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A cosmological argument can also sometimes be referred to as an argument from universal causation, an argument from first cause, the causal argument or the prime mover argument. The concept of causation is a principal underpinning idea in all cosmological arguments, particularly in affirming the necessity for a First Cause .
More specifically, ontological arguments are commonly conceived a priori in regard to the organization of the universe, whereby, if such organizational structure is true, God must exist. The first ontological argument in Western Christian tradition [i] was proposed by Saint Anselm of Canterbury in his 1078 work, Proslogion (Latin: Proslogium, lit.
William Lane Craig (born 1949), who revived the Kalam cosmological argument during the 20th and 21st centuries. The Kalam cosmological argument is a modern formulation of the cosmological argument for the existence of God. It is named after the Kalam (medieval Islamic scholasticism) from which many of its key ideas originated. [1]
The first three ways are generally considered to be cosmological arguments. [5] Aquinas omitted various arguments he believed to be insufficient or unsuited, such as the ontological argument made by Anselm of Canterbury.
German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) divided arguments for the existence of God into three groups: ontological, cosmological, or teleological. [28] Scholars disagree on whether Avicenna's "Proof of the Truthful" is ontological, that is, derived through sheer conceptual analysis, or cosmological, that is, derived by invoking empirical ...
Other arguments for the existence of God have been proposed by St. Anselm, who formulated the first ontological argument; Thomas Aquinas, who presented his own version of the cosmological argument (the first way); René Descartes, who said that the existence of a benevolent God is logically necessary for the evidence of the senses to be meaningful.
The cosmological argument, later attributed to Aristotle, thereby concludes that God exists. However, if the cosmos had a beginning, Aristotle argued, it would require an efficient first cause , a notion that Aristotle took to demonstrate a critical flaw.
Gödel's ontological proof is a formal argument by the mathematician Kurt Gödel (1906–1978) for the existence of God. The argument is in a line of development that goes back to Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109).