Principle of Sufficient Reason

[Dragon*of*Heaven]

The Principle of Sufficient Reason written by St Thomas Aquinas states the Idea:

Every effect requires a cause, and that nothing that exists in the physical world is the cause of its own existence. Or put simply there must be an Uncaused Cause to begin the cycle.

This idea is further backed by St. Anselem's definition of God. "That than for which nothing else can be conceived." he goes on to explain it with: Existence is in a way perfection becuase to exist is better than to not exist. Supposing that God was only a figment of peoples imagination and not a creation in reality then the idea in peoples head is not a correct dipiction of God. God being the greatest conceivable being would not be the greatest if it did not exist in reality."
(was collected from a book by Thomas E Woods Ph.d)

These two ideas create interesting "proofs" of a God. I have currently put most of my thoughts toward a solution undoing them both, but I could use some help. If you guys have any constructive ideas I would love to read them.;

[vertigo]

It's called begging the question. As soon as you say 'every effect requires a cause' you are assuming there's a prime cause.

[vertigo]

Do I need to comment on 'God being the greatest conceivable being, he must exist because existing is great'?

[Dragon*of*Heaven]

Do I need to comment on 'God being the greatest conceivable being, he must exist because existing is great'?

Well I suppose it would depend on your positon Vertigo. If you follow and contend that the ideas, hypothosis's, and Laws of science are importent then you may wish to do so yes. Disregarding that both of these gentelmen are saints in the catholic faith, they are also thought to be great thinkers by the scientific commmunity as a whole. So to that end Vertigo it may be useful to yourself to say what it is which you think. And if I may add, It will certainly help the rest of us to hear your view points. If I am not mistaken this is a bord for discussion not for simply posting asinine retorts on the most base of an idea.

It's called begging the question. As soon as you say 'every effect requires a cause' you are assuming there's a prime cause.

Well these two statements are said to be possible "Proof" of the existence of God. They are upheld by only a couple billion people on the planet. If your are stateing that they could be invalidated by such a base statement in reasoning, please do go out and attack the church directly. I personaly hate the idea that most of the world could be held under one stupid rational so if you can disprove this compleatly and utterly please do so. If not please expand on your statment to make it into something that proves what you are talking about and not just a simple statment.

[vertigo]

I want you to tell me about that second argument. You are more than capable of dealing with it. I will talk about the first one.

Firstly, we have a premise that says: 'every effect requires a cause'. The definition of 'effect' is something with a cause. So saying 'every effect requires a cause' is actually saying nothing at all. It's like saying 'every blue sky must be blue'. If we know the definition, we don't need this statement (this is actually saying something else, which I'll get to later).

Look carefully at the argument. Following that statement, we have 'nothing that exists in the physical world ...'. We were just talking about effects, now we are talking about physical existents. No physical existent is the cause of it's own existence, I certainly agree with that. It's a true statement (of physical existents). He concludes: 'there must be an uncaused cause to begin the cycle'. At what point did we decide that physical existents are effects? If you assume they are, you assume the conclusion.

The mistake is that the premise is misstated, it should read 'every physical existent requires a cause'. The argument would then make sense, although one would need to defend the premise. By defining physical existents as effects, the speaker begs the question.

[vertigo]

DOH, I liked how you phrased that first paragraph in your last post. Even though you were probably annoyed with what I said you didn't show it.

[dan]

vertigo said:

It's called begging the question. As soon as you say 'every effect requires a cause' you are assuming there's a prime cause.

Actually, it isn't begging the question, because the principle that "Every effect requires a cause" is intuitively reasonable, whether or not there is a "prime cause." So it does not require that you "assume there's a prime cause" in order to use that principle in the argument for God's existence.