I am privileged to be one of the general editors of the upcoming Dictionary of Christianity and Science (Zondervan, April 2017). Paul Copan, Tremper Longman, Michael Strauss, and I–along with our excellent team at Zondervan–have endeavored to create a reference work that tackles the most important terms, concepts, people, and debates at the intersection of Christianity and science, from an evangelical perspective. Over the next few weeks I’ll be featuring sneak-preview excerpts from the Dictionary, available exclusively here at the CAA blog.
Cosmological arguments for a transcendent reason or cause of the universe have been formulated and defended for thousands of years by notable philosophers. One of the most prominent contemporary defenders of (one version of) the cosmological argument is William Lane Craig. In the excerpt below from his article on this topic in the Dictionary, Dr. Craig provides a brief definition and history, and explains three different types of cosmological arguments.
______________
The cosmological argument is a piece of natural theology that seeks to demonstrate a Sufficient Reason or First Cause of the existence of the cosmos. Its proponents include many of the most prominent figures in the history of western philosophy: Plato, Aristotle, Ibn Sina, al-Ghazali, Maimonides, Anselm, Aquinas, Scotus, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, and Locke, to name but some.
We can distinguish three basic types of cosmological argument: the Kalam cosmological argument for a First Cause of the beginning of the universe, the Thomist cosmological argument for a sustaining Ground of Being of the world, and the Leibnizian cosmological argument for a Sufficient Reason why anything at all exists.
The Kalam cosmological argument derives its name from the Arabic word designating medieval Islamic scholasticism, which helped to advance this version of the cosmological argument. The argument aims to show that the universe had a beginning at some moment in the finite past. Although medieval proponents of the argument pressed philosophical arguments against the infinitude of the past, the stunning discoveries of astrophysical cosmology related to the origin of the universe in a big bang some 14 billion years ago have especially reignited contemporary interest in the argument. If the universe began to exist, then, since something cannot come out of nothing, the universe must have a transcendent cause, which brought it into being.
The Thomist cosmological argument, named for the medieval philosophical theologian Thomas Aquinas, seeks a cause that is first, not in the temporal sense, but in the sense of rank. On Aquinas’s Aristotelian-inspired metaphysic, every existing finite thing is composed of essence and existence and is therefore radically contingent. If an essence is to be instantiated, there must be conjoined with that essence an act of being. The instantiation of an essence involves a continual bestowal of being by an external cause, or the thing would be annihilated. Although Aquinas argued that there cannot be an infinite regress of causes of being and that therefore there must exist a First Uncaused Cause of being, his actual view was that there can be no intermediate causes of being at all, that any finite substance is sustained in existence immediately by the Ground of Being. This must be a being who is not composed of essence and existence and hence requires no sustaining cause. It is, as Thomas says, ipsum esse subsistens, the act of being itself subsisting. Thomas identifies this being with the God whose name was revealed to Moses as “I am” (Ex. 3:14).
The Leibnizian cosmological argument is named for the seventeenth-century German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, who sought to develop a version of the cosmological argument from contingency without the Aristotelian metaphysical underpinnings of the Thomist argument. “The first question which should rightly be asked,” he wrote, “is this: why is there something rather than nothing?” (“The Principles of Nature and of Grace, Based on Reason”). Leibniz meant this question to be truly universal, not to apply merely to finite things.
On the basis of his principle of sufficient reason (PSR) that “no fact can be real or existent, no statement true, unless there be a sufficient reason why it is so and not otherwise” (“The Monadology”), Leibniz held that this question must have an answer. It will not do to say that the universe (or even God) just exists as a brute fact. There must be an explanation for why it exists. He went on to argue that the Sufficient Reason cannot be found in any individual thing in the universe, nor in the collection of such things which is the universe, nor in earlier states of the universe, even if these regress infinitely. Therefore, there must exist an ultramundane being that is metaphysically necessary in its existence, that is to say, its nonexistence is impossible. It is the Sufficient Reason for its own existence as well as for the existence of every contingent thing.
Taken from Dictionary of Christianity and Science by Paul Copan, Tremper Longman III, Christopher L. Reese, and Michael G. Strauss, General Editors. Copyright © 2017 by Paul Copan, Tremper Longman III, Christopher L. Reese, Michael G. Strauss. Used by permission of Zondervan. www.zondervan.com.
Pre-order the Dictionary of Christianity and Science and, for a limited time, receive $140 of bonus content.
“If the universe began to exist, then, since something cannot come out of
nothing, the universe must have a transcendent cause, which brought it
into being.”
This is one of the points where the Kalam Cosmological Argument goes wrong. Without any proof, it assumes the presence of a time before the Universe. It must do that because the first premise of the KCA deals with things that know a beginning somewhere in an already existing timeline. As far as science is concerned however, the Universe might be uncaused. According to Stephen Hawking, the chance of that being true is a staggering 95%.
Ed, the kalam argument doesn’t assume that time existed prior to the existence of the universe. The principle of sufficient reason is a metaphysical claim that holds whether we’re talking about the very first moment of time, when the universe began to exist, or any time thereafter. Just like the logical principle of non-contradiction holds at all times, so does the PSR. About science, by its nature it can’t provide evidence that something can come from nothing. Science deals with matter and laws of nature. Take those away, and science has nothing to work with.
Hawking writes in The Grand Design: “Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create
itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is
something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It
is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set
the universe going.”
But this is absurd. Our uniform experience and intuition tells us that something cannot come from nothing. Science doesn’t do anything to diminish that intuition. In fact, science is built on that intuition. If things just popped into existence out of nothing, science would be impossible, because trying to establish consistent cause and effect relationships would be impossible.
Since the universe began to exist, it requires a Creator to explain its existence.
Hi Ed:
You wrote:
“This is one of the points where the Kalam Cosmological Argument goes
wrong. Without any proof, it assumes the presence of a time before the
Universe.”
As Chris indicated the PSR applies which Leibniz showed is from cause to
effect, i.e., an a priori proof (not Kantian) reflecting causal order.
That said, you have it in reverse, it’s a minority of Scientists who make
claims like these below who assume the presence of a time before the Universe.
“”Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will
create
itself from nothing. As far as science is concerned however, the Universe might
be uncaused.”
Un-caused in what frame of reference? NULL time? It is ironic Hawking’s himself
gave us the answer in his past work, but to simplify, it has been shown by
science that the universe had a “finite” beginning in time. Period.
This means that before the universe began to exist, there was nothing, except
the word nothing must be viewed as pure negation. In other words, before the
universe began to exist there was No time, No space, No matter, No laws of
Physics and no flying monkeys.
It’s a contradiction to postulate anything temporal before the universe began
to exist (such as one of the laws of physics, gravity) since it turns NULL time
into an arrow of time.
First and foremost, you need to understand what a “Transcendent
Cause” is. The dictionary definition of the word Transcendent is
“existing apart from and not subject to the limitations of the material
universe.”
The issue is getting to Transcendent. And the necessity of a transcendent
cause. The reason you gave that seems to trouble you about the Kalam Ed is that
it “assumes the presence of a time before the Universe” and that is
EXACTLY what it does not do. The science you quoted does.
BTW, if gravity created an uncaused universe, why would the universe be
uncaused? Gravity would be the cause. Back to square I. Who caused gravity?
This reminds me of the bizarre “quantum gravity” solution. IF (there
is no proof) but if there was quantum gravity before the universe, it would be
teaming with energy and sub-atomic particles.
Since it’s impossible that gravity (quantum or real), or any other law of
physics existed eternally in the past, Hawking’s would need to formulate
something like:
“Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create
itself from nothing.”
1. Before the universe began to exist, there was gravity
2. Given that gravity can create a universe, this means the universe can create
itself from nothing.
3. Therefore, the universe can create itself from nothing, since gravity is
nothing.
In the Grande Design, Hawking’s postulates M-Theory, or the Multiverse, the god
of atheism rejected by about 70-80% of physicists, most of whom are atheists or
agnostics.
One who is brilliant is Roger Penrose (look up the “Hawking Penrose theorem”).
I admit it is a shame these two were friends and Hawking’s
was hammered by his peers for his last book, so I ask myself, do Penrose really
need to chime in like this?
Yes, I believe he did, since many people who do not understand how ridiculous
M-Theory (Multiverse) is, can hear it from someone with Penrose’s reputation.