Where have I brought in an assumption?
What assumption have I brought in?
You assume that the argument is invalid.
And why does the first premise have to be shown to be false?
We are not talking issues of soundness here but of the validity of the logic.
Do you understand the difference?
Yes. You think the argument is invalid because you believe in attempts to sneak God into the premises, thereby begging the question.
If it can be found that no such tactic is intended, does that make the argument valid?
Is the argument invalid regardless of the intention behind the argument?
Everything that begins to exist has a cause
Do you agree that this premise could include God as something that begins to exist?
Or are you jumping to the known conclusion, before the conclusion has been made.
The universe began to exist
Could God be included in this premise. I think yes, because we as yet have no indication of God being anything, let alone transcendental.
So we must assume the universe is everything thus far.
Therefore the universe has a cause
Unless you don't agree that the universe has a cause, this is pretty air tight.
God is either non existent, not necessary, or a thing that has been caused. up to this point.
There is clearly no begging the question.
You may not agree with the argument, but it is valid.
As has been stated already, if the KCA merely stopped at "therefore the universe has a cause" then we could move on, but as formulated by Craig - at least as detailed in the OP - the conclusion is "that cause is God" (please see the OP in case you have forgotten).
This is the begging of the question - clearly shown by Dan Barker's reformulation that remains logically consistent with Craig's KCA.
So what caused the universe?
If something that was caused, caused the universe, it begs the question what was the cause of that cause, and so on.
An infinite regress has been shown to be at best problematic, so that can be thrown out.
Did the universe cause itself? No, because the universe would have to previously exist in order to bring itself into being.
Did the universe arise out of nothingness?
Something cannot come out of nothing. Even if such an absurdity could occur, why is it only limited to universes?
Why don't we see thing popping into existence all the time.
So what are we left with?
'Altogether'!
An uncaused agent.
The criticism of Craig's formulation, as detailed in the OP, has been quite clearly laid out, the question-begging highlighted.
So far all you have done is made assertions that the criticism is wrong.
Just because you think it has been laid out, doesn't mean it is true.
You are basically accusing Craig of sneaking God in, but you have no evidence of this. It is simply based of squirming of Dan Barker.
Rather than distort an airtight argument with objections that have nothing to do with the premises (AS I HAVE LAID OUT), provide evidence that Dr.Craig's intention was to sneak God into the premises. Do you understand?
jan.