Summary Of The Cosmological Argument

Just under seven years ago, astronomers using the Hubble space telescope presented results they hoped would help answer one of the most contentious issues in astronomy of the 20th century – the question of the distance scale of the universe. But there was some unease when the result was announced. According to the report, other galaxies were close enough that, extrapolating backwards from their current rate of recession and making adjustments for the influence of gravity, they all would have been together (that is, the Big Bang would have occurred) as recently as 8 billion years ago. Unfortunately, there was strong evidence already in place that some stars were at least 12-15

Many philosophers have posed the question: How can I prove that God exists? Thomas Aquinas attempted to prove the existence of God in a rational way through his Cosmological argument. Aquinas argued that every event as we observe it has a cause and a casual chain cannot be infinite. Therefore, a first cause is necessary and this cause is God. Aquinas’ argument is unsuccessful because it assumes that God is a necessary being, fails to prove that the world is not an infinite chain of events, and undermines the basis of his argument by saying that God is infinite.

Celebrated on October 31st, the festival of Halloween (also known as Samhain) includes dressing in costume, trick or treating, and decorating. Tracing back in history Halloween is considered to be one of America’s oldest holidays, and is still celebrated today. Halloween is believed to come from Celtic rituals. Celtics believed the cosmological myth of Saman (Lord of the Dead). Saman would call on the souls of the people that passed away that year to take them to the afterlife or underworld; the Celtic underworld identifies with the Christian Hell. In order for the spirits to believe they were on their own, the living would wear costumes and mask their identities, along with fairies, witches and demons. This functions as a cosmological myth because it provides a creation story and framework in which this universe occupies and includes many other realms of existence. Another tradition that followed was to give food to the Saman, to persuade him to be more tolerant while he judged the dead ancestors of the living, which he would chose to take to the underworld. In this essay I will further investigate what the origins of Halloween consist of and how it offers reasoning for trick-or-treating. Also I will examine how trick-or-treating, which is still continued today, is connected to ancient Celtic festivals.

The Cosmological Argument takes several forms but is basically represented below. Cosmological Argument Things exist It is possible for those things not to exist Whatever has the possibility of non-existence, yet exists, has been caused to exist. Something cannot bring itself into existence because it would have had to exist to do

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.

have been as a result of a divine being, who wished it to happen, and

Objection zero states, “The Cosmological Argument does not get us to the Christian God”. Some might think of the independent being as something different than God, though Clarke’s intention was never to get us fully to God. Clarke never personifies the independent being, thus it could be anything one might believe it to be. The overall goal of the Cosmological Argument was to get us all to accept there might be an independent being and it is the responsibility of other arguments to show us that the independent being is

The Strengths and Weaknesses of the Cosmological Argument for the Existence of God The cosmological argument seeks to prove the existence of God by looking at the universe. It is an A posteriori proof based on experience and the observation of the world not logic so the outcome is probable or possible not definite. The argument is in three forms; motion, causation and being. These are also the first three ways in the five ways presented by Aquinas through which he believed the existence of God could be shown.

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.

SWA4: Is the cosmological argument commonsensical? Samuel Clarke and Baron D’Holbach have very different views when it comes to an infinite being. D’Holbach is an atheist who says that believing in a good is not reasonable or innate. Further, he says religion makes people give their attention to something they can never comprehend or experience. Clarke on the other hand believe that there has to have been a being that has exited in all of eternity without a cause a being that just exist because of absolute necessity.

Catholic Church: St. Thomas Aquinas (Cosmological Argument) In St. Thomas Aquinas’s cosmological argument claims the following that the universe exist and its very existence has a cause and that cause is God. In his unfinished book Summa Theologiae, Aquinas put forward five ways for the existence of God. His first way is the argument from motion and by studying the works of Aristotle, the Greek Philosopher, he concluded from common observation that the planets, rolling stone or any object that is in motion is put in motion by other forces or object.

out that God is unique and that the laws of nature do not apply to

My favorite argument for the existence of God is Thomas Aquinas’ fourth cosmological argument, which is based on our conviction that things can be quantified. If something can be sweet-sweeter-sweetest or big-bigger-biggest, there must be an absolute maximum by which to set the standard to judge all the rest. (Highfield, 2008). I’ve always felt that nothing comes from nothing. Everything has to have come from something. If our world is the happenstance of some cosmic collision, where did the colliding matters come from? There must be a Creator who is greater than creation, i.e. God, “the uncreated creator of the world.” (Highfield, 2008, p. 94). Like Pascal, I’ve always felt it better to believe in God’s existence and risk only the loss of

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 eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Christian belief encountered significant opposition. Until then, most of the world shared the belief of the “Medieval world view” that not only was the earth positioned at the center of the universe, but that God was all knowing, all powerful and all good. God was thought to have created and sustained the wondrous workings of the universe. This belief told the people all they needed to know about the meaning and purpose of life. Then, scientific discovery and methods began to undermine religious beliefs. Scientists began to reveal that natural laws and natural forces governed the world. Opposing beliefs, e.g. the Marxism belief, criticized Christian views. People like, Bacon, Copernicus, Kepler,