Well, my only criticism about the intuitive statements is that they rely on some experts' intuition. There are two main problems with that:

1. Experts' intuition fails quite often, especially when it's only intuition without empirical data.
2. We keep discovering very weird and counter-intuitive things about the universe all the time, so showing that something seems counter-intuitive now is basically an argument for absolutely nothing.

When I think about the bolded part of your post, I think there is a bit of an equivocation in Craig's argument. Since he (and you) put the question of "why there is something, rather than nothing", this should imply that the universe we are studying (which began with the Big Bang) is ALL there is. But if it is not (neither we nor Craig know this), then the whole argument fails, because even if we assume that science shows that our universe did indeed have a beginning (thus confirming his second premise), it might well be a part of a grander universe which itself does not have a beginning. So, the equivocation I am talking about is: when Craig says "the universe had a beginning" he is talking about OUR universe. But in order for his argument to work, he has to be talking about the grander universe which may or may not exist.

You're right, the definition of the paradox is not based on intuition, but the argument is that its interpretation of the paradox leads to counter-intuitive (not wrong) conclusions.

Alright, so if science can somehow show that the universe did not have a beginning, would you agree then that the scientific data will contradict the argument?

(Although it is more difficult to find contradicting data for the cosmological argument, I think it would be far easier to find such contradicting data for the fine-tuning argument and the argument about Jesus' divinity).

Why the quotation marks? Even if I agree with you that it's not so bad that Craig's using the argument from authority, how about the other fallacies I listed: argument from personal incredulity, false choice fallacy, equivocation, and other contradictions*

*For instance, in relation to the second (teleological) argument: "He rejects option B because he claims there is no evidence for it. And then… declares option C the winner by default, even though there is no evidence for it either."

I might do that, but I think it would be better if a theist did it first, and then I can respond to the criticisms like you did to mine (kind of like the "I cut, you choose" technique). That way I won't be accused of not applying the same scrutiny when analyzing atheists' arguments.

As I said, you don't have to watch the full debate now, you can start with the opening statement (which usually has the basic contents of the discussion and most of the fallacies, if present, are there) which is no more than 10 minutes.

I still find this very odd. I don't know why you're still referring to the scientists' intuition when you're talking about scientific consensus. It just seems out of place in the context of the argument.

I do not understand this at all. Why is it that the claim that there is something imply that the universe we are studying is all that there is? It seems that the claim of the existence of a transcendent God already invokes the claim that there is more than just this physical universe.

Heh.... I've actually raised this type of objection before but for other purposes. It is true that the word universe is not well-defined and that such an equivocation is possible. However, in this case, your claim of equivocation doesn't mean anything. The object in question is *THIS* universe, which required *SOMETHING* to get it started. The "grander universe" (as you put it -- which is now clearly defined to be something different that the "universe") can be understood merely as the realm of God. It's not actually introducing anything new into the argument, because this if just another infinite regression problem ("Who designed the designer?"; "If God created the universe, who created God?"; and that sort of thing).

Making sure to note the precise definition of "universe" that is intended, it will create a contradiction.

The quotation marks exist because I have not considered your positions on the whole very carefully. I do not immediately agree that they are valid objections, but I need to refer to them somehow.

As far as the example you've presented, it seems that you are equivocating on the word "evidence." The multiverse hypothesis has no evidence for it in an observationally limiting sort of way. There is no way (under our current knowledge of how the universe works) that we could observe ANYTHING about another universe in the multiverse.

However, design inferences are possible as evidentiary claims, even if they are not quantifiable. For example, we can understand the difference between a house and cave in terms of random chance and design, but this inference cannot be quantified (this is one of the big struggles for intelligent design -- design inferences are qualitative, not quantitative). So there is "evidence" of design in a non-trivial way, but it's also a non-scientific way.

As far as the rejection of A, that's another intuitively plausible position. Notice that A is a non-argument: It is because it has to be. So as people who search for a reason for things (sometimes where no reason exists), the rejection of A happens at that intuitive level in the minds of the listeners. It's basically equivalent to the question "Is this house designed or not designed?" It's not necessary (and especially in a debate format) to make an argument in order to reach the conclusion that the house is designed. Maybe the physical laws did build that house and that house is a necessary consequence of the arrangement of the universe and the laws that drive it, but that's does not appear to be plausible.

That's okay, but it should be stated: (q) some thing that begins to exist does not have a cause.

To contradict (p), you must affirm that some thing (X) that begins to exist does not have a cause. In other words, by claiming 'not everything' you're affirming that out of the set of everything there's a subset X that does not have a cause: if 'not everything which begins to exist has a cause,' then it necessarily follows that 'some thing X that begins to exist does not have a cause.'

It was a typo, sorry.

But, look how it reads with my above qualification: if some thing (X) does begin to exist, then (q') there may or may not be a cause or reason why some thing (X) exists. You're not affirming anything.

Again, you must affirm that some thing X began to exist without a cause to contradict the first premise. What you're doing here is confusing what that something is with whether or not it has a cause, so your consequent doesn't follow.

1.4 With q: (q→ q') if (q) some thing X does begin to exist, then (q') there is no cause or reason why some thing X exists.

Unless you retreat into skepticism, you'll still need to affirm that some thing (X) begins to exist without a cause.

I'm more into Thomism, so I can't say for certain in regard to Craig, but traditionally theologians end this argument with something like, "… and this we call God." That's a key point a lot of atheists miss. Theologians are not positing God as the necessary cause; they're saying that which we call a necessary cause, we call God. "Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God." - Aquinas

While I obviously understand why an atheist would object to terming that first-cause God, the key issue with the argument is whether or not there is a first or necessary cause, not what we call it. So, whether everything just popped into existence from nothing or existence could not possibly not exist, there's still a lot more explaining to do. Unfortunately, modern philosophy has pretty much abandoned pure metaphysics in lieu of epistemology or at least subjected the former to the latter, and modern physics is more centered around mathematical modeling of reality than reality research. So the 'God question' is really the most active arena of thought if one is interested in why anything exists at all.

Yeah, I was talking about something naturalistic.


Well, we seem to agree here. Introducing God or another naturalistic universe doesn't solve the problem. My point was that the scientific consensus for the universe having a beginning (i.e. not being infinitely old) hold only for THIS universe. We don't know if the grand (naturalistic) universe is not actually infinitely old. What I was saying is that in order for the Kalam argument to work, Craig has to show how the grand universe has also a beginning. If he doesn't, even if we accept that our universe has a beginning, it could then be just another naturalistic effect of a previous naturalistic cause. Nothing necessitates a transcended God yet.


I still fail to see the evidence for ID. The arguments proponents for ID have been giving are either "if something looks designed, it must be designed" or the more sophisticated versions about things like the human immune system, the bacterial flagellum, etc. which are said to be "too complex" to have evolved, or that some physical constants which appear to be fine-tuned for life to exist, in which case they are invoking backward probability estimation (you would know it's a pretty meaningless operation). So, there is no real evidence for design, only arguments from ignorance. Given all that, Craig cannot declare option C the winner after hastily dismissing A and B.

Yes, I wasn't considering option A very seriously anyway. Option B is the most likely explanation (even without the multiverse hypothesis).

Okay, here I would give the answer that most agnostic atheists give. I cannot affirm that something begins to exist without a cause, I am just saying that we don't have the necessary knowledge of the universe to conclude that it is impossible for something to exist without a cause. (Although, if God exists, he doesn't have a cause either, but see below).


The problem with this argument is that both Craig and Aquinas say that this first cause which they call God also has to be personal. Otherwise, if it's only a matter of labeling the first cause, I don't care whether we are going to call it God or something else.

I would personally object to terming it God because it creates confusion.

I absolutely agree. As long as it's explaining and not taking things on faith.

This is why ontological arguments are not ultimately convincing. It's merely a definition game. But it is worth noting that if you accept the premise that an infinite regression of causes is intuitively absurd, it *does* lead you to the notion of a first cause ("God"). But if you find the idea of an infinite regress of causes to be intellectually sustainable, there's no reason given for you to trade that belief. Again, the foundation is the position of intuitive plausibility.

I find that most people who hold this type of position to be straddling intellectual fences. I've never met anyone who is willing to say that a car or plane or something else like that fails to have what can be called "the appearance of design." Even Dawkins admits the existence of such an concept. So even if there is no precise definition of "design" it is something that we are intellectually able to distinguish or determine. This does NOT imply that anything with the "appearance of design" is ultimately designed.

However, in the same sense that there is no clear standard of the acceptance of design, there is also no clear standard for the REJECTION of design. That is, the non-design inference suffers from the same problem as the design inference. So the question boils down to some statement like the following: The cause must be sufficient for the effect.

And this is where both sides spin their wheels in terms of getting traction to somehow "prove" their position. It's very similar to the question of free will and determinism. Neither side has an empirical argument that can be made. Nobody can "prove" in any real sense that X is more likely than Y when it comes to these types of statements. That's just reality.

So while you say "I fail to see the evidence" you should take a long hard look as to what it might take for you to "see evidence" for it -- what would it take to convince you? (And don't take the easy route of saying something like 'if the scientific community accepts it...' because that simply says that you're unwilling to think for yourself.) It might be that you don't believe that such evidence is even possible. That's perfectly acceptable. (For example, I don't think I will ever accept hard determinism because the experience of freely willed choices will override any argument that is presented to me.)

But if you are in that position, then you must recognize that you've established an impossible standard for the other side, and that attempts to argue are not intellectually fair because you've established yourself to have a no-lose situation. So if you want to argue against that position, you need to challenge the opposition on *THEIR* terms and not yours.

(By the way, this is how I feel about your position regarding arguments about the existence of God. You've already established that you think such arguments must reach some higher standard than what you are willing to accept for scientific positions, but you also seem to hold the idea that scientific positions are the MOST convincing positions to hold, and therefore no theist will ever be able to make a successful argument. I don't think there's anything wrong with holding to such a position, but it also means that your arguments are intellectually disingenuous unless you are willing to argue on the theists' terms.)

I haven't read all the exchanges you two have had but would like to point out something re this post.

You said that even Dawkins admits to "appearance of design". This admission is almost universal, excepting All In Flynn and maybe 2 or 3 other people in the history of the world.

This is by definition evidence of design. Which is why some people fight against the idea even of appearance. Because to admit the appearance exists is to admit evidence for design exists. At the very least it forms the basis for an argument that the design inference is plausible and not irrational.

Do you have any sources for this (that the admission is almost universal even between atheists)?

To me, world and human don't appear designed. I would expect them to be much different (simpler) if they were designed.

I don't understand why this would be an evidence of design. Even if it is true that almost all people think that the world has an appearance of design, that still doesn't say anything about whether their intuition is right.

And you have no clue why some people fight against the idea of appearance. Of course, *some* are almost surely doing it for the reason you mentioned, since there are millions of us, but I don't think you meant it in this way. I think you rather meant to imply that significant number of mentioned people fight for this reason, not just any percentage >0.

I agree with one small remark. As I responded to duffe, if there is a first cause, and it's simply a matter of labeling it "God", then there is no disagreement. But if the claim is that the existence of a first cause implies that this first cause has to be personal, then I would disagree because it is not something that follows from the argument.


Well, even natural selection in a way "designs" things. So, I would also agree that a lot of things look designed and they are designed, but in a self-organizing way, without external force guiding it. What most people are objecting to is intelligent, purposeful design.

The same way there is no clear standard for the rejection of the existence of God. If somebody makes the claim that we have proof AGAINST intelligent design, they would be making a big intellectual error in my opinion. That is why most atheists are trying so hard to explain that we are not claiming there is evidence against ID, but that there is no evidence in favor of ID. The whole problem comes from the fact that people like Behe ans Dembski are making a positive claim which they later fail to support with positive evidence.

A bit off topic, but there is empirical evidence that speaks against the existence of free will.

Come on dude, you must know by now that I would never say a thing like that. If I've been criticizing Craig for making these types of arguments from authority, it would make me look pretty foolish if I did the same thing

I cannot quite imagine how the positive evidence for ID would look like, but I'm guessing we would know if we find it. One thing that comes to my mind is falsifying evolution (e.g., finding fossils of animals or plants from a time in which they were not supposed to have evolved yet). But this is too vague, I am not sure I have the necessary background to elaborate on that at this moment. But in any case, even if such standards didn't exist yet, that does not justify ID proponents presenting false evidence, right?

Again, if you are interested, I could send you some of the papers I have that undermine those experiences.

I think the problem here's that you and me don't view science the same way. I don't regard science as a separate institution which has its methods, but religion is another institution and has other methods. I regard science as the natural extension of philosophy: simply a tool for reaching all kinds of truths about the world by logically valid conclusions. It just so happens that for a lot of things we cannot make logically valid conclusions without the scientific method. I am holding the position that everything should in principle be explorable scientifically. And I would argue that even religious people are doing the same thing, the only difference is that they are doing it internally (and it's subjective), whereas science is trying to move the subjective evidence to the realm of the objective evidence.

See my response to Aaron. If something looks designed, it is designed (as long as you use the very broad definition of the world). But if you say "if something looks designed, then it is intelligently designed", you are making a leap of faith. In no way does your conclusion follow from the observation.

Has Craig or anyone else come up with a philosophical treatment of causality that allows us to meaningfully ask "What caused spacetime?"

The admission is that life looks designed to fit its environment in exactly the same sense that a puddle looks designed to fit the surface it's in.

What I said was the appearance of design is EVIDENCE. That has nothing to do with faith.

But it's not evidence. I don't know how you could claim such a thing. Some rocks (shaped by water over hundreds of thousands of years) look like humans, animals, etc. That is, they appear designed, as if sculptor made them. In reality they are NOT designed, however. Do you see where the link between "appear" and "is" breaks?

Many things that appear to be designed at first glance appear to be udesigned on further investigation. The shape of a mountain or bubble or nautilus shell to give three obvious examples. But to discover this you have to know MATH. That is why it is so ridiculous to pay attention to anyone's opinion on either side of this issue if they don't know math.

The issue hangs on what is meant by 'this appears designed'. If it's confined to a report of a subjective impression - "I look at life/the universe and consistently think: This must have been made," then "the appearance of design" is uncontroversial (by virtue of irrelevance if nothing else).

If it's allowed to spread beyond that, to something more like "The universe possesses a quality or set of qualities which create in the mind of a disinterested observer the impression of being the product of intent, such that an identical observer in a universe lacking those qualities would necessarily conclude otherwise, or would consistently fail to conclude likewise," that's where the problem comes in.

Your consistent failure - and you've had well over a year, if my position really is unique, which I very much doubt - to identify any such qualities, and to describe a universe lacking those qualities, means that I can cheerfully accept your claim of a universal 'appearance of design', since clearly you must mean it in the first sense.

"Joe looks pretty guilty to me," is evidence of Joe's guilt. Just not the sort worth bothering about. Same deal.

You should make sure you know what the other person is arguing, then. As far as I know, no ontological argument concludes anything about a personal God.

Your use of quotes around the word "design" is highlighting that you're shifting the definition of design around a bit. The addition of "purposeful" (for example) does not help your position because it's extending the concept even further. We would be able to recognize the design of an arrowhead (insofar as it does not appear to be merely the result of naturalistic processes), but we would potentially not be able to distinguish its purpose. And the determination of the purpose is something that goes beyond the "appearance of design" (it speaks to something like the "appearance of purpose").

This is a philosophical flaw in your interpretation of the data. Free will vs. determinism is an empirically underdetermined problem. Go find the thread in SMP if you're interested.

Given that I've *ALREADY* accused you of doing this, I don't think you realize what you're saying.

It's worth noting that the falsification of evolution *STILL* would not qualify as positive evidence for ID, unless you're taking a really strange view of the nature of "positive evidence."

This new classification of "false evidence" means what, exactly? Falsified information?

Except that they don't. I can almost guess which papers you would link. Is it the one where they do brain scans to predict the "choices" that people make, and that the "experience of choice" happens after the indicating factors? Yeah, I've seen that one, and unless I'm mistaken the authors explicitly indicated that this does not show that free will doesn't exist.

Well, this would be precisely what I mean by establishing an impossible standard. It would be useful for you to think more carefully about your epistemological standard. In particular, the underlined sentence does not appear to be a statement that can be explored scientifically.

My last post was a response to what you said here:

You were talking about the cosmological argument, not the ontological argument (which you just mentioned in the beginning of your post).

And here's what Craig has to say:

So, unfortunately, he does talk about a personal God.

Yeah, whatever. I don't use the word "design" for natural processes, I was just saying that some people can decide to label this so, but the label doesn't matter. The meaning behind the term is what's important. So, I was saying that there is a lack of evidence for purposeful design in nature.

I don't know how that thread was named and it's going to take me a long time to find it. You can give me a link if you feel like it.

I don't know what was being discussed in that thread, but regardless of what it was, I can tell you that there IS evidence against the existence of free will. That is not to say that this proves that hard determinism is true, but then again science doesn't attempt to prove things with 100% certainty anyway.


The things you were accusing me of in the previous thread were not conceptual, but semantic. I wasn't careful in the words I was using, which made my individual posts look like they were sometimes contradicting each other. And you were careful enough to not miss a single one of them.


That's why I said I don't know how the positive evidence would look like. The falsification of evolution would at least open the door for something like ID.

By the way, it's not my job to find evidence for a theory which I am not proposing, nor to determine what the evidence would look like. It is not my fault that a group of people are positing an unfalsifiable "scientific theory" for which it is impossible to find any positive evidence, other than perhaps the intelligence which designed the universe to appear to us and to explicitly say "Yes, it is true, I designed it."

Unreal evidence. Pseudo-evidence. Something which is called evidence, but is not. I don't know how else to name it.


I don't know which ones you've heard about exactly. From your description, I can guess that you're probably talking about the Libet studies. Libet does say that his experiments don't necessarily rule out free will (although he admits that they rule out at least half of what people call free will; and his claim is unjustified anyway). But no, I am talking about more recent studies which are far more interesting.


That is why I said "in principle". In practice, there are currently things we can't explore scientifically. I just don't declare those things "impossible to study" just because we can't study them now.

And since you bring up the underlined sentence as something unexplorable by science, you do make a difference between studying something (looking for evidence for it) and proving/disproving it, right?

If you know what those 3 things are then you already know they are not designed (as to their shape) and so appearance isn't evidence. For instance, we don't think a cloud that looks like a camel is designed to look like a camel because we know other facts that inform us as to what it really is. But complexity and structure are evidence of intelligent design. Why else would Dawkins need to write a book explaining why the appearance doesn't PROVE design?

I should point out, as you've made this mistake before and I didn't correct it, that appearance here doesn't just mean "how it looks", but includes concepts such as function and apparent purpose. If things in the cell operate like machines then their appearance of design isn't primarily referring to how they look but the fact that they are LIKE machines we design, in function and purpose.

The logic clearly allows God to be an "abstract object," which is usually where these sorts of arguments end up. But it does seem that he enhances the position to push towards the idea of a personal God. Oh well.

You can only do this after an understanding of "purpose" in nature has been defined. I'll explain this further below when I talk about "evidence."

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/47...use-lc-789993/

There's not a lot of value directly related to our topic here, except to say that you've got a lot of arguing ahead of you if you want to make the claim that determinism can be shown empirically.

You still need to clarify your sense of the word "evidence." The idea of 100% certainty is a red herring.

Here is where your concept of "evidence" is most blatantly confused. It's not your job to "find" evidence, but if you cannot even admit that you don't even have a concept of evidence that would qualify, then you have arranged an impossible standard for the other side. Since you have no standard, you can *ALWAYS* say "that's not evidence" or "that's not enough evidence' or any of a number of other objections. It's not good enough for you to say "I'll know it when I see it." It's intellectually disingenuous.

This is what happens with conspiracy theories -- they've arranged their understanding of the situation in such a way that no amount of evidence can convince them.

This is not helpful, but does highlight how poorly you understand the concept of "evidence."

Since you seem to believe that a philosophical problem can be approached empirically, it does not surprise me that you think what you think.

In principle, it is impossible for you to scientifically study the question of whether everything is in principle able to be studied by science. Science is not a self-verifying epistemological standard.

I think your weaknesses in philosophy are showing.

So, what you're essentially saying here is: "for things we know they are not designed, the appearance doesn't matter. But for things which appear to be designed but we don't know whether they are designed or not, we will assume they are designed". I can't think of a better demonstration of an argument from ignorance.

Oh no, please, anything but the bacterial flagellum! This "argument" has been crushed, smashed... and completely destroyed. Does it ever occur to you to read more than one of the sides on an issue?

Wow, that is one long thread. I don't know if I will be able to read the whole thing any time soon. Can you show me the parts which are more relevant to our discussion here?

An observation which is compatible with one theory and incompatible with the rival theory.

But again, it's not my fault that they are presenting a view for which no evidence can be presented! What if I asked you to tell me what kind of evidence would qualify for the falsification of the existence of Santa Clause? If you can't tell me what the evidence would look like, should I accuse you of intellectual dishonesty?


And that is just your assertion. Since you're accusing me of not knowing what evidence is (?) can you tell me what your definition is?

Of course I think a philosophical problem can be approached empirically. Why shouldn't it? Most contemporary philosopher think that philosophical problems should be ultimately resolved with science. People who want some of the issues to stay in philosophy are just afraid that their view is going to be falsified and want to remain in the comforting realm of abstract reasoning in which nothing can be shown to be false. I don't understand how you can dismiss what those studies have found without having any idea for what they're about?

Come on, man. You can't play the "you're weak in philosophy, you don't know what evidence is" type of card forever. It's not fair. Either elaborate on your remarks, or just don't make them. I don't know what you think you're accomplishing by declaring me ignorant in different fields.

The relevant theme is that the question of free will vs. determinism is not empirically decidable. It came up in several points throughout the thread, but there is no single are where it's thoroughly discussed.

The basic idea is that there is no empirical measurement or series of measurements that can either prove or deny the existence of free will. It's just as nonsensical as trying to disprove the existence of non-physical entities by measuring things.

This doesn't work. An ellipse can be approximated to an arbitrarily high degree of accuracy using epicycles (it can always be arranged to fall within any degree of error). Therefore, observations of celestial objects neither supports nor rejects the theory of elliptical orbits. You are clearly invoking something else, and this is happening at a higher level because it has nothing to do with the empirical observations themselves.

It's not about "fault." It's about whether you are able to engage the conversation in an intellectually honest manner. If you have established a system in which the other side *CANNOT* make any positive statements, then it's impossible to actually have a conversation about it. You've denied their ability to advance an argument that you are willing to accept. Therefore, they're just talking to a brick wall.

I think there's plenty of evidence that Santa Claus isn't real. But it's not on the basis of some sort of empirical measurement in which I attempt to capture Santa Claus in a net or something like that. It's a matter of tracing the intellectual origins of Santa Claus. The American understanding of a man with cheeks like roses and a nose like a cherry can be traced to a poem.

It's just that this isn't evidence in any conventional scientific sense. And this is where your understanding of evidence reveals an extremely narrow epistemology that is INCAPABLE of addressing many questions.

Evidence is information that points in one direction or another. It's broadly defined because many things qualify as evidence. I have no necessary standard of repeatability, or falsifiability, or anything like that. It includes untested sensory input, and it also includes the values obtained from highly tuned, specialized instruments. It includes logical thought processes and abstract arguments that are completely disjoint from any empirical effects at all.

LOL on so many levels.

Level 1) LOL @ Appeal to authority, especially after making such a big deal about it
Level 2) LOL @ Ad hominem, because you can't even find a way to produce a positive argument for your position
Level 3) LOL @ "Most contemporary philosophers think that philosophical problems should be ultimately resolved with science" because it's FALSE. Where did you get this belief? And how can you assert such a strong consensus when the views of philosophers vary so dramatically on such a wide range of topics? It feels like you're talking our of your rear end here.

I'm not dismissing ANY empirical information that is being provided. I'm dismissing the ability of those studies to do what you are claiming that they do. There is a logical error in the position that there exists empirical data that disproves the existence of free will. You can prove that the will can become affected or even disabled due to drugs or magnets, or that the experience of free will is correlated with a particular set of impulses from certain neurons, but there is no empirical measurement which, when completed, actually concludes with "therefore, there is no free will."

It's very simple. You've set up a self-defeating standard of knowledge. You won't accept that it's a self-defeating standard of knowledge. I have nothing more to say.

You don't have a coherent system of understanding for this conversation. You're making it up as you go, and it's very obvious that you're doing this. There's evidence in previous posts that you don't do very well talking philosophically, which only adds to my skepticism that you're actually able to have a meaningful conversation at this level.

What do you hope to gain in the conversation by drawing a line between "prove/disprove" and "looking for evidence"? Are you going to bring up 100% certainty again, as if that's a meaningful distinction (especially coming from someone who is trying to use science as the epistemological standard)? I see nothing more than a smoke screen of words that don't carry useful content.

Well, I guess it depends on the particular 'we' your appeal to authority for knowledge of the universe includes. For example, Quentin Smith now accepts both premises of the KCA on empirical grounds, as he argues in his chapter "Kalam Cosmological Arguments for Atheism" in The Cambridge Companion to Atheism.

Did it ever occur to you to find out what the argument from ignorance means? Or the definition of evidence?