Thomas Aquinas

God and Explanations

C. F. J. Martin
THOMAS AQUINAS
THOMAS AQUINAS
God and Explanations

C. F. J. Martin

Edinburgh University Press

 © C. F. ]. Martin, 1997

Edinburgh University Press

22 George Square, Edinburgh

Typeset in Monotype Ehrhardt by Westkey Ltd, Falmouth,

and printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Eastbourne

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
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 CONTENTS

Introductory Preface vu

Acknowledgements xvm

Copyright Permissions xx

1. The Summa Theologiae as a Summary of a Divine Science 1

2. The Nature of Science in Medieval Thought 15
3. The Role of Questions in the Articulation of Science 32
4. The Signification of a Name 37
5. The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 50
6. Demonstrating the Existence of a Cause from its Effect 80
7. The Existence of God as a Scientific Question 97
8. 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 110
9. The First Way 132
10. The Second Way 146
11. The Third Way 155
12. The Fourth Way 171
13. The Fifth Way 179
Select Bibliography 207
Index 209
 INTRODUCTORY PREFACE 1

Like many other people, I have tended in the past to skip prefaces and
introductions. I have always felt that if an author puts something he wishes
to say to me outside the body of his book, then I am under no obligation
to read it. This is ridiculous, of course, since I am under no obligation to
read any of the book at all. But my experience suggests that this ridiculous
attitude of mine is fairly common. Let me make a plea: do not skip this
preface unless you are sure you want to. What I have to say now cannot
properly form a part of what I have to say in the book, but I am sure that
it needs saying. I only hope my readers will be sufficiently warned by this
first paragraph that if they do skip the reading of it they may fail to
understand the book. Worse, if they skip the preface they may find
themselves reading something they do not like, or leaving aside something
they would like.
Since the days in which I was an undergraduate a change of nomencla-
ture has been spreading over the teaching and the writing of philosophy
in Britain. When I was young, all those who taught or learnt in philosophy
departments were considered to be philosophers, in some sense, and to be
doing philosophy. It was out of fashion at the time to try to do philosophy
entirely out of one's own head, and I approved and approve of this modest
fashion. Since not everyone can manage to do everything, and since tastes
differ, what philosophers principally read to support the efforts of their
own minds varied. Some read principally Kant; others, principally the
empiricists. Some, the kind I liked best, read principally the ancients, and
a very few read the medievals, as I have done since those early days in
philosophy. Others, meanwhile, were working in more restricted but more
rapidly moving fields, and read principally their contemporaries. Each
choice was respected by the others, at least to the extent that those who
chose to do their philosophy one way recognised the right of others to
choose to do philosophy another way. All were willing to concede to the
others the right to claim that they were trying to do philosophy, even
though they may have thought that those others were not going the best
Vlll Introductory Preface

way about it. All were more or less aware of the restrictions and advantages
of their own choice, and of those of others. (Usually, of course, they were
more aware of the advantages of their own choice, and of the disadvantages
of the choices of the others, but that is natural.) It was a fairly free and
relaxed world, in my recollection of it, and no-one would refuse to cite a
contemporary author in support of his or her view of an ancient text, or
refuse to cite an ancient author in support of a step in a contemporary
debate. We were all philosophers.
But between ten and fifteen years ago I began to find that a new name
was being given to the kind of studies I was interested in: searching for
the wisdom with which to answer problems people have had all through
the ages, problems apparently inseparable from the great problem of being
a human being, in the writings of those who had been dead for more than
seven hundred years. My interests were now being called 'the history of
philosophy'. I felt at the time that the name was inappropriate. It is a
matter of fact that in almost any schedule of examinations for undergradu-
ates there will be some papers which are to be answered principally by
reading material written by people still alive or not long dead, and some
papers which are to be answered principally by reading material written
by those long dead. It seems to me natural that the latter should be called
'historical' papers, though there might be another half-dozen labels at least
as natural. But to call them studies in the 'history of philosophy' seemed,
and seems, misleading to me. There is a discipline, or set of disciplines,
called 'science'; and there is a separate discipline called the 'history of
science'. There is 'art', and there is the 'history of art', quite separate; and
there is 'music', and there is the 'history of music', also quite separate.
While it is hard for people who know no music to study the history of
music, it does not seem to me impossible. But I would claim that it is
impossible for those who know no 'philosophy' to study the 'history of
philosophy'. (I would also be inclined to make the stronger claim that
those who study 'philosophy' and care little for the 'history of philosophy'
will remain with a severely limited understanding of 'philosophy', but I
do not intend to press this claim at once.) The label, which implies that
'history of philosophy' is not philosophy, seems to be at best misleading.
Perhaps I should have said 'I would have made one or other of these
claims' for as I found my own studies labelled the 'history of philoso-
phy', inaccurately enough, I began to notice the growth of a subject
which could also be called the 'history of philosophy' with a good deal
more accuracy, a subject of considerably less interest to me. I found
myself increasingly subjected, at conferences and in reading journals,
to productions which seemed to me to be lacking in any philosophical
 Introductory Preface lX

interest, except incidentally. These productions showed a breadth and

a depth of erudition that I could not aspire to: I do not have the necessary
patience or eye for detail. But these admirable qualities seemed to be
directed indiscriminately to any object, provided that it was within the
scope of what people would now or would once have called 'philosophy'.
A case in point was the loving care directed to the reading, recovery and
elucidation of hitherto wholly neglected medieval texts which dealt with
the medieval logic exercise of oppositiones. Listening to or reading these
papers I noticed that either the medieval authors or their contemporary
commentators were incapable of distinguishing between suggestions for
winning strategies and proposals to improve the rules of the game. It
seemed clear to me that no logical insight was to be derived from the studies
of these texts, and so I neglected them. I was allowed to: I was lucky. A
colleague of mine wrote a introductory book on medieval logic, in which
he confined himself to those authors and texts which, in his (generous)
view could afford valuable logical insights. A distinguished historian of
logic said in print that this book should be consigned to the flames. This,
besides being a highly offensive thing to say to a Jew, as my colleague is,
implies to anyone familiar with the writings of Hume that the book contains
nothing but 'deceit and sophistry'.
Strong attitudes indeed. I, and those who thought like me, found
ourselves in danger of falling between two stools, the only two stools
currently permitted. On the one hand was the stool of'philosophy' which
means developing some currently fashionable topic, in however detailed
or trivial a way, basing oneself solely on material published within the last
few years - or, since the advent of e-mail and the Internet, to be published
within the next year or so. On the other hand was the 'history of philoso-
phy', whose exponents seemed to be pure scholars, caring little or nothing
for philosophical importance, or even logical importance, but only for the
erudition of digging up the past- not, I fear, to learn from it anything that
might be of value to anyone today who is exercised by that wonder which
is traditionally said to be the origin of philosophy.
The case of the history of logic is particularly interesting. It may be
objected, perhaps fairly, that I seem to want to go back to a dilettante age,
now fortunately superseded, of elegant gentlemen reading the classics for
their own improvement. I have no objection to elegance, though I am not
elegant, and no objection, other than political and economic, to gentlemen,
though I am not a gentleman, and I certainly have no objection to people,
of any class or level of elegance, reading anything with the desire, however
far-fetched, of 'self-improvement', of making themselves better people. I
certainly wish to improve myself, in many senses of the word, and I think
X Introductory Preface

that reading classic authors, in a broad acceptance of that word, may come
to be a way of self-improvement. This criticism passes me by. If the
alternatives suggested to me seemed of more value to myself, my friends
or to society, then I might consider them. If another Ruskin came to ask
me to help build a road to Hinksey village, I might join in. But I cannot
see any reason to suppose that to devote myself to what is now called
'philosophy' or what is now called the 'history of philosophy' would
contribute in any way to the improvement of myself, to the improvement
of anyone else, to the well-being of Hinksey villagers, or even to the
innocent gaiety of nations.
A more serious criticism would be the following: these gentlemen you
seem to admire lacked sufficient grasp of historical perspective. The
problems dealt with in, say, the Middle Ages, were not the problems we
face today, and the concepts they employed in their answers were not
our concepts. We cannot learn from them, because we do not live in
their world. One cannot learn to live well from Aristotle's theory of
excellence, say, because that theory was developed in a wholly different
social and political context from our own; and the same objections apply
to Aristotle's medieval heirs. Their world is not our world, our faith is
not theirs, and they are in any case as likely to have misunderstood
Aristotle as much as your beloved elegant gentlemen did, or as the dons
of the early twentieth century did when they insisted on translating
Plato's polis as 'state'. Any differences between what Plato said of the
polis and what they would be inclined to say about the state could be
attributed to a mistake on Plato's part. Collingwood famously pointed
out that this was about as sensible as translating Plato's word trieres, a
trireme, as 'steamer', and then drawing attention to the odd ideas the
Greeks had about steamers.
I do not think this criticism is valid. First, I do at least claim to share,
for example, a great deal of the faith of Aquinas, and thus I am convinced
that it is not impossible for me to share a great many of his concepts,
his problems and his answers to these problems. Moreover, I neverthe-
less live among my contemporaries, and though I strongly differ from
them in all kinds of mental and moral attitudes, I have little difficulty
in understanding them, and little more difficulty in making myself (at
last) understood. This last claim, of an asymmetry between my under-
standing of my contemporaries and their understanding of me, is not, I
think, arrogance: it is merely recognising my position as a member of a
religious or conceptual minority. The average intelligent Jew or Muslim
in Britain understands far more about Christianity than the average
intelligent Christian understands about Judaism or Islam, and all three
 Introductory Preface Xl

understand more about secular practical atheism that the average intel-
ligent person in this country understands about monotheistic revealed
religion.
So in a case where the facts are little in dispute I think I can make good
my claim that understanding of an alien way of thought, and learning from
it, is not impossible. The case of the history oflogic comes in pat, strongly
on the same side. There is no more possibility of denying that logic has
made great strides over the last 120 years than there is of denying the
similar progress made by aeronautical theory and engineering. (The
remembrance of Wittgenstein leads me to put these two examples to-
gether.) No logician in the English-speaking world would deny it, and
very few would even refuse to use the very expressions I have used. There
does exist a set of undeniable logical principles and propositions, which
are better known and better understood than they were in Kant's time,
for example. No-one with sufficient knowledge would deny that this set
was better known and better understood in, say, Aquinas's or Mair's day
than they were in Descartes' day. Thus some writings of medieval phi-
losophers and logicians do have a pure abstract logical interest (while other
medieval writings, such as those on oppositiones, just like the logical
writings of the period between Descartes and Boole, say, do not), and it
would be sensible for a logician of the present day, were he or she skilled
enough, to consult them.
This is, I think, undeniable. And what is true oflogic, is true of other
branches of philosophy, though the investigations in these other
branches must be carried out with more caution. There really is a set of
unchangeably true propositions about, for instance, the relationship
between our language and our world. Any human performance of which
these propositions did not hold we would not be able to recognise as a
language at all.
In the same way, there are propositions about our world and about
ourselves whose truth we cannot deny, while continuing to live in the same
linguistic world as our fellows. That we all must die, that we need to eat,
be covered, enjoy ourselves, that we need company and some kind of
friendship, that we are animals and have some compulsion to reproduce,
none of these can be denied. That we are compelled to look for explana-
tions, and go beyond the intellectual skills which suffice to adapt us to our
environment, are also true. That we are puzzled by change and time, by
the structure of our world, and that many people have an urge to look for
an explanation, not of this or that phenomenon but of the world as a whole,
all these are true. They were true in distant ages as well, and though it
may seem possible to deny that the thoughts of people of distant ages may
Xll Introductory Preface

be of value to us, this denial is no more respectable than is the idea that
foreigners are intrinsically funny.
I am not arguing for the existence of'perennial problems' in the sense
that our perhaps trivial and transient concerns and methods of investi-
gation can be projected back on to the writers of the past. I have recently
published a book in which I argue that such a performance is a mistake.
But it is a mistake because it limits our chances of learning from those
who have gone before us. If we make this mistake, like the dons satirised
by Collingwood, we will look only for the answers to our current
problems and have our eyes closed to the perhaps greater problems the
ancients or the medievals might have shown us. We may even have our
eyes closed to all but the sort of answer we might have been inclined to
look for in the first place. At the very lowest level, to go to older writers
to look for answers to current problems only will close our eyes to the
fact that these writers had their silly and trivial current problems as well,
and we will not be able to make the comparison and see many of our
own problems as silly and trivial. To read former writers in such a spirit
is not what I recommend.
But I do protest against the abandonment of any attempt to go back to
former writers to learn from them, an abandonment which is implied in
the current opposition between 'philosophy' and 'the history of philoso-
phy'. I know I am not alone in this protest and that many better writers
have said what I am trying to say. Among the most popular are Martha
Nussbaum and Alasdair Macintyre; I think it is not a coincidence that
their works are read by people who would not dream of reading anything
written in what is now called 'philosophy' or 'the history of philosophy'.
But, apart from my lack of talent compared with these two authors, and
with many others, I face further difficulties. I am writing on medieval
philosophy, which was not accepted as serious or real philosophy when I
was an undergraduate, as ancient philosophy was. If I were writing on
Aristotle I should face a less difficult task: the task of bringing back
something that existed and flourished in the English-speaking world as
recently as twenty years ago and which is still practised by some. I have a
far harder task. It is noticeable that the vogue for Macintyre has fallen off
considerably since he started talking more about the Middle Ages than
about the ancients or about the Enlightenment, and still worse, started
talking about God.
The task I am attempting in this work is that of 'analytical Thomism'.
The recently published Oxford Companion to Philosophy tells us that this is
a broad philosophical approach that brings into mutual relationship
the styles and preoccupations of recent English-speaking philosophy
 Introductory Preface Xlll

and the concepts and concerns shared by Aquinas and his followers.
This approach bears some relation to that of those post-war Oxford
philosophers, e.g. Austin and Ryle, who sought to reintroduce
certain concepts into the analysis of thought and action, such as those
of capacities and dispositions, which are prominent within Aristo-
telian philosophy. In the case of analytical Thomists the primary
areas of interest have been intentionality, action, virtue theory,
philosophical anthropology, causation, and essentialism. The ex-
pression 'analytical Thomism' is rarely employed but it usefully
identifies aspects of the writings of philosophers such as Anscombe,
Donagan, Geach, Grisez, Kenny and Macintyre.
There is pretty clearly no room for analytical Thomism either within
'philosophy' or 'history of philosophy'. It is noticeable that most of the
writers mentioned above are of an older generation and achieved a position
before this division became accepted or, in some cases, are people of
immense and outstanding talent, or are even regarded by 'philosophers'
and 'historians of philosophy' alike as marginal, as mere journalists or
dilettantes. I have not achieved my position, I am not a person of immense
talent, and so I must be content for my work to be marginalised, or to be
regarded as a journalist or a dilettante. But having stated what this book
is to be - analytical Thomism, neither 'philosophy' nor 'history of phi-
losophy', but the best attempt I can make at what I consider to be
philosophy - I can at least avoid those critics who will accuse me of
blundering. It is not that I am trying to do both 'philosophy' and 'history
of philosophy' in one book, foolishly and, of course, failing. I reject both
notions - and I am trying to do something different. I am looking at how
Aquinas discusses the question of whether there is an explanation for the
world, distinct from itself, and the question of how the search for an
explanation in general should proceed. I try to relate the two discussions
and I hope that there will be material of interest and value for people who
like to read Aquinas, or who like to speculate on the existence of God, or
on the nature of the search for explanations. This is a modest aim, and I
think I have in part achieved what I set out to do. It is for the critic to
discuss how far I have succeeded, or how far what I sought to do is worth
achieving. It is not for the critic to jump to the unreasoned conclusion that
this work cannot be of any value because it is neither 'philosophy' nor the
'history of philosophy'. If a piece of work has value, it has it independently
of current fashions of academic classification.
This may sound an excessively arrogant claim, but I conceive that the
tyranny of this division between 'philosophy' and 'history of philosophy',
and the consequent persecution of those who do not choose to do either,
XIV Introductory Preface

has reached a point at which arrogant or harsh reactions are justified. I

feel that in present circumstances I have some right to be harsh. It has
happened that a tenured lecturer at a British university, an analytical
Thomist, and thus neither a 'philosopher' nor a 'historian of philosophy',
has found his freedom of association, his freedom of research and his
freedom of teaching threatened or actually restricted, at least in part
because he was neither a 'philosopher' nor a 'historian of philosophy'. He
was driven into illness, depression and resigning his post, with long-term
unemployment to look forward to. The matter is thus not of purely
academic importance and thus justifies non-academic language in reacting
to it.
My proposal in writing this book, despite all my fears for the future in
Britain of what I still think of as philosophy, is a modest one and a strictly
scholarly or educative one: it is to communicate my understanding of St
Thomas. This understanding, such as it is, is one which involves connex-
ions and parallels. Perhaps this is true of any kind of understanding: we
can only understand in relation to what is familiar to us. What is familiar
to me is the English-speaking analytical style of philosophy. Thus the
book is directed to those who share this familiarity and wish to extend
their philosophical knowledge into other periods and ways of thought.
I do not mean to claim that we are limited in our understanding to what,
in the writings of another period, finds a direct echo in our own times. It
is true that at times we will bump up against ideas which cannot be
immediately understood in contemporary terms, or in anything obviously
related to these terms. Thank God for that - otherwise we would be shut
within an intellectual prison formed by temporal provincialism of outlook.
I believe that it is, at least sometimes, possible to make the imaginative
leap necessary to get some kind of understanding of what at first seems
absolutely alien. But once the leap has been made, if understanding is
achieved, this understanding can be, as it were, justified retrospectively.
And this retrospective justification consists, to a great extent, in arguing
through from the familiar to the imaginatively grasped unfamiliar, and so
discovering that the apparently alien can indeed be understood in terms
of some analogical extension of the concepts and even prejudices we began
with.
I offer this understanding, such as it is, in the first place to those who
are likely to understand even less than I do: that is, to those who have been
reading medieval philosophy for less time than I have. It would be, I think,
something of an impertinence for me to offer it to my equals, and still
more to offer it to my betters. If my equals or betters happen to find by
some chance something in this book that helps their understanding, I shall
 Introductory Preface xv

be very pleased and rather surprised. It is meant to be of use to students

with some grasp of the usual concepts of analytical philosophy and some
slight understanding of medieval philosophy. The whole is supposed to
be of value to those interested in the philosophy of St Thomas; the first
half may also be of interest to those concerned with the philosophy of
science, while the second half concerns what is called the philosophy of
religion. (Perhaps I may be permitted to object to this label as well. There
is clearly a philosophy of religion, as there is a philosophy of art, and as
there ought to be a philosophy devoted to any important human activity.
But a philosophical study of the existence and nature of God is not a study
of religion or of any human activity. Religion and the philosophical study
of God have little in common except their object, God.)
The particular object of this study are the Five Ways in which St
Thomas offers to prove the existence of God, considered in the context
of his theory of science. I do not think that the Five Ways have been
properly studied in this context before, but to try to do this is a very natural
move. 'Does God exist?' is, for St Thomas, a scientific question; indeed,
it is the first substantive question of the new divine science he is seeking
to establish. This can be thought of as a science that is Augustinian in
project and content, Aristotelian in structure and concept. 2 In the context
of such a science, what kind of a question is 'does God exist?' How do we
answer such questions? What kind of understanding of the word 'God' is
required for us even to start? What notion of existence is involved in giving
answers to this question, and how does this notion relate to other notions
of existence? How does a question like 'Does God exist?', and the methods
used in answering it, relate to other similar questions in other sciences?
How do they relate to the sorts of scientific questions we ask and the
methods we prefer to use in answering them? Do we in fact, in our
scientific endeavour, ever ask such questions as 'Does X exist?' How do
all these considerations apply in the special case of God? To what extent
do the Five Ways follow the methods of science which I will claim to find
outlined in St Thomas's works? What kind of arguments are the Five
Ways? How are they structured? How well do they work?
In essence, this book is what I have been teaching students in the part
dedicated to Aquinas in the medieval philosophy optional course in
Glasgow over recent years. Those students have professed themselves
happy with what I offered them, but there is always the feeling at the back
of one's mind that one's own students are a captive audience. I put this
work before the wider public in the hope that others will find it useful and
thus, as it were, retrospectively justify my classroom practices over recent
years.
XVI Introductory Preface

Some readers may be annoyed by the rhetorical, frivolous, and would-

be amusing nature of some parts of the book. 3 They may ask, is this
rhetorical style worthy of philosophy? Well, the performance I actually
achieve probably will not, as it stands, be worthy of St Thomas, but I
should like to record my view that the idea that rhetoric and philosophy
are mutually exclusive is an error. St Thomas's own technical clarity and
brevity is a mode of rhetoric, and they contribute admirably to his
philosophy. His style, his rhetoric, is one of the features that makes him
a greater man than either Scotus or Ockham. Many philosophers are great
in spite of their style, but many others are great both in style and content.
Wittgenstein springs to mind, but he is not the only one. It is probably in
part the lucidity of Russell's style - i.e. his rhetoric - which helps us to
appreciate him (justly) as a much greater philosopher than, say, Moore or
Ayer.
That may not be quite the point which critics may wish to make
against the rhetoric I try to employ here. They will probably be irritated
by the fact that I make fun of elements in the empiricist tradition and
of important figures in the development of that tradition. The reason
why I do this is that people in the empiricist tradition themselves make
free use of the weapon of ridicule and it seems to me time that they got
a dose of their own medicine. It is the commonest thing in the world
for empiricist lecturers so to train their students that they giggle when-
ever they hear the word 'essence', or trot out the ancient joke about
'virtus dormitiva' 4 whenever they hear talk of powers. This, I fear, is
either ignorance or dishonesty. The lecturers in question probably know
that some of the greatest philosophical minds have based their thought
about the world on the concepts of essence or of power, and if they
pretend that anyone who does so is eo ipso a suitable target for ridicule,
they are being dishonest. If they do not know that some of the greatest
philosophical minds upheld the concepts of essence and power, then
they are so ignorant that I wonder what they are doing in a university
at all. To teach young people to laugh at things which you dislike and
which you know they don't understand is to my mind not the noblest
possible work of an educator. Empiricist lecturers, who may very well
not understand the concepts of essence and power themselves, can be sure
that their students don't, because they will have taken very good care never
to explain them, but only to present a caricature.
If my opponents can laugh at me, can I not laugh at my opponents?
Particularly since, thank God, I am in a minority. I need not fear that I
am teaching my students to laugh at something they do not understand,
which has never been presented properly to them; I know that however
 Introductory Preface xvu

little care I take to present empiricist attitudes to them, however carica-

tured the picture of empiricism I present, my esteemed colleagues will
make sure that my students do not remain in ignorance of the best case
that can be made for empiricism. I admit, indeed, that I hope to use the
weapon of artificially provoked giggles, but my aim is that by so doing we
may come to an agreement to end its use once and for all. While only one
side uses such a weapon, it will continue to be used. When both sides use
it, when some of my colleagues find half their classes breaking out in
uncontrollable mocking laughter whenever they hear the words 'constant
conjunction', we may be able to reach a truce. Clearly, artificially provoked
giggles on both sides are valueless in a philosophical discussion, and once
we have reached a state where both sides are suffering from their use we
can then perhaps agree to drop them and concentrate on the real points
of debate. But while they are used only on one side, the side which uses
them will be more successful and will, moreover, be convinced that it is
winning the debate. So, curiously enough, those colleagues who may feel
that I am using unfair weapons are in fact the object of my dearest concern.
I fear that they have become so accustomed to using unfair weapons that
they do not recognise them as unfair and valueless. My use of unfair
weapons may wake them up to this fact, and they will then be able to stop
using them. All being well, everyone will benefit from the process.

NOTES

1. I have never properly understood the difference between an introduction and a preface. As far
as I can make out, an introduction attempts to explain the oddities of the book, while a preface
attempts to explain the oddities of the author. If this is correct, then 'introductory preface' is a
good title for this section, in which the oddities of both are exposed, if not explained, pell-mell.
2. A fully developed account of this view of St Thomas's thought can be found in A. Macintyre,
Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London: Duckworth, 1988) and Three Rival Versions ofMoral
Enquiry (London: Duckworth, 1990).
3. If you dislike this sort of thing, take a look at the last chapter, where the tone is about as frivolous
as I can manage. If you can't bear it, then invest your time and money elsewhere.
4. For this venerable joke, see Chapter 13, pp. 188-90.
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The help I have had in this work from innumerable people, none of whom
is in any way responsible for any errors of fact, of argument or of taste that
the book may contain, would be impossible to catalogue. My philosophical
debt to Professor Geach and Professor Anscombe is immense, as any
reader will notice, and I have done my best to make this clear in my notes
and citations; but there is much that I owe them which cannot be
acknowledged in that kind of detail. The first chapter, obviously, also owes
a lot to the work of Alasdair Macintyre. I should like to mention my
colleague from Glasgow, Professor Alexander Broadie, and two colleagues
from Pamplona, Professor Alejandro Llano (especially for his getting me
started on the theme of esse ut verum, being in the sense of the true: see
Chapter 5, p. 66 n. 37) and Dr Jaime Nubiola. I also owe a good deal to
innumerable students in both places, as well as in Mexico and in Rome,
for whose sake and with whom I have been working on this theme. Three
of these students stand out as having helped me particularly to clarify my
thoughts: Niall Taylor, Craig Russell and Dr Maria Alvarez. I also owe a
good deal to the authorities of the University of Glasgow, particularly my
Head of Department, Ephraim Borowski, for granting me one term's paid
leave after six years' service in the university and a longer period of unpaid
study leave thereafter. As is perhaps well known, no-one in Glasgow has
any technical right to any study leave at all. Without these leaves the book
would not have been written.
I wrote this book during this period of leave, a time when I was ill,
depressed and distressed. The work I have done would have been wholly
impossible, and not just uncongenial and difficult, without the help and
kindness of many people. It is beyond my ability to thank them adequately.
In the first place are my father and mother, who both died between the
completion of the first draft and the reading of the proofs. I owe too an
incalculable amount to my very dear friend and colleague Alexander
Broadie, already mentioned, to Scott Meikle, also of the Glasgow depart-
ment, and to Dr John Divers of the University of Leeds. In addition I
 Acknowledgements XIX

should like to thank, however inadequately, my friend, colleague and

former student Eileen Reid, whose kindness and generosity to me in these
difficult times was so great, and to which I never managed to respond in
an appropriate way.
I have to thank the people I have been living with over this period, for
their forbearance: the residents of Dunreath Study Centre in Glasgow,
the residents of Grandpont House, Oxford, and the residents ofResiden-
cia Universitaria Monreal in Pamplona. The help I have received from all
the members of the sub-faculty of philosophy in the University of Navarre
has been immense. In Oxford I owe thanks to Corpus Christi College for
offering me common-room rights during my stay. Among other people
in Pamplona I wish to thank Andrew and Ruth Breeze for their kind
hospitality, and I am especially grateful to Ruth for providing just the right
degree of affectionate nagging to get me started and keep me moving on
the bulk of the book.
The material for this book was partly developed in and through classes
and seminars I gave in the University of Navarre, as well as in the
University of Glasgow, and the bulk of the book was written in Pamplona,
where the University of Navarre is located. The book, if it has any merit,
is thus yet another result of the magnificent relations which have been
established between the philosophy departments in the two universities.
These relations are mostly the fruit of the efforts of Professor Broadie.
Perhaps no-one will expect this book to be very good, written as it is by
a sick and perhaps embittered man. It is as good as I can make it and, as I
have said, I have had many wise and good friends who have helped me
make it better than it might have been. That the good is theirs and the
bad is mine should be clearer even than it usually is in these cases.
 COPYRIGHT PERMISSIONS

Some of the material published here, as part of a larger and more impor-
tant project, has previously been published elsewhere, when I thought it
had sufficient importance on its own to interest the learned public.
Material used in Chapter 1, dealing with the argument from authority,
has appeared in my Introduction to Medieval Philosophy (Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press, 1996) and in A. J. Hegarty (ed.), The Past
and the Present: Problems of Understanding (Grandpont Papers No. l,
Oxford, 1993).
Material used in Chapters 2 and 3 has appeared in K. Jacobi (ed.), 'Rules
for demonstration and rules for answering questions in Aquinas', Argu-
mentationstheorie: Scholastische Forschungen zu den logischen und semantis-
chen Regeln korrekten Folgerns (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1993).
Material used in Chapter 4 has appeared in I. Angellelli and A. D'Ors
(eds), 'Significatio nominis in Aquinas', Estudios de la historia de la L6gica
(Pamplona: Ediciones Eunate, 1990).
Material used in Chapter 13 has appeared in 'Libertad y revocabilidad',
Anuario Filos6fico, 1994/ 5, and is about to appear in a collection of
Thomistic Papers edited by J. Haldane, under the title 'Voluntary and
non-voluntary causality'.
I am grateful for permission to re-use this material here.
 1
•
THE SUMMA THEOLOGIAE AS A SUMMARY OF A
DIVINE SCIENCE

The Summa Theologiae, Aquinas's uncompleted master-work, is, according

to its title, a summary of the study of God. This study of God - theologia
-Aquinas himself usually called 'sacra doctrina', sacred teaching, or 'sacra
scientia', sacred science. What these titles mean, and why such a study is
necessary and opportune, is spelt out by Aquinas in the twelve articles of
the first question of the Summa. The study of sacred teaching is necessary,
he concludes, it is authentically a 'science', in the Aristotelian sense, it is
a single science and it is a speculative science, though it has practical
implications. It is superior to any other science, it is a kind of wisdom and
it has God as its object. Like other sciences it proceeds by way of
argumentation, and it depends on a correct interpretation of God's self-
revelation in Scripture.
The first substantive question, which follows the methodological arti-
cles outlined above, is whether God exists, a question which is prefaced
by a discussion of whether the existence of God is self-evident and
whether it can be proved at all. Once these preliminary questions are
settled, though, the first genuinely substantive discussion is, as I say,
whether God exists.
Is this a philosophical question at all? If so, why does it come here, at
the beginning of a summary of theology, of the science of God, studied in
and through God's own self-revelation? We need to answer these ques-
tions if we are to be confident that there is any interest of what we would
call a philosophical kind in studying Aquinas on this point. To answer
them we have to understand what Aquinas meant by a science.
Aristotle defined 'episteme', the kind of knowledge that Latin Aris-
totelians called 'scientia', as 'definite knowledge through explanations'. 1
There is no doubt that St Thomas thought of this definition as correct,
and that he used it out of respect for Aristotle's authority. 2
Both expressions just used are important here. Aquinas thought of this
definition as correct, and he used it out of respect for Aristotle's authority.
2 God and Explanations

Before we begin to examine what the definition implies for the study of
Aquinas's Summa, and for the philosophical nature of the examination of
the existence of God, we need to see how authority and truth were related
in St Thomas's mind.
For there can be little doubt that this feature of St Thomas's work is
one which is extremely alien to the minds of present-day philosophers.
Even though, as we shall see, St Thomas undoubtedly thought of the
existence of God as what we would call a philosophical question - briefly,
a question that can be answered correctly by the natural light of human
reason alone, without recourse to the content of God's self-revelation -
he does not think it at all odd to appeal to the authority of the Bible -
putatively God's word - in answering it. 'ls there a God?' asks Aquinas
and answers 'Apparently not'. He gives the two strongest arguments he
can find for believing that there is no God, and then proceeds to explain
why this appearance - that there is no God - is deceptive. The process is,
as he calls it, argumentative. The arguments he gives against the position
he is eventually to take up are the strongest he can find: this is his usual
practice. In this case the arguments given continue to be the two most
cogent arguments available. But he nevertheless appeals to authority: after
giving the arguments against, the objections, as they are known, he at once
begins his own response by quoting Scripture. There is a God, he says,
because God's own name, as revealed by God, is 'I am who am'. 3
Aquinas was aware that someone who does not believe in God will
scarcely be impressed by an alleged revelation. In his earlier summary, the
Summa Contra Gentes, designed for the use of missionaries among Mus-
lims, he draws attention to the hopelessness of trying to use against
Muslims Scriptures that Muslims will not accept. 4 Muslims, to be sure,
believed in God then as they do now; and while it is, I believe, a matter
of some dispute among Muslim doctors about whether Christians really
believe in the one true God or not, Christian doctors, like St Thomas,
normally have no difficulty in concluding that Muslims believe in the
Christian God, though they combine it with what a Christian regards as
an over-simple view of God's internal life. (Christians, according to
Muslims, hold what must be either nonsensical or blasphemous beliefs
about a Trinity within God. To what extent these beliefs mean that the
Christians are deceiving themselves when they claim to believe in the one
God of Abraham and the Prophets is, I think, a disputed question among
Muslim theologians.)
Was it that St Thomas, though acquainted with Muslims, did not know
of the existence of atheists? Surely not. He knew enough history of ancient
philosophy to refer to the Epicureans, and they held that there were no
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary of a Divine Science 3

gods, or that if there were, they were only a part of the system of randomly
generated worlds of which we also form a part.; He knew, surely, of the
various philosophers and sophists labelled by their contemporaries as
'godless' (atheoi). He knew of the existence of the Emperor Frederick II
Hohenstaufen - after all, he put to death at least one of Aquinas's family
- who was alleged to be an atheist. 6 One who lived so much among the
young would not have been more ignorant than was Adelard of Bath,
whose young nephew, about a century before Aquinas's birth, told him
that many of his contemporaries held that there was no God, or that God
was identical with nature. 7 Above all, if I may myself use an argument
from authority, Aquinas believed in what he read in the Bible, and in the
Book of Psalms it twice says 'The fool has said in his heart, there is no
God' - a text, incidentally, quoted by St Thomas within the same question
as the Five Ways. 8
Thus we can be sure that Aquinas knew that his use of an argument
from authority would fail to convince in arguing against an atheist, and
that there were such people as atheists. Why, then, does he use this
argument?9
The simplest answer is, perhaps, that he always uses such arguments:
they are an indispensable part of his argumentative procedure, his way of
handling a question. Medieval learning in the universities at this period
proceeded by way of the quaestio, the 'question' in a technical sense, that
is the discussion for and against a given thesis. This might appear as a real
debate, which might or might not be recorded and published, with more
or less editorial input; or it might just mean the use of the quaestio-form
in a published work. The latter is what we have in the Summa. In either
case the question was announced and arguments for and against either
side were put. In a live debate, these would be suggested by the students,
and the master's assistant (the bachelor) would marshal them into some
kind of order - sometimes, for example, playing off one against another -
and present them to the master. In a composed work in quaestio form the
master would do this, more briefly, for himself. The master would then
give his 'determination' - his magisterial solution - and then deal with
whatever objections to his answer had not already been resolved.
The form of the live debate was followed in a streamlined way in works
composed in this form. In such a work, like the Summa, the more
streamlined questions are at some remove from this process, though not
wholly detached from it. But in either case, in a live debate or in a
question-based textbook, there was always an appeal to authority, an
authoritative text given at the outset of the 'determination', to support the
line the master had decided to take.
4 God and Explanations

Clearly this way of proceeding is very foreign to our way of doing

philosophy. While even today a typical article in a philosophy journal will
contain a high proportion of footnotes that give references, the texts are
seldom, it is claimed, being used in an authoritative way. They are
typically, or notionally, being used to show that a given author did indeed
hold the view that is being ascribed to him, or because the author cited
has expressed a point better than the author citing can hope to do. Or at
least, this is what we hold. And there seems little doubt that the medievals
did not use authorities in this way. It is clear that the medievals took the
fact that Aristotle said so-and-so to be a good reason for believing that
so-and-so is the case. We do not believe this, or profess that we do not.
All contemporary philosophers would at least say that they refuse to accept
such an 'argument from authority'. Indeed, one sometimes comes across
cases of contemporary authors in philosophy who are inclined to reject a
thesis simply because it was said by some older philosopher who has been
highly regarded by others. This last attitude is perhaps abnormal and
should be dealt with by psychological rather than philosophical or histori-
cal investigation, but the existence of such an attitude highlights the
contrast between the modern and the medieval. Given that we at least
believe that we do not appeal to authorities in the way that medieval
thinkers did, how should we react to their texts?
There are two obvious ways of reacting, which I should wish to reject.
The first is that of people like Bertrand Russell, who held that the use of
the argument from authority shows that the medievals were not doing
philosophy at all - or, more modestly, that the medievals were not doing
what we call philosophy. This kind of reaction is unfortunate, since one
who reacts in this way is unlikely to bother to read the medieval philoso-
phers and is thus unlikely to be able to learn anything from them.
Another reaction is more intelligent, and less disastrous, but it still in
the long run shows a failure of understanding. This is the reaction of those
who are not put off by the use of the argument from authority and read
on in the medieval philosophers. Those who do so soon discover that
besides these, to us, unacceptable arguments from authority, there are
other arguments which are, by our standards, very good indeed. This may
lead them to read further, to become interested in medieval philosophy
for the modern-style arguments that they can find in it; and they will thus
become accustomed to skip the frequent arguments from authority, or to
regard them as being of merely historical interest, as indicating the sources of
the writer. In short, they will read the medieval writer as if he were a modern.
This is a mistake. It is to fail to grasp what is distinctive in the medieval
author. Read in this way, the medieval author will not be able to tell us
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary ofa Divine Science 5

anything very different from what a modern author would tell us, so we
might as well read a modern author. We will not have our eyes opened by
the shock of discovering a radically different way of thinking. Above all,
we will not really have understood the authors we are studying.
The modern who reacts in this way can find some justification even
within medieval writings. It is often said that the most important parts of
a conceptual framework are those that are never discussed, but taken for
granted; but we are fortunate in that there were discussions among the
medieval philosophers about the use of arguments from authority, despite
the fact that arguments from authority formed an important part of their
conceptual framework. The reason for these discussions is not that me-
dieval thinkers had any doubts about the value of authority in general, it
is rather that arguments from authority had different values when the
authority they were based on was a human authority, and when the
authority they were based on was divine. Hence we find these discussions,
one of which, perhaps the best known and most accessible, is to be found
early on in Aquinas's Summa Theologiae, in the methodological first
• 10
question.
Aquinas says that the argument from a divine authority is the strongest
argument of all, while the argument from a human authority is the weakest
of all. This conclusion would be supported by most other medieval
thinkers. The reason for this distinction is that human minds, even when
honestly applied, are quite often mistaken and sometimes may be applied
dishonestly, while God cannot be mistaken, cannot be deceived and
cannot deceive. Hence 'Aristotle says such-and-such' is obviously of much
less weight than 'God says such-and-such'.
There are complications, of course. There is the question of the inter-
pretation of the authority: what exactly did Aristotle mean when he said
that such-and-such was the case? Every statement needs to be interpreted
in the correct way and this means, in practice, that it is rarely necessary
to contradict an authority. Perhaps the text of Aristotle seems to say clearly
that there are no centaurs, but even if you had seen a centaur, you need
not say that Aristotle was wrong. You might argue that Aristotle meant
something slightly different from the obvious sense of his words.
No-one would be likely to worry about such a trivial case, of course,
but the possibility always existed. This made it possible to blur in practice
the important theoretical distinction which has been referred to, between
the different strengths of divine and human authority. You could never
straightforwardly contradict a thesis with divine authority behind it- that,
the medievals considered, would have been unreasonable. (And given
their premisses, they were surely right.) The argument from divine
6 God and Explanations

authority was stronger than any other. But what was the correct interpre-
tation of the statements made with divine authority?
The answer to that question would commonly rest on human authority:
the usual or obvious interpretation of Scripture had been made by some
human being at some time. It might typically derive from St Augustine. But
the argument from Augustine's authority, that this interpretation is in fact
the correct interpretation of Scripture, is an argument from human authority.
Thus, for example, the Bible tells us that King Solomon made a large
round vessel for the Temple, a vessel which measured ten cubits across
and thirty cubits round. u The natural interpretation of this passage
implies that 1t, the ratio between the diameter of a circle and its circum-
ference, is three. Probably no figure respected as an authority by the
medievals ever upheld this natural interpretation - certainly Augustine
would not have done so. 12 But if any had upheld this interpretation, the
human authority of that writer, which was an argument in favour of this
interpretation, no matter how great his authority might be, would have
been vulnerable to stronger arguments drawn from the science of geome-
try. The medievals knew that 1t is not three, and so would have claimed
that the natural, literal interpretation of God's authoritative statement
must in this case be rejected, despite any argument from human authority
in favour of that interpretation. The interpretation of this passage in the
Bible must be such that we take it to be giving only rough measurements.
The argument from God's authority is the strongest of all: it is invulner-
able to any other argument. But the argument from the human authority,
which might be brought in favour of the literal interpretation, is the
weakest of all arguments: it is vulnerable to any other argument, let alone
one as strong as a proof of geometry.
It is thus possible for the modern reader to justify his ignoring argu-
ments from authority when he finds them in medieval writers on the
grounds that the medievals did not take them very seriously either. The
argument from human authority is, even to the medieval reader, the
weakest of all; are modern philosophical readers of the medievals not
justified in regarding this argument as being so weak as to be negligible?
Moreover, modern philosophers probably do not believe in God, or even
if they do, they may have very different ideas about what God may be
supposed to have said, and how he said it, from the ideas the medievals
had. Are modern philosophers not then entitled to believe that what the
medievals thought of as the voice of God was in fact a merely human voice,
the voice oflsaiah or St Paul? Are they not accordingly entitled to treat it
as a human authority, the weakest argument, which modern philosophers
regard as negligible?
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary of a Divine Science 7

This is a fair point, but there is a feature of Aquinas's discussion that

should cast doubt over this typically modern reaction. When discussing
the thesis that the argument from human authority is the weakest of all
arguments, Aquinas cites the human authority ofBoethius in its support. 13
This should make us think. The argument from human authority, for
Aquinas, though weak, is not negligible, as he is wining to cite it even in
support of the weakness of arguments from human authority.
We can sum up the difference between the medieval and modern
attitudes to authority as follows. For the moderns the voice of authority
is no argument at all; for the medievals it was an argument. Admittedly it
was the weakest argument of all, so that any other argument was stronger,
but it was none the less an argument. You needed another argument to
refute it, before you could ignore it. The moderns think they can just
ignore it without any other argument.
For the medievals, if Aristotle said that centaurs did not exist, and you
had no stronger reason for believing that centaurs did exist - for example,
the evidence of your own senses - then you had good reason for believing
that centaurs did not exist. There was an authoritative statement, so the
question 'Do centaurs exist?' was not purely an open one. Since an
authority had spoken on the subject, the burden of proof and the form of
the question were established. It is therefore a mistake for modern readers
to understand the medieval position, that the argument from authority is
the weakest of all, as a polite under-statement of their own position, that
the argument from authority is no argument at all. This is not what the
medievals meant: they meant what they said, that the argument from
authority was an argument, even though any other form of argument was
stronger.
The medieval attitude to authority, then, was different from ours.
Do we just have to accept this as a brute fact, or can we come to have
some imaginative grasp of what it meant to have this different attitude?
Can we even come to understand it, to see that it is at least not totally
unreasonable or superstitious, as some modern philosophers might
tend to regard it?
The best way to go about this task of understanding, I think, is to try
to see how our own attitude to authority is itself not self-evidently correct,
but stands in need of an explanation, an explanation which is rather hard
to find. I think that this self-examination - this instilling into the reader
of the philosophy of the past a feeling of strangeness about his or her
own unexamined beliefs - is of the greatest value in coming to understand
the past, and also is one of the elements of greatest educational value
in the study of past beliefs.
8 God and Explanations

It would perhaps be permissible to say that the main attempt of modern

philosophy has been to give a firm foundation to knowledge. At the back
of our minds all of us moderns have the idea that all our knowledge derives
either from experience or from self-evidently true principles. 14 This
notion derives from Descartes and his heirs, from the typically modern
(i.e. post-Cartesian) project of founding all knowledge on true, certain and
indubitable principles. Now, that which we believe because we have been
told it - that which we believe on authority - though it may be true, is far
from being certain or indubitable, at least by post-Cartesian standards.
But we should try to clear our minds of this cant, and consider the matter
calmly. If we do, we should be able to realise that most of what we believe
we believe because we have been told it: we believe it on authority. Now
we should be clear that on our own principles we have no right to believe
this. As a result, it is our own attitude to authority that looks odd and in
need of explanation, not that of the medievals.
It is in fact entirely reasonable to believe what we are told. Most of what
we are told is true, and when false, it is usually in itself unimportant, or
false in unimportant ways. Moreover, when it is false, we can often correct
it - usually, let me add, by being willing to learn from better authorities.
To restrict our actions to what we can do on the basis of our own
experience and on deduction from self-evident principles would be to
restrict our action unreasonably. Also, it is clearly unreasonable to believe
what we are told while also believing that we have no right to believe what
we are told, which is, in fact, roughly what the modern position is. If we
do believe what we are told, as we do - if we do trust in authority, as we
do - then we should recognise the fact. Thus, it is reasonable to trust in
authority. It is unreasonable to trust in authority and pretend that we
don't. We can even go further: it is simply unreasonable not to trust in
authority.
How do we decide what is reasonable and unreasonable? In particular,
how does a modern philosopher come to the conclusion that it is unrea-
sonable to trust in authority? The answer must be, by applying his
standards of reasonableness. The crucial question which follows on from
this is, how do modern philosophers acquire their standards of reason-
ableness?
I am sorry to say - or rather, I am really rather pleased and amused to
say - that standards of reasonableness are acquired on authority. When
we were children, we were brought up under authority. This teaching to
a great extent made us what we are: it introduced us into our community,
into our family, into our nation, into the human race (considered as a social
phenomenon) as full and active members. There are two things to be
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary ofa Divine Science 9

noticed here. The first is that we needed to be introduced - we could not

have attained this status on our own. We were made into full members of
the club. We had, no doubt, a right to be made members of the club, in
virtue of our birth into this species; but without our upbringing, and the
use of authority in this upbringing, this right would never have been
exercised.
The other thing to notice is that this community is not just the
community of those now living. My great-grandparents were dead before
I was born, but part of what I am I owe to them, physically, psychologically
and culturally. Despite all the generation gaps that exist or have existed,
what we learn on the authority of our parents about who we are, about
what to believe or do, is substantially the same as what they learnt from
theirs. The differences which we know to exist between the attitudes of
different generations are only noticeable because they stand out against a
background of agreement. This is what it is for a culture to exist. It is
passed on by authority, and it continues through time by tradition; what
is passed on by the authority of a parent generation is mostly passed on
by the authority of the child generation to its children.
But nowadays we never speak of this. Tradition, like authority, is seen
as very much a second-best: something to be superseded, something,
perhaps, that is necessary in childhood, or in past centuries, but not at all
to be welcomed by adults of today. Instead, we say, we should trust in
reason.
To see through the fallacy involved in this popular slogan we should
notice the fact that if we are to trust in reason we need to know what the
standards of reasonableness are. We do in fact have standards of reason-
ableness, as the little child does not. That is why we have to use tradition
and authority in teaching children: there can be no dispute about this. But
what is seldom noticed nowadays is that we have standards of reasonable-
ness because we have been initiated into our culture by means of tradition
and authority. Once we have the standards of reasonableness, we can
challenge this or that part of traditional authoritative teaching in the name
of these standards of reasonableness: that is, we can challenge doubtful
parts of the tradition in the name of more basic parts - perhaps, in the
name of the tradition as a whole. But we cannot use part of the tradition
to challenge the tradition as a whole: we cannot claim that it is unreason-
able to hold to any tradition, when the very standards of reasonableness
which we are employing in this challenge only come to us from tradition.
The unreasonableness of such a claim is like the unreasonableness of the
following sentence: 'It is impossible for there to be an intelligible sentence
written in the English language.'
10 God and Explanations

It should be noticed that what I am myself doing here is precisely

issuing a challenge to one part of our culture in the name of the standards
of reasonableness that form another part of it. I am challenging our
modern attitude to tradition, because it is not reasonable, and I make the
challenge in the name of the standards of reasonableness that I hold as the
fruit of tradition. This seems itself a reasonable challenge. What I could
not do is challenge our modern culture as a whole for being unreasonable
as a whole, because my standards of reasonableness derive from the
tradition of this culture, with a little help from reflection on ancient and
medieval culture. The modern opposition between tradition and reason
is as unreasonable as a universal attack on the unreasonableness of modern
culture as a whole would be.
It would, indeed, be possible to maintain that it is not only unrea-
sonable not to trust in authority: it is also impossible. There is a
rabbinical story of a Gentile who came to Rabbi Hillel, asking to be
taught the Law. But, he went on, he only wanted to be taught the
written Law, not the oral Law; that is, he wanted to be able to read
God's written word for himself, without the glosses put on it by the
wisdom of the teachers of Israel. The story is of Rabbi Hillel, who was
renowned for his kindness and courtesy, so the interview did not end
at that point, as it might well have done if the Gentile had gone to
another rabbi. Rabbi Hillel began by writing out the Hebrew alphabet
on a sheet of paper and telling the Gentile to come back once he had
mastered it. The Gentile, nonplussed, replied that he recognised the
Hebrew alphabet, and admitted that he would have to master it before
he could be taught the written Law, but he didn't know which letter
was which. 'Ah,' replied the Rabbi, 'so you want me to tell you which
letter is which?' 15 In the same way we need to be taught our very
language, on authority, if we are to be able to systematise even our own
experience sufficiently to make it into anything that could be a foun-
dation of other knowledge, or to grasp even self-evident truths.
Even if trust in authority is necessary, it is still hard for us, in our
culture, to appreciate the fact. To help us, we can perhaps draw attention
to a number offeatures of even our society and culture in which authority
and tradition are paramount, even though they are not generally recog-
nised. Religion is still mostly a traditional affair, even though many
theologians do not seem to realise it, or even deny it. A couple of cases
currently in point are the ordination of women and allowing priests to
marry. The best argument against women's becoming priests is that this
has never been done: that restricting the priesthood to men is something
which the Christian Church has done in a traditional faithfulness to the
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary of a Divine Science 11

inscrutable will of God, as first revealed in Christ's choice of the apostles.

Theoretical arguments based on a supposed appropriateness of males for
the priesthood certainly exist, but they seem weak. If the argument from
authority and from tradition is not accepted, there seem few compelling
reasons for continuing to do as has been done up to now; but if authority
and tradition are recognised, the reason they give is entirely compelling.
The same point is true of the marrying of priests. Journalists, commenta-
tors and even theologians nowadays fail to distinguish between the ques-
tion of whether we should allow or even encourage married men to become
priests, and the question of whether we should allow those who have
become priests to get married afterwards. This failure to distinguish is
based on a failure to recognise the importance of tradition. Different
Christian communities, of undeniable apostolic tradition, have over the
centuries had different opinions, for different reasons, of whether or not
one should allow married men to become priests. No Christian commu-
nity of unquestioned apostolic tradition has ever allowed priests to marry
after becoming priests. The tradition is clear and strong, but we seem
nowadays incapable of recognising it or regarding it as important. Once it
is recognised, other arguments have to be evaluated in terms of whether
they are strong enough to overthrow the argument from authority and
tradition. The question is not an open one, which we are called upon to
answer out of our own heads, as if for the first time.
Religious tradition, however poorly understood by religious believers
or commentators these days, provides a clear reflection of the attitudes of
earlier ages. But there is another parallel: we can compare the pre-modern
attitude to the tradition of learning to modern traditions of science.
For Plato and Aristotle, to become a learned person, a philosopher, is
a process that involves admitting the authority of the philosophical tradi-
tion, involves accepting the attitudes, beliefs, behaviour and standards of
that community. These attitudes include attitudes to the history of that
community and hence attitudes to the tradition itself. Like the traditional
reasonableness of the human race, and like religious traditions, such a
tradition has its own standards, which are also accepted on the authority
of tradition. These can be used to judge individual parts of the tradition,
or individual features of the present state of the tradition in this genera-
tion, which may be found to be defective in one way or another. But of
course the tradition as a whole cannot be judged as not up to standard by
the standards of that tradition. It could only be so judged by outside
standards: and it is not at all surprising that those with different standards
should judge it badly. But they are likely to misunderstand it, as much as
we misunderstand the medievals. There are no neutral standards.
12 God and Explanations

We can, if we wish, compare the tradition of learning as understood by

Plato and Aristotle with the tradition of the scientific community in our
own day. This is perhaps the nearest we come in our society to a commu-
nity based on a genuine tradition. The truth about this is disguised from
us by the rhetoric used by journalists, philosophers of science and even
by scientists themselves about 'reason', but in fact the scientific commu-
nity is a traditional one, based on authority. Those who wish to enter it
have to give up whatever other beliefs, standards and attitudes they may
have had, and adopt, on authority, the new standards of the scientific
tradition. They cannot hope to justify the beliefs, attitudes and standards
of science by means of beliefs, attitudes and standards which they bring
from outside. Among these attitudes, it is important to notice, is an
attitude towards the scientific tradition itself: an attitude to the history,
or rather the story of science. The story of the scientific tradition which
the newcomer must accept is not a detailed history of everything that any
scientist has ever done in the name of science: it is a genuine tradition, a
story which picks out only those things which are to be believed at the
present day, or have in some way contributed to what is believed at the
present day. This is very much the same as the way in which newcomers
into a religious tradition are not told about all the heresies there have been:
they are told the Faith. Once newcomers have established themselves in
the scientific community, they may use the standards of science to correct
this or that current or recently past view, but they cannot use the standards
of science to overthrow science.
It is indeed, no coincidence that while we do not find appeals being
made to authority in articles in philosophy journals, we do find them in
scientific journals. The average paper in Nature, as Geach has pointed out,
contains far more references to past work than does the average article in
the Summa Theologiae. 16
It will be said that the two cases are not on all fours: that the results
cited in an article in Nature are, at least in principle, repeatable, while the
authorities cited in the Summa are not. This would involve a confusion.
Clearly, the authorities cited in the Summa do not refer to repeatable
experiments, since theology is not an experimental science. But they do
refer to repeatable reasonings. The experiments are unrepeatable because
there are no experiments; but the reasoning is repeatable, which means
that it is open to question and open to revision. Notice that there is no
contradiction between the attitude of such post-modern contemporaries
of ours as Quine and the attitude of St Thomas, while both attitudes are
strongly at odds with the modernist, foundationalist conception of science
and philosophy. Quine thinks we should regard any proposition which we
 The Summa Theologiae as a Summary ofa Divine Science 13

hold as being in principle revisable. But this revisability in principle

requires that we should hold the rest of our belief system steady while we
revise the belief in question, and make whatever subsequent adjustments
to the system that thus become necessary. The rest of the belief system
can be used as lever and fulcrum to overthrow any given belief because
we are able to treat the rest of the belief system as fixed. There is no
bedrock truth, but at any time some beliefs must be treated as if they were
fixed. Often they will be methodological beliefs: and for this reason St
Thomas begins the Summa by setting out his methodology. In the same
way some at least of our standards of reasonableness must be received from
authority and held fixed if we are to overthrow others. In the same way,
within science, our trust in older scientific authors and in the validity of
their experimental methodology must be held fixed if we are to believe
that their results are even in principle repeatable.
To sum up, then, if St Thomas frequently cites Aristotle, or St
Augustine, it is because, as I said at the beginning of this discussion, he
both has respect for their authority and thinks that what they say is correct.
St Thomas's trust in his authorities is not a blind trust, like that which
the Pythagoreans are said to have had in the ipse dixit of their master: it is
a rational trust. It is not just that St Thomas has this trust - he is able to
expect his readers to have it too. His readers are to be students and masters
in the schools, people who have a share in the tradition which he is
developing. This seems alien to modern philosophy, and indeed it is, but
it is not alien to the practice of modern science, and it should not be alien
to the philosophy of those who, like Quine, are struggling to throw off the
dogmas of modernism, in either its rationalistic or empiricist forms.
I have often found, when leafing through university prospectuses, that
philosophy is recommended to the prospective student by some phrase
such as 'Philosophy teaches you to challenge accepted wisdom and ques-
tion everything' .17 My only comment is, who says so? Is this phrase not a
part of accepted wisdom? Should it not then be questioned? In fact, the
student who questions everything (and you always get a couple each year)
is no more likely to be successful in philosophy than he is in science,
engineering or law. Philosophy teaches you to question the things that
philosophers usually regard as questionable, no more and no less. There
is no doubt that the exclusion of the student who wishes to raise the
sceptical doubt in every single philosophy class is a necessary condition
of progress in this as in every other form oflearning. That in St Thomas's
day the exclusions practised were different from ours should raise no
difficulty. That these exclusions were more extensive than ours is a
difference of degree and not of kind. Some may feel that any loss that was
14 God and Explanations

incurred through the breadth of medieval exclusions was more than made
up for by the speed and intensity of the development that these exclusions
made possible.

NOTES

I. See Aristotle's Posterior Analytics, I, 2, 72a!0--72b4.

2. See Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.4, n. 32.
3. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, sed contra; Exodus, 3.14.
4. See Summa Contra Gentes, I, 2.
5. The Epicureans were called atheists in the ancient world, and there seems little doubt that one
of Aristotle's objections to Democritus was that he left no room for the divine in his system.
6. He was also, I believe, alleged to be the son of Beelzebub, so one doesn't know how seriously this
kind of accusation was meant or taken.
7. Adelard of Bath, Questiones naturales, q. 76, edited by M. Miiller, in Beitriige zur Geschichte und
Theologie des Mittelalters, vol. 31, fasc. 2 (Miinster in Westfalen: Aschendorff, 1934), p. 69.
8. Psalms, 14 [13]: I, and 53 [52]: I. St Thomas quotes the latter in Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2 a. I.
9. My discussion of the argument from authority, in this chapter, and of the figure of Augustine,
derives in great part from A. Macintyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London: Duckworth,
1988) and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (London: Duckworth, 1990). The argument
from authority is discussed in a more polemic context in my 'Arguments from authority', The
Past and the Present: Problems of Understanding (Oxford: Grandpont Papers, 1993), pp. 25-35,
and in a fuller historical context in my Introduction to Medieval Philosophy (Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press, 1996) pp. 16---44.
10. Summa Theologiae, I, q. I, a. 8.
I I. I Kings, 7:23.
12. Augustine pointed out, in discussing to what extent the first two chapters of Genesis need be
taken literally, that God's purpose in giving us this book was to make us Christians, not
astronomers. His own interpretation of the seven days of Creation was so non-literal that it made
no reference to any periods of time whatsoever.
13. Summa Theologiae I, q. I, a. 8, second objection: 'Locus ab auctoritate est infirmissimus,
secundum Boethium.'
14. This thesis is dealt with excellently by P. T. Geach in 'Knowledge and beliefin human testimony',
in The Past and the Present: Problems of Understanding (Oxford: Grandpont Papers, 1993), pp.
15-24. The historical background is dealt with by Macintyre, in Three Rival Versions. To add
another argument from authority, Pope John Paul II clearly takes a similar view in Crossing the
Threshold of Hope (London: Collins, 1994).
15. I believe I found this story in the notes to the Yale Judaica Series edition of The Sayings of the
Fathers, with reference to a quotation attributed to Ben Bag-Bag, but I cannot now be sure. The
editors conjectured that the Gentile protagonist of this story was so impressed by Hillel's answer
that he eventually converted to Judaism and himself became a rabbi, taking the name written
BGBG, because he was the man who had needed to be told the difference between Band G, beth
and gimel.
16. Geach, 'Knowledge and belief in human testimony', pp. 15-24.
17. Compare, for example, the sections on philosophy in the Glasgow University undergraduate
prospectuses for 1993--4 and 1994--5.
 2
•
THE NATURE OF SCIENCE IN MEDIEVAL THOUGHT

I have tried to make out what St Thomas thought he was doing in the
Summa Theologiae, and to some extent I have tried to make out why he
did it. Also I have tried to see why the attempt is not a wholly pointless
one. My aim is to elucidate the first substantive question he asks in this
study, and to do this it was necessary to examine what kind of a study it
is. St Thomas was trying to construct what he thought of as a science: that
is, a systematic body of knowledge, a part of wisdom, as he says, out of all
the materials available to him. Among the materials available to him are
the authorities, and, as we have seen in the previous chapter, it came
naturally to a medieval thinker to begin his scientific investigations with
an examination of material derived from authority, as it comes natural to
us in our ordinary occupations and thoughts. The two authorities whom
Aquinas most respects and most uses are Aristotle and St Augustine. The
choice of these two is not arbitrary. St Augustine in some sense provided
the model, Aristotle the detailed method.
The striking feature of the work of St Augustine is his attempt at
harmonisation, at reconciliation. This is recognised by any encyclopedia,
which will explain Augustine's achievement as that of bringing about a
synthesis between Christian and pagan wisdom. But there is more to be
said. The synthesis, the harmony, which Augustine first sought was a
harmony between his thought and his life. This harmony was something
he had been seeking over half a lifetime, but which he had only achieved
through making the submission of humility required for his conversion.
The well-known story of the moment of his conversion is extremely
relevant here, as in the discussion of many other stages of Augustine's
thought. The great scholar was only able to harmonise his life and his
thought through taking the half-overheard inconsequential babblings of
a child as a voice from Heaven. It was this that enabled his will to respond
to his intellect and to achieve the harmony oflife that he had been seeking,
the lack of which harmony had been torturing him for years.
16 God and Explanations

From this fact stems Augustine's belief that in some sense the under-
standing of faith precedes the understanding of reason: a paradoxical
claim, since it seems rather obvious that while God gives reason to all, he
gives faith only to some. But for Augustine reason on its own will wander
blindly, incapable of understanding even its own truths, unless the rea-
soner submits to the radical conversion to the faith which Augustine
himself had undergone, a conversion which threw new light on all his
previous learning. At last, he thought, he had achieved an understanding
in which his life and his thought could be united. This meant a wholesale
re-appraisal of his previous thought. At last, he felt, he could understand
Plato correctly, better even than Plato had done. He could at last see why
and how Plato had been right (when he had been right) and why and how
he had been wrong (when he had been wrong). All human learning could
now be seen in the light of faith: it could either be pressed into service to
illuminate the understanding of faith, or be definitively rejected as incon-
sistent with the faith. 1
This view of Augustine's developed into a tradition, which enlightened
the succeeding centuries. Harmonisation, reconciliation and synthesis
became the ideals pursued at the University of Paris, as they had been at
the Augustinian-inspired schools which had preceded it. In Aquinas's
time this ideal was facing its greatest challenge.
The slow, argumentative discussion and development of this unified
tradition of human and divine learning had been thrown into turmoil by
the re-appearance in the West of the works of Aristotle. Aristotle was
already, to the early medievals, a name to which respect was due, an auctor,
one with authority. The neo-Platonic philosophy which Augustine had
made the basis of the human part of his synthesis of wisdom had already,
before Augustine's time, adopted Aristotle's logic to provide it with a
structure. Moreover, some of Aristotle's fundamental metaphysical cate-
gories had become known in the West through the writings of Boethius,
and had provided a framework for the development of theological specu-
lation about the inner life of God and God's relation to the world.
For this reason, the newly discovered writings of Aristotle could not
merely be brushed off as unimportant, as trivial and erroneous philosophis-
ing. Moreover, the general philosophy of Aristotle fitted far better, unsur-
prisingly, with the logic of Aristotle which the medievals were used to
working with, than it did with the general neo-Platonic philosophy adopted
by Augustine. Above all, Aristotle's work presented a fully developed,
coherent view of the world as a whole and of the human being's place in it,
which was in important respects inconsistent with the view upheld by the
Augustinian synthesis. It naturally presented itself as a rival to that view.
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 17

Moreover, the Augustinian position itself demanded that it should be

able to give some account of this rival. The aim of the Augustinian project
was a synthesis of all human wisdom. Any proposition put forward for
inclusion in that synthesis, in principle, could be judged in the light of
that wisdom. If true, it could be incorporated; if false, it could be shown
to be false and rejected. It looked, at this time, as if the philosophy of
Aristotle could neither be incorporated nor rejected. Medieval thinkers
were all too prone to accuse their opponents of teaching that there could
be two separate kinds of truth, a religious truth and a truth of reason. Any
thinker who did so hold would have been guilty of abandoning the
Augustinian project (as well as the Aristotelian logic which structured it),
and it is in fact hard to pin down any medieval thinker as actually having
made such a radical claim. But we do have, from the period, the notes of
an anonymous student who was confused enough by the problems of the
age to note, 'The above [Aristotelian] propositions are true in the Faculty
of Arts, but not in the Faculty of Divinity'. 2
It was into this world, facing this problem, that Aquinas came - and he
did not shirk the problem. He attempted to establish the framework for,
or to make the first step in, creating a new complete synthesis, a synthesis
of the Augustinian tradition and the wisdom of Aristotle. The joint
importance of these two authors to Aquinas can be brought out in a crude
but effective way: in the index of a recent edition of the Summa theologiae,
references to both run to over thirty columns, while references to their
nearest rival, St Leo, run to only ten.
We could say, putting it crudely, that the aim and spirit of St Thomas's
project was Augustinian. Aquinas was seeking an understanding which a
Christian could live by, and the holiness of his own life may be held by
some to have confirmed that he achieved this aim. But in many ways the
structure was Aristotelian.
Thus in the case at issue, of the discussion of the nature of science:
Aquinas is seeking for wisdom, wherever it may be found, and if the
beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord,3 a necessary preliminary is
to establish that the Lord is God. But this wisdom is understood by
Aquinas as being an Aristotelian science, a science of the kind for which
Aristotle laid down principles in his Posterior Analytics and which he tried
to develop in his Metaphysics.
The Posterior Analytics is a curious work. It seems to present as the ideal
science a system of deductive inferences from stated axioms. A body of
knowledge on these lines was well known for centuries in Euclid's geome-
try. We may pause to marvel at Aristotle's perspicuity in laying down rules
for what was not to be achieved until several generations after his death,
18 God and Explanations

but our principal reaction is usually one of impatience. Surely no other

body of knowledge is, or could be, articulated in such a way. If no other body
of knowledge can be an Aristotelian science, then the notion of an Aristo-
telian science is of very little interest to us.
Moreover, there is a very apparent contradiction between Aristotle's
account of science in the Posterior Analytics and his actual practice in the
Metaphysics, the Physics, the Ethics or the De Anima, to say nothing of his
practice in his magisterial works on natural history. We find nothing in
these that is parallel to the structure of Euclid's geometry. Instead,
Aristotle examines common experience, as found either in folk-wisdom
or in the writings of the poets or of other philosophers; or, where common
experience is lacking, he makes his own observations. He then brings
arguments, his own or those of others, against the obvious or usual
explanations of these experiences. If these objections can be rejected, as
they often are, the common view is held to stand, perhaps suitably
modified by criticism, or perhaps with a more developed explanation
provided by Aristotle himself. And then on to the next topic.
We can make of this what we will. One bizarre, but possible, reaction,
might be to reject all of Aristotle's substantive work for not fitting in with
his professed methodology. Another, less bizarre reaction, which actually
occurred among later scholastics, would be to reduce all of Aristotle's work
to the structure suggested in the Posterior Analytics. This, as I say, has
actually been done; it is an operation which has in great part been
responsible for the bad name that Aristotelian scholasticism still has in
some quarters. Another reaction is to reject the Posterior Analytics, a
course which has been taken by authors as recent, and as favourable to
Aristotle, as G. E. M. Anscombe. 4
A sounder reaction is one which has more recently gained favour. 5 This is
to observe that what Aristotle is recommending in the Posterior Analytics is
not what he thinks he is doing in the rest of his works. In the Posterior Analytics
Aristotle is laying down what he takes to be the correct articulation of a body
ofknowledge once achieved: it has nothing to do with the way in which that
body of knowledge is acquired. The model in the Posterior Analytics is just
that, a model, an ideal. It bears the same relation to what Aristotle does in the
rest of his works as a management consultant's flow-chart of the operations
and relations aimed at in the operation of a work-space to the processes of
designing and constructing an office layout, and hiring and training the staff
who will carry out the operations and bear these relations. It is not, in fact, a
theory of finding out truths, which, crudely speaking, is what we think a
theory of science should be; it is a theory of the relations which should be
seen to exist between truths once found out.
 The Nature of Science in Medieval Thought 19

Whether the theory in the Posterior Analytics is in fact a good account

of the relations between the truths of a science once found out, is a
disputable question, which will be examined shortly. What is important
to notice here is that Aristotle should not be criticised for doing badly
something he never set out to do - giving an an account of finding out -
and that therefore neither should St Thomas be criticised for imitating
him.
We might observe, though, that even if Aristotle's account of the
structure of a completed science is correct, we may fault him for failing
to draw our attention to the difference between this account and an
account of the way in which we can find out. Certainly we can criticise
him for not giving us a sufficient account of finding out. He gives us no
theory of science in the modern sense, no theory of finding out, though
he held such a theory, at least tacitly, as we can see by examining his actual
practice. This criticism can also be made against St Thomas, but with less
force; in his Commentary on the Posterior Analytics St Thomas does give
more explicit attention than his master to the process of finding out.
Nevertheless, we can still criticise St Thomas for a lack of explicitness
in distinguishing between a theory of a completed science and a theory of
finding out. And we also need to look at whether the theory of the ideal,
completed, model science is accurate or not. If it is not accurate, then, we
might think, just in so far as St Thomas succeeds in making his new divine
science like the model, he will be failing to produce a good science. In the
same way, the management consultant's flow-charts may be perfectly well
constructed, but they may not help us to achieve what we need to achieve.
This reaction would be an exaggerated one. St Thomas would not have
thought that what he left at the end of the Summa Theologiae, even if that
work had been completed, would have conformed to the model in any
detail. The construction of a divine science is not work for one individual.
Even in geometry, Euclid's achievement was to put together in a coherent
structure the work of innumerable predecessors. Aristotle was proud of
being the first to produce a science oflogic, but it was clearly not complete;
he knew it was not complete, and St Thomas, who himself provided some
interesting developments and corrections of Aristotle's logic, did not take
it to be complete. St Thomas would have held that no science, with the
possible exception of geometry, was at his time complete: all required
more development. The more developed a science was, the more one
could hope to see in it the features of the model; and St Thomas does often
draw attention to the way in which Aristotle's work often does match the
model in important respects. We can expect, then, to find St Thomas
holding that in so far as his work is complete it will match the model, but
20 God and Explanations

the fact that the model is based on a misunderstanding, if it is a fact, need

not mean that Aquinas's work, when valuable, is so only by mistake.
Clearly, though, some examination of the model is in order. Crudely,
the model is articulated in a top-down, deductive manner, though any
science which has been built up to fit it will in fact have been developed
in a bottom-up, inductive or dialectic manner. The process of finding
out starts with individuals, and therefore with the contingent, but it
eventually reaches the universal and the necessary. A completed science,
therefore, has to do with the universal, and it consists of necessary
truths. 6
The conception of 'necessity' involved here need not be a very strong
one: often it seems to be equivalent to no more than 'universality' or
'everlastingness'. But, for an Aristotelian, there are, strictly speaking, no
universal and everlasting contingent truths: there is nothing that just
happens to be always the case. The necessity involved in a completed
science is at least natural necessity. Though it need not be as strong as
logical or mathematical necessity, it is never as weak as pure contingent
universality or everlastingness, as what just happens to be always or
everywhere the case.
It is important to recognise, though, that for a theistic Aristotelian such
as Aquinas, all the natural necessities in the world, though genuine
necessities, are in a sense conditional necessities, and in that sense are
infected with contingency. Aquinas thought, with Aristotle, that the
uniform circular motions that had been observed in the heavenly bodies
were necessary, both in the sense that they continue for ever, and in the
sense that given that there are the heavens that there are, the movements
could not have been otherwise. But it was a debatable point whether there
could not have been more or fewer heavenly bodies and, for Aquinas, it
was indisputably true that the world, with its heavenly bodies, might not
have existed at all. What Aristotle would have thought on this question is
again disputable, but the medieval thinkers who assimilated Aristotle were
unequivocal on this question.
The whole question of the necessity of the truths of a completed science
is yet more complicated by an observation of Aquinas that the link from
effect to cause is necessary, while the link from cause to effect is contin-
gent.7 His point is that this individual effect could not have come to be
without this cause - since had it come about any other way we would not
count it as 'this individual effect', but as another, qualitatively indistin-
guishable, individual effect - while what in fact caused this effect, in a
different overall context, could have had a different effect. Since in the
realm of physics, for example, many of the explanatory links in a science
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 21

will consist of the efficient causality of which he is speaking here, 8 the

distinction between the dialectical, inductive and contingent process of
building up a science, and the necessary, deductive nature of the science
once constructed, seems doubly threatened, in that the links of bottom-
up, effect-to-cause reasoning employed in the construction of a science,
which should be contingent according to the theory, appear to be neces-
sary; while the links of top-down, cause-to-effect reasoning that will be
found in a completed science, which should be necessary, appear to be
contingent.
The problem is intractable. We can perhaps make a start by pointing
out that there is no reason to suppose that every useful, interesting or
important piece of knowledge which we acquire in building up a science
will eventually find its place in the completed science. Certainly, not every
necessary connection which we make use of in building up a science will
have to form a part of the completed science. 9 While it is clear that St
Thomas, following Aristotle, regards what he calls a 'science', a completed
science, understood as we have said, as a paradigm of knowledge, it is also
clear that there is plenty of important knowledge which fits this paradigm
only very imperfectly. We need to take a step back, and try to understand,
first, why their notion of 'science' is important to Aristotle and to Aquinas,
and how one science is related to another in the overall structure of
speculative wisdom.
Plato, before Aristotle, had drawn attention to the difference between
knowledge and true belief, and the distinction may go further back than
that, to Socrates. 10 Clearly, we are unwilling to grant that a person knows
this or that fact simply because she or he very strongly believes it. We are
all acquainted with strong, unfounded belief, and it may very well be false.
Even when it happens to be true, that it is true is contingent. We expect
someone who claims to know some fact to be able back the claim up with
reasons, as Plato said in the Meno. We do not, in general, accept that people
know that so-and-so is the case, even if so-and-so is the case, unless they
have not only reasons, but the right reasons, for claiming that so-and-so
is the case.
The tag that Plato uses in the Meno to mark out the difference between
true belief and knowledge - that knowledge is 'tied down by calculation
of reasons' - comes close to Aristotle's own definition of episteme, science,
already mentioned, that it is 'definite knowledge through reasons' or
'through explanations'. (The more classical translation, 'certain knowl-
edge through causes', is ambiguous with regard to the 'certain', and too
restrictive in modern philosophical English as regards 'causes'. 'Cause' in
modern philosophical English tends to mean what Aristotle called the
22 God and Explanations

'efficient cause' or 'efficient mode of explanation', an explanation in terms

of how a thing came about. Aristotle famously also recognises explanation
in terms of matter - of what a thing is made of; in terms of form - of what
makes what it's made of into what it is; and in terms of end - of what it's
for).
Aristotle and, following him, St Thomas, regard science as the fullest
kind of knowledge because the reasons given in science are the right
reasons. This appears to mean the following. Let us suppose, to take an
example of Aristotle's own which St Thomas discusses, that there is an
eclipse of the moon. 11 I can know this by observation. I may go further,
and discover, building up a science, that there is an eclipse of the moon
because the earth is obstructing the light of the sun. Is this all I need to
know? Are my reasons for knowing that there is an eclipse of the moon,
and that the Earth is obstructing the light of the sun, as good as they might
be?
Aristotle holds that they are not. In this case I know that p - that there
is an eclipse of the moon - and I know that q- that the Earth is obstructing
the light of the sun. I also know that p-because-q, that there is an eclipse
of the moon because the earth is obstructing the light of the sun. Aristotle
clearly thinks that until the order of reasons for my knowledge matches
the order ofreasons for reality, my knowledge is still imperfect. His ideal
is that I should know that p because I know that q, that I should know that
there is an eclipse of the moon because I know that the earth is obstructing
the light of the sun. To know that the sun is obstructing the light of the
sun because I know that there is an eclipse of the moon is an imperfect
kind of knowledge, one that falls short of complete science.
The example, though Aristotle's own, is in some ways badly chosen, and
makes the whole idea of Aristotelian science look more absurd than it need.
Aristotle's science is not concerned with individual occurrences: he does not,
therefore, have to hold that scientific knowledge is a better way to know
whether the moon is in fact at present eclipsed than is looking at the moon,
though the way he sets up the example seems to suggest this. What he does
have to hold is that ifl know that at times the sun's light is obstructed by the
earth, and that therefore there are, at those times, eclipses of the moon, I have
a better reason for holding that there are at times eclipses of the moon than
I would have through having noticed the Moon eclipsed from time to time;
and, a fortiori, it is to have a better and more complete kind of knowledge
than if I only know that the earth sometimes obstructs the light of the sun
because I know that the moon is sometimes eclipsed.
This may still seem a little odd: surely, some would say, I could not
have better warrant for believing that the moon is eclipsed than my having
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 23

seen the moon eclipsed? I think this is a mistake. I have seen rainbows,
and water on tarmac roads on hot days. But I do not believe that there is
a physical object called a rainbow, and I do not believe that there is more
water on tarmac roads on hot days than on cool rainy days. My having
observed eclipses is far from being the best reason I could have for
believing that there are physical processes called 'eclipses'. If I am to
believe this, I need stronger warrant, which brings my belief in eclipses
into an organised system of explanation of how the physical world works.
It is because I have no such warrant for a belief in a physical object called
the rainbow, or for the existence of water on the road on a hot day, that
in the end I come to disbelieve in their existence.
Put in this context, Aristotle's position does not look quite so absurd.
Moreover, it draws attention to the fact that each piece of knowledge in a
scientific system is only as good as the system of science as a whole that
supports it. If the best reason I can have for holding that the moon is
eclipsed is my knowledge that the earth is obstructing the light of the sun,
then it matters a great deal what is the best reason I can have for holding
that the earth is obstructing the light of the sun. And the best reason here
would be to do with some optical thesis about the way light travels in
straight lines, and some astronomical thesis about the relative movements
and positions of earth, moon and sun.
This explains why the notion of science is important to Aristotle and
to Aquinas. A body of science, if achieved, would provide one with the
best foundation or warrant for a knowledge-claim that one could have. In
the same way, the best foundation or warrant for a claim to know some
theorem in Euclid is to be able to demonstrate it from Euclid's axioms.
This connects with the next point of explanation. Each 'science' - each
articulated body of explanatory knowledge, within a given subject-matter
- should, like Euclid's geometry, be traceable back to certain axioms.
These will be truths which are taken as basic for the science in question.
They will be few and of universal scope. Thus, certain definitions and
statements about properties of bodies as such will form the axioms of
physics, certain definitions and statements about properties of living
beings will form the axioms of biology, and so on for each individual
science. It is important to notice that these axioms are taken as fundamen-
tal for the purposes of the science concerned. It is not the task of a science
to prove its own axioms; what a science has to do is to draw out the
reasonings from them. The axioms can be, and usually are, the conclusions
of a more fundamental science: indeed, it is the question of what conclu-
sions are used as the basis for what science that settles the question of
which science is more fundamental than which. Thus, strictly, no science
24 God and Explanations

is complete until all sciences are complete. It is hardly to be wondered at

that the practice of Aristotle and St Thomas is so different from what they
lay down in their model. If there were no reasonable process of construct-
ing a science which differed markedly from the structure laid down for
how a completed science should be, there would be no possibility of
starting - nothing could be known until everything were known.
Although the above remarks may have done something to make the
notion of Aristotelian science less thoroughly alien to our conceptions, less
absurd, and therefore to that extent more acceptable, little has been done
in direct defence of the notion. In fact, little can be done. I shall continue
by drawing attention to some other features of the articulation of science
which have their effect in the theory of how a science is to be built up, in
the hope of showing at least that the theory of a completed science, though
perhaps in this day and age indefensible overall, is at least comprehensible,
and is not likely to give rise to great distortions in the building up of a
science in detail.
Key elements in the structure of a completed science are definitions.
Definitions, for Aristotle and St Thomas, are always real rather than
nominal definitions: they are always definitions of what the thing is, not
definitions of what the word is. I notice that the distinction between the
two is well brought out by the difference between, say, the Oxford English
Dictionary and the Spanish Diccionario de la Real Academia. The English
dictionary seeks to tell you how the word is used, and thus tell you what
it applies to. The Spanish dictionary tells you what the thing is that the
word applies to, and thus tells you how the word should be used. Both
kinds of dictionary are useful in different ways, and since the word often
means what the thing is which the word is used to apply to, the definitions
often coincide. But there is an important notional difference at stake.
A definition, then, for St Thomas, 12 is a formula of words expressing
what a thing is. This, too, is likely to be misunderstood. For Aquinas, as
for Aristotle, what a thing is is its true essence - what explains why it is
the way it is. Thus, to choose a geometrical example, a circle is a plain
figure bounded by a line called the circumference, which is such that all
straight lines drawn to the circumference from a single point within it are
all of equal length one to another. 13 This definition explains why a circle
has all the features that it has. Equally, a human being is a rational animal;
this definition, if it is both true and complete, will explain why human
beings have the features which they essentially have. Time is the meas-
urement of movement, according to before and after. And so on.
We will see later something of how these definitions are arrived at, in
the stage of constructing a science. What is important here is to see what
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 25

is their role in a complete science. They are the key steps in its structure.
It is clear that very little about the real world of moving bodies follows
from those first principles of physics, those axioms mentioned above,
which define what it is to be a physical entity subject to change. For those
first principles to give reasons for what bodies actually do in the world,
we have to add information about what bodies there are in the world and
what these bodies are. This information is given by the definitions. I have
just said 'what bodies there are' and 'what these bodies are', as if distin-
guishing the question of existence from the question of essence. It is
natural to make such a distinction, and indeed it is made by both Aristotle
and St Thomas, but it is important to notice that in their minds they are
linked. If there are no planets, for example, then there is no 'what' for the
planets to be: there is no essence, and therefore no definition, of what does
not exist. 14 Equally, to say that the planets have no essence is to say that
the planets do not exist, perhaps in the sense that rainbows do not exist;
or, if they do exist, that they are mere coincidental phenomena, as we
might say the weather is, and not appropriate studies of science.
Here we come up against the harder questions which I have been
dodging. Do not the limits imposed on the notion of science by Aristotle
and St Thomas make it too restricted to be interesting? Indeed, do they
not make it too restricted to have any application at all outside the realms
of Euclidean geometry and its offshoot, Ptolemaic astronomy? (And since
it turns out that Ptolemaic astronomy is false in large and important
respects, this is a limited field indeed.)
It is true that for St Thomas and Aristotle it seems that there could be
no such science as what we call the science of meteorology. For these two
authors the phenomena which make up the weather are just that, phenom-
ena, coincidental existents which obey no laws, which have no essence.
This is not just ignorance on their part: the fact that we can point to
regularities and laws in the weather would probably make no difference
to them. The weather, and the entities that make it up, are not substances,
things with their own nature or essence, and therefore there can be no
unchanging truths about them. 15
For it is a well-known fact that Aristotelian science is about eternal, or
at least everlasting and unchanging truths. 16 This follows from the 'neces-
sity' of the truths of science, which again follows from the aim of science
to provide as good a reason for one's beliefs as one could possibly have.
We cannot have a better reason for our belief thatp than that it could not
possibly be that not-p. Hence science aims at necessary truths. And what
is necessary is always the case, since what is sometimes not the case can
be not the case. Hence science is of unchanging truths.
26 God and Explanations

Aristotle, indeed, may even have held that what is always the case is
necessary, that there is nothing that just happens to go on for ever, though
the attribution of this view of Aristotle is disputed. 17 But at this point we
strike a difference with Aquinas. Part of the reason for holding that
Aristotle believed that what is always the case is necessary, is the view that
he believed in the principle of plenitude: that whatever can happen, at
some time does happen. (There is an interesting parallel with the view of
necessity and possibility which is nowadays called extreme modal realism,
that whatever can happen does happen somewhere, in some real but
non-actual 'possible world'.) Thus, whatever can stop happening, at some
time does stop; thus, whatever always happens, happens of necessity.
Aristotle was thus committed to a view, which we find him frequently
mocked for, of the eternity of, for example, animal species. 18 Since it was
clear that it is necessary for kittens to come from cats, in some sense of
'necessary', Aristotle seems to have thought that the series of cats produc-
ing kittens must have existed from eternity. But it is also arguable that all
Aristotle meant by 'the eternity of species' was that a natural kind has no
tendency to stop existing, as such, while the individuals of a given natural
kind generally do have such a tendency.
Be that as it may, this is where we begin to see important differences
between Aristotle and St Thomas. The latter's metaphysics is creationist;
the former's is not. St Thomas believed that the world at some time came
into existence and will at some time cease; Aristotle did not. Thus St
Thomas cannot have held the principle of plenitude in the form that, it is
alleged, Aristotle may have held it. That form of the principle depends on
the existence of infinite time in which all real possibilities might be
actualised. St Thomas did not believe in an infinite extent of time.
St Thomas thus could not glibly identify the necessary, in any sense,
with what always happens. Moreover, he had given some thought to the
question of mules. Mules had been discussed by Aristotle, but he did not
see the metaphysical implications. St Thomas did see the metaphysical
implications, and accepted them. 19 A mule is born from a horse. and a
donkey, but is neither a horse nor a donkey. It is recognisably a third
equine species, another natural kind of the horse family :_ though an
imperfect one, as one cannot breed mules from mules. Even if one grants
that horses and donkeys might have existed for ever, as far back as the
world exists breeding and giving birth to the next generation of horses or
donkeys, this cannot be true of mules. It must be the case that species can
come into existence; and it must have been obvious to St Thomas that if
one took the trouble to keep horses and donkeys apart, that species would
cease to exist as well.
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 27

St Thomas, then, does not identify the necessary with what always
happens. Nor, given his creationist metaphysics, could he hold that
anything created could be in any very strong sense a necessary existent,
that it could not have not existed. 20
Be that as it may, there seems to be room in St Thomas's theory for a
genuinely necessary science of the contingent. If this is so, he might be
able to admit what we call the science of meteorology as a genuine science,
in his sense - albeit one which is still in process of completion and not yet
completed. The key text for this is the introduction to his Commentary on
the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle.
The subject-matter of ethics, in general, is human action. But human
actions are individual, contingent, temporal and temporary. How then
can they be the subject-matter of an Aristotelian science, which has to
do with the necessary and everlasting? The answer given is to distinguish
between a broader and a narrower sense of'subject-matter'. It is true that
in general the subject-matter of ethics is human actions. Human actions
form its 'material object', to use scholastic jargon. But clearly this is going
to be in any case an insufficient account. Other studies, such as history,
or, in our day, psychology and sociology, also study human actions. What
is it that distinguishes ethics from these?
The distinguishing mark of any science is its 'formal object': the precise
aspect under which its material object is studied. Clearly the formal object of
ethics will have to do with human actions in so far as they are good or bad.
St Thomas prefers to say that the formal object of ethics is the ordering of
human actions towards the end of human life, or, since one and the same
science deals with contraries, 21 the extent to which human actions fail to be
ordered to their end. There are clearly good reasons for holding that this
ordering will be in the relevant sense necessary and unchanging. The end of
human life is what human beings are for; and it is a plausible claim, as well
as one which Aristotle and St Thomas would certainly endorse, that what
human beings are for depends on the very nature which is expressed by the
definition of the human being. It is arguable that this end, what human beings
are for, does not, will not and cannot change so long as human beings exist.
The manner in which human actions are directed towards or away from this
end will also be radically unchangeable. Not, of course, that there may not
be more or less wicked periods of history, but such a historical study falls
outside the scope of ethics. All ethics has to tell us is, for example, that if there
are periods in which such-and-such is done, they will be more wicked periods,
to the extent that such actions are directed away from their proper end.
This kind of thought is not wholly alien to us, though some people
nowadays may find its application to the field of ethics troublesome.
28 God and Explanations

(Though in this context it is worth remarking that distinguished contem-

porary moral philosophers in the English-speaking world, at least until
very recently, have been willing to take the alleged special 'universal-
isablity' of moral judgements as a mark of the special subject-matter of
ethics.) But in other cases we can see the application. Science, we tend to
think, in some sense prescinds from the here and the now and aims at
timeless validity. Token-reflexive expressions such as 'here', 'now', 'I',
'you', 'yesterday', 'tomorrow', 'over there', have no place in what we
would call a scientific discourse. This point is made clearly in Frege's
essay, 'The Thought', 22 and Quine lays particular stress on it in, for
example, Word and Object. 23 Even experimental results - which are of
course achieved in a particular time, in a particular place, by a particular
scientist or group of scientists - are supposed to be intrinsically repeatable,
and in so far as they fall short of repeatability or are suspected of falling
short of repeatability, are to that extent ruled out as being serious scientific
discourse. Thus this kind of Aristotelian thought is far from being wholly
alien to us.
There can, then, be a true Aristotelian science of the apparently wholly
contingent field of human actions, provided that the formal object of study
is sufficiently clearly delimited to provide us with the necessity and unchang-
ingness that we need. The same point can be made about physics. For
Aristotle and St Thomas, most of the movements of terrestrial bodies are in
themselves wholly contingent. But there is a necessary and unchanging
ordering that they have, which we can make the object of scientific study.
Aquinas will also allow us to express ourselves more loosely. We usually say
that the subject-matter of natural philosophy is that which is subject to
change, rather than speaking more strictly and saying it is 'the ordering of
natural things'; and in the same way we can say that the subject-matter of
moral philosophy is human performance in its ordering to its end, or human
beings in so far as they act voluntarily for an end. 24
There are, indeed, more general considerations which help us to the
same end. For Aquinas the per accidens, that which is composite or which
exists coincidentally (see below, pp. 63-5), cannot properly be the object
of scientific study. 25 But everything that is per accidens, that exists coinci-
dentally, is made up of the per se, that which exists in its own right. 26 And
the per se is a proper object of scientific study. Thus there is nothing in
the world that falls outside the scope of scientific study, even though not
every description which is true of this or that part of the world sufficiently
determines it as a possible object of a scientific study.
A passage early on in the Summa, later repeated, 27 gives a general
epistemological and logical background to this point. The way we
 The Nature ofScience in Medieval Thought 29

understand the world need not be the way the world is, in the following
sense: our structures of thought need not exactly match the world's
structures. To say that the cat is on the mat we need to use a number of
words which cannot be all pronounced at once, though if the cat and the
mat are not present all together, in the appropriate relation, the sentence
will not be true. The relation between the cat and the mat is a spatial
relation, while the relation between the words 'cat' and 'mat' is, in spoken
English, a temporal one. In written English the relationship between the
words is a spatial one, but not the same spatial relationship as that which
exists between the cat and the mat. We do not need to perform typo-
graphical prodigies such as:

cat
rnat
Meanwhile, in Latin there is no particular spatial or temporal relationship
that need exist between the words, and so on.
This, as Aquinas says, does not mean that our thought is false. Our
thought would be false if it represented the world as being otherwise than
the way the world is. It does not become false merely by itself being
otherwise than the way the world is. 28 This point, which is true of our
thought in general, is true also of our scientific thought. It represents, in
whatever way, necessary and unchanging aspects of a changing and
contingent reality. According to Aquinas, the changeableness and contin-
gency is made up of the coincidence of many strands of unchangeable and
necessary causality or explanation. Our scientific thought does not mis-
represent the world: it represents it to us in the only way that we can
understand. That some descriptions that are true of the world are not
descriptions relative to which we can understand the world adequately,
or articulate our understanding, is not surprising. Understanding every-
thing does not mean understanding everything about everything. When
we read a book we do not need to know how many characters it contains,
and when we examine the world of moving bodies we do not need to know
how many moving bodies happen to have collided in the last half-hour
between here and the end of the road.
The conclusion we can perhaps draw is that the Aristotelian notion of
science employed by St Thomas is neither so bizarre nor so restricted as
at first sight appeared. We can understand the desire for achieving a
science which will be in some sense universal, necessary, and unchanging,
and we can see that this desire will not rule out the possibility of genuine
scientific knowledge of the contingent and changing world. Neither
Aristotle nor St Thomas are partisans of the kind of a priori science that
30 God and Explanations

made the young Kant think he could make an accurate guess at the
physical and indeed moral characteristics of the presumed inhabitants of
other planets. 29

NOTES

1. For a defence of this view of the Augustinian project, see A. Macintyre, Three Rival Versions of
Moral Inquiry (London: Duckworth, 1990).
2. See Macintyre, Three Rival Versions, pp. 107-8.
3. 'Timor Domini initium sapientiae', Psalms, 111 [110): 10.
4. See G. E. M. Anscombe, essay on 'Aristotle', in G. E. M. Anscombe and P. T. Geach, Three
Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1981), p. 6.
5. See typically the view expounded by J. Barnes, in his translation of and commentary on Aristotle's
Posterior Analytics (Oxford: Clarendon, 1975).
6. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.II, 1.4, n. 323: 'Scientia non est de singularibus'. See also
Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 47, a. Sc.
7. See for example, Commentary on the Perihermeneias, L.I, 1.14, n. 186; cf. below, Chapter 6, note
45.
8. See Chapter 6 below, note 48.
9. For example, it is surely important to know, as Kripke as pointed out, and as Aquinas also
believes, that who you are depends on who your parents are. Thus Socrates is necessarily the son
of Sophroniscus and Phaenarete. But such a particular truth as 'Socrates is necessarily the son
of Sophroniscus and Phaenarete', though it is both true and necessarily true, and though we
might well use it as an example in building up a science of human identity, will have no place in
the universal science of human identity once completed, which will ignore all such particular
truths.
10. Cf. Plato, Meno, 98a4.
11. See Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, I. I.
12. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.VII, I.I I, 1528: 'Definitio vero significat quid est res'; and
1.12, n. 1537: 'Definitio enim ratio ratio significans quod quid est.'
13. Euclid, Elements, Book I, section I, defir.ition 15.
14. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, lect. 2, n. 17. 'Non entium enim non sunt definitiones.'
15. See, for example, Commentary on the Metaphysics, L. VI, 1.2, 1172-6: 'scientia non speculat de
ente per accidens' ('Science does not examine the coincidentally existent').
16. See, for example, Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.4, n. 32; L.I, 1.16, n. 136; L.I,
1.42, nn. 376-8.
17. See below, Chapter 11, p. 157, and the references there made to the work ofKnuuttila and Llano.
18. Though I cannot understand how there can be those who mock Aristotle and yet take seriously
the extreme modal realism of, for example, D. Lewis, as an opponent which needs facing. Any
difference between them seems to me to count in Aristotle's favour: for example, if he reduces
necessity to what always happens, he has as restricted an ideology as Lewis and a far more
restricted ontology.
19. See, for example, Summa Theologiae, I, q. 73, a. I, ad 3.
20. On this, a discussion in the first part of the Summa is relevant: on the power of God (Summa
Theologiae, I, q. 25). In article five Aquinas asks whether God could have made things other than
he did, and answers that he could; in article six he claims that at least in some sense God could
have made things better than he did. The whole discussion takes place against the background
of article three, which discusses the almighty power of God, in which St Thomas claims that the
only limits to the power of God are logical ones. But on this see the interesting discussion by
P. T. Geach, in 'Omnipotence', in Providence and Evil (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1977), pp. 3-28.
21. Commentary on the Physics, L.VIII, 1.2, n. 977: 'Scientia, licet sit una contrariorum ... '.
22. In P. F. Strawson (ed.), Philosophical Logic (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967).
23. W. V. 0. Quine, Word and Object (Cambridge: M.I.T. Press, 1960); see, for example, p. 142.
24. Commenta~y on the Nicomachean Ethics, L.I, I.I, n. 3.
25. See above, note 15.
26. Commentary on the Metaphysics, Book V, lectio 9; and cf. Chapter 5 below, pp. 63-5.
 The Nature of Science in Medieval Thought 31
27. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 12, ad 1 and I q. 85, a. 1, ad 1.
28. See P. T. Geach, 'God's relation to the world,' in Logic Matters (Oxford: Blackwell, 1981).
29. In hisAllgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels (Universal Natural History and Theory
of the Heavens), Third Part, in Kant's Werke (Berlin: Reimer, 1910), pp. 351--68. It is worth
reading this just to see what Kant meant by 'dogmatic slumbers', and to realise that the influence
of Hume was in at least one case highly positive.
 3
•
THE ROLE OF QUESTIONS IN THE ARTICULATION
OF SCIENCE

The last chapter was an attempt to expound intelligibly, if not entirely to

vindicate, the notion of scientific study which St Thomas derived from
Aristotle, and to show that such a notion is not so foreign to our own
conceptions of inquiry as we might at first sight think. If the ideal of
science which they held is one we can, after all, with certain reservations
subscribe to, we can also look to them for guidance in a task which is
perhaps of more interest to us than it seems to have been to them: a search
for an understanding of the processes of coming to acquire a structured
body of knowledge, and of the rules that govern that process.
If we grant that the Aristotelian/Thomistic scientific project is not so
alien to us as it at first appeared, we need to look at the way in which this
project is to be carried out. Here, as has been said, their explicit writings
on science are not of much help, since these writings give us an account
of the relationships between truths once grasped, an account of what is
understood by one who has achieved perfect scientific knowledge. What
we want is rather an account of how we can begin to build up such a
science.
Clearly, we can get some hints from the way in which our two authors
in fact go to work. In Aristotle's case, this involves the gathering of
common opinions, the dialectical challenging of them, and their accep-
tance, modification or rejection. St Thomas follows a similar dialectical
pattern with the (to my mind rather slight) difference that he has a body
of authoritative writings and opinions which he wishes to reconcile with
one another and with his own thought, in so far as possible.
But Aquinas at least occasionally gives us some kind of explicit account
of the building up of a science, and, in any case, some of the considerations
relevant to the structuring of a completed science once possessed are
relevant also to the building up of a science.
Chief among these is the role attributed to questions. Knowledge, for
St Thomas, and a fortiori the structured knowledge through explanations
 The Role ofQuestions in the Articulation ofScience 33

in which science consists, is a series of answers to questions. To ask a

question is to want to know, and to know is to be able to answer a question. 1
It is true that the very idea of a completed Aristotelian science means that
St Thomas is more interested in what is communicated by the knowledge-
able teacher to the ignorant student, than he is in how the investigator
finds out for himself. But even the perennial reference to the teacher,
which appears to match the top-down, deductive nature of Aristotelian
science, admits of some reference to the process ofinvestigation. For while
St Thomas holds that the top-down deductive structure of a completed
science is in some sense more intelligible in its own right, the student can
best come to understand it by going through a process which follows the
process of the discoverer or investigator. 2 Even when it is a question of a
student's learning rather than an investigator's discoveries, St Thomas
has an interest in making the student find out, as if for himself, rather than
allowing him to be told.
Be that as it may, however we are to think of the way in which we come
to understand the answers to questions, the first thing to grasp is what
kinds of questions are scientific questions, and how they are related. St
Thomas, following Aristotle very closely, uses two pairs of criteria to
establish a four-fold division. The first pair of criteria consists in a
distinction between what we could call questions of fact and questions of
explanation. It is one thing to ask whether such-and-such is the case,
another to ask why it is the case. The other pair is a distinction between
questions about a thing and questions about a proposition. We thus have
questions about the fact of a thing, and about the fact of a proposition;
and questions about the explanation of a thing, and about the explanation
of a proposition.
The question about the fact of a thing is an est?, does it exist? The
question about the fact of a proposition is quia? is it the case? The question
about the explanation of a thing is quid est?, what is it? And the question
about the explanation of a proposition is propter quid? why is it the case? 3
These four scientific questions can be set out conveniently in the
following diagram:
Fact Explanation
Thing An est Quid est

Proposition Quia Propter quid

34 God and Explanations

Clearly there is an order of priority among these questions. We need to

discover the answers to questions of fact before we can hope to discover
the answers to questions of explanation. 4 This is indeed St Thomas's
practice: we find him asking 'Does God exist?', as the first substantive
question of the Summa, before looking at the question of what God is.
(Though as a matter of fact he goes on to remark that in the case of God
the best we can hope for is an answer to the question of what God is not. 5)
But this, of course, is in the context of the construction of a science. St
Thomas manages to give us the very strong impression that in a complete
science, worked deductively from the top down, the answers to questions
of explanation are given first and the answers to questions of fact are
conclusions from the explanation. The picture he puts across is that the
best possible reason we could have for believing that p is a good grasp of
the reason why p is the case: the best reason we could have for believing
that x exists is a good grasp of the real essence of x.
This kind of science looks chimerical. To return to the example used
in the last chapter, it looks as if the best reason we could have for believing
that the moon is eclipsed is our belief that the earth is obstructing the light
of the sun; indeed, it looks as if St Thomas wants us to hold that until we
do know that the earth is obstructing the light of the sun, and that for this
reason the moon is eclipsed, our knowledge that there is an eclipse does
not count as scientific. Or to use an example that both St Thomas and
Aristotle give for the answering of an an est? question, we do not know
that thunder exists unless we know that fire is extinguished in clouds, on
the (admittedly false, as St Thomas insists6) supposition that thunder is
the quenching of fire in the clouds.
Though we would be hesitant about admitting so much, we would
surely agree that our knowledge that the moon is eclipsed does not form
a part of a body of science unless it can be put in some intelligible relation
with its explanation, and we might even agree that our knowledge that
thunder exists requires tying down to some kind of explanation for us to
be able to know what we really mean when we say thunder exists. Compare
again the question, 'Does the rainbow exist?' Of course in one sense it
does, and in another sense it doesn't: a scientific answer to this question
will establish what the rainbow is in order to be able to tell us in what sense
the rainbow exists and in what sense it doesn't.
Even the picture of the completed science which St Thomas gives us
here, which seem to invert the natural order of the questions, is not so
bizarre as at first sight it appears. In any case, there is explicit commentary
in St Thomas about the order to be followed in answering the questions,
when we are constructing a science. This order is the natural order
 The Role ofQuestions in the Articulation of Science 35

suggested above: first, questions of fact, and only then questions of

. 7
exp1anat1on.
We should remember that the answer to the question quid est? is
supposed to be a definition, a real definition, a statement of the real essence
of the thing in question. It is for this reason, above all, that this question
has to follow on after the question an est? That which does not really exist
will have no essence, and therefore no definition which really expresses
that essence. In modern terms we might want to say that we need to have
some grasp of what xis before we can have a chance of discovering whether
or not x exists. St Thomas sometimes talks in this way,8 but he normally
prefers to restrict the notion of 'what a thing is' in such a way that there
is no answer to 'what is it?' when the thing in question does not exist.
Clearly, though, he needs to give some account of the knowledge which
we need to have previous to any attempt to answer a question an est? and
in fact he gives us a very full and detailed account, in terms of his notion
of significatio nominis. Before we can begin to ask whether X exists, we
need to have some knowledge of what the word 'X' means.

NOTES

I. On questions, see Chapter 6 below, pp. 80---93: Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, I. I,
n. 409.
2. On teaching and learning, see Summa TheologiaeI, q. 117, a. le.
3. Perhaps the most important single passage for this doctrine is to be found in Commentary on the
Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.1 nn. 408-12:
408. There are four things which are asked about, i.e. that, why, whether it is, and what it is
(quia, propter quid, si est, quid est). To these four everything that can be asked about or known
can be reduced. (Though in Topics I he divides questions or problems into four another way,
all of which kinds of question are included in one of the above kinds, namely the question that.
But there he is talking only about the questions which are disputed dialectically.)
409. Then when he says 'For when we ask whether', etc., he makes clear what is meant by the
aforementioned questions. First he deals with the composite questions. To make these clear
we have to consider that it should be possible to know, and hence ask about, only a statement,
since knowledge is only of the truth, and truth is signified only by a statement.
But as it is said in De lnterpretatione II, there are two ways of forming a statement. In one
way it is formed from a noun and a verb without anything added, as when we say 'a man is',
in the other way, when there is some third expression besides, as when we say 'a man is white'.
A question can be formed which refers either to the first kind of statement, in which case
it is a simple question; or to the second kind, in which case it will be a composite kind of
question. This kind of question is also called a 'plural' question, because it asks about the
composition of two things.
About this kind of statement two kinds of question can be formed. One is, is this which is
said true? Aristotle first sets this out by saying that we ask whether a certain thing is this or
that. This is in some way plural: for we take two things, one of which is the subject and the
other the predicate, as for example when we ask whether the sun is failing in an eclipse or not,
or whether man is an animal or not. This is what is called asking that (quia). This is not because
the word that is the mark or sign of asking a question, but because we are asking in order to
know that it is so. The evidence for this is that when we find this out by means of a proof, we
stop asking; and if we had known this at the beginning, we would not have asked whether it
was so. For inquiry does not cease until the attainment of what was sought for. And so, since
36 God and Explanations
the question we were asking, whether this is this, ceases when we attain the answer, it is so,
it is clear what is sought by this kind of question.
410. Then when he says, 'For when we know', etc., he shows us the kind of question that
follows from this, which is also plural. He says that when we know that it is so, we ask why
(propter quid) it is so. For example, when we know that the sun is failing in an eclipse, or that
the earth is moving in an earthquake, we ask why the sun is failing, or why the earth is moving.
And we ask this with a plural question.
411. Then when he says, 'There is another way', etc., he shows us two other kinds of question,
which are not plural but simple. He says that we ask some questions which are different from
the two kinds mentioned, in that they are not plural- as when we ask whether there is a centaur
or not. For here we simply ask about a centaur whether it is (an est), not whether it is this, for
example, white or not. And just as, when we know that this is that, we ask why, so when we
know about something whether it simply is, we ask what it is (quid est), for example, what is
God? or what is man? These are all the things that we ask: and when we find out, we are said
to know.
412. Then when he says 'For what we are asking when we ask', etc., he shows the relation
between the above questions and the middle term ....
On the first, we must notice that of the above four questions - two plural, two not - he
links the first two of each kind together, i.e. the question that and the question whether it is.
He says that when we ask about that thi:s is this, or when we ask about something whether it is,
we are just asking whether any middle term of what we are asking is to be found or not. This
is not something which is said as such in the question.
For when I ask whether the sun is eclipsed, or whether there is a man, I do not ask, as far
as the form of the question is concerned, whether there is any middle term by which I can
demonstrate that the sun is eclipsed or that there is a man. Nevertheless, if the sun is eclipsed,
or there is a man, it follows that there is some middle term for me to find to demonstrate what
I am asking about. For there are no questions asked about what is immediately known: even
though they are true, they have no middle term. This is because such things are obvious, and
do not fall under any question. So then, it follows that the person who asks whether this is
this, or whether this is simply, is asking whether there is a middle term.
For what is being asked in the question whether it is, or the question that, is whether there
is something that is a middle term. This is because the middle term is the description of that
about which we are asking whether it is this, or simply is, as we shall say below. But it is not
being asked for qua middle term.
4 See Commentary on the Posterior analytics L.I, 1.2, n. 17, and L.11, I.I, n. 410.
5. Summa Theo/ogiae, I, q. 3, preamble.
6. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, 1.7, n. 477.
7. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, 1.7, n. 474.
8. De ente et essentia, 3.
 4
•
THE SIGNIFICATION OF A NAME

The last chapter dealt with the crucial role of the asking and answering
of questions in the medieval theory of the building up of a science. It
also argued for the pre-eminence, among questions, of those of the
form 'Does X exist?' or 'Do X's exist?'. Since, as we have remarked,
the first substantial question in St Thomas's new science of God is
'Does God exist?', it is clear he is sticking very closely to what his
theory prescribes here. But as St Thomas himself is very well aware,
no answer to the question 'Do X's exist?' will be forthcoming, and no
solid start can be made in attempting to answer a question, without a
grasp of what the word 'X' means. St Thomas gives us a very full
account of what it is for a word to mean something, and how we can
come to find out what it means, and applies these reflections to the
special case of the word 'God'.
The notion of significatio nominis, the signification or meaning of
a name, plays an important role in St Thomas's account of answers
to existential questions, what we have called questions about the fact
of a thing; i.e. of how one can come to answer the question an est?, is
there such a thing? The principal context in which he explains this
notion is his discussion about the language we use about God, and
how it signifies. 1 But he also uses it explicitly in his discussion of the
logical preambles to the existence of God, 2 and in general discussions
of how we can come to give answers to questions of the form 'Does
X exist?'. It is worth our while to examine these doctrines closely, in
order to see that while the doctrine seems to have been developed to
deal with the rather special case of God, it is not a mere ad hoc: it has
a clear rationale and a possibility of being applied far more widely.
In order to see this more clearly I shall suggest parallels with well-
known doctrines and discussions of Frege and Kripke, which were
developed well outside any theological context and are of very wide
application.
38 God and Explanations

We read in the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics:

Before one knows whether something exists, one cannot strictly
speaking know what it is: for there are no definitions of what does
not exist. Hence the question, does it exist, is prior to the question,
what is it. But one cannot prove that something exists, unless one
understands what its name signifies.' 3
Some of the notions involved here are clarified later:
For there is no quiddity or essence of that which does not exist: so
no-one can know what something that does not exist is. But one can
know the signification of the name, or a description made up out of
several names. In this way someone could know what the name
'tragelaphus' (or 'goatstag', which is the same) signifies: he could
know that it signifies 'some kind of animal made up of goat and stag'.
But it is impossible to know what the goatstag is, for nothing in
reality is a goatstag.' 4
A 'name' here - and throughout this context - is not a proper name, but
a 'name for a nature', nomen naturae, what Frege would call a Begriffiwort,
concept-word, or what Geach would call a predicable expression.
There are obvious similarities here with Frege's own doctrine, that
concept-words have reference. It should be noticed that though St
Thomas uses the word 'name' here, as Frege does not, the nature which
is so 'named' is not considered to be in Fregean terms an object. A nature
is not something complete, selbstiindig, any more than Frege's Begriffe are.
St Thomas would say it is 'more something that belongs to an existent
than an existent itself. 5 It is, however, something real, something actual,
something in the realm of ens. The question of the genuine existence of
non-actual or non-real entities, such as numbers, which was so important
to the mathematician Frege, is of little interest to St Thomas.
Given that for St Thomas the field of interest is the real or actual, there
is an even closer parallel between what St Thomas says and Kripke's
doctrine on the reference of natural-kind terms. But there is an important
difference here, too: Kripke is discussing the naming of natural kinds that
we are acquainted with, while St Thomas is more interested in the
question of how we can come to know or prove that a nomen naturae which
we come across in fact refers to any nature.
A nature is 'what a thing is': it is expressed by the definition of the
thing. 6 The point being made here is that on the one hand one cannot
know what a thing is until one has found and investigated it, while on the
other one has to have some notion of it if the search for it - the answering
 The Signification ofa Name 39

of the question an est?- is even to begin. This notion is supplied by what

the word means, the significatio nominis. Borrowing slightly later jargon,
we might say that we cannot have a real definition of a thing until we have
found it, and thus know that it exists; but the search for it has to start from
a nominal definition. This is made clear a little later on.
On the first point, he supposes first that a definition is a description
which signifies what a thing is. But if there could be no description
of a thing other than its definition, it would be impossible for us to
know that a thing exists without knowing what it is. This is because
it is impossible for us to know that something exists except by means
of some description of that thing. For we cannot know whether a
thing that we are completely ignorant of exists or not. But there is
such a thing as a description of a thing, apart from its definition.
This is either a description which explains what the name signifies,
or a description of the thing itself which has the name, which is
different from the definition, in that it does not signify what the thing
itself is, as the definition does, but perhaps some accident of it. 7
It seems possible to neglect the 'other descriptions' referred to here: St
Thomas himself seems to do so, and even makes some theoretical diffi-
culty about whether they can be really useful. 8 In any case, what does not
exist will not have any accidents, any more than it has a nature or quiddity:
so when we start from a position of complete ignorance about whether a
thing exists only the significatio nominis will be available to us.
When St Thomas really sets himself to prove the existence of some-
thing, there is no doubt that the description of the thing he uses is the
significatio nominis. His first criticism of what he takes to be St Anselm's
ontological argument,9 is that perhaps a person who hears the name 'God'
may not understand that it signifies 'something greater than which noth-
ing can be thought of .10 His own Five Ways, on the other hand, are clearly
intended to prove the existence of a God, by proving the existence of
something which falls under a description which (he claims) anyone would
recognise as expressing the signification of the word 'God'. Each of the
Ways ends with a tag to the effect that everyone understands that an object
which answers to the description of a first cause, etc., is understood by
everyone to be God, or. is called God by everyone, or is said to be God by
everyone. 11 The point is made particularly clearly a little after his discus-
sion of the Anselmian argument:
The answer to the second objection is that when a cause is being
proved by means of its effect, we have to use the effect in the place
of the definition of the cause, in order to prove that the cause exists.
40 God and Explanations

This is particularly the case with God, since in order to prove that
something exists, we have to take as the middle term [sc. in the
demonstration 12) what its name signifies, not what it is. This is
because the question 'what is it?' follows on from the question 'does
it exist?' 13
But immediately after this we have a complication within the notion of
'what a name signifies'.
But the names of God are imposed in virtue of His effects, as will
be shown later. Hence when we are proving that God exists by means
of His effect, we can take as the middle term what this name 'God'
· "fi1es. 14
s1gm
This is the first appearance in the Summa of a distinction which plays an
important role in the discussion of the names of God in I, q. 13. The
distinction is between 'id a quo imponitur nomen ad significandum' and
'illud quad nomen imponitur ad significandum' (or equivalent phrases)-
between that in virtue of which a name is imposed, and that which a name
is imposed to signify. A good account of this distinction is given early on
in the question.
The answer to the second objection is that there is sometimes a
difference, within what a name signifies, between that in virtue of
which a name is imposed, and that which a name is imposed to
signify. The name 'lapis', stone, for example, is imposed in virtue of
its hurting the foot, 'laedit pedem'. But it is not imposed to signify
what 'hurting the foot' signifies, but to signify some kind of body.
If it were not so, then anything which hurts the foot would be a
stone. 15
The inaccuracy of the etymology (which I believe derives from Isidore of
Seville) is not relevant here. What is relevant is that we have a clear parallel
here with Kripke's thesis about the difference between the fixing of
reference and reference itself. The reference of the word 'helium', to use
Geach's illuminating example 16 - which incidentally antedates Naming
and Necessity by some time - was fixed in terms of the production of
such-and-such lines in the solar spectrum: but the word refers not to a
process of production but to an element. A later passage makes the parallel
clearer.
We have to say that that in virtue of which a name is imposed is not
always the same as that which a name is imposed to signify. For just
as we come to know a thing from its properties or operations, so we
 The Signification ofa Name 41

sometimes name the substance of a thing in virtue of some property

or operation that it has. So, for example, we name the substance stone
in virtue of some action that it has, i.e. its hurting the foot. But this
name is not imposed to signify this action, but to signify the sub-
stance stone. 17
This point has already been made, and is familiar to us. Less familiar is a
point that follows immediately:
But if there are things which are known to us in themselves, such as
heat, cold, whiteness, and the like, these are not named in virtue of
something else. Hence in such things there is no difference between
what a name signifies and that in virtue of which a name is imposed. 18
There may be an attempt here to make something of the same point which
Kripke wishes to make for the reference of the word 'pain' later in Na ming
and Necessity. Be that as it may, what is of interest to us in this passage,
given that we are trying to tease out St Thomas's doctrine about signifi-
cation and its relation to the answering of questions of existence, is that
here we catch sight of a three-way distinction, as opposed to the two-way
distinction we have seen so far. This is not a one-off slip of the pen: other
passages seem to suggest that the three-way distinction appears to be
genuinely part of St Thomas's doctrine on signification as a whole. 19 The
three-way distinction is as follows. First we have that in virtue of which a
name is imposed, then that which a name is imposed to signify, then that which
a name does signify. The first complication is that this last notion appears
at first sight to be the very notion, that of the signification of a name,
within which the distinctions are being made. But this does not of itself
argue against St Thomas's claim to be making distinctions within the
notion of what a name signifies: he is merely using one and the same
expression both in a more generic and in a more specific use. The two uses
seem to relate to a sort of a sense-reference distinction: we might say,
crudely, that within 'what a word signifies' we can distinguish two other
elements beside what the word actually in the end turns out to signify.
The verbal complication is easily resolved, and in St Thomas's writing it
does not seem to cause any confusion.
Perhaps more perplexing is the fact that if we do introduce the notion
of 'what a name signifies', in this more specific use, as in the last passage
cited, the notion of 'that which a name is imposed to signify' seems to have
no recognisable role. We could compare and contrast Kripke, for example:
he distinguishes between the fixing of the reference and the reference,
which clearly correspond to 'illud a quo imponitur nomen' and 'id quod
significat nomen' in this use. Where does the notion of'that which a name
42 God and Explanations

is imposed to signify' fit in? One might suspect mere confusion. St

Thomas in fact sometimes even starts out by making the distinction
between 'a quo imponitur nomen' and 'illud ad quod significandum
imponitur nomen', but continues by contrasting it with 'illud quod nomen
• 'fi1cat., 20
s1gm
On this point, McCabe suggests that when St Thomas distinguishes
between 'id a quo nomen imponitur' and 'id ad quod significandum
nomen imponitur',
he is not simply pointing to the obvious fact that etymology is a poor
guide to meaning. He is comparing the very odd difference between
knowing how to use a word and knowing what it means when used
of God to the difference between the etymology of a word and its
• 21
meamng .
This at first sight is not of much use for our problem: it tells us nothing
about the difference between 'id ad quod significandum nomen imponi-
tur' and 'id quod significat nomen'. What is more, this account lacks the
generality which I claimed that this doctrine had: on this account, this is
a problem which arises with language about God alone, while I am trying
to see here a doctrine of general application. Fortunately there are two
texts, which, while related to what McCabe says, bring out all three of the
different notions:
We must say something else, then: that names of this kind [e.g.
'good', 'wise', etc.] signify the divine substance. 22
The answer to the third objection is that these names, 'good', 'wise',
and the like, are indeed imposed in virtue of perfections which
proceed from God to creatures; but they are not imposed to signify
the divine nature, but to signify those very perfections in them-
selves. 23
We see here that when such words as 'good' and 'wise' are used of God,
what they in fact signify is God's own nature: but that is not what they
are imposed to signify, and a fortiori not what they are imposed in virtue
of. This, indeed, goes to make McCabe's point. But what McCabe has not
noticed is that the point can be generalised. Though St Thomas may have
come to make the distinction in order to sort out the theological problem
McCabe refers to, it is of wider philosophical interest than that.
The theological point being made here is that a name that is imposed
to signify a perfection which is usually distinct from the nature of the being
which has that perfection, may, when applied to God, signify God's own
simple nature. Q!.iite generally, on the other hand, a name which is
 The Signification of a Name 43

imposed to signify a certain nature may fail to do so, as the examples we

first examined from the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics make clear.
The name 'goatstag', though imposed to signify a certain nature, certainly
does fail to signify any such nature, as we have seen: and, according to the
opinion of for example the Biblical Fool, the name 'God' may so fail as well. 24
St Thomas thus has two notions which he opposes to 'id a quo
imponitur nomen': that of 'id quod nomen imponitur ad significandum'
and that of 'id quod nomen significat'. It is true that for the most part
these double each other uselessly - usually a name is imposed to signify a
nature or a perfection, and does so. Most of what we set out to say we
succeed in saying, most of what we set out to talk about we succeed in
talking about. Hence in most cases it is all one which notion we oppose to
the notion of 'id a quo imponitur nomen' - we can start with one and
continue with the other. We have seen that in fact Aquinas does this on
occasion, without thereby leading the reader into any serious confusion.
But sometimes it is not all one: sometimes we need to allow for the
possibility of a nomen naturae failing to signify the nature it is imposed to
signify, as when we are asking whether there is anything of that nature,
or, of course, when we are discussing the application of that word to God.
We seem to have here a parallel to Frege's doctrines on proper names
-that they can fail to refer. But there is an important difference here, too.
Frege does not hold that a concept-word can fail to refer; indeed, he would
be very unhappy with the suggestion that such a word can fail to refer
merely because there is nothing that falls under the concept. That there
is something which falls under a concept is not a mark of a concept - it
cannot affect what the concept, the reference of the concept-word, is. 25
'Goatstag' would be a concept-word for Frege, and would thus refer to a
concept, even though we cannot truly predicate 'being a goatstag' of
anything. So, even though if anything is a goatstag it is an animal of a
certain nature, and even though there is no animal of that nature, the word
'goatstag' does not, for Frege, cease to have reference.
St Thomas, of course, does not have the Fregean notion of concept. He
would say, as we have seen, that the word 'goatstag' is imposed to signify
a certain nature, but since there is nothing of that nature there just is no
such nature that it in fact signifies. But he does have some grasp of the
Fregean point: he holds that names signify realities only mediately, by
means of a ratio or conceptio: 'The description which a name signifies is
the intellectual conception of the thing signified by the name ... a name
only signifies a reality by means of an intellectual conception'. 26
St Thomas would say, then, that in every case there is a ratio or
description under which such a name signifies a nature, so that even if
44 God and Explanations

there is no nature that is in fact signified, the word which is imposed to

signify a nature still signifies a certain ratio. St Thomas, who is part of a
philosophical tradition which ignores the modern problem of privacy, is
naturally not bothered with the problem of how something mental, like
the ratio, can be common to many thinking subjects. He would agree,
moreover, with Frege that what a nomen naturae is true of makes no
difference to what it signifies:
The answer to the first objection is that there being many names is
something that follows the signification of a name, not its predica-
tion. The name 'man', for example, is said in only one sense, no
matter what it is said of, whether it be said truly or falsely. The name
'man' would have many senses only if we intended to signify differ-
ent things by it: if, for example, someone intended the name 'man'
to signify what really is a man, and another meant to signify by the
same name a stone or something else. Hence it is clear that a Catholic
who says that the idol is not God is contradicting the heathen who
says it is. This is because both are using the name 'God' to signify
the true God. For when the heathen says that the idol is God, he is
not using the word in the sense in which it signifies 'that which is
thought to be God'. If he were, he would be speaking the truth, as
even Catholics occasionally use this name with such a signification,
as when they say 'All the gods of the heathen are demons'. 27
Apparently, then, the intended signification of a nomen naturae is not in
the least affected by what it happens to be predicated of, whether that
predication be made truly or falsely. But if this is so, then the intended
signification of the name 'goatstag' is still some nature, the nature of some
kind of animal composed of goat and stag. But the signification of that
name cannot be a certain nature, as there is no such nature.
At this point St Thomas seems to be badly in need of the Fregean notion
of Begriff, concept, but he can still make shift with his own notion of ratio.
We could say in Fregean terms that the reference of the name 'goatstag'
is to a concept- this reference succeeds. It is intended to refer to a concept
that is a nature, but it does not in fact so refer - this more specialised
intended reference fails. We have a case here not of failure of reference,
but of error of reference. The parallel is not to a proper name such as 'Don
Quixote', which is intended to refer to a human being, and has a sense,
but no reference; the parallel is rather to the use of proper names by the
victims of deception. Tom Castro, the Tichborne claimant, who had spent
some time in Australia and in Chile, was called 'Orton' by his opponents
and 'Tichborne' by his supporters. 'Orton' was certainly the name of a
 The Signification ofa Name 45

criminal Australian butcher, and 'Tichborne' was certainly the name of

an English aristocrat who had visited Chile. If the claimant was genuine,
then the use of the name 'Orton' was mistaken in the following way: it was
intended to refer to a human being, a human being who had spent time
in Australia, and it did so refer; but it was also meant to refer to a criminal
butcher, and it failed to refer to any criminal butcher. If the opponents of
the claimant were right, then the name 'Tichborne' was mistaken in the
following way: it was intended to refer to a human being, a human being
who had spent time in Chile, and it did so refer; but it was also meant to
refer to an English aristocrat, and it failed to refer to any English aristocrat.
Likewise, 'goatstag' is intended to refer to a certain concept, and does
so refer. But 'goatstag' is also intended to refer to a certain nature, and it
fails to refer to any nature. Since there are no goatstags to possess that
nature, there is no such nature either. St Thomas would have to say:
'goatstag' is intended to signify a certain ratio, and does so signify. But it
is also intended to signify a certain nature, which it does not signify- since
there are no goatstags to possess that nature, there is no such nature.
The notion of 'illud ad quod significandum imponitur nomen', then, is
used by St Thomas to double for 'id quod significat nomen' in making the
distinction with 'illud a quo imponitur nomen' in order that the distinction
can be used in cases where the name does not or may not signify any nature.
This doubling or intentionalising of the notion makes this distinction a
refinement on Kripke's distinction between the reference of a natural-kind
term and that by which the reference is fixed. We have seen how the notion
of a name's being imposed to signify a nature relates to Fregean notions of
reference, and takes account of the problems which arise when we do not
know whether there is anything that has the nature signified. What then of
the other half of the distinction, the notion of 'illud a quo imponitur nomen'?
Apart from its value to make the Kripkean point about fixing of reference, is
it, like the other notion, of any interest in itself?
McCabe related this notion to its theological use, but the discussion of
questions of existence, with which we are principally concerned, may
seem to suggest that there is more to be made of it. We noticed that it was
difficult to make sense of the idea of having any ratio (other than the
significatio nominis) of the kind of thing whose existence we are proving;
we also noticed that St Thomas actually does use the significatio of the
name 'God' when proving His existence, and seems to suggest that this is
what we should do to prove the existence of the goatstag. But what is this
significatio nominis here? It cannot be the significatio nominis in the re-
stricted sense, 'id quod nomen significat': whether the name actually
signifies a real nature is just the point at issue when we are asking whether
46 God and Explanations

anything of that kind actually exists. The notion of 'id ad quod significan-
dum imponitur nomen' looks more useful: we are certainly going to need
to know what the name is imposed to signify. We are going to need to
know that it is imposed to signify a nature rather than an individual: 28 and
presumably part of knowing what the name is imposed to signify may be
knowing that it is imposed to signify a nature rather than a (possibly
accidental) perfection, or relation. 29 But beyond that, what notion can we
have of something about whose existence we are not sure?
We certainly need to have some notion of it, to have some description
or ratio: if not, as we have seen, the search could never start. As St
Thomas says: 'If there were someone who had no knowledge of God
under any description whatsoever, he would not even name Him,
except perhaps as we utter words whose meaning we are ignorant of?'. 30
In fact, St Thomas gives considerable importance in this context to the
notion of 'a quo imponitur nomen ad significandum', as giving us the
ratio or rationes we need when we are seeking to prove something's
existence. For example, as we have already seen, 31 St Thomas considers
that the fact that 'nomina Dei imponuntur ab effectibus', God's names
are imposed in virtue of His effects, is relevant to establishing 'quid
significet hoc nomen Deus', what the name 'God' signifies, with a view
to proving that God exists. The same is true of the goatstag passage:
the ratio of 'goatstag' that we could use when proving that the goatstag
exists or not is one that is 'ex pluribus nominibus compositam', made
up out of several names, and it is this that tells us that the name
'goatstag' signifies 'some animal made up out of goat and stag'. This is
another case where the significatio nominis is told us by 'a quo imponitur
nomen'.
St Thomas elsewhere explains the relation between 'a quo imponitur
nomen' and the significatio nominis. For example, we have already learnt
from passages cited above 32 that the different names of God are imposed
from His effects. This remark is refined when we discover that these
different names are not synonymous because 'though they signify one
thing, they signify it under various different rationes or descriptions'. 33
Different names, that is, have different descriptions under which they
signify, and the different names answer to the different effects in virtue
of which they are imposed. Hence the ratio or description under which a
name signifies, which may be all that we know when we begin to enquire
whether that which it signifies exists or not, is known by us from our
knowledge of that in virtue of which it is imposed to signify.
There is one last text, which helps to bring all these considerations
together:
 The Signification of a Name 47

So because God is not known to us in His own nature, but is

glimpsed by us in virtue of His operations or effects, we can name
Him from these, as has been said above. Hence this name 'God' is
the name of an operation, in so far as that in virtue of which the name
is imposed is concerned, since this name is imposed in virtue of His
universal providential care for the world. For everyone who speaks
of God understands that 'God' names that which has universal
providential care for the world. 34
This passage clearly seems to relate to the tags with which each of the Viae
concludes, which I referred to above. Those tags are to be thought of as
filling out what the name 'God' signifies, and here St Thomas relates those
generally accepted notions of what 'God' signifies to that in virtue of
which the name is imposed. We may find his unquestioning use of
etymology, and especially oflsidorean etymologies, to help him establish
that in virtue of which a name is imposed, and thus what it signifies, rather
over-trusting. But this trait does not detract from the value of the account
as a whole. It should be of general value to Kripkeans and other essential-
ists when they move on from referring to easily recognisable natural kinds
and come to wonder about the problems involved when we are trying to
establish the existence of a natural kind or of an individual of such a kind.
In any case, it should be clear that when St Thomas asks 'Does God exist?'
his question is backed up by a fairly solid account of how we can understand
such a word as 'God' in such a question. It remains to be seen whether he
also has an equally full account of how we can understand the word 'exists'.

NOTES

I. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13.

2. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2.
3. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, lect. 2, n. 17:
Antequam sciatur de aliquo an sit, non potest sciri proprie de eo quid est: non entium enim
non sunt definitiones. Unde quaestio, an est, praecedit quaestionem, quid est. Sed non potest
ostendi de aliquo an sit, nisi prius intelligatur quid significatur per nomen.
4. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, lect. 6, n. 461:
Qµia enim non entis non est aliqua quidditas vel essentia, de eo quod non est nullus potest
scire quod quid est; sed potest scire significationem nominis, vel rationem ex pluribus
nominibus compositam: sicut potest aliquis scire quid significat hoc nomen tragelaphus, vel
hircocervus, quod idem est, quia significat quoddam animal compositum ex hirco et cervo;
sed impossibile est scire quod quid est hircocervi, quia nihil est tale in rerum natura.
5. 'Magis entis quam ens': Summa Theologiae, I, q. 45, a. 4; see P. T. Geach, 'Form and existence',
in God and the Soul (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969) For a discussion of the notion
of'real existence', see Chapter 5 below, pp. 56, 66-7.
6. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.2, lect. 8, n. 484: '[D]efinitio [est] ratio significativa
ipsius quod quid est.'
7. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.2, lect. 8, n. 484:
48 God and Explanations
Circa primum, supponit primo quod definitio sit ratio significativa ipsius quod quid est. Si
autem non posset haberi aliqua alia ratio rei quam definitio, impossibile esset quod sciremus
aliquam rem esse, quin sciremus de ea quid est; quia impossibile est quod sciamus rem aliquam
esse nisi per aliquam illius rei rationem. De eo enim quod est nobis penitus ignotum, non
possumus scire si est aut non. Invenitur autem aliqua ratio rei praeter definitionem; quae
quidem vel est ratio expositiva significationis nominis, vel est ratio ipsius rei nominatae, altera
tamen a definitione, quia non significat quid est, sicut definitio, sed forte aliquod accidens.
8. As we shall see later, when the question of the existence of God comes up, St Thomas uses the
significatio of the name 'Deus', not some other description of God. The same is true of the goatstag
mentioned above. On the theoretical difficulty, see Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L. II,
lect. 7, nn. 474-6.
9. St Thomas, like Gaunilo, clearly understands this famous argument of St Anselm in a way which
assimilates it to a great extent to Descartes' ontological argument. It is a matter of dispute whether
this reading is faithful to the subtleties of St Anselm's thought.
IO. Summa Theo/ogiae, I, q. 2, a. 1, ad 1: 'forte ille qui audit hoc nomen Deus non intelligit significari
aliquid quo maius cogitari non possit'.
11. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, c.
12. St Thomas holds, in the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L. II, lect. 1, n. 412, that to ask
'is there such a thing?' is to ask 'is there a middle term which can be used in a demonstration of
its existence?'
13. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2:
Ad secundum dicendum quod, cum demonstratur causa per effectum, necesse est uti effectu
loco definitionis causae ad probandum causa esse: et hoc maxime contingit in Deo, quia ad
probandum aliquid esse, necesse est accipere pro medio, quid significet nomen, non autem
quod quid est, quia quaestio quid est sequitur ad quaestionem an est.
14. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2: 'Nomina autem Dei imponuntur ab effectibus, ut postea
ostendetur: unde demonstrando Deum esse per effectum, accipere possumus pro medio, quid
significet hoc nomen Deus'.
15. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 2, ad 2:
Ad secundum dicendum quod in significatione nominis aliud est quandoque a quo imponitur
nomen ad significandum et aliud ad quod significandum nomen imponitur; sicut hoc nomen,
lapis, imponitur ab eo quod laedit pedem, non tamen imponitur ad hoc significandum quod
significet laedens pedem, sed ad significandam quamdam speciem corporum, alioquin omne
laedens pedem esset lapis.
A parallel is to be found at De Potentia, q. 9, a. 3, ad I.
16. P. T. Geach, essay 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), p. 109ff.
17. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 8c.
Dicendum quod non est semper idem id a quo imponitur nomen ad significandum, et id ad
quod significandum nomen imponitur. Sicut enim substantiam rei ex proprietatibus vel
operationibus eius cognoscimus, ita substantiam rei denominamus quandoque ab aliqua eius
operatione vel proprietate; sicut substantiam lapidis denominamus ab aliqua actione eius quia
laedit pedem; non tamen hoc nomen impositum est ad significandum hanc actionem, sed
substantiam lapidis.
18. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 8c: 'Si qua vero sunt quae secundum se sunt nota nobis, ut calor,
frigus, albedo, et huiusmodi, non ab aliis denominantur. Unde in talibus idem est quod nomen
significat, et id a quo imponitur nomen ad significandum.'
19. See, for example, Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 7, ad I.
20. For example, in Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 8c and ad 2.
21. In his translation of Summa Theologiae, I, qq. 12-13, Blackfriars edn, vol. 3, Appendix 3, p. 105.
22. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 2c: 'Et ideo aliter dicendum est quod huiusmodi quidem nomina
[sc. bonus, sapiens et huiusmodi] significant substantiam divinam.'
23. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 9, ad 3:
Ad tertium dicendum quod haec nomina, bonu, sapiens, et similia, imposita quidem sunt a
perfectionibus procedentibus a Deo in creaturas. Non tamen sunt imposita ad significandum
divinam naturam, sed ad significandum ipsas perfectiones absolute.
 The Signification of a Name 49
24. 'The fool has said in his heart, there is no God', Psalms, 14 [13]: I, and 53 [52]: I.
25. G. Frege, Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Oxford: Blackwell, 1959), §§ 46, 51, 52.
26. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. Sc and ad I: 'Ratio enim quam significat nomen est conceptio
intellectus de re significata per nomen .... nomen non significat rem nisi mediante conceptione
intellectus'.
27. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 10, ad I:
Ad primum dicendum quod nominum multiplicitas non attenditur secundum nominis prae-
dicationem, sed secundum significationem. Hoc enim nomen, homo, de quocumque prae-
dicetur, sive vere sive false, dicitur uno modo. Sed tune multipliciter diceretur si per hoc
nomen, homo, intenderemus significare diversa; puta, si unus intenderet significare per hoc
nomen, homo, id quod vere est homo, et alius intenderet significare eodem nomine lapidem
vel aliquid aliud. Unde patet quod catholicus dicens idolum non esse Deum, contradicit
pagano hoc asserenti; quia uterque utitur hoc nomine, Deus, ad significandum verum Deum.
Cum enim paganus <licit idolum esse Deum, non utitur hoc nomine secundum quod significat
Deum opinabilem; sic enim verum diceret, cum etiam catholici interdum in tali significatione
hoc nomine utantur, ut cum dicitur, Omnes dii gentium daemonia.
28. 'lmpositum ad significandum aliquod singulare': Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a.9c.
29. See Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 9, ad 3:
Ad tertium dicendum quod haec nomina, bonus, sapiens, et similia, imposita quidem sunt a
perfectionibus procedentibus a Deo in creaturas. Non tamen sunt imposita ad significandum
divinam naturam, sed ad significandum ipsas perfectiones absolute.
Also Summa Theologiae, a. 7, ad I:
Relativa quaedam sunt imposita ad significandum ipsas habitudines relativas, ut dominus et
servus, pater et filius, et huiusmodi; et haec dicuntur relativa secundum esse. Qyaedam vero
sunt imposita ad significandas res quas consequuntur quaedam habitudines, sicut movens et
motum, caput et capitatum, et alia huiusmodi; quae dicuntur relativa secundum dici.
30. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 10, ad 5: 'Si vero aliquis esset qui secundum nullam rationem
Deum cognosceret, nee ipsum nominaret, nisi forte sicut proferimus nomina quorum significa-
tionem ignoramus'. This is clearly St Thomas's way of explaining the question 'What is X?', as
asked by a High Court judge.
31. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2: seep. 40 above.
32. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 2c, and I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2.
33. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 4c: 'Licet significant unam rem, significant earn sub rationibus
multis et diversis.'
34. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. Sc:
Qyia igitur Deus non est notus nobis in sui natura, sed innotescit ex operationibus vel
effectibus, ex his possumus eum nominare, ut supra dictum est. Unde hoc nomen Deus est
nomen operationis, quantum ad id a quo imponitur ad significandum. lmponitur enim hoc
nomen ab universali rerum providentia. Omnes enim loquentes de Deo hoc intelligunt
nominare Deum, quod habet providentiam universalem de rebus.
 5
•
THE NOTION OF EXISTENCE USED IN ANSWERING
AN EST?

We are currently discussing questions of the form 'Do X's exist?', in the
context of the Aristotelian-Thomistic theory that such questions have a
key role in building up a science. In the last chapter we examined the grasp
we need to have of the term 'X' in such a sentence if we are to hope to
begin to answer it sensibly. Contemporary parallels were used, but if the
reader finds them distracting or even incorrect they can be dispensed with.
St Thomas's doctrine, I claim, is as I have expounded it. In this chapter
we will look at the other part of the key question, 'Does X exist?', the
notion expressed by the verb 'exist'. Perhaps every philosopher has at the
back of his or her mind the idea that Aquinas gives great importance to the
notion of existence and has some rather odd doctrine about it. This view is,
I think, not much more true than the idea that Aquinas discusses how many
angels can dance on the point of a pin. Aquinas's doctrine on existence is
solid, fully worked out, and, in the best of senses, really rather pedestrian.
We can see this in his commentary on Book V, Chapter 7 of the
Metaphysics of Aristotle. 1 Book V (or .::1, Delta) of the Metaphysics is
Aristotle's philosophical lexicon, in which he gives an outline of the
principal terms he is going to use. St Thomas, as so often, follows Aristotle
fairly exactly, but gives us a fuller and more systematic account. For St
Thomas, Aristotle's notion of existence is a case of 'focal meaning' or
'analogy': there are several systematically related senses of expressions for
existence, with certain family resemblances and connections, grouped
more or less tightly around one sense which is central. The central or focal
meaning of expressions of existence is regarded as central or focal, not
because of any special logical, historical or semantic priority, but because
what it expresses can be seen as the notion of existence which is in some
sense metaphysically prior.
Thus the senses of expressions of existence can be seen to form, as it
were, a nest of increasingly central meanings, established by a series of
distinctions. 2 The first distinction ( 1) is that between the potentially
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 51

existent and the actually existent. The relevant passage begins: 'Then he
makes a distinction between actuality and potentiality. He says that "the
existent" and "exist" signify either that which is said or spoken poten-
tially, or that which is said or spoken actually'. 3
The second distinction (2) is made within that which exists actually
rather than potentially, between what Aquinas calls 'existence in the sense
of the true' and what we might call 'real' existence. The passage begins:
'Then he gives us another sense of "the existent", according to which exist
and exists mean the composition of a proposition, which is brought about
by the intellect when it composes or divides. Hence he says that
"existence" here means the truth of a thing: or rather, as another version
has it, that existence means that some sentence is true'. 4
The third distinction (3), made within that which really exists, is
between that which exists coincidentally (per accidens) and that which
exists in its own right (per se); and the fourth distinction (4), within that
which exists in its own right, is between accident and substance. These
distinctions are introduced by
Here the Philosopher distinguishes the different senses of 'the
existent' [ens]. . . . First he distinguishes, within the existent,
between the existent in its own right [ens per se] and the coincidentally
existent [ens per accidens]. Then he distinguishes the different ways
of being coincidentally existent, and thirdly, the different ways of
being existent in one's own right. 5
The latter of each of the four pairs distinguished in this enumeration is
thought of as more focal than the former: thus, substance is what is
expressed by the most focal meaning of all. This fits with the epigram of
Aristotle: 'The question that was asked long ago, is asked now, keeps on
being asked and always baffles us - "What is being?" - is the question
"What is substance?" ' 6
The order imposed in the enumeration above is not that followed by
Aquinas in the passage under discussion, where instead of ( 1), (2), (3 ), (4),
he gives us, following Aristotle, more or less (3), (4), (2), (1). However,
the order I have given above seems more perspicuous, in that it is an
ordering from less to more focal.
The first distinction, then, to be made within the notion of existence is
between that which exists potentially and that which exists actually. The
full text of the relevant passage in the Commentary on the Metaphysics, V,
7, runs:
Then he makes a distinction between actuality and potentiality. He
says that 'the existent' and 'exist' signify either that which is said or
52 God and Explanations

spoken potentially, or that which is said or spoken actually. That is,

in all the terms discussed above, the terms which signify the ten
categories, something is said actually, and something said poten-
tially. Hence it happens that each of the categories can be divided
into actuality and potentiality. This is true of reality outside the
mind: things are said actually and things are said potentially. It is
also true within the activities of the mind, and for privations, whose
existence is purely dependent on the mind. We say that people know,
both because they could be using their knowledge, or because they
are using it. It is the same with 'resting': one might either be actually
in a state of rest, or able to be resting. This applies not only to
accidents, but also to substances. For we say that the Mercury- i.e.
the statue of Mercury - exists in the stone potentially, and that the
half of a line exists in the line potentially. This is because any part
of a continuum exists potentially within the whole. He gives a line
as an example of a substance, using here the opinion of those who
thought that mathematical entities were substances. He has not yet
rejected that view. We say that there is corn even when it is not yet
complete, and the corn is only sprouting: and this is there poten-
tially. But when there is something potentially and when there is not
yet anything potentially is a subject he leaves to be discussed else-
where, in Book Nine. 7
The distinction being made is between potentiality and actuality, as he
says. We should perhaps rather say: between that which can exist and that
which does exist. One should notice that in fact he is appealing to a usage
in philosophical Latin according to which that which can be is said to be;
we might say, a usage in which the modal particle is omitted. It is not clear
how common or how important this usage is in English, but the picture
we are given, of our being able to consider that which actually is the case
as being surrounded by a kind of penumbra of that which can be the case,
is clear enough. The examples he gives are also clear, and several of them
fit English usage well enough. We might well say that the statue is inside
the stone, as Michaelangelo did, meaning that we can make the statue from
the stone. In the same sense, of course, a heap of loose chippings is also
inside the stone, and though we would not normally say anything of the
kind, it is a natural extension of what we would say. We say that this grain
of corn is wheat, in the sense that it can grow into a fully developed plant
of wheat. We also say that someone is resting when he or she is able to
rest, i.e. is not currently performing any other task, although for all we
know the unfortunate character may be wide awake, rigid and sweating in
bed, and not actually resting at all.
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 53

But, as I say, even if the usage of dropping the modal particle that
expresses potentiality is not all that common, the picture is clear. It is true
that that which merely can be the case is not in fact the case. A potential
trip to the Post Office is not a kind of trip to the Post Office, any more
than a proposed trip is one. That is, it is not a kind of trip to the Post
Office in the way that a recent trip to the Post Office, or a quick or an early
or a troublesome trip to the Post Office are kinds of trips to the Post
Office. 8 All the same, that which can be the case can be talked about
sensibly in a way that we cannot talk about what cannot be the case. It is
important for me to know the various things I can do this afternoon, in
any sense of the expression 'I can do': can do sensibly, easily, without
spending too much money, without making myself ill, and so on. But there
is little point in my sitting down to make a list of all the things I can't do
this afternoon: there are far too many of them. I can't calculate 7t to twenty
decimal places, I can't calculate 7t to twenty-one decimal places ... and
so on ad infinitum. Not to speak of all the calculations of other kinds that
I can't perform, and all the other non-calculative operations I can't
perform.
While the picture of the 'penumbra' of possibility surrounding the
actual world is surely to attribute too much reality to what is merely
possible, it is equally a mistake to try to eliminate all talk of possibility
altogether. St Thomas, in fact, can give us some guidance about how to
treat possibility. That which is existent in the sense of being possibly
existent is less central and less focal than that which is actually existent.
Potentiality rests on actuality in two ways. First, potential existence is
always a potential existence in some way; a potentiality is always a
potentiality to something. There are no pure potentialities. That which
can be can be something or other. But, equally well, potentiality rests on
actuality in another way as well. That which can be F is always something
else, say G, actually. That which can be a statue is at present an unformed
block of marble, and so on.
These distinctions are closely related to the distinctions which Kenny
makes between a power, its exercise, and its vehicle. 9 Every power- every
active potentiality, to use a jargon closer to Aquinas's here - is defined in
terms of its exercise, of what it is a power for. And equally every power
rests on a vehicle, some actual state of the possessor of the power, in virtue
of which the possessor has that power. Opium has a dormitive power,1° a
power to put people to sleep, and it is in terms of the actual exercise,
sometimes carried out, of putting people to sleep, that the power is
defined. It has that power even when it is not exercised. Equally, it has
this power in virtue of the vehicle of that power, of some actual features
54 God and Explanations

of its chemical composition, which can, theoretically, be described inde-

pendently of the exercise of the power. If no animal had ever taken opium,
the power would exist, unknown to us, though it had never been exercised.
If the brains and nervous systems of animals were different from what
they are, the chemical reality which is in fact the vehicle of the power to
put people to sleep would remain, but it would no longer be the vehicle
of this power, since this power simply would not exist.
There seems to be, as Kenny comments, 11 a variety of perennial temp-
tations when we come to treat potentialities philosophically. We can try
to reduce the power to its exercise, and say that the dormitive power of
opium is no more than the fact that often when people take opium they
go to sleep. We can try to reduce the power to its vehicle, and say that the
dormitive power of opium just is its chemical structure. Or we can
'transcendentalise' the power and regard it as a kind of ghostly or shadowy
actuality. There can be no doubt that in general St Thomas's ways of
talking lead us closer to the 'transcendentalist' error, but it is arguable that
he at least avoids the more serious errors that follow from it. For example,
transcendentalism about the powers of the mind is Cartesian dualism; and
it is notorious that St Thomas is a strong anti-dualist. In any case, since
transcendentalism is a less common error nowadays than the other two,
St Thomas can provide us with a good counter-balance to the errors to
which we are ourselves more inclined.
The next distinction Aquinas makes is that between what he calls 'the
existent in the sense of the true' and what we could call 'the really existent'.
Aquinas himself has no special label for this latter, more focal sense: he
merely calls it 'existence' (esse) or 'the existent' (ens). 12
The 'existent in the sense of the true' is important. This notion
corresponds closely to our contemporary notion of existence, which is
roughly that existence is that which is expressed by the existential
quantifier. Also, it is clearly stated by Aquinas to be the notion of existence
used in answer to the question 'an est?', does it exist?. It is therefore the
notion most relevant to our present investigation, which is aimed at
elucidating Aquinas's answer to 'Does God exist?'. We will need, later in
the chapter, to chase the notion through its numerous occurrences
throughout Aquinas's work, but for the present we can confine ourselves
to how it fits into the nest of increasingly focal meanings of expressions
of existence, which Aquinas sketches for us in his Commentary on the
Metaphysics V, 7.
Then he gives us another sense of'the existent', according to which
exist and exists mean the composition of a proposition, which is
brought about by the intellect when it composes or divides. Hence
 The Notion ofExistence Used in Answering an est? 55

he says that 'existence' here means the truth of a thing: or rather, as

another version has it, that existence means that some sentence is
true. Hence the truth of a proposition can be called the truth of a
thing through its being so caused. This is because an utterance is
true or false depending on what the thing is or is not. For when we
say that something exists, we mean that a proposition is true: and
when we say it does not exist, we mean that a proposition is not true.
This works whether we are making an affirmation or a denial. In
making an affirmation, we say that Socrates is pale, meaning that
this is true. In making a negation, we say that Socrates is not pale,
meaning that this is true, i.e. his not being pale. In the same way we
say that the diagonal is not commensurable with the side of a square,
meaning that this is false, i.e. the diagonal's being commensurable.
But you should know that this second sense is related to the first
as effect to cause. This is because truth and falsehood in a proposi-
tion follow from what a thing is in reality. Truth and falsehood are
signified by this word 'is', used as the copula. But there are things
which are not existents, but which are dealt with by the intellect as
if they were: such as negations and the like. Thus sometimes we
speak of the existence of something in this second sense and not the
first [i.e. in the sense of 'existence in the sense of the true', and not
in the sense of 'real existence']. We say, that is, that blindness exists
in the second sense, on the grounds that the proposition is true which
says that something is blind. We are not saying that it is true in the
first sense. For blindness has no existence in reality: rather it is being
deprived of some existent. But it is merely coincidental that anything
should have something truly said or thought of it: because reality
does not depend on knowledge, but vice versa. The existence which
each reality has by nature is substantial. So if, when we say 'Socrates
exists', we take this 'exists' in the first sense, it is a substantial
predication. The existent, after all, is a kind which is superior to all
existents, as the kind 'animal' is a superior kind to 'human being'.
But if we take it in the second sense, it is a coincidental predication. 13
The first thing which a contemporary linguist might say about this is that
it displays something of a blurring between veridical and existential senses
of the verb 'esse' in philosophical Latin. The 'veridical' usage is a usage
which Latin philosophers seem to have taken over from Greek, in which
it is common: a use of the verb 'to be' as roughly equivalent to our English
'to be the case that'. The use of the verb 'to be' on its own in a veridical
sense is rare in English; a possible example might be 'He thinks Labour
will win the next election, and it may well be'. 14
56 God and Explanations

It is fairly clear that in the first paragraph St Thomas is thinking

primarily of this veridical use. His examples - 'Socrates is pale', 'Socrates
is not pale', 'the diagonal is not commensurable with the side of a square'
could equally well have been translated by 'It is the case that Socrates is
pale', 'It is not the case that Socrates is pale', and 'It is not the case that
the diagonal is commensurable with the side'. But it is surely equally clear
that in the second paragraph St Thomas is thinking principally of some
kind of existential sense. His examples here are 'Blindness exists', and two
different existential senses of 'Socrates exists'. What is going on here?
The key is the distinction which he is making between the two senses
of'Socrates exists' in the second paragraph. One of them is clearly a sense
in which'- exists' can also be said of blindness; the other is equally clearly
a sense which cannot be said of blindness at all, because blindness is a
privation. That is, blindness is not a reality, but the absence or lack of a
reality, the power of sight in a given pair of eyes. There is a sense, then,
of the predicate ' - exists' in which it is roughly equivalent to ' - is
something real', and in this sense it cannot truly be said of blindness. But
there is equally a sense in which ' - exists' means something else, and can
be said truly of blindness.
The sense in which'- exists' is true of Socrates, but not of blindness,
is a sense which is, as it were, a generalisation of'-is alive', or, perhaps,
so far as this passage would suggest, of ' - is a living being' or ' - is a
human being'. A sentence of the form '-exists', taken in this sense, tells
us something about the subject: the subject is not an abstraction, a mental
entity, a privation or negation, but rather belongs to one of the following
kinds: an animal, a plant, an inanimate object or collection of objects, a
spiritual creature like an angel, or God. It is a sense of'- exists' in which
it makes sense to say that something comes into existence, continues to
exist, or ceases to exist; a sense in which it makes sense to say that one
thing is dependent for its existence on another. That which exists in this
sense, as Geach points out, is that which is capable of initiating or
undergoing real change. The difference between 'real change' and any other
kind ofchange-i.e. any change that fits the criterion that an object a has changed
if and only if 'a is F' is true at time t1 and is false at time t2 -is illustrated by the
difference between 'The butter has gone down to the basement' and 'The butter
has gone down in price'. 15 This is St Thomas's notion of 'real existence', 16 which
many authors profess to find mysterious. The fact that I don't find it mysterious
at all is one of those worrying phenomena that make me worry whether I may
not be really stupid after all. 17
What, then, does the predicable expression'- exists' mean in 'Blind-
ness exists' or in the 'esse ut verum' sense of 'Socrates exists'? St Thomas
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 57

insists on relating it with the veridical sense he has been discussing in the
previous paragraph, both by his use of the label 'existence in the sense of
the true', and by the explanation he gives here. It means, he tells us, 'the
composition of a proposition, which is brought about by the intellect when
it composes or divides'. 'Compose' and 'divide' here are technical terms
of medieval logic, roughly equivalent to 'predicate affirmatively or nega-
tively'. This statement he thinks is made clearer by saying 'existence
means that some sentence is true'.
We can perhaps see what this means by looking at the first of his
examples, 'Socrates is pale', 'Socrates albus est'. These sentences are indeed
sentences, propositions, enuntiative utterances. They differ, from, for
example, the mere complex expression (oratio)18 'Socrates albus', 'pale
Socrates', by the presence of a copulative use of the verb 'esse', to be. We
can add this copula to a complex expression such as 'Socrates albus', and
there seem to be three ways of describing the result.
1. 'Socrates est albus', 'Socrates is pale'. The addition of the copula
is the mark of predication, 19 of what Frege called 'the advance
to a truth-value'.
2. 'Est Socrates albus', 20 'It is the case that Socrates is pale'. This
is a veridical use of the same verb. It scarcely differs in sense
from 1: it only stresses that there has been an advance to a
truth-value.
3. 'Socrates albus est', 'Pale Socrates is an existent'. This is an
existential use of the same verb.
It would be wrong, then, to think of St Thomas as having confused three
senses of the verb 'to be' in philosophical Latin: rather he has observed
that the three senses coincide in usage so closely that it is impossible to
separate them. It is interesting to notice that Charles H. Kahn, in his
magisterial work The Verb 'To Be' in Ancient Greek, 21 comes to a similar
conclusion to that of St Thomas, when dealing with Greek, a language
which had strongly influenced the philosophical Latin of the Middle
Ages. According to Kahn, we should distinguish very clearly from all
other uses what he calls the 'vital' use of the verb 'to be': a use in which
' - is' is equivalent to ' - is alive', or to a generalisation of it, a use which
is roughly equivalent to what I have called the notion of 'real existence'.
All other uses, whether veridical or existential, are transforms of the
copula, according to Kahn. 22
We cannot stop here. The sentences St Thomas quotes in the second
paragraph do not appear to be copulative uses of the verb 'to be', and not
even veridical uses, but purely existential. We should surely consider them
58 God and Explanations

as secondary or derived uses. 'Caecitas est', 'Blindness exists', we are told,

means that something is blind. This, when taken with the reference to
veridical uses in the first paragraph, that 'existence means that some
proposition is true', will give us a clue which we will be able to follow up
later. Suffice it to say here that there is good reason to suppose that
'Blindness exists' is thought by St Thomas to be equivalent to some such
sentence as 'Some sentence of the form "a is blind" is true'. Equally,
'Socrates exists', in the relevant sense, is equivalent to some such sentence
as 'Some sentence of the form "Socrates is F'' is true'.
The sense just outlined, the sense of'existence in the sense of the true',
is, as we shall see, the sense in which we use the word 'exist' when we ask
'Does God exist?'. But part of the point of saying this comes from
contrasting this notion with other more focal notions. Within the notion
of the really existent, as outlined above, Aquinas wishes to make a
distinction between that which (really) exists in its own right and that
which (really) exists coincidentally.23 The relevant texts of Commentary on
the Metaphysics, V, 9 are as follows:
885. Here the Philosopher distinguishes the different senses of'the
existent' [ens]. First he distinguishes, within the existent, between
the existent in its own right [ens per se] and the coincidentally existent
[ens per accidens]. Then he distinguishes the [different] ways of being
coincidentally existent [section 886], and thirdly, the [different]
ways of being existent in one's own right [section 889].
He says, then, that one sense of 'the existent' is the existent in its
own right, and another is the coincidentally existent. But you should
be aware that [despite the similarity between per accidens, coinciden-
tally, and accidens, accident] this division within the existent is not
the same as the division which is made between substance and
accident. This is obvious from the fact that he himself later divides
the existent in its own right into the ten categories, of which nine
are accidents. The existent is divided into substance and accident by
considering it without reference to anything else. In this way white-
ness, considered by itself, is said to be an accident, and a human
being is said to be a substance. But the coincidentally existent in the
sense we are talking about here has to be grasped by making a
relation between accident and substance. This making of a relation
is signified by the word 'is', when we say e.g. 'a human being is pale'.
Hence this whole, that a human being is pale, is an existent coinci-
dentally. So it is clear that the division of the existent into the
existent in its own right and the coincidentally existent comes to our
notice in virtue of something's being predicated of another, either
The Notion ofExistence Used in Answering an est? 59

in its own right or coincidentally. The division of the existent into

substance and accident, on the other hand, comes to our notice in
virtue of something's being by its own nature a substance or an
accident.
886. Then he shows us in how many ways the coincidentally
existent is expressed. There are three ways, he says: the first is when
an accident is predicated of an accident, as in the sentence, 'someone
honest is musical'. The second is when an accident is predicated of
a subject, as in the sentence, 'A human being is musical'. The third
is when a subject is predicated of an accident, as in the sentence,
'Someone musical is a human being'. Since he has already distin-
guished [earlier in this book of the Metaphysics] between some-
thing's being a cause coincidentally and its being a cause in its own
right, he uses here the notion of being a cause coincidentally to make
clear the notion of being an existent coincidentally.
887. He says that we assign a cause coincidentally when we say
that [e.g.] someone musical is building. This is because being some-
one musical coincides in a builder, or vice-versa. (It is clear that
'so-and-so is such-and-such', [e.g.] that a musical person is building,
just means that such-and-such coincides in so-and-so.) It is just the
same, too, with the different ways of being coincidentally existent,
which we mentioned above. We say, then, that a human being is
musical, predicating an accident of a subject; or that someone
musical is a human being, predicating a subject of an accident; or
that someone pale is musical, or vice versa, that someone musical is
pale, predicating an accident of an accident. In all these sentences
the word 'is' just means 'coincides in'
This last - when an accident is predicated of an accident - means
that both accidents coincide in the same subject. The former - when
an accident is predicated of a subject - is said to exist because the
accident coincides in an existent, that is in the subject. But we say
that someone musical is human because the predicate is the person
in whom being musical coincides, though being musical is put in
subject-position.
It is much the same kind of predication when a subject is predi-
cated of an accident, and when an accident is predicated of another
accident. [i.e. the grammatical structure of the sentence is no guide
to the logical structure]. For a subject is predicated of an accident in
the following way: the subject is said to be that in which the accident
mentioned in subject-position coincides. In the same way an acci-
dent is predicated of an accident, because it is predicated of the
60 God and Explanations

subject of the accident. Hence, when we say that something musical

is a human being, it is like saying that something musical is pale,
since that in which being musical coincides - i.e. the subject - is pale.
888. It is clear, then, that the things that are said to be existent
coincidentally are said to be so for three reasons. It may be that both
the subject and the predicate belong to the same thing, as when an
accident is predicated of an accident. Or it may be that the predicate
- such as 'musical' - is in an existent, i.e. the subject which is said
to be musical. This is the case when an accident is predicated of a
subject. Or it may be that the subject, which is put in predicate
position, is that in which the accident exists: that of which that
accident, used as a subject-term, is said. This is the case when [what
is really] a subject is [grammatically] predicated of an accident, as
when we say, 'Someone musical is a human being'.
889. Then he makes distinctions within the [different] ways of
being existent in one's own right. First he distinguishes the existent
which is outside the mind into the ten categories or predicaments.
This is what is completely existent. Then he puts forward another
kind, the existent which is only in the mind [section 895-6]. Thirdly
he divides the existent into the potentially existent and the actually
existent [section 897]. The existent divided up in this way is more
general than the completely existent, since the potentially existent
is only relatively and incompletely existent.
First, then, he says that the things which signify the figures of
predication are said to be existents in their own right. You should
be aware that the existent cannot be broken up in a determinate way
in the way that a genus is broken up into its species, by specific
differences. This is because a specific difference is not itself a
member of the genus, and thus it does not fall within the essence of
that genus. But there is nothing that can fail to fall within the essence
of the existent, so as to be capable of specifying it. This is because
that which does not fall within the existent is nothing, and so cannot
make a specific difference. This is how the Philosopher proved in
the third book of the present work that the existent cannot be a genus
[998b21].
890. Hence the existent should be specified according to different
ways of predicating, which follow on from different ways of existing.
As he says, "'Is" signifies in the same number of ways as there are
ways of saying', i.e. there are as many ways of expressing the
existence of something as there are ways of predicating something.
That is why the first division of the existent is into what are called
The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 61

the categories or predicaments: because they are distinguished by

different ways of predicating. This is because some of the things
which are predicated signify what a thing is, others what it is like,
others how big, and so on. So within each of the different ways of
predicating, existence should signify the same thing. When we say
'A man is an animal', for example, the 'is' signifies [the existence of
a] substance. But when we say 'A man is pale', it signifies [the
existence of a] quality, and so on.
891. You should know that the predicate can be related to the
subject in three ways. In one way, it is what the subject is, as when
I say 'Socrates is an animal'. This is because Socrates is that which
is an animal. This predicate is said to signify first substance, i.e. an
individual substance, that of which everything [else] is predicated.
892. In the second way, the predicate is taken from something that
is in the subject [i.e. an accident]. This predicate can be in the subject
in its own right and without reference to anything else. This may be
either as following from its matter, as it is in the case of quantity, or
as following from the form, as it is in the case of quality. Or, on the
other hand, it can be in the subject, not without reference to anything
else, but with some reference to something else: this is the case of
relation. In a third way, the predicate is taken from something
outside the subject. This can be sub-divided: it may be completely
outside the subject or not. If it is, then if it is not some measurement
of the subject, then it is a predicate of having, e.g. Socrates has shoes
on, or has clothes on. But if it is the measurement of the subject,
then since extrinsic measurement is either time or place, the category
is taken either from the side of time, i.e. when; or from the side of
place, in which case it will be where, provided that the arrangement
of its parts in the place is not considered. If it is considered, it will
be posture. There is another kind of category if that from which the
predicate is taken is in the subject of which it is predicated in some
relative way. If it is in the subject as its origin, then it will be a
predication of acting. This is because the origin of an acting is in the
subject of the acting. But if it is in the subject as its terminus, then
it will be a predication of being acted on. This is because being acted
on has its terminus in the subject which is acted on.
893. But there are predications in which the word 'is' [which is
the same as 'exists' in Latin] is clearly not used. You should not
think, however, that such predications do not belong to the predi-
cation of existence. For example, take 'A man walks'. Aristotle
dismisses this by saying that all predications of this kind signify that
62 God and Explanations

something exists. This is because any verb can be analysed into the
verb 'is' [or 'exists'] and the participle. It makes no difference
whether you say a man is walking, or walks; and similarly for the
others. Hence it is clear that there are as many ways to express
existence as there are ways of predicating. 24
What we can derive from this text is that the really existent (ens) can be
in some sense divided into two: the really existent in its own right (ens per
se) and the really existent coincidentally (ens per accidens). St Thomas
insists that this is a division made on logical rather than metaphysical
criteria: there are no metaphysical criteria on which to base a division of
the existent, as the very notion of the existent is metaphysically prior to
any criterion that could be used to make such a division. That is, any
metaphysical criterion would have to be based, in some sense, on an
existent, and this basis for the criterion would thus necessarily be part of
what the criterion serves to divide. The criterion, then, is logical: that of
Aristotle's 'Categories', manners of predication, which are outlined in the
work of the same name. 25
Aristotle holds that of anything we care to mention there are several
different things we may want to say: several different questions we may
want to ask about it, we might say. The principal division among the
things that we want to say about some subject is between what it really is
in itself and what it happens to be. When this division is applied to the
existent, the resulting two groupings of categories are those of substance
and accident. Substance is what a thing is, rather than what it happens to
be. When we make such a predication as 'a is F, within the category of
substance, it is equivalent to' Fis what a really is' .26 Since for both Aristotle
and St Thomas the notions of 'the existent' and 'the one and the same'
always go together, 27 we can think of a predication in the category of
substance as providing the criteria of identity for the subject. Both these
two would subscribe to Quine's dicta 'No entity without identity' and 'no
identity without entity'.
But when the predication 'a is Fis made in one of the other categories,
the accidental categories, as they are called, the sentence is equivalent to
'Fis what a happens to be'. We can diversify the accidental categories,
following St Thomas's gloss on Aristotle here: we can explain 'Socrates
is five foot six' as 'Five foot six happens to be Socrates's height'; 'Socrates
is wise' as 'Wise is how Socrates happens to be'; 'Socrates is Crito's friend'
as 'A friend is how Socrates happens to be to Crito', or perhaps 'A friend
of Crito is how Socrates happens to be to others'; 'Socrates is wearing a
coat' as 'Wearing a coat is how Socrates happens to be dressed'; 'Socrates
is up early' as 'Early is when Socrates happens to be up'; 'Socrates is in
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 63

prison' as 'Prison is where Socrates happens to be'; 'Socrates is sitting

down' as 'Sitting down is how Socrates happens to be positioned'; 'Soc-
rates is talking' as 'Talking is what Socrates happens to be doing'; and
'Socrates is having his pulse felt' as 'Having his pulse felt happens to be
what Socrates is having done to him'.
Clearly this list, if it is meant to be exhaustive, needs a good deal more
work. St Thomas's justification of the criteria on which it is based, given
in the text above, is ingenious but unconvincing. The category of time, of
when, in particular seems to resist adequate phrasing and rationalisation.
If we except time, we might want to give a rather more metaphysical
account of the categories of being, and say that change can occur with
respect to any one of the categories without occurring with respect to any
other. 28 But even so more thought will be needed.
The categories are important in this context because anything that is
said entirely within one category expresses a per se existent, an existent in
its own right, something that is also one and the same thing in its own
right. For example, the sentence 'Socrates is a human being' talks about
Socrates and Socrates alone; not Socrates plus something else, human
nature. Equally 'This length [ - - - - - - ] is one inch' talks about a
length, a quantity, and that alone, and thus expresses something wholly
in the category of quantity; 'This shape [o] is a square' expresses something
wholly in the category of quality. Both individual substances, such as
Socrates, and individual accidents, such as this length [ - - - - - - ],
this shape [□], are per se existents, existents in their own right. This
doctrine does not affect the claim that Aristotle and Aquinas are about
to make, that substance has, notwithstanding, a priority, a focality with
regard to accidents. The claim that is being made here is that per se
existents have a priority or focality with regard to per accidens existents,
coincidental existents, things that are expressed by expressions which
are made up of elements from more than one category.
For example, 'Socrates is pale' tells us about two separate per se
existents, the substance Socrates and the individual colour-accident, this
paleness. It also tells us, therefore, of a complex existent, a coincidental
existent, a complex unity, a per accidens unity or existent: the paleness of
Socrates. The examples St Thomas gives of expressions which tell us
about per accidens existents tend to be complete sentences, or at least
complex expressions, such as 'Pale Socrates'. But there are of course
innumerable single and apparently simple expressions which express per
accidens existents: 'Postman', for example, means 'Person who delivers the
mail', an extremely complex per accidens existent which combines the
substance of the person, the action of delivering, the relation to letters,
64 God and Explanations

and possibly the whole complex of society in which people (more sub-
stances) write (another action) letters (themselves complex existents in-
volving paper - another complex existent - and ink - yet another), and
arrange for (another action) their (relation) letters to be carried (passion)
to other people (more substances) who live elsewhere (place). 29 'Lunch'
or 'party' are other words that express per accidens existents: I leave it to
the reader to work out the per se existents involved in them. In general,
any artefact and any complex is going to be a per accidens existent.
How interesting is this? Is its value purely historical? I should say not.
One may question to what extent St Thomas and Aristotle succeed in
correctly identifying that which exists in its own right, as opposed to that
which exists coincidentally. There is no doubt, for example, that they
would both have thought that air was an existent in its own right, and
there is equally no doubt that when we apply their criteria to what we now
know about air, it turns out to be pretty highly coincidental. One may also
wonder to what extent our ability to pick out the coincidental depends
on the alleged fact that the expressions for the coincidental hop be-
tween categories. If this is so, does the whole enterprise not depend on
the accuracy of the categories, which we have no special reason to
believe in?
But leaving aside these points, which seem to be minor, I do not think
that we can do without some kind of a distinction between the coinciden-
tally existent and that which exists in its own right, between the per
accidens and the per se. Indeed, those who this century have tried hardest
to overthrow the distinction have only ended up in suggesting alternative
candidates for the per se and the per accidens. The young Russell claimed
that persons and things are only logical constructions out of events. There
is no doubt that with this he intended to undermine the distinction
between the per se and the per accidens, according to which things and
persons, being substances, are prior, while events are secondary. But all
he succeeded in doing was claiming that we had got the same pair of
candidates the wrong way round: if the young Russell were right, events
would be existents in their own right and people and things would be
highly coincidental complexes formed out of them. I take it that at this
stage no-one is likely seriously to maintain that Russell might have been
right: 30 if we are stuck with a distinction between the per se and the per
accidens, we are stuck with the candidates we have had since Aristotle's
time, and the order in which he placed them. Aristotle, after all, was only
showing the way in which our common-sense metaphysics is reflected in
our language; we cannot take Russell seriously until he has developed a
whole new language and taught us to speak it. 31
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 65

The distinction between the per se and the per accidens has some
application in the specific case of the arguments for the existence of God,
but so far as I can make out the distinction between substance and
accident, and the arguments for the priority of substance, have not. 32
What is particularly important for the discussion of the existence of
God is the notion of esse ut verum, which has already been sketched out
with the help of texts from the Commentary on the Metaphysics. I intend
to show that St Thomas thought that it was this notion, not that of real
esse, which was used in answering questions of the form 'Does X exist?',
and I hope to be able to suggest that he was able to anticipate, to a great
extent, the points raised by Kant and Frege against the Ontological
Argument of Descartes.
For the first point, the texts are easily cited. Probably the best early text
is from his Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard:
But 'being' in these two different senses is predicated in different
ways. If it is taken in the first sense [real esse], it is a substantial
predicate, and has to do with the question, what is it? But if it is taken
in the second sense, it is an accidental predicate, as Averroes says in
commenting on this point, and has to do with the question, does it
exist:1' 3
Reference to the answers to two different questions is to be found also in
two later texts, one from De Malo and one from the Summa Theologiae:
The existent is said in two ways. In one way it signifies the nature of
the ten categories, and in this sense, evil is not an existent or anything
real, nor is any privation. But in another way it is used to reply to
the question does it exist?, and in this sense evil does exist, just as
blindness exists. Not that evil is a reality. Being a reality means not
only the answer to the question does it exist?, but also to the question
what is it:1'4
Is there evil in reality?
We approach this point in this way: apparently there is no evil in
reality ....
Moreover, the existent (ens) and reality are convertible terms. So
if evil is an existent in reality, it should be a reality, which goes
against what we have said ....
The answer to the second objection is that (as it says in Book Five
of the Metaphysics) the existent has two senses. In one sense, it means
the existence of a reality: in this sense the existent is divided into the
ten categories, and in this sense it is convertible with reality. In this
66 God and Explanations

sense no privation is an existent, and hence evil is not an existent.

In another sense the existent means the truth of a proposition, which
arises in predication. The mark of predication is this word is: and
this is the existent which is an answer to the question does it exist? In
this sense we say that there is blindness in an eye.35
I should like to suggest that the distinction St Thomas is making in these
passages, between what is said in answer to the question 'does it exist?'
and what is said in answer to the question 'what is it?' corresponds closely
to the account given by Frege when he tells us that existence is analogous
to number - 'affirmation of existence is in fact nothing but the denial of
the number nought' 36 - and that number is not a mark (Merkmal) of a
concept, but a property (Eigenschafi) of the concept itself. That is, the
denial of the number nought is not something that is true or false of the
individual things of a kind; it forms no part of the answer to the question
what things of that kind must be like (quid est?). To put it briefly, to say
that God exists, or that a unicorn doesn't exist, doesn't mean attributing
existence to God, or non-existence to some unicorn, but attributing being
God to something, attributing being a unicorn to nothing; or, for the
matter of that, denying being a unicorn of anything. You name it, it isn't
a umcorn.
The assimilation of Aquinas's doctrine here to Frege's was first made,
as far as I know, by Geach. 37 He draws attention to the fact that Frege
himself is conscious of Aquinas's other notion of existence, real existence,
as I have called it, 'actual existence', as Geach says, to assimilate the
English expression to Frege's Wirklichkeit. The notion of existence which
Frege regards as equivalent to the denial of the number nought, Aquinas's
esse ut verum, Frege calls Esgibtexistenz.
There are differences between the two doctrines, of course, as well as
similarities. Both Aquinas and Frege regard esse ut verum or Esgibtexistenz
as extending more widely than real esse or Esgibtexistenz. That for Frege
the 'actual', the Wirklich, was only a part of the existent, is well known.
Aquinas is equally explicit.
Whatever is said to be an existent in the former way [i.e. really
existent] is also an existent in the latter way [i.e. with esse ut verum]
... But not everything that is an existent in the second way is an
existent in the first way .... Privations are said to be existents in the
second way, but not in the first way. 38
Though there is a similarity here, it masks a difference. Frege's favoured
examples of non-actual existents (non-real existents, in my jargon) are
numbers; Aquinas's are privations. In fact there is little doubt that Aqui-
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 67

nas would disagree with Frege's Platonism about numbers: although

Aquinas has some luminous and suggestive remarks about numerical
terms as applied to God, 39 his explicit doctrine about numbers in general
is a rather poor Aristotelian account according to which numbers are
human mental productions. 40 This is perhaps not important; we may, I
think, agree with Geach that Frege and Aquinas would both accept that
the dead are paradigmatically non-actual (or non-real) existents, things
that exist with esse ut verum alone, not with real esse. It is clear that Frege
would accept this; if we ask 'how many dead are there?' the correct answer
is a denial of the number nought, while the dead are paradigmatically
non-wirklich. Equally, for Aquinas we can form true affirmative proposi-
tions about the dead - for example 'Socrates was wise' or 'Socrates is
famous', and it is thus clear that the answer to 'Do the dead exist?' is 'They
do'. In the same way the answer to 'Does God exist?' is 'He does'. But the
dead are par excellence those who no longer exist with real esse, since
Aquinas holds, following Aristotle, that for living things, to exist is to be
alive. 41 (It is worth recalling, by the way, that a dead person is not to be
equated with a corpse. Clearly, since people die in explosions, and in any
case corpses decay and disappear, there are far more dead people than
there are corpses.)
A much more serious difference between the two authors is that in this
context Aquinas has nothing that answers to Frege's distinction of concept
and object, to the distinction of levels of predication which forms the
framework ofFrege's doctrine.
We have already seen something of the account which St Thomas gives
of esse ut verum. Things exist with esse ut verum if a true affirmative
proposition can be formed about them. Leaving aside for a moment the
difficult question of what constitutes the 'affirmativeness' of a proposi-
tion, we already run into a disagreement with Frege. For Frege, things
cannot exist with Esgibtexistenz at all, strictly speaking. Esgibtexistenz is
something that can only be true of a concept, a kind, not of an object. For
Frege, 'Julius Caesar exists' is equivalent to 'Julius Caesar is greater than
zero', which ought to be as foolish an expression as 'Julius Caesar= 2'.
However, for St Thomas, we have already seen that a sentence such as
'Socrates exists', taken in the esse ut verum sense, makes perfectly good
sense: indeed, it is even true, while the same sentence taken in the real esse
sense has not been true since the hemlock took effect.
Kenny suggests that Aquinas's account is actually limited to giving a
sense to expressions of the form 'X est', i.e. 'X exists', in which 'X' is an
abstract expression typically signifying a privation, but possibly some
other kind of form. 42 This is a mistake. Aquinas applies his account to
68 God and Explanations

sentences such as 'Deus est', 'God exists', where the subject-term is not
an abstract but a concrete term. It is a mere coincidence that in his
favourite example, 'Caecitas est', 'blindness exists', the subject-term is an
abstract one. For St Thomas, the difference between an abstract term such
as 'caecitas', 'blindness', and a concrete term such as 'Caecum', 'blind' or
'something blind', is merely a difference of mode of signification (modus
significandi), not a difference of thing signified (res significata ). 43 Aquinas
makes this point with reference to positive and indeed substantive terms
such as 'divinitas', Godhead, as opposed to 'Deus', God, or 'humanitas',
human nature, as opposed to 'homo', 'human being't and it seems that it
applies also to positive accidental determinations, such as the difference
between 'albedo', 'paleness', and 'album', pale. 45 But there is no reason to
suppose that it would not apply to the difference between 'vacuitas',
'emptiness', and 'vacuum', 'empty space'; and, as we shall see, Aquinas is
willing to maintain the truth of the proposition 'Non est vacuum', empty
space does not exist. 46 For this to be true, Aquinas has to maintain that we
cannot form a true affirmative proposition about empty space, about
'vacuum'.
Kenny wants to insist that what is said to exist or not exist must be
considered as the subject of the sentence. But all Aquinas tells us is that
the relevant affirmative proposition has to be formable 'about' (de) X.
Surely a proposition can be formed about X in the relevant sense without
'X' being the grammatical subject of that proposition? 'Dominus so/us est
Deus', 'The Lord alone is God', is clearly 'about' God as much as it is
about the Lord. In any case, Aquinas's detailed account of the grammar
of sentences which express esse ut verum tells us that the verb 'to be' as
used in such sentences is a copulative use. Sentences such as 'Socrates est'
and 'Ma/um est' ('Evil exists') are both sentences which express esse ut
verum, and, ex hypothesi, the verb 'est' in either sentence is a copula. This
leaves both sentences elliptical: 'Socrates est' has to be elliptical for 'Soc-
rates est aliquid', or simply as equivalent to 'Socrates est-', where the gap
is to be filled up by a predicable expression, a term taken to have what
most medievals would have called 'simple suppositio'. 47 But then, by parity
of reasoning, 'Ma/um est' cannot be taken as elliptical for 'Ma/um est
aliquid', the more so as Aquinas has told us that 'Ma/um est aliquid' is in
fact false. Even taking it as equivalent to 'Ma/um est-' must be wrong: the
gap is in the wrong place. The paradigmatic use of 'ma/um' is not as a
subject-term but as a predicate. 'Ma/um est' is thus elliptical for ' - est
ma/um'.
We need not confine ourselves to reflection on general principles.
Aquinas in fact gives us a text in which he definitely regards the 'X' in 'X
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 69

est' as a predicate, and therefore regards the whole as elliptical for 'Aliquid
est X' or as equivalent to'- est X'. The text is in the Commentary on the
Sentences ofPeter Lombard.
Existence (esse) has two senses, that is as meaning the truth of a
composition, and as meaning the act of an essence. So when we say:
one thing is 'the Father exists', another is 'the Son exists' - in such
a way that existence is the predicate of the sentence - it means the
existence which is an accident of essence. Hence it is false, since all
three have one essence, and one existence. But when we say: one
thing is 'the Father exists', another is 'the Son exists' - in such a way
that 'Father' is the predicate in the sentence - in 'exists' the truth of
the composition is meant. 48
The theology here is clear: it is heretical to attribute to God more than a
single real esse, act of existence. But obviously it is equally heretical to deny
that there is a Father, there is a Son, and there is a Holy Spirit. These
three existential propositions are of the esse ut verum form, and do not have
anything to say about God's real esse. But no less clear is the grammar: for
St Thomas, the difference between 'Pater est' in the sense which expresses
real esse, and 'Est Pater' in the sense in which it expresses esse ut verum, is
that in the former sense the word 'Pater' is the subject-expression, while
in the second sense the word 'Pater' is a predicable expression. The
parallel with Frege is closer than it seemed at first, and certainly closer
than it is on Kenny's account.
Crucially, St Thomas's account can be used, as Frege's was, to demolish
the ontological argument of Descartes. A key text here is early in the
Summa Theologiae:
Is God's act of existence identical with his essence?
We approach this point in this way: apparently God's act of existence
(esse) is not identical with his essence ....
Moreover, we can know of God that he exists, as has been said
above. But we cannot know what he is. So God's existence (esse) is
not identical with what he is, his essence or nature ....
The answer to the second objection is that existence (esse) has two
senses. In one sense it means the act of existence; in the other it
means the composition of a proposition, which is made by the mind
in joining a predicate to a subject. Taking existence in the first way,
we cannot know the existence of God, just as we cannot know his
essence: we can only know it in the second way. For we know that
this proposition which we make about God, when we say God exists,
is true: and we know this from his effects. 49
70 God and Explanations

Again, the theology is clear. God's essence is unknowable; but, accord-

ing to Aquinas, God's essence is identical with God's existence. How
then can we know the existence of God? Simply because what we know
when we know the existence of God is God's esse ut verum. We are not
claiming to know anything about God's real esse, which is indeed
unknowable. Thus the existence which is identical with God's essence,
the existence which is a perfection of God, which God necessarily
possesses, which is inseparable from the very idea of God, as Descartes
would say, is simply not what we are trying to show when we argue
that there is a God, when we answer to the question 'An est Deus?'
affirmatively. 50 Aquinas would say that when Descartes argues
'Necessarily, God has all perfections; existence is a perfection; there-
fore God exists', he is playing on the ambiguity of the two notions of
existence which St Thomas is here distinguishing. In the premiss
'Existence is a perfection', the word 'existence' has to mean real esse,
which is part of the answer to the question 'Quid est Deus?'. In the
conclusion, 'God exists', the word 'exists' has to mean esse ut verum,
the notion of existence which is used in giving an answer to the question
'An est Deus?'.
We have already seen something of the rationale for the connection
which St Thomas suggests between this notion of existence (esse ut verum)
and the notion of truth, the connection which is enshrined in his very
terminology. His full account of the connection - that X exists, in this
sense, when an affirmative proposition can be formed about X - seems to
take some time to develop. In some texts he speaks of an affirmative
predication (compositio) being made about X. In some texts he omits to
mention that the proposition has to be affirmative, and in others he omits
to mention that the proposition has to be true.
It seems impossible to establish any firm delineation between proposi-
tions or predicates which are affirmative and those which are negative. Is
'Socrates is bald' affirmative or negative? And what about 'Socrates is not
bald'? As we shall see shortly, there may be a possibility of establishing a
difference between those predicates that do and those predicates that do
not presuppose the real existence (esse) of their subjects - what Prior called
'El-predicables'. 51 But to justify calling predicates so distinguished 'af-
firmative' and 'negative' one would have to justify most of St Thomas's
account of the nature of truth, and also justify the relation of dependence
which he alleges to exist between propositions which express esse ut verum
and those which express real esse.
Nevertheless, it is not difficult to see the intuitive distinction which St
Thomas wishes to make, and the reasons for it. One can take as typical,
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 71

perhaps, the sentences 'Deus est', God exists, which St Thomas regards
as true, and 'Phoenix est', the phoenix exists, which St Thomas regards
as false. 52 Either will be true if a true affirmative proposition can be formed
about either God or the phoenix. St Thomas will want to claim that true
affirmative propositions can be formed about God: for example, 'Domi-
nus est Deus', the Lord is God; or 'Deus in principio creavit caelum et
terram', in the beginning God created heaven and earth. There is no
problem here. What is crucial is that St Thomas is committed to saying
that no true affirmative proposition can be formed about the phoenix: any
affirmative proposition which we can form about the phoenix will be false,
and any true proposition which we can form about the phoenix will be
non-affirmative. An affirmative proposition we might want to form about
the phoenix could be 'Phoenix est avis', the phoenix is a bird, or, perhaps
pointing to a sideshow at a fair, or to a picture 'Iste est phoenix', this is a
phoenix. But both these will be false, according to St Thomas. The
phoenix is not a bird because it is not real, is not anything at all. 53 And
'This is a phoenix' will not be true in either imagined situation: a picture
of a phoenix is no more a phoenix than a picture of a human being is a
picture of a human being, and if there are no phoenixes it will turn out
that however cleverly the illusion is managed at the fair, it will be no more
than the sort of trick we are used to at fairs. 54
Meanwhile, true sentences about the phoenix will be non-affirmative.
We have established that 'The phoenix is a bird' and 'This is a phoenix'
will both be false, and we may thus take it that 'The phoenix is not a bird'
and 'This is not a phoenix' will both be true. True non-affirmative
sentences such as these can be multiplied indefinitely: the phoenix is not
a bird, and it is not a fish or a reptile, for that matter. And 'this is not a
phoenix' is going to be true whatever it is that I point at. However, the
very indefinite multiplicability of such sentences shows us partly what is
meant by saying that such sentences are not affirmative: there is no end
of saying what something is not.
What about a less indefinite and less obviously negative proposition,
such as 'Phoenix est avis fictus', the phoenix is a fictional bird? Here
there is no negative particle to give us a clue, and 'The phoenix is a
fictional bird' seems to have a certain contextual appropriateness which
is not shared by 'The phoenix is a mythical fire-breathing reptile'. This
contextual appropriateness makes 'the phoenix is a fictional bird' look
true, while 'the phoenix is a mythical fire-breathing reptile' is false.
There is in fact little problem here: the recourses of medieval logic are
sufficient to establish that 'Phoenix est avis fictus', even if true, is no
more affirmative than is 'Phoenix non est avis'. 'Fictus' is what the
72 God and Explanations

medieval logicians and grammarians called an adiectivum alienans, an

alienating adjective. 55 This concept is best explained by way of exam-
ples, and a good example in modern English is 'forged'. A Scottish
five-pound note is both a five-pound note and Scottish, but a forged
five-pound note is not both a five-pound note and forged. Precisely
because it is forged, it is not a five-pound note. The adjective 'forged'
alienates or invalidates the true application of the other descriptions.
The same is obviously true of 'fictional': Sherlock Holmes, in so far as
he is a fictional detective, is not a detective at all, and thus the phoenix
is not a bird. 'Phoenix est avis fictus' is thus clearly non-affirmative.
There is a gap here. St Thomas should clearly have something to say
about intentionality, and should discuss whether 'Phoenix dicitur esse
avis', the phoenix is said to be a bird, counts as an affirmative proposition
for the purposes of providing a basis for 'Phoenix est', the phoenix exists.
But though clearly something could or should be said, it seems hard to
bring intentional cases such as this under the heading of non-affirmative
propositions.
An attempt might be made, as mentioned above, to equate 'affirm-
ative' propositions with those which affirm or presuppose some real
existence in their subject. Clearly being said to be a bird does not imply
any real existence in its subject, but at the most in those to whom the
saying is attributed. But this cannot be used directly as a criterion for
affirmativeness in the relative sense, since were we so to use it we would
run up against the problem of negations and privations. By St
Thomas's account, we ought not to be able to affirm truly of evil or
blindness any predicate which would imply the real existence of evil or
blindness. It is worth noting that we can, however, affirm being evil or
being blind of a number of real existents, and, indeed, only of real
existents. The dead are not evil or blind any more, though they once
were. This looks like providing a more accurate criterion: some indi-
vidual exists in the esse ut verum sense if we can affirm of it some
predicate that implies its present or past real existence, and some
concept is instantiated if we can affirm it of some present or past real
existent. This criterion seems to give us what we want, but it has taken
us far from St Thomas's tag of 'forming an affirmative proposition'.
However, it does not take us very far from a point which appears to be
important in St Thomas's treatment of esse ut verum. St Thomas several
times insists that the notion of esse ut verum is not only non-focal, but in
some sense also derivative 56 from the notion of real esse. 57 Any sentence
affirming esse ut verum can be traced back to, we might say, some sentence
affirming real existence. A sentence affirming esse ut verum in some way
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 73

depends for its truth on some sentence affirming real existence. The
notion of esse ut verum is derivative.
In some cases we can see what is meant. Often we simply affirm the esse
ut verum of something that exists anyway with real existence, as in the case
of God. When we affirm the esse ut verum of the dead we are implicitly
affirming at least a past real existence. When we affirm the esse ut verum
of privations such as evil or blindness we are implicitly affirming the real
existence of the subject of the privation. At this point, however, St
Thomas will have to part company very definitely with Frege. For Frege,
numbers are genuinely non actual existents, (non-real existents, in my
semi-Thomist terminology). It is hard (Frege would say impossible) to
see their esse ut verum or Esgibtexistenz as derivative from some real
existence. 58 St Thomas would probably answer quite shortly here that
numbers are human constructions based on material realities, 59 and Frege
would certainly answer even more shortly that St Thomas didn't know
what he was talking about. 60 It is indeed worth pointing out that St
Thomas's claim about numbers is surely incompatible with his belief that
there may have been very many angels before there were any material
realities, and certainly before there were any human minds to reflect on
them, and also with his belief that there were three divine persons before
there was any created mind at all. 61 If numbers are a construction of any
mind, they must be constructions of the divine mind. But it does seem a
little implausible that numbers are part of God's creation; it would seem
more appropriate to regard them as in some way part of God. This would
appear to be the only way we can make the esse ut verum of numbers
derivative from some real existence, and I admit it seems a pretty desperate
recourse. Still, there seem to be reasons, independent of maintaining this
thesis about the derivativeness of esse ut verum, for holding that numbers
may be a part of God. The claim that numbers cannot be God's creation
and therefore subject to God's will has its own intrinsic attractiveness,
while Frege's Platonism about numbers - the claim that they are genuine
non-real existents - was on occasion unattractive even to himself. 62
Enough has been said, perhaps, to show that St Thomas's notion of esse
ut verum, though in some ways strange to us, combines a great deal of
logical and grammatical insight. Given that it is this notion which is used
in answering questions of the form 'Does X exist?' (an est?), which is the
form of the particular question which we are gradually approaching, 'Does
God exist?' (an est Deus?), it remains for us to examine the account which
St Thomas gives us of how in general such questions can be answered,
particularly when it is a question, as it often is in science, of proving the
existence of a cause from its effects.
74 God and Explanations

NOTES

I. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, nn. 885-97.

2. See G. E. L. Owen, 'Aristotle on the snares of ontology', in R. Bambrough (ed.), New Essays on
Plato and Aristotle (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979).
3. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, n. 897: 'Ponit distinctionem entis per actum et
potentiam; dicens, quod ens et esse significant aliquid dicibile vel effabile in potentia, vel dicibile
in actu.'
4. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, n. 895: 'Ponit alium modum entis, secundum quod
esse et est significant compositionem propositionis, quam facit intellectus componens et dividens.
Unde <licit, quod esse significat veritatem rei. Vel sicut alia translatio melius habet, quod esse
significat quia aliquod dictum est verum.'
5. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, n. 885. 'Hie Philosophus distinguit quot modis
dicitur ens .... Primo distinguit ens in ens per se et per accidens. Secundo distinguit modos entis
per accidens .... Tertio modo entis per se.'
6. Metaphysics, book Z, 1028b 3-9. The translation is thatofG. E. M. Anscombe, Three Philosophers,
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), p. 19.
7. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, n. 897:
Ponit distinctionem entis per actum et potentiam; dicens, quod ens et esse significant aliquid
dicibile vel effabile in potentia, vel dicibile in actu. In omnibus enim praedictis terminis, quae
significant decem praedicamanta, aliquid dicitur in actu, et aliquid in potentia. Et ex hoc
accidit, quod unumquodque praedicamentum per actum et potentiam dividitur. Et sicut in
rebus, quae extra animam sunt, dicitur aliquid in actu et aliquid in potentia, ita in actibus
animae et privationibus, quae sunt res rationis tantum. Dicitur enim aliquis scire, quia potest
uti scientia, et quia utitur; similiter quiescens, quia iam inest ei quiescere, et quia potest
quiescere. Et non solum hoc est in accidentibus, sed etiam in substantia. Etenim Mercurium,
id est imaginem Mercurii, dicimus esse in lapide in potentia, et medium lineae dicitur esse in
linea in potentia. Quaelibet enim pars continui est potentialiter in toto. Linea vero inter
substantias ponitur secundum opinionem ponentium mathematica esse substantias, quam
nondum reprobaverat. Frumentum etiam quando nondum est perfectum, sicut quando est in
herba, dicitur esse in potentia. Quando vero aliquid sit in potentia, et quando nondum est in
potentia, determinandum est in aliis, scilicet in nono huius.
8. The example is from Geach.
9. In The Metaphysics of Mind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 71-4 on vehicle,
exercise and power, pp. 27-8, 83 on powers (capacities); and in Will, Freedom and Power, pp.
9-11.
10. This sentence 'opium has a dormitive power' is seldom uttered except in mockery. I assert it as
plainly and simply true. The reader may find it interesting to consider what strange view of the
world is involved in rejecting this statement as false, and how such a view of the world relates to
the view of the world presupposed by, for example, the science of pharmacology and our common
practice of buying aspirins.
11. In The Metaphysics ofMind, pp. 71-4, and in Will, Freedom and Power, pp. 10-11.
12. Though he does seem to suggest the label of 'ens perfectum' in Commentary on the Metaphysics,
L.V, lectio 9, n. 889: see below, p. 80 and n. 24.
13. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, nn. 895-6:
Ponit alium modum entis, secundum quod esse et est significant compositionem propositionis,
quam facit intellectus componens et dividens. Unde <licit, quod esse significat veritatem rei.
Ve! sicut alia translatio melius habet, quod esse significat quia aliquod dictum est verum. Unde
veritas propositionis potest dici veritas rei per causam. Nam ex eo quod res est vel non est,
oratio vera vel falsa est. Cum enim dicimus aliquid esse, significamus propositionem esse
veram, et cum dicimus non esse, significamus non esse veram; et hoc sive in affirmando sive
in negando. In affirmando quidem, sicut dicimus quod Socrates est albus, quia hoc verum est.
In negando verum, ut Socrates non est albus, quia hoc est verum, scilicet ipsum esse non
album. Et similiter dicimus quod non est diameter commensurabilis lateri quadrati, quia hoc
est falsum, scilicet non esse ipsum non commensurabilem ....
896. Sciendum est autem quod iste secundus modus comparatur ad prim um sicut effectus
ad causam. Ex hoc enim quod aliquid in rerum natura est, sequitur veritas et falsitas in
 The Notion ofExistence Used in Answering an est? 75

propositione, quam intellectus significat per hoc verbum 'est' prout est verbalis copula. Sed
quia aliquid quod est in se non ens, intellectus considerat ut quoddam ens, sicut negationem
et huiusmodi, ideo quandoque dicitur esse de aliquo hoc secundo modo et non primo. Dicitur
enim quod caecitas est secundo modo, ex eo quod vera est propositio, qua dicitur aliquid esse
caecum; non tamen dicitur quod sit primo modo vera. Nam caecitas non habet aliquod esse
in rebus, sed magis est privatio alicuius esse. Accidit autem unicuique rei quod aliquid
affirmetur intellectu vel voce. Nam res non refertur ad scientiam, sed e converso. Esse vero
quod in sui natura unaquaeque res habet est substantiale. Et ideo cum dicitur 'Socrates est',
si ille 'est' primo modo accipiatur, est de praedicato substantiali. Nam ens est superius ad
unumquodque entium, sicut animal ad hominem. Si autem accipiatur secundo modo, est de
praedicato accidentali.
14. See C. J. F. Williams, What is Existence? (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981), p. 305. It is perhaps worth
noting that 'es que ... ' in modern Spanish is a clear example of a veridical sense of one of their
two verbs 'to be', a usage which has become so common and worn-down that for many people
it is no more than a verbal tic. 'No he pegadoni golpe' ='I haven't done a stroke of work'; compare
'Esque no he pegado ni golpe', which can perhaps best be translated, using a comparable verbal
tic of some English-speakers, as 'I haven't done a stroke of work, actually'.
15. See Geach, 'What actually exists', in God and the Soul (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul,
1969), pp. 71-2.
16. The label is unfortunate, as if suggesting that the other notion of existence is in some way unreal.
But etymologically, the label 'real' existence is appropriate, since it is the kind of existence that
can truly be attributed to things (res) and their properties, determinations and combinations.
Geach, who introduced the notion most clearly into contemporary English-speaking philosophi-
cal discourse, uses the label 'actual' existence. But this is a label that I have difficulty in using,
since the label 'actual' is also needed for the distinction with 'potential' existence, and since it
has made some think (e.g. Kenny) that the distinction between 'real existence' and 'existence in
the sense of the true' can be juggled away by the use of a distinction between a classificatory sense
and an actual, present-tense sense- see his The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul,
1969) pp. 89-91. The contrast established in the passage quoted, where tense is not relevant
(since, to be accurate, Socrates does not exist any more) makes it clear that this is a mistake.
17. See C. F. J. Martin, The Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas: Introductory Readings (London: Rout-
ledge, 1988), pp. 49-55, 114-17, for a discussion of this perplexity.
18. For the difference between a complex expression (oratio) and a declarative sentence (enunciatio)
or proposition (propositio) see Martin, The Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, pp. 18-30, discussing
passages such as L.I, 11.4-5 in St Thomas's Commentary on the De lnterpretatione.
19. See, for example, Quodlibetales IX, q. 2, a. 3, notes 53 and 55 below.
20. Word order counts for little in Latin, but a medieval author might well have tried to fix the
flexible usage of his language as something rather like what I suggest.
21. Charles H. Kahn, The Verb 'To Be' in Ancient Greek (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1973).
22. Op. cit. p. 224, pp. 407-14.
Another passage relevant to the connection between copulative and veridical senses of the verb
'to be' in Latin, and St Thomas's notion of esse ut verum, is to be found later on in the Commentary
on the Metaphysics, at L.VI, 1.4, n. 1223:
Here he is commenting on being (ens) in the sense of the truth of a proposition .... He says,
then, that 'a sense of being means, as it were, true', that is, that it just means truth. For when
we ask if man is an animal, the answer is, he is; which means that the previous proposition is
true. And in the same way, non-being means, as it were, false .... This kind of being, which
is called true, and non-being, which is called false, arise in composition and division. Simple
utterances do not mean anything true or false; but complex utterances become true or false
by affirmation and negation. Here affirmation is called composition, because it means that the
predicate is in the subject, while negation is called division, because it means that the predicate
is apart from the subject.
Hie determinat de ente, quod significat veritatem propositionis .... Dicit ergo quod ens
quoddam dicitur quasi verum, id est quod nihil aliud significat nisi veritatem. Cum enim
interrogamus si homo est animal, respondetur quod est, per quod significatur propositionem
praemissam esse veram. Et eodem modo non ens significat quasi falsum .... Hoc autem ens
quod dicitur quasi verum et non ens quod dicitur quasi falsum, consistit circa compositionem
et divisionem. Voces enim incomplexae neque verum neque falsum significant, sed voces
76 God and Explanations
complexae per affrrmationem aut negationem veritatem aut falsitatem habent. Dicitur enim
hie compositio, quia significat praedicatum inesse subiecto. Negatio vero dicitur hie divisio,
quia significat praedicatum a subiecto removeri.
23. 'Existent in its own right', and analogous phrases, translate ens per se. 'Existent coincidentally'
and analogous phrases translate ens per accidens. This excellent rendering comes, I think,
originally from C. Kirwan in his translation and commentary on books r, .1., E, of Aristotle's
Metaphysics (Oxford: Clarendon, 1971 ).
24. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, nn. 885-93:
Hie Philosophus distinguit quot modis dicitur ens. Et circa hoc tria facit. Primo distinguit ens
in se et per accidens. Secundo distinguit modos entis per accidens. Tertio modos entis per se.
Dicit ergo quod ens dicitur quoddam secundum se, et quoddam secundum accidens.
Sciendum tamen est quod ilia divisio entis non est eadem cum ilia divisione qua dividitur ens
in substantiam et accidens. Quod ex hoc patet, quia ipse postmodum ens secundum se dividit
in decem praedicamenta, quorum novem sunt de genere accidentis. Ens igitur dividitur in
substantiam et accidens, secundum absolutam entis considerationem, sicut ipsa albedo in se
considerata dicitur accidens, et homo substantia. Sed ens secundum accidens prout hie
sumitur, oportet accipi per comparationem accidentis ad substantiam. Quae quidem compa-
ratio significatur hoc verbo 'est', cum dicitur 'homo est albus'. Unde hoc totum, homo est
albus, est ens per accidens. Unde patet quod divisio entis secundum se et secundum accidens,
attenditur secundum quod aliquid praedicatur de aliquo per se vel per accidens. Divisio vero
entis in substantiam et accidens attenditur secundum hoc quod aliquid in natura sua est vel
substantia vel accidens.
886. Deinde ostendit quot modis dicitur ens per accidens; et <licit quod tribus: quorum
unus est, quando accidens praedicatur de accidente, ut cum dicitur, iustus est musicus.
Secundus, cum accidens praedicatur de subiecto, ut cum dicitur, homo est musicus. Tertius,
cum subiectum praedicatur de accidente, ut cum dicitur musicus est homo. Et quia superius
iam manifestavit quomodo causa per accidens differt a causa per se ideo nunc consequenter
per causam per accidens manifestat ens per accidens.
887. Et <licit quod sicut assignantes causam per accidens dicimus quod musicus aedificat,
eo quod musicum accidit aedificatori, vel e contra, constat enim quod hoc esse hoc, idest
musicurn aedificare, nihil aliud significat quam hoc accidere huic, ita est etiam in praedictis
modis entis per accidens, quando dicimus hominem esse musicum, accidens praedicando de
subiecto; vel musicum esse hominem, praedicando subiectum de accidente; vel album esse
musicum, vel e converso, scilicet musicum esse album, praedicando accidens de accidente. In
omnibus enim his esse nihil significat quam accidere. Hoc quidem, scilicet cum accidens de
accidente praedicatur, significat quod ambo accidentia accidunt eidem subiecto; illud vero,
scilicet cum accidens praedicatur de subiecto, dicitur esse quia enti (idest subiecto) accidit
accidens. Sed musicum esse hominem dicimus quia huic - scilicet praedicato - accidit
musicum, quod ponitur in subiecto. Et est quasi similis ratio praedicandi, cum subiectum
praedicatur de accidente, et accidens de accidente. Sicut enim subiectum praedicatur de
accidente ea ratione, quia praedicatur subiectum de eo, cui accidit accidens in subiecto
positum; ita accidens praedicatur de accidente, quia praedicatur de subiecto accidentis. Et
propter hoc, sicut dicitur musicum est homo, quia scilicet illud cui accidit esse musicum,
scilicet subiectum, est album.
888. Patet igitur quod ea quae dicuntur esse secundum accidens, dicuntur triplici ratione:
aut eo quod ambo - scilicet subiectum et praedicatum - insunt eidem, sicut cum accidens
praedicatur de accidente, aut quia illud - scilicet praedicatum, ut musicum - inest enti, id est
subiecto, quod dicitur esse musicum (et hoc est cum accidens praedicatur de subiecto ); aut
quia illud - scilicet subiectum in praedicato positum - est illud cui inest accidens, de quo
accidente illud (scilicet subiectum) praedicatur. Et hoc est scilicet cum subiectum praedicatur
de accidente, ut cum dicimus, musicum est homo.
889. Deinde distinguit mod um entis per se: et circa hoc tria facit. Primo distinguit ens quod
est extra animam per decem praedicamenta, quod est ens perfectum. Secundo ponit alium
modum entis, secundum quod est tantum in mente. Tertio dividit ens per potentiam et actum:
et ens sic divisum est communius quam ens perfectum. Nam ens in potentia est ens secundum
quid et imperfecturn.
Dicit ergo primo quod ilia dicuntur esse secundum se quaecumque significant figuras
praedicationis. Sciendum est enim quod ens non potest hoc modo contrahi ad aliquid
determinatum sicut genus contrahitur ad species per differentias. Nam differentia, cum non
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 77
participet genus, est extra essentiam generis. Nihil autem posset esse extra essentiam entis,
quod per additionem ad ens aliquam speciem entis constituat: nam quod est extra ens, nihil
est, et differentia esse non potest.
890. Unde oportet quod ens contrahatur ad diversa genera secundum diversum modum
praedicandi, qui consequitur diversum modum essendi; quia quoties ens dicitur - id est quot
modis aliquid praedicatur - toties esse significatur, id est tot modis significatur aliquid esse.
Et propter hoc ea in quae dividitur ens primo dicuntur esse praedicamenta, quia distinguuntur
secundum diversum modum praedicandi. Quia igitur eorum quae praedicantur, quaedam
significant quid, id est substantiam, quaedam quale, quaedam quantum, et sic de aliis. Oportet
quod unicuique modo praedicandi, esse significet idem: ut cum dicitur homo est animal, esse
significat substantiam. Cum autem dicitur homo est albus, significat qualitatem, et sic de aliis.
891. Sciendum enim est quod praedicatum ad subiectum tripliciter se potest habere. Uno
modo cum est id quod est subiectum, ut cum dico Socrates est animal. Nam Socrates est id
quod est animal. Et hoc praedicatum dicitur significare substantiam primam, quae est
substantia particularis, de qua omnia praedicantur.
892. Secundo modo ut praedicamentum sumatur secundum quod inest subiecto: quod
quidem praedicatum vel inest ei per se et absolute, ut consequens materiam, et sic est quantitas;
vel ut consequens formam, et sic est qualitas; vel inest ei non absolute, sed in respectu ad aliud,
et sic est ad aliquid. Tertio modo ut praedicatum sumatur ab eo quod est extra subiectum:
quod quidem si non sit mensura subiecti, praedicatur per modum habitus, ut cum dicitur,
Socrates est calceatus vel vestitus. Si autem sit mensura eius, cum mensura extrinseca sit vel
tempus vel locus, sumitur praedicamentum vel ex parte temporis, et sic erit quando; vel ex
loco, et sic erit ubi, non considerato ordine partium in loco, quo considerato erit situs. Alio
modo ut id a quo sumitur praedicamentum, secundum aliquid sit in subiecto, de quo
praedicatur. Et si quidem secundum principium, sic praedicatur ut agere. Nam actionis
principium in subiecto est. Si vero secundum terminum, sic praedicabitur ut in pati. Nam
passio in subiecto patiens terminatur.
893. Quia vero quaedam praedicantur, in quibus manifeste non apponitur hoc verbum 'est',
ne credatur quod illae praedicationes non pertineant at praedicationem entis - ut cum dicitur,
homo ambulat - ideo consequenter hoc removet, dicens quod in omnibus significatur aliquid
esse. Verbum enim quodlibet resolvitur in hoc verbum 'est' et participium. Unde patet quod
quot modis praedicatio fit, tot modis ens dicitur.
25. Categories: see Aristotle's Categories and De lnterpretatione, translation and commentary by J.
Ackrill (Oxford: Clarendon, 1978), especially the first five chapters.
26. See Anscombe, 'Aristotle', in Three Philosophers, pp. 7-13.
27. See, for example, Commentary on Metaphysics L.IV, 1.2, n. 560.
28. See Anscombe, 'Aristotle', in Three Philosophers, pp. 14-18.
29. See G. T. Geach, section 'Form' in essay 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell,
1961), p. 87.
30. But see below, Chapter 13, pp. 187-8.
31. Compare the work of Kripke, who has taught us that the unconscious metaphysics which is
enshrined in our ordinary use oflanguage is highly essentialist. Aristotle's metaphysics at times
seems little more than a formalisation of this unconscious metaphysics.
32. For the application of the per se I per accidens distinction in the discussion of the existence of God,
see Chapter 6 below, pp. 91-2, and Chapter 8, pp. 113-14. The distinction between substance
and accident has no application to God: God has no accidents, and is not, properly speaking, a
substance; God is beyond the categories.
33. Commentary on the Sentences ofPeter Lombard, L.11, d. 34, I.I, sol:
Ens autem secundum utrumque istorum modorum diversimode praedicatur: quia enim
secundum primum modum acceptum, est praedicatum substantiale, et pertinet ad quaes-
tionem quid est; sed quantum ad secundum modum, est praedicatum accidentale, ut Com-
mentator ibidem <licit, et pertinet ad quaestionem an est.
I may say that a careful reading of Averroes's Commentary on Metaphysics, V, 7 suggests that St
Thomas is being over-modest: the distinction between the use of 'esse' as a substantial predicate
and its use as an accidental predicate is indeed to be found in Averroes, but the connection with
the answers to two different sorts of questions is Aquinas's own. The parallels with the passage
on esse ut verum quoted from the much later Commentary on the Metaphysics, V, 9, especially para.
896 in fine - see note 13 above - are worth noticing.
78 God and Explanations
34. Quaestio disputata de malo, q. 1, a. I., ad 19:
Ens dicitur dupliciter. Uno modo quod significat naturam decem generum, et sic neque
malum neque aliqua privatio est ens neque aliquid. Alio modo secundum quod respondetur
ad quaestionem an est, et sic malum est, sicut et caecitas est. Non tamen malum est aliquid;
quia esse aliquid non solum significat quod respondetur ad quaestionem an est, sed etiam quod
respondetur ad quaestionem quid est.
35. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 48, a. 2, ad 2.
Utrum malum inveniatur in rebus. Ad secundum sic proceditur: videtur quod malum non
inveniatur in rebus ....
Ens et res convertuuntur. Si ergo malum est ens in rebus, sequitur quod malum sit res
quaedam, quod est contra praedicta.
Ad secundum dicendum quod sicut dicitur in V Metaphysicorum, ens dupliciter dicitur.
Uno modo secundum quod significat entitatem rei, prout dividitur per decem praedicamenta,
et sic convertitur cum re; et hoc modo nulla privatio est ens, unde nee malum. Alio modo
dicitur ens quod significat veritatem propositionis, quae in compositione consistit, cuius nota
est hoc verbum est: et hoc ens est quo respondetur ad questionem an est, et sic caecitatem
dicimus esse in oculo.
36. Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Oxford: Blackwell, 1959), § 53.
37. In the section 'Esse' of the essay 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers, and in 'Form and existence'
and 'What actually exists?', in God and the Soul (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969).
My debt to Professor Geach in my understanding of this topic is incalculable. Also I should
like to pay tribute to Professor Alejandro Llano, of the University of Navarre, who first drew
to my attention the importance of Geach's ideas here. Some of the development of Geach's
ideas which I make here I owe to Professor Llano: cf. his Metafisica y Lenguaje (Pamplona:
EUNSA, 1984).
38. In II Sententiarum, 34, I.I, sol:
Quaecumque ergo dicuntur entia quantum ad primum modum, sunt entia quantum ad
secundum mod um ... Non autem omnia quae sunt entia quantum ad secundum mod um sunt
entia quantum ad primum . . . [P]rivationes dicuntur esse entia quantum ad secundum
modum, sed non quantum ad primum.
39. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 30, a. 3c: 'Termini numerates non ponunt aliquid in Deo, (roughly, 'the
application of numerical terms to God does not signify any reality'.
40. See, for example, Commentary on the Metaphysics, L. XI, I.I, n. 1262.
41. See Summa Theologiae, I, q. 18, a. 2c, referring to De Anima, L.II, 415b13: 'Vivere viventibus
est esse.'
42. See A. Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 85-86.
43. Cf. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 1, ad 2.
44. Ibid.
45. Quodlibetales, IX, q. 2, a 3: 'Whiteness is said to exist, not because it has self-existence in itself,
but because by it something has being-white' ('Albedo dicitur esse, non quia ipsa in se subsistat,
sed quia ea aliquid habet esse album').
46. See Commentary on the Physics, L.IV, 11.9-14, where the non-existence of the vacuum is
discussed; see also Chapter 6 below, p. 83.
47. Summa Theologiae, III, q. 16, a. 7, ad 4: 'Ad quartum dicendum quod terminus in subiecto
positus tenetur materialiter, id est pro supposito; positus vero in praedicato, tenetur for-
maliter, id est pro natura significata.' ('The answer to the fourth objection is that a term in
subject-position has material suppositio, that is, it stands for an individual; but when it is in
predicate-position, it has formal suppositio, that is, it stands for the nature which it signifies').
It is clear from this that St Thomas adopts the common logician's convention that in a sentence
of the form 'A est B', 'A' stands for some object, and 'B' stands for some concept (to use Frege's
terminology). A logician such as Burley would probably have made Aquinas's point by saying
'Terminus in subiecto positus supponit personaliter, terminus in praedicato positus supponit
simpliciter'. See A. Broadie, An Introduction to Medieval Logic (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2nd edn, 1993), where this doctrine of Burley's (and of Aquinas's) is given greater attention than
in the first edition.
 The Notion of Existence Used in Answering an est? 79

48. Commentary on the Sentences, I, d. 28, in expositione textus:

Esse dicitur dupliciter: scilicet prout significat veritatem compositionis, et secundum quod
significat actum essentiae. Quando ergo dicitur, Aliud est Patrem esse, aliud est Filium esse,
ita quod ly esse sit praedicatum dicti: significatur esse quod est accidens essentiae; unde falsa
est, quia sicut una est essentia trium, ita et unum esse. Cum autem dicitur, Aliud est esse
Patrem, aliud esse Filium, ita quod ly Patrem praedicetur in dicto, in esse significatur veritas
compositionis.
The text of the last sentence as punctuated by Mandonnet gives no sense at all. Punctuated as
above, one can get the sense given in my translation, though the use of 'in esse' to mean 'in the
word"esse"' is an unusual one. But there is evidence in the manuscripts that this difficult sentence
was corrupted and reconstructed very early: it is possible that what St Thomas wrote was 'Cum
autem dicitur, Aliud est esse Patrem, aliud esse Filium, ita quod ly Patrem praedicetur in dicto,
ly esse significat veritatem compositionis', i.e. 'But when we say: "one thing is 'The Father exists',
another is 'The Son exists"' in such a way that "Father" is the predicate in the sentence, the
"exists" signifies the truth of a composition'.
49. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 3, a. 4, ad 2:
Utrum in Deo sit idem essentia et esse. Ad quartum sic proceditur: videtur quod in Deo non
sit idem essentia et esse .... Praeterea, de Deo scire possum us an sit, ut supra dictum est. Non
autem possumus scire quid sit. Ergo non est idem esse Dei, et quod quid est eius, sive quidditas
vel natura .... Ad secundum dicendum quod esse dupliciter dicitur. Uno modo significat
actum essendi, alio modo significat compositionem propositionis quam anima adinvenit
coniungens praedicatum subiecto. Primo igitur modo accipiendo esse, non possumus scire
esse Dei, sicut nee eius essentiam, sed solum secundo modo. Scimus enim quod haec
propositio quam formamus de Deo, cum dicimus Deus est, vera est: et hoc scimus ex eius
effectibus.
50. See P. T. Geach, in the essay 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers pp. 89-90.
51. See A. N. Prior, Past, Present and Future (Oxford: Clarendon, 1967).
52. I cannot for the life of me find any definite text where St Thomas professes disbelief in the
phoenix. Nor, for that matter, in the centaur, which I would have sworn to. Let us, for the
purposes of this discussion, take it that St Thomas doesn't believe in the phoenix.
53. For 'is not real' St Thomas usually uses some such phrase as 'non est aliquid': see note 34 above.
54. Compare the stuffed mermaid which used to be on show in one of the hotels in Aden: it was, I
gather, the stuffed upper half of a female chimpanzee rather clumsily sewn on to the stuffed lower
half of a large cod.
55. Used byP. T. Geach, in 'Goodandevil',inP. Foot, Theories ofEthics (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1967), p. 64.
56. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, lectio 9, n. 896: 'Sciendum est autem quod iste secundus
modus comparatur ad primum sicut effectus ad causam.' See above, note 13.
57. Cf. also e.g. Quodlibetales, IX, q. 2, a. 3: 'Esse dupliciter dicitur: uno modo secundum quod est
verbalis copula significans compositionem cuiuslibet enuntiationis quam anima facit: unde hoc
esse non est aliquid in rerum naturae, sed tantum in actu animae componentis et dividentis.'
58. See e.g. Frege, Grundlagen der Arithmetik, § 61.
59. See e.g. Commentary on the Metaphysics L.VII, 1.10, nn. 1494-6.
60. See e.g. Frege, Grundlagen der Arithmetik, §§ 23-4.
61. Numbers of angels, see Summa Theologiae, I, q. 50, a. 3c; possible precedence of creation of angels
over material creation, see Summa Theologiae, I, q. 61, a. 3c; precedence of creation of angels over
creation of human beings, see Summa Theologiae, I, q. 90, a. 4c; on eternal existence of three
divine persons, see Summa Theologiae, I, q. 30, a. le.
62. Geach, in the preface to the essay 'Frege', in Three Philosophers p. 130, attributes the following
anecdote to Wittgenstein: 'The last time I saw Frege, ... I said to him: "Don't you ever find any
difficulty in your theory that numbers are objects?" He replied "Sometimes I seem to see a
difficulty - but then again I don't see it".'
 6
•
DEMONSTRATING THE EXISTENCE OF A CAUSE
FROM ITS EFFECT

The last chapter gave an account of the notion of existence which St

Thomas believes to be used in the asking and answering of questions of
the form 'Does X exist?', distinguishing it from other notions which he
perhaps regards as more important. It has been argued that the notion St
Thomas thinks he is using here is substantially identical with the notion
which all post-Fregean philosophers have been familiar with, and thus
need not cause us any particular hesitation.
So much for the question; what about giving the answer? Once the
question 'Does X exist?' has been analysed, distinguished from other
related questions, and clarified, we can at least start to give an answer, but
little that has been said so far gives us any clue to how to attempt an answer.
To discover how to attempt an answer we have to turn again to the
Aristotelian account of science.
In recent years more attention than hitherto has been given to Aristo-
telian accounts of science. It is now widely accepted that Aristotle and his
heirs are not, as was thought at one time, trying vainly to give what we
would call a theory of science - a theory of how to find out, of how
knowledge is acquired - but, as I claimed in Chapter 2, a theory of how
knowledge once found out should ideally be structured. 1 This under-
standing has led to a new appreciation of Aristotelian work. Nevertheless,
though we now understand what Aristotle and his heirs intended to do,
and can thus see their work as valuable, we should not allow this to blind
us to the fact that a theory of Aristotelian science is not enough; we also
need a theory of science in the modern sense. That is, Aristotelians also
need a theory of how to find out.
This chapter aims at investigating whether a theory of the acquisition
of knowledge, a theory of science in the modern sense, can be found in
the writings of Aquinas. The text principally examined will be the Com-
mentary on the Posterior Analytics, where Aquinas, following Aristotle,
discusses both the notion of 'demonstratio quia per effectum' 2 and that of
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 81

answering the question 'an est?'. 3 These two notions are brought together
memorably in the discussion of the possibility of demonstrating the
existence of God from God's effects, which St Thomas gives us immedi-
ately before embarking on the Five Ways, a passage which is worth
recalling.
The answer to the second objection is that when a cause is being
proved by means of its effect, we have to use the effect in the place
of the definition of the cause, in order to prove that the cause exists.
This is particularly the case with God, since in order to prove that
something exists, we have to take as the middle term [sc. in the
demonstration] what its name signifies, not what it is. This is
because the question 'what is it?' follows on from the question 'does
it exist?' But the names of God are imposed in virtue of His effects,
as will be shown later. Hence when we are proving that God exists
by means of His effect, we can take as the middle term what this
name 'God' signifies. 4
The two notions can also be seen to be implicitly used together in
discussions in the Commentary on the Physics, particularly that of the
existence of place. 5
One obstacle in this investigation is that while Aquinas was clearly
interested in finding out, in acquiring scientific knowledge, he seems to
have little explicit interest in a theory that would give an account of the
processes involved. Evidence for such a theory in his writings, then, has
to be sought in asides, as it were, in digressions from what he sees as his
main task of explaining Aristotle's theory of the articulation of a completed
science.
There is another obstacle to our understanding of what Aquinas has to
say, which is at first sight more daunting. The circumstances in which
Aquinas is attempting to build up some kind of natural science may be
thought to be quite different from the circumstances we find ourselves in
when we do science. We, it is often said, typically start from a phenome-
non and look for its cause: this cause, until discovered, has no name in our
language. This is not how things are with Aquinas: he has all the names
he needs, perhaps too many. He has many words such as 'place', 'vacuum',
'self-mover' and the like - words which stand for concepts with an alleged
explanatory role. His task is to find out whether the concepts that these
words stand for are coherent, whether they in fact have any explanatory
role, and whether there is anything in reality that these words stand for.
Hence his typical starting point is a question such as 'an est locus?' or 'an
est vacuum?' (is there such a thing as place or as the vacuum?).
82 God and Explanations

It might be alleged, against this, that though people often claim that
modern science works in the way outlined, often it is not in fact true of
present-day science. The contemporary scientist, it seems, very often does
give names to causes whose very existence, let alone nature, is not
understood. 'Quarks' and 'superstrings', I understand, would be cases in
point. Be that as it may, it is clear that Aquinas's sort of enquiry is not
totally alien to modern science. We can see this quite clearly if we leave
aside the contentious present and look at the recent past: modern scientists
have certainly had occasion to make the same sort of investigation as
Aquinas typically makes. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, for
example, modern scientists had to ask 'does phlogiston exist?', and at the
beginning of the twentieth century, 'does ether exist?' (and I suppose
scientists are probably asking even now 'do superstrings exist? or 'do
quarks exist?'). Hence even modern science may fairly often have to ask
questions of exactly the same form as Aquinas's. We shall see later that in
any case the way in which Aquinas answers such questions uses techniques
analogous to those that must be used to answer the question which is
ideally seen as central to modern science, 'What is the explanation for this
phenomenon?'
There are still other obstacles to our seeking a theory of science, in the
modern sense, in Aquinas, but they are more easily dealt with, at least
initially. For example, Aquinas always speaks of the Aristotelian science
which he is building up by answering questions as expressing 'necessary'
truths. We, on the other hand, do not speak of the truths of science as
necessary, but there can be no doubt that we treat them as if they were
necessary, in Aquinas's sense - that is, as universally and everlastingly, or
even timelessly, true.
Again, we speak of our science as a technique of proving the cause from
the effect, while Aquinas is clear that there can be no demonstratio propter
quid per effectum. 6 It is not hard to get round this difficulty. The apparent
conflict is resolved by noticing that our way of speaking is rather loose.
What we prove is not the explanation, not the propter quid of the phenome-
non, but the truth - the quia - of the hypothesis that we have formed to
explain the phenomenon. We devise a hypothesis to explain a phenome-
non, and what we seek to prove is that this hypothesis is the case. This is
clearly a demonstratio quia, and quia can certainly be demonstrated from
the effect. 7
With these difficulties out of the way, we can go on to Aquinas's
treatment of the answering of questions. Scientific questions are to be
answered by demonstration: 'Science is knowledge acquired by means of
demonstration. We have to acquire knowledge by demonstration of what
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 83

we were previously ignorant of; and we ask questions about what we are
ignorant of.' 8 How, then, according to Aquinas, can demonstration be used
in the answering of questions? The difficulty we face here is that most of
Aquinas's treatments of this relate to the answering of, say, a pupil's
questions by one who is in possession of a complete science. The demon-
strations usually discussed, therefore, are deductive demonstrations from
higher principles, from the causes, from what is 'notius in se', more fully
known in itself, if not always 'quoad nos', more fully known so far as we
are concerned. The material thus needs careful handling if we are to show
what can be demonstrated in the answering of a question by one who does
not possess complete science, but is rather labouring to build it up. 9
The questions usually start with a word. We have drawn attention
above to the claim that modern science is more likely to start with a
phenomenon. We will see later how the two kinds of discussion can be
connected. The aim, then is to start with a word that is in common use
such as 'God', 'place', 'vacuum', or to be found in reputable authors, such
as 'goatstag', 'Idea', 'phlogiston', and discover whether there is anything
that the word picks out. 10 The discussion of 'place' is particularly inter-
esting as it is the clearest case of St Thomas arguing for the existence
rather than the non-existence of something, using the Aristotelian method
he expounds, apart from the rather special case of the existence of God,
on which we are aiming to throw light.
The first thing we need is to understand the word, to have some idea
of the 'significatio nominis', as discussed in Chapter 4. 11 If we do not have
this, we cannot even ask 'Does it exist?'; we cannot ask anything about, it,
except in so far as we can ask about the meaning of a word that is wholly
unknown to us. 12 It is important to notice that a word may include being
a cause in its very signification: this is certainly the case with 'God',
according to Aquinas, 13 and would seem to be the case with 'Idea',
'phlogiston', and probably 'vacuum'. But there are many words which do
not so obviously include the notion of being a cause in their very signifi-
cation: 'goatstag' and 'place' are not immediately obvious to us as causal
concepts.
Some of the discussions of answers to an est questions seem to suggest
that a good understanding of the signification of the word in question
already gives us enough to be able to prove that there is nothing in reality
to correspond to a given word: that the answer to 'an est X?' is 'non est'.
It would seem, that is, that there are words whose signification is such that
there can be nothing in reality that is signified: this would seem to be one
of the approaches adopted in the discussion of 'an est vacuum?' . 14 Again,
Aquinas has a word for 'squaring the circle', 'tetragonismus' .15 It seems
84 God and Explanations

fairly clear that 'An est tetragonismus?', 'Does tetragonism exist?', could
be answered fairly simply by a consideration of the signification of this
word alone. It is perhaps also of interest that Aquinas does not disagree
in general with the view of Averroes, which he cites, that demonstrations
by means of a reductio ad absurdum are often found among 'demonstratio-
nes per sign um vel per effectum', which again are often used in natural
• 16
science.
Consideration of the signification of the word in question, then, may
lead one to be able to answer the an est question in the negative. On the
other hand, such a consideration may lead one to seek to improve or clarify
the usual understanding of the signification of the word. This seems to be
what Aristotle does at the beginning of his discussion of the vacuum, and
Aquinas seems to approve. 17 The usual signification of the word is ac-
cepted, but it is refined of obvious difficulties before the discussion is
permitted to go any further.
We might very well want to do the same thing with the signification
of the word 'goatstag'. The obvious signification of 'goatstag' is 'animal
composed of goat and stag' . 18 This needs clarification. If we take it to
mean an animal that really is composed of parts of two other animals,
then the answer to 'an est hircocervus?', 'does the goatstag exist?', can
probably be given very shortly, in the negative, from a consideration
of the signification of the word alone. But while the ignorant who hear
of the goatstag may take this to be the signification of the word, it is
much more likely that those who first used it meant rather something
like 'Animal that looks as though it is composed of goat and stag'. If
we refine the signification of the word in this way, we have a far more
interesting investigation on our hands, one that could be answered
either affirmatively or negatively.
How can we carry out this investigation? It is clear that while the
signification of the name 'X' may justify us in answering 'an est X?' in the
negative, it need not justify such an answer, and it must also be clear that
it will not justify us in answering it affirmatively. Aquinas saw this point:
one of his objections to the account he accepts of Anselm's argument for
the existence of God (an account which assimilates it to the ontological
argument of Descartes) is that even if we admit that the word 'God' is
understood to signify 'that greater than which nothing can be thought of
- which, as we have seen, he thinks would not be universally admitted -
it does not follow that we understand that what is signified by this name
exists in reality. 19
Some investigations must be continued, then, by other means. Aquinas
actually takes it on himself to demonstrate that God exists. How is this
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 85

possible? To demonstrate one needs a medium demonstrationis. 20 In a

complete science the medium demonstrationis that X exists would be the
definition ofX, 21 but in building up science, a definition ofX is precisely
what we are trying to work towards. We should not forget that we do not
even know yet whether X exists, and if it does not exist, it will have no
nature, and thus no definition. 22 In the case of God, things are yet more
difficult, for Aquinas knows that even if we were to prove that God exists,
we can reach no definition of God. 23 How, then, can God's existence be
demonstrated?
The demonstration actually given of God is a demonstratio causae per
effectum: the effect is used, in place of the definition, as the medium
demonstrationis. 24 It is obvious to everyone, Aquinas thinks, that the word
'God' signifies 'cause of the world'. 25 Aquinas stresses, in the conclusion
of each of his Five Ways, that everyone takes God to be that which has
been proved to exist, 26 and what has been proved to exist is a cause or
explanation of the world, in some causal mode or other. This insistence
on the common understanding of the signification of the word 'God' gains
point from his objection against Anselm, as we have seen, that not
everyone - and least of all the Fool-will understand that the word 'God'
signifies 'that greater than which nothing can be thought of .27 But given
that this is the common understanding of the signification of the word,
we immediately grasp what is to be the medium in a demonstration of
God's existence: it is to be the world, God's effect, considered under any
aspect that may be found suitable. 28
But though the problem is so easily solved in the case of God, it may
not be so simple if, as we said above, the word in question does not include
being a cause in its signification. Aquinas gives us no lead here: but some
kind of an answer can surely be found. An obvious course to take is to
examine the signification of the word more carefully, and decide what the
proper effect of the thing signified might be. The word 'goatstag', for
example, includes in its signification being a kind of animal. We know
what kind of effects we expect from animals - we know, in modern terms,
what evidence to demand for the existence of an animal. It is such an effect,
if it can be found, which will serve as the medium of the demonstration. If
this suggestion is right - that a knowledge of what sort of evidence we can
expect for the existence of a thing is eo ipso, in St Thomas's terms, a
knowledge of what should be the effect of a supposed cause - then every
case of trying to establish the existence will take the form of an argument
from effect (once found) to cause. Every word that we may want to
substitute for 'X' in 'Does X exist?' will be a word which signifies
something with some kind of explanatory role. 29
86 God and Explanations

Thus, to take a case which Aquinas actually does discuss, we know that if
place exists then it will be the terminus, and thus the final cause, of change
of place. Thus change of place can be used, as Aquinas and Aristotle use it,
as the medium of a demonstration of the existence of place. 30
We might point out here that at this point, too, we might be able to
conclude directly to the non-existence of what the word in question
signifies. When the existence of phlogiston was being disputed, Lavoisier
pointed out that according to the theorists who defended it, phlogiston
was supposed to have inconsistent effects - I believe, that the loss of
phlogiston was supposed to have the effect of making a substance heavier
on being released by rusting and tarnishing, and that of making it lighter
on being released by combustion. Thus Lavoisier was able to argue that
there was no such thing as phlogiston.
The investigation must be carried on beyond this point by making use
of Aristotle's notion of proving a cause from its effect. This is discussed
by Aquinas in the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics. 31 It seems that
the notion is used and discussed elsewhere: but, unfortunately, not always
under exactly the same title. In the full discussion in the Commentary on
the Posterior Analytics he speaks of a 'demonstratio quia per effectum',
while in the Summa Theologiae he speaks of 'demonstrare causam esse per
effectum'. Elsewhere he speaks of 'demonstratio per sign um vel per
effectum' or 'demonstratio signi'. 32 How much importance should be
attach to these different formulations?
There seems no reason to suppose that 'demonstratio per signum' is
anything other than equivalent to 'demonstratio per effectum', as Aquinas
seems to imply. It is true that we can consider as a sign of X not only an
effect of X but also its cause, as when we take the stars as signs in the
forecasting of weather;33 and also that we can take one thing as a sign of
another when they both share the same cause, but are not otherwise
directly related as cause and effect. 34 But it is clear that 'demonstratio per
sign um' is contrasted with 'demonstratio propter quid', and can thus
surely be taken as equivalent to 'demonstratio quia per effectum'. 35
It is not so immediately obvious, though, that 'demonstratio quia per
effectum' should be taken as equivalent to 'demonstrare causam esse per
effectum'. After all, 'quia' and 'an est' are supposed to be two different
questions. However, Aquinas tells us explicitly that the two kinds of
question are very closely related. Neither can be answered by a demon-
stration without first finding out that a medium exists, 36 so every question
quia at least involves a question an est.
When we are asking' An est X?', then if the signification of 'X' includes
being a cause then it will obviously be possible to demonstrate that X exists
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 87

by means of its effect. Even if the signification of 'X' is not so clear, we

can, it has been suggested, probably work out what kind of effect X might
have. We need to examine whether there is any such phenomenon as what
the effect of X would be; but the phenomenon that we pick on as our
medium demonstrationis, as the effect of X, will presumably be one which
either is obvious to the senses or might be if we came across it. The
question an est? and the question quia? both involve the question 'an est
medium?', is there a medium?, but if we choose our medium correctly the
answer to this will be obvious. Hence, incidentally, the description of such
a proof as 'demonstratio per signum'. If the effect is obvious when the
cause is not, the effect is a sign of the cause, something that indicates the
cause to us. 'There's no smoke without fire', we say, using even in our
contemporary proverb what any medieval thinker would have given as a
prime case of a 'natural sign'. 37 ·
A more rigorous answer can be given by insisting that cause and effect
are correlative terms. Since what is demonstrated by demonstratio in the
strict sense, scientific demonstratio per causam, is always an effect of that
cause, we must expect that the only thing that can be demonstrated per
effectum is a cause. 38 Moreover, any question about whether a cause exists
- a question an est - can be re-expressed as a question about whether it is
the case that A is the cause of B - a question quia. It would seem necessary
to grant, in fact, that every question 'an est?' can be answered by a
demonstratio quia, and if we have no knowledge of the cause then the
demonstration must be by means of the effect. Thus we can use demon-
stratio quia per effectum to demonstrate that a cause exists - demonstrare
causam esse per effectum. 'Does A exist?', a question of the an est type, is
answered adequately by 'A is the cause of B', which at first sight is the
answer to a question of the quia type.
A point that may be important here is the way in which Aquinas's
typical questions of the 'an est X?' type differ from the questions which
we might take as typical of modern science, where there is no name such
as 'X' for the cause that we are trying to discover. We have said that
Aquinas starts from a word, and wants to try to demonstrate that the word
stands for something in reality. In order to do this, he first tries to establish
the answer to the question 'What would be the effect of what the word
stands for, if anything?', in order to be able to use this effect as a medium.
We also pointed out that the answer to 'an est X?' where Xis taken to be
a cause, as here, can be expressed as an answer to a question of the type
quia: whether it is the case that this effect is caused by X. This possibility
is enough to entitle us to blur the distinction between the two types:
Aquinas explicitly says that what the mind accepts as an answer to a
88 God and Explanations

question is the answer to that question, 39 and 'A is the cause of B' would
certainly be accepted as an answer to the question 'Does A exist?'. The
difference between this kind of question and modern ones where there is
no name for the cause can thus be seen to be unimportant. Aquinas usually
starts with a word for a cause, whose existence he then proceeds to prove
from its effect; we, perhaps, usually start with a phenomenon, about whose
cause we form a hypothesis, and then proceed to prove the existence of
the cause from the nature of the effect. The existence of the name is
evidence that commonly a hypothesis has been formed. 40
Naturally, we could always invent a word for the cause of the phenome-
non, which would bring our practice exactly into line with Aquinas's.
Thus it is possible to make a rather trivial reduction of our account of
finding out to Aquinas's. What is more important is the fact that in
Aquinas's account the signification of the word that the investigation
starts with plays the same role as a hypothesis about the nature of the cause
does in ours. In neither case are we attempting what Aquinas regards as
the impossible task of demonstrating 'propter quid per effectum': in both
cases we have a quia to demonstrate. Thus the fact that Aquinas does not
have an account of hypothesis, which one thinks of as a key notion in a
theory of science, is perfectly explicable, and does not mean that his theory
of finding out must be radically flawed.
The question now is, how does demonstratio per effectum work? The
exposition which Aquinas gives of Aristotle's account, in the Commentary
on the Posterior Analytics, 41 adds little to what Aristotle himself says. Of
more interest is what he actually does in his use of such demonstrations.
The strategy he adopts in the Five Ways, for example, is to examine the
characteristics of the alleged effect of God, that is, the characteristics of
the world, the whole complex of things in process of change that we see
about us. Since the world is a complex of things in process of change, it
must be caused by something not in process of change, something,
therefore, outside the world. He then points out that 'cause of the
processes of change in the world, not itself in process of change' is
generally accepted as being part of the signification of the word 'God'. 42
A similar strategy is used in the discussion of the existence of place. The
phenomenon of change of place demands a terminus as final cause, and
the signification of the word 'place' is certainly that of'terminus of change
of place'. 43
It is not clear whether the conclusion reached by such a demonstration
is scientific or not- that is, whether it must be necessary, universally and
eternally true. 44 It has already been mentioned that for Aquinas the effect
cannot exist without the cause, while the cause can exist without the
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 89

effect;45 thus though, given the effect, the cause must exist, it does not
follow that given the cause the effect must exist. Will the connection I
have demonstrated count as scientific knowledge? It would seem not, as
there need be no necessity about the connection between cause and effect:
though we have been able to demonstrate the cause from the effect, it may
not be possible to demonstrate the effect from the cause. Thus the
knowledge which has been acquired need not be part of a system of
scientific knowledge in the Aristotelian sense, though it would certainly
count as scientific knowledge in the modern sense. 46
The problem appears particularly acute when we consider some of
Aquinas's reflections on the peculiar characteristics of natural science.
Aquinas insists that this kind of argumentation is especially frequent in
natural science: demonstratio per effectum is very frequent, 47 demonstration
along the line of efficient and final causality is more common in natural
science than in other sciences,48 and demonstration in natural science
tends to demonstrate the existence of one thing from the existence of
another which is really, not merely rationally, distinct from it. 49 But this
seems to cast doubt on whether it is possible to produce an Aristotelian
natural science at all. This perhaps does not threaten St Thomas's project
of proving the existence of God, but it does seem to threaten my aim of
showing that the notions used by St Thomas in his Five Ways are not ad
hoc, but have a wide field of application in other parts of philosophy; and
indeed, as I have hoped to suggest, that what St Thomas has to say about
the acquisition of science is in general of considerable value even to
contemporary discussions.
It may be that no general answer is possible here, but we can at least
indicate certain lines of argument that may be useful. It seems that in some
cases at least, once we have established the existence of a cause, it may be
possible to go on to establish that the connection between cause and effect
is necessary in the relevant sense.
To show it as necessary in the relevant sense we have to establish that
the effect follows necessarily, that is, by nature, from the cause. To do this
we have to be able to establish what the nature of the cause is: we have to
be able to find its real definition. So far we have been working with a more
or less refined nominal definition, what Aquinas calls the 'significatio
nominis'. It is important to remember that until it is demonstrated that
the cause exists, we cannot have any better definition: there are no
definitions, in the strict sense, of what does not exist. 50
Now that we have established the existence of the cause, are we any
better off? The answer, in Aquinas's mind, seems to be that it all depends.
We now know that this cause has these effects; we can use these to further
90 God and Explanations

refine the notion we have of the signification of the word that stands for
the cause. Aquinas follows Aristotle in doing this for the notion of place,
or rather, explains that this is what Aristotle is doing. 51 This refinement
is carried out by answering counter-arguments based on the signification
of the word 'place'. Aristotle has given an argument to prove that place
exists, from the existence of change of place. In this section he puts
forward objections to this argument, based on claims that the signification
of the word 'place' is such that nothing in reality can be signified by it -
that the expression is in some way self-contradictory, and that thus place
does not exist, and that the argument given for its existence must be
fallacious. Aristotle is able to refute all these, and in the process learn some
more about place - that it cannot be, for example, as some of the
counter-arguments suggest, either a body or a non-bodily substance.
But a clarification of our understanding of the signification of the word in
question is not yet the production of a definition. However, Aquinas holds
that if the effects are 'adaequati' or 'proportionati' to the cause then we can
actually use the effects to discover the nature of the cause; and that even if
they are not, as the world is not 'adaequatus' or 'proportionatus' to God, we
can at least discover some 'conditiones', characteristics, of the cause.
But there are some things which cannot be known by us by our
considering them directly themselves, but only by considering their
effects. If an effect is 'adequate' to its cause, then the nature of the
effect is taken as a principle in demonstrating the existence of the
cause and in tracing the nature of the cause. And from this, in turn,
the properties of the cause are made clear. But if the effect is not
'adequate' to the cause, then the effect is made the principle of a
demonstration that the cause exists, and also of some of its charac-
• • 52
tenst1cs.
The exact meaning of 'adaequatus' and 'proportionatus' is not clear. In
one place at least, consideration of a parallel passage seems to indicate that
Aquinas holds that material effects are not sufficiently adaequati to spiri-
tual causes for us to come to any real understanding of spiritual beings. 53
It is interesting, though, that Aquinas's most famous use of the word
adaequatus, in his account of truth and knowledge, seems positively to
demand an adaequatio between the material and the non-material. But we
need not, perhaps, go into this question too deeply: it seems that it will be
possible to acquire some knowledge of the nature of the cause, either
directly or indirectly, from knowledge of any effects. 54
The step can be made if the effects from which the cause is being proved
are, as Aristotle and Aquinas seem to think that ideally they should be, 55
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 91

'convertibiles' with their cause. It seems obvious that effects which are
'convertibiles' with their cause must be 'adaequati' or 'proportionati'.
Such effects, being 'convertibiles', are themselves properties of the
cause. 56 From the properties of a thing we can come to know its nature:
this is frequently stated. We should notice also that this acquisition of
knowledge could be considered as yet another demonstration of cause
from effect, since accidents can be considered as signa of essence, 57 though
presumably the cause and the effect are to be found in the line of formal
causality rather than of efficient causality.
Thus when the effects are convertibiles we can infer directly, by one
demonstration, what the nature of the cause is. But Aquinas tells us that
if the effects are not convertibiles, nor even proportionati or adaequati, we
can at least infer - by demonstration of cause from effect again, we must
presume - some characteristics of the cause. 58 These characteristics may
well be properties that are convertibiles with the cause, even if the effects
themselves are not. From these properties, then, we can, as above, infer
the nature of the thing whose properties they are, again by a demonstration
of cause from effect in the line of formal causality.
There is a difficulty here, though. The conditiones of the cause which
some effect may give us knowledge may not be properties of it, but some
non-proper accidents. It is to be supposed that Aquinas would answer that
in that case the causality would not be per se - not necessary in the relevant
sense - but merely per accidens. 59 But this is only to re-state the problem.
What happens if we mistakenly take the non-proper accidents of the cause
to be properties of it, as may very well happen, and develop, on that basis,
an erroneous definition of the cause?
We may observe that on Aquinas's own showing this may happen very
easily: in the discussion of the existence of God Aquinas regards it as
important that the word 'God' is imposed in virtue of God's effects. But
a name may very easily be imposed in virtue of a per accidens effect. The
word 'lapis', according to Aquinas and Isidore, as we have seen, is imposed
in virtue of the per accidens effect of a stone in hurting the feet. The
strategy successfully adopted in proving the existence of God might easily
lead to disaster in proving the existence, and arguing for the nature, of
stones. 60
The answer to this difficulty would seem to be that it is not the task of
a theory of science to provide an infallible methodology: only to describe
the way the method works when it does work correctly. It is surely not an
objection to a theory of science that a science which is built up according
to the method it prescribes may sometimes be mistaken. It is true, though,
that we need an account of how such mistakes may come to light and be
92 God and Explanations

put right, and this, it seems, Aquinas does not provide. We can only appeal
to the way in which chains of explanation converge and can be compared.
We infer from the existence and characteristics of the effect the exist-
ence of a cause, and we attribute the efficacy to something in the cause.
This may be a property, in which case we will be correct when we infer
something about the nature of the cause from it, or it may be a non-proper
accident. If we take a non-proper accident of a cause as a property, then
we are eo ipso taking the effect to be a per se one when in fact it is only per
accidens. A per accidens effect is the result of the convergence of more than
one line of causality. 61 Thus our account will lead to some gap or some
redundance in our account of some other line of causality, which may quite
easily come to light.
Moreover, we will take the nature of the cause to be other than it really
is. These errors are surely likely to show themselves sooner or later. It may
take a long time, and when they do show themselves prejudice may make
it hard for us to accept the need to rethink that part of science - but that
is actually what happened with the overthrow of the phlogiston theory.
Aquinas's theory of science has not yet been shown to be inadequate as an
account of the history of modern science.
It is surely true, though, that even if we do rightly identify properties
of the cause, and they are able to tell us something about the nature of
the cause, this need not yet give us a suitable definition. Aquinas
himself points out that some properties - shape, for example - are of
more use than others in reaching a knowledge of the nature of a thing,
in deciding on a definition. 62 If the effects only allow us to conclude the
existence of some properties, there is no guarantee that these properties
will be the ones from which the nature can be inferred. This is again
an apparently serious objection, but surely all it means is that science
is not easy, and that we may need to amass a great deal of information
about effects before we have anything like complete knowledge of the
cause.
Science is not as easy as the sketchiness of the account extracted from
Aquinas seems, at first sight, to suggest it is. But the account should be
taken, not as a list of simple instructions, by following which we will
infallibly build up a science, but rather as an account of how science works
when, as a matter of fact, it is done successfully. Aquinas does not suggest
that you can simply read off the definition of a thing from its properties
- you will need to have, if not a full, at least an adequate list of the
properties, and apply the methods of definition correctly.
The methods of definition he gives are those of Aristotle: genus and
difference, and 'like and unlike'. 63 It would be interesting to investigate
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 93

how these are supposed to work: it may be that even in developing

definitions we are to apply the notions outlined above. For example, genus
is related to specific difference as matter is to form, 64 so perhaps part of
arriving at a definition is the inference of a material cause from an effect,
following the rules of demonstratio causae per effectum. But even if it proves
that there is no application of the account developed here in the theory of
definition, which is the heart of Aquinas's theory of scientia, at least the
account developed here seems to give the skeleton without which that
theory could not stand up.
The claim, then, is that St Thomas's discussion of the existence of God
can be seen to be in line with his overall theory of the construction of a
science, particularly in regard to the answering of questions of existence.
Further, I claim that this theory has nothing mysterious about it, but is
closely parallel to the familiar, pedestrian sort of scientific/philosophical
discussion that takes place when the validity of an explanatory hypothesis
is in question. There is nothing odd about the question of whether there
is a God, and there is nothing odd in the way that St Thomas sets about
answering it, any more than there is in the way he sets about answering
any other question of the same type.

NOTES

1. See the introduction to J. Barnes, translation and commentary of Aristotle's Posterior Analytics,
(Oxford: Clarendon, 1975).
2. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.1, 1.23, 196--200.
3. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, especially I.I, 407-17: see pp. 33-6 above.
4. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2:
Ad secundum dicendum quod, cum demonstratur causa per effectum, necesse est uti effectu
loco definitionis causae ad probandum causa esse: et hoc maxime contingit in Deo, quia ad
probandum aliquid esse, necesse est accipere pro medio, quid significet nomen, non autem
quod quid est, quia quaestio quid est sequitur ad quaestionem an est. Nomina autem Dei
imponuntur ab effectibus, ut postea ostendetur: unde demonstrando Deum esse per effectum,
accipere possumus pro medio, quid significet hoc nomen Deus.
See above, pp. 39-40.
5. Commentary on the Physics, L. IV, 11.1-2, 406--21 and 1.8, 487-93 (a passage too long and too
dense to quote adequately here).
6. In the Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.23, n. 195, it is stated that one way in which
a demonstratio quia can differ from a demonstratio propter quid is that the former can be 'per effecta'
while the latter cannot. 'In his quae probantur per effecta demonstratur quia, et non propter
quid.'
7. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.23: see note 6.
8. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, I. I, n. 408: 'Scientia est cognitio per demonstra-
tionem acquisita. Eorum autem oportet per demonstrationem cognitionem acquirere, quae ante
fuerint ignota: et de his quaestionem facimus, quia ignoramus.'
9. But see above, Chapter 2, p. 33.
10. Existence of God: Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3; of place: Commentary on the Physics, L.II,
11.1-2; of vacuum: Commentary on the Physics, L.IV, 11.9-14; of goatstag: Commentary on the
Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.6, n. 461, Commentary on the Perihermeneias, L.I, 1.3, n. 35; ofldeas:
Summa Theologiae, I, q. 15, a. I.
94 God and Explanations

11. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LIi, 1.6, n. 461.

For there is no quiddity or essence of that which does not exist: so no-one can know what
something that does not exist is. But one can know the signification of the name, or a
description made up out of several names. In this way someone could know what the name
'tragelaphus' (or 'goatstag', which is the same) signifies: he could know that it signifies 'some
kind of animal made up of goat and stag'. But it is impossible to know what the goatstag is,
for nothing in reality is a goatstag.
Quia enim non entis non est aliqua quidditas vel essentia, de eo quod non est nullus potest
scire quod quid est; sed potest scire significationem nominis, vel rationem ex pluribus
nominibus compositam: sicut potest aliquis scire quid significat hoc nomen tragelaphus, vel
hircocervus, quod idem est, quia significat quoddam animal compositum ex hirco et cervo;
sed impossibile est scire quod quid est hircocervi, quia nihil est tale in rerum natura.
See above, Chapter 4, p. 38.
12. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 10, ad 5: 'If there were someone who had no knowledge of God
under any description whatsoever, he would not even name Him, except perhaps as we utter
words whose meaning we are ignorant of.' ('Si vero aliquis esset qui secundum nullam rationem
Deum cognosceret, nee ipsum nominaret, nisi forte sicut proferimus nomina quorum significa-
tionem ignoramus.') See above, Chapter 4, p. 46.
13. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2 - see above Chapter 4, pp. 39--40, 46.
14. Commentary on the Physics, LIV, 11.13, nn. 541-3. For example, n. 541: 'For the word "vacuum"
sounds like something empty and non-existent; and it sounds empty and unreasonable and untrue
that the vacuum should exist.' (Nam vacuum sonat aliquid inane et quod non est; et inaniter et
absque ratione et veritate quod vacuum sit.')
15. Commentary on the Physics, LI, 1.2, n. 18: 'tetragonism, or the squaring of the circle' ('tetragonis-
mum, id est quadraturam circuli').
16. Averroes is credited with the idea in Commentary on the Physics, LVII, 1.1, n. 889. Cf. also
Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LI, 1.40, nn. 35lff.; Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate,
1.2, q. 2, a. 1, resp. ad q. 1.1: 'The demonstration by means of a sign or by means of an effect is
of frequent use in natural science' ('demonstratio quae est per signum vel per effectum, magis
usitatur in scientia naturali ').
17. Commentary on the Physics, LIV, 1.10, nn. 509-11, especially 509-10: 'In these three ways, then,
the signification of this name can be taken ... Then [Aristotle] shows us what needs to be added
to this signification' ('Sic igitur tribus modis potest accipi huius nominis significatio ... deinde
... ostendit quid addendum sit ad hanc significationem').
18. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LII, 1.6, n. 461: 'Quoddam animal compositum ex hirco
et cervo.'
19. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 1, ad 2: 'Dato autem quod quilibet intelligat hoc nomine Deus
significari hoc quod dicitur, scilicet id quo maius cogitari non potest, non tamen propter hoc
sequitur quod intelligat id quod significatur per nomen esse in rerum naturae.'
20. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LII, 1. 1, n. 407: 'In demonstrationibus autem cognitio
conclusionis accipitur per medium . . . medium in demonstrationibus assumitur ad aliquid
innotescendum.'
21. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LII, 1.1, n. 415: 'Non ergo demonstratio resolver in
primam causam, nisi accipiatur ut medium demonstrationis definitio subiecti.'
22. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, LII, 1.6, n. 461; Commentary on the Posterior Analytics,
LI, 1.2, n. 17: see above, Chapter 4, pp. 33--6, 38.
23. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 3, preamble: 'We cannot know what God is' ('De Deo non possumus
scire quid sit').
24. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2: see above, p. 81.
25. 'The names of God are imposed in virtue of God's effects' ('Nomina Dei imponuntur ab
effectibus'): Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2, quoted above, Chapter 4, pp. 39--40, and in
this chapter, p. 81. See also texts from Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13 quoted above in Chapter 4,
pp. 40-7.
26. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3: see above, Chapter 4, pp. 39, 47, and below, Chapter 7, pp. 104-5.
27. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 1: see above, Chapter 4, p. 39 and note 9.
28. For example, as a system of efficient causality (perhaps the first and certainly the second way).
See below, Chapters 9 and 10, pp. 132--44 and 146-53.
29. See above, this chapter, p. 81, where the expression 'explanatory role' is used, and below, this
chapter, p. 88, on hypothesis.
 Demonstrating the Existence ofa Cause from its Effect 95
30. Commentary on the Physics, L.IV, 1.1, n. 411: 'It is local change that makes people recognise place
... place is something real, ... and is the terminus of local change' ('Transmutatio secundum
locum induxit homines ad cognitionem loci ... locus est aliquid, et ... est terminus motus
localis. ').
31. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.23, nn. 195-200.
32. Demonstrationes per signum and demonstrationes per effictum, and use in natural science, Commen-
tary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. 1, resp. ad. q. I.I: see above, Chapter 2, note 8, and
below, note 48; demonstratio signi, Commentary on the Physics L.VII, 1.1, n. 889.
33. De Veritate q. 9, a. 4, ad. 5; Summa Theologiae, I, q. 70, a. 2, ad 2.
34. Ibid.
35. Commentary on the Physics, L.VII, 1.1, n. 889.
36. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.1 n. 412: 'In a question "does it exist?", or in a
question "Is it the case?", we are asking whether a medium exists' ('Qy.aeritur enim in quaestione
si est, vel quia est, an sit id quod est medium').
37. Cf. e.g. Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 95, a. Sc.
38. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.18, n. 570: a rather complex passage, but one whose
clear moral is that the effect is demonstrated through the cause, and the cause is demonstrated
through the effect.
39. See Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.1 n. 409.
40. See above Chapter 3, note 1 and note 29 in this chapter, on explanatory role.
41. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.23, nn. 195-200.
42. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3. See below, Chapter 9, pp. 141-2.
43. Commentary on the Physics L.IV, 1.1, n. 411: see above, this chapter, note 30.
44. Though we should notice that for Aquinas a truth may still be 'universal' and 'necessary' in the
relevant sense, even if it has counter-examples, owing to the indeterminacy of matter. I am
grateful to Professor S. Knuuttila, who made this point to me in discussion. See also the
discussions above in chapter 2, pp. 20--1, 25-30.
45. See e.g. Commentary on the Periherrneneias, L.I, 1.14, n. 186; and see above, p. 20.
46. See above, p. 21.
47. Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate 1.2, q. 1, a. 1, ad. 9: 'Effectus sensibiles, ex quibus procedunt
naturales demonstrationes . . .' ('Sensible effects, from which the demonstrations of natural
science are drawn ... '); and q. 2, a. I, resp. ad q. I.I: see above, this chapter, note 27.
48. Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. I, resp. ad q. 1.1: 'In natural science, in which
we perform demonstration by extrinsic causes [i.e. not by the material or the formal cause, which
are 'intrinsic' causes], we prove one thing from another which is wholly extrinsic to it' ('Sed in
scientia naturali, in qua fit demonstratio per causas extrinsecas, probatur aliquid de una re per
aliam omnino extrinsecam').
49. Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. 1, resp. ad q. I.I: 'This is most obviously the
case in natural science, where we pass from the knowledge of one thing to the knowledge of
another - e.g. from the knowledge of the effect to the knowledge of the cause. And it is not that
we pass from one thing to another that is distinct from it merely in reason, and not distinct in
reality.' ('Hoc magis in scientia naturali servatur, ubi ex cognitione unius in cognitionem alterius
devenitur, sicut ex cognitione effectus in cognitionem causae. Et non proceditur solum ab uno
in aliud secundum ration em, quod non est aliud secundum rem.') See also note 48 of this chapter.
50. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.II, 1.6, n. 461; Commentary on the Posterior Analytics,
L.I, 1.2, n. 17: see above, Chapter 2, pp. 24-5, and Chapter 4, p. 38.
51. Commentary on the Physics, L. IV, 1.5, nn. 446ff. E.g. at 447: 'Then ... he shows what sort of
definition should be given of "place" ' ('Deinde ... ostendit qualis debeat esse definitio danda
de loco').
52. Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. 4, ad 2:
Qy.aedam vero res sunt quae non sunt nobis cognoscibiles ex seipsis, sed per effectus suos. Et
si quidem effectus sit adaequatus causae, ipsa quidditas effectus accipitur ut principium ad
demonstrandum causam esse, et ad investigandum quidditatem eius, ex qua iterum proprie-
tates eius ostendentur. Si autem sit effectus non adaequatus causae, tune effectus efficitur
principium ad demonstrandum causam esse, et aliquas conditiones eius.
Cf. also Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 3.
53. Parallel to Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. 4, ad. 2: Summa Theologiae, I, q. 88,
a. 2.
54. But see below, Chapter 8, pp. llS and 125--o.
96 God and Explanations
55. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.23, n. 195-200.
56. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.I, 1.8, n. 73; 1.31, n. 267.
57. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, 1.14, n. 533: 'We should ... consider their proper
passions [e.g. quantity and quality, as explained in the previous sentence], since, as has been said,
these are signs that make obvious the proper forms of species' ('Oportet ... considerare proprias
passiones, quae, sicut dictum est, sunt signa manifestantia formas proprias specierum').
58. Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate, 1.2, q. 2, a. 4, ad. 2. See above, this chapter, note 52.
59. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, 1.19, nn. 576ff. This passage is too long and too dense
to quote effectively here, but the whole discussion is one of whether a single cause implies a single
effect, and vice-versa.
60. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. 2, ad 2: see above, Chapter 4, p. 40.
61. On the relationship between causality and the per accidens, see Chapter 8, pp. 113-14.
62. Commentary on the Physics, L. VII, 1.5, n. 917: 'Shapes correspond to the species of things most
closely, and show them most clearly' ('Figurae maxime consequuntur et demonstrant speciem
rerum'). It is presumably for this reason that non-zoologists regard black swans as black swans
rather than rather large and odd-shaped aquatic crows.
63. Commentary on the Posterior Analytics, L.11, 1.14, nn. 537ff: 'First he puts forward the most
appropriate way of tracing what belongs to a definition, i.e. the division of a genus' ('Primo
proponit mod um maxime convenientem ad investigandum ea quae sunt in definitione ponenda,
scilicet per divisionem generis'). Also L.11, 1.16: 'Here he teaches us to trace the essence in
another way ... If one is seeking the definition of a thing, one has to pay attention to the things
that are like it, and also to the things that are unlike it' ('Hie docet investigare quod quid est alio
modo ... si aliquis inquirit definitionem alicuius rei, oportet quod attendat ad ea quae sunt similia
illi, et etiam ad ea quae sunt differentia ab ilia re').
64. Genus as matter of species, Commentary on the Perihenneneias, L.I, 1.8, n. 97. 'The specific
difference applies to the genus in its own right, not coincidentally; it delimits it, in the same way
that form delimits matter' ('Differentia advenit generi non per accidens sed per se, tamquam
determinativa ipsius, per modum quo materia determinatur per formam').
 7
•
THE EXISTENCE OF GOD AS A SCIENTIFIC
QUESTION

I have claimed in the last chapter that the sketchy account of the building
up of a science which Aquinas gives us, by way of answering questions of
the form 'Does X exist?' by demonstrating the cause from the effect, is
one that should satisfy us. It is coherent with the rest of the theory of
science which St Thomas and Aristotle espouse, and it is consistent with
the methods they actually employ in their development of sciences. It is
consonant with common sense, and clearly matches a great deal of the
experience of scientists in recent centuries.
The present chapter is a central one. In it I aim to bring together the
different doctrines of Aquinas which have been so far explained, and to
show how they relate to the particular question of God's existence. That
is, I have expounded what kind of inquiry St Thomas takes himself to be
undertaking, and set out what he believes to be the rules and techniques
to apply in such an inquiry, and what its order should be. It should be a
scientific inquiry, carried out as a scientific inquiry should be, starting
with questions of existence, which may require a preliminary examination
of the meaning of the words used: the 'X' and the 'exist' used in 'Do X's
exist?'. It should be an attempt to show the existence of a cause from its
effect. All these features, I shall claim, can be found in St Thomas's
approach to the question 'Does God exist?'.
A key text here is Summa Theologiae, q. 2, articles 1 and 2, where St
Thomas asks whether the existence of God is not so obvious to us that it
does not need demonstration, and whether it is in any case possible to
demonstrate it. These two articles discuss to what extent the existence of
God is a question to be solved by reason, or by faith in authority; they
suggest an answer to the question to what extent the existence of God is
a scientific matter, and they hint at the relation between this kind of
question (an est) and other questions. They make reference forward to
Aquinas's later discussion of the signification of the word 'God',1 and they
make it clear that the existence of God is to be proved by showing reasons
98 God and Explanations

for regarding the world as an effect and by proving the existence of a cause.
Later texts, some of them clearly referred to here,2 develop the account of
the signification of the word 'God' and establish a clear connection
between the notion of 'cause of the world', under some description or
other, and the signification of the word 'God'.
First, the question of the existence of God is a question to be answered
by reason rather than by authority; or, at least, a question which can be
answered by reason, and does not need to be answered by authority.
Naturally there is a curious problem involved in the notion of believing
in God on the authority of God who reveals his existence, on which a
number of things could be said. 3 But this problem need not be faced here.
It is worthwhile making the point that in fact most people who believe in
God believe it because they have been told that there is a God by people
they respect, and despite the fact that they have probably been told that
there is no God by people who they otherwise respect. 4 Equally, most
people who believe there is no God believe it because they have been told
that there is no God by people they respect, though they have probably
also been told that there is a God by people they otherwise respect. The
lessons of Chapter 1 of this book, on the respect due to the argument for
authority, should make us slow to condemn either attitude as intellectually
valueless. But Chapter 1 should also make us realise that different argu-
ments from authority may have different values.
Two crucial elements for determining the value of an argument from
authority are the trustworthiness of those who transmit the authoritative
teaching, and the intrinsic value of its source. It is often said that the
trustworthiness of those who transmit the teaching that there is a God is
vitiated by the fact that they very much want there to be a God - it is a
question of wishful thinking. Clearly, for this remark to have any validity,
the idea of God thus transmitted has to be the idea given by traditional
religion, of a God who will bring the dead to life and reward those who
have served him. But it is worth remembering that this same God of
traditional religion has what we might call a dark side. Involved in the
traditional religion of Western culture is the idea that God is the supreme
end of human life, and that without possession of God human existence
will be both endless and pointless. Traditional believers have to believe
that both they and all those they care for stand in immediate danger of
having to face an eternity of misery. No-one can possibly be a traditional
believer through wishful thinking, though one might be a modernistic or
liberal believer. But there is no sanction from tradition or authority for
being a liberal or modernistic believer. A traditional believer may retort
on the unbeliever with a tu quoque: a refusal to believe in God may equally
 The Existence of God as a Scientific Question 99

be wishful thinking, a refusal to face up to unpleasant realities. As a

genuine effort to help a friend who one suspects of wishful thinking,
remarks of this kind may have their value, but they have no place in serious
debate about the existence of God. As general remarks, they are simply
unfounded rudenesses, which will get us no further.
As regards the question of the intrinsic value of the origin of the authority
and the tradition, the believer is in fact on slightly stronger ground than
the unbeliever. Leaving aside the knotty question of whether we can
believe in God on God's authority, the believer can appeal to, for example,
the authority of Moses, who spoke to God face to face. Moses allegedly
had experience of the existence of God, and a trust in the tradition that
goes back to Moses is a trust in that experience. The unbeliever, on the
other hand, cannot trace back his tradition to the authority of, say,
Bradlaugh, who had an experience of God not existing. There is no such
kind of experience. Of course the unbeliever can allege that the believer's
tradition does not go back to Moses, or that Moses's experience was
illusory, and these claims are quite plausible. There are such things as false
and garbled traditions, on anyone's account, and there are such things as
delusory experiences. But it is important to notice that some such claim
must be made by the unbeliever to undermine the evidence presented by
the believer. At this stage the unbeliever is on the defensive, the believer
has the initiative, the believer is logically one jump ahead of the unbeliever.
It is no doubt true that in the present age the unbeliever will claim to
have arguments for not believing in God. But in our present age the
respect which is due to the argument from authority and tradition is
largely ignored. Very few people will admit to basing their beliefs on
authority and tradition, despite the fact that most of our beliefs are so
based. Anyone, believer or unbeliever, will claim to have arguments, other
than those of authority and tradition, for what he or she believes. The
question is, should we admit the claim? Without putting in question
anyone's sincerity, the very badness of arguments which are often adduced
either for or against the existence of God should make us doubt whether
a belief in God or a belief in the non-existence of God can possibly be
really based on the arguments alleged.
This point cuts both ways; it affects both sides in the dispute. Many
believers claim that they believe in God on the basis of arguments, and
many of them are capable of enunciating the arguments which they
consider to be the basis for their belief in God. It is a matter of extremely
gross observation that many of these arguments are very bad indeed. Some
people will say that they believe in God because of the obviously non-
natural character of moral norms. 5 This is a very poor argument indeed,
100 God and Explanations

since it is not obvious to most people that moral norms are non-natural.
Still poorer is Descartes' Ontological Argument, which a number of
people profess to be the basis of their belief in God. Yet others will give
a muddled and indeed self-contradictory farrago based on one or other of
St Thomas's Five Ways: 'Everything has to have some cause, therefore
there must be some thing that has no cause and causes all the rest.' A
sincere belief that one has arguments for one's beliefs is no guarantee that
one does in fact have them. If this is true of the one who believes, it may
equally be true of the one who disbelieves. There is no a priori reason for
supposing that atheists have any more non-traditional, non-authoritative
rational grounds for their belief that God does not exist, than theists have
for their belief that God does exist. What we have to do in either case is
examine exactly what the rational grounds, the arguments, are.
This is certainly the view of St Thomas, who puts forward and answers
a fideist objection:
Apparently the existence of God is not something that can be
demonstrated. For the existence of God is an article of faith. But the
things that belong to faith are not things that can be demonstrated,
since demonstration makes us know, and faith is of those things
which are not obvious, as St Paul makes clear in Hebrews 11. So the
existence of God is not something that can be demonstrated ....
To the first objection we must reply that the existence of God,
and other things that can be known of God by natural reason (see
Romans 1), are not articles of faith, but approaches to the articles of
faith. Faith presupposes natural knowledge, as grace presupposes
nature, and any perfection presupposes something that is made
perfect. There is no objection to something's being in its own right
a thing that can be demonstrated and known, while by some indi-
vidual who does not grasp the demonstration it is accepted as
something believed. 6
Moreover, the existence of God is not merely something known by the
natural light of human reason, rather than by faith: it is something that
requires argument, a demonstrative process. It is not, as some believers
have thought, something obvious to all human beings. It is an interesting
fact of psychology that a number of believers seem to have thought that
supposed unbelievers really know in their heart that there is a God and
are only pretending to believe that there isn't. It is also an interesting fact
of psychology that a number of unbelievers seem to have thought that
supposed believers really know in their hearts that there is no God, and
are only pretending to believe that there is one. I mention this merely to
 The Existence of God as a Scientific Question 101

remind the reader that we are on delicate ground, where the most irra-
tional beliefs - about the motives and attitudes of other people, at the very
least - can apparently strike very deep roots. The rather cool rational
attitude of St Thomas in these questions is in fact rather uncommon, and
we should not take for granted that we share it, though we should certainly
accept it as a good model to follow.
St Thomas discusses the question of whether or not the existence of
God is known to all in the following passage:
Apparently God's existence is known to us in its own right. Things
are said to be known to us in their own right when a knowledge of
them is fixed in us by nature, as is clear from the case of the first
principles. But, as Damascene says, 'the knowledge that God exists
is fixed in all by nature.' Therefore God's existence is known to us
in its own right ....
To the first objection, we should say that to know that God exists
under some common description, and subject to some confusion, is
indeed something that is fixed in our nature; i.e. in so far as God is
human flourishing. For human beings by nature desire their own
flourishing, and what human beings desire by nature they also have
knowledge of by nature. But this is not to know that God exists
without qualification. In the same way even though I know Peter,
and Peter is approaching, this is not the same as knowing the person
who is approaching. For many people judge the highest human
good, human flourishing, to be riches; others pleasure, and others
other things. 7
Though the question of the existence of God may be a question for reason
to settle, rather than faith, and though the reason may have to proceed
discursively in answering it, rather than finding the answer evident or
'known in itself, it is still not yet clear that the question is a scientific one.
We can appeal, if we wish, to St Thomas's preamble to the second
question of the Summa Theologiae, which sketches out the structure of his
work. The divine science will deal with God, with human beings in so far
as they are related to God, and with Christ, who is the way for human
beings to reach God. When dealing with God, it will consider the divine
essence, the divine persons, and the way in which creatures derive from
God. When dealing with God's essence it will first ask whether God
exists. 8
Nevertheless, though St Thomas regards this question as a scientific
question, it cannot be dealt with in the top-down manner which belongs
to a completed science. Clearly this science is just beginning, and is far
102 God and Explanations

from being completed; and, in any case, what stands in the place of the
first general principles of a natural science, in the case of sacred science,
are the principles of revealed faith. 'Just as the other sciences do not argue
to prove their principles ... so this science does not argue to prove its
principles, which are the articles of faith'. 9 Lastly, and perhaps most
importantly, there can be no completed top-down science of God for
human beings. A completed top-down science of God would require a
grasp of God's essence or nature, which is impossible for us:
But since we do not know what God is, the proposition 'God exists'
is not known to us in its own right. Rather it needs to be demon-
strated through things which are better known as far as we are
concerned, and less known in their own nature: i.e. through God's
effects. 10
The existence of God needs to be demonstrated, then, from God's effects,
in a dialectical or bottom-up manner.
My reply is that there are two kinds of demonstration. One kind is
demonstration through the cause: the kind that is called 'demonstra-
tion why?', and which is carried out through things which are prior
without qualification. The other kind is through the effect, and is
called 'demonstration that', and it is done through the things which
are prior so far as we are concerned. For since sometimes effects are
more obvious to us than are their causes, we can proceed through
the effect to knowledge of the cause. It is possible to demonstrate
through any effect the existence of its proper cause, 11 provided that
the effects are more known so far as we are concerned. This is
because the effects depend on their causes, and so once we suppose
the effect, it is necessary that the cause should exist before it. Hence
God's existence, which is not known in its own right so far as we are
concerned, can be demonstrated by effects which are known to us.' 12
It will be recalled from the last chapter that demonstrative answers to
the question 'propter quid?', 'why?', can only be given from the top down,
arguing from cause to effect. Here it is stated very clearly that the existence
of God can only be reached arguing from the effect to the cause, dialecti-
cally, from the bottom up. Moreover, rather than attempting to prove the
answer to 'an est Deus?', 'Does God exist?', we are attempting to prove the
truth of the thesis that God exists, a demonstration quia, 'quia Deus est'.
The existence of the word 'God', therefore, already provides us with an
explanatory hypothesis: these effects exist, the world exists, because God
exists. 13
 The Existence of God as a Scientific fb,estion 103

A similar point is made by St Thomas in the reply to the third objection:

To the third objection we have to say that we cannot come to a
complete knowledge of a cause through effects that are not propor-
tionate to that cause. But from any effect we can clearly demonstrate
the existence of the cause, as we have said. Thus from the effects of
God we can demonstrate God's existence, though we cannot,
through these effects, come to a complete knowledge of God in the
divine essence. 14
This passage relates to the problem we guessed at towards the end of the
last chapter. It was argued there that for the full development of a science
we will have to seek for effects that are 'proportionate' to their causes. 15
In the case of God, none of the effects that God brings about in the world
are proportionate. Possibly, though, a point made in the previous passage
is relevant. God's effects are not proportionate to God, in the sense that
God might have willed not to bring about any created effects whatsoever
and could have brought about many other kinds of effects. Moreover, we
cannot directly conclude to a knowledge of God's nature from an exami-
nation of God's effects. Indeed, possibly we cannot conclude to a knowl-
edge of God's nature at all; we certainly will never reach a full knowledge
of what God is, 'quid est Deus' in the strict sense. 16 But nevertheless the
existence of the created world may be a 'proper' effect of God in the
relevant sense: the world is such that it could not have been made by
anything but a God. The world as God's effect is not proportionate to
God, but this does not mean that God is a 'common' cause of the world,
and certainly it does not mean that the God is in some sense the 'per
accidens' cause of the world. We saw that it is when a per accidens causality
is taken to be a per se causality that there is danger of error in the science
• 17
we are constructmg.
Be that as it may, these passages make clear what sort of a question
'Does God exist?' is supposed to be, how it relates to questions of other
kinds and how we can hope to set about answering it.
Unsurprisingly, the notion of significatio nominis surfaces in this con-
text, in passages we have already considered:
The answer to the second objection is that when a cause is being
proved by means of its effect, we have to use the effect in the place
of the definition of the cause, in order to prove that the cause exists.
This is particularly the case with God, since in order to prove that
something exists, we have to take as the medium what its name
signifies, not what it is. This is because the question 'what is it?'
follows on from the question 'does it exist?' But the names of God
104 God and Explanations

are imposed in virtue of His effects, as will be shown later. Hence

when we are proving that God exists by means of His effect, we can
take as the middle term what this name 'God' signifies. 18
The significatio nominis of 'God' is thus clearly stated to be that of being
a cause of certain effects. It does, indeed, remain to see of what effects.
There are attempts to prove the existence of God from some arbitrarily
chosen object in the world; 19 more common are attempts to prove the
existence of God from the existence and nature of some special object in
the world, or some special part of the world, which is thought of as being
in some way explanatorily privileged. Attempts to prove the existence of
God from the current cosmological hypothesis of the Big Bang would be
a clear instance of this: everything else in the world is explained in relation
to the Big Bang, and then the Big Bang is held to require an explanation
in terms of a relationship to something outside the world. It would seem
that St Thomas would have no objection to this manner of proceeding, 20
but it is arguable that in the Five Ways he is seeking to prove the existence
of God from the existence and certain features of the world as a whole21 -
the world as a whole, considered as a system of efficient causes, for
example, as in the Second Way, or considered as a system of final causes,
as in the Fifth Way. 22
In any case we can derive definite information about what St Thomas
considers the significatio of the word 'God' to be, for the purposes of
proving that God exists. Each of the Five Ways, as has been mentioned,2 2
ends with a tag which, it can be argued, gives us the significatio which is
relevant to that Way. The First Way ends 'So we have to come to some
first initiator of change which is not in a process of change initiated by
something else, and everyone understands that this is God'. 24 The Second
Way ends, 'Hence we must suppose some first efficient cause, and this is
what all call "God" '. 25 The Third Way ends, 'We must suppose, then,
something that is necessary in itself, which does not owe its necessity to
some outside cause, but rather causes the necessity of the other things:
and this is what all say is God'. 26 The Fourth Way ends, 'Therefore there
is something that is the cause of the existence and the goodness and of all
perfections in everything: and this, we say, is God'. 27 The Fifth Way ends,
'Therefore there is some being with understanding which directs all things
to their end, and this, we say, is God'. 28
It would appear that in these tags St Thomas is making the claim not
merely that these phrases express legitimate accounts of the significatio of
the word 'God', but also that (at least most of them) are easily recognisable
as doing so: 'everyone understands' that this is God. It will be remembered
that Aquinas's first objection to the argument he derives from Anselm is
 The Existence of God as a Scientific Question 105

that it may be that someone who hears the word 'God' may not understand
that it signifies that greater than which nothing can be thought of. 29 It is
to be presumed that he regards his own arguments, and therefore the
accounts he gives of the significatio of the word 'God', to be exempt from
this criticism. This is a strong claim, but perhaps it is not too unrealistic.
The accounts he gives of the significatio of the word 'God' are couched in
clearly technical language, unlike that of Anselm. Aquinas may be permit-
ted to explain what the technical language means, and may fairly plausibly
claim that when this has been done these accounts of the significatio of the
word 'God' will be accepted by all. They refer to familiar ideas, such as
that God is the ultimate explanation of all change and of all efficient
causality, an everlasting being whose everlastingness is not dependent on
anything else, the most perfect being and the explanation of all perfection
in the world, the point which the world exists for. These concepts are
clearly familiar, though it is clearly still possible for the atheist to claim
that nothing falls under them. But the account given by Anselm is
different. It is given in non-technical language, in words that everyone can
understand, but the idea is clearly unfamiliar, indeed original. Though
one understands the words, one might very well want to spend time
investigating exactly what concept it is that they delimit.
We have seen that the notion of existence used in answering the
question 'an est' is that of esse ut verum; and we have already seen a text in
which this is explicitly stated of the answer to 'an est Deus?'. 30 We have
also seen that for a proposition of the form 'X exists', in the esse ut verum
sense, to be true, we need to be able to form some true affirmative
proposition about X. The tags which conclude each one of the Five Ways,
besides providing us with the significatio nominis of 'God', may also
provide us with the relevant affirmative propositions on which the truth
of 'God exists' is based.
God is a first initiator of change which is not in a process of change
initiated by something else; God is a first efficient cause; God is
something that is necessary in itself, which does not owe its necessity
to some outside cause, but rather causes the necessity of the other
things; God is the cause of the existence and the goodness and of all
perfections in everything; God is a being with understanding which
directs all things to their end.
It is also clear that the existence of God is to be proved from God's effects,
and that to that extent the significatio of 'God' must in some way include
the notion of being a cause. The texts which support this claim for the
word 'God' have already been cited. St Thomas holds that things have
106 God and Explanations

names imposed on them in virtue of what we know of them; and it is clear

also that we have no direct knowledge of God, but only of God's opera-
tions in creation. Thus we name God in virtue of the relation that creatures
bear to him.
It is in so far as a thing can be known by our intellect, that we can
put a name to it .... God cannot be the object of our vision in this
life, in so far as his essence is concerned. Rather God is known to us
from creatures, in so far as they have a disposition towards their
originating principle.... In this way God can be given a name by
us, drawn from creatures. 31
I submit, then, that we are fully justified in applying to the question of
God's existence the logical and methodological considerations which have
been expounded in the previous chapters. For some readers the previous
methodological chapters may shed light on what follows; for others, what
follows may shed light on what has gone before. All I can claim is that I
believe that this (to me) obvious set of connections has never appeared in
print before, and an understanding of the connections has helped me with
both problems.

NOTES

I. In Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13: see Chapter 4 above.

2. E.g. a number of texts in Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, some of which have already been quoted
in Chapter 4 above; also e.g. I, q. 3, a. 4.
3. For interestingly different views, see G. E. M. Anscombe, 'Faith', in Collected Philosophical
Papers ofG. E. M. Anscombe, Vol. 3 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1981), pp. 113-20, and P. T. Geach,
The Virtues (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), pp. 20-114.
4. Cf. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 11:
The foregoing view [that the existence of God is known in its own right, and therefore cannot
be demonstrated] comes in part from custom. People are used to hearing the name of God
and invoking it from their infancy. But custom - and especially custom which goes back to
infancy - acquires the force of nature. Thus is happens that the things our mind is filled with
from childhood are held as firmly as if they were known by nature and in their own right.
Praedicta autem opinio [sc. quod Deum esse sit per se notum, et ideo demonstrari non
possit] provenit partim ex consuetudine, qua ex principio homines assueti sunt nomen Dei
audire et invocare. Consuetudo autem, et praecipue quae est a principio, vim naturae obtinet;
ex quo contingit ut ea quibus a pueritia animus imbuitur ita firmiter teneatur ac si essent
naturaliter et per se nota.
5. This argument is used (among others) by C. S. Lewis, in Mere Christianity (London: Collins,
1955).
6. Summa Theologiae, q. 2, a. 2, obj. I and ad I:
Videtur quod Deum esse non sit demonstrabile. Deum enim esse est articulus fidei. Sed ea
quae sunt fidei non sunt demonstrabilia, quia demonstratio facit scire, tides autem de non
apparentibus est, ut patet per Apostolum ad Hebraeos, XI. Ergo Deum esse non est demon-
strabile ....
Ad primum ergo dicendum quod Deum esse et alia huiusmodi quae per rationem naturalem
nota possunt esse de Deo, ut dicitur Rom. I, non sunt articuli fidei, sed praeambula ad
 The Existence of God as a Scientific [b,estion 107
articulos. Sic enim tides praesupponit cognitionem naturalem, sicut gratia naturam et ut
perfectio perfectibile. Nihil tamen prohibet id quod per se demonstrabile est et scibile, ab
aliquo accipi ut credibile, qui demonstrationem non capit.
7. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. I, obj. I and ad I:
Videtur quod Deum esse sit per se notum. Illa enim nobis dicuntur per se nota quorum cognitio
nobis naturaliter inest, sicut patet de primis principiis. Sed sicut <licit Damascenus, 'omnibus
cognitio existendi Deum naturaliter est inserta.' Ergo Deum esse est per se notum ....
Ad primum ergo dicendum, quod cognoscere Deum esse, in aliquo communi sub quadam
confusione, est nobis naturaliter insertum, in quantum scilicet Deus est hominis beatitudo;
homo enim naturaliter desiderat beatitudinem, et quod naturaliter desideratur ab homine
naturaliter cognoscitur ab eodem. Sed hoc non est simpliciter cognoscere Deum esse, sicut
cognoscere venientem non est cognoscere Petrum, quamvis sit Petrus veniens. Multi enim
perfectum hominis bonum, quod est beatitudo, existimant divitias, quidam voluptates, qui-
dam autem aliquid aliud.
An alternative translation for 'known to us in its own right' might be 'self-evident' or 'evident'.
8. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, praeambula: 'Tractabimus de Deo; de motu rationalis creaturae in
Deum; de Christo ... De Deo ... considerabimus ... essentiam divinam; ... distinctionem
personarum; ... processum creaturarum ab ipso. Circa essentiam vero divinam considerandum
est an Deus sit.'
9. Summa Theologiae, I, q. I, a. 8c: 'Sicut aliae scientiae non argumentantur ad sua principia probanda,
... ita haec doctrina non argumentatur ad sua principia probanda, quae sunt articuli fidei.'
10. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. le:
Sed quia nos non scimus de Deo quid est, non est no bis per se nota [sc. haec propositio, Deus
est], sed indiget demonstrari per ea quae sunt magis nota quoad nos et minus nota secundum
naturam, scilicet per effectus.
11. A 'proper' cause, so far as I can make out, is a cause such that this cause could only have produced
this effect, and, above all, an effect such as this could not have been produced by any other cause.
A 'common' cause is a cause such that it could have produced many other different effects, and
an effect such as this could have been produced by a number of other causes, e.g. by A or by 8.
We may be able to infer the existence of the proper cause - i.e. a cause such that without this
cause an effect such as this could not have come about - even though the effect is not proportionate
to the cause. But we cannot infer the existence of a particular common cause - i.e., the existence
of cause A or of cause B, where either A or B is sufficient to have caused the effect - where the
effect is not proportionate to the cause, i.e. proportionate either to A or to 8. The cause of the
world could only be God, which makes God the proper cause in one sense; but, of course, God
could have produced many other worlds of different kinds, and thus is not the 'proper cause' of
the world in the other sense. Equally well, the world is not a proportionate effect of God, in that
we cannot infer from the nature of the effect to the nature of the cause. On the notion of
'proportionateness' or 'adequateness' of effects, see above, Chapter 6, p. 90, and below, this
chapter p. 103.
12. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2c:
Respondeo dicendum quod duplex est demonstratio. Una quae est per causam, et dicitur
'propter quid', et haec est per priora simpliciter. Alia est per effectum, et dicitur demonstratio
'quia', et haec est per ea quae sunt priora quoad nos. Cum enim effectus aliquis nobis est
manifestior quam sua causa, per effectum procedimus ad cognitionem causae. Ex quolibet
autem effectu potest demonstrari propriam causam eius esse, si tamen effectus sint magis noti
quoad nos; quia cum effectus dependeant a causa, posito effectu, necesse est causam praeex-
istere. Unde Deum esse secundum quod non est per se notum quoad nos, demonstrabile est
per effectus nobis notos.
13. See Chapter 4, note 11, Chapter 6, notes 10, 13, 25 and 29, and Chapter 7, note I: see also Chapter
4, p. 46, and Chapter 6, pp. 87-8.
14. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 3:
Ad tertium dicendum quod per effectus non proportionatos causae non potest perfecta
cognitio de causa haberi, sed tamen ex quocumque effectu potest manifeste nobis demonstrari
causam esse, ut dictum est, et sic ex effectibus Dei potest demonstrari Deum esse, licet per
eos non perfecte possimus eum cognoscere secundum suam essentiam.
 108 God and Explanations
15. The word principally used for 'proportionate' in the texts cited in Chapter 6- see note 52 -was
'adaequatus'. Here the word 'proportionatus' is used. I take it that the two words are being used
to make the same point.
16. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 3, praeambula:
When we know that something exists, we are left to seek out how it is, in order to know what
it is. But we cannot known what God is, but rather what God is not; so we cannot give
consideration to how God is, but rather to how God is not.
Cognito de aliquo an sit, inquirendum restat quomodo sit, ut sciatur de eo quid sit. Sed
quia de Deo scire non possumus quid sit sed quid non sit, non possumus considerare de Deo
quomodo sit, sed potius quomodo non sit.
17. See Chapter 6, above, p. 91.
18. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, ad 2:
Ad secundum dicendum quod, cum demonstrator causa per effectum, necesse est uti effectu
loco definitionis causae ad probandum causa esse: et hoc maxime contingit in Deo, quia ad
probandum aliquid esse, necesse est accipere pro medio, quid significet nomen, non autem
quod quid est, quia quaestio quid est sequitur ad quaestionem an est. Nomina autem Dei
imponuntur ab effectibus, ut postea ostendetur: unde demonstrando Deum esse per effectum,
accipere possumus pro medio, quid significet hoc nomen Deus.
19. I seem to recall Chesterton would offer to prove the existence of God from an umbrella, an
elephant, a coal-scuttle or a pen-knife.
20. Cf. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, where there seems to be an attempt to show that everything else
in the world is to be explained in relation to the movement of the outermost sphere of the heavens,
and that the movement of the outermost sphere of the heavens requires to be explained in relation
to God.
21. Comparison between the Summa Contra Gentes passage just referred to, and the First Way in
Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3 makes this clear, I think. Cf. the remarks in P. T. Geach, Three
Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), pp. 111-13.
22. See A. Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 35-{i; and see
below, Chapters 10 and 13, pp. 146 and 179.
23. See above, Chapter 4, p. 39.
24. 'Ergo necesse est devenire ad aliquod primum movens, quod in nullo movetur; et hoc omnes
intelligunt Deum.'
25. 'Ergo est necesse ponere aliquam causam efficientem primam, quam omnes Deum nominant.'
26. 'Ergo necesse est ponere aliquid quod est per se necessarium, non habens causam necessitatis
aliunde, sed quod est causa necessitatis aliis, quod omnes dicunt Deum.'
27. 'Ergo est aliquid quod est causa esse et bonitatis et cuiuslibet perfectionis in rebus omnibus, et
hoc dicimus Deum.'
28. 'Ergo est aliquid intelligens, a quo omnes res naturales ordinantur in finem, et hoc dicimus
Deum.'
29. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 1 ad 1: 'forte ille qui audit hoc nomen Deus non intelligit significari
aliquid quo maius cogitari non possit.' See Chapter 4 above, p. 39.
30. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 3, a. 4, ad 2:
Is God's act of existence identical with his essence?
We approach this point in this way: apparently God's act of existence (esse) is not identical
with his essence ....
2. Moreover, we can know of God that he exists, as has been said above. But we cannot
know what he is. So God's existence (esse) is not identical with his essence or nature ....
The answer to the second objection is that existence (esse) has two senses. In one sense it
means the act of existence; in the other it means the composition of a proposition, which is
made by the mind in joining a predicate to a subject. Taking existence in the first way, we
cannot know the existence of God, just as we cannot know his essence: we can only know it
in the second way. For we know that this proposition which we make about God, when we
say God exists, is true: and we know this from his effects.
Ad quartum sic proceditur. Videtur quod in Deo non sit idem essentia et esse .... Praeterea,
de Deo scire possumus an sit, ut supra dictum est. Non autem possumus scire quid sit. Ergo
non est idem esse Dei, et quod quid est eius, sive quidditas vel natura .... Ad secundum
dicendum quod esse dupliciter dicitur. Uno modo significat actum essendi, alio modo
 The Existence of God as a Scientific Question 109
significat compositionem propositionis quam anima adinvenit coniungens praedicatum
subiecto. Primo igitur modo accipiendo esse, non possumus scire esse Dei, sicut nee eius
essentiam, sed solum secundo modo. Scimus enim quod haec propositio quam formamus de
Deo, cum dicimus Deus est, vera est: et hoc scimus ex eius effectibus.
See Chapter 5 above, p. 70, for a fuller discussion.
31. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. I, a. le:
Secundum igitur quod aliquid a nobis intellectu cognosci potest, sic a nobis potest nominari .
. . . Deus in hac vita non potest a nobis videri per suam essentiam, sed cognoscitur a nobis ex
creaturis secundum habitudinem principii .... Sic igitur potest nominari a nobis ex creaturis.
 8
•
'DOES GOD EXIST? APPARENTLY NOT'

'Is there a God?' asks Aquinas, and answers, 'Apparently not' .1 This
method is, of course, the one he follows throughout the Summa, a method
derived from the intellectual practice of the quaestio, of which we saw a
little in the first chapter. 2 In this, as in every case, St Thomas first presents
objections, the strongest arguments he can find against the thesis en-
shrined in the formulation of the quaestio, or against the answer which he
is going to adopt. 3 Usually he presents us with three objections, but in this
case he presents only two - two arguments which are still regarded as the
most successful arguments against the existence of God. 4 They can be
labelled 'the argument from evil', and 'the argument from partial expla-
nation' or 'the argument from science'.
Aquinas expounds the argument from evil as follows:
Apparently there is no God.
For if one of a pair of contraries were to be infinite, the other would
be completely destroyed. But in the word 'God' is included the
notion that God is an infinite good. If there were a God, then, there
would be no evil to be found. But there is evil to be found in the
world. Therefore there is no God. 5
It is worth noticing that, as St Thomas renders this argument, it is of a
form that has already been discussed. It is an attempted demonstration of
the non-existence of some supposed entity, on the basis of some features
of the significatio which can be attributed to the name of that thing. 6 We
have seen St Thomas using this technique himself to demonstrate the
non-existence of vacuum, of empty space, and discussing (and eventually
rejecting) its use to demonstrate the non-existence of place. Equally, it
will be remembered that Lavoisier allegedly used the same technique to
demonstrate the non-existence of phlogiston. It is clearly a valid method
of reasoning. It is also clear that for this kind of argument to work, just as
for Aquinas's own arguments in favour of the existence of God to work,
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 111

there has to be a solid measure of agreement between the parties to the

discussion on the signification of the word in question. In this case the
one arguing against the existence of God has taken up a notion which is
part of the signification of the word 'God' in what is called 'classical
theism': 7 that God is infinitely good. The defender of the existence of
God, in a context in which classical theism, or a religious tradition which
includes classical theism, is the norm, is in fact not likely to deny this.
There are many different versions of the argument from evil, but they
all follow the pattern which is followed by the argument St Thomas gives.
This is roughly as follows:
1. The existence of God and the existence of evil are incompatible.
2. Evil exists.
3. Therefore, God does not exist. 8
In so far as various forms of the argument from evil differ, it tends to
be with regard to different kinds of evidence given for the first premiss.
This is entirely appropriate. The argument is apparently of valid form;
thus, if the premisses are true, the conclusion must be true. The defender
of the existence of God has to attack the truth of one of the premisses.
The second premiss is all too obviously true. There are, indeed,
religious and philosophical groups both in East and West who hold that
the existence of evil is only an illusion. 9 The claim appears to be confused.
If they mean that if we could behold reality without confusion and without
error, we would be free from evil, it is at least possible, though perhaps
unlikely. If they hold that evil does not exist and there is only an erroneous
(and therefore evil) appearance of evil, they stand self-contradicted.
\Vhen we claim that evil exists, of course, we are not claiming that evil
is an entity or a reality. The existence we attribute to evil is existence in
the sense of the true, esse ut verum, the kind of existence which we can
attribute to blindness and other similar privations. 10 All we need to
maintain, to support the claim that evil exists, is that various people,
things, actions or occurrences are bad: and this is obviously true. The
second premiss is thus unchallengeable.
Thus discussion has to centre on the first premiss, that the existence of
God and the existence of evil are incompatible. This can be variously
supported. Aquinas suggests a metaphysical justification for it; a more
common line nowadays would argue on more moral grounds. We would
not claim that some man we knew was good ifhe had power to stop certain
evils which he knew about and did not do so. On the view of classical
theism, God is supposed to be good, all-powerful and all-knowing. This
appears inconsistent, since it appears that God does not stop evils which
112 God and Explanations

he knows about (being all-knowing) and which he has power to stop (being
all-powerful). Therefore the existence of a good God such as classical
theism supposes, and the existence of evil, are incompatible. 11
There are objections to this formulation of the argument from evil
which query the notion of God's almighty power or universal knowledge.
But these defences do not seem of much value. Sometimes they go so far
as to abandon traditional elements of classical theism, which seems a
desperate move. Moreover, as Geach has pointed out, the argument from
evil still stands even if we leave aside questions of God's power and
knowledge, and concentrate simply on the fact that God is the Creator of
the world. 12 Since the Five Ways profess to demonstrate the existence of
a Creator of the world, such a form of the argument from evil would
certainly overthrow the Five Ways. The form which St Thomas gives, in
any case, does not depend on the notions of God's power and God's
knowledge, but solely on that of God's infinite goodness, a notion of which
he himself makes use in the context of the Five Ways, at least in the Fourth
Way if not in the others. He cannot even defend himself, then, by claiming
that God's power and knowledge are further claims which he has not yet
made, and should not be supposed in advance of his proof that there is a
God.
It is sometimes suggested that the existence of evil and the existence of
God are not incompatible, because evil proceeds not from God but from
human free will. 13 This 'free-will defence', as it is called, appears ineffec-
tive as it stands. There seem to be innumerable kinds of evil which do not
depend on human free will: an obvious example would be those sufferings
of animals and of infants which are caused by natural phenomena. More-
over, the fact that an action proceeds from the free will of a creature does
not mean that it does not also proceed from God. If human free actions
did not proceed from God they would not be created. 14 Creation, as we
shall see later, is not so much something God once did, as something that
God is continually doing: it is more like a performance than a production. 15
There is nothing in the world, then, that is not God's action. For some
forms of the free-will defence, human actions would have to exist inde-
pendently of God's creation, and this is inconsistent with classical theism
in general and with the thought of St Thomas in particular.
Nevertheless, there is an argument, related to the free-will defence,
which may be consistent with the thought of St Thomas. What is objec-
tionable in the free-will defence is the doubt it seems to throw on the
notion that God is the cause of the world as a whole and of everything that
is in it. However, we may derive from St Thomas's account of the way in
which per accidens existents are caused, an argument which may suggest
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 113

that God is not the cause of everything in the world in exactly the same
way. This argument does not throw doubt on the notion that God is the
cause of the world and of all that is in it, including the evil that exists: it
only questions the mode in which we can attribute to God being the cause
of evil.
We have seen that we should not attribute reality, real esse, to evil. But
if St Thomas is right in his suggestion of what I have called the 'deriva-
tiveness' of esse ut verum, there should be some reality on which the esse
ut verum of evil is based. In general this is not difficult to see. Evil, like
blindness or any other privation, needs to have some really existent
subject. 16 But the presence of some defect or privation in some really
existent subject is not a per se existent but a per accidens existent. 17 The real
existent from which the existence of evil derives is thus a per accidens
existent.
This point may be of value. For St Thomas, as we have already seen
hinted, 18 that which exists per accidens exists as the result of the coincidence
of two different strands of explanation. The example he gives, following
Aristotle, is that of a man digging in a field who finds a treasure. 19 There
is no doubt a reason why the man is digging at that point in the field -
perhaps it seems to him the best place for a drainage ditch. No doubt there
is also a reason why there is a treasure buried just there: perhaps the person
who buried it thought that it would be easy for him to find there and
difficult for anyone else to find. Once these two lines of explanation are
given - a reason why our hero is digging at point X, and a reason why
there is a treasure at point X - sufficient reason has already been given
why this man should dig at point X and find a treasure. We do not need
to seek a reason why this-man-should-dig-at-point-X-and-find-a-treas-
ure, considered as a single phenomenon, as if it were a per se existent which
requires a single explanation. 20
Similarly, though everything which happens happens by God's will, it
is not necessarily true that every description under which an occurrence
falls is a description under which that occurrence is willed by God. It is
sufficient that there should be some description, even a per accidens one,
under which it is willed by God. Obviously, if God knows everything,
God knows every description which is true of every occurrence which he
wills. But so do I know many descriptions which are true of the occur-
rences which I will. As Kenny points out, when I walk across the field to
the river I do a certain amount of damage to the grass and wreak a certain
amount of havoc among various micro-organisms which live in that
habitat. 21 I am not so ignorant as to be unaware of this, but though I will
to walk across the grass and I know I thus damage certain micro-habitats,
114 God and Explanations

is it therefore true that I will (in any interestingly strong sense) to damage
the micro-habitats?
To this it might be objected that my will is not, as God's is supposed
to be, unlimited. I cannot be supposed to will everything which I do. The
objection is unsound. God's will is unlimited because God's will extends
to everything in the world, as mine does not. But this does not mean that
God's will extends to everything under every description which is true of
it. It is a common teaching among traditional believers in both Christianity
and Judaism that the text of Scripture is inspired. Every word, and
therefore every letter, is, as it were, written by God and willed by God:
willed by God, indeed, in a very special and direct way in which other
ordinary occurrences in the world, though willed by God, are not. Nev-
ertheless, most Christians and many Jews have regarded as misguided and
even superstitious those who have sought to use the dispositions of the
letters in the Bible, taken according to some numerical pattern, as vehicles
of special messages from God. The first letter of Scripture, say some of
the Rabbis, is aleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet; 22 the middle
letter of Scripture is mem, the middle letter of the alphabet; the last letter
is tau, the last letter of the alphabet. Surely this is no coincidence? And
surely it is no coincidence that these three letters spell 'emeth, truth? Well,
it seems to me that it is a coincidence, and it certainly forms no part of
traditional belief, let alone of classical theism, that it is not. 23
Even if this argument against the truth of the first premiss - that the
existence of God and the existence of evil are incompatible - is regarded
by some as doubtful, there is at least one other argument. The first premiss
relies on the accepted truth of the claim made by classical theists that God
is supremely good. But it is also a claim of classical theism that God is
transcendent and inscrutable. 24 The doctrine of God's transcendence is
that God surpasses everything which we can say of him. All our language
about God will contain at least some misleading elements. If we say that
God is good we seem to imply that God's goodness is something distin-
guishable from God, as Socrates's goodness is something distinguishable
from Socrates, and thus that God is in some way complex or composite.
If, on the other hand, we say that God is goodness itself, we seem to imply
that God is an abstraction, as the word 'goodness' in our ordinary language
means something abstract rather than something concrete. 25
It is therefore highly dangerous to suppose that when we say that God
is good we must be attributing to God the sort of thing we would be
attributing to a human being when we say she or he is good. A good human
being is brave and resistant to the temptations of pleasure, when in the
pursuit of some good thing which is difficult of achievement. But God is
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 115

not brave, as there is nothing that constitutes a threat or danger for God.
God is not resistant to the temptations of pleasure: God has no temptations.
God has no projects for pursuing some good difficult of achievement: nothing
is difficult for God. A good man is kind to animals, but Geach has argued
that there is no reason to suppose that a good God must be kind to animals. 26
This is just as well, as all the evidence seems to be that the world God has
made is a system which is simply indifferent to the sufferings of animals.
An appeal to the traditional belief in God's transcendence is thus of
some value in taking away the force of the first premiss of the argument
from evil. What reason do we have for supposing that God's transcendent
goodness is incompatible with the existence of evil? We may indeed have
a strong feeling that it ought to be, but strong feelings about what ought
to be the case are notoriously a poor guide to what actually is the case,
even as regards this world; a fortiori, they will be a yet poorer guide to
what actually is the case as regards God.
We can add to these considerations those drawn from God's inscruta-
bility.27 'Inscrutable' is one of those curious words which outside a tech-
nical field - here, that of natural theology - is used only in a cliche, in this
case a rather offensive one. Westerners traditionally regard Orientals,
particularly Chinese and Japanese, as 'inscrutable'. I take it that this is
because it is hard for a Westerner to guess what an Oriental is thinking
from what he or she does or says, presumably because of the differences
between Oriental and Western physiognomy, and those between cultur-
ally differing modes of expression in gesture and speech.
If one is stupid and tactless enough one need not go to the ends of the
earth, and spend one's time being rude about their inhabitants, in order
to grasp the meaning of 'inscrutability' in human contexts. I am myself
extremely stupid and tactless, and I find it practically impossible to make
out what my own countrymen and women - perhaps especially women -
are thinking, on the basis of what they do or say, unless it is painfully and
embarrassingly plain and explicit. Thus most people are for me, in the
relevant sense, inscrutable.
However, I am not in other ways grossly stupid: I have managed to lead
most of my life so far with a fair degree of what might be considered
success, according to various criteria. Thus the difference between myself
and my fellows is not really all that great. Nevertheless, it appears that the
differences between me and my fellows is sufficient to have given rise to
a high degree of inscrutability. The moral is fairly clear: the differences
between God and any of God's creatures are infinitely greater than the
differences between me and my fellows, and so we have to presume an
infinite degree of inscrutability in God.
116 God and Explanations

If God is inscrutable, you cannot tell what God is thinking, or what

God means, or even what God is like, directly from a contemplation of
what God does or says. If I have often been mistaken about the goodness
or badness of my fellow-creatures on the basis of my judgement about
what they do or say, a fortiori any creature may be yet more grossly
mistaken about the goodness of God, on the basis of his or her judgement
about what God does or says. This conclusion is highly agnostic, of course,
but I do not need here to offer more than an agnostic conclusion. I am
trying to overthrow the confidence with which people feel they can assert
that the existence of God is incompatible with the existence of evil. I am
not here trying to prove that God is good, all I am trying to show is that
there is no sufficient reason to believe that the goodness of God is
incompatible with the existence of evil.
Indeed, this is all that needs to be shown. As Davies points out, 28 on the
basis of the argument from evil, as expounded above, we can form another
argument which runs exactly on all fours with it.
I. God exists.
2. Evil exists.
3. Therefore, the existence of God and the existence of evil are not
incompatible.
This argument is a mere logical transposition of the argument from evil
given above. If the argument from evil is of valid form - as it is - then this
argument will be of valid form too; that is, if the premisses are true the
conclusion will be true. The two arguments have the second premiss, 'Evil
exists', in common. Thus the only difference between them lies in their
first premisses, 'The existence of evil and the existence of God are
incompatible' and 'God exists'. Which of these two premisses is true?
Here there is no remedy but to investigate the two premisses, and the
arguments for holding them. We have just taken a look at the first premiss
of the argument from evil, and have seen that it depends on the truth of
certain views of classical theism; and we have seen that the resources of
classical theism are also sufficient to cast doubt on it. There is, I have
claimed, no good reason for holding that the existence of evil is incompat-
ible with the existence of God. Meanwhile, there may well be good reasons
for holding that God exists - we are about to examine them in the Five
Ways.
Clearly, it is important that the arguments for the existence of God
which we give should be independent arguments: that is, they should not
be arguments which depend on the non-existence of evil or on the
goodness of God, understood in some common, non-transcendent way.
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 117

Someone who held that God exists because this is the best of all possible
worlds would be vulnerable to the argument from evil, because the
existence of evil would at the same time give him reason to question the
truths of the premiss on which his argument for the existence of God is
based. But the Five Ways are in this sense independent of the existence
of evil.
It is worth pointing out, in any case, with Davies, 29 that the argument
from evil seems in practice to work less as an argument for not believing
in God than as a reason for not bothering to consider what evidence there
might be for believing in God. The possibility of turning the argument
on its head, as Davies turns it, shows that this is intellectually dishonest.
The arguments for the existence of God need at least to be considered,
and compared with those for believing that the existence of God and the
existence of evil are incompatible. I have suggested that the latter argu-
ments are weak: it remains to be seen whether the arguments for the
existence of God are any stronger.
Aquinas, in his reply to the first objection, does not need to enter
into the complications we have discussed. He couches the first premiss
of the objection in strongly metaphysical terms, rather than in the
quasi-moral or quasi-aesthetic terms which would probably be used
nowadays, and in terms of which we sketched out the reasons for
believing the first premiss. As a result the objection Aquinas gives is
not vulnerable to the objections we have made: believing in it does not
depend on ignoring the subtleties of God's mode of causation of the
per accidens, or God's transcendence or inscrutability. It is, however,
vulnerable to the reply which he makes.
To the first objection, then, we have to say, as Augustine does in his
Enchiridion, 'God is supremely good: so no evil would be allowed in
God's works were God not so good and almighty as to be able to
make even evil good'. It is proper, then, to the infinite goodness of
God to allow evils to exist and to draw good from them. 30
This is clearly a denial of the first premiss, that the existence of God and
the existence of evil are incompatible. The argument for this premiss, as
sketched out in metaphysical form in Aquinas's objection, is that the very
existence of something infinitely good is incompatible with the existence
of anything which is evil. Aquinas simply denies this: God's bringing good
out of evil is evidence of yet greater goodness than would be the non-ex-
istence of evil. There is no more reason to believe in the metaphysical
version of the first premiss of the argument from evil than there is to
believe in any other version.
118 God and Explanations

The next objection which St Thomas raises, the second argument for
not believing in the existence of God, can be called the 'argument from
partial explanation'. His version runs:
Apparently there is no God ....
The second argument is, that which can be achieved by a smaller
number of originating principles is not brought about by a larger
number. But, apparently, everything we see in the world can be
achieved by some other originating principles even if there is no
God. This is because natural things can be brought back to the
originating principle of nature, while things which come about
intentionally can be brought back to the originating principle of the
human reason or will.
So there is no need to suppose that there is a God. 31
As a matter of historical anecdote, it is perhaps worth noticing here the
use of the principle which is (obviously incorrectly) called 'Ockham's
razor': in Aquinas's formulation, that which can be brought about by a
smaller number of principles is not brought about by a larger number.
Aquinas's formulation appears to be a metaphysical profession of faith in
a principle of explanatory economy, while the principle usually attributed
to Ockham is rather a normative principle of methodology. The practical
results are the same, though Aquinas's formulation appears in some ways
more radically minimalist than Ockham's, strange as it may seem to the,
alas, large number of contemporary English-speaking philosophers who
accept the myth of Aquinas as a scholastic multiplier of unnecessary
entities, and of Ockham as the forerunner of the glorious empiricist
. .
re d uctlomsm of our d ay. 32
But leaving aside anecdote and rhetoric, the objection is a serious
one. The claim it makes is that the world does not in fact need an
explanation. Since the Five Ways are an attempt to prove that the world
requires an explanation in terms of a relationship to something other
than itself, namely God, the argument, if valid, undermines precisely
the kind of argument which Aquinas favours. The claim that the world
needs no explanation, though, is one that needs disambiguating.
Davies 33 tells of a famous debate on the wireless, about the existence of
God, between Copleston and Russell. Russell, perhaps wisely, attempted
a move similar to this objection: he tried to undermine Copleston's
position by denying that there was any need to look for an explanation for
the world. Copleston asked whether this meant that Russell regarded the
world as 'gratuitous', like some existentialist philosophers; but Russell
objected even to the word 'gratuitous', as it seems to suggest that the world
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 119

might have been otherwise. He preferred to say 'The world is just there,
that's all'.
'The world is just there, that's all' is not the claim being made in the
objection which Aquinas offers. Aquinas's objection claims that the world
has an explanation, or a number of explanations: nature and reason are
those given. A similar kind of objection might claim that the world is such
that it explains itself, or that in some other way needs no explanation; just
as (on Aquinas's account) God is such that he explains himself, or needs
no explanation. Russell, by contrast, claims that the world is 'just there'.
I cannot see how Russell's claim differs from a stark refusal to bother to
think whether the world needs an explanation or not. One thing is to look
for an explanation and fail to find one; another is to show why the world
requires no explanation; yet another is to show how the world explains
itself; yet another, to show that it can be explained by for example nature
or reason. Russell explicitly refuses to do any of these things, and I do not
think that one would do him much of an injustice by characterising his
attitude as 'sulks'. Copleston could equally have thrown a fit of the sulks
and said 'God is just there, that's all', but I don't think it would have made
for a very good debate, or for very good wireless. Moral: not all the
reasonableness is always on the side of those who are called rationalists.
As I say, the objection Aquinas brings is far more reasonable than
Russell's sulks. It has a place in a serious debate, of which St Thomas's
own arguments provide the other side. Like the argument from evil, it is
common to this day - though, like the argument from evil, not exactly in
the form which Aquinas gives us - and it is psychologically very forceful.
The claim it makes amounts, roughly, to the claim that there is no need
to look for God as the explanation of the world, because the world already
has an explanation. The sum of the partial explanations which can be given
for this or that part of the world - as Aquinas says, the sum of nature as
an explanation for natural phenomena, and of human reason as an expla-
nation for voluntary actions - provides a complete explanation of the
world as a whole.
Aquinas's own reply is perhaps, at this stage, not very enlightening. In
it he refers us explicitly to his own Five Ways, as providing a reason for
denying that the explanation offered for the world by the objection can be
a complete one.
To the second objection we have to say that since nature acts towards
a determinate end in virtue of the direction of a superior agent, then
we have to bring back the things that come about through nature to
God, as well, as their first cause. In the same way, too, things that
come about intentionally should be brought back to some higher
120 God and Explanations

cause: not the human reason and will, for these can change and fail,
and everything that can change or fail must be brought back to some
first unchanging originating principle which is necessary in its own
right, as we have shown. 34
Since Aquinas himself refers us to his own developed arguments ('as we
have shown'), we may perhaps omit for the present a careful examination
of this reply. If Aquinas is right, going through the Five Ways will make
it clear that the objection has no force. However, it will be useful to return
to an examination of the apparent force of the original objection, perhaps
couching it in terms which we would be more likely to use nowadays. This
performance is of value not merely to help us to realise that the discussion
St Thomas is involved in is not so alien to us as might at first appear, but
also because some considerations which arise from an examination of the
objection may provide a clue to the strategy Aquinas is following in the
Five Ways.
Putting the matter crudely, the objection is as follows. If we have an
explanation of the existence of each bit of the universe, can we not just
lump all those partial explanations together? And if we do so, have we not
then given an explanation of the whole universe? If such a complex of
partial explanations existed, would not Aquinas's search for an explana-
tion of the universe as a whole be at least redundant? If we had such an
explanation of the whole universe (because we had an explanation of each
and every bit of it) is it not a bizarre idea to then start looking for an
explanation of the universe as a whole? Just what justification could there
be for a distinction between 'the whole universe' and 'the universe as a
whole' which seems to be necessary if Aquinas's project is not to be just
ridiculous?
We can go further. It is true that we do not have an explanation of each
and every bit of the universe, nor do we feel confident that we are likely
to get one in the very near future. We are not Victorians, after all: we do
not believe that science provides all the answers - yet. But we do have an
idea of what sort of thing science has to do to explain each and every bit
of the universe. Some bits are well explained, some less well, some scarcely
at all, but we are on our way. Providing an explanation of the existence of
each and every bit of the world is an intelligible and theoretically feasible
project. We have not got such an explanation yet, and we may never reach
it, but we know what it would be to have such an explanation. Victorian
optimism may have been misplaced, but do we not have grounds for
holding that it is at least possible that there should be a scientific expla-
nation of each and every bit of the universe? If this is so, then if it is not
obvious that our search for God is wholly redundant and ridiculous, it is
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 121

only our current state of relative scientific ignorance which conceals the
· obviousness from us. This, in the eyes of any theist, is tantamount to a
rejection of the existence of God. No classical theist can say, 'There must
be a God now, but as science develops the need for God will diminish
until maybe God becomes redundant'. (It is the fact that modern science
is expected to come up with the explanations of this or that part of the
world, incidentally, which has brought it about that this objection against
the existence of God, which I have called 'the argument from partial
explanation', a label which fits Aquinas's formulation well, is now often
called 'the argument from science'.)
This argument is already quite concrete and understandable, but it has
become a commonplace in the philosophy of religion to bring it down to
earth yet more by what is now called the example of the five Inuit, or
argument of the five Inuit. 35 The argument goes as follows. If one were to
meet a group of five Inuit standing on a street corner, the presence of this
group is a surprising phenomenon, 36 one which requires an explanation.
But suppose you had an explanation of the presence of each one of the
group: would it then still be sensible to demand an explanation of the
presence of the group as a whole? 37 Clearly not.
It is worth pointing out that this kind of argument is one which Aquinas
himself would accept. We have seen above that for Aquinas there need be
no reason for coincidences, for the per accidens as such. That which is per
accidens is the result of the convergence of two or more lines of explanation
or causality, and once each of those lines of explanation has been given,
the per accidens existent is already explained. To seek for an explanation
of the per accidens as such is to demand that it should be, in the modern
jargon, 'over-determined'. If I seek an explanation of why I should have
bumped into a friend in the street, there need be no other explanation than
the explanation of why I am proceeding along street S from east to west
at time t, plus the explanation of why my friend is proceeding along street
S from west to east at time t. I can lump the explanations for each bit of
the meeting together, and I have an explanation of the meeting as a whole.
What goes for the meeting of me and my friend goes for the group oflnuit,
too: if there is a reason why lnuk A is at point X at time t, and a reason
why lnuk B is at point X at time t, and a reason why lnuk C is at point X
at time t, and a reason why lnuk D is at point X at time t, and a reason
why lnuk E is at point X at time t, then there is eo ipso a reason why there
is a group of five Inuit at point X at time t.
More to the point, what goes for a group of Inuit goes for the world as
a whole. In the example we have a complex and surprising phenomenon,
the presence of a group of five Inuit; a phenomenon which excites our
122 God and Explanations

curiosity and makes us want to look for an explanation. The existence of

the world, it is suggested, is in every way parallel: a complex and surprising
phenomenon, a phenomenon which excites our curiosity and makes us
want to look for an explanation. We ignore the siren call of Lord Russell
to regard the world as 'just there', as we would probably ignore an appeal
from one of our more boring friends to regard the Inuit as just there. (My
grandmother used to say 'Don't stare' and 'mind your own business'. That
Lord Russell should have so much in common with my grandmother is
another of those trivial but interesting sidelights on the history of philoso-
phy.) In the example, we are supposed to find an explanation of the
presence of each and every one of the Inuit who compose the group; and
once we have that, we will not need to look for an explanation of the
presence of the group as a whole. In the case of the world, we are on our
way to having provided for us by science an explanation of the existence
of each and every thing in the world. Equally, then, it is claimed, we do
not need to look for an explanation of the existence of the world as a whole.
The case against arguing for the existence of God, in so far as arguing for
the existence of God means arguing for an explanation for the existence
of the world as a whole, rests.
Clearly the time has come to tell a story. Once upon a time there were
five Inuit standing on a street corner in Glasgow: Nanuk, Amoraq, Kadlu,
Kotuko, and Angekok. 38 The claim being made is that when we have an
explanation of the presence of each and every one of the group we then
needn't ask for a reason for the presence of the group as a whole. Let us
endeavour, then to find an explanation of the presence of each and every
one of the group. Why is Nanuk there? Nanuk has a strong, if not
necessarily a good reason for being there: he is deeply and madly in love
with Amoraq, and where she goes, he goes. Why is Amoraq there? Amoraq
is there because she is Kadlu's wife (I told you that Nanuk's reason for
being there was strong but not necessarily good), and she is accompanying
her husband. Why is Kadlu there? Kadlu is there because, not unnaturally,
he does not wish to see his wife go off touring Europe without him, and
particularly not in the company of Nanuk, of whom he has (justifiable)
suspicions. Why is Kotuko there? Kotuko is there because he is the infant
son of Amoraq and Kadlu, and is too young to be left at home on his own.
Why is Angekok there? Angekok is there because (as, I understand, his
name suggests) he is the village sorcerer or shaman, a person of some
authority in the community, who is there to keep an eye on Kadlu and
Nanuk, to make sure that they don't start quarrelling or even fighting,
thus lowering the high reputation the Inuit people have hitherto deserv-
edly enjoyed in Scotland.
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 123

What is wrong with this story? As a novel, it's pretty thin on both
characterisation and plot, as a pulpit anecdote its moral is rather unclear.
But as a story to explain why each and every one of the group of five Inuit
is standing on the street corner in Glasgow, there is nothing wrong with
it. Ask 'Why is he there?' or 'Why is she there?' of any one of the group
and the story provides a perfectly valid explanation. If the thesis which
this example was developed to support is correct, we can now lump all
these partial explanations together and we will have an explanation of the
presence of the group as a whole. To look for any further explanation of
the presence of the group as a whole should be redundant and ridiculous.
One does feel, however, that not everything that needs to be said has
been said. Yes, we might say, I can see a reason why each should be on a
street corner in Glasgow, and these reasons, lumped together, do indeed
give some sort of a reason why all should be there: what I cannot see is a
reason why any should be there. Some explanation is surely still missing.
Can I have found a sufficient reason for the presence of all when I have a
crying need for a reason for the presence of any?
What is wrong with the story, what makes it unsatisfactory for us to
lump together the explanations of the presence of each and call the
resulting story an explanation of the presence of the group as a whole, is
the following feature: the explanation of the presence of each member of
the group is given in terms of his or her relation to some other or others
of the group. Naturally I composed the story, such as it is, to display this
feature. When the explanation of the presence of each member of the
group is given in terms of his or her relation to some other or others of
the group, then we cannot lump together the explanations of the presence
of each member of the group and call it an explanation of the presence of
the group as a whole. It is therefore not redundant or ridiculous, in such
a case, to seek for a further explanation of the presence of the group as a
whole.
This further explanation can take various forms. It could indeed be an
explanation for the presence of each and every member of the group
directly; in the imagined case, they might each be members of the North
Manitoba Ethnic Dance Troupe which is about to perform at the Mayfest
Arts Festival. Equally well, it could be an explanation primarily and
directly for the presence of only one; maybe Kadlu is an exceptionally
good footballer and is thinking of signing for Partick Thistle. 39 In the latter
case, one might want to say that Kadlu has a reason for being there and
that the others don't. This would be a mistake. The others have a reason
for being there: they are there, directly or indirectly, because Kadlu is,
and Kadlu is there to sign for Thistle. Thus the reason for the presence
124 God and Explanations

of the group is Kadlu's signing for Thistle. In this case Kadlu occupies an
explanatorily privileged place relative to the rest of the group. If the story
were told another way, another one, or several others, might occupy the
explanatorily privileged place. Or, as has been said, it might be that none
of them occupies an explanatorily privileged place; as in the dance troupe
explanation, they might all have an equally strong and equally immediate
explanation for their presence. The form of the explanation is at this point
irrelevant: what is relevant is that the story as originally told cannot be the
end of the matter, there must be an explanation of the presence of the
group as a whole, over and above the various explanations of the presence
of each member of the group.
Equally unimportant, clearly, is the size of the group. What goes for
five Inuit goes for ten, for twenty ... for as many as you have room for
on the street corner. No matter how large the group, if the explanation of
the presence of each is given in terms of that person's relation to another
of the group, we need a further explanation of the presence of the group
as a whole. This remains true, we may point out, even if the group is
infinitely large. We may grant that there is something odd about the
picture of an infinitely large group of Inuit, or of anybody, standing on
any finite corner of any finite pair of streets in Glasgow, but the point
remains. Easier to imagine, perhaps, is a group of infinite, or at least
indefinite, temporal duration. For as long as you care to mention there are
five Inuit standing on the street corner, since when one goes another
comes. If the presence of each lnuk is explained in terms of his or her
relation to another of the group - e.g. if each new arrival explains his or
her presence by saying 'I'm here to take over from Whatsisname' - then
even if the group is infinitely large, then we will still need an explanation
of the presence of the group as a whole.
Let us apply the parallel. Science, let us admit, does adequately explain
the existence of each and every thing in the world; or, if in fact it doesn't,
let us admit that it looks as if one day it might. If we ask for the explanation
why this or that thing exists, science can give it to us, or at least can
plausibly claim that one day it will be able to give it to us. In the same way
our original story gave us a explanation of the presence of each and every
lnuk. But the parallel continues. The explanation of each and every thing
in the world is given in terms of that thing's relationship to something else
in the world. Clearly this is so: science very carefully avoids telling us
about anything outside the world; science is rightly agnostic about any-
thing outside the world. So it was with the Inuit: the explanation of the
presence of each was given in terms of his or her relationship to some other
member of the group. For this reason we required a further explanation
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 125

of the presence of the group of Inuit as a whole, and for the very same
reason we not only may, but must, require an explanation of the existence
of the world as a whole.
The parallel continues yet further. This further explanation could
relate each part of the world directly with some single explanation, as the
dance-troupe explanation did to the Inuit; this, as we shall see, is the kind
of explanation favoured by St Thomas in the Five Ways. 40 Or the further
explanation might relate in some more direct and privileged way to some
individual part of the world, as the football explanation related directly to
K.adlu and indirectly to the others; this would be similar to the way in
which some people explain everything else in the world in terms of its
relationship, direct or indirect, to the Big Bang, and then wonder about
the explanation of the Big Bang. St Thomas, I think, would not object to
this kind of explanation, but, as we shall see, he does not (in the Five Ways,
at least) think he has sufficient evidence to establish the explanatory
priority of any particular part of the universe. 41
Lastly, the parallel applies also to the question of the infinite extent of
the whole. For St Thomas, the world is limited in physical extent. He also
believes, though, that while in fact the world had a beginning in time, it
might have existed for ever. 42 He makes use in a number of the Five Ways
of a step in the argument which claims 'We cannot go on to infinity in this
line'. As we shall see, the sense in which he uses 'we cannot go on to
infinity' is a curious one, one which is compatible with the hypothetical
everlasting existence of the world; 43 he might have expressed himself more
perspicuously by saying 'If we go on to infinity in this line, there is no
explanation'. This is precisely the point made when the presence of the
group of Inuit was imagined indefinitely protracted in time.
This illustration - which the reader may feel has been over-laboured -
has the additional justification that it can be used to illustrate what may
be thought of as the overall pattern of the Five Ways. 44 St Thomas's claim,
in each of the Five Ways, is that the world as a whole requires some kind
of explanation; and the conclusion of each of the Five Ways is that the
explanation of the world of the kind which that Way demands is some-
thing which we call God. In a sense, 'God' is at this stage no more than a
label for 'the explanation of the world'. St Thomas feels himself obliged
to go on in later questions of the Summa to argue that, for example, there
can be no more than one God, that God does not enter into any kind of
composition with the world, that God is good and almighty, and so forth,
through all the traditional attributes which classical theism attributes to
God. The conclusions of the Five Ways are very agnostic, in a sense,
though not tentative. It seems, for example, that the Third Way might be
126 God and Explanations

consistent with a multiplicity of physical or material Gods, such as the

ancient Greeks traditionally believed in, and possibly that the Fourth Way
is consistent with a multiplicity of formally distinct spiritual Gods, such
as (perhaps) some of the Greek philosophers believed in.
Though the Five Ways can be seen to follow something of a common
pattern, they differ essentially in detail. They differ essentially, in that
though in each case what is being argued for is the need that the world as
a whole has for an explanation which is distinct from it, in each of the Five
Ways the world as a whole is being considered under a different aspect,
under a different description, as a systematic whole, representing various
different manners of systematisation. This is clear from the first sentence
of each of the Five Ways. St Thomas begins by identifying a particular
feature - call it feature X - a different feature for each of the Five Ways.
This feature is displayed by this or that bit of the world: in each case St
Thomas takes this claim as being obviously true, and does not argue for
it. One of the distinguishing marks of feature X is that anything which
displays feature X requires an explanation in terms of its relation to
something else: the fact of displaying feature X means that whatever
displays it requires an explanation, and does not explain itself. This is
clearly a vulnerable point of each in the Five Ways: it is possible for the
critic to argue that the feature which St Thomas identifies does not have
this distinguishing mark. At various points we will see St Thomas defend-
ing his identification of a feature X against obvious criticisms of this kind.
A good example is the defence he offers for the principle 'omne movens
ab alio movetur', everything which is in process of change has that change
initiated in it by something else, in the First Way. 45
The next step in each of the Five Ways is likewise questionable. It is
what Geach calls the 'lumping-together' move. 46 This consists in moving
from the claim that this or that part of the world displays feature X to the
claim that the world as a whole displays feature X. There is nothing
particularly mysterious about this move: it can be made perfectly straight-
forwardly with regard to any number of features, and with regard to any
number of systems which contain parts which display that feature. The
pattern of argument is that any system which contains parts which display
feature X is itself something which displays feature X. It is not disputable
that this move works where feature X is, say, 'complexity'- any whole
which contains complex parts is itself complex. Equally, it is not disput-
able that this move fails to work for 'smallness'- a system which contains
small parts may itself be rather large, even, indeed, if all its parts are small.
Here again there is room for the critic to raise a query: is the feature X
which St Thomas has identified one which permits of this move? We can
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 127

see the point being argued fairly explicitly in the Third Way. 47 It is worth
saying, however, that there is no obvious contradiction between this mark
of feature X - that it permits us to make the lumping-together move -
and the previously identified mark, that whatever displays feature X
requires an explanation in terms of a relation to something different to it.
Any alleged inconsistency will need looking at on its merits.
This brings us to the penultimate move in each of the Five Ways. It has
been claimed that parts of the world display feature X, and that whatever
displays feature X requires an explanation in terms of a relation to
something else. If the lumping-together move is valid, we are obliged to
admit that the world as a whole, which consists, at least in part, of things
which display feature X, is itself something that displays feature X. On
the supposition that an appropriate feature X has indeed been identified,
we are forced to conclude that the world itself, as a whole, requires an
explanation in terms of something else. It is worth pointing out that this
move does not yet bring us directly to God. There might be something
which explains the existence of the world as a system which displays
feature X, which is in some way separate from or distinct from the rest of
the world as a whole, which nevertheless itself displays feature X. If it
does display feature X, then it too requires an explanation in terms of its
relation to something else. We then must perform the lumping-together
move over again, putting this new explanatory entity together with the
rest of the world which displays feature X, and ask of this newly enlarged
systematic whole, what is its explanation. We might, indeed, ask about
that particular explanatory entity, itself displaying feature X, what is its
explanation: this would be to attribute to it a position of explanatory
privilege, such as we offered to Kadlu as footballing star in the story of
the Inuit, such as some people nowadays would offer to the Big Bang, or
such as St Thomas in the Summa Contra Gentes seems to want to attribute
to the outermost sphere of the heavens. 48 It is worth pointing out that in
the Summa Theologiae St Thomas abandons this strategy, and prefers that
of performing the lumping-together move over again. Clearly this strategy
is of greater generality and does not depend so much on shifting physical
theories which would identify what is explanatorily privileged in different
ways at different times.
But now we come to the concluding moves of the Five Ways. No matter
how many explanatorily privileged elements of the world we may identify
at one time or another, we are entitled to perform the lumping-together
move as often as we have reason to do so, and to recognise in the (now
expanded) system of the world which we now behold, something which
displays feature X. Now matter how big the world is, no matter how many
128 God and Explanations

extra elements, explanatorily privileged or not, we find ourselves obliged

to build into it, the world does not cease to be something which displays
feature X. And that which displays feature X requires an explanation in
terms of a relation to something else. This remains true even if the world
is of infinite extent: if the explanation of the presence of each member of
the group of Inuit is his or her relationship to another member of the
group, then the presence of the group requires an explanation, even if the
group is of infinite size or of (at least) indefinitely long duration. The
whole system - the group of Inuit, the world as a whole - will thus lack
an explanation, until we posit the existence of something, in terms of a
relationship to which the whole system which displays feature X can be
explained. And this posited something, through the reasoning we have
just expounded, cannot itself display feature X, or it would itself be just
a part of the newly expanded system of things which display feature X.
We therefore postulate the existence of some thing which does not display
feature X, which therefore does not require an explanation in terms of its
relationship to something else, in terms of a relationship to which the
world as a whole is explained. And this, Aquinas tells us, we call God.
Two glosses are worth making at this point. The way we have explained
the Five Ways makes it clear why it is absurd to ask 'But who made God?'.
The God whose existence we have been forced to postulate, by the very
force of the argument, does not display feature X, and therefore the
question 'Who made God?', or, more accurately, 'What is it in terms of a
relationship to which the existence of God is explained?', does not arise. 49
The second point to be made is that this last line of each of the Five Ways
provides yet another point at which the critic may object. The critic may
very well protest that he does not see why the explanatory entity thus
postulated needs to be called 'God': in more formal terms, that he cannot see
why 'Entity lacking feature X, in terms of a relationship to which the world
as a whole, in so far as it is itself something which displays feature X, is
explained' enters into the signification of the word 'God'. The pattern I have
suggested for all of the Five Ways thus admits three crucial points for the
objector, while in each of the Five Ways there may also be particular points
for objections to be made, which relate to the different ways in which the
accounts of the different kinds of feature X are developed. Displaying the
arguments in this way should make it easier to understand the arguments of
St Thomas and to recognise them as valid, if they are valid; but it will also
make it easier to find points of questionable validity. The structure alleged
is not a kind of trick to make the arguments more acceptable: it seems to
me to be a useful piece of common ground on which supporters and
opponents of the Five Ways can carry out their debate.5°
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 129

If this position, that there is a discernible single structure to be found

in all of the Five Ways, is acceptable, our next move has to be to examine
the detailed development of each of them.

NOTES

1. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3: 'Utrum Deus sit ... Videtur quod Deus non sit.'
2. See Chapter I, p. 3.
3. Usually; sometimes he regards neither the thesis enshrined in the quaestio nor the contrary which
he expounds in the objections as being an adequate account of the problem.
4. See e.g. J. L. Mackie, The Miracle of Theism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1982), especially Chapter 5,
pp. 81-101, and Chapter 9, pp. 150-176.
5. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, !st objection:
Videtur quad Deus non sit. Quia si unum contrariorum fuerit infinitum, totaliter destrueret
aliud. Sed hod intelligitur in hoc nomine 'Deus', quad sit quoddam bonum infinitum. Si ergo
Deus esset, nullum malum inveniretur. lnvenitur autem malum in mundo. Ergo Deus non est.
6. See Chapter 6 above, pp. 83-4.
7. Usually taken as roughly equivalent to the belief defined in R. Swinburne, The Coherence of
Theism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977), p. 1.
8. This formulation, and much in my account of the argument from evil, I owe to B. Davies, An
Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edn, 1993), pp.
32-54.
9. In the East: various Hindu or Buddhist systems which hold that all existence is an illusion and
the existence of evil is a fortiori an illusion. In the West: religious groups in the West such as the
Christian Scientists; philosophers such as the Stoics and McTaggart. The Christian Scientists
at least at times appear to hold the self-contradictory view expounded in this paragraph, while
the others seem to have held the more reasonable claim.
10. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 48, a. 2, ad 2 and Quaestio Disputata de Malo, q. I, a. 1., ad 19. See
Chapter 5 above, pp. 65-73.
11. See Mackie, The Miracle of Theism, Chapter 9, pp. 150-76.
12. Cf. P. T. Geach, 'An irrelevance of omnipotence', in Providence and Evil (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1977) pp. 29-39, and Truth, Love and Immortality (Berkeley and Los Angeles,
University of California Press, 1979), pp. 164-5.
13. Expounded by A. Plantinga, God, Freedom and Evil (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1975);
discussed by Mackie, The Miracle of Theism, Chapter 9, e.g on pp. 155--6, 162-6, 172-6.
14. See Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy ofReligion, especially pp. 42-3. Compare also I van's
rejection of the free-will defence in The Brothers Karamazov, discussed in Davies, pp. 37-8.
15. See below, Chapter 11, p. 168; also compare P. T. Geach, Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell,
1961), p. 110.
16. See above, Chapter 5 note 35.
17. See Summa Theologiae, I, q. 11, a. I ad I: 'Privation is a negation within a subject' (my stress),
'Privatio est negatio in subiecto'.
18. See Chapter 6 above, p. 92.
I 9. See the discussion of divination in Summa Theologiae, I, qq. 115, 116, where the indeterminate-
ness of the cause of the per accidens is the principal reason given for the irrationality of this kind
of superstition.
20. It is true that there can be such an explanation. A latter-day St Nicholas, wishing to do good by
stealth, might have hidden the treasure at point X and then encouraged our hero to dig his ditch
at point X. Anything which can be expressed by a proposition can be grasped by the mind and
thus brought about by an intelligent agent. But the point is that there is no need to postulate a
further explanation.
21. See A. Kenny, The Metaphysics ofMind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991).
22. As a matter of fact to make this work you have to take what appears to be the third word of Genesis
( 'elohim, God) as being in some sense really the first word, either because it is the most important
word in the sentence or because it is the subject of the sentence. But this kind of detail never
stops the people who like this sort of thing.
130 God and Explanations

23. My thanks are due to Professor Geach, in conversation, for the idea expressed in this example,
and to Professor Broadie for the elegant detail of this precise example.
24. On the relative inadequacy of any descriptions we may apply to God, see Summa Theologiae, I,
q. 13, a. 2c.
25. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 13, a. I, second objection and reply.
26. See Geach, 'Animal pain', in Providence and Evil, pp. 67-83.
27. This point is made by Plantinga, God, Freedom and Evil.
28. See Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy ofReligion, especially pp. 53-53.
29. See Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy ofReligion, p. 54.
30. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, ad I:
Ad primum dicendum quod sicut <licit Augustinus in Enchiridione, 'Deus cum summe bonus
sit, ullo modo sineret mali aliquid esse in operibus suis, nisi esset adeo omnipotens, et bonus,
ut bene faceret de malo.' Hoc ergo ad infinitam Dei bonitatem pertinet, ut esse permittat mala,
et ex eis eliciat bona.
31. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, second objection:
Praeterea, quod potest compleri per pauciora principia non fit per plura. Sed videtur quod
omnia quae apparent in mundo possunt compleri per alia principia, supposito quod Deus non
sit; quia ea quae sunt naturaliter reducuntur in principium quod est natura, ea vero quae sunt
a proposito reducuntur in principium quod est ratio humana vel voluntas. Nulla igitur
necessitas est ponere Deum esse.
32. It is also worth pointing out that Aquinas, in his reply to this objection (see note 34 in this chapter)
does not reject the principle used in the objection. Rather he insists that it is necessary to posit
another originating principle, since the principles cited in the objection are not in fact sufficient
to explain the relevant natural and voluntary phenomena.
33. Davies, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, p. 87.
34. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, ad 2:
Ad secundum dicendum quod cum natura propter determinatam finem operetur ex directione
alicuius superioris agentis, necesse est ea quae a natura fiunt etiam in Deum reducere sicut in
primam causam. Similiter etiam quae ex proposito fiunt oportet reducere in aliquam altiorem
causam, quae non sit ratio et voluntas humana, quia haec mutabilia sunt et defectibilia. Oportet
autem omnia mobilia et deficere possibilia reduci in aliquod primum principium immobile et
per se necessarium, sicut ostensum est.
35. This argument used to be called 'the argument of the five Eskimos', but it appears that the North
American people who call themselves 'Inuit' (singular lnuk) very much dislike the more common
name. Since I understand that the name they dislike comes from the Algonquian language of the
Inuit's southern neighbours, and means something like 'stinking fish-eaters', one does not have
to be a fanatic for political correctness to take the trouble to use the less familiar word.
36. In Glasgow, at least, if not in Churchill, Manitoba. The example betrays its non-Canadian origin.
37. The argument, I believe, was first used by P. Edwards, in 'The cosmological argument', in
Rationalist Annual, 1959, pp. 63-77; also in D.R. Burrill, (ed.), The Cosmological Arguments: A
Spectrum of Opinion (New York, 1967), pp. 114-22.
38. As far as I can make out, most of these are genuine Inuit names, and ifl'm wrong I submit that
they're at least plausible.
39. There is a rather ancient Glasgow joke which might suggest that Kadlu was given a trial for
Rangers, but they dropped him because he ate fish on Friday.
40. See e.g. above, Chapter 8, p. 104, and below, Chapter 13, pp. 196--201.
41. See Chapters 9-13 below; but contrast Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, where St. Thomas seems to
attribute some kind of explanatory priority to the outermost heavenly sphere of Aristotle's
cosmology. See Chapter 7, note 20.
42. See Chapter 11, p. 157, below, on the Third Way.
43. See Summa Theologiae, I, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7, and Chapter 11, p. 167, below on the Third Way.
44. This pattern is in general that observed by Geach, 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers, pp. 111-17.
45. See Chapter 9 below, pp. 135-41. See also the parallel passage in Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13,
where St Thomas admits that this step in the argument is a 'questionable premiss'.
46. See Geach, 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers, p. 113.
47. See below, Chapter 11, p. 160.
48. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13.
 'Does God Exist? Apparently Not' 131
49. Cf. Geach, 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers, p. 113. This point is worth stressing as the
best-known contemporary anti-God propagandist in Britain, Richard Dawkins, seems to be
unaware of it.
50. Cf. A. Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 1-5.
 9
•
THE FIRST WAY

The 'Feature X' identified in the First Way appears to me to be 'being in

process of change', in Latin 'moveri'. There is some ambiguity in this Latin
word: it can be used to mean 'moving', in the intransitive sense of the
English word, i.e. precisely that of being in a certain process of change.
Though the English word is usually limited to the notion of change of
place, there seems no essential use of this specific sense (which the Latin
word can also have) in the First Way. Moreover, the parallel passage in
the Summa Contra Gentes1 shows us St Thomas explicitly discussing a
number of different kinds of change, so it would appear that the notion
of change of place is not foremost in his mind. But the more serious
ambiguity consists in this: the same word 'moveri' is also the passive form
of 'movere', to move in the transitive sense, to initiate change in something.
It has been alleged by Kenny that Aquinas is thinking principally of the
regular local movements of the Aristotelian heavens, on the one hand, and,
on the other, is hopelessly confused by the ambiguity of 'moveri' as
between 'being in process of change' and 'having a change initiated in
oneself'. 2 Here we can perhaps see the first advantage of observing the
structure we have outlined. Such an ambiguity, if it existed, would
invalidate the identification of the relevant feature X as both being a
feature which (at least) parts of the world uncontentiously display, and
also being a feature in virtue of which that which displays that feature
requires an explanation in terms of a relationship to something else. In the
sense 'being in process of change', 'moving' in the intransitive sense, most
of the world displays the feature of 'moveri'; and in the sense of 'having
one's change initiated by something else', 'being moved by something'
(using 'moveri' as the strict passive of 'moving' in the transitive sense), it
is obvious that everything that displays the feature of 'moveri' requires an
explanation in terms of a relationship to something else. The fallacy would
consist in holding, clearly mistakenly, that there is a single feature ade-
quately expressed by 'moveri' in its two different senses.
 The First Way 133

It should become clear, as we examine the First Way, that St Thomas

does not commit any such fallacy of equivocation. He spends a good deal
of the First Way arguing that everything that is in process of change has
that change initiated in it by something else: that is, he argues that
whatever 'is moved' in one sense also 'is moved' in the other. It may be
that his arguments fail to prove his point, and indeed they are slightly
obscure, but it is clear that he has not been confused into a fallacy by the
mere fact that one Latin verb has two senses. Someone who argues at
length for the claim that whatever a particular verb applies to in one sense,
that same verb applies to in the other sense, has not committed a simple
fallacy of equivocation.
Let us examine the text, then.
The first and clearer way is one which is taken from the fact of
process of change.
It is certain - it is obvious to the senses - that in this world some
things are in process of change.
But everything that is in process of change has that change initiated
in it by something else.
For nothing is in process of change unless it can be that towards
which it is in process of change. But a thing initiates change in
so far as it actually is something.
This is because to initiate a process of change just is to lead
something from being able to be something to actually being
it. But something cannot be led from being able to be some-
thing to actually being it except in virtue of some existent
which actually is something. Thus, that which actually is
hot, i.e. fire, makes the wood, which can be hot actually to
be hot, and in virtue of this it initiates change in it and gives
it a new quality.
Now it is impossible for something to be able to be something and to
actually be the same thing at one and the same time: only different
things. For what actually is hot cannot be able to be hot at the same
time, though it is, at the same time, able to be cold.
It is impossible, then, that a thing should be an initiator of change
and a thing in process of change, with respect to the same determi-
nation and in the same way. That is, nothing initiates change in
itself. So everything which is in process of change must have that
change initiated in it by something else.
But if that which initiates the change is itself in process of change,
then it too must have its change initiated by something else: and so
on.
134 God and Explanations

We cannot go on to infinity in this line,

for if we did there would be no first initiator of change, and thus
no other initiator of change,
since the later initiators of change initiate change only in virtue
of their having change initiated in them by the first initiator of
change. Thus a stick does not initiate change except in virtue
of having change initiated in it by the hand.
So we have to come to some first initiator of change which is not in
a process of change initiated by something else, and everyone un-
derstands that this is God. 3

The curious indentation in this text is not merely a freak of the editor or
the printer: it is aimed at clarifying the structure of the argument to some
extent. The sections which begin at the left-hand margin are the main
premisses of the argument and its conclusion. Those sections indented
are subsidiary arguments introduced in support of what has gone imme-
diately before. Beyond this, there are sections yet further indented which
are yet more subsidiary arguments adduced in support of elements in the
first-level subsidiary arguments.
Running down the left-hand margin, then, we have a clear outline of
the argument.

The first and clearer way is one which is taken from the fact of
process of change.

1. It is certain - it is obvious to the senses - that in this world some

things are in process of change.
2. But everything that is in process of change has that change
initiated in it by something else.
3. But if that which initiates the change is itselfin process of change,
then it too must have its change initiated by something else: and
so on.
4. We cannot go on to infinity in this line,
5. So we have to come to some first initiator of change which is not
in a process of change initiated by something else, and everyone
understands that this is God.
Premiss 1 identifies a feature X uncontentiously displayed by at least parts
of the world. Premiss 2 asserts the claim that everything which displays
this feature requires an explanation in terms of a relationship to something
else. Premisses 3 and 4 perform and defend the lumping-together move,
and lead us to the conclusion, 5. The argument appears to me to be of
 The First Way 135

valid form, and thus if its premisses are true, its conclusion will also be
true. Premiss 1 is, as I have said, uncontentious; premiss 3 is little more
than a re-statement of one of the marks of the given feature X. It is
premisses 2 and 4 which are contentious, and both are given detailed
support here by Aquinas. It is worth noticing that in the slightly more
articulated version of this argument which he gives in the Summa Contra
Gentes, he identifies these two premisses as being 'doubtful' 'dubiosae', 4
or, as we might say, 'questionable'. He is quite clearly aware of the points
at which his argument is vulnerable.
The first questionable premiss, then, is premiss 2, everything that is in
process of change has that change initiated in it by something else, and
there is a long and difficult argument to support it. It stands in need of
clarification, indeed, as much as support. At first sight, it looks like a
straightforward denial that there are self-movers, things that initiate
change in themselves. This claim appears ridiculously false: the dog which
begins to bark would seem to be an obvious counter-example. St Thomas,
who follows Aristotle in holding that one of the things that marks out
animals is their capacity for self-movement - 'the originating principle is
in themselves' 5 - does not in fact hold anything so false. His claim is rather
that no material thing is a self-mover in a carefully defined sense: there is
nothing which as a whole initiates change within itself as a whole. 6 In an
animal, let us say, what happens is that one part initiates change in another
part.
This caveat is important if we are to make much of the argument which
he adduces in support of his premiss 2. Skipping the indented subsidiary
arguments, as before, the structure is as follows:

For nothing is in process of change unless it can be that towards

which it is in process of change. But a thing initiates change in so far
as it actually is something.
Now it is impossible for something to be able to be something and to
actually be the same thing at one and the same time: only different
things. For what actually is hot cannot be able to be hot at the same
time, though it is, at the same time, able to be cold.
It is impossible, then, that a thing should be an initiator of change
and a thing in process of change, with respect to the same determi-
nation and in the same way. That is, nothing initiates change in itself.
So everything which is in process of change must have that change
initiated in it by something else.

The argument, as it stands, looks rather dubious. It clearly rests on one

general principle which is fairly acceptable, that that which becomes F is
136 God and Explanations

not-F and can be F. But it seems also to rest on a principle which is not
only questionable, but in fact false: that only that which is F can make
something else F. The example Aquinas gives in the subsidiary argument
which we have just omitted makes it seem as if this principle is definitely
being used.

This is because to initiate a process of change just is to lead some-

thing from being able to be something to actually being it. But
something cannot be led from being able to be something to actually
being it except in virtue of some existent which actually is something.
Thus, that which actually is hot, i.e. fire, makes the wood, which can
be hot actually to be hot, and in virtue of this it initiates change in it
and gives it a new quality.

The example of heat itself is questionable, though there are obvious

examples which do fit the point Aquinas seems to be making. As Kenny
points out, you cannot dry yourself with a wet towel. But there are
innumerable examples which do not fit the pattern that that which makes
something F must itself be F. Again, with Kenny, we can say that the
king-maker need not be a king, and indeed very few murders are commit-
ted by dead men. 7 And as Geach points out, Aquinas himself would have
been aware of a strong counter-example even within the field of heat:
Aquinas, like most Aristotelians, believed that while the sun was the cause
of heat on earth, the sun was not itself hot. 8
It is true that if this second principle were true, Aquinas would have
achieved his point, and made it clear that whatever is in process of change
has that change initiated in it by something else, since nothing can both
be F and not-Fat the same time, so ifan initiator ofF-ness has to be F,
and something that comes to be F has to benot-F, then nothing can initiate
change in itself. But it is hard to believe that he can be meaning to offer
us such an obviously defective argument.
It is worth noticing, at least, that while the tone and the choice of
example suggest that Aquinas may indeed wish to say that only what is F
can make something F, the actual text of the argument does not say this.
The conclusion which is indeed warranted by the premisses, and is
explicitly drawn, is that only something that is actually something or other
can make something else to be F.
The reason for this might be as follows. The only requirements on
that which is made to be F, so far as the process of 'being made to be
F' is concerned, are that it should be not-F, and that it should be able
to be F, that it should be F in potentiality. No doubt there are plenty
of other determinations which it has, plenty of other descriptions which
 The First Way 137

are true of it, but from the fact that it is a subject of a change to being
F, all we are entitled to conclude about it is that it is non-F and can be
F, is F in potentiality. Neither of these two descriptions suffice to give
us a rationale or explanation for its coming to be F. Neither being
non-F nor being capable of becoming F offer us any explanation of the
fact which we have to explain, which is that it becomes F. If there is to
be any explanation of its becoming F, it must be at the very least in
virtue of some other aspect, given by some other true description: a
description which is not purely negative, such as ' - is not-F', nor
purely potential, such as'- can become F'.
This does not get us any further than the claim which Aristotle and
Aquinas would make for the obvious self-movers such as animals, that
when the dog begins to bark, for example, it is a case of one part or aspect
of the dog initiating a change in another part. 9 We seem to have some
justification for the claim that nothing as a whole initiates change in itself
as a whole.
It remains to be seen whether this claim will serve us in the development
of our account of the First Way, but before we examine that question, it
may be worth while examining whether even the more modest claim just
made can be justified. That it is justified on Thomistic grounds, and on
the basis of the text of the First Way seems clear; and the parallel passage
in the Summa Contra Gentes, which lists a variety of different kinds of
change, seems to justify our taking the text of the First Way in this sense,
and abandoning the obviously false suggestion that only what is F can
make something else F .10 But there may also be considerations which we
can draw from more contemporary views on the nature of change and
explanation which may help us to provide a more convincing justifica-
tion.11
We can begin by saying that every change is a beginning of existence.
Not that the dog's starting barking is the beginning of existence of the
dog, of course, but it is at least the beginning of the existence of the
barking. And we can also insist, pace Hume, 12 that every beginning of
existence has a cause. Anscombe, in the latter of the two articles cited,
points out that the only way we can identify a beginning of existence as
such, as being a genuine beginning of existence, is by attributing to it a
cause. To claim that the dog's beginning to bark is indeed a beginning of
existence of the dog's barking, and not, for example, the mysterious
invisible and untraceable arrival to the dog's throat of a barking which may
have existed for centuries elsewhere, is only possible through an
identification of the cause, which we may take to be some kind of
stimulation in the dog's brain.
138 God and Explanations

This seems to get us no further than the account we gave of what St

Thomas actually said. We are, perhaps, forced to admit some cause or
explanation of each change that is something different from the change
itself. We can admit, too, that when the change is from not-F to F, from
being able to be F to being F, it is not the being not-Fas such, not even
the being able to be Fas such, which is the cause of the change. The cause,
we may be willing to admit, must be something actual, some real existent,
we might say, using the terminology we used earlier in discussing St
Thomas's doctrine on existence.
But this does not get us very far. We have to admit, perhaps, that there
is something in the dog other than its barking which explains its beginning
to bark; something in the dog which explains its beginning to bark, which
is also other than its previous non-barking and other than its previous
being able to bark. Neither of these two latter features are any kind of
cause or explanation of the dog's beginning to bark; rather they are its
logical presuppositions. But can we get from here to the general thesis St
Thomas wishes to reach, that everything that is in process of change has
that change initiated in it by something else?
It may be possible to bridge the gap. If every change is, under a different
description, a beginning of existence, and every beginning of existence
requires a cause, it may be possible to argue that every change requires a
cause, under some description. And it may be that possible answers to the
question, 'under what particular description?', may be subject to certain
limitations.
A crucial feature in the philosophical analysis of any change is the
identification of the subject of the change. This point has been known at
least since the time of Heraclitus, who told us that upon those who go
down into the same rivers, other and other waters ever flow. 13 An inter-
esting feature of our shifting from the consideration of the dog's starting
to bark in the night as being a change in the dog, to our consideration of
the same phenomenon as the beginning of existence of the dog's barking,
was that when we shifted our consideration, and thus the description we
gave of the phenomenon, we found ourselves obliged to make a simulta-
neous shift from the dog as subject of the change to the barking as subject
of the beginning of existence; or (in the possible alternative description
envisaged) to the barking as the subject of a mysterious and invisible
journey through what science-fiction writers like to call 'hyperspace'.
What difference does this shift of subject make?
Interestingly enough, it seems to make no difference to the argument.
We know that the dog began barking because of some stimulation in its
brain, and because we know this - because we can attribute a cause or
 The First Way 139

explanation - we reject any possibility that the barking was really started
some time earlier by some other dog and transferred to our Rover. If this
is so, it seems that we can generalise from 'every beginning of existence
must have a cause' to 'every initiation of a process of change must have a
cause'. We can go one step beyond this, even. Every process of change (as
opposed to an instantaneous change) is itself a continually repeated series
of initiations of a process of change. To deny this would seem to take us
into the territory of Zeno, in which we are to suppose a series of static
instants at which no change takes place. We should rather say, with the
medieval Aristotelians, that every instant is to be considered either as the
last instant of the preceding state or as the first moment of the succeeding
state. 14 If this is so, then every process of change requires a cause which is
external to that process of change itself. We do not have to deny the
existence of self-movers such as animals, but it seems that we do have to
accept the Aristotelian account of them: that in the self-movement of
animals it is strictly one part of the animal which moves another part,
which initiates a process of change in another part. Clearly, too, 'one part'
and 'another part' need not be understood in terms of spatially extended
parts, though one of the arguments which Aristotle gives for this thesis
seems most naturally taken in the sense of spatially extended parts. The
mature Aristotelian doctrine actually suggests that in an animal it is the
soul that moves the body, and here there is no idea of the spatial location
of the soul. Leaving aside the soul and the body, we can instead at least
admit that animals and other obvious self-movers, initiators of change in
themselves, do not count as self-movers in the strong sense, as St Thomas
would say: it is not the whole animal which initiates a process of change
in the whole animal.
This still does not yet seem to have brought us clear reasons to accept
the thesis that everything which is in process of change has that change
initiated in it by something else. We seem to have been brought to the
conclusion that every process of change has to be initiated by something
other than the process of change itself, but we still seem far away from St
Thomas's conclusion. St Thomas's conclusion seems to be that every
process of change has to be initiated by something other than the subject
of the process of change, and all we seem to be able to conclude is that
every process of change must be initiated by something other than the
process of change itself.
It seems that it will be necessary to bring forward the use of the
lumping-together move, to which we would normally attribute a later
place in the First Way as in the other Ways. Our premiss 3 says: 'But
if that which initiates the change is itself in process of change, then it
140 God and Explanations

too must have its change initiated by something else: and so on.' This
is a point which can surely be made, mutatis mutandis, for the conclu-
sion we seem to have reached. If we admit the conclusion that every
process of change has to be initiated by something other than the
process of change itself, we can perform at this stage a low-level
lumping-together move, and consider the process of change and that
which initiates it as a whole. Is this whole itself in process of change, or
not?
There seems little reason to deny that every material thing acts on other
material things - initiates changes in it - while being itself in process of
change; indeed, in virtue of being itself in process of change. However
many intermediate steps, aspects, and mechanisms there may be in the
material subject of any process of change, we will eventually have to
consider that material subject of a given process of change as itself the
subject of a process of change, a process of change which can no longer be
explained as being initiated by something else within that subject. 15 It
begins to look as if for the material universe, at least, the principle
'Everything which is in process of change has that change initiated in it
by something else' will hold good. I do not know whether Aquinas would
regard this as sufficient: it may be that he thinks the principle holds good
for the angels, for example, in which he had such a great interest. But I
take it that since Aquinas's project is to prove the existence of the invisible
God from the things we see, 16 the principle need not apply more widely
than the material universe for the First Way to work as he wishes it to
work.
Even if this account of Aquinas's defence of the principle 'Everything
which is in process of change has that change initiated in it by something
else' is sound, there is a difficulty with it. It seems to make the First Way
indistinguishable from the Second Way, as we shall see in the next
chapter. The Second Way works from considerations of efficient causality
in general, and though the above discussion has been couched as far as
possible in the terms of 'process of change' which are appropriate to a
consideration of the First Way, it has made essential use of the principle
'Every beginning of existence has a cause': a principle which applies
indifferently to all cases of efficient causality. But this can be considered
later; in any case, St Thomas clearly regards the First and Second Ways
as closely linked, and perhaps to assimilate one to the other is not too
•
serious !".
a 1au 1t of exegesis.
. 17
Perhaps we need to take a step back at this stage and take a broader
view. We began by alleging that the feature X identified by the First
Way is 'being in process of change'. This seems fairly undeniable. For
 The First Way 141

this feature to be an adequate feature X for the purposes of the

argument, according to the structure which we claimed would be
followed, it needs to be a feature such that whatever displays that
feature requires an explanation in terms of a relation to something else.
The subsidiary argument St Thomas gives, which we have been exam-
ining, is an argument aimed at proving that this is indeed the case. We
can perhaps legitimately make two claims. One is that St Thomas's
subsidiary argument does indeed seem to work provided that we are
restricted enough in our identification of the subject of the change -
which again, of course, implies some kind of qualification (perhaps an
unwelcome one) to the answers we might be entitled to offer to the
question 'What counts as being a "something else" , in relation to
which whatever displays feature X requires to be explained?'. The
second claim is the one made in the last paragraph but one, that
whatever we may think of the principle 'Everything that is in process
of change has that change initiated in it by something else' as a universal
metaphysical principle, there seem to be good reasons for accepting it
as true of all bodies. And perhaps this is all we need to show.
It is all we need to show at this stage in the argument, for it should by
now be obvious that we are still very far short of proving the existence of
God. One of the more curious features of the garbled versions of the Five
Ways which can still sometimes be met with in books of apologetics is that
they (mis-)represent, say, the first half of one of St Thomas's arguments
and then pretend to have proved the existence of God. The argument so
far given would bring us to God only if the 'something else' which explains
the possession of feature X by some parts of the world must necessarily
be something which does not itself display feature X. This is because
Aquinas takes it that 'God' means something that initiates change and is
not itself in process of change. But a number of the considerations we have
adduced about material things show that this direct jump to God is one
which we have no right to make.
It looks, indeed, as if the whole material universe is something which
displays feature X as a whole; it looks as if the whole material universe is
perpetually and in every part in process of change. I do not know whether
this is a contingent fact or a necessary one, but it is probably the fact which
makes St Thomas think that this 'way' is the clearest of all the five. But
this fact is irrelevant to the argument. 'Being in process of change', besides
having the mark proper to a well-chosen feature X, of requiring an
explanation in terms of a relation to something else, also has the second
mark proper to a well-chosen feature X, of being generalisable from a part
to a whole. If a system has a part which is in process of change, then that
142 God and Explanations

system is in process of change. We do not need to claim that every part of

the system is in process of change, though in fact this seems to be the case
with the material universe. If there is change in any part, there is change
in the whole, just as if there is (say) colour in any part there is colour in
the whole: i.e. the whole is not monochrome, pure black and white, even
if most of it is.
Thus whether it is every part of the world or only some part of it which
is in process of change, 'being in process of change' is something which
can be said truly of the world. The world, as a lumped-together system,
displays feature X. And, by the account given of feature X, anything which
displays feature X requires an explanation in terms of a relation to
something else - in this case, to something which initiates change. Here
we can begin a very tedious set of suppositions, imagining, as it were,
outside each limit of the world as we know it, some initiator of change.
But we would then be able to ask of that initiator of change, whether or
not it is in process of change. If not, then we have reached God already;
but if it is in process of change then we have wearily to lump this new
initiator of change in with the world as previously delimited, and ask about
this (newly expanded) world, 'What is it that explains its possession of
feature X?' and so on, and so on.
This is where the next step which Aquinas makes may come as some-
thing of a relief: 'we cannot go on to infinity in this line.' As already
commented, Aquinas in the Summa Contra Gentes calls this premiss
'doubtful' or 'questionable'. 18 Some of the points we have already made
are relevant here, since this step is a part of the 'lumping-together' move,
and to give an adequate account of the first questionable premiss we found
ourselves having to begin to make the lumping-together move somewhat
prematurely. The point at issue here is that if we grant that a system of
things which display feature X itself displays feature X, and therefore
requires an explanation in terms of a relation to something else, it does
not matter how large the system is. If a system of things in process of
change is itself in process of change, then that change must have been
initiated in it by something else. The same is true for any initiator of
change in the system which is itself in process of change, and it doesn't
matter how many of them there are. To return to the homely example, it
doesn't matter how many Inuit there are, if the only explanation of the
presence of any is his or her relation to another: the presence of the group
as a whole requires an explanation, even if the group is infinitely large.
St Thomas is sometimes taken as saying here that the universe could
not be infinitely large, or could not have existed for ever. This is a mistake.
St Thomas certainly thought that the universe, though incalculably large
 The First Way 143

- and I mean just that, incalculably: the medievals knew that the distance
to the fixed stars was so great that the whole diameter of the Earth, which
they knew quite accurately, was infinitesimally small by comparison-was
finite in extension. He would also have had difficulties with the notion of
an infinite spatial extension, difficulties which seem to me very reasonable.
But though he also held that the earth had not existed for ever, he held
that it might well have done. Only faith in God's revealed word is
sufficient to inform us that 'In the beginning God created the heavens and
the earth'. Our own reason is only sufficient to tell us that the world, even
if it has existed as long as God has existed, i.e. for ever, has for ever been
God's creation. 19 Thus St Thomas has no difficulty with the idea of the
everlasting existence of the world, and thus no difficulty with the notion
of an infinite series of initiators of change which are themselves in process
of change. He gives the example later on in the Summa: if an eternal
blacksmith had been making horseshoes for all eternity, he would have
produced an infinite number of horseshoes and used, worn out and broken
an infinite number of hammers and anvils. 20 There is nothing wrong with
this kind of 'going on to infinity'.
Thus Aquinas's point is not that the series of initiators of change,
themselves in process of change, could not go on into infinity. He was
sure, from his knowledge of the Bible, that in fact it didn't, but he is
equally sure that it could have gone on for ever. His point is rather that
even if such a series goes on for ever, it fails to explain the existence of
feature X. In his own words:

we cannot go on to infinity in this line, for if we did there would be

no first initiator of change, and thus no other initiator of change,
since the later initiators of change initiate change only in virtue of
their having change initiated in them by the first initiator of change.
Thus a stick does not initiate change except in virtue of having
change initiated in it by the hand.

The crucial sentence here is 'since the later initiators of change initiate
change only in virtue of their having change initiated in them by the first
initiator of change'. It is in virtue ofitself displaying feature X that this or
that initiator of change explains the presence of feature X in other things:
which gets us no further towards an explanation of the presence of feature
X in the world as a whole, even though there should be an infinity of such
initiators, a wilderness of such monkeys. 21
Hence the conclusion: 'So we have to come to some first initiator of
change which is not in a process of change initiated by something else,
and everyone understands that this is God.' If any reader dislikes the
144 God and Explanations

argument, I think that the plausible objections are as follows. The first is
that one might say: 'I don't see that "being in process of change" is a
suitable feature X, in that I don't see that it demands an explanation in
terms of a relation to something other than what is in process of change.'
This looks a difficult position to maintain, though Aquinas's argument in
support ofit is, as we saw, hard to follow in detail. The second is that one
might say: 'I don't see that "thing that initiates change in other things,
which is not itself in process of change" is included in the signification
of the word God' - or, better: 'I don't see why this notion shouldn't apply
to other things as well.' I don't know what answer St Thomas would make
to such an objection, but I suppose that it might have been the thought of
objections such as this last one which made him develop five different
ways to show that God exists. If the reader is doubtful about one of the
suggested significations, perhaps another will be more plausible.

NOTES

I. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, n. 19.

2. A. Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 8-9, 19-23.
3. Summa Theologiae, I, q 2, a. 3:
Prima et manifestior via est quae sumitur ex parte motus. Certum est enim, et sensu constat,
aliqua moveri in hoc mundo. Omne autem quod movetur, ab alio movetur. Nihil enim movetur
nisi secundum quod est in potentia ad illud quo movetur. Movet autem aliquid secundum quod
est in actu, movere enim nihil aliud est quam educere aliquid de potentia in actum. De potentia
autem non potest aliquid reduci in actum nisi per aliquod ens actu; sicut calidum in actu, ut
ignis, facit lignum quod est calidum in potentia esse actu calidum, et per hoc movet et alterat
ipsum. Non autem possibile est quod idem sit simul in actu et in potentia secundum idem, sed
solum secundum diversa: quod enim est calidum in actu non potest simul esse calidum in
potentia, sed est simul frigidum in potentia. lmpossibile est ergo quod idem et eodem motu
aliquid sit movens et motum, vel quod moveat seipsum. Oportet ergo omne quod movetur ab
alio moveri. Si ergo illud a quo movetur moveatur, oportet et ipsum ab alio moveri, et illud ab
alio. Hie autem non est procedere in infinitum, quia sic non esset aliquod primum movens, et
per consequens nee aliquod aliud movens, quia moventia secunda non movent nisi per hoc quod
sunt mota a primo movente, sicut baculus non movet nisi per hoc quod est motus a manu. Ergo
necesse est devenire ad aliquod primum movens, quod in nullo movetur, et hoc omnes intelligunt
Deum.
4. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13 n. 4.
5. 'Ev <XIYt(fl ~ CXPXll, Nicomachean Ethics, III, I, 11 lla, 22-7.
6. See e.g. Commentary on the Physics, L.VIII, 1.10.
7. Kenny, The Five Ways, p. 21.
8. See P. T. Geach, review of Kenny, The Five Ways, Mind, vol. 79, 1970, pp. 467-8.
9. Commentary on the Physics, L.VIII, 1.7, nn. 1023-4.
10. See Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, n. 19.
11. I am thinking especially of the accounts of causality developed by Professor Anscombe in
'Causality and determination' and 'Times, beginnings and causes', in Collected Philosophical
Papers ofG. E. M. Anscombe, Vol. 2 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1981), pp. 133-62.
12. Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, Bk I, Part 3, Section 3 (ed. L. A. Selby-Bigge, 2nd edn,
Oxford: Clarendon, 1978), pp. 78-82.
13. Fragment 12.
14. Cf. Commentary on the Physics, L.VII, 1.8, n. 944, and L.VIII, 1.17, n. 1122.
15. This may be one of the points being made by St Thomas in his listing of different kinds of change
and modes of causality in his account in Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, e.g. at n. 19.
 The First Way 145
16. At Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 2, sed contra, St Thomas quotes Romans 1: 20: 'For the invisible
things of him from the creation of this world are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made'.
17. For the Second Way see Chapter 10.
18. See Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, and also note 4 in this chapter.
19. On this point St Thomas disagreed with many of his contemporaries, e.g. with his greatest British
contemporary, Robert Grosseteste, and with his friend and colleague St Bonaventure. St Thomas
in fact went so far as to write what was for him a rather bad-tempered pamphlet to support his
views, De Aeternitate Mundi Contra Murmurantes.
20. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7:
Ad septimum dicendum, quod in causis efficientibus impossibile est procedere in infinitum
per se; ut puta si causae quae per se requiruntur ad aliquem effectum multiplicarentur in
infinitum, sicut si lapis moveretur a baculo, et baculus a manu, et hoc in infinitum. Sed per
accidens in infinitum procedere in causis agentibus non reputatur impossibile; ut puta si omnes
causae quae in infinitum multiplicantur non teneant ordinem nisi unius causae, sed earum
multiplicatio sit per accidens; sicut artifex agit multis martellis per accidens, quia unus post
unum frangitur. Accidit ergo huic martello quod agat post actionem alterius martelli. Et
similiter accidit huic homini, inquantum generat, quod sit generatus ab alio. Generat enim
inquantum homo, et non inquantum est filius alterius hominis. Omnes enim homines
generantes habent gradum unum in causis efficientibus, scilicet gradum particularis generan-
tis. Unde non est impossibile quod homo generetur ab homine in infinitum; esset autem
impossibile si generatio huius hominis dependeret ab hoc homine et a corpore elementare et
a sole, et sic in infinitum.
Cf. P. T. Geach, 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), pp. 111-12.
21. The point being made by the italicised phrase 'in virtue of is the point which St Thomas develops
more fully in the quotation from Summa Theologiae, I, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7 (see note 20 above), in
terms of a distinction between a per se and a per accidens infinite series of causes: the former being
impossible, the latter being perfectly possible.
 10
•
THE SECOND WAY

An obvious reaction one might have on passing from the First Way to the
Second Way, is that the First Way is a particularly clear or paradigmatic
case of the same phenomenon investigated in the Second Way; or, if you
prefer, that the Second Way is a generalisation of the First. St Thomas's
own words show that he regards the First Way as especially clear and
obvious, presumably because the phenomenon from which it starts, that
of the processes of change in the world, is particularly clear and obvious.
(This claim perhaps helps to cast some doubt on Kenny's reading of the
First Way,1 which makes it depend on a quite high level of training in
Aristotelian physics, not to say Ptolemaic astronomy. Even among well-
educated people in the thirteenth century it would surely have been
stretching things a little to call an argument which depends on detailed
knowledge of physics or astronomy one which is clearer and more obvi-
ous.) Be that as it may, there is a good case for making out that the Second
Way is a generalisation of the First. The First Way has to do with process
of change, the Second Way has to do with efficient causality in general.
In St Thomas's book, not every example of efficient causality is an
example of a process of change, or even of the initiation of a process of
change. A beginning of existence, for example, which certainly requires
an efficient cause, is not, strictly speaking, a change in that which begins
to exist. As I commented in the last chapter, for the analysis of change one
of the most important points to establish is the subject of change, and that
which begins to exist is not strictly speaking a subject of change, a subject
which undergoes some modification. Before it begins to exist, it isn't there
to undergo any modification at all. A beginning of existence would thus
fall under the Second Way, but not under the First Way.
So far so good; but unfortunately one could make out just as good a
case that the First Way is in some sense a generalisation of the Second
Way. St Thomas would hold that not every process of change is to be
explained in terms of efficient causality, or, at least, he would claim that
 The Second Way 147

not every process of change is to be explained in terms of efficient

causality alone. The most famous example in St Thomas's thought is
one which is unlikely to appeal to us as scientifically serious. St Thomas
thought that the rotation of at least the outermost, and perhaps of
others, of the heavenly spheres was to be explained in terms of final
causality. These crystalline spheres of Aristotle's astronomy, which St
Thomas seems to have taken perfectly seriously, are intelligent, or are
at least guided by intelligences. They know what God is like and are
moved by love of God to try to be like him. God is always active and
never changing, hence the ceaseless and invariable circular movements
of the heavens, which represent the nearest approach a material being
can make to being both always active and never changing. The picture
is a nice one, though to our way of thinking it is also bizarre, but what
is important is that these spheres move as they do in order to be like God.
Nothing pushes them along except desire, and that desire is based on
knowledge of the good. That process in particular is initiated and
continued by one particular type of final causality, and not by efficient
causality at all. So there will be examples of changes which illustrate the
First Way which do not illustrate the Second. 2
If the example just given is too alien to be of any help to the reader,
then one can perhaps remember the dog that starts barking in the night-
time. The dog starts barking, perhaps, in order to scare away the intruder,
or in order to warn the household, or in order to affirm its own territory,
or in order to achieve a reward or avoid a punishment from its master.
Any one of these explanations will do; which one you choose will depend
on what you think is within the limits of canine intelligence. But all of the
explanations are in terms of final causality.
This would seem to be as good a point as any to outline the Aristo-
telian doctrine of the four modes of explanation or causality, to which
reference has already been made. 3 Aristotle, and, following him, St
Thomas, recognised four different modes of causality or explanation.
'Efficient causality', or explanation in the efficient mode, is the closest
to what we nowadays generally mean by 'causality', an explanation in
terms of how a thing came about. 'Material causality', or explanation in
the material mode, is an explanation in terms of what a thing is made
of. 'Formal causality', or explanation in the formal mode, is an expla-
nation in terms of in virtue of what the stuff that a thing is made of is
the thing that it is. Lastly, 'final causality', explanation in the final
mode, is an explanation in terms of what a thing is for. We have already
seen that for Aristotle and St Thomas 'science' is 'definite knowledge
through explanations', and we have seen them using both efficient and
148 God and Explanations

final causality in proving the existence of a cause from the effect. 4

Science may be structured in terms of any of the four different modes
of explanation. It is therefore worth being sure that we know what we
mean by them. A good example, one given by Aristotle, is that of a
faggot, a bundle of sticks tied together in order to be carried more
easily. 5 The example is one of an artefact, and indeed most of the
straightforward examples are of artefacts. This is because the question
of the explanation of natural objects in the final mode is highly disput-
able nowadays. We will examine it when we come to look at the Fifth
Way, but I do not wish to prejudge here the discussion which I will be
carrying out there, about the possibility and legitimacy of looking for
final modes of explanation of natural phenomena.
If we are looking for an explanation of the faggot, then, the first thing
we have to say is what it's made of, its matter - we have to give an
explanation in the material mode. The answer is clear: sticks and string.
If instead of sticks and string it consisted of flowers and ribbon, it would
not be a faggot but a bouquet. 6 But the same matter, the same sticks and
string could be scattered half-way across the forest, or put together in a
different way to make a rudimentary birdcage. What makes the sticks and
string to be a faggot and not, for example, a heap of sticks with a piece of
string on top, or a rudimentary birdcage, is the way they are tied together.
This is the form of the faggot, the explanation of what the faggot is in the
formal mode, what distinguishes it from other things which could be made
of the same matter. The explanation in the efficient mode is clear and
simple: it is yonder peasant, gathering winter fuel. Yonder peasant is the
one who effects or brings about the existence of the faggot. The explanation
in the final mode is also clear: for ease of transportation. That is what
faggots are for, the end of a faggot - if you live a good league hence, it's
the devil's own job to carry a heap of sticks through the snow if you haven't
tied them up in a faggot.
Possibly the notion of explanation in the formal mode is the most
obscure of the four. Aristotle gives other examples, in the same context. 7
The difference between a lintel and a threshold is not one of their matter,
he would say - they are both beams of wood wide enough to stretch
between the uprights of the doorway. One could be substituted for the
other and no harm would be done: the former threshold would have
become the lintel and the former lintel would have become the threshold.
The difference is in their position; it is thus the position at the top of the
doorway which is the form of the lintel, what makes this matter, this
beam of wood to be a lintel, which constitutes the formal explanation of
what it is to be a lintel. Equally, it is the position at the.foot ofthe doorway
 The Second Way 149

which is the explanation in the formal mode of what a threshold is. Or,
again, the difference between breakfast and dinner is not one of matter
but of time: the form or formal explanation of breakfast, what makes
breakfast breakfast as opposed to dinner, is the time of day, and likewise
for dinner. We should be able to accept this even though as a matter of
fact we don't normally have cornflakes for dinner or soup at breakfast.
For us there may well be a culturally determined, but purely accidental,
difference of matter between breakfast and dinner. The ancient Greeks,
less dietetically fortunate than we, had a breakfast that consisted of a
sort of porridge, and a dinner that consisted of a sort of porridge. If they
were better off they might have had two courses at dinner, the first a
sort of porridge and the second a sort of porridge. Plato went on record
as saying that no-one could do philosophy in a place as rich as Sicily
where people ate three times a day. 8
Leaving aside the gastronomical questions, though, the different modes
of explanation should be fairly clear. Since a science progresses towards
explanations in one or another of these modes, we could expect that the
Five Ways could be classified according to this system. But it does not
seem so easy. The Second Way is explicitly said to be based on efficient
causality, and the word 'finis', end, that in terms of which explanation in
the final mode is given, is also explicitly used in the Fifth Way. But the
First Way, as we have just seen, may relate to any kind of explanation
which may be given of processes of change, whether efficient or final.
Kenny claims that the Third Way relates to explanation in the material
mode,9 and it is certainly true, as we shall see, that one of the 'derivatively
everlasting' things which the Third Way speaks of is matter. But so are
the forms of, for example, animal species: so the Third Way may relate as
much to the formal mode of explanation as it does to the material mode.
As for the Fourth Way, it is not the easiest task on earth to identify any
conceivable or intelligible mode of explanation to which it relates. I have
seen it claimed that the Fourth Way relates to 'transcendental causality',
which I sometimes suspect to be an academically more respectable way of
saying 'it is not the easiest task on earth to identify any conceivable or
intelligible mode of explanation to which it relates' .10
Thus while one might wish to claim that the First Way relates to final
causality at least as much as it does to efficient causality, there is no
doubt that the explanation I gave of the First Way in the last chapter in
fact related to efficient causality alone. This is partly because final
causality is both a difficult and an unfamiliar notion, one which arouses
fairly justifiable suspicions in the contemporary reader; and partly
because to give an adequate account of final causality would have
150 God and Explanations

dragged out the chapter too much, and it seems better to leave that
account until we come to deal with the Fifth Way, where it cannot be
avoided. But also, in part, the reason was that I could not see how to
give an adequate account of the initiation of processes of change in terms
of explanation in the final mode.
This had the perhaps unfortunate consequence that many of the con-
siderations adduced in the account of the First Way have at least as much
right to be given in the account of the Second Way. In order to justify
Aquinas's principle, 'Everything that is in process of change has that
change initiated in it by something else', I made use of the principle that
every beginning of existence has a cause. This principle relates most
obviously to efficient causality, and, indeed, to cases of efficient causality
(beginnings of existence) which are not strictly speaking initiations of
processes of change at all.
It is not clear what should be said here. It may be that the understanding
of the First Way we have been striving to achieve conflates it unduly with
the Second Way, and the critic may suspect that the apparent effectiveness
of either of the two ways rests on an unnoticed confusion of the distinct
but related notion used in the other. There seems to be no a priori way of
determining an answer to this; what one must do is await a definite
challenge in this line and hope to find a way to refute it. I suspect that any
such challenge would have to centre on an allegation that there has been
a confusion in the way in which subjects of change in the First Way were
identified rather loosely, and draw attention to the mis-match between
the account given there and any likely identification that could be made
of the efficient causes and effects mentioned in the Second Way.
The actual text of the Second Way clearly follows a structure similar
to that of the First Way, and equally clearly exemplifies the overall
structure which was suggested for all of the Five Ways.
The second way is from the notion of efficient cause.
We find, in things around us that we sense, an order of efficient
causes.
But we do not find - nor could there be - anything that is the
efficient cause of itself.
For if anything were, it would have to be prior to itself, and
this is impossible.
Now, it is not possible that there should be an infinite series of
efficient causes.
This is because in any ordered series of efficient causes, the first
cause is the cause of the intermediate causes, and the intermediate
cause is the cause of the last cause.
 The Second Way 151

This is so whether there is just one intermediate cause or more

than one.
If a cause is eliminated, the effect is eliminated too: so if there
were no first efficient cause, there would be no last or intermedi-
ate cause either. But if the series of causes is infinitely long, then
there will be no first efficient cause, and hence no last effect and
no intermediate causes. This is obviously not the case.
Hence we must suppose some first efficient cause, and this is what
all call 'God' .11
Again the indentation indicates the structure of the argument, to some
extent. The main structure is clear and apparently valid:
1. We find, in things around us that we sense, an order of efficient
causes.
2. But we do not find - nor could there be - anything that is the
efficient cause of itself.
3. It is not possible that there should be an infinite series of efficient
causes.
4. Hence we must suppose some first efficient cause, and this is
what all call 'God'.
What I have called 'feature X' here is, roughly speaking, being an effect;
or, perhaps better, being a subject of efficient causality. That this feature
is part of the world is obvious, as the first premiss tells us. That it is a
feature which requires an explanation in terms of a relation to something
else is the point of the second premiss. The argument given in support of
the second premiss - 'for if anything were, it would have to be prior to
itself, and this is impossible' - though possibly acceptable to the average
contemporary reader, requires a little elucidation. Contemporary thought
tends to regard causality - what Aristotelians call 'efficient causality',
more or less - as a relation between two events, the cause and the effect.
The medievals, however, regarded efficient causality as a relation between
a thing, the agent or cause, and an event, the effect. This medieval account
is perhaps more defensible than many people nowadays would think, but
I shall leave the defence of it to the discussion of the relationship between
efficient causality and final causality I shall make when we come to deal
with the Fifth Way. Another important point of exegesis is to clarify the
meaning of 'prior' in this argument. According to the contemporary
account, the cause-event has to precede the effect-event temporally. This
kind of thought is very alien to the medievals, who preferred to think of
the existence and activity of the cause or agent as being simultaneous with
the effect caused. 12 The word 'prior' in this argument, then, means
152 God and Explanations

'metaphysically prior'. We do not have a handy technical term in contem-

porary philosophy to express this notion. The word 'derivative' can be
used (as it is by Anscombe 13 ) to express the correlative relation, and so we
could express the point which St Thomas is making as, 'For if anything
were [the efficient cause of itself], it would have to be derivative from
itself, and this, we may well admit, is in fact impossible.
The next step is taken tacitly: it is the lumping-together move. Any-
thing which is a system of parts related by efficient causality, in which
parts are effects, is itself an effect - something which cannot be the
efficient cause of itself, and which requires an explanation in terms of a
relation to something else. Put this way, the step looks dubious. One might
want to hold that there might be parts of the world which are outside the
system of efficient causality. One would want evidence for this, but it
seems to me that in this case feature X does not generalise sufficiently. It
is true that a whole which contains any parts which are in process of change
is itself in process of change, as we saw in the First Way; but it does not
seem so obvious that a whole which contains parts which are effects must
itself be an effect. Perhaps, though, the lumping-together move need not
be so widely generalisable. Whatever we may say of the world as a whole,
it is clear that a great part of the world is a system of efficient causality,
and, indeed, it is worth saying that so far as any of us can tell the whole
world is a system of efficient causality. It is hard to see what could be
meant by saying that there are parts of the world which fall outside the
system of efficient causality which the rest of the world belongs to. In what
sense would these causally ineffective and unaffected bits of the world
form part of the same world at all? What, we might ask, is a world supposed
to be except a unified system of efficient causality?
A system of efficient causes, like the world, is eo ipso a system of effects,
and here the lumping-together move appears valid: a system of effects is
an effect. Feature X is sufficiently generalisable, in that it extends to a
great part of the world at least, if not necessarily to the world as a whole,
though in fact it seems to, and it also seems difficult to understand what
it would be for this feature not to extend to the whole world. This system
of effects, of efficient causality, which is at the very least a very great part
of the world, cannot cause itself: it requires an explanation in terms of a
relation to something different.
St Thomas goes on to make, in his third premiss, 'It is not possible that
there should be an infinite series of efficient causes', in slightly different
terms, the point made in the First Way, that we cannot go on to infinity
in this line; or, as I claimed above, more accurately, going on to infinity
in this line fails to be an explanation.
 The Second Way 153

Now, it is not possible that there should be an infinite series of

efficient causes. This is because in any ordered series of efficient
causes, the first cause is the cau~e intermediate causes, and
the intermediate cause is the cause of the last cause. This is so
whether there is just one intermediate cause or more than one. If a
cause is eliminated, the effect is eliminated too: so if there were no
first efficient cause, there would be no last or intermediate cause
either. But if the series of causes is infinitely long, then there will be
no first efficient cause, and hence no last effect and no intermediate
causes. This is obviously not the case.
This, I think, given the formulation of Aquinas's claim which I have used,
that going on to infinity in this line fails to be an explanation, and given
the account I have provided of this claim in the last chapter, needs no
detailed defence here, though Aquinas's detailed defence has some inter-
esting features which might be worth investigating elsewhere.
And thus Aquinas reaches his conclusion: 'Hence we must suppose
some first efficient cause, and this is what all call "God" '. The account
of the signification of the word 'God' contained in this conclusion seems
to be unquestionable. Objections to this Way will have to rest on the notion
of efficient causality being employed, or on the possible identifications of
the subjects of efficient causality, and on the doubt about the extent to
which 'being a subject of efficient causality' is appropriately generalisable
in the lumping-together move. Otherwise the argument appears unassail-
able.

NOTES

l. A. Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 27-33.
2. See e.g. Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.XII, 1.7, nn. 2519-2535.
3. See above, Chapter 2, p. 22.
4. See above, Chapter 6, pp. 88---9.
5. See Metaphysics, Book VII, 1042b, 15-22.
6. To show that material causality can indeed have a role in explaining phenomena in the world,
consider how in the explanation of a marital quarrel the following line of dialogue might feature:
'Happy St Valentine's Day, dearest, I've brought you a faggot.'
7. Metaphysics, Book H, 1042b, 15-22.
8. Plato, Seventh Letter, 326b.
9. Kenny, The Five Ways pp. 35-36.
10. See, e.g., A. L. Gonzalez, Teologia Natural (Pamplona: EUNSA, 1985), p. 152.
11. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3:
Secunda via est ex ratione causae efficientis. lnvenimus enim in istis sensibilibus esse ordinem
causarum efficientium. Nee tamen invenitur, nee est possibile, quod aliquid sit causa efficiens
sui ipsius, quia sic esset prius se ipso, quod est impossibile. Non autem est possibile quod in
causis efficientibus procedatur in infinitum, quia in omnibus causis efficientibus ordinatis
primum est causa medii, et medium est causa ultimi; sive media sint plura, sive unum tantum.
Remota autem causa, removetur effectus. Ergo si non fuerit primum in causis efficientibus,
154 God and Explanations
non erit ultimum nee medium. Sed si procedatur in infinitum in causis efficientibus non erit
prima causa efficiens, et sic non erit nee effectus ultimus, nee causae efficientes mediae: quod
patet esse falsum. Ergo est necesse ponere aliquam causam efficientem primam, quam omnes
Deum nominant.
12. See Kenny, The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), p. 40.
13. In one of the papers already cited, 'Causality and determination', in Collected Philosophical Papers
ofG. E. M. Anscombe, Vol. 2, p. 136.
 11
•
THE THIRD WAY

The Third Way is subtle and complex, and has no obvious surface
similarity to the previous two, as the Second had to the First. It is couched
in terms of the possible and the necessary, and thus has at least a strong
verbal resemblance to another argument given for the existence of God,
most famously by Leibniz. There are several points at which the argument
appears extremely weak, but at which it can be defended quite well. The
jump from the world to God does not take place, surprisingly enough, at
the step between the possible (or contingent) and the necessary, but at a
step between the derivatively necessary and the underivatively necessary.
This last pair of notions, of derivative and underivative necessity, is highly
obscure, as is the feature X on which the Third Way is based.
Let us look first at the text:
The third way is drawn from the possible and the necessary, and is
as follows.
Some real things that we find have the possibility of being and not
being.
This is because we find some things that come into existence and
cease to exist, and hence have the possibility of being and not
being.
But it is impossible that everything that exists should be such [or: it
is impossible that all such things should always exist1]: for that which
has the possibility of not being at some time does not exist.
If, then, everything had the possibility of not being, at some time
there would be nothing real.
But if this were the case, then there would be nothing now:
since that which does not exist only begins to exist through
something that does exist. Hence if nothing were in existence, it
would be impossible for anything to begin existing, so nothing
would now exist. This is clearly not the case.
156 God and Explanations

Therefore not all beings have this possibility: there must be some-
thing real which is necessary.
But everything which is necessary either owes its necessity to some
cause outside it, or not.
There cannot be an infinite series of necessary beings whose neces-
sity is caused, just as, we have seen, there could not be in efficient
causes.
We must suppose, then, something that is necessary in itself, which
does not owe its necessity to some outside cause, but rather causes
the necessity of the other things: and this is what all say is God. 2
The first thing which needs to be said here is that the notions of 'possible'
and 'necessary' are here being taken in a temporal sense: they mean,
roughly speaking, 'having a tendency to stop existing' and 'having no
tendency to stop existing'. This usage, curious enough to our ears, is
common enough among Aristotelians. It is clear that what is necessary is
always the case, is everlasting. Equally that which sometimes is and
sometimes is not the case is contingent; it is 'possible' in the sense of
'maybe it is, maybe not'. This point would be accepted quite generally.
More disputable is a claim which Aristotle may sometimes make, that that
which is always the case, or is everlasting, is eo ipso necessary, while that
which is possible to be thus and so at some time is thus and so. Aristotle,
it will be remembered, held that the world had existed from all eternity,
and it may be that he held that whatever is possible is at some time realised,
and that that which is always the case is necessary. 3 What is certainly true
is that Aristotle is strongly unwilling to believe that anything can just
happen to be always the case: he will not recognise any contingent
universal or everlasting truths.
Whether or not it is correct to attribute a belief in the Principle of
Plenitude to Aristotle, there is no doubt that he quite often uses the
words 'possible' and 'necessary' in temporal senses: that which is some-
times the case is called 'possible' and that which is always the case is
called 'necessary'. 4 This is perhaps not as bizarre as it might seem, or
at least not quite so unfamiliar. There is a strong school of modal
logicians, those who deal with necessity and possibility, who insist on
taking literally the language of 'possible worlds' which is used to clarify
certain aspects of modal discourse. That which is necessary is true in
all possible worlds (or 'at all possible worlds' - the jargon varies), and
that which is possible is true in some possible world. That is, they in
some sense maintain that that which is necessary is everywhere the case,
and that which is possible is somewhere the case. 5 The shift from
expressions of time - always, sometimes - to expressions of space or
 The Third Way 157

quasi-space - in all possible worlds, everywhere, or in some possible

world, somewhere - is not so great a change. Aristotle's most question-
able and least plausible doctrine about modality, and the apparently
bizarre language which expresses it, turn out to have very close parallels
in a widely-held - or at least strongly defended - contemporary theory.
It seems undeniable that St Thomas is using Aristotle's language
here, and using modal terms in temporal senses. What is not so clear is
the extent to which this implies an acceptance of any other modal views
of Aristotle. Whatever we may say of Aristotle - and, as has been said,
it is a disputed question - there is no doubt that St Thomas did not
maintain the Principle of Plenitude. One can find it said in works on
the history of modality that everyone from, say, Boethius through to
Duns Scotus held the Principle of Plenitude,6 but this is simply a
mistake. St Thomas could not have held the Principle of Plenitude
simply because he did not hold an eternity of time: since for him the
world had a beginning some finite time ago and is to have an end some
finite time in the future, there simply is not enough time for all real
possibilities to be realised. Moreover, when St Thomas speaks in prop-
ria persona about modalities, as opposed to when he is expounding
Aristotle, his account is not temporal but logical. 7
But there is a complication which needs mentioning here. It is clear
from the way the Third Way develops that St Thomas is in fact arguing
from the (false) hypothesis that the world has existed for ever. The
rationale for this is given very clearly in the parallel passage in the Summa
Contra Gentes. 8 Aquinas thinks that if it is admitted that the world had a
beginning in time, the existence of God follows immediately. The begin-
ning of the world in time is clearly a phenomenon which demands an
explanation in terms of its relation to something outside the world, and
here we might all admit that 'that which explains the beginning of the
world' is something we all call 'God'. But Aquinas also believes that he
has no philosophical evidence that the world did begin in time, and so he
is going to grant to his atheist opponent that maybe the world has existed
for ever. Even so the world is demonstrably God's creation, claims
Aquinas; he is granting to his opponent the chance to make his strongest
case, since he believes that even so it can be overthrown.
I do not know quite what we should make of this. It is true that to me
it seems obvious that if the world had a beginning in time, then it was
made by something outside the world. Since earliest childhood, however,
I have been subject to propaganda from atheist writers on cosmology who
have been dinning it into me that the mere fact that, so far as we can make
out, the world had its origin in a single moment a certain finite time ago,
158 God and Explanations

does not mean that we have to look for an explanation for that origin
outside the world itself.
There are several things that need to be said here. One, against the
atheist, is that I am incapable of regarding a beginning of existence as
anything but a phenomenon which requires an explanation. Another,
against certain theists who lay great stress on the Big Bang, is that I see
no especially strong reason to hold that the Big Bang is to be identified
with the moment of which the Bible says 'In the beginning God created
the heaven and the earth'. The Big Bang is the start of the present
disposition of material reality; it is the point beyond which our investiga-
tions of material reality cannot reach. I can see no reason why material
reality might not have had its origin at some earlier moment. If the whole
of the matter of the universe was once very, very small, very, very dense
and very very hot, and at a certain moment began the process of expansion
and cooling in which it continues to this day, I don't see why it might not
have existed in some incalculable way for some incalculable period in its
hot, small and dense state before the initiation of its expansion, or Big
Bang.
That said, I notice that the same atheist writers on cosmology who tried
so hard to convince me that the Big Bang did not need an explanation were
tremendously excited by the alleged rival theory of the steady state of the
universe: a theory for which there existed not the slightest evidence, but
which was pursued with great enthusiasm and at great expense, merely
because if you could believe in the steady state you didn't have to believe
in the Big Bang. The steady state theory has, I believe, finally been given
up by its supporters; but instead I find an equally enthusiastic search for
justification for the theory of the concertina-like universe. 9 If the universe
contained a good deal more matter than it does - something like ten times
what it does, I believe - then we need not conclude that the Big Bang was
a unique event, which seems to require an explanation, and which we
might be tempted to identify with the Biblical moment of creation. Given
the actual mass of the universe, as far as we know it, the universe is
continually expanding and is getting gradually less and less dense and
cooler and cooler. One day (though 'day' is the wrong word) all the
differences of heat in the universe will have been equalised, and the whole
universe will be very large, very cool, and entirely static. 10 But if there
were ten times the mass in the universe that there is, there is a possibility
that gravity would suffice to reverse this process at a certain point. The
universe would begin to collapse in on itself again until at last it was again
a very dense, very hot, very small lump, indistinguishable from the
original lump from which the Big Bang started.
 The Third Way 159

Well, I am told that the theory of the concertina-like universes will not
work particularly well either, because the swings of the concertina will
continue to get wider and wider until in any case the mass of the universe
is insufficient to bring about the re-collapse: so even if this epoch of the
universe will end in a re-collapse, a new Big Bang, and thus a re-born
universe, some epoch of the universe will have a definite end in the
uniform coolness of 3° K. (Or maybe for that epoch, which is to come
about on the last and widest swing of the concertina, the uniform tem-
perature is supposed to be something else: I don't know. It would be funny
if it were a temperature which was capable of sustaining human life in a
paradisal state. If it were discovered that the concertina universe would
leave us all at the end of time in a paradisal state we might find fewer
physicists keen on the theory. It would be still worse if we found ourselves
obliged to believe that the final state of the universe were one in which
human life were possible, but acutely uncomfortable.)
Be that as it may, what seems to me to be definitely significant is the
apparently obsessive activity of some physicists in searching for what they
persist in calling 'the missing mass', i.e. the quantity of matter which they
think would be sufficient to make the universe collapse in on itself again.
Every two years or so the newspapers announce with a fanfare that the
missing mass (or at least quite a lot of it) has been found. Then a few
months later some of the newspapers publish a far smaller article in which
it is admitted that the mass which has been discovered was rather less than
had been at first thought. What never appears in the papers is an admission
that within a year it has always, so far, been proven definitively that the
extra mass which has been detected has turned out to be incommensurably
tiny compared with what would be required to make the concertina swing.
There are perhaps more things to be said on this, but they can be left for
a book on the socio-psychology of the scientific-philosophical community.
I shall take it, then, that St Thomas is right, and that if the world had
a beginning in time it is obvious that there is a God. I therefore also take
it that he is right, in the Third Way, to presume that it had no beginning
in time, and to attempt to prove that there is a God even on that
hypothesis.
With so much of a preamble, the structure of the Third Way is fairly
clear:
1. Some real things that we find have the possibility of being and
not being.
2. But it is impossible that everything that exists should be such
[or: it is impossible that all such things should always exist]: for that
which has the possibility of not being at some time does not exist.
160 God and Explanations

3. Therefore not all beings have this possibility: there must be

something real which is necessary.
4. But everything which is necessary either owes its necessity to
some cause outside it, or not.
5. There cannot be an infinite series of necessary beings whose
necessity is caused, just as, we have seen, there could not be in
efficient causes.
6. We must suppose, then, something that is necessary in itself,
which does not owe its necessity to some outside cause, but rather
causes the necessity of the other things: and this is what all say is
God.
Again the question arises of identifying feature X. It looks as if feature X,
so far as this Way is concerned, will be 'possibility', or, as I glossed it,
'having a tendency to stop existing'. In fact, as the argument develops, it
is clear that this does not get us to God: it does not get us past the third
premiss. The notion then taken up is that of 'derivative necessity', or,
following the temporal gloss, 'derivative everlastingness'. Thus feature X
is a rather complex disjunctive feature: it is 'either having a tendency to
stop existing, or having no tendency to stop existing, but only in some
derivative way'. More elegantly, we might identify it as 'not having a
tendency to go on for ever, except derivatively'. Expressed either way, the
notion is pretty obscure.
The first part of the notion, the idea of 'possibility' or of 'having a
tendency to stop existing', is not too hard. It is something we observe
in ourselves and in most of the things around us. The first premiss -
'some real things that we find have the possibility of being and not being'
- is clearly true. It scarcely needs the supporting argument St Thomas
gives, that 'we find some things that come into existence and cease to
exist, and hence have the possibility of being and not being'. The second
premiss, though, is more doubtful. 'But it is impossible that everything
that exists should be such [or: it is impossible that_all such things should
always exist]: for that which has the possibility of not being at some time
does not exist.'
I think we should grant that that which has the possibility of not being,
at some time does not exist, at least if we grant the supposition of unlimited
time. But this truth does not seem to support the first part of the premiss,
on either reading: 'it is impossible that everything that exists should be
such'; or, 'it is impossible that all such things should always exist'. The
supporting argument which St Thomas gives does not seem to help
matters.
 The Third Way 161

If, then, everything had the possibility of not being, at some time
there would be nothing real. But if this were the case, then there
would be nothing now: since that which does not exist only begins
to exist through something that does exist. Hence if nothing were in
existence, it would be impossible for anything to begin existing, so
nothing would now exist. This is clearly not the case.'
The further claim being made here is that it cannot be that everything
should be 'possible' in the relevant sense, should have a tendency to stop
existing: for if everything did have a tendency to stop existing, then, given
infinite time, it would already have stopped and nothing would exist now.
It looks here very strongly as if St Thomas thinks he can pass from the
premiss 'Everything has to stop some time' to the conclusion 'There is
some time at which everything has to stop'. This is a thoroughly dodgy
move, as it stands: it appears to be a clear instance of what is called
technically the 'quantifier-shift fallacy', 11 or, less technically, the 'nice girls
and the sailor fallacy'.
The name is drawn from an obvious example. We may grant, ifwe like,
that it is true that every nice girl loves a sailor. But we are not entitled to
conclude from that premiss that there is some superlatively attractive and
fortunate sailor such that every nice girl loves him. From the true premiss
'Every road leads somewhere' we cannot conclude 'There is somewhere
- e.g. Rome - where every road leads' .12 The fallacy is technically called
the 'quantifier-shift' fallacy because such words as 'every' and 'some' or
'a' are the natural-language expressions of the universal and particular
quantifiers in logical notation: and between the premisses and the alleged
(fallacious) conclusions we have inverted the order of the quantifiers, i.e.
we have 'shifted the quantifiers'. This same inversion of the quantifiers
occurs when we pass from 'everything stops existing at some time' to
'there is some time at which everything stops existing'.
It is certainly true that Aquinas's argument here can be represented as
embodying a fallacy, as being an instance of an invalid form. But, as Geach
points out, if we wish to show that an argument is invalid, it is not
sufficient to show that it can be represented as instantiating an invalid
form. 13 It might instantiate an invalid form and at the same time instantiate
a valid form: and for an argument to be valid it is sufficient that it should
instantiate a valid form. The potentially vast numbers of invalid forms
which it may instantiate are completely irrelevant. As Geach goes on to
point out, we can represent any valid argument as instantiating at least
one invalid form. For there is nothing to stop us linking the premisses of
any argument together with 'ands' or other connectives, and representing
the long sentence thus formed by the letter 'p'. Representing the
162 God and Explanations

conclusion of the argument by 'q', we are thus able to represent any

argument as a whole as instantiating the form 'p, therefore q', which is
about as invalid an argument form as one could wish to avoid, or to detect
in the work of one's rivals.
Clearly, though, some kind of burden of proof rests on the defender of
St Thomas to show that there is some valid form which his argument
instantiates; or, given that logic is far from being a complete science, to
show that there is some form instantiated by this argument which can
plausibly be regarded as valid. 14 We can begin by a clarification. Aquinas
does not in fact say 'if everything stops existing at some time, then there
is some time at which everything stops existing'. Rather he says 'if
everything stops existing at some time, there is some time at which
everything has stopped existing'. The use of tenses is essential to this
argument, and makes the argument at least not a pure and direct example
of the quantifier-shift fallacy. A pure and direct example of the quanti-
fier-shift fallacy would lead us to conclude (fallaciously) that there is some
moment at which everything ceases to exist, zap, like that, a universal
power-cut, as it were. This is not what Aquinas wishes to suggest.
Unfortunately the logic of tenses is little understood these days. It was
brilliantly developed by Arthur Prior in the 1960s, but he was so far ahead
of any of his contemporaries that no-one since seems to have got up to the
level even of fully understanding Prior, let alone developing his work. My
own understanding of tense-logic is slight, but I spent a full week once
filling innumerable sheets of paper with probably ill-formed logical for-
mulas in an attempt to work out this argument as valid. I failed, but some
of the points I noticed in the process of wrestling with the logic, with the
different ways of representing the present and the perfect tenses in the
two versions, accurate and inaccurate, of the argument in question, made
me suspect that there is a way of demonstrating the validity of Aquinas's
real conclusion here. 15
Another possible way out is to attend not to the form but to the
content of the argument. The passage from 'All the nice girls love a
sailor' to 'There is some sailor that all the nice girls love' is certainly
fallacious, but in a suitable context - among a population containing
only one sailor, for example, such as the population of the rather curious
neighbourhood in which Popeye is represented as living - when the
premiss is true, the conclusion will be true as well. 16 Equally well, there
may be features of the content of the argument, or of the context in
which it is being made, which will enable us to pass from the premiss
to the conclusion. It is arguable that if everything has a tendency to stop
existing, then there is a real possibility of everything's stopping existing.
 The Third Way 163

Certainly, if one claims that everything has a tendency to stop existing,

one is eo ipso debarred from saying that it will never be the case that
everything has stopped existing. We have seen that it is possible to
attribute to Aristotle the belief that in infinite time all real possibilities
will be realised; and while we cannot attribute the Principle of Plenitude
to Aquinas in propria persona, it may be that he held that on the
supposition of infinite time all real possibilities will be realised. This
would explain Aquinas's argument and acquit him of the charge of
having committed a gross fallacy; and the additional premisses we have
provided may even be true.
But in fact we need not worry about to what extent the Principle of
Plenitude is true, or may be true on the supposition of infinite time, or
may have been held by Aquinas to be true on the supposition of infinite
time. We can simply say the following: given that the world now exists,
then if it never had a beginning, but has existed for ever, it must be capable
of existing for ever. 'Xis F' entails 'X can be F'; therefore, 'the world has
existed for ever' entails 'the world is capable of having existed for ever'.
As the medievals would have put it, 'Ab esse ad posse valet consequentia',
'The inference from 'is' to 'can be' is a sound one'. Or, in more modern
terms, 'P, ergo possibly P' is a theorem of any system of modal logic that
aims at capturing our notions of real or logical necessity and possibility.
Therefore, at least the world as a whole, and maybe also some part of it,
must have a capability of existing for ever. If the world has a capability of
existing for ever then it is not like, for example, human beings who have
a tendency to stop existing. Thus we have to accept the conclusion of the
sub-argument, what we listed above as premiss 3: not all beings have this
possibility (of ceasing to exist); there must be something real which is
necessary [i.e. everlasting, having no tendency to cease existing]. We
might say, more carefully: there must be at least one real thing, viz. the
world itself, which has no tendency to cease existing and is thus everlasting
or 'necessary' in the relevant sense.
I suppose that most people think that there will always be, in each of
the Five Ways, some flaw, falsehood, or fallacy, and that such readers may
get nervous when an apparent fallacy has been disposed of. They should
not get nervous at this stage: we are very far from God. All we have arrived
at is the everlastingness of the world, the fact that the world itself (and,
for all I know, some parts of it) has no tendency to stop existing - given,
that is, that it has in fact existed since for ever. In fact Aquinas would hold
that not only the world, but also certain elements of the world are
'everlasting' in this sense, the sense of not having a tendency to stop
existing.
164 God and Explanations

One of the elements or parts of the world which will be in this sense
'everlasting' will be matter: using the word this time not in the sense given
it by modern physics, but in the Aristotelian sense of the stuff of which
things are made. 17 Things cease to exist, though the matter of which they
are made does not cease to exist, but becomes something else. The stuff
which at one moment is a hedgehog jogging gently across the road is the
next moment, after my car has passed, a flat parcel of spiky meat. The
stuff which at 8.00 a.m. is nicely arranged and separate toast, butter and
marmalade, by 8.30 a.m. has become a nasty mess in my stomach, and well
before lunchtime has become (for the most part) part of me. The part of
it which fails to become part of me within a couple of days will be part of
the reason why one is foolish to go swimming off the beach at Troon. The
stuff which is me, as I wander carelessly out into the desert, within a few
days will be parts of vultures, hyenas and a large number of beetles. Thus,
hedgehogs cease to exist, but their matter persists. Toast, butter and
marmalade cease to exist, but their matter persists. I will cease to exist,
but my matter will persist: if not transformed into vultures, hyenas, and
beetles, since I hope for an easier and more homely death, at least dissolved
and changed into flowers and fruits with Adam and all mankind. Matter,
then, is in the relevant sense everlasting - it has no tendency to stop
existing.
It is for this reason that Kenny alleges that the Third Way has to do
principally with material causality, explanation in the material mode, in
terms of what things are made of. 18 It is certainly true that matter is one
of the everlasting things which Aquinas thinks exist, and indeed is one of
the everlasting things which, if the argument he has given above is sound,
he has proved to exist. But as I commented, the argument certainly proves
the everlastingness of the world as a whole. That matter should turn out
to be everlasting as well is no more than an extra. There seems no reason
to associate the Third Way with matter in any special way.
This becomes yet clearer when we realise that for Aquinas, as for
Aristotle, forms have as much right to be considered everlasting in the
relevant sense as does matter. By 'forms' here I mean, for example, the
species of living things. Aristotle apparently thought that such species
were eternal. He is usually taken to mean that as far back as you go in the
everlasting history of the world you find cats having kittens, people having
children, etc. It is often also alleged that he thought that it was impossible
for any species to die out, but there does not seem to be sufficient evidence
that he held this belief. All we can bring home to him is the belief that
biological species do not have the tendency to stop existing that individu-
als of that species have. This is what reproduction means, and it is
 The Third Way 165

undeniable. Whether he thought that it was impossible for any species to

come into existence is not so clear, but St Thomas definitely thought that
at least one (imperfect) species had come into existence: I refer you yet
again to his discussion of the question of mules. 19 When people say, as they
do, that Aristotelian conceptions of animal species are in frank contradic-
tion to Darwinian views they are to be absolved of the charge oflying only
by incurring the lesser charge of parroting falsehoods they have never
bothered to check.
What is important to both Aristotle and Aquinas, and important to us
in our following the Third Way, is that, for example, animal species are
everlasting in the relevant sense. That is, they do not have the obvious
tendency to cease existing which individuals of those species have. That,
indeed, is the whole point of an animal species: it can replace itself, if not
infinitely, at least indefinitely. This does not mean that it cannot be
extinguished, and it does not mean that it cannot have had a beginning;
what it means is that once started it might as well go on for ever, so far as
we know. It may be that nowadays with our knowledge of the second law
of thermodynamics we can be sure that nothing in the world will in fact
go on for ever. This would naturally weaken this argument, as any proof
that the world is not everlasting would weaken any argument based on the
hypothesis that it is everlasting. But since it is the second law of thermo-
dynamics which leads us to conclude not only that the world will have an
end but also had a beginning, so far as we are concerned, this whole
consideration returns us to the question of St Thomas's strategy here. If
the only answer to St Thomas's arguments that even an everlasting world
must be God's creation, is that the world is not everlasting, St Thomas
would take it that he has won the debate. If the world had a beginning,
then it is God's creation and there's an end on it. As I commented, people
have tried hard to convince themselves and others that the fact of the
world's having had a beginning in time does not mean that it must be
God's creation, but the effort they put into proving by whatever dubious
means there are at their disposal that in fact the world did not have a
beginning in time makes their affirmations less convincing than they
might like them to be.
Be that as it may, if we grant the hypothesis of the everlasting world,
then we should also grant the hypothesis of the everlastingness of the
species of living things, i.e. the fact that they lack the tendency to stop
existing which is shown by the individuals which go to make them up.
Thus the Third Way relates just as much to form and to formal causality
- explanation in terms of form - as it does to material causality, explana-
tion in terms of matter.
166 God and Explanations

We now come to the step which is aimed at getting us from the world
to God, premiss four: 'But everything which is necessary either owes its
necessity to some cause outside it, or not.' We are supposed to ask whether
the everlastingness displayed by the everlasting things in the world - i.e.
the world itself, matter, the species of living things, and whatever other
everlasting things there may be which I have failed to notice - is an
everlastingness which they possess in their own right or derivatively. This
at first sight appears to be a curious question. How should we know? And
what are these everlastingnesses supposed to be derivative from? To
answer 'derivative from God' would seem fairly obvious, but until we
understand what derivativeness consists in this would be to repeat words
without much sense for us. Moreover, since Aquinas is about to re-use
the 'we cannot go on to infinity in this line' step, which in the previous
two ways related to a series of causal derivativeness within the world, it
seems as if to give the answer 'God' at this stage would be premature and
therefore unwarranted.
I wonder whether it is, possibly, too good to be true, or at least too
appropriate to be a pure coincidence, but the three examples of everlasting
things which I have been able tu find all allow of a fairly straightforward
interpretation of the notion of 'derivativeness'. I assure the reader that I
did not consciously choose these three examples with this in mind: the
example of matter was given me by Geach and Kenny; the example of
species I developed in thinking about possible objections to Kenny's
association of the Third Way with material causality; and the example of
the world as a whole came to me in a flash as I was wrestling with the
problem of showing clearly and briefly in a lecture that Aquinas's earlier
argument was valid, despite his apparent use of the quantifier-shift fallacy.
The everlastingness of the world as a whole is clearly derivative from
the succession of its parts, in the way that the existence of any whole is
derivative from the existence of its parts. The world is everlasting (ex
hypothesi) not because any individual thing in the world has lasted for as
long as the world has, but because it has always been the case that at least
one thing has started before all the others have finished. In a similar way
a royal dynasty lasts for as long as it lasts because the heir has been born
or at least begotten before the king has died. Matter is likewise derivative.
Matter does not exist except in some form or other: the same matter is
first living human flesh, then dead human flesh, then part of a vulture,
but is always matter subject to some form. If the very existence of matter
is derivative from the existence of the formed things which the matter
goes to make up, a fortiori the everlasting existence of matter is equally
derivative. The existence of species is likewise derivative from the
 The Third Way 167

existence of the individuals of that species: no rats, no Rattus rattus.

Hence, again, a fortiori, if the existence of the species is derivative then
the everlasting existence of the species is derivative.
Here it looks as if Aquinas should be objecting not to a vicious infinite
regress (premiss 5, 'there cannot be an infinite series of necessary beings
whose necessity is caused, just as, we have seen, there could not be in
efficient causes') but rather to a vicious circle. It looks as if we are saying
that this or that individual can cease to exist, but this doesn't mean that
everything has to cease to exist. This is just as well, since by the earlier
argument we are committed to holding that everything did have to cease
to exist, nothing would exist now, which conclusion is palpably false. No,
the mere fact that individual bits of the world, or individual material
entities, or individual members of species, have to cease to exist, doesn't
mean that the world as a whole, or matter in general, or the species of
living things have, to cease to exist: these last three are everlasting. But
when we ask why they are everlasting, we find out that they exist ever-
lastingly - indeed, that they only exist at all - because of the existence of
this or that perishable individual bit of the world, or this or that perishable
individual material entity, or this or that perishable living individual of a
.
given species.
.
Intuitions vary - to me this circle looks yet more vicious than any of
the infinite regresses St Thomas has offered us so far. That is, it looks like
even less of an explanation. It is as if I asked why a group of five Inuit is
still standing on the corner after so many years, since I know that even
Inuit get tired, get cold, get hungry, get bored, grow old and die. I am
then told that this is not a problem: of course individuals get tired and
cold and go away, etc., but the group doesn't get tired or bored or go away
or die. When I ask how this is, I am told that it is because as one individual
goes away another joins the group. This, as I say, looks like a vicious circle.
Moreover, it will remain a vicious circle no matter how big the circle is.
Maybe the everlasting existence of the species Rattus rattus depends on
the ever renewed generation of an infinite number of perishable rats. But
the infinite number of the group of perishable individuals on which the
everlastingness of the species depends still leaves me without an explana-
tion: we cannot, in fact, go on to infinity in this line. As I see the argument,
the vicious circle is rather tight, but St Thomas is quite right to point out
that a vicious circle is still a vicious circle even when it is of infinite size.
Perhaps, indeed, this is what a vicious infinite regress consists in: it is a
series which, were it less than infinite, would be a vicious circle.
I think that we can safely conclude, then, that even if the world is
everlasting, 'we must suppose something that is necessary in itself, which
168 God and Explanations

does not owe its necessity to some outside cause, but rather causes the
necessity of the other things: and this is what all say is God'. If the world
is not everlasting, as apparently it isn't, then I leave the reader to her or
his intuitions. Though leaving aside that particularly vexed question, the
fact that Aquinas undertakes to prove to us the existence of a God who
created the world even if the world has existed for ever, makes one point
which is of crucial importance in understanding the relationship between
God and the world. The thesis that the world was made by God does not
require that the world was made by God in time - that for some number
n, God created the world 10n seconds ago. Contemporaries of St Thomas
(such as Grosseteste) often cited an ancient example: if an eternal foot had
been pressing eternally in the dust, there would be an eternal footprint
beneath it. But though foot and footprint were equally eternal, there
would be no doubt that the footprint was the effect of the foot. Equally,
an eternal world, though eternal, would be the creation of, and dependent
on, an eternal God. 20
We can go further than that. The world is not something which God
once made: the world is something which God is still making: indeed,
'which God is still doing' would be more accurate, as creation is more like
a performance than it is like a production. The world is made by God from
nothing, i.e. not out of anything. It thus has no consistency of matter to
keep it in existence. As Aquinas says, 'God made the world' is more like
'The musician made music' than it is like 'The blacksmith made a
horseshoe'. 21 The horseshoe is made out of iron, and once the making is
finished the iron remains. But the world is made not made out of anything,
so if God stops making the world the world stops, just as when the
musician stops making the music, the music stops. Despite Aquinas's use
of tags such as 'we cannot go on to infinity in this line' there is no question
in any of the Five Ways of our having to trace the universe back through
time to its origin. Whether we continue to believe in the Big Bang or not,
St Thomas's arguments stand. Though if we turn out to be capable of
convincing ourselves that there was a Big Bang but that it does not require
an explanation, my own view is that no arguments, whether those of St
Thomas or those of anyone else, will be able to help us very much. To
what extent the Lord helps those who help themselves I am not sure; but
I am sure that when those who could help themselves by thinking intelli-
gently and resolutely refuse to do so, they have no right to expect the Lord
to help them - or anyone else, for that matter.
 The Third Way 169

NOTES

I. It appears impossible to settle the correct reading of the text at this point - see the Latin
alternatives given in the next note. However, it makes no difference to the effectiveness of the
account I shall be giving of the Third Way, which reading we take.
2. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3:
Tertia via sumpta est ex possibili et necessario, quae talis est. Invenimus enim in rebus
quaedam quae sunt possibilia esse et non esse, cum quaedam inveniantur generari et corrumpi,
et per consequens possibilia esse et non esse. Impossibile est autem omnia quae sunt talia esse
[vel omnia talia semper esse], quia quod possibile est non esse, quandoque non est. Si igitur
omnia sunt possibilia non esse, aliquando nihil fuit in rebus. Sed si hoc est verum, etiam nunc
nihil esset: quia quod non est non incipit esse nisi per aliquid quod est. Si ergo nihil fuit ens,
impossibile fuit quod aliquid inciperet esse, et sic modo nihil esset, quod patet esse falsum.
Non ergo omnia entia sunt possibilia, sed oportet aliquid esse necessarium in rebus. Omne
autem necessarium vel habet causam suae necessitatis aliunde, vel non habet. Non est autem
possibile quod procedatur in infinitum in necessariis quae habent causam suae necessitatis,
sicut nee in causis efficientibus, ut probatum est. Ergo necesse est ponere aliquid quod est per
se necessarium, non habens causam necessitatis aliunde, sed quod est causa necessitatis aliis,
quod omnes dicunt Deum.
3. This double claim is called 'The Principle of Plenitude', and is frequently attributed to Aristotle:
e.g. by J. Hintikka, in Time and Necessity (Oxford: Clarendon, 1973), p. 109. However, other
authors have disputed this attribution: see A. Llano, 'The Principle of Plenitude', in D. M.
Gallagher (ed.), Thomas Aquinas and his Legacy (Washington: Catholic University of America
Press, 1994), pp. 131-48, especially pp. 136--7.
4. See, for example, Chapter 9 of Book I of the De lnterpretatione.
5. The leading exponent of this view is David Lewis: see his books Counterfactuals (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1973) and On the Plurality of Worlds (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986).
6. IfI have not misunderstood him, this is the thesis of Simo Knuuttila, probably the greatest expert
on medieval accounts of modality. See, for example, 'Time and modality in scholasticism', in S.
Knuttila (ed.), Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies in the History of Modal Theories
(Dordrecht and Boston: Reidel, 1980), and 'Varieties of natural necessity in medieval thought',
in I. Angelelli and A. d'Ors (eds), £studios de la Historia de la L6gica (Pamplona: Eunate, 1990).
For a solid refutation of the view that St Thomas held the Principle of Plenitude, see Llano, 'The
Principle of Plenitude', in Thomas Aquinas and his Legacy, pp. 131-48.
7. Compare the passage about God's power already referred to in Chapter 2 above, p. 27 (Summa
Theologiae, I, q. 25).
8. Summa Contra Gentes, I, 13, 30.
9. On these murky questions in psycho-cosmology (or cosmo-psychology), see S. L. Jaki, 'Oscil-
lating worlds and wavering minds', Chapter 14 in Science and Creation (Edinburgh: Scottish
Academic Press, 1974), pp. 336--60.
10. I admit that my way of expressing these physical truths may not be particularly accurate or
elegant. Most of my knowledge of the Second Law of Thermodynamics depends on the Flanders
and Swann song called, I believe, 'First and second law'. I have been unable to find full publication
details for this reference, much to my regret.
11. See A. Kenny, The Five Ways(London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 63-9, who accuses
Aquinas of committing this fallacy.
12. For something of the history of this fallacy, and a number of interesting examples, see P. T.
Geach, 'History of a fallacy', in Logic Matters, pp. 1-12; also Kenny, The Five Ways, provides
some examples.
13. See P. T. Geach, review of Kenny, The Five Ways, in Mind, vol. 79, 1970, pp. 467-8.
14. Ibid. The Five Ways.
15. I had the encouragement in this particular task of Dr Maria Alvarez, then an M. Phil. student at
Glasgow, whose name I should like to mention here with the gratitude and admiration that I owe
her for this and for much other help and intellectual stimulation over the years.
16. Mention of Popeye reminds me that we are indebted to his inventors for what has been called
'the redundancy theory of personal identity': 'I am what I am and that's all that I am.'
17. See P. T. Geach, Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), p. 115.
18. See A. Kenny, The Five Ways pp. 36, 46--69.
170 God and Explanations
19. See Chapter 2, p. 26 above.
20. Used by e.g. Grosseteste in the First Particula of his Hexaemeron.
21. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 46, a. 2, ad 7: see Geach, Three Philosophers, pp. 111-12; see also Chapter
9, p. 143 above.
 12
•
THE FOURTH WAY

It is a sound rule of academic prudence to admit one's ignorance promptly

when one's chances of disguising it are slight. Thus I had better begin this
chapter by saying that I don't think I understand the Fourth Way, and
have even less confidence in my ability to make it out as an argument that
proves the existence of God. I console myself by the consideration that I
am in good company: both Kenny and Geach seem to give up on the
Fourth Way. 1 But since a book with a title or sub-title like Four out ofthe
Five Ways in the Context of St Thomas's Theory of Science would have
attracted yet fewer readers than one sub-titled (as I intended) The Five
Ways ofSt Thomas in the Context ofhis Theory ofScience I shall make bold
to offer the reader some considerations about the Fourth Way, in the hope
that the Advertising Standards Authority will thus be encouraged to treat
my publishers leniently.
We might as well begin with the text: no previous explanation, I think,
will make it any easier.
The fourth way is taken from the degrees which are found in things.
In things we find that some things are more or less good, or true, or
noble, and other such things.
But 'more' and 'less' so-and-so are said of various things in so far
as they approach, in their different ways, that which is most
so-and-so, as that which is hotter is that which is closest to that
which is hottest.
There is, then, something which is most true, and best, and most
noble, and which therefore most exists: for those things which are
most true are most existent, as it says in the second book of the
Metaphysics.
That which is said to be greatest in any kind causes everything of
that kind,
as for example fire, which is the hottest thing, is the cause of all
hot things, as it says in the same book.
172 God and Explanations

Therefore there is something that is the cause of the existence and

the goodness and of all perfections in everything: and this, we say,
is God. 2
As usual, the indentation is supposed to indicate something of the struc-
ture of the argument, but I offer this with even less confidence than on
other occasions. If the indentation is correct, we have the following
structure to the argument:
1. In things we find that some things are more or less good, or true,
or noble, and other such things.
2. There is, then, something which is most true, and best, and most
noble, and which therefore most exists: for those things which are
most true are most existent.
3. That which is said to be greatest in any kind causes everything
of that kind.
4. Therefore there is something that is the cause of the existence
and the goodness and of all perfections in everything: and this, we
say, is God.
This not only does not look like a valid argument, it does not look much
like an argument at all. We can begin by pointing out that the qualities
Aquinas uses in this Way are what the medievals called 'transcendentals':
good, true, noble, and the like. The label means that these notions apply
indifferently to anything in any of the categories of the existent. This
concept is not altogether unfamiliar to us: we are accustomed to regard
certain notions, for example, the central concepts of philosophical logic,
such as identity, existence, reference, truth, etc., as having some applica-
tion in all fields of discourse without exception. The crucial difference,
though, is that St Thomas's transcendental notions are not logical but
metaphysical notions: they apply not within the realm of syntactically
structured expressions but within the realm of reality.
This we should not perhaps be surprised at, since we have seen how St
Thomas sees a close relation between the realm of truth and the realm of
existence, and sees the former as in some way derivative from the latter. 3
To stop to argue around the validity of the notion of the metaphysical
transcendentals would perhaps require another couple of books, books
which I am sure I am incapable of writing; so perhaps we can just take this
notion on trust tentatively for the time being, and see whether it helps us
make progress with the Fourth Way.
An important part of the doctrine of the transcendentals is that of their
'convertibility' with existence. ('For those things which are most true are
most existent, as it says in the second book of the Metaphysics.') That is,
 The Fourth Way 173

that which is, for example, good, also exists; and that which exists is also
good; it is good to the extent and in the way that it exists, and it exists to
the extent and in the way that it is good. Hence, for example, something
that exists per accidens will only be good per accidens. A clearer and perhaps
more obviously acceptable example might be that that which exists per
accidens (an ens per accidens) will also be one and the same thing per accidens
(unum per accidens). This brings us close to the Quinean principle of 'No
entity without identity', and makes the whole doctrine of the transcen-
dentals a little less bizarre. 4
However, the next point of the argument does look bizarre: the claim
that there are degrees of existence which correspond to the degrees of the
other transcendentals. One might wish to admit degrees of goodness or
nobility; but the notion of the truth of a thing is one which we would
immediately reject, and we would also reject any connection between
degrees of this or that quality and degrees of existence. But again the
doctrine can be, if not defended, at least sketched out in a way which makes
it less obviously unacceptable. Take for example the question of the truth
of things. To the average contemporary English-speaking philosopher,
there can no more be a truth of a thing than there can be a meaning oflife.
But the fact that the average first-year student of philosophy feels that his
or her lecturers are missing something when they insist in their rather
literal-minded way that life does not have a semantic structure and
therefore cannot have a meaning, may encourage us to look for an under-
standing of the notion of the truth of a thing.
The medievals defined truth in a number of ways, but the most
favoured was 'adaequatio rei et intellectus', the match of mind and reality. 5
A match is a match, and if A matches B, then B matches A; but there is
always a question of onus of match. Generally, when we look out on the
world and talk about it, the onus is on our mind to match up to reality.
But this is not always so. When we act or speak or make some production,
we can condemn the action or utterance or production as being in some
way false if it does not match our mind, our intention. The onus of match
here is reversed. (It is worth noticing, by the way, that there is no doubt
that it was this sense of 'true' and 'false' which was uppermost in the minds
of the Greek philosophers, and they had a struggle to develop the more
abstract sense in which sentences on their own are true independently of
the mind of their utterer. That is why when Aristotle and Plato want to
talk about truth and falsity in an abstract sense they very often talk of 'is
and is not'. 6}
So much for the different ways in which the human mind and reality
have to match: the onus is on the human mind to match the reality it
174 God and Explanations

observes, and the onus is on the reality we produce to match the human
mind. But the human mind, for St Thomas, is not the only, nor the most
important mind. What of God's mind?
The whole world is God's production, and so the relationship of the
whole world to God's mind is analogous to the relationship which exists
between our own mind and our productions or performances. That is, the
onus of match is on the world: it is up to the world to match up to God's
mind, and in so far as it does so, it will be true, in this sense.
But how can the world fail to match up to God's mind? Presumably
only in virtue of some defect, and a defect, as we learned earlier,7 is an
absence of some real existent or existence. The doctrine is beginning to
look a little less odd.
But what of degrees of existence? Geach has pointed out that we can
find at least one good and clear example in which something may exist to
different degrees without any substantial, substantive or qualitative
change: that of sound. 8 A note may be sung or performed at a greater or
lesser volume; it may, indeed, swell or diminish or die away entirely. The
ceasing to exist of the note is no more than the diminution to zero of the
intensive magnitude of the note; and since there is ex hypothesi no quali-
tative change in the note thus performed, what are we to say except that
the note, when louder, exists to a greater degree, and when softer, exists
to a lesser degree, until perhaps it ceases to exist at all?
Kenny has pointed out that this example is a pretty isolated one: 9 Geach
has retorted that it doesn't matter how isolated it is, it shows that the
doctrine makes sense. 10 If we are to get any further forward with the
Fourth Way we will have to accept Geach's point, at least tentatively, and
admit that there seems to be some sense in what is said here.
Unfortunately it seems to me that at this point we begin to run out of
possibilities of understanding. It looks as if feature X in this Way is 'having
a perfection to a limited degree', or perhaps, if we bring forward the
account of the convertibility of the transcendentals with existence, 'exist-
ing to a limited degree'. As a feature X in use in the alleged structure of
one of the Five Ways, whatever displays this feature will require an
explanation in terms of its relation to something different, and I cannot
for the life of me see why this should be. Indeed, the use of this feature X
presents an extremely curious contrast with the Third Way. In the Third
Way it appeared that the feature X which required an explanation was,
more or less, 'possessing existence to a (temporally) unlimited extent';
while here it is 'possessing existence to an (intensively) limited degree'
which apparently requires explanation, according to the mind of St
Thomas.
 The Fourth Way 175

Nor does this feature X inspire confidence as one which has the other
mark which a feature X must have for the purposes of this type of
argument. This other mark is that of generalisability. A whole which
contains parts in process of change is itself something which is in process
of change, as we saw in the First Way. A similar point could be made with
regard to the Third Way: a whole which contains parts which are either
perishable or derivatively everlasting is itself something which is either
perishable or derivatively everlasting. But is it the case that a whole which
contains parts oflimited perfection or limited existence is itself something
of limited perfection or limited existence?
Taking the word 'perfection' in its more familiar English sense of
'complete goodness' the point might be made out, provided that we
accept a very sound medieval principle, frequently cited by St Thomas,
which appears to have originated with the distinguished scholar who is
now known by the rather splendid name of Pseudo-Dionysius the
Areopagite. 11 The principle is 'Bonum ex integra causa, malum ex
quocumque defectu': a thing is good if everything about it is good, and
bad if anything about it is bad. 12 This thesis about the asymmetry of
good and evil is clearly true. For my dinner-party to be a good one, I
have to provide good materials and prepare them well. No matter how
careful the cooking, the dinner will be a failure if I have stocked my
larder with what I have found in the bins at the back of Pricerite; and
no matter how expensive or carefully chosen the provisions, my guests
will feel somewhat cheated if I have just thrown the whole lot into the
oven at gas mark 7 for a couple of hours. I remember hearing Mrs Foot
appealing to the asymmetry of good and evil, and quoting this ancient
principle, in an ethical context in the not too distant past, so it may well
have some contemporary appeal. Taking 'perfection' in this familiar
way, then, there is some justification for holding that 'limited perfec-
tion' is generalisable; and if we have some faith in the doctrine of the
transcendentals and their convertibility with existence, we may hold
that this applies to the more general sense of perfection which St
Thomas is employing here.
What is not at all clear is, as has been said, that whatever displays this
feature X requires an explanation in terms of a relation to something
else, let alone that it requires an explanation in terms of a relation to
something of unlimited perfection. St Thomas seems to allege that the
existence of a more and a less requires an explanation in terms of a
relation to a most.
But 'more' and 'less' so-and-so are said of various things in so far as
they approach, in their different ways, that which is most so-and-so,
176 God and Explanations

as that which is hotter is that which is closest to that which is hottest.

There is, then, something which is most true, and best, and most
noble, and which therefore most exists: for those things which are
most true are most existent, as it says in the second book of the
Metaphysics.
That which is said to be greatest in any kind causes everything of
that kind, as for example fire, which is the hottest thing, is the cause
of all hot things, as it says in the same book.
There are some things which can be said. The existence of a more and a
less does indeed require the existence of a de facto most: if all of the male
lecturers of Glasgow University are more or less good-looking, then there
will be one (allegedly the former Dean of Arts) who is the most good-look-
ing. But this does not help us much: the Dean of Arts, though a fine figure
of a man, has no chance next to Daniel Day-Lewis. His de facto relative
highest beauty falls very far short even of a more widely extended relative
beauty, let alone absolute beauty. In any case, the same point can be made
with regard to defects as well as perfections. Lecturers in Glasgow are
relatively ugly, and while it would be invidious to name names, there is
no doubt that there is one who is the ugliest of the lot. 13 This existence of
a de facto most, which is required by the existence of a more and a less,
will not get us where we want to go: particularly as I can see no reason
whatsoever why the existence of the de facto most should cause or explain
the existence of the more and the less.
One might try to claim that the existence of a more and a less requires
a notion of the most, but I find this doubtful. And again, it is hard to see
how the existence of an idea of the most can explain the real existence of
the more and the less. Indeed, it is hard to see how the existence of any
kind of idea can explain the real existence of anything at all. In any case,
an argument like this is going to bring us only to the existence of an idea
of God, which may be very interesting but was hardly in doubt from the
beginning.
I am inclined to leave this argument as a mystery. But there is some
slight illumination which I think may be cast on the problem by the
original example of the group of Inuit. The phenomenon which needed
to be explained in the case of the group of Inuit was their presence on a
street corner in Glasgow. The presence of the group of Inuit, or of each
member of the group, was the parallel to the existence of the world or of
any part of it. One might query whether presence admits of degrees, and
whether the existence oflimited presence requires an explanation in terms
of absolute presence.
Put like that, the story of the Inuit looks even more bizarre than the
 The Fourth Way 177

Fourth Way itself, but we can perhaps smooth off some of the rough
edges. Presence may not admit of degrees, but presence on a street corner
certainly does. If you have ever waited leaning against the wall on the street
corner for someone who was meanwhile leaning on the wall just round the
corner waiting for you, you will know what I mean. For a group of as many
as five Inuit, the concept of standing on the street corner admits of degrees:
unless the corner is of a very odd shape, 14 or unless they are standing in a
human tower on one another's shoulders, one will be nearer the corner
than another.
Does this require explanation? Not really, since it is something that is
so obvious. But it does require the existence of a street corner, for them
to be nearer to or farther away from. The street corner is, I suppose, in
some unlimited and perfect degree present at the street corner, since
everything is in an unlimited and perfect degree present where it is. And
in a sense it is the perfect and unlimited presence at the street corner of
the street corner itself, which does something to explain the presence, to
a greater or lesser extent, of the Inuit at the street corner. If there is no
perfect and unlimited presence of the street corner, there will be no limited
and varying degree of presence of the Inuit.
If this parallel represents in any way the argument St Thomas is trying
to give us in the Fourth Way, then the Fourth Way is very different from
the others. I do not know how to classify the kind of explanation of the
world that it offers. But this fits fairly well with the text of the Fourth
Way: 'Therefore there is something that is the cause of the existence and
the goodness and of all perfections in everything: and this, we say, is God.'
What kind of cause is being spoken of here is obscure. It is not a question
of efficient, final, material, or even, so far as I can make out, formal cause.
Equally well the presence of the street corner explains the presence of the
Inuit in a quite different way from the story that they are a dance troupe
due to perform at Mayfest, or that Kadlu is signing for Thistle, that they
are waiting for a bus or even that they have been transported there by a
whirlwind, as in The Wizard of Oz. It is a strange argument, and the
stranger the notion of explanation we claim is being used in it, the better
chance we have of being right. Or perhaps I should say, the slightly less
chance we have of being wrong. Good luck to the next person to approach
the Fourth Way.

NOTES

1. See, e.g. P. T. Geach, Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), pp. 116---17, A. Kenny, The
Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), p. 95.
2. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3:
178 God and Explanations
Quarta via sumitur ex gradibus qui in rebus inveniuntur. Invenitur enim in rebus aliquid
magis et minus bonum, et verum, et nobile, et sic de aliis huiusmodi. Sed magis et minus
dicuntur de diversis secundum quod appropinquant diversimode ad aliquid quod maxime est,
sicut magis calidum est quod magis appropinquat maxime calido. Est igitur aliquid quod est
verissimum et optimum et nobilissimum, et per consequens maxime ens. Nam quae sunt
maxime vera sunt maxime entia, ut dicitur II Metaphysicorum. Quae autem dicitur rnaxime
tale in aliquo genere est causa omnium quae sunt illius generis; sicut ignis, qui est maxime
calidus, est causa omnium calidorum, ut in eodem libro dicitur. Ergo est aliquid quod est causa
esse et bonitatis et cuiuslibet perfectionis in rebus omnibus, et hoc dicimus Deum.
3. See above, Chapter 5, p. 73.
4. See e.g. Commentary on Metaphysics, L.IV, 1.2, n. 560.
5. Used by Aquinas in e.g. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 16, a. le.: attributed to Isaac Israeli, De
definitionibus.
6. On this, see C. F. J. Martin, 'Virtues, motivation and the end oflife, in L. Gormally (ed.), Moral
Truth and Moral Tradition, Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1994), p. 125, note 36.
7. See Chapter 5 above, p. 56, and chapter 8 above, p. 113.
8. See P. T. Geach, in the section 'Esse' in the essay 'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1961), pp. 93-4.
9. A. Kenny, 'Form, existence and essence in Aquinas', in H. A. Lewis (ed.), Philosophical
Encounters (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1991), pp. 71-2.
10. P. T. Geach, 'A philosophical autobiography', Philosophical Encounters, pp. 1-25.
11. This author appears to have been an early sixth-century monk from Syria, a remarkable
neo-Platonic theologian, who wrote pseudonymously under the name ofDionysius, the Athenian
disciple of St Paul (Acts 17: 34), who was a member of the Athenian religious council of the
Areopagus. In St Thomas's time the author was actually identified with the original bearer of his
pseudonym, and his writings were considered of near-apostolic authority for this reason. In the
sixteenth century it became clear that a mistake had been made: hence Pseudo-Dionysius. But
though he was not a disciple of St Paul his works are worthy of great attention.
12. See e.g. Summa Theologiae, 1-11, q. 18, a. 4, ad 3.
13. I shall name no names, but Glasgow folklore and tribal loyalty demand that I should claim that
he supports Rangers.
14. Glasgow folklore regards the ultimate in romantic humiliation as being 'left standing on Boots's
corner': the corner on which Boots's largest shop in the centre of town used to stand was covered
by a canopy, and was an excellent place for a young man to arrange to meet his girlfriend. If she
didn't turn up, he was left standing. Fortunately the corner was designed with a re-entrant angle,
protected by the canopy: thus it had a relevantly odd shape. No doubt it was partly this feature
which made it popular as a trysting-place. It was nearly impossible for the young man to be round
one side of the corner while the young woman was round the other.
 13
•
THE FIFTH WAY

The Fifth Way, as often remarked, depends on final causality, explanation

in terms of an end, of what is the point of things. The aim is to show that
the world, like its parts, requires an explanation in terms of what it's for,
and what the world is for is set by God. It is a mistake to say that this
argument is based on the world's being for a purpose: it is rather based on
the world's having a point, which is at first sight quite another thing. The
circulation of my blood has a point, but it does not have a purpose; nor do
I even have a purpose in circulating my blood, since circulating my blood
is not something in the strict sense which I do. I can't help it. It is true
that in order to reach God Aquinas has to argue that the point of the world
has to be a purpose set for it by God, but that is a further step in the
argument. We can see this clearly from the text:
The fifth way is taken from things' being directed.
We see that there are things that have no knowledge, like physical
bodies, but which act for the sake of an end.
This is clear in that they always, or for the most part, act in the
same way, and achieve what is best. This shows that they reach
their end not by chance but in virtue of some tendency.
But things which have no knowledge do not have a tendency to an
end unless they are directed by something that does have knowledge
and understanding.
An example is an arrow directed by an archer.
Therefore there is some being with understanding which directs all
things to their end, and this, we say, is God. 1
This is the briefest of all the Five Ways, and its structure is apparently
clear.
1. We see that there are things that have no knowledge, like
physical bodies, but which act for the sake of an end.
180 God and Explanations

2. But things which have no knowledge do not have a tendency to

an end unless they are directed by something that does have knowl-
edge and understanding.
3. Therefore there is some being with understanding which directs
all things to their end, and this, we say, is God.
But this simplicity is deceptive, and the history of natural theology and
apologetics has made it yet more difficult for us to read this argument as
we should. Most people would want nowadays to object to the first
premiss, and to deny that we see that physical bodies act for the sake of
an end. But they would grant that if we saw physical bodies acting for the
sake of an end, we should conclude immediately to the existence of God.
Aquinas does not agree, I think. He thinks that it is almost unquestionable
that, for example, physical bodies act for the sake of an end; what is tricky
is the step from the unconscious end-directedness which we see all around
us to the conscious end-directedness which he needs to assert if he is to
prove the existence of God.
One of the things that has happened between Aquinas and ourselves
has been the growth of a general disbelief in explanation in terms of what
things are for. This is partly the result of a failure to understand what it
is to explain something in terms of what it's for, and partly the result of
the rather curious psychological phenomenon of the near-universal accep-
tance of what is really a rather poor argument for the existence of God,
the argument from design.
The argument from design had its heyday between the time of Newton
and the time of Darwin, say, a time in which most people apparently came
to see the world as a minutely designed piece of craftsmanship, like a clock.
It is no coincidence that the most famous presentation of the argument
from design actually compares the world to a clock: it is known by the
name of Paley's watch. 2 It is also worth noticing that according to the great
computerised Index Thomisticus, in the 8,000,000 words Thomas Aquinas
definitely wrote, and the 3,000,000 he may have written besides, the
universe is never compared to a clock. 3
The argument from design takes as its basis the perceived mis-match
between the detailed dovetailing of the different parts of the mechanism
of the world and any story we could tell about how this comes to be as the
result of blind chance. A favourite example of Paley's is the eye: how could
the eye be so perfectly adapted to its function if it came about merely by
chance? It must have been designed.
It is worth noticing that this is not so much an argument about final
causality, an argument in terms of what things are for, as an argument
about efficient causality, an argument in terms of how things have come
 The Fifth Way 181

to be the way they are. This is because the notion of teleology, of things'
being for a point, which is used in the argument from design is indeed a
notion of purpose, of conscious teleology. Unconscious teleology or final
causality, as we shall see, does not conflict with efficient causality; indeed,
a decent explanation of what things are for actually demands a decent
explanation of how they come to do what they do. Conscious teleology,
or purpose, or design, is different. Conscious teleology supplants any
alternative explanation in terms of efficient causality and supplies its own.
An account in terms of conscious teleology, purpose or design says 'Some
mind conceived the idea of the end, and set about to arrange things so as
to bring it about'. When there is a designing mind involved, end or point
becomes purpose, and as it were gets in behind the chain of efficient
causality and sets it going.
There is no doubt that this argument is or was immensely attractive.
Reid regards the human tendency to infer from detailed arrangement
some designing mind as one of the principles of commonsense; 4 and even
Hume regards the argument from design as the chief reason for believing
in God. 5 But the argument from design has two enormous drawbacks.
The first is that it is, roughly speaking, an argument from ignorance,
and is thus immensely susceptible to advances in science. Paley could not
see how the eye could have come to be without a Designer; Darwin comes
along and does no more than sketch a sort of answer of how things like
eyes might more or less have come to be, and no-one finds it possible to
take Paley seriously any more. This is not good philosophy, but it is a
pretty clear picture of the fate of eighteenth-century natural theology in
the early part of the nineteenth century. 6
The second objection to the argument from design is that it does not
get us to God, but only to a Designer, a Demiurge, as Plato would say; or,
as the eighteenth century loved to say, the Great Architect. The Being
whose existence is revealed to us by the argument from design is not God
but the Great Architect of the Deists and Freemasons, an impostor
disguised as God, a stern, kindly and immensely clever old English
gentleman, equipped with apron, trowel, square and compasses. Blake has
a famous picture of this figure to be seen on the walls of a thousand student
bedrooms during the 1970s: the strong wind which is apparently blowing
in the picture has blown away the apron, trowel and set-square but left
him his beard and compasses. Ironies of history have meant that this
picture of Blake's is often taken to be a picture of God the Creator, while
in fact Blake drew it as a picture of Urizen, a being who shares some of
the attributes of the Great Architect and some of those of Satan. 7
The Great Architect is not God because he is just someone like us but
182 God and Explanations

a lot older, cleverer and more skilful. 8 He decides what he wants to do and
therefore sets about doing the things he needs to do to achieve it. God is
not like that. As Hobbes memorably said, 'God hath no ends': there is
nothing that God is up to, nothing he needs to get done, nothing he needs
to do to get things done. 9 In no less lapidary Latin, Aquinas said, 'Vult
ergo Deus hoc esse propter hoc; sed non propter hoc vult hoc' .10 In definitely
unlapidary English we could say: the set-up, A-for-the-sake-of-Bis some-
thing that God wants; but it is not that God wants B and for that reason
wants A. We know that the set-up A-for-the-sake-of-Bis something that
God wants, because it is something that exists, and everything that exists
exists because of God's will. But it is simply profane to think that you can
infer from that the unfathomable secrets of the inside of God's mind and
will. Acorns for the sake of oak trees, to repeat an example of Geach's, are
definitely something that God wants, since that is the way things are. But
it is not that God has any special desire for oak trees (as the Great Architect
might), and for that reason finds himself obliged to fiddle about with
acorns. If God wants oak trees, he can have them, zap! You want oak trees,
you got 'em. 'Let there be oak trees', by inference, is one of the things said
on the third day of creation, and oak trees are made. There is no suggestion
that acorns have to come first - indeed, the suggestion is quite the other
way around. To 'which came first, the acorn or the oak?' it looks as if the
answer is quite definitely 'the oak'. 11 In any case, what's so special about
oak trees that God should have to fiddle around with acorns to make them?
God is mysterious; the whole objection to the great architect is that we
know him all too well, since he is one of us. 12 Whatever God is, God is not
one of us - a sobering thought for those who use 'one of us' as their highest
term of approbation.
The argument from design fails, then, because it is an argument from
ignorance, because it confuses the final and efficient modes of explanation,
and because even if it succeeded it would not prove the existence of God
but of some Masonic impostor. But like other bad arguments, its defeat
and death has left it to wander the world like a ghost, oppressing the spirits
of those who are looking for other and better arguments. 13 The haunting
we suffer from when we attempt to take a proper look at the Fifth Way
means that people think that as soon as we admit any kind of teleology
into the world, any kind of explanation in terms of what things are for, we
are at once committed to God.
I have a heavy burden of prejudice to overcome here. Let me just say
that as far as I can make out by far the hardest move in the Fifth Way is
the move from unconscious to conscious teleology, and, for my part, I am
not sure that St Thomas gives us conclusive reasons for making that move.
 The Fifth Way 183

I regard them as strong, but not conclusive, and the impression I have is
that others regard them as not very strong at all. So bear with me. The
case I am going to make for explanation in terms of what things are for is
worth examining in its own right, and I give you my word that there is no
booby-trap: you will not find yourself suddenly committed to believing
in God merely because you have come to accept that at least some things
in the world need to be explained in terms of what they're for. 14
'Having a point' or 'being for something' or 'displaying a tendency', or,
as Aquinas would probably say, 'directedness', is the feature X in this
Way. I think that it is, as Aquinas says, perfectly obvious that some things
in the world display this feature X, and it is clearly a feature X that requires
an explanation in terms of a relation to something else: viz, their point,
what they are for, what they have a tendency towards or what they are
directed to.
We see that there are things that have no knowledge, like physical
bodies, but which act for the sake of an end. This is clear in that they
always, or for the most part, act in the same way, and achieve what
is best. This shows that they reach their end not by chance but in
virtue of some tendency.
Aquinas clearly thinks that this feature X is generalisable: that if any part
of the world displays this feature X, the world as a whole displays it. This
step I find more doubtful, though I do find it plausible to infer that if any
part of the world apparently displays this feature X, has a point, then it at
least makes sense to ask whether the world as a whole displays feature X.
I shall not in fact stop with the obvious facts to which Aquinas alludes,
but shall go on to argue that in fact every bit of the world displays feature
X, at least to the same extent as that to which every bit of the world
displays the feature X we looked at in the Second Way, that of being a
subject of efficient causality. This move I shall make principally for its
own sake, because it is philosophically important and deeply unfashion-
able. But this move also helps the Fifth Way a little: if every bit of the
world displays this feature X it becomes a good deal more urgent and at
least apparently a good deal more sensible to ask whether the world as a
whole displays it; and, by parity of reasoning with the lumping-together
move we performed in the Second Way, it even begins to look likely that
the world as a whole does display feature X. But we still will not have
reached God. There will be a further step, which Aquinas scarcely even
sketches for us, which will say that if the world as a whole does display
feature X, the way in which it displays this feature cannot be an uncon-
scious way. In this respect the world as a whole is unlike most of the bits
184 God and Explanations

of the world which display feature X, since they do display feature X in

an unconscious way. The point in terms of a relation to which the world
is to be explained is thus going to be revealed as being indeed a purpose,
a point conceived by a mind to which the world is directed by that mind.
But it is this last step that brings us to God, and it is the most contentious
step of all.
To an unprejudiced mind there are innumerable features of the world
which display the relevant feature X, that have a point. All the different
parts of an organic whole - a human body, for example - have a point in
relation to the life of the whole body. Acorns we have already mentioned;
and indeed all the paraphernalia of animal and plant reproduction actually
resist definition except in terms of what they are for. Imagine, for example,
the task of identifying the sexual organs of some animals that were very
different from us, animals found on Mars, for example. 15 You cannot hope
to identify the sexual organs in terms of three-dimensional geometry, of
what bits stick out and what bits stick in - you have to identify the
function. People who study the ecology tend more and more to describe
it in teleological terms: what else is meant by the metaphor of calling the
whole ecosystem of the earth by a proper name, 'Gaia', as if it were itself
an organism?
These biological examples are particularly useful in that they show us
that we are not here depending on ignorance. The way the sexual organs
work is well understood. We even known quite a lot about how the
ecosystem works, and it is significant that we have come to speak of the
ecosystem in more and more organic terms - that is, more and more in
terms of what things are for - the better we have come to understand how
it actually works. Thus teleological explanations, explanations in terms of
what things are for, are not in the least rivals to efficient explanations,
explanations in terms of what things do or of how they do it. 16 The idea
that final causality and efficient causality are in some sense at loggerheads
derives from arguments like the argument from design, where efficient
explanations were lacking. Because efficient explanations were lacking,
the obvious final explanation was postulated as pre-existing as an idea in
someone's mind, which would then provide the required efficient expla-
nation. The mind of the Great Architect is a cover for ignorance of
efficient causality: the existence of final schemes of explanation may have
suggested that cover, but the reason why it suggested the cover is that a
decent teleological explanation, far from usurping the place of a decent
efficient explanation, actually demands one.
Unlike Paley's watch, Geach's watch is worthy of a place in contempo-
rary and non-historical works of philosophy. 17 A good old-fashioned
 The Fifth Way 185

mechanical watch, like many other artefacts, is a paradigm of something

that can and must be explained in terms of efficient causality. The minute
hand rotates twenty-four times in each period of the earth's rotation,
because it is moved by cog A; the hour hand rotates twice in every period
of the earth's rotation, because it is moved by cog B; cog A and cog B move
at such-and such a rate because they are moved by cog C via gearing D;
... because it is moved by the escapement, which moves because it is
moved by the hairspring, which moves because it is moved by the
mainspring. So far so good. If I had had a story like that to tell about the
world my version of the Second Way would have been far more elegant.
But the same watch, like many other artefacts, is also a paradigm of
something that can and must be explained in terms of final causality. The
mainspring moves in order that the hairspring may move which moves in
order that the escapement may move which moves ... in order that cog
C via gearing D may move cog A and cog B, and cog A moves in order
that the minute hand may rotate twenty-four times in each period of the
earth's rotation, and cog B moves in order that the hour hand may rotate
twice in every period of the earth's rotation. This story, in terms of final
causality, of what is the point of what, of what things are for, is just as
good as the last story, which was in terms of efficient causality, of how
things come about. Indeed, it does not take much philosophical acumen
to realise that the one story has to be as good as the other, since they are
the same story read in opposite directions with suitable adjustments to the
connectives. Neither is prior, neither makes the other redundant. Some-
times, as in the case of the sexual organs, we start by telling the final story
and get round to developing the efficient story, and sometimes, as in the
case of, I believe, the pineal gland, we first tell the efficient story and then
get round to telling the final story - working out what it's for. 18
So, prejudices aside, we can ask what this or that bit of the world is for;
and we can, in some cases, get an answer. We get it, at least sometimes,
by considering efficient causality: what this or that bit of the world actually
does. There is, thus, no conflict between final explanations and efficient
explanations, and it might be possible to maintain, as in the cases we have
considered, that the one requires the other and vice-versa. They require
each other, they even live off each other, given that the final explanation
is just the efficient explanation read in the opposite direction, with the
'becauses' substituted by 'in order tos', while the efficient explanation is
just the final explanation read off in the other direction, with the 'in order
tos' substituted by 'becauses'. This is certainly Aquinas's doctrine: as he
puts it, rather more elegantly, 'causae sunt ad invicem causae' (one kind of
explanation explains the other). 19
186 God and Explanations

Aquinas thinks that the world as a whole is a system of efficient causes,

as we saw when considering the Second Way. This is not the sort of claim
that many people, except possibly neo-Pythagoreans, would bother to
question. But a corollary of this belief, combined with this account of the
relationship between efficient and final modes of explanation, is that the
world as a whole is a system of final causality; and this claim is unlikely to
be even considered by the majority of our contemporaries. It implies, for
example, that of almost anything - certainly of anything that forms a part
of a system of efficient causality- we can sensibly ask 'What's it for? What
is the point of it?', and can hope one day to be able to give an answer which
is more or less correct.
Pick up any book of the history of the philosophy of science and you
will find this sort of view guyed unmercifully. Aristotle - and, by
implication, St Thomas, though few of those who work on the history
of the philosophy of science even bother to look at St Thomas, confining
themselves to remarks about angels on the points of pins - is represented
as a sort of primitive animist. Stones fall to the ground, Aristotle says,
because they have a tendency to return to their proper place, which is
the centre of the earth. Add to this the fact that the word he uses for
'tendency' is 'orexis', 'appetitus' in Latin, which can equally well be
translated as appetite, desire, or even lust, and you have a rather
charming but deeply ridiculous picture. Things like stones can be
represented as having a little and rather simple soul within them, a soul
which only knows where its rightful place is and only wants to return
there. Remove constraints from the stone and this passionate desire
takes over, and it flies to the bosom of the earth panting with lust. Why
this picture, which I find rather exciting, should be considered as
ridiculous in the century of Freud, I am not quite sure. I would have
thought that a picture of the universe as brimming with quasi-sexual
desire would be rather attractive to our contemporaries. Perhaps this
tells us something about the way in which philosophy has become
detached from the concerns and interests of ordinary people in the last
couple of hundred years.
The picture just drawn of Aristotle's world-view, though worthy of
serious poetical consideration, is in fact no more than a parody, aimed
at making the notion of final causality ridiculous. But the reality of the
doctrines of Aristotle and St Thomas, someone might want to say, is
already ridiculous enough. The idea that we can seriously ask of almost
any bit of the universe, at least in so far as it forms a part of a system of
efficient causality, 'What's the point of it?', is an idea which has been
seriously out of fashion for about the last three hundred years.
 The Fifth Way 187

Well, many ideas which have been out of fashion for the last three
hundred years are quite good ones. About three hundred years ago it
became unfashionable for preachers to tell their flocks that the goods they
happened to have in their power over and above what they needed for
their own support and that of their families, and for the discharge of any
civic duties they might have, did not belong to them at all, but belonged
to the poor, to those who needed it, and was owed to them as a debt of
justice. Someone who had more than he needed and did not give to the
poor was not guilty of a lack of charity or philanthropy but was simply a
thief. 20 That idea became unfashionable three hundred years ago, but it
seem to me a pretty good one. The same might well be true of the notion
of final causality. 21
Unsurprisingly, I should like to approach this question of final
causality through the question of efficient causality. We have already
mentioned that the standard modern account of causality regards it as
a relation between two events. This is entirely false to the practice of
science, which deals with relations not between events but between
things. As was perhaps mentioned when discussing the notion of the per
accidens, and the young Russell's pretence that people and things were
logical constructions out of events, making events prior to things is not
so much to put the cart before the horse as to put the mule before the
horse and the donkey. Events cannot be identified except as in terms of
their relations to things. The Battle of Waterloo, an event which we
quite frequently refer to, at least if we live to the south-west of London,
can only be identified in terms of Napoleon and a lot of his chaps
meeting Wellington and (rather later) Blucher and a lot of their chaps
on the slope of a hill about twenty miles south of Brussels and spending
most of the day beating all hell out of each other. There is no chance of
identifying Wellington dependently in terms of his being the victor of
Waterloo. The death of Socrates is the death that it is because it is
Socrates' death: Socrates is not who he is because he is the person who
died that death. Which death? we ask, and the only answer that we can
give which makes no reference to Socrates is that it was the death that
occurred early in the morning of (say) the fourth day of the month
Boedromion, in the prison of the Eleven, in the archon year of (say)
Agathocles. But this identification of the event depends on the prior
identification of all kinds of things and persons: the sun, to give us the
hour, the moon, to give us the day of the month, Athens, whose officers
the Eleven were, and where the prison was situated, and Agathocles.
'399 BC' is even less help, since it contains a reference to the birth of
Jesus 22 of Nazareth 23 in Bethlehem, 24 a reference which we know was
188 God and Explanations

established by one Dionysius Exiguus 25 in terms of a reference to Rome 26

and its foundation 27 by Romulus, 28 which Dionysius derived from the
histories of Livy, 29 a reference which we know (by reference to the
account given by Josephus 30 of the life and death 31 of Herod the Great3 2)
must have been mistaken. In brief, things are prior to events, and the
world, as a system of efficient causality, is a system of things. The world
is the totality of things, not of facts.
I believe that this claim is already likely to be unpopular enough, but
having started I might as well continue. These things which are related
by efficient causality are things with powers, and it is in virtue of their
powers that they exercise causality. This thesis is usually subject to as
much ridicule as is the picture of Aristotle's highly sexed physical uni-
verse. As soon as the word 'power' appears on the page, someone will
already be penciling in the margin a witticism about 'virtus dormitiva'.
This joke derives from Moliere and is probably the poorest joke ever used
in any philosophical context - certainly the poorest joke to be used more
than once. I have a certain right to speak here, as many of the jokes I make
in philosophical contexts are very poor indeed. Some of them have no
point, others have a very slight and unimportant point. But at least my
jokes don't miss the point altogether, and don't get used to make exactly
the opposite point to the one they really represent. And the really poor
ones I feel embarrassed about, and don't use more than once.
Moliere represents for us an examination of a medical doctor, and the
joke is that when the doctors can't answer difficult questions they
disguise their ignorance with high-sounding Latin phrases. Thus, when
asked why opium puts people to sleep, the candidate replies that it is
because opium has a 'virtus dormitiva', that is, a power to put people to
sleep. It seems a little hard to pull such a joke to pieces, but since
contemporary authors continue to misunderstand the point of the joke,
I am going to have to. This joke is funny for the following reason 33 - in
his answer the doctor merely repeats what everyone knows in techni-
cal-sounding language. Doing so is supposed to inspire confidence in
the patient. This is a trick which doctors often play: in the First World
War, what the troops called 'trench fever' the doctors called 'P. U. O.',
pyrexia of unknown origin. The nature of this pyrexia is still unknown.
The technique sometimes makes the patient feel more confident, which
often helps towards a cure. Sometimes the mere giving of a label - for
example, RSI, or repetitive strain injury, which means no more than
that you are suffering discomfort or pain because you have strained your
nerves, tendons and muscles, in some obscure way, through repeatedly
performing slight movements such as typing - can be of immense
 The Fifth Way 189

benefit to the patient because he or she is thus enabled to sue the pants
off his or her employer. But when the doctor uses some high-sounding
phrase to repeat what we already know, and we are sharp enough to spot
this, and have no hope of a recovery or of compensation based on jargon
alone, we laugh. So (let us hope) did Moliere's audience.
I feel deeply embarrassed flogging this joke to death, but it has to be
done. The joke is funny because the answer is true but profoundly
uninformative. Uninformativeness is a relative notion: an expression can
be informative to one person, uninformative to another. When I point out
that Glasgow is in Scotland, not England, this is uninformative to most
of my readers, but when I visit Spain I have occasion to make this remark
quite often, and it is informative. In the Moliere case, we are supposed to
be an intelligent and well-educated seventeenth-century audience who
can work out that the dog-Latin sentence in question means that opium
puts people to sleep because it has a power to put people to sleep. This is
profoundly uninformative (and therefore, let me insist, mildly funny)
because we knew it already. The answer is true, but tells us nothing we
didn't know. We pay doctors to tell us things we didn't know, so when a
doctor is represented as earning his money by telling us things we already
knew well, covering his minor dishonesty in high-sounding language, we
find it amusing.
Contrast, if you can bear to, the account given of this same joke by those
who use it most, people of an empiricist cast of mind. Rather than regard
'opium puts people to sleep because it has a dormitive power' as true but
uninformative, they see it as tautological. What else, they ask, could
'opium has a dormitive power' mean other than 'opium puts people to
sleep'? They think that the doctor in the play is to be laughed at because
he repeats a tautology as if it were informative. This will not do. Informa-
tiveness and uninformativeness are, as I said, relative notions: relative to
the degree of ignorance or education of the reader or listener. If Moliere
had wanted to give us a tautological answer, his own dog-Latin and that
of his audience would surely have been up to it. 'Why does opium put
people to sleep?' 'Q!ioniam duke sugus papaveri inquantum sumitur
omne animal dormitare facessit'. That Latin is pretty doggy, but the worse
the Latin, the easier to understand: 'because the gentle juice of the poppy
sends to sleep any animal that takes it'. That is a tautology.
In contrast, 'opium sends people to sleep because it has a dormitive
power' is a perfectly sensible, if not very informative, scientific statement.
It is not a tautology, and we can prove this in a nicely ironic way. A
tautology is not significantly deniable: the negation of a tautology is a
self-contradiction, which no-one can believe or even sensibly affirm. It is
190 God and Explanations

ironic that those very people of empiricist casts of mind who claim that
'opium sends people to sleep because it has a dormitive power' is a
tautology are just the people who deny this alleged tautology, who claim
that it is false that opium sends people to sleep because it has a dormitive
power. They deny, in fact, that opium has a dormitive power, because
they deny that there are any such things as powers. They should not be
allowed to have it both ways: they must not claim both that the famous
sentence is a tautology and that it is false.
Someone like Locke would say that we have no way of knowing whether
opium has, in its real essence, a dormitive power or not. We should limit
ourselves to commenting on the fact that the (possibly quite disparate)
kinds of thing which we group together roughly under the nominal
essence of opium in fact send people to sleep. Though, for Locke, we
shouldn't be surprised when they don't: a man who was not surprised at
the story of the rational parrot, or the offspring of bulls with mares, or of
apes with women, has no real right to be surprised at anything. 34
Or let us consider Hume. If you ask Hume whether it is the case that
opium puts people to sleep because it has a dormitive power, he will
answer no (at least if you catch him in the library rather than at the
backgammon-board). There is no possible evidence on which we can base
such an affirmation as 'opium puts people to sleep because it has a
dormitive power'; all we find is a constant conjunction between people
taking opium and people going to sleep. To what extent we find this, and
how constant the conjunction is, we had better not ask. In the interests of
science and of annoying Humeans I am perfectly capable of taking a
powerful emetic just before taking my opium, and thus showing that the
conjunction between taking opium and going to sleep is by no means as
constant as one might have thought. Of course it will be alleged that a
constant conjunction which can be so easily falsified is not what Hume or
the Humeans meant, and I am well able to believe it; but I have yet to find
anyone capable of telling me just what the devil they do mean.
Putting the rhetoric on the back burner for a little bit, the thesis I am
trying to suggest is that the system of physical science with which we are
all familiar, a system which most would be happy to see described as a
system of efficient causality, is a system of things, principally bodies, and
their powers, and the effects of these powers. It is true that science is more
than this. I have claimed that the answer 'opium puts people to sleep
because it has a dormitive power' is perfectly true, and, indeed, if the
account of science I have just offered is in any way accurate, it is in some
ways a model answer. But 'model' answer is exactly right; or perhaps I
should rather call it a blueprint for an answer, or the framework for an
 The Fifth Way 191

answer. It is, after all, wholly uninformative, it tells us nothing which we

did not know already; and it can scarcely be claimed that science tells us
nothing which we did not know already.
I am not a particular fan of uninformative answers, but I see nothing
wrong with them when they prepare the ground for an informative one.
And this answer is a case in point. Against the beliefs of any empiricists,
or any believers in magic, it tells us that opium has a dormitive power and
thus prepares us for an investigation into what that power consists in.
Kenny would say it prepares us for an investigation of the vehicle of that
power, 35 and the account he gives of the relationship between powers and
their vehicles is a good one. What was wrong with the doctor's answer in
Moliere is that we expect the doctor to know more than we do, to be
capable of going one step beyond the uninformative answer we already
know, and to tell us what the vehicle of this dormitive power is - some
feature of the chemical structure of opium which enables it to send us to
sleep through some action within the chemical content of the brain (I
expect). When the doctor fails to say something like this we feel cheated
because we are paying him a lot for the years of study which are supposed
to take him further in the investigation of the powers of natural things
than we will ever get, and if he cannot tell us a suitable story about the
vehicle we expect him to admit it and not fob us off with a lot of Latin. In
my bedside table I have a packet of tranquillisers, and in the instructions
that came with the pills I find the superb phrase: 'Alapryl, a preparation
of halazepam, is a tranquilliser derived from benzodiazepine. As with
other benzodiazepines, the exact mechanism by which it achieves its
therapeutic effects is not clearly established.' 35 That's the way to talk: no
comic dramatist in the world could take the mickey out of that kind of
remark. Nor could any empiricist have any objection. But oddly enough
the real scientists regard this kind of admission rather shamefacedly. I take
this as evidence that my account of science, as an investigation of powers
and their vehicles, though crude, is at least more accurate than that of the
empiricists.
But if the world, considered as a system of efficient causality, necessar-
ily involves the notion of powers, then it also necessarily reveals itself as
a system of final causality. For powers are defined and identified in terms
of their ends- their 'exercises', as Kenny would say. 37 We can thus perhaps
see reason for identifying, (not merely this or that bit of the world), but
the world as a whole as a system which requires explanation in terms of
what it's for.
We can go further. Leaving behind the question of powers, it is possible
to claim that the notion of efficient causality requires the notion of a
192 God and Explanations

tendency, and the notion of tendency, still more clearly than that of a
power, needs to be defined and identified in terms of what it's a tendency
towards. 38 I shall attempt to show this by outlining a framework for
understanding reasoning in causal contexts- contexts of efficient causality
- which works by assimilating causal reasoning to practical reasoning.
Following a suggestion of Geach, I shall argue that systems of causal
reasoning display the logical feature of 'defeasibility', a feature which is
often held to be distinctive of practical reasoning. I shall suggest that the
reason for this logical isomorphism between causal and practical reasoning
is that just as practical reasoning starts from goals, which are conscious
ends, so all causal reasoning involves the notion of tendencies, which are
specified in terms of ends.
Causal set-ups, then, are to be described as stating tendencies. These
tendencies are specified in terms of their end, of that to which they are
tendencies. For example: substances A and B, when mixed, have a ten-
dency to produce an explosion. Given the additional premiss that sub-
stances A and B have been mixed, we very happily conclude that there
will be (or has been) an explosion. But suppose that we add in extra
premisses, as for example that substances A and B have been mixed in a
medium of substance C: and that substance C has a tendency to interfere
with the operations of these tendencies of substances A and B. We
conclude that there will be no explosion. This reasoning is as defeasible
as practical reasoning is. 39
If causal premisses are taken to express tendencies, which can be
interfered with, and if this interference may invalidate any conclusion that
may be drawn from the premisses, the parallels between causal reasoning
and practical reasoning seem to be clear. That which may defeat the
conclusion of the causal reasoning is interference, that is, the action of
other causal tendencies not mentioned in the original premisses. Mean-
while, that which may defeat the conclusion of practical reasoning is the
addition of other goal-expressing premisses.
This parallel can be developed. The relevant premisses in practical
reasoning are premisses which express goals: in causal reasoning, the
relevant premisses are premisses which express or describe tendencies.
The premisses in both cases involve an unavoidable reference to an end.
This is clear in the case of practical reasoning: but it should be no less
clear in the case of causal reasoning. A tendency is specified in terms of
what it is a tendency towards: the notion of an end is thus unavoidably
involved. 40
It is true that an explosion is not produced, in the imagined case, and
to that extent the tendencies of substances A and B to produce an
 The Fifth Way 193

explosion are not fulfilled. But though these tendencies, under that
description, are not fulfilled, there are surely other descriptions of the
same causal tendencies of substances A and B under which the tendencies
are fulfilled. We have to to tell some such story as that while substance A
has a tendency to combine with substance B in such a way as to produce
an explosion it also has a tendency to combine with substance C to produce
some compound which does not have a tendency to produce an explosion
when combined with substance B. Both these tendencies could perhaps
be redescribed in general terms of, for example, valency, in such a way
that both tendencies can be seen as species of one and the same generic
tendency, just as both effects - the combination with B to produce an
explosion, and the combination with C to prevent an explosion - can be
seen as different fulfilments of the same tendency. We are not to think of
tendencies becoming wholly inoperative when interfered with. A mixture
of A and B in a medium of C is something with causal tendencies quite
different from those of the same quantity of C alone: the tendencies of A
and B continue to exist and to have some fulfilment. The same tendencies,
we want to say, under certain descriptions may be fulfilled, and under
other descriptions may not be fulfilled.
A question may arise of what right I have to speak of 'the same
tendencies under different descriptions'. If a tendency is specified by its
end, as it surely must be, then a tendency with a different end is a different
tendency. I believe this problem can be circumvented. Every tendency
has an end, but this end will be variously describable. Quite a lot of what
one is first taught in science classes, I would say, consists in establishing
alternative (and more general) descriptions of given tendencies. For
example, in basic dynamics, attaching such-and-such a weight to this rope,
running over a pulley, has a tendency to lift such-and-such other weight
attached to the other end. An alternative description of this tendency, in
terms of force, and alternative descriptions of the weights in terms of mass,
are made available. It is clearly the same tendencies which are differently
described here.
This may give the clue to an answer. We should not say that a tendency
that is 'frustrated' by interference is not fulfilled, we should rather say
something like 'this tendency is fulfilled in a non-paradigmatic way'. Each
tendency will be specified in terms of an end, the end will be an event,
and hence the tendency will be specified by a description of an event. For
example, we may describe a tendency as a tendency to produce an
explosion, say. The paradigmatic fulfilment of the tendency will be the
occurrence of an event that meets the description that was used in
specifying the tendency - in this case, an explosion. There may well be
194 God and Explanations

no such occurrence, no explosion, in which case there will be no paradig-

matic fulfilment of the tendency. But there will be some fulfilment of the
tendency - a non-paradigmatic one. We will have to redescribe the
tendency to produce an explosion in such a way that the failure of the
mixture to explode is also a fulfilment of the tendency: for example, by
redescribing it as a tendency to combine with other substances in such-
and-such ways. But a fulfilment of a tendency will be paradigmatic or
non-paradigmatic relative to a certain description of the tendency: for
every fulfilment of a tendency that is non-paradigmatic under a certain
description, there will be another description of the tendency such that
the fulfilment is paradigmatic under that description. Both the combina-
tion of substance A with substance B to produce an explosion, and the
combination of substance A with substance C, and the consequent failure
of substance A to produce an explosion despite the presence of substance
B, will both be paradigmatic fulfilments of the same tendency of A under
different descriptions. Moreover, as our understanding develops, we can
offer a description of the tendency in A to the paradigmatic effect of
producing an explosion in the presence ofB such that is also a description
of a tendency to the paradigmatic effect of failing to explode in the
presence of B and C.
This will need tightening up. A first objection to this would seem to be
that since any event can be described as 'something happening', any
tendency can be described as a tendency for something to happen. This
would empty this doctrine of all content. 'If there is a tendency for
something to happen, something will happen' does not look helpful. (We
may notice, though, that even this example is not wholly vacuous: it has
enough content to be false. If the conflicting or interfering tendencies are
equally balanced, then nothing will happen.) But the point is well made.
We will need some kind of stipulations about levels of generality of
descriptions of ends to be used in specifying tendencies. A first shot would
be to stipulate something like the following: when we are dealing with
conflicting or interfering tendencies, we are to seek for alternative, more
general descriptions of these tendencies such that both tendencies are
fulfilled paradigmatically. That is, the tendencies are to be specified in
such a way that both are fulfilled paradigmatically. If we then stipulate
that the least general such description is to be taken, we shall avoid at least
the uninformativeness of attributing to agents 'tendencies to bring it about
that something happens'.
That is, we don't want to have laws of chemistry that say something
like 'When the substances A and Bare put together, something happens'.
But nor do we want laws that say 'When substances A and B are put
 The Fifth Way 195

together, an explosion occurs', which, given that there may be interfer-

ence, would be false. We want a description of the tendencies of A and B
such that the event described by 'an explosion occurred' and the event
described by 'an explosion did not occur' are equally paradigmatic fulfil-
ments of the tendencies.
We may want to add here a suggestion that the scientific project is one
of determining appropriate levels of generality of description. The least
general level is the place to start, but this, in our example, may get us no
further than saying that A has a tendency to combine with B to produce
an explosion and to combine with C to avoid an explosion. This is not yet
a scientific explanation: but it seems to be the place at which to start a
scientific investigation, to see what further more general and more ex-
planatory, and hence more appropriate, descriptions of this tendency in
A we can produce. Appropriateness here is a difficult notion to specify,
but it is one which it is necessary to use. What we want is a level general
enough for us to be able to say that the tendencies are fulfilled paradig-
matically, but not so general as to be uninformative - and not so particular,
meanwhile, as to be useless for explanation of other causal efficacy of the
subjects.
The mysterious notion of explanatoriness seems to be making an
entrance here. Explanatoriness is indeed a mysterious concept, but there
are features which it is known to have which can be seen to be relevant
here. The giving of an explanation appears to create a non-extensional
context: to use Professor Anscombe's example, to say 'There was an
international crisis because the President of the French Republic made a
speech' is explanatory, while 'There was an international crisis because
the man with the biggest nose in France made a speech' is not, even if the
President of the French Republic is the man with the biggest nose in
France. 41 That is, explanation is in some sense relative to a description. It
should occasion no surprise, then, that causal reasoning in terms of
tendencies, which is supposed to be explanatory, should turn out to have
description-relativity built in to it. This is yet another parallel to practical
reasoning: actions are said to be intentional only under certain descrip-
tions, and here we have it that effects are attributable to a tendency only
under certain descriptions. I am not able to enter into a full discussion of
this.
This account clarifies a number of difficulties about non-voluntary
causality, and allows us to make clear the difference between voluntary
and non-voluntary causality. Non-voluntary causality needs to be de-
scribed in terms of tendencies, tendencies to some paradigmatic effect.
These tendencies may often be fulfilled non-paradigmatically, because of
196 God and Explanations

interference. That is, there may well be no possible description of the

effect which is also a description of the paradigmatic fulfilment of the
tendency. However, the tendencies will always be fulfilled, if only non-
paradigmatically: there will always be some description of the tendency,
in terms of some paradigmatic fulfilment, such that the tendency, so
described, is fulfilled paradigmatically. The apparent vacuousness of this
is limited by the fact that if the paradigmatic fulfilment does not occur,
there will always be some interference; and the actual outcome will also
be a non-paradigmatic fulfilment of the interfering tendency. Once we are
committed to taking the least general descriptions of the two tendencies
under which the fulfilments are paradigmatic, the account we give will be
the starting place, at least, for the search for an appropriate explanation -
it will describe the outcome as the paradigmatic fulfilment of the conflict-
ing tendencies. There will always be such a description available, barring
the case of miracles.
The case which has here been made, then, is that a description of the
world in terms of its being a system of efficient causality is necessarily a
system which involves tendencies, and therefore also a system which
involves finality: indeed, that a description of the physical world which
ignores finality is as absurd as a description of human action which ignores
human goals. Of course both kinds of description, which I here categorise
as absurd, are possible, in the sense that they can be written out or talked
about. What is more difficult to know, as Aristotle remarked about
Heraclitus, is to what extent it is possible to believe in them. 42
If what has been said is accepted, or even half-accepted, it makes
sense to see the world as a system of final causality, as displaying a
tendency. This, it will be remembered, was the feature X for the Fifth
Way. That 'displaying a tendency' has the mark of a suitable feature X
of requiring an explanation in terms of a relation to something else is
clear. It is not so clear to what extent it is generalisable, to what extent
we can infer from 'part of this whole displays feature X' that 'the whole
displays feature X'.
It is pretty clear that St Thomas believes that the feature is generalisable
since he does not take the trouble, as I have done, to claim that each and
every part of the world displays a tendency. It is perhaps simple enough
to understand why he thinks this. If I put my file on the floor, and then a
book on top of it, and then my word-processor on top of the book, and
then a flower-vase on top of the word-processor, and then put a stick in
the flower vase, and then carefully wrap a small scrap of ribbon around
the stick, a question arises of what the devil I'm up to; more scientifically,
what is the point of all that?
 The Fifth Way 197

I answer: 43 I put the file on the floor in order to put the book on top of
it, and I put the book on the file in order to put my word-processor on top
of the book, and I put my word-processor on top of the book in order to
put the flower-vase on top of the word-processor, and I put the flower-
vase on top of the word-processor in order to put a stick in it, and I put
the stick in the flower-vase in order to tie a piece of ribbon around the end
of the stick. I have given something of a sketch of a system of final
causality. Each part of the system of final causality, until the last, has a
perfectly good explanation.
(We might have given this example in terms of our stock group oflnuit,
of course, and the same point could have been made: lngekok is here to
prevent quarrels between Kadlu and Kotuko, and so on. I have avoided
using the example here because the point of any of the group's presence
will be in terms of conscious teleology, their purpose. When dealing with
teleological relations within the world, we are interested principally in
unconscious teleology.)
Something remains to be said. If the last step of tying the ribbon, or the
system as a whole, fails to have a point, one is surely entitled to say that
the apparent point of each previous stage is wholly illusory. Again, as in
the case of the Inuit, there can be a variety of forms of final explanation
which will suffice. Maybe the point of each part other than the tying of
the ribbon derives from the point of the ribbon in itself, as in the case
where the ribbon is yellow, and lacking an old oak tree I wish to build
some structure tall enough for my sweetheart to be able to catch sight of
the ribbon from the window of the bus. Or it may be that the point of each
part does not relate directly or indirectly to the point of the explanatorily
privileged ribbon - I am merely seized by the aesthetic passion of making
piles of incongruous objects. Or something between the two: the upper
part of the structure is a booby-trap, and the lower part is to make sure
that it stays put until my victim gets here. As in the case of the Inuit,
no-one knows and no-one cares, but it is a plausible claim that unless the
whole has a point no part of it has a point, all appearances of final structure
notwithstanding.
Thus St Thomas thinks that if the world as a whole does not have a
point, then the things in the world that seem to have a point don't have a
point either. There is room here for a subordinate argument such as he
gives us in the first three Ways, that we cannot go on to infinity in this
line, but perhaps there is no need for him to give it. The point had already
been made for him by Aristotle in the Nicomachean Ethics44 - if everything
is for the sake of something else, there is no point in anything. A parallel
example which I have sometimes given is the 'Lottery in Babylon' of
198 God and Explanations

Borges's short story of the same name. 45 The story contains a number of
deliberate inconsistencies, but one of the things that is said or suggested
is that the lottery, which has come to embrace all aspects of Babylonian
life, and doles out both good and bad fortune, has become infinite.
Nothing ever happens as a result of any drawing of the lottery except some
further drawing of the lottery. The governors of Babylon, or the gods of
Babylon, have introduced and extended this lottery with the aim of
keeping their subjects in a useful and agreeable state of apprehension and
hope. The reader, though, wonders how long it will be before someone
recognises that the lottery determines nothing but further drawings of the
lottery, and announces, as it were, that the emperor has no clothes on at
all. And what will happen to the useful and agreeable state of hope and
apprehension then?
St Thomas seems to put before us a stark choice: either the world
requires an explanation in terms of what it's for, or nothing in the world
in fact has any point, though it may seem to. The problem with this choice
is that people may very well take the alternative St Thomas rejects. It is
not uncommon for people to say that they regard the world as having no
point, and regard any appearance that anything in the world has a point
as purely delusive. Some theists, reacting to this answer, might make the
kind of remark that Aristotle makes about Heraclitus: they say it, but they
can't mean it. Having myself suffered in my time from clinical depression
(that is what working in the Philosophy Department of Glasgow Univer-
sity can do for you), I think that this theistic retort is both cheap and
inaccurate. One can perfectly well believe that neither one's own life nor
the life of the world as a whole has any point that one is capable of
understanding, and still jog on without feeling logically, morally or psy-
chologically compelled to go for the overdose of sleeping pills.
But this is where my stronger claim, that the world as a whole has to
be seen as a system of final causality, makes it harder to refuse to take St
Thomas's preferred alternative: that the world as a whole is something
that requires explanation in terms of some point that it has, in terms of
being for something. For if my account of science is anything like right,
then the whole of science is entirely fallacious if the world is not the sort
of thing that has a point. This is an option which will seem perfectly
plausible to depressives, but will seem less so to others. It is not merely a
question of failing to see much point in life, but one of suddenly being
unable to see any intelligible structure to life at all. This would take us
well beyond anything which we can find parallels for in depressive
symptoms, and brings us into the country of people who mistake their
wives for hats. And here Aristotle's point against Heraclitus does seem to
 The Fifth Way 199

have a certain validity. We know that there was at least one man who
mistook his wife for a hat, but if someone tells us that it is a mistake he is
prone to make we find it pretty hard to believe: - at least when he is playing
backgammon rather than elucubrating in the philosophy section of the
l1.brary. 46
It begins to look, then, as if the lumping-together move with this feature
X has some validity. Even if we are willing to be hard-nosed about St
Thomas's claim that the bits of the world which apparently have a point
will fail to have one if the world as a whole has no point, we may feel a bit
more doubtful about being hard-nosed if we find out that if we refuse to
ask what the point of the world is, we are left with a world whose structure
as a system of final causality, and therefore as a system of efficient
causality, turns out to be wholly illusory. Or perhaps not: perhaps this is
the reason why people have been trying to drum into us for centuries that
the world can be a comprehensible structure of (quasi-) efficient causality
without implying any beliefs about tendencies, and therefore without
implying any vision of the world as a structure of final causality. The
question which remains, though, is not that of whether we are capable of
seeing the world as a structure of quasi-efficient causality while ignoring
the tendencies which are thus presupposed, thus enabling us to ignore the
final structure of the world. Of course we can do it - we've done it for
centuries. The question is whether we should. Likewise, it is clear that we
are capable of considering all the money and goods that come into our
power by means which our legal system sanctions as being our own, to do
what we like with. The question is whether we should: whether we would
not be behaving with some kind of minimal honesty if we returned to the
unfashionable old idea that what we have above and beyond what we need
for our own support, that of our families, and the fulfilment of our civic
duties, is not actually owed as a debt of justice to those who are in need of
it.
Be that as it may, once we start wondering about what the point of the
world is, about what the world is for, or even once we start wondering
whether it might not after all make sense to ask such a question, we run
into a curious little problem which takes us on to the last step in the Fifth
Way: 'But things which have no knowledge do not have a tendency to an
end unless they are directed by something that does have knowledge and
understanding. An example is an arrow directed by an archer.'
This is the crucial claim of the Fifth Way, the step that takes us to God
- and it is a little curious. It can be paraphrased as: every unconscious
teleology, every case of something being for something without awareness
of what it's for, is dependent on some conscious teleology, on some mind
200 God and Explanations

which is aware what that thing is for. It seems obvious to me that just in
so far as one is disposed to admit the existence of unconscious teleology,
one will be disposed to deny this claim, and just in so far as one is disposed
to admit this claim one will be disposed to admit the existence of uncon-
scious teleology. Here I find myself isolated. Both Reid and Hume were
inclined to admit the claim, and neither is much of a friend to unconscious
teleology. Most of my contemporaries, I think, would agree with the two
Scots here. St Thomas admits the existence of unconscious teleology and
actually makes the claim. I feel rather friendless when I admit that to me
the evidence for the existence of unconscious teleology seems overwhelm-
ing, but I cannot at first sight see any reason for holding the claim that it
must in general depend on conscious teleology.
'In general', I say. In the case of the world as a whole, there is, as I have
mentioned, a problem with the lumping-together move which may in this
case, if in no other, justify the dependence of unconscious teleology on
conscious teleology. We have agreed, at least for the sake of argument, to
regard the world as a system of things which are for something, which
have a point, which display unconscious teleology. And, at least for the
sake of following St Thomas's argument, we have to agree to perform the
lumping-together move and ask what is the point of the world as a whole.
This leads to a problem. Unconscious teleology seems always to be
system-relative, if that is not too much of a neologism. A typical relation
of unconscious teleology, of one thing being for the sake of another
without consciousness of what it's for, will be the relationship of a part to
a whole, as in the case of a bodily organ; or the relationship of one part of
an interconnected teleological system to another part of the same system,
as in the case of the acorn. The examples are the most obvious ones, but
clearly if we agree to count anything which manifests a tendency as having
a point, and any part of the system of efficient causes which we call the
world as manifesting a tendency, this will be quite generally true. The bit
of the world which displays unconscious teleology, which has a point,
which is for the sake of something, is, in the end, for the sake of the world
as a whole.
What then can we say of the world as a whole? If the world has a point,
if it is for anything, this cannot be a case of unconscious teleology, since
unconscious teleology is always relative to a system, is always a case of a
part being for the sake of the whole. There is, by definition, no greater
whole of which the world forms a part. Even if there were, we could just
perform the 'we cannot go on to infinity in this line' move, and quickly
come to the limit. There is therefore going to be something, viz. the world,
which has to have a point if anything within the world is to have a point.
 The Fifth Way 201

Apparently there are things within the world that have a point; indeed,
apparently the whole structure of the world depends on things displaying
tendencies and thus having points, being for something. Therefore the
world as a whole does have a point, does display teleology. But this
teleology cannot be unconscious, since there is no greater whole for the
world to have as its unconscious point. Therefore the teleology of the
world must be conscious: the point of the world must be conferred on it
by some mind. 'Therefore there is some being with understanding which
directs all things to their end, and this, we say, is God.'
I can never quite make up my mind as to whether or not I find this
argument convincing. A parallel discussion in ethical arguments strikes
me as equally perplexing, and perplexing in an interestingly similar way.
The kind of moral philosophy I favour is broadly speaking Aristotelian,
and has as its most fundamental concept that of human well-being,
flourishing. I can argue to some effect about the content of this notion of
well-being, about how it is related to human dispositions and actions, and
what sort of things we can or should do to achieve it. That is, grant me
that human well-being is a good thing and I can deduce for you a whole
ethical system, offering on the way at least specious refutations of any rival
system. But if you ask me to prove to you that human well-being or
flourishing is itself good, I find myself at a loss. I don't even know how I
could begin such a proof. The only way to start which occurs to me is to
go all ecological and relate the life of human beings to the life of Gaia, or
whatever. This has several difficulties. First, I don't believe in the exist-
ence of Gaia. Secondly, it's pretty obvious that there are at least important
aspects of the life of Gaia which we human beings are not very good for.
Thirdly, we cannot go on to infinity in this line: were I able to prove that
human well-being is good for the life of Gaia you would be perfectly
entitled to ask me what the life of Gaia is good for. No answer is obviously
forthcoming.
At this stage the temptation is to throw up one's hands and appeal to
an intuition that human well-being is a good thing, or that the life of Gaia
is a good thing. Intuitions are in any case suspect, and in this context, that
of ultimate goods, I find so many different candidates for the post of being
the ultimate good, offered to me on the basis of so many different people's
different intuitions; and so many of these candidates I find absurd or
disgusting. So the appeal to intuitions is doubly or trebly suspect. 47
Though I am a philosopher, and regard with the gravest suspicion any
attempt to bring in theological considerations into my strictly philosophi-
cal work, I begin to wonder whether the only point of human well-being
is that it seems to be something God wants. Perhaps here we are still in
202 God and Explanations

the realm of philosophical theology, natural theology. I spoke earlier of

the truth which things have through their matching God's mind. A closely
related doctrine to this is that God's knowledge of the world is causative:
'Scientia Dei, causa rerum' ,48 (God's knowledge causes things to be). God
does not have to observe the world to see how things turn out - this would
make him passive to the world, and that contradicts the notion of God as
Creator. God's knowledge of the world is like our knowledge of our own
actions: we know what we are doing without observation. 40 The truth of
things in the world depends on God's knowledge, not vice-versa; it is not,
that is to say, that the truth of God's knowledge depends on things in the
world.
A parallel point can be made for God's will, and sometimes is. Things
are the objects of our desire and goodwill because we find them good.
But to transfer this kind of love to God would involve us in the same
kind of mistake as would to think of God as having to learn from the
world. Things are the object of God's desire and goodwill and this
makes them good. (I do not wish to enter into the famous volunta-
rist/ anti-voluntarist controversy of the late Middle Ages here, and give
serious consideration to the question of whether we might not wake up
tomorrow to find that adultery was perfectly legitimate after all. 50 The
thesis I have maintained does not entail this kind of voluntarism. There
might be aspects of God's nature which set limits to what God can
desire, and adultery might well fall outside these limits.) If human
flourishing is a good thing, I want to suggest, in any ultimate sense, it
can only be because God wants human beings to flourish. Likewise, if
the world has a point, if it is for anything, it is because God has given
it a point, has made it for something.
As I have said, I don't know whether or not the Fifth Way is a good
proof. The alternative is pretty dreadful- that there's no point to anything
- but just because a thing is pretty dreadful doesn't have to make it false.
Here the atheist cannot sensibly be accused of wishful thinking. But, as I
have already commented, the theist need not be guilty of wishful thinking
either, particularly if he or she subscribes to one or other of the traditional
religions in our culture which embody classical theism. The atheist's
conclusion, that there's no point to anything, may be a pretty dreadful
one; but a more dreadful one, surely, is the theist's conclusion that there
is a very definite point to everything and that I and you and everyone you
care for and countless others may well miss it.
If the worse comes to the worst, and you feel you have gained nothing
either way from this book, draw this moral: don't make facile accusations
of wishful thinking against people who disagree with you, and try to be
 The Fifth Way 203

consistent enough in your thought to make sure that any accusation of

wishful thinking made against you is false.
So much for the irrelevant moral tacked on at the end of the tale - what
has the real point of the tale been? The real point of writing this book has
been to show that what I used to think of as philosophy can still be done.
With modest attention to our own limitations, we still can gather remark-
able new insights into important problems - the existence of God, the
nature of scientific inquiry, the notions of meaning and existence - from
a study of the wisdom of older authors. We are not confined to studying
them as if they were members of an alien species, pegged out on a card
maybe, or even going about their unfathomable business, whose thoughts
can have no impact on our own. If we want to know about the existence
of God, or about the nature of science, we should read Aquinas, not merely
the writers of this century. If we want to study Aquinas we should pay
him the compliment of treating as important what he thought of as
important. To study Aquinas as Aquinas is a poor piece of flattery, since
Aquinas cared very little for Aquinas, while he did care for God and for
science.
Not that he cared for God and science in equal degrees, but he clearly
thought that caring for God, for him, entailed developing a science of
God. This meant he had to develop a theory of science. The first steps
- perhaps the most important step - in his developed science is the
question of the existence of God, and he answers it strictly according to
his own rules for answering such questions. The Five Ways are not a
brilliant jewel that can easily be wrenched out of its setting; to under-
stand them we have to understand what kind of a question St Thomas
thinks he is asking, why he asks it, how he thinks it is possible to set
about answering it, and how the answers he gives meet up to his own
standards - yes, and to our standards too. Unless, of course, the careful
reading of St Thomas has sometimes given us reason to abandon our
own standards, which we have acquired in a severely limited environ-
ment, and take on his standards.
The great benefit to be derived from reading pre-modern authors is to
come to realise that after all we might have been mistaken up to now. This
realisation is perhaps the chief and most general service I hope to have
done to my readers.
There is a lesser, more modest and more specific aim that I have had:
to make it clear that it is wise to attempt some understanding of St
Thomas's theory of science before trying to understand his arguments for
the existence of God. I also hope to have contributed something to the
understanding of both. Equally well, I think it would be foolish to try to
204 God and Explanations

understand St Thomas's theory of science and explanation without relat-

ing it to his most famous scientific arguments in the context of explana-
tion, which are the five ways. Lastly, I hope that some may have been able
to develop new ideas of their own on the problems of the theory of science,
on explanation, and of the existence of God, by being exposed to St
Thomas's thought in a new way. That is the sort of thing I mean by
'philosophy'.

NOTES

I. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3:
Quinta via sumitur ex gubernatione rerum. Videmus enim quod aliqua quae cognitione carent,
scilicet corpora naturalia, operantur propter finem; quod apparet ex hoc, quod semper aut
frequentius eodem modo operantur, et consequuntur id quod est optimum. Unde patet quod
non a casu sed ex intentione perveniunt ad finem. Ea autem quae non habent cognitionem
non tendunt in finem nisi directa ab aliquo cognoscente et intelligente, sicut sagitta a sagittante.
Ergo est aliquid intelligens a quo omnes res naturales ordinantur in finem, et hoc dicimus
Deum.
2. See W. Paley, Natural Theology (London: Charles Knight, 1836), pp. 1-6. Paley's watch is clearly
to be included among the exhibits of any Museum of the History of Philosophy, along with
Aristotle's black swan, Ockham's razor, Buridan's Ass, Zeno's Arrow and Aquinas's point of a
pin.
3. To those who object that he may have been unfamiliar with mechanical clocks, it is worth
commenting that he compares to clockwork the way animals sometimes operate, in Summa
Theologiae, 1-11, q. 13, a. 2, ad 3.
4. 'The last metaphysical principle ... is, That design, and intelligence in the cause, may be inferred
with certainty, from marks or signs of it in the effect': T. Reid, Essay VI, 'Of judgement',
Chapter V, 'First principles of necessary truths', in Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man
(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1969), p. 660. In the same place he refers to Hume's attitude
to this principle.
5. See the discussion of the argument from design, and Hume's reaction to it, in]. L. Mackie, The
Miracle of Theism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1982), Chapter 8, pp. 133-49.
6. The enormous attraction of the argument from design is shown by the fact that Professor
Dawkins, the best-known scientific atheist in Britain today, devotes most of his anti-God
arguments to showing that the argument from design fails to prove the existence of God. I agree,
as will be seen. However, he seems also to think that the failure of one argument for the existence
of God proves that God does not exist. Perhaps this is merely because he has heard ofno other,
or has failed to notice that other arguments are significantly different.
7. It is no coincidence that according to Blake the Fall of Man occurred when Newton ate the apple.
8. Being 'one of us', of course, the question arises for him, as it does for us, 'and how did he get
there?' or 'and who made him?'. This question cannot arise for the true God who we argue to as
one who precisely lacks the features which we have, which make the question 'who made us?'
inescapable.
9. This point is excellently made by P. T. Geach, 'An irrelevance of omnipotence', in Providence
and Evil (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), p. 36. My knowledge of Hobbes is not
up to identifying the source.
IO. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 19, a. Sc.
I I. 'Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and such as may seed' (my italics).
12. E.g. it's pretty obvious that his other name is Sarastro and he has the most marvellous bass voice.
This fact makes me worry less about the obvious identification of the Q)ieen of the Night, the
villainess in The Magic Flute, with the Catholic Church: those who think the Great Architect is
the goodie pay the Catholic Church a compliment by considering her the baddie, since such a
conception admits that she upholds a belief in God the Creator by virtue of her opposition to the
Great Architect.
 The Fifth Way 205
13. A similar bad argument was the one that contraception is bad because it's like anal intercourse,
traditionally regarded as unquestionably bad. Since the invention of the Pill contraception may
have no physical similarity whatsoever to anal intercourse, but the mind of the Catholic church
has continued to regard it as bad. The ghost of the bad old argument makes some people think
that contraception isn't bad because it isn't like anal intercourse, and makes others think that anal
intercourse can't be bad after all because contraception isn't. Readers unfamiliar with liberal
Catholic moral theology will find it hard to believe that people can be guilty of such confusion,
but they had better take my word for it: anything would be better than having to read through
liberal Catholic moral theology. On this question, see G. E. M. Anscombe, 'You can have sex
without children; Christianity and the new offer', in Collected Philosophical Papers of G. E. M.
Anscombe, vol. 3, pp. 82-96.
14. Many readers will have noticed the debt I owe in this passage, as elsewhere, to Geach, 'An
irrelevance of omnipotence', in Providence and Evil, pp. 35-6, and the section 'Operations and
tendencies' of the essay 'Aquinas' in Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), pp. 101-9.
15. Anscombe, 'You can have sex without children', in Collected Philosophical Papers, p. 85.
16. See P. T. Geach, in 'Why men need the virtues', in The Virtues (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1977), pp. 9-12.
17. Ibid,p.11.
18. Ibid.
19. Commentary on the Physics, II, 1.5, n. 182: 'Quaedam sibi invicem sunt causae, secundum
diversam speciem.' For a justification of this, see Commentary on the Metaphysics, L.V, I. 2, n.
775.
20. See Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 66, a. 2.
21. The parallel between the unfashionableness, in the modern enlightened age, of certain ancient
and medieval views on explanation and certain ancient and medieval views on economics and
ethics is not a freak of my own. A nice sidelight on the history of ideas is the fact that one of the
last few books condemned by the Spanish Inquisition before it was forced to shut up shop in the
early nineteenth century was Adam Smith's The Wealth ofNations. Fray Antonio de la Santisima
Trinidad, the assessor appointed to examine the book, objected both to the moral doctrines, which
implied that economic activity was wholly outside the scope of ethical considerations, and to the
metaphysical presuppositions, which, among other things, rejected the idea of final causality. He
also identified Smith as 'no mere Protestant, but a man of no religion, good or bad', and draws
attention to Smith's use of Deistic or Masonic catch-phrases such as 'the religion of all sensible
men'. The Great Architect was confused with God pretty generally in that period, but Fray
Antonio was not deceived. Take note that the Inquisition did some good in its time. For further
details, see S. Meikle, 'Adam Smith and the Spanish Inquisition', in New Blackfriars Review,
vol. 76, no. 890, February 1995, pp. 70--80.
22. A person.
23 A place.
24. Another place.
25. Another person.
26. A place.
27. An event! but one which is identified by reference to a place, Rome, and a person, Romulus.
28. Another person.
29. Another person.
30. Another person.
31. Another event! but one which is identified by reference to a person.
32. Another person.
33. It is painful to me (and no doubt to the reader) that here I have to pose as a joke German professor,
but I can see no other way of making what I think of as an immensely important point.
34. I have often wondered why John Locke is considered the prime exponent of common sense. It
has only slowly occurred to me that 'common sense' here means 'the system of beliefs which it
is in the interest of the post-1688 British ruling class to propagate among its subjects', and in this
sense I can see John Locke as a highly distinguished exponent.
35. In The Metaphysics of Mind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 71-4 on vehicle,
exercise and power, pp. 27-8, 83 on powers (capacities); and in Will, Freedom and Power (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1975), pp. 9-11.
36. Translation of Notes of Alapryl, trade name ofHalazepam, produced by Laboratorios Menarini
SA, Barcelona, under licence from Schering-Plough.
206 God and Explanations

37. In The Metaphysics ofMind, pp. 71-4 on vehicle, exercise and power.
38. This sketch of an account of efficient causality follows ideas derived from a paper given by P. T.
Geach, 'Teleology and laws of nature', at the conference Finality and intentionality, at the
Universite Catholique de Louvain, 1990. I have been unable to establish whether this paper has
been subsequently published. He was developing ideas he had used in G. E. M. Anscombe, and
P. T. Geach, Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961), pp. 101-9.
39. This paragraph exhausts my recollection and notes of Geach's paper - what follows is my
reflection on it. It may be that this reflection has been guided by unconscious memories of other
points Geach made. For the 'defeasibility' of practical reasoning, see Kenny, Will, Freedom and
Power, pp. 71-96, and The Metaphysics of Mind, p. 145, although he would probably disagree
with the claim which I make, following Geach, that causal tendencies are also defeasible. For a
fuller discussion of the issues involved here, see my paper 'Libertad y revocabilidad', Anuario
Filosofico, vol. 23/3, 1994, pp. 991-1006.
40. This point is clearly made by Geach in the 'Operations and tendencies' section of the essay
'Aquinas', in Three Philosophers, p. 104.
41. An example drawn from 'Causality and extensionality', in Collected Philosophical Papers, p. 175.
42. Aristotle, Metaphysics, r, 1005b, 24-7. Compare also Wittgenstein, 'Wass wir nicht denken
ki.innen, dass ki.innen wir nicht denken', from Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London: Routledge
and Kegan Paul, 1922).
43. 'Respondeo dicendum quod': Summa Theologiae, passim.
44. Nicomachean Ethics, Book I, 2, 1094a, 20-2. 'Nor do we choose everything for the sake of
something else: this would drag on into infinity, and so the tendency would be vain and pointless.'
45. J. L. Borges, 'Una loteria en Babilonia', in Ficciones, Obras Comp/etas, Vol. 1 (Barcelona: Emece,
1989), pp. 456--60.
46. See 0. Sacks, The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat (New York: Harper Perennial, 1990); D.
Hume, A Treatise on Human Nature, Book I, Part 4, Section 7.
47. In some ways the best apparent candidate for an ultimate good is money, which can measure and
be exchanged for any good thing you care to mention, and which, in our society, seems to be
generally sought as if it were the ultimate good.
I'm sick oflove; I'm still more sick of rhyme:
But money gives me pleasure all the time.
Despite the elegance of the epigram, and despite the tendencies in our society to see money as
the ultimate good, tendencies which our masters are apparently doing their best to encourage,
money as a candidate for ultimate goodness has the unusual distinction of being both absurd and
disgusting.
48. Summa Theologiae, I, q. 14, a. Sc.
49 Cf. G. E. M. Anscombe, Intention (Oxford: Blackwell 19 57). 'On sensations of position', Collected
Philosophical Papers, pp. 71-4; P. T. Geach, 'Omniscience and the future', in Providence and Evil
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), pp. 57-8.
50. There was a Bible published in England in the seventeenth century which contained an
unfortunate printing error in what is variously known as the Seventh or the Sixth Commandment:
the 'not' had been omitted in 'Thou shalt not commit adultery'. Whether this was a simple
mistake, a hopeful gesture on the part of the proofreader or a contribution to the voluntarist/ anti-
voluntarist debate is not clear.
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Angellelli, I. and D'Ors, A. (eds), Estudios de la historia de la logica (Pamplona: Eunate, 1990)
Anscombe, G. E. M., Collected Philosophical Papers ofG. E. M. Anscombe, 3 vols (Oxford: Blackwell,
1981)
Anscombe, G. E. M., Intention (Oxford: Blackwell, 1957)
Anscombe, G. E. M. and Geach, P. T., Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961)
Aquinas, Commentary on Boethius De Trinitate (In Boethium de Trinitate Expositio), in Opuscula
Theologica Vol. 2, ed. R. Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti, 1954)
Aquinas, Commentary on the De Interpretatione ( In librum Perihermeneias Expositio ), ed. Spiazzi (Turin:
Marietti, 19 55)
Aquinas, Commentary on the Metaphysics (In XII libros Metaphysicorum Aristotelis Expositio), ed. M. R.
Cathala and R. Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti, 1964)
Aquinas, Commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics (In XII libros Ethicorum ad Nicomachum expositio),
ed. Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti, 1964)
Aquinas, Commentary on the Physics ( In VIII Libros Physicorum Expositio), ed. P. M. Maggiolo (Turin:
Marietti, 1954)
Aquinas, Commentary on the Posterior Analytics (In II libros Posteriorum Ana(yticorum Expositio), ed.
Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti, 1955)
Aquinas, Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard (In IV libros Sententiarum Petri Lombardi),
ed. P. Mandonnet (Paris: Lethellieux, 1929)
Aquinas, Disputed Question on Evil (Quaestio disputata de malo), ed. P. M. Pession (Turin: Marietti,
1949)
Aquinas, Disputed Question on Truth (Quaestio Disputata de Veritate), ed. Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti,
1944)
Aquinas, On Being and Essence (De ente et essentia), in Opuscula Philosophica, ed. Spiazzi (Turin:
Marietti, I 947)
Aquinas, On the Truth of the Catholic Faith (Summa Contra Gentes), ed. P. Marc (Turin: Marietti,
1967)
Aquinas, Quodlibetal Questions (Quaestiones quodibetales), ed. Spiazzi (Turin: Marietti, 1949)
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, ed. T. Gilby (London: Blackfriars with Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1963)
Aristotle, Categories: see Aristotle's Categories and De Interpretatione, translation and commentary by
J. Ackrill (Oxford: Clarendon, 1978)
Aristotle, Metaphysics, ed. W. Jaeger (Oxford: Clarendon, 1957)
Aristotle, Metaphysics Books r, .1., E, translation and commentary by C. Kirwan (Oxford: Clarendon,
1971)
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, ed. J. Bywater (Oxford: Clarendon, 1894)
Aristotle, Posterior Anarytics, translation and commentary by J. Barnes (Oxford: Clarendon, 1994)
Bambrough, R. (ed.), New Essays on Plato and Aristotle (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979)
Davies, B., An Introduction to the Philosophy ofReligion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edn,
1993)
Frege, G., Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Oxford: Blackwell, 1959)
Gallagher, D. M. (ed.), Thomas Aquinas and his Legacy (Washington: Catholic University of America
Press, 1994)
Geach, P. T., God and the Soul (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969)
Geach, P. T., Logic Matters (Oxford: Blackwell, 1981)
Geach, P. T., Providence and Evil (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977).
Geach, P. T., Truth, Love and Immortality (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press,
1979)
Geach, P. T., The Virtues (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977)
Geach, P. T. and Anscombe, G. E. M., Three Philosophers (Oxford: Blackwell, 1961)
Gormally, L. (ed.), Moral Truth and Moral Tradition (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1994)
208 God and Explanations
John Paul II, Crossing the Threshold of Hope (London: Collins, 1994)
Kahn, Charles H., The Verb 'To Be' in Ancient Greek (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1973)
Kenny, A., The Five Ways (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969)
Kenny, A., The Metaphysics ofMind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991)
Kenny, A., Will, Freedom and Power (Oxford: Blackwell, 1975)
Lewis, H. A. (ed.), Philosophical Encounters (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1991)
Macintyre, A., Three Rival Versions ofMoral Inquiry (London: Duckworth, 1990)
Macintyre, A., Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London: Duckworth, 1988)
Mackie,]. L., The Miracle of Theism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1982)
Martin, C. F. J., The Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas; Introductory Readings (London: Routledge, 1988)
Swinburne, R., The Coherence of Theism (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977)
Williams, C. J. F., What is Existence? (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981)
 INDEX
a priori science, 29
adaequatus, 90-1
Adelard of Bath, 3
affirmative propositions, 70-2, 105
alien ideas, understanding of, x-xi, xiv
alienating adjectives, 72
an est? questions, 33-9 passim, 54, 70, 73, 81-7
passim, 97, 102, 105
analytical philosophy, xiv-xv
analytical Thomism, xii-xiv
animal species, 26, 164-7
animals, sufferings of, 112, 115
animism, 186
Anscombe, G. E. M., xiii, xix, 18, 137, 152, 195
Anselm, St, 39, 84-5, 104-5
apologetics, 180
argument from authority, 2-7, 11-15, 98-9
argument from design, 180-4
argument from evil, 110-17, 119
argument from partial explanation or from
science, I I 8, 121
Aristotle and Aristotelian thought, x-xv
passim, I, 4-7, 11-29 passim, 32-3,
50-1, 61-4, 67, 80-92 passim, 97, 113,
132-9 passim, 147-8, 156-7, 163-5,
173, 186, 196-8, 201
St Thomas's differences with, 26
astronomy, 25, 146-7
atheism, 2-3, 105, 157--8, 202
Augustine and Augustinian thought, xv, 6,
13-17, 117
Austin, J. L., xiii
authority
human and divine, 5-7
modern attitiude to, 7-12
see also argument from authority
Averroes, 65, 84
axioms, scientific, 23, 25
Ayer, A. J., xvi
barking of dogs, 135, 137-9, 147
Begriffswort see nomen naturae
Big Bang, 104, 125, 127, 158-9, 168
Blake, William, 181
Boethius, 7, 16, 157
'bottom-up' reasoning, 102
Bradlaugh, Charles, 99
Broadie, Alexander, xviii, xix
causal reasoning, 192, 19 5
causality
modes of see explanation
voluntary and non-voluntary, 195--6
see also efficient causality; final causality;
formal causality; material causality; per
accidens; 'transcendental causality'
cause and effect, links between, 20-1, 81-2,
85-93, 97--8, 102-5; see also efficient
causality
change, process and initiation of, 133-46, 150
children, upbringing of, 8-9
classical theism, 111-16 passim, 121, 125, 202
coincidental existence see per accidens
Collingwood, R. G., x, xii
concept-words see nomen naturae
concertina-like universe, 158-9
conditiones, 91
contingency, 20-1, 28-9, 156
convertibles, 91
Copleston, F. C., 118--19
cosmology, 157--8
creation see God's creation
creationism, 26-7
Darwin, Charles, and Darwinism, 165, 180-1
Davies, B., 116-18
deductive nature of science, 33-4
defeasibility, 192
definitions of things, 24-5, 38-9, 92-3
demonstration, 82-4, 87-91, 100, 110
'demonstration why' and demonstration that',
102
derivative necessity, 155, 160, 165-7
Descartes, Rene, 8, 65, 69-70, 84, 100
design, argument from see argument from
design
'determinations', 3
dialectics, 32
divine science, xv, I, 19, 101-2
doctors' jargon, 188-91
210 God and Explanations

Duns Scotus, Johannes, xvi, 157 formal causality, 147-8., 165, 177
'formal object' of scientific study, 27-8
'El-predicables', 70 foundationalism, 12
eclipses, 22-3, 34 Fourth Way, the, 112, 126, 149, 171-7
ecology, 184, 201 Frederick II Hohenstaufen, Emperor, 3
efficient causality, 21-2, 91, 104-5, 140, 'free-will defence', 112
146-53, 177, 180-92passim, 196,199 Frege, G., 28, 37, 43-5, 65-7, 73
elliptical language, 68-9 fundamental science, 23
empiricism, xvi-xvii, 13, I 18, 189-91
end-directedness, 180, 183; see also teleology Gaia, 184, 201
ens see existence Geach, P. T., xiii, xix, 12, 38, 40, 56, 66-7, 69,
Epicureans, 2-3 112,115,126,136,161,166,171,174,
episteme, I, 21 182, 184, 192
Esgibtexistenz, 66-7 geometry, Euclidean, 17-19, 23, 25
esse ut verum, xix, 56, 65-73 passim, 105, 111, 'goatstag', the, 38, 43-6 passim, 83-5
113 God
essence, concept of, xvi, 24-5, 69, 91 existence of, xv, 1-2, 34, 37, 40, 45, 47, 54,
essentialism, 47 58,65-70, 73,81-5,89-93,97-101,
ethics, 27 106, 110-22, 128, 140-1, 157, 168,
everlastingness of the world, 163-8 passim 181-2, 203---4
evil, argument from see argument from evil existence of an idea of, 176
existence names of, 46-7, 103-6
actuality and potentiality of, 51---4, 60 philosophical study of, xv, 20 I
degrees of, 173---4 signification of the word, 97-8, 104-5, 111,
questions of, 37---46 passim, 50-7, 61-2, 128, 153
80-5, 93, 105 God's creation, 112, 143, 158, 165, 168
see also esse ut verum; God; per accidens; God's goodness, 114-16
'real existence' God's mind, 174, 182,202
existentialism, 56-7, 118 God's transcendence, 114-15, 117
experimental science, 28 Gods, multiplicity of, 126
explanation, modes of, 147-9, 182 Great Architect, the, 181---4
explanation of the world, xiii, 85, 119-26, Grosseteste, Robert, 168
197-200
one bit at a time, 120---4 harmonisation oflife and thought, 15-16
explanations, knowledge through, I, 21-2, 32, Heraclitus, 138, 196, 198
147-8 Hillel, Rabbi, 10
explanatoriness, 19 5 history of philosophy, viii-xiv
extreme modal realism, 26 history of philosophy of science, 186
Hobbes, Thomas, 182
faggots, 148 Hume, David, 137, 181,190,200
faith, 16, 100-1 hypotheses, 88, 93
articles of, I 00, I 02
'fictus', 71 indentation of text, 134, 151, 172
fideism, 100 Index Thomisticus, 180
Fifth Way,the, 104,148, 150-1, 179-204 inscrutability, 115-17
final causality, 147-51, 177, 181-7 passim, 191, instantiation by argument, 161-2
196-9 passim interpretation of authorities, 5-6
finis, 149 intuition, appeal to, 20 I
first principles see axioms Inuit on a Glasgow street corner, 121-5,
First Way, the, 126, 132-52passim, 155, 175 127-8, 142, 167, 176-7, 197
five Inuit, the, argument of see Inuit on a Isidore of Seville, 40, 47, 9 I
Glasgow street corner
Five Ways to prove God's existence, xv, 39, jokes in philosophy, 188-9
81, 85, 88-9, 100, 104, 112, 116-20, journals, philosophical and scientific, 12
125-9, 149, 163, 168, 203---4; see also
First Way; Second Way; Third Way; Kahn, Charles H., 57
Fourth Way; Fifth Way Kant, Immanuel, 30, 65
flourishing, human, 201-2 Kenny, A., xiii, 53---4, 67, 69, 113, 132, 136,
folk-wisdom, 18 146, 149, 164, 166, 171, 174, 191
 Index 211

knowledge Ockham's razor, 118

as distinct from true belief, 21 opium, 53-4, 188-91
theory of acquisition of see science: modern oppositiones, ix, xi
theory of ordination of women, 10
Kripke, S. A., 37-8, 40--1, 45, 47 Oxford Companion to Philosophy, xii
Oxford English Dictionary, 24
Lavoisier, A. L., 86, ll0
Leibniz, G. W. F. von, 155 Paley's watch, 180--1, 184
Leo, St, 17 parents, learning from, 9
lintels and thresholds, 148-9 partial explanation see argument from partial
Llano, Alejandro, xix explanation
Locke, John, 190 Paul, St, 100
logic, science of, ix, xi, 19 per accidens and per se, 28, 51, 58, 62-5, 91-2,
'Lottery in Babylon', 197-8 103, 112-13, 117-121, 173,187
'lumping-together' move, 126-7, 135, 139-42, philosophy
152-3, 183, 199-200 different approaches to, vii-xiv, 4, 203-4
of science and of religion, xv
McCabe,]. M., 42, 45 see also analytical philosophy; history of
Macintyre, Alasdair, xii-xiii, xix, 30 philosophy; medieval philosophy;
marriage of priests, 10--11 moral philosophy
material causality, 147-8, 164-6, 177 phlogiston, 82-3, 86, 92, ll0
matter, 164, 166 it, value of, 6
medieval philosophy and logic, ix-xii, xv, 3-5, place, concept of, 83, 86, 88, 90, 110
17, 71-2, 151 Plato and Platonism, x, 11-12, 16, 21, 67, 73,
medium demonstrationis, 85, 87 149, 173, 191
Meikle, Scott, xix Plenitude, Principle of, 26, 156-7, 163
Meno, the, 21 'possiblity', concept of, 160--3
metaphysics, 117-18 Posterior Analytics, 17-19
meteorology, 25 Posterior Analytics, Commentary on, 19, 38, 43,
Michelangelo, 52 80, 86, 88
'missing mass', the, 159 powers, notion of, 190-1
modal logic, 156-7, 163 practical reasoning, I92, 19 5
modernism, 12-13 predication, 44, 58-62, 70
Moliere, 188-9, 191 Prior, A. N., 70, 162
Moore, G. E., xvi 'proportionate' effects, 90-1, 103
moral norms, 99-100 propter quid? questions, 33, 102
moral philosophy, 28, 201 Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, 175
Moses, 99 Pythagoreans, 13, 186
'moveri', meaning of, 132-3
mules, 26, 165 quaestio-form, 3, ll0
Muslim belief, 2 quantifier-shift fallacy, 161-2, 166
quarks, 82
names, signification of, 35-46 passim, 83-90, questions
103-4, 110; see also God; nomen naturae asking and answering of, 32-3, 37, 82-3,
natural science, 89 87-8
natural theology, 180--1, 202 informative and uninformative answers to,
Nature (journal), 12 188-91
necessary truths, 20, 25, 27, 29, 82, 89, 156 of fact and of explanation, 33
neo-Pythagoreans, 186 types of, 33-4
Newton, Isaac, 180 quia? questions, 33, 86-8, 102
'nice girls and the sailor' fallacy, 161-2; see also quid est? questions, 33, 35, 103
quantifier-shift fallacy Quine, W. V. 0., 12-13, 28, 62, 173
Nicomachean Ethics, 197
nomen naturae, 38-9, 44 rainbows, existence of, 23, 34
nought (number), 66-7 rationalism, 13, ll 9
numbers, doctrine of, 66-7, 73 rationes, 43-6
Nussbaum, Martha, xii 'real existence', 56, 58, 66
reasonableness, standards of, 8- 13
Ockham, William of, xvi reductio ad absurdum, 84
212 God and Explanations

reductionism, 118 tautology, 189-90

Reid, Thomas, 181,200 teleology, conscious and unconscious, 180--4,
religion, traditional nature of, I 0-11 197-201
repetitive strain injury, 188 tendency, 192-9 passim
rhetoric, xvi, 190 paradigmatic and non-paradigmatic
ridicule of philosophical ideas, xvi-xvii, 26, fulfilment of, 193--6
186--8 tenses, logic of, 162
Russell, Bertrand, xvi, 4, 64, 118--19, 122, 187 'tetragonismus', 83--4
'sulks' of, 119 theism see classical theism
Ryle, G., xiii Third Way, the, 125, 127, 149, 174--5
Tichborne claimant, 44--5
sacred science see divine science top-down reasoning, 101-2; see also deductive
science nature of science
argument from see argument from partial tradition, 9-10, 99
explanation in religion, 98
Aristotelian and Thomistic concepts of, in the scientific community, 12
1-2, 15-29 passim, 32-3, 89, 147---8, transcendence see God's transcendence
203--4 'transcendental causality', 149
modern theory of, 80-3, 88, 91-3, 97, transcendentalism, 54
203--4 transcendentals, doctrine of, 172-5
see also a priori science; deductive nature of trench fever, I 88
science; divine science; experimental trust in reason and in authority, 9-12
science; fundamental science; natural trustworthiness of authorities, 98
science truth
Scotus see Duns Scotus eternal or universal, xi, 20, 25, 82, 88, 156
Scripture, inspiration of, 114 of religion and of reason, 17
second law of thermodynamics, 165 of things, 173
Second Way, the, 104, 140, 146--53, 155, 183, relationship between different types of,
185--6 18-19,32
self-imrovement, ix-x see also necessary truths
self-movers, 135, 137, 139
Sicily, 149 ultimate good, 20 I
significatio nominis see names, signification of 'universalisability' of moral judgements, 28
Socrates, 21, 187 University of Paris, 16
soul and body, 139 Urizen, 181
sound, variable existence of, 174
steady state theory, 158 veridical usage, 55-8
Summa Contra Gentes, 2, 127, 132, 135, 137, vicious circles and vicious infinite regress, 167
142-3, 157 Victorian optimism, 120
Summa Theologiae, 1-2, 5, 12-13, 15, 17, 19,
28, 34, 40, 65, 69, 86, 97, 101, 110, 125, Waterloo, Battle of, 187
127 wishful thinking, 98-9, 202-3
superstrings, 82 Wittgenstein, Ludwig, xi, xvi
synthesis of all human wisdom, 15-17
Zeno, 139