The Cosmological Argument

Question 1

How did Aquinas attempt to prove the existence of God?

Answer 1

a Posteriori

Question 2

What does ‘Cosmos’ mean?

Answer 2

The universe

Question 3

Describe the argument from motion

Answer 3

• Everything in the world is moving or changing
• Nothing can do so by itself
• There cannot be an infinite regress of things changing other things
• There must be a Prime Mover (God)

Question 4

Describe the argument from causation

Answer 4

• Everything in the world has a cause
• Nothing is the cause of itself
• There cannot be an infinite regress of causes
• There must be a first cause (God)

Question 5

Describe the argument from contingency

Answer 5

• Everything in the world is contingent
• If it is possible for things not to exist, there must have been a time when they did not
• There must have been a time where nothing existed
• Things exist now so something must have brought them into existence (God)

Question 6

What did Copleston say about the CA?

Answer 6

• There are things that are contingent
• Nothing in the world is self-explanatory
• There must be a cause of the universe which is outside of it
• This being must be self-explanatory which contains within itself the reason for its own existence
• This necessary being is God

Question 7

How did Russell criticise Copleston?

Answer 7

• Refused to accept the notion of a necessary being
• “The universe is an unintelligible brute fact”
• “I should say the universe is just there and that’s all”

Question 8

How did Hume criticise the CA?

Answer 8

• We have no experience of creation so we cannot speak about it meaningfully
• To move from ‘everything we observe has a cause’ to ‘the universe has a cause’ is too big a leap in logic

Question 9

How did Kant criticise the CA?

Answer 9

Said that we cannot jump from the physical world to the metaphysical world

Question 10

Who was Aquinas (13th century) influenced by when proposing the CA?

Answer 10

Aristotle and his Prime Mover