PAR 101: Invitation to Philosophical Thinking

PAR 101: Invitation to Philosophical Thinking Intro to Philosophy of Religion Walter Thomas Schmid, Ph.D.Philosophy and Religion, UNCW

What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? • About 500 years after Socrates’ death, Christianity burst upon the ancient world • For the next 1000 years, educated believers in the Abrahamic religions wondered about the relationship between philosophy and religion • During the reign of Caesar Augustus, Philo of Alexandria began the tradition of “religious philosophy” • How to understand miracles in the Bible? • How to conceptualize the ‘God’ of the Bible? • Could man know of ‘God’ except through revelation and faith? • Among the religious philosophers: • Jewish: Philo, Moses Maimonides • Christian: Augustine, Thomas Aquinas • Islamic: Al-Farabi, Averroes

How would you explain the concept of ‘God’? • ‘God’ is – what/who? • Among the attributes belonging to ‘God’ are:

Can we know if ‘God’ exists? • Revealed Theology: we know that God exists by faith, e.g. we know everything said of God in Holy Scripture • Natural Theology: we can know that ‘God’ exists by reason, i.e. we can understand ‘proofs’ which every reasonable person should agree to

Two Types of “Proofs” of God “A priori” proofs “A posteriori” proofs These proofs infer the existence of God, from something in the world. The most famous are: The cosmological argument(the fact the world exists, implies a ‘first cause’) The design argument (the quality of things in the world point to a Designer) The moral argument (the existence of moral absolutes points to a Lawgiver) • These are proofs which are based on the very nature of the ideas involved, e.g. 2+2=4. • St. Anselm argued that if we understand the concept of God, we will logically deduce that God must exist.

The Ontological Argument • God is “the greatest possible being.” • We conceive of God. • But then God must exist, for if we were to conceive of him as existing only in the mind, and not existing in reality, we would not conceive of “the greatest possible being.” • Therefore, God exists.

Arguments pro and con CON: PRO: Those arguments are very different: God’s being is necessary, not contingent. God must exist. You still don’t get it: once you truly grasp the idea of God, you must conclude that God not only does but must exist. God IS “the greatest possible being” and that being cannot not exist! • By that argument you can prove the most perfect island (utopia) or the most perfect evil (the devil) exists. • That confuses a concept having a certain property with a thing actually existing in the world • ‘God’ has the property of existence, like ‘President’ has the property of being head of the U.S. federal government • if ‘God’ exists, then He is all-powerful, all-good, necessary, etc. – but does he exist?

A posteriori arguments • Cosmological Argument: cf. Thomas Aquinas: • The world exists. • Nothing comes from nothing. • The world must have come about by some motion or cause. • Therefore, there must have been something that brought it into existence = the ‘First Cause’ or ‘First Mover’ = God • Design Argument: cf. Thomas Aquinas, “5th Way” and “Intelligent Design” theorists today • Moral Argument: cf. Kant, C. S. Lewis • The moral laws are absolute, not contingent like natural laws. • There is no source of absolute laws, other than God. • Therefore the source of the moral laws = God.

Cosmological Argument • Nothing comes from nothing, i.e. everything in the world has some ‘cause’ or is brought about by some prior ‘movement.’ • But this cannot go on to infinity, with each thing pointing back to some prior cause or movement, and the sequence of past events or causes going backwards indefinitely. • Therefore, there must have been a first movement or first cause, which brought the world into existence = what we call ‘God’ Which step/s of this argument can be questioned?

What does it mean? • Walking on a beach, you come across a circle of driftwood and shells. Standing in its center, at exactly noon, light flashes from the sun off the shells, illuminating you. Curious, you come back an hour later, and it happens again (1:01). It happens again (1:59). Is this by chance? Or was there a designer?

The design argument • You tell your story to a friend, and she says: “That’s a good example of the basic idea of the argument from design.” • “If you discover something that shows ‘evidence of design’ and it is unlikely it could come about by chance, it is rational to conclude there was a designer.”

The Design Argument “From there the argument for God is simple: • Whenever there is ‘evidence of design’ and it is highly unlikely it came about by chance, there is a Designer. • The universe shows a lot of evidence of design. • Therefore there is a Designer of the universe, i.e. God.”

What is ‘evidence of design’? • “Anything with a means-end structure. • Did you know there if certain very improbable things weren’t true, life on earth could not exist? • Like the exact angle of the earth in orbit and the exact distance from the sun? • Some really basic constants in physical matter, which are necessary for carbon based life-forms, but also very improbable. • When the arrow hits the target, it’s not chance.”

Purpose and Value in Nature • “Consider about any living thing. It is made up of parts of parts, in which every part has a purpose. Did they just come about by chance? • Could the human eye have just ‘evolved’ out of slimy matter in the sea? It doesn’t seem very likely.”

The design of humankind • “It’s even more impressive when you think about the human mind, and human intelligence.” • So there is ‘evidence of design’ in • (i) the solar system; (ii) living things and their behavior; and (iii) human reason. • “They all point to a Designer.”

“But is the basic premise sound? Can’t something be improbable, but not imply a designer? Isn’t that what evolution is?” “And as Hume says, even if you prove there was a designer of some things, would that prove a Designer of the whole?” You ask: is the argument sound?

The Moral Argument (C. S. Lewis) • The moral law is absolute, not contingent like natural laws. • There are 2 basic ways of understanding morality. • The materialist view explains it in terms of instinct or human convention. • The religious view says the law points to an Author = ‘God.’ • The moral law cannot be understood as arising from instinct or social convention. • Therefore we must accept the religious view: the author of the Law = ‘God’. • Which of these premises can be questioned? • Must we understand morality as an ‘absolute’ commandment? • Could morality have evolved? • Could it be a function of human choice? • Religious ethics: back to ‘Euthyphro dilemma’

The Design Argument PRO CON: Evolution disproves the basic principle An evolutionary origin for all living form – neither ‘mere chance’ OR ‘design’ Hume’s arguments vs. the logic of the argument Can we really know anything about the universe “as a whole” – or are we driven in the end to “rational agnosticism”? • Some criticisms fail, e.g. the ‘design’ is imperfect • Some arguments for it fail, e.g. the ‘teleological life’ argument • But the “Anthropic” claim is challenging . . . • If the odds vs. carbon-based life are 1,000,000 to 1, • Then isn’t it rational to conclude it is not by chance?

PAR 101: Invitation to Philosophical Thinking