Don't worry. I'm still here.

Just had a boomer tell me he is redpilled and doesn’t like the “tolerant left”

How long before you think he mentions Ben Shapiro and the intellectual dark web.

what is the intellectual dark web

wait till he brings up chemtrails

Who here knows about the aristotelian proof for god's existence?

Of course.

What about them?

Just wanted to understand it a little better

I'm researching aquinas' arguments because I'm an atheist

and I'm just looking for proof otherwise

What I'm having trouble with here

Same tbh

Even though it is high grade, even for most Thomists, Metaphysics ought to be a must-read for any apologist.

Is understanding why the "god" in a sustaining series of causes isn't also subject to an infinite regress

Like I understand that there's a difference between linear and hierarchical causes

But what gives the "unmoved mover"different qualities here

or why

The Angelic Doctor utilized Aristotelian proofs constantly. I'd really recommend getting into the foundations via Metaphysics. But, to get to your point, the primary issue that Aristotle posits depends also on the nature of substances, you know. Like the nature of the natural world via one that isn't natural and is not bound by natural law, but instead is the promulgator of said law.

So the fact that it exists outside of natural law is the reason it cannot itself be caused?

Well, Aristotle posited that as a first mover, in this case, God, He is outside "natural impulse" and is therefore good.

Unless of course even He is a secondary "mover" and someone was even above Him.

The primary aim to grasp is the necessity of the mover itself.

And just to clear up the jargon there, being outside "natural impulse" means that he is not subject to the law that everything must have a cause?

And i've heard people use the term "good" in theology but I'm not sure what it means in that context

grrrr stop having a complex discussion on theology christcucks!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leK2WkAHLYk

He is not subject, per se, as He was the cause itself. However, His acts as first mover is necessity for the secondary cause. In other words, without the movement, there would be no secondary cause.

Without His act, there would be no result. This said as He created the Natural Law, how then could we say He is bound by it? If one is extra-natural, how then can one be Natural?

That makes sense

But what I'm not understanding is why this argument is any more convincing than the argument that there is no plane outside of the natural world and there is just an infinite series of causes

From a Thomistic perspective, infinity in the Natural world is implausible.

And not to go down the road of science, but I'd say that is also decently held to be the same in that field.

Can you enlighten me on why infinity is not possible from that perspective?

Wasn't aquinas willing to concede that it is possible that the linear cause of the universe could be infinite just for the sake of argument?

Well let us go back to Aristotle, he posited correctly with regards to his rivals the Pythagoreans, that "objects of sense" (i.e. Nature) cannot be infinite. How can there be an infinite amount of causes in a natural world? How could something naturally exist forever? If this isn't the case, how then could something come from nothing without an extra-natural act by something unnatural?

The Angelic Doctor conceded plenty, however he felt with regard to this that the only way that could be is if God had always and infinitely was with the universe, but he certainly didn't accept that notion, and I don't find it well grounded in Thomism.

True

which is why i said he just did it for the sake of his argument

But my answer to your first message

I hold him in extreme esteem, but in some matters he was repudiated by the magisterium. Example being, the Immaculate Conception.

would be that as far as I know mass/energy can't be created or destroyed