On Matter

How can we know that matter is not eternal either in its parts or as a whole? Gangadean appeals to entropy and the fact that things in the observable world are differentiated in terms of certain properties. There is hot and cold for instance, and this is despite the propensity of what is observed to reach sameness over time (which is related to the second law of thermodynamics). If the observable world were eternal, and the laws of the nature were constant, then we would expect that there wouldn't be these types of differences---houses would become the same as the dirt on which they are built, as would the sun cooled like the space about it.

What I want to point out is that first, Gangadean rules out the very possibility that matter is eternal, by appealing to the findings of observable science. Of course, he has no way of, himself, verifying (with certainty) that the second law of thermodynamics is true of the totality of physical universe. As I understand it, the theory is based on widespread observation, but also very complicated mathematics and scientific theorizing and experimentation (notice, I'm told this third or fourth hand also). Likewise it is doubtful that anyone at WF is in any better of a position regarding verification. So I fail to see how this law can be appealed to in a deductive proof for God's existence. An argument is only as strong as it's weakest link. So first, Gangadean and anybody wielding this argument must be able to prove beyond any doubt (a thing that in principle, I think, is not even possible because our perceptions/observations are not fully trusthworthy) that matter (every last bit of it) behaves and is just the way that he says it does/is.

Secondly, Gangadean spends a good amount of time in his book (and his lectures) pointing out the limitations of drawing conclusions about the world based on observations. He cites optical illusions for instance, to show that our perceptual faculties are not entirely trustworthy. But then why does he depend on the findings of the observational sciences in a crucial step in his deductive argument? It would appear to me that he must qualify this step in his argument with, "Only if we can trust what we observe about the world, and extend this to the unobservable world" then matter is not eternal. But of course this would weaken his claim substantially. There would be no proof that matter is not eternal. You cannot use observational data as a premise in an argument to prove something with certainty unless you allow that we can be certain of what we see.

So what I am suggesting is that we don't know for sure, that matter is uniformly as Gangadean seems to think it is. It appears to us as if all of matter (that we can observe) falls prey to entropy or moves towards sameness, and is prone to change. This is what our current science and observations may tells us (again we can only trust the experts at their word, here). But since it is all based on observation, with our primitive tools and imperfect perceptual faculties, we must proceed with caution. We must also sort through how much of the scientific findings in favor of things like entroy are based on inductive reasoning (which has its own problems and also weakens any claim to a deductive proof providing premise: see Hume's problem of induction). This is particularly true when it regards matter at the most fundamental levels (notice Gangadean doesn't discuss fundamental particles when he talks about matter in its parts or as a whole), we may be surprised at what is later discovered.

Nor is it helpful to cite something like, "there isn't any good reason to believe otherwise." That's a contingent fact about what reasons we've discovered--it doesn't entail that there are not any such reasons yet to be discovered. The demands of clarity that Gangadean puts on everyone would not allow such contingent facts to matter. Otherwise, what is "clear to reason" would be dependent on things like "what we currently know" or "what our scientists currently tell us." That's no good for Gangadean's claims of knowing with certainty that matter can't possibly be eternal. He's not talking epistemic possibility here, he's talking metaphysical possibility.

(For Gangadean's argument against the Eternality of Matter see Philosophical Foundation, pp 52-53).