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Fight For A Place In The First - College Term Papers

Fight For A Place In The First

Efficient Cause
Who and what is God? Why do some people adamantly conclude that a God exists? St. Aquinas goes from believing that there must be an efficient first cause to the conclusion that God is that cause. Why must Aquinas make such an extraordinary jump from there being a cause, to assuming that this cause must be God? In a scientific point of view, wouldn’t it be just as plausible to make matter the first cause? After all, according to the Law of Conservation of Matter, matter cannot be created nor destroyed. Matter is the substance that any physical object is composed of. Matter is closed and finite, with no beginning nor end. The best explanation to the existence of God ...

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existed. If a being exists, it is because some being before it caused it to exist. Therefore, if no first cause exists, neither will any other being exist. Therefore, there must be an efficient first cause -- God.
St. Aquinas’s argument assumes that a first cause is needed to explain the existence of anything. St. Aquinas also assumes this first cause to be God. How can anyone rationally conclude that there is a God from the simple statement that a first cause is necessary for the existence of anything? A first cause does not prove God, it only assumes that there is a God, at best. Could one not put matter in the place of God in St. Aquinas’s argument and still assume there is a first efficient cause? The theory that matter “is”, is just as plausible as the theory that God “is”. Matter is closed and finite in extent, with no beginning nor end.
Putting matter in the place of God in the end of the argument given by St. Aquinas is just as plausible. In fact, matter is an ...

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 12/23/2005 03:20:44 PM
Category: Miscellaneous
Type: Premium Paper
Words: 966
Pages: 4

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