Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-16T00:25:33.654Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Is the Universe Self-caused?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2000

Abstract

Quentin Smith has been arguing for more than a decade that the universe is uncaused. For nearly as long he has also argued that it appeared spontaneously from literally nothing. I have replied to these arguments in many places, including a recent essay in Philosophy. Now, apparently, Smith has changed his mind: in his most recent contribution to Philosophy, he argues not that the universe is uncaused, but that it is self-caused. His motives for so doing remain much the same, however: he would like to undermine the efforts of theists to show that the universe requires an external cause, by arguing that the universe can cause itself (580). I do not think that the arguments he gives for this new position are any more plausible than his older ones for an uncaused universe, so I don't think that he has advanced the cause of atheism. This essay defends that evaluation.

Type
Brief Report
Copyright
© The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)