Theism or Atheism: McHugh vs Krueger

[Dr Rick]

Ladies and Gentleman:

Two scholars, Christopher McHugh and Douglas Krueger, have agreed to debate the case for theism and the case for atheism here on the IIDB in a formal debate (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&postid=880742#post880742)

This thread is being opened so that we may comment upon the proceedings.

Christopher McHugh is an independent scholar and Christian apologist. He has several forthcoming articles in PHILO, and is also a referee for that journal. McHugh is one of a small number of philosophers worldwide invited by Quentin Smith to publish a paper in a special upcoming "invited authors only" symposium issue of PHILO. He has engaged in debates with such philosophers as Graham Oppy, Ted Drange, George H. Smith, and Richard Gale.

Doug Krueger is the author of What is Atheism? A Short Introduction (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1998), and his articles have appeared on The Secular Web and in American Atheist magazine. Krueger has a B.A. and an M.A. in philosophy and he is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. Krueger is the co-founder, with Darrel Henschell, of the Fayetteville Freethinkers, and they appear regularly on the local public radio station, television stations, and their articles can be seen in the local newspaper All About Town. Krueger has participated in numerous formal debates on the existence of god and secular ethics.

They will both begin with opening statements on their respective positions. We can anticipate an enlightening exchange; I would like to express our gratitude on behalf of all the members and guests of the Secular Web to both Chris and Doug for agreeing to this debate.

Gentleman, have at it.

Rick

[Jobar]

Fantastic!

(Doc, that's 'have at it' and not 'have had it'. ;))

[Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas]

Excellent!


Thanks for the heads up Dr. Rick. Looking forward to this.




Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[Vorkosigan]

I shall alert some other forums.

[Steven Carr]

What happened to the Tresmond-Krueger debate
at http://www.tektonics.org/ Has Tresmond abandoned it?

[Bialar Crais]

This sounds interresting. Good work getting these gentlemen to debate here...

[diana]

Beautiful. Can't wait. Thanks for the heads up.

d

[Theli]

Any ideas when this debate will take place?

[Theli]

It has begun...
http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=47897 (Formal Debate)

[Blake]

Wow. That's a real pretty structure Mr. McHugh has pieced together.

I'd like to know what his definition of "deficiency" is, and also what relevance a Godlike thing has to our world when the thing in question has been defined out of all connection to it, so that none of our language applies to or approaches it. How can a being of whom it is not possible to say anything be worthy of "worship"? Why should it inspire anything except complete indifference?

[beastmaster]

McHugh's sole purpose appears to be to prove that a "perfect being" exists.

So what?

Who cares if there is a "perfect being" if it doesn't love us or judge us or intervene in human lives or deaths?

Is it possible for a perfect being to do any of those things? Don't emotion, thought, and action *entail* a deficiency?

At best, McHugh offers a proof of Platonic Idealism, not a proof of the existence of "God" as understood by any religions.

Edit: OK, I see that McHugh conveniently "defines" God to not be a Platonic form. But McHugh's God is the functional equivalent thereof. McHugh's "God" doesn't do *anything* -- He just sits around being perfect.

[copernicus]

I agree that McHugh's argument is nothing more than repackaged platonism. He begins his debate by saying he can't improve on other unnamed arguments by others. So, while accepting the validity of arguments he weasels out of trying to defend, he embarks on a very convoluted, abstract attempt to defend a version of Anselm's admittedly discredited "argument from perfection" claim. This is not a debate between theism and atheism. It is an attempt to distract us from that debate.

The focus on "logic" is a logically necessary part of McHugh's obfuscation. Logic is nothing more than the manipulation of symbols. Anyone can agree that a logical proof is valid or invalid, given the rules for rearranging the symbols. It is the grounding of those symbols in language that causes the problem. If the symbols are grounded in mistaken or incoherent premises, then one can prove any conclusion at all by logic. Hence, McHugh devotes much effort to his claim that his negatively-defined deity "cannot be parodied". Whenever someone starts to pile up negatives in their statements, put your hand on your wallet.

Is the property of "existence" like other properties that we assign to symbolic predicates? We know what it means for a conclusion to be "logically necessary", but do we know what it means for a hypothetical being to be "logically necessary"? Can existence be a logically necessary property? I accept the logical necessity of my own existence, but what about the existence of a "godlike being"? (Whatever that means.) All I can say about McHugh's twists and turns so far is that logical necessity is the mother of logical invention. ;)

[Theli]

Well, first off... basing a logical argument of that caliber on something as vague and subjective as perfection, that just won't work. And secondly- "without deficiency" is downright impossible.
If X is infinite it lacks an end, and if X is finite it lacks continuity.

And then he completely changed the definition of god by saying that god has no positive attributes. And from what I understand, something must have positive attributes to even be a thing and have a name.
There are colors that are not blue, but there is no such color as "non-blue".
By chosing the definition of god so that he slips through the holes of logic, it's painfully obvious that Chris has invented this god.

And another thing most apologists never ever bother to do-- don't just apply attributes to god, prove their existence. If they are not proven then god is fictional.

I guess we'll just have to wait for Doug's counterargument.

ehh.. here's the real URL for all those too lazy to look the thread up. :)
Formal Debate (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=47897)

[missus_gumby]

I'm probably wrong, or out of order somewhere, but...


1) If God is conceived to be something without deficiency of any kind, then God cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. [This proceeds from the intuition that having the possibility of non-existence is a form of deficiency.]
2) God is conceived to be without deficiency of any kind. [This is from the definition of God as an absolutely perfect being.]
3) God cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. [From 1 and 2]

The above argument may leave one with the suspicion that there is a fallacy involved somewhere. Fortunately, such fears can be allayed by the recognition that this type of argument can be rendered in formal logic so that there is no controversy over its validity.

... doesn't the above work equally well for the Invisible Pink Unicorn? (PBUHHH)

[wiploc]

(1) q -> Nq (Anselm's principle)
(2) Nq v ~Nq (excluded middle)
(3) ~Nq -> N~Nq (Becker's postulate)
(4) Nq v N~Nq (from 2 and 3)
(5) N~Nq -> N~q (from 1)
(6) Nq v N~q (from 4 and 5)
(7) ~N~q (intuitive postulate)
(8) Nq (from 6 and 7)
(9) Nq -> q (modal axiom)
(10) q (from 8 and 9)


It helps me to translate this kind of thing into English. I'm going to do this here in case it also helps other people, and so people can tell me if I get it wrong.

> (1) q -> Nq (Anselm's principle)

- If there is a perfect being then it is logically necessary
- that there is a perfect being.

Comment: we want to be careful not to jump to the
conclusion, based on this, that any being who exists
is a necessary being. Since contingent beings
demonstrably exist, either this is talking about a
different kind of necessity than philosophers usually
go on about, or it is simply false.


> (2) Nq v ~Nq (excluded middle)

- Either it is logically necessary that there is a perfect
- being, or it is not logically necessary that there is a
- perfect being.


(3) ~Nq -> N~Nq (Becker's postulate)

- If it is not logically necessary that there
- is a perfect being, then it is logically
- necessary that it is not logically necessary
- that there is a perfect being.

See comment under (1) above. This says
that something must be true because
it is true.


(4) Nq v N~Nq (from 2 and 3)

- Either it is logically necessary that there
- is a perfect being, or it is logically necessary
- that it is not the case that it is logically
- necessary that there is a perfect being.

See comment under (1) above. I'm going to
quit reiterating this comment, but I am suspicious
about the fact that according to this system,
everything that is true is necessarily true. In this
system, any x equals NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNx.
This may turn out to be harmless, depending where
he's going with it.


(5) N~Nq -> N~q (from 1)

- If it is necessarily the case that it is not
- the case that it is necessarily the case
- that a perfect being exists, then it is
- necessarily the case that it is not the
- case that a perfect being exists.

I'm going to try to boil that down some more:

- If god doesn't exist necessarily, then
- he doesn't exist at all.

This does work, so long as we hold it firmly
in mind that contingent being can exist
necessarily, and that anything that does
exist exists necessarily. I think this defines
all the meaning out of the word, "necessary;"
and I think it will lead to tricksy distortions;
but it doesn't seem to me in itself to be a
violation of logic.


(6) Nq v N~q (from 4 and 5)

- Either it is necessarily the case that a
- perfect being exists, or it is necessarily
- the case that it is not the case that a
- perfect being exists.

I think this reduces to, "q v ~q." I think his
peculiar usage of N means this conveys no
more meaning than, "q v ~q."


(7) ~N~q (intuitive postulate)

- It is not the case that it is necessarily the
- case that it is not the case that a perfect
- being exists.

This doesn't follow. If anything that is true
is necessarily true, then if there is no god it is
necessarily true that there is no god.
Therefore, we can't know ~N~q unless we
first know whether q.


(8) Nq (from 6 and 7)

- It is necessarily the case that there is a
- perfect being.

His case: "Either god exists or he doesn't;
therefore he does." This is no stronger
than the opposite case: "Either god exists
or he doesn't; therefore he doesn't." An
argument which is no stronger than it's
own opposite argument is an argument
that has zero weight.


(9) Nq -> q (modal axiom)

- If it is necessarily the case that a perfect
- being exists, then a perfect being exists.

Here, I wonder if there hasn't been a shift
of meaning in the word "necessary." Before,
if something happened to exist, it was
necessary, but now if something is necessary
it must exist. (Maybe I'm expressing a qualm
rather than a sound objection?)


(10) q (from 8 and 9)

- A perfect being exists.

crc

Notes:
where "q" = There is a perfect being, "N" = It is logically necessary that, "~" = It is not the case that, "v" = or, and "p -> q" = p strictly implies q:

[Thomas Metcalf]

I'm really surprised he's attempting to use an ontological argument, and I really don't think he'll get very far with it.

Here's another pair of negative properties:

(9) Not being strictly identical to the God for Whose existence Chris McHugh is arguing in the present debate.

(10) Not being strictly identical to a being compatible with the existence of the God for Whose existence Chris McHugh is arguing in the present debate.

I don't think these properties have null extensions. That is, there is certainly a possible being who's not identical to McHugh's God, and there's a possible being whose existence is incompatible with McHugh's God. And (9) and (10) don't specify any positive property of the same quality, nor is there a property of the same quality with which it is incompatible, so they satisfy Gale's guidelines.

So McHugh given us the material with which to argue his own God out of existence.



Here's another objection. Negative properties are commonly incompatible with each other, if "non-contingent" is truly a negative property. Try adding "non-necessary" and "non-impossible" to his list; they'll contradict "non-contingent." Or better, the property "non-necessary or non-impossible." (I don't know whether negations of disjunctions are of the same "quality" as negations, but I don't see any reason to think they're not in this case. The disjunctive property may seem to you to entail a particular property and therefore seem to be a positive property -- if so, then which one does it entail?) The fact that this contradicts "non-contingent" suggests to me that "non-contingent" isn't a genuine negative property, based on Gale's criterion ("A property P is negative if and only if there is no property of the same quality as it with which it is incompatible."). Another thing that suggests that to me is that the whole argument turns on "non-contingent" being a negative property, and that's what gives the argument its feel of defining something into existence. Alethic modal status isn't a determining predicate, so I don't think its negation is, either.

Also, try "non-infinite"; I'm not so sure "non-finite" is a negative property, because it seems to specify "infinite," and "infinite" doesn't seem to be a negative property if you think about it. McHugh writes in the notes, "Its complement 'non-finitude' is negative because it only entails terms of the same quality as itself," but we can certainly understand the property of infinitude as a positive property. In fact, it entails "immeasurable in theory" or something similar.


Finally, it's rather a large bullet to bite to say that "God is non-good" and "God is not the creator of the universe" and "God is not omnipotent" are true, or even that they might be true. I think this is a place where his argument really starts to sound dubious.

[wiploc]

The following is a list of properties that are logically guaranteed to be conceptually compatible with each other because of their negativity:

We could add these to the list:
non-photogenic,
not anything like the Christian god,
non-independent,
non-supernatural,
non-infinite.

If he'll agree that these are negative, then doesn't he have to agree that his system proves the existence of a god with these characteristics?

Or how about this one: non-existent. Doesn't his system prove that his god can be (is compatible with) non-existence?
crc

[Silent Dave]

I see that McHugh anticipates the objection that I would have made:


Another objection is that one can imagine a possible world in which a Godlike being does not exist, and therefore it must be the case that the existence of such an entity is not logically necessary. But even though it is prima facie imaginable that such a being does not exist, it is not really a coherent thought, for any possible world is subject to all conceptual laws and logical truths. As such, the concept of what it means to be Godlike would be a consistent concept (since it entails only negative properties), and would still imply the denial of contingency as a matter of definitional truth. From these facts, the existence of something Godlike can be deduced using nothing but truths of logic. When one makes the objection that they can conceive of a world without something Godlike, they are ignoring the implications of abstract reasoning, and are not recognizing that the conclusions derived as a matter of conceptual necessity are binding in all possible worlds.


Imagine a possible universe P such that

(1) P is subject to all conceptual laws and logical truths,
(2) the concept in P of what it means to be Godlike is consistent,
(3) the concept in P of what it means to be Godlike implies the denial of contingency as a matter of definitional truth, and
(4) a Godlike being does not exist in P.

How is P incoherent? McHugh's answer is that (4) is logically impossible given (1)-(3). But would the argument that shows this be identical to McHugh's argument? If so, then McHugh's response begs the question, for P's argument would be sound if and only if McHugh's argument is sound, which is exactly what is at issue. If the arguments are not identical, then McHugh must tell us what P's argument is so that we may determine whether it is successful. He has not done this -- nor, judging from his opening statement, does he ever intend to. Either way, McHugh's response fails.


Dave

[Silent Dave]

Another problem with McHugh's argument is that the concept of a godlike being not being deficient in any sense, while necessary if the exclusivity of negative criteria is to be maintained, is problematic to the point of lethality (is that a word?). Although the properties of a Godlike being may be necessarily compatible with each other due to their negativity, this is no guarantee that each of the properties is indivudally coherent. With respect to the property of not being deficient in any sense, one can make any number of cases for incoherence. For example:

(1)To exist is to exist as something, and not as something else.
(2)Thus, to exist is to be limited.
(3)To be limited is to be, in a sense, deficient.
(4)Thus, to exist is to be, in a sense, deficient.
(5)Thus, a being that is not in any sense deficient cannot exist.
(6)Thus, a Godlike being cannot exist.
(7)Thus, there is not a possible world in which in a Godlike being exists.

Note that this objection does not assume that existence is a property, nor does it assume a rigid positive concept of perfection on the part of the GLB.


Before closing down for the time being, let me consider a parody.

Definition: Something is Godlike* if and only if it contains properties 1-8 EXCEPT PROPERTY 7 (non-finitude).

If McHugh's logic is sound, then a such a being is metaphysically possible, and thus necessarily exists (due to property 1). Yet, according to McHugh's definition, this being is not Godlike since it does not possess, at minimum, 1-8. It is therefore not identical to the being that McHugh is arguing for. The only solution can be that GLB and GL*B both exist in all possible universes (they cannot be the same entity -- one is Godlike, the other is not).

This logic can be applied a number of times, by removing any property or set of properties save property (1). The only solution is that all such beings exist in all possible universes. Although McHugh can still maintain the soundness of his argument, he would have to accept something like polytheism in order to be consistent. Somehow I don't see that happening . . .


Dave

[Silent Dave]

I keep thinking about this argument and having fun with it in my mind. Two additional points have occured to me. First, one could argue for the necessary nonexistence of the GLB from its possible nonexistence, and then write the following:

"Another objection is that one can imagine a possible world in which a Godlike being does exist, and therefore it must be the case that the existence of such an entity is logically necessary. But even though it is prima facie imaginable that such a being does exist, it is not really a coherent thought, for any possible world is subject to all conceptual laws and logical truths. As such, the concept of what it means to be a world without a Godlike being would be a consistent concept (since it entails only negative properties), and a Godlike being would still imply the denial of contingency as a matter of definitional truth. From these facts, the necessary nonexistence of something Godlike can be deduced using nothing but truths of logic. When one makes the objection that they can conceive of a world with something Godlike, they are ignoring the implications of abstract reasoning, and are not recognizing that the conclusions derived as a matter of conceptual necessity are binding in all possible worlds. "

The only reason the intial paragraph was phrased the other way around in the first place was because McHugh happened to be arguing for theism. The only difference is that, whereas McHugh derives the existence of a possible world with a GLB from the conceptual coherence of its definition, I derive the existence of a possible world without a GLB (call it W) from the conceptual coherence of its own definition -- W is defined as having, at minimum, the essential property of not being capable of supporting the existence of a GLB. W only becomes incoherent when McHugh's argument is taken into consideration. But then, the GLB becomes incoherent when MY argument is taken into consideration -- it cannot have the properties it does and not exist in W.

Perhaps later I'll form a formal and complete counterargument based on W, but for now let me just state my second point: if instead of "Godlike being" the person making the argument called the argued-for entity something that makes no reference to theism -- The Righteous Dude, or The Mysterious Mr. Blue, or El Supremo Asshole -- what basis would there be for calling the argument a refutation of atheism?


Dave

[Clivedurdle]

I was taught in mathematics to be very careful when infinities and zero occur in equations - the same I assume applies to logical arguments.

There is a reason that science is based on observation - you have to attempt to ground thinking somewhere - imaginary worlds and beings with hypothetical abilities do not help this process.

By the way, I am a Cretan and all Cretans are liars.

[Silent Dave]

Okay, I'm back. McHugh admits that the argument can be parodied by adding additional negative properties such as not-good or not-powerful. He maintains that this doesn't pose a problem for the theist because "the divine essence is believed to transcend all our positive concepts." In other words, God isn't good . . . he's SUPER good! Meta-good! Uber-good! Beyond-the-ken-of-mortals-good! Good in a way we can't possibly understand.

It's interesting that McHugh uses the same simplistic wording that he says sophisticated theologians are complaining about in order to prove his point. If we take what the sophisticants are saying to heart, we can make the parody a problem for the theist, simply by watching our wording (please check my work for null extensions and the like):

(9) not being good in any sense of the word

(10) not being something that is analogical to good

(11) not being anything that renders it worthy of worship by any sentient being

(12) not being capable of interaction with the natural universe

(13) not being conscious in any sense of the word, or anything analogous to conscious

(14) not being knowledgable in any sense of the word, or anything analogous to knowledgable

Or, if you want to cut right to the chase . . .

(15) not having anything whatsoever in common with the God of theism other than properties 1-8.

I'm sure these can be improved upon, but you get the idea. The only question that remains is, how many of the Godlike(*) beings can exist? Presumably an infinite number, since they take up no space. :D But we can make a case for inconsistency: McHugh is a Christian apologist, and hence a monotheist; he is forced by his own logic, however, to accept the existence of all conceptually coherent Godlike(*) beings imaginable. In order to be consistent, therefore, he must abandon Christianity and become a polytheist -- and I will stake my entire Star Trek collection that he won't do that. His only alternative, however, is to arbitrarily declare that only a being with ONLY definitional properties 1-8 qualifies for theistic godhood. Aside from special pleading, at least insofar as the theism/atheism debate is concerned, McHugh would still have to deal with all those little Godlets running around.

Perhaps we should simply rethink our assumptions regarding negative properties, conceptual coherency, metaphysical possibility, etc.


Dave

[vtran31]

If they are not proven then god is fictional.

Do you mena if sometihng is not proven it is fictional? Did I misunderstand? Becuase if you mean that, then gravity didn't exist until it was proven

[Vorkosigan]

Must a perfect being be good? The reasoning behind that one escapes me.

[Harrumphrey]

1) If God is conceived to be something without deficiency of any kind, then God cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. [This proceeds from the intuition that having the possibility of non-existence is a form of deficiency.]
2) God is conceived to be without deficiency of any kind. [This is from the definition of God as an absolutely perfect being.]
3) God cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. [From 1 and 2]

I admit that I haven't gotten much further than the above passage, so my points may well be moot. Nevertheless, the above "syllogism" is so circular and fraught with semantic problems that it seems pointless to include in a debate at all.

Just play the old switcheroo. Substitute another word for "god" to see if it works. "If Peter Cottontail is conceived to be something without deficiency of any kind..."

In other words, CAN it be conceived so? The entire case rests on that all-important "if". I might as well say that if my grandmother had balls, she'd be my grandfather.

I think you guys have already covered the problems of "deficiency" and "perfect" etc.

And this is supposed to be a "formal" debate? Sheesh...

[Dr. Retard]

About 3 or 4 years ago, I read McHugh's argument on GODEXIST and had some truly awesome objections. I can't remember them now.

In any case, this 'negative terms' business needs to be explained further. Take the properties named by 'being even' and 'being odd'. Which one is negative? Beats me. Take the properties named by 'being contingent' and 'being necessary'. Which one is negative? Beats me. Do all pairs of 'opposites' have one negative member? Beats me.

Gale's second criterion entails that, where you have two incompatible properties 'of the same quality', then neither property can be negative. Like red and blue. They're incompatible, and they're 'of the same quality', so neither is negative. Now take necessity and contingency. They look to be 'of the same quality' to me. They're incompatible with each other. So neither is negative. Specifically, 'non-contingency' cannot be negative, as McHugh needs. Surely he's thought of this. So does he think that necessity and contingency are not 'of the same quality'? If so, why? What counts as being 'of the same quality'?

My inner positivist revolts at all this.

[Theli]

Does Krueger not care to grace us with his presence?
It seems to become the shortest debate in history.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Let me try actually to diagnose McHugh's problem (well, the problem with his argument) instead of just parodying it by adding extra negative properties like "not compatible with the existence of the God for Whose existence McHugh is arguing in the present debate."

I think with contingent beings, the only way for them to be impossible is for them to have contradictory attributes. So a contingent being defined only in negative properties might be guaranteed to be possible. But when you're talking about necessary beings, all that has to obtain for them to be impossible is for them not to exist in one possible world. That's a lot easier to secure than incoherence. God is impossible (if He doesn't exist), not because He's self-contradictory, but because there's a possible world in which He does not exist.

Does that seem to get at the real problem with McHugh's argument? I'm not satisfied with mere parodies of ontological arguments anymore.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Dr. Retard :

About 3 or 4 years ago, I read McHugh's argument on GODEXIST and had some truly awesome objections. I can't remember them now.

I was surprised to see it appear again. I wonder if he considers it refined enough to deploy now, or simply that Krueger isn't of the intellectual caliber of the GODEXIST posters, or something.

Now take necessity and contingency. They look to be 'of the same quality' to me. They're incompatible with each other. So neither is negative. Specifically, 'non-contingency' cannot be negative, as McHugh needs.

I understand how neither necessity nor contingency can be negative. But why would that entail that "non-contingency" can't be negative? Maybe because "non-contingency" isn't compatible with "non-necessity-or-impossibility"?

Also, I don't know anything about the mystical turn McHugh employs to get away from some parodies. Is he really just admitting that "God is not good," "God is not powerful," "God is not just," and the like, are true? I think most people, atheists and theists alike, would accept the truth of "If God exists, God is powerful."

[Clutch]

(1) q -> Nq (Anselm's principle)
(2) Nq v ~Nq (excluded middle)
(3) ~Nq -> N~Nq (Becker's postulate)
(4) Nq v N~Nq (from 2 and 3)
(5) N~Nq -> N~q (from 1)
(6) Nq v N~q (from 4 and 5)
(7) ~N~q (intuitive postulate)
(8) Nq (from 6 and 7)
(9) Nq -> q (modal axiom)
(10) q (from 8 and 9) Yuck. (7) is "intuitive" in a purely epistemic sense. That is, it attempts to elicit the intuition that it's "epistemically possible" for there to be a god.

But the other axioms used here do not apply to epistemic modality. Eg, Becker's postulate does not hold for epistemic necessity, nor, obviously, does the modal axiom (9).

Simple equivocation.

[Dr. Retard]

Originally posted by Thomas Metcalf
I understand how neither necessity nor contingency can be negative. But why would that entail that "non-contingency" can't be negative? Maybe because "non-contingency" isn't compatible with "non-necessity-or-impossibility"?[/B]

I thought "necessity" and "non-contingency" were perfectly identical. Contingency is just "existing in one world, not existing in another world" and necessity is "existing in all worlds, or no worlds".

But I looked again, and McHugh has necessity as "existing in all worlds" and non-contingency as "existing in all worlds, or no worlds". The same argument applies, mutatis mutandis, to contingency and non-contingency. Both properties look to be 'of the same quality' and they're incompatible. So which one gets to be negative? Looks like an arbitrary choice on McHugh's part. (He happened to apply "non-" to one of them, but it could have gone the other way just as easily)

[Ernest Sparks]

While searching around for this 'Becker's Postulate', I found this page:

The Ontological Argument Peter Suber,Philosophy Department, Earlham College
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/courses/re/onto-arg.htm#RuleC

notice these bits:

"NB: there is no standard modal logic"

"...Becker's postulate is not innocuous"

"Then Becker's logic alone could give us for any proposition, q, the crucial premise, q *THEN* *NECESSARILY* q. Then any proposition could be proved by an ontological argument. For this reason, the modal logician, Arthur Prior, has said: "Modal logic is haunted by the myth that whatever exists exists necessarily."

{edit-just a little more}

"It ain't necessarily so, then necessarily it ain't necessarily so."
huh?
I would think that if it ain't necessarily so, it might still be actually so.

[Ernest Sparks]

{try again!}

given: It ain't necessarily so.

If it possibly-ain't ain't-necessarily-so, then it possibly is necessarily so.

Does that lead to- It's necessarily so? (That's what is needed to contradict the given.)

[Jobar]

Whew! Heavy plowing, there.

Some initial thoughts- can we substitute 'fiction' for 'God' throughout his argument, without changing the logic?

All his attempts (indeed, all attempts) to define God are of necessity intensional; being that there is no physical entity which can be pointed to, the concept must be explained using words only. I've always felt that concepts can be defined intensionally, but that entities- and to be existent, God must be an entity rather than a concept, I'd say- must be defined extensionally. We must be able to shut up and point to it.

As copernicus states:
The focus on "logic" is a logically necessary part of McHugh's obfuscation. Logic is nothing more than the manipulation of symbols. Anyone can agree that a logical proof is valid or invalid, given the rules for rearranging the symbols. It is the grounding of those symbols in language that causes the problem. If the symbols are grounded in mistaken or incoherent premises, then one can prove any conclusion at all by logic. Hence, McHugh devotes much effort to his claim that his negatively-defined deity "cannot be parodied". Whenever someone starts to pile up negatives in their statements, put your hand on your wallet.

I would say that the problem is grounding symbols in reality rather than in language; we can conceive of fictional languages which have no earthly connections, just as McHugh conceives of God, without being illogical. But I completely agree with copernicus that all the logic in the world is useless at proving something existent or nonexistent. And McHugh is providing no extensional definitions. All his attempts move higher up the ladder of abstraction, instead of downward to the earth.

[Jobar]

McHugh is attempting to palm an ace here; I've seen this trick tried before.

It seems that there is no way to escape the conclusion of such a parody, for it functions on exactly the same principles as the proof that attempts to parallel. But, despite its success, the parody fails to pose a problem for the theist because its conclusion is perfectly consonant with the traditional apophatic way of conceiving God (which is the preference of mystics). Many theologians (of the Christian tradition and others) deny literal interpretation of predicates such as "goodness," "power," and whatnot of God. They do this not to imply that God is evil or weak, but because the divine essence is believed to transcend all of our positive concepts. The positive terms normally predicated of God, like goodness and power, are considered analogical; they approach the essence of God, but can never reach it adequately. In such a context, the non-deficiency of God is said to surpass all positive interpretations of “perfection.” The denial of positive predicates, like “goodness” is done in order to purify the concept of God from any deficiency that would be entailed by our limited positive understanding of goodness. The non-goodness of God does not imply that God is evil or neutral, but merely that our limited notion of goodness is too frail to be literally predicated of God. This negative understanding of the divine nature seems to present us with a deity that is eminently more worthy of worship than is a being the essence of which can be encapsulated in one of our empirically derived positive concepts.

He's trying to use pantheistic arguments for a transcendental God. I shot down Albert Cipriani for this; in this thread. (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=32719&perpage=25&pagenumber=2)

[Silent Dave]

Originally posted by Theli
Does Krueger not care to grace us with his presence?
It seems to become the shortest debate in history.

He's probably just waiting for us to deconstruct McHugh's argument to the point where he would feel silly defending it. ;)

Well, probably not. Given that this is (and, IIRC, has been for many years) McHugh's crown jewel argument, and he has given himself nothing else to defend in this debate, he has no choice but to avoid, at all costs and at all times, giving the impression that his argument is anything but sound. Of course, one could argue that Krueger, being an atheist, also has a vested interest in appearing confident in his arguments regardless of their actual soundness. But while Krueger has a wide range if philosophical thought to draw from so that he has a good chance of finding arguments that probably ARE sound, rather than just appearing sound, McHugh has painted himself into a corner. I refrain from speculating why. But I agree with the person that said that McHugh is not participating in the greater theism vs. atheism debate, but trying to distract us from it.


Dave

[copernicus]

Thanks for your comment, Silent Dave. That was my remark. I have been enjoying the commentary here on McHugh's argument, but I have to admit that I am sorely disappointed. McHugh has defined the debate on a very narrow point--a variation of Anselm's 11th century argument. I simply can't believe that one can reduce the theism/atheism debate to such a narrow ontological nitpick. There is the larger issue of what theism is all about and why one would choose to accept or reject it. I do not approach the debate from the perspective of logical proof. Rather, I see it as a question of plausibility.

Given the limitations of the human lifespans, why should people choose theism over atheism, or vice versa? Clearly, none of us have any special knowledge of what life is all about. We are all mortal, and we can only "know" what we discover during our short existences. So why are most people religious? What is so important about believing in god(s)? Why would someone choose to reject belief in deities? Does the concept of "God" make sense? These are the issues that one would expect to encounter in a debate between theists and atheists. Instead, we get a very sterile, narrow definition of the "deity", and all of the interesting questions are by-passed.

I am willing to be patient for Krueger's response. I just hope that he does not fall for the debater's trap of letting the first speech define the scope of the debate. If this debate is to be confined to McHugh's definition of "God", then it should be entitled "Resolved: God is a Logical Necessity". Such a debate would not attract a very wide audience (deservedly so, IMHO), but it would be more honest. On the other hand, if this is to be a debate about "Theism vs. Atheism", then it should be opened up to the larger, and more interesting, questions. So I think that we should give Krueger some space to reason out his response. My only comment (from the Peanut Gallery) is that he broaden the issues to make it more interesting.

[Ernest Sparks]

If this debate follows good form, Krueger will make an opening statement that argues a solid atheist position (e.g. some version of the incoherence of the God concept) or argues an agnostic position (e.g. the issue of God is not effectively decidable) and follow it with an argument toward the greater efficency or honesty of an atheist position. The rebuttals will come in the subsequent rounds.
But, we just have to wait and see what actually happens.

[Jobar]

I've often thought that an excellent opening statement in defense of strong atheism could be structured around bd-from-kg's post here. (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&postid=809099#post809099) Indeed, that whole (admittedly long and a bit wandering) thread is well worth mining for some extraordinarily strong atheistic arguments.

[Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas]

Gang,

First of all. I have to say I find McHugh's opening statement hilarious. In one fell swoop he levels a blunt commentary on the shortsightedness of the debate topic 'Theism vs Atheism' and at the same time reduces this debate down to what really matters...whether or not God exists.

Come on guys. It's not as if atheism has a better country club while theism has better parking and we need to discuss the pros and cons of each. No. If atheism is right. Theism is wrong. If theism is right. Atheism is wrong. There is no middle ground or 'Well, atheism is true, but I happen to favor those theist chaps...think I'll sign up at their frat house.'

In short he is saying "Atheism vs theism??? Fine. Atheism is false. I win."

<end of rant>



Ok with that out of my system. I have got to say...I have absolutely no freaking idea what McHugh is talking about. This seems to me the worst proof of God's existence in the entire history of man. And that's saying a lot. This is why I have always stayed away from it and as result know nothing about it.


I just don't get it. It seems that this 'proof' of God is based entirely on claiming that an attribute of 'perfect' is 'must exist'. Is this right? Why don't atheists simply not accept this premise? End of story. Time for ice cream.

Anyway can somebody please explain in unbiased terms an outline of this basic argument.


Thanks a bunch.





Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[Silent Dave]

Well, I suppose that there is no non-arbitrary reason to suppose that necessity is more perfect than contingency, but I submit that that is the least of McHugh's problems.

Here's a quick statement of the argument, which is about as unbiased as I can make it at just this moment:

(1) If God is logically possible, then God is logically necessary (from the definition of God).
(2) God is logically possible (from the definition of God).
(3) Therefore, God is logically necessary (from 1 and 2).

Oh, and atheism actually has better parking. ;)


Dave

[copernicus]

I don't think that there is any argument to support the notion that perfection entails existence. Perfection only makes sense with respect to what linguists call "gradable modifiers" or semantic predicates. (See http://www.ucl.ac.uk/internet-grammar/adjectiv/adjectiv.htm for a tutorial on the semantics of adjectives. Most adjectives represent gradable predicates.) One must be able to describe the quality of the adjective in terms of degrees on a scale, where "perfection" refers to the extremity of the scale.

The existence property is binary, not scalar. There are no degrees of existence. Something either exists or it doesn't. (I suppose that one could get nitpicky about this from the perspective of quantum physics, but that has nothing to do with the scalar semantics that I am referring to here.) The problem with the predicate "exists" is that it just doesn't make sense to talk about it as a perfectible attribute. The scholastics were famous for their descent into sophistry, and McHugh fits in "perfectly" with their tradition, if you take my meaning. ;)

[Theli]

In short, he tries to prove god's existence by defining god as "existant", without even bothering to prove that god actually has that quality. I'm suprised that he didn't see that fallacy himself as he seems to know his way around philosophy.

And Krueger has still not shown up?

If Krueger showed up today and wrote his reply, mcHugh might already have abandoned the thread.

Too bad. :(

[Jobar]

I've been noticing McHugh coming here to EoG several times in the past days. Mr. McHugh, I am not aware of what is taking him so long, but one of the major advantages of debate in a written forum like this one is that there is ample time for thought and careful writing. I am willing to wait as much as a month before I become impatient; if for any reason you cannot wait that long, or if you wish us to, we will see if it is possible to poke up Mr. Krueger a bit. You may send a private message to any of the moderators or administrators of II; I understand that you would not wish to post here, given the circumstances.

And, I hope that you are finding our amateur theologizing (a-theologizing?) interesting. Jobar.

[wiploc]

Originally posted by copernicus
I don't think that there is any argument to support the notion that perfection entails existence.

And we can give examples: Jehovah, for instance, is definitely better non-existent than he would be existent. :)
crc

[Dr. Retard]

Another attempt at an unbiased simplication of the argument:

(1) God is defined in terms of negative properties alone.
(2) Negative properties cannot contradict each other.
(3) Therefore, God's definition is not self-contradictory.
(4) Therefore, God's existence is possible.
(5) If God's existence is possible, then God's existence is necessary and actual.
(6) So God exists.

One interesting question I thought of last night. Assume and agree with McHugh that negative properties cannot contradict each other; does it follow that an entity defined purely in terms of negative properties is indeed not self-contradictory? I think not. Maybe there's a lurking incoherence in any 'purely negative concept'. In other words, maybe every concept needs at least one positive property.

[Dr. Retard]

Ack, simplification.

[Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas]

Dr. Retard,
Originally posted by Dr. Retard
Another attempt at an unbiased simplication of the argument:

(1) God is defined in terms of negative properties alone.


I don't think God thinks of Himself in terms of negative properties...

Exodus 3:14
And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM...


Originally posted by Dr. Retard

(2) Negative properties cannot contradict each other.
(3) Therefore, God's definition is not self-contradictory.
(4) Therefore, God's existence is possible.
(5) If God's existence is possible, then God's existence is necessary and actual.
(6) So God exists.

One interesting question I thought of last night. Assume and agree with McHugh that negative properties cannot contradict each other; does it follow that an entity defined purely in terms of negative properties is indeed not self-contradictory? I think not. Maybe there's a lurking incoherence in any 'purely negative concept'. In other words, maybe every concept needs at least one positive property.

It seems like someone (God included) can simply reject premise 1. Or is 1 saying God can be defined in only negative properties.

Also...why it do we assume that if it's possible for something to exist than it does exist?



Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[Keith Russell]

Isn't McHugh's entire argument simply a version of the 'proof of God' that, if one can imagine a perfectly perfect being, then such a being must exist?

I never understood why anyone would believe imagination to be so powerful.

Keith.

[Secular Pinoy]

Doug Krueger just posted!

Not at the formal debate though, he's at the bugs forum testing his account. Hehehehe... :D

[theIPU]

Originally posted by missus_gumby
I'm probably wrong, or out of order somewhere, but...



... doesn't the above work equally well for the Invisible Pink Unicorn? (PBUHHH)

It always does...... :)

[Dr. Retard]

Originally posted by Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas
Or is 1 saying God can be defined in only negative properties.

It's saying "God (as defined by McHugh) is defined..." He could just as well have called it 'Schmod'. Or 'Gary'. If he successfully proves its existence, then that's a startling accomplishment, one that theists and atheists ought to be interested in.

Also...why it do we assume that if it's possible for something to exist than it does exist?

Because God is a necessary being, and with necessary beings, possibility implies necessity implies actuality. It's a straightforward consequence of everyday modal concepts. This is the upshot of the 'modal ontological argument' of Hartshorne, Malcolm, and Plantinga. The usual response is to deny the possibility of such a weird being. McHugh's 'contribution' is a supporting argument for this controversial possibility -- the 'negative properties' argument.

[Thomas Metcalf]

I think this is the real problem with the argument.

A possible world is a consistent maximal proposition. It's consistent because no two conjuncts contradict each other -- that is, P won't appear with -P -- and it's maximal because for any proposition Q, the consistent maximal proposition must entail Q or -Q.

So if God is self-contradictory, then any possible world that contains God is inconsistent, and therefore there is no possible world in which God exists, and therefore, God is impossible. That's one direction of a biconditional: If God is self-contradictory, then God is impossible.

Here's the other direction of a biconditional: If God is impossible, then God is self-contradictory. Now, for McHugh's argument to work, he has to demonstrate the truth of this conditional, so he can take the contrapositive if God is not self-contradictory, then God is possible. (I'll grant if God is defined only with negative properties, then He is not self-contradictory; the proposition is analytically true, as far as I can tell.) But I really don't think the truth of that conditional is obvious when God is defined as a non-contingent being.

If God is non-contingent, then He's necessary or impossible. And so the only way for Him to exist is if He's a necessary being. But I don't think if God is impossible, then God is self-contradictory works for necessary beings. For a necessary being to be impossible, there just has to be a possible world in which it doesn't exist. And that seems quite, well, possible.

So I guess I deny that if God is impossible, then God is self-contradictory. It's only clear that such a proposition is true for contingent beings. For non-contingent beings, there are different ways for them to be impossible.





I think I can also consistently say that alethic modal status isn't a determining predicate. (This might be the same sort of problem.) Being necessary or contingent or impossible isn't a "real" part of a being's definition. We can't define "nunicorns" as "necessary unicorns," for example. And second, we don't figure out whether things exist if we've already discovered their alethic modal status as non-contingent; otherwise, we already know we're doomed to failure (if they're necessary) -- or we don't even have to try to figure out whether they exist, because they already do -- so either way, we'd already know we were wasting our time. Only with contingent beings does it make sense to argue for their existence.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Dr. Retard :

One interesting question I thought of last night. Assume and agree with McHugh that negative properties cannot contradict each other; does it follow that an entity defined purely in terms of negative properties is indeed not self-contradictory? I think not. Maybe there's a lurking incoherence in any 'purely negative concept'. In other words, maybe every concept needs at least one positive property.

I was thinking along similar lines, although not that maybe every concept needs a positive property. I was thinking not that such an entity might be self-contradictory, but that a non-self-contradictory entity might nonetheless be impossible. That is, I accept "if self-contradictory, then impossible" but not the converse, especially when it comes to beings such that if they exist, they're necessary. All we really need for a would-be necessary being to be impossible is that it fails to exist in one possible world. So it's a lot easier for a would-be-necessary being to be impossible than it is for a would-be-contingent being.

(If talking of defined-to-be-necessary persons being possible or impossible even makes sense. I doubt that alethic modal status is a determining predicate.)

[Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas]

Dr. Retard,
Originally posted by Dr. Retard

Because God is a necessary being, and with necessary beings
What is a 'necessary being' and why is God one?


Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[Jamie_L]

FYI: Krueger's opening post is up.

Jamie

[beastmaster]

I think this debate is off to a problematic start because both participants have offered non-identical definitions of God. It seems to me that the theist should enjoy the privilege of defining God and the atheist should define atheism. Otherwise you end up crucifying strawmen.

McHugh's definition of god:

(1) Non-contingency
(2) Non-dependency
(3) Not being subject to contingent laws
(4) Not being natural
(5) Not being a logical law, a number, a mathematical truth, a Platonic form or some other abstraction
(6) Not being spatiotemporal
(7) Non-finitude
(8) Not being deficient in any sense
Krueger's definition:

(1) omnipotent (all-powerful),
(2) omniscient (all-knowing),
(3) omnibenevolent (all-good),
(4) transcendent (outside of space and time),
(5) omnipresent (present everywhere),
(6) who created the world, and
(7) who rules the world (that is, the being interacts with the world by desiring to have the people in it behave in certain ways or believe certain things—this is to distinguish this view from deism, for example, which would be the same as theism except for the omission of the last characteristic on this list).
McHugh's #6 and Krueger's #4 are the same. Arguably, Krueger's #6 follows from McHugh's #1 and 3. Otherwise, there are important differences.

DIFFERENCE #1: Krueger adds #7 to the definition in order to pull deism into the world of atheism. But that seems to capture a lot of ground from McHugh through a definitional sleight-of-hand. Who says deism is not a form of theism? McHugh seems to think the deists are on *his* side. (In fact, an earlier post of mine argued that McHugh was arguing for the functional equivalent of a Platonic form, and not a true God).

DIFFERENCE #2: Krueger defines God as being omniscient and omnibenevolent as a set-up to his argument from incoherency.

But McHugh will simply claim that God is *neither* omniscient nor omnibenevolent; rather, for McHugh, God is free of deficiency, ergo free of any contradiction.

I'm not saying that McHugh has a good argument, but it seems that Krueger has expended quite a lot of effort arguing against a bogeyman.

[Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas]

Gang,

Yikes.


I am really trying to be unbiased here guys...but Krueger didn't even mention McHugh's opening statement.

????

Or even address arguments for God of the nature of McHugh's argument.



Also I thought the Incoherent Attributes excercise was only for goths in high school. I didn't really think mature atheists brought this up in actual formal debate.



My 02


Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas

[Bill Snedden]

Originally posted by Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas
I am really trying to be unbiased here guys...but Krueger didn't even mention McHugh's opening statement.

Actually, in many structured debates, each side presents its own independent argument. The following rebuttals are where each side will attempt to attack the opposing side's argument.

Originally posted by Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas
I thought the Incoherent Attributes excercise was only for goths in high school. I didn't really think mature atheists brought this up in actual formal debate.

Well, the Logical PoE isn't really dead, just sorely wounded... :D

It was somewhat interesting to me to see the disparate nature of the opening arguments. McHugh has presented something quite novel and, to my eyes, interesting (if less than completely successful ;)). Krueger has presented...well...some of the "good old standards". Not that there's anything wrong with that, but there's certainly a difference in approach.

It does seem clear that while Krueger is attacking the god of traditional theism, McHugh is defending something more akin to a "philosopher's god", or the god of panentheism.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

[Thomas Metcalf]

1. The Argument from the Presumption of Atheism

I'm not too impressed with this one. It just doesn't seem necessary to presume that God doesn't exist in absence of evidence for Him. Why not just retain unbelief? Why add unnecessary beliefs?

2. The Incoherent Attributes Argument

This one's a lot better, but I have a few problems. I think it's pretty weak to talking about the knowledge of what it feels like to do certain things; I have my doubts that this sort of knowledge really exists. That is, I doubt the existence of some qualia. And it doesn't seem too much of a concession for the theist to say that God has all propositional knowledge, but not all phenomenal knowledge; after all, it's impossible to have all phenomenal knowledge (Krueger's "knowledge by direct acquaintance") because no omniscient can know what it feels like to be a non-omniscient being. Further, no one can know what it feels like to be identical to my uncle Jon and also what it feels like to be non-identical to my uncle Jon.

He also confuses an incompatibility in his presentation of the omnipotence/omniscience incoherence. What he describes is actually an omniscience/omniscience incoherence (which suggests again to me that it's impossible to have all phenomenal knowledge). An omnipotence/omniscience incompatibility is that God does not have the power to learn or to forget.

3. The Argument from Suffering/Evil

I don't think he presents the strongest version of the argument here. I like Drange's decision to put all the weight in the first premise so the second premise becomes analytically true, like this:

A) If God exists, then there is less suffering than there is now.
B) But there isn't less suffering than there is now.
C) Therefore, God doesn't exist.

I also think Krueger should have provided some more pre-emptive response to theodicies. He should have mentioned that any theodicy must explain how the suffering is necessary for some good, and how God couldn't have accomplished the good some other way.

4. The Argument from Nonbelief

I think the weak point here is premise 4. That God wants something to happen doesn't entail that God will attempt to make it happen. But I think Krueger is correct that we can come to believe in persons without a violation of our free will. I think the only real response to ANB (as to AE) is an unknown purpose defense, that for some reason, it's better if we believe on less evidence than God could provide. But I have no reason to believe that.




In general, McHugh looks a little more like a professional philosopher, but Krueger seems to have a fairly wide knowledge of the important arguments here. I think Krueger has the distinct advantage in that McHugh has chosen only to present one argument, and a very unpopular argument at that. But I hope McHugh can't bog Krueger down too much in the dialectic surrounding the arguments, and I hope he doesn't make the "mystic" move and try to say that God isn't omnipotent or omniscient, just non-limited in knowledge and non-limited in power. I would hate to see the two diverge into talking about two different gods, but I think most people will be able to see that Krueger's God is closer to the God of the apologists. I'm just worrying with beastmaster and Bill Snedden that their gods are too different.

But I think both of them could be more representative of the currently important arguments in philosophy of religion. In McHugh's place, I would have added the supplement of a sophisticated probabilistic finetuning argument and maybe a sophisticated third-stage cosmological argument. In Krueger's place, I would have concentrated on a couple of really defensible incompatibilities, like omnipotence vs. moral perfection and maybe try to strengthen the idea that God needs to have maximal phenomenal knowledge. And I would have presented a better argument from suffering.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Satan Oscillate My Metallic Sonatas :

I am really trying to be unbiased here guys...but Krueger didn't even mention McHugh's opening statement.[Emphasis original.]

He was presenting opening statements of his own. So he didn't respond to McHugh yet. Otherwise, it would be unfair to McHugh, because each gets the same amount of posts.

Or even address arguments for God of the nature of McHugh's argument. [Emphasis original.]

I'm worried about that. I have a feeling there should have been a baseline definition of God in the beginning before the debators started to make their cases. There's a real danger that McHugh will go off in his own direction with that rather unpopular view of God, and make the debate itself rather unrepresentative of the current debate within philosophy of religion.

Also I thought the Incoherent Attributes excercise was only for goths in high school. I didn't really think mature atheists brought this up in actual formal debate.

Oh, not at all. Are you thinking of the logical problem of evil? Incompatible properties arguments are fairly powerful. See Morriston's recent paper in Religious Studies about omnipotence and necessary moral perfection. It's in one of the 2002 issues I think.

[Silent Acorns]

My problem with McHugh's argument is that he defines God as a being that possesses only negative properties and then claims that this proves its existence. In other words, God has the property of existence. But surely the property of existence is a positive property, so his proof falls apart because:

1) the only resaon we are sure that god is possible is that he has no self-contradictory properties
2) the only reason we are sure that god has no self-contradictiry properties is that it has no positive properties
3) but god would then have the positive property of existence
4) therefore god has at least one positive property
5) therefore god might be self-contradictory
6) therefore god might be impossible
7) therefore god might not exist

So, in the end McHugh's argument leads to nothing more than "god might exist", which makes for a pretty lame proof.

[Bill Snedden]

Originally posted by Thomas Metcalf
Are you thinking of the logical problem of evil? Incompatible properties arguments are fairly powerful. See Morriston's recent paper in Religious Studies about omnipotence and necessary moral perfection. It's in one of the 2002 issues I think.

Actually, when SOMMS posted that, it was immediately that to which I thought he was referring. I thought that the LPoE was generally regarded as weak with the Evidential "flavor" as much stronger. Indeed, Drange's formulation seems very much of this sort (attacking so-called "inscrutable" evil).

Or perhaps your reply is acknowledging this but stressing that there are other, stronger, versions of incompatible properties arguments that attack other properties?

Regards,

Bill Snedden

P.S. tangentially related, but have you read The Evidential Argument from Evil (http://www.secweb.org/bookstore/bookdetail.asp?BookID=56)? I bought it last year but haven't had a chance to check it out yet.

[Bill Snedden]

Originally posted by Silent Acorns
But surely the property of existence is a positive property, so his proof falls apart...

I'm not too sure about this, and someone please correct me if I misstate anything, but I don't think that existence is generally held to be a predicate in the same sense as "redness" or any of the other properties McHugh is using. I'm not sure that vitiates your objection, but I think it would tend to mitigate its strength somewhat.

In other words, "existence" isn't really a property that something can have or not have. The instantiation of primary properties determines whether or not something exists, but an object doesn't have "existence" as well as these primary properties in the sense that it might also have these and not exist. I think we tend to ignore this rather fine distinction in ordinary speech, but I think that it's a real one in terms of the sort of metaphysical debate in which we're embroiled.

Of course, I could be on a completely wrong tack. In which case, someone please come to my rescue! :D

Regards,

Bill Snedden

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Bill Snedden :

I thought that the LPoE was generally regarded as weak with the Evidential "flavor" as much stronger.

It is.

Or perhaps your reply is acknowledging this but stressing that there are other, stronger, versions of incompatible properties arguments that attack other properties? [Emphasis original.]

I'm saying there are stronger incompatible-properties arguments, like Morriston's.


P.S. tangentially related, but have you read The Evidential Argument from Evil (http://www.secweb.org/bookstore/bookdetail.asp?BookID=56)? I bought it last year but haven't had a chance to check it out yet.

Actually, no, I haven't. I think I'm probably familiar with the issues inside, but I should pick it up. It would be nice to have that collection of essays.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Bill Snedden :

I'm not too sure about this, and someone please correct me if I misstate anything, but I don't think that existence is generally held to be a predicate in the same sense as "redness" or any of the other properties McHugh is using. I'm not sure that vitiates your objection, but I think it would tend to mitigate its strength somewhat.

Right. Existence isn't a property; existence isn't a determining predicate. We don't define things as existent or not; we define them and then figure out whether they exist. In fact, most of our systems of predicate logic are, well, predicated on the assumption that it doesn't make sense (or at least isn't useful) to think of existence as a determining predicate. Kant used this discovery to present two objections to the Cartesian ontological argument in Critique of Pure Reason.

There's an alternative way to formulate first-order predicate logic with existence as a property, if we replace the existential quantifier with a "particular" quantifier. Then instead of saying "there exists some object x such that x has property F," we'd say "for some of the objects x in the domain, x have property F and have property E," where E is existence. This would mirror the "universal" quantifier better, as well as mirroring the distinction between necessary and contingent beings when we're talking about possible worlds. This is an attractive formulation of first-order predicate logic for several reasons, but it doesn't allow for the problems that used to arise when we would take existence to be a property as far as ontological arguments. The problem would simply move from showing that (Ex)(Gx) (there exists some x such that x is God) to showing that (Px)(Gx & Ex) (there are some members of the domain who are God and exist). Both of these have been impossible to demonstrate, so the proposed new formulation of predicate logic wouldn't help the ontological argument.

[Silent Acorns]

Originally posted by Bill Snedden
In other words, "existence" isn't really a property that something can have or not have.

I freely admit that I find this talk of negative and positive properties to be highly obfuscating (by the way, is it obfuscating to use the word obfuscating?), but existence sure seems to be a property to me. But even if it's not, I still stand by the idea that if one gives ANY positive property to their god (such as it cares whether or not we believe in it) McHugh's argument won't apply to it, so his proof still leaves me with a big "so what?"

[Silent Acorns]

I also have a real problem with "8) Not being deficient in any sense " as a negative property. How is "not being deficient in any sense" different from "being proficient in every sense"? Surely, the latter is a large set of positive properties, so why not the former?

[Jamie_L]

In defense of an unoriginal atheist opening arguement:

Atheism is a response to the proposition of theism. It's a bit for such a position to make an independent "opening statement."

To make any kind of independent opening statement, one is, unfortunately, forced to pen a definition of God. Perhaps the debate would have started better if a definition had been agreed to at the start. However, given the theist OP's original concept of God, starting with such a definition would certainly have demolished the whole concept of an independent atheist OP.

Thomas Metcalf:
On the Arguement from Non-Belief. In Drange's formulation, it's not just that God wants people to believe, it's God wants people to believe more than anything else. In this case, by definition, God will make it come to pass. The only reason for it not to come to pass is that God wants something else more than people to believe. When attacking the Christian God, you can use scripture to back up this claim, as it's pretty clear on this point. In Krueger's version, you have to infer this from "omnibenevolent". That is, if God is truely omnibenevolent, he will want more than anything for all his creations to be saved. Wanting something else more than that (i.e., not making it come to pass) would entail some lesser degree of benevolence, in which God is okay with the idea of having some of his creations go unsaved.

Jamie

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Jamie_L :

In Drange's formulation, it's not just that God wants people to believe, it's God wants people to believe more than anything else. In this case, by definition, God will make it come to pass. The only reason for it not to come to pass is that God wants something else more than people to believe. When attacking the Christian God, you can use scripture to back up this claim, as it's pretty clear on this point.

Yeah, this seems to be a stronger formulation. It doesn't follow in any clear way simply from omnibenevolence that God would want it more than anything else.

[Brother Fred]

His whole rebuttal is debunk.

I don't think Krueger has rebutted him yet. Krueger has simply presented his own opening arguments.

[Ernest Sparks]

McHugh's argument.

I don't think 'q -> Nq' is valid (logically true). I don't think '~N~q' is valid either. A Modal logic, like the S5 system, is a system for producing valid statements from logical axioms. Therefore, the McHugh argument must be basically an attempt at a natural deduction from instances of axioms from S5 and these statements as postulates. The only valid result would be something of the form:

(...(q -> Nq) -> (...... -> (Nq -> q) -> q)...)

[,with lots of repeated parentheses and intermediate conditionals]. That initial 'q ->' begs for a valid statement 'q' in order to detach any conclusion other than this complex nest of conditionals.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
conjecture: every valid ontological argument only concludes with something of the form: (...(q ->...... , and needs a valid q statement to get any further.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If the intention is to appeal to semantic interpretation to justify 'q -> Nq' and '~N~q', then we are into something like alternate-world classes, accessibility relations, frames, valuation functions and models for interpretation, the stuff normally used to validate this kind of logic externally. That is quite an order, given all the basic predicates occuring in these statements (contingency, law-contingency, deficiency, spatiotemporality, etc.) I sure would like to see that.

[Theli]

And Krueger replied, it's crazy!

[Jobar]

Let's try to keep this thread centered around the debate, folks. If xian or anyone else wishes to spin off a related topic, wonderful- but don't hijack this one.

Or else I'll have to don my hobnailed and steel-toed Moderator Jackboots. ;)

[diana]

Tangential conversation moved here. (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&postid=900748#post900748)

Let's keep this thread focused on the debate, please.

d

[Silent Acorns]

Originally posted by Silent Acorns
I also have a real problem with "8) Not being deficient in any sense " as a negative property. How is "not being deficient in any sense" different from "being proficient in every sense"? Surely, the latter is a large set of positive properties, so why not the former?

Bumped because this got lost after xian showed up and I'd still like to hear a reply.

[xian]

well i had a large post about experiential knowledge that was in direct response to what Kreuger said, yet it was moved and called "tangental".......???...??

Kreuger did not address McHugh in his opening statement. As such, when i made my post it did not contain any modal formulas or "property" arguments that everyone else has been talking about. Are we only allowed to talk about McHUgh's arguments? I want to focus on Kreuger's arguments. I can understand moving a few of my posts, but one in particular about experienial knowledge, should not have been moved IMHO


btw: i just want a mod to read this, please delete it once you do. thx.

[Ernest Sparks]

xian,

There is no debate challenge statement, such as "Theism is right and Atheism is wrong". There is only a topic title, "Theism vs. Atheism", which is not a statement, or if construed to be an abbreviated statement, the equivalent of "Theism and Atheism are contrary", which hardly any one would debate. Therefore, each debater just starts off with a gambit of his own. And at this rate, it may take a whole new generation of II members to continue following it.

[xian]

Originally posted by Ernest Sparks
xian,

There is no debate challenge statement, such as "Theism is right and Atheism is wrong". There is only a topic title, "Theism vs. Atheism", which is not a statement, or if construed to be an abbreviated statement, the equivalent of "Theism and Atheism are contrary", which hardly any one would debate. Therefore, each debater just starts off with a gambit of his own. And at this rate, it may take a whole new generation of II members to continue following it.

yes, i gotcha on that one. thanks.

[7thangel]

Originally posted by Keith Russell
Isn't McHugh's entire argument simply a version of the 'proof of God' that, if one can imagine a perfectly perfect being, then such a being must exist?

I never understood why anyone would believe imagination to be so powerful.

Keith.

Isn't that the American Dream?

[beastmaster]

Dr. Rick, would you please explain the format of this debate, now that the opening statements have been made?

How long does it go on?
When does it end?
Are McHugh and Krueger alternating?
Do they have limited space or time?

TIA.

[Bumble Bee Tuna]

I just still can't grasp the idea that there are actually people who think the ontological argument has any sort of merit. It's just so absurd...

1. If the IPU is conceived to be something I like, then the IPU cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. (going from the intuition that I only like things that exist)

WTF? If the IPU is concieved to be grakgha, and I define grakgha to include existing, then the IPU exists because I concieve the IPU to be grakgha?

It's semantic trickery at its very worst.

-B

[Dr Rick]

Originally posted by beastmaster
Dr. Rick, would you please explain the format of this debate, now that the opening statements have been made?

How long does it go on?
When does it end?
Are McHugh and Krueger alternating?
Do they have limited space or time?

TIA.

In the next three weeks, Doug and Chris are expected to each post responses to eachother's opening statements and then one more follow-up.

Rick

[xian]

Originally posted by Bumble Bee Tuna
I just still can't grasp the idea that there are actually people who think the ontological argument has any sort of merit. It's just so absurd...

1. If the IPU is conceived to be something I like, then the IPU cannot be conceived to have the possibility of not existing. (going from the intuition that I only like things that exist)

WTF? If the IPU is concieved to be grakgha, and I define grakgha to include existing, then the IPU exists because I concieve the IPU to be grakgha?

It's semantic trickery at its very worst.

-B

Hu? this is not the ontological argument. it makes me wonder if you really understand it.

[copernicus]

Originally posted by xian
Hu? this is not the ontological argument. it makes me wonder if you really understand it.
xian, McHugh's argument does strike me as a reformulation of Anselm's ontological argument, and McHugh admits as much. He just thinks that he has found a way to restate it so as to meet the objections of critics.

I share BBT's puzzlement over why McHugh tried to pin his argument (pro-theism) on such a narrow issue. Krueger painted with a much broader brush, and properly so. I think that McHugh has simply started out the debate by retreating into a shell that he thinks needs no empirical evidence to defend. Like most intelliegent theists, he gives up on arguing for the plausibility of his deity, hoping instead to dazzle his opponent with obfuscation and logical nitpicking. When all is said and done, you can't create God out of hot air any more than God could have created the universe out of nothing.

[Ernest Sparks]

McHugh said:

I begin with an exposition of some representative attacks on the traditional form of the modal ontological argument. I then show that the controversial premises in the argument can be modified so that they are necessarily true.

So, according to him, this is a modified modal ontological argument, or, he might hope, a perfected modal ontological argument.

It may be logically valid. The problem is the closed statement q that expresses the existence of his intended godlike object.

I have yet to succeed in expanding it and testing the validity of his

(1) q -> Nq

through deduction. By the way, the argument doesn't show the line

(1.1) N(q -> Nq)

, but it is crucial in completing the argument.

In the end, I think the argument works essentially because this modal logic system is so ontologically profligate. The weak point of the argument is the line

(7) ~N~q

and maybe a deep analysis of its meaning will spotlight my alleged ontological flaw.

[TomboyMom]

1. Just had to comment on how smart you all are. Incredible level of discussion compared to any other board on the net. Almost enough to scare me off of even putting my $.02 in. (but not quite.)

2. Is it just me, or does McHugh's argument start by assuming what he's trying to prove? Something like, "If there is a God, then God must exist."?

Rene:confused:

[Ernest Sparks]

TomboyMom,

Welcome, Rene!

This board is so active and so varied, a person can jump into just about any topic, ranging from the ridiculous to the sublime.

1. A piece of advice: read a lot before you reply to a serious topic thread. Then think a lot about what you are going to say. Sometimes I forget that and get pummeled. :)

2. I would like to think that all versions of the cosmological argument boil down to: if God exists, then God exists. This one is clever. The main assumptions are:

'If there really were a God, then there would have to be a God in each and every decently logical world picture'

and

'There could be such a God in some decently logical world picture'

. The first assumption takes advantage of what might be called the non-committance of the material conditional (If). To deny it requires affirming that there is, in fact, such a God. The specified nature of that God requires, furthurmore, that there consequently must be such a God in every decently logical world picture. So the recipient of this assumption is suborned into accepting the first assumption. The second assumption looks like the real key. Supposedly merely supposing that their might be such a God, it in fact forces the conclusion that such a God must be in EVERY decently logical world picture, including the real world itself. The gist of the other lines of this argument is to, in fact, go stronger than the first assumption:

'If there possibly were a God in some decently logical world picture, then there must be such a God in each and every decently logical world picture'

.

That is why I find BOTH of these assumptions and their consequences fascinating.

Ernie

[beastmaster]

McHugh argues in his rebuttal:

I agree with Krueger that extraordinary claims require very strong evidence in order to be justifiably believed, but I disagree that belief in the existence of God counts as an extraordinary claim. Contrary to what Krueger says, belief in the existence of the supernatural is so intimately connected to our common sense experience that it has permeated all cultures at all times. It is also the case that a lot of our common sense beliefs entail some form of theism without many of us even realizing it. For example, consider that the actions of free-willed beings cannot be reduced to the interactions of deterministic processes (like chemical reactions), or even to alleged quantum indeterminism (for such purported indeterminism is still limited by the laws of probability, but free will is not limited in this way). If we take the common sense stance that we do have free will, then we must conclude that the ultimate substance of reality is something like a free will too, for the existence of our free will cannot be explained in terms of the blind interactions of non-free substances. Therefore, there is a God (at least in the sense of there being a free will as the ultimate causal substance). This basic form of theism is entailed by the common sense belief that we have free will, and is therefore very far from being an extraordinary claim. Of course, atheists may attempt to deny that we have free will, but this seems to me to be an extraordinary claim of the most extreme kind, for we can directly experience our freedom through introspection. To conclude that our experience of freedom is an illusion is quite like asserting that all physical objects are an illusion. McHugh is adopting an erroneous definition of "extraordinary" claim.

A claim is extraordinary if it contradicts natural laws; a claim is ordinary if it is consistent with natural laws. According to the argument, the claim that god exists is extraordinary because god is supernatural (by definition).

But McHugh would rather bait and switch by accepting that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and then covertly redefining terms. For McHugh, a claim is extraordinary if it is counterintuitive; a claim is ordinary if it is intuitive, or "common sense" as he puts it. Thus, he asserts that the absence of free will is extraordinary because it is counterintuitive. And he asserts that god-belief is an ordinary claim because it is "common sense."

Wrong. The absence of free will does *not* contradict natural laws. Therefore, it is an ordinary claim. It doesn't matter that it is counterintuitive.

While many people believe in god intuitively, that does not mean that god is consistent with natural laws. Mere human intuition cannot render an extraordinary claim ordinary.

Edit: McHugh would be better off arguing that the existence of god isn't an extraordinary claim on the grounds that god does not *contradict* natural laws, rather god is *independent* of natural laws.

[Bumble Bee Tuna]

Originally posted by xian
Hu? this is not the ontological argument. it makes me wonder if you really understand it.

I don't know the names of the arguments, but in his statement he called in a modified version of the ontological argument, so that's what I'm calling it. It's ridiculous no matter what you call it, though.

-B

[Dr. Retard]

Originally posted by xian
Hu? this is not the ontological argument. it makes me wonder if you really understand it.

Nice April Fools joke.

[Theli]

Did anyone else notice this little contradiciton?
Therefore, there is a God (at least in the sense of there being a free will as the ultimate causal substance).
Then:
An immutable God could changelessly will the creation of the universe in the form of an “if-then” command rather than directly.
He first argued a neccessity for free will, a creator that has free will was neccessary to produce our sense of free will. This was never really explained though, just stated.
And then he refered to god as being programmed. In a way that god respond to external information in a predetermined manner, in other words not the free will he described in the begining of his post.

So, wich is it?
Does god have free will or are his actions predetermined?
And, if god is programmed, who created the program?

[copernicus]

Theli, I agree with you completely that this sounds like a contradiction, but scholasticism avoids contradictions with a solid shield of split hairs. The best that I could make of McHugh's argument was that God had the freedom to choose not to make the universe, but that in no way implied that His Immutable Holiness would have chosen not to. After all, we are here, and for him to have chosen otherwise would have meant that we wouldn't be here in the first place. So, if God is "immutable", then he must have just always wanted to create the universe by willing it into existence (and hence willing time to begin).

The problem for McHugh, as you and I see it, is that decisions are defined as changes of state. You do not ever "decide" to create anything if there was never a point in time where the decision was "not made". What "decide" means is "to not have an answer, and then to have an answer". It does not mean "to have an answer, and then have an answer". For all of McHugh's claims about "common sense", his argument flies in the face of our common understanding of English words.

[yguy]

After skimming over the posts of Kreuger and McHugh, I have to laugh. In the unlikely event that there is a clear winner in this battle of cyborgs, who will care?

I don't think this debate is about getting closer to the truth. I think it's about egotistical intellects colliding. A gentrified version of the hoarders vs. the wasters in Dante's inferno.

[Theli]

The best that I could make of McHugh's argument was that God had the freedom to choose not to make the universe.
But he said that god didn't choose weither to create the universe or not.
These are his exact words:
"An immutable God could changelessly will the creation of the universe in the form of an “if-then” command rather than directly.
For example, rather than God creating in a way that requires a change of mind, He could changelessly will something like “If there is no universe, then let the universe begin to exist""
Wich would mean that the universe was created because of the nature of god, not because of god's choice (wich he didn't have).
And it's the "if-then" type of will that he himself rejected, because it was incompatible with the free will he already have accepted.

[Ernest Sparks]

McH does this to refute the Drange argument about God's immutability. Apparently, God's will is like one of those computer language compiler tables that works the source code without changing itself (I think they are called 'floyd productions'). Each entry is a conditional test on the current state of the data that skips to the next entry if the test fails and executes a subroutine if the test suceeds, then transfers somewhere else, unless the table says the process is done. The table is programmed in advance and is supposed to anticipate every circumstance. Can a God with such a table change his table, thereby exhibiting free will, despite Drange and supposed immutability? A human programmer could, so I suppose the Eternal Programmer could also.

additional
I wonder if he uses a debugger, or just lets it go to see what happens. That might explain a few things about the world. :)

[Thomas Metcalf]

Here are some criticisms I have of McHugh's first rebuttal. I'll address them to him.

1. Presumption of Atheism

Contrary to what Krueger says, belief in the existence of the supernatural is so intimately connected to our common sense experience that it has permeated all cultures at all times.

I don't find this convincing at all. An extraordinary claim is not the same as an unpopular claim. And "the supernatural" is not the same as your very unpopular mystical version of the apologetic God. You would do better to deny that we ought to disbelieve extraordinary claims in absence of evidence.

If we take the common sense stance that we do have free will, then we must conclude that the ultimate substance of reality is something like a free will too, for the existence of our free will cannot be explained in terms of the blind interactions of non-free substances.

And this one seems to me almost completely meritless. What is the "ultimate substance of reality" and why must there be one? And who's trying to explain the existence of our free will with anything other than the fact that sufficiently complex minds produce free will? It could even be a brute fact.

Other philosophers have put forth countless common sense reasons for thinking that there is a God.

Well, that's not really relevant. If Krueger can refute your argument in this debate, and you can't provide any others, then the Presumption of Atheism argument goes through for the purposes of this debate.

2. Incompatible Properties

Definition - Someone is “omnipotent” if and only if they can cause any logically possible situation whatsoever to obtain. For example, God could cause the world to come into being, but could not cause an omnibenevolent being (such as Himself) to commit a sin, for that would not be a logically possible situation.

He can't bring about the logically possible situation (Morriston's example) "thousands of innocent creatures are maliciously tortured forever." Ergo, God is not omnipotent.

3. Incompatible Properties

Due to space limitations, ...

Huh? What space limitations? I don't recall any of those in the description of the debate. Maybe Krueger and McHugh have secret space limitations. I guess he might mean the iidb space limitations.

An immutable God could changelessly will the creation of the universe in the form of an “if-then” command rather than directly.

Well, this just suggests another incompatibility. God cannot have desires, or at least cannot have desires that ever get satisfied. Ergo, again, God is not omnipotent.

What appears to be needless suffering may, in fact, have some purpose. The mere fact that we do not know what the purpose of suffering is does not constitute evidence for the absence of purpose.

This is a crude Unknown Purpose Defense and very problematic for morality and epistemology. If we accept this sort of skepticism, we lose our ability to evaluate normative and factual claims. After all, God might have a secret, hidden reason to hide things from us. We can't trust, to use a common example, that earth is more than 10,000 years old, because what appears to be 10,000 year old earth evidence may, in fact, have been planted by God to serve some unknown purpose. And what appears to be a child drowning may in fact be required to allow for a greater good, so we should hesitate before saving her. Thus, Christianity leads to global skepticism (except for the belief in God), and to moral nihilism.

The argument also fails because the assertion of the truth of premise 1 presupposes the conclusion of the argument, viz. it simply assumes that there is no God who ultimately gives meaning to what appears to be pointless suffering. The argument is question-begging; it assumes that there is no God in order to supposedly show that there is no God.

This is quite surprising. Does McHugh understand how deductive arguments work? This is a mistake that I wouldn't expect even beginning philosophers to make. All deductive arguments are question-begging, if McHugh's criticism is to be taken seriously. Consider this "question-begging" argument:

(a) All men are mortal.
(b) Socrates is a man.
(c) Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

Would McHugh say that (a) presupposes the truth of (c), so the argument is circular? After all, (a) simply presupposes that the man Socrates is mortal, when that's precisely what's at issue. Consider this argument:

(d) All impossible beings are self-contradictory.
(e) A negative-property-wise defined God is not self-contradictory.
(f) Therefore, a negative-property-wise defined God is not impossible.

It looks as if, by McHugh's lights, the argument is question-begging because (d) presupposes that (f) is true.

Consider that a free-willed being could choose to rebel against God’s perfect will, and thereby cause himself to suffer needlessly.

This is not a case of needless suffering. The story would go that the suffering is necessary for a greater good, viz. a human's free will desire being satisfied.

Furthermore, we should expect there to be seemingly needless suffering given the existence of certain descriptions of God.

The fact that the Bible suggests there will be seemingly needless suffering does not in any way give an explanation for why there will be seemingly needless suffering. If God existed, there would be less seemingly needless suffering -- that's the claim of the atheist. If the Bible simply observes that God allows for seemingly needless suffering, that doesn't tell us He has a good reason for allowing seemingly needless suffering.

4. Argument from Nonbelief

The same goes for the argument from nonbelief.

5. Conclusion

I could still maintain my belief in the mystical concept of God that I defended in my opening statement.

No, because his arguments work against that being as well. Take the argument from evil for example. If the mystical God is not deficient, then if we were to determine that there is evidence of a deficient God, this would be evidence against McHugh's God. And it is deficient to allow needless suffering to exist. McHugh's "mystic" move fails, in fact, in the opening statements, because his negative properties are still inconsistent with their denials, and a Godlike* being has properties that entail the denial of "non-deficient."

I conclude that while Krueger could have provided stronger versions of his arguments, McHugh has not answered the classic problems with the Unknown Purposes Defense, nor recognized serious problems both with his conception of God and with his own tactics in this debate.

[Bill Snedden]

<nods approvingly>

Very nice, Thomas!

Regards,

Bill Snedden

[xian]

I don't find this convincing at all. An extraordinary claim is not the same as an unpopular claim. And "the supernatural" is not the same as your very unpopular mystical version of the apologetic God. You would do better to deny that we ought to disbelieve extraordinary claims in absence of evidence.

McHugh wasn't talking about claims. He said nothing of popular "claims" but of experience. What is "extraordinary" other than "not ordinary?" Ordinary experience points to the supernatural. He gave one piece of evidence, and that was free-will which you did not refute. i do not see how you have rebut this.


He can't bring about the logically possible situation (Morriston's example) "thousands of innocent creatures are maliciously tortured forever." Ergo, God is not omnipotent.

nice try. God could very easily bring about that situation. His power would allow him too. His nature does not. THis is not a limitation of his power, but a condition of his nature. Again, rebuttal failed.


Well, this just suggests another incompatibility. God cannot have desires, or at least cannot have desires that ever get satisfied. Ergo, again, God is not omnipotent.


of course he can. God can have desires...and can also have unsatisfied desires....this has no bearing upon omnipotence. I have the power to satsify my desire to eat a cheeseburger. I decide to eat a tuna sandwhich. and your point?


This is a crude Unknown Purpose Defense and very problematic for morality and epistemology. If we accept this sort of skepticism, we lose our ability to evaluate normative and factual claims. After all, God might have a secret, hidden reason to hide things from us. We can't trust, to use a common example, that earth is more than 10,000 years old, because what appears to be 10,000 year old earth evidence may, in fact, have been planted by God to serve some unknown purpose. And what appears to be a child drowning may in fact be required to allow for a greater good, so we should hesitate before saving her. Thus, Christianity leads to global skepticism (except for the belief in God), and to moral nihilism.


huh? "After all, God might have a secret, hidden reason to hide things from us"

and He might not. The point is that a finite limited dependent being should never presume something but simply act according to default moral standards. NOt rescuing a child is making a presumption about something you are ignorant of. The default position is to save the child, and unless you have keen knowledge that trumps the default position, you are commiting moral sin to do otherwise. God understands this and expects humans to act according to the default moral response, unless knowledge is obtained that would mandate otherwise. Its no different than a soldier being given a directive by his commander. Hey should always act within the Rules of Engagement unless told otherwise. His commander knows a bigger picture, and it is not the subordinates place to act outside the default boundaries. This does not cause you to lose your ability to "evaluate normative and factual claims, and I fail to see how it does. If there is something unknown to you in the universe....how does that mean that you lose your ability? Even in a godless universe...you still will never know many things according to QD, yet who in their right mind will claim that therefore means we lost the ability "to evaluate normative and factual claims?" You do not make any sense here.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by xian :

McHugh wasn't talking about claims. He said nothing of popular "claims" ...

McHugh's first response: "I agree with Krueger that extraordinary claims require very strong evidence in order to be justifiably believed, but I disagree that belief in the existence of God counts as an extraordinary claim. [Emphasis added.]"

Ordinary experience points to the supernatural.

"Ordinary experience of the supernatural" is an oxymoron. And further, you did not answer my point that supernatural does not entail theism.

He gave one piece of evidence, and that was free-will which you did not refute. i do not see how you have rebut this.

One way to see whether I refuted it is to read my post. If you look again (or for the first time, I fear), you see that I question whether anyone's trying to explain the existence of free will, why it can't be a brute fact or simply a function of sufficiently complex minds.

nice try. God could very easily bring about that situation. His power would allow him too. His nature does not. THis is not a limitation of his power, but a condition of his nature. Again, rebuttal failed.

This move has been abandoned for decades in leading apologetics. McNothing is a being whose nature prevents him from doing anything. McNothing cannot do anything, but this is a condition of his nature. Ergo, McNothing is omnipotent. (By your analysis. I prefer the widely accepted analyses of omnipotence by Christian philosophers Thomas Flint, Alfred Freddoso, Joshua Hoffman, and Gary Rosencrantz, which are inconsistent with your analysis.)

of course he can. God can have desires...and can also have unsatisfied desires....this has no bearing upon omnipotence. I have the power to satsify my desire to eat a cheeseburger. I decide to eat a tuna sandwhich. and your point?

Do you understand the line of the dialectic so far? If God had a desire that later got satisfied, God would have changed from desiring that something to change to not desiring that something change. But God can't change.

The point is that a finite limited dependent being should never presume something but simply act according to default moral standards.

Then don't presume you know what default moral standards are. And what reason do we have to follow these standards? God will make sure there's no needless suffering, so if anyone does suffer, it's for a greater good.

NOt rescuing a child is making a presumption about something you are ignorant of.

Rescuing the child is making just as much of a presumption, viz. the presumption that the child's death isn't necessary for a greater good.

The default position is to save the child, and unless you have keen knowledge that trumps the default position, you are commiting moral sin to do otherwise.

Why should that be the default position? Shouldn't the default position be not to save the child, because God won't let her drown unless it's for the greater good?

You still haven't answered my other point. How do we know the earth is more than 10,000 years old? We can't justifiably believe there aren't elves who manipulate the uranium in our rocks to fool us into thinking earth is actually 4.6 billion years old when it's really just 10,000 years old. After all, if these elves existed, we certainly wouldn't know about them. And similarly, we can't believe earth is more than 10,000 years old because God might have ineffable, unknowable reasons that he has to fool us about the age of the earth, the way he hides the reasons for all the suffering in the world, because it's just better that we don't know about it.

[xian]

"Ordinary experience of the supernatural" is an oxymoron. And further, you did not answer my point that supernatural does not entail theism. "


first of all I never said that. Second, how can you claim it is an oxymoron? A supernatural existence may indeed actually exist. The only case you can call it an oxymoron is by saying "experiencing" an effect of supernatural causation would be natural simply because it occurs in the natural universe.

either way, your statement is misleading



"Shouldn't the default position be not to save the child, because God won't let her drown unless it's for the greater good?"

If that is your moral code, then so be it. But my moral code, according to my theistic Christian beliefs mandate I save the child, and I would attempt to do so.

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by Bill Snedden :

<nods approvingly>

Very nice, Thomas!

Regards,

Bill Snedden

Thanks for the support, Bill. :) Next time you're looking for someone to represent the atheist side in a similar debate...

[Thomas Metcalf]

Originally posted by xian :

A supernatural existence may indeed actually exist. The only case you can call it an oxymoron is by saying "experiencing" an effect of supernatural causation would be natural simply because it occurs in the natural universe.

Look at the lengths you have to go. You have to say that experiencing something supernatural is natural. I don't think anyone will find that plausible.

If that is your moral code, then so be it. But my moral code, according to my theistic Christian beliefs mandate I save the child, and I would attempt to do so.

Actually, that's not my moral code, because I'm not a Christian. If I were a Christian and fully aware of my beliefs, I would realize that God will make sure the best outcome happens in any crisis, so there's no point in trying to influence the outcome a certain way. We have no way to tell whether some suffering is necessary for a greater good, so let's not run the risk of precluding some greater good by trying to alleviate people's suffering. What's the point of trying to prevent some non-needless suffering?

The alternative position is that there is some genuinely needless suffering, and therefore, we should attempt to prevent it. This is the position of most atheists.

Still awaiting your response about how theism (when conjoined with the Unknown Purpose Defense) entails almost global skepticism.