Kalam and the Horrendous Space Kablooie!

Your Rent a Friend is listening to the Smoking Popes (again)
His mood is pretty good, even though the coffee hasn’t entirely kicked in

If you’re like me (And even though we’ve just met, I think I can tell that you are) you don’t quickly embrace things that don’t make sense. Like Macs. I know everyone says they’re the greatest thing since shredded cheese, but EVERY TIME I touch one I wind up sitting there saying, “Why isn’t this working?” or “What’s it doing NOW?!?!” and “Does ANYONE know how this thing works?”

So I’m still working on Windows™. Unless I see some reasonable proof that Mac is better than PC, some solid evidence, I’m sticking to PC. I’m glad you have a warm relationship with your Mac. If that works for you, then I’m happy for you. But that’s not for me. If you want me to buy a Mac, you’re going to have to show me some real evidence. Something I can understand which is not only internally consistent, but makes sense of the problems I’ve had in the past and the fact that NO ONE seems to know how to make it work except Stacy, and SHE isn’t around when it starts freaking out. WHY did we even BUY this stupid thing if Stacy is the only person around here who knows how it works?!?!?!  But I digress…

For many people, Christianity is much like my Mac experience. They say, “Look, if that works for you, that’s great. I just can’t embrace it as true. I tried the whole “church” thing and I didn’t like it. My knowledge and experience have encouraged me to keep using Windows™. Metaphorically speaking.” What you need is a good friend (at a reasonable hourly rate) to show you all the facts. Someone to clear up confusion, show you the buttons to push and to explain why your true goals are best met (and in a certain manner ONLY met) in Jesus. And that is just what I am going to do. If you want proof that God exists, then let’s start with the universe itself. I’m going to show you how the entire universe is proof for the existence of the God of the Bible. You can’t ask for more proof than the entire universe!

Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome- The Kalam Cosmological Argument!
This argument has been made popular and formidable by one of my favorite philosophers, Dr. William Lane Craig. He can be found at http://www.reasonablefaith.org
and he has two very excellent podcasts which I recommend very highly.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument goes like this:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Pretty simple right? If you agree with points 1 and 2, then it will be obvious that point 3 MUST follow. Is this proof that God exists? It will be once you apply it. Read on, friend.

Point 1 is as simple as it sounds. If something comes into existence, then it MUST have a cause. Not even science fiction writers can violate this principal. Consider if you woke up one morning and went downstairs to make coffee, and as you descended the stairs, you suddenly saw a giraffe in your living room. One thought you would not have is, “Goodness me! A giraffe has suddenly come into existence, uncaused, in my living room!” More likely you’d think, “Where did THAT come from?” Or maybe, “How many times do I have to tell those kids that if they don’t lock the doggie door after Scraps comes in…”

If your kids tried to say, “We didn’t leave the door unlocked! It just popped into existence while we were watching Captain Video! Can we keep it?” you would not buy this story, because you know that anything that begins to exist has a cause, including giraffes. The universe could no more pop into existence uncaused than a giraffe could. I would argue that it is in fact LESS likely to happen because the universe as a whole is (in Cosmological terms) “Bigger.”

Now we must consider point 2, “The Universe began to exist.” Is it true? The universe either came into existence as point 2 asserts, or it is eternal and was never caused- it simply always was. How do we know the universe came into existence? There are two reasons. First is the absurdity of infinity (Which would make a cool name for a band). Second is MODERN SCIENCE!

Let’s start with infinity. Why can’t the universe have an infinite past? Because we would NEVER arrive at today. Imagine every day is a domino falling over. Every one is knocked over by the previous one, and itself knocks over the following one. If you have a million dominoes, you can watch any one of them and eventually you will see it fall. The 1,000,000th domino will take a while to fall, but eventually #999,999 will knock into it and they will all fall over. If your dominoes are INFINITE, then it doesn’t matter which one you watch; that domino will still have to wait for an INFINITE number of previous dominoes to fall before it does. And so will the one before it. And the one before that. And the one before those- into infinity. In short, if the row of dominoes is infinite prior to your domino, you will never see it fall. If the past is infinite, you will never arrive at today. Or yesterday. Or the day before that… But we HAVE arrived at today. Thus, there cannot have been an infinite past. Also, practically speaking, if you ever come across a pizza place with an “infinity minutes delivery guarantee,” order from somewhere else.

So, it’s impossible to have an infinite past. Conveniently, this works out well for Albert Einstein and everyone who came after. Modern science has decided that the universe, while very old and much larger than the average giraffe, is not infinite. It has a first moment of existence. They call this the “Big Bang.” Modern Science is not real good in the naming department. I agree with Calvin (of Calvin and Hobbs by Bill Watterson) that it should be renamed the Horrendous Space Kablooie! Contact your congressman and see if he can do something about it.

If the first moment of the universe was the Horrendous Space Kablooie!, then what caused the Kablooie to go Kablooie?  The Big Bang Theory does have an answer about the cause: There was none. It happened without a cause. “It’s tremendously unlikely,” they admit, “that an entire universe would suddenly pop into existence for no reason, but it only had to happen once.” Yet, if we know better when it comes to the giraffe in the living room, then we must certainly find it harder to accept for the ENTIRE UNIVERSE. As I’ve said before, this is like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, without a hat or a magician. Or, until it appears, a rabbit. That would be quite a trick especially if the rabbit is as big and complex as an entire universe. There MUST have been a cause (see premise 1).

The Horrendous Space Kablooie is the first moment of energy, matter, space, and even time itself. It all popped into existence a finite time ago. What could have caused this? The cause had to be something not made of matter or energy, because they didn’t exist before this. It could not have been something that takes up space because there wasn’t any yet. Besides, something not made of matter doesn’t need to take up any space.

The universe is really big and the Horrendous Space Kablooie was (as the name implies) a massive event with lots of energy, so the cause must have been AMAZINGLY powerful. More powerful than Superman and Chuck Norris COMBINED.

If you know anything about, well, anything, then you know that the universe is a very complicated place. It would take more than chaos to make this universe. It would take a super genius to create the laws of energy, space, and time. Just read a chemistry textbook and you’ll see what I mean. It’s complicated, but REALLY organized, like little league, only more so.

Also, this cause must have been able to freely choose to create the universe, because without time, there would be no natural laws acting to cause it (i.e. no prior dominos falling to knock over the Kablooie one). It must have been something like a mind making a choice. This works because a mind can chose to do things, and can exist without a physical form, and can intelligently organize the laws of chemistry or baseball.

Finally, the cause of the universe must itself be uncaused. If it had to be caused, then it would have had to come from an uncaused cause- otherwise its cause will need a cause… well, imagine an infinite row of dominos. The one you are watching will never fall because an INFINITE number of dominos will have to fall before yours does. There has to be an uncaused cause somewhere in the chain of events or nothing will ever get done around here. This uncaused cause will be timeless and eternal- meaning it did not begin to exist (Thus free of Premise 1).

Here’s how Dr. Craig sums up his argument: “So on the basis of an analysis of the argument’s conclusion, we may therefore infer that a personal Creator of the universe exists who is uncaused, without beginning, changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, and unimaginably powerful.”

Does the universe prove the existence of the God of the Bible? Not in His entirety. But you have to admit that it’s a really good start. If that’s not God he just described, I don’t know who it is. Not even Chuck Norris can make a universe, or even a giraffe (though, he could kill one with his bare hands if he really had to).

As you will see, there are lots of good reasons to believe the Biblical account of God. This is just the tip of the ice berg. Now if someone could do the same for Macs, well, they’d really have something there.

rentafriend2000@hotmail.com