The Moral Argument for the existence of God

Background to Kant                                        

Remember that Kant was a Protestant. Since the days of the Reformation, Protestantism had been characterised by its emphasis on faith. The Catholic church on the other hand stressed the importance of reason as a foundation of faith. It is also woth remembering that Kant had rejected the so called “proofs of the existence of God” put forward by the rationalists, especially Descartes (see the Ontological Argument). He didn’t think there must be a God simply because we have an idea of God (reason). Nor did Kant agree with the conclusions of Aquinas who had decided that there must be a God because everything had to have a first cause.

Kant thought that it was essential for morality to presuppose that man has an immortal soul and that God exists and that man has free will. He refers to these as postulates – and to postulate is to assume something which ultimately cannot be proved.

Kant’s Argument

1. Kant believed in the fairness of the universe.

2. He believed that everyone seeks complete happiness and virtue,

3. This he referred to as the summum bonum (the highest good)

4. Kant thought that because everyone seeks it, it must be achievable.

5. However clearly not everyone achieves it in this life. Many die unfulfilled and unhappy.

6. He thought there must be a life after death where the summum bonum is achievable.

7. If there is a life after death, there must be a God.

8. God therefore is a “postulate of practical morality”.

This argument does not state there is a God who is the source of morality and who dictates what is moral and what is not. Kant’s line is that God is required for morality and fairness to achieve its end.

I am indebted to Dr Peter Vardy for some of the wording in the 8 points above.

View this PowerPoint on the Moral Argument

 

Applied ethics – abortion

This PowerPoint may serve as an introduction.

click on the image

Radio debate between Copleston and Russell 1948

The Cosmological argument with Frederick Copleston and Bertrand Russell

Copleston put forward his argument which concentrates simply on contingency.

• 1 There are things in the universe which are contingent – that is there was a time when they did not exist eg you and me.
• 2 Everything in the world is like this. Nothing in the world contains within itself the reason for its own existence ie nothing is self explanatory.
• 3 The cause of everything must be outside of the world.
• 4 This cause must contain within itself the reason for its own existence.It must be a necessary being.
• 5 This being is God.
  

  Bertrand Russell

Frederick Copleston

In 1948 there was a famous radio debate between Fr Frederick Copleston SJ and the agnostic philosopher Bertrand Russell.

Russell refused to accept the idea of necessary beings. Beings that exist and cannot be thought not to exist.

He replied “…what I am saying is that the concept of cause is not applicable to the total.” Just because each human has a mother does not mean that the whole human race has a mother. He thought that the universe was just a brute fact and needed no explanation for its existence – “I should say that the universe is just there, and that’s all.”

At the end of the discussion there was a sort of stalemate because Russell felt that Copleston was importing the idea of God into the argument, under his claim that there had to be a necessary being which was the cause of the universe.

Russell was unmoved over his point that there are no such things as necessary beings.

Listen to a recording of this debate

Read a transcript of what was said

Cosmological Argument

As an introduction to the Cosmological argument take a look at this PowerPoint.

PowerPoint on the Cosmological Argument

Thomas Aquinas

Don’t forget Aquinas was a champion of the philosophy of Aristotle. You can see the more scientific approach coming through in what Aquinas says.

Remember too the importance of causation we say in Aristotle and the idea of the Prime Mover.

This argument a posteriori. Aquinas looks at the world and draws conclusions from what he sees. The difficulty with this view is when one moves beyond the world. Contingent facts are fine but do they need a necessary cause?

(One) The argument from motion

1. Everything in the world is moving or changing.
2. Nothing can move or change by itself.
3. There cannot be an infinite regress of things changing other things.
4. Therefore, there must be a first (prime) mover (changer).
5. This is called God.

(Two) The argument from causation

1. Everything in the world has a cause.
2. Nothing is the cause of itself.
3. There cannot be an infinite regress of causes.
4. Therefore, there has to be a first cause to start the chain of causes.
5. This first cause we call God.

(Three) The argument from contingency

1. Everything in the world is contingent (can either exist or not exist).
2. If things cannot exist, there must have been a time when they did not exist.
3. If everything cannot exist, then there must have been a time when nothing existed.
4. Things exist now so there must be something on which we all depend which bought things into existence.
5. This necessary being we call God.

Objections of David Hume 1711-1776

Hume was an atheist and an empiricist so there was not chance that he might be sympathetic to Aquinas’ point of view.

1. Hume thought the argument was logical but not correct.

2.Using the evidence of Aquinas there seemed to be no reason why there simply had to be one Prime Mover or world creator, logically there could have been lots of them .

3. He challenged the idea of cause and effect. Does one thing cause another to happen or is that simply the pattern we put on a series of events.

4. He questioned why the Prime Mover of world creator had to be the God of Christianity.