Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 91 No. 1, 2021.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.53745/bs.91.1.3
The Maximal Contingent Fact in Leibniz’s Cosmological Arguments
Goran Lojkić
orcid.org/0000-0001-8859-4146
; Institute of Philosophy, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
Leibniz’s cosmological arguments are a class of cosmological arguments for existence of the metaphysical first cause, whose defining characteristic is application of some wider explanatory principle or non‑local principle of causality on so‑called maximal contingent fact, i.e., contingent fact that contains or implies every contingent fact of the relevant kind. One of the strategies of attack on Leibniz’s argument is, therefore, to argue that the respective maximal contingent fact does not exist. The article describes two principal ways in which one might try to carry out this critique. The first is to deny that the maximal contingent fact is the legitimate sum of facts, the second is to deny the existence of contingent facts in general. The article presents a few alternative formulations of the claim of existence of maximal contingent fact, their background theoretical motivation, and manners in which specific formulations avoid critique. The author argues that the forms of critique that are related to the maximal contingent fact are not a serious threat to Leibniz’s arguments for the existence of the first cause.
Keywords
cosmological arguments; Leibniz’s cosmological argument; contingency; maximal contingent fact; necessary existence; first cause.
Hrčak ID:
260614
URI
Publication date:
7.2.2021.
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