Monday, November 2, 2015
NO Brute Facts -- The Principle of Sufficient Reason
You are hiking in a remote wilderness, miles from the nearest building or even cell phone tower. You come upon a clearing and see a crystal sphere hovering over you and emitting colorful light pulses in some seeming order: red, blue, green and the pattern repeats. Should there be an explanation for this odd phenomenon or is it acceptable to shrug our shoulders and mutter "Stuff happens"? Can we extrapolate from this case to a general principle of the universe? If so, can we prove that God (or a reasonable facsimile) exists?
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Hume’s idea of the principle of sufficient reason gives us square one on the path to find out the truth about god’s or gods’ existence. Summarized, the Principal of Sufficient Reason, or PSR, states:
ReplyDelete1 Whatever exists must have a reason for existing
2 there is a chain of causes that made the existence of everything
3 we must find the first cause that started the chain
4 that start of the chain had to have created himself
5 god created everything
Conclusion - god created himself
This idea shows us that everything that we know to exist has a reason and is a resultant of something else that exists. So this is why we are not allowed to just scoff things off and say that “stuff happens”. Of course, there is always something wrong with the argument. For PSR, it is since the chain must have a beginning but the beginning of the chain must have a reason for its existence. This beginning is god. Since god created any and everything something had to have created god. In this case there must be another a reason for god’s or gods’ existence. This reason could take the shape of a infinite divine chain that explains the existence of god or gods. This divine chain is simply an extension of the chain that we think we know of. So therefor, using PSR, we can never truly understand what god is and how he or she came to be. So PSR is not and cannot help us prove god’s or gods’ existence.
One idea of the universe is that it could be thought of as in infinite chain of causes and effects with beings that explain the beings that it causes. Everything that we exist must have something that came before it and cause its existence. The other idea is that there is a being that contains the reason for its existence. Containing the reason for your existence means that there is not an outside cause to your being; instead you are the reason for your own existence. If this idea is true, it proves the existence of God because the only being that has the power to cause its own existence must be God. The question is whether or not that God is the traditional God that is defined as being omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent. One argument for God not being the tradition God that we think of is that maybe the infinite chain does not need a cause or explanation. Ever individual part of the chain can be explained so why would we need to explain the chain as a whole. A real life example of the idea is if you built a birdhouse and someone asked you where the birdhouse came from. Then you respond by telling them where every individual part of the birdhouse came from and they ask again; but where did the birdhouse come from? A birdhouse is just an arbitrary name that we give to a collection of parts and the same idea could apply to the infinite chain of beings.
ReplyDeleteHume would reflect upon this orb by returning to Principle of Sufficient Reason and then moving to the the cosmological argument. Hume first starts via restating the PSR which states that everything is produced for a reason or by reason and nothing can produce itself it or be the cause for its own existence. From here Hume establishes the cosmological argument for gods existance. Hume first starts by realizing there must be either an infinitely long trace of causes or there is one ultimate cause for everything. Then, Hume realizes that due the PSR either this chain or ultimate cause must both have been created by something themselves. Hume concludes that god must have created the universe. Fundamentally Hume realizes that everything in our universe known and unknown must be either directly or indirectly created by god. Thus, in accord to this reasoning the orb to which you see must have a reason for its creation or must have been created for by a reason. There may be many reasons for the presence of the orb. Potensially, the orb could be present simpily for your consideration of its existance or an event to which is yet to happen. But, as you see no reason for the presence of the orb it is concludable that the orb creation itself must have been by reason. Furthermore, due to the PSR it is fundamentally evident that an orb cannot create itself and must therefore have a creator. Similar to the reasoning for the infinitely long chain, as each creation must have a higher creation and god must be the highest creator, the orb must therefore be created directly or indirectly by god.
ReplyDeleteA philosopher would argue that all knowledge is worth pursuing, so the thought process of accepting the universe as it can be perceived is not a philosophical one. This case can certainly be extrapolated to the universe. We know that for every action or being, there is a cause, so the floating orb must have some cause for its existence - it could not have just materialized in the universe without any purpose. The Principle of Sufficient Reasoning states that everything requires an explanation. Therefore, the universe must have come about in some fashion too. Either there is an infinite chain of causes and effects or there is a singular infinite cause that has the reason for its own existence. If we approach the creation of the universe scientifically, the most common explanation is the Big Bang Theory. However, the Big Bang must have a cause too. And its cause must have another cause. The Big Bang Theory does not sufficiently explain the creation of the universe because it only suggests another link in an infinite chain of events. It may be correct, but it does not prove or disprove the existence of God because God may still be the final link in the chain, or the chain may be infinite. Another possibility is that a cause that contains its own reason for existence exists, but that cause is not God. There is a jump in reasoning between this point and an omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient being existing. Perhaps it is possible for a cause that is not sentient to be the true creator of the universe. The infinite chain vs. singular cause argument does not in itself support God as the creator of the universe for this reason.
ReplyDeleteEverything happens for a reason and it is not enough to let things happen and not try to explore the cause. One of the most difficult questions is what is the cause of the universe and everyone living in it? Scientists have predicted that the universe came about due to the Big Bang, Yet, they don't explain the cause of this. The most popular belief through different cultures and stories is that the world started due to the power of one or more higher beings. Yet, no one knows where those beings came from. There could be one infinite chain of causes. Or there could be one all powerful, all knowing, and all good power that has its cause within it. This power would be God. The problem with the infinite chain of causes is there is no cause for the chain itself. According to the Principle of Sufficient Reasoning everything must have a cause. Therefore, there can't be and infinite chain, leaving only the option of a God. There are problems with this argument, though. This argument proves that there could be a higher power but doesn’t prove this higher power is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent. Yet, just because everything needs an explanation doesn’t mean these explanations need to be found or are easy to be found. Somethings are not possible to know for sure or find enough information to prove.
ReplyDeleteIf you were to come across a glowing orb in the middle of the woods, it is very unlikely that you would accept that it exists independent of any reason. This is true of everything in the universe: everything can be explained scientifically, or by some other chain of occurrences. It is not in human nature to simply accept an occurrence to have no reasoning. This leads into the principle of sufficient reason: it is a way to prove god’s existence, by the argument that:
ReplyDelete1. Everything in the world has a reason for its existence
2. There is an infinite chain of causes/reasons which support each other
3. There must be a beginning to the chain
4. This first cause must prove its own existence
5. God exists
This argument is what is known as the cosmological argument: God exists as the answer and reason for everything in the universe. There is, however, a problem with this argument. The infinite chain does not need to be explained by the existence of a god: there may be a beginning to the chain, but assuming this beginning is God is wrong. In the vast expanse of time and space, the chain truly may be infinite, which is something far beyond human knowledge or conception, and we thus create the existence of a god for an explanation of what we cannot otherwise explain. That this being is an all-powerful, omnipresent God is an assumption, backed by little to no fact. The cosmological argument is flawed in that we, as humans who seek answers, require a god. There is no true proof of His existence; it is simply a fabricated design to explain what we do not yet understand, and cannot come to understand. If we came across a glowing orb in the woods, God’s existence would not be a satisfactory answer: in fact, it may be a more commonly accepted version of shrugging your shoulders and dismissing the issue. God is not a force which we can prove to exist by this situation, it is merely another excuse for inexplicable forces.
In the scenario that one is hiking in the wilderness and comes across a hovering crystal sphere, one cannot just say “stuff happens” and move on with life. Hume’s principle of sufficient reason states that everything that exists has a reason for its existence. From that point, he says that we can go in one of two directions. Either there is an infinite chain of beings in which each being is the explanation of another part of the chain, or there is a finite chain in which there was a cause which Hume calls God. I agree with Hume on the fact that everything that exists has a reason. Things don’t just exist. I also agree with Hume’s belief that the universe in finite and has a creator. How can the universe be an infinite chain? We are able to explain everything up till the big bang. However, we do not have an explanation for the big bang. What happened before the big bang? The universe didn’t just “pop” into existence one day through the big bang, there had to have been a creator, a God. To strengthen this argument, we can look at Hume’s design argument. We look around us. The universe is so complicated. Yet, it still runs like clockwork, everything is like a part of a bigger something. How can something such as the universe so complicated just exist without a creator/designer? Before the big bang, there had to have been a creator/designer who planned out how everything in the universe would work. In our world, complicated machines like car engines exist. A pile of metal cannot be the explanation for the engine. Someone had to have designed/created it. Like a car engine, the universe is a complicated “machine” that contains many small parts that seamlessly work together. Without a designer, it would be impossible for a complicated machine to function. An explosion (the big bang) cannot be the explanation for the universe. An explosion cannot create a carefully designed and seamless machine
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