[Serious] Thomism: Then & Now

[HappySkeptic]

I'm not sure I agree with the essential cause idea, but I will explain how science defines a cause (which would be an accidental cause)

Classical: state A is a cause future state B if a change in the state of A would result in B being different.

Quantum: state A is a cause of future state B if by changing A, the probability of measuring a state B is changed.

In physics, there is no such thing as an essential cause, unless one claims that the laws of physics themselves are such a thing.

[emjay]

Why create a rule with the intention of immediately breaking the rule while asserting that no other thing could..similarly, break that rule or satisfy it's conditions?  Is there any particular reason, for example, that there aren't dozens or millions of things that are at the end of their respective and discreet causal chains?

Basically, it seems to me, that there are only two conclusions that can be drawn from all this, if we accept the concept of a essentially ordered series and it's application to the world as per, say, Belaqua's Sun example. Basically, given any physical thing we could think of in the universe, it's going to track back, or perhaps more accurately, down, in an essentially ordered series, first to whatever we'd deem the most fundamental aspects of the known universe (just call that a placeholder... eg 'fundamental particles' for simplicity... so it doesn't matter if we know (yet or ever) what they are or not), and then, potentially, to a further sustaining cause beyond that, ie the first cause as referred to by Aquinas. I say 'potentially' though because that's the two conclusions I see here... either:
a) that the buck stops with the fundamental particles themselves... that they are the first cause, in which case they would have to be eternal/uncaused to fit the description/meet the requirements of the first cause, or
b) that the first cause is beyond that, namely Aquinas' first cause.

Is that similar to what you're saying here (ie why can (a) not be the case?)... it seems kind of similar, but granted I think we both can agree I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to logic, or indeed physics - that's not being self-deprecating, just realistic - so I may be, and probably am, way off base, and that there's subtleties or angles I'm not seeing here, but just saying how I see it as it stands. But that's part of what I was hoping to get out of this thread/subject, not just understand the argument, but also see how my obvious betters addressed it, once everyone was on the same page what the argument actually was.

[The Grand Nudger]

If we're tracking things all the way down the rabbit hole to fundamental forces or particles...and the buck stops there, it would seem we have a plurality of final causes. Is there any reason other than insistence that cause beyond that, one more layer down, is a set of one?

[emjay]

If we're tracking things all the way down the rabbit hole to fundamental forces or particles...and the buck stops there, it would seem we have a plurality of final causes.  Is there any reason other than insistence that cause beyond that, one more layer down, is a set of one?

Just to be clear, are you envisioning a linear or parallel set of, let's call it 'pre-fundamental', causes? I'm guessing you'd mean the latter because it doesn't look like the former would add anything to the question, just shift the first cause back a few steps. If you do mean the latter, ie parallel, causes then that looks like it would tie in with something else I was curious about... whether elements in an essentially ordered series have to be a strictly linear one item per element set, or whether it could be more hierarchical than that, with one or many dependencies at any particular level. ETA: Nevermind; on reflection I think it's self-evident it would be hierarchical like that most of the time... if something was made of two materials for instance, where neither was dependent on the other, but both equally dependent on the next element.

[The Grand Nudger]

At some point, any argument for a final cause asks us to assume that all parallel lines or sets come together, altogether, at a single point or set comprised of just one member. That doesn't appear to be the case at our current level of investigation. Assuming that there is another level beneath, pre-fundamentals, is it necessarily the case that there is only one pre-fundamental?

[emjay]

At some point, any argument for a final cause asks us to assume that all parallel lines or sets come together, altogether, at a single point or set comprised of just one member. That doesn't appear to be the case at our current level of investigation. Assuming that there is another level beneath, pre-fundamentals, is it necessarily the case that there is only one pre-fundamental?

Fair enough... sorry about piggybacking as it were on your question... I'll get out the way now

[Neo-Scholastic]

Yes, in trying to talk metaphysics with physical analogies, nothing is going to be 100% right. ...
Yep, I have yet to find the perfect way to say it. Modern people just don't think that way naturally, so it's hard to express in an intuitive way. If you think of a good example please let us know!

Indeed. Perhaps if Christian apologists found a better analogy or example of a truly essentially ordered, per se, series then maybe having such an example handy would help resolve the modern misunderstandings about the 5 Ways. On the flip-side, maybe the difficulty of finding an obvious and truly representative example reveals an hidden problem, perhaps some kind of category error. I say this because the best examples for per se series seem to refer to intellectual objects. And intellectual objects seem to lack any obvious power to produce change. At the same time, change is axiomatic in natural science and left unexplained. And physical laws are assumed by our atheist friends, such as @TheGrandNudger, to be brute facts that require no further explanation. Perhaps. But as I see it, the Law of Sufficient Reason applies when science only describes the various ways changes happen but remains silent [intentionally*] about the metaphysical preconditions required for those changes to happen.

Moreover, substances, as understood in Scholasticism, often include intangible qualities, like final causes, that are excluded in natural science. For those with physical reductionist leanings, the efficacy of this methodological exclusion seems to warrant ontological exclusion as well. In contrast to this, ontological exclusion of intellectual objects makes the world ultimately unintelligible.** Lacking a metaphysical ground for intangibles, “things” like trusses, kidneys, or acids cannot be identified or understood as discrete kinds of things with discrete qualities and properties. So it makes me wonder if the 5 Ways say more about epistemology than ontology, i.e. maybe God or a god-like concept is required, even if taken for granted, to make the sensible world intelligible and have meaningful discourse about it.

*methodological naturalism confines its inquiries to efficient and material causes.
**This seems true by definition.

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If we're tracking things all the way down the rabbit hole to fundamental forces or particles...and the buck stops there, it would seem we have a plurality of final causes.  Is there any reason other than insistence that cause beyond that, one more layer down, is a set of one?

Hmmmm. I think you mean to say that there is near infinite number of final causes any object can or could have. I don't disagree. At the same time, within that nearly infinite set of final causes, only a few of them are very good. I think the final cause of my heart is pumping blood whereas Hannibal Lecter thinks its dinner. Likewise books are clearly over-qualified to serve as door-stoppers. Do you think, perhaps, the fitness of an object to a specific final cause plays a part? And can one exist by degrees, maybe even shades between potential and actuality...a kind of "statistical" existence rather than a binary one. For example the final cause of a chair is to provide seating. But we all know there are weak, tippy chairs that could barely support a teenage girl and hard wooden chairs that are so uncomfortable you cannot sit for very long. Both function but poorly. IMHO that makes them less chair-like somehow.

[The Grand Nudger]

Maybe not infinite, we're at least entertaining the idea that the number of things in the causal set below/under/prior to the four fundamental forces, for example, could less than four. Is there any particular reason to assume that the number of things in the next set down won't be three and stop there? Or, if it doesn't, that the next down is two and stops there?

Why, aside from motivated reasoning, as you put it, do we assume that a full explanation of all causal chains will reduce from four at all? Isn't it possible that the addition of another fundamental force (which seems plausible, at present) can accomplish the same job?

There's no clear necessity that all causal chains terminate in the same set of precisely one. This undermines arguments for a singular final cause and yet it exists as a silent premise in the face of all evidence at present to the contrary.

[Belacqua]

Perhaps if Christian apologists found a better analogy or example of a truly essentially ordered, per se, series then maybe having such an example handy would help resolve the modern misunderstandings about the 5 Ways. 

It seems to me that the examples so far are good enough, overall. There is always a danger of mistaking an analogy for something bigger of course -- as in the clock example, the motor is the First Cause only of the movement in the clock, and not of anything more. The motor itself is caused by a variety of things, so we can't declare that it deserves the name First Cause in some kind of metaphysical sense. The fact that the causal series in the clock is simultaneous doesn't do any more than describe such a series -- it doesn't prove anything more about the universe. 

Frankly I think the misunderstandings concerning the Five Ways come largely from force of habit and from arrogance. I don't know how many times I've seen people pass confident judgment when they don't know what "cause" means. And from the sentences you quote in your reply, it's clear that Nudge still doesn't know the difference between a Final Cause and a First Cause. Why such resistance happens I can't say. 

One issue, I suppose, is that some people treat the Five Ways as if they are supposed to be self-evident syllogisms. As if when you read through to the end of one, the conclusion is supposed to be obvious. This is a bad mistake, I think. Because the terms and arguments are so obscure to modern people, each of the Five Ways ends up being more like the table of contents, or a semester's course syllabus. Each step requires study. 

On the flip-side, maybe the difficulty of finding an obvious and truly representative example reveals an hidden problem, perhaps some kind of category error. I say this because the best examples for per se series seem to refer to intellectual objects. And intellectual objects seem to lack any obvious power to produce change. 

Yes, this is a constant problem. The existence of intellectual objects, or things demonstrable only by metaphysics and not physics, is another thing that modern people have trouble with. It's impossible to get some people to recognize that God is not supposed to be a big physical body, for example. 

At the same time, change is axiomatic in natural science and left unexplained. And physical laws are assumed by our atheist friends [...] to be brute facts that require no further explanation. Perhaps. But as I see it, the Law of Sufficient Reason applies when science only describes the various ways changes happen but remains silent [intentionally*] about the metaphysical preconditions required for those changes to happen. 

Moreover, substances, as understood in Scholasticism, often include intangible qualities, like final causes, that are excluded in natural science. For those with physical reductionist leanings, the efficacy of this methodological exclusion seems to warrant ontological exclusion as well. In contrast to this, ontological exclusion of intellectual objects makes the world ultimately unintelligible.

Yes, I've been told straight out that any question not resolvable by science is "illegitimate." The fact that the limitations to science are there -- very properly -- are blown up to mean that all knowledge must stop at those limits. 

Frankly I don't think that science does exclude Final Causes, although modern people don't tend to think of them that way. I mean, scientists will admit that eyeballs are to see with. Properly working ones see well, and those that don't see well are considered to have a problem. Nothing about this requires an intelligent designer. 

So it makes me wonder if the 5 Ways say more about epistemology than ontology, i.e. maybe God or a god-like concept is required, even if taken for granted, to make the sensible world intelligible and have meaningful discourse about it.

Well, I think they are meant to be ontological explanations, but you're certainly right that they are attempting to make things understandable to us. The questions beyond the limits of science, the questions about intelligible objects, and the questions about how they all go together demand a greater epistemological range than science properly uses. So yeah -- we moderns need to remake our comfortable epistemologies somewhat even to grasp the Thomist arguments, much less argue whether they're right or wrong.

The fact that people keep demanding empirical evidence when it's not relevant, or refuse to consider metaphysical questions which can't be addressed in that way, are where the category errors come in. People continue to think that the lack of empirical evidence for God, as if he were Bigfoot, is a relevant argument. 

Hmmmm. I think you mean to say that there is near infinite number of final causes any object can or could have. 

Someplace I read that the Final Causes of water include floating boats, reconstituting instant ramen, and probably an infinite number of others. Maybe water holds the record for most Final Causes. 

IMHO that  makes them less chair-like somehow.

Yes, this is basic, I think. When the Final Cause is something decided by a person, then the finished product may manage to reach that more or less well. The whole idea of increased skill and better mousetraps operates on this ambition. Moreover, when the Final Cause is something abstract like justice or mercy, it is usually taken for granted that perfection is unlikely in this world. One of the main ideas about Jesus, after all, is that he was the only one perfect enough to balance justice and mercy perfectly. 

And when it's something decided by a person, the Final Cause is an essential quality of the object -- not accidental, I think. The color of a chair is accidental, but its sit-down-uponness is a defining feature.

[Neo-Scholastic]

This YouTuber has a good rundown of the 5 Ways.