RE: Thomism: Then & Now
November 1, 2021 at 1:13 pm
(This post was last modified: November 1, 2021 at 1:36 pm by Neo-Scholastic.)
It goes deeper.
Sure, it could be that some intangibles are not real but that is different from extrapolating from examples about chairs and pots and concluding that no intangibles are real. Here's an intangible: a unit. Are there units? If not how can we do math without it. Or maybe go the other way: is there a totality? ...the All, as it were.
It is obvious were I am going by mentioning units and allness. These are attributes of God: unity and perfection. And we recognize those attributes in creatures to the degree they participate as some limited kind unity and completeness. So I can see why an atheist would deny the validity of any intangibles even if it comes at the cost denying the validity of math and the utility of language.
That is why I think the issue is deeper. The intelligibility of the material world of change necessarrily depends on the reality of some unchanging intangibles to make sense of it...like a unified and complete ground for being. And it is my position that, even if the 5 Ways do not demonstrate to the satisfaction of Pyrrhonian skeptics the reality of some grond for being, the 5 Ways still show us how indispensible intangibles are to reasoning.
Sure, it could be that some intangibles are not real but that is different from extrapolating from examples about chairs and pots and concluding that no intangibles are real. Here's an intangible: a unit. Are there units? If not how can we do math without it. Or maybe go the other way: is there a totality? ...the All, as it were.
It is obvious were I am going by mentioning units and allness. These are attributes of God: unity and perfection. And we recognize those attributes in creatures to the degree they participate as some limited kind unity and completeness. So I can see why an atheist would deny the validity of any intangibles even if it comes at the cost denying the validity of math and the utility of language.
That is why I think the issue is deeper. The intelligibility of the material world of change necessarrily depends on the reality of some unchanging intangibles to make sense of it...like a unified and complete ground for being. And it is my position that, even if the 5 Ways do not demonstrate to the satisfaction of Pyrrhonian skeptics the reality of some grond for being, the 5 Ways still show us how indispensible intangibles are to reasoning.
<insert profound quote here>