Taking the fight to the real issue

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The is the second time I have had to explain this to you: you are just being hard headed. Restating something which I have already addressed is just silly.

Here it is for you again:

The argument does not beg the question:

You confuse necessity de re with necessity de dicto. Necessity de re is the necessity of a thing (res); necessity de dicto is the necessity of a statement (dictum). The second premise of the cosmological argument asserts that a certain statement is possible, namely, If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God. I does not argue that the universes explanation should be God. It is introducing the fact out of necessity to the argument.



No it isn't I have been going over this with you for quite a while now and you are still asserting that God's cognition must conform to how you understand cognition. There is still no reason for me to believe your statement is true.



I have no idea what you are driving at here; I think I need an AG translator



I offered you an olive branch... nice response... Ok we can have this discussion but my responses will be a little slow. I have no interest in devoting my entire life to this discussion.



Oh, yes AG your the world best philosopher. Dr Craig is a fool and Plantinga is a fail... Grow up, this is an autism forum. If you really want to take them on, then go for it. I will just sit here and giggle when they scrape you off the pavement.

As to your dysteleological argument: it moves against all of the evidence of the teleological argument. It comes down to what you consider more likely.

Last edited by 91 on 13 Nov 2010, 10:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Considering overcoming addiction entails admitting that you cannot control it; I would be careful with all of this talk about the power of the individual.

Look, fine, I might have been wrong on the argument.

I still rebutted it even if it isn't begging the question.

"As for the existence of the universe, I won't play around with notions of "necessity". Here's the options I see:
1) The impossibility of nothing to exist.
2) The possibility of an infinite past, just across universes, for instance with a chaotic inflation model.
3) The necessity of all possible universes existing. (I believe one of the arguments in modal logic requires that all possible universes actually exist somewhere. Given that our universe is possible, this means it is actual. I don't believe this argument much, but it is more plausible than God given what is entailed.)"


Because cognitive science is the study of the necessary qualities for cognition. It is really a very abstract field with a lot of connections to computer science, which is also another very abstract field. All I am asserting is that God's cognition must conform to the logical requirements found through our studies in cognition. This does not seem absurd.


The notion of "possible worlds" in philosophy only refers to logically possible worlds. That's most of what it says.




I don't really care for olive branches. I like arguing. I am also a slightly abrasive person.


I don't HAVE TO BE the world's best philosopher. Nor do my statements mean that I am smarter than either man, or more competent than either man. All they require is that I know the argument and the rebuttal and judge one to be better than the other. As it stands, it is not as if

Now, as it stands, you only used one argument by Plantinga, and it was one that Plantinga himself already acknowledged as weak. I mean, there are a lot of Plantingan arguments and perspectives that you could have used, whether it was Reformed Epistemology, or the Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism. Plantinga's major field is epistemology, but your arguments focused on metaphysics. So, really, I can't say I should feel ashamed of outright rejecting something that is clearly not the best of Plantinga. The Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism is really a much better argument, and I think Dan Dennett is also noted for floundering in response to it. (Dennett really is completely outside of his field when addressing religion and metaphysics though, the man's expertise is in neither field. He's not dumb, but I like Dennett for his work on philosophy of mind, as he does not add value by wading into issues of religion.)

The balance of your arguments, perhaps reflecting your Catholic background, and Craig's use of classical apologetic methods, is very much weighted towards Craig. The problem is that the Kalam really does require a view of time that is unorthodox among physicists, and thus is a weak argument for that reason. The moral argument is undercut by a number of issues, such as the Euthyphro, and even the possibility that ethics did evolve. Even further, while the teleological argument DOES have a number of defenders, the problem is that it occupies the same domain as the stronger atheistic arguments. I'd simply argue that the facts theism attempts to explain can be better explained by other possibilities, while the problems atheism brings forward are real problems that are difficult to solve. A real problem with Craig is that while he is known, because he is known, the criticisms of his positions are also very well-known, and debates involving Craig are also very well-known.


Well, the problem is that I provided arguments that undercut the problems your teleological argument brings forward. Possible universes undercut the problems with chance. The complexity of minds makes the supposition of God less of a justified maneuver. However, a real issue is that these dysteleologies still seem very difficult, if not impossible to make compatible with God.

Good that you are careful. The question involves whether you are careful enough. Obviously people do overcome addiction therefore people should be encouraged to understand it can be controlled.

One more thing to bring up - theism vs deism. Here is how theism could be via the same mechanisms that deists ascribe to (this isn't a professional proof so bear with me)

1) Every event is caused by a preceding event
2) Because of 1, nothing can happen that wasn't going to happen
3) The material universe, as we know it, came from the big bang
4) Even if an empty universe existed infinitely before this one - events traced to the same point in time and the same space occur exactly as they occur; whether its big bang by itself or big bang overlapping with dark energy from 4-dimensional eternal complex.
5) God is supposedly omniscient/omnipotent
6) If God created the big bang the entire chain of consequence from the big bang was determined by God, as omniscience cannot create an unknown to itself.
7) If the big bang was created by an omniscient deity, further intervention by an omniscient omnipotent God would be contradictory to its omniscient/omnipotent nature.

a hypothetical off of this:
hypothetical suggestion: prayer works
7) If the big bang was created by an omniscient deity, further intervention by an omniscient omnipotent God would be contradictory to its omniscient/omnipotent nature.
4) Even if an empty universe existed infinitely before this one - events traced to the same point in time and the same space occur exactly as they occur; whether its big bang overlapping or big bang and dark energy from 4-dimensional eternal complex.

hypothetical conclusion - prayer is answered at the big bang
further conclusion - prayer is created at the big bang
further conclusion - both prayer and answer occur on the same causal chain.


This might seem weak sauce to those of you who approach philosophy like computer programming but, I think they're still points worth mulling over - even if my syntax sucks. Other than that I think you can see what I'm saying - a God could have easily built the universe as a deist would see it but still would have plenty of room to put a theistic touch on things.

Just to tackle one point, the proposition that every event is caused by a preceding event is a generalization from limited observation in areas of specialized magnitude. It is unwarranted, just as the assumption that the sunrise has re-occurred throughout all human history is no proof it will continue indefinitely. Cosmologists have definite indications otherwise.

the problem with using deism to justify theism is that it doesn't. I mean, the above proof is as good at proving prayer/ justifying theism as it is at proving the "Satan is a dick" theory of fossilization.

I'm sure someone more versed in formal logic, like ag, could poke holes in it but the argument seems vague enough to be workable. It just doesn't actually justify any theist ideas. Conspiracy theories, no matter how unlikely, always seem to require less mental gymnastics to accept than creation myths.

It might be noted that an empty universe is a meaningless concept. So-called empty space itself has huge energies and automatically generates pairs of virtual particles which become actual in the proximity to a black hole.

To kick around the old deflated football of an omniscient God is an idiotic pursuit since the concept has so many self contradictory implications as to merely condense to a comic bit of amusing nonsense.

Your talking about organized religion though? I'm going back to the concept of theism as a personal God, not YEC claims or dualistic (God vs. Satan) battles. As it is I have no belief in either of those.

I'm talking about any claims that use the vagueness to prove specificity. If the presence of your deity is null, the relevance of his existence is equally null. At this point you're just renaming the properties of physics "god" at best and arbitrarily assuming intent.

Though I agree this is much less ridiculous than any theism based on "revelation," it's still baselessly (and needlessly) overcomplicating things by assuming human qualities are applicable.

Initially I was stating that from known scientific reality one can just as easily grab an icon from organized religion and beat it to slivers or can reverse-engineer understanding of intent via the known universe and scientific reality to come up with a God that falls in line with that. People may argue that its utterly irresponsible to have religious dogma govern national or legal conduct but that's an altogether different matter, I just don't think that belief in a private sense would ever be fairly classified as a mental disorder. My argument with deism vs. theism is that - if a God set things in motion - apathy would would be a rather strange supposition or condition to place on that act, Hitchen's made a comment in a debate once that that the notion of a personal God was far more ridiculous than an impersonal/deistic God, I don't see how a personal God would have to intervene in the course of time or matter any more than an utterly apathetic/impersonal one. The bullet points I laid out show why I don't see the apathy or non 'seeming' intervention as necessary as answers to prayers or things that seem real-time to believers, IMO, would not need to be real-time at all (just as I believe that not a waking moment of our lives nor the history of the universe has been).

The Cosmological Argument

You have stated:

"As for the existence of the universe, I won't play around with notions of "necessity". Here's the options I see:
1) The impossibility of nothing to exist.
2) The possibility of an infinite past, just across universes, for instance with a chaotic inflation model.
3) The necessity of all possible universes existing. (I believe one of the arguments in modal logic requires that all possible universes actually exist somewhere. Given that our universe is possible, this means it is actual. I don't believe this argument much, but it is more plausible than God given what is entailed.)"

My Response

1) Well it would seem that in order to prove you point you would have to prove that it is impossible for nothing to exist. Essentially you would have to answer ‘why should there be something rather than nothing’? This would get us no where since the cosmological argument postulates that the answer is God. So in order to actually prove that it is impossible for nothing to exist you would have to answer Schopenhauer’s question first.

Please note that this is not invoking infinite regress; since you would first have to have evidence of the first supposition in order to make it invalid for me to ask for you to demonstrate the why. So if you can answer Schopenhauer’s question; I will grant you your first point.

2) The Chaotic Inflation model postulates that it is easy to ‘create a universe’ but does not deal with the question of how it became possible to create a multiverse that spawns universes (it does not need to do this to explain our universe). However far back you push it you would eventually fall into the trap of having to admit to the existence of Aristotle’s ‘Unmoved Mover’ eventually. Also the further you go back; you generate more teleological evidence that supports that argument.

Aristotle’s ‘Unmoved Mover’
i. There exists movement in the world.
ii. Things that move were set into motion by something else.
iii. If everything that moves were caused to move by something else, there would be an infinite chain of causes. This can't happen.
iv. Thus, there must have been something that caused the first movement.
v. From 3, this first cause cannot itself have been moved.
vi. From 4, there must be an unmoved mover.

As an addendum to that Michio Kaku attempted to destroy the Cosmological Argument in his book Hyperspace where he put forward the issue of gas molecules moving on their own without outside interaction. So before you start bringing up this point please consider that it has already been discredited as a non sequitur; since one cannot disprove the existence of primary causality by taking note of the persistence of secondary causality.

3) As I have stated previously there is no reason to suppose that there is an infinite number of universes, since the number would be contingent on the number that could exist within the confines of mathematics. This really has more to do with the Teleological Argument, not the cosmological argument because it does not escape Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover or the question of ‘Why there is something rather than nothing’.

The Teleological Argument


Your invocation of Chaotic Inflation actually works against you when considering the Teleological Argument. Since, based on the concept of Chaotic Inflation it is actually rather easy to create a universe. Since the aim of the Teleological Argument is based on the supposition that the universe has been fine tuned for life, the fact is that if it is easy for someone or something to create a universe it is more probable than not that we live in such a universe rather than not. For instance this argument was put forward by Nick Bostrom when he postulated his ‘simulation argument’.

The Moral Argument

It is in this argument that you seem to exhibit the most confusion. Firstly you have supposed that Gods mind must be complex based on the present understanding of logic. Since God is immaterial, I see no reason to grant this. Secondly you continue to assert that Gods existence and his essence must be the same thing, which is clearly not the case when one reads Plantinga’s argument on the subject. This is due to the fact that only divine essence must be simple to escape Euthyphro’s dilemma or even the modified Euthyphro; due to the fact that nature and action are not the same thing.

The Ontological Argument from the Possibility of God’s Existence to His Actuality

You have claimed that your inversion of the logic inherent in the Ontological argument represents the destruction of that logic through ‘reductio ad absurdum’. This is because you are not demonstrating ‘reductio ad absurdum’ when you are inverting the logic. For example when Dawkins inverted the Ontological Argument at the Templeton Foundation Conference in Cambridge and claimed what you are claiming he was laughed at for missing the point.

"I've forgotten the details, but I once piqued a gathering of theologians and philosophers by adapting the ontological argument to prove that pigs can fly. They felt the need to resort to Modal Logic to prove that I was wrong" (God Delusion, p. 84)

Dr. Craig Responded:

‘A parody of the argument that moves from a logical impossibility to actuality is not parallel to the argument.’

Also it is worth noting that the Ontological Argument is based on modal logic, so one does not need to invoke an outside force to prove Dawkins wrong.

The conservation of momentum (the third law of motion as given by Newton) indicates there is no such thing as an unmoved mover.

ruveyn

I am rather fascinated by the frequent eruption of the question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" It boils down to the question of what do you mean by "Why?" What does "why" mean in that context? Is it a question of motivation or structure or intent? It's such a vague question as to be totally meaningless.

"why" has two main meanings:

1. From what cause or by what means - very related to "how" or "how come".
2. For what end or purpose.

Sometimes it is an interrogative "for what reason" which could pertain to either means or ends.

As you can see as an interrogative "why?" pertains to means or to ends. The context of the question is required to disambiguate the query.

ruveyn

And how would you interpret the question as to why there is something rather than nothing?