God is traditionally described as causa sui, as self-caused. Construed positively, however, the notion appears incoherent. Nothing can function as a cause unless it exists. So if God causes his own existence, then his existence as cause is logically prior to his existence as effect. God must 'already' (logically speaking) exist if he is to cause himself to exist — which teeters on the brink of incoherence if it does not fall over.
So I suggest that causa sui be read privatively rather than positively, as affirming, not that God causes himself, but that God is not caused by another. This reading may gain in credibility if we look at some similar constructions.
1. Suppose I am self-employed. It sounds distinctly odd to say that I employ myself, that I stand in the employment relation to myself. After all, I don't hire myself, fire myself, pay myself a wage, etc. It is rather the case that I am employed, but not by another. I am neither unemployed, nor do I positively employ myself. So I suggest that 'self-employed' functions privatively rather than positively.
2. For a second example, consider an entity that is self-illuminating. The moon is not self-illuminating: it is illuminated by another, the sun. But the sun is self-illuminating in that it is the source of the light by which we see it. This is not to say that the sun illuminates itself positively, but that the sun is not illuminated by another. The sun is luminous, but not positively self-illuminating: its luminosity does not derive from its shining upon itself. Therefore, in the sentence 'The sun is self-illuminating,' 'self-illuminating' is to be taken privatively, not positively.
3. A third example is self-evidence. A proposition p is self-evident if it glows by its own epistemic light so to speak, or in plain English, if its evidence is not inherited from another proposition or propositions by a process of inference. A self-evident proposition is one that does not depend on any other proposition for its evidence. Such a proposition is evident, but not such that it inherits its evidence from itself. 'Self-evident' is therefore a privative expression.
The distinction is a subtle one. Suppose I ask you why you find it evident that p. You reply: I find p to be evident because p entails p and p is evident. That response is obviously defective, because circular: a proposition cannot be the source of its own evidence any more than an entity can be the cause of its own existence. So 'self-evident' and 'self-caused' must be taken privatively.
4. A fourth example is self-existence. To say of x that x is self-existent is to say that there is no y such that x depends on y for x's existence. But it follows straightaway (replacing 'x' with 'y' on the right-hand side of the preceding sentence) that x does not depend on x for x's existence. And yet x exists. So 'self-existence' is to be taken privatively rather than positively.
When we say that God is causa sui, or self-caused, what we are really saying is that God is necessarily self-existent: necessarily, there is no y such that God depends on y for his existence.
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