappointed. This is one of those times. Here I'm clearly saying god is subject to logic. As I clearly wrote in the post, "god cannot do the logically impossible or be the logically impossible." These aren't my terms and conditions, or the limitations of human intellect, this is our ability to be logical. Deny this, and you throw all of logic out the window. That includes your ability to logically "prove" atheism false - or anything else. That change requires time is obvious and certain. To change requires two states of being that cannot exist at the same time, otherwise you'd get a contradiction: A = ¬A. This is logically impossible. That this guy doesn't understand that means he fails logic 101, and that means his assessment of the rest of the argument fails. This is why I like to get all theists to agree beforehand that god is not beyond logic. I do this because - exactly as I predict - theists resort to special pleading to explain away god's inconsistence. When he says god "is beyond all, transcends all. No theist, no atheist, no theologian or pope can ever truly understand God or explain Him," he is resorting to special pleading. If you can't coherently explain god, you can't coherently say god exists. This guy fails to do that. His response to argument 1 completely fails and did exactly what I predicted.

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Why I'm An Atheist - 13 Reasons & Arguments For Atheism



More than three years ago I wrote a post entitled Why I'm An Atheist, where I briefly explained some of the reasons why I don't believe in god. That post, which was long over due at the time, needs an update. With each passing year I get much better at understanding the arguments for and against the existence of god, and since that post came out I've created several new arguments of my own. Rather than write it in essay form, which I did in the original post, I'll instead outline the main reasons and arguments briefly, one by one. So here we go.

I'm an atheist because....

1) The traditional notion of god isn't coherent


In order to even consider the possibility that a god exists, we first need a coherent concept of god. The traditional notion of god in classical theism is that of a timeless, changeless, immaterial mind, who also must be infinitely good, infinitely wise, and can do anything logically possible. There are some variations on this concept, but almost all traditional or classical theistic gods have these basic characteristics. The problem is that a timeless, changeless being by definition cannot do anything; it's necessarily causally impotent and nonfunctional. Change requires time, and time requires change. This is logically certain. And to create something, one must do something. Doing requires a change, regardless of whether that change is mental or physical. A being that cannot do anything cannot be omnipotent. As a result, the traditional notion of god is self contradictory. The theist's only resort here is special pleading. That's why I like to get all theists to agree beforehand that god is not beyond logic. That is, god cannot do the logically impossible or be the logically impossible. Once a theist agrees with this, they've cut themselves off from special pleading as an option. Some theists think god is atemporal before creating the universe, and temporal after creating the universe. But it isn't logically possible to exist timelessly and then suddenly jolt yourself into time out of your own will, because your will was timeless and frozen. It couldn't change into the state to want to change.

Given the necessary rules of logic the traditional attributes of god are incoherent:

P1. It is logically impossible to do something without doing something.
P2. It is logically impossible to do something without change (even if everything is immaterial).
P3. It is logically impossible for change to exist without time.
C. As such, a timeless, changeless being cannot do anything.

The failure of theists to come up with a coherent description of god is enough by itself to warrant atheism, but there's many more reasons to think no gods exist.

Saturday, April 16, 2016

Logical Argument Against Free Will


This is a logical argument I created several months back that attempts to prove free will is impossible. It's been tested but it's not necessarily in its final form. Let me know if you think it succeeds or not.



Most people believe in libertarian free will. That is, they reject determinism, are incompatibilists, and believe that our will, mind, and consciousness are not determined by anything and are free to choose any number of possible courses of action. Libertarian free will requires at least 3 things:

(1) We are in control of our will
(2) Our mind is causally effective
(3) In the same situation we could have done otherwise

This view is popular among lay people but not among scientists and philosophers.[1] Why is this? It's because not only is libertarian free will in violation of our best scientific theories, it's incoherent.

One simple question to ask the libertarian is: Do our thoughts have causes? Yes or no?

If our thoughts have causes, whatever caused them can't be our will or our mind, because our thoughts are our will and mind. And saying that our soul causes our thoughts (or will or mind) just pushes the issue back one step further, because the question now becomes is the soul caused when it causes the will? If it is caused, then whatever caused it can't be the soul (or the mind or the will), it has to be something else that is not you. Once you have that you are essentially admitting that your will is not truly free since it has a cause that is not a part of you and not something you could have had any control over.

Therefore this premise is true: If our thoughts (or whatever caused them) are caused we cannot be in control of them

If our thoughts do not have causes, then you are saying that they begin to exist without a cause. Without a cause they would be totally random fluctuations and it would be a mere coincidence that they had any connection or relationship to the physical world or reality. Since you can't have any control over something that is uncaused by definition, you cannot be in control of your will if your will or thoughts are uncaused. This would also apply to any claim that the soul causes the thoughts if you claim the soul is uncaused. Additionally, this would violate the kalam cosmological argument's first premise (everything that begins to exist has a cause) and would essentially falsify it. This is a very popular metaphysical principle many theists believe (who also believe in libertarian free will).

Therefore this premise is true: If our thoughts (or whatever caused them) are uncaused we cannot be in control of them

On top of that, the ability to "choose" your thoughts is logically impossible. You can't choose what your next thought, desire, or idea will be, without that thought, desire, or idea already popping into your consciousness in a manner you couldn't have freely controlled. In order to choose your next thought, you'd have to think about it, before you think about it. That's incoherent. You can't have a thought, about a thought, before you have the thought. If you can't choose your next thought, or any of your thoughts, how is your will or mind controlled by you, and in what sense is it free? It isn't. Thoughts arise in consciousness and we have no control over it.

Therefore this premise is true: It is logically impossible to choose our thoughts

Hence we can argue:

P1: Our thoughts (mind or will) is either caused or uncaused, no other option is available
P2: If our thoughts (or whatever caused them) are caused we cannot be in control of them
P3: If our thoughts (or whatever caused them) are uncaused we cannot be in control of them
P4: It is logically impossible to choose our thoughts
P5: Being in control of our thoughts, mind, or will — or whatever caused them is a requirement of libertarian free will
C: Therefore libertarian free will is logically impossible

Right now I'm only asking for a justification of (1) above from the requirements of libertarian free will; (2) and (3) are a whole other argument that only adds to the difficulty the libertarian has. Basically, one must first establish whether libertarian free will is even logically possible before one can establish that it's true. And that's my challenge. Notice that this argument makes no assumption about whether things must have causes or not, nor does it make any assumptions about whether we have a soul or not, or whether materialism is true. It is agnostic on all of these views.

Saturday, October 10, 2015

Quote Of The Day: William Lane Craig Is Wrong On Cosmic Time


William Lane Craig really doesn't like the B-theory of time, also known as eternalism. He's written whole books and essays trying to debunk it and to promote the A-theory of time, also known as presentism. The reason why is clear. Craig's favorite go-to argument for god's existence is the kalam cosmological argument, and it presupposes the A-theory of time. In fact, on the B-theory, the argument is useless. So Craig has spent many calories trying as hard as he can to make the case for the A-theory. One of them is this notion that "cosmic time" allows us to have an objective reference frame, which is ruled out under special relativity which says that all reference frames are subjective. It's even convinced another atheist blogger at one point that the relativity of simultaneity doesn't imply a block universe and the eternalism that describes it. But this is wrong, as physicist Aron Wall writes on his blog:

Now it is true that on some specially nice spacetimes, there is a naturally nice choice of time coordinate. For example in an FRW expanding universe, there is a "cosmic time" coordinate which tracks the overall size (the "redshift factor") of the universe. Some philosophers, such as St. William Lane Craig, have suggested that God's "time" might simply be this "cosmic time".

But this is a misunderstanding of the physics of our universe. The FRW metric is a just an approximation to reality. It describes a universe which is completely uniform (the same in everywhere) and isotropic (the same in every direction). This is a very good approximation on large distance scales (billions of light years), but on shorter distance scales (e.g. the solar system, or the milky way, or your living room) you may have noticed that matter is not distributed uniformly. It comes in clumps, and each of these clumps has a gravitational field which distorts the spacetime metric, making the FRW metric no longer correct. On a lumpy spacetime, the notion of "cosmic time" is not well-defined.

Aron Wall is a physicist and a devout Christian, so he certainly doesn't have a theological ax to grind here.

Friday, September 25, 2015

Why the Big Bang Singularity Does Not Help the Kalām Cosmological Argument for Theism


Came across this interesting paper on the big bang and why it doesn't help the most popular argument touted in favor of god, the Kalām Cosmological Argument.

Abstract:

The cosmic singularity provides negligible evidence for creation in the finite past, and hence theism. A physical theory might have no metric or multiple metrics, so a ‘beginning’ must involve a first moment, not just finite age. Whether one dismisses singularities or takes them seriously, physics licenses no first moment. The analogy between the Big Bang and stellar gravitational collapse indicates that a Creator is required in the first case only if a Destroyer is needed in the second. The need for and progress in quantum gravity and the underdetermination of theories by data make it difficult to take singularities seriously. The singularity exemplifies the sort of gap that is likely to be closed by scientific progress, obviating special divine action. The apparent irrelevance of cardinality to practices of counting infinite sets in classical field theory and Fourier analysis is noted.

See the link here: Why the Big Bang Singularity Does Not Help the Kalām Cosmological Argument for Theism

Thursday, July 17, 2014

The Reality of Past, Present, and Future—Video


Professor Brian Greene teaches Special Relativity in his free online course at WorldScienceU.com and shows how the B-theory of time (AKA eternalism) flows from it.

Take the course on Special Relativity here!




Sunday, May 11, 2014

20 Questions Atheists Struggle To Answer (Extremely Short Answers)


These questions were floated around to atheists over the years and I'd thought I'd take a quick crack at them. These are my (extremely short) answers to them.

1. What caused the universe to exist?

The universe may not need a cause, especially if the B-theory of time is true. All causes in the universe are (a) temporal and (b) material, showing that our notion of causality doesn't necessarily apply to the origin of the universe, if it is the beginning of space and time.

2. What explains the fine tuning of the universe?

Chance. The same way that our planet is just the right distance from our sun to allow life to exist, so is our universe.

3.Why is the universe rational?

Because logical impossibilities are in fact, impossible.

4. How did DNA and amino acids arise?

Well we know amino acids can spontaneously arise naturally as the Miller-Urey experiments showed us, and as the building blocks of DNA, amino acids probably evolved from simpler molecules as in the RNA hypothesis. If "God did it" is your explanation, then you would be saying that scientists should stop doing all their research in molecular biology and close all their institutions, thus proving that faith is opposed to science.

5. Where did the genetic code come from?

It most likely evolved through many years and attempts from simple molecules to more complex ones.

6. How do irreducibly complex enzyme chains evolve?
There are no real irreducibly complex parts of biological systems, there is simply our current ignorance to how some of them formed, and there is a whole lot more ignorance by creationists who use things like the bacterial flagellum as an example of IC when it has been clearly refuted.

7. How do we account for the origin of 116 distinct language families?

Languages evolved over tens of thousands of years all over the world. There is zero evidence that the biblical story of the Tower of Babel explains the origin of language, and most Christians today it seems even reject such an absurd story.

8. Why did cities suddenly appear all over the world between 3,000 and 1,000 BC?

It was due to the invention or agriculture around 10,000 BC that lead to the first towns and cities being developed. When humans stopped hunting and gathering and began farming and domesticating animals, they had a reason to stay in one place permanently.

9. How is independent thought possible in a world ruled by chance and necessity?

I'm not sure what independent thought means here, but if it is implying free will, there is no evidence of free will.

10. How do we account for self-awareness?

Consciousness.

11. How is free will possible in a material universe?

Given the laws of physics that we have which are deterministic, there is no free will.

12. How do we account for conscience?

Through extremely complex interactions between neurons and chemicals the exact mechanism by which we don't yet understand. We do know that mind is a product of the brain and there is zero evidence that the mind controls physical brain states.

13. On what basis can we make moral judgements?

We usually assess whether our actions will benefit us and others and whether they will increase harm. We certainly don't use the Bible to make moral judgements, or else we'd actually increase harm and likely end up in jail.

14. Why does suffering matter?

Suffering matters because we recognize that it is a state we don't want ourselves and others to be in.

15. Why do human beings matter?

Because we have the most highly evolved cognitive faculties that allows us to make rational decisions as well as suffer to the highest extent of all other species.

16. Why care about justice?

Because we naturally care about fairness, and justice requires fairness.

17. How do we account for the almost universal belief in the supernatural?

Because it was evolutionarily beneficial for our ancestors to believe in false positives (believing in things that weren't there) and this lead to the belief in angels, demons, spirits and gods.

18. How do we know the supernatural does not exist?

For several reasons. (1) because of the reason I gave for number 17 which shows that evolution would have lead to our belief in the supernatural even if it didn't exist; (2) because we have no evidence for it, even though the supernatural is in principle verifiable since it is said to interact with the physical world; (3) assuming that the supernatural exists makes no sense when critically examined. For these reasons we can be reasonably confident the supernatural doesn't exist.

19. How can we know if there is conscious existence after death?

We can and already do know that consciousness is fully dependent on the physical brain and so when the brain goes, consciousness goes. There are also too many unexplained questions about consciousness and the soul for which no dualist has any satisfactory answers.

20. What accounts for the empty tomb, resurrection appearances and growth of the church?

It is not an established fact that there was an empty tomb and resurrection appearances. They may have all been made up by the writers of Mark and Matthew, who wrote 40-50 years after the supposed events and were not eyewitnesses. Paul never mentions an empty tomb. See Four facts that aren't really facts.

As you can see, many of these questions probe the "God of the gaps" territory, and some, like the question about languages, are so bad even most Christians wouldn't recognize them as tough questions for the atheist.


Sunday, April 27, 2014

The Theist Who Just Won't Understand


The logical incompatibility of an omnibenevolent god with gratuitous suffering is very easy to understand for most people, yet over on the Possible Worlds blog, smug theist Randy Everist just could not grasp why there is any such conflict between the two. I suspect that he really does indeed recognize that this is an unsolvable problem and that it logically entails that the god of classical theism is impossible. But to avoid this becoming apparent, I think he's feigning ignorance, misunderstanding, and that there is any logical problem here at all. There are no plausible explanations to this problem. I know because I've refuted pretty much all of them. It's possible there are other theodicies that I haven't heard yet, but this is exactly why I like to challenge theists - I want to hear their best explanation.

I thought Randy Everist would be a good candidate as he is well familiar with the arguments for god but he subtly admitted that he doesn't really have an explanation. All he did was try really hard to play defense and falsely claim that I have not properly made the case that there is any logical conflict between gratuitous suffering and omnibenevolence. You can read our debate using the link above to be the judge.

Many atheists know that debating with theists is like talking to a brick wall. Randy is no exception. He exemplifies the core of what I think the problem with theism is. When cornered by a good argument, they special plead, or they'll claim that not having an answer doesn't mean the atheist is right by default, even if the problem is logical. Well, if that is so, then the same thing works for the atheist who may not be able to fully explain the origin of the universe. The atheist not having an answer doesn't mean the theist is right by default. I think we all understand this is correct.

I made my argument as easy to understand as one possibly can. I even made it into several different logical arguments. For example:

1. Omni-benevolence is incompatible with gratuitous suffering,
2. gratuitous suffering exists via evolution, 
3. therefore the god of classical theism cannot exist.

Very few theists disagree with premise 1, but Randy seemed to be saying that this wasn't so. He responded:

Why should we think that's true? Where have you defended the premise that an omnibenevolent God is incompatible? Where have you shown a premise set that is logically incoherent, and defended why?

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Multiverse Seen As More Likely


For the past week the major news coming from science was that faint gravitational waves from the earliest moments of the universe were detected by the BICEP2 observatory near the south pole. The findings, if correct, would confirm a prediction made by Einstein nearly 100 years ago in General Relativity, as well as in inflationary theory developed by Alan Guth in 1980.

"It's hard to build models of inflation that don't lead to a multiverse," says Guth, quoted from a recent Huffington Post article. Since most models of inflation lead to a multiverse, and the recent finding corroborates predictions made by inflation theory, then it seems that the multiverse just got a big boost in credibility. For years the critics were saying that the multiverse was pure speculation, tantamount to an atheistic version of god as an explanatory force. We may or may not ever have direct confirmation of another universe, but if the data holds up and is confirmed by additional tests (of which there are several pending) then the predictions made in inflation theory that other universes are likely will move it closer to physics from metaphysics.

The multiverse does offer us an explanation for many of the current puzzles in science, like why the values of the physical constants are in the life permitting range. So if we have good evidence that the multiverse is true, there goes the fine tuning argument - which I consider the only decent argument theism has. And if the fine tuning argument implodes, then theism is really going to be in trouble in the future. Take away the cosmological argument and the fine tuning argument for example, (which I think there are already good refutations for) and theism really has nothing left to stand on. There is nothing within the universe that really needs god as an explanation that isn't better served by science and philosophy. 

So what's left for theism? What will the nature of apologetics look like in 2050 when we might have discovered quantum gravity and when an inflation model with multiverse predictions becomes the cosmological paradigm rendering the fine tuning argument a total dud? I wonder what debates about the existence of god will be like then. 

Presumably the atheist will have a much larger arsenal of data to draw from, as has always been the case when new scientific discoveries are made. I am optimistic that within this century, theism will become the minority position in the West, because it's explanatory power will fail to compete with the rigor of naturalistic science, and because many of the social functions that religion has played will be replaced by secular alternatives.  


Monday, February 24, 2014

I Think Carroll Won The Debate


It was a very intense debate Friday night at the Greer Heard Forum between Sean Carroll and William Lane Craig and I have to say I think Carroll decisively won. This isn't due to any sort of atheistic bias on my part, as I think Craig has "won" several of his debates on style and deliverance, but this is due to the fact that Carroll addressed nearly all of Craig's arguments and handsomely refuted them.

The debate relied on a lot of high end physics and cosmology that the average layperson simply does not understand. Thankfully I've become increasingly more knowledgeable about physics and cosmology over the years in large part as a result of debating theists. A frequent topic that came up was the concept of Boltzmann Brains - living physical brains that can spontaneously arise out of the quantum vacuum whose initial entropy states appear to be more likely than the initial low entropy state that our universe had. To refute the issue of the Boltzmann Brain dilemma, one has to have a serious understanding of the science behind it and its philosophical implications - something I think your average atheistic debater has no idea how to address or refute. I know that Dr. Carroll has written extensively on the Boltzmann Brain problem in his scientific papers and other works and he is well equipped to handle accusations that its a defeater for the multiverse.

(On a side note, I just recently signed up for free online classes from the World Science Festival on relativity that will be taught by Brian Greene (see here for details). I would certainly like to have a deeper understanding of the science behind relativity and quantum mechanics, even if it means I may have to face my crippling fear of math. You should check it out.)

Anyway, as far as the debate went, I wish that there was another round of rebuttals and I wish that there was a cross examination period so they could've gone head to head. I think Carroll really could've pressed Craig on some of his misuse of science to support his case for theism, and he could have pressed Craig on the B-theory of time (which Craig actually brought up!) as it is a knock-down argument against the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

Craig also made a lot of noise, as he always does, over the idea that the universe "popped" into existence from nothing that he thinks the atheist must believe. Even if one grants the A-theory of time, the universe doesn't really pop into being. The reason why is that this presumes that you somehow have absolute nothing - and then - the universe inexplicably "pops" into existence. But this is not how it works because it presumes time exists prior to the universe. Since time is intertwined with space, from the very first moment of t=0 you have a universe. There is no moment when nothing exists prior to the universe. Therefore, you start with a universe; it doesn't pop into being. It's the same way how you cannot rewind a DVD passed 00:00:00. There is no such time as -00:00:01 on a DVD player. From the moment the DVD starts at 00:00:00 you have a movie. Carroll brought this up during the Q & A but they were not allowed to go back and forth on it.

Overall, it was a very good debate and I think Craig got hammered pretty hard from a physicist who knows the science much better than he does. I wish Sean would engage in many more debates like this one as it turns out he's one of the best debaters on behalf of atheism.


Saturday, December 28, 2013

William Lane Craig's Christmas "Gift" To Atheists


What can I say, the man never tires in his quest to evangelize the world into the Christian faith.

In William Lane Craig's recent op-ed on FoxNews.com, he rolls out the same 5 tired old arguments for god's existence that he's been using for decades as a "gift" to atheists. It's not like as if many atheists will be on FoxNews.com anyway. Most of us non-believers regard Fox News and everything that it does to be a charade, exemplified by their phony annual "War on Christmas," their bending over backwards for the religious right, and their outright lies and manipulations - to name a few. I can't see how any intelligent person, atheist or not, would take Fox News as a serious news organization.

But perhaps that makes it perfect for a person like William Lane Craig. I mean after all, he's first and foremost an apologist, and an apologist is a propagandist, who must lie and distort the facts in order to make their case convincing - in a way just like Fox News! So in Craig's piece, he challenges atheists who he claims "have no good reasons for their disbelief." Um, excuse me? We have plenty of good reasons for our disbelief, and I've recently outlined some of them in my post Why I'm An Atheist. But hey, Craig was only offering us his "experience." I will at least give him some credit that there has been a failure of many public atheists in communicating arguments for atheism properly. This is something atheists need to improve on. But for a person obsessed with atheism, William Lane Craig should have undoubtedly heard all the arguments by now and he's been called out several times on abysmal failures to refute arguments for atheism (like his failed attempt to claim animals do not consciously suffer). I suspect he really just wants to reassure his readers (who haven't researched into the arguments for atheism) that atheists don't have any good arguments in the hope they'll just take his word for it.

Friday, December 20, 2013

Why I'm An Atheist



I've been feeling a bit compelled recently to write about why exactly it is that I'm an atheist and what reasons I have for being one. While I feel that this post was long overdue, an adequate justification for my atheism has been the product of a learning curve several years in the making. I know many others have written posts explaining why they aren't a Christian or why they aren't a Mormon, or a Muslim, etc., but technically I can't write a post like that because I was never myself a member of any religion. What I can do, is justify why I'm an atheist and why I think the naturalistic worldview best describes reality, and so here I want to put into a single post the main reasons why I personally am an atheist, and why I think you should be one too if you aren't already. I apologize for the length.

Wednesday, October 9, 2013

I Was Bored, So I Decided to Pick On Craig (Again)


I've been dry lately for material to write about. Whenever I get like this I always find that criticizing William Lane Craig can be used as filler. I just love tearing apart his arguments. And it pays dividends: If you get into a debate with a theist over god, you are almost guaranteed to hear Craig's arguments get recycled over and over again. Often verbatim. I've been debating this retarded Jehovah's Witness over on the Friendly Atheist's blog and he literally copies Craig's arguments word for word by copying and pasting them because he knows nothing about actual science or philosophy. So it's good to have refutations of Craig's arguments already written so that they too can be copied and pasted in response to the lazy theist who is going to plagiarize someone else's argument. I mean hey, if they're too lazy to write their own argument themselves and resort to copying and pasting, then I'm justified in copying and pasting my response too.

So without further ado.....

I came across a piece Craig wrote in a Christianity Today article from 2008, in which he summarizes his repertoire of arguments for god, so I will use that article as my critique of his arguments.Craig lays out first, as he almost always does, the two versions of the cosmological argument. He's so predictable. Most of you already know the cosmological argument from contingency. I will just dive into my criticism of Craig's justification of its premises. The argument goes as follows:

1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
3. The universe exists.
4. Therefore, the explanation of the universe's existence is God.

Craig justifies premise 1 with an example:

Imagine that you're walking through the woods and come upon a translucent ball lying on the forest floor. You would find quite bizarre the claim that the ball just exists inexplicably. And increasing the size of the ball, even until it becomes co-extensive with the cosmos, would do nothing to eliminate the need for an explanation of its existence.

I've heard this story used many times to illustrate that the universe's existence needs an explanation. First of all, the analogy is flawed. upon seeing a translucent ball lying on the forest floor, of course we'd ask the question of how or why such a thing exists. But the difference with a translucent ball, and the universe is that we have no known experience with such a thing existing by natural means. All balls that we know of are man made. So we could ask, what is the ball made out of? Plastic? Well we know plastic is man made. But suppose it was made of some unknown substance. It would still have to be made up of atoms. Atoms are matter, and matter is just another form of energy, all of which would go back to the early universe. But now an interesting thought arises. If the translucent ball were shrunk, instead of expanded, to the size of a subatomic particle, like a virtual particle, then it is not at all hard to see how the ball could pop into existence with no apparent cause needed. And when you apply gravity to the laws of quantum mechanics, space and time can pop into existence and whole universes can be born from quantum fluctuations.

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