The first cause argument is the silliest and most ridiculous of the arguments for God's existence. All of the first cause arguments, be it the Kalam argument or the Contingency argument, fail because they needlessly deny the possibility of an infinite series. Not only that, but they most surely do not prove any God's existence. Rather, they prove there is a first cause, which could be anything. Ockham's razor lets us shave away any needless hypotheses about a necessary God when we can simply say that energy was the first cause and the one necessary thing.
A quick refutation of the Kalam argument:
1. Anything that begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
The argument uses Big Bang cosmology to support the second premise. However, Big Bang cosmology denies the first premise. Technically, the singularity always existed. It is arguably "synonymous" with nothing, but it's not exactly "nothing". Not only that, but the universe couldn't have "begun" to exist, because time itself was created at the Big Bang. If time was created along with the universe, then that means the universe existed for all time, or always. And, of course, this argument only proves that the universe or energy itself may have been the first cause. Not only that, but a tacit assumption of the argument is that there cannot be an infinite string of causes, but that is an unwarranted assumption.
God is not a theory, because it makes no predictions and has no explanatory power. String theory is derived from quantum physics and should make certain predictions that could test it. I don't know much about string theory, and I suppose you aren't exactly a Phd in the matter either, so I don't think you are warranted just throwing it out there saying it isn't based on evidence or that it doesn't follow scientific methodology by making ample predictions.
First of all, dark matter DOES give off evidence, which is why scientists tend to believe it exists. There are certain unexplained gravitational effects, and the theory of dark matter seems to account for this. Not only that, but dark matter is not "nonexistence", so I don't really see why you think it is relevant to my discussion.
This has nothing to do with what I said. Science does make claims. One such claim is that man evolved from apes. Science is not absolutely certain, but it is based upon evidence, predictive power, and falsification. Even scientists can make claims about how the world works.
If the theory has explanatory power and accounts for phenomenon while making falsifiable predictions, then the theory certainly isn't believed without "evidence". The explanatory and predictive power IS the evidence. That's how science works. Your example thus has nothing to do with my argument. Any hypothesis of God, however, would have virtually no explanatory power because it absolutely could not be tested based on its predictions. It would predict any observation.
For an example, let's look at the debate between "intelligent design" and evolution. Evolution predicts that we should observe certain features of biological life. We should not biological similarities in structure and DNA for ancestors and descendants. If we don't, it is probably wrong. We should observe vestigial parts that are evolutionary left-overs from a time when they were once used. If we don't, it is probably wrong. We should also observe a geological distribution that gives off evidence of common descent. If we found that the animals that are supposed to be related could not possibly have migrated to two distant areas, then there is a problem.
Notice how with evolution, the fact that it SPECIFICALLY predicts certain observations, and the fact that a contrary observation could falsify it, is what gives it such great explanatory power.
Let's look at intelligent design. What would we expect to see? Well, we could see similarity OR dissimilarity. A designer could design it either way. We could see vestigial parts or no vestigial parts. The designer may have been inept or silly and put those useless parts in there for fun. We could see any geographical distrubtion whatsoever, because the designer could put organisms anywhere he chose.
So you see, this theory makes no predictions and has no explanatory power. Even though it can account for the observations we make, the fact that it can account for ANY observation is why this is no big surprise. Evolution, however, can account ONLY for these observations, and yet that's just what we see. It would be a miracle for such an accurate prediction if it were false!
I have shown why the cosmological argument fails. Stop spouting off this nonsense about how theories of dark matter and string theory are the same as theories of God. They are not the same.
The theories would NOT be consistent with the scientific method if there were a lack of evidence. I think the problem is that you don't understand what would constitute evidence. Notice how, in the evolution example, no one need directly observe evolution to know it is true. The evidence is in its effects, which can be observed, and which are specifically predicted. The predictive power of a theory, and the fact that the observations fit the framework while not falsifying it, IS the evidence. the first step of the scientific method is to hypothesize, but one can't hypothesize about just anything. Saying, "Magical elves did it" could certainly explain almost anything, because magic can account for anything, but that doesn't make it a good scientific hypothesis.
I don't think you know what "testable" means in science, either. Something is testable so long as it makes specific predictions. The Big Bang theory, for instance, would predict an expanding universe and red shifts. There are other predictions we could also pull from the theory. This is what allows it to be tested. If one of the predictions turns out false, we can abandon it. The reason there are so many competiting theories for the origin of the universe is because a lot of it is so speculative that it is difficult to test. But why you think this is evidence for accepting God's existence is silly. This is a god of the gaps argument. You have retreated into uncertainty, a good hiding place for any God, and then said that this gives us sufficient evidence to believe. Hold it right there. That's complete crap. Give me some predictive power of your "god" hypothesis so that I can potentially test it. Otherwise, I will write it off as being wholly unsupported by any evidence or explanatory power.
"another good example is string theory. the strings of string theory are too small to even come close to seeing them through the most powerful microscope."
Again, the fact that we can't "see" them or DIRECTLY observe them doesn't mean they are believed in WITHOUT EVIDENCE. We can't directly observe evolution, either. But that doesn't mean all the things it predicted isn't evidence.
Simply listing off a bunch of theoretical physics and then waving your hands and saying "God is just like that" is silly. It is NOTHING like that. Give me a prediction, or a test. Keep in mind the scientific definition of prediction or testability, not the one you seem to have invented.
"you remain neutral until evidence is forthcoming. just like you don't assume god exists (religious) or assume he doesn't (atheist). the logical scientific answer to whether there's a god is to be agnostic."
You must not have understood my post then. Nonexistence CANNOT be proven with evidence. The ONLY thing you would expect to see given nonexistence is a complete LACK of any evidence. Given that this is a very specific prediction, and it could potentially be falsified by receiving evidence, it is reasonable to conclude from the lack of evidence that God does not exist. This is a type of scientific reasoning. I am looking at the specific prediction of a claim, noting that it has been fulfilled, noting that it could be falsified, and adopting it. A claim of existence, on the other hand, would make no specific prediction. It is compatible with lacking evidence (if we're ignorant) and present evidence. Therefore, it can't be falsified. Therefore, the burden of proof should be on their shoulders.
Not only that, but agnosticism is an epistemological view, not an ontological one. And to claim that scientists can't make a predictive hypothesis about nonexistence...indeed, to make any claim of nonexistence IMPOSSIBLE by denying my inferences...is limiting inquiry at the highest level, and is certainly not pragmatically justified.
Whew.
