Cosmological Argument Flashcards
Overall
Based on the claim that everything exists because it was caused by something else; that ‘something’ was itself also caused by something else
However it is necessary for something to have started this all off- something which did not and was not itself cause/ created. That ‘something is God.’
Key Features
A posteriori Synthetic Inductive Its post evidence Argued based on evidence
Contingent
It needs something else to cause it and sustain it
Depends on something else for its existence/ truth it could be false
A plant is contingent of getting rays from the sun
Criticisms
Doesn't have to be God Science proves something can come from nothing No world making experience Inductive leap Something must have caused God Chance vs Cause
The five ways
Motion- Things that must be moved by something. There cannot be an be an infinite regression chain of movers (Infinite regression)
Cause- There must be a first uncaused cause
Contingency- Everything on earth is contingent. It is caused and comes into being. Has to be a necessary being
Gottfried Leibniz: Support
“Principle of sufficient reason”
The cosmological argument is inductive, gives reason for why we exist
We have not found a reason for the universe within the universe so it’s got to be external
J.L Mackie: Support
illustrated Aquinas’s rejection of infinite regress with a train; Each carriage pulls the one behind it, but it wouldn’t get anywhere without an engine
God is like the engine
David Hume: Criticism
Argues Aquinas made an inductive leap. He moves from establishing the need for an uncaused causer, to identifying this as God
Bertrand Russell: Criticism
Even if specific things in the universe need an explanation; why does the universe a whole?
Some things are ‘just there’ and require no explanation – the universe is one such case
