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I Believe In God

I enjoy the philosophy behind the existence of God. My favorite proofs for His existence are Thomas Aquinas' five ways, which are sadly quite terribly misunderstood by most people.
The second and fifth ways are my favorites, but here is the second way, a proof of God from efficient causation:

1. There are series of efficient causes of things in the world.
2. Nothing exists prior to itself.
3. Therefore nothing is the efficient cause of itself, because to be the efficient cause of itself, it would have to be prior to itself.
4. If a previous efficient cause does not exist, neither does the thing that results.
5. Therefore if the first thing in a series does not exist, nothing in the series exists.
6. The series of efficient causes cannot extend ad infinitum into the past, for then there would be no first member, and no things existing now.
7. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God.

Premise 1 is pretty obvious. Efficient causes are the usual causes that we see in day to day life. For example, electricity causes a light bulb to turn on.
Premises 2 and 3 go together. Nothing can cause itself, because a cause has to be prior to its effect. However, what Aquinas does not say is that everything has a cause. Things are either caused by something else or are entirely uncaused.
Premises 4 and 5 are pretty self-evident.
Premise 6 is one which most people misinterpret to be speaking of an entirely different type of causation than what Aquinas had in mind. For Aquinas, there were two different types of causal series.
1) Accidentally ordered series. In these series, the effect is not dependent on the cause for its existence. An example of such a series is people having children. The children continue to exist and produce more offspring even after their parents die.
2) Essentially ordered series. In these series, the effect depends on the cause for its existence. An example of this would be someone's hand moving a stick which in turn is moving a stone. Once the hand stops moving, both the stick and stone stop moving. They depend on the movement of the hand for their movement.
Aquinas wrote elsewhere that he did not believe it was possible to philosophically prove that accidentally ordered causal series could not go on to infinity. Therefore, he is talking about essentially ordered series.
So, if we go back to the stick pushing the stone scenario, the stone is moving because the stick is moving, the stick is moving because the hand is moving, the hand is moving because certain motor neurons are firing, and these are firing because of others, and it keeps going back and back and back, but if there is no first member in the series, there is no way the stone can be moving at all. Aquinas concludes that there must be an uncaused cause sustaining things in existence at every moment, and that this cause is God. It's not just the watchmaker God of modern intelligent design arguments. It is a God continually, actively, sustaining His creation, which I think is a very beautiful picture of Him.

I am indebted to Edward Feser's book Aquinas for this information.


HazelMotes
It's amazing that Aquinas didn't notice the fallacy in his reasoning. If God always existed, for an infinite amount of time, then it could be said that one moment of God's existence "caused" the next one. Aquinas' God didn't just pop into existence from nothing; at any moment of his existence, there was a moment which preceded it. So he still has an infinite series.

Aquinas is also unclear on the concept of time. An act of will, such as God's creation of the universe, has two components: conception and execution. If these occur in sequence, then God is trapped within the arrow of time the same way we are; time, in other words, would be more powerful than God.

This is why a conscious, causative, involved deity cannot exist.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
God is not composed of parts, so ultimately, all of his traits are interchangeable and although we see them as different aspects they all come down to the same thing. God is all of those different things, but He is also one. God is being, and anything predicated of being is also necessarily part of the essence of being. Aquinas held that truth = goodness = beauty = oneness = being = God. God isn't the sum of a bunch of different things because He is one. His traits are all one and the same thing, although we have a conceptual distinction between them and see them all in varying degrees in all created things.
Isayoldchap
God is not, Himself, being. He is a being. Just as we are lesser beings, He is the supreme being, but he is separate from the universe and separate from other individual beings. In order for hell to exist, humans need to be entirely separable from God, so His essence cannot be being, which is existence. He is the cause of existence, but he is not synonymous with it. This is my understanding, though if The Angelic Doctor's differs from mine, I'm probably wrong. I would appreciate it if you would quote or direct me to the particular portion of the Summa that you got this from. I should like to study it, myself.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
Here's the Summa online: http://newadvent.org/summa/1.htm Check out question 3, articles 3 and 4.
DarksBane
1-4 are unproven and quite possibly wrong. Nothing has ever been observed to contradict these four statements, but that doesn't mean that nothing in the potentially extreme oddity of unobserved reality does. Also, they eat the idea of an unmoved mover. If nothing can exist without a cause, then said mover has to have a cause, thus making it moved and incapable of solving your 'problem.'-Statement #6 is unproven. There's no reason why a series of events can't infinitely regress the way they can infinitely progress.-Statement 7 is generally bullcrap. Even if this unmoved mover exists, it could've been anything from the quiet birth of spacetime to the violent death of a randomly spawning star. Neither of those two things are sentient, omnipotent, etc., contrary to the description of God.
-
EDIT:
1-4 are valid claims. I had initially mistaken them for a similar set of claims.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
What you quote is an objection that Aquinas refutes in the article. Aquinas holds that the existence of God is not self-evident to us. He always sets up his writing by first stating objections and then refuting them. This one in particular is Saint Anselm's ontological argument, and I completely agree with you that it is flawed.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
What Aquinas was referring to here is specifically the transcendentals, which are qualities that all being, or everything, possesses. Beauty, oneness, truth, goodness, and being were qualities that Aquinas held to be present in all things.
His statement about fire was an error of the physics of his time, so that is understandable. But nowadays we would say that heat is present wherever there is molecular motion, and absolute zero would be a temperature at which molecular motion stops. We say things are colder or hotter, but that really refers to a thing possessing more or less molecular motion. All things still possess some degree of heat as long as there is motion. If there is an absolute hot, then all things that possess heat resemble it in varying degrees. One might argue that the opposite applies, and that all things resemble coldness in their closeness to absolute zero. But I would argue that anything that possesses the slightest degree of heat resembles absolute hot in that it possesses some heat. Absolute coldness stands on its own in possessing no heat whatsoever.
It's the same with the transcendentals. Everything that exists possesses some degree of beauty, oneness, truth, and goodness. "oneness" just refers to a thing's unity and identity as a whole, so it's easier to focus on truth, beauty, and goodness. "Truth" here must be understood not in the sense of true or false statements, but in being true to one's nature. Something that is more beautiful is arguably something better and truer than something less beautiful. Nevertheless, all things possess these qualities, and a complete lack of them would result in non-being. Because all existing things possess these qualities in varying degrees, Aquinas argues that there must be a maximum that is goodness itself, truth itself, and beauty itself, and that all things resemble it.
I hope that makes sense.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
By "best result" here, Aquinas doesn't mean a single result applying to all of humanity. He is talking about each and every thing in nature acting "always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result." He believed that teleology, final causes, or purpose existed in nature. An acorn would suffice as an example. Acorns always grow, or try to grow, into trees. If they are eaten or not planted, they are prevented from doing so, but they still contain the ability to do so. If they are planted in bad soil, they might grow a little bit but then die. Nevertheless, they are still acting towards the end of growing into a big oak tree.

So, why is it that acorns lacking intelligence consistently grow into trees? This also can be applied to evolution. Why is it that all matter tended towards the result of producing life and higher forms of life?

For Aquinas, matter lacking intelligence cannot possibly tend towards such ordered and consistent results on both smaller and bigger scales, unless it has a creator continually directing them towards their results. There cannot be final causality or purpose without efficient causality.
Rycbar17
I'm glad you've found a philosophy writer that supports your beliefs. I just read Aquinas' proofs a few months ago for a college course, but found it a bit flawed honestly. I understand this paradox with infinite regression, we must have had something to start off this chain reaction we call the universe after all. But Aquinas just says that we understand this prime mover as God, but is it really the Hod we depict in Abrahamic religion? Who is to say this prime mover isn't a pantheon of deities, or a single deity that is misunderstood by the human race, or etc.? This proof only shows there must have been a prime mover, a substance that is self-efficient. Why then can't the universe be self-efficient, or the Big Bang, or you. The universe continually supporting itself through its natural processes, the effects of the Big Bang still unraveling, etc. It was a good start for Aquinas, but it needs work if it's going to prove the existence of God.
Rycbar17
Is this the whole argument that God embodies all perfect things and He then must exist since it is more perfect to exist than not to exist? Or am I confusing philosophers here?
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
You might be thinking of the fourth way, which is also hugely misunderstood. But besides the five ways, Aquinas has other arguments for just what sort of being God must be and his attributes and stuff like that.
Rycbar17
Kk. Well again I'm glad you found a philosopher you like :)
Darktooth41
I like how this implies there is a first thing. That came first. Because it had to have come first. There had to be a beginning. But we call it God.
This origin could be anything. It is God, I suppose. But is it the God we know? Or something else entirely? Hooray for never being able to know. Because knowing would be boring.
FriarJuniper
Thank you for posting this. If your profile is accurate you are quite the intellectual for your age! Personally I don't buy the logic of this argument but it is beautiful as poetry.
darkanddesolate · 26-30, F
Thanks. As for me, I cannot help but see the logic of it. Aquinas for me is the greatest philosopher who ever lived. His writings are quite difficult to comprehend, but even the small bit of them that I can grasp is truly inspiring.
manstars
Please go to youtube and enter this in the search box:
CONTACT 2016 I.V.(EPISODE 3) THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE FOREVER TIME
Cheers, AelousAthene
AoSS
Would you be interested:

http://www.experienceproject.com/stories/Believe-In-God/7428982
theguywiththeredhair
Very interesting take on the existence of our Creator, I must say.
Amanwhowanders
It's a nice try but it's still just conjecture
Trex34
Deep stuff. Thanks for sharing.

 
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