Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The first two Ways relate to causation. When Aquinas argues that a causal chain cannot be infinitely long, he does not have in mind a chain where each element is a prior event that causes the next event; in other words, he is not arguing for a first event in a sequence.
The question does not include the timing of when anything came to exist. Some have suggested the possibility of an infinite regress, where, if an entity can't come from nothing and this concept is mutually exclusive from something, there must have always been something that caused the previous effect, with this causal chain (either deterministic or probabilistic) extending infinitely back in time.
A cosmological argument, in natural theology and the philosophy of religion, is an argument which asserts that the existence of God can be inferred from facts concerning causation, explanation, change, motion, contingency, dependency, or finitude with respect to the universe or some totality of objects. [1][2][3] A cosmological argument can ...
Argument from degree. The argument from degrees, also known as the degrees of perfection argument or the henological argument, [1] is an argument for the existence of God first proposed by mediaeval Roman Catholic theologian Thomas Aquinas as one of the five ways to philosophically argue in favour of God 's existence in his Summa Theologica.
Unmoved mover. The unmoved mover (Ancient Greek: ὃ οὐ κινούμενον κινεῖ, romanized: ho ou kinoúmenon kineî, lit. 'that which moves without being moved') [1] or prime mover (Latin: primum movens) is a concept advanced by Aristotle as a primary cause (or first uncaused cause) [2] or "mover" of all the motion in the universe. [3]
The Quaestiones Disputatae de Veritate (transl. Disputed Questions on Truth, henceforth QDV[1] and sometimes spelled de Ueritate) by Thomas Aquinas is a collection of questions that are discussed in the disputation style of medieval scholasticism. It covers a variety of topics centering on the true, the good and man's search for them, but the ...
Important trichotomies discussed by Aquinas include the causal principles (agent, patient, act), the potencies for the intellect (imagination, cogitative power, and memory and reminiscence), and the acts of the intellect (concept, judgment, reasoning), with all of those rooted in Aristotle; also the transcendentals of being (unity, truth, goodness) and the requisites of the beautiful ...
Causal reasoning is the process of identifying causality: the relationship between a cause and its effect. The study of causality extends from ancient philosophy to contemporary neuropsychology; assumptions about the nature of causality may be shown to be functions of a previous event preceding a later one. The first known protoscientific study ...