State and assess two different objections to the cosmological argument

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State and assess two different objections to the cosmological argument

In this essay I will look at the following form of the cosmological argument:

(1) Every being has a cause

(2) the world as a whole has a cause

(3) there must exist a necessary first cause who brought about the world

Firstly, I will look at the objections to the jump from (1) to (2); namely, it is wrong to jump from every being in the world having cause to the world as a whole having a cause. It is wrong to make this jump because our concept of cause is based on our view of 'particular things' (Bertrund Russell)1 and not the whole. Similarly there could not be an infinite series of individual contingent beings ; on this view there is no need for the world as a whole to be contingent. Secondly I will examine the objections to (3); I will agree with Hume that because it is possible to think of God not existing, God is not a necessary being and therefore does not necessarily exist. Finally I will argue that because of these two objections the cosmological argument is seriously weakened.

To begin with, I will argue that it is unreasonable to make the jump from (1) to (2). Just because individual beings have a cause this does not mean that the whole has a cause. Hume gives a persuasive argument for this when he states that if we can account for every individual part, then we have sufficiently explained that whole. Hume writes that 'The uniting of several countries into one kingdom..... Is performed merely by an arbitrary act of the mind'2; I agree that if it is only an arbitrary act of the mind, then this weakens the argument. Bertrund Russell gives a swaying argument to support this objection. He argues that just because individual human beings have mothers, it does not mean that the world as a whole mother.
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Now I will argue that it is wrong to state that the world as a whole needs a cause because it is possible that there are an infinite series of causes and no ultimate cause to the world. It is perfectly possible to conceive that the series of cause and effect in the world has no beginning and no end. In this case, there would be no need for a necessary first cause to exist. Mackie adds to this objection by questioning why only one first cause is necessary; there could be 'an indefinitely large number'3 of first ...

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