You are still assuming "movement" and "causality" are real. If, as the argument states, that they are illusions based on the complexity of the state we find ourselves in a static universe of the present moment, then you can completely remove time.

For the other points, I do not believe you understand the argument as you are still assuming time in your premises. This is understandable, I had the same objections when I first encountered this theory but the more I reflected on it, the more I came to see that it could be true.

To take your argument and assuming what we experience as time has "external" reality or reflects change, re: the singularity hypothesis, I am not sure that is a good candidate as you still run into problems explaining how that singularity came to be (as for anything to come to be, time would be required). I suppose one could argue that within a singularity where the laws of physics may not apply, things can occur in ways we cannot currently comprehend that can cause time to start, however, that is still right now as much a flight of fancy as imagining a world without time. It does remind me of one theory that suggested the big bang is actually the explosion of a black hole in another universe, and that each black hole in our universe spawns its own universe, and that we do not see black holes as exploding due to time dilation (if we were to speed up time, we would see them explode like supernova if billions of years were viewed in seconds).

Your response assumes time and causality are real, and not an illusion.

However, the argument states that if you remove time, then causality itself is an illusion.

If you remove time, there is no prior moment, or subsequent moments. There is only this present moment. The only reality, in this theory, is the present moment. Think of a photograph. It is a snapshot of a static universe. What if, in this static universe, certain things were constituted in such a way that they had a brain with a memory, with expectations of things to come, and even an experience of a world that has passed and is now moving and full of life when in reality, nothing happened or is actually happening as it is, in fact, a static universe like a photograph?

This static universe does not need a cause or a start because in order for it to have one, time would be required, but if time is not a fundamental structure of this reality: then it simply is.

Although we may "experience" things are happening and that time is real much as Plato's cave-dwellers worship the shadows on the wall as reality, we do run into several issues if we assume reality as we experience it is reflective of the actual and fundamental structure of reality, qua, questions such as how can something come from nothing, how can anything exist without a start or causation, or why is there anything at all instead of nothing?

Consider this: What is the past if not memory? What is the future if not what we expect? Can you prove the past or the future have occured or will occur? You can only fall back on this very moment of "right now", all else could be an illusion. Even what you just read may only be a result of the complexity of the reality you find yourself in "believing" in such a past when in fact there is only "right now" that has any reality, a now that never passes but exists timelessly (not eternally for there is no time). See the Boltzmann Brain hypothesis for additional elucidation of this theory.

This is not some half-baked theory, but something derived from quantum theory, specifically the Wheeler-DeWitt equations, which offer a description of a world where time is not required in order for a world to exist.

Having said that, this is a theory (and not my own). There are many others which assume time is real that I find very appealing as well but no other theory that I have come across can best explain the problem of first causation in a temporal universe as the one that eliminates time.

I like the comparison between the present moment and a hard drive, but why not take it a step forward and propose like Barber that time and motion are illusions and even the past and future? No time means there is no need to explain how something can come from nothing for nothing ever happens in a static universe: things just exist in a timeless state.

The problem with asking for something to have a start is that the argument might always be circular: there will always be a need for a "prime mover", at least with much of how we understand the world now. People can argue space-time as an emergent phenomona, quantum fluctuations in the void, but none of that ever really solves the problem of explaining how those things themselves came to be. Some will say this is beyond the limits of our understanding, and perhaps that is the correct approach.

However, there are other views as well: existence may very well be a brute fact, without beginning, without end, an eternal wheel. In that sense, perhaps Time itself is the one thing that requires no start (though this does take a very simple view of Time or Change as being something which exists independently of any observer).

However, a contrary view is that worldly existence may also be an illusion, in which no Time or causality exists in-itself, but is just a by-product of the complexity of the present reality we eternally exist in (e.g., block theory of time, boltzmann brain). In this view, the past and future are not real, time does not actually exist, and we exist in a static universe where nothing ever happens because time does not actually exist, we are just deceived into believing it does by how our mind is constructed in this reality of the "present moment" in which we are stuck like a broken record that does not realize it is playing the same moment over and over. If you remove time, you eliminate the need for a start, for causality, because if time does not exist, nothing ever passes or comes into existence, everything just is as it always has been and always will be. You need not ask for a "how" or a "start" in a timeless universe since without time, nothing ever happens, things just exist. There is no need for someone to put them there, for you would need time in order for that to happen and time never was, nor will it ever be, a feature of noumenal reality in this theory.

Having said that, I still find a timeless theory a bitter pill to swallow and would like to believe our experience of time has some validity but I think many assumptions we have of basic reality, especially related to quantum reality and specifically, entanglement, will need to be better understood in order to pave a new theory that will make everyone go "ah-hah! How could I have not seen that before?".

The answer may very well be out there, I just think we are not there quite yet (unless of course the timeless interpretation is real and we are stuck in Plato's cave admiring the shadows).