NEW Assignment Feedback and Memos (Tut202 Letters for 2018 to 2021) • Recent and OLD assignment questions, and answers • With Lecture's Commentary. Great for exam Prep.
1 INTRODUCTION
This tutorial letter discusses assignment 02 and offers you guidelines for the final examination.
2 GENERAL COMMENTS ON ASSIGNMENT 02
Question: Critically Discuss St Thomas Aquinas’ Five Proofs for the existence of God [100
marks]. (Hint: A Critical Discussion in addition to consisting of a recapitulation of the arguments
of Aquinas must also include your own independent assessment of his reasoning and whether
you think it is sound)
Discussion
Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) is considered one of the greatest philosopher-theologian of the
Middle Ages. He set out to provide proof for the existence of God based on what he considered
to be empirical facts about the world. The first three arguments are often referred to as the
Cosmological argument because they each begin from the fact that there is a cosmos or a world
whose existence needs to be accounted for. His aim was to offer clear and compelling
arguments for the existence of God; the perfect creator of the universe. Aquinas therefore set
out to provide philosophical arguments to demonstrate the existence of God using rational
argumentation rather than simply relying on faith. These five proofs for the existence of God
appear in his famous work the Summa Theologica. We describe each of the arguments below.
a). Argument from Motion
It is certain and agreed on the basis of our experiences of the world that some things in this
world are in motion. Since whatever is in motion is moved by something other than itself, then
either the chain of movers go back infinitely far (which is impossible) or else there is a first,
unmoved, mover, an original source of motion- and this is God.
Objection: If the principle that everything that is in motion is moved by something else is indeed
true then it should hold true for everything including the so-called prime mover himself. The
decision to postulate the unmoved mover goes against the very principle on which this
argument is premised. You can also object to this argument by appealing to the findings of
modern physics concerning motion.
b). Argument from efficient causality
In the world that we perceive around us there are a series of causes. In each ordered series of
causes, the first item is the cause of the next item, and this in turn is the cause of the next. An
efficient cause is an agent, a maker, something that brings something else into being. No matter
how many caused causes there are in a series, there must be an uncaused cause (a first
cause) that is responsible for the chain of causality that runs through the whole series. To this
cause, “everyone gives the name of God.”
3
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