Is there "Evidence" of God?

Great Debates
261

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, Left Hand of Dorkness.

But again, I’ve explained in quite some detail with a deductive proof sketch why it is entirely compatible with the common parlance. As I’ve said a couple of times now, if I made some specific error, you should be able to point it out; and if I have not, why is the conclusion wrong when the premises and inferences are right? It is easy to respond to a man who has written 5,000 words with a simple “I disagree”, but where is my alleged mistake? On the other hand, there is also the complaint that there is no mapping at all between SB and NE, and the complaint is made without a shred of supportive reasoning. I think someone (it might have been you) even suggested that some philosophers find the whole concept meaningless. But I’ve provided documentation that philosophers for hundreds of years have accepted this mapping and believe it to be coherent even when they find the proof unsound. It seems to me that the onus is on those who claim something is amiss — despite a centuries old history for this argument all the way to modern day modal constructions in which no one of any status has ever protested this mapping — to show exactly why, beyond merely, “It doesn’t satisfy me personally or the people I know at work,” or something to that effect. If I have made an error, I will own up to it and admit it. But show it to me.

The only reason why a significant number will not answer NE is because a significant number have not studied philosophy. It is a technical term of the trade, as it were. That’s like complaining that you might ask a random sampling of people what a Black Hole is, and that a very few will answer “Singularity”. So therefore, singularity is an unreasonable term.

I’m sorry, and with all due respect, but that’s just ridiculous as I see it. Examine their words:

Kant: “…and thus reason concludes that the Supreme Being, as the primal basis of all things, possesses an existence which is absolutely necessary”.

Kant flat out equates the two, and he is possibly the widest read philosopher in existence, after perhaps Aristotle.

Descartes: "…but in no case is necessary existence so contained, except in the case of the idea of God."

Descartes connects NE directly to the term God itself.

Leibniz: Therefore this degree of grandeur and perfection, or rather this perfection which consists in existence, is in this supreme all-great, all-perfect being: for otherwise some degree would be wanting to it, contrary to its definition.

By “perfection which consists in existence”, Leibniz means NE. Since the eleventh century, necessary existence has been understood to mean ontological perfection (perfection which consists in existence). And Leibniz ties this directly to supreme (all-great, all-perfect) being.

**Clark: God’s necessary existence is a presupposition of the existence of anything at all. **

And the Calvanist ties NE directly to God.

How you could possibly read these as not mapping SB to NE to God is unclear. You may disagree with the proof all you like, but I would greatly appreciate an acknowledgment that you were mistaken about what these men wrote. I have read the whole books, and I assure you that I am not misrepresenting them here, which is tantamount to what you’re saying.

262

I was the first respondent to this thread. Since then, I have seen one heck of a lot of talk, around “proof of god” Not that it actually matter to were this discussion is going, I believe I have the answer to the OP. In fact, I believe that liberal actually has the answer when he said:

In the OP, Stranger On A Train said:

So in other words, there is no proof of the Christian god. There is "evidence” that could lead one to believe that there might be something that has created reality, but it could be Gravity Elves, or not even a being at all, but a bunch of unthinking cells. Then again, such logically deduced “proof” is useless when trying to convince one of christiany. Now, I know that is not the matter at hand, but again, it answers the OP.

263

On the contrary: Descartes is the only one of those that seems ot equate the two.

Kant suggests that a SUpreme Being has an existence that’s absolutely necessary. He doesn’t suggest that anything with a necessary existence is therefore a supreme being. The Pope has a hat; not everyone with a hat is the Pope.

Leibniz says
Leibniz: Therefore this degree of grandeur and perfection, or rather this perfection which consists in existence, is in this supreme all-great, all-perfect being: for otherwise some degree would be wanting to it, contrary to its definition.

That seems to say that the perfection which consists in existence is in this supreme being–that part of being supreme is existing, not that they’re the same thing. In order to be a driveable car, there’s gotta be a seat in you: not everything with a seat in it is a driveable car.

And Clark says that God’s necessary existence is necessary to the existence of anything at all–again, saying that God’s gotta gotta exist, not that anything that’s gotta exist is God. My hair is red; not everything that’s red is my hair.

As for addressing why your proof isn’t compatible with common parlance, I’m afraid I don’t know how to do that, because while I’ve granted that “necessary” is mappable to “supreme” in some instances, and that “existence” is mappable to “being” in some instances, I don’t see where you address the common usage of “Supreme Being,” as, “Entity that is superior to all other enities in all ways,” which is, as I’ve said, much closer to the common usage of the term.

The fact that most people don’t study philosophy is precisely the point: when you say “Supreme Being” to most people, they believe you’re saying something very different from what someone who’s studied your proof thinks you’re saying. They think you’re talking about the kid who got 1600 on the SAT, not the kid who shows up at every single testing site.

Daniel

264

Left Hand of Dorkness, I’m afraid that I cannot respect your opinions on this matter. They are too far afield from standard interpretations, and run afoul of the very intent of the writers themselves. Kant used a copula, not an implication, so your reference to the Pope’s hat is irrelevant. Leibniz is talking about existence, not as a part of God, but as the topic of the proof. And Clark’s construction was genitive, meaning that God is its very source. I don’t suppose you can respect mine either, and I don’t know whether you even understand it — but I must say that I do not understand yours at all. It is completely antithetical not only to the context of the writings, but to the whole history of debate over the ontological argument. I’m sorry, and I respect you personally, but you are simply wrong. It is like you have interpreted the Second Amendment to mean that people have the right to bear heraldic shields blazoned with bearings.

265

I agree with Daniel. Certainly a Supreme Being must be necessarily existent in all worlds to be truly supreme. My reading of your quotes is in this context. But if this entity in one world has no freedom of action, that is existent but nothing else, could it said to be supreme in this world? And by supreme I mean the normally accepted meaning of the term.

I assume that a corollary of NE is existent throughout all of time, right? But, though I know you associate God with love, I fail to see how necessary existence is so associated.

I’ll review your proofs to see if I can find anything referring to the common meaning of supremacy here, but I can’t remember seeing any.

266

It is the existence, and only the existence, that they mean is supreme. It is positively nothing about any action of any kind, free or otherwise. You yourself had cautioned the “peanut gallery” about this sort of thing.

Time is a topic of temporal logic. And love isn’t even under discussion, unless you’re wanting to change the subject. Which is okay… just saying.

Sure. Whatever.

267

Hey, no problem. I’m not particularly concerned with whether the Big Guns back you up or back me up–but the excerpts you’ve given me don’t convince me they back you up. I read most of them as saying, “God has gotta gotta exist, or God’s not God;” I read your interpretation of them as saying, “If ya gotta exist, you’re God.” Those are two different statements.

As for your Supreme+Being proof, consider this:

Last week, as a joke, I mailed a 20-pound wheel of Manchego to my friend in Redmond, Washington. He works at Microsoft, and I sent it to his work address.

Now, I could post in great detail about the Wittgensteinian nature of the word “cheese,” and about how Manchego fits most definitions of this word, and how we must conclude that it is proper to call my gift to him “cheese.” I could discuss relative sizes of Manchego blocks, especially ones in Redmond, and offer charts to prove that this one is larger than others. I could give a treatise on the word “the” as applied to singular nouns, proving that it denotes specificity. I could temporize on the nature of space and geographical designations, and show that this one is at Microsoft. I could, in short, prove to you that it is the single largest aged dairy product on the Microsoft campus.

But if I then concluded that it was The Big Cheese at Microsoft, and went on to make statements about how The Big Cheese at Microsoft doesn’t pay a dime of income tax or ever involve itself directly with coding projects, I’d still be wrong.

Daniel

268

My first answer is no. My second is what do you mean by identity? If you mean identity of beings across worlds, then no. I’m not sure if this is implied by your proof or not. Not to mention communication across worlds. That’s where we get into trouble with supreme again. In some meanings of supreme an entity that could communicate across worlds would be superior to an entity existent in all worlds who could not.

269

I see no one wants to answer my latest post, number 262, so I will post the following a ridiculous over-simplification of the various ontological arguments, so as to once again be on topic. Despite their over simplification, I believe they get to the heart of the argument.

(1) I define God to be X.
(2) Since I can conceive of X, X must exist.
(3) Therefore, God exists.

ontological argument 2
(1) God exists.
(2) Since God exists, God must be perfect.
(3) That which is perfect must exist.
(4) Therefore, God exists.

modal ontological argument
(1) God exists.
(2) God, existing, is either necessary or unnecessary.
(3) God is not unnecessary, therefore God must be necessary.
(4) Therefore, God exists.

270

Scott, those aren’t so much “oversimplified” as they are “incorrect.” God may be defined into meaninglessness by the proof, but not into existence.

Daniel

271

But you brought in the philosophers peanut gallery in support. I have a hard time believing, and your quotes do not demonstrate, that their definition of God and supreme being are the same as yours. Their definition of God does include necessary existence, but to stop there I think would have been heretical at the time. I was asking people to not use their prior definitions of God to evaluate your proofs, since yours depended on your clear and concise definition. But then you appeared to be claiming that their prior definition was the same as yours, which I do not think is true.

I don’t think you’d need it, since your proof does not include the notion of time, and, if valid, would be valid in any moment of time. Timelessness and being eternal are other traits commonly associated with God. Since I don’t think anyone would argue with any of this, I’ll drop it.

[/QUOTE]

I read a comment of your to imply that supremacy in the peanut gallery sense also came out of your proofs.

272

Do you recall the first response to this thread? What you have said is exactly my point.

273

You misunderstand. Your summaries, not Lib’s proof, define God into existence; this difference between the two invalidates your summaries.

Daniel

274

:eek: Ohhhhhh. :eek:

Sorry!

275

I ran into this trap. In Lib’s definition, God is exactly that thing which gotta exist.

If I can summarize what I recall of traditional ontological arguments, it goes:

God is defined as the greatest of all. (the traditional definition of supreme being.)

Existence is greater than non existence.

If God did not exist, then he would not be the greatest of all.

Thus, god must exist, and must necessarily exist, because a necessarily existent entity is greater than one which is not necessarily existent.

I challenged this on the definition of greatest, but since the proof Lib uses does not use a definition of greatest, my objection did not apply.

276

Hmm…how is that different from my paraphrase of Lib’s view that “If ya gotta exist, you’re God”? That’s what he’s saying (I think); the philosophers he’s quoting seem to be saying the other statement, namely, that “God’s gotta gotta exist, or God’s not God.”

In other words, Lib’s makes necessary existence both a necessary and sufficient condition to get the God-crown; the other philophers make necessary existence a necessary (but not necessarily sufficient) condition.

Daniel

277

Contact is one example of utility. And while you may not be in contact with modus ponens, you have been in contact with the expression of it when you learned it.

There is one utility argument of “so what?” The god you define is morally neutral. But more important than that, the God you define is existent but not necessarily detectable, so our never seeing a trace of him/her/it means nothing. But even if we did detect something possibly godlike, we’d have no way of increasing our confidence in it. It would be existent in one world, fine. We could never know if it were existent in all. In the traditional definition, though miracles etc. do not prove the existence of god, it at least would give me some degreee of confidence. In your definition, that sort of power is in no way involved, so Biblical magic tricks would neither increase or decrease our confidence in the godliness of the entity. It is weaker than deism, since deism as I understand it defines God as the creator, and you don’t even do that.

Thanks. I’ll check this out when I have some time.