Thomas Aquinas

[Jamie123]

In an earlier thread (http://lds.net/forums/topic/57028-does-god-exist/) MormonGator suggested I check out “Quinque Viae” by St. Thomas Aquinas.

 

I have, and it’s very interesting. Here are some comments:

 

(My summaries of Thomas Aquinas’ arguments are rather laconic – if you think I’ve missed some important point by brevity, please tell me.)

 

1. The unmoved mover

 

“Nothing moves unless it is moved by something else. (Nothing which moves is own mover.) In order for anything to move, there must have been a first mover: God.”

 

Comments:

 

This is very much what I was getting at in my earlier post; if we interpret “move” as “come into existence” then how does that apply to God? If God is the “author of existence” then His own existence must rely upon Himself. He is both “mover and moved” – which totally contradicts what Aquinas is saying.

 

Also the first observation that nothing moves without a mover may have been true in Thomas Aquinas’ experience, but what about quantum-level events such as radioactive decay, that are only governed by probability?

 

2. The first cause

 

 “Everything must have been caused by something else. (Nothing that is caused is its own causer.) So for anything to be caused there must have been a first cause: God.”

 

Comments:

 

This seems to be little more than a restatement of the argument 1, so I’ll move straight on…

 

3. Argument from contingency

 

“A thing may be either (a) non-existent or (b) existent for a finite period of time. It must be possible to all these things to be non-existent at the same time, in which case there would be nothing to make anything else become existent. Something must therefore exist permanently: God.”

 

Comments:

 

This assumes that (a) things do not come into existence spontaneously (the axiom behind arguments 1 and 2, which is questionable in the light of quantum theory) and (b) that a thing may exist without necessarily causing another thing to exist. This would require a thing exist without influencing in any way other things that exist. Is this even possible? Leibniz might have argued that there are an infinite number of monads which play no part in the pre-established harmony of the universe, but could such entities truly be said to “exist”? (I don’t know, and I always thought Leibniz was wacked.)

 

4. Argument from degree

 

“Some things are more perfect than others. Perfection must therefore have an ultimate standard from which all other degrees of perfection are assessed: God.”

 

Comments:

 

I shall have to think about this some more before I can really comment, but for the moment two ideas spring to mind: firstly Plato’s “transcendent forms” – things that exist imperfectly in reality have their perfect archetypes in the world of ideas. But if a thing that exists as an idea can be truly said to “exist” then mermaids and dragons and the Loch Ness monster (not to mention God) truly exist. When communication engineers talk about the “gain” of an antenna, they measure that with reference to a perfectly “isotropic” antenna – but that does not mean that the perfect isotropic antenna really exists.

 

This also makes me think of Anselm’s ontological argument: “The greatest thing imaginable” must exist as an idea, it cannot truly be the greatest thing imaginable because a “real” greatest thing imaginable would be greater. That real greatest thing imaginable is God. (This has to be has to take second place to Leibniz’s monadism in the “weird ideas” charts – but there again I’ve probably misunderstood it horribly.)

 

5. Argument from design

 

“Natural bodies obey certain laws (e.g. trees grow, rocks fall, hot air rises) in a manner characteristic of intelligence, though the bodies themselves may be unintelligent. There must therefore be an intelligence behind their behaviour: God.”

 

Comments:

 

This reminds me of David Hume’s “Dialogues”: the character Cleanthes makes exactly this argument – that the universe is like a machine, and a machine must have a maker. Philo responds that if the universe is like a machine then given its imperfection it is a very poor machine, and that the God who made it was either an “apprentice” who has since moved on to better things, or else a senile old deity who died eons ago. He suggests (if I remember rightly – it’s years since I read it) that the universe is more like a vegetable.

 

Though (to return to what Thomas Aquinas had to say) vegetables grow according to natural laws which most have an intelligent origin, so we’re at the start of an infinite regression of the sort he rejects in his first two arguments.

 

Overall Comments

 

To restate my original suggestion, I contend that God – the source of existence – cannot be categorized as either existent or non-existent (just as water cannot be categorized as either wet or dry). If so then Thomas Aquinas (and Dawkins too for that matter) are wasting their time trying to answer the question “Does God exist?” The question itself is ill-formed and unanswerable.

 

 

[Guest MormonGator]

Told you he was good. :-) 

[ether-ore]

As I went through those philosophers you just outlined (good job by the way), I came away with a similar sense of frustration with the unanswerable,  I thought studying these guys would give me some insight into proof of God and "beginnings".  Now that I have that degree, I'm fully qualified to ask if people want fries with their happy meal.  To compound the problem, I've tried sifting through the implications of some of the things Joseph Smith has said as well as the implications of the Pearl of Great Price.

 

Ok, so Joseph Smith says that as man is God once was and as God is, man may become.  This suggests a chain of Gods back through infinity without beginning.  Comparing that with our own genealogy which can be traced back to a pair of beings (Adam and Eve); it doesn't seem to work.  Can the Gods be traced back to a single pair?  I can't imagine that it does.  That would imply idleness on the part of the Gods for the eternity prior to the decision to create anything... which itself makes no sense.  The alternative would suggest and infinite number of pairs 'giving birth' to an infinite number of spirit children; a process which never began nor will exhaust itself.  It simply boggles the mind.

[askandanswer]

I posted this in the forum about Adam - first man on earth a few minutes ago. Its something else to ponder about when thinking about how and when gods began.

 

http://lds.net/forums/topic/56756-adam-first-man-on-earth/page-11#entry822184

 

I think that evolution must have something to contribute in response to the question of where did life come from, and how did we come to be as we are, because I can't think of any other satisfactory answer to the question of where did the first god come from. That first god must have come from somewhere and evolution seems to be the only answer around at present. To say that our God is a result of His god ad infinitum really doesn't get us very far. 

Edited May 8, 2015 by askandanswer

[Traveler]

Many years ago I watched the Star Trek movie, "The Wrath of Khan".  In the final sequence of a battle between Captain Kirk and Khan – Spok says to Kirk, “He is thinking in two dimensions”.   But then the final shot by Kirk is not fired until the two space ships are in the same two dimensional plain????

 

The problem is that as we address an immortal G-d we tend to think and define understanding in mortal terms – both in regards to an immortal and exalted G-d and as ourselves as something not immortal.  Thus we seem to think of G-d and ourselves as two existing things that are evolving (or coming about) independently or at different “times”. 

 

I tend to think of a more important and eternal connection between us and G-d.  That without man – as the spiritual covenant children of G-d – that G-d would not be G-d.  And also that without G-d we would not man or could not be his covenant children.  In essence the two are eternally linked and deeply rooted - each in the other.  In other words we are eternally locked together with G-d in an eternal process that has neither beginning nor end.   The point of G-d’s origin or G-d’s G-d therefore becomes meaningless and irrelevant.

 

Also – I do not think Thomas Aquinas is anything more than philosophical babble speak that proves nothing.

[askandanswer]

I tend to think of a more important and eternal connection between us and G-d.  That without man – as the spiritual covenant children of G-d – that G-d would not be G-d.  

 

I don't think God's"godness" depends on our existence. We are no doubt a product of his "godness" which status He would have achieved in its fulness prior to being able to create us.

[Traveler]

Your thinking is too finite.  Let me attempt a rephrase.  If to be a G-d requires awareness – how could G-d be aware and ignorant of us – even his would be spiritual children?  Since we, as spiritual intelligence, are eternal, his g-dness indeed does depend not just on his awareness of us but the very relationship between us.  I believe the fault in thinking is that somehow because we add something to G-d’s g-dness that somehow that diminishes his g-dness – To the contrary it adds to and makes his g-dness greater and more complete – so much so that without such addition (even though and especially because we are nothing) there would be no such G-d.

[askandanswer]

It looks like there might be a little misunderstanding between us here. I was thinking more along the lines that God probably has other sheep not of this earth to whom He is a God, and if that is the case then His Godliness would not depend on our existence. I think on the question of whether or not God needs spirit children in order to be God our thinking might not be too far apart. 

[Traveler]

It looks like there might be a little misunderstanding between us here. I was thinking more along the lines that God probably has other sheep not of this earth to whom He is a God, and if that is the case then His Godliness would not depend on our existence. I think on the question of whether or not God needs spirit children in order to be God our thinking might not be too far apart. 

 

I think there is something about a G-d that loves.  G-d could not love unless there was something to love.  I for one think there is something added to greatness when it is moved from theory or thought to action.  Thus G-d becomes better by making sacrifices for us.  To me the question of other worlds and other possibilities makes no difference - because he loves and for each thing he loves - he become greater.

[bytor2112]

Recruiting hot bed.....tons of future college and NFL talent produced at St Thomas Aquinas

[Jamie123]

G-d could not love unless there was something to love.

 

This is one of the great ideas behind the Trinity: that God "contains" the loving community of the Father, Son and Spirit. God contained love for others within Himself from the start.

 

At the moment I'm reading The Shack by Wm. Paul Young (a book my wife has long badgered me to read, and I'm finally getting round to doing so). The protagonist, while grieving for his murdered daughter, meets God and finds "Him" to be three people living together in a log cabin; when he asks "God the Father" (who defies his expectations by appearing to be a black African woman) why there are three of them and not one, she explains that if there were only one of her, she would be unable to love as God.

Edited May 12, 2015 by Jamie123