Tahafut_al-Tahafut-transl-Engl-van-den-Bergh

the assumption is impassible that such a succession could occur without
an eternal agent or through a temporal agent. For if there were an infinite
number of matters, an actual infinite would exist, and this is impossible. It
is still more absurd to suppose that this succession could occur through
temporal agents, and therefore from this point of view it is only true that a
man must become from another man, on condition that the successive
series happens in one and the same matter and the perishing of the curlier
men can become the matter of the later. Besides, the existence of the
earlier men is also in some respect the efficient cause and the instrument
for the later-all this, however, in an accidental way, for those men are
nothing but the instrument for the Agent, who does not cease to produce a
man by means of a man and through the matter of a man. The student
who does not distinguish all these points will not be able to free himself
from insoluble doubts. Perhaps God will place you and us among those
who have reached the utmost truth concerning what may and must be
taught about God’s infinite acts. What I have said about all these things is
not proved here, but must be examined by the application of the
conditions which the ancients have explained and the rules which they
have established for scientific research. Besides, he who would like to be
one of those who possess the truth should in any question he examines
consult those who hold divergent opinions.’
Ghazali says:
The answer to all this has been given above. I only single
out this question because they have two proofs for it.
The first proof is that given by Galen, who says: If the
sun, for instance, were liable to annihilation, decay would
appear in it over a long period. But observation for
thousands of years shows no change in its size and the fact
that it has shown no loss of power through such a long time
shows that it does not suffer corruption.’ There are two
objections to this: The first is that the mode of this proof-that
if the sun suffers corruption, it must suffer loss of power, and
as the consequence is impossible the antecedent must be
impossible too-is what the philosophers call a conjunctive
hypothetical proposition,’ and this inference is not
conclusive, because its antecedent is not true, unless it is
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