(December 21, 2015 at 2:02 pm)Cato Wrote:(December 21, 2015 at 1:52 pm)Delicate Wrote: It would be nice if, instead of 100 people making 200 feeble objections to the ontological argument, there could be one, singular, comprehensive refutation that would convince people the ontological argument was fallacious.
Can someone come up with something like that? That would help.
It would be nice if, instead of 40,000 Christian denominations making a myriad of different unsupported claims based on a single source, there could be one, singular, comprehensive display of evidence that would convince people that god was real.
Can someone come up with something like that? That would help.
It's in a book called "Mere Christianity." It's been around for several decades.
You're welcome.
(December 21, 2015 at 2:05 pm)Cato Wrote:(December 21, 2015 at 2:02 pm)Delicate Wrote: In other words, you have no evidence that it's an unsound argument?
The veracity of its premises cannot be demonstrated; therefore, the argument is unsound. This has been demonstrated repeatedly.
These repeated demonstrations would be wrong.
The criteria for accepting a premise is not that it can be demonstrated. Lots of premises are taken to be true that are either not demonstrated, or impossible to demonstrate. Rather, the criteria for accepting a premise is whether it, or its negation has some evidence or justification to support its truth or falsehood.
The classic example of a premise that we take to be true without demonstration are regularities in nature.
Eg, take the claim "The sun will rise tomorrow." This cannot be demonstrated. If you believe it, it's because you rely on inductive inference as the justification for your belief.
Bottom line: Demonstration is not the criteria for assenting to a premise. Thus you don't have a successful refutation here.
