Research Paper on Cosmological Argument

Introduction

The cosmological argument is philosophical reasoning that seeks to seek a first cause (or a cause without cause) for the Universe. The argument is mostly used to explain the existence of a supreme deity recognized as God. The argument starts from the general premise that everything that came into existence has a cause. Now, the Universe came into being, it did not always exist, so it has a cause. In fact, each entity has a cause, which also has a cause, and so on. However, it is not possible to go back infinitely in a series of causes, because thus the Universe could not even begin. Since infinite regression is impossible, there must be a first cause, which is necessarily uncaused (James, 2009).

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For hundreds of years, believers have formulated demonstrations that conclude the existence of a deity. Some of these are part of a family of arguments that are called "cosmological." These can be grouped by convenience into three types:

1. Thomistic cosmological arguments, which conclude that there is a being sustaining the existence of the universe second by second.
2. The Leibnizian cosmological arguments, which conclude in the existence of a being that represents a sufficient reason for something to exist instead of nothing.
3. The cosmological arguments of the first cause, which conclude in the existence of a being that explains why the universe had a beginning in its existence.

The Kalam cosmological argument is of the third type and constitutes evidence in favor of the existence of a deity, which as a cause, explains why physical reality had a beginning in its existence. His greatest exponent today is the Christian philosopher and theologian of the United States of America, William Lane Craig. (1), which calls this argument "Kalam", for the contributions it received in the theological tradition of Islam (especially for the philosophical arguments presented by al-Ghazali, philosopher, theologian, and Persian jurist).

The Kalam presents three crucial dilemmas:

1. The things that had a beginning in their existence: they had some cause, or they did not have any cause.
2. Physical reality had a beginning in its existence or did not have a beginning in its existence.
3. If physical reality had a beginning in its existence: its cause is personal or impersonal.

Cosmological arguments appear in two stages with the first stage proving the existence of a being which is the origin or cause of everything else and other beings, features identified with God. The second phase expounds other characteristics ascribed to God such as omnipotence, omniscience, kindness, etc. In his argument, Clarke reasoned that because the universe exists in the present, then by logical deduction it must have existed in the past.

A transcendental agent is a cause that explains the beginning in the existence of physical reality, and as such, it is an argument that can and has been defended by monotheists of different currents, such as Muslims, Jews, Christians and some Deists. In Christianity, it is held that God is the creator of physical reality, so that this argument, although it cannot discern the identity of the creator of physical reality, can raise the probability of the conclusion: the Christian God exists. This is because the likelihood that the Christian God exists is more significant if there is a personal being creator of physical reality, and conversely, the likelihood that the Christian God would be much less if there is no particular creator of the physical reality (Bruce, 2012).

In the Kalam, it is reasoned that because all things within physical reality have a beginning in their existence, the physical reality as a whole must also have an origin in its existence. This is an error known as the informal logical fallacy of composition, the equivalent of saying that if a refrigerator is made of atoms, and atoms are invisible to the human eye, then, the fridge is invisible to the human eye as well. In the cosmological argument, these three requirements should be met, so that the guarantee of deductive reasoning can be claimed.

The Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR)

PSR asserts that there is a reason or explanation for everything in existence and that in that effect there exist a reason or justification for each positive fact. PSR provides sufficient explanation through the use of reasons and causes (Kara, 2014). This principle supports the cosmological argument by claiming that there exists an explanation for everything in existence. It offers a notion of dependability where one thing is related to another.

The cosmological argument can be expounded to include six premises:

• Nothing would be in existence today if nothing existed in the past
• Something exists in the present
• Something has always been in existence
• If something has always been in existence, it means that the reality has been existing as an independent being or successive dependent beings
• The reality could not have been a series of successive dependent beings
• By deductive reasoning, an independent being (God) has always been in existence

The third premise gives an explanation to the first premise as per PSR; that something actually existed in the past because something does exist in the present. The fourth premise is based on PSR's assertion of the existence of a reason or explanation for why things exist.

Humean Objection to the Cosmological Argument

There are criticisms; the first is that the premises are not necessarily right, it cannot be said that everything must have cause and that the Universe has a beginning. The second is that causality itself is not a concept pacified in philosophy, as David Hume explained. There are also nonlinear causal models, as in chaos theory, in which each event is cause and effect of another (Pruss, 2007). David Hume mentions that the causal principle is not valid by logical necessity, for if a brick suddenly appeared in existence, without cause or reason, we would not have any violation of any of the three classical principles of logic. Then, although this is true, it does not show that the causal principle is false if it shows that it is not necessarily true.

The first premise of the cosmological argument, despite what the objection says, does not implicitly or explicitly create two categories to classify the things that exist. The first premise, what it does, is to mention the requirement that must be met to affirm that something has a cause, in this case: that something has had a beginning in its existence. The categories that the objection mentions have nothing to do with the first premise. In fact, both categories are the result of the existence of a principle of classical logic called the "principle of the excluded third." If something exists, that something had a beginning in its existence or it did not. There is no third option, so how is it possible that a logically necessary truth is a request for principle

If the first premise did not exist, these categories would still exist, since they are derived from a principle of classical logic, not from the premises of the Kalam cosmological argument. Second, if the objection was right, then the first premise and the affirmation "everything had a beginning in its existence" should not be compatible and therefore could not lead to a coherent and comprehensible conclusion. This is because according to the objection, the first premise is holding that there is something that did not have a beginning in its existence (the deity), and pointing to that, accuses the argument of committing a request for principle, therefore, a premise that argues that something exists without having had a beginning in its existence, would collide with the idea that everything had a start in its presence.

Conclusion

Many unbelievers accept that the existence of some deity might be possible. However, it does not follow that they admit that a god ever existed, that a deity exists, or that a deity will exist. In the same way, we can agree that the notion of a brick appearing in existence without cause or reason is a logically possible idea, without this compromising us to reject or doubt the causal principle. Accepting that something could happen, does not commit us to recognize that something happened, happens or will happen. The argument that the first premise is correct is not by logical necessity. Instead, what is held is that the proposition of the first premise is a contingent truth; it could be right, and it might not be true.

References

Craig, William Lane; Sinclair, James D. (May 18, 2009). "The Kalam Cosmological Argument." In Craig, William Lane; Moreland, J. P. The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology. Wiley-Blackwell. Pp. 101-201.

Reichenbach, Bruce (2012). "Cosmological Argument." The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2006 Edition, Edward N. Zalta (ed.) ed.).

Richardson, Kara (June 2014). "Avicenna and the Principle of Sufficient Reason." The Review of Metaphysics. 67 (4): 743-768.

Alexander R. Pruss (2007) "Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit: Augments new and old for the Principle of Sufficient Reason" in Explication Topic in Contemporary Philosophy Ch. 14