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First Cause
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first cause
first causenouna source or cause of something
First Cause
Americannoun
noun
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a source or cause of something
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(often capitals) (esp in philosophy) God considered as the uncaused creator of all beings apart from himself
Etymology
Origin of First Cause
First recorded in 1895–1900
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
This reverts to the problem of the First Cause, which is the uncaused cause that gave rise to all other causes.
From Scientific American ● Mar. 4, 2018
But to him, ethical piety cannot depend upon the impersonal First Cause manifested in nature but upon the First Cause manifested in the "will-to-love."
From Time Magazine Archive
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Here the First Cause of street cars, steamboats, telephones could be seen.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Aquinas reasoned that each effect must have a cause and that an endless chain must proceed back to a primordial First Cause or Prime Mover.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Of Causes which increase the Diseases of the People, with general Considerations —— 47 First Cause, the great Care employed to force the Sick to sweat, and the Methods taken for that Purpose —— ib.
From Advice to the people in general, with regard to their health by S. A. D. (Samuel Auguste David) Tissot
The differences in density first cause stars to collide and merge.
From Science Daily ● May 30, 2024
Somewhat obscurely, Aristotle claims that this first cause is “thought thinking itself.”
From Textbooks ● Jun. 15, 2022
West Antarctica “is what will first cause big problems for everyone with sea level rise,” he said.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 26, 2022
Kerry’s first cause after returning from fighting in the Vietnam War was activism for the first Earth Day, in 1970, he says.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 7, 2021
But there had always been the lake, which was the town’s first cause of existence, a place for immigrant settlers to put down their loads.
From "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.