The Existential or Contingency Proof for God's Existence

After about five months without blogging, I finally have a new post. Last post I mentioned how only philosophy can answer the question about God's existence. Here is what I think to be the best proof. The proof is found in St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica, specifically the "second way", but it is understood more fully after reading his work "On Being and Essence."

There are a few problems with trying to do this online (where there are people with diverse backgrounds, philosophical systems, and scientific beliefs): 1) it requires a good understanding of Aristotelian terms and metaphysics, but I'll try to do my best to explain each step without going into too much detail. If you would like me to further explain anything, I will come back and modify it. 2) It requires a belief and confidence in logic and its implications. Someone may say that one cannot universally apply logic to the exterior world. My only response to such a statement could be the following: What makes you hold that belief? And why are you asking for a proof of god if you deny the use of logic? After that little preamble, I will try to begin.

All things that exist have essences (that which makes them what they are). If a thing derives its existence from something other than its essence, then it is contingent. In other words, if a thing's essence does not include existence, than it is necessarily caused by something else. This causer's (the other that brought the contingent thing into existence) essence either contains its existence or it itself is contingent. In which case it itself must have been brought into existence by something else. Now this causal series of contingent beings must stop at some being who is not contingent. If it did not stop at some non-contingent or necessary being, then there would exist a long chain of beings who all are contingent, but the chain itself is not. But the chain itself is just a collection of contingent beings, nothing more. Therefore there must be some necessary being which has brought this chain into existence. Okay, so we have established the existence of at least one necessary being (whose essence includes existence), who by definition cannot not exist.

But why can't there be many things, like electrons or energy or quarks, that are necessary beings. Let's see if there has to be only one....

Let's say there are many necessary beings. This is the tricky part. How could we distinguish them from one another? In other words, how are they actually distinct? They would have to differ in that their essences all have different essential traits that are required in order for them to exist. If this is the case, then those traits by which they differ will either be included in that trait which makes them a necessary being, or will be some essential trait that is distinct from that trait which makes them a necessary being. It cannot be the trait that makes them a necessary being, because they, from what we concluded before, all share this trait. So the cannot differ by it. Thus they must differ through some essential trait that is other than that which makes them a necessary being.

But this is impossible. For in order for a thing to exist all its essential attributes must exist too (otherwise they would not be part of its essence). But if the trait that makes it necessarily exist depends on some other trait in order for it to exist, it would then not necessarily make it exist. This is absurd. Therefore all the essences of necessary beings must be exactly alike, and differ in no way.
The only other possible way that any necessary beings could differ is if they differed "accidentally" (through traits that are not essential, but came from the outside). This would mean that the necessary being was once one thing, then brought something else into existence, which in turn acted upon the necessary being, turning it into two beings instead of one. This is strange to say the least, and ultimately impossible. If you would like me to go into that, I can as well.

Thus we have shown there to be one necessary being, through which all other beings inherit their existence. One can go on and show how this being is immaterial, intelligent, all-knowing, etc. through other proofs which I will go into, if you would like, in my next blog....