Doesn't the cosmological argument contain at least two logical fallacies?

Posted earlier as "evidence" for the existence of the Christian god:





"Both the Cosmological argument and the argument from contingent beings that I answered would give you what your looking for "





If the universe was made by a god because nothing can exist without cause, then something must have "caused"/made that god, otherwise the argument requires special pleading to make its point.





The argument makes the assumption that a causal chain of events cannot be infinite, that it must terminate at a point. While the nature of cause and effect is observed by experiment (within the limits of the uncertainty principle at least), whether this chain can be infinite or not is certainly not mandated by experiment and is only inductively prefered. One could even consider it an act of begging the question to assume that a causal chain is finite in order to prove a first cause.





In addition, even if the universe was devised by some creative force, there is no evidence that this creative force was a religious god. There are an infinite number of causes other than a human-inspired god that could have caused the creation of the universe. The creator of the universe need not even be supernatural, or sentient or intelligent to satisfy this argument of "first cause".





According to Gödel's second incompleteness theorem an axiomatic system cannot be proven by its own axioms. Yet this is what this argument longs to achieve. It tries to prove God by its definition which has been proven to be impossible by Gödel. If the cosmological argument is valid, where is the error in Gödel's second incompleteness theorem?|||I guess it just begs the question.





It skips right over the possibility the universe has always existed in some form or another.|||Correct.





There's one other big problem: even if a valid "logical argument" for some claimed god's existence could be made (and none have yet), that would only show that the claimed god is logically possible -- not that it actually exists. To show it exists, and isn't just logically possible, you still need actual evidence of its existence.





Peace.|||"If the universe was made by a god because nothing can exist without cause, then something must have "caused"/made that god"





That's why they've changed it to "Anything that begins to exist must have a cause."





But yes, I agree that the argument has both logical fallacies and conclusions that are not supported by the preceding points.|||Christian Sceptic - "The Cosmological argument doesn't claim that nothing exists without a cause. The premise is, and I quote, "Everything THAT BEGINS TO EXIST has a cause of its existence.""





Which would actually be relevant, had the universe "begun to exist".





But it didn't. So it's not.|||Remember what I said - it always come down to the argument from ignorance.





I just don't listen to a majority of the claim, and pay attention to the end..."goddunnit".





They are all the same, no matter how verbose, no matter what terms are used, and no matter how lengthy they are.|||Yes, what created the supposed creator is a very valid question.|||I'm glad I'm not the only one who figured that out.|||"The creator of the universe need not even be supernatural, or sentient or intelligent to satisfy this argument of "first cause"."





--Or even singular. From the versions of the Cosmological argument I have seen, no argument is given why there must only be a single cause for the universe. Empirically that may be the case with the Big Bang theory, but logically I don't see why a singular cause must be the case.





Aside from logical fallacies, I think the Cosmological argument contains questionable assumptions too.|||Cause and effect refers to a directional sequence, and that direction must be an arrow of time. It's a change with respect to time - otherwise there is nothing to separate the parts in sequence or define a sequence at all.





I cannot see how any assumption can claim that time is finite unless we have evidence that it is (which we don't currently have), so you are quite right to disagree with that.





What's more, any cause MUST exist within a time-line, otherwise it cannot be guaranteed to precede the effect, which would mean it's not a linked cause at all. As time is part of the Universe, any "first cause" must still be part of the Universe, which means the Universe cannot be the effect of any *preceding* cause. Any cause is itself not nothing, so is therefore part of the Universe.





Causality is very much part of classical physics anyway (via the correspondence principle), and at the quantum level uncaused events are the norm.|||If the Universe needs a creator, so does the creator. Absolutely.





If the lack of a Creator enters us into the infinite regress issue, positing a creator does not resolve the infinite regress issue - only pushes it back one. Also true.





Also - it's philosophically bankrupt to posit a God just because you've reached the end of your own understanding (which is all this argument is).





The argument from ignorance (again, all this is) is not a replacement for positive evidence.





There's also an incomplete axiom agreement - but it's a bit much to go into here.|||The Cosmological argument doesn't claim that nothing exists without a cause. The premise is, and I quote, "Everything THAT BEGINS TO EXIST has a cause of its existence."



That a causal chain cannot be infinite is not an assumption, but a fact. An infinite regress of contingent things does not cause anything.



Finally, whatever the cause of the universe is according to this argument, it must be timeless, spaceless, immaterial, powerful, etc. Whatever other name you want to call this thing or being, it is just giving "God" a different name.|||But you are missing the second most important point, yes it is debated but it is also said that nothing can exist without thought and or “mind” entering into it. Thus the singularity is credible because it can well be first thought that created all mater via thought and force otherwise carbons and everything else would not exist because an atom is neutral when not combined and for us to exist atoms are not in there neutral state.



Yet you dismiss the fact that the thought is also created via energy AKA your brain as example to this, and yet your brain or rather your DNA’s structure is still atoms in the end thus you are no different to a rock if you look closely enough and yet you can imprint atoms with thought via your mind so given this to be true AND IT IS true. Thought exist in a non physical state, thus the possibility of God is plausible.