In an earlier post I argued that the nature of science is such that it cannot demonstrate an entity/event to be uncaused, and thus scientific discoveries can never inveigh against the causal premise (“whatever begins to exist has a cause”) of the kalam cosmological argument (KCA) for God’s existence. Here I want to extend the discussion to the cosmological premise (“the universe began to exist”) of the KCA as well.
The contrapositive of the second premise is “the universe is eternal.” The nature of science, however, renders it incapable of demonstrating the universe to be eternal even if the universe were eternal. Why? Science is an empirical discipline based on what can be observed and quantified. For science to prove that the universe is eternal, it would have to do so empirically. But this is impossible. An eternal past cannot be observed or quantified.
To see why, consider a staircase. Suppose there exists a staircase that extends far into space beyond what we are able to observe. Some speculate that the staircase is infinite in size, while others contend that it is enormous in size, but still finite. How would one go about testing whether the staircase was infinite or just really big? Remember, we are talking about science, so we are limited to empirical methods of inquiry. One way to test the possibility is for a scientist to start walking the staircase, counting each step along the way: one, two, three, four…1000…1,000,000…1,000,000,000…. Could our scientist conclude after traversing the 1,000,000,000th step that since the staircase continues on beyond his observational horizon it must go on infinitely? No. For all he knows, it may end 100,000 steps ahead, and if he keeps walking/counting for one more week he would finally reach the end of the staircase. Because he wants to make a scientific—and hence, empirical—assessment of the staircase’s size, our dedicated scientist keeps walking and counting. Could he, one hundred years and 100 trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion steps later, conclude that the staircase is infinite? No. For all he knows it could end one trillion steps from where he stands. So he traverses one trillion more steps, but there’s still no end in sight. Is he justified at this point in concluding that the staircase is infinite? No, not empirically. For all he knows, it could end one trillion steps from where he stands. Our scientists could go on counting for billions of years and traverse trillions upon trillions more steps, and he would always be in the same predicament: never able to know whether the staircase is truly infinite in size, or just a really really big (yet finite) staircase that he has yet to reach the top of.
The same is true of the universe. No matter how far back in time scientists are able to see by peering through a telescope, they can never know whether the universe continues on infinitely into the past, or just a little past their present observational horizon. Even if they could see 1 trillion years back in time, the empirical nature of science prohibits them from making any conclusions about what—if anything—is beyond that point. For all they know, the regress could keep going on forever, or it could terminate at 1.1 trillion years in the past.
Science can only speak to what it has observed, and since it is impossible to observe an infinite number of past moments, science is incapable of verifying that the universe has existed from eternity past. And if science is incapable of verifying that the universe is eternal, scientific objections against the second premise of the KCA are dead in the water. Only philosophy is equipped to answer questions about the existence of infinites. If it can be demonstrated philosophically that the infinite is incapable of being instantiated in reality, then it can be demonstrated that the universe is not past-eternal. While I think philosophy has demonstrated this quite clearly, even if I am mistaken and premise two is actually false, it could only be demonstrated to be so philosophically, not scientifically. While scientific findings can support the premises of the KCA, they cannot rebut the same.
March 18, 2011 at 12:35 am
Hi,
I would like to know what you make of the LHC experiments that aims to proof exactly what you say it can’t proof (Large Hadron Collider). Also, what do you think of the Higgs boson particle and what will happen if the LHC can proof that it exists?
Lastly there are also other models, like the Cyclic Universe Theory (also known as the Cyclic model) which puts definitive start and end events of the universe, but in an endless cycle. Would a successful LHC experiment give these theories more weight?
Very interesting stuff indeed…
Thanks
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March 21, 2011 at 12:04 pm
Hi Nico,
I think you are misinformed about what the LHC experiments are designed to do. They are trying to mimic the early conditions of the Big Bang in an attempt to better understand particle physics. But the Big Bang theory holds that the universe is temporally finite, not eternal.
As for the Higgs boson, nothing will happen if it is proved to exist. It will just finally answer the question of what gives particles their mass. That’s all. It has nothing to do with the age of the universe.
The physics of cyclical models won’t work. Even if they could, entropy would carry over from cycle to cycle, which puts a past extremity on how long ago the cycles began. In other words, they cannot avoid a beginning.
But apart from all this, the fact remains that finite beings can never verify that something is infinite. The only being that could positively verify that some X is infinite is a being that is infinite himself, because only if he was co-extenstive with X could he know that X was infinite. Finite beings would always be playing catch-up, never able to see beyond their own horizon, and thus never being able to conclude whether the entity in question has an end or not.
Jason
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March 21, 2011 at 12:23 pm
Good points – thanks. I really appreciate you taking the time explaining it so that even I can understand 🙂
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April 11, 2011 at 9:36 am
Good post, Jason. You helped make a complex discussion more reachable for those who aren’t familiar with these topics!
Are there still many atheist who hold to an infinite universe?
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April 11, 2011 at 11:07 am
Thanks Jeff,
I don’t know of any prominent atheist who still thinks our universe is eternal. The empirical evidence for the Big Bang is too great. But over the last decade or so many of these atheists seem to have gravitated toward a multiverse idea. They think this allows them to admit that our universe is temporally finite, but that perhaps the larger multiverse in which our universe is contained is eternal. What they fail to recognize is that the various multiverse scenarios don’t actually provide an eternal past, so all they have really done is move the problem of the beginning back some steps.
Jason
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August 6, 2011 at 11:17 pm
The empirical evidence of bigbang is too great?
Now, I want you to give the devil his due. I am a beleiver in God yet I don’t beleive big bang. Listen very carefully, at one point, you seem to get it, empiricism only deal with the observable. ‘universe’ as used by a so called scientist is the ‘observable universe’ what if there are some things that are unobservable? Clear! A scientist has NO permision to assert for us anything concerning such matters. The big bang theory can only suggest that the ‘observable universe’ appears to have had an origin. Or the universe AS WE CURRENTLY KNOW had a beginning. Not ‘everything begun at big bang’
Now, get to know one thing, no matter how we amuse our selves that the big bang is empirically confirmed, two things emerge
2. Certainly, it will never RULE out the posibility of an eternal universe (you seem to know this sometimes!). Such is the nature of empirical science (inductive thinking)
3Empirical evidence requires human being to interprate hence can’t escape the bias of the observer. There are scientists who have a different interpratation of the alleged proof of ANY science theory.
The problems you encounter is the result of the false assumption that the existence of God is contigent to whether the unverse had a beginning or not. It isn’t! People engage in unecessary issues beyond understanding as the eternity. Even the bible in hebrews say; ‘what is seen came not from what is seen’. In otherwords, the writer says, by faith, we understand that things, as observed was not the way they were from everlasting. Only God was. He didn’t talk of things in the state other than as seen now because it may be beyond understanding.
To see my point, the suggestion of Multiverse and God is just a play of words! Both sides quite donnot understand what they are talking about. How multiverse morphed to universe obviously is as inexplicable as how God created universe. Perharps the debate should reduce to the question; what is the nature of God or how did he create the universe. Of which is it foolish?
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August 7, 2011 at 12:15 am
Jason,
I am sorry I have alot to tell you than I can do it here.
Philosophes can prove that an eternal universe is impossible?
By ‘philosophy,’ I think you mean ‘deductive thinking.’ Sorry to disapoint you, they can’t. The reason is plainly simple. Deductive thinking reguires that we begine with SOUND premises. The problem don’t arise in deduction process but in that first assumption. We cannot conclude anything in deductive thinking that we were not assuming in premises! So deductions, when we become strict, proves nothing!
Nobody can proof that eternal universe is impossible using logics alone! Never! Crane begine by saing ‘an actual infinite cannot exist’ as a premise! And you don’t notice a problem? He is already assuming that eternal duration cannot have happen! So what is he going to prove? (eternal duration of course cannot have happen if it had a beginning but it can if such a duration had no beginning, there is no contradiction here) ‘Infinite’ and eternal is just a play of words! He says actual infinite’s inexistence is intuitively obvious! Who decides what is obvious and what is not? Finite past is clearly not obvious to me but rather downright irrational so the logical process, at its best proves nothing to me. At its worst is ridiculus!
Yet I beleive that God exist and have been leaving forever! How? Simple! The eternity is beyond understanding! What you are asking me is to account for God’s existence which is unfair to me. God, certainly is an ACTUAL INFINITE which, yes, cannot exist but only within a finite mind.
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December 18, 2011 at 5:37 pm
The universe must be eternal. If it has a finite lifetime, no matter how long, that finite period of time in relation to eternity is infinitesimally brief and the probability that it should be ocurring now is effectively zero.
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December 19, 2011 at 2:36 am
Raoul,
A finite universe would have to occur at some point in history, and someone would have to be there to experience it, so no, it is not improbable.
Besides, you have to deal with the scientific evidence which points to the beginning of the universe and the philosophical issues of the problem of the infinite regress and the impossibility of forming the infinite via succession.
Jason
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June 21, 2012 at 11:05 am
[…] summary, even if it could be demonstrated scientifically that the universe is eternal (and it can’t), atheists cannot avoid the causal question. The universe cannot cause itself, so the cause must […]
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February 12, 2013 at 11:22 am
[…] Science Cannot Prove the Universe is Eternal […]
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March 30, 2014 at 11:34 am
Hi,
can you please give me your input of the atheist(is very common on web even through psysicians) claiming from the post:
The evidence from cosmology points to a noncyclical universe (that is, to linear time), but it does not exclude the possibility of cyclical time. However, a cyclical universe is the only way atheists can avoid an absolute beginning with, presumably, a beginner. Nietzsche already knew that and that’s why he revived eternal recurrence.
By the way, there are two different ways to define the universe. One is to limit it to what can be observed directly or indirectly. The other is to say that it is the whole set of physical beings moved by impersonal forces, wherever they are to be found (that would include the possibility of worlds beyond the big bang). The philosophical definition is more in agreement with the latter. The universe is whatever exists without being supernatural. That comes from:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/crossexamined/2011/08/john-lennox-responds-to-stephen-hawking/
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April 16, 2014 at 7:03 am
[…] Science Cannot Prove the Universe is Eternal […]
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June 3, 2014 at 7:34 am
Right,
the topic was discussed here:
http://forums.philosophyforums.com/threads/rational-scientific-method-63662.html
The rational thinking method postulate that the default position is that Universe is made of objects that exist and space. And further more that NO BING BANG, NO CREATION etc
Please have a look and let me know if you can debate/debunk this “scientific” approach and philosophy.
his leader described it on his hub: http://fatfist.hubpages.com/
Regards ,
S.C
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February 1, 2015 at 12:24 pm
http://fatfist.hubpages.com/hub/CREATION-is-IMPOSSIBLE-Space-Matter-Motion-are-ETERNAL
Jason, would u check this out and let us know what u think?
This guy argues for an eternal universe, no Big Bang, no creation etc.
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February 1, 2015 at 7:10 pm
C:
There was no creation; there was no big bang; both are illusions of the imagination:
The one imagined what he did not know(God) and the other used what he knew(Math/Physics) to obfuscate why he did not know.
The Universe always existed like a Garden where everything is seeded, is born into, grown, blooms, withers, dies, regenerated; the cause of its own effect; when and where stars are formulated by it one day we will know but one man’s lifetime is hardly sufficient to understand how millions of light years away lie fellow planets and stars and yes , regenerated life. Of this there is no doubt. I welcome the knowledge yet to fathom: the way, the life and the truth; ask, seek and knock…….. Hey didn’t somebody say that before?
We do not need God of the Ancients who sacrificed their children for bumper crops or dances for rain anymore than we need the Big Bang to accept the reality the Universe never existed before we were born it.
Seems perfect reasonable to me when one thinks that miracles began with magic tricks made for Moses by the elders looking for a Champion to free the people from slavery and that Moses made to convince Pharaoh. And when one considers that the residual heat left from star deaths remain in the Universe of its birth and can only be explained from the heat generation of a Big Bang; it just changes lanes in the highway in the sky. Something like the wind; you hear the sound thereof but do not know from whence it came or where it goes…..
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October 8, 2020 at 9:05 am
[…] Image from: https://theosophical.wordpress.com/2011/03/17/science-cannot-prove-the-universe-is-eternal/ […]
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