An Essay about Atheism in Latin

[Belacqua]

You make it sound like these Christian philosophers were equally impelled by their Christianity to accept the idea of ataraxia as they were impelled to reject it, and that after a significant period of deliberation struggles, they eventually arrived at the decision to reject it. I don't think it was much of an option.

Granted, I imagine that anyone recommending indifference and incuriosity would not have gotten much of a hearing at that point. It’s impossible for me to say, of course, to what extent the philosophers of the day were willing to consider wildly different views — psychology is complicated and mind-reading is impossible.

Experience with human nature indicates that none of us is very good at giving serious consideration to whatever conclusion is the exact opposite of what we currently hold. 

What false things did I say about the arguments? I expressed a view of the arguments in general which is confirmed by the observations I've made and the collective knowledge of today's world, with parts of that knowledge adequately accessible to me. As for the arguments specifically, I was careful enough to read and understand the best I can what they're stating, so if I misrepresented any of the arguments, it was not intentional and I am open to correction. But just implying that I said false things about these arguments without elaboration isn't helpful.

Apologies, I didn’t mean to say that you had said anything wrong about the Five Ways. (It should be clear to everybody that you are among the most careful posters here.) I meant to say “we” in the most inclusive way possible. And of course I had recently referred to Dawkins’ very poor explication. 

Ultimately, it's all about really understanding what these arguments are saying, and often times this can be achieved by reading the right free-to-access articles on the Internet (which doesn't take semesters to accomplish).

I honestly think that some people begin with the assumption that anything in theology will be so stupid and obvious that it takes no effort at all to knock it down. And that it’s so wrong that we are entitled to just type out and publish whatever occurs to us. 

You’re right, of course, that a serious search on the Internet can teach us what we need to know. With the caveat, of course, that since any fool can make a web page what we find is likely as not to be wrong, and it’s a mistake to settle for whatever explanation jibes with our own initial thoughts. 

But I stick with my assertion that each of the Five Ways is not as easy as it may look, and that we need to make extra sure we are understanding the terms as they were meant. Language changes, special fields have special vocabulary, what we read is a translation, etc. etc. 

The obvious example to this would be the word “cause” as used in Aristotle or theology. No doubt you’ve seen that people on forums like this one nearly always assume that “cause” always and only means “efficient cause,” which is how we use it today. But of course in the olden times it meant something much more like “all the things that must be the case for X to be the case.” So my parents getting together caused me, but I am also caused, in the old sense, by the particular atoms in my body at the moment, and the particular form I have at the moment, and etc. 

Confusion over this word has led to misunderstandings, in which people have angrily told me that the Kalaam (temporal) argument is exactly the same as Thomas’ First Cause (essential) argument. So again, this doesn’t prove that any of the arguments is true, just that some people are dismissing them for incorrect reasons. 

As for the Fourth Way, I spent some time Googling that today. (Happy to say that the Internet is useful!) Not surprisingly, there’s more to it than I thought at first. It relies, as so much of Thomas’ work does, on the distinction between act and potency, and how one gets into the other. Here is a useful article:

https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/...stence-god

And here is how the author of that article re-writes the Fourth Way in language that is more like we moderns use:

Some things are found to be more perfect than others. Thus, some things have less than the superlative degree of perfection. Since a thing's perfection is its actuality, these things have less than the superlative degree of actuality. Something whose actuality is less than complete must be caused by something else with at least as much actuality. The resulting hierarchy of causes cannot be infinite, so there must be a first cause whose actuality is complete, who is pure act, and who therefore has all perfections in a superlative degree. And this we call God.

Obviously we don’t think that way any more, and a lot of it needs further clarification. Especially, I would guess, the assertion that if a thing’s actuality is less than complete it must be caused [in the old sense of the word] by something with at least as much actuality. 

Now, how can we figure out the reasoning behind this, since it isn’t obvious to us? The best way I know of from experience is to read Scholastic Metaphysics, by Edward Feser*

This book is an excruciatingly careful step-by-step explanation of how the actualization of potential works according to Thomas. It defines all the terms, it gives examples for all the ideas, it ends up with conclusions that I would never have come up with on my own in a million years. Yet despite having read it carefully, and despite being extremely skeptical of its truth, I am not capable myself of saying why it’s wrong. 

In other words, to understand the assumptions behind the Fourth Way, we need a hell of a lot of background. If the contents of this book were presented as a series of college lectures — two a week for an hour each — it would take at least a semester to get through. So yes, the Fourth Way at least demands that much work. (No doubt people who are smarter than I am could do it faster.)

I am afraid that FlatAssembler, in his discussion of the Fourth Way, has been distracted by a shiny object. It’s true that in the original text, Thomas says that fire is the hottest thing, and it’s true that he was mistaken in that. But the fact that his example is wrong does nothing at all to show that the proof itself is wrong. Flat has allowed himself to focus on an irrelevant detail. And this is why I think it is often too easy for us (me and everybody) to dismiss things that we don’t sufficiently understand. 

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*Necessary disclaimer for people who judge me by jumping to false conclusions: By mentioning this book I am not claiming that it is perfectly accurate, nor that its author is a super-genius, nor that every opinion he has ever expressed is the same as my own opinion. I refer to this book for one reason and one reason only: it explains in detail how the actualization of potentiality is said to work according to Thomas Aquinas. No doubt there are other books on the same subject.