choosing not to be catholic

[Winchester]

This is like Optimus and Megatron, except we're both Megatron.

[Selah]

I like the bumblebee one

[Winchester]

He kicks butt in the new movies, doesn't he?

Edited May 18, 2010 by Winchester

[Socrates]

I am Iron Man.

[Winchester]

[quote name='Socrates' date='18 May 2010 - 05:07 PM' timestamp='1274216839' post='2113059']
I am Iron Man.
[/quote]
Stop talking like you're Ironman.

[Anomaly]

[quote name='Anomaly' date='09 January 2007 - 12:46 PM' timestamp='1168357606' post='1159821']
What a conundrum for those who worship the temporal Church. One either needs to suspend all common sense, or admit that Cardinals, Bishops, Priests, Popes, and other Church Bureacrats are Religion Politicians.
[url="http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=22526"]http://www.catholic.org/international/inte...ry.php?id=22526[/url]
But yet:

Isn't this a matter of Faith and Morals? Infallibility? Face it. It's a bunch of humans, no better than you or I, providing different interpretations and political ideology. Being a member of the Clergy doesn't make you any more Christian than paying your dues at the local Catholic Church makes you a better Christian. Though Jesus is present in the Church, as He is present in those who gather in His name, that doesn't mean that human fraility and foibles are not present as well. Religion is not God.
[/quote]
What a great post and the point exactly.

[Winchester]

You have moments of semi respectability. Even when you're wrong.


You even go over your old posts and gloat to yourself. How alike we are!

[Anomaly]

[quote name='Winchester' date='18 May 2010 - 06:19 PM' timestamp='1274217593' post='2113072']
You have moments of semi respectability. Even when you're wrong.


You even go over your old posts and gloat to yourself. How alike we are!
[/quote]
I never gloat, not even to myself. It's a character flaw I suffer from.

Actually, I was disappointed with my grammar and word usage. I think I meant "Religious Politicians" but that term is inadequate. Maybe "Politicians with paychecks from a Religion" would be more apropos.

[Fiat_Voluntas_Tua]

[quote name='Hassan' date='18 May 2010 - 12:09 PM' timestamp='1274198950' post='2112780']
I heard about them from my youth minister, however that is not what I studied. I checked out the Summa and read his arguments as he presented them (as translated from the Latin by an order of Dominican Friars). I had never read scholastic philosophy before so it took several hours of on again off again reading to really start to get into his language but my sources in this are primary.[/quote]

Going right to the Summa (without much knowledge of Aristotelian causality) is a good way to not fully understand what he is talking about... To understand Calculus you can't just go right to a Calculus book, more precisely, Calculus presuppose a vast knowledge of general mathematics which you won't get in a calculus book. To understand Aristotelian arguments you can't (solely) go right to the argument...that is a sure fire way to misunderstand the argument, just as you can't learn calculus without a detailed understanding of algebra/etc.

[quote name='Hassan' date='18 May 2010 - 12:09 PM' timestamp='1274198950' post='2112780']
could you be more specific?
[/quote]

When Aquinas talks about a First Cause he doesn't mean a temporal first cause...He argues (not in the summa) that it is possible for the world to not have a beginning in time. So clearly what he means by first cause is not a temporal first, but rather an efficient first. So to understand what the heck Aquinas is arguing for you [b]HAVE [/b]to have a real detailed understanding of efficient causality...Also, when he talks about motion, or things being moved, he is talking about the actuality of a potential which is not necessarily local motion (physical movement)...movement can take place in the mind in the way Aquians is using "motion"; if you don't have a detailed understanding of these concepts then you simply don't understand his argument. The same goes for various other features of the other 4 ways... e.g., "teleology", and "necessity", etc.

[quote name='Hassan' date='18 May 2010 - 12:09 PM' timestamp='1274198950' post='2112780']
I'm happy to admit that I was not then and am not now anything close to an expert on Aristotelian or Thomist philosophy. But I don't know what specific knowledge in respect to this would help the validity of his argument. Understanding the Aristotelian understanding of causality that he was working with helps explain why he thought his argument was sound. But given that no one, as far as I know, claims that Aristotelian physics are valid, I don't see how this helps make his argument any more valid.[/quote]

First, see my first comment regarding understanding calc presuppose an understanding of algebra/etc. You HAVE to understand Aristotelian causality to understand his arguments..it is that simple because his arguments esssentially involve a detailed utilization of such concepts! How can one know what Aquinas means when he say's "everything in motion is moved by another", [b]unless [/b] you know what he means by motion? And how do you know what he means by motion unless you know Aristotelian causality?

Second,
Aquinas's discussion of causality has never been proven false by modern physics...His "physics" is not what we mean by "physics" today. Sure, some of his empirical "scientific" theories might have been false...but that doesn't have anything to do with his discussion of causality.

[quote name='Hassan' date='18 May 2010 - 12:09 PM' timestamp='1274198950' post='2112780']
I'll keep it in mind.
[/quote]
You should keep it in mind and then act on it...

Edited May 18, 2010 by Fiat_Voluntas_Tua

[Hassan]

[quote name='Fiat_Voluntas_Tua' date='18 May 2010 - 06:33 PM' timestamp='1274222000' post='2113142']
Going right to the Summa (without much knowledge of Aristotelian causality) is a good way to not fully understand what he is talking about... To understand Calculus you can't just go right to a Calculus book, more precisely, Calculus presuppose a vast knowledge of general mathematics which you won't get in a calculus book. To understand Aristotelian arguments you can't (solely) go right to the argument...that is a sure fire way to misunderstand the argument, just as you can't learn calculus without a detailed understanding of algebra/etc.[/QUOTE]

To understand the whole of calculus, yes. We are not talking about the whole of Aquinas' metaphysics, we are talking about five specific arguments. To fully understand calculus and it's foundation you need to understand set theory and logic along with algebra which is also based on these two things. You don't need that much algebra or set theory or advanced logic to understand why Russell argued against infinitesimals.

If there is some specific thing in the argument that can only be understood trough Aristotelian and neo-platonic philosophy (I'm not sure how available neo-Platonism was at the time, but alright) then let's look at it. But just dogmatically decreeing these things isn't convincing.



[QUOTE]When Aquinas talks about a First Cause he doesn't mean a temporal first cause...He argues (not in the summa) that it is possible for the world to not have a beginning in time. So clearly what he means by first cause is not a temporal first, but rather an efficient first. So to understand what the heck Aquinas is arguing for you [b]HAVE [/b]to have a real detailed understanding of efficient causality...if you don't then you simply don't understand his argument. The same goes for various other features of the other 4 ways... e.g., "teleology", and "necessity", etc.[/QUOTE]

Let's look at it


[i]The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. It is certain, and evident to our senses, that in the world some things are in motion. Now whatever is in motion is put in motion by another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thus that which is actually hot, as fire, makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and thereby moves and changes it. Now it is not possible that the same thing should be at once in actuality and potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot simultaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cold. It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e. that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by another. If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God. [/i]

Aside from understanding potentiality and actuality, which Aquina himself explains, what background knowledge is necessary to understand Aquinas' argument? Maybe the Greek understanding of infinity as opposed to the post-Cantor understanding.

[i]
The second way is from the nature of the efficient cause. In the world of sense we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinity, because in all efficient causes following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or only one. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate cause. But if in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God. [/i]

I'll admit that I didn't know what an efficient cause was. But I was and am capable of looking it up.

http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath581/kmath581.htm
[i]Efficient causes, according to Aristotle, are prior conditions, entities, or events considered to have caused the thing in question.[/i]



http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03459a.htm
Efficient cause

The efficient cause is that which, by its action, produces an effect substantially distinct from itself. It is denominated efficient on account of the term produced by its action, i.e. the effect itself, and not necessarily from any presupposed material principle which it is conceived as potent to transform. The action, or causality, of the efficient cause is conceived as one which educes the actuality of the effect from its potentiality. This it is held to do in virtue of its own actuality, though precisely how no one has ever explained. No explanation of the essential nature of the action of the efficient cause would seem to be possible. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that

an effect shows the power of the cause only by reason of the action, which proceeds from the power and is terminated in the effect. But the nature of a cause is not known through its effect except in so far as through its effect its power is known, which follows upon its nature. (Contra Gentiles, III, lxix, tr. Rickaby.)

Both the fact of efficient causality, and an account of its mode of action, as to accidents, are thus expressed by St. Thomas, in answer to the objections of "some Doctors of the Moorish Law":

Now this is a ridiculous proof to assign of a body not acting, to point to the fact that no accident passes from subject to subject. When it is said that one body heats another, it is not meant that numerically the same heat, which is in the heating body, passes to the body heated; but that by virtue of the heat, which is in the heating body, numerically another heat comes to be in the heated body actually, which was in it before potentially. For a natural agent does not transfer its own form to another subject, but reduces the subject upon which it acts from potentiality to actuality. (Op. cit., Bk. III, lxix.)

The same argument, mutatis mutandis, would likewise hold good if applied to the efficient causes of substances. The efficient cause, unlike the material and the formal, is thus seen to be entirely extrinsic to its effect. It is held to act in virtue of its form. The fact and mode of this action is given in the above quotation from the "Contra Gentiles"; but the precise nature of the action, or relation, between the efficient cause and its effect is not stated. It is quite clear that the accident, quality, power, or motion in the cause A is not held to pass over into the effect B, since a numerically new one is said to be reduced from potentiality. Equally clear is it that nothing of the first efficient cause is supposed to pass over into its effects, as creation is said to be ex nihilo sui et subiecti; and there is nothing in God to pass over, since all that we conceive of as in God is God Himself. Consequently it would seem that the concept of efficiency in general includes no more than the activity of the cause as producing the effect by educing an accidental or a substantial form from the potentiality of matter. In the one case of forms not so educible, the efficient cause (God) creates and infuses them into matter. (Cf. In III Phys., Lect. 5.)

There are many divisions and subdivisions of the efficient cause commonly made in Scholastic treatises, to which the reader is referred for a more complete development of the subject. Under this head, however, will be added the principal dignities, or axioms of causality, as laid down by the Schoolmen:

1. Whatever exists in nature is either a cause or an effect (Contra Gent., III, cvii).
2. No entity can be its own cause (op. cit., II, xxi).
3. There is no effect without a cause.
4. Given the cause, the effect follows; the cause removed, the effect ceases. This axiom is to be understood of causes efficient in act, and of effects related to them not only in becoming but also in being (op. cit., II, xxxv).
5. An effect requires a proportionate cause. This axiom is to be understood in the sense that actual effects respond to actual causes, particular effects to particular causes, etc. (op. cit., II, xxi).
6. The cause is by nature prior to its effect. Priority is not necessarily understood here as relating to time. (Op. cit., II, xxi; Summa theol. III:62:6; "De potentiâ", Q. iii, a. xiii; "De veritate", Q. xxviii, a. vii.)
7. The perfection of the effect pre-exists in its cause (formally, virtually, or eminently). (Cf. Summa theol. I:6:2.)
8. Whatever is the cause of a cause (precisely as cause) is the cause also of its effect. This axiom enunciates a truth with regard to series of connected causes formally acting by their nature. (Cf. Summa Theol. I:45:5.)
9. The first cause (in any order of causes dependent one on the other) contributes more to the production of the effect than the secondary cause. (Cf. De causis, in cap.) Arguments, besides that given above, for the establishing of the fact of efficient causality in the physical world are to be found in the "Contra Gentiles", III, lxix.

It may be pointed out, in anticipation of the conception of purely mechanical, or dynamical, causation to be referred to later on, that in this system causation is not merely taken to mean an impulse, or change, in motion. The theory advanced is one to account for change of any kind, and, by a profound analysis, to reach the causes upon which things depend for their becoming and their actual beings.


[quote]First, see my first comment regarding understanding calc presuppose an understanding of algebra/etc. You HAVE to understand Aristotelian causality to understand his arguments..it is that simple because his arguments esssentially involve a detailed utilization of such concepts!

Second,
Aquinas's discussion of causality has never been proven false by modern physics...His "physics" is not what we mean by "physics" today. Sure, some of his empirical "scientific" theories might have been false...but that doesn't have anything to do with his discussion of causality.


You should keep it in mind and then act on it...
[/quote]

The problem with Aquina's Second argument is that it commits, as I recall, a quantifier shift fallacy. I don't see how a deeper understanding of efficient causality helps him as his real problem is with set theory.

Edited May 18, 2010 by Hassan

[Bennn]

[quote name='Anomaly' date='18 May 2010 - 11:26 PM' timestamp='1274218013' post='2113078']
I never gloat, not even to myself. It's a character flaw I suffer from.

Actually, I was disappointed with my grammar and word usage. I think I meant "Religious Politicians" but that term is inadequate. Maybe "Politicians with paychecks from a Religion" would be more apropos.
[/quote]

Well, you do seem to harbour lots of hatred toward the Church. It isn't healthy to stare yourself blind upon the faults of the human members of the Church. She's infallible in her eternal doctrines on faith and morals. Yet, you seem to act as if we suspend that infallibility to every single word and act a Cardinal or a Bishop says or does. No where do you see us imply such things. If the Church would consist of Saints alone, she would lose the very core of her sacramental nature, that is to sanctify the sinners so that they inherit eternal life with God. The fact that you seem to return here time after time (and you are welcome here), witnesses of a deep restlesness and lack of inner peace from your part. Is that not enough reason to question your millitant hatred towards our Catholic faith?

You are not at peace, and I wish you would find it in Christ.

[Winchester]

[quote name='Anomaly' date='18 May 2010 - 05:26 PM' timestamp='1274218013' post='2113078']
I never gloat, not even to myself. It's a character flaw I suffer from.

Actually, I was disappointed with my grammar and word usage. I think I meant "Religious Politicians" but that term is inadequate. Maybe "Politicians with paychecks from a Religion" would be more apropos.
[/quote]
Contrariness is another.


I am rarely satisfied completely with my rebuttals.

[Mark of the Cross]

[quote]What a conundrum for those who worship the temporal Church. One either needs to suspend all common sense, or admit that Cardinals, Bishops, Priests, Popes, and other Church Bureacrats are Religion Politicians.
[url="http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=22526"]http://www.catholic....ry.php?id=22526[/url]
But yet:

Isn't this a matter of Faith and Morals? Infallibility? Face it. It's a bunch of humans, no better than you or I, providing different interpretations and political ideology. Being a member of the Clergy doesn't make you any more Christian than paying your dues at the local Catholic Church makes you a better Christian. Though Jesus is present in the Church, as He is present in those who gather in His name, that doesn't mean that human fraility and foibles are not present as well. Religion is not God.[/quote]

[quote name='Winchester' date='19 May 2010 - 09:19 AM' timestamp='1274217593' post='2113072']
You have moments of semi respectability. Even when you're wrong.

[/quote]
Without having gone to the link, maybe you would be so kind as to point out where he's wrong, apart from grammar?
For the Church to be totally infallible all humans would need to leave. The clergy are also human.

[quote]You even go over your old posts and gloat to yourself. How alike we are![/quote]

I think most of us are at least a bit like that. We wouldn't be human otherwise! It's called ego, a human characteristic.

[Fiat_Voluntas_Tua]

[quote name='Hassan' date='18 May 2010 - 07:09 PM' timestamp='1274224181' post='2113172']
To understand the whole of calculus, yes. We are not talking about the whole of Aquinas' metaphysics, we are talking about five specific arguments. To fully understand calculus and it's foundation you need to understand set theory and logic along with algebra which is also based on these two things. You don't need that much algebra or set theory or advanced logic to understand why Russell argued against infinitesimals.

If there is some specific thing in the argument that can only be understood trough Aristotelian and neo-platonic philosophy (I'm not sure how available neo-Platonism was at the time, but alright) then let's look at it. But just dogmatically decreeing these things isn't convincing.





Let's look at it


[i]The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. It is certain, and evident to our senses, that in the world some things are in motion. Now whatever is in motion is put in motion by another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thus that which is actually hot, as fire, makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and thereby moves and changes it. Now it is not possible that the same thing should be at once in actuality and potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot simultaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cold. It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e. that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by another. If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God. [/i]

Aside from understanding potentiality and actuality, which Aquina himself explains, what background knowledge is necessary to understand Aquinas' argument? Maybe the Greek understanding of infinity as opposed to the post-Cantor understanding.

[i]
The second way is from the nature of the efficient cause. In the world of sense we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinity, because in all efficient causes following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or only one. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate cause. But if in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God. [/i]

I'll admit that I didn't know what an efficient cause was. But I was and am capable of looking it up.

http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath581/kmath581.htm
[i]Efficient causes, according to Aristotle, are prior conditions, entities, or events considered to have caused the thing in question.[/i]



http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03459a.htm
Efficient cause

The efficient cause is that which, by its action, produces an effect substantially distinct from itself. It is denominated efficient on account of the term produced by its action, i.e. the effect itself, and not necessarily from any presupposed material principle which it is conceived as potent to transform. The action, or causality, of the efficient cause is conceived as one which educes the actuality of the effect from its potentiality. This it is held to do in virtue of its own actuality, though precisely how no one has ever explained. No explanation of the essential nature of the action of the efficient cause would seem to be possible. St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that

an effect shows the power of the cause only by reason of the action, which proceeds from the power and is terminated in the effect. But the nature of a cause is not known through its effect except in so far as through its effect its power is known, which follows upon its nature. (Contra Gentiles, III, lxix, tr. Rickaby.)

Both the fact of efficient causality, and an account of its mode of action, as to accidents, are thus expressed by St. Thomas, in answer to the objections of "some Doctors of the Moorish Law":

Now this is a ridiculous proof to assign of a body not acting, to point to the fact that no accident passes from subject to subject. When it is said that one body heats another, it is not meant that numerically the same heat, which is in the heating body, passes to the body heated; but that by virtue of the heat, which is in the heating body, numerically another heat comes to be in the heated body actually, which was in it before potentially. For a natural agent does not transfer its own form to another subject, but reduces the subject upon which it acts from potentiality to actuality. (Op. cit., Bk. III, lxix.)

The same argument, mutatis mutandis, would likewise hold good if applied to the efficient causes of substances. The efficient cause, unlike the material and the formal, is thus seen to be entirely extrinsic to its effect. It is held to act in virtue of its form. The fact and mode of this action is given in the above quotation from the "Contra Gentiles"; but the precise nature of the action, or relation, between the efficient cause and its effect is not stated. It is quite clear that the accident, quality, power, or motion in the cause A is not held to pass over into the effect B, since a numerically new one is said to be reduced from potentiality. Equally clear is it that nothing of the first efficient cause is supposed to pass over into its effects, as creation is said to be ex nihilo sui et subiecti; and there is nothing in God to pass over, since all that we conceive of as in God is God Himself. Consequently it would seem that the concept of efficiency in general includes no more than the activity of the cause as producing the effect by educing an accidental or a substantial form from the potentiality of matter. In the one case of forms not so educible, the efficient cause (God) creates and infuses them into matter. (Cf. In III Phys., Lect. 5.)

There are many divisions and subdivisions of the efficient cause commonly made in Scholastic treatises, to which the reader is referred for a more complete development of the subject. Under this head, however, will be added the principal dignities, or axioms of causality, as laid down by the Schoolmen:

1. Whatever exists in nature is either a cause or an effect (Contra Gent., III, cvii).
2. No entity can be its own cause (op. cit., II, xxi).
3. There is no effect without a cause.
4. Given the cause, the effect follows; the cause removed, the effect ceases. This axiom is to be understood of causes efficient in act, and of effects related to them not only in becoming but also in being (op. cit., II, xxxv).
5. An effect requires a proportionate cause. This axiom is to be understood in the sense that actual effects respond to actual causes, particular effects to particular causes, etc. (op. cit., II, xxi).
6. The cause is by nature prior to its effect. Priority is not necessarily understood here as relating to time. (Op. cit., II, xxi; Summa theol. III:62:6; "De potentiâ", Q. iii, a. xiii; "De veritate", Q. xxviii, a. vii.)
7. The perfection of the effect pre-exists in its cause (formally, virtually, or eminently). (Cf. Summa theol. I:6:2.)
8. Whatever is the cause of a cause (precisely as cause) is the cause also of its effect. This axiom enunciates a truth with regard to series of connected causes formally acting by their nature. (Cf. Summa Theol. I:45:5.)
9. The first cause (in any order of causes dependent one on the other) contributes more to the production of the effect than the secondary cause. (Cf. De causis, in cap.) Arguments, besides that given above, for the establishing of the fact of efficient causality in the physical world are to be found in the "Contra Gentiles", III, lxix.

It may be pointed out, in anticipation of the conception of purely mechanical, or dynamical, causation to be referred to later on, that in this system causation is not merely taken to mean an impulse, or change, in motion. The theory advanced is one to account for change of any kind, and, by a profound analysis, to reach the causes upon which things depend for their becoming and their actual beings.




The problem with Aquina's Second argument is that it commits, as I recall, a quantifier shift fallacy. I don't see how a deeper understanding of efficient causality helps him as his real problem is with set theory.
[/quote]

Efficient causes are "prior"...sure but prior in what sense? Temporal or logical? You have to know what a logically prior efficient cause is in order to understand the argument.
And yes, many people do think that Aquinas's argument commits a quantifier shift (One of the things that makes me dubious of this way).

Aquinas clearly knew neo-platonic philosophy. He wrote several commentaries on many of their writings...[url="http://www.home.cc.duq.edu/~bonin/thomasbibliography.html#neoplatonism"]here[/url]are some in English...many others have not been translated (or if so are not available on-line).

Hassan, I am not claiming to be an expert in the these matters, but I think have studied it enough professionally to know that I do not fully understand his arguments...But those who are, clearly will claim that an adequate treatment of them is no small matter...something which can doubtfully be had by a 10th grader or given by a youth minister grade (not knocking YM...too much). Have you ever read a Thomistic scholar on the 5-ways?

I would be happy to discuss his 5-ways further elsewhere (maybe in a private message or in a separate post (I hate hijacking topics...something I tend to do often), but I all wanted to point out is that understanding his arguments presuppose a good deal of his thought. Also a more FULL treatment of his 5-ways is found in the Summa Contra.

[Apotheoun]

Aquinas, as I understand it, is using the term [i]efficient cause[/i] in a very specific and subtle manner to indicate that which causes a thing, which is finite because it does not possess the cause of its being within itself, to be here and now.