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STT
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No other thing but the free-agent itself. Otherwise, the free-agent is not free.
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STT
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No, it doesn’t follow. It only means that each element of reality is aware of what it is doing based on knowledge.
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Wesrock
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In your case the rubber is what’s being acted upon. What we’re interested in as far as the Fifth Way goes is the efficient cause of the changes in the rubber, whatever that may be. The efficient cause of the change must in some way have that change as its end, and if the thing that is the efficient cause is not intelligent then it is “aimed” to effect that end by something that is intelligent. I don’t think we need to be so crass as to say the final cause of a spherical metal mold is to make rubber into balls. The metal is a substance and its spherical shape is an accident of that substance. If the mold was cast by human beings then it is the extrinsically imposed purpose of the mold that it make rubber balls, but a final cause is not an end imposed from the outside, it is intrinsic to the substance as it’s been constituted into that substance as part of its nature, the metal as metal, not the metal as shaped like a sphere. The “ends” and causal regularities we see in it are what we would identify, and the effects of metal may simply be related to its conductivity or physicality, transfer of momentum, contact with other things, etc…
We tend to see more complicated final causes that go beyond just transient causality in non-intelligent living organisms that are either nutritive souls or sensitive souls.
For one, the Fifth Way is in regards to non-intelligent bodies. So it doesn’t really concern whether an intelligent being needs to be directed by another intelligent being. It only makes a claim in regards to non-intelligent beings.
Continued in next post.
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Wesrock
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Continued from previous post.
@AlNg
Second, suppose you’re right. It could go on for one, two, three, a hundred, a million steps. What it cannot do is continue to an infinite regress (the argument is one of continuous action, an essentially ordered series, not a linear one, but I didn’t get much into that, and an essentially ordered series cannot proceed to an infinite regress). Therefore whatever terminates the series would necessarily be intelligent, and so even if the proximate term giving the non-intelligent entity its end is not the supreme being, ultimately whatever does terminate the regress would also have to be intelligent (because any term that wasn’t would, by the Fifth Way, need an intelligent aimer). And it necessarily is the same thing as the Prime Mover, for if the “Prime Intelligence” had an essence that was not identical to its existence, or if it was a potency being actualized and not pure act, then that potency would need to be actualized by another (leading to the Prime Mover). And if the Prime Mover lacked intelligence, then it would have to be determined to its ends by the Prime Intelligence. The only resolution that avoids an impossible infinite regress is that they are one and the same, and all the same corollaries of uniqueness, immutability, eternity, omnipotence, intelligence (of course), omniscience, and free choice follow.
Third… actually, I can put this after your #2.
@AlNg
Second, suppose you’re right. It could go on for one, two, three, a hundred, a million steps. What it cannot do is continue to an infinite regress (the argument is one of continuous action, an essentially ordered series, not a linear one, but I didn’t get much into that, and an essentially ordered series cannot proceed to an infinite regress). Therefore whatever terminates the series would necessarily be intelligent, and so even if the proximate term giving the non-intelligent entity its end is not the supreme being, ultimately whatever does terminate the regress would also have to be intelligent (because any term that wasn’t would, by the Fifth Way, need an intelligent aimer). And it necessarily is the same thing as the Prime Mover, for if the “Prime Intelligence” had an essence that was not identical to its existence, or if it was a potency being actualized and not pure act, then that potency would need to be actualized by another (leading to the Prime Mover). And if the Prime Mover lacked intelligence, then it would have to be determined to its ends by the Prime Intelligence. The only resolution that avoids an impossible infinite regress is that they are one and the same, and all the same corollaries of uniqueness, immutability, eternity, omnipotence, intelligence (of course), omniscience, and free choice follow.
Third… actually, I can put this after your #2.
Well, yes, you can be like the archer to an arrow. That was only an analogy St. Thomas used, though. He’s ultimately looking for the final cause of substances, that which imparts to them their natural end such that they operate by it intrinsically. It’s not something that simply uses the thing like an archer uses an arrow, it’s what gives being to the thing, that constitutes it with its final cause.
I can’t tell if you’re referring to pantheism or just saying a bunch of things that would either be God or need to be caused by God, so I’ll leave that for you to clarify.
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AlNg
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Different intelligent beings can be guiding different non-intelligent
entities so there would not be a unique final cause.
Whether specific to the argument or not, what i said remains possible. I.e., it is possible for one intelligent who is doing some guiding to be directed by one or more other intelligent beings.
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Wesrock
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First of all, thank you for your very well thought out post. I know I snipped out almost all of it and I don’t mean to ignore it. It’s very well stated. But the part I quoted I don’t agree with. You’re conflating the opinions of naturalist philosophers with the scientific method itself, and I would agree with the neo-Aristotleans that a philosophy of science (and the scientific method) would be incoherent without formal or final causes.
St. Thomas was certainly aware of chance occurrences and effects. A favorite of his was the example of a farmer plowing his land and striking a buried chest of goal. The man who buried the gold did so intentionally and not by chance. The man who plowed the field did so intentionally, but his end was to create a furrow and not to strike gold. It was chance that led to the specific effect of him discovering the buried gold.
What goes on at the level of copying DNA does involve errors, but the processes exhibit a sort of causal regularity. The selection pressure of cold environments on an organism does not have a purpose of freezing the animal to death, but there is a causal regularity in the exchange of random kinetic energy between the organism and the environment, and in the internal processes of the animal. You have a number of different things interacting each other tending to specific (and not random) ends (the physical reactions, copying DNA, etc…), but the specific confluence of all these things with each other is an example of chance like the farmer discovering the chest of gold.
Continued in next post.
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Wesrock
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Continued from previous post.
@o_mlly
As I wrote before, St. Thomas isn’t denying chance effects, and the Thomist does not claim that evolution in itself is aimed at producing human beings. What St. Thomas is saying is that the final cause of any type of thing is not randomly generated at any given moment. When one billiard ball hits another billiard ball there is a transfer of momentum. It does not cause a bunny rabbit to appear this time or cause the balls to ignore gravity the third time or cause a supernova to explode across the galaxy on the fourth time. What it tends to is consistent and determined, not up to chance at any given moment. The same with acorns growing into trees. It’s not like the acorn has an equal spread of probability at any given moment of maybe growing into a tree or maybe growing into a dog or maybe growing into a television (if only).
That natural selection does work by chance, as a confluence of many other different things that are exhibit causal regularity, is perfectly fine.
At the same time, while evolution is not in itself intrinsically ordered towards creating man or any other specific species, we also recognize that God intended to make the reality we have (with humans) as opposed to a different reality (without humans). Evolution does not have to have a final cause of humankind for God to accomplish this.
@o_mlly
As I wrote before, St. Thomas isn’t denying chance effects, and the Thomist does not claim that evolution in itself is aimed at producing human beings. What St. Thomas is saying is that the final cause of any type of thing is not randomly generated at any given moment. When one billiard ball hits another billiard ball there is a transfer of momentum. It does not cause a bunny rabbit to appear this time or cause the balls to ignore gravity the third time or cause a supernova to explode across the galaxy on the fourth time. What it tends to is consistent and determined, not up to chance at any given moment. The same with acorns growing into trees. It’s not like the acorn has an equal spread of probability at any given moment of maybe growing into a tree or maybe growing into a dog or maybe growing into a television (if only).
That natural selection does work by chance, as a confluence of many other different things that are exhibit causal regularity, is perfectly fine.
At the same time, while evolution is not in itself intrinsically ordered towards creating man or any other specific species, we also recognize that God intended to make the reality we have (with humans) as opposed to a different reality (without humans). Evolution does not have to have a final cause of humankind for God to accomplish this.
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Wesrock
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Hand-in-hand with the Argument From Motion, however, it would show that the Prime Mover could not lack intelligence.Wesrock:
Different intelligent beings can be guiding different entities so there would not be a unique final cause.
Please see the “Second” point in the post after that one.
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AlNg
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It doesn’t show a unique prime mover. There could be many different final causes operating independently or in some sort of joint operation.
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Wesrock
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The Argument From Motion has some very simple corollaries that show there must be a unique and above-all Prime Mover, and the Fifth Way shows this cannot lack intelligence.Wesrock:
It doesn’t show a unique prime mover. There could be many different final causes operating independently or in some sort of joint operation.
If your point is that the Fifth Way doesn’t do everything by itself, for the moment I’ll grant it. I’ll think on it some more and will get back to you if I have additional thoughts.
Edit: I say this as a point of interest or curiosity and not as an argument or a proof. I wonder if perhaps an angle could be made that something must exist which just is Perfected Intellect as its essence is a corollary from this without appealing to the conclusions of the other four ways. I’m not saying I have that argument or that it works, and it may well be the Fifth Way does not, by itself, establish all of the divine attributes (including uniqueness). It’s just something that popped into my head which may not at all follow from the Fifth Way alone (along with some philosophy of the mind). I’m trying to get my head around it.
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AlNg
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OK -----------------------
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Wesrock
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Anyway, while I’m happy to continue to try to defend the argument, I’d at least be satisfied if people had a better understanding of what the Fifth Way is and is not and how it’s an entirely different animal than Paley’s or Swinburne’s intelligent design arguments.
I think this is the first time I’ve ever run through it at length and there are some rough edges I’d like to learn how to present better off-the-cuff.
I think this is the first time I’ve ever run through it at length and there are some rough edges I’d like to learn how to present better off-the-cuff.
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IWantGod
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Thanks for all the posts you have written. I have always had difficulty with the fifth way as a standalone argument.
For example whats to stop some one from simply saying that it just is the nature of things to move to particular ends and that the laws of physics is just something necessary? Why does there need to be further explanation beyond that without appealing to the other 4 ways?
When we appeal to the other four ways, the fifth way becomes clear because anything that is changing is unnecessary, and so there is a reason to ask why there is regularity in that which is unnecessary, and it is easy to see why only an intellect can explain it.
It is my mission however to fully understand it as a standalone argument.
Thanks for your patience and God bless.
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o_mlly
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Thank you for your comments. The issue seems more worthy of a paper rather than merely a post. But let me make a few points to defend the necessity to debunk evolution theory in order to support Aquinas’ 5th argument.
Aristotle did not impose the understanding of all 4 causes for all effects but only effects for which there is an apparent, antecedent and integral intelligent cause. [See Aristotle ( Metaph ., 1044 , b , 12 , “ the eclipses of the moon appear to serve no end”)].
Scientists rightly cringe at claims of universality as Aquinas implicitly does in his 1st premise: natural things work toward a goal. (More on this issue below.)
We must remember that for Aquinas, the cosmos was one of perfect hierarchical order, immutable, interconnected and stable. His theology could not divorce itself from his worldview.
The 1st premise presumes an Intelligence exists whose knowledge controls and directs all events, even chance events, to preordained goals. Aquinas’ universal claim that all things “work toward some goal” is rather a faith-belief rather than a science-fact. No one in his time would reject that in a perfectly ordered cosmos that the opposite could be true. Not so today, the premise begs the very question. (Since there are laws then there must be a lawgiver.)
Perhaps we need a more precise definition of the concept “chance”. Let us define chance as accidental circumstances. Accidental circumstances ought not to be seen as a negation of causality but as a more complex form of causality. Statistics can be employed to further analyze how chance bears on the experiencing the end promised in the final causality. Seen in this light, chance and causality are not necessarily in contradiction but rather, in combination, explain how something will only be realized by chance despite the fact that that final end is certain.
The relation of final cause to effect is in an inverse relationship to the normal precedence of cause to effect. Science does not, and I think, should not recognize this inversion as doing so would preempt to a large extent the necessity to experiment: Why test what is predetermined?
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o_mlly
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(continued)
Finally, if we accept final causality in principle and apply the principle to what is presently unknown as opposed to what finality is presumably known: human life on earth, what does the principle require us to believe about the existence of human life on other planets?
If nature is determined to continually develop new life forms, as final causality shows that it does on earth, and the emergence of these life forms is partly determined by fortuitous circumstances (chance) to end in human life then ought we to believe that human life, or at least life, exists or will exist elsewhere in the immensity of time and space? Disbelief requires identifying some unique and unrepeatable chance circumstance on earth that is never possible on other planets. The word “never”, like “always”, makes scientists cringe.
Finally, if we accept final causality in principle and apply the principle to what is presently unknown as opposed to what finality is presumably known: human life on earth, what does the principle require us to believe about the existence of human life on other planets?
If nature is determined to continually develop new life forms, as final causality shows that it does on earth, and the emergence of these life forms is partly determined by fortuitous circumstances (chance) to end in human life then ought we to believe that human life, or at least life, exists or will exist elsewhere in the immensity of time and space? Disbelief requires identifying some unique and unrepeatable chance circumstance on earth that is never possible on other planets. The word “never”, like “always”, makes scientists cringe.
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IWantGod
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You are making the assumption that God is claimed to be necessary for no reason. The real claim is that a being with the same or many of the metaphysical attributes we give to God is necessary or required in order for there to be such a thing as existence because otherwise there will be a metaphysical contradiction. To claim that the Universe is necessary is different and it leads to a contradiction because it can be shown to be an unnecessary being lacking the attributes required to ultimately explain either existence in general or it’s own existence.
In other-words physical reality lacks the explanatory power that you are merely asserting it to have.
The first 2 ways properly understood removes any doubt of that.
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Wesrock
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You have it backwards. It’s what attributes things in the universe have that makes them contingent. Composition, extension, mutability, lack of intelligence (for some things), and more, all of which must be grounded on something that is none of these things in order to provide sufficient reason for everything else. Once we see that, we can begin to see how that which is simple, has no extension, is immutable (while positive words, those three refer to what God is not), and so on is necessary.IWantGod:
You will have to provide more detail here. There is absolutely no difference in claiming that the universe is necessary versus ‘God’ being necessary. What attribute does God have that the universe does not have? It appears you are clearly using special pleading in your defense.
Again, what attributes does God have that resolves the problem of necessity that the universe cannot have?
But this is a topic about the Fifth Way, not about all of the other cosmological arguments for God or an analysis about what God is not.
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Wesrock
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The Kalam argument has its issues, even St. Thomas rejected it in his day (its premises) for making bad assumptions. The classical arguments for God, however, make no special pleading. If you believe they do, point out where they do and demonstrate for me whether you don’t know what special pleading is or you don’t know what the arguments are.
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AlNg
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Should we continue here with ways 1,2,3,4 or focus only on the 5th way?
In any case, i don t think that the 5th way proves the existence of a Supreme Creator. It only argues that something or things “intelligent” may be guiding something non-intelligent. But inasmuch as humans and animals have consciousness, it can be argued that consciousness is part of and intrinsic to the universe itself so there is no need of invoking some sort of Being outside of the universe with these properties.
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Wesrock
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It is the nature of a thing to move to those specific ends. That is one of the first propositions and is readily apparent. One of the objections the early moderns had with the notion of final causality was specifically over the same issue St. Thomas saw: in what we can a thing’s end be present in the thing? The end is certainly not present really. The end is only really present when it’s been effected. The only other mode of existence was for it to be present mentally or intelligibly, but these things lacked intelligence and the ability to hold things in thought. The early moderns saw that, too, and so struck it from the board. St. Thomas saw, however, was that eliminating final causality was nonsense, and that the only remaining explanation is that the aiming had to be provided by something intelligent.
The Ways all work in tandem, but I do think the Fifth Way goes further than your paragraph seems to allow. God is his own end, but if he lacked intelligence he would need to be directed to it by something intelligent. Which is absurd, as what we refer to as God is the term of the regress.
Aristotle was correct that an eclipse is not an end or final cause, it is a chance event due to other causal regularities such as the Earth being affected by the Sun’s gravity well and moving in an orbit about it, the Moon orbiting the Earth, the Sun giving off life, the Earth blocking light.
We’re not here simply to do historical exegesis on Aristotle or St. Thomas. They recognized certain basic principles and had correct insights, but philosophy continues and we learn more from nature. Hence why I referred to Neo-Aristotleans and not Aristotle himself. Maybe scientists wouldn’t cringe at the premise “natural things work towards a goal” if they took the time to understand what’s being said.
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