(August 28, 2011 at 9:19 pm)Ryft Wrote:If god were to remove his influence from our universe, then logic would no longer be necessarily true, thus within our universe if logic depends on god it is contingent on him in some way.(August 28, 2011 at 1:33 pm)Captain Scarlet Wrote: If [the TAG] goes through, it would mean that in some way logic depends on God and is thus contingent. But to state this appears to be self refuting because it would mean logical truths aren't necessarily true, but are instead arbitrary ...
That does not follow. Logic "depends on God" in the sense that it is grounded in the nature and character of God; thus it cannot be arbitrary and cannot fail to be necessarily true, as God himself is necessary being (cf. actus purus).
There is an assertion that these things are 'grounded' in gods character how is this known and what does it mean? A beings character only has meaning in relation to others and the population in general. For example to state than someone is larger-than-life is only meaningful if that person is not the only one around and it says something about them. But to say god has the character of grounding logic seems to not meet either challenge. Firstly it says nothing about him (unless he is a computer). Secondly it leaves me wondering as compared to which other god or populations of gods we can say that this particular one is the logic grounder. It appears to be a convenient mechanism for the theist to anchor a problem that would otherwise exist in theism. If god was around for an eternity with all of these characteristics bootstrapped into his very being (by an unknown process), it renders the concept so far from anything we can comprehend, it becomes meaningless and something which we are not justified believing in.
"I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence"...Doug McLeod.
