The Principle of Contingent Causation: The Impossibility of Infinite Regress.

[brewer]

Correct.  As you would find in the link Bel offered, infinite regress has been argued to be incompatible with specific analytical positions and particular metaphysical ideologies or principles - but a difficulty for systems that people use to organize their thoughts or assert their beliefs is not a problem for the universe.  It's our problem.  There are and have always been things that do exist and are a problem for us or some other belief we hold.  As I said pages and pages ago, in this arguments against infinite regress are appeals to consequence.  If infinite regress existed, that would be bad -for whatever x the arguer holds dear-.  I actually agree with this and it is troubling, but, ofc... it doesn't follow that because a thing would be inconvenient to a cherished belief that thing must not exist.

It's a wonder to me that the faithful mine dead and dead-end arguments from antiquity when pursuing the case for their gods.  We've gotten much better at arguing since saint tommys failed attempt at syncretism, and we know a hell of alot more about the world we live in.  A god informed by better arguments and by greater and more accurate data sets would seem to be preferable, to me.  I suppose it might not end up looking like the god they wish existed - the central trouble that the religious often have and what..to me..indicates a deplorable shallowness in their beliefs...but hey..whatever.  Like infinite regress, that's our problem, not a gods problem.

You falsely assume that I follow this discussion routinely. But NBD. Couldn't help but take another jab at NX and Bel.

[The Grand Nudger]

Hehehe, I know, I know, we don't all have the same compulsions. I follow this stuff because apologists are shameless liars who routinely post links that are either dead, or explicitly say the exact opposite of whatever they're claiming those links demonstrate. They count on other people not giving a shit. I guess I can't rule out some of them being flaming morons - but I don't think idiocy and dishonesty are mutually exclusive.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I don't know that, and the argument doesn't address that. Of course Christians say that God is immortal, but that's not in the present argument.

I'm pretty sure Aquinas was indeed a Christian.

[The Grand Nudger]

You can't rely on what saint tommy said or believed to understand what saint tommy meant. Stupid atheist.

[Thumpalumpacus]

No, it's a key part of Thomas's argument that anything which is non-contingent has not come to be. And this includes, of course, a First Cause. He thinks that the First Cause is the only non-contingent thing.

That sounds pretty immortal to me, yet you deny above that this is part of Aquinas's argument.

Do you think that Thomas argues that God came to be? The whole point is that he never came to be, he is the only non-contingent, uncreated thing.

So if he wasn't created, then he is indeed immortal. You can't eat your cake and have it too.

"Contingent' means that they depend for their existence on something else. "Non-contingent" means that they don't. The non-contingent First Cause (which Thomas says is the only non-contingent thing) hasn't come to be. 

Meaning it has always been there. Meaning it's immortal.

Currently it appears that some quantum events occur without an efficient cause. As I explained earlier in the thread, the causes that Aristotle and Thomas talk about are not only efficient causes. 

To repeat: for them, the causes of X are all the things that must be the case in order for X to be the case. All quantum events depend for their occurrence on other things being the case -- for example, the existence of space/time. Therefore, in the sense of αἰτία, which is what Thomas is talking about, all quantum events are caused.

And you're certain that the existence of the universe itself is not a quantum event?

Thomas argues that one non-contingent thing does exist, but hasn't come to be. It couldn't come to be, because there is nothing essentially prior which could cause it to come to be. 

Which is the special pleading I've already pointed out.

"Come to be" is not the same as "exists." It means "begins to exist." Thomas thinks that God exists, but never came to be.

Which is, of course, an undemonstrated assumption.

You added the idea that it has to last forever, which is of course a Christian belief, but isn't covered in the Argument from Contingency. 

Incorrect, as I showed in my post immediately preceding this.

As to why the non-contingent thing is necessary for contingent things to exist, that's what the thread is about, and it's been covered several times already.

You cannot simply proclaim the necessity. You must demonstrate it. Thus far you haven't done so. Do you have anything new to add that would make Aquinas's arguments valid? I'm tiring of nailing you Jell-O to the wall.

[The Grand Nudger]

No one has anything to rescue saint tommy. His arguments have been out there for centuries. They are not successful. Even saint tommy himself decided his arguments were cold dogshit after going on some mystical fucking vision quest. The interest lies in a resurgence of (previously abandoned) thomism as an effect of a contemporary faction within the rcc engaged in the culture wars who see regressive theology as politically expedient. It's actually a pretty fascinating story, but like saint tommys statements and beliefs and midnight rides, I'm sure we'll be told that we absolutely can't draw any conclusions from it.

[polymath257]

This is the case because the sun is made from hydrogen from a process involving natural laws.

I'm curious why you thought you needed to tell me this.

What have I said which indicates that I don't understand it, or believe otherwise?

Did you continue to read on? The point is that natural laws (for example, of causation) are an underpinning of the notion of dependence.

Put another way, what does the concept of dependence (and thereby the notion of contingency) depend upon?

[Belacqua]

I don't know that, and the argument doesn't address that. Of course Christians say that God is immortal, but that's not in the present argument.

I'm pretty sure Aquinas was indeed a Christian.

I'm afraid that I'm not making the argument clear to you.

I apologize for taking your time and annoying you. I'll admit defeat and leave it here. 

Thank you for the conversation and good luck in the future.

[Nishant Xavier]

Ok.

So since most of the objections from our Atheist Friends come down to the Infinite Regress issue, let's illustrate with a simple example: Your friend, let's call him Friend 1, wants to borrow something from you, it can be a ball or a loan or anything, that's not important. Now, he says he will give it to you, but there's a condition; he himself will borrow it from Friend 2, to give it to you. Friend 2 in turn does so from Friend 3, and so on and on and on. Now, Three Conclusions follow:

Step 1: If in fact this goes on till infinity, you will never get the ball/money.
Step 2: If in fact you ever got the money, the series did not go on forever.
Step 3: Indeed, it would have terminated with someone who had the money without having to borrow it.

I trust the analogy is clear: He who gave being to you, if he received it from someone else, cannot be the Ultimate Cause of All Being. Thus, if every being who gave being to another were itself contingent on another being, the series would go forever, and thus no being at all would ever exist (just like you would never get the money in the above example); but granted that contingent beings exist, dependent on other prior beings, it clearly follows (similar to step 2 in the above example), that the series of contingent beings did not go on forever. Rather, it terminated with a Supreme Being, who had Being in Himself, without having to receive it from another. And this, as the Angelic Doctor of Theology (St. Thomas) says, is whom everyone calls Almighty God.

[Please note, we don't believe St. Augustine, or St. Thomas, or any Saint, except only Lord Jesus and Mother Mary, to be Inerrant, Impeccable or Infallible; we do however believe St. Augustine and St. Thomas were Deep Thinkers, Great Philosophers, and Beautiful Theologians, as they clearly were; but more important than either of them personally is the certain knowledge of Almighty God, from logic and reason, to which they lead the sincere seeker of Truth; something St. Paul also mentions in Romans 1, God has revealed His attributes in Creation and Nature: "20 For since the Creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—His eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse." (Rom 1:20)].

If anyone wants to challenge 1 or more of the above 3 steps, pls explain which and why with reasons of your own.

Now, to address Polymath:

So you are assuming that the set of causes is indexed by the natural numbers? What supports that assumption?

Yes, I am assuming that. Natural Numbers are Numbers that exist in Nature. How can there be being -3 (the -3rd being in existence) for e.g? There can be First Being in existence, 2nd Being in existence, and so on. And also, regarding 0, unless you want to say "there are 0 Elephants in the locker" is a meaningful statement, 0 would not be a natural number; certainly there is no such thing as a "zeroth being". 

Are you claiming a zeroth being could exist in Nature? A -10th being could naturally exist? I trust not. But pls explain if you are. You said: "if, for example, the index set is the set of integers, the 'proof' you have given fails", hence I said the above.

My proof is valid for all Natural Numbers N, no matter whether N is 2 or 100 TN. Granted that N is Finite, a First Being exists, a zeroth being does not exist, and the First Being therefore is not contingent or dependent on a prior being but exists necessarily, without beginning or end.

Then there is  the ambiguity of the term 'dependent'. Typically, it is equivalent to 'caused by', which assumes some sort of natural law. But it can also mean 'logically follows from', which is a very different thing.

Dependent here includes any kind of dependence, but mainly your first category of causal dependence. I am including both personal and impersonal causes. Whatever caused contingent beings, even if it was entirely impersonal, but contingent, was dependent upon other things. And so on and so forth, till infinity. Which is another way of saying, that's not how things actually came about.

Let me give an example: an increasing number of Atheists (more than 55% according to a recent poll) believe in Aliens, and some even hold to the hypothesis that Aliens created life on Earth; while Christians could be open to the possibility that God created intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe, we deny absolutely that any supposed "alien creator" could be the Absolute First Cause of anything. Why? Because this alien, by definition, is contingent upon the alien planet it exists in; and thus would require another alien creator, contingent upon another alien planet; and so on and so forth forever; which is another way of saying, that's not how things actually came about.

And the same applies to the other Atheist Sophism alleged earlier in this thread; let's assume our universe came into being from alleged other universes, and that said other universes came into being from others; now these other universes, being contingent, because they begin and cease to exist, came into being in turn from others, and so on and so forth forever. Which means, that's not how things actually came about.

Thus, even postulating trillions of unseen universes, which seems to blatantly violate Ockham's Razor, does not suffice to avoid the logically inescapable conclusion of the Necessarily Existent Non-Contingent First Cause. Only such a Being can explain why anything exists at all.

Wait a minute. You only showed that there exists a non-contingent entity (the term 'being' usually implies that it is alive). You did NOT show that it is unique. How do you know that there are not multiple non-contingent entities? How do you know that there are not multiple such that appear every second?

Yes. To answer that, I would have to establish Property IV of the First Cause, namely Divine Simplicity, another distinct Augustino-Thomistic Doctrine. I will do that in the subsequent post. Once we understand what God really is, we will understand why there can be only One God. 

God Bless.

[Belacqua]

I'm curious why you thought you needed to tell me this.

What have I said which indicates that I don't understand it, or believe otherwise?

Did you continue to read on? The point is that natural laws (for example, of causation) are an underpinning of the notion of dependence.

Put another way, what does the concept of dependence (and thereby the notion of contingency) depend upon?

Nobody's challenging any natural laws, as far as I know. 

I agree that "dependence" is probably clearer for modern people than Aristotle's term translated as "cause." The traditional English would be "X is caused by A, B, and C." But you're right that "X depends for its continued existence on A, B, and C" would be closer to the meaning for modern people. 

What does the concept of dependence depend on? You mean the idea of it in my brain? I guess it depends on 1) my observation that things depend on other things, and 2) the many people who have written about dependency in the world. That's how the concept got into my mind.

An essential series of causation, or of dependency, certainly isn't any sort of magical thing.