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This is true in the absence of further assumptions. But once you or I assume Maitzen's argument is true (and I think we both do) the second becomes a mere instantiation of the first.
This is false if Maitzen's argument is true. Conditional on Maitzen's argument, an infinite string answers the former and hence the latter. I could justify this by repeating what I've written in my two comments upthread, but it might be more productive if I give a different argument.
How do we usually answer "Why is there X?"? I think we usually pick out X's most salient cause. "Why is there an ambulance outside my neighbour's house?" "Because the neighbour had a heart attack." We're basically saying, "here's the most interesting antecedent node in the causal graph, and had we deleted or substantially altered it, there wouldn't have been X". If we'd deleted the "neighbour's heart attack" node, there wouldn't be an "ambulance outside neighbour's house" node.
This gives me a way to interpret "What's the First Cause?", or "Why is there anything?", or "Why is there everything?", or "Why isn't the universe in the counterfactual no-turtle state?" (to paraphrase you). These questions are asking for a node in the causal graph that's antecedent to everything. But how can I do that if the causal graph is an infinitely long string? There's no such node!
There is still the question of why there is an infinitely long string.
That question fails in the same way as the others. It's asking for a causal node which, if altered or deleted, would turn the infinite string of causal nodes into a finite one. But no node in an infinitely long string has that power, so the question's implicit assumption is false.
A why question has more possible anwers than efficient causality.
This might be true of "Why" questions in general but I'm talking about the more specific class of questions that start "Why is there". Can you think of examples of the latter that have a sensible answer that isn't a salient cause?
Sure. "Why are there airbags in cars" is answered with "to protect the occupants". it would be inane to give a a causal answer, such as "because someone fitted airbags".
"to protect the occupants" is merely syntactically simpler than "because of the builder's desire to protect the occupants." -- the two statements equally well indicate causality.
To be fair, this could be phrased as "because someone decided they were the best way to protect the occupants, and fitted them." However, I would define an answer to a "why is there" question more broadly - what explains why the universe is not in the counterfactual situation of this not being there? If you count any causal antecedent as an answer, you can't explain causal loops, and you can only explain parts of infinite chains, not the whole.
I agree with you about this. (And also agree with you & ArisKatsaris's response to PrawnOfFate's airbag example.) I suspect we just differ in our reactions to this inability to explain: you think it's a bug while I think it's expected behaviour.
Any causal chain eventually has to (1) end, (2) loop back on itself, or (3) go on forever without looping. So it's inevitable that if I try to locate the universe's cause, I'll get a counterintuitive answer. I'll find that it either just sprang into existence without being caused, that it caused itself, or that there's a never-ending procession of turtles.
None of these feel like Real Explanations, but (at least?) one of them must be the case. So I already know, a priori, that the universe's causal chain has no Real Explanation. If I think one exists, that just means I've failed to notice my confusion. Asking "Why is there everything?" and its equivalents is a failure to notice confusion.
What do you think you are confused about? You have grounds for thinking the question has no answer, but those are not per se grounds for thinking there was never a question.
About the reason the universe exists. I'm using "confusion" as shorthand for not having an explanation that feels adequate on a gut level (which leads to a sensation of confusion), whether or not that confusion is justified.
I don't doubt the question's existence. I doubt the question is worth asking.
By time you are saying things like "Well I'm confused, but... ...and therefore, it must be the case that A, B, or C", you should worry that you have already baked your confusion into your formulation of the question.
Or there could be a fourth explanation neither of us has thought of.
"There could be an (n+1)th explanation neither of us has thought of" is a fully general counterargument to any argument by cases.
If propositional calculus (simpler than it sounds is a good way of describing causality in the territory, I very much doubt there is a fourth option. If I'm doing logic right:
1.¬A is A's cause(1)∨A is A's cause (1)(By NOT-3)
2.A has a cause→ ¬A is A's cause(1)∨A is A's cause(1)(By THEN-1)
3.A has a cause→ ¬A is A's cause(1)∨A is A's cause(1)→A has a cause ∧¬A is A's cause(1)∨A is A's cause(1)(By AND-3)
4.A has a cause→A has a cause ∧¬A is A's cause(1)∨ A is A's cause(1)(Modus Ponens on 3)
6.¬A has a cause∨A has a cause ∧ A is A's cause(1)∨¬A is A's cause(1)(Modus ponens on 5)
Which, translated back into English, means that something either has a cause apart from itself, is it's own cause*,or has no cause. If you apply "has a cause apart from itself" recursively, you end up with an infinite chain of causes. Otherwise, you have to go with "is it's own cause(1)", which means the causal chain loops back on itself or "has no cause" which means the causal chain ends.
Nothing thus far, to my knowledge, has been found to defy the axioms of PC, and thus, if PC were wrong, it would seem not only unsatisfying but downright crazy. I believe that I could make at least a thousand claims which I believe as strongly as "If the Universe defied the principles of logic, it would seem crazy to me." and be wrong at most once, so I assign at least a 99.9% probability to the claim that "Why is everything" has no satisfying answer if "It spontaneously sprang into being", "Causality is cyclical." and "an infinite chain of causes" are unsatisfying.
(1)Directly or indirectly
The paraphrase introduces some efficient causality without removing all the teleology.
The point I was making is that a preceding cause is not the only kind of answer to a "why" question.
I'd say the causality was there all along and MugaSofer & ArisKatsaris just made it explicit. Causality can become teleology by operating through a mind, but it remains causal for all that.
There is some evidence of that within the universe, but it is not a conceptual identity. The big Why question could still have an answer that is irreducibly teleological. The universe as a whole has to have some unique properties.
Sorry, which argument is this? He makes several.
The argument that once the elements in the string are individually explained, the string as a whole is explained.
Edit: maybe I should call it the Hume-Edwards principle instead.
Ah. Well, I agree with it in principle; I just think he misapplies it.