In this paper, I will argue that God exists because nothing can be its own cause. Chains of causes and effects occur, but in order for a chain to occur, there must be a first cause. God is the first cause, therefore God exists. Throughout this paper, I will talk about God as an ultimate being but I will not relate to religion. Whether you relate to Allah, Krishna, Jesus, etc. I will only focus on proving the existence of God.
Everything happens because something along the way causes it to happen, in other words, there is a first cause. God exists because there must be something rather than nothing, therefore existence has a cause and God is the cause. Thomas Aquinas argued that everything needs a casual explanation for things that are caused.
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If not God, then what is the first cause? In order for something to exist, it must have a start, something to cause it to occur, otherwise it never occurred. Thomas Aquinas’ Cosmological argument for the existence of God, he believed and proved that cause and effect is the work of God and God is the cause of everything. This point is very difficult to dispute or even doubt. Aquinas based it off the idea that as a group of humans we have acquired the need for an explanation to everything, nothing is without a reason, and God is the explanation to the first cause. First I want to prove that there must be a first cause to everything. Say you found a dog in front of your house one day. You wouldn’t just say, “Hello dog. Where did you come from? I assume from nowhere.” No you would look for a reason, or a cause as to why the dog is there and where it came from. Did someone leave it for you? Is it lost? Did it just appear from thin air? You start looking for reasoning, whether it be a physical cause the dog is there, a psychological cause, or a supernatural cause. It is not likely to deny the Principle of Sufficient Reason, which states that everything must have a reason or a cause. If you think about it, none of us would be here without a cause, …show more content…
A simple explanation is that if there isn’t a reason for a first cause then everything in the universe is unexplained. If there is no first cause then everything is like a chain with links holding onto each other, but there is nothing holding onto the chain. There cannot be an infinite chain of sustaining causes because assume for contradiction that an infinite series of links exists on a chain. We can have a chain that uses two different types of links, a steel one and a bronze one and no two similar links are linked together. From that we can conclude that if we remove the bronze links, the steel ones can be rearranged so that no steel links are linked to another steel link. Logically this conclusion is absurd, so we can conclude that an infinite series of links cannot exist. Here is another analogy. Suppose there is a newspaper that tells you about all the news happening in the world and you want to read a copy of that newspaper. You ask your neighbor if they have that newspaper. They say no, and that they have to get it from their friend. Does their friend have it? No, they have to get it from their cousin. Do they have it? No, they have to get it from their teacher, who has to get it from another teacher… etc. However long or short this chain of newspaper borrowers may be, you would only get it if someone actually
In this paper, I will explain how Descartes uses the existence of himself to prove the existence of God. The “idea of God is in my mind” is based on “I think, therefore I am”, so there is a question arises: “do I derive my existence? Why, from myself, or from my parents, or from whatever other things there are that are less perfect than God. For nothing more perfect than God, or even as perfect as God, can be thought or imagined.” (Descartes 32, 48) Descartes investigates his reasons to show that he, his parents and other causes cannot cause the existence of himself.
Thomas Aquinas, a leading scholar of the Middle Ages, argued that “Everything in the universe has a cause. Trace those causes back and there must have been a First Cause that triggered everything else. God is that First Cause.” This was known as his “First Cause” argument.
The question of God’s existence has been debated through the history of man, with every philosopher from Socrates to Immanuel Kant weighing in on the debate. So great has this topic become that numerous proofs have been invented and utilized to prove or disprove God’s existence. Yet no answer still has been reached, leaving me to wonder if any answer at all is possible. So I will try in this paper to see if it is possible to philosophically prove God’s existence.
St. Thomas Aquinas presents five arguments to demonstrate the existence of God. However, this paper focuses on the fifth argument. The fifth argument is regarded as the Teleological Argument and states that things that lack intelligence act for some end or purpose. While the fifth argument satisfies God’s existence for Aquinas, some contemporary readers would argue that Aquinas neglects the laws of physics. Others argue that Aquinas allows a loophole in his argument so that the Catholic conception of God is not the only intelligent designer.
In his Meditations, Rene Descartes attempts to uncover certain truths about existence. In his Third Meditation, he establishes his "special causal principle" (SCP). Descartes uses this principle to explore the origin of ideas, and to prove the existence of God. I agree that there is much logic to be found in the SCP, but I disagree with Descartes method of proving God's existence, and in this essay I will explain why. I will begin by explaining the SCP, and will then demonstrate how Descartes applies this principle to prove that God exists. I will then present my critique of the SCP, and expose the flaws in both of Descartes proofs with regards to the principle. A conclusion will then follow.
If God did not exist, he would not be the greatest being imaginable. He is the greatest thing imaginable. Therefore, he does exist. From this argument, God’s existence is viewed. as necessary (Ayer. A. J. 1973).
Rene Descartes’ third meditation from his book Meditations on First Philosophy, examines Descartes’ arguments for the existence of God. The purpose of this essay will be to explore Descartes’ reasoning and proofs of God’s existence. In the third meditation, Descartes states two arguments attempting to prove God’s existence, the Trademark argument and the traditional Cosmological argument. Although his arguments are strong and relatively truthful, they do no prove the existence of God.
He continues by saying that for any change to occur there must have been a previous cause that existed in reality and if one was to trace this line of causes and effects all the way back there must be a first cause that began the chain. But there cannot be anything worldly like that because anything natural must have an impetus already in reality to transform it from potentiality to reality. The only explanation, in Aquinas' e... ... middle of paper ... ... s a cause except God.
This theory is Aristotle’s belief that something can not come out of nothing. Aristotle says, “How will there be movement, if there is no actually existing cause?…The seeds must act on the earth and the semen on the menstrual blood”. What he is saying is that something must be set into motion by something else. There is always a cause to an effect. One relies on the other. Therefore, before origin there must have been an “immovable mover”, that being God.
Dr. William Lane Craig supports the idea of existence of God. He gives six major arguments, in order to defend his position. The first argument is quite fare, Craig says that God is the best reason of existence of everything. He gives the idea, that the debates between all the people, cannot reach the compromise, because the best explanation of the reasons of existence of everything is God, and nothing can be explained without taking Him into consideration. The second argument of Craig is from a cosmological point of view: he says that the existence of the universe is the best proof of the existence of God. Because, the process of the creation of the universe is so ideally harmonious, that it seems impossible to appear accidentally. The third argument is about the fine tuning of the universe. The universe is designed in such a way that people always have aim of life, and the life of people and the nature are interconnected. The fourth argument of Dr. Craig is about the morality: God is the best explanation of the existence of the morality and moral values in people’s lives. The...
The Genesis 1:1 God created the heavens and the earth and it goes on to talk about how God created man in his own image. His own perfect image, these mathematical perfections in the world is not just random occurrences. There has to be a reason or significant creator behind these findings. In science it is proven that everything must be acted on to act. If this is true then there must be an acting force or something that created it all in the beginning.
This paper's purpose is to prove the existence of God. There are ten main reasons that are presented in this paper that show the actuality of God. It also shows counter-arguments to the competing positions (the presence of evil). It also gives anticipatory responses to possible objections to the thesis.
A third rational argument for the existence of God is the cosmological argument. All results need a cause. This universe and everything in it is an outcome. There must be reason that caused everything to come into existence. Fundamentally, there must be something or someone “un-caused” to cause all other things to come into existence. That “un-caused” someone is God.
In this essay I discuss why there is proof that there is a supernatural being known as God, who has created everything we know and experience.
...roofs of God’s existence are basically the same in that they are all, essentially, examples of cause and effect. This cause and effect does not neccesarily prove there is a God but it does lead one to wonder what may be the highest cause, and for this there is no proof.