(October 2, 2024 at 12:34 am)Ahriman Wrote: I would argue in support of the idea that something that exists is necessarily greater than something that does not exist. My imaginary girlfriend is definitely not as good as a real girlfriend would be.
I'd argue that "something that does not exist" is a contradiction of terms. In order to be "something" it must exist. Your imaginary girlfriend exists, if only in your imagination. Ditto unicorns, dragons, pixies, and giants. I'd ask for a list of things that you think don't exist but simply writing them down would cause them to exist. Married bachelors, square circles, and other paradoxes don't exist because they aren't anything. They're tortured words that can't describe anything rational and when you try to imagine one you quickly find out that you can't. "Something that doesn't exist" may well fall into this category.
About now is when the theologist typically amends this to include "exists in reality", as if mental states weren't real, at which point I take a quick look at every definition of the Abrahamic god in the last few thousand years and after reading through a lot of "intangible", "unknowable", "undetectable", "ineffable", ad nauseum I'm left wondering what they mean by "reality".
