A Posteriori Arguments for God’s Existence Aquinas’ Five Ways Chapter 28 A Posteriori Arguments for God’s Existence Aquinas’ Five Ways

Nature: A Cosmos, not a Chaos The Greeks were the first Western thinkers to label nature a cosmos The debate over whether the world order has a rational cause or is due merely to: Chance combination of eternal bits of matter is older than the debate over God’s existence © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

Nature: A Cosmos, not a Chaos In neither the Jewish nor the Christian Bibles is there any argument for: God’s existence Christian writers found the most useful philosophical framework within the: Philosophy of Plato © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Disputed Question The form adopted by Aquinas in his: Presentation of the arguments for God’s existence An approach to religious questions of: The form presented here by Aquinas’ arguments is often called natural theology © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

St. Thomas Aquinas: The Five Ways Whether God Exists? We proceed thus to the Third Article: Objection 1 Objection 2 Reply Objection 1 Reply Objection 2 © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Argument From Change The ancient Greeks were fascinated by change: For it seemed to them an intricate puzzle Change is the movement from a thing’s potentiality to its actuality We experience things being moved from potentiality to actuality © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Argument from Efficient Causality Aquinas used terms for causality that: Have pretty much dropped out of our philosophical vocabulary Used the term cause to refer to: Explanatory principles other than efficient causes © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Argument from Possibility and Necessity A contingent being is a dependent being The opposite of a contingent being is a necessary being If the universe is infinitely old, all possibilities would have been realized By this point it is clear what God’s characteristics are © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Argument from Gradations of Being There must be a standard of being by which all things are In Thomistic thought: Anything that is must possess certain qualities common to all other beings © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

The Argument from Design The last of Aquinas’ arguments is: Based on the observance of order and apparent purpose in the world The design argument reached its height of popularity in the eighteenth century © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.