A very brief demonstration of the Contingency Argument

[irichc]

I.

Argument

All that exists in Nature is contingent, since its non-existence doesn’t imply any contradiction.

However, if there is no Necessary Being (i.e., One whose inexistence would imply a contradiction), there wouldn’t be any reason for Something to exist rather than Nothing, and nothing would exist at all.

But Something exists. Thus, it would be contradictory that something real and effective had (if we exclude God) *and had not *(if we take the being for itself) the same reasons for existence as for non-existence.

Therefore, God, the Necessary Being, exists.

II.

Corollary

It has ben proven that, if we can demonstrate that from God’s inexistence it follows a contradiction, then God exists. In other words: if something contingent exists contingently, then the Necessary Being (i.e., God) exists necessarily.

In order to reject this argument it would be required to give, at least, one of these two proofs: a) That someting real and effective exists necessarily; or b) That something real and effective exists despite of being impossible.

However, we call “necessary” that from whose inexistence it results a contradiction in any case. So, although matter is, and obviously it would be contradictory for it being and not being at the same time, we cannot state it is eternal, that is, it doesn’t follow it exists in any case.

Thus, if matter didn’t exist, no contradiction would arise. Nevertheless, if God didn’t exist and matter did, all which exists contingently would be impossible or contradictory, and then, it would lack a rational justification.

I conclude: it lacks a rational justification to affirm that God doesn’t exist. Vice versa, to assume Its existence can be considered rational. Therefore, God exists.

Greetings.

Daniel.

Theological Miscellany (in spanish):

gratisweb.com/irichc/MT.htm

 

[Dr.Colossus]

This is St. Thomas Aquinas’ third proof for the existence of God, is it not? That one was always my favorite.

 

[carnap72]

You wrote:

*However, if there is no Necessary Being (i.e., One whose inexistence would imply a contradiction), there wouldn’t be any reason for Something to exist rather than Nothing, and nothing would exist at all.

But Something exists. Thus, it would be contradictory that something real and effective had (if we exclude God) and had not (if we take the being for itself) the same reasons for existence as for non-existence.

Therefore, God, the Necessary Being, exists.
*
My difficulty with your reasoning is this. Why do you automatically assume that if there is anything necessary holding up the existence of the universe, then it must be a Being (let alone God)? How do you know that it isn’t some inanimate stuff? Why call anything that is necessary ‘God’? By using this word, it sounds like you are letting in all the attributes of the Roman Catholic God without any proof.

 

[Magnanimity]

First, let me comment on the original post. The argument from contingency of beings to the Necessary Being usually uses the concepts of possibility (or “potentiality”), which I think is preferable to phrasing it in terms of “involving a contradiction.” After all, that sort of “contradiction” language reminds one more of an ontological argument than a cosmological one. There is nothing contradictory about nothing ever existing. It is existentially undeniable that now something exists, sure, but still, complete non-existence does not involve a contradiction. It’s not that God’s non-existence is conceptually contradictory (how could it be?), rather, it’s that His non-existence is actually impossible since there is contingent being.

If I follow you, you are trying to provide the proof which answers the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” the only answer to which, of course, is that a Necessary Being brought all of this something into existence because contingent being cannot provide the ground for its own existence.

carnap72:

My difficulty with your reasoning is this. Why do you automatically assume that if there is anything necessary holding up the existence of the universe, then it must be a Being (let alone God)? How do you know that it isn’t some inanimate stuff?

If I may jump in here, the answer to this question need not be given by a Catholic, nor even a Thomist. William Lane Craig, for example, can answer the question just from his Arabic Kalam argument. If the universe came to be a finite time ago, then reality went from Necessary Being alone to Necessary Being + creatures (ie, contingent beings). The most reasonable explanation for this change in the state of affairs of reality is found in volition. If there was no contingent being, but then contingent being came to be, something would have to “move” reality toward this new state of affairs. The only reasonable explanation, it would seem, is that a will, a volitional act entailing a prior causal agent moved reality to this new state of affairs. Hence, the Necessary Being would have to be volitional, which would entail a will, which would further entail an agency as properly attributable to the Necessary Being, which is exactly what Catholic theism affirms of God.

 

[Xenon-135]

I think I am begining to understand the concept of contingency, but could someone please reword this is simpler terms. I seem to be swimming inside my head when I try to digest the terms against the logic. I would love to be able to adapt this to my own apologetic efforts, but I need to feel confident in my personal understanding of this prior to utilizing it for apologetical purposes.

Thanks

 

[Magnanimity]

Xenon-135:

I think I am begining to understand the concept of contingency, but could someone please reword this is simpler terms. I seem to be swimming inside my head when I try to digest the terms against the logic. I would love to be able to adapt this to my own apologetic efforts, but I need to feel confident in my personal understanding of this prior to utilizing it for apologetical purposes.

Thanks

Gotcha. I know, metaphysics in the context of medieval theology, which is where all of this comes from as it pertains to the Church, can be a infinite sea with very high and tumultous waves. Let’s see if this helps:

Contingent being could not be. That is, it’s possible that it not exist.

Necessary being cannot not be. That is, it must exist.

That’s what the terms are referring to when used in these cosmological arguments. Though Norman Geisler is an Evangelical Thomist, he’s a philosophical Thomist nonetheless, and I couldn’t recommend his writings on these points more highly. He has several places in his prolific writings where he gives full-fledged cosmological arguments like the one given here, and he is writing for the intelligent layman. See his articles on the proofs for the existence of God is his Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics. Also, he has a book on St. Thomas Aquinas which is very helpful. The most full orbed treatments, however, occur in two other works of his – *Christian Apologetics *and Philosophy of Religion, 2d ed. He really takes you step by step in a way that’s easy to follow and deals thoroughly with contingency and necessity in these contexts. He’s very well worth reading. Peter Kreeft references him in these regards also.

 

[The_Old_Road]

I think this argument is solid, but it requires alot of groundwork and explication, along with a modicum of common sense. The problem with trying to advance this argument against scientifically or philosophically literate people is that they will say, “Why can’t electrons-- or muons, etc.-- be necessary?” If matter is, in scientifically simplistic terms, merely instantiations of energy, matter can never really be exnihilated therefore never really contingent.

A previous post brought up William Lane Craig and the Kalam Argument. IMO, and the opinion of professional mathematicians I have discussed this argument with, it is at best a convolution of linguistic and mathematical confusion, and was rejected by Aquinas. Peter Kreeft deals with this in his Summa of the Summa, but strangely lists it among the arguments for God’s Existence in his Handbok of Christian Apologetics. Btw, how does the Kalam argument really differ from St. Bonaventure’s argument against an eternal past??

There are a number of recent works by Catholic philosophers that rehabilitate the Cosmological argument, and put it in modern scientific and philosophical language. Works by Barry Miller, David Braine, and C.F.J. Martin make use of modern logic, the philosophy of language, and in Braine’s work, modern physics (Braine has training in physics and philosophy from Oxford).

 

[The_Old_Road]

Xenon-135:

I think I am begining to understand the concept of contingency, but could someone please reword this is simpler terms. I seem to be swimming inside my head when I try to digest the terms against the logic. I would love to be able to adapt this to my own apologetic efforts, but I need to feel confident in my personal understanding of this prior to utilizing it for apologetical purposes.

Thanks

The only books I’d suggest to a beginner are by Brian Davies, OP. His An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion is the standard text in university courses in the philosophy of religion-- at Catholic and non-Catholic universities. His other book which goes into more detail is Thinking About God. For an easy introduction to Aquinas’ Five Ways see his two books on Aquinas (Aquinas and The Thought of Thomas Aquinas).

 

[buffalo]

carnap72:

You wrote:

*However, if there is no Necessary Being (i.e., One whose inexistence would imply a contradiction), there wouldn’t be any reason for Something to exist rather than Nothing, and nothing would exist at all.

But Something exists. Thus, it would be contradictory that something real and effective had (if we exclude God) and had not (if we take the being for itself) the same reasons for existence as for non-existence.

Therefore, God, the Necessary Being, exists.
*
My difficulty with your reasoning is this. Why do you automatically assume that if there is anything necessary holding up the existence of the universe, then it must be a Being (let alone God)? How do you know that it isn’t some inanimate stuff? Why call anything that is necessary ‘God’? By using this word, it sounds like you are letting in all the attributes of the Roman Catholic God without any proof.

We Roman Catholics call this “First Cause” God.

From the Catechism:

V. HOW CAN WE SPEAK ABOUT GOD?

[39](javascriptpenWindow(‘cr/39.htm’) In defending the ability of human reason to know God, the Church is expressing her confidence in the possibility of speaking about him to all men and with all men, and therefore of dialogue with other religions, with philosophy and science, as well as with unbelievers and atheists.

40 Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.

[41](javascriptpenWindow(‘cr/41.htm’) All creatures bear a certain resemblance to God, most especially man, created in the image and likeness of God. The manifold perfections of creatures - their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures" perfections as our starting point, “for from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator”.15

[42](javascriptpenWindow(‘cr/42.htm’) God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, image-bound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God–“the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable”–with our human representations.16 Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God.

[43](javascriptpenWindow(‘cr/43.htm’) Admittedly, in speaking about God like this, our language is using human modes of expression; nevertheless it really does attain to God himself, though unable to express him in his infinite simplicity. Likewise, we must recall that “between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying an even greater dissimilitude”;17 and that "concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and how other beings stand in relation to him."18

 

[Magnanimity]

“I think this argument is solid, but it requires alot of groundwork and explication, along with a modicum of common sense. The problem with trying to advance this argument against scientifically or philosophically literate people is that they will say, “Why can’t electrons-- or muons, etc.-- be necessary?” If matter is, in scientifically simplistic terms, merely instantiations of energy, matter can never really be exnihilated therefore never really contingent.”

There is no conceivable way to prove, either scientifically or philosophically, that energy cannot be created or destroyed. The scientific law actually just asserts what is observable–that matter is not created or destroyed. And, just philosophically speaking, the fact of change itself is sufficient to demonstrate contingency.

“A previous post brought up William Lane Craig and the Kalam Argument. IMO, and the opinion of professional mathematicians I have discussed this argument with, it is at best a convolution of linguistic and mathematical confusion, and was rejected by Aquinas.”

You are right in saying it was rejected by St. Thomas, or at least, most Thomistic scholars agree with this understanding that he rejected the Kalam argument because he thought there was no way to prove philosophically that God had or had not been creating from eternity. The only way to know anything about this, he says, is by special revelation from God.

However, I know of several philosophers who have backgrounds in math even, who hold that this argument is sound. I haven’t really any idea what it has to do with linguistics and/or math. It’s basically a simple categorical syllogism as Craig introduces it anyway, and the argument is surely valid. The only way to undermine it is to deny one or both of the premises. And I don’t see what linguistics or math have to do with denying either premise.

“Peter Kreeft deals with this in his Summa of the Summa, but strangely lists it among the arguments for God’s Existence in his Handbok of Christian Apologetics.”

I don’t think it is strange. Most contemporary apologists I’ve read, whether Catholic or not, seem to think it is a sound argument.

 

[The_Old_Road]

Magnanimity:

There is no conceivable way to prove, either scientifically or philosophically, that energy cannot be created or destroyed. The scientific law actually just asserts what is observable–that matter is not created or destroyed. And, just philosophically speaking, the fact of change itself is sufficient to demonstrate contingency.

I meant to say annihilation when I said exnihilation. What I meant was simply that radical contingency (vs. some transformation to one state or substance to another) seems alot harder to understand, and certainly harder to describe.

Magnanimity:

You are right in saying it was rejected by St. Thomas, or at least, most Thomistic scholars agree with this understanding that he rejected the Kalam argument because he thought there was no way to prove philosophically that God had or had not been creating from eternity. The only way to know anything about this, he says, is by special revelation from God.

However, I know of several philosophers who have backgrounds in math even, who hold that this argument is sound. I haven’t really any idea what it has to do with linguistics and/or math. It’s basically a simple categorical syllogism as Craig introduces it anyway, and the argument is surely valid. The only way to undermine it is to deny one or both of the premises. And I don’t see what linguistics or math have to do with denying either premise.

It is a linguistic and mathematical confusion in the same way Zeno’s paradox is (and I think Kreeft uses this analogy in his Summa of the Summa). I must rely on popular works to understand this issue (e.g., Rudy Rucker, Douglas Hofstadter, etc.), but from I gather, Cantor’s transfinite mathematics does to the Kalam argument what differential calculus does to Zeno’s paradox.

 

[Magnanimity]

The Old Road:

It is a linguistic and mathematical confusion in the same way Zeno’s paradox is (and I think Kreeft uses this analogy in his Summa of the Summa). I must rely on popular works to understand this issue (e.g., Rudy Rucker, Douglas Hofstadter, etc.), but from I gather, Cantor’s transfinite mathematics does to the Kalam argument what differential calculus does to Zeno’s paradox.

In popular manner, W.L. Craig puts the argument forward in this way.

1. Anything which comes to be has a cause outside of itself for its coming to be.
2. The universe came to be.
3. Therefore, necessarily the universe has a cause outside of itself for its coming to be.

Again, I’d need more info from you before I could see what all of this has to do with linguistics or math. As far as I can tell, it is one among many sound arguments for the existence of God. Sure, by itself it doesn’t seem to get you all the attributes of God as Catholics understand Him to be. But then, I know of no single argument for God’s existence which does this either.

 

[JustSomeGuy]

The problem with Catholic philosophy and theology is that we rarely seem to listen to the answers from people that we make these arguments for. The ontological and contingency arguments have long been set aside, but they are constantly regurgitated by us.

Few claim that the fallacy of the argument is a formal one. The problem is that, in the contingency argument, the conclusion is contained in the premise. The same observation can be made about any argument that makes use of the concept “Necessary Being”. Necessity by definition means existence. To use terms like “necessary existence” is redundant. It is a contradiction to state that a necessary being does not exist, only because we have labeled this being with the adjective “necessary”. What else would we mean when we call a thing of any kind “necessary”. This term is used to say “it is not possible for this thing to not be (exist.)” If I say “that is a necessary rock” what I mean to be telling you is that if all things (which are not necessary) were to be innihilated, then this rock would still exist, along with the other necessary things. Why is that? Because this rock is necessary; it could not be otherwise.

From the phenomenologist perspective, the label ‘contingent’ is also a fallacy. Just because a thing can be imagined not to exist, that does not mean that it is possible for it to not exist. Many things can be imagined, but that doesn’t make those things possible. I can imagine a blue dog, but that does not mean that there could be a blue dog. In fact, it is not possible for a dog to be blue, precisely because there are no blue dogs. Imagining it does not matter. To say “but there could be a blue dog” is a fallacy of the language. Just because an adjective can be grammatically used to modify a noun, there is no reason to state that an object signified by that modified noun is possible. A person can reasonably maintain that there are no contingent beings. If the thing exists, then it exists necessarily. It cannot be otherwise, because it is not otherwise. I cannot imagine a rock that does not exist, even if I say I can. If a thing does not exist, then it is no more a rock than it is an elephant. I can imagine a thing and give it the name “rock” and then modify it with the adjective “non-existent”, but that amounts to a bunch of nonsense in the world of real rocks and elephants. It is a mere trick of the language performed in the mind. Hence the conditional, “If there are contingent beings, then God exists” is denied syllogistically. Therefore the contingency argument is flawed, because it leads to a false conclusion. God, in fact, exists. This argument just doesn’t prove it.

Despite the fact that this argument makes true statments about the One True God, it is not a cogent argument. St. Thomas used this argument in his synthesis of Aristotelian thought, precisely because the philosophers of the Middle East (Averro et al.) had been making use of the early Greeks. The premise of a “necessary being” was mutually accepted. For more of St. Thomas’ own comments on this aspect and the purpose of his synthesis, see Summa contra Gentiles, Part One. From that accepted starting point, St. Thomas goes on to logically demonstrate the Divine Simplicity, that God’s existence is His essence, etc. But St. Thomas maintains throughout (in line with the reasoning in Romans 1) that beyond the assumption that God is the Highest Being, we must rely on His divine self-revelation. In other words, he agreed with St. Anselm that if one accepts the possibility that God exists, then it can be proven that God exists actually. He rejected the possibility of proving the actual existence of God by reason alone, which is the Rationalists’ project. This has been rejected by the Church because it can lead to fallacies about God and to skepticism, among other reasons.

 

[Magnanimity]

JustSomeGuy:

The ontological and contingency arguments have long been set aside, but they are constantly regurgitated by us.

It is hardly the case that such arguments have been set aside. In fact, the latter half of the 20th century saw an amazing proliferation of writings, both for and against the various cosmological arguments. And Plantinga “resurrected” the ontological argument.

JustSomeGuy:

Necessity by definition means existence.

Rather, necessity is predicated of a being. There is no such thing as necessity per se, anymore than there is of thought per se. Just as one always thinks “of something,” so too, whenever necessity or contingency is predicated of subjects, they are predicated of beings.

JustSomeGuy:

To use terms like “necessary existence” is redundant. It is a contradiction to state that a necessary being does not exist, only because we have labeled this being with the adjective “necessary”.

No, you have not got it right. The cosmological arguments do not get to “logically” necessary beings, they get to actually necessary ones. That is, given the reality of contingent being, there is no possible way for contingency to be without necessity supplying the ground for its existence. Contingent being cannot (not logically nor actually) ground its own existence. But, contingency is undeniable. Hence, there must be a necessary being. That is the essence of cosmological arguments. They are grounded in reality, not logic. This fundamental misunderstanding of the cosmological arguments underlies all your comments about rocks and necessity, etc. Also, you are not attacking the actual cosmological arguments as they’ve been presented since you make this fundamental error of making them grounded in logic and imagination rather than what is actually the case with them-they are grounded in being and reality. So, perhaps some of the criticisms you give in the second to last paragraph of your reply may be directed to some formulations of ontological arguments, the same could not be said of the cosmological arguments. Hence, you’ve given us no good reason to think they are not sound arguments, but perhaps you’ve given food for thought as regards ontological arguments, which (perhaps) could be said to be grounded more in imagination than reality. Also, as I’ve said you seem to miss the understanding that necessity and contingency are predicated of beings.

JustSomeGuy:

But St. Thomas maintains throughout … that beyond the assumption that God is the Highest Being, we must rely on His divine self-revelation. In other words, he agreed with St. Anselm that if one accepts the possibility that God exists, then it can be proven that God exists actually. He rejected the possibility of proving the actual existence of God by reason alone, which is the Rationalists’ project. This has been rejected by the Church because it can lead to fallacies about God and to skepticism, among other reasons.

There is an enormous error in what you say here, and it is historical and hence factual. St. Thomas Aquinas specifically says (visit the link to the ST at NewAdvent.org if you need to look it up), in his answer to the question ‘whether God exists’ that the existence of God is self-evident. But, he does make a distinction. He says that while the existence of God is self-evident in itself (entailing that one does not need special revelation to know it), it is not necessarily self-evident to us. Hence, most people come to belief in God not in the way of Aristotle or Mortimer Adler (ie, via the arguments) but by a faith tradition. Still, it remains true that the existence of God is self-evident in itself, hence your claim here about St. Thomas is false.