Editing Cosmological argument (section)

=== "What caused the first cause?" ===
Objections to the cosmological argument may question why a first cause is unique in that it does not require any causes. Critics contend that the concept of a first cause qualifies as [[special pleading]], or that arguing for the first cause's exemption raises the question of why there should be a first cause at all.<ref>{{harvnb|Reichenbach|2022}} 4.5</ref> Defenders maintain that this question is addressed by various formulations of the cosmological argument, emphasizing that none of its major iterations rests on the premise that everything requires a cause.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=07bHgxbG6A4C&q=curious+blind+spot+in+the+anglo+cause+everything&pg=PA49|title=The Creative Retrieval of Saint Thomas Aquinas: Essays in Thomistic Philosophy, New and Old|first=W. Norris|last=Clarke|date=August 25, 2009|publisher=Fordham Univ Press|isbn=9780823229307}}</ref>

Andrew Loke refers to the [[Kalam cosmological argument]], in which the causal premise ("whatever begins to exist has a cause") stipulates that only things which ''begin to exist'' require a cause.<ref name=Loke1>{{cite book|last= Loke|first= Andrew Ter Ern|title= God and Ultimate Origins|year= 2017|publisher= Springer International|isbn= 9783319575476|page= 189}}</ref> [[William Lane Craig]] asserts that—even if one posits a plurality of causes for the existence of the universe—a first uncaused cause is necessary, otherwise an infinite regress of causes would arise, which he argues is impossible.<ref name="craig-sinclair"/><ref name=Reichenbach/> Similarly, [[Edward Feser]] proposes, in accordance with Aquinas's discourses on the [[Five Ways (Aquinas)#Second way: The Argument of the First Cause|Second Way]], that an essentially ordered series of causes cannot regress to infinity, even if it may be theoretically possible for accidentally ordered causes to do so.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Feser |first1=Edward |author1-link=Edward Feser |title=Five Proofs of the Existence of God |date=2017 |publisher=Ignatius Press |isbn=978-1621641339}}</ref>

Various arguments have been presented to demonstrate the metaphysical impossibility of an actually infinite regress occurring in the [[reality|real world]], referring to [[thought experiments]] such as [[Hilbert's paradox of the Grand Hotel|Hilbert's Hotel]], the [[The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman#References to Tristram Shandy|tale of Tristram Shandy]], and variations.<ref>{{harvnb|Loke|2017|loc=Chapters 2-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | author = Waters BV |title=Methuselah's Diary and the Finitude of the Past |journal=Philosophia Christi|volume=15 |issue=2 |pages=463–469 |date=2013|url=http://philpapers.org/archive/WATMDA-2.pdf |doi=10.5840/pc201315240|access-date=}}</ref>