1. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, that come into being and go out of being i.e., contingent beings.
2. Assume that every being is a contingent being.
3. For each contingent being, there is a time it does not exist.
4. Therefore it is impossible for these always to exist.
5. Therefore there could have been a time when no things existed.
6. Therefore at that time there would have been nothing to bring the currently existing contingent beings into existence.
7. Therefore, nothing would be in existence now.
8. We have reached an absurd result from assuming that every being is a contingent being.
9. Therefore not every being is a contingent being.
10. Therefore some being exists of its own necessity, and does not receive its existence from another being, but rather causes them. This all men speak of as God.
Subscription Note:
Choosing to subscribe to this topic will automatically register you for email notifications for comments and updates on this thread.
Email notifications will be sent out daily by default unless specified otherwise on your account which you can edit by going to your userpage here and clicking on the subscriptions tab.
Again number 7, and this time it is certainly not a postulate, and it does not follow from 1-6.
So how would the contingent entities arise if they were not caused by another entity?
That is just the problem. You have the hidden postulate that only entities can cause other entities to arise. So clearly 7 can not be derived from 1-6.
No. You're confusing terms. I said contingent entities in my response. The argument itself is a reductio ad absurdum of the idea that all entities are contingent. Premise 6 shows that, if every being is contingent, then there was a point when there was no other being that could have caused new beings. Premise 7 just shows how that view leads to nothing arising at all.
Uhh, your reference to 6 and 7 as being premises, despite the fact that you clearly labelled them as conclusions is quite shocking. I don't know what else to say without making an insult. Literally stunned.
I haven't used the term "conclusion" once. I never labeled them as conclusions. I labeled them as the 6th and 7th premises. They are premises of the argument that concludes that you must have some non-contingent beings. Honestly, what are you talking about?
The OP is flawed because it draws a conclusion without facts. It states facts that are not facts. It is a classic case of forming a theory based on a predetermined outcome.
BUT let's just assume this highly opinionated line of flawed logic is indeed fact. The glaring component is that his god could not exist because the god would have to have come from nothing and his line of reasoning states that is impossible.
At any rate, the OP failed to PROVE his god in the first place. Therefore his god does not exist.
Why do you make a point of confusing contingent and non-contingent beings? Are you familiar with the terminology here? God would not have to come from something because he's not a contingent being. The entire point of the argument is to show that non-contingent beings must exist. By definition, nothing caused something that is non-contingent. The non-contingent being is grounded in and of itself and not by another cause.
@ Radical
You are doing nothing more than using semantics to come to a predetermined conclusion. That is a fallacy of logic. Prove your god. Prove that said god is non-contingent. Then prove that said god took the actions that you claim. So many childish holes in your theory it isn't even funny.
I don't have a predetermined conclusion. The conclusion follows from the premises. There must be an ultimate cause that is non-contingent. That means an eternal being. And what actions am I claiming god took?
@Radical
NO, you definitely have a predetermined conclusion. You take a "leap of faith" leaving out facts necessary to come to your conclusion. If this were a term paper or even a legal argument, it would fail and be thrown out due to the lack of evidence to support it.
If you don't believe me, just try and submit it to the Academy of Science. It would be summarily rejected!
Why would I submit a deductive argument to an institution focussed on inductive truth? I think you're the one who's not giving any evidence here. Show me how the conclusion doesn't follow from the premises. Or show me which premises are wrong and how you this.
@Radical
You said:
1) 1. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, that come into being and go out of being i.e., contingent beings.
Answer: Where is there evidence of this? This is just a blanket statement of YOUR opinion. "WE" who is "we"? Science makes discoveries of what is, NOT what is not.
You said:
2. Assume that every being is a contingent being.
Answer: The key here is "assume". Why should I or anyone "assume" anything? I want facts, not assumptions.
You said:
3. For each contingent being, there is a time it does not exist.
Answer: How do you know that to be true? And if it is true why shouldn't we "assume" that ALL things are contingent? The flaw is that there is an unanswered variable. You assume that some things are contingent and others are not ( actually that only one thing is not). You have jumped to a conclusion with absolutely no supporting evidence. In other words, you have moved the goal post. You interjected a variable and haven't accounted for it.
You said:
4. Therefore it is impossible for these always to exist.
Answer: You can't know that to be true but state it as fact. The fact is that all things take a different form and never disappear. Such is the case of energy. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/energy-can-neither-be-created...
You said:
5. Therefore there could have been a time when no things existed.
Answer: If we accept your logic, then even the non-contingent thing couldn't have existed. http://www.space.com/20710-stephen-hawking-god-big-bang.html
You said:
6. Therefore at that time there would have been nothing to bring the currently existing contingent beings into existence.
Answer: refer to answer to #5.
You said:
7. Therefore, nothing would be in existence now.
Answer: Again refer to answer to #5
You said:
8. We have reached an absurd result from assuming that every being is a contingent being.
Answer: No, YOU have reached that conclusion. It is just YOUR opinion and nothing more, and why it is your opinion, for the life of me, I can't see why!
You said:
9. Therefore not every being is a contingent being.
Answer: Again you haven't proved this to be true. It is just YOUR opinion, not a fact.
You said:
10. Therefore some being exists of its own necessity, and does not receive its existence from another being, but rather causes them. This all men speak of as God.
Answer: Again this is where YOU have moved the goal post AND take a huge leap of faith.
A) Why does there need to be some being that exists on its own? Can you prove that this being exist? Can you prove, that if said being exist that it has the capability and did indeed cause other beings to come into existance? Then you say "This all men speak of as God." That is a false statement. Not all men believe there is a god or anything like the being you describe, and FYI not many will accept your highly illogical factless opinionated theory.
If you can't understand the fallacy of your stream of conscience nonsense, then I cannot help you. Also, YOU have made claims and stated what YOU deem as accepted fact in your OP. Don't shove your responsiblity of proof on me. If you wrote this as a thesis, you would have to argue for it. You wouldn't be allowed to push the burden of proof onto the board you would be presenting to.
1. We know contingent beings exist because we know that certain states of affairs can give rise to others.
2. We assume that all beings are contingent because this is a reductio ad absurbum of that claim.
3. I know that to be true because of the definition of contingent beings. If they are contingent, then they are caused by another being. That means at some point, they didn't exist.
4. If energy was never created, how is here? Are you arguing that energy is necessary? That would mean energy is eternal? But then you'd have to throw out the big bang. Energy is conserved within the system we call the universe. We're going beyond the universe with this argument.
5. What necessary thing couldn't exist? The premises so far have assumed no necessary beings exist. There is no necessary being thus far in the argument.
6. This argument is designed to show that only contingent beings existing is impossible because nothing could have arisen.
7. Refer to 5 and 6
8. What do you mean it is just my opinion? We reached a conclusion that nothing could occur if we have only contingent beings. Since things have occurred, we know that there must be necessary beings. This seems very simple and yet you seem to understand it so poorly.
9. What do you mean I haven't proved this? Again, you're just operating at a surface level. You're not willing to go further than stating it's my opinion. How does one premise not follow from the last? That is what I need to understand from you.
10. It needs to be something that exists on its own because every single one of the 9 premises before this show that a world in which only contingent beings exist is impossible. YES I can prove that this being exists because I just DID. It must cause other beings to come into existence because it is the first necessary being. Now you could certainly argue for multiple first causes, but that's a separate discussion. The "all men speak of as God" was part of Aquinas' argument. He was a Catholic in the 13th century. Of course he thought all men called the first cause "God". But I am not a Catholic. I think there is reason to believe the first cause(s) must be a mind or minds.
You refuse to PROVE ANYTHING! The fact is that energy actually existed BEFORE the Big Bang. It merely changed and that is it. Science doesn't assume knowledge beyond what is known or can be proven. You apparently do. Even so, you STILL jump to a conclusion. You ASSUME that there is a non-contingent being. You assume that everything else IS contingent. You assume that the non-contingent beings created the contingent. That is a pure assumption and illogical. If we would actually use your premise, we would conclude that the non-contingent beings would create non-contingent beings, not mortal ones. As for your reference to the catholic statement, it is just more christian dogma.
Cool. So what caused your god to exist?
You're making the same mistake as the other atheist. You confuse contingent beings and necessary beings. The aim of the argument is to show that necessary beings must exist. I'm in a Skype discussion where someone is arguing that the cosmological arguments are question-begging.
@RW
"1. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, that come into being and go out of being i.e., contingent beings."
How do things come into being and go out of being? When a living thing dies, the materials of its body are transformed into other things, but they do not go out of existence. The same is true of stars and everything else in the universe. I'm actually several billion years old, though the present pattern of my matter is a little younger than that.
Your phrase "go out being" suggests total annhilation. Can you give an example of that happening in nature?
I would say Aquinas was referring to your essence going out of being. So when the living thing dies, that living thing has has gone out of being. The matter, of which it is composed, did not go out of being. But the living being did. The essence of the being was that it was living. That essence has ended.
RW: "I would say Aquinas was referring to your essence going out of being"
What's "my essence"? Does this theory apply only to living things?
Have you heard this one? I have a very old ax that belonged to my great grandfather. It's had several new handles and a couple of new heads, but it still works fine." Does the ax still exist, or has it "gone out of being"?
In my ontology, the original ax lost its essence when you changed the handle the first time. The essence applies to all things.
"the original ax lost its essence "
But it's still the same system, the same concept, the same function. Your body is constantly rebuilding itself. Does that mean you're losing your essence?
"The essence applies to all things."
Yes, but what is it? You introduced this term, so you should define it. Does it consist of atoms, or is it the system around which the thing is built, like my ax?
Essence is the ontology of a given system. The system being either the ax or the human. The essence of the human is changing all the time yes.
"Essence is the ontology of a given system. "
Yes. And ontology is the essence of a given system. You'll have to do better than that.
So what happens when something "comes into being" or "goes out of being"? This seems to be the foundation of the argument you initially presented.
If we're talking about living things, they are created through sexual or asexual reproduction, which means they inherit their essence from the cells of their parents. I carry the DNA of my mother and father, and I have their essence in my memory. They're both dead, but does their essence continue in me, or has it been annhilated? I note that you're not talking about consciousness from your statement "The system being either the ax or the human."
You seem to be perceiving our continuously interconnected reality in terms of discretely separated units.
RadicalWhiggery:
2) Even if every being is contingent, it does not follow that the set itself is contingent. (From mathematics we know that the fact that every element of a set possesses a property does not mean that the set must possess that property.) Thus, the universe may not be contingent even if all objects in it are contingent.
5) "Could" or "Would?"
6) A universe that is not contingent could bring contingent beings into existence. Why do you use the word "being" which is used often for a living being? Perhaps "object" or "physical arrangement" understood to apply to a region that is more or less well defined.
7) Again, we have the possibility of a non-contingent universe. What if nature doesn't share your idea of "nothing?" For all you know, the most empty reality can get might be space with quantum fluctuations, meaning that from your perspective there never could be a state of philosophical nothing. That is, a portion of nature might not be contingent. You are simply assuming that there is a lower level floor of "nothing." Nature doesn't have to agree with you!
8) How do you rule out an infinitely old reality? It might be contingent beings all the way down! There is no reason to assume that all contingent beings in that reality had to be missing at some point of time. Since there is no beginning, there is no need for a non-contingent starting point. (Also, consider my point above.)
10) Assuming for the sake of analysis that there had to be a non-contingent being, why just one being? Several contingent beings, responsible for different parts of reality (as in a committee) might have been the case. One non-contingent being would, obviously, not be responsible for bringing in any of the others. How is it that this contingent being has life, intelligence? If nature has a bottom floor, especially if empty space and quantum fluctuations, that would be a much more realistic stab at a non-contingent being (if one is needed). Are you prepared to call empty space and quantum fluctuations (or some other aspect of nature) "God?"
Would you be interested in continuing this on Skype?
@RW: "Would you be interested in continuing this on Skype?"
No thanks. I like this forum. I can compose a post in a few seconds while I'm working. Skype would take my whole attention.
We do calls pretty much daily, but no one has to join these. You're always welcome to just post arguments in chat and have people respond. The reason I'm asking is because I'm not as philosophically educated as many of the people in the Skype group. They could probably give a better answer to your questions than I could.
RadicalWhiggery:
I should add one more observation. If there was a real proof for God it would be taught in every university philosophy class. It would make the front pages of every newspaper. It would be all over the Internet and featured by Wikipedia to the exclusion of all else. It would be hailed by every theologian who would promptly drop all of the other dubious arguments. The electronic pulpit would go crazy! It would be in refereed, scientific journals everywhere! There would be no such thing as an intelligent, Christian theologian or philosopher who admitted that there was no proof of God.
Why the huge silence? I can only think of two excuses. Either the proof is so incredibly complex that philosophers are still divided over it, or that it is really, really recent and hasn't had time to catch on. I don't see either of those conditions applying to your proof. The most reasonable explanation for it not catching on is that it is just another piece of philosophical smoke and mirrors. Someone, guided more by wishful thinking than by rigor, has overlooked one or more subtle (or not so subtle) errors that get pointed out by other philosophers in obscure journals. The popular "proof," however, lives on in the minds of some people.
Good point Greensnake. When the whole world has been searching for several thousand years, absence of proof becomes proof of absence.