Knowledge is Power (11) - Augustine, Anselm and Aquinas
Augustine
Augustine is a Christian saint from medieval philosophy. Augustine's philosophy is mix of Platonism and Biblical view. Augustine believed that our purpose is to attain peace with God; therefore our moral source is in the Bible and the saving power of Jesus. For him, evil was absence of good and freewill is our choice between good and evil. Christianity is a concrete example of mysticism.
Anselm and Aquinas
They both came from the same Christian background; however they used different methods in proving the existence of God.
Anselm's ontological argument is a "priori" proof of God's existence. Anyone who understands what it means to say that God exists can be led to see that God does exist. Anselm starts with premises that anyone who understands what it means to say that God exists, they belive that God truely exists.
In Anselm’s definition, God is “a supremely perfect being”, something “that than which nothing greater can be conceived”. Anselm argued that this being exists in the mind, and concluded that if the greatest possible being exists in the mind, than it must also exist in reality. So God exists in the mind and also in reality.
Thomas Aquinas by Carlo Crivelli [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
Aquinas cosmological argument is based on Reason, and it is a "posteriori" argument, meaning that it happened after admitting the existence of the physical Universe. It is based on First Cause, which was the idea that the Universe must be caused by something that is itself uncaused, which he believed that is God. He argued that the First Cause is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate cause is the cause of the ultimate cause. There is a cause and effect and no one can take away the cause, as there would be no effect. Therefore, in Aquinas' argumentation it was necessary to admit the First Cause, which is God, a being that exists by necessity, something that must exist in order for anything else to exist.
This post is a part of my series "Knowledge is Power". In case you missed the previous articles, you can read them here:
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Cool ! This was discussed just few weeks ago from our Philo Class !!!
Yes, I was tutoring a philo introductory class, that's why I shared a few posts here. Now I'm doing an ethics class, I will post more interesting stuff (I hope). Thanks for stopping by.
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