HRG

Necessarily true => true in all universes/worlds/models/ => provable from axioms of 1st order predicate calculus => analytically true.

I do realize that this is not a 100% waterproof argument.
Actually, I don't see a difference between the two. Once you replace "bachelor" by its definition, your sentence becomes a logical tautology.
Omnipotent etc. or necessarily omnipotent etc. ? There is a difference which is crucial for the ontological argument
Not to me. How do you disprove that it exists necessarily ? Have you checked all universes ?

Necessary existence of an Anselmian God is implied by its definition. Similarly, the necessary existence of my Anselmian cat is implied by its definition.
Not at all. Necessity applies only to those properties which are listed in the definition of God-1.
I repeat my question: How do you know that ?

Please explain how omnipotence and omniscience (that are included in the definition of your God) can be non-contingent qualities, but F is not.
[quote]
But F obtains in every possible world in which God-1 obtains. Hence, F obtains in every possible world. But this contradicts our assumption that F is contingent. Hence, God-1 leads to a contradiction. A similar line of criticism can be made, in my opinion, for any arbitrary feature of our world taken to be an ostensible parallel to the ontological argument.
[quote]
The point is that we don't know whether a particular feature of our world is arbitrary - lacking comparison with other worlds.

But if you disagree with my cat about its divine nature , how about God-2: a necessary being, but necessarily not omniscient ?

Or God-3: a necessary being, but necessarily indifferent to suffering ?

Actually, I believe that you are correct about the inconsistency of a necessary cat. But I maintain that a necessary God (or God-2, God-3 etc.) is inconsistent as well.

Regards,
HRG.

[ August 25, 2002: Message edited by: HRG ]</p>

Philip Osborne

"If everything that EXISTS has been observed to have a cause, require the time to do so, and be contingent, then even a supernatural being that is claimed to EXIST must be contingent on all that's implied in the concept of EXISTENCE."

Then I will use the concept of existence*, which your argument against the possibility of necessary existence is inductive in nature, yet it is presented as some sort of deductive argument (it is said to produce a formal contradiction in the concept of God). As I've mentioned before, this simply rejects the ontological argument out of hand without engaging any of its premisses. Your crucial assumption is thatif there is any property F which is common to all things which possess the property G, F is essential for possessing G. However, this does not seem correct. Common properties of existents may include temporality, contingency, etc. However, they are not necessarily essential properties for existence. To exist requires the instantiation of real properties. Nothing about this entails temporality, contingency, etc. And the concept of a necessarily existent being does not violate this criterion, so it seems that the possibility of necessary existence is not ruled out by the concept of "existence."

"I do realize that this is not a 100% waterproof argument."

It seems to me, anyway, that it is not the case that every necessarily true statement will be provable in first-order logic, which does not have modal concepts such as necessity and possibility. The only way your argument is going to work is if you can somehow show that every possible world is subsumed under every possible model of first-order logic.

"Omnipotent etc. or necessarily omnipotent etc. ? There is a difference which is crucial for the ontological argument...."

I thought you rejected essentialism. In any case,omnipotence and omniscience are essential properties of God and hence God is necessarily omnipotent and omniscient. Actually, Richard Gale has suggested holding God's omnibenevolence to be contingently true in the actual world; since there are possible worlds in which vast amounts of gratuitous evil obtain, and God cannot possibly allow such evils to exist, it follows that God does not exist in those worlds. But then, it is not true that God exists in every possible world. And if God cannot exist contingently, then God does not exist at all. This will not be convincing to theists who remain modal skeptics about such worlds, but it is something that should be noted.

"I repeat my question: How do you know that?"

If God-1 has properties which are exactly identical to your cat, then those properties should retain their modal status. The reason is that the modal status of a thing is not a property we can arbitrarily ascribe to it and expect to come up with a meaningful concept; it is in a sense "supervenient" on that concept. For instance, we do not come to the conclusion that square circles are impossible simply because we attached the property "impossibility" to the concept; nor can we ascribe "possible existence" to it and think that now, square circles can be instantiated. The reason is that the properties of a square circle are of a kind that contradict themselves, hence making them impossible. Impossibility is a judgement we make about square circles on the basis of the concept. And in the case of your cat, the most reasonable assumption is that its properties entail contingency. This contingency is inextricably tied to the concept of the cat, because that concept is necessarily the way it is and so are the criteria that we use to make judgements about its modal status. So its modal status cannot change between when it is predicated of your cat, and when it is predicated of God-1.

"Please explain how omnipotence and omniscience (that are included in the definition of your God) can be non-contingent qualities, but F is not."

God is an unlimited being; it is logically impossible for God to have any metaphysical limitation imposed upon his nature in any way. Assuming personhood is not inconsistent with limitlessness (please don't object that it is not; that is not the point), it seems to follow that God is necessarily omnipotent and omniscient. Causal contingency is a limitation, and so cannot be predicated of God. That is, God cannot be caused. I assume that for every proposition p, if p is possible, then p possibly has an explanation. By contraposition, if p cannot possibly have an explanation, p is not possible. Suppose it is possible for God not to exist. That is, suppose God exists at w but not at q. Thus, God's existence at w can be explained with reference to some causally contingent feature of w, while His non-existence at q can be explained with reference to the absence of that feature. But this contradicts our assumption that God is not causally contingent. Hence, it is not possible for God to contingently not exist. But it is true of every contingent being that they possibly do not exist. Hence, God is not a contingent being.

Sincerely,

Philip

[ August 25, 2002: Message edited by: Philip Osborne ]</p>

rainbow walking

Philip: Then I will use the concept of existence*, which your argument against the possibility of necessary existence is inductive in nature, yet it is presented as some sort of deductive argument (it is said to produce a formal contradiction in the concept of God).

rw: Metaphysical arguments that entail the question of a gods existence can only be induced. However, ontological formalities can be deduced once specific terms and concepts are established. Existence is just such a term. Existence has been defined as the act of resisting nothingness. Based on this definition there isn’t any prioritization between existence and action. Existence implies an act and action implies existence. And both are explicitly subject to inaction and nothingness therefore neither can be formally demonstrated to be either necessary or non-contingent.

Philip: As I've mentioned before, this simply rejects the ontological argument out of hand without engaging any of its premisses.


rw: Not at all Philip. This refutation demonstrates the actual inconsistencies inherent in Anselm’s argument of necessity. It is a natural extrapolation based on an acceptance of the premises from the “for the sake of argument” position. It follows from the non-contingency claims and is deducted from them. There is no rejection of the premises as those premises are the crux of the rebuttal.

Philip: Your crucial assumption is that if there is any property F which is common to all things which possess the property G, F is essential for possessing G.

rw: In this case property F (existence) is the critical property and is implied in every premise. What you call my “critical assumption” is merely a reduction of this property to its common denominator. Anselm does not make any distinction of properties crucial to existence in his reach for necessity but only assumes some commonality of properties in all existent things. Allowing this basic assumption in his argument naturally incurs non-contingency be an attributable defining characteristic when arguing for a Necessary existent. But a non-contingent existent thing is a logical impossibility. Anselm does not question the properties of existence but only their reductive necessities. His is just a more clever attempt to lop off infinite regression. It is the infinity of the regress that theologians and philosophers are attempting to insert a stop-gap finitude with the label “god”.

Philip: However, this does not seem correct. Common properties of existents may include temporality, contingency, etc. However, they are not necessarily essential properties for existence. To exist requires the instantiation of real properties. Nothing about this entails temporality, contingency, etc.

rw: TO EXIST requires an act of resistance to nothingness. Only if you remove the potential and possibility of nothingness can you avoid the temporality and contingency of existence. Temporality and contingency are REAL properties of existence made the more so by the possibility of NOTHINGNESS. Modal logic and Necessity do not avoid this issue.

Philip: And the concept of a necessarily existent being does not violate this criterion, so it seems that the possibility of necessary existence is not ruled out by the concept of "existence."

rw: Amusingly, the futility of this argument is immediately obvious when one realizes that it is nothing more than an attempt to establish a set of things, (even if that set contains only one thing), that is exempt from the “act of resisting nothingness”. Such a thing or being is, and will always and forever be, contingent on said act. It is logically impossible to establish Necessity on this basis. Necessary, non-contingency and existence are dialectically opposed from the womb.

Kenny

As far as I can tell, this definition is meaningless. “No-thing,” by the very meaning of the term is not a “thing” to be resisted. “Nothing” does not refer to anything, only the absence of being.

Pure “nothingness” is a logical impossibility because the phrase “nothing exists” is a logical contradiction. If one speaks of “being” not being, one isn’t speaking of “being” anymore. Being has to be. Whatever the minimal set of conditions are for being to be, these conditions must be satisfied. One way to understand the OA is as the claim that this minimal set of conditions is identical with the nature of God.

God Bless,
Kenny

rainbow walking

Kenny: As far as I can tell, this definition is meaningless. “No-thing,” by the very meaning of the term is not a “thing” to be resisted. “Nothing” does not refer to anything, only the absence of being.

Rw: The operative term being used here is nothingness which is not a thing but a state of non-being.

noth·ing·ness (n¾th“¹ng-n¹s) n. 1. The condition or quality of being nothing; nonexistence. 2. Empty space; a void. 3. Lack of consequence; insignificance. 4. Something inconsequential or insignificant.

Kenny: Pure “nothingness” is a logical impossibility because the phrase “nothing exists” is a logical contradiction.

Rw: No one has introduced such a “phrase” in this discussion Kenny. You are misrepresenting my argument with this straw man.

Kenny: If one speaks of “being” not being, one isn’t speaking of “being” anymore. Being has to be.

Rw: By virtue of the possibility of “not-being”, being inculcates specific properties necessary to its continuance “to be”. Temporality and contingency are essential properties of being.

Kenny: Whatever the minimal set of conditions are for being to be, these conditions must be satisfied.

Rw: Yes.

Kenny: One way to understand the OA is as the claim that this minimal set of conditions is identical with the nature of God.

Rw: Then neither god, nor his nature can be demonstrated to be either Necessary or non-contingent. If such a being exists his existence is just as susceptible to the terms of existence as any other being.

Philip Osborne

"rw: TO EXIST requires an act of resistance to nothingness. Only if you remove the potential and possibility of nothingness can you avoid the temporality and contingency of existence. Temporality and contingency are REAL properties of existence made the more so by the possibility of NOTHINGNESS. Modal logic and Necessity do not avoid this issue."

Here seems to be where the fallacy of your argument lies, in my humble opinion. You argue that every instance of an object requires an "act of resisting nothingness." You implicitly assume that any means by which an entity can resist nothingness are such as to entail contingency. But there is no argument for this assumption, so I see no reason why theists should accept it.

You might say that nothingness can only be resisted if it is at least a logically possible alternative to existence. If this is so, then my objection is much simpler: your argument is question-begging. To make the assumption that nothingness is always a possible alternative to a thing's existence is just to say that all real existence is contingent. But this clearly assumes what you are trying to prove. Furthermore, you do not present any argument to suggest that nothingness is always a possible alternative, so it does not seem that your argument is successful.

Additionally, it can be plausibly argued that it is logically impossible for absolutely nothing to exist. A possible world is generally defined as the instantiation of various properties. A world with nothing in it would instantiate no properties, which is just to say that it is not a possible world at all. Another way of stating this is that "there is no possible world at which there is no possible world."

Sincerly,

Philip

rainbow walking

Philip: Here seems to be where the fallacy of your argument lies, in my humble opinion. You argue that every instance of an object requires an "act of resisting nothingness." You implicitly assume that any means by which an entity can resist nothingness are such as to entail contingency. But there is no argument for this assumption, so I see no reason why theists should accept it.

Rw: Indeed, any circumstance of resistance to nothingness entails contingency in the resistance. Continued “somethingness” is contingent on resistance. How that resistance is instantiated is immaterial. There is no means by which an entity can be said to exist and not to be in resistance to nothingness at the same time. Any claimant who attempts to establish a set of existent, non-contingent entities has the burden of proving that such entities can be exempted from the possibility of nothingness.

Philip: You might say that nothingness can only be resisted if it is at least a logically possible alternative to existence.

Rw: There are only two possibilities here: existence or nothingness, which is to say non-existence. If there is another logical alternative I’m not aware of it.

Philip: If this is so, then my objection is much simpler: your argument is question-begging. To make the assumption that nothingness is always a possible alternative to a thing's existence is just to say that all real existence is contingent.

Rw: Uh…yeah, it is intuitively obvious and meaningful to assert nothingness to be the logically possible alternative to existence. Not only possible but it has been observed to be inevitable in most cases, thus temporality becomes one of the properties of existence.

Philip: But this clearly assumes what you are trying to prove.

Rw: Does it? I wasn’t aware that I had any obligation to prove the obvious. It is the theist asserting a set of one non-contingent, necessary being that has the obligation of proof. No thing or entity has ever been observed to exist independent from the contingency of resistance to nothingness, not one, nada. Every single existent thing resides in a continuous state of resistance to both nothingness and change. And in every case both change and nothingness eventually became the inevitable conclusion of every entities existence.

Philip: Furthermore, you do not present any argument to suggest that nothingness is always a possible alternative, so it does not seem that your argument is successful.

Rw: Why should I present an argument for the obvious?

Philip: Additionally, it can be plausibly argued that it is logically impossible for absolutely nothing to exist.

Rw: And why should you wish to embark upon such a straw man expedition?

Philip: A possible world is generally defined as the instantiation of various properties. A world with nothing in it would instantiate no properties, which is just to say that it is not a possible world at all. Another way of stating this is that "there is no possible world at which there is no possible world."

Rw: Inventing another tautology to justify the absence of a cogent rebuttal is hardly worth responding to. There are likely as many possible worlds as there are probable worlds as there are actual worlds, but only those that are actual, actually exist, leaving the rest as nothing more than potentialities in the minds of sentient beings. Galaxies collide and stars burn out, atoms decay and sentient beings die. That is the reality in which we reside. Now if you want to argue the validity of change as opposed to nothingness then we shall have to delve into the theology of the Christian god who boasts of himself as being a God who changes not.

HRG

If "necessity" = "true in all possible worlds", then it can be described within 1st order logic.
This should be obvious since every possible world can be described in first-order logic.
Then I object to the assumption zhat a necessarily omnipotent and omniscient God is possible.
Only because of your definition of "God", which includes necessary benevolence.

I may define a "God-5" which is necessarily indifferent, a "God-6" which is necessarily malevolent etc. All of them are suitable candidates for the ontological argument.
That's exactly what I claim about your God concept: it is not possible to ascribe modal status to it and expect to come up with a meaningful concept. My "necessary cat" is of course an argument by reductio ad absurdum.
In my definition, necessity is inextricable tied to the concept of God-1, since it is part of the definition. Just as you tie necessíty to the definition of God-0.
God is an unlimited being;

it is logically impossible for God to have any metaphysical limitation imposed upon his nature in any way.
[/quote]
And this follows exactly from what definition or from what axiom ?

And what should stop me from defining a necessary, but limited being , call it "God" - or God-6, to distinguish it from your God-0 - and apply the OA to it ?
Modern physics seems to contradict your assumption. It says that there is no explanation why one specific pion decays into muon + neutrino, and not into electron + neutrino.

Anyway, your requirement would end in an infinite regress of explanations, explanations of explanations etc. Different universes are differentiated by "brute facts".
"God" is just a label. What does it mean, and how can you be sure that the entity denoted by "God" in w is the "same" in some sense as the entity denoted by "God" in q ?

You see, that's the hidden fallacy in using "God" as a symbol for an existing entity from the start, before an existence and uniqueness proof is given. What should be used instead is a predicate G(x) = "x is god-like, because of properties P1, P2, P3 ... etc.".
Not as I see it. God's existence in w would simply be a property of w, his non-existence in q simply a property of q.
I've indicated where the holes in your argument can be found, IMHO.

Regards,
HRG.

Philip Osborne

"Does it? I wasn’t aware that I had any obligation to prove the obvious. It is the theist asserting a set of one non-contingent, necessary being that has the obligation of proof."

It is obvious here that your objection is inductive in nature, rather than a deductive argument from the concept of existence. As I've said, this does not engage the OA or theistic arguments which support necessary existence at all.

"This should be obvious since every possible world can be described in first-order logic."

I'm not so sure about this. Suppose w is a possible world and x is something that possibly exists. Suppose further that x does not exist in w. If this is so, since x is possible, w will have the property of x possibly existing in it. Since first-order logic does not have modal operators, it cannot account for these properties.

Also, since my knowledge is relatively limited, does Godel's proof exclude modal operators from the purview of his proof?

"And this follows exactly from what definition or from what axiom?"

It does not follow from any definition or axiom. It IS the definition. I'm not sure what the problem is here, unless you are asking for a clarification of what "unlimited" means.

"And what should stop me from defining a necessary, but limited being , call it "God" - or God-6, to distinguish it from your God-0 - and apply the OA to it?"

I tend to think that if a property is limited, it possibly has a cause of its instantiation. This cause may not be a sufficient condition for the thing's existence, but nonetheless it entails the contingency of the thing in question, as I've argued before.

It is true that there are some parallels to the OA that may seem to work, such as an "evil God," etc. The problem is that they all stumble over the same possibility premiss that the OA does. I think there are solutions to this problem, though time and space prohibit me from giving them here.

"Modern physics seems to contradict your assumption. It says that there is no explanation why one specific pion decays into muon + neutrino, and not into electron + neutrino."

My definition of "explanation" does not require that this explanation necessitate or be a sufficient condition for what is being explained. At any rate, is it at least true that that there is a reason for the pion to decay into either the muon + neutrino or the electron +neutrio rather than not decay at all?

"Anyway, your requirement would end in an infinite regress of explanations, explanations of explanations etc. Different universes are differentiated by "brute facts"."

Not necessarily. Supposing I accept that different universes are differentiated by different brute facts, my proposition can still be true. For instance, x may be the brute fact of w, but that does not rule out it having an explanation in w1. On this construal, even though every fact possibly has an explanation, every world still has its own brute facts.

Sincerely,

Philip

[ August 26, 2002: Message edited by: Philip Osborne ]</p>

rainbow walking

Philip: It is obvious here that your objection is inductive in nature, rather than a deductive argument from the concept of existence. As I've said, this does not engage the OA or theistic arguments which support necessary existence at all.

Rw: Please describe the inductiveness of the argument as it has been deducted from observable events. The OA, at best, is nothing more than a tautology for the existence of existence and stamps God over the latter. As has been demonstrated before, one can substitute aliens or energy or any other equally spurious integer for god and arrive at the same conclusion. However, since your objection appears to be derived from my omission of argumentation in support of what should be obvious, here is your requested argumentation:

Premise 1. Existence and non-existence are two separate and distinct axiomatic states of being. A state of being either possesses the property of existence or it does not. Non-existence defaults to a state of non-being where it can be shown that the question of non-existence has been concluded with the greatest available degree of probability.

Premise 2. There are no logically possible worlds where either of these states of being can be excluded or converged into a third possible state, thus…

Conclusion 1. All logically possible worlds are dependent on these two corollary states of existence or non-existence as the primary implied or specified contingency to their logical possibility.

Premise 3. Existent state’s of being have been observed to remain existent by the conduction of transient action. Non-existent states of being have never been observed conducting transient action but are, nonetheless, the cause of it as existent states of being engage in transient acts to avoid the state of non-existence.

Premise 4. Therefore transient action appears to be the conditional determinative property separating these states of being in all logically possible worlds.

Premise 5. Thus existent states of being transiently act to sustain their status either by natural force, biological edict, sentient discretion, or any combination thereof. In other words, a state of non-existence EXISTS as a logical possibility and natural consequence of an absence of, or improper transient act.

Premise 6. Transient acts are conducted in a space/time continuum. Where no space/time continuum exists, no transient action can logically obtain to an existent state of being.

Premise 7. There are no logically possible existent worlds devoid of transient action as defined by number 5 above.

Conclusion 2: Transient action is a Necessary prerequisite of any logically possible existent world.

Premise 9. If transient action is prerequisite to a state of existent being in any logically possible world it is logically intuitive to assume it to be prerequisite to a state of existent being in all possible worlds.

Premise 10. Transient acts require the existence of a causal agent for their instantiation. Causal agents require transient action as a contingency of their state of existent being.

Premise 11. Therefore any logically possible world must have been instantiated as a transient act of an existent causal agent whose existence necessitated a causal transient act.

Premise 12. Thus any transient causal act of instantiation of any logically possible world was Necessary to the continued existence of the causal agent from which we logically derive…

Conclusion 3. The causal agent can be no more or less Necessary than the transient causal act of instantiation. Both are contingencies to any logically possible state of being. Thus we have arrived at the inter-dependency of cause and effect.

Now we move to our final conclusion by asking, “Could there be an original first causal agent responsible for all subsequent transient acts resulting in all subsequent logically possible worlds and states of being?”

Premise 13. All causal agents and transient acts are inter-contingent for their state of existent being. No transient act can exist without a causal agent and no causal agent can exist without a transient act.

Premise 14. Both causal agents and transient acts are contingent upon one another to achieve one primary goal: continued existence. Absent the corollary states of existence/non-existence, both the causal agent and the transient act become logically meaningless concepts from which no logically possible world can be attained.

Premise 15. Based on Premise 6 and 14 there are two primary axioms upon which all causal agents and transient acts are contingent: Time and Existence. In the absence of these two axioms no appeal to a Necessary, non-contingent causal agency can be made because said agency absolutely requires both time and existence as a prerequisite to the instantiation of any logically possible world.

Premise 16. Therefore there can be no Necessary existent causal agent who exists non-contingently within the constraints of logic and nature.

Final Conclusion: This leaves us only with the deductive final state of non-existence, non-being, nothingness as the necessary first cause and the inevitable non-contingent conclusion to all states of existence.

Final Note: If you think that “something from nothing” is not logically possible then you have no knowledge of quantum theory.