The second way of Aquinas is to do with causation and that nothing is an efficient cause of itself. Aquinas believes cause and effect are natural in our world and that whatever happens is caused by something else. It would be illogical to say something can cause itself because that means it was there before it began, “It is necessary to admit a first efficient cause to which everyone gives the name of God”, therefore there needs to be a first cause – that is God. It is not possible for the efficient cause to go back to infinity, because if there is no efficient first cause, there will be no following causes.
The third way is Aquinas’ belief of a necessary being. Nothing in our world is permanent – everything is contingent which means it exists but could equally well not exist. Considering this it means it is possible that there was a time when nothing existed but since we know it is not possible for nothing to come from nothing, which means there had to be something in existence. There was a time before certain things existed, and there will be a time when they no longer exist. There must also have been a time when nothing existed. For Aquinas, the only thing which has always existed is God (who would therefore have necessary existence). Furthermore, Aquinas saw no way to explain how anything was here, unless something was already in existence prior to it. Thus if God did not exist, nothing else would exist. Aquinas concluded that this necessary being, which all contingent beings came from, is God.
In conclusion it is evident that Aquinas’ cosmological argument seeks to argue for the existence of God based on what we experience of the world and universe we live in. The central aim of the argument is to establish what caused everything to be here and how the world and the universe began.
Hume’s criticisms alone completely discredit the cosmological argument – Discuss
This statement represents the view of those such as Kant, Russell and of course Hume himself who are against the cosmological argument because of various faults in the theory. I disagree with the statement as I believe the cosmological argument is a logical way of establishing how the world and universe began – there must have been something that is outside space and time, non-contingent and needed no cause of its own and this in my opinion was the superior power of God.
The philosopher David Hume questioned the idea that every event has a cause. Hume pointed out that human beings are in a habit of assuming that every event has a cause, but he believes this cannot be proved. Although I agree that that our minds are in the habit of seeing causes and effects this is because there is sufficient evidence to believe this. Since all things in the universe are, in my opinion, dependent on something else for their own existence, for example, people would not have existed without their parents, the universe as a whole can be seen as a collection of contingent objects therefore the ultimate explanation for their existence must be external to the universe, i.e. God was the cause. Hume also believed that just because things have causes doesn’t necessarily mean everything does therefore he believed the universe was necessarily existent and caused itself. This is the fallacy of composition and although there is strengths in this idea, I do not believe that the universe so full of complexity could not have had a designer, which I believe to be God.
Hume was famous for recognising when a line of argument disobeys the rules of logic and instead of moving from one step to the next makes a great leap. To move from ‘everything we observe has a cause’ to ‘the universe has a cause’ is too big a leap in logic. Hume also argued that we assume that there is a relationship between cause and effect, because our minds have developed a tendency of seeing causes and automatically associating effects with them – this is called inductive reasoning. Although I do not believe that Hume’s criticisms completely discredit the argument I do agree that this is a constructive point as we cannot assume a connection between cause and effect and they could possibly be separate events.
Hume’s next criticism is one of the lack of empiral evidence as there is no direct experience of the creation of the universe. Hume maintains that the Cosmological argument begins with familiar concepts of the universe and concludes with not-so-familiar concepts beyond human experience. For Hume, God’s existence cannot be proven analytically since the definition of God’s nature is not knowable. Hume concludes that it is not possible to prove the existence of a being who is unknowable and different from all other beings. When considering this I see Hume’s point however there is no evidence of any experience of the creation of the universe therefore the idea of proof in this aspect of philosophy is, I believe, irrelevant.
In conclusion, given the controversy and debates that surround the cosmological argument, including Hume’s critiques, it is certainly apparent that the theory is not without its faults. That having being said, I do not believe that the criticisms of Hume completely discredit the argument as there is no proof of anything to do with the creation of the universe therefore every viewpoint can be reasoned with. Even today the cosmological argument remains appealing and credible and after balancing all opinions, although it is slightly contradictory when saying everything needs a cause except God, it stays a strong argument that Hume’s critiques have not completely discredited.