Thread 24607719

>I write a letter ridiculing my annoying neighbor
>He reads the letter and kills himself
What is the cause of his suicide?
Is my letter the material cause or is his own brain chemistry?
Am I the efficient cause for writing the latter or is his own hand? Or is the letter itself the agent?
And where does God fit into all this without being the final cause of literally everything?

>>24607719 (OP)
The cause of something like a suicide would be complex. Your letter would be a proximate cause.

The material cause would be the body of your neighbor.

The formal cause would be their suicidal thinking.

The efficient cause would be their own method of suicide, but your letter would be a proximate efficient cause.

The final cause would be the drive to avoid suffering and attain greater well-being.

>>24607762
>suicide would be complex
>a proximate cause
Okay that makes some sense.

>>24607719 (OP)
The boulder should be bigger in the second panel.

>>24607719 (OP)
Depends how far you want to go back in the cause/effect cycle (or spiral). Isn't the original cause of everything unknowable? And given that it would mean he was always going to kill himself.

>>24608409
The same way a snowball gets bigger the longer it rolls.

>>24607719 (OP)
I built a machine that rolled this stone for me but this crack stole it and my stone too

>>24608417
>Isn't the original cause of everything unknowable?
uh... no? It may be unknowable absolutely but not absolutely unknowable.

>>24608799
I'm all ears. What caused everything?

>>24608859
Nothing.

I get it... Aristotle's Metaphysics is interesting from a historical perspective, but applying it to real-life nowadays is just silly. Humans had 2.3k years to come up with a better framework for describing reality and thankfully they did. The world isn't teleological, and causation is simply a useful, emergent phenomenon. Study physics instead.

>>24608859
God caused the universe to come into being.
>>24608894
>The world isn't teleological
Filtered by the cosmos

>>24608898
If God caused everything than you MUST concede that God is absolute Nothing.

>>24608956
God is the uncaused cause
>>24607719 (OP)
An effect can have more than one cause. In fact effects that only have one single cause are very rare to not say almost impossible.

>>24609003
>God is the uncaused cause
Exactly, Nothing.
Everything can only come from Nothing.
Nothing cannot be caused. Nothing cannot be known.
God is Nothing.

>>24607719 (OP)
He didn’t even open your letter. He was probably flossing his teeth with an m1 garand.

>>24609003
makes sense