Philosophy 1020 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: William Lane Craig, Kalam Cosmological Argument, Actual Infinity

• School: Western University
• Department: Philosophy
• Course: Philosophy 1020
• Professor: John Thorp

Document Summary

The kalam argument, introductory historical and biographical matters. The word kalam is an arabic word meaning, roughly, speech or discourse. The argument was much discussed by early islamic scholars, and that is why it is now. It is used, in islam, to designate the tradition of philosophical theology known as. Big voice in the pro-religious side of philosophy: the basic kalam argument: Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence. Defense of the first premise: nothing can just pop into existence. No creation ex nihilo (out of nothing) Everything that happens has to have a cause. It seems unthinkable that something could come out of nothing . If the universe had no beginning, then its age would be infinite, actually infinite. Its history would be an actually infinite series. Potentially infinite- we have an element with a few rules but we haven"t done it all yet.