• Leibniz’ Principle of Sufficient reason adds that there needs to
be a ‘complete’ or ‘sufficient’ reason or cause for everything
that exists
• The Kalam Argument is that the universe must have a cause
because everything in the universe has a cause, although the
cause (God) is different from the universe because the cause
must be distinct from the effect.
• Craig adds that because the present moment exists, time can
not be infinite; and as God chose to create the universe He
must be a personal being.
• Swinburne argues that the universe relies upon God’s
continual creation for its existence, if God ceased to exist so
would the universe..
• Copleston says that God is a ‘Cause in esse’: one which
sustains its effect continuously because the universe is
dependent upon God’s continual creation.
Amcan y wers
• You will study the views of
philosophers who dispute
Aquinas’ Cosmological Argument.
• You will assess whether these
criticisms show that the
cosmological argument is
ineffective or effective.
Lesson objective
John Stuart Mill (1806 – 1873) Theism
• Agreed
“Our
experience
instead of
furnishing an
argument for
a first cause,
is repugnant
to it.”
with
Aquinas’ theory of
cause
• But he argued that to
say the cause of the
universe is uncaused
is a contradiction.
• He questions: if
God is the cause of
the universe then it
makes sense to ask
what or who caused
God?
David Hume Dialogues Concerning Natural
Religion (1779)
1) Aquinas’ version of the
Cosmological Argument
commits the fallacy of
composition (a conclusion
that what is true of the
part is true of the whole).
Therefore just because
everything around us has
a cause, this does not
mean the same can be
said for the universe.
David Hume Dialogues Concerning Natural
Religion (1779)
2) Aquinas may have been mistaken in thinking
that there had been a start to the universe. (Our
understanding of the laws around us are the
result of our experience – so we EXPECT that
everything has a cause.
Therefore we may be wrong. Our experience today may not
apply to the beginning of the universe.
• The universe could be infinite so maybe there was no
beginning and no external cause i.e. God.
• Why couldn’t the universe cause itself? After all God
is self-caused.
• There could be an infinite regress of cause (The
process of cause and effect going back infinitely;
needing no primary cause). Therefore no ‘start’ to the
universe. (However while a valid philosophic
argument this is not a valid scientific argument (think
about the ‘Big Bang’).
David Hume Dialogues Concerning Natural
Religion (1779)
“Why may not the
material universe
be the necessarily
existent Being,
according to this
pretended
explication of
necessity?”
David Hume Dialogues Concerning Natural
Religion (1779)
3) Questions Aquinas’ argument that
God has ‘necessary existence’.
Says that this is inconsistent with
contingency. Because Hume says
it is illogical that God is different to
everything else.
Why should the cause of the universe
not be contingent like everything
else?
Immanuel Kant: Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
• We can only know the things about the world around us because
we experience these things everyday.
• But we have no direct experience of the creation of the
world – so we can not consider the possibility of
knowing the beginning of the universe.
• Therefore to try to arrive at a
conclusion about the beginning of the
universe ‘has no meaning whatsoever’.
Immanuel Kant: Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
Kant disagreed with the argument from
contingency (i.e. that God is a necessary being)
because he says that necessity cannot be applied
to anything that exists.
Necessary could be applied to
statements that could be
‘tautological’ (Something which
explains itself). Therefore to say that
a being is necessary contradicts all
reason and experience!
Anthony Kenny The Five Ways: St Thomas
Aquinas’ Proofs of God’s existence
• Uses modern scientific progress to
argue against the C.A.
• Influenced by Isaac Newton’s ideas:
First Law of Motion: ‘Principle of
Inertia’.
• Shows that animals have the
capabilities to move themselves
without being moved by another.
• It is possible that an object can be in
one of two states – stationary or
moving at a constant rate – without
any external force acting on it.
Bertrand Russel: Radio debate with FR Copleston (1948)
1) Agreed with Kant – illogical to use the
word ‘necessary’ when connected to a
cause.
2) Like Hume he argued that the whole
idea of cause is derived from our
experience of the world around us.
However we cannot use this experience
to conclude that the whole universe has
a cause.
3) The universe might be a brute fact
without a cause.
4) He refused to accept the idea that the
universe had a first cause. He argued
that there was an infinite regress of
cause. (The process of cause and effect
going back infinitely; needing no primary
cause).
“I
should
say that
the
universe
is just
there
and
that’s
all.”
“Every man who exists
has a mother; and it
seems to me your
argument is that
therefore the human
race has a mother, but
obviously the human
race hasn’t a mother –
that’s a different logical
sphere.”
Philosophers are split over whether the Cosmological Argument
adequately proves the existence of God.
John Stuart Mill questions that if God is the cause of the universe,
what or who caused God?
David Hume argues: 1) Just because everything around us has a cause
doesn’t mean that the universe definitely does; 2) The universe does
not necessarily have an external cause it could have caused itself or
it could be infinite; 3) Why should the cause of the universe not be
contingent like everything else?
Immanuel Kant states: 1) That as we have no direct experience of the
beginning of the world we cannot consider the possibility of knowing the
beginning of the universe; 2) ‘Necessary’ cannot apply to any being
(including God).
Bertrand Russel agreed with Hume and Kant and argued that the
universe may not necessarily have a first cause but that it could
have an infinite regress of cause.