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Postscript to the Cosmological Argument

As children growing up, each of us at some point becomes aware of the laws of cause and effect.  Every effect has a cause, and each cause must be sufficient to produce the effect in question. 

Then when in childhood or adolescence we become aware also of the beauty and power of nature, most of us will say to ourselves, “There must be an explanation for all of this.”  What we see is this magnificent natural world, and we know intuitively that it must have a cause, and that the cause must itself be colossal.

Not only that; but we have also by this time learned to distinguish objects and events that are designed from those which result from impersonal forces such as wind erosion, earthquake, or chemical reactions.  We may not be able to articulate exactly how we make such distinctions, but every child can accurately tell a slab of marble from a statue.  (We will elucidate the precise criteria for design in a future post.)  Finally, we also have understood by this time that design invariably signals personhood – that is, it implies intention, which is an activity of mind, and only of mind.  Put it this way: design is a mental activity — and we know this as children.

But then the child returns to her classroom and does not consider the matter further for months or years, until her next experience of nature, and again she tells herself, “There must be an explanation for all of this.”  Even then she does not pursue the inquiry in any deliberate way; and before long her elders begin teaching her that her intuition is not true, that it is irrational and superstitious, and that science shows that everything is the unintended result of impersonal forces.

But it is perfectly rational to apply the laws of cause and effect to the universe itself – why wouldn’t we? – and perfectly rational to infer mind from design.

Anything which exists either had a beginning or it didn’t, and if it did, then it either had a cause or it didn’t.  The evidence of science overwhelmingly shows that the universe did have a beginning.  What is irrational is to suppose that anything could come into existence, uncaused.

What we all need is someone to confirm that our childhood intuition was and is true.

Those who confirmed that intuition for me are men such as William Craig, Michael Behe, Hugh Ross, J. P. Moreland, John Lennox, and Stephen Meyer.  I thank my God for each one.

A Little Deeper Into the Cosmos

More on the Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God

Why is there something rather than nothing?

If anything exists, then an uncaused being exists.  How do we know this?

Something does exist: the universe; and the universe either had a beginning or it didn’t.  If it didn’t, then it has an infinite past, and neither has a cause nor can it have a cause, and that would end the inquiry.

But we happen to know that the universe did have a beginning, and since it did not create itself, it must have had a cause outside itself.  Thus there exists, in addition to the universe itself, at least one other being – specifically, whatever it was that caused the universe to exist.

Either the cause of the universe was itself uncaused, or it was preceded by an infinite regress of caused causes.  An actual infinite regress of caused causes is impossible.  Therefore, the universe was caused by an uncaused cause.  QED.

What kind of being is this uncaused cause of the universe?

Big Bang cosmology entails that space and time themselves came into existence with the matter and energy of the Creation event.  Therefore, the cause of the universe must be:

     Uncaused

     Spaceless

     Timeless

     Immaterial

     Stupendously powerful

Other observations enable us to add to the list of divine attributes.  The fine-tuning of the universe shows that the First Cause has crafted the constants of physics to achieve a particular purpose, namely, a universe hospitable to complex life.  Purpose is a mental activity: only minds have purposes.  Therefore the First Cause is a personal being.  The fine-tuning demonstrates also that the First Cause is transcendently intelligent.

Why does the universe exist?  Why is there something rather than nothing?  Because God caused the universe to exist.  Then why does God exist?  I do not believe there is an answer to that question.  God does not exist for a reason: he just is.  He is the uncaused cause.  He, and only He, contains in Himself the explanation of His own existence.  As He said to Moses: “I am that I am.  Tell them that I am sent you.”

So to someone who asks, “If God created the universe, then who created God?” the proper response is to point out that the answer is obvious, but that it is the wrong question.  The question is not who created God, but how can it be that God exists, uncaused?  What is the reason for God’s existence?  And the only answer I know of is that He just exists.  He and He alone contains within himself the explanation for his own existence.

And we are in awe once again, and our hearts overflow with gratitude.

Many philosophers maintain that the reason God exists is that He is the necessary being.  I’m not clear on what that means.  Wouldn’t it be possible that nothing at all exists?  Then God would also not exist, right?  Then He doesn’t exist by any sort of logical necessity.  In what sense, then, is he the necessary being?

I suspect the answer is that if God did not exist, then nothing would exist.

So my answer to the question how we know God exists is that we know it from the fact that something that is not God exists and had a beginning.  Everything else follows by logical necessity.

The Heavens Declare the Glory

Several people who follow this blog have been complaining about the recent dearth of posts.  Mea culpa!  I repent!

Here is a fascinating special case of the fine-tuning of the universe.

There are 90 naturally-occurring elements in the periodic table – elements like hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, and many others.  Every physical thing in the universe is made up of these elements or of combinations of these elements.

Each element has distinctive properties, and the properties of all the elements, taken together, result in our physical world –the Earth, the Earth’s atmosphere, the iron that drives the Earth’s magnetic field, the water that makes life possible, the sun, the moon, the stars, our bodies.

It makes me weep to realize the wisdom and power displayed in the Creation.

Where do these elements come from?

I learned several years ago that there have been three or four generations of stars.  The first generation, formed at about 100 million years after the Creation event, consisted only of the lightest elements, hydrogen and helium.  During the lifetime of those stars, they produced heavier elements by a process of fusion – that is, by combining lighter elements to form heavier ones under extreme heat and pressure.  When these stars reached the end of their lifespans, they collapsed, and then they exploded, spreading those heavier elements throughout the cosmos.  Then under gravitation the debris from the explosion of those stars formed a second generation of stars, which likewise produced even heavier elements, collapsed, and exploded.  (They are still exploding; they are called “super-novas.”)  Our sun is an instance of at least a third-generation star, if not a fourth.

Recently it was learned that iron is the heaviest element formed in this manner – by fusion within the first generations of stars.  Now cosmologists have discovered how the heaviest elements were formed.

Most massive stars (say, 10 times the mass of our Sun) exist in binary systems with a twin.  When they die, they explode, but their cores remain, and they collapse to a diameter of only 10 to 12 kilometers, forming the densest objects in the universe other than black holes – so dense that the protons and electrons combine, forming neutrons; and hence they are called “neutron stars.”

The twin neutron stars then circle each other for eons until at last, under their mutual gravitational attraction, they fall into each other.  When they collide, they annihilate in the most spectacular events ever observed.  But after the collapse and before the explosion, they form the heavy elements by a process called “rapid neutron capture,” or the r-process.  Then the explosions again spread these heaviest elements throughout the universe.  Some of them ended up in Earth’s soil.  We ingested the plants that drew those elements out of that soil, and those elements keep us alive by performing vital life functions, from the regulation of brain development to the formation of strong bones.

You can read more from Scientific American at https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-star-collisions-forge-the-universes-heaviest-elements/

Glory to God!

Water: Designed for Life

In April I published links to a wonderful 7-part essay by John Millam, Ken Klos, and Iain D. Sommerville, entitled, Water: Designed for Life (Reasons to Believe 2013).

I have to apologize to those who have tried to open Part 2, or anything after Part 1, by clicking on the links which the publisher provided at the bottom of Part 1.  They don’t work.  (They did work when I first posted the essay.)  Here’s what does work: Once you have opened Part 1, at the top of your browser window will be the URL for that web page, ending in “part-1-of-7.”  Place your cursor next to the 1 and replace it with a 2 and <press> enter.  The same for parts 3-7.  (Yes, I do have permission from RTB to tell you to do this.)

Feast on this thrilling exposition of the miraculous properties of a substance we all take for granted, water, in seven quick strokes by pasting the following URL into your browser:

reasons.org/explore/blogs/todays-new-reason-to-believe/read/tnrtb/2013/05/20/water-designed-for-life-part-1-(of-7)

Everything is fine-tuned.

The Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God is Virtually Conclusive

I cannot leave this argument alone.  Every time I sit down to write about the teleological argument for the existence of God (the argument from design), my thoughts turn to the cosmological argument instead.  Here is my latest effort to reduce the argument to its essence.

There are only four possible explanations for the existence of the universe:

  1. The universe is past-eternal;
  2. The universe had an uncaused beginning;
  3. The universe was caused by a caused cause; or
  4. The universe was caused by an uncaused cause.

We can eliminate the first three explanations.

If the universe is past-eternal, then it did not have a beginning.  If so, then it did not have a cause, but just is.  God may or may not exist, but an uncaused universe does not require it.

Empirical science has shown, however, that the universe did have a beginning.  This leads to two more possible explanations for its existence: either it had a caused beginning, or it had an uncaused beginning.  If the universe had an uncaused beginning, then God may or may not exist, but as noted above, an uncaused universe does not require it.

But an uncaused beginning is unlikely because it would violate the laws of cause and effect.  At the very least, it would seem to do so: there is no plausible basis for maintaining that the universe could have had an uncaused beginning. 

The universe, then, must have had a caused beginning.  If so, then again there are two possible explanations for its existence: either the cause itself had a beginning and hence a cause, or the cause itself did not have a cause and hence was past-eternal.

A caused cause is merely one element in an infinite series, unless the series itself has a beginning; and it can only begin with an uncaused cause.  An actual infinite series is impossible and absurd.  Therefore the series of causes must “end” (begin) with an uncaused cause, which uncaused cause must be past-eternal.

(Every caused universe is past-finite and every past-finite universe which can be actualized is caused.  Every uncaused universe which can be actualized is past-eternal and every past-eternal universe is uncaused.)

Thus three of the four possible explanations for the existence of the universe have been excluded: a past-eternal universe; an uncaused beginning; and a beginning brought about by an infinite series of caused causes.  The remaining explanation, that the universe was brought into being by an uncaused, past-infinite cause, must be true.

The Moral Argument for God Gets Some Air

[On August 21, 2021, our local newspaper, The Eugene Register-Guard, published a “Guest View” by atheist Charles H. Jones, to which I felt compelled to offer a riposte, which was published as a Guest View September 4, 2021.  Here are both essays.]

Guest View, “Whose Morality Carries More Weight?”

By Charles H. Jones, Register-Guard August 21, 2021, page 6A

Saying an entire class of people is immoral, such as Blacks or Jews, is generally considered prejudicial and hateful. I would be surprised to see, and don’t recall seeing, such racist statements in The R-G. Yet, versions of “atheists are immoral” have appeared at least eight times in the past four years – including three columns within the last year. This is usually stated in less obvious, but logically equivalent, variations of “morality derives from God.” But, after all, how can atheists be moral when they deny the source of morality?

This isn’t just a philosophical issue. There are countries where atheism is a capital offense. I’ve met someone who is hiding for fear of their life because they left Islam. Complete shunning – loss of family, friends and jobs – is not unusual when people leave some religious communities.  I’ve met someone who was kicked out of their house at 16 for leaving Christianity.

The acceptance of openly stated anti-atheist prejudice epitomizes religious privilege.  But this privilege shows itself daily via “in God we trust” and “under God.”  Public promotion of faith and prayer also is an example of this privilege and prejudice.  And it is very concerning that the Supreme Court is legalizing religious discrimination based on this prejudice.

Claims of moral superiority based on God aren’t limited to denouncing atheists.  There are religions where not believing in the proper god deserves eternal torture.  Even within a single religion, God’s supposed morality has been used to claim supremacy and privilege for men, heterosexuals, the monogamous, the married, whites and castes (among others).

Another harmful result of morality from God is the promotion of the United States as a Christian nation.  Stating the mistaken belief that the Constitution is based on biblical principles reduces the roughly 30% of the U.S. that are non-Christian to second-class citizenry.  I’ve personally been told I should leave the country because I’m atheist.  This erroneous belief also played a part on Jan 6.  Most of the people in the Capitol mob weren’t just white supremacists, they were also Christian Nationalists.  Their movement is partially motivated by the belief that Christians are morally superior.  Their violent actions are even supportable by Jesus’ militant side (Matthew 10:34).  The Christian god is an authoritarian figure – a divine king, not an elected official.

I am not saying all theists are inherently immoral.  I am not claiming there is a single external source of morality and you are immoral if you deny it. I claim, and the evidence supports, that theists are simply mistaken about their source of morality. For example, most people today condemn slavery, yet slavery is doctrinally supported by the three largest religions.  Jesus never denounced slavery and implicitly condoned it, while Paul explicitly wrote, “Slaves, obey your earthly masters …” (Ephesians 6:5-6); Mohammed owned slaves; and then there’s karma. Even if some doctrinal passage appears to be anti-slavery, it demonstrates doctrinal self-contradiction rather than elimination of the doctrinal support. This is evidence that people look for doctrine to support their preexisting beliefs rather than deriving their beliefs from doctrine or God.

Religions are doctrinally in opposition.  Yahweh is not Allah is not Zeus.  Reincarnation does not lead to Valhalla.  Claiming belief in one religion is claiming that all other religions are false.  (Why claim one of thousands of religions if you don’t think it’s the one true – and thus superior – religion?) If you want to promote unity – to bring everyone together – you have to keep your religion out of the public square.  This is the reason for the establishment clause of the First Amendment.  This is why it is unconstitutional to promote religion in public schools and why it is polite to hold a moment of silence rather than a prayer at public gatherings.  I fully support people’s right to their religious beliefs, but that same right allows me to say, “Keep them to yourselves; they’re divisive.”

Where does morality come from? There are arguments based on evolution, but most people are unaware of them.  I believe most people, secular or not, derive morality from love, compassion and humanism.  Isn’t having a conscience part of the human condition?  Would you rape and murder if God didn’t tell you not to?

What’s more important, promoting morality and unity, or claiming one group of people is morally superior to all others? 

Charles H. Jones, Ph.D., is a retired mathematician. He organizes the Eugene Atheist Pub Social through Meetup.

Guest View, “Objective human values we all cherish”

By Thomas Alderman, Register-Guard September 4 2021, page 6A

Charles H. Jones (Guest View, Register Guard August 21, 2021, page 6A) maintains that the expression, “‘morality derives from God’ [is the] logical equivalent [of] ‘atheists are immoral,’” and thus claims that to hold to traditional theism is in itself a claim to moral superiority.  How fortunate we are that it is not so!

Christian theists, of all people, are the least likely to consider themselves morally superior, for the faith itself entails an admission of moral failure and the need for forgiveness.  It is forgiveness that we celebrate.

Jones goes on to say that “theists are simply mistaken about their source of morality. . . .  I believe most people, secular or not, derive morality from love, compassion and humanism.  Isn’t having a conscience part of the human condition?  Would you rape and murder if God didn’t tell you not to?”

But the question is not what I would or would not do: the question is, if I do it, am I wrong, or am I merely breaking a social convention?

Jones himself expects us to acknowledge such duties as binding apart from God, and he says we can know about these duties through conscience.  Conscience is merely the perception of a moral duty, however; and in order for a duty to be objective, it must be binding irrespective of our perceptions.  If it is wrong, it is not because I think it is wrong: it is wrong whether I think it is wrong or whether I do not.  Otherwise, it is not objective, and my perception is an illusion – which is precisely what many other non-theists maintain.

But Jones joins the rest of humanity in affirming objective moral values and duties; his appeal to conscience, however, does not account for their existence.

If we have a duty to care for each other, it must be because of something inherently valuable in us.  Then there would be something real for conscience to apprehend.  But Darwinism does not help us – what is my duty to an accident of nature or a highly-organized collection of cheap chemicals?  And if I myself am an accident of nature, how can I know that my experience of conscience is not itself an illusion?

Other nontheistic accounts of morality also fall short.  Under social compact theory, I give up some of my prerogatives in exchange for your doing likewise so that we can coexist; but I am perfectly entitled not to give up my prerogatives (even if we call such people criminals and put them in jail).  Immanuel Kant’s (1724-1804) Categorical Imperative taught that we are obligated to act according to principles which we would wish to be universally observed.  That is surely good advice, and may seem appealing to other philosophers; but it fails to explain why we are morally wrong if we reject it.  In short, no adequate nontheistic account of objective morality has ever been proposed.

But the biblical account of creation explains it well: humans have inherent value and dignity because we were created in the image of God, as we see in the first book of the Bible:

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

     Genesis 1:26-27

Jones is right about one thing: we do have an intuition of the value in ourselves and others and hence, of our duty to care for one another.  The God image in ourselves and in others, if it is real, explains, as nothing else does, our perception of ourselves and of others as having inherent dignity and value, and justifies our belief in objective moral values.  Conversely, our intuition about inherent human value, supposing it to be true, provides additional warrant for our belief in God.

God is also the best explanation for the origin of the universe, for the fine-tuning of the laws of physics, for the origin of life, for language, mathematics, and for reason itself.  God exists.  If God exists, then there is a ready explanation for the objective human values we all cherish.

Bio: Thomas Alderman is a lawyer and blogger living in Springfield.