WJ

Hi Jack!

I think you're still missing the point. You as an atheist use deduction to draw conclusive evidence of god's non-existence, right?

Now if that is true, logical necessity and logically necessary propositions are arrived at thru that same method, deduction.

Which is it Jack?

In other words, Philip's point is that you (one point anyway), on the one hand deny any credence to the conclusions reached by logical necessity and/or the ontological argument, yet by virtue of both its methodology (deduction) you agree its an accurate way or method in making such judgements, in this case, about God's non-existence.


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Jack the Bodiless

No, I deny that the existence of God IS a conclusion reached by logical argument of any sort.

And I also do not claim to have a conclusive argument against any concievable God: only against certain conceptions of God (such as the Biblical God).

MrDarwin

Hey, I've got a question: I saw an Edsel the other day, does that mean that an Edsel plant exists somewhere?

What I'm getting at is that if God once existed but does no longer (e.g., he/she/it got tired of existing, and being omnipotent willed him/her/itself out of existence, leaving behind the universe running on its own), how would we know? Would anything change about the world around us?

Philip Osborne

"If the answer to 'why are we here' is 'God', then the questions don't stop there. WHY did God 'create the Universe as a free act', and WHY is there a God to do this at all?"

According to the Libertarian theory of free will, an action which is free stands in no further need of explanation. Presumably, this does not apply to the universe, which has no will and cannot will itself into existence. Additionally, one might argue that God's motivation for creation is that God is perfectly loving, and as such, God would seek to exercise His perfect love. But He cannot doe this if there are no other creatures other than Himself.

The answer to the question "Why is there a God" is that it could not be otherwise, in virtue of the concepts involved. Presumably, explanations of this sort constitute satisfactory answers to a "why" question.

"Saying that God is "necessary" does not answer the question. The existence of a Ford Cougar implies the existence of a Ford car plant to manufacture it: in fact, the existence of the car plant is necessary, given the existence of the Ford Cougar. But if I ask "why does the Ford car company exist", then the answer "here is a Ford Cougar, therefore the company MUST exist" is NOT a satisfactory answer to the question!"

The sense of necessity I am using allows for only one interpretation; truth in all possible worlds. Although the existence of the car plant is necessitated by the existence of the Ford Cougar, it does not follow that the car plant exists in all possible worlds; hence it does not follow that the car plant is necessary. Also, God's necessary existence is not directly related to the existence of the universe. God's existence is necessary, whether or not the universe exists.

"They may not like it, but I can still SAY it. "God's existence is possibly caused": there, I've said it again. But these are the same people who object to an uncaused...."

If you want to say that God can be caused, then I will use the term God*, which bears the same characteristics of the traditional theistic conception of God except that God* cannot exist contingently (this actually isn't an exception to the traditional conception of God, as I've mentioned), and hence cannot be caused. If you say that this being can be caused, then you are creating a contradiction. It is analytically true that God*, if He existed, would not be caused to exist, and thus you are saying that a being which cannot be caused to exist is possibly caused.

Of course, you may object by constructing the definition universe*, which is the same as the actual universe except that it cannot be caused to exist. The problem with that would be the question of whether or not the actual universe would be a referent of the term universe*. Since it is plausible to suppose that the actual universe can be caused, it seems plausible to suppose that our universe is not a universe*.

-Philip

Jack the Bodiless

The phrase "free will" is meaningless without a definition of what the will is supposedly "free" of. If we assume it's "free from biochemical causality", then there is no reason to assume that the hypothetical "X-factor" that alters mind states independently of biochemical factors is limited to will. It becomes entirely possible that an unintelligent Universe "X-factored" itself into existence.
No. It does not explain why an omnimax God with the specified characteristics is required to exist.
And yet a godless Universe is a perfectly valid concept. There are also an infinite variety of possible Universes created and controlled by deities radically different from the J/C one (if that is your preferred model). Therefore God does not exist in all possible worlds.

The assertion that the J/C God DOES exist in all possible worlds, and any world without the J/C God will somehow magically not work, is pure dogma: a refusal to consider alternatives, a closing of the mind. Another example of not applying a Big Question to God.

We are still no closer to understanding WHY these Big Questions should not be applied to God: why the theist erects and maintains a barrier to further thought on this subject.
And equally plausible to suppose that our Universe IS a universe*. Furthermore, defining God* to be uncausable does not mean that this uncausable God actually exists. Maybe God (without the *) exists, or no God exists.

This is a Big Question.

Volker

Hi Jack!

And this Big Question can't be answered. In no way, that's just the problem. Because whatever answer you find, your answer can be questioned - ad infinitum.

You will therefore run with reasoning in one of three problems (and an exception to that hasn't been detected yet):

1. You will need a reason for a reason indefinitely - impossible to manage in finite time.
2. You will run into a logical circle (A is the cause for B, and B is the cause for A).
3. You will stop the endless chain of reasoning somewhere (arbitrarily). That's dogmatical.

You'll need something like a "final reason", and you won't get that, no matter how you try. If god really exists he would be something like that "final reason" (that is what theist hope), but because we can't see a final reason, we can't see why god should be one! Therefore, absolut truth might exist, we might even have reached it at some point, but even if we had we can't prove that, so we don't know.

This implies that all knowledge is either developing or false (or we can't see wether it is false or not - which is the same for us). Because god is not developing (according to theists), knowledge about god is false or unknown. Either god does not exist, or our knowledge about him ist false.

This explains in my humble opinion why
(1) We can't prove the existence of god.
(2) We can't find the answer to the Big Question in god.
(3) Everything theists tell us about god must be either false or can't be differenced from false assumptions.

You can now choose only one of three beliefs:
(a) Taoism
(b) Agnosticism
(c) Atheism

All other views are logically invalid.

Philip Osborne

"It becomes entirely possible that an unintelligent Universe "X-factored" itself into existence."

To my knowledge, anyway, nothing can cause itself to exist, for prior to the thing's existence, it must exist in order to perform the causal action necessary for its existence. But if its existence is logically prior to this action, then obviously this action cannot be the cause of its existence.

"No. It does not explain why an omnimax God with the specified characteristics is required to exist."

For metaphysically necessary states of affairs, the explanation of their truth is that they could not possibly be otherwise. It seems that denying this could only be done on the basis of the question-begging assumption that all explanations are in terms of contingent facts being explained by other contingent facts.

"And yet a godless Universe is a perfectly valid concept. There are also an infinite variety of possible Universes created...."

What I am thinking of here is the S5 modal ontological argument, which I'm sure has been discussed on other threads. The argument states that for any being to which Anselm's principle applies, if this being possibly exists, it necessarily exists, and if this being possibly does not exist, it necessarily does not exist. Your belief that God possibly does not exist only seems like a valid concept, just as my belief that God possibly exists seems like a valid concept. Both seem plausible, but lead to contradictory conclusions. To get past this conceptual stalemate, there has to be some demonstration of either the possibility or the impossibility of God's existence that goes beyond the mere intuition of what it is.

"And equally plausible to suppose that our Universe IS a universe*. Furthermore, defining God* to be uncausable does not mean that this uncausable God actually exists. Maybe God (without the *) exists, or no God exists."

If you suppose that our universe is a universe*, you are stating that theories of cosmology such as the Big Bang or Hartle-Hawking cosmology are logically impossible states of affairs. It does not seem that this is an acceptable consequence.

The question of whether God* or God exists, it seems, can best be settled on the basis of theistic argument. And in my opinion, it is easier to argue for the existence of God* than God.

-Philip

Jack the Bodiless

True, but maybe the Universe is an exception. It is even possible that the Universe owes its existence to a Universe-creating time machine built later by advanced beings that evolved within it. The Universe is not like other "things" we are familiar with.

But my point was merely that there is no reason to assign special magical properties to "free will", even if "free will" exists. Paradoxical aspects of the First Cause are not resolved merely by ascribing "will" to it.
This does nothing to explain why an alleged "metaphysically necessary" entity IS actually metaphysically necessary, and why some other "metaphysically necessary" entity isn't up to the job.

At best, such arguments reach a dead end by declaring that SOMETHING is metaphysically necessary, without being able to tell us what this "something" actually is.
"Big Bang cosmology" is merely a term for cosmological models that incorporate a Big Bang (which is pretty much all of them nowadays). This Big Bang could have been triggered by some uncaused or self-causing aspect of the Universe.
(Note: because "God" is ambiguous in this context, I'll use God- when I'm specifically describing a caused God, the God who isn't God*).

Why is it easier to argue for God* than God-?

It seems to me that if any given Universe (using this in its broadest sense, to include "all that exists", including God) can sustain a hugely powerful magical being, then this could be either God* or God-: if it cannot, then it won't be either God* or God-. God* has only one marginal advantage: there might be Universes in which God- could exist but does not.

Conversely, however, an initially godless Universe that supports the evolution of intelligent life might eventually acquire a God-, or even a race of such beings. This entity might then create other Universes.

Philip Osborne

"This does nothing to explain why an alleged "metaphysically necessary" entity IS actually metaphysically necessary, and why some other "metaphysically necessary" entity isn't up to the job."

The reason something is metaphysically necessary is due to the fact that this thing has properties of a kind that cannot be instantiated in some worlds and fail to be instantiated in others, and due to the fact that this thing possibly exists. These two premisses lead to the conclusion that this thing necessarily exists.

Your question "why are some necessary entities necessary, and others are not?" does not seem to even be meaningful. By the law of identity, every necessary entity is necessary. So there is no need to explain the existence of certain necessary beings that differentiate them from necessary beings which aren't necessary, because there is no such thing as a necessary being which isn't necessary.

"'Big Bang cosmology' is merely a term for cosmological models that incorporate a Big Bang (which is pretty much all of...."

It seems you are suggesting that the Big Bang is not the cause of the whole universe, although it may occur in parts of it. Let's suppose that is true. Suppose some part of the universe x is caused by a Big Bang. It follows that it is possible for x to be caused by a big bang. So why is x possibly caused? Presumably, this is so because x has properties of a kind which lend themselves to being caused by a Big bang (i.e. the Big bang is a kind of event which could bring about the existence of such properties). But if one construes the universe as physical space-time, and considering what kind of an event the Big bang is, it seems extremely plausible to suppose that the properties of x are of an extremely similar kind to the properties of the universe itself. And if this is so, it becomes very likely that the properties of the universe are of a kind that lend themselves to being caused. To hold that there is some very small difference that prevents the universe from being caused as opposed to x seems too ad hoc to be acceptable.

"It seems to me that if any given Universe (using this in its broadest sense, to include "all that exists", including God) can sustain a hugely powerful magical being, then this could be either God* or God-: if it cannot...."

The problem with arguing for God is that it may very well be the case that God no longer exists; perhaps his non-existence was brought about by some sort of causal factor, q. There can be no ontological and/or cosmological arguments for the existence of a God who is possibly caused, since such a God is not necessary the atheistic objection, "Who caused God?" will apply to theistic cosmological arguments using God. Secondly, it seems hardly consistent with theistic tradition to suppose that a God who came across a thing like q would say "Oh no, here comes q, what am I going to do? Ahhhhhh!!!" A God who can be brought out of existence by some contingent causal feature of the world seems a rather puny God.

Sincerely,

Philip

HRG

So if we call the conjunction of all those properties P, (Ex)P(x) is a tautology (true in all possible worlds) ? *)

What would these properties look like - and how would you deduce (Ex)P(x) from the axioms of logic ?

I submit that the concept of "necessarily existing
thing" is inconsistent, just like "largest integer".

Regards,
HRG.

*) (Ex) = "there is an x such that"