Is God's Existence Possible?

[Moral Orel]

How doesn’t it? As long as you don’t know everything, there always remains a possibility that you’re wrong about thinking God isn’t possible.

A child might think that he can fly if he just flapped his arms hard enough because he doesn't know it's impossible. "It's possible as far as I know" is not the same as "It's possible".

 

[Tree of Life]

A child might think that he can fly if he just flapped his arms hard enough because he doesn't know it's impossible. "It's possible as far as I know" is not the same as "It's possible".

Please see post #114 - Is God's Existence Possible?

You're talking here about physical impossibility. This thread is about logical impossibility. There's is nothing logically impossible about a child flying by flapping his arms.

 

[Silmarien]

By "God" I mean a maximally great being. God would be the only necessary being upon whom everything else depends. The universe would be contingent and God alone would be necessary. God would be the cause of the universe, the source of moral values, the source of rationality, the source of beauty, and the source of personality. God would be "the good".

God would be all powerful and all knowing. His character would be the very standard of justice. Everything in creation would be related to him and it would be impossible to understand anything rightly without understanding its relation to him.

Is it possible that God exists? Or is it impossible? Explain your answer.

My frustration with the modal ontological argument is that it appears to conflate epistemological and ontological possibility. I appreciate the argument and I think it's insightful for grasping the notion of necessity, since the S5 logic behind it is clever: if there is a possible world where a necessary being exists, then that necessary being exists in all possible worlds, simply because of what is meant by necessity.

However, even we accept logic as a guide to ontology (which some do not), I do not see how we can conclusively determine whether there could be a possible world where a necessary being exists. Theoretically someone could demonstrate that the concept of God is incoherent and that therefore God is logically impossible, but our failure thus far to provide such a demonstration does not actually mean that there is a possible world where a necessary being exists. I do not think we can cross that epistemological boundary and say that the model ontological argument succeeds.

Despite being an admirer of ontological reasoning in general, I'm voting with the atheists in the poll, since in the context of the model ontological argument, "it's possible that God exists" is a much stronger claim than I am willing to make.

 

[Chriliman]

A child might think that he can fly if he just flapped his arms hard enough because he doesn't know it's impossible. "It's possible as far as I know" is not the same as "It's possible".

In order know an all knowing God isn’t possible you have to be the very thing you’re trying to say isn’t possible. Knowledge is the key in both our examples.

 

[ToddNotTodd]

God is logically possible so long as God's existence is not necessarily false. I don't see why God's existence would be necessarily false. Therefore God's existence is possible.

Argument from ignorance. Just because you don’t see why a god’s existence is necessarily false, doesn’t mean that it isn’t. Therefore your conclusion is obviously false.

Now, you could turn this around if you can show evidence that a god’s existence can not be necessarily false.

So what’s that evidence?

 

[Moral Orel]

In order know an all knowing God isn’t possible you have to be the very thing you’re trying to say isn’t possible. Knowledge is the key in both our examples.

But I'm not claiming to know whether God is possible or impossible. Just because I don't personally know, doesn't mean I should accept that it is in fact possible.

 

[ToddNotTodd]

How doesn’t it? As long as you don’t know everything, there always remains a possibility that you’re wrong about thinking God isn’t possible.

Just because I don’t know if a square circle is possible doesn’t mean that it’s possible. Your describing an argument from ignorance.

 

[ToddNotTodd]

Please see post #114 - Is God's Existence Possible?

You're talking here about physical impossibility. This thread is about logical impossibility. There's is nothing logically impossible about a child flying by flapping his arms.

Arbitrarily limiting the argument to logical possibility is dishonest.

Show that there can’t be a universal physyical property that precludes a god.

 

[Moral Orel]

Please see post #114 - Is God's Existence Possible?

You're talking here about physical impossibility. This thread is about logical impossibility. There's is nothing logically impossible about a child flying by flapping his arms.

Doesn't matter. My point is about what we don't know. Until we know everything about every aspect of reality, we can't know that nothing in reality is logically inconsistent with a God. Even Augustine argued against the Ontological argument by pointing out that we don't know enough about God. He basically said that only God Himself could make the argument because it would require omniscience to know whether it was possible to begin with.

Edit: Aquinas said that, not Augustine. My bad.

 

[Chriliman]

Just because I don’t know if a square circle is possible doesn’t mean that it’s possible. Your describing an argument from ignorance.

We do know a square circle is impossible.

 

[Silmarien]

Doesn't matter. My point is about what we don't know. Until we know everything about every aspect of reality, we can't know that nothing in reality is logically inconsistent with a God. Even Augustine argued against the Ontological argument by pointing out that we don't know enough about God. He basically said that only God Himself could make the argument because it would require omniscience to know whether it was possible to begin with.

Augustine lived centuries before the ontological argument was first formulated by Anselm. Are you sure he's the theologian you're thinking of? It was Aquinas who was a critic of Anselm (though for different reasons), but I'm not sure what argument Augustine might have been responding to here. If you have a citation here, I'd be interested in seeing it.

 

[Philip_B]

Well lets begin there and if you think we've begun dealing with an impossible God, let me know. Here's the argument in simple expression:

1. God's existence is possible.
2. If God's existence is possible, then God exists in some possible world.
3. If God exists in some possible world, then God exists in all possible worlds.
4. If God exists in all possible worlds, then God exists in the actual world.
5. If God exists in the actual world, then God exists.

Notes:

Premise (2) is just a technical explanation of the meaning of premise (1). A "possible world" is what philosophers mean by a "hypothetical situation".

This argument depends on a right understanding of "possibility" (which we've discussed in other posts). If something is logically possible then it is not necessarily false.

This argument also depends on a right understanding of "God". "God" is a logically necessary being. If he exists, then he must exist and it would be inconceivable for him to not exist. His non-existence would be just as inconceivable as 2+2=5.

If a logically necessary being exists in some possible world, then he exists in all possible worlds because that's what it means to be a necessary being.

So if it's possible for God to exist, then God certainly exists.

Part of me would like ths to be OK, and part of me struggles. I was quite happy to argue that God was before existence, and after existence and therefore beyond existence. I find that a lot more compelling than the argument here which in some sense smells like sophistry and and seems somewhat of a circumlocution, and at very least confuses the 'idea of God' with God.

2 + 2 or course equals 11 (in base 3) or 100 (in base 2 save for the fact that 2 does not exist in base 2!). I think that the problem is the idea that God is 'a logically necessary being', as clearly there are many who would dispute that, and Christians would resist the suggestion that God is a being, preferring the position that God is the creator of being.

 

[Chriliman]

But I'm not claiming to know whether God is possible or impossible. Just because I don't personally know, doesn't mean I should accept that it is in fact possible.

That’s fine. ToddnotTodd seemed pretty certain that God isn’t possible, but maybe he means he doesn’t know for sure. Idk

 

[ToddNotTodd]

We do know a square circle is impossible.

Not everyone does. For those people, is a square circle possible, while for someone who does know it isn’t?

Of course not, because whether something is possible or not doesn’t depend on whether we know it’s impossible or not.

 

[durangodawood]

My argument is that if God's existence is possible then God exists by definition. I'm not arguing that God exists by definition.

Yes you are:

I don't see how we could understand God as anything other than a logically necessary being....

Right here^^^ Your definition of God includes his existence.

So your argument starts with his existence just by using your definition of God.

You can remedy this by removing "a logically necessary being" from the definition of God we use for the purpose of your logical argument. Shall we do that and run the argument again?

 

[Tree of Life]

My frustration with the modal ontological argument is that it appears to conflate epistemological and ontological possibility. I appreciate the argument and I think it's insightful for grasping the notion of necessity, since the S5 logic behind it is clever: if there is a possible world where a necessary being exists, then that necessary being exists in all possible worlds, simply because of what is meant by necessity.

However, even we accept logic as a guide to ontology (which some do not), I do not see how we can conclusively determine whether there could be a possible world where a necessary being exists. Theoretically someone could demonstrate that the concept of God is incoherent and that therefore God is logically impossible, but our failure thus far to provide such a demonstration does not actually mean that there is a possible world where a necessary being exists. I do not think we can cross that epistemological boundary and say that the model ontological argument succeeds.

Despite being an admirer of ontological reasoning in general, I'm voting with the atheists in the poll, since in the context of the model ontological argument, "it's possible that God exists" is a much stronger claim than I am willing to make.

I'm glad you appreciate the force of the argument even if you're uncomfortable with the moves it makes.

 

[ToddNotTodd]

That’s fine. ToddnotTodd seemed pretty certain that God isn’t possible, but maybe he means he doesn’t know for sure. Idk

You should know, since I’ve never said that I believe that a god isn’t possible.

 

[Tree of Life]

Argument from ignorance. Just because you don’t see why a god’s existence is necessarily false, doesn’t mean that it isn’t. Therefore your conclusion is obviously false.

Now, you could turn this around if you can show evidence that a god’s existence can not be necessarily false.

So what’s that evidence?

You seem to be dealing more in terms of evidentialism than in the realm of logic. I'm not sure that you really understand what we're talking about here. Nonetheless...

To claim that a proposition is necessarily false is quite a strong claim. If you're going to suggest that "God exists" is necessarily false, then the burden of proof is on you to demonstrate this. Otherwise we may assume that "God exists" is not necessarily false.

 

[Tree of Life]

Just because I don’t know if a square circle is possible doesn’t mean that it’s possible. Your describing an argument from ignorance.

If you say that you don't know whether or not a square circle is impossible, you simply don't understand the concepts "square" and "circle" or the basic laws of logic.

 

[Tree of Life]

Arbitrarily limiting the argument to logical possibility is dishonest.

Show that there can’t be a universal physyical property that precludes a god.

At this point I really have no idea what you're talking about.