Clarke and Rowe on the Cosmological Argument

Clarke and Rowe on the Cosmological Argument

Initial Considerations:

E. “For want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; for want of horse the rider was lost; for want of the rider the battle was lost; for want of the battle, the kingdom was lost. And all for the want of a horse-shoe nail.” (B. Franklin).

1. Is this an explanation of the loss of the kingdom?

Consider the sequence of events:

The shoe is lost; the horse is lost; the rider is lost; the battle is lost; the kingdom is lost.

2. Does E provide an explanation for each event in the sequence?

3. Does E provide an explanation for the sequence itself?

4. Is this explanation different in kind from a conspiracy theory which addends to E the further claim that the King’s treasonous prime minister arranged the loss of the kingdom by taxing horse-shoe nails in order to deprive the kingdom of the necessary nail, shoe, horse, rider and finally battle?

Clarke’s Argument.

Idea: Everything has an explanation. A particular thing may be explained by citing its cause. Hence, each event or object in a sequence of causally connected events or objects can be explained by appeal to its immediate predecessor in the sequence. But the sequence is itself something over and above its members. That thing, the sequence, is not explained by the collection of explanations of the members of the sequence. Hence, something outside the sequence is required. If we consider the sequence of events that constitute the history of the universe, each event can be explained by appeal to some prior event, but the sequence itself requires some further explanation. Such an explanation can be found only by appeal to an independent thing, namely God.

Some terms:

Dependent Being: a thing whose existence is to be explained by appeal to something else (which is its cause).

Independent Being: a thing whose existence is not to be explained by appeal to something else.

A Collection or Sequence of dependent things is itself a dependent thing.

Reasons for Existence: The features of the world or of some object or thing which make it the case that that object actually exists at a given point in space and time. A description of these reasons would be an explanation for the existence of the thing.

The argument:

1. For everything that exists, there is a reason for its existence, and hence an explanation of its existence.

2. There is an infinite sequence of dependent beings, namely the successive total states of the universe.

3. Suppose there is no necessary thing, external to the sequence, which produces it.

4. There can be no cause of the sequence external to it, because everything which might count as a cause is included as part of the sequence.

5. Though each member of the sequence can be explained by appeal to the prior member of the sequence, nothing in the sequence can explain the sequence as a whole, because each member of the sequence is dependent.

6. So given the supposition in 3, the sequence of the states of the universe is a collection of dependent things, and so must be explicable, but it cannot be explained.

Hence, 7. The supposition in 3 must be false—there must exist some necessary thing which provides the explanation for the sequence of events constituting the history of the universe.

Rowe

Rowe gives a slightly different reading of the argument, on which it depends on a particular claim, called the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR). According to Rowe, the principle has two parts, a and b:

PSRa: Every being (thing or object) has an explanation.

PSRb: Every positive fact (every truth of the form ‘Thing X exists’ and of the form ‘Thing X has property P’) has an explanation.

Simlarly, according to Rowe, Cosmological arguments come in two parts: the first part attempts to show that an object exists which is self-explanatory, i.e. not a dependent being. The second part of the argument attempts to show that this object must have the properties we normally attribute to God—omniscience, omnipotence, omni-benevolence, and so on. Rowe concentrates on the first part of the argument.

The Argument:

1. Every being is either dependent or self-existent (independent).

2. Not every being can be dependent.

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3. There exists a self-existent (independent) being.

Why, according to Rowe, do the proponents of the cosmological argument think that 3 follows from 1 and 2? The idea is this:

Suppose PSR a and b are true. Consider an infinite sequence of dependent beings. Each member of the sequence must be explicable (by PSR a), and can be explained by appeal to its cause—the prior member of the sequence.

But the occurrence of the sequence itself is a fact, and hence by PSR b stands in need of an explanation.

That explanation cannot be found in any member of the sequence, because each is a dependent being. For that reason each member is not self-explicable. Since each is itself part of the sequence, if that member of the sequence explained the sequence as a whole, it would explain itself as well, and so it would be self explicable. So the sequence as a whole requires explanation from outside the sequence.

Whatever thing provides that explanation must itself be self-explicable. For if not, we will just have expanded the sequence by one member, which, being dependent, cannot explain the sequence of which it is a member.

Objection: one way to explain a collection or sequence is simply to concatenate the explanations of each individual member of the sequence. No further cause of the sequence as a whole is needed for an explanation of the sequence.

Rowe contends Hume is wrong—if PSRb is true, there always is a further explanation to give. Since PSRb might be true, a request for further explanation is not illegitimate. Hence, the Hume/Franklin style explanation is not an explanation of the sequence itself.

The crucial questions:

Is PSRb is true? and Can know this?

If it is correct, Clarke is right to insist that the sequence of the history of the universe has an explanation, and that such an explanation requires the existence of a self-explicable, independent being.

So if PSRb is true, and we can show this, then we can establish that God must exist.

However, if PSRb is false, then, whether or not the Hume/Franklin style explanation is a real explanation of the sequence of the history of the universe, there is need not be any further explanation to give, and so there need not be an independent being external to the sequence.

So if we cannot conclusively establish PSRb, the cosmological argument will fail, because it relies on an assumption which is, even if true, irremediably contentious.

Rowe thinks we cannot conclusively establish PSRb