Cosmological Argument
- Created by: GKMorrison
- Created on: 29-01-14 11:23
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- Cosmological Argument
- Nothing can be the cause of itself
- The universe changes
- The world consists of contingent beings that have the possibility not to exist
- 2 Chief claims
- Whatever begins to exist has a cause
- The universe began to exist
- The universe has a cause
- Whatever begins to exist has a cause
- The universe has a cause
- David Hume
- He was an empiricist
- Relied on knowledge gained only from the senses
- Asked whether the universe had to have a beginning
- Just because everything in our world is governed by cause-effect, that doesn't meant the universe had to have a cause
- "If the material world rests upon a similar ideal world, this ideal world must rest upon some other; and so on, without end"
- Suggested that maybe there wasn't one Prime Mover.
- Could there be more serving as a committee?
- Challenges cause-effect saying that it might be the case that what we perceive as causation is simply statistical conjunction
- Linking together similar cases with the same statistics
- The whole purpose of an action is perceived to have a specific cause due to past experiences and expectations that we have
- Questions why the Prime mover has to be a christian God
- Based on past experiences, wouldn't it be more logical to suggest a world created by male and female gods who are born and who will die?
- He was an empiricist
- Thomas Aquinas
- Is it obvious that there is a God?
- Beyond all direct human experience
- Can it be made obvious?
- The universe is God's creation
- Evidence of God's creation can be found using intellect and reason
- The universe is God's creation
- 5 a posteriori proofs for the existence of God
- 5 Ways
- 1) Motion
- Kalam argument
- Everything in the world is moving or changing
- Nothing can move or change by itself
- There cannot be an infinite regress of things changing other things
- Therefore there must be a prime mover
- This is called God
- Cosmological argument is based on the first three of Aquinas' ways
- 2) Causation
- Everything in the world has a cause
- Nothing is the cause of itself
- There cannot be an infinite regress of causes
- Therefore there has to be a first cause to start the chain of causes
- This first cause we call God
- 3) Contingency
- Everything is the world is contingent
- It can either exist or not exist
- If things can not exist, there must have been a time when they did not exist
- If everything in the world can not exist, there must have been a time when nothing existed
- Things exist now so there must be something on which we all depend which brought us into existence
- This necessary being we call God
- Focused on contingency
- Everything is the world is contingent
- 1) Motion
- Is it obvious that there is a God?
- Fredrick Copleston
- Focused on contingency
- There are things in this world that are contingent
- They might not have existed
- All things in the world are contingent
- Everything depends on something else for its existence
- Therefore there must be a cause of the universe that exists outside of it
- This necessary being is God
- This cause must be a necessary being
- One which contains the reason for its existence inside itself
- Immanuel Kant
- Opposed the theory that a chain of cause-effect events can be set in motion from outside the realm of the physical universe
- Any talk of the casual cycle stretching beyond the empirical world is non-sensical
- Makes no sense
- Cause-effect is set within a spatio-temporal world
- Relating to space-time world
- Cosmos = the universe as an ordered, harmonious and holistic entity
- Argues for the existence of God a posteriori based on the apparent order of the universe
- Nothing comes from nothing. The universe exists, so something must have made it. That can only be God.
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