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Philosophy: Cosmological and Teleological Argument 1 LICUAN, Rio Regene A.

Does God exist?

The Absolute Impossibility of Disproving God's Existence
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Humans are not qualified to make absolute statements such as, "there is no God". Especially since mankind's knowledge is extremely finite, as Edison put it. So the selfproclaimed atheist ignores their complete lack of all knowledge and boldly claims that there is absolutely no God and that He absolutely does not exist. The problem is that they cannot prove it, for it is absolutely impossible to prove that God does not exist. If there is anything absolute it is that one cannot claim with absoluteness that He does not exist. That, in itself, is absolutely impossible. That's about the only thing we can say with absoluteness. That is absolutely true. -Jack Wellman

Teleological Argument
-comes from the word telos which means "purpose" or "goal." belief that things in the world have an ultimate purpose the practice of determining what the essential purpose of things in the world is derives the conclusion that God exists from the way things in nature are ordered and their apparent purpose the existence of a designer can be assumed -Introduced by an Islamic philosopher Averroes -the fifth of Saint Thomas Aquinas' Five Ways, his rational proofs for the existence of God -continued by empiricists in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, who believed that the order in the world suggested the existence of God

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-William Paley developed ideas with his version of the watch maker analogy. In the same way a watch's complexity implies the existence of its maker, so too one may infer the Creator of the universe exists, given the evident complexity of Nature Cicero (c. 106c. 43 B.C.) divine power can be found in reason, which exists throughout nature Paul the Apostle (A.D. 5-67) Romans 1:18-20, that because it has been made plain to all from what has been created in the world, it is obvious that there is a God. Marcus Minucius Felix (late 2nd-3rd c.), analogy of an ordered house in his The Orders of Minucius Felix Xenophon, Socrates (c. 469-399 B.C.) the adaptation of human parts to one another, such as the eyelids protecting the eyeballs, could not have been due to chance and was a sign of wise planning in the universe. Augustine of Hippo (A.D. 354430) perspective in his work City of God. He describes the "city of man" and essentially posits that God's plan is to replace the city of man with the city of God (at some as-yet-unknown point in the future) Plato (c. 427c. 347 B.C.) posited a "demiurge" of supreme wisdom and intelligence as the creator of the cosmos in his work Timaeus. Plato's teleological perspective is also built upon the analysis of a priori order and structure in the world that he had already presented in The Republic. Plato does not propose creation ex nihilo; rather, the demiurge made order from the chaos of the cosmos, imitating the eternal Forms. Aristotle (c. 384322 B.C.) the most complete explanation in regard to the natural, as well as the artificial, is for the most part teleological. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle addressed the existence of gods

Averroes His work was highly controversial, officially banned in both Christendom and Islamic Spain. Averroes' teleological arguments can be characterized as presuming one god. He proposes that order and continual motion in the world is caused by God's intellect. In knowing all forms and patterns, God provides order to the Lesser Intelligences. Aquinas The fifth way is taken from the governance of the world. We see that things which lack knowledge, such as natural bodies, act for an end, and this is evident from their acting always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result. Hence it is plain that they achieve their end, not fortuitously, but designedly. Now whatever lacks knowledge cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence; as the

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arrow is directed by the archer. Therefore, some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God. St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica David Hume, presented arguments both for and against the teleological argument in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion Watchmaker analogy William Paley's "watchmaker analogy" -- argument with reference to a timepiece [S]uppose I found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think that, for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch as well as for [a] stone [that happened to be lying on the ground]? For this reason, and for no other; namely, that, if the different parts had been differently shaped from what they are, if a different size from what they are, or placed after any other manner, or in any order than that in which they are placed, either no motion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or none which would have answered the use that is now served by it. William Paley, Natural Theology Fine-tuned Universe the fine-tuning of the Universe is the apparent delicate balance of conditions necessary for human life. In this view, speculation about a vast range of possible conditions in which life cannot exist is used to explore the probability of conditions in which life can and does exist. "The mere fact that it is enormously improbable that an event occurred... by itself, gives us no reason to think that it occurred by design As intuitively tempting as it may be... -Kenneth Himma Intelligent design movement Cornelius G. Hunter, have asserted that the methodological naturalism upon which science is based is religious in nature Michael Behe attempts to prove the existence of an intelligent designer, rather than the God of classical theism. He uses the analogy of a mousetrap to propose irreducible complexity: if a mousetrap loses just one of its parts, it can no longer function as a mousetrap. Irreducible complexity in an object guarantees the presence of intelligent design. There are instances of irreducible complexity in the natural world and that parts of the world must have been designed Criticism A very small part of this great system, during a very short time, is very imperfectly discovered to us; and do we thence pronounce decisively concerning the origin of the whole? -David Hume -the design argument is built upon a faulty analogy as, unlike with man-made objects, we have not witnessed the design of a universe, so do not know whether the universe was the result of design. Moreover, the size of the universe makes the analogy problematic: although our experience of the universe is of order, there may be chaos in other parts of the universe

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from this sole argument I cannot conclude anything further than that it is probable that an intelligent and superior being has skillfully prepared and fashioned the matter. I cannot conclude from that alone that this being has made matter out of nothing and that he is infinite in every sense. Voltaire, Trait de mtaphysique

-even if the argument from design could prove the existence of a powerful intelligent designer, it would not prove that this designer is God The works of God are such that only God can perform them. Just so, but where then are the works of the God? The works from which I would deduce his existence are not directly and immediately given. The wisdom in nature, the goodness, the wisdom in the governance of the world -- are all these manifest, perhaps, upon the very face of things? Are we not here confronted with the most terrible temptations to doubt, and is it not impossible finally to dispose of all these doubts? But from such an order of things I will surely not attempt to prove God's existence; and even if I began I would never finish, and would in addition have to live constantly in suspense, lest something so terrible should suddenly happen that my bit of proof would be demolished. Sren Kierkegaard, Philosophical Fragments -the argument from design does not take into consideration future events which may serve to undermine the proof of God's existence: the argument would never finish proving God's existence

SUMMARY The world exhibits complexity and order, and this complexity and this order cannot have happened by accident. Thus some mind must have designed the complexity and order of nature, and that mind is God. Those making a teleological argument argue that nature appears to have an order and everything appears to have a purpose, that this purpose could not have happened randomly, and therefore God must have designed the world in some particular way

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Cosmological Argument
general pattern of argumentation (logos) that makes an inference from certain alleged facts about the world (cosmos) to the existence of a unique being, generally identified with or referred to as God initial facts are that the world came into being, that the world is contingent in that it could have been other than it is, or that certain beings or events in the world are causally dependent or contingent philosophers infer either deductively or inductively that a first cause, a necessary being, an unmoved mover, or a personal being (God) exists argument arises from human curiosity as to why there is something rather than nothing invokes a concern for some complete, ultimate, or best explanation of what exists contingently raises intrinsically important philosophical questions about contingency and necessity, causation and explanation, part/whole relationships (mereology), infinity, sets, and the nature and origin of the universe argument for the existence of a First Cause (or instead, an Uncaused cause) to the universe, and by extension is often used as an argument for the existence of an "unconditioned" or "supreme" being, usually then identified as God Aquinas It is possible that the world could have not existed. Therefore, because it does exist, something must have caused it to, and that something is God. In other words, the existence of the world is contingent upon God's existence Leibniz (16461716) appealed to a strengthened principle of sufficient reason, according to which no fact can be real or existing and no statement true without a sufficient reason for its being so and not otherwise (Monadology, 32). Leibniz uses the principle to argue that the sufficient reason for the series of things comprehended in the universe of creatures (36) must exist outside this series of contingencies and is found in a necessary being that we call God Plato (c. 427347 BC) motion in the world and the Cosmos was "imparted motion" that required some kind of "selforiginated motion" to set it in motion and to maintain that motion supreme wisdom and intelligence as the creator of the Cosmos in his work Timaeus

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Aristotle (c. 384322 BC eternal cosmos with no beginning and no end (which in turn follows Parmenides' famous statement that "nothing comes from nothing") intend a theological correspondence between the prime mover and deity (presumably Zeus), functionally however, he provided an explanation for the apparent motion of the "fixed stars" (now understood as the daily rotation of the Earth).

Plotinus the One transcendent absolute caused the universe to exist simply as a consequence of its existence - "creatio ex deo." His disciple Proclus stated 'The One is God' Avicenna (c. 9801037) inquired into the question of being, in which he distinguished between essence (Mahiat) and existence (Wujud) existence must be due to an agent cause that necessitates, imparts, gives, or adds existence to an essence. To do so, the cause must coexist with its effect and be an existing thing A version of the cosmological argument could be stated as follows: Every finite and contingent being has a cause. A causal loop cannot exist. A causal chain cannot be of infinite length. Therefore, a First Cause (or something that is not an effect) must exist. -According to the argument, the existence of the Universe requires an explanation, and the creation of the Universe by a First Cause, generally assumed to be God, is that explanation.

Stylized version of argument (Kalam cosmological argument, by Al-Gazali and William Lane Craig)
Whatever begins to exist has a cause. The Universe began to exist. Therefore, the Universe had a cause.

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In esse and in fieri In fieri-"becoming" similar to building a house, once it is built, the builder walks away, and it stands on its own accord. (It may require occasional maintenance, but that is beyond the scope of the first cause argument.) in esse"in essence" light from a candle or the liquid in a vessel.-where the light of the candle is dependent on the candle's continued existence, not only does a candle produce light in a room in the first instance, but its continued presence is necessary if the illumination is to continue Contingency the Universe could, under different circumstances, conceivably not exist (contingency), its existence must have a cause not merely another contingent thing, but something that exists by necessity (something that must exist in order for anything else to exist). In other words, even if the Universe has always existed, it still owes its existence to an Uncaused Cause, Aquinas further said: "...and this we understand to be God