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Cosmological Argument Analysis

993 Words4 Pages

Alisa Perez Perez 1
PHI 233
25 October, 2015
Cosmological Argument The Cosmological argument states that everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence. Such that the universe began to exist therefore the universe has a cause of its existence. It uses a general pattern of argumentation (logos) that makes an inference from certain alleged facts about the world (cosmos) to the existence of a unique being. Who is generally identified or referred to as God. Including Bertram Russell’s argument that denies the universe needs an explanation. Another argument from David Hume who held the idea that when the parts are explained the whole is also explained. A third argument comes from Immanuel Kant and his concept of their being …show more content…

The first is advocated by Acquinas which says that based on the impossibility of an essentially ordered infinite regress. The second which Craig terms the Kalam argument holds that an infinite temporal regress is impossible because an actual infinite is impossible. The third espoused by both Leibniz and Clarke is overtly founded on the Principle of Sufficient Reason. They put that one way of distinguishing the versions of the argument is in terms of relevance of time. In Aquinas version consideration of the essential ordering of the cause and effect is treated as real but not temporal. Saying that the first cause is not a first cause in time but a sustaining …show more content…

Russell who was following Hume contends that “since we derive the concept of cause from our observation of particular things, we cannot ask about the cause of something like the universe that we cannot experience. The universe is just there and that’s all.” Russell also replies to the argument that the move from the contingency of the universe commits the Fallacy of Composition. He says which mistakenly concludes that since the parts have a certain property the whole likewise has that property. One example of the Fallacy of Composition Bertrand Russell says “that since all of the bricks in the wall are small, the wall is small is fallacious. Yet it is an informal fallacy of content, not

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