Cosmological argument

Question 1

What is the cosmological argument?

Answer 1

The cosmological argument argues that God exists based on study of the universe.

Question 2

Is it a posteriori or a priori?

Answer 2

A posteriori as it is based on experience of the universe

Question 3

Is it deductive or inductive?

Answer 3

Inductive as it leads to a probable not definite conclusion

Question 4

How did Aquinas contribute to the cosmological argument?

Answer 4

Aquinas came up with five ways of proving that God exists through the use of reason alone. These five ways were posed in order to support faith. The first three ways form Aquinas’ cosmological argument.

Question 5

What is Aquinas’ first way of?

Answer 5

Motion

Question 6

Explain the first way of motion

Answer 6

• By this, Aquinas meant movement and change
• Everything in the universe has the potential to change into something else
• In order to change, external forces are required as nothing can change itself
• This means there is a chain of change
• Aquinas believed this chain of change could not be infinite
• Therefore the chain of change must have been started by something which was not changed itself (or else it would be part of the chain of change) but triggered change
• This must be God (based on Aristotle’s view of the prime mover)

Question 7

Why did Aquinas believe that the chain of change could not be infinite?

Answer 7

There is evidence of a beginning in Genesis

Question 8

What example supports potentiality?

Answer 8

Sperm and egg have potential to form a baby

Question 9

What is Aquinas’ second way of?

Answer 9

Cause and effect

Question 10

Explain the second way of cause and effect

Answer 10

• Aquinas believed the chain of cause and effect was not infinite due to evidence of a beginning in Genesis
  
  • The start of the chain must cause the chain without being caused itself (or else it would be part of the chain)
  • This was the uncaused cause or the first cause
  • This must be God

Question 11

What example supports cause and effect - causes resembling effects?

Answer 11

Match must be hot to cause heat in log

Question 12

What is Aquinas’ third way of?

Answer 12

Contingency

Question 13

Explain the third way of contingency

Answer 13

• Things in the universe come in and out of existence
  
  • Given time is infinite, all possibilities must happen
  • There must, therefore, have been a time when nothing existed
  • However, something exists now
  • You can’t get something from nothing
  • There must have been something that has always existed and does not depend upon anything else for its existence
  • Aquinas called this being the necessary being - it exists necessarily
  • This being is God

Question 14

How does Kenny criticise the first and second ways?

Answer 14

• Kenny argues that it is not the case that everything relies on something else for its movement or change – there are (or it as least possible for there to be) things that are self-moving. This uses Newton’s first law of motion. If this is the case, then it is possible that the universe could consist eternally of matter in motion. There does not need to be a prime mover. Kenny claims that we can find plenty of much more mundane examples of things that change themselves – animals and people for instance.
• Kenny argues that whatever causes the change does not have to have the characteristic of that change itself e.g. It is true that fire is hot and that makes the wood hot (Aquinas’ example) but Kenny points out that kingmakers are not necessarily kings themselves and dead men do not commit murders.

Question 15

What are the strengths of the cosmological argument?

Answer 15

• The Cosmological argument does give an explanation for the Universe. If there is an explanation for the Universe then it is possible that it could be contained in God.
• Science supports the idea that the Universe has a beginning e.g The Big Bang. Evidence that the universe is expanding also suggests that it had a starting point.
• If the Universe had no beginning, then an infinite number of past moments of the Universe’s history have elapsed, and they are being added to as time goes on. However, it is impossible to add to an infinite number of things. Therefore, we can not add to an infinite number of past moments of the Universe, yet the Universe continues to exist and past moments are added. This implies that the Universe has a beginning.
• The cosmological argument may be the simplest explanation for why there is something rather than nothing. It is the most plausible explanation.
• Without the first cause we are left with the question of why there is anything at all (Leibniz) – contingent explanations do not serve as a sufficient explanation for the universe.

Question 16

How does William Lane Craig support the cosmological argument?

Answer 16

He supports the idea that the universe cannot be infinite. Craig says to imagine a library with an infinite number of books. If you add a book to it or loan one out, it still has an infinite number of books in it (you cannot add to or take away from infinity). If every book was taken out, the shelves would still have to be full if it is an infinite library. Therefore infinity cannot exist in reality. It does not make sense.

Question 17

How does Coppleston support the cosmological argument?

Answer 17

He said “god is a sufficient first cause of the universe”

Question 18

What is Leibniz’s sufficient reason?

Answer 18

○ This states that everything that exists, everything that happens and everything that is true has a reason for its existence. This reason may be known or unknown but it will always have a reason.
○ Like Aquinas, Leibniz argued that as most things are contingent (come in and out of existence), there has to be something which is not contingent to sufficiently explain the reason for the existence of everything which is contingent. This “something” had to contain the reason for its existence within itself. This, he termed, the Necessary Being i.e. God.

Question 19

What are Russell’s weaknesses of the cosmological argument?

Answer 19

• “Brute fact” (also Satre)
• claimed that scientists were discovering “first causes which have not in themselves got causes” - eg energy is not created nor destroyed

Question 20

What are Hume’s weaknesses of the cosmological argument?

Answer 20

• The universe itself may be eternal - it does not need a beginning
• Just because everything in the universe has a reason for its existence, it does not mean that the universe has a reason for its existence
• We have no experience of other universes and their creation. We were not there when the universe started i.e. we have a lack of empirical evidence and so we cannot draw conclusions about the start of this universe or the design of it. As humans, we are inclined to make illegitimate leaps between cause and effect.
• It is possible to imagine something happening without a cause or a reason.

Question 21

What is Hume’s epicurean hypothesis?

Answer 21

Given infinite time, all possibilities would happen, so the universe would have come about in infinite time.

Question 22

Weaknesses of Hume/Russell?

Answer 22

• with infinite time, perhaps a creator could come about
• Just because we don’t know the cause, it does not mean that there is not one-Leibniz