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Entire History

The of

Western Philosophy
Fifty Minutes
in

 if (the best philosophy) doesnt seem peculiar you havent understood it

Edward Craig

The Entire History of Western Philosophy in 50 Minutes

Philosophy: the love of Wisdom

especially questions about ultimate reality

why things are the way they are

making sense of life

thinking about thinking

the no-mans land between science and theology, exposed to attack from both sides

Bertrand Russell

The Entire History of Western Philosophy in 50 Minutes

as soon as you start to comment on philosophy you have started to philosophise!

The Entire History of Western Philosophy in 50 Minutes

Much of the story of philosophy is in dialogue with Christian faith.

Can you prove that God exists? Why is there evil in the world? Can miracles happen? Is there life after death? Is experience useful evidence? What is good? Can we describe ultimate reality with ordinary words?

The question of miracle The existence of God

The question of life after death

Three important themes

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Era or school

Philosopher Key point Key point

Key point

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Presocratic
Philosophical thinking before Socrates

Thales

c. 620 540 BCE

Thinking about the world without first thinking about gods Water the 1st Principle from which everything came God in all things

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Presocratic
Philosophical thinking before Socrates

Pythagorus
570 480 BCE

First systematic step-by-step reasoning Ultimate reality in number

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The unexamined life is not worth living

Academics
Because Plato started an Academy

Socrates

c. 470 - 399 BCE

Wrote nothing recorded by pupil Plato Concerned with ethics: what is good knowledge = virtue
ignorance the cause of evil

dialectic argument
proposal, answer, counter answer

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Academics
Because Plato started an Academy

Plato
Aristocles aka Fatso

Human being is really soul that fell from the stars Theory of ideas
remembered - on earth, there is only the imperfect

c. 427 - 347 BCE

Ideal forms e.g. beauty

Ideal city-state: The Republic

Platos allegory of the cave

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Nature does not act without a goal

Academics
Because Plato started an Academy

Aristotle
384 - 322 BCE

member of Platos academy systematic. scientific, diverse

Classification of knowledge

teleology: purpose God as Prime mover

revered by Church scholars

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Into the Christian era

Cynics: ascetic, minimise emotion Stoics: virtue based on good, be indifferent to suffering Neo-platonists
body bad, spiritual good

Augustine 354 430 Believe in order to understand

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Scholastics
Thinking based in Christian monasteries

Anselm
1033 - 1109

the first ontological argument

God something than which nothing greater can be thought

an argument simply from thinking, not from observation

The Ontological Argument

from Greek for to be, so concerned with being

Gods definition entails his existence

What is the better gift: virtual roses ..

or the real thing?

The Ontological Argument God is that than which nothing greater can be thought
the concept of God exists in the understanding God is a possible being

Anselm (1033-1109)

if God exists only in the mind and is only a possible being, then if he existed in reality he would have been greater if so, God is a being than which a greater can be thought which is impossible!

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Scholastics
Thinking based in Christian monasteries

Thomas Aquinas
1225 - 1274

Favoured by RCs Influenced by Aristotle

Five Ways or Five arguments for the existence of God

a cosmological argument (4 of the 5)

a teleological argument (the 5th)

Thomas Aquinass Five Ways

1. Everything is changing but something must have caused it.

2. Every effect must have a cause

3. Things come into existence, and cease to exist. There must be a cause. 4. Excellence must come from perfection

5. The harmony of things suggests design.

This all must be God!

The Cosmological Argument

cosmos - the world or universe based on what can be seen concept of contingency dependent on something that may or may not happen

The Cosmological Argument

The Unmoved Mover Thomas Aquinas First Way everything that is in motion (changed) is moved by something else

infinite regress is impossible

emphasis on dependency it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, moved by no other, and this everyone understands to be God.

The Cosmological Argument

The Uncaused Causer Thomas Aquinas Second Way everything that happens has a cause infinite regress is impossible

emphasis on agency

There is no case known in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God

The Cosmological Argument

Possibility and Necessity Thomas Aquinas Third Way things come into being and later cease to exist

some contingent beings exist

if any contingent beings exist, then a necessary being must exist

(the cause of the universe must be external to it and must always have existed)

The Cosmological Argument

Excellence Thomas Aquinas Fourth Way in this world there is a scale of more good and less good

this cannot be an infinite scale

there must therefore exist perfection at one end of the scale - which is what everyone knows as God

The Teleological Argument

telos - end or purpose focus on order, regularity, benefit and purpose uses analogy

recalls Plato: all things ordered by the mind

based on what can be seen

The Teleological Argument

The Argument from Design Thomas Aquinas Fifth Way everything works to some purpose
Thomas Aquinas 1225-1274

observed beneficial results suggest there is a pattern of direction behind this

modern example - animal migration this must be God!

The Teleological Argument

The Argument from Design
Thomas Aquinas 1225-1274

whatever lacks knowledge cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed therefore some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God

Summa Theologica

The Question of Miracle

1. God does what nature could never do

Thomas Aquinas 1225-1274

2. God does what nature could do, but in a different sequence or connection
3. God does what nature can do, but from his power

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Scholastics
Thinking based in Christian monasteries

William of Occam d. 1347 Occams Razor: Entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity All being equal, accept the simplest answer

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The Age of Science

Thomas Hobbes
1588 - 1679

materialist: God is matter

natural state of human beings = war society prevents a falling back to this state (social contract)

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Cogito ergo sum I think, therefore I am

Rationalists
Knowledge comes from logical deduction

Descartes
1596-1650

the father of modern philosophy a philosophical framework for the natural sciences

a mathematician
deduction (from the reality of the mind), not perception (from senses)

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Rationalists
Knowledge comes from logical deduction

Spinoza
1632 - 1677

the Universe is One mind and body just different ways of conceiving this one Reality everything is a necessary part of that Reality therefore there is no free will

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The mind is furnished with ideas by experience alone

Empiricists
Knowledge is based on sense experience

John Locke
1632 - 1704

everything we know is derived from experience

the mind at birth is a tabula rasa

(a blank slate)

primary (objective - really exist) & secondary

qualities of objects

(subjective ideas in the mind)

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Empiricists
Knowledge is based on sense experience

David Hume
1711 - 1776

anything not given in experience is to be discarded therefore there is no God, self, causation, inductive knowledge I am nothing but a bundle of perceptions miracles violations of laws of nature

Arguments against miracles

David Hume
1711 - 1776

Hume described miracles as violations of the laws of nature

he said that claims of miracles came from ignorant and barbarous people with poor quality of testimony who might gain from their accounts many religions cite miracle as support for their beliefs - but they could not all be right

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A response to Hume

William Paley
1743 - 1805

evidence in creation of design

the Clockmaker analogy an argument from design

(teleological argument)

The Teleological Argument

The Argument from Design

In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone I might possibly answer that it had lain there for ever But suppose I found a watch upon the ground I should hardly think of the answer which I had given before when we come to inspect the watch we perceive that its several parts are framed and put together for a purpose
Natural Theology

William Paley (1743-1805)

The Teleological Argument

The Argument from Design
Purpose Regularity
William Paley (1743-1805)

analogy of watch found on heath

could not say always there! human eye design must be a designer

regularity, order, rule in universe

motion of planets, gravity, in solar system designing principle at work

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500 CE 1000 CE 1500 CE Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe the stary heavens above and the moral law within

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Idealists
Rationalism + empiricism

Immanuel Kant
1711 - 1776

categories for incoming sensedata

categorical imperative a universal moral law a moral argument for the existence of God

The Moral Argument for the Existence of God

we recognise an obligation to achieve the highest standard of goodness and that this goodness should be rewarded by happiness good and happy - the summum bonum, the highest good - ought to happen so it has to be possible

BUT while we can achieve good, we cant always ensure happiness as well
THEREFORE there must be a God who can do this

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Idealists
Rationalism + empiricism

Hegel

1770 - 1831

dialectic thesis, antithesis, synthesis

a progression towards absolute truth

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Materialists
Everything is made of matter

Karl Marx
1818 - 1883

atheistic dialectical materialism socialism the necessary outcome of economic conflict

religion keeps the oppressed quiet

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Materialists
Everything is made of matter

Ludwig Feuerbach
1804-1872

people are scared to face up to the fact that there is nothing after death

so they make up the father-figure they would like to be real

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To the present day

God is dead!

Existentialists: the human predicament

(Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Sartre)

Linguistic philosophy:

(Wittgenstein)

religious statements not open to truth or falsity

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To the present day

Paul Tillich
1883-1965

Philosophy frames the questions to which theology brings the answers

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To the present day

Freud: projected order Coplestone: self-causing universe Russell: just there Dawkins: The God Delusion

Wiles: Auschwitz > God not involved Holland: perception

Hartshorne: memory in the mind of God Hick: replica

Swinburne: good testimony

Vardy: reprint

Does Philosophy offer Proof of the Existence of God?

No - but some more recent philosophers have argued that there is a demonstrable weight of probability that makes belief in God an intellectually defensible claim

How much can the discipline of philosophy help us develop better analytical skills? How much can we know about God by thinking, rather than by revelation? How can philosophical thinking prepare the human heart to understand the human predicament, and so be open to the Good News of Jesus? How can addressing philosophical issues create opportunities for dialogue with todays youth?