Mccloskey Cosmological Argument

William Paley’s teleological argument (also known as the argument from design) is an attempt to prove the existence of god. This argument succeeds in proving that while existence was created by an aggregation of forces, to define these forces, as a conscious, rational, and ultimately godlike is dubious. Although the conclusions are valid, the argument makes several logical errors. The teleological argument relies on inductive reasoning, rendering the argument itself valid, but unsound. The argument fails to apply its own line of reasoning to itself, resulting in infinite regression. Beyond the scope of its logical flaws, the arguments content lacks accurate comparisons. The argument hinges on a

In his article, On Being an Atheist, H.J. McCloskey tried to show that atheism is a more reasonable and comfortable belief than that of Christianity.   McCloskey argued against the three theistic proofs, which are the cosmological argument, the teleological argument and the argument from design.   He pointed out the existence of evil in the world that God made.   He also pointed out that it is irrational to live by faith. According to McCloskey, proofs do not necessarily play a vital role in the belief of God.  Page 62 of the article states that "most theists do not come to believe in God as a basis for religious belief, but come to religion as a result of other reasons and factors."  However, he feels that as far as proofs serve theists,

As regards the cosmological argument itself, McCloskey states that "all we entitled to infer is the existence of a cause commensurate with the effect to be explained, the universe, and this does not entitle us to postulate an all-powerful, all-perfect, uncaused cause." (p.63) This is indeed true, there is no reason to necessarily infer a God person, however; the inference is of the nature that suggests (hence the term infer) a cause of such magnitude that it is practically God-like. Moreover, his words do not disprove the rational of a God. Entitlement not to call this cause "God" is neither entitlement to deny calling this cause or considering this cause to be "God."

The argument discussed is one that has an unending list of contingent beings, all of which need a cause for existence. According to the article, McCloskey assumes that the argument calls for an uncaused cause to start an infinite number of contingent beings. McCloskey believes that each contingent being simply exists with an infinite number of causes that eventually lead back to a case of chance. In “Philosophy of Religion” by Stephen Evans, Evans refers to this way of thinking as a “brute fact.” According to Evans, by claiming this stance would turn the partial argument into a whole argument and concurrently, “this will require the defender of the argument to claim that the contingency of the whole of the universe can validly be inferred from the contingency of all its parts.” Where McCloskey’s ignorance further takes a violent curve against acquiring knowledge about the beginning of the universe connects to his argument is when he said “This means that the first cause must be explained as being a necessarily existing being, one who cannot exist.” What he is alluding to, and is also the focal point of his disapproval of theism, is that humans do not have the right to claim that a being created the universe. If an atheist can claim that there is no such existence of God, then why is it that a theist cannot claim the existence of a God?

He went on to say that even if the universe did begin, it does not

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.

In the article, The Kalam Cosmological Argument by Theodore Schick, he states that there is scientific proof for explaining the creation of the universe but this proof also provides evidence of what others believe shows the existence of God, who to them, is the one who created the big bang that then created the universe. Within this article, there are several arguments that lie within the main premises of the overall argument that oppose to the idea that God is the creator of the universe. This argument would also be deductive and invalid. When doing the test for validity, there is a possibility that the conclusion could be false because it might not necessarily be God who was the cause for the universe but rather it was only the science that

Besides proving god’s existence, the cosmological argument’s fundamental function is to negate the possibility of an infinite regress, which means that things just keep going backwards in time forever without any definitive beginning. The cosmological argument consists of two precedents and one conclusion: (1) Everything that exists has a cause, (2) the universe exists (and therefore must have a cause), (3) ergo, god exists because he is what caused the universe. During Flanagan’s assessment of the argument, he indicates the logical fallacies that cause the argument’s downfall. First of all, the argument is, as Bertrand Russell put it, “flagrantly inconsistent” in nature because it, “…insists first that everything has a cause and then denies that everything that exists has a cause on the grounds that this would require believing in an infinite regress” which is exactly what the argument hopes to avoid. In other words, the fallacy is that the argument states that while everything in existence has a cause, god himself, who exists, is

Following the rabbit example with one along a broader scale, if a theist believes that if a substance cannot be produced by anything else, and an atheist would similarly agree, than that substance must inhere in itself, or that, “…if everything is caused by itself or another than God must be a substance, and as a substance, then His existence involves essence. Since God’s essence exists, then so does God.” (Lin, 2007, p. 274) What if an atheist believed that the cosmological argument was unsound because they were quite certain that God did not exist. Given their argument, they would in fact, by rejecting God’s existence, be acknowledging it based on a logical inference suggested by Kelly

I believe that every argument is defeasible. I think that the reason that McCloskey is saying this is because he is arguing the God of the bible and not the minimalistic ideal of God. Everyone is entitled to believe what he or she wants to believe, he saying that the cosmological argument, does not entitle us to an all-powerful and all-perfect God but that still does not disvalue the rational of there being a God in the first place and I believe that makes his statement meaningless in disproving the necessity and presence of God.

Another reason to doubt the Cosmological argument is because of Descartes circular arguing. For example, If premise V is true, an infinite substance can only cause ideas of an infinite substance then, God has to have a clear and distinct perception of a infinite substance as well. God has to have an idea of an infinite being in order to compare, and conclude, that

In the article, “On Being an Atheist”, H.J. McCloskey discusses the reasons of why he believes being an atheist is a more acceptable than Christianity. McCloskey believes that atheism is a more rational belief versus having a God who allows people to suffer so he can have the glory. He believes to live in this world, you must be comfortable. The introduction of his article, he implements an overview of arguments given by the theist, which he introduces as proofs. He claims that the proofs do not create a rationalization to believe that God exists. He provides 3 theist proofs, which are Cosmological argument, teleological argument, and the argument of design. He also mentions the presence of evil in the world. He focuses on the existence

McCloskey often and strongly believes that there are “proofs” which exist in the world. These “proofs” provide “sound” reasoning for why the existence of God is impossible. From Foreman’s presentation we can learn that we cannot use “proofs” to best explain the existence of God. As we look in the world and universe around us we see that God is the best possible approach. Just like we use best possible approach in the sciences, we can use the best possible approach to support that God does indeed exist. In all reality when we are faced with an argument, we can always find a way to refute the opposing view point. Fortunately, on the topic of God exists one comes to the end of the road eventual. God cannot be explained in the minds of men for we cannot comprehend God, no one can. For we

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.

McCloskey nevertheless attends to specific claims presented in each of the more popular proofs for God’s existence. Regarding the Cosmological Proof, he says, the existence of the world does not entitle one to hold that, since the world consists of an