[Music] hello and welcome to philosophy vibe the channel we would discuss and debate different philosophical ideas today we're going to look into Thomas Aquinas his five ways he attempts to prove the existence of God fascinating Thomas Aquinas was a 13th century theologian and philosopher he developed the five ways or the five proofs as logical methods of investigation that prove the existence of God the first four ways are seen as versions of the cosmological argument whereas the fifth way is understood to be a version of the teleological argument we shall run through each of the five proofs now and critically assess them let's go very well let's start with the first and second way now both of these follow the cause-and-effect principle that we all understand the first proof is known as the argument from motion this is an argument that's heavily inspired by the works of Aristotle within his theory of causation we can see and understand with our own senses that everything around us is in a constant state of motion a constant state of change everything is always moving and always changing leaning on Aristotle's idea of potentiality to actuality something moves from its potential to fulfill its purpose what it was meant to do for example a seed moves towards becoming a plot and reaching its sexuality however Aquinas questions where does this motion come from everything is in a state of motion and for something to move it needs something else to move it there is nothing that is responsible for its own motion everything needs a mover however if everything needs a mover this will lead to an infinite regress we will keep going on going back and back and back infinitely Aquinas rejected the idea of an infinite regress and said this is impossible why is this impossible if we go forever into the past that there was no point in which everything started and with no sports how do we have anything there must be a start there must be something that started the motion of the first cause the first mover that is itself unmoved this is known as the unmoved mover or the prime mover and this would be good I see so the fact that we have a world and the universe and nature the fact that these are all in a state of motion means it is necessary that there was a being that started the motion of a being that is not put in motion by another but the one that creates all the motion in the universe and so this is the first way that proves that God must exist right then we move on to the second method using the cause-and-effect principle this is known as the argument from efficient cause now an efficient cause is something that causes something else if I build a car I am the efficient cause of the car the carpenter is the efficient cause of the wooden chair the Builder is the efficient cause of the house do you see yes you can say that your parents are the efficient cause of you and your grandparents are the efficient cause of your parents and so on and so on yes I understand so Aquinas notices that everything in existence has an efficient cause if something does not have an efficient cause it would not exist and there is no case in which something is the efficient cause of itself however if everything has an efficient course this would lead to an infinite regress as we would keep on going back in time efficient cause preceded by an efficient cause preceded by another efficient cause and so on ad infinitum again Aquinas rejects the idea of infinite regress logically it does not make sense infinite regress implies no first cause and if there is no first cause there will be no sequence to follow and there would be nothing but there isn't nothing there is something in fact a whole universe so Aquinas claims there must be a first cause and uncaused cause and this is God okay both of these are a very problematic approach how so firstly they fail at their own criteria Aquinas states that everything needs a mover and everything needs a cause and so the universe needs a mover and needs a cause so this must be God but why doesn't God need a mover why doesn't God need a call why is God exempt from this criteria because as Aquinas explained God is the first mover so God is beyond space and time outside of this realm and so would not follow the same physical rules that apply to what's inside the realm I think that's an easy escape for the feast why should we just accept that God is unmoved and uncaused and more so why can't we use this same reasoning for the universe itself why can't we say that the universe is uncaused we can take Bertrand Russell's approach to this and say the universe is just a brute fact Russell states I should say that the universe is just there and that's all so the universe is itself the uncles cause and we can take God out of the equation I'm sorry but I would disagree here scientists are in a general agreement that the universe had a beginning a starting point known as the Big Bang so the universe has not always been there it had a beginning and so it had a cause we need something before the universe and this can only be good no I don't think that's right sure I will agree with the Big Bang but that only explains the beginning of the observable universe there is nothing to rule out multiple universes or multiple layers of universes or perhaps a super universe that's all other universes come out of this causes all the other universes and gives all the other universes their motion this could very well be the first mover of our universe and the uncaused cause of the totality of reality we do not need to put a god in place hmm well personally I think the existence of God seems more reasonable than the existence of a super universe that's just your opinion and in fact many would argue that the fixation of home cause and effect is actually quite unreasonable how so I would like to raise David Humes arguments at this point Hume claim that the cause and effect argument for the existence of God actually takes quite a leap we noticed the laws of cause and effect within the universe but why do the laws that govern within apply to the whole this is just an assumption let me give you an example you can say I have a mother you have a mother every human being has a mother but you cannot say the human race has a mother what applies to the parts does not necessarily apply to the whole and just because we observe cause-and-effect within the universe does not mean this then applies to the universe itself I see and I would also like to raise here that infinite regress is ruled out too quickly by Aquinas sure there may seem to be logical problems with this concept but we are basing this on our empirical understanding of cause and effects fair enough finally some of us would even argue as a discussion around anything beyond our universe beyond space and time is meaningless and this would include arguments for God Emmanuel Kant raised this in his critique of pure reason all our knowledge comes from within the physical world within time and space so we cannot apply what we understand about causation within the confines of space and time to outside of space and time in short our empirical understanding of causation cannot be reasonably used to prove the existence of a being beyond the empirical universe okay then let's move on to the third way this is known as the argument from possibility and necessity Aquinas made a distinction between contingent beings and necessary beings a contingent being is something that quite possibly could not have existed the non-existence of this thing is entirely possible whereas a necessary being is something that cannot not exist the non-existence of this being is logically impossible it must always exist in every possible world Aquinas then argued that's everything in the universe was contingent everything that does exist could quite easily not have existed this includes you me the chair you're sitting on the sky above us everything is contingent if everything is contingent it also means there was a time where everything did not exist and if there was a time where everything didn't exist then there would not have been something to create everything we see today the fact that there exists everything today means there must be at least one thing that is not contingent but in fact has necessary existence in which all contingent beings and things come from and this would be God God is a necessary being who has always existed and must always exist the fact that we have a universe time space matter this means the non-existence of God is actually impossible again we are running into the same problems why can't the universe as a whole be considered the necessary thing why must we put a god in place in fact why can't we have a sequence of contingent beings going back to infinity but this would be an infinite regress yes but as I've already said our lack of understanding about the macro reality means we cannot rule out infinite regress and so many this seems more reasonable than the existence of a conscious all-powerful God okay well let's move on to the fourth way this is known as the argument from gradation here we find similarities with Plato's theory of forms Aquinas argued that we often grade things in terms of good or bad better or worse there is always a metric in which we judge something so let's say we see a crowd of people and notice a very tall person we understand they are tall in comparison to other people of a different smaller height likewise we can refer to a good knife this is in comparison to a bad knife one that cuts very well and the other is blunt and does not cut very well at all the fact there are degrees of goodness means there is a standard we are measuring against yes I understand so when we say something is cold it's in comparison to that which is the coldest so there is that which is the biggest there is that which is the hottest the truest the noblest etc etc and so it follows that for there to be great there must be that which is the greatest there must therefore be something that is perfect that everything is measured against and it is also argued that the maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus and so there must be a perfect being in which every kind of perfection comes from and this being is God this would hold some sorts of weights if we didn't have such diverse opinions on what good and great actually are people disagree on these things all the time that is why there are different cultures with different morals how can we be measuring against the same standard when we disagree so much on what's good and bad great or perfect actually is surely if God was perfect and we all measure against his perfection we would always instinctively know what good is or what bad is what is better what is worse this is clearly not the case so I cannot accept the fourth way very well so let's move on to the fifth way this is seen as the teleological argument is referred to as the argument from design again we will see similarities with Aristotle's work here using the idea of motion Aquinas argued that all things move towards a specific goal even non intelligent things all non intelligent things in our world have their own purpose a goal they tend to and follow through natural law if we take a flower with sunlight and water it will grow vertical we can do this again with a different flower and again the same results it is this movement the purpose of the flower following the laws of nature to its end or to its delos right now here Aquinas has argued that something without knowledge a non intelligent thing cannot fulfill its purpose unless it is guided by something with knowledge Aquinas used the example of an archer and his bow and arrows the bow and arrow is a non intelligent thing its purpose is to shoot an arrow however without its archer it is just a bit of wood and string it would lay motionless doing nothing in order for this to achieve its purpose and do what it was meant to do it needs the archer to place the arrow onto the bone shoot it as though in order for the bow and arrow to reach its purpose it needs an intelligent being someone with knowledge to guide it right yes I see well then most of nature is on intelligent yet nature itself has a purpose everything within nature is following a direction so if every unintelligent thing needs an intelligent being to guide it then it seems that nature our world and our universe needs an intelligent being to give it this direction to give everything its purpose and this being is what we call God okay but are they really being guided or is this just a random state of affairs how can all this be random look how intricate and complicated our world is how complicated nature is yes but you were saying that because you exist on a planet that have managed to evolve and survive and so you believe this has been specifically created and tailored to accommodate life and of course tailored for human beings but consider for a second how many thousands if not millions of other planets there are just in our galaxy that do not have any life or anything growing on them if there is such an intelligent creator why is life so scarce it seems our planets and all life upon its is just down to luck a random planet where things behave in a random way we have just happened to grow and survive on it there is no guided intelligence - it's just organized chaos complete randomness that we have become accustomed to life developed and adapted to the environment not the other way around if this is the case we do not need an intelligent being to guide the non intelligent things the non intelligent things have just randomly come about by chance we do not need God in the equation honestly I think you're downplaying how intricate and complex this planet is for it just to be down to chance no I'm not if we are dealing with an infinite universe then eventually a play that sustains this type of life would have to come about the fact that it is so rare strengthens my point there would not be millions of planets with life just the odd one it is still possible but unlikely and so we have one planet where life has developed and that is earth completely down to chance with no designer and no intelligent being guiding nature well I suppose we have to disagree on that point if you would benefit from having the script to this video and you also want to support the channel then please check out our philosophy of religion ebooks on this script is included in part 3 the link will be in the description but that's all the time we have to now thank you for watching we hope you enjoyed the vibe and what are your thoughts do you think Aquinas is Fiveways are good arguments for the existence of God are they perhaps better arguments that can be raised or are they all fundamentally flawed do you believe in God and if so what do you think are the most convincing arguments proving God's 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