The WORST Objection to the Kalam Cosmological Argument

Yes, this is low-hanging fruit, but it's brought up enough that it warrants a response. This is the worst objection to the Kalam Cosmological Argument.

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#Kalam #Belief #ExistenceofGod

[ADHD_Samurai]

you know it's going to be fun when the video starts off with Dillahunty....

[PintsWithAquinas]

Mate, what an excellent well thought out video. Well done!

[nathanfosdahl]

I miss these videos. I love the interviews (at times) but your presentation style of ideas is so winsome and accessible. I realize your goal is to introduce people to the intellectual side of Christianity but you do that as well as just about anybody out there!

[cyclingscotty]

How do you get from - If the universe came into existence ; then god(s) brought it into existence? How did you rule out other processes or other magical entities?

[stefanheinzmann]

Dude, it is you who makes me cringe! You are jumping the shark here. You come very close to understanding what the "objection" is actually about: To point out that there is a stage 2, which is often overlooked or glossed over, but whose assertions are even more questionable than those of the "basic" Kalam. Yet you seem to believe that it is Dillahunty & Co. who need to be told this! You delude yourself into thinking that they miss the point, when actually it is you who misses it!

Just to hammer this in: There is a long way from having established that the universe has a creator, to identifying this creator with a god, or specifically the christian god. This is Dillahunty & Co.'s point. This is what you call "stage 2", and it doesn't matter if you include this second stage with the Kalam or not - this is only terminology, but not an argument by itself. By the same token, what you call "objection" isn't actually an objection, it is pointing out a fact that you don't deny: That there is a stage 2. So if you hadn't wanted to manufacture a very cheap and misguided attack from it, you could just have agreed with Dillahunty & Co.

They have a good reason for pointing this out: Apologists often devote a lot more effort to stage 1, and tend to take stage 2 for granted. They clearly assume that it is stage 1 that needs to be argued for, while stage 2 can be slipped through much more easily. This is either a misconception or a cunning debate ruse, and trying to stop it is something that Dillahunty & Co are absolutely entitled to.

Now, please retract foot from mouth.

[JimmyAkin]

Wow! This IS a particularly bad objection to the Kalam. It's an even more extreme equivalent of the arguments that say, "Aquinas's First Way only proves a Prime Mover, not the God of Christianity (Trinity, Incarnation, etc.)." Uh . . . right . . . that's why the rest of the First Part of the Summa exists.

[philosophyofreligion]

All the videos you showed of people talking about THE KALAM were concerned with Craig's version of it. None of them objected to THE KALAM as a category.

[mikealrodriguez]

Erasmus' argument, as cited in this video, is completely presuppositional, much like many of the stage 2 arguments. It is pretty clear from the footage in this video that the critics are referring to the the simple form of Craig's argument. You do not even need to be a theist to accept this form of the Kalam. I'm a Christian btw.

[DeconvertedMan]

The argument doesn't work. Its broken. Stop using it.

[alwayslearningtech]

Just started watching. It's not an objection to the kalam. it's just pointing out that the kalam doesn't get you to God even if it is a good argument. It's saying that you can accept the kalam argument, but still not get to God... That's not an objection to the kalam... I hope you cover this in the video, but I doubt it.

[gremsen]

In all seriousness, Matt Dillahunty has spoken about this a million times and its curious that you cut out the part were he refers to the argument presented. Also the one you presented is infinitely worse, because you haven't demonstrated God in any way. I could say:
(1)the universe came into being (something which hasn't been proven)
(2)if the universe came into being it had to be snarked from the florpas (just an assertion)
(3) the universe was snarked from florpas. (Yes, the structure is valid, but it is not sound)

- Who said the universe came into being? What if it was always here? But then you say: Oh, but then you'd have an infinite regress. Ok, maybe but did you account for spontaneous quantum events? did you account for it being a natural function of whatever the proto-universe was, is an infinite regress really an impossible property of an early stage universe, or is that us applying simple maths to something we don't know yet? We don't actually know this, the Big Bang theory can't account for anything beyond the Planck time, so anything beyond that is a mystery - i.e WE DON*T KNOW.
- "Brought it into being". Smuggling in intention is disingenious and just laziness or dihonesty depending on intent from the author. Who demonstrated that it had to be brought into being? We don't know that. You have to base your assertions on something, or else I have a better argument than you, because Snarking and Florping can account for everything god can, plus every question the theologians ponder about.
- God - which god? Does it have to be timeless? Maybe it disappeared when it created the universe, what if it gave its life for the universe, like in the fictional universe of Nirn in Elder Scrolls? Does it have to be material? What if its the body of the universe, like in the creation story of the Norse? Did it then have to be sentient or is it simply the corpse of a creator being continually blown up? What if God can't actually create universes, but he only says he could and he snuck in "the door" when time started from outside it, just to be its ruler? Do we know the answer to these assertions or are they just commonly held beliefs because most people don't understand the Big Bang and claim "atheists just say something can come from nothing" - which is false.
- If God is so powerful, how come he hasn't provided better evidence, not to convince the atheist, but you know.. the billions of sentient creatures until the old testament, the tribes and societies in america before missionary work, asia, africa, every island. None have a story which accounts for jesus coming to them. Curiously he came to Paul, a person in close relation to him - and not to the chinese emperor of african wise men, or the high priests of south america. We know he could demonstrate his divinity, and also speak all languages and know all things. If I could teleport and manifest in reality and have all knowledge and I wanted to convert the entire planet without coercing them - I would sow more than one seed and I wouldn't sow it in the exact place where it would be found if it was just a story. BAH.

[TheVofR]

Basically your video is just about semantics/definitions though. What Matt and the others said about what they referred to as the 'Kalam' is still true - it doesn't mention God and isn't an argument for God. The fact that there are other arguments that do mention God which you identify as 'Kalam' doesn't really refute what they are saying, it's just you are talking about two different things. Maybe your definition of Kalam is more accurate, I don't know, but it doesn't affect their argument. Basically your whole video could have just been you saying "They shouldn't have called it "The Kalam Cosmological, but a Kalam Cosmological argument". It's like you are trying to use kind of a very technical point to make it appear as if you've refuted what they were saying when you haven't.

[lanceindependent]

If it's a category, why do you call it THE Kalam, rather than Kalam cosmological arguments?

Checkmate, Christians!

[visualdon]

Its one of those objections that sounds good if you don't stop to think about it. That's clearly what happened here, one person made the original bad objection, the others saw it and then just repeated it without really analysing why its a terrible objection.

[gerhitchman]

You just made a 10 minute response video to a 2 second clip of Dillahunty. I'm no fan of Dillahunty in general, and surely Dillahunty slipped up here, but why couldn't you be more charitable and look into the context in which Dillahunty said this, and then construct a steel-man argument to respond to instead? Why do you always go for the cheap punches, the low hanging fruit? Shame on you bro. BTW all of this would be way less hypocritical/cringey if you also didn't see yourself as some "Christian intellectual" in a sea of Fideism.

[AWalkOnDirt]

I agree with the atheists on this one. The Kalam even if granted (and it shouldn’t be granted) does not get to god. To support the Kalam in following arguments, Christian apologists generally submit a string of assertions. These assertions shouldn’t be granted.

Here is a red flag. When something like a god can be crafted from a complete and full void of knowledge then something has gone wrong. How can knowledge be mined form a complete void in knowledge? It’s impossible We don’t know a single attribute outside our universe yet Christians are crafting a god?

There are many issues with the Kalam. It’s just a bad argument. I haven’t even addressed the weak premises of it.

[Carlos-flch]

You simply know that an argument is nonsensical all you need to do is look if it's still evolving still changing. A bad argument keeps changing and has multiple forms simply because it's yet not good enough. An argument that keeps changing for hundreds of years because it still doesn't work, will probably not work if changed a million times over. It's bad.

[XGoliath]

Loving return to these style of videos. I tend to watch them more than the long debates because I usually only have breaks at work for YouTube since I have 2 under 2 at home

[ramezaziz]

Brownie point for crediting, rightly, John Philoponus for the cosmological argument. It baffles me why WLC insists on keeping him in obscurity.

[dodlord]

Is Erasmus Kalam supposed to be a joke? What kind of argument is that. "What's cool about it is that it mentions God... in the second premise".

I am lost for words how that is your benchmark for what makes a good argument.

Replace God with anything else, and it literally makes the same amount of sense.