Matt McTeigue Benjamin Blake Speed Watkins; Craig derives those attributes

from ruling out their negations--this is a valid form of inference.

And see Sinclairs contribution to the Blackwell if you haven't. He comprehensively

covers the multiverse and hyperspace possibilities.

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Lance Hannestad He "rules out their negations" with really problematic

arguments.

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Eddie Crume-Edwards You are making his argument far too complicated by
positing different scientific theories. At the BB all space time and matter came into
existence as we know it. This is not controversial. Now it could have came from an
eternal quantum vacuum. But that gets us nowhere closer to a solution. We then
have to wonder where the eternal vacuum came from as it is clearly “something”.
And why did the expansion happen when it did and not 100 trillion years ago or
why did it happen at all? You still can’t escape the need for a cause. These are
philosophical questions that physics and cosmology can’t answer. This is what
Craig’s argument is getting at. Anyway you slice it, you still need a cause. Unless
you believe you can get something from nothing, which is absurd.

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Lance Hannestad If the quantum vacuum is eternal then you *don't* have to
wonder where it came from, anymore than you do with God. I don't see how
positing God would be any better an explanation there.

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Eddie Crume-Edwards You still need a cause of why inflation started.

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Lance Hannestad The quantum vacuum causes inflation, why is that any worse
than God causing inflation?

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Eddie Crume-Edwards I guess you don’t if you’re ok with believing an eternal

vacuum one day for no reason at a certain point in time (metaphorically) created
the entire universe as we know it.

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Lance Hannestad How is that any worse than an eternal person one day for no
reason at a certain point in time creating the entire universe as we know it?

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Lance Hannestad At least we *know* that the quantum vacuum behaves non-
deterministically. The agent causation that Craig appeals to in the kalam is pure
speculation, and imo pretty bad philosophy.

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Emil Tchernev Eddie Crume-Edwards "At the BB all space time and matter came
into existence as we know it. This is not controversial."
This is not accurate.

" And why did the expansion happen when it did and not 100 trillion years ago or
why did it happen at all?"

This would imply that time was flowing when only the quantum vacuum
existed...and that all of a sudden, the universe "popped" into existence and
expansion occurred.

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Emil Tchernev Eddie Crume-Edwards "You still need a cause of why inflation

started."

There is a mechanism for it explained by Alan Guth. It's probably somewhere here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqjsZEZMR7I

Before the Big Bang 4 : Eternal Inflation & The…

YOUTUBE.COM

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Johnny Gee Emil Tchernev Posting a very technical video that is an hour long, and
saying that the sufficient answer you seem to endorse is "probably somewhere" in
this video seems kind of unfair now, doesnt it? How is your interlocutor supposed
to react to this, sit to this possibly hour-long video, having to be on attention the
whole time for maybe there might be your answer shortly mentioned in it? 
Can you not link to a better source?

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Emil Tchernev If someone is going to attack the science, they should be willing to
read a paper or watch a video that explains it.

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Ernest Warwick Lance Hannestad : //How is that any worse than an eternal

person one day for no reason at a certain point in time creating the entire universe
as we know it?//

A timeless and omniscient creator, who -- in Craig's own words -- apprehends all
truths in a single intuition, sans the universe, does not decide. 

So, the key point here, is that, because volition is required to bridge the causal
gap (as it were) between timelessness and temporality, in Dr. Craig's mind, the
idea that God would simply timelessly be cognizant of the fact that the universe is
created in time is simply an entailment. For us, in time, this implication brought
about our universe, some 13.875B years ago.

If it were the case that a non volitional cause could have brought our space-time
into existence, it could not have done so without being subject to its own space-
time, nor could it have been timeless, unless its effects are of the same sort. 

For, no matter how randomly we construe a potential material cause from a

previously existing state of affairs, any sequential or subsequent effect would still
be either timeless, now; or, else we may, rather, view both cause and effect in
time.

In the latter case, it seems impossible that timeless events exist at all. Dr. Craig
does seem to reject this notion, though he is open to the idea that Swinburne et al
may be correct about eternal time.

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Johnny Gee Emil Tchernev (Whew lad, could I deliver a tu quoque here, but, you
know, whatever)

First off, I dont see how anyone "attacked the science" here. Your interlocutor just
disagrees with your interpretation of the science.
Second, lets imagine that one really hasnt heard about that certain view by Guth
before for some reason, eventhough one has tried to be up to date with the
physics. What is wrong about providing sources for such a person? Also, from
your comment it is clear that youre not even sure whether what youre refering to
is actually in the video, therefore they might have to sit through the video for no
reason at all

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Lance Hannestad Ernest Warwick "If it were the case that a non volitional cause
could have brought our space-time into existence, it could not have done so
without being subject to its own space-time, nor could it have been timeless,
unless its affects are of the same sort. "

This sounds very vague ("subject to its own space-time"?). But I don't see why
you'd believe any of these things. I'm aware of Craig's arguments, that I assume
you're thinking of here. But I don't think they're any good.

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Ernest Warwick On my view, and Dr. Craig's, timeless events are a non starter,
and rejected from the outset, as problematic.

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Lance Hannestad Ernest Warwick Sure, because events are by definition

temporal states of affairs. But how is that relevant to the issue at hand?

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Lance Hannestad Ernest Warwick Are you assuming that if there is an impersonal

cause of the universe, then it is an event cause? That would be pretty question
begging. Why couldn't it be a state cause, or an object cause?

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Ernest Warwick Lots to be said here. I just wanted to mention that, because this
is how Dr. Craig argues for God's timelessness. Other difficulties may arise. My
spell check is nuts!

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Ernest Warwick By the way, Lance, I haven't forgotten our discussion on infinity.
I'll hopefully have time to revisit that subject here, one day.

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Lance Hannestad Sure

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Ernest Warwick I think we would need to first and foremost, flesh out what a
material timeless state or affairs would look like. From there, perhaps, determine
how such a state might confer temporality on its effects.

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Lance Hannestad Why does it have to be a material state? And the state doesn't
"confer" temporarily onto the effect, that doesn't make any sense. Rather, the
cause produces a temporal effect. The effect is itself intrinsically temporal. You
cannot have a beginning of existence without a beginning in time.

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Ernest Warwick In the case of a timeless cause, its effects would necessarily be
of the same sort. That is what Craig's KCA implies (without volition).

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Lance Hannestad I don't see why you'd think that, nor do I see anything in the
KCA that implies that. It sounds like a non-sequitur.

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Ernest Warwick He does, in fact, argue this vehemently.

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Lance Hannestad Okay, present the argument then. And it would be helpful if you
numbered the premises, and stated which conclusions follow via which
inferences.

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Lance Hannestad Though you can't be right, because if you were then it would
follow on Craig's view that the universe is a timeless object (since he thinks that
the cause is a timeless agent). And that's certainly not what Craig is trying to
prove.

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Ernest Warwick Sure. In Craig's own words. https://winteryknight.com

WINTERY KNIGHT
...integrating Christian faith and knowledge in the public square
WINTERYKNIGHT.COM

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Lance Hannestad I think you copy/pasted the wrong thing.

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Ernest Warwick Sorry. I'll post propr link.

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Emil Tchernev Lol Wintery Knight, what a dishonest source. I corrected their

interpretation of the Big Bang by posting a bunch of sources from cosmologists
and they deleted my comment and blocked me from posting.

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Emil Tchernev Whoever runs that page has zero integrity.

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Ernest Warwick Paragraphs 5,6,7...

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Lance Hannestad Ernest Why don't you just reproduce his argument?

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Ernest Warwick I am very limited in what I can do without a computer. The print is
so small on my phone, I can barely see what I am typing. Sorry

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Lance Hannestad I will try to reproduce it, and you could tell me if it sounds right.

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Ernest Warwick Sure

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Lance Hannestad As I recall, Craig says that because a state cause is sufficient
for its effect, if there is a timeless state cause then its effect must also be
timeless. I assume he's appealing to the intuition that if A is sufficient for B, then
any time A exists B must also exist. But notice this intuition doesn't support
Craig's premise, for the timeless cause of the universe doesn't exist for *any*
time. Therefore, there is no time in which the sufficient cause exists while the
effect does not. In other words, it's perfectly compatible to say that: A is sufficient
for B, that A is timeless, and that B is temporal.

Craig's problem, it seems, is that he's thinking of timelessness as some kind of

spooky temporal location (hence why he sees mystery where there is none), when
in fact it's the absence of any temporal location.

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Lance Hannestad That being said, notice this argument does not apply to object
causes. It can't, or else it would rule out Craig's own view, that the universe was
brought about by an agent cause. So even if I were to grant that the cause of the
universe couldn't have been a timeless state cause, there's still a lot that needs to
be defended before you can get to God. And, I'm not aware of Craig having
defended that the cause is not an impersonal object behaving indeterministically,
just as Craig thinks the agent cause did.

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Lance Hannestad And, just to be clear, by a "state cause" I mean a cause that is a

state, and by an "object cause" I mean a cause that is an object (rather than a
state, or an event). An agent cause is an object cause where the object is an
agent, behaving intentionally. Craig thinks that agents are capable of behaving
indeterministically, but I see no reason to think that *only* agents have this
capacity. In fact, it seems like we have quite a lot of evidence of impersonal
objects doing this too. E.g., when a radioactive atom emits a particle, it appears to
be doing so without undergoing any change of state. Maybe Emil can back me up
on this.

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Ernest Warwick I don't agree with this construal of the argument. I'll have time to
reply later, today. 

Craig's primary concern is that non volitional states of affairs are already in time
(temporal) by definition, wherever and whenever they may exist. 

He also believes there can be no time gaps between cause and effect -- else we
may doubt that the affect is actually causal -- and that essentially all effects are
immediate, and simultaneous with their affects, e.g God's actualizing his timeless
intentions is simultaneous with the coming into existence of the universe and time
(nuance here). 

More later...

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Bryan Richards "You still can’t escape the need for a cause. These are
philosophical questions that physics and cosmology can’t answer. This is what
Craig’s argument is getting at. Anyway you slice it, you still need a cause. Unless
you believe you can get something from nothing, which is absurd."

for something that contains no energy, why would you need energy to make it?
you wouldn't.

for something that isn't subject to time (because it doesn't exist) why would it
need a cause... when cause and effect doesn't exist? you wouldn't.

the universe itself is NOT subject to the same laws that govern objects within it.

NONE of this requires a state of nothing to "exist" or change into something. in

fact i've never heard a scientific discipline postulate this, only philosophy.

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Jorn Poulsen Personally, I don't find Craig's argument a proof of anything

resembling theism.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/jorn-poulsen/the-kalamcosmological-argument-
pros-and-cons/10211652860343427/
Jorn Poulsen
November 7, 2016 · 

The kalam/cosmological argument - pros and

cons
Here’s the kalam/cosmological argument as rendered deductively by Craig:
whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence
the universe began to exist
See More

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Jorn Poulsen An atemporal mind is incoherent nonsense, to put it bluntly. Even

moreso a deity "outside of spacetime" that "will'ed" the universe into existence
"from nothing". This part can be thrown out, which incidentally have significant
implications (that I'll leave for the reader to expose and explore). Some critical
inquiry is warranted here.