Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God

[HopOnPop]

I guess if we take your suggestion to remove the earth from the picture and go a step further and remove everything from space and leave only the cup; with the cup being the sole existing thing in the universe, as far as I know, the cup would simply stay put as there would be nothing for it to fall to or from. Would that be correct? If so, then where is the need for everything to be "sustained" by God?

Yes, that's correct. But even with all of the universe still intact around this house and its contents, gravity is such a weak force especially over long distances, even with the universe still present (including the moon and the sun) everything in the cup-house model would still just appear to be "floating" in space for a very, very long time, relatively undisturbed. It might even, if its initial trajectory is just right at the moment the Earth disappears, simply slide right out of the solar system into interstellar space, remaining much as it did when it was "sitting on” the Earth, to travel vitually forever, fairly undisturbed, through open space (radiation and micro-meteor exposure asside).

But its not just a poor analogy, his whole idea is rather misguided. This guy is trying to insist reality itself has a general "hierarchy" to it -- one thing may seem to provide "support" (or provide the needed component to cause "change") to another, in some long chain of 'supporters' and 'the supported' (or changers and the changed), and from that, he concludes there must be a need to be some eventual, "ultimate" source of "support" (or "change") involved that is present and indispensable to everything being “supported.” But this idea is simply not what his example illustrates, nor is it what reality demonstrates in general when one turns to a more rigorous examination of this system, using, say simple Newtonian physics, rather than merely relying on common sense (which is the problem with Aristotelian reasoning).

What common sense doesn't show you (but science does) is that every entity in the universe has its own innate contribution of energy to provide to any given system (like an individual gravitational force). The cup supported by the table, supported by the floor....only *appears* that way because we, as the observer are sitting on the Earth surface too. What science shows us (relativity, in this case) is that if we take on a neutral point of view (off-planet, for instance) of this scenario, all we would have is a group of objects with mutual gravitational attraction to one another and each supporting one another in some way. Thus, the ultimate source of "support" (or "change") is not the Earth (or God) but merely the innate features that arrise out of each constituent piece in any scenario. This is how gravity works, its how energy flow works, and I would contend, this is how every system one can imagine works, much to the chagrin of people who rely upon Aristotelian “common sense” based reasoning.