-Whether Time and chance have any kind of causal/creative capabilities.
-Whether the universe arose from nothing without a cause (self creation).
Objection 1
It seems that the universe and life came to be through some random chance occurrence. For science through the big bang theory has accounted for the origin of the universe in the distant past. And this origin was purely a natural phenomena.
Objection 2
It seems that the universe came into existence from nothing. For this phenomena is observable in everyday quantum physics, where virtual particles arise from nothing without a cause.
On the contrary, chance is understood as a description of the likelihood of something taking place. For in such a description we talk of a 50 percent chance or an 80 percent chance of a certain phenomena or event(s) taking place. Or in other occasions, we say the likelihood of event A taking place is 1 in every 1000 attempts. Therefore in the sense of what is does, chance is descriptive and predictive and in the sense of what it is, chance is purely an abstract concept.
Not a chance
I argue that Time and chance are all said to be abstract concepts. And such concepts in and of themselves possess no creative or causal capabilities. For abstract concepts exist in the mind and are properly the act of a mind. And due to their mind existence, abstract concepts have no ontological status of being. Therefore they can have no physical impact on what is real. For it would be an impossibility for time to move a bucket of water or for chance to lift a table or mathematical equations to put money in your bank account. Therefore without the agent capable of bringing about the effect in question, no amount of time or chance could ever cause anything to physically happen just like it would be practically and logically impossible for this abstract concepts to be the cause of the universe and life.
No amount of chance given enough time (millions of years) or time given enough chances could bring anything at all into existence, because all these abstract concepts have absolutely zero causal capabilities.
Self Creation
The model of origin through chance and time is self creation. For as demonstrated earlier, both time and chance are abstract concepts. And since abstract concepts exist in the mind, they have no substance and no status of being. Given that they have no status of being, therefore they are literally nothing and every argument for the origin of the universe through chance and time is basically a model of the origin of the universe from nothing without a cause (self creation).
I answer that, it is manifest that self creation is a logical impossibility. Because for something to create itself, it must be before it was. It must exist and not exist at the same time, a clear violation of the law of non contradiction. A universe just like anything else cannot arise out of nothing without a cause as that would amount to self creation. Therefore the universe must have been brought into existence by a cause other than the universe itself, a cause that transcends the universe. And so every model that appeals to some element in the natural world (including quantum physics) as the origin of the universe is simply invoking the idea of self creation i.e. the natural world is the cause of the natural world.
Conclusion
But if random chance even with the help of time cannot bring a universe into being, then it follows that intentionality or purpose or predetermination the opposite of randomness is the only other alternative. And it also follows that intentionality or purpose or predetermination are only the act of a mind. And so absolutely speaking it goes that the cause of the universe must be intelligent, and clearly a highly intelligent one for there to be such level of creativity. Such a being is otherwise known as God.