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Cosmological Vs Ontological Argument

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There have been an innumerable amount of arguments for the existence of God for hundreds of years. Some have become much more popular due to their merit, and their ability to stay relevant through changing times. Two arguments in particular that have been discussed for a very long time are the ontological and cosmological arguments. Each were proposed in the period of the high middle ages by members of the Roman Catholic Church. They each have been used extensively by many since their introduction. However, one of the arguments is superior ant that is the ontological argument. The Ontological argument is the stronger of the two due to the fact that it is based in pure logic and reasoning. The major premise of the Ontological argument is about what God is. In the Abrahamic tradition God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. He is the pinnacle of perfection because of those points, and therefore it is …show more content…

This is its biggest weakness, in order for it to succeed someone has to presuppose that God exists. Another weakness is based on whether or not existence is an actual property of something like its size, weight, or color. If existence isn’t considered a property then it fails, but if it is then it succeeds. Then there is the cosmological argument. The cosmological argument looks to the world to prove God’s existence rather than pure definitions. The proponent of the cosmological argument was St. Thomas Aquinas, a theologian in the eleventh century CE (Solomon). He proposed that everything that exists must have a cause, and that the cause was God (Aquinas). Aquinas’ first point was based off of motion, that nothing can be both the mover and moved. An item sitting in place has the potential to be moving, but cannot move unless something that is already moving imparts motion to it

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Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence 2. The universe began to exist 3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of existence His defense of the Kalam Cosmological Argument revolves mostly around the second premise. This is mostly due to him finding the first premise as intuitively obvious, where he claims that “no one, seriously denies it”. From experience, we find that physical objects do not come into existence without causes.

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378 Words | 2 Pages

For this disputation, I had the pleasure of arguing against the topic of be it resolved that you can convince a non-believer to affirm the existence of God using philosophical arguments. As the opposing side, Sarah and I counter argued the following: the argument from motion, the ontological argument, Pascal’s Wager, the cosmological argument, the teleological argument, and the moral argument. The argument from motion argues that it is only possible to experience that which exists, and people experience God, therefore God must exist; however it can be counter argued that since faith cannot be demonstrated or experienced, as it is unseen, God cannot exist.

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God 's existence has been a continuous debate certainly for centuries. The issue of God 's existence is debatable because of the different kind of controversies that can be raised from an "Atheist as being the non-believer of God" and a "Theist who is the believer of God". An atheist can raise different objections on the order of the universe by claiming that the science is a reason behind the perfection of the universe. In Aquinas 's fifth argument, he claims that the order of the universe cannot be explained by chance, but only by design and purpose. To explain this order of the universe he concludes that, there is an intelligent being whom we call "God".

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The question that is asked time and time again is whether or not god exists. It is evident that people hold different beliefs. It is evident that through some of the beliefs of J.L. Mackie that it could be argued that God does not actually exist. I find this argument to be more agreeable. In Mackie’s Evil and Omnipotence, he argues many points to support why it should be believed that god does not exist.

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100 Words | 1 Pages

The ontological argument is an argument based, not on the observation of the universe as cosmology and theological arguments but rather using only the reason. Everything we see today in the universe was created by a God, which created the humans in a predict time and perfect time. The first and most popular form of this argument starts from Anselm of Canterbury in the 11th century. It begins with the statement that the concept of God is such a being, that nothing greater can be conceived. Since existence is possible, and existence is greater than non-existence, then God must

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143 Words | 1 Pages

McCloskey claimed that the cosmological argument “does not entitle us to postulate an all-powerful, all-perfect, uncaused cause.” At first glance of this statement I am understanding the statement as that something doesn’t allow us to come up with a belief or solution, which is silly. In the same thinking one could say that based on his arguments he is not allowed to assume there is no God. Nevertheless, based on the existence of a contingent being it points toward the existence of a necessary being because they require an ultimate cause. Beyond this, the cosmological argument may be limited.

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552 Words | 3 Pages

The Cosmological Argument is an a priori argument, seeking to establish the existence of a self-existent being through the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR), in order to then attempt to prove that that self-existent being is the “theist God” (48). In the Cosmological Argument, philosophers argued that the world’s foundation is based on the implicit relationship we have with the world and one another. Their arguments can be epitomized below: (a) Every being (that exists or ever did exist) is either a dependent being or a self-existent being. (b) Not every being can be a dependent being.

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753 Words | 4 Pages

The argument for God’s existence is that God is a perfect being, he is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, and supremely powerful. Descartes goes on to talk about how God exists because he can conceive of him as better than himself (AD 40). God is perfect and perfect at everything, and was the first thing that sent everything into motion (AD 45). God is the ultimate cause.

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Since premise two has been rebuffed by me, it renders premise 3 unsound which in turn renders premise four unsound thereby proving that God does not exist and proving that the first cause argument does not validate or prove the existence of God. The first cause argument while it is a very important argument still lacks credibility and is self-defeating as it is riddled with a lot of problems that makes it hard to reach a true and sound

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539 Words | 3 Pages

Before restating the Anselm’s argument for the existence of God, it is important to understand who Anselm was and what might have compelled him to come up with the ontological argument for the existence of God. Anselm’s background information will be helpful in evaluating the validity and reliability of his arguments. Anselm was born in Italy in c. 1033. In 1063, he entered the famous monastery. In 1093, he moved to England, having been appointed Archbishop of Canterbury.

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Thomas Aquinas is the second critique of Anselm’s position. Take note that Aquinas assumed that the existence of God is obvious. He supported cosmological argument to prove that God exists. The cosmological argument uses the physical things that exist in the universe to demonstrate God’s existence. In his criticism of Anselm’s argument, Aquinas disagrees with the use of the word “God” and argues only some who hear the word “God” understands what it means (Himma, 4).

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945 Words | 4 Pages

St. Anselm and Descartes are known for presenting the first ontological arguments on the existence of God. The word ontological is a compound word derived from ‘ont’ which means exists or being and ‘–ology’ which means the study of. Even though Anselm and Descartes’ arguments differ slightly, they both stem from the same reasoning. Unlike the other two arguments on God’s existence (teleological and cosmological), the ontological argument does not seek to use any empirical evidence but rather concentrates on pure reason. The rationale behind this school of thought

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1784 Words | 8 Pages

The traditional claim of all Cosmological Arguments is defined as “something outside the universe is responsible to explain the existence of the universe” (PowerPoint 380). In the “causal argument,” or the First Cause Argument on the cosmological argument, “something” outside of the universe that is supposed to inform us about the existence of the universe is argued to be explained as God. As the first cause argument goes into depth and with the help of Thomas Aquinas, it is easy to see how God is responsible for explaining the existence of the universe around us. Within the first cause argument on the cosmological argument the following premises and conclusions are discussed: Premise 1: There exists things that are caused. Meaning that

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818 Words | 4 Pages

Argument for the existence of god is being proposed in several ways. Some based on science while some are about personal experience and some on philosophical arguments such as ontological arguments, first cause arguments, arguments based on deign, moral arguments. Each of these support conception. Ontological argument say that if you inculcate the idea of god , we can see him . There is a saying that “Nothing comes from Nothing but something comes from something”.

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915 Words | 4 Pages

Pg. 63). The general principles of a cosmological argument are: effects have causes, things happen and things exist for a reason, it’s trying to explain things, and all our sciences, studies, and lives are based on it (McGowan, Michael. N.p.). During Josh Wheaton’s speech in defending his belief, he uses this type of argument and talks about the Big Bang. He talked about how in the 1920s, Belgian astronomer and theist, Georges Lemaitre, said the entire universe jumping into existence in a trillionth of a second, out of nothing, in a flash of light, is how he would expect the universe to respond if God were to actually utter the command in Genesis 1:3, “let there be light”.

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