The Ultimate Why Question: Why Is There Nothing at All Rather than Nothing Whatsoever? ultimate why question: why is there anything at all rather than nothing whatsoever?

4. Thomas Aquinas on the Ultimate Why Question: Why Is There Anything at All Rather than Nothing Whatsoever?

84 John F. Wippel 4 S Thomas Aquinas on the Ultimate Why Question Why Is There Anything at All Rather than Nothing Whatsoever? Let me begin by acknowledging that I have not found Aquinas raising this question in these exact words. But it is interesting to note that a contemporary of his who was teaching in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Paris, the so-called Latin Averroist, Siger of Brabant, did address the question in these terms. He did so either during or immediately after Thomas’s second teaching period at the University of Paris, which ended in 1272. Siger considers this issue in two of the four surviving versions of his Quaestiones in Metaphysicam (ca. 1272–75), which in fact are reportationes , that is, student reports of his lectures on Aristotle’s Metaphysics. While commenting on Aristotle’s Metaphysics Bk. IV, chapters 1–2, Siger recalls Aristotle’s claim that there is a science that studies being as being and the properties that pertain to it per se. Moreover, Siger notes that, according to Aristotle, it belongs to this science to inquire after the first principles and causes of being insofar as it is being.1 Siger is aware that this remark might seem to contradict a position he This chapter is an expanded version of the Presidential Address to the Annual Meeting of the Metaphysical Society of America given on March 11, 2006, at the Catholic University of America. 1. See the Munich version, in Siger de Brabant. Quaestiones in Metaphysicam (Munich and Vienna versions), ed. William Dunphy (Louvain-la-Neuve: Éditions de l’Institut Supérieur de Philosophie, 1981), 168–69. Thomas Aquinas   85 himself had defended earlier in the “Introduction” to his Commentary on Bk. 1. There, at question 2, he had stated that there can be no principle and cause of being as being, for such a principle would then be a cause and principle of itself. This also implies that for Siger the First Principle or Cause—God—falls under being as being, the subject of metaphysics.2 Yet, as Siger now notes, in Metaphysics IV, c. 1, Aristotle himself clearly does refer to the need to inquire after the principles and causes of being as being in this science.3 Siger proposes to resolve this apparent conflict in the following way. When Aristotle refers to principles and causes of being as being, he does not intend to speak of being in the absolute or unqualified sense, for this would imply that every being has a cause. That in turn, Siger comments, would imply that no being would have a cause, presumably because if there were no uncaused cause, there would be no caused causes, and hence no effects whatsoever. Siger continues, however, by saying that Aristotle really intends to speak of causes of every caused being when he refers to the need to search for the principles and causes of being as being.4 Moreover, Siger comments, not every being has a cause of its existence , nor does every question about existence admit of an answer in terms of a causal explanation. Thus, he continues: “If it is asked why there is something rather than nothing,” we may take this question in either of two ways. If we restrict the question to things that are themselves caused, we may respond that this is ultimately because there is some immobile Primum Movens and some immutable First (that is, Uncaused) cause for every caused being. But if we take the question as applying to the totality of beings and ask why there is something rather than nothing , a causal answer cannot be given. For this would be to ask why God himself exists rather than not, and this question cannot be answered by citing some cause. Siger therefore obviously does not admit the possibility that God could be the efficient cause of his own existence. Rather, he 2. Quaestiones in Metaphysicam (Munich version), 37. 3. Ibid. (Munich version), 169. 4. Ibid. See especially: “Et est hic intelligendum quod non intendit Philosophus per principia et causas entis secundum quod ens, quod ens absolute dictum habeat causas et principia, ita quod causam habeat eius in eo quod ens, quia tunc omne ens haberet causam; quod enim convenit enti in eo quod ens, cuilibet enti convenit quia inest per se et universaliter; si autem omne ens haberet causas, tunc nullum ens haberet causas; non enim esset aliqua causa prima et si non esset prima, nec...