I could be a shard of a galactic superconsciousness. I could be one of many consciousnesses. I could be the only consciousness. The point you’re repeatedly missing is that I am a consciousness. And thus, identifiable.
Liberal, I find it a little odd that you would still proffer an argument that has been proved false. A little intellectual honesty could go a long way. I don’t see why you would want the argument; it’s not helpful to us theists :D. I found an old post by you, however, on good and evil. I’m actually right with you most of the way; goodness is umatched and evil is but a deprivation. This has actually been the favoured view by many theologians; namely, Augustine and Boethius, I believe.
One note, you mention that the “Supreme Being” is ontologically contingent on nothing. That is not true. Something that exists can be contingent upon something, but that thing itself cannot be contingent. In fact, the Supreme Being you propose is contingent upon several things; for one, the axioms of logic. He cannot exist in worlds where the rules of logic are not. Even if these are impossible worlds, He is still contingent upon them.
So I leave the board for a little while and boy howdy does this get good. So if I may ask a question, on what level is it important to distinguish the I from the “thing” that is thinking.
In other words, in my relatively primative view I can accept the truth that something (which I shall define as “I”) is thinking, and therefore must have some form of existance. Now as this thing that is percieving thought has some form of concious (i.e. self awareness) and further does not know from where it came (i.e. its begining) or where it is going (i.e. its death) can there ever be “proof” or a known truth that doesn’t wind up having the circular logic we mentioned before. For example math for the most part is based on 0 and 1, which in of themselves are unprovable concepts. We have faith that they exist, and certainly they “feel” right, but we have no proof of them (other then the circular logic as defined in other posts).
So my question, is there even the potential to proove the existance of a “higer conciousness”? In other words, if bound by the rule that we are only truly aware of a concious that has thought, is there anything besides faith that any other existance can be proven (much less “God”). In short, what is the requirement to proove anything outside ourselves, and then we can worry about God?
And to answer a question posed to me in a post awhile ago. On a personal level I am at least aware that a conciousness exists (again that I have defined as “I”) and I have faith (un-proven and not logical in the least) that things outside that concious exist. That faith then leads to another leap that “higher order” had something to do with things that exists outside of me.
Forgive my ineptness at writing, and the real potential that I have lacked understanding of some of your arguments, but please note, that I have been enjoying these posts and hope they continue
I agree, and I have brought this up. However, in many cases of the proof that are linked to, a lot of logic is left out. For instance, to be “necessary” in a given world, something would have to exist not in all possible worlds you could come up with intellectually, but all worlds that relate to that world via a “relationship” function. In this case, the “relationship” function appears to be all worlds that follow logic are related to each other.
Therefore, your objection still stands, but was assumed within the proof, even if it was not explicitly spelled out.
I’m sorry, but I’m pretty new to Modal Logic. What is meant by “relationship function” exactly? Could you expand?