Does God Exist
Does God ExistWhat is God? Who is God? Why do some people conclude that a God
exists? Saint Thomas Aquinas goes from the fact that there must be a first
efficient cause to the conclusion that God is that cause. Why must Aquinas
make the extraordinary jump from there being a cause, to assuming that this
cause must be God? Would it not be just as plausible to make matter the first
cause? Matter is the substance that any physical object is composed of.
Matter is closed and finite, with no beginning or end. The best explanation to
the existence of God, is that God does not exist as a first efficient cause. The
argument for God, as presented by Aquinas, is to show that the existence of
the world and everything in it can only be explained if there is a God who is
the first cause. The argument states that it is impossible for any being to be
the efficient cause of itself because then it would have to bring itself into
being, and to bring itself into being, it would have to exist before it existed. If
a being exists, it is because some being prior to it, was it’s cause. Therefore,
if no first cause exists, neither will any other being exist. Therefore, there is a
first efficient cause–God. This argument assumes that a first cause is needed
to explain the existence of anything. Aquinas also assumes this first cause to
be God. How can anyone rationally conclude that there is a God from the
simple statement that a first cause is necessary? Therefore, a first cause does
not prove God, it only assumes that there is a God, at best. Could one not
put matter in the place of God in Aquinas’ argument and still assume there is
a first efficient cause? The theory that matter “is”, is just as plausible as the
theory that God “is”. Matter is closed and finite in extent, with no beginning
or end. Putting Matter in the place of God in the end of the argument given by
Aquinas, is just as plausible. In fact, matter is an easier concept to understand
and to believe in than God. Everyone has a different view of what God is and
even what he stands for, but many of those same people understand the
concepts of matter. Matter is all around us, and even we are matter. We
interact with matter everyday and in every situation, so the knowledge of
matter is not trivial. God does not interact with us, he is not around us, and
we do not associate with God in the same manner in which we associate with
matter. Matter is an understandable concept while God is...
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