ROB KOONS
  • Home
  • Published articles
  • Work in Progress
  • Lectures
  • Contact and Links
  • Old Blog (2021-22)

The Rigorous Thomist

A Blog by Rob Koons

Kalam Argument, part 2

9/5/2021

2 Comments

 
Here again is my Pruss-inspired version of the Kalam argument, relying on causal finitism:

P1. Every event has a finite causal history (no causal loops or infinite regresses).
P2. For everything that begins to exist (at some point in time), the event of its beginning to exist must have a cause.
P3. Every non-eternal thing began to exist at some point in time (since the past of each non-eternal thing is finite in length).
P4. If the yy cause the xx to begin to exist at t, then the yy exist at t or at some time earlier than t or eternally. 
Therefore, every non-eternal thing is ultimately caused to exist by some eternal (godlike) thing.

There is, however, a problem with premise P3. Causal finitism alone does not seem to give us a finite past, not even a finite history for a given thing. 

​Suppose that we have a thing x that exists in time and suppose that causal finitism is true. This means that each event in the history of x must have a finite causal history. Is this enough to entail that x must have begun to exist at some point in the past? Couldn’t the history of x begin with an event or state that is infinitely extended in the past direction? Let’s call such an initial state a simple infinitely long past state or SILPS.
 
We can refute the possibility of a SILPS by posing a dilemma: either time itself has an intrinsic measure (in which sense time can pass in the absence of change) or it does not. If time does not have an intrinsic measure, and the initial state of x is a simple state, without discrete parts, then that state cannot have any temporal duration, much less an infinite duration (since there are, ex hypothesi, no changes concurrent with this state by which time could be extrinsically measured). Hence, we must suppose that time itself has an intrinsic measure.
 
However, this is also inconsistent with a SILPS, since if time has an intrinsic measure, then any extended period of time has discrete proper parts corresponding to the measurable proper parts of that period of time. If an event or state has a duration corresponding to that extended period, then it too must have temporal parts corresponding to the proper parts of the period of time. Thus, the state is not simple or “uneventful” after all. This is a strong argument, although it will not persuade those who think that extended simples (like extended Democritean atoms) are metaphysically possible.
 
Here is a version of the argument without the assumption of a finite past (P3):
 
P1. Every event has a finite causal history (no causal loops or infinite regresses).
P2. For everything that begins to exist, the event of its beginning to exist must have a cause.
P3.1. If something has existed for an infinite period of time, then it must have an infinite causal history (because a simple infinitely long past state is impossible).
Therefore, every non-eternal thing is ultimately caused to exist by some eternal (godlike) thing.
 
Since my argument for P3.1 is less than ironclad, I will argue in future posts both for causal finitism and for the finitude of the past of each temporal thing. This provides support for both arguments: the original argument (which depends on both causal finitism and the finite duration of the past) and the revised argument (which depends on causal finitism and the impossibility of SILPS).

2 Comments
Rıfat Algan
9/9/2021 02:38:32 pm

Hello Dr Koons, thanks for the nice article. I would like to ask a few questions about this topic.

1) Some people think that God's creation of the universe ex nihilo contradicts the principle of "ex nihilo nihil fit". What do you think about this?

2) Some people think: If the universe has a beginning, instead of saying that the universe came from nothing, we can say that it came from nowhere because the beginning of the universe is also the beginning of time, and the kalam argument assumes that the beginning of the universe was an event, but it takes at least two times for something to be an event, for example the explosion of a ball. Consider the event. At time t1 the ball is solid and at time t2 the ball breaks out. Do you think it takes at least two times for something to become an event?

I would be very happy if you could answer what you think about these questions.

Reply
Chris Oliver C. Dela Cruz link
7/22/2024 04:33:21 am

Good day, Sir Rifat!

Although your questions are from 2021, I hope I can address some of them here.

1. When we say that God created out of nothing, what it means is that God did not use a pre-existing matter to create the universe. Rather, everything comes from God. From a thomistic perspective, God has the essence of the universe (or all things contained in the universe), and He actualizes it or gives existence to those essences since everything that exists, except for God who is Pure Actuality or Pure Existence, is a composition of essence and existence. When we mention that "ex nihilo nihil fit", what that means is that nothing comes from nothing.

That statement does not contradict creatio ex nihilo but it affirms it. Nothing comes from nothing. Therefore, there has to be Something (God) which brings about something else (the universe). The universe cannot come about if there was no cause for it or if reality started with nothing (including not having God, if that is even possible in the first place).

Creatio Ex nihilo will only contradict ex nihilo nihil fit if we will claim that the only way God could create the universe is from pre-existing matter, but that there was no pre-existing matter. If that's the case, it will contradict it. but since we believe that God's creation involves in giving existence to the essence which is present in God's mind, then it doesn't really contradict but affirms that something can only come from Something (God). The statement "nothing comes from nothing" is just a negative terminology describing "something can only come from something."

2. I find this question interesting because it's something that I also think of when dealing with Kalam Cosmological Argument. It's because it's easier to conclude to God if we know, for a fact that there was a time when no physical things exist. At the same time, time exists because it's a measurement of change, and what is essential to the universe is that it's subject to change. After all, only God who is Pure Act (with no potentialities) is subject to change. Anything else besides God is subject to change.

As such, a skeptic may claim that the history is finite, but that we cannot prove that there was a time when there was no physical things in existence. Maybe, something just exists without any past moment. In your example, it might be the case that a ball (assuming it existed at first moment of time) is solid, then on the next moment of time, it breaks out. Skeptics may claim that the first member of the chain of finite past is an existing thing, but not God Himself. Or, to be closer to cosmology, they could claim that the big bang singularity existed at the first moment of time, without having past, then the universe expanded.

I can only think of the principle of causality from Argument from Motion (first way) of St. Thomas Aquinas. Whatever is moved is moved by something in act (or something existing). Or, whatever is changed is changed by something existing. Since the big bang singularity involves an intense ball of energy in sub-atomic level that has potential, there has to be something actual that will actualize that potential to expand. But, if this cause has a potential as well, for it to be actual, something already actual should actualize that potential and so on, and so forth, but since there is no infinite regress, there has to be an actual being that has no potentialities, or what we would call as Pure Act.

The "disadvantage" that I may see from this argument is that if the solution to kalam argument is the argument from first mover, then we can just have the argument from motion without the need to argue whether past is infinite or finite. At the same time, there seems to be an advantage here. It's advantageous in such a way that it will negate the temporal cause which, from skeptics, is the only necessarily causal feature. Instead of thinking that temporal cause is the only type of cause, there is also simultaneous causation. Also, there are some skeptics who deny that there is a cause that gives existence to things that exist at every moment of time such as those who uphold to existential inertia, which I find to be problematic. They claim that the cause of my existence is my existence at previous moment of time. If we can exclude the possibility of finite past, then what that means is that it denies the idea that existence at previous moment of time is sufficient explanation for existence at current moment of time.

I am unsure if advocates of kalam cosmological argument can provide an alternative explanation without utilizing the argument from motion.

Thank you.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Rob Koons, a professor of philosophy, trained in the analytic tradition at Oxford and UCLA. Specializing in the further development of the Aristotle-Aquinas tradition in metaphysics and the philosophy of nature.

    Archives

    August 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021

    Categories

    All
    Acts Of Existence
    Actualism
    Actuality
    Agency
    Being
    Causal Finitism
    Causation
    Change
    Classical Theism
    Contingency
    Design
    Divine Freedom
    Divine Simplicity
    Efficient Causation
    Essence
    Eternity
    Ethics
    Evil
    Existence
    Fifth Way
    First Cause
    First Mover
    First Way
    Five Ways
    Fourth Way
    Free Will
    God's Existence
    Goodness
    Grace
    Grim Reaper
    Haecceity
    Immateriality
    Infinite Regress
    Infinity
    Instrumental Causation
    Intelligence
    Joe Schmid
    Justice
    Kalam Argument
    Knowledge
    Love
    Matter
    Maximum Being
    Metaethics
    Modal Collapse
    Modality
    Motion
    Necessary Being
    Parts/Wholes
    Passions
    Passive Potentiality
    Patchwork Principle
    Perfection
    Persistence
    Platonism
    Potentiality
    Powers
    Predestination
    Prime Matter
    Providence
    Pure Actuality
    Real Distinction
    Relativity
    Scotism
    Second Way
    Sin
    Substantial Change
    Teleology
    Third Way
    Time
    Unity Of God
    Virtue
    Will Of God

    RSS Feed

Site powered by Weebly. Managed by Bluehost
  • Home
  • Published articles
  • Work in Progress
  • Lectures
  • Contact and Links
  • Old Blog (2021-22)