(November 30, 2022 at 9:30 pm)Neo-Scholastic Wrote:(November 30, 2022 at 9:12 pm)Jehanne Wrote: I am okay with everything that you state, as long as it is understood that there are events that just happen (e.g., the radioactive decay of one atom versus the nondecay of another) that are not caused by anything; they just happen.
Sounds like your problem is not with Thomism but rather the Principle of Sufficient Reason.
I guess that such depends. I believe that I exist, that other individuals have minds such as myself, that the Cosmos is comprehensible and can be described by mathematical, physical and statistical models; that deductive & inductive mathematical proofs exist, etc.
I don't think that the PSR can establish the existence of God, a Creator, a soul, an afterlife or any sort of paranormal or supernatural forces and/or effects in our Universe. Rather, we ought to reject non-material causes due to the fact that if paranormal or supernatural entities or forces existed, such could be observed, empirically. In this respect, absence of evidence is evidence of absence.
As for the origin of the Universe, the fact that mathematical physicists can develop coherent mathematical models that describe an eternal Universe is sufficient for me, as I think that an infinite, eternal Universe is a more parsimonious explanation than an uncaused God whom we do not observe and who is arguably much more complex than we are, having been the product of several billion years of biological evolution.
