RE: The Ontological Argument for the Existence of God
December 15, 2015 at 7:52 pm
(This post was last modified: December 15, 2015 at 8:13 pm by athrock.)
(December 15, 2015 at 6:25 pm)Delicate Wrote:[*](December 15, 2015 at 6:08 pm)Jenny A Wrote: Oh goody!
Seriously, if there is a better formulation, let see it. Please provide definitions for any words not used in a colloquial way.
Actually it is a little technical because it relies on modal logic concepts like possibility and necessity, as well as the S5 axiom.
Here are the two definitions Plantinga starts with
[*]A being is maximally excellent in a world W if and only if it is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect in W; and
[*]A being is maximally great in a world W if and only if it is maximally excellent in every possible world.
Given these two definitions, the argument is constructed:
1. The concept of a maximally great being is self-consistent.
2. If 1, then there is at least one logically possible world in which a maximally great being exists.
3. Therefore, there is at least one logically possible world in which a maximally great being exists.
4. If a maximally great being exists in one logically possible world, it exists in every logically possible world.
5. Therefore, a maximally great being (that is, God) exists in every logically possible world.
From a formal-logical analysis, everything is consistent. There aren't any "holes" in the argument.
Instead, most atheists who have a problem with it question P4 because it reliexs on the S5 modal axiom. Which, oddly enough, is something atheist philosophers are quite comfortable with outside this context.
If Plantinga has reformulated the argument, it's worth another look. Where can I read a discussion of this online?
Thanks.
(December 15, 2015 at 6:41 pm)Delicate Wrote:[*](December 15, 2015 at 6:33 pm)SofaKingHigh Wrote: [*][*]
I've seen some mental gymnastics and word spastics in my time, but this takes some beating.
Try scrabble.
^ This is the typical response you'll see from atheists who are uneducated and uninformed on issues like this.
There's a fear of anything that might discredit their religion, and even if they can't find anything wrong with it, they must repudiate it. They are not intellectually competent enough to refute it with reason or evidence, and thus, out of their fear and paranoia, resort to name-calling, emotional appeals, and empty rhetoric.
This is why atheism is intellectually bankrupt.
[*]
I'll be the first to admit that a lot of serious philosophy is beyond my skillset (and I get bored), but that doesn't prevent me from trying to pull the curtains back as far as I can.
That's actually the reason I started this thread in the first place...to increase my understanding through dialogue.
Not everyone has the...um...temperament for discussions like this, and they are threatened by something they do not understand which appears to contradict what they want to believe.
They aren't alone, of course. Believers do the same thing when confronted with science that is beyond them.
(December 15, 2015 at 6:47 pm)Stimbo Wrote: Well, it's all shits 'n' giggles, until someone giggles 'n' shits - all over an atheist forum.[*]
[*]
Forgive me, Stimbo, but I see that your name is in red and that you are an administrator, so I must ask:
Is it a good thing or a bad thing if one of this forum's functions is that it becomes a sort of online learning center for people who want to go deeper with subjects like this?
Believers go to Sunday School to learn more about what they believe; it seems that online forums have become the classrooms of non-believers.
Do you agree?
(December 15, 2015 at 7:48 pm)Stimbo Wrote: Why, when the whole point of parody is to highlight the inadequacies in the arguments?[*]
[*]
That's fine unless folks are merely memorizing the punch lines without understanding what makes the jokes work.
Would YOU be persuaded to give up your (non)beliefs by mockery?
So, why would atheists expect to make any serious in-roads into theism without making genuinely solid arguments?
