Pwrpnt - Contingency Cosmological Argument

THE CONTINGENCY OR DEPENDENCY

cosmological ARGUMENT for the existence of God

This Powerpoint presentation is prepared by Dr. Peter Vardy, Vice-Principal of Heythrop College, University of London for

Heythrop College,

DIALOGUE EDUCATIONAL VIDEOS. Copyright reserved

University of London, is the specialist theology and Philosophy College of the University. It offers undergraduate and postgraduate courses in Theology, Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion and Ethics. www.heythrop.ac.uk

The Cosmological Argument for the existence of God There is no such thing! There are a number of arguments. The major ones are: THE KALAM ARGUMENT – this argues for the need for a cause of the Universe at the beginning of time (these are dealt with on a separate Powerpoint) THE DEPENDENCY or CONTINGENCY ARGUMENTS – these argue for the need for the Universe to depend on something necessary, i.e. something that cannot not-exist. The arguments have a long history, pre-dating Aristotle. However Aquinas’ versions of the Contingency arguments and the Kalam argument are the best known today.

THE SIMPLEST VERSION Frederick Copleston sj (former Principal of Heythrop College) put forward what is probably the simplest cosmological argument in a debate with Bertrand Russell in 1947. Copleston’s argument misses out key steps in the arguments of Aquinas’ and Leibniz but retains the main thrust of their arguments.

COPLESTON’S ARGUMENT 1) EVERYTHING IN THE UNIVERSE IS CONTINGENT In this first premise, Copleston is claiming that all things in the Universe, from stars to trees to human beings, are ‘might not have beens’ they need not have existed and are dependent on something else for their existence. Nothing in the Universe is non-dependent.

Copleston’s argument (2) 2) THE UNIVERSE IS SIMPLY THE TOTALITY OF CONTINGENT THINGS AND IS ITSELF CONTINGENT This is the key step. It moves from saying that everything in the Universe is contingent to the claim that the universe as a whole is contingent. It is important to notice that there are two separate statements here – and that there is a a jump in the argument. Even if one accepts that everything in the world is contingent, it would be possible to argue that the Universe as a whole is necessary and that everything within the Universe depends on the Universe as a necessarily existent totality.

Copleston’s argument (3) 3) GIVEN THE UNIVERSE IS CONTINGENT OR DEPENDENT, THERE MUST BE SOMETHING ON WHICH IT DEPENDS – NAMELY GOD. If the Universe is indeed contingent (premise (2)), then it follows it must depend on something. Notice two further implicit assumptions here: A) That whatever the universe depends on has to be necessary (which means dependent on nothing else), and B) That whatever this is, is the same as the God of religious belief.

BETRAND RUSSELL’S REPLY Russell rejects Copleston’s opening premise – he rejects all talk of things within the Universe or the Universe as a whole being contingent or dependent. He does this because he claims that the very language of contingency implies there must be something necessary – he is effectively accusing Copleston of smuggling the conclusion in with the premise. Russell says that the Universe ‘just is’. It’s the ultimate brute fact and requires no explanation. If Russell is right to reject the language of contingency and if his claim that the Universe is the ultimate brute fact is accepted, then his reply undermines Copleston’s argument.

Copleston’s exasperation Copleston accepts that if Russell refuses to even ask the question why there is a universe, then he cannot be checkmated. The acceptance of the Universe as a brute fact rules out requiring an explanation. However he clearly considers this position to be unreasonable. As Gerry Hughes sj, Master of Campion Hall, Oxford, says “Any child of 5 would see that the question ‘why is there a Universe at all?’ is a reasonable one”. Supporters of the argument claim that God is a better ultimate explanation than the brute fact of the Universe.

THE KEY ISSUE The key issue is possibly whether the world as a brute fact (Russell) is more self-explanatory than God (Copleston) as the cause of the Universe. Hick and Swinburne take different views on this. It is essential, if the argument is to succeed, to show why God is the better ultimate explanation. Swinburne ('The Existence of God') maintains that God is a SIMPLER explanation than the brute fact of the universe because God provides a personal explanation - but this is debatable. Aquinas considered that God was metaphysically simple (this is the defining characteristic of the Thomist God on which other features such as God's timelessness, immutability, spacelessness, etc. depend) but this is VERY different from saying that God provides a simple explanation. Also, it is one thing to say God is personal, but it is far from clear what this means when applied to the wholly simple God it certainly cannot be understood univocally, it does not have a similar meaning to a human being who is seen as personal.

GETTING MORE COMPLICATED! Copleston’s is the simplest argument but in order to understand the issues more fully, it is important to be aware of more complex forms of the argument and replies to them. These forms start with Aquinas’ ‘Five Ways’ and, in particular, THE THIRD WAY – the argument from contingency. This argument includes additional steps to that of Copleston……….

Aquinas’ Five Ways

Aquinas' Five Ways are the cornerstone of Catholic Natural Theology because they claim to show that language about God successfully refers. Aquinas was not creating new arguments but using old ones. Aquinas' Fifth Way owed much to Plato's argument in 'The Timaeus‘ and the rest are derived from Aristotle. There are five arguments: 1) FROM MOTION 2) FROM EFFICIENT CAUSES 3) FROM CONTINGENCY AND NECESSITY 4) FROM GRADES OF PERFECTION IN THINGS, and 5) FROM DESIGN It is not at all certain that Aquinas DID intend his arguments to establish the existence of God independent of faith, although most commentators assume this was his intention..

AQUINAS’ THIRD WAY

Peter Vardy's summary of it is as follows: Everything can 'be' or 'not be', If this is so, given infinite time, at some time everything would not-be If there was once nothing, nothing could come from it, Therefore something must necessarily exist (NOTE MOST CAREFULLY that this is not God). Everything necessary must be caused or uncaused, The series of necessary things cannot go on to infinity as there would then be no explanation for the series, Therefore there must be some Being 'having of itself its own necessity', This is what everyone calls God. ALL THESE STEPS CAN BE CHALLENGED…

Aquinas’ Third Way Aquinas first sets out to show that not everything can be contingent. He claims that if everything can not-exist then, if there had been infinite time going back into the past, there would have been a time when there was nothing at all. He claims this because he considers that in infinite time all possibilities would be realised and one possibility is that nothing once existed. If, Aquinas claims, there was once nothing in existence, even now there would be nothing as nothing can come from nothing. He clearly considers it absurd to say there is nothing now. From this he concludes that not everything can be contingent – there must be something necessary.

NECESSARY BEINGS Aquinas considers there are two types of necessary beings: 1) CAUSED NECESSARY BEINGS. These are angels which Aquinas considered could not not-exist once they were created. He did not think there could be an infinite regress of such necessary beings as then there would be no explanation for the series. So there must be another category… 2) AN UNCAUSED NECESSARY BEING. This is the de re necessary God. The God who cannot notexist and is not dependent on anything else.

What is Aquinas’ ‘ultimate explanation? Aquinas' arguments purport to arrive at 'That which is necessary to explain the Universe' or that which is necessary to explain motion, causation or contingency. We do not know what God is, but whatever God is, God is whatever is necessary to explain the Universe's existence. There is a jump, however, from whatever this is to describing it as God. THIS GAVE RISE TO PASCAL'S QUOTE "The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - not the God of the philosophers". Aquinas ends his proofs by saying 'This is what everyone calls God' but this can be challenged. Aristotle's Prime Mover appears radically different from the God of most Christians. If we said that God was 'whatever sustains the universe in existence' we would be somewhere near to what Aquinas was saying - but this 'whatever' may be some way from Yahweh.

This lies at the heart of the central problem in Philosophy of Religion – namely ‘What is ‘God’?

God necessarily exists….. It is important to recognise that Aquinas ends up with God as de re necessary – God is necessary in and of God’s self and God is uncaused. This is NOT meant to be the same as logical necessity (de dicto necessity – necessity based on how words are used) which applies in the Ontological argument. It is really important to try to be clear on the difference between de re and de dicto necessity. The Ontological argument starts with de dicto necessity and attempts to arrive at de re necessity. Th Cosmological argument starts from the world and tries to reason to de re necessity.

The de re necessary, wholly simple God The de re necessary God is wholly simple, bodiless, without parts, immutable, timeless and spaceless. SIMPLICITY is the key defining characteristic of this God…. The two central characteristics of Divine simplicity are (1) the identity of essence and existence in God - God is not some thing that just happens to exist, God’s essence includes existence. God cannot be a material being because God: ‘...cannot have any intrinsic accidental properties: cannot, therefore, change in any way; and cannot be an individual of any given species or genus. Hence an absolutely necessary being does not have a nature in any straightforward sense at all’. (2) God has no potential. Everything in the universe is actual and has potential – but God is pure actuality and has no potential at all.

WILLIAM OF OCKHAM (1290 – 1350) Ockham raised three problems with Aquinas’ approach: He challenged Aquinas' view that an infinite series was impossible. He maintained that causes could be ORIGINATING CAUSES and not CONSERVING CAUSES He queried whether there was any necessary link between cause and effect. This was the same point which was made by Hume centuries later Ockham did not think it possible to prove that there was only one God nor that the most perfect possible being existed. There is a distinction between two possibilities. Either God is:

i) The most perfect being that actually exists - in this case, there is clearly such a being (whatever it may be) but this does not mean it is the Christian God, or ii) The most perfect being that could possibly exist. In this case, however, there is no way of showing that this POSSIBLE being is also an actual being.

Leibniz’ argument "Suppose the book of the elements of geometry to have been eternal, one copy always having been written down from an earlier one. It is evident that even though a reason can be given for the present book out of a past one, we should never come to a full reason. What is true of the books is also true of the states of the world. If you suppose the world eternal you will suppose nothing but a succession of states and will not find in any of them a sufficient reason.”

Leibniz’ argument Leibniz' argument can be summarised as follows 1) The world we see is changing 2) Whatever is changing lacks within itself the reason for its own existence, 3) There is a sufficient reason for everything either within itself or outside itself, 4) Therefore there must be a cause beyond itself for its existence 5) Either this cause is itself caused or is its own sufficient reason, 6)There cannot be an infinite regress of causes because this will never provide a sufficient reason, 7)Therefore there must be a first Cause of the world which has no reason beyond itself but is its own sufficient reason.

The key to this argument is the PRINCIPLE OF SUFFICIENT REASON which Leibniz thought to be self-evidently true.

Hume’s criticisms 1) Like causes resemble like effects - the most that can be derived from finite effects will be finite causes. 2) We have no experiences of universes being made. Nothing counts for or against the hypothesis about the origin of everything. 3) No proposition about existence can be logically necessary. The opposite of any statement about experience is always perfectly possible. This may rest on a confusion as Aquinas does not claim that God's existence is logically necessary - instead he claims that the existence of God is necessary GIVEN motion, cause, contingency, etc.. 4) The words 'necessary being' have no consistent meaning. Any being claimed to exist may or may not exist. 5) If 'necessary being' means only 'imperishable being', then the universe itself may be necessary. 6) An infinite series is possible. 7) There is no way of establishing the principle of causality (see discussion of this point under Ockham).

KANT Kant rejects the Cosmological argument as he did not consider there was any way of reasoning from finite events to a transcendent cause. In particular, he rejected the idea of a ‘necessarily existing being’ saying that this was nonsense. The only things that are necessary are propositions where truth rests on linguistic convention – in other words on the way words are used. Thus ‘All spinsters are female’ is true because of the way we use words and the definition we give to spinsters.

MARTIN LEE Lee considers that the Cosmological argument rests on a confusion as EITHER God is something or nothing. If God is something we can ask what caused God. If God is nothing, then nothing cannot be a cause of the Universe. So Lee rejects the very idea of a self-explanatory, necessary ‘something’. AQUINAS’ reply to this would be that God is NEITHER something NOR nothing – God is in a category of God’s own. The question, however, is how such a category can be established. He could be accused of inventing this unique category in order to stop the regress of explanation.

THE HEART OF THE MATTER The heart of the issue is whether the Universe needs an explanation. The most the argument itself could arrive at is a positive answer to this question and then to claim that the Universe does, indeed, have an explanation. This next step, the identification of this cause with the God of Christianity, Islam and Judaism is, however, a separate step and further argument is needed to establish this. Some hold that the unmoved mover, the uncaused cause, the de re necessary being is not personal enough to be the same as the ‘Thou’ of religious belief. This, however, is a separate issue…..