RE: The Modal Ontological Argument - Without Modal Logic
February 15, 2014 at 8:46 pm
(This post was last modified: February 15, 2014 at 8:48 pm by Simon Moon.)
(February 15, 2014 at 7:42 pm)Darkstar Wrote: Biologist Richard Dawkins, in his book The God Delusion, rejects the argument as "infantile". Noting that he is "a scientist rather than a philosopher", he writes: "The very idea that such grand conclusions should follow from such logomachist trickery offends me aesthetically." Also, he feels a "deep suspicion of any line of reasoning that reached such a significant conclusion without feeding in a single piece of data from the real world."
I share Dawkins's sentiment here.
I forgot about that quote from Dawkins.
He is correct though. Coming to the conclusion that a god exists based purely on a logical argument is ridiculous.
Logic only works if it is fed sound premises.
Do most people posting them even understand the difference between 'validity' and 'soundness' when it comes to logic, and why they are both essential?
Sooner or later, the 'rubber has to hit the road' so to speak, and actual evidence has to be produced. All these logical arguments are nothing more than word play until then. They are kind of fun to dismantle, though.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.
