A level AQA Cosmological Argument.
Part of the Arguments for the existence of God topic in the Philosophy component of Religious Stuides.
One fully written A01 and one fully written A02.
Achieved full marks on both.
A01 outlines the theory/is a summary
A02 question is: ‘The Cosmological Arg...
13th century philosopher Aquinas presents an inductive argument – uses the premises to supply
strong evidence for the truth of the conclusion. The argument is also a posteriori meaning that it is
based on conclusions we draw from sense experience. In his book ‘Summa Theologica’ Aquinas
proposes his argument for the existence of God – the Cosmological Argument.
Aquinas’ cosmological argument appears in the first 3 of his 5 ways. Way 1 is his argument from
motion and change, way 2 is his argument from causation, and way 3 is his argument from
contingency and necessity. From way 3 Aquinas argued that the world consists of contingent beings,
(they begin and end), and they depend on something for their existence. For example, humans
depend on their parents, and their parents rely on their parents (and so on). The conclusion that
Aquinas forms is that if everything in the world is contingent, contingent things need something else
to bring them into existence. If nothing had brought the world into existence there would still be
nothing because ‘if everything is possible to not be, then at one time there would have been nothing
in existence’, but ‘out of nothing, nothing can come’/ ‘ex nihilo nihil fit’.
This leads Aquinas to the conclusion that there must be a being who exists necessarily (has no cause
and is not dependent on anything for its existence). This being is responsible for bringing all other
contingent things to exist – ‘this all men speak of as God’. This leads Aquinas to believe that God’s
existence is necessary to sustain everything else (continent beings).
Aquinas rejects the idea of infinite regress – he believed ‘it is impossible to go on to infinity in
necessary beings’ – there cannot be an infinite series of uncaused necessary beings (such as angels
and souls) – this is ‘absurd’ because then there would be no ultimate cause of the series, and so no
series at all. Aquinas argues there must be an uncaused necessary being that cannot not exist –
Aquinas states that this is the God of Christian theism, and this God is the cause of all ‘caused
necessary beings’ and contingent beings.
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