Examine the strengths and weaknesses of - The Thomist Cosmological Argument of the Existence of God - The Kalam Cosmological Argument

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Becky Jones U6T

a) Examine the strengths and weaknesses of -  

  1. The Thomist Cosmological Argument of the Existence of God
  2. The Kalam Cosmological Argument  (33 marks)

b) On what grounds can it be claimed that one of these arguments is stronger than the other?  (17 marks)

The term ‘cosmological’ derives from the word ‘cosmos’ meaning the world or universe as a perfect and well-ordered system.  The Cosmological Argument is a classical argument, which attempts to infer the existence of God from the creation of the cosmos.  Another name for the argument is ‘The First Cause Argument’ because it talks about the cause of the cosmos.    

The main propounder of the Cosmological Argument was St. Thomas Aquinas.  In his book entitled ‘Summa Theologica,’ he presents ‘Five Ways’ to argue the existence of God.  The first three of his Five Ways form the Cosmological Argument.

The First Way is based on motion.  In the world, things are in motion, and whatever is in motion must have been moved by something else.  For example, in a row of dominoes, the tenth domino is moved by the ninth domino, which is moved by the eighth domino, all as a result of a child knocking the first domino in the row.  According to Aquinas, this chain of movement cannot go back to infinity, so there must have been a first mover, which itself was unmoved, and began the movement in everything.  He believed that this First Mover was God.  

In his Second Way, Aquinas identified a series of causes and effects in the universe.  He observed that nothing can be the cause of itself, as this would mean that it would have had to exist before it existed.  So things come into existence because something has caused them to happen.  Aquinas rejected an infinite series of causes and believed that there must have been a first, uncaused causer that started the chain of causes that caused all events to happen.  This first cause was God.  

In his Third Way, Aquinas identified the contingency of matter in the universe.  Everything comes into existence and later ceases to exist, so he concluded that there must have been a time where nothing existed.  The cause of the universe must therefore be external to it and have always existed. This non-contingent being must be God.  

This is an A Posteriori argument, which can be defined as one in which the truth may only be true after empirical evidence has been used to prove it.  The advantage of this, is that the argument is based on something from which we have sense experience, in this case the universe.  The first premise of the Cosmological Argument is a posteriori.  Because it is based on what can be seen and experienced in the universe, it is incontestable, and should lead to a logical conclusion, a very strong advantage for any argument.

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    Leibniz supported Aquinas in his Principle of Sufficient Reason.  He believed that there must be an explanation or reason for everything, and therefore for the existence of the universe.  He argues that to say that there is an infinite regress would be saying that the world has no explanation.  Science however tells us that everything has an explanation so it is reasonable to assume that the universe has an explanation.  He therefore suggests that there can be no infinite regress, so the only explanation for the universe is an unmoved mover and uncaused cause, which he describes as ...

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