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    42
    Whatever exists must have a cause or ground for its exist... — Carmelics
    Home/Natural Theology
    HistoryEditSee Inverse

    Whatever exists must have a cause or ground for its existence

    CausationNatural Theology
    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.Nothing can come from nothing (Ex nihilo, nihil fit)
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    • 2.If something existed without a cause, it would have come from nothing
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
    ?
    • 1.The concept of 'cause' is derived from experience of temporal succession within the universe, making it inapplicable to the universe's own existence.
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    • 2.Hume demonstrated that causal necessity is a habit of mind projected onto events, not a metaphysically binding relation discoverable by pure reason.
      ?

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    • 3.Therefore, demanding a cause for all existence smuggles an empirically-derived concept into a domain where empirical validation is impossible.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Quantum vacuum fluctuations produce particles without deterministic prior causes, establishing empirical precedent for uncaused events.
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    • 2.The PSR, if applied universally, generates a vicious regress unless one admits a brute fact terminus, meaning the principle must itself eventually be abandoned.
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    • 3.Admitting any brute fact — including God's existence — dissolves the original argumentative force of demanding causes for all things.
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    Topics

    Natural TheologyCausation

    Related

    Admitting any brute fact — including God's existence — dissolves the original ar...Hume demonstrated that causal necessity is a habit of mind projected onto events...If something existed without a cause, it would have come from nothingNothing can come from nothing (Ex nihilo, nihil fit)
    +4 moreShow less
    Quantum vacuum fluctuations produce particles without deterministic prior causes...The PSR, if applied universally, generates a vicious regress unless one admits a...The concept of 'cause' is derived from experience of temporal succession within ...Therefore, demanding a cause for all existence smuggles an empirically-derived c...

    Similar

    Everything must have a cause or ground for its existence95%The existence of something requires a first cause or sufficient ground...88%For each thing there must be a cause or reason both for its existence ...85%Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.85%

    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: hume-religion
    View source passageHide passage
    In Lucretius’s The Nature of the Universe – which is the greatest classical statement of a system of atheism – it is argued that it is impossible that matter was created and that it must, therefore, be eternal and uncreated. The basis of this argument is the general causal principle: “Nothing can come from nothing” [Ex nihilo, nihil fit.] In the late 17th and early 18th centuries this principle was turned against the Epicurean atheism of thinkers such as Lucretius and his modern counterparts. Mo
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (1 for, 2 against)
    Edits
    1 edit