Analyse the strengths and weaknesses of Copleston’s views.

Copleston’s view was that it was logical that the universe must have been created by God as it was
made up of contingent parts and continent beings are unable to create themselves. Copleston
therefore argued that there must be a necessary being who created contingent beings and he
believed this to be God. His argument is a form of the cosmological argument and he asserted that
God creating the universe as an expression of love was the best explanation for the origins of the
universe as it provided a complete explanation for how and why we exist. Additionally, Copleston
argued that further proof of the existence of God could be found in accounts of mystical religious
experiences as these can have such a dramatic impact on the life of the experient. He argued that,
for these experiences to be so powerful, there must be a source of the experience, and again, he
proposed that this must be God.

One of the strengths of Copleston’s view is that believers do not have to ignore scientific accounts,
and subsequent evidence of how the universe began, such as the Big Bang; what it is does mean is
that they have to include God as part of the explanation. The most obvious way of doing this is to
name God as the creator of the gases that caused the Big Bang, that then set in motion the
development of the universe.

Many would argue that a significant strength of Copleston’s view is the reaffirmation of logic as he
argued that it was logical to assume that, as the universe was made up of contingent parts, it too
must be contingent. This led Copleston to conclude that there must be a necessary being that
created the universe as contingent beings cannot cause themselves to exist.

As regards religious experience, many would see Copleston’s views here as strong because there are
wealth of case studies that show individuals makingmassive changes in their lives following a
religious experience. Although his was a conversion experience, we can refer to the life of Nicky
Cruz to support this. Nicky was a violent gangster in New York who, following a religious experience,
changed his life completely by dedicating it to God and helping young people break away from drugs
and violence. Copleston would see this as clear evidence of the existence of God as what else would
have caused such a dramatic change in Nicky’s life?

Some however would call Copleston’s views weak as he focuses heavily on the idea that everything
needs to have a sufficient reason, yet God creating the universe as an expression of love raises many
unanswered questions such as why is there evil and suffering in the world? Many would accuse
Copleston of failing to provide a complete explanation for that.

Russell criticised Copleston on the basis that we derive the concept of cause from our observation
of particular things, we cannot ask about the cause of something like the universe that we cannot
experience. The universe is “just there, and that's all”, it is a brute fact. Russell also spoke of the
‘Fallacy of Composition’, that is to make conclusions about the whole based on observation of the
parts. In other words, Russell believed that it was a mistake to say that just because we have
observed that parts of the universe are contingent and require a cause, that the universe itself must
also be contingent and require a cause.

Further criticisms come in response to Copleston’s argument that the impact of religious experience
is proof that there must be a source, ie God, of that experience. Many sceptics would argue that the
most these experiences can prove is whether the recipient believes the experience to have come
from God rather than actually prove that God is the source. Ultimately, all religious experiences are
unverifiable testimony and this is generally regarded as a weak form of evidence as we only have the
person’s word and interpretation of what has happened.
There are those however who would argue that Copleston’s views are remain strong as we cannot
escape the logic that something simply cannot come from nothing. To say that the universe, or in
reference to the Big Bang, the gases that caused the universe, have just always been there is an
unsatisfactory explanation. The idea of just accepting something as a ‘brute fact’ is seemingly
completely inconsistent with all scientific thinking.

In response to the challenge of evil and suffering, what critics have ignored is the wealth of
explanation that reconciles it with God creating the universe. The theodicies of Augustine and
Ireneaus have explained why God allows them to exist in the universe. Augustine argued that they
are the result of original sin and Ireneaus asserted that they were the result of free will and were
necessary to help us grow in the likeness of God. Whilst some people may not like these
explanations, there is no denying the fact that the existence of evil and suffering in a universe
created by God can be explained.

Finally, in response to criticisms that the impact of religious experience only serves to show us
whether or not the experient believes they have experienced God, many would counter argue that
there are millions of people worldwide who have reported similar experiences and impact, is it really
reasonable to assume that they must all be deluded or mistaken in very much the same ways? This
is known as the cumulative argument, the idea that many testimonies of the same thing should be
more convincing than just a few.

In conclusion, I believe that the strengths of Copleston’s argument out-weigh the weaknesses. A key
feature of his argument is the idea that something cannot come from nothing and, not only is this
logical, there is a wealth of empirical observation to support this idea.

Analyse the strengths and weaknesses of Copleston’s views. 20

marks
 Intro Need a necessary being
Impact on people’s
lives proves RE is valid

Idea Don’t have to ignore

the Big Bang

Contingent beings need

a necessary one

Impact of RE proves
God

Argument Doesn’t explain evil

Against and suffering

Fallacy of Composition

Impact isn’t proof

Counter Logical – something

Argument cannot come from
nothing

Explanations for evil

Cumulative argument

Conclusion God creating the

universe and RE are
vindicated