Instigator / Pro
7
1763
rating
29
debates
98.28%
won
Topic
#3223

THBT: The Kalam Cosmological argument does not successfully prove the existence of a supernatural deity.

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
3
0
Better sources
2
2
Better legibility
1
1
Better conduct
1
0

After 1 vote and with 4 points ahead, the winner is...

Bones
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
One week
Max argument characters
10,000
Voting period
One month
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
3
1546
rating
7
debates
57.14%
won
Description

THBT: The Kalam Cosmological argument does not successfully prove the existence of a supernatural deity.

BoP:

Bones: The Kalam Cosmological argument does not successfully prove the existence of a supernatural deity.
Contender: The Kalam Cosmological argument successfully proves the existence of a supernatural deity.

DEFINITION:

Kalam Cosmological Argument =

p1: Everything that begins to exist has a cause.
p2: The universe began to exist.
Conclusion: Therefore, the universe has a cause.
Ergo, there is a supernatural deity

Supernatural = attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding of the laws of nature

RULES:
1. No Kritik.
2. No new arguments are to be made in the final round.
3. The Burden of Proof is shared.
4. Definitions are agreed upon and are not to be contested.
5. Rules are agreed upon and are not to be contested.
6. Sources can be hyperlinked or provided in the comment section.
7. A breach of the rules should result in a conduct point deduction for the offender.

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@Bones
@949havoc

Bones is probably more justified in suggesting that I has ignored his argument as I didn’t really talk about his rebuttal of P1: which would also likely have won him the debate IMO; I didn’t cover it as on its own for P2 doubt added, pro has established his burden for debate; and con did not

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@Bones
@949havoc

I have had the objections shared: while I won’t quote the PM; I would prefer to make the response public.

I explained why I thought both of the arguments were kritiks - one because it challenged whether things could be proven which is an implicit assumption of the resolution ; the second I pointed out challenges the definition uses in the resolution itself. I didn’t do this in conduct, but in the arguments section, so I think I explained why I felt these were kritiks. 949 left several key rebuttals until the last round on several key points : for which pro points out would consist of a last round blitzkrieg: and argued that it amount to poor conduct if you did it. The point of this is that 949 withheld key rebuttals to dropped arguments until the last round - not the generalized back and forth of stuff you had already been talking about since the start; and thus offered their first rebuttal to these points in a way that their opponent could not respond. The first kritik I spotted and pro didn’t - I would not have awarded conduct on this. The second kritik was not substantial, and on its own I wouldn’t have awarded conduct, the final round rebuttal I would have shrugged off had pro not justified why it deserves a conduct ding; if it were just that; I would have held off - but the last round rebuttals and the first kritik was enough to push me over.

With the second: I dont always reference all the individual points and give more words to explain why arguments didn’t work than the debater did making it - typically if i I find a swathe of arguments irrelevant to the resolution, I’ll talk about it broadly, but may not talk about every specific argument.

The rebuttal to the video to support God is irrelevant to the resolution - as even if I accept it as true, it doesn’t affirm the resolution; and secondly it forms a new affirmative argument that I am unable to consider because it’s the final round; so I kinda considered it as part of the blizkrieg. This is what I meant by “tangling in the weeds of irrelevance”

The issue I had with cons arguments about past present and future; is that he conceded a theory of time was false; he has to explain why, if this theory is false, that the universe could still have begun to exist consistently with the kalam. The only place they really tries to do that, was with their argument about string theory - which as I explained was kinda explained by pro. That’s kinda why I listed that as the main part of the argument - as it’s the only point that could affirm the resolution. I thought about writing a sentence about this, but I felt it was part of the geneal theme I highlighted in pros constructive section about forgetting what they’re arguing for/irrelvance.

To clarify specifically - the a/b theory put forward by pro and as argued is critical to Kalam P2 not because there is no past/present/future - but that kalam (and a-theory) requires that there is only present exists; and the universe is progressing through a series of presents - Tensed time. B theory treats time as a dimension; while we may observe the universe travelling through presents - all points are as real as any other - so as people argued, you can’t really say it begins to exist in any meaningful sense Arguing the past present or future do really exist, are orthogonal to that point; and without being tied into a thesis about how one may conclude the universe began to exist in the b theory - the point doesn’t really matter IMO - con was arguing on more of a side track that doesn’t appear clearly linked to the resolution.

If con hadn’t conceded a theory was false, or had spent any time explaining explaining how premise 2 was valid despite a theory being false, I may have talked about this in more detail: which is mostly what I was talking about in the section where I explained you were not really affirming your burden in paragraph 3/4/5 in post 13.

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@949havoc

"You will note, in passing, that the vote gave me points. Don't know what "no points" you're talking about."

On this cite, if someone does not distribute all points to a contestant in a particular category, this is known as the voter not giving points to either side. It's slang, yes you got points, but they were neutrally distributed so they are equivalent to nothing.

"That is not the basis of my report"

Feel free to @ ram and tell him where he went wrong then.

"if that is how you want to satisfy yourself, I guess it's better than premature efactulation."

k faux.

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@Bones

You will note, in passing, that the vote gave me points. Don't know what "no points" you're talking about. That is not the basis of my report, but, if that is how you want to satisfy yourself, I guess it's better than premature efactulation.

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@Bones
@949havoc

The vote could have been in error; I am human and make mistakes, and I may have missed something - I don’t think I have, but I’m always willing to take another look - if you think there was a problem with it, please feel free to tell me; I’m sort of intrigued as to what specifically people thought was wronf

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@949havoc

I do know how to win gracefully, I just find it a tad bit disrespectful to report a vote which was cast by a reputable voter who clearly put time into the decision on the basis that it does not award you points.

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@Bones

Do I? Don't think so. You do know how to win gracefully, don't you? That, I can disprove

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@949havoc

You don't have to report every vote that is against you.

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@Bones
@949havoc

Please bear in mind that when I’m reviewing a debate; I’m reading it about 27 times, I skip back and forward in individual points - and when I get to the end, I try and double check my key points I missed, and check explicitly for stuff that I say was needed but not present, to make sure I hadn’t missed anything.

I actually recall getting to the end after not finding an affirmative for con; and finding his reference to where he claimed he had: going back and realizing it’s stuff that I already dealt with.

As a first step. I will review an argument, figure out what it’s saying, then work out whether - if I accepted it - whether it would prove the resolution. If it doesn’t, I won’t spend time critiquing the finer back and forth on it - that’s what happened in this one. Half of the arguments weren’t clear, or didn’t affirm the resolution.

This doesn’t mean I didn’t miss anything, so by all means if you think I left anything out - I’m only human - I’m happy to reassess if you let me know.

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@Ramshutu
@Bones
@949havoc

**************************************************
>Reported Vote: Ramshutu // Mod action: Not Removed
>Voting Policy: info.debateart.com/terms-of-service/voting-policy
>Points Awarded: 4 points to con.
>Reason for Decision: See Voting Tab

>Reason for Mod Action:
While there may be substantive issues with the interpretation that the voter brings to this debate, the vote still sufficient to meet the voting standards of the site. The voter does not have to exhaustively cover everything said by both debaters, even when some points state the absence of certain arguments that may be present in some form within the debate, and at least in the cases of alleged misinterpretation, I can see how the voter came to view the arguments in this light. With regards to the conduct point, the voter's interpretation of the rules of the debate appear reasonable, and while there may be differing interpretations of said rules, the voter does have leeway to interpret in the way he did here.
**************************************************

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@949havoc

Come on, just between the two of us :)

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@Bones

Who?

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@949havoc

I don't know if anyone's told you but your syntax and formatting are practically identical to Fauxlaw.

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@Ramshutu

Cheers. Thanks for the time.

What pro has done; is demonstrate that unless A-theory is true, the KCA is false; con agrees A-theory is false, and doesn’t really challenge pros key point, that KCA described “causes” are predicated on A theory. To me, at this point the debate is over.

What I think con tries to do, is try and explain how the KCA could still be true with some other theory of time. Con ambled through a description of string theory: but pro correctly points out that this matches the B theory of time too.

At this point I think con lost track of what they were trying to argue. There was a lot of back and forth on scripture, and talking about what a possible explantation would look like.

Distilling all this down: the way I view this resolution, is that to win, con needs to show that both the premises are true, and the conclusion of God follows. For Pro - he needs to invalidate one or more of the premises and/or show the conclusion doesn’t follow.

Con didn’t meet his burden, he neither showed the conclusion followed, nor that the premises were true - reviewing where the passages he claimed he showed the premises were true, it seems to show nothing of the sort.

Pro doesn’t do the best job; R1 has a great take down using A-theory, which was never really challenged and sort of forgotten about; followed by tangling in the weeds of irrelevance. But what pro does do, is provide significant doubt of the veracity of P1, in round 1, and keeps dragging con back to it. In this respect: pro must get the arguments, though based on points rather than K/O.

As a result - arguments to pro.

Conduct: Con makes two kritiks and a last round blitzkrieg. I was borderline for conduct as pro didn’t mention one Kritik, and both were inherently irrelevant. But after pro specified for con not to make a last round rebuttal - only for con to make a last rebuttal pushes it over the edge for me; pro convinced me that the last round rebuttal was unfair, and the two rule violations with a stipulated penalty of conduct violation makes it clear a conduct mark down is warranted.

Conduct to pro.

Even if accept it this without challenge, the argument torpedoes both sides of the debate and doesn’t meet cons burden. There was a laboured argument that if pro cannot disprove it, then con is affirmed, but it’s not clear at all how this is the case.

In addition, this appears a straight up Kritik - though pro doesn’t point this out. The argument appears to challenge an assumption inherent in the resolution.

(4) Newton: Con made an argument concerning Newton and the KCA - if I accept all of this as-is, it still isn’t clear how this supports the resolution, and so can be rejected. At best con is arguing that all things must have a notional cause - however pro counters with QT, indicating that not everything has a notional cause; this was ignored by con in the final round.

(5) god within nature.

Again, even if I accept that flawed definitions of supernatural precludes a “within nature” deity - that doesn’t appear to show the KCA proves or does not prove such a deity exists. So as before, I’m left stumped as to why con thinks this supports his case. At best it challenges the definition in the resolution - which con accepted - but that renders this a second kritik as pro points out. Con attempts to defend the kritik by pointing out something about the sentence making no sense in its own - it is unclear what con meant here.

Pro constructive.

Special relativity and retrocausality. Con drops these arguments until the last round, and as they were dropped until pro could no longer respond, I’m going to ignore their rebuttal. As a result this means I have to assume that the A theory of Time is invalid. This appears to be a position conceded by con too. Saying this I feel This was weakly explained by pro.

Pro neatly ties the KCA to causality, that linear time with team is necessary for things to “begin”, and that a tenseless B theory time would invalidate the inherent premises.

Cons response was to point out that old theories are often superseded (pro countered that the KCA is older - genius rebuttal btw!)

S&G

I’m not going to award this; but I came close, cons formatting and style made its incredibly difficult to follow the arguments they were making, I could probably have justified a ding here as a result, but I’ll chalk it down to style for now.

General:

To me, both pro and con sort of missed the fundamental issue with the KCA - which is that the KCA proves that the universe has a cause, but nothing about it necessitates that the cause is a supernatural deity. Pro touches upon this slightly in R3, but doesn’t give it any real ink.

Con doesn’t cover this AT ALL. For me, without con explaining how the universe having a cause proves God, he cannot meet his burden. Everything else is just dancing around a syllogism that doesn’t show what Con thinks. The only reason I have not just called this here, is that pro seems to implicitly argue as if should the KCA be valid, it proves God.

Everything con said could have been undermines had pros entire R1 been:

“If The KCA is valid, and the universe has a cause, there is no necessary reason why that cause must be a supernatural deity”

I’m not swaying my vote on this; but just pointing a big chasm that probably should have been argued but wasn’t.

Con constructive.

I’m going to start here, as when reading the arguments it was complete unclear what the constructive argument con was making. Con must offer a reason to me as to why the KCA proves God. A lot of that argument was implied but not written down.

In R1 (3) con makes an argument about “proof” and science: I am not going to lie - after multiple reads I am not confident I fully understand what con was trying to argue, it seems that the argument appears to simply muddy the waters about can be proven or not.

One week. Come on now.

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@BigPimpDaddy

I missed the announcement that you're a site spokesman. Speak for yourself. You cannot hide in the community. Little people? Argue for your limitations, but keep them to yourself because you do not speak for the rest,

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@Bones
@949havoc

This community is to small and the little people that are here are to lazy to vote, including me.

Seriously, we're gonna need some votes.

Agree with Bones. Why is everyone so shy? Come on, vote.

Two weeks to vote, come on now don't be shy.

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@Sum1hugme
@Nyxified

The two of you are on opposite sides of a debate largely revolving around the KCA. Perhaps you would be interested in voting?

Also, anyone else who wants to vote, please feel free.

Vote bump

Con R3 references:

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/#CausPrinQuanPhys

2 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/

3 https://biblehub.com/genesis/1-1.htm

4 https://biblehub.com/genesis/1-2.htm

5 https://www.mathsisfun.com/definitions/line.html

6 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/infinite-regress/

7 Isaac Newton, Opticks, 4th ed. (London: William Innys, 1730), pg. 344; spelling and punctuation modernized.

8 https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/#CausPrinQuanPhys

9 https://biblehub.com/strongs/genesis/1-1.htm

10 Isaac Newton, Opticks, 4th ed. (London: William Innys, 1730), pg. 344; spelling and punctuation modernized.

11 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejKUJu9xct4

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@949havoc

Thanks for the quick response.