And it goes on and on and on... or does it?

So yesterday I talk a little bit about the leibniz Cosmological Argument for the existence of God.  And one of the possible counterexamples for this argument is that the universe is eternal!  As we established eternal means without beginning or end or in other words INFINIT!!!  Which brings us to todays topic!  An Infinitely existing universe.

The counter arguments goes something like this.  What if the brute fact is the universe it's self.  As we stated if you remember Premis (1) was this:

"Everything existing thing has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause."


This could lead one to conclude that the universe is a thing that is necessary by nature.  For us to exist the univers needs to exist so why does God have to come into the picture, why can't the universe exist in it's own right?

For something to be necessary by it's own nature it must be eternal, for if it were not eternal it would not be necessary because there would have been a time without it or a time coming where it no longer is.  So the universe is eternal, no big deal right?  Well actually it is kind of a big deal.  See if the universe is eternal that would mean that it would contain an infinit number of events the preceded and other event, for instance you reading this blog.  This is where our problem resides.

According to set theory if a particular set contains an infinit number of (x) then adding (z) more (x) would not increase the number of (x) in the set.  The same holds true if one were to subtract (z) or (y) from the set.  The problem with the universe having an infinit number of events that precede any one event is that the univers would have to go through an infinit number of events to get there.  What this means is that we would have never gotten to you reading this blog or me writing it or either of us being born for that matter or anything!  Because there would need to be a limitless number of events that precede any other event.

What does all of that mean?  It means that infinity is not possible it is an impossibility.

But wait, not it's not because if you take any two integers you could divide them into 1/2 or 1/4 or 1/8 into infinity, meaning that there are an infinit number of divisions between two integers = Infinity real.  This is a confusion of terms.  It's a confusion between actual infinity and potential infinity.  Actual infinity is impossible and is the kind that we talk about when we talk about the universe being eternal because actual time would have had to pass to get us to this moment.  Potential infinity is any situation where there is a potential amount of answers such as the space between two integers.

Ergo, the universe cannot be infinit which means that is cannot be necessary of it's own nature.  Which means that is must have come to exist through some other means, God.

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." - Gen 1:1


Next time a look at the Kalam Cosmological Argument and the conclusion of this section of Cosmological arguments.