Existence of God - Based on Observation

Question 1

What is Aquinas’ Fifth of the Five Ways? (Summa Theologica)

Answer 1

• The Idea from Aristotle of the Final Cause, the purpose of things
• Version of a design argument - achieves its end through its design
• Nature is teleological and everything serves a purpose
• Aquinas is not concerned with how things fit together
• There is purpose in the universe, purpose comes directly from the will of god

Question 2

Quote Aquinas in his Fifth Way

Answer 2

“natural objects, act for a purpose, and this is evident from their acting always - or nearly always” - Note even he says ‘nearly always’ showing perhaps even he struggled to find purpose in some things

Question 3

What is Aquinas’ example of the archer?

Answer 3

• An archer (who gives the arrow purpose) guides its arrow (which has no purpose) to the target just how God guides everything to its end

Question 4

What are some clear issues with Aquinas’ Fifth Way?

Answer 4

• Word ‘purpose’ implies a mental state - objects do not have a mental state
• Dock leaves found near stinging nettles - but why do nettles sting in the first place?
• Nettles could perhaps be used as medicine - but does not follow that purpose is in the nettles themselves
• We give things purpose

Question 5

Who was William Paley and what was his design argument?

Answer 5

• An enlightenment thinker
• Noted the complexity of the human eye and its ability
• Suppose you stumbled across a rock, you could denominate it came from natural causes e.g wind, erosion etc
• Instead you stumbles across a watch, there would be no denomination of a natural cause for it, it is far too intricate with its cogs etc - there must have been a watch maker
• Applied to the universe to show its intricacy has a creator, in this case God

Question 6

What are 3 vital comments made by Paley

Answer 6

1) Our inference would remain the same even if we hadn’t ever seen a watch, the watch is so obviously different from the rock it must’ve had a different type of origin
2) Even if the watch did not function perfectly as does the universe, there is enough evidence of design to deduce the watchmaker
3) Our inference would still be correct even if there were parts of the machine whose function we could not work out

Question 7

What is Humes 1st Criticism of Paley’s design argument?

Answer 7

The Aptness of the Analogy:
- The comparing of the world to a machine shapes the argument already, machines have machine makers.
- Suppose the world was a cabbage, it’s leaves are intricate in design and it serves a purpose however we would not draw the conclusion of a cabbage maker
- By choosing a machine for the analogy, they have already got the result they want

Question 8

What is Humes 2nd Criticism of Paley’s design argument?

Answer 8

The Epicurean Thesis:
- Finite particles in the universe moved around freely for infinite time, underwent every combination
- One of these combinations was relatively stable and fit well together, the one we live in - a universe with some apparent order
- Monkeys in a room full of typewriters with infinite time would eventually undergo every combination, the bible and Shakespeares works

Question 9

What is Humes 3rd Criticism of Paley’s design argument?

Answer 9

Argument from Effect to Cause:
- Cannot go from an effect to a cause greater than that needed to produce the cause
- Set of scales, only see one pan but it is in the air and we know the other is heavier
- We don’t know whether it has feathers or an elephant in it to make it heavier
- The same way we cannot go from the world with all its limitations to God
- Perhaps this world is a discarded effort of an infant deity or work of a committee of gods

Question 10

What was John Stuart Mill’s objection?

Answer 10

• Amount of evil in the world as an objection to design
• A flawed universe has a flawed creator
• Natural evil, e.g illness, plague, volcanoes, earthquakes etc
• Seem to be a part of the world structure, a good shipbuilder would not be good if his ships were leaky

Question 11

Quote John Stuart Mill

Answer 11

“Not even the most distorted and contracted theory of good”

• In his Essays on Religion, Nature and the Utility of Religion

Question 12

Quote Anthony Kenny on Paleys type of argument

Answer 12

“leads to a God which is no more the source of good than the source of evil”

Question 13

Explain the theory of Evolution

Answer 13

• Origin of Species, 1859
• ‘Survival of the fittest’ - T.H Huxley
• Natural Selection
• Survival is a matter of pure chance, species depend on their ability to fit in and adapt to the world

Question 14

Explain F.R Tennants modern design argument

Answer 14

• Developed the anthropic principle
• The world has created a precise environment for man, this must have been planned

Question 15

What does F.R Tennant assume?

Answer 15

• That the entire universe exists for the sake of the earth, this is unlikely
• The universe is an amount of vast space with so many possible events
• Where does evidence for design exist in remote uninhabited and uninhabitable galaxies?

Question 16

What is Richard Swineburne’s modern design argument?

Answer 16

• The simplicity of the universe
• Elements combined, following physical laws lead to such richness, simple and economical explanation would be that god planned it
• Temporal order, idea of all-pervasiveness of regularity of order in the universe, we accept induction as the basis of the laws of nature
• Swineburne appeals to Ockhams Razor

Question 17

What are some issues with Richard Swineburne’s argument?

Answer 17

• He asserts God as an explanation, for an explanation to work we must understand it, we cannot explain or know God’s mind
• Evil remains a problem
• Not all bits of the universe work well together or functions to an obvious purpose - not as simple and harmonious
• Modern science has found particles work in random ways, quantum theory points to a much more complex universe, not one on just Newtonian lines

Question 18

What are Aquinas’ first 4 of the 5 ways?

Answer 18

Cosmological arguments for the existence of god

Question 19

What is the Prime Mover? (Quote)

Answer 19

• for Aquinas, an uncaused cause who initiates all movement in the universe, motion is the consequence of a creative act of god
• “it is impossible… a thing could be both mover and moved”

Question 20

What is the First Cause (Quote)

Answer 20

“So we must admit a first efficient cause which everyone calls ‘God’ “
- Very term ‘God’ refers to something that does not have a cause
- God is the cause, we are the effect

Question 21

What are some objections to the First Cause? (Quote)

Answer 21

• Meaning of ‘cause’ in relation to God, God is not another cause in the way that a mixture of certain chemicals will cause an explosion, he is a very different kind of cause, we know a biological and chemical cause but nothing of a divine cause
• If God is a cause of no known type then we have no known process for understanding that about which we are talking, these are outside of scientific processes we are able to observe
• ” ‘Cause’ is now recognised to be a problematic notion, even in its normal use. How much more so in this abnormal use” - Dorothy Emmet

Question 22

What is Necessity and Contingency? (Quote)

Answer 22

• Everything in our existence is contingent, but not everything can be
• There must be something necessary, not dependant on anything else, on which everything depends
• Something cannot come out of nothing
• “there would be nothing in existence now, because things only come to exist because of things already existing”

Question 23

What are some objections to Necessity and Contingency?

Answer 23

• Assumes there was a time when once nothing existed, no reason to assume this, there could have been overlapping chains of contingent beings
• Bertrand Russell asks whether it makes sense to say ‘necessary being’, it is a special usage of the word
• If nothing other than God is necessary, we cannot see his necessity directly so its impossible to argue that we have a concept of necessity to which we can attribute to God