RE: The Principle of Contingent Causation: The Impossibility of Infinite Regress.
July 4, 2023 at 2:30 am
Ok, so in Good Thomistic Fashion (as in the Summa), let's address the objections first:
The first one, quite common in this thread, seems to be something along these lines.
Objection 1: "The First Cause is not yet proven to be Jesus Christ, therefore I don't have to admit it."
[Alternately, "Since Saint Thomas believed the First Cause is Jesus Christ, ergo ... etc" still fallacious].
Response: that's a Non Sequitur. One could come to Jesus Christ in say premise 10 or so. That does nothing to show step 3 or 4 of the Argument is not logically valid and follows necessarily from the preceding premises. The only way for Atheists to show that is to contest one of those same steps.
Steps 1 to 4 as outlined in the OP could be affirmed by people from various persuasions, including Deists, Hindus, some Buddhists, Muslims, and Christians, beside others. It says nothing, as yet, about the Personality, or Goodness, of the First Being/First Cause, but only about Its Existence.
The Moral Argument, from Conscience, would help in establishing the Creator's Goodness, and thus His Personality as well; this argument is focused first on establishing that a First Cause of the Universe exists, while the Universe itself, and all things within it, exist contingently and not necessarily.
For a secular example: if one proved Pythagoras' Theorem by appealing to Pythagoras' Theorem, that would be circular. But not if one proved it from first principles that can be independently known. And the fact that one may later build on PT, or apply it in various ways, does not diminish the proof.
Objection 2: "Even if a Necessary First Cause of all things exist, this First Cause could allegedly be the universe/something else natural itself."
This objection does not take into account what we proved about B1, the First Being. The First Being is non-contingent. Contingency is shown in 2 ways. First, (1) something that is contingent began to exist; (2) second, something that could even conceivably cease to exist is certainly contingent. Now, most Scientists agree the Universe began to exist, in the Big Bang, and also, almost all agree that, at least in theory, that the Universe either will or could cease to exist one day. Therefore, (3) the Universe exists contingently, not necessarily. Why is this relevant? Because we proved in the OP, mathematically, that B1 exists Non-Contingently. Therefore, B1 cannot be the Universe, but refers to the First Cause of the Universe itself.
Recall the proof of the non-contingency of B1. Since there is no B0, and Bn by definition is contingent only if it is dependent on a prior being Bn-1, it follows that the First Being in existence is non-contingent; the First Being exists necessarily. And for the above reasons, that the visible universe does not demonstrate the necessary properties of B1, the First Cause is not the universe; rather, it is the First Cause of the Universe that exists necessarily or non-contingently.
Objection 3: I, an Atheist, affirm, just like that, that an Infinite Number of Beings can exist (and the proof for this is?). Therefore, even if the argument holds for all finite n, it fails when n is infinite. Therefore, I don't have to believe in a First Cause".
Once more, notice how Atheists exempt themselves from the obligation to prove what they claim (in this case, the absurdity that an Infinite Number of Beings can exist) and the necessity of demonstrating that in a series of logical steps. Then, they demand that we Theists should do so.
We Theists can, but they cannot. Anyway let's examine this objection.
Firstly, notice we haven't assumed anything about N. N indeed holds good for all values, whether it be 2 or 100 trillion. That shows any and all contingent beings in existence, whether today or 4 thousand years ago, should have been able to use these steps to come to the knowledge of the First Cause. What of the claim that the number of beings in existence could be actually infinite?
I mentioned this objection in the OP and answered it briefly thus: "The only alternative to the existence of an actual first being is an infinite series of contingent beings, but that is impossible because an infinite series never ends; and if there were an actual infinite of real beings, we would never have gotten to the present moment; again, an infinite series cannot be formed by successive addition, because no matter how [many] beings you add to each other, whether it is 1 or 1 trillion, n will always be finite. Therefore, granted that we got here, granted that we are 1 in a series of contingent beings, the number of beings in existence is finite."
Again, a simpler refutation is from Modern Science; since most Physicists are agreed the Universe is of Finite Age (roughly 13.7 BN years), it clearly follows that an Infinite Number of Beings could not have existed in said finite time. That such arguments should be seriously proposed by Atheists, in order to undermine Premise 2, shows how weak the Atheistic position ultimately is.
Regards,
Xavier.
The first one, quite common in this thread, seems to be something along these lines.
Objection 1: "The First Cause is not yet proven to be Jesus Christ, therefore I don't have to admit it."
[Alternately, "Since Saint Thomas believed the First Cause is Jesus Christ, ergo ... etc" still fallacious].
Response: that's a Non Sequitur. One could come to Jesus Christ in say premise 10 or so. That does nothing to show step 3 or 4 of the Argument is not logically valid and follows necessarily from the preceding premises. The only way for Atheists to show that is to contest one of those same steps.
Steps 1 to 4 as outlined in the OP could be affirmed by people from various persuasions, including Deists, Hindus, some Buddhists, Muslims, and Christians, beside others. It says nothing, as yet, about the Personality, or Goodness, of the First Being/First Cause, but only about Its Existence.
The Moral Argument, from Conscience, would help in establishing the Creator's Goodness, and thus His Personality as well; this argument is focused first on establishing that a First Cause of the Universe exists, while the Universe itself, and all things within it, exist contingently and not necessarily.
For a secular example: if one proved Pythagoras' Theorem by appealing to Pythagoras' Theorem, that would be circular. But not if one proved it from first principles that can be independently known. And the fact that one may later build on PT, or apply it in various ways, does not diminish the proof.
Objection 2: "Even if a Necessary First Cause of all things exist, this First Cause could allegedly be the universe/something else natural itself."
This objection does not take into account what we proved about B1, the First Being. The First Being is non-contingent. Contingency is shown in 2 ways. First, (1) something that is contingent began to exist; (2) second, something that could even conceivably cease to exist is certainly contingent. Now, most Scientists agree the Universe began to exist, in the Big Bang, and also, almost all agree that, at least in theory, that the Universe either will or could cease to exist one day. Therefore, (3) the Universe exists contingently, not necessarily. Why is this relevant? Because we proved in the OP, mathematically, that B1 exists Non-Contingently. Therefore, B1 cannot be the Universe, but refers to the First Cause of the Universe itself.
Recall the proof of the non-contingency of B1. Since there is no B0, and Bn by definition is contingent only if it is dependent on a prior being Bn-1, it follows that the First Being in existence is non-contingent; the First Being exists necessarily. And for the above reasons, that the visible universe does not demonstrate the necessary properties of B1, the First Cause is not the universe; rather, it is the First Cause of the Universe that exists necessarily or non-contingently.
Objection 3: I, an Atheist, affirm, just like that, that an Infinite Number of Beings can exist (and the proof for this is?). Therefore, even if the argument holds for all finite n, it fails when n is infinite. Therefore, I don't have to believe in a First Cause".
Once more, notice how Atheists exempt themselves from the obligation to prove what they claim (in this case, the absurdity that an Infinite Number of Beings can exist) and the necessity of demonstrating that in a series of logical steps. Then, they demand that we Theists should do so.
We Theists can, but they cannot. Anyway let's examine this objection.
Firstly, notice we haven't assumed anything about N. N indeed holds good for all values, whether it be 2 or 100 trillion. That shows any and all contingent beings in existence, whether today or 4 thousand years ago, should have been able to use these steps to come to the knowledge of the First Cause. What of the claim that the number of beings in existence could be actually infinite?
I mentioned this objection in the OP and answered it briefly thus: "The only alternative to the existence of an actual first being is an infinite series of contingent beings, but that is impossible because an infinite series never ends; and if there were an actual infinite of real beings, we would never have gotten to the present moment; again, an infinite series cannot be formed by successive addition, because no matter how [many] beings you add to each other, whether it is 1 or 1 trillion, n will always be finite. Therefore, granted that we got here, granted that we are 1 in a series of contingent beings, the number of beings in existence is finite."
Again, a simpler refutation is from Modern Science; since most Physicists are agreed the Universe is of Finite Age (roughly 13.7 BN years), it clearly follows that an Infinite Number of Beings could not have existed in said finite time. That such arguments should be seriously proposed by Atheists, in order to undermine Premise 2, shows how weak the Atheistic position ultimately is.
Regards,
Xavier.
