Big Spoon

An argument stated by theists more times than I can remember is that everything has a cause, but infinite regression is impossible so there must be an uncaused first cause.

So "everything has a cause" implies "at least one thing didn't have a cause" - surely a contradiction?
From a mathematical approach, showing that assumption A leads to a contradiction would lead to assumption A being refuted, and it could then be concluded that not everything has a cause.

Philosoft

Also, it might be possible to show that there is some variable upon which causation is dependent that renders a "first cause" incoherent in the absence of the variable. String theory suggests time might be this missing variable.

Bob K

Posted by Big Spoon on March 24, 2003 11:32 AM:

People who search for a first cause are actually searching for the source of causality, the source of cause->effect.

According to the First Law of Thermodynamics, matter/energy cannot be destroyed, only changed in form, matter<->energy, as described by E = mc2 and m = E/c2.

This fact means that matter/energy is infinite in duration, that it has always existed, exists now, and will exist in the future, and that it cannot not exist.

That which has always existed thus never had a beginning, and will never have an ending.

That which has always existed, exists now, and will always exist, and has no beginning nor ending, has no first cause, cannot have been caused by a first cause, is itself not a first cause, and will never produce a final effect.

As we can count time from an initial timepoint, T0, backwards or forwards without end ...

Past Infinity ... <- T-2 <- T-1 <- T0 -> T+1 -> T+2 -> ... Infinity Future

... causality, causes causing effects which become causes of other effects ..., etc., is extended infinitely, without beginning nor ending, without a first cause nor a final effect.

Causality itself is thus both infinite regression and progression. You can review the history of causality backwards without limit and observe the making of the history of causality forwards without limit

Thus, matter/energy is the source of causality.

Neilium

Philosoft,

Do you know of any books or links on string theory for dummies? I have tried several times to get some kind of understanding, but I usually end up staring more than reading.

thanks,

Neil

eh

It's funny how people sometimes use the law of energy conservation to show that the universe could not have had a beginning, then completely ignore the 2nd law of thermodynamics. One must wonder as Kant did, why hasn't heat death already occured in the universe?

Philosoft

Neil, grab a copy of The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. Very light on math but very conceptual. A must for any amateur science library.

John Page

Tat

As I understand the agurment, the uncaused causer is god. The claim is that since the universe had a beginning, it was either caused or uncaused. Most events are caused, so there is a good reason to think the universe was caused. Thus there must be an uncaused causer, ie god.

The objections are obvious:
(i) There is no like between "uncasued causer" and some old guy with a beard (xian god).
(ii) A great many events, especially at the quantum level are thought to be uncaused.
(iii) The third objection is more subtle. What the above argument boils down to is saying that if the universe had a beginning, every casuational chain had a beginning with an uncaused causer. Ie, if the universe had a beginning, the chain z was caused by y was casued by x was caused by w etc. must also have a beginning. This is not so. Suppose an event at time t were caused by a unique event at time t/2. An infinite chain of regress in a finite amount of time.

I don't see the argument listed in the Arguements for the Existance of God section. Perhaps someone should write an article on it (or maybe I'm overlooking it).

John Page

From this site:Planck

Pyrrho

The problem is, you are not dealing with mathematics, but with a rationalization used to shore up a belief for which there is insufficient evidence. The argument itself is irrelevant. You will even find many Christians and other religious people agreeing with your analysis of the argument. Of course, there are others who are more emotionally attached to that particular argument, and you can expect that they will try to maintain the argument in some way or other (perhaps by saying that everything in the universe has a cause, but God is outside the universe, so they verbally eliminate the contradiction). Anyway, most religious people have a very high tolerance for contradictions, so such matters need not concern them.