Conatus: REVISED EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

of this in Spinoza, whilst Descartes spoke of conceiving of God as necessarily the most perfect thing.

The definitions provided for proofs of God’s existence can also be contrasted with Thomas Aquinas’ five ‘ways’ to God. For Aquinas, God is: Creator (hence, teleological argument): The source of motion (motion only makes sense if there is an ‘unmoved mover’): The ‘first cause’ of the universe (hence the cosmological argument — a chain of ‘efficient’ causes requires a first cause): The instance of absolute perfection. (An argument similar to the ontological argument and also deployed by Descartes. The fact that there is a gradation of value suggests that there should be something that is the most valuable or perfect. Also, the contingent nature of things — that is, it appears to us that things could have been different — suggested to Aquinas that there must be something that has a ‘necessary’ existence, that is, something that could not be otherwise. The ‘degrees of perfection’ argument for the existence of God is known as the ‘henological’ argument.) Finally, for Aquinas’ five ways, there is the ‘final cause’ or purpose to which the universe moves (a further variant of the teleological argument). The orderly nature of events is supposed by Aquinas to suggest some final state towards which the universe is moving.

Two further arguments for God's existence are presented to us by the Christian faith. Firstly, it is proposed that the person of Jesus Christ is evidence for God. Secondly, it is claimed that an individual can know God through personal

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