Contingency, Composition, and Construction
Start with a contingent individual — call it, a. Then ask, “What is the difference between existing a and a?” Surely, there must be some difference. If there were no difference between an existing individual and that individual then every merely possibly individual would be automatically actual, which false.
In other words, if we suggest identity between every contingent individual and its existence we are saying that the essence of that individual entails that individual’s existence. But this is amounts to an elimination of contingency rather than an explanation of it. Of course this is not to say that no entity could be identical with its existence (for theists that is what God is), just that no contingent individual can be identical with its existence, otherwise it wouldn’t be contingent in the first place.
The fact of contingency demands that every existing contingent individual must be composed of two irreducible metaphysical co-principles: essence and existence. Thus, the difference between existing a and a is that existing a has an act of existence that causes a to be distinguished from nothing.
If we deny this metaphysical composition of contingent being — if we deny some existing individual has an act of existence (that in virtue of which it is a real being) — there is no longer any way to differentiate something from nothingness or mere possibility, which commits us to saying something both is and is not. In other words, that something both has that which differentiates it from nothing (by saying it exists) and does not have that which differentiates it from nothing (by denying its act of existence) = a contradiction. Thus, acts of existence are not only real but they are the most fundamental aspect of any reality.[2] Moreover, if some individual does not have existence automatically in virtue of being identical with its existence, it must have existence imparted to it by some extrinsic cause. Oh, and just to make a quick concession to Kant, the act of existence does not add conceptual content to the essence of Fido, but it nevertheless makes all the difference by putting Fido into the actual world.
OK. Now, consider this. Fido’s act of existence depends upon Fido for its bound or pattern. It is, after all, Fido’s act of existence, not some other thing’s. Thus, Fido’s act of existence requires Fido for its individuation. Yet, Fido requires his act of existence to be a real being. Indeed, Fido cannot do anything – including Fido-ize his act of existence – unless Fido exists.
The fundamental difficulty, is this. Fido depends upon his act of existence, yet his act of existence depends upon Fido: a relation of mutual dependence, where each makes sense only by pointing at its counterpart.
So, how ever was it that Fido came to to exist if Fido is composed of two principles each requiring the other for their occurrence? Again, there could be no Fido without Fido’s act of existence and there could be no Fido’s act of existence without Fido. (Nor can one drag the other from the void of nothingness, because without the other neither would be!)
How can this be solved? There is one solution. Fido and his act of existence are brought about simultaneously by some extrinsic unifier: by some entity distinct from Fido which can cause Fido to be. That can impart existence to Fido’s essence.
Ultimately, the best – in fact, only conceivable – candidate for this is some entity whose essence is identical to its existence, thus not requiring an extrinsic unifier of its own, and that must have intellect and incredible causal power, since it must be capable of conceiving of different patterns of existence (= relational thinking) and bringing them about.
While presented abstractly, this proposal is actually somewhat close to home. For example, when we think of something – say, Fido – there is an act of thinking individuated by some particular thought content. That act of thinking is bound (or patterned by) that particular thought content and depend upon it, and vice versa. Remove the act of thinking and there is no thought content; remove the thought content and there is no longer that act of thinking. Yet both are brought about simultaneously by the power of mental activity and both fade into non-existence upon the cessation of it.
God and creation can be thought about analogously in this sense, I suggest. God creates when he “thinks” us into being. Our existence demands God’s continual activity. If God stopped thinking about us — even for the slightest moment — then poof: out of existence we go. Fortunately, there are good reasons to think God never will stop thinking about us.
To put everything in a nut shell. Contingency points to composition and composition points to construction. The explanatory regress this invites can only be halted by something escaping all really composed categories (especially on the level of essence/existence) which requires no construction of its own.
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[1] While some philosophers continue to deny that existence (or an act of existence) is a real property (i.e., there are those who say existence is a property of concepts only, and one that cannot be predicated of individuals), this so-called “thin” or quantificational theory of existence is ultimately untenable for reasons in addition to what has just been stated. For example, another (frankly insuperable) problem with the thin theory of existence is that, in order to make sense of property instantiation, we must presuppose existence, since no property can be instantiated without some individual already existing. And whatever presupposes existence cannot explain existence. As Turner Nevitt puts it, “Take the statement. ‘Planets exist,’ and now consider Vulcan (the mistakenly posited inter-Mercurial planet). Does Vulcan instantiate the property of being a planet? If so, then the analysis of existence in terms of property instantiation is mistaken, since Vulcan does not in fact exist, so its instantiating the property of being a planet does not show that planets exist. But if Vulcan does not instantiate the property of being a planet, of course that can only be because it does not in fact exist, which shows that existence is presupposed by property instantiation, rather than being explained by it.” Turner Nevitt, “How to Be an Existential Thomist,” The Thomist, 3 (2018), vol 82, 321-52. Feser offers his own critique of thin existence, saying, “Consider that when we are told that ‘cats exist’ means that ‘there is at least one x such that x is a cat’ or that something falls under the concept of being a cat, there is still the question of what makes this the case, of what it is exactly in virtue of which there is something falling under this concept. And the answer to this further question is, as Knasas and others have pointed out, what the Thomist is getting at when he argues that the existence of a thing is distinct from its essence (in this case, from the essence of a cat), and must be imparted to it, so as to actualize what is otherwise merely potential, if that thing is to be real.” Feser, Five Proofs of the Existence of God, 138.
[2] For a rigorous defense of existence being a real first-level property of concrete individuals, see Barry Miller, The Fullness of Being: A New Paradigm for Existence (University of Notre Dame Press, 2012), 22-81.