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A Typology of Cosmological Arguments

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The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz

Part of the book series: Library of Philosophy and Religion ((LPR))

Abstract

The critical attacks of Hume and Kant mark a watershed in the history of the cosmological argument. Leibniz and Wolff were probably the last significant philosophers who felt it sufficient simply to present the argument in a brief form, confident that it needed no further underpinning. Hume and Kant ushered in what might be called the modern era of the cosmological argument; things could never be quite the same after their sceptical critique: Arthur Schopenhauer noted that Kant had dealt a ‘death blow’ to the cosmological argument and that by the time of his own writing, theistic proofs had ‘lost all credit’.1 Modern defenders of the argument have felt obliged to expound the proof at greater length, defending it against the combined criticisms of the two English and German philosophers. It seems natural, then, to halt at this juncture and survey the ground over which we have travelled without moving into contemporary discussions of the cosmological argument. I propose in this brief chapter to develop a typology of cosmological arguments which, I hope, may serve contemporary philosophers as a guide in discussion of the argument.

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Notes

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  1. William Lane Craig
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© 1980 William Lane Craig

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Craig, W.L. (1980). A Typology of Cosmological Arguments. In: The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz. Library of Philosophy and Religion. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-04993-6_9

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