Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Principle of Sufficient Reason: No Brute Facts?
You are hiking in a remote wilderness, miles from the nearest building or even cell phone tower. You come upon a clearing and see a crystal sphere hovering over you and emitting colorful light pulses in some seeming order: red, blue, green and the pattern repeats. Should there be an explanation for this odd phenomenon or is it acceptable to shrug our shoulders and mutter "Stuff happens"? Can we extrapolate from this case to a general principle of the universe? If so, can we prove that God (or a reasonable facsimile) exists?
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The Cosmological Argument, which appears in Part IX, follows:
ReplyDelete1. Principle of Sufficient Reason- everything has to have a reason for its existence (ruling out brute facts).
2. Things cannot be the cause of their own existence.
3. There is either infinite succession or some ultimate cause for existence.
4. Infinite succession never finds an ultimate cause.
5. Thus, there must be some ultimate cause that necessarily exists.
6. That cause is God.
7. God exists.
According to Demea, everything must have a reason for its existence. It is not acceptable to say, “It is there just because,” therefore ruling out brute facts. The infinite chain cannot be an ultimate cause because “each single effect is determined to exist by the power and efficacy of that cause which immediately preceded.” (54) For example, if someone asks who created Geofphdr(y), he would respond by saying his parents; then the person can ask who created his parents, and he would respond by saying his grandparents; the chain would continue on forever and there will never be a final cause for all existence. This being said, we must “have recourse to a necessarily existent Being who carries the reason of his existence in himself.” (55) The existence of this being cannot be doubted because an ultimate cause is a cause that does not have a cause. This cause can only be God, or a reasonable facsimile.
I think Demea is making a reasonable argument. I agree with the Principle of Sufficient Reason; I think that someone can find a reason for the placement and existence of everything. In the case mentioned in the question, the reason for existence of the object could possibly be some kind of signal that the natives of that land use to communicate; in this case, just because the hikers don’t know what the orb is, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have a purpose. Another simple example for reason of existence is this: perhaps there is a book on the floor. There is no reason for it being on the floor specifically, but this doesn’t mean that there isn’t reason why it is not somewhere else. If something is randomly placed somewhere and you have no reason for specifically putting it in that spot, you can argue that the reason is not because it is in that spot, but because it is not in another spot. Going back to the book argument, perhaps the book was on your desk and it was taking up a lot of room. You were trying to work, but you didn’t have enough room so you put the book on the floor. There is no reason that it is specifically on the floor, but there is a reason why it is not on the desk—because it was getting in your way.
I also agree with the point Demea makes about infinite succession. Many people would say that the cause for an object’s existence is because a human made it. This then goes back to the chain of who made that human, who made the human who made that human, etc. Thus, some ultimate cause must exist. Although I am not 100% sure that this cause is God, I do believe that there is an ultimate cause. Perhaps the cause could be God; perhaps the cause could be the natural nature of the world, which some might say was made by God and some might say it was due to physics, astronomy, etc. Regardless of what the cause may be, there is an ultimate cause which can potentially be God, therefore proving He, or some other replication of God, exits.
The argument for God’s existence based on the principal of sufficient reason, that everything must have a meaning or cause for its existence, goes as follows:
ReplyDelete- There must be a reason or cause for everything’s existence,
- Things cannot be the cause of their own existence
- There is either an infinite chain of succession of causes or an ultimate cause that is a necessary being, meaning that that being exists without out a cause or meaning.
- The infinite chain has no explanation and it’s illogical. According to this theory everything must have a cause and there is no such thing as a necessary being, but the chain itself has no meaning or cause for its existence.
- There must be an ultimate and necessary being which is God
I do believe that everything does need a meaning or a cause for their existence. Take the example of walking in the woods and seeing a glowing ball of light floating in the center of a clearing, that orb must have a cause for its existence. Things have explanations for their existences they do not just appear from nothing. This specific example can be applied to all things in the universe. Everything has a source or cause of for its existence. Inevitably, most things in our universe stem from the cause of our universe or, as widely accepted, the big bang. The big bang must also have a source or cause for its occurrence; it did not appear from nothing. You cannot get something from nothing. Thus, the principal of sufficient reason is true.
However, the conclusion of the argument is faulty. There is no explanation given as to why the cause or meaning for the existence of the universe must be God. There is nothing that indicates that the necessary being must be any of the three qualities that define God, omnipotent, omnipresent, and omni-benevolent. The necessary being or thing could be the universe itself or a box that the universe is contained in. Even if the principal of sufficient reason is true, God’s existence does not necessarily follow.
According to the principle of sufficient reason, everything in the world must have a reason for its existance and for its use. Everything in the world is there because someone or something caused it to be there...however this in no way means that it was god. Though a floating, color-changing orb in the middle of the forest may seem very illogical, and may in fact have been put there by god, however there is no proof that he does or does not exist at all. God is said to be omni-benevolent, omni-potent and omni-present, but that doesnt mean that such a being caused everything. If a child throws a crayon onto the floor, obviously the crayon is not their for no reason. It was the child's will to take the crayon and throw it down. This is the same basic principle for everything else. An object or being doesn't just appear out of thin air and do something for no reason, there is always something behind it. Though I believe that the principle of sufficient reason gives a valid statement, it cannot be used to prove that God exists because there is simply not enought proof to do so.
ReplyDeleteThe principle of sufficient reason says that everything in this world must has a meaning or reason which is something that agree with. I think that we all were created by or came from something. It's along lasting chain and the ultimate question is how did that chain begin? Everything didn't just appear out of nowhere. Like the light reference in the question, no you don't just shrug it off and say "stuff happens" because most people's minds won't let them do that anyway. Curiosity makes us want to know where that came from and more importantly why it was there. With all this being said I don't believe that the conclusion really works here. I don't think that just because everything needs a meaning that the meaning has to be a higher power. I'm not at all saying that I don't believe in God (statement to my fellow classmates) I'm just saying that this argument doesn't prove God's existence. In my mind there are so many random things that you could say that could conclude this argument but at the end of the day no one really knows. Yeah we all have our ideas as to how everything began and as to how everything was created but how many of those ideas can really be proven with facts? Not many...
ReplyDeleteThe principle of sufficient reason demonstrates that every occurrance in the universe has a cause and/or reason. This means that anything and everything that exists cannot just exist. To have an occurrance just occurr for no other reason than, "it does," would not be from a natural thing, but of a greater power, whose existence is justified in itself. This idea seems to be an effective explanation of the existence of a god. After all, could you attribute a spontaneous occurrance, with no explanation, to anything else? While at first this theory seems to make sense in it's explanation,it does not hold up under closer scrutiny. It is admitted that human understanding of the universe is extremely limited in scope. Is it not possible that we do not know that everything needs an explanation? Could said action not be the result of some phenemena that we as humans do not understand yet or are incapable of understanding ever? To say that the existence of God is evident in sponaneous, apparently unexplainable, occurrances is to make an unsound conclusion for something that we have no knowledge of.
ReplyDeleteHume's principle of sufficient reasoning is that everything must have a reason and a cause for existing and that the cause of existence is God because there must be an ultimate cause of infinite succession and the idea of infinite succession is insane. According to this idea, the glowing orb that I see in the woods must have a cause (God) and a reason for existence. If one is to accept Hume's argument and the premises, then God must exist and the argument must apply to more than just the orb in the forest, like, for example, the idea that the human race and the world was created for a reason and that things happen for a reason.
ReplyDeleteEven if Hume's argument is correct, I think that the key issue in this idea is the fact that everything must have a reason for its creation. The idea that God created everything is simple enough, but since he didn't tell us why and for what purpose he created everything we are left to flounder around and squabble over our ideas of why things exist but in reality, even if we come to a conclusion, we can never be sure that we are correct. In this case, I believe that even if Hume is correct that everything has a reason and a creator some things really can "just happen." According to Hume the orb in the forest was created by God and that it serves a purpose, but trying to find out the purpose of an apparently useless and unexplained phenomenon like shining light in a forest can be exhausting and inconclusive. Everything may have a reason, but if we are to accept that God is O squared (omnibenevolent, omnipotent, omniscient) and that we humans have a finite amount of knowledge, we may never be perfect enough to understand the orb.
The argument on sufficient reason that God exsists. Everything must have a meaning or a cause for existance. The argument is:
ReplyDeleteA. Everything in the world needs to have a reason for its existance
B. Things or beings can not cause there own existance.
C. There are two ways in which we are existing, either one big "Mother" cause like an ultimate cause or infinate succesion.
D. There is no "Mother" cause for infinate succesion.
E. Therefore it is necessary for an ultimate cause to be in existance.
F. The ultimate cause=God
G. There is a God
So the argument is saying that everything in the world has a reason for existance, in other words everything has a casue. This casue mght not be known, but it is there. If I were to walk in a forest and see a floating orb with lights shining all around it i would be freaked out, but i would know that there had to be a cause for it to be there, not necesarily God, but some casue. I agree with Stephanie in that this argument proves that God exists, but it doesnt go about the right way to do so. I do believe in God being the ultimate cause meaning I believe that there is no necesary reason for him to exist. If you think about it, we are living in a world that is perfect for our sustainablity. The most important thing for our existance is water and is it just by coincidance that water is 2/3 of the world? I dont think so. God must exist, bit not based on the Cosmological Argument.
The idea behind the Principle of Sufficient Reason, that everything has a reason, is sound enough. Also true is the idea that there cannot be an infinite chain, because then it would go back forever without ever explaining its own existence. So therefore there must be some sort of definite reason for existence. So the question is, can we ever know what this reason is? I'm not so sure. The principle of sufficient reason does prove there is a definite reason for existence, but that fact alone offers no explanation for what that reason is. Demea wants this to prove Gods existence. It might, as the God we think of could be responsible for existence. But does it have to be this version of God? Couldn't it just as possibly be an evil God, or any other type of God. Maybe God created everything on accident, we just don't know. And why does it even have to be a God being? It could just as easily be an event or an object that caused everything, there is really no way to tell. So the Principle of Sufficient Reason cannot be used to prove anything more than the definite reason. Of course, it does not disprove anything either, so both theists and atheists can try to use the principle to prove their separate views. But nothing will come out of this argument, because the argument cannot be used to prove anything further
ReplyDeleteI think there have been enough statements of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, so I’m not going to reiterate it again.
ReplyDeleteThe drive to explain all the odd phenomenon of the universe, like the crystal sphere in the original statement of the question, is essentially what drives all scientific research. It seems that in our modern mindset, it is impossible to simply see a phenomenon, of nature or otherwise, and not try to explain it. Because of this, I think we have a pretty complete understanding of the workings of at least our planet. Therefore, there probably is a logical explanation for any crystal sphere in an empty clearing.
There are more specific cases for which I think the Principle of Sufficient Reason does not apply. For example, we have no idea how to explain the very existence of our universe. When we ask ourselves why the universe is the way it is, we have explanations down to the particle level. Beyond that, we have no idea why the universe operates with the specific constant it does, etc. Why particles, as opposed to strings? Why a specific number of kinds of particles? I think that we eventually have to concede that we will find a question to which we have to answer, “I don’t know – that’s just the way it is.” When that question is asked, the only answer would be a God or something comparable.
So while I think that we should vigorously seek the reasons behind the existence of our universe and the way that thinks work the way they do, I think that we will eventually come to a point where we have to concede that a God must exist. There are a few fundamental questions that cannot be answered by science of reason and can only be explained by a God.