Part 2:          Analysis and preliminary evaluation of the argument.  (About 7.5%)

Due Date:     Friday, March 4

Part 3:          An outline of your essay on the argument in question.  (5%)

Due Date:     Monday, March 14

Part 4:          The completed essay, of about 1200-1500 words in length.  (15%)

Due Date:     Wednesday, March 30
 

Proportion of Final Grade for this Project as a Whole:   30%
 

Instructions - Part 2

       Part 2 of this first essay-writing assignment involves two tasks.  In part 2A, the goal is to make use of the information about inference indicators that emerged from doing Part 1 to work out what the sub-arguments in the passage are.  Part 2B is then concerned with locating possible weaknesses in the argument.

Topic:  A Proof of the Existence of God Based on the Idea of Necessary Beings and Contingent Beings

        The following proof of the existence of God combines some ideas found in related arguments that different authors have offered, but it is based mainly upon a combination of St. Thomas Aquinas's third proof of the existence of God, and an argument set out by John Duns Scotus.

        "One way of proving the existence of God turns upon the distinction between necessary beings and contingent beings.  Let me begin by explaining, then, that distinction.  The objects that one encounters in the world of space and time are such that their existence is not necessary, and one can easily imagine their not existing.  But one can also say something stronger - namely, that all of the things that exist in the world of space and time have a tendency to cease to exist, a tendency to break apart, to undergo destruction.  Let us define, then, a contingent being as one whose nature is such that it involves a tendency to cease to exist.  A necessary being, on the other hand, will be anything that, either because of its own nature, or because of its relation to some other thing, cannot cease to exist.  Given this distinction, the first question we need to consider is whether it is possible that absolutely everything is a contingent being, and when we do this, we can see that this is not possible.  In the first place, if something involves an inherent tendency not to exist, then at some point it will cease to exist.  Assume, then, that everything is a contingent being.  It follows that everything that exists will cease to exist at some time, and therefore that, at some time, absolutely nothing would exist.  But then there would be nothing in existence now, since nothing can come into existence unless there is some cause of its coming into existence.  Hence, if absolutely everything were a contingent being, then there would be nothing in existence now.  Since that is false, it must be the case that not everything is a contingent being.  So there must exist at least one necessary being.

        We now need, however, to introduce a second distinction - namely, a distinction between necessary beings whose necessity is caused by some other being, and necessary beings whose necessity does not depend on any other thing - and then we need to ask whether all necessary beings might have their necessity caused by some other being, or whether, on the contrary, there must be some necessary being that has its necessity due to its own nature, rather than having its necessity caused by any other thing.  And one can approach this question in the following way.  Consider anything that, as far as its own nature goes, would tend to drop out of existence.  That thing might be held in existence by something else.  But could there be an infinite series of things, each of which, of its own nature, had a tendency to cease to exist, but each of which was held in existence by something else?  Surely not.  Surely the series must contain, at some point, something whose nature is such that it cannot cease to be.  Consider the following analogy.   A boxcar may be part of a train that is in motion, but a boxcar has no power to move itself, and so, if the boxcar were not being pushed by something, it would gradually slow down and stop.  Moreover, adding more boxcars would not help.  A finite series of boxcars, if not being pushed by something, will, therefore, slow down in just the same way that a single boxcar will.  Would an infinite series of boxcars help?  Surely not.  Surely an infinite series of boxcars would not differ from a finite series of boxcars.  So we can conclude that a series of boxcars, be it finite or infinite, will always slow down, and eventually stop, unless they are being pushed by something that is a source of power - here, a locomotive.  Generalizing upon this example, we can conclude that the motion of a collection of things, all of which have a tendency to slow down and stop requires if it is to continue - and regardless of whether the collection is finite or infinite - the existence of something that is a source of power and that does not itself have any tendency to slow down.  Then, generalizing on the case of motion, we can draw the following, more abstract conclusion:  If one has a collection of things, each of which, as far as its own nature goes, would tend to do A, but where the things are not doing A, then there must be something outside the collection that does not have a tendency to do A, and that prevents the collection of things from doing A.  Consider now the collection of things that are necessary, but whose necessity is not derived from their own natures.  Each of those things would, as far as its nature goes, tend to cease to exist.  So we can apply the generalization that we just arrived at, and conclude that if there is a collection of things that, as far their own natures go, have a tendency to cease to exist, then, if they are not dropping out of existence, there must be something whose nature is such that it cannot cease to exist, and which holds all other necessarily existent things in existence.

        We saw earlier, however, that there must be at least one necessarily existent thing - a thing that cannot drop out of existence.  We can therefore conclude that there is something that is a necessarily existent thing, whose necessity derives from its own nature, and which holds any other necessarily existent things in existence.  But we also noted earlier that everything in space and time is contingent, and has a tendency to cease to exist.  The necessary being whose existence we have just proved cannot, therefore, be located anywhere in space and time.  Accordingly, it cannot be anything physical.  It must, therefore, be a pure mind.  So we have established that there is a necessary being, which has its necessity of its own nature, which holds other things - including the whole physical universe - in existence, and which is pure mind.  And what could this, but God?  We have therefore shown that God exists."

Part 2A:  The Eighteen Sub-Arguments

Instructions

1.  With three exceptions, each inference involves two premises - one of which may be implicit, rather than being explicitly stated.  In the case of the fifteen inferences for which this is so, set out the two premises, and the conclusion.  (1 point for each correct premise, and for each correct conclusion, for a total of 45 points.)

2.  List the inference indicator for each inference in the indicated place.

3.  In working out the premises and the conclusion, remember to make use of information about the type of inference indicator involved, and what that implies about the likely locations of the relevant conclusion, and at least one of the premises.

4.  One of the inferences - inference number 4 - is of the type encountered in the previous exercise, where the author is making use of the technique of "conditional proof".

5.  In the case of the one inference that is of this type, indicate the assumption that is to be discharged, and the conditional, ‘if, then’,  conclusion that is ultimately established.  (1 point for each, for a total of 2 points.)

6.  Two of the inferences are of a type that did not occur in the previous exercises.  They involve generalizing in a certain way, in that, after one has established a conclusion for a specific case, one moves immediately from that conclusion to a more general conclusion.  So these inferences involve only one premise each.

7.  The basic idea here is that the line of argument that was used to make plausible the more specific conclusion could in principle be paralleled to establish the more general conclusion.  But then why not simply set out the more general argument?  The answer may be that the author feels that the basic idea involved is more readily grasped if one focuses upon a concrete example, rather than upon the possibly much more abstract, general case.

8.  It is important to note that arguments that involve the sort of generalizing just described are not, as they stand, deductively valid.  But the idea is that one could in principle transform the argument as a whole into a deductively valid one by replacing the more concrete argument by the more abstract one.

9.  In the case of the two inferences that are of this type, indicate the more specific statement that serves as the premise for the generalization, and then the more abstract conclusion that is being advanced.  (1 point for each premise and conclusion, for a total of 4 points.)

10.  An important thing to keep in mind is that, in a complex argument, the sub-arguments have to link together in a certain way - namely, every conclusion of a sub-argument, with the exception of the grand, final conclusion, must serve as a premise in some other sub-argument.
 

Sub-Argument 1  -  Inference indicator  =

Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 2  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 3 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

 Sub-Argument 4 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise that is being discharged:
 

Conditional conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 5  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 6 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

 Sub-Argument 7 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 8  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 9 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

 Sub-Argument 10 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise:
 

Conclusion:
 
 
 

Sub-Argument 11  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise :
 
 
 

Conclusion:
 
 
 

Sub-Argument 12  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 
 
 

Premise 2:
 
 

 Conclusion:
 
 
 
 

Sub-Argument 13 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 
 
 
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 
 

Sub-Argument 14 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 15  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 16 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 

Sub-Argument 17 -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 

Premise 2:
 

Conclusion:
 
 

Sub-Argument 18  -  Inference indicator  =
Premise 1:
 
 

Premise 2:
 
 

Conclusion:
 

Part 2B:  Preliminary Assessment of Dubious Parts of the Argument

        Indicate five places in the above argument that seem to you involve a basic, or independent weakness - where an independent weakness is defined as either a case of fallacious reasoning in a sub-argument, or a case of an implausible, independent, premise, and where a premise is an independent premise only if it is not a conclusion of an earlier sub-argument.  (Note, too, that when a premise is introduced only as a premise that is going to be discharged in a conditional proof, it is not open to objection.)  Specify, in each case, the sub-argument in question, and whether it is the reasoning that seems suspect, or one of the premises.  (If you think that the reasoning is fallacious, and that an independent premise is implausible, focus on the weakness that seems to you the most serious.)  Then try to say, very briefly, what you think is wrong with the inference, or with the premise, in question.  (2 points for each plausible answer, for a total of 10 points.)

Weakness 1:   Sub-Argument Number
Is the reasoning fallacious?  Yes       No
Or is an independent premise  implausible?  If so, which one?
 
 
 
 

Weakness 2:   Sub-Argument Number
Is the reasoning fallacious?  Yes       No
Or is an independent premise  implausible?  If so, which one?
 
 
 
 

Weakness 3:   Sub-Argument Number
Is the reasoning fallacious?  Yes       No
Or is an independent premise  implausible?  If so, which one?
 
 
 
 

Weakness 4:   Sub-Argument Number
Is the reasoning fallacious?  Yes       No
Or is an independent premise  implausible?  If so, which one?
 
 
 
 

Weakness 5:   Sub-Argument Number
Is the reasoning fallacious?  Yes       No
Or is an independent premise  implausible?  If so, which one?