About a month ago I got to attend a lecture and Q&A by William Lane Craig at Rutgers University. The lecture was remarkably dry ( like much of this blog), but anyone fascinated by the Kalam Cosmological Argument would have been satisfied. Dr. Craig defended the premises of the argument and then further argued that only theism could satisfy the argument's conclusion. At this particular lecture, the Kalam Argument he presented varied slightly from the one he usually gives, but for the purpose of this post I will present the usual one:
1. Everything that has a beginning has a cause
2. The universe had a beginning
3. Therefore, the universe had a cause.
I have heard his defense of the argument before, so I spent a lot of my time formulating the question I was going to ask in person. My question concerned an issue of inadequacy; in other words it concerned whether "God" (as described in classical theism) could be the "cause" in Kalam's conclusion. The Kalam Argument requires that the cause in the conclusion to be timeless without the space-time universe. However, just as Dr. Craig argued that naturalistic entities could not be the cause of the space-time universe because they themselves must be temporal, my point was that God, as a thinking/conscious entity, must necessarily be temporal.
Dr. Craig responded to my question (which I articulated quite well I may add) by saying that he had addressed such an objection of inadequacy in his book Time and Eternity. He said that a timeless person may not be your "garden variety" person, but it could still be a person nonetheless. Summarizing his own position, Dr. Craig said temporal features of person hood, such as memory, are inessential and thus the objection can be defeated.
Even though I haven't read what he wrote in Time and Eternity, from what he said to me, I doubt that his response could defeat the objection. Something like memory may be inessential to person-hood, but consciousness and thinking, I would say, are essential. In any case, classical theism cannot deny such properties to God, so if these properties are irreconcilable with timelessness, then classical theism has a serious problem.
Perhaps, however, I should elaborate on why these properties are irreconcilable. Consciousness seems inherently be a flow of mental states. I cannot conceive of a "static" consciousness. Perhaps, the inconceivability stems from the fact that I can't tease apart my thinking from my conscious states. But this only goes to show the intrinsic temporal nature of thinking. As evident by the "ing", thinking is necessarily a process, one that contains different mental states. It seems then that a timeless entity wouldn't be able to have any kind of train of thought.
To make my point clearer, ask yourself this question: Without the space-time universe, could God count to ten? It's clear that he couldn't, since counting would indicate the passage of time. First, this seems to make God's omnipotence contingent on space-time, but more importantly it shows that God isn't even able to think without space-time. Without thinking, God is robbed of one of his essential features, as one could no longer call him a mind. I don't know how Dr. Craig would respond to this illustration of counting, but I think it effectively demonstrates that a mind can't be timeless, and hence not capable of being the cause of the space-time universe.
As interesting as this point is as a defeater for Kalam and perhaps classical theism, it's also indicative of how difficult it is to grapple with non-space time reality. Can we conceive of any entity that exists beyond space-time? From what I remember from Dr. Craig's critiques, what he has to say about the inadequacy of naturalistic causes seems to hold up as well as my critique of God. Does this failure of our cognition point to a Kantian thesis where space-time are faculties of the mind? It may sound absurd, but maybe there's an element of truth to it. I hate to be a mysterian, but Kant's conclusion on the impossibility of conceptualizing the beginning of the universe seems to be on the mark.
I hope to encounter Dr. Craig again, but I will likely approach him with a different topic. Probably less cerebral...
This is an interesting take on the Kalam argument. Craig's proof that the existence of the universe cannot extend infinitely into the past is mathematically flawed, and has bee thoroughly debunked by mathematicians. He simply does not understand trans-finite mathematics.
ReplyDeleteI'm not convinced that there can't be something akin to our concept of temporality outside the bounds of space-time. You could view time as a dimension (one of several), and allow that there might be some extra-dimensional realm where it is possible for something to exist outside of space-time while being able to "see" everything within it at once. This is much like the idea of "Flatland", where the world exists in a two dimensional plane, but someone in a three-dimensional world can see it all at once. That doesn't imply that the three-dimensional being has no ability to move in two dimensions. In fact, his abilities are beyond the comprehension of the Flatlanders.
But I wanted to reply to your comment at Dangerous Idea: "Loftus has books to sell, so there's a monetary incentive for him to be snarky (more respectful writing isn't as entertaining)."
While I agree that Loftus has a tendency to get hot under the collar while interacting with theists in com-boxes, I think his books (at least what I've read of them) are really quite thoughtful and well written. Have you read them? He's certainly no Ann Coulter.
Congratulations are in order as you are the first commentator on this blog. Hooray.
ReplyDeleteI use this as a venue to articulate my thoughts on certain issues concerning metaphysics so I don't constantly ruminate on them without getting anywhere. I'm not seeking a large audience, but an occasional comment is cool. Welcome.
I'm not going to pretend that I understand "trans-finite" mathematics, but I think what Dr.Craig would say is that even though mathematicians can use the concept of actual infinities in their work, they are not instantiated in reality. I think Craig illustrates this persuasively when he talks about the impossibility of counting down from infinity. I personally think the only ways to sink the Kalaam is affirming the B-theory of time(plausible given what we know about time) and/or using an argument from inadequacy (like in this blog post).
What you wrote about the possibility of "something akin to our concept of temporality outside the bound of space-time" is interesting but I don't think it sinks my position. Notice how you put "see" in parenthesis indicating it was analogous to seeing, but not really. Since we are only using analogous terminology, we really do not have true knowledge of this vague "thing" outside of space-time, but rather we employ fictions that may be useful. Since our concepts aren't truly applicable, God, being an amalgamation of certain concepts of ours, is also inadequate as an explanation of space-time.
As for Loftus, no I have not read his books, but since I already share his position, I'm not sure it would do much for me if I did. If I see his book at a book store, though, I'll take a look at it.
"I think Craig illustrates this persuasively when he talks about the impossibility of counting down from infinity."
DeleteBut that's precisely where he goes off the rail. The concept of counting down from infinity is not coherent with mathematical logic. Consider a line that is infinitely long. It might have an end-point, but it cannot have two end-points. If it did, it would be finite. You can assign numbers along the line, and there would be a number at the end - let's say it's zero. There is no other end. Infinity is not a definite number. But Craig wants to treat it like a definite number. He wants to say you can start counting down from there, but there is no "there" to start from. The best you can do is say that you've been counting down for an infinite time. You cannot say you've counted down from some starting point. So Craig's explanation is trying to use the logic of finite numbers while dealing with infinites. That's not valid logic. And that's precisely why he encounters contradictions when he takes this approach. This is not just my opinion. Any mathematician would agree.
Here is a mathematician's discussion of Craig's logic.