THE IMPORTANCE OF THE ARISTOTELIAN ARGUMENT

In Chapter 1 of Five Proofs of the Existence of God (hereafter: FPEG),  Edward Feser presents his Aristotelian argument for the existence of God.  This is the most important argument in the book, because the other four arguments presented by Feser in later chapters all have a significant dependency on this first argument.

Specifically, the other four arguments rely on the assumption that a purely actual being must have various divine attributes (e.g. omnipotence, omniscience, being eternal, being fully good, etc.).  These assumptions are argued for in the Aristotelian argument, so if that part of the Aristotelian argument fails, then the remaining four arguments also fail.  If Feser fails to prove that a purely actual being must have various divine attributes, then ALL FIVE of his arguments for the existence of God FAIL.   Similarly, if Feser succeeds in proving that a purely actual being must have various divine attributes, then significant portions of the other four arguments also succeed.  So, a great deal rests on Feser’s Aristotelian argument.

THE BASIC FORM OF THE ARISTOTELIAN ARGUMENT

All five of Feser’s arguments for the existence of God have the same basic form:

I. There is exactly one being of type X.

II. IF there is exactly one being of type X, THEN God exists.

THEREFORE:

III. God exists.

Feser’s Aristotelian argument can be summarized using the same form:

IA. There is exactly one purely actual actualizer.

IIA. IF there is exactly one purely actual actualizer, THEN God exists.

THEREFORE:

III. God exists.

In Feser’s formal outline of the Aristotelian argument (FPEG,  p.35-37), there are fifty statements.  Statements (1) through (18) contain the reasoning supporting (IA), and statements (19) through (49) contain the reasoning supporting (IIA).  So, the Aristotelian argument can be divided into two large pieces.

CHUNKING UP THE ARISTOTELIAN ARGUMENT

I plan to examine somewhat smaller pieces of the argument.  To guide my critique, I will divide Feser’s Aristotelian argument into seven small-to-medium-size chunks:

I.  There is at least one purely actual actualizer: premises (1) through (14).

II. There cannot be more than one purely actual actualizer: premises (15) through (18).

III. Any purely actual actualizer must be immutable, eternal, immaterial, and incorporeal: premises (19) through (27).

IV. Any purely actual actualizer must be perfect and fully good: premises (28) through (32).

V. Any purely actual actualizer must be omnipotent: premises (33) through (37).

VI. Any purely actual actualizer must be  the cause of the existence of all beings, intelligent, and omniscient: premises (38) through (47).

VII. God exists IF AND ONLY IF there is exactly one purely actual actualizer and that  being is immutable, eternal, immaterial, incorporeal, perfect, fully good, omnipotent, the cause of the existence of all beings, intelligent, and omniscient: premise (49).

NOTE: Premise (48) is a conjunction that summarizes several previous sub-conclusions: (18), (21), (23), (25), (27), (29), (32), (37), (39), (44), and (47).

Given this way of dividing the Aristotelian argument up into seven chunks, I plan to write at least seven posts on this argument, and I might well need to write more than one post on some of these chunks, so it could easily take a dozen posts for me to critically examine this first, and most important argument in Feser’s case for the existence of God.