wpe149.jpg (11431 bytes)

The First Cause Argument

-Nate Archer

Think About It...

If you’ve grown up in a home that believes that God exists, you will probably come to a time in your life when you ask yourself if you believe what you believe just because it is what you were taught growing up.  Do you just believe it because your parents told you it was true, or if you believe it because it actually is true.  Maybe you didn’t grow up believing in God and you are wondering if there actually are good reasons why people believe in God. 

I believe that there are good reasons to believe in the existence of God.  I also believe that these reasons go deeper than “the Bible tells me so.” or “I just know.”  I believe the Bible, but let’s face it, if someone doesn’t believe in the God, there’s a good chance they aren’t going to believe what the Bible says either. 

Now, to be fair, you must admit that it is possible that God exists.  If you start out saying that God is impossible, then there is no way I can convince you.  If you make the presupposition (or assumption) that God doesn’t exist, then what you are doing is called circular reasoning.  Basically, you are saying, “God doesn’t exist because it is impossible for God to exist, and it’s impossible that God exists because He doesn’t exist.”  That doesn’t prove anything!  Instead of circular reasoning, you need to have an open mind.  You might be thinking that you don’t know of any good evidence for there to be a God, and so it seems unlikely that there is a God.  That’s okay!  At least you are keeping an open mind and agreeing that it could be reasonable to believe in God if you found some good evidence.

There are many good arguments that I think make a good case for the existence of God.  Some may be stronger than others.  Some might be more compelling to some people than to other people.  Some of these arguments include:

·         The Design Argument: The universe is obviously the work of an extremely powerful intelligent designer, such as God. (Click here for some notes on the impossibility of evolution, an important part of the design argument)

·         The Resurrection Argument: The only realistic explanation for the empty tomb is the resurrection of Jesus.  If Jesus rose from the dead, it proves His claims that He was God.  (Click here for the resurrection argument)

·         The Moral Argument: the fact that people know there is a right and wrong suggests that there is a divine moral law giver

 [By the way, when I am using the work “argument” here, I don’t mean that we are getting flared up or mad.  When you are discuss a topic, an “argument” is your line of reasoning for what you believe.]

I can’t get into every argument for the existence of God here.  The one I want to focus on is the first cause argument.  The big term for this is the cosmological argument.  Basically, the first cause argument says that the universe must have had a first cause and that first cause is best explained as being God.

 

THE FIRST CAUSE ARGUMENT:

Everything that we see has a cause.   Everything that we are familiar with has been caused by something else.  It is like a row of dominoes.  One domino falls and knocks down the next domino.  Now the next domino falls and knocks down the next one.  Everything we are familiar with is like that.  You were caused by your parents.  Your parents were caused by their parents.  Your computer was caused by people in a computer factory.  When a pool ball rolls into a pocket, it is because it was hit by another ball.  That ball was hit by the cue ball.  The cue ball was hit by someone with a cue.  Balls don’t start rolling for no reason at all.  Nothing starts happening for no reason.

THE RULE OF CAUSE AND EFFECT: Nothing starts happening without a cause.  Nothing comes into existence without a cause.

wpe147.jpg (10643 bytes)

Think about dominoes again.  When one domino falls, it was because it was caused to fall by the domino before it.  That domino was caused to fall by the domino before that one. However, we all know that there had to be a first domino.  There had to be a first cause to get the whole series going.  In the same way, the world we live in as a series of causes and effects.  Every effect was caused by a cause.  It is reasonable to think that if you go back far enough, you will come to a first cause.  If that’s the case, it seems that God would make a pretty good candidate to be the one who is the first cause.  (The Bible claims that God is the first cause.  Genesis 1:1 says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”)

But now, people always ask, “If everything was caused by something else, what caused God?  If everything is made by something else, what made God?”    

Look again at the “rule of cause and effect” that I wrote above.  Does it say that everything has a cause?  No.   It says that nothing starts happening without a cause.  Nothing comes into existence without a cause.  Another way to say this would be to say that everything that starts happening has a cause.  Or, everything that comes into existence has a cause.  If something has never started, if it has never had a beginning, then it doesn’t need a cause.  

In philosophy, there are two types of beings: “necessary” (uncaused) beings and “ contingent” (caused) beings.  Everything that we are familiar with is a contingent/caused being.  However, there must be a necessary/uncaused being that is the cause of everything else.  If everything we are familiar with is caused, there must have been something that didn’t need a cause that got the ball rolling.

Big Technical Term: "Necessary" being "Contingent" being
Simple Term Uncaused being Caused being
Beginning? No Yes
Always Existed? Yes No
Could exist by itself? Yes No, needed something else to cause it
Examples: The first cause/God Dominoes, people, trees, motion, everything else

 

Also, it is good to point out that if God exists, it is better to say that He is uncaused rather than that He is self-caused.  Nothing can be self-caused.  Nothing can bring itself into existence.  It is a contradiction.  If something needs to be created, then it doesn’t exist.  But if something doesn’t exist yet, then it isn’t around to cause anything, even itself.  So, we should say that the first cause is “uncaused” not “self-caused.”  It is interesting to note that in the Old Testament, then Moses asked God what His name was, God told Moses to tell the Israelites that “I AM” had sent him.  (Exodus 3:14)  

Now here is the next problem.  Now someone will say, “But why does God have to be the thing that is uncaused?  Couldn’t something else be uncaused?  What if the universe itself had no cause?”  Or, someone might say, “I know what caused the universe.  The Big Bang caused the universe.”

 

What about the Big Bang?

Many Christians are afraid of the Big Bang because they think it is a scientific way to explain how the universe got here without God.   However, in actuality, even if the Big Bang did happen (and I'm not saying if it did or didn't) it is a really big reason why people should believe in God!   

Science used to hold to a model of the universe called the steady state model.  The steady state model was nice for atheists because it said that the universe has always existed.  If the universe has always existed, then the universe doesn't need a cause.  Also, if the universe has been around for eternity, then it would seem that there has been plenty of time for evolution to occur... and therefore no reason for God.

When science started producing evidence for the Big Bang, many scientists, including Einstein, actually resisted the idea.  They didn't want to believe in a Big Bang because a Big Bang implied a beginning and a beginning implied a creator!

Mark: How do you think the universe got here?

Bob: That's easy, the Big Bang.

Mark: What caused the Big Bang?

Bob: ...uuuhhhh?

If the universe did explode into existence with the Big Bang, we have to ask, "What caused the Big Bang?"  Remember, the Big Bang is supposed the be the source for everything including space and time.  If the universe began with the Big Bang, then it had a beginning.  If the universe had a beginning, then it is not uncaused.  It is also not self-caused because it is impossible for anything to create itself. 

If the universe is not uncaused, then there must have been something that caused it.  Whatever this cause was, we can know a few thing that are obviously true about it.

  • The cause is powerful enough to create the entire universe
  • The cause is outside of space and time (Our universe's space and time were created in the Big Bang.  Whatever caused the universe needs to have been separate from the universe, so the cause is outside of space and time.)
  • The cause seems to be an intelligent designer (There are dozens and dozens of things that needed to be just right for life to even possibly exist!)
  • The cause is beyond our three dimensions of space, and one dimension of time.  (String theory is a new area of science dealing with the first fractions of a second after the Big Bang.  According the string theory, the universe existed in at least 10 dimensions for the first fraction of a second.  Thus, it seems highly possibly that the creator would be at least a 10 dimensional being.  Now, if God exists in at least 10 dimensions, it isn't to hard to think that God could exist as a Trinity, a unified triple-person)
 wpe14A.jpg (32738 bytes)

 

 

 

"For the scientist who has lived by faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream.  He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries."

-Robert Jastrow, founder of NASA'a Goddard institute, Director of Mt. Wilson Institute

A Philosophical Argument About Infinity

Let's say that you don't care about the Big Bang.   You might think it's too scientific and there's no way you could check all the facts.  Is there still a way to prove that the universe must have had a beginning?   The answer is that there is.  It's a purely philosophical argument, and thinking about it can cause your brain to melt.  But then again, sometimes it's fun to melt your brain.  This argument is also nice because you don't have to worry about any scientific facts.

The technical name for this argument is the Kalam Cosmological Argument.  Basically it says that there must have been only a limited amount of time that has passed before now or else "now" would have never been reached.

Let me explain.

Imagine a row of dominoes stretching past you.  You can see the row of dominoes stretching off into the distance and over the horizon.   Because the dominoes stretch past the horizon, you can not see how far they go and you can't see the beginning.  The line of dominoes could be ten miles or ten million miles long for all you know.

Now you ask yourself, "Could the row of dominoes actually have no beginning?"  Could the row of dominoes go on forever?  If it did, wouldn't that mean that there was no need for a first cause?  What if the dominoes were falling, but had always been falling for all eternity because the row of dominoes was infinitely long? 

As you continue to look at the row of dominoes, you see that none of the dominoes have fallen yet, at least as far as the ones you can see.  But then, in the distance you now see the row of dominoes falling, each one knocking down the one after it.  Now you think to yourself, "could these dominoes have been falling for all eternity, or was there a beginning?"

But as you think about it, you realize that the very fact that the dominoes are falling in front of you proves that they could not have been falling for eternity! 

Why?

First, think about this: How long does it take to count to infinity?   The answer is that you can never actually count to infinity.  There is always one more number you can add.  In the same way, how long would it take to walk an infinite number of steps?  The answer is that you could never walk an infinite number of steps.  No matter how many steps you took, it would always be a limited number.  Even if we gave you a bionic body to keep you alive forever, and even if we supercharged your bionic body so that you could take a million steps a second, you could never finish taking an infinite number of steps.  No matter how many steps you took, it would always be a finite number of steps.  The number of steps might be stretching towards infinity but it is never going to actually get to infinity.  It is impossible to complete an infinite number of steps.

In the same way, how long would it take an infinite number of dominoes to fall?  The answer is that it would take longer than forever.   (That means it is impossible.)  No matter how many dominoes fall, it is always a finite number that have fallen.  Now, if you had a line of dominoes in front of you that was infinitely long, it would mean that there were an infinite number of dominoes that would have to fall before the dominoes would reach where you are standing.  Even if you teleported yourself a billion miles down the line, there would still be an infinite number of dominoes that would have to fall.  (Infinity minus a billion is still infinity.)   Now, if an infinite number of dominoes had to fall before they reached you, the falling dominoes would never reach you.  This is because an infinite number of dominoes could never finish falling!  But if the falling dominoes did reach you, you could then know for sure that the line of dominoes was not infinitely long.  Instead the number of dominoes must be finite, or limited. 

You better read that paragraph again.  That was pretty mind numbing, huh?

wpe148.jpg (14185 bytes)

Now think about it, if the universe has been around forever, it would mean that there have been an infinite amount of seconds that have ticked before now.  However, how long would it take for an infinite amount of seconds to tick?  Right!  It would take an infinite amount of time and therefore an infinite amount of seconds could never finish ticking.   If an infinite amount of seconds had to tick before getting to "now," time could have never reached "now."  But because we did reach "now" it obviously means that there was not an infinite amount of seconds before now.

Okay, I know that one really hurt the brain.  Don't try and figure out where "now" would be if there had been an infinite amount of time.  That's impossible.  That's also the point!  Time doesn't make sense unless there is a first moment to mark everything off.

It works the same way with cause and effect.  If there was no first cause, it would mean that cause and effect have been happening forever.   Could there have been an infinite string of causes?  The answer is no.   If an infinite number of causes had to happen before you turned your computer on, you could never have turned your computer on because the infinite number of causes would never have finished happening.

Bottom line: It is impossible for there to have been an infinite number of causes or an infinite amount of time before now.  It is literally inconceivable.  Therefore, there must have been a first cause and also a beginning to the universe. 

Xeno's Paradox

By the way, if anyone ever tries to disprove the Kalam argument with "Xeno's paradox", here's the answer: 

Xeno's paradox says that technically it should be impossible for anyone to walk 10 feet.  The reason for this is because in order to walk 10 feet, you first have to walk the first half of the distance.  But before you can walk the first half of the distance, you have to walk the first half of the half of the distance.  But before you can walk the first half of the half of the distance, you have to walk the first half of the half of the half of the distance... and this goes on forever.  There are an infinite number of "halves" that you would have to cross before reaching the other side.  But, it's impossible to do an infinite number of things, isn't it?  Well, the fact that we all actually can walk ten feet, quite easily, proves that we can do an infinite number of things.   Right?

The solution is that there is a difference between a potential infinite and an actual infinite.  A potential infinite is stretching towards infinity, but is actually still a limited number.   This is like when you try to count to infinity.  You are counting towards infinity, but always have only a finite number.  Now on the other hand, an actual infinite really is infinitely large.  An example of this would be if the universe actually had been around forever.  If so, there would have been an actual infinite number of seconds before now. 

The solution to Xeno's paradox is that when you walk ten feet, you are not crossing an actual infinite number of "halves."   No matter how may times you divide the 10 feet in half, you can never divide it in half an infinite number of times.  Because it is only a potential infinite number of halves, it is still limited and you can still cross it.

 

Summary
  • The Universe either didn't have a beginning or it did have a beginning.
  • If the Big Bang is true, or if the Kalam argument is true, then the universe did have a beginning.
  • If the universe did have a beginning, then it is not uncreated.  (If it was uncreated, it would have always existed.   If it always existed, it wouldn't have a beginning.)
  • The universe is not self-created, because that is impossible.  If something needs to be created, it doesn't exist.  If something doesn't exist, then it isn't around to create itself.
  • The universe must either be uncreated, created, or self-created.  If it is not uncreated or self-created, then it must be created.
  • If the universe is created, there must have been a creator!
  • At the very least, this creator must be powerful enough to create the universe, and the creator must be outside the universe, including space and time.
  • The best candidate for this creator, especially taking into account the other arguments such as the resurrection of Jesus, is the God of the Bible.
 wpe14E.jpg (30990 bytes)

 

Conclusion

Even without using the evidence found in the Bible, there is good reason to believe that God exists.  At the very least, a skeptic must agree that the existence of God is possible if not very likely!  When you combine this with the evidence from other arguments such as the moral argument, design argument, and the resurrection argument, it is extremely likely that God exists, and that this God is the God of the Bible.  God has not been silent; He has spoken.  If the existence of God is likely, a skeptic should take into account the witness of the writers of the Bible.  These writers have witnessed the existence of God first hand and have written to tell about it.  God has shown Himself.

Further, the Bible teaches that all people know deep down that God exists.  It is evident in creation even to people who don't have Ph.D. in astrophysics.  God has planted the knowledge of His existence in everyone's heart.  However, our hearts are sinful and we suppress this knowledge because we don't want there to be a God.  We don't want God to tell us what to do.  We don't want to be accountable to a divine judge.  In reality, deep down, there are no atheists.  However, people choose to live as though God does not exist because they don't want Him to exist.  Giving reasons for the existence of God is good, but ultimately the real problem people have is a heart problem, not a head problem.

 

"The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.  For although they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.  Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools."

-Romans 1:18-22

 

Recommended Reading

*Hugh Ross, The Creator and the Cosmos (Colorado Springs: Navpress, 1993) A great book about the scientific aspects of creation.  Ross explains the Big Bang and why the Big Bang would indicate that there needs to be a creator.  Very detailed, but if you really like science, you can make it through the book.  Try to get the third edition at least because it will include the latest scientific discoveries.

Hugh Ross, Creation and Time (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1994) This is the best book about the day-age theory, the theory that God did in fact create the universe through the Big Bang and then created animals over a period of millions of years, but not through evolution.  This book argues that it is not unbiblical to think of the six "days" of creation as long periods of time.  (This book is much easier to read than The Creator and the Cosmos)

Hugh Ross, Beyond the Cosmos (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1996) This book explored the extra-dimensionality of God.  Very interesting and philosophical, and easier to read then The Creator and the Cosmos.

*Bruce Bickel & Stan Jantz, Bruce & Stan's Guide to How it All Began (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2001.)  This book has a very good amount of information and detail but is very easy to read and understand.  It is simplified but not simplistic.  Think of it as "Creation for Dummies."   Bruce and Stan simplify and present a lot of Hugh Ross' material. 

*McDowell, Josh, The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1999.) An update on McDowell's classic work, Evidence That Demands a Verdict.  Lots of researched information.  Intermediate reading.   A great resource for all aspects of defending the faith.  McDowell's A Ready Defense is also a GREAT book to have on hand.

Sproul, R.C., Not a Chance (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1994.) A great book about the impossibility that "chance" created the universe.  Sproul shows that "chance" isn't anything but mathematical odds and can't do anything.   It also shows how many important scientists irrationally think that "chance" is the cause of the universe.  Additionally, this book is a good resource if someone argues that quantum physics shows that there are effects that do not have causes.  (Many people think that quantum physics demonstrates that, but it does not.)

Moreland, J. P. Scaling the Secular City (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1987.) A very advanced book about all areas of apologetics.  It has a great section on the Kalam cosmological argument, including Xeno's paradox, and a great section on the resurrection argument.  Very advanced reading.

 

Recommended Web Sites

www.origins.org  This site features scholarly and popular resources concerning intelligent design and philosophical theism by many highly respected scholars

www.reasons.org The web site of Dr. Hugh Ross

 

Hit Counter hits since this counter was added 1/25/05, well after the article was published

go to main page