William Lane Craig presents a version of Wilhelm Leibniz’s contingency argument as follows:[1]+
- Anything that exists has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
- If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
- The universe exists.
- Therefore, the universe has an explanation of its existence (from 1 and 3).
- Therefore, the explanation of the existence of the universe is God (from 2 and 4).
Evidence for the external causes mentioned in premise 1 is drawn from our success in finding explanations within the natural realm, explanations translatable into the language of physics. Let me emphasize that these explanations, these physical causes, are invariably found within the natural realm.[2]+
Premise 4 presumes that, if things within nature are caused, then the natural realm itself must (via premise 1) have a cause as well. That’s like saying that everything inside the refrigerator is cold; therefore, the outside of the refrigerator must also be cold. You may recognize this presumption (everything, the origin of the natural realm included, must have a sufficient reason or cause) as the PSR. As mentioned earlier, the PSR commits an extrapolation error.
Given that all evidence supporting premise 1 consists of physical causes, we might be tempted to conclude that, regardless of how far back we look in the causal chain, we will find another physical cause. That is sheer conjecture. Granted, it is more in keeping with our experience than is Craig’s conjecture, but it is still conjecture.
Premise 2 says the cause of the universe, if any, must be God. In support of this premise, Craig points out that if a cause is a material (physical) cause, then it is, itself, part of the material realm. Therefore, it cannot count as the cause of the material realm.
He goes on to say that for something to be the cause of the material realm, that cause must be immaterial (supernatural). In other words, if we trace back through all the causes within the material realm, and if we encounter the very first material cause, which we can call M, then if we find the cause of M, that cause must be immaterial.
Craig’s supporting argument takes a form philosophers label as a disjunctive syllogism, which says, “If there is a cause of M, then (1) M or Not-M is the cause, (2) M is not the cause; therefore, Not-M is the cause.” Craig successfully demonstrates with this argument that if the material realm has a cause, it must be immaterial.
As impressive as that may seem, all it means is this: If material and immaterial causes exist, and if we filter out all material causes, we are left with only immaterial causes. That statement, though true, amounts to logical legerdemain. Like many magicians’ tricks, Craig’s argument incorporates clever distraction. As far as we know, no immaterial (nonnatural) entities exist. Perhaps material (natural) causes extend back (1) infinitely or (2) to a finite uncaused beginning. Either option comports with our experience. Craig embraces the existence of nonphysical causation even though no such causes have ever been identified or even adequately defined. His disjunctive syllogism is a hand-waving distraction from this reality.
But it gets worse. Premise 2 says, “If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.” Craig brazenly substitutes the term God for immaterial cause. When challenged on the legitimacy of this substitution, Craig shrugs that these two terms are equivalent.
Then why make the substitution? Let’s get real. Craig knows that God is taken by most people in his audience to be a conscious being, whereas immaterial cause, to the extent that it has meaning, does not imply any such thing. An immaterial cause might be impermanent, unconscious, and totally ungodlike. Craig smuggles in a portrait of his pet divinity by using the heavily freighted term God.[3]+
As noted earlier, all evidence for premise 1 consists of physical causes.[4]+ But Craig does not want to talk only about physical causes, so he stipulates that premise 1 includes efficient causes, a concept introduced by Aristotle. Craig applies this term to conscious agents, both natural and supernatural. Hence premise 1 includes physical forces, material interactions, and agents, both natural and supernatural. The term efficient cause is broad enough to encompass causes that are physical, immaterial, mystical, and supernatural.[5]+
Premise 1’s being about efficient causes raises concerns about Craig’s argument. As discussed, whatever credibility premise 1 has is owed strictly to our experience of causes that appear to be physical causes. Craig, after citing physical causes to establish premise 1, switches unannounced to immaterial causes in premise 2.
Critics have accused Craig of committing the informal fallacy known as equivocating.[6]+ Equivocating is a major no-no in philosophical circles. It is frowned upon when speakers trick listeners by surreptitiously switching between alternate meanings of a word that has multiple meanings.
For example, suppose I say to you, “Yesterday I saw a huge boa and took a fancy to it. Today I bought a boa.” I might be talking about a frisky anaconda named Claudette (who dearly longs to give you a passionate hug), or I might be talking about a fluffy pink stole made of ostrich feathers. Whichever I am talking about, I should be clear. Right? But what if I snickered that I meant snake in the first sentence and stole in the second? You would accuse me of intentional deceit.
Craig denies equivocating between physical and immaterial causes, saying that he meant efficient causes all along.[7] If we accept that defense, and I do, then Craig is not guilty of equivocating. Still, using a word in a context where the audience likely won’t recognize this switching back and forth between meanings is a poor practice. Craig’s approach, if adopted by a door-to-door salesman, would be classified by the legal profession as a bait-and-switch scam.
Craig’s switch from physical to immaterial causes is worse than a poor practice. It stymies his effort to prove God exists. To see why, let’s return to the boa example, in which I misled you about whether I was talking about a snake or a stole. I could mimic Craig’s defense and say that I was talking about efficient boas, a term that encompasses both snakes and stoles, arguing as follows: We have seen efficient boas (snakes) within nature. Therefore, an efficient boa (stole) exists beyond nature. The weakness of this argument would be less apparent if I struck all references to efficient boas, snakes, and stoles and used only the word boas, by which I would still mean efficient boas: We have seen boas within nature. Therefore, boas exist beyond nature.
Rewording the argument does not make it sound, just cunning. Craig engages in precisely this sort of wordplay, rendering his argument deceptive and potentially fallacious. His conclusion is that immaterial causation (God) exists. However, given that premise 1 refers to efficient causes, premise 1 presupposes immaterial causation.[8]+ Thus, the conclusion is contained in a premise. This is typical of an informal fallacy known as begging the question. The philosopher Walter Sinnott-Armstrong says “To avoid begging the question, one’s reason to believe the premise must be independent of both (a) one’s belief in the conclusion and also (b) one’s reason to believe the conclusion.”[9]
Craig could defend himself against the charge of begging the question by insisting that premise 1 does not encompass immaterial or supernatural causation. That would mean that premises 1 and 2 equivocate. Yet, as mentioned, Craig and I agree that he is not equivocating.
The one remaining alternative is for Craig to insist that his argument is virtuously circular. Circular reasoning is often used as a synonym for the fallacy of begging the question. Both are forms of petitio principii (“appeal to the principle”). But they’re not synonyms. Circular reasoning can be used in a virtuous (non-fallacious) manner to draw out a conclusion implicit in a premise. Craig notes that, “In a deductive argument, the conclusion is implicit in the premises.”[10]
If we embrace this maximally charitable interpretation of Craig’s argument, what does his argument accomplish? It certainly does not prove that any godlike being exists, but it does successfully demonstrate that if we believe in (1) a past-finite cosmos, (2) the PSR, and (3) the actual existence of supernatural causation, then we should agree that the natural realm has at least one supernatural cause.[11]+ In my view, a past-finite cosmos (though unevidenced) is plausible, whereas the case for the PSR is weak, and the case for supernatural causation is essentially nil. Craig’s argument is therefore unpersuasive.
[1] Craig often says that his premises are “more probably true than false,” and that, this being so, we should embrace his conclusion. But suppose an argument has three premises, each of which we judge to be true with 51 percent confidence—more probably true than false. The probability of the conclusion (the conjunction of all three premises being true) equals .51 × .51 × .51 = 0.132651 or roughly 13 percent. With three premises, you’d need to have roughly 80 percent confidence in each premise to assert that the conclusion is probable.
[2] When I speak of causes in this book, I typically mean physical causes: events, agents, things, facts, or states of affairs. These are potentially resolvable down to fundamental particles, fields, and forces. We distinguish between aggregate causes (“Driving too fast around the curve caused the accident”) and discrete causes (“The electron’s drop to a lower orbital energy level was caused by a photon emission”). The term “discrete” is relative because, as explained in the section “Metaphysical vs. Methodological Naturalism,” we can never know whether we have found the most discrete causal level. Explanations are verbal accounts of causes. When we speak of explanations, we typically mean causes that resolve down to physical materials or forces or conscious agents that are, as far as we know, resolvable to physical causes. But, of course, someone could offer an explanation that includes fairies, gods, voodoo, and so forth.
Craig mentions a class of entity that exists from “the necessity of its own nature.” As mentioned in the preceding section, Willard Van Orman Quine observed that necessary and contingent are purely hypothetical distinctions. This section focuses on other issues pertaining to Craig’s argument.
[3] Craig claims to have auxiliary arguments to prove godly qualities. In my view, those arguments fail. In any case, those arguments aren’t presented in his contingency argument, so the conclusion should not be.
[4] Keep in mind that even agents such as humans and polar bears appear to be physical entities that are part of nature. They are not supernatural.
[5] Aristotle used the term “material cause” for inert matter, such a block of stone. His concept of a material cause was utterly passive, whereas our modern view a matter is both far more potent and encompassing.
[6] A formal fallacy is an error in the logic of an argument that is visible in the form of the argument: how the argument’s premises and conclusion are laid out. An informal fallacy, in contrast, can’t be detected by examining the form of the argument. You must investigate how the terms in the argument are used.
[7] William Lane Craig, “Objections So Bad I Couldn’t Have Made Them Up (Worst Objections to Kalām Cosmological Argument),” Reasonable Faith with William Lane Craig, February 2, 2012, https://www.reasonablefaith.org/videos/lectures/objections-so-bad-i-couldnt-have-made-them-up.
Craig is speaking of the Kalām argument, not the contingency argument, but the objections and defenses largely overlap.
drcraigvideos, “Objections So Bad I Couldn’t Have Made Them Up (Worst Objections to Kalam Cosmological Argument),” February 2, 2012, YouTube video, 58:19, https://youtu.be/gtfVds8Kn4s.
[8] Craig’s stated conclusion is “the explanation of the existence of the universe is God,” whereas I have expressed his conclusion “immaterial causation exists.” Recall that (1) Craig himself substituted “God” for immaterial cause, and (2) Craig used the term explanation to refer to efficient (immaterial as well as material) causes. The phrasing I used is therefore logically entailed by Craig’s own terms.
[9] “Begging the Question,” Australian Journal of Philosophy 77, no. 2 (June 1999): 174–91.
[10] Craig, “Objections So Bad I Couldn’t Have Made Them Up.”
[11] Craig’s argument does not demonstrate that there is a single supernatural cause. There could be multiple supernatural causes, running either in parallel, in series, or both.