Exploring the Possibility of Updating the Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God

In the following paper, I will outline Samuel Clarke’s “Modern Formulation of the Cosmological Argument” and restate some of the points that he makes. Samuel Clarke’s argument for the existence of God states that “There has existed from eternity some one unchangeable and independent being” (37). The argument follows a logical flow and can be better understood when the structure is laid out and the argument reconstructed.

1. The Cosmological Argument for the existence of God is based on the principle of cause and effect. What this basically means is that the universe was the effect of a cause, which was God. One of the oldest and most well known advocates of the Cosmological Argument was Thomas Aquinas who outlines his argument for the existence of God in his article entitled The Five Ways. The first way in his argument is deals with motion. Aquinas says that in order for something to be in motion something had to move it because it is impossible for something to move without the presence of some sort of outside force upon it. Therefore the world around us, nature, and our very existence could not have been put into motion without the influence of the

Leibniz and Aquinas adopt the view of contingency to explain the sufficient reason of ‘something rather than nothing’. To Hume’s fallacy of composition; which asserts that just because parts of a thing is caused by one thing, it is a mistake to believe the whole is created in the same way, it is only a matter of having one simple substance that makes up the whole thing. Let’s take for example a car which has different parts, made by different people; the wheel, the seats the doors etc. when each part is broken down into the simplest form in any form of matter, it is still an atom with sub atomic particles. Leibniz’s attempt to use contingency to suggest a cosmological argument is

Typically, cosmological arguments occur in two different phases. The first phase’s purpose is to provide the premise that there is a ‘first cause’ or an

The Key Ideas of the Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God A) The cosmological argument is to prove the existence of god. In this type of argument we are looking at cause and not design. This type of argument is an aposteriori argument because it is based upon experience. Thomas Aquinas puts the key ideas into 3 ways.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument presented by Dr. William Lane Craig states that everything that beings to exist has a cause, the universe began to exist; therefore: the universe has a cause. The Cosmological argument argues that the universe that we live in has a cause and purpose. There must be a creator (God) of the universe because the universe cannot have a cause without something or someone feeling the need to create. In the Craig-Dacey debate Dr. Dacey opening argument or rebuttal was aimed to disprove God’s existence. Dr. Dacey begin to show that the concept of God is self- contradictory.

The cosmological argument for the existence of God is based on causation and the world having a beginning. It holds that everything that exists has a cause and there must have been an initial cause. The argument attempts to prove the existence of God by making an inference from the world. It starts from the reality that things exist and then follows that there is a cause for the existence of these things. It acknowledges that something caused the universe to exist and some thing is currently keeping it existing.

The cosmological argument is an a posteriori argument which intends to prove that there is an intelligent being that exists; the being is distinct from the universe, explains the existence of the universe, and is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent and omnibenevolent. The basic notion of cosmological arguments is that the world and everything in it is dependent on something other than itself for its existence. It explains that everything has a cause, that there must have been a first cause, and that this first cause was itself uncaused.

The Cosmological Argument as previously discussed, is the existence of the universe and “cosmos” is the direct suggestion that God exists. This can be and is often indicated as the “first-cause argument”. This is because they believe that God is the first reason for the cause of the existence of the universe. One of McCloskey first complaints is that people are not suitable to believe that the universe needs a cause. McCloskey finds this to be true simply because, it would require a root for the universe which in turn, would also obligate a source for God. He then continues to profess that even if the cosmological argument is able to facilitate us to hypothesize the existence of God, then there would be no reason to hypothesize that God has to be omniscient, omnipotent, and many more. There are living things in our world that have no clue how they came to be. Essentially everything that happens has to be caused by something, which would mean that the actualization of our universe has to be contingent on a cause. He also stated that he believes that the cosmological argument, “does not entitle us to postulate an all-powerful, all-perfect, uncaused cause,“ (McCloskey, 51).

The goal of the cosmological argument is to support the claim that God exists as the first cause of the universe. According to Nagel, the argument runs as following:

He thus argues that the universe must be directed by an external intelligent being, and that is God. Through his fifth way, Aquinas clearly demonstrates design qua regularity and thus, the existence of

Cosmological Argument has been taking by many and divided into parts of their argument. Rowe was influenced by the Philosophers Saint Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century and Samuel Clarke in the eighteenth century. All men have similar view points, also are slightly different, and can be translated

Firstly I would like to start my argument with the famous 13th century philosopher, Thomas Aquinas. Aquinas’ argument is known as the cosmological argument. This is the idea of: the unmoved mover, the uncaused causer and idea of contingency, these three arguments are all a posteriori (based on the evidence in the universe around us). The unmoved mover is the concept that, in theory (is logically acceptable even for an atheist), that nothing can be in motion without something first putting

A cosmological argument focuses on the notion of causation and that everything in the universe including us must have an initial cause, for nothing comes from nothing. Thomas

I believe that that the Cosmological argument gives good reason to believe in the existence of God. The Cosmological argument focuses on everything having a cause except one thing that started it all, this starter is known as the “Prime Mover”. The Prime Mover is the one that starts everything without anything having a previous effect on it. With that people have assumed that the logical answer to who the prime mover is, is God. This to me seems the most logical of arguments because although there is the idea of eternity and an eternal cycle there has to be a starting point. I do not believe the argument is successful.