I don't know what you read, but this is patently false and an utterly absurd characterization (not to mention the strange contempt dripping off the screen). Did

I don't know what you read, but this is patently false and an utterly absurd characterization (not to mention the strange contempt dripping off the screen). Did you read Aquinas himself, or some characterization all too eager to caricature him? Or, if you did read him, did you read whatever you read in the correct manner and light to do justice to the work? I don't know what "unjustified starting assumptions" you have in mind, but a stock caricature is the whole "Everything has a cause, so the universe has a cause" thing, which neither Aquinas nor any major proponent in the tradition has ever defended. I'll just link to a post by one such proponent instead of repeating or summarizing it here [0]. [0] https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2014/07/clarke-on-stock-caricature-of-first.html https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2014/07/clarke-on-stock-car...