* Cosmological Argument * in Just Stuff

  Professor X is a cosmologist. He likes to deal in hard, brute facts and 
  has little time for religious or philosophical speculation. It seems 
  justifiable to ask this expert one of the most important questions that 
  has occupied mankind's thoughts for as long as there has been any thought: 
  "Where do we come from?" Let's put it another way, in more 'scientific 
  terms' if you like: "What is the cause of the existence of the Universe?"
  The Professor would, no doubt, be able to provide an answer along the 
  following lines: We know that you, as a human being, are a result of 
  sexual reproduction. You are the cause of your mother and father. The 
  human race as a whole, according to Darwinian theory, is the result of an 
  evolutionary process from other life forms. All life forms on Earth are 
  the result of atoms - particularly carbon and oxygen - combining into 
  complex molecules in an environment warmed by a stable sun. Our Sun is a 
  middle-aged star and the Earth, together with the rest of the solar 
  system, was formed around 4.5 billion years ago. Our star is just one of 
  an aggregate of stars that make up a galaxy - the Milky Way - which, in 
  turn is one of an aggregate of galaxies that formed around 10 billion 
  years ago. All the galaxies make up the universe which began around 15 
  billion years ago as a result of a 'Big Bang': an explosion that occurred 
  'out of nothing', beginning with the universe packed into a space smaller 
  than an atomic nucleus that rapidly expanded in a tiny fraction of a 
  second into a dense mixture of radiant energy and exotic particles.
  So there you are! Glad you asked? At this point you could simply thank the 
  Professor and walk away feeling quite content with the answer given. But 
  why should you? Are you not still justified in asking the inevitable 
  follow-on question: "Yes, but what caused the Big Bang?" The Professor may 
  stumble a little here and, perhaps, will speculate over the possibility 
  that the Big Bang is actually a part of a series of such events: the 
  universe expands, then shrinks again and the whole process begins all over 
  ad infinitude. There may also be other Big Bangs occurring in space at this 
  moment; in which case space is not a universe at all, but a multiverse. 
  But at what point does the good Professor drift from empirical fact to 
  unproven speculation? Have we not moved from the belief that the universe 
  does not have an infinite history, to one where it does? Is the suggestion 
  that the Big Bang simply occurred 'out of nothing' any different from a 
  religious believer saying that God created the universe out of nothing?


  Problems With Infinity-

  We are still faced here with the problem of 'beginnings'. If there are a 
  series of Big Bangs, what began this series? If there are many universes, 
  what are its boundaries? Could we settle with the response that both the 
  series goes on for infinity and that there are no boundaries? Therefore, 
  both time and space are infinite: they will go on forever, and have done 
  so in the past. There is no beginning and no end. Yet, conceiving of 
  infinity has always proven to be difficult. The argument goes something 
  like this:
  Time and Space are infinite.
  In an unlimited amount of time and an unlimited amount of space, there 
  must exist unlimited possibilities.
  Therefore, anything that you can imagine as a possibility will, at some 
  time and place, actually occur.
  This is the same as the thesis that if you have an immortal chimpanzee 
  tapping away at a typewriter it will eventually produce the complete works 
  of Shakespeare. It may take billions and billions of years; but time is 
  infinite! We have forever! As a thought experiment, imagine the most 
  pleasurable life possible. It can be anything you like: immense wealth, 
  ruler of the world, the perfect marriage, etc. Now, with infinite time on 
  our hands, eventually the environment will be produced somewhere in space 
  by which you are exactly what you have imagined. You can be assured that 
  at some point in time and space you will live that life; and not only 
  once. Rather disturbingly, you can also imagine the most unpleasant and 
  horrific life possible and you're also going to live that life again and 
  again! It may, of course, be the case that you only have your 
  consciousness once, and when you die that's it; regardless of the 
  likelihood that your physical state can re-combine, your soul cannot.
  In addition, the argument for infinity could also be an argument for the 
  existence of God: in an infinite amount of time and space it is logically 
  possible that a God, at some point in time, will exist. Why not? You can 
  imagine the existence of an all-powerful, superior being and, in a 
  universe of infinite possibilities, that being must, at some point, exist! 
  Moreover, of course, as He is God, He must have always existed. Therefore, 
  He exists now. A retort to this argument is that God is not a logical 
  possibility. That in an infinite universe only those things that perform 
  according to the universal laws of nature can occur, and God is not 
  according to those laws. Can we be sure that laws are so fixed? Even if 
  they were, does the emergence of a being superior in power and knowledge 
  to any other living creature fly against the laws of nature? What kind of 
  God is logically possible?
  Without getting into a debate over the nature of God, the important point 
  is that infinity is riddled with conceptual difficulties that many find 
  inadequate. For example, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716), in his 
  Theodicy, stated the following:
  Suppose the book of the elements of geometry to have been eternal, one 
  copy having been written down from an earlier one. It is evident that even 
  though a reason can be given for the present book out of a past one, we 
  should never come to a full reason. What is true of the books is also true 
  of the states of the world. If you suppose the world eternal, you will 
  suppose nothing but a succession of states and will not find in any of 
  them a sufficient reason.
  For Leibniz, there must be a 'sufficient reason': a complete explanation 
  that explains why something exists. He, obviously, was not satisfied with 
  the idea of infinity: a dissatisfaction that was based around the 
  scientific premise that things are not 'just there', but are in some way 
  related to other events. Leibniz, here, is a proponent of the ancient 
  metaphysical thesis 'ex nihilo nihil fit' ('of nothing, nothing comes'); 
  but this sits somewhat uncomfortably alongside the belief that God created 
  the universe ex nihilo!

  In the Beginning-

  Wouldn't it be much easier to say that there is a beginning? Let's be 
  empirical about this: when we observe the world we see that everything has 
  a cause: the rain causes the plants to grow, the plants cause the 
  production of oxygen, oxygen causes animal life to exist, etc. Does it not 
  follow from this that the whole universe, too, has a cause? Aristotle (384 
  - 322 BC) - rejecting Plato's concept of eternal Forms - believed that 
  everything must have an 'efficient cause'; the efficient and final cause 
  was the 'Unmoved Mover'. Aristotle was a major influence on Thomas Aquinas 
  (1225-1274) who developed the causal argument as part of his Christian 
  beliefs. Basically, Aquinas stated that if 'A' causes 'B', and 'B' causes 
  'C', then 'A' is the first cause, and 'C' is the last cause. But what 
  happens if 'A' does not occur? Neither 'B' nor 'C' will occur either. The 
  causal chain must, therefore, have a beginning, and that beginning is God.
  Is there anything wrong with that logic? After all, we experience this 
  process every day. EXAMPLE-  I get into my car, drive to the university, and give a 
  lecture on the Cosmological Argument. If I had not got into my car and 
  stayed in bed instead, then there would have been no drive in the car and 
  no lecture. My difficult decision to get out of a warm bed and stumble 
  into a cold car was undoubtedly the cause of my getting to the university 
  to give a lecture. However, getting into my car was not the cause of 
  everything else in the whole universe! It is not, therefore, the First 
  Cause. If 'A' is the first cause, then 'B' must also be the first cause of 
  'C', and 'C' the first cause of 'D', and so on. Every cause would be the 
  first cause! We are also faced with the obvious paradox here of, on the 
  one hand, saying that everything has a cause and, on the other, saying 
  that there is a causa sui (cause of itself); something that was not caused 
  by something else!
  Aquinas rephrased the argument in terms of dependency: Doesn't dependency 
  have to be grounded somewhere in non-dependency? Every creature is 
  dependent (i.e. contingent) for its existence on something else, without 
  which it would not have been. For example, if my mother had not met my 
  father during World War Two then I would not now exist. In fact, I also 
  have the war to thank for my existence today. But how can you have a chain 
  of dependent beings without, at the end of the line, having a being that 
  does not depend on something else? There must exist a non-dependent, 
  self-existent, necessary being. The very fact that one being depends upon 
  another being suggests that dependence must come to an end at some point; 
  or can you have infinite dependency?
  This argument is still causal, but plays on the term 'dependence' rather 
  than 'cause'. However, as Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) once pointed out, 
  just because every human being had a mother it does not follow that the 
  human race as a whole had a mother. In other words, it is wrong to argue 
  from individual cases to a whole collective. Three people can have their 
  own individual reasons for, say, going to see the same film, but it does 
  not follow that there need be one collective reason why the group of three 
  are in the cinema at the same time and sitting next to each other. We 
  could also follow the path of David Hume (1711-76) who would argue that, 
  as the creation of the universe is beyond our experience, there is simply 
  no empirical evidence to satisfy our curiosity. John Stuart Mill 
  (1806-1873), in his article Theism, said: 'Our experience, instead of 
  furnishing an argument for a first cause, is repugnant to it.'
  Still, we can't help being curious. Nonetheless, Hume and Mill have a 
  point: where does all this speculation leave us? Does it help us to 
  believe in a First Cause or, for that matter, in the existence of God? A 
  religious believer may well be able to say that God is 'special': to ask 
  the question "What or who caused God?" misses the point entirely and is, 
  in fact, irrelevant here. God just is: he is the eternal, uncaused, 
  timeless, creator.
  Equally, the atheist could use a similar argument in response to the 
  question: "What caused the universe?" As Russell once said: "I should say 
  that the universe is just there, and that is all." The universe just is: 
  like the laws of nature, the universe is a brute fact; it's the way things 
  are. Neither response is particularly helpful, it has to be said.

  A Question of Faith-

  Ultimately, whether you are a supporter or an opponent of the argument, a 
  certain degree of faith is required. It is natural to feel a certain 
  dissatisfaction with the 'just there' argument, as it is natural for us to 
  try and seek explanations for things. Yet, for the non-believer, a 
  religious explanation simply will not do either. Both the for and against 
  arguments are 'a priori' in that they appeal first to experience to 
  substantiate their claims; yet both perceive what they experience 
  differently. Supporters of the argument, such as Aquinas and Leibniz, see 
  that all things have a cause and, therefore, there must be a first cause; 
  whereas opponents, such as Mill, also see that all things have a cause 
  and, therefore, there cannot be anything that is uncaused. Whereas, 
  philosophers such as Hume and Russell refuse even to speculate beyond that 
  which we are able to experience.
  Even if it were proven that there is indeed a 'First Cause' and we define 
  this as 'God' we are still left with the usual difficulties that occur in 
  all arguments for the existence of God: does this definition fit within 
  the classical theist concept of a benevolent, omnipotent, omniscient, 
  timeless being? Or would it be more accurate to redefine God as something 
  far less personal: as a 'force of nature' rather than a Supreme Being? 
  What kind of God are we talking about?

  Regards,
  Rick Ogden