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The Ontological Argument - valid or debunked?
RE: The Ontological Argument - valid or debunked?
Our world is obviously a possible world.

Craig doesn't make it clear whether he is talking about actual possible worlds or merely logically possible worlds.

Technically any world that isn't self contradictory is a logically possible world.

And he jumps from that to talking about possible worlds like they're actual alternative worlds.

A maximally great being is logically possible in all worlds but there is no reason to believe it is actual in any possible world.

He goes from "Possibly exists in all worlds therefore actually exists in all possible worlds."

He acts as if those are interchangeable statements when they are two very different things.

If something possibly exists it doesn't mean it necessarily exists at all, not even in a possible on. After all our world is a possible world so if something "exists in all possible worlds" that would mean it exists in ours. But that something possibly exists in a world just means "it might exist, it might not exist."

Logically possible doesn't even mean actually possible it just means not proven to be logically impossible. It just means possibly possible.

Logical possibility is the only demonstrably coherent kind of possibility though. So to jump from that grounding of pretty much fucking anything including the FSM and a maximally great being being logically possible in all worlds to equivocating that with the notion of it being actual in all possible worlds and our world is clearly a possible world therefore it exists in our world is to commit the equivocation fallacy because "logically possible in all worlds" is being incorrectly taken to mean "actually residing in all possible worlds."

It's not made clear whether "possible worlds" is referring to merely possible worlds or all possible worlds including both possible worlds that may or may not be actual and worlds like ours which is both possible and actual.

What happens when something is ambiguous and not made clear and defined properly? It's easy to switch or equivocate between the two to suit one's fallacious argument.
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RE: The Ontological Argument - valid or debunked? - by Edwardo Piet - June 22, 2016 at 8:34 am

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