What you say is very interesting, even if I still have some problems grasping everything.

Ok, simultaneity is not important for the series of movers. But it remains important for the first mover, otherwise our argument will identify God with the author of the big bang, and we know that the argument doesn't go back in time, but is valid also here and now. So, what I find hard to understand is how can the unmoved mover influence the causal series. In what way? Until today, I thought He did it just being the first of the series. But you are telling me that it is not necessarily right: the first mover influences the entire series, and not only it's first element. Feser's example is really good, when he says that also a circular series would require a first mover. But how would that mover act on that series? Can you give me an example to understand this concept?

Lawrence;

Feser and others focus on simultaneous causal chains - nay, hammer at them - in order to make clearer the implications of the premise that 'Everything that moves [i.e. changes], moves by another'. But there's still the ordinary sense that I was caused to be by my parents, and their existence in turn by their parents etc. In the 1940s debate between Bertrand Russell and Fr. Copleston (of the nine-volume history of philosophy), they get stuck on their different notions of 'the Universe': Russell assumes the Universe is a 'set' distinct from its members, and so the properties of the members, like being caused by another, need not be had by the set (Lots of sets are 'heterogenous' that way: the set of water-worlds is not itself wet, for example.) Copleston on the other side assumes all us things together are the Universe; and so to say we all are caused by another just is to say the Universe is. There is no set 'Universe' distinct from its members; thus no need to move from 'all the members are caused by another (or contingent, or in motion)'  to 'the Universe is caused by another (or is contingent, or in motion etc.)'

(Unfortunately in the interview they do not bring out this deep difference for their audience; instead they stop dead; Copleston says in that creaky accent well-bred Englishmen had back then 'Let's move on', and Russell replies with a little more freeze 'Yes, let's,' and they're on to the moral arguments about God.

Latin Lesson: <i>primus</i> is more than 'first' in a number line (as in the diner sign 'first come, first served'), it is often better translated 'prime, primary'. In contrast is <i>secundum</i>, which is more 'secondary, derivative' than merely 'second in a lineup'. God is the Primary Cause; causes in the Universe are 'secondary' in that fuller sense. 

Chris-Kirk
 

lawrence89 wrote:

I understand the argument and I find it valid. But I don't understand exactly what we are talking about. Can we identify the per se series we are following with some specific objects of the world? For example: the hand moved by the muscle, the muscle moved by electric stimulus etc... is this series the series we are following? I'm not sure. I know that we don't have to follow per accidens series, that are usually studied by sciences. But my question is: why are they per accidens? Because they are temporal?

Well, I'm not sure how you can understand the argument and not understand it!

Since this forum is inspired by Ed Feser's blog, I thought this particular post was clear about the distinction between per se and per accidens causal series:

http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/08/edwards-on-infinite-causal-series.html

Perhaps you like me don't find so much of a distinction between the two, at least in the usual examples. Surely my capacity to father children is dependent on my existence, which *is* dependent on my parents giving me birth, and so back? But the point of the distinction is to identify a *primary* sort of mover. You are the primary-style mover of the stone, even though there are instruments between - the hand, the stick. But your remote ancestor is not a primary-style mover of your children; your ancestors in between aren't instruments of his will. You will the stone to move (by means of a stick, by means of your hand); the first Speaks did not will that I, Chris Kirk Speaks, come into existence (careful; he cannot *will* I be born, though of course he might well *wish* that his house lasts for ages to come, and even wish some handsome, intelligent descendant be named - but modesty forbids I go further). In the per se series, you the stone-mover are a primary-style mover like God; in the per accidens series, remote ancestor Speaks is just the first in a line.

Does that help a little?

C Kirk