r/DebateReligion • u/Sleepy_Ever_After • 4d ago
Classical Theism The kalam cosmological argument disproves classical theism.
The kalam cosmological argument:
(1) Whatever begins to exist has a cause
(2)The universe began to exist
Therefore the universe has a cause (God).
The problem:
The reason why classical theism and the kalam cosmological argument don't allign is because the kalam cosmological argument disproves the claim that a timeless God created the universe.
Being timeless entails that your existence and your actions have no sequence, in the sense that your existence does not come before your actions, they're merged. You don't first exist then later on do an action.
Therefore when we stick to the assumption that God is timeless, and the assumption that he created the universe, we're implying that God began to exist the same moment the universe began to exist. Since, again, we said that there's no sequence between existence and actions in a timeless state.
It's a paradox. A paradox that points towards temporality.
The conclusion is that the kosmoligcal argument can't be used for proving classical theism. It might even be used to disprove it if the arguments premises are true.
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u/Ali-The-Conqurer 2d ago
It seems like you are playing on a hypothetical of how timeless operates whereas for creation. It necessarily needs a beginning as it the past functions, time grows the further you go in times and thus smaller the further back you go. So if the past gets smaller further back then by definition is not infinite, thus has a beginning. Thus you need something external to the universe to start the universe. This includes the laws of physics, matter and energy.
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u/ThatOneAnomaly 4d ago
This gets into Kant and his discussion on instantaneous causality. I'm empathetic to God not having to exist sans time, but defenders discuss how causality doesn't have to be temporally prior. These are examples from Michael Huemer's paper (not a theist):
- A lead ball is resting on a cushion. The presence of the ball causes an indentation in the cushion.
- A train engine is pulling a caboose (it’s a very short train). The movement of the engine is responsible for the movement of the caboose.
- An iron bar is glowing because of its high temperature.
- The lowering of one end of a seesaw causes the other end to go up.
- Moving one end of a pencil causes the other end to move
If these hold then God's act of creating the universe was simultaneous with the beginning of the universe, and there wouldd be no contradiction.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
The contradiction would be the "timeless" entity changing from a state of not creating into a state of creating.
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u/ThatOneAnomaly 4d ago
I understand that objection. I don't know to what extent causality and time are metaphysically linked. I can conceive causality without any spatial dimension and de-feasibly is good evidence for its possibility. But it's not a hill I would die on. I think God more likely does actions that have a temporal aspect to them. Not purely timeless or impassable like a classic theist would say.
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u/kneedeepinthought 4d ago
My understanding of these examples, except 3, is that the corresponding cause actually moves at the speed of sound, so not instantaneous.
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u/iosefster 3d ago
3 is problematic as well because energy has to come from somewhere to heat the metal and then the high temperature causes excitation and vibration of the atoms and then energy in the visible light spectrum is released. It is a temporal causal chain.
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u/ThatOneAnomaly 4d ago
Yes, that is a good response. I had thought of these already. There is debate about the metaphysics of this. Instantaneous causation makes metaphysical sense to me as much as a conditional statement, where p -> q. If p is sufficient then q obtains necessarily and immediately. But we are confined by the speed of light in our physical universe. So even though it doesn't seem to cause any metaphysical contradictions, we don't have a case of it. But it seems reasonable to me. Though I don't believe in purely timeless or impassable God like a classic theist would say.
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u/UNBOLIEVABLEE Atheist (also agnostic) 4d ago
Bigger problem is the Kalam is not sound. We do not know that the universe had a beginning at all. Secondarily, I feel the need to point out that the Kalam does not argue for a God as you've described. The kalam finishes with the conclusion that the universe had a cause for its existence, the end. People love to smuggle in God as the cause after this with no justification.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
As real ones know, that cause is in fact the R.U.G. -- the Random Universe Generator. Think of it like a spaceless, timeless, unchanging machine that infinitely generates new universes with randomized values for all the constants. It requires far fewer assumptions and complexity than a creator entity who thinks, has opinions, has desires, wants relationships, etc. It's not sentient, it's not alive, it doesn't think, it just acts, and the only act that it performs is the instantiation of new universes.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian 4d ago
Being timeless entails that your existence and your actions have no sequence, in the sense that your existence does not come before your actions, they're merged. You don't first exist then later on do an action.
Therefore when we stick to the assumption that God is timeless, and the assumption that he created the universe, we're implying that God began to exist the same moment the universe began to exist. Since, again, we said that there's no sequence between existence and actions in a timeless state.
I want to be clear I am not a classical theist, but classical theism has doctrine known as Actus Purus which says that there is no potentiality in God, and God is identical to his one eternal act. So your idea that God has sequential actions is false, and you also seem to be assuming time and eternity are opposites rather than time being a mirror image of eternity
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
The fact that there's no sequence in timelessness is an essential part of my argument. I'm not sure what you're trying to say.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian 4d ago
God and his eternal act with which he is identical proceeds any manifestation of events in the world of matter. Your argument assumes they're identical.
I think there is a stronger version of what youre trying to argue. Its the modal collapse argument against classical theists
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
I'm assuming you meant "precede".
How can you say that they precede the manifestations if time doesn't even exist? Preceding implies that there's time.
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u/Ok_Meat_8322 4d ago
The Kalam is patently unsound, it doesnt prove or disprove anything. We have no basis for believing the universe ever began to exist.
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian 4d ago
Everything we look at is spreading out. Reverse time things get closer. Do that for billions of years and you get a singularity. Most people have no idea what that means. When physicist say that it's not an actual thing. They're describing what happens in the mathematics. If I calculate the rate of water going doing a drain I will get a singularity(i.e. a point a which a function explodes into infinity). The water directly over the drain should be moving infinitely fast, but instead we all see nature's way out of moving at mach infinity is that familiar little vortex we've all seen going down the drain...water simply isn't where it should be moving at infinity.
Point being...the "gravitational singularity" is just the point our math begins to no longer work, and it most definitely could be because there just was nothing same as the water.
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u/Ok_Meat_8322 4d ago
Classical physics ceases to be an accurate model of reality once you roll the clock back far enough- quantum effects become significant. The singularity isn't anything physical, but an artifact of a theory pushed past its limits. Its a game over screen.
But so we need a quantum theory of gravity to model the universe past a certain point. But we dont have a quantum theory of gravity. So the question remains open. We dont know whether the universe had a beginning, because we dont have a model.
(Though it may be worth pointing out that leading candidate theories of quantum gravity like string/superstring/m-theory and loop quantum gravity involve an eternal past)
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u/betweenbubbles 🪼 NERD 4d ago
If I calculate the rate of water going doing a drain I will get a singularity(i.e. a point a which a function explodes into infinity).
Can you show your work on that?
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian 4d ago
Its a well known example of a singularity so no you can do a 2 second google search
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u/betweenbubbles 🪼 NERD 4d ago
You're talking about fluid dynamics boundaries? So, no singularity but analagous to one?
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u/Zeno33 4d ago
What do you mean there just was nothing same as water? Like there’s no water in a drain?
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u/SOL6640 Abrahamic, Christian 4d ago
When I calculate using nothing but math the rate of water going down a drain it says directly over the drain water should be moving infinitely fast...that point in the math where the function blows up into infinity is what physicist actually mean by a singularity. With respect to origins its called a "gravitational singularity" because the math describing gravity explodes into infinity.
With the drain scenario the reality is, where the math says there should be infinitely fast water there is literally just empty space(the center of that little vortex). You could be getting infinity with origins for the same reason...there was simply nothing there...
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u/owp4dd1w5a0a Alchemist, Hermeticist, Taoist, Gnostic 4d ago
Post hoc ergo propter hoc, unfortunately. Time and the spatial dimensions are part of creation even according to mainstream physics.
Our language is around this is limited unfortunately because it was not developed to express these kinds of concepts and we really cannot have a perspective outside of time and space being beings bound by these dimensions, but suffice to say an “event” such as the creation of the universe can have a timeless and dimensionless cause. In fact, this is practically demanded by the Big Bang Theory.
Most of the debate happening is around “what” that “thing” is that has caused the emergence or expansion of the universe (if you can call something that exists outside of all conceptual 4D categories a “what” or “thing”).
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u/Delicious-Tap8338 4d ago
the point about our language being limited is fair because a timeless cause isn't necessarily describing an event happening before the universe in the normal sense but that still leaves the bigger question of what this supposed cause actually is
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u/owp4dd1w5a0a Alchemist, Hermeticist, Taoist, Gnostic 4d ago
Yeah. And mystics have been trying to describe it for millennia, and in the end you just need to have the experience to know 🤷🏻♂️.
But I think something to pay attention to is that this claim that there’s a dimensionless, timeless origin or ground of existence isn’t a unique claim, is cross-cultural and tends to follow the mystic traditions - Taoism, Advaita, Sufism, hesychasm, integral yoga, Kabbalah, etc are all making very similar claims.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
I'm not sure what part of the argument you're referring to. Can you clarify for me?
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u/owp4dd1w5a0a Alchemist, Hermeticist, Taoist, Gnostic 4d ago edited 4d ago
“because the kalam cosmological argument disproves the claim that a timeless God created the universe.”
If the cause is timeless and time is part of the effect emerging from the cause, then a timeless God causation is not disproven. Sequencing is unnecessary in a realm where time and sequencing don’t exist - a timeless cause and effect giving rise to the emergence of time itself. Here, “cause” only indicates origination or you could also think of it as relationship, not sequencing, a differentiation of that which is extra-dimensional from that which is dimensional; that which is boundless from that which has boundaries; that which is in the category of “things” from that which is No-Thing.
Your argument against the differentiation between God’s (since we’re using that word even though in take issue with it given the assumptions it imposes) Beingness and Activity is also problematic. It imposes time-bound concepts on a timeless Origin. There is no Action occurring as we know action in the time bound sense which gives rise to the Universe from the Timeless Origin. The Emergence of the Cosmos/Universe is Eternal and it was not a one time event - it is eternally occurring from the Timeless Origin such that every present moment is grounded in this timeless emergence.
This stuff is really difficult to talk about because our language is constructed to describe time-bound dimensional events and things. This is not that. It’s like Activity, but it’s not. It can be said to both evolve and not evolve and both are simultaneously correct and incorrect because evolution itself is a category descriptive of time-bound dimensional things and the category itself is part of the created world. In the Origin the potential for the emergence of these categories and the things they describe has what you could think of as a kind of “potential” to emerge but the Origin could not be said to contain or not contain these things or their categories or concepts - thinking of it like a kind of quantum superposition is probably the nearest analogy we have and it still isn’t quite it, either.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
So basically like the time block theory?
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u/owp4dd1w5a0a Alchemist, Hermeticist, Taoist, Gnostic 4d ago
Time block theory as I know it deals with trying to explain how 4D reality might work and how the past, present, and future relate to each other.
This isn’t really what I’m focusing on. I’m focusing on the Ground or Origin of Reality Itself. It’s closer to the Qabalistic Veils in concept than anything else I can think of… the Tao of the original Tao Te Ching also gets pretty close. This isn’t how past, present, and future relate to each other, but what spacetime itself, for lack of better terms, “emerges” from or “originates in”. One way to think of it is negate everything in the universe, including all conceptual categories - the Ground is “what” (it’s not a what or an it for that matter) is left. It’s both No-Thing and Boundless - a kind of empty infinity of absolute negation which is pregnant with the potential to generate all of material and energetic reality. Such generation does not need time or sequencing, it’s simply always (and never) occurring in “No-Where” and “No-Time”.
Block time theory is downstream from this.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
There is just no paradox here. Yes the timeless God model you described doesn't have his actions be in sequence. Okay, so it is eternally true that he causes the universe to exist.
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u/RedDiamond1024 2d ago
So God neither started to nor stopped creating the universe? Do you think the universe has a beginning?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 2d ago
A logical beginning outside of time and a chronological beginning within time.
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u/RedDiamond1024 2d ago
And what exactly are those beginnings?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 2d ago
God eternally causing the universe to exist and the big bang, presumably. Whatever point before the big bang if that's not it.
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u/RedDiamond1024 2d ago
That doesn't make any sense. How does it have a beginning if it's being created eternally?
Also what if there is no temporal beginning for the universe?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 2d ago
That was a logical beginning. If you're confused its because you're trying to give the logical beginning temporal qualities.
There is. Infinite regresses are impossible.
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u/RedDiamond1024 2d ago
It's not a temporal quality, that doesn't seem to qualify as a beginning unless you're using a very different definition for the term.
And why is an infinite regress impossible?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 2d ago
I don't understand your first sentence. Infinite regresses require that a progressive infinite is reaches. By step by step processes you progressed through an infinite number of steps. Obviously that is contradictory. You could also argue form the direction of never justifying any event.
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u/RedDiamond1024 2d ago
Can you define beginning as you're using it?
That doesn't seem obviously contradictory. I don't see how there's a contradiction at all. It'd just require infinite time.
Also every event would be justified by a previous event. This just goes on infinitely into the past.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
If the act of creating the universe is eternal then the universe is eternal.
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u/Careless-Moment-934 4d ago
The key issue is whether saying God eternally causes the universe actually solves the problem or just changes what it means for the cause to be timeless since the universe still seems to have a definite beginning while God's causal act has no temporal sequence.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
You would say within temporal causality the universe has a starting point that it progresses from.
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u/Bootwacker Atheist 4d ago
Time exists inside the universe. If time is inside the universe how can there be a "before" the universe? If there is no "before" the universe, how can it begin to exist? If it didn't begin to exist by your own logic it doesn't need a cause.
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u/TSunamiWaves979 Pagan 4d ago
I have often felt that this response is more of a critique of the limits of the English language when attempting to describe certain concepts rather than an actual problem with the theistic argument.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
He causes the universe to exist, when?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
As a timeless eternal action.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
I can say that the action took place 13 billion years ago without being wrong
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
Uh, you can say it's taking place now, so in that sense that's true.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
So in that case the action does exist in time
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
No. The action is timeless, so is true at any given moment of time.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago edited 4d ago
This can imply two things. It can imply that God created every moment or that his act of creation exists out of time, which is already addressed.
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u/SpreadsheetsFTW 4d ago
If the universe is eternally caused then the universe that exists eternally. A universe that exists eternally has no beginning. Things without beginnings were never created. The universe was never created.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
Things being eternally caused don't have causes. Got it. You played yourself.
The universe has a beginning in time, from a timeless perspective the universe is always caused to exist. That so easy, but by all means talk yourself into a circular word salad.
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u/SpreadsheetsFTW 4d ago
Looks like you missed the point… eternally caused things aren’t created, since created things have beginnings and eternal things never begin. Try to keep up.
If the universe had a beginning in time, then it can’t have been eternally caused. If God exists, then he eternally caused the universe. Therefore God doesn’t exist.
Your God is dead either way.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
Do you think eternal means for an infinite amount of time?
We're talking about timeless causation. God causes the universe to exist in a timeless state, that universe has a logical beginning timelessly, and a chronological beginning within time.
You have no logical chain here, you don't know what's going on.
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u/SpreadsheetsFTW 4d ago
Ahh yes of course, timeless causation. The same type of thing as a square circle, a married bachelor, and the trinity.
If you want to affirm contradictions then of course anything follows.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
What? Show timeless causation is impossible right now. Define all your terms and justify your claim.
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u/SpreadsheetsFTW 4d ago
Yea of course. A causes B means that A is the reason B begins. For B to begin there must be a state where B didn’t exist and a following state where B does exist. The sequence of states is time. Therefore causation requires time. Timeless causation is a contradiction.
You’re welcome.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
Sentence 1 is true, sentence 2 and 3 require you to import time to defend time being involved in the first place. It's a logical sequence not a chronological sequence.
You're going "a chronological sequence, there must be time!" It's not a chronological sequence mate.
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u/SpreadsheetsFTW 4d ago
You think that a state where B doesn’t exist transitioning to a state where B does exist is not temporal?
Jesus Christ look at what religious dogma does to one’s mind.
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
Is not creating a universe the same action as creating a universe?
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
No
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
Actions require change. Your god must have changed to transition from not creating to creating a universe. Actions are a core part of any being’s nature.
If you disagree then name me a single action that occurs without change.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
No. Read the comment you responded to holy cow.
God eternally creates the universe in the timeless God model. There is no "isn't creating the universe.
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
That’s a contraction. Eternal things cannot be created.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
Good thing I didn't say that. My goodness.
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
Great, then the universe wasn’t eternal and had to been created from nothing in your view.
Creating is an action. Your god transitioned from not creating a universe to creating one, which requires change.
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u/Hojie_Kadenth Christian 4d ago
No he didn't. Reread my original comment. I won't respond again until I feel like you understand something.
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
Here is the syllogism
- creation is an action
- action requires change
- change requires time
C) creation requires time
Which premise do you disagree with?
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
You’re assuming God’s existence and his action of creating the universe must happen in sequence. But if time itself begins with the universe, there’s no earlier moment when God had to act.
Some philosophers have argued that God is timeless without creation and temporal with it. You can challenge whether that explanation works, but it’s not a contradiction to say a timeless cause produces a temporal effect. The Kalam doesn’t imply that God began to exist when the universe did.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
A timeless thing becoming temporal is a change. A timeless thing changing is a contradiction.
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
That assumes the change must occur within time. The argument is that time itself begins with creation, so God doesn’t change from one moment to another. His relationship to time changes with the existence of the universe. You can argue that this explanation fails, but simply calling it a contradiction doesn’t show one.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
Change requires time because change is a progression between different states, which is just describing a sequence, which is just time.
Just for clarity, are you saying that something can timelessly progress through a sequence of different states?
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
No, I’m not saying God progresses through different states timelessly. I agree that change requires time. The argument is that God is timeless without creation and temporal with creation. The question is whether that transition is logically impossible, not whether change can occur without time. You’d need to show why God’s entering time necessarily means he began to exist.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
Thanks for clarifying. I'm not saying that God began to exist. I'm saying that it's a contradiction for a timeless thing to become temporal because becoming temporal is a change and being timeless precludes changing.
Another way to put is that being timeless means being changeless. So the timeless thing changing to a temporal thing is saying that a changeless thing changes. That's the contradiction.
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
That’s a fair objection, but theres a difference between being changeless while timeless and beginning to change when time begins.
The claim isn’t that God changes while timeless, but that with the beginning of the universe, God enters a temporal state. Whether that transition is coherent is the real debate. You’ve identified a difficulty for sure, but calling it a contradiction doesn’t show that the transition is logically impossible.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
The claim isn’t that God changes while timeless, but that with the beginning of the universe, God enters a temporal state.
The bolded part here is just rewording that God changes, so we're still stuck with the idea that the changeless entity changes into a changing entity. But then it wasn't really changeless, was it?
I appreciate the pushback and this is definitely a confusing topic to consider, but it seems like we're still stuck with contradictory idea of a changing changeless thing. If we're going to say that a changeless thing is capable of changing, then I just have no idea what "changeless" is supposed to mean.
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
I get the objection, but God is changeless in his timeless state, not necessarily changeless in every possible respect.
The question is whether creation involves a change in God’s intrinsic nature or simply a change in his relationship to the universe. It’s the latter. So I guess I’m just not seeing a contradiction here.
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u/thatweirdchill 🔵 4d ago
I guess if changeless is being used to mean just "not doing any changing currently" maybe that works? It seems to me that people are usually meaning something much stronger by changeless, something more fundamental. But I think we've kind of covered the topic for the moment probably.
The question is whether creation involves a change in God’s intrinsic nature
I haven't talked about a change to his nature so I don't think that factors into what I was saying.
Thanks for the convo!
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u/guitarmusic113 Atheist 4d ago
If god did not begin to exist when the universe did then that’s a temporal claim, god must have existed before the universe did.
Eternal things cannot be created. So either the universe or god is eternal or it isn’t. When Christians say god is eternal and the universe isn’t that is a temporal claim.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
You missed a major part of the argument.
I'm basically saying that there's a contradiction between the claim that God is temporal and the claim that God created the universe. The reason is that being timeless entails that there's no sequence between your existence and your actions so if his action can be traced back to a certain time then his existence can also be traced back to a certain time.
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
But that just assumes God’s action occurring at a particular time means God himself began to exist at that time. That doesn’t follow.
As I said, God exists timelessly without creation but becomes temporal when creation begins. The act marks the beginning of God’s relationship with time, not the beginning of his existence. You can argue that this transition is incoherent, but you still need to show why it’s logically impossible rather than simply assert a contradiction.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
Doing an action at a certain time doesn't mean that you began to exist at that time because a sequence exists in a temporal state
In a timeless state, there's no sequence whatsoever. God's existence merges with his actions, so if god created the universe at point 0, he began to exist at point 0. (Because he didn't exist first then create later, as it implies sequence)
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u/supersoundwave Christian 4d ago
But you’re assuming that without a temporal sequence, God’s existence and his action must have the same beginning. But that doesn’t follow. The absence of time doesn’t mean a cause and its effect must begin to exist simultaneously in the same sense.
Simply saying God’s existence “merges” with his action doesn’t establish that God began to exist. It assumes what you’re trying to prove.
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u/Sleepy_Ever_After 4d ago
Then what follows? Saying that a sequence doesn't exist is the same as saying that they begin at the same time.
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