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William Craig Cosmological Argument

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In William Craig’s ‘kalam’ version of the cosmological argument he argues that “the universe has a cause of its existence.” His argument relies on two crucial premises which state that “whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence” and “the universe began to exist” (Craig). In this paper, I will begin by breaking down Craig’s take on the cosmological argument. I will then propose an objection to his argument that questions why there must be a cause of the beginning of the universe, and furthermore, why this cause must be God. I will conclude with a response Craig would give to this objection. Craig validates that his argument, “the universe has a cause of its existence”, is true by assuming the initial premise that everything that …show more content…

He defends this argument by providing the example of the Big Bang theory, which disproves the possibility of actual infinities in time. Craig appeals to modern science when he refers to the Big Bang theory in his argument. This theory explains how the universe began according to science. By accepting this theory, one is accepting the fact that the universe did begin to exist at a specific point in time. Therefore, the past has an absolute start point and cannot be an actual infinity. Given that Craig assumes the two premises “whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence” and “the universe began to exist” are true by providing justifiable explanations per statement, he comes to a conclusion about the universe. He concludes that “the universe has a cause of its existence” and that the cause of the universe’s existence is God …show more content…

The Big Bang was an event in time that occurred when nothing had yet existed. It was the cause of the universe, it sparked existence. Here the opponent would continue to question that if nothing existed in the world before the Big Bang, then what would make it necessary for something to have somehow existed to cause it? Before this point in time, there was no existence or sign of life yet, so why is it necessary for Craig to say that a greater, almighty power must have caused this coming into existence of the universe? Why couldn’t the beginning of the universe be just that- the beginning of the

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Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence 2. The universe began to exist 3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of existence His defense of the Kalam Cosmological Argument revolves mostly around the second premise. This is mostly due to him finding the first premise as intuitively obvious, where he claims that “no one, seriously denies it”. From experience, we find that physical objects do not come into existence without causes.

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I have to admit that Zimmerman’s talk was hard at times for me to comprehend. I would love feedback if I understood his divine argument wrong, because I have had a few discussions about it with my peers and many took away different views from his final argument for a divine being, and in this paper I will explain how I understood his final argument. To come upon the divine being of God, he had to eliminate all the other contingent and necessary options believed by other philosophers and scientists through reasoning. He explained how it wasn’t possible for their to be no answer for the cosmos, nor were any of the contingent explanations of science, philosophy, or an infinite past made any sense.

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McCloskey differs from the belief of the teleological argument and claims “to get the proof going, genuine indisputable examples of design and purpose are needed” (McCloskey pg. 65). The argument shows that the universe exhibits an order of design and infers that its cause, therefore, must have a Creator. (Evans & Manis pg. 77) The cosmos is in a precise order and it has reason to why the earth came into existence the way it is.

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According to Samuel Clark’s argument, things exist the way they are in order to show the existence of God. All things need an explanation for their existence according to Aristotle. For instance, why the earth is spherical, why different places experience different climatic patters, why different geographical areas have different time zones and why do creatures that are in found in different places have features that enable them survive in such conditions. These considerations lead to a belief that there must be a cause for the universe (Rowe 67). At the same time, this cause needs to be extremely perfect for the universe to align itself in its current manner.

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In the article, “The Absurdity of Life without God”, William Craig argues that if there really is no God, life would have no purpose. I loved this article so much I printed it out and have it kept in my office for other people to read. When one truley pieces the story of God together, it really is the best explnation for the universe. It is just not plausable that the expanision of the universe caused a “big bang” of all life, matter, in the perfect peice. The earth is the perfect distance from the sun so that we don’t burn up, and is perfect distance close so we don’t freeze.

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The first premise of my argument is, there has never been the case in our lives were a thing was the efficient cause of its self. This premise says that nothing can be the cause of itself and thus it cannot have existed before it has existed. An example is a cup made of plastic, the cup is not its first efficient cause since it cannot create its self. The cup was created by a human who is the first efficient cause, he used a machine and plastic which are intermediary causes leading to the ultimate cause, the plastic

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Richard Taylor’s Cosmological Argument consists of many aspects that explain conditions in which God, the universe, the earth and all the other planets, and the living beings of Earth, exist. As Taylor stated there is really only a sufficient reason as to why something exists in which he follows up by stating that the universe requires an explanation as to why it exists. This means though people who don’t really think about why the universe does exist or how it exists, but there is a reason as to how it came to be or why it exists. This is where sufficient reason comes in. It helps give an explanation to something that exists.

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If God does not need a cause of existence, why would the universe need one? Therefore, stating that God does not need a cause, contradicts the whole cosmological argument. If God must exist for the sake of having the universe, there must be a cause for god too. To argue the idea that you need a final cause for motion, there are many physical events at the sub-atomic quantum that have no evident cause. Besides these new scientific discoveries, why couldn’t there be more than one final cause?

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Since premise two has been rebuffed by me, it renders premise 3 unsound which in turn renders premise four unsound thereby proving that God does not exist and proving that the first cause argument does not validate or prove the existence of God. The first cause argument while it is a very important argument still lacks credibility and is self-defeating as it is riddled with a lot of problems that makes it hard to reach a true and sound

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The cosmological argument looks to the world to prove God’s existence rather than pure definitions. The proponent of the cosmological argument was St. Thomas Aquinas, a theologian in the eleventh century CE (Solomon). He proposed that everything that exists must have a cause, and that the cause was God (Aquinas). Aquinas’ first point was based off of motion, that nothing can be both the mover and moved. An item sitting in place has the potential to be moving, but cannot move unless something that is already moving imparts motion to it

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Craig defends the Kalam by using two arguments. Argument one is as follows: Whatever begins to exist has a cause of existence; the universe began to exist; therefore: the universe has a cause. Argument two addresses the cause of existence more specifically and is as follows: Whatever begins to exist has a cause, the universe has a cause; if the universe has a cause, then an uncaused, personal creator of the universe exists.

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Therefore, the universe has to have come into existence from an ultimate source, and this source is referred

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In his first-cause argument, he states that everything we are able to observe has a cause and that nothing can cause itself. In order for something to cause itself, it would have to exist prior to itself, which is impossible. Nor can something be caused by an infinite regress of causes. (Vaughn, Lewis. Pg.

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