Five Ways (Aquinas)

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The Quinque viæ (Latin for "Five Ways") (sometimes called "five proofs") are five logical arguments for the existence of God summarized by the 13th-century Catholic philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas in his book Summa Theologica. They are:

1. the argument from "first mover";
2. the argument from universal causation;
3. the argument from contingency;
4. the argument from degree;
5. the argument from final cause or ends ("teleological argument").

Aquinas expands the first of these – God as the "unmoved mover" – in his Summa Contra Gentiles.^[1]