An Ontological Proof that God Does Not Exist

[firedragon]

Yeah. It's not a serious argument that God doesn't exist. I'm using it to point out the flaws in the traditional ontological argument.



No, it's not a serious argument. I wouldn't accept this argument for the same reason I wouldn't accept the ontological argument that God does exist.

OMG.

 

[blü 2]

Then you aren't addressing 'God' but a particular view of God limited to the physical realm. It is your intention to limit God to a being that is bound by time and creates things within time

That's what 'real' means, existing in the world external to the self, not purely conceptual or imaginary. A real god would have to have objective existence.

You also presume we exist when we may simply be something like a platonian form or ghost world.

You could test this hypothesis by living up to your netname and dropping a brick on your foot, no?

 

[Scolopendra]

Premise 1: God is the greatest possible being.

Premise 2: God accomplished the creation of the universe.

Premise 3: To accomplish something while suffering a handicap is greater than accomplishing that thing with no handicap.

Conclusion: A God who created the universe while being handicapped is greater than a God who created the universe without being handicapped.

Premise 4: The greatest possible handicap is non-existence.

Conclusion: The greatest possible God necessarily does not exist.

I'm an atheist but still I'd like to comment each premise.

Premise 1: This is true for most if not all monotheistic religions, but what about polytheism?

Premise 2: This is true only for some theistic religions.

Premise 3: This one is quite subjective. Most of us have the instinct to value sacrifice and carrying a burden as positive traits but I wouldn't be too sure about the universality of this claim.

Premise 4: True but simply as a logical consequence of premise 3. One might argue that the handicap has to be great but not too great to the point of limiting premise 2.

 

[Tiberius]

I'm an atheist but still I'd like to comment each premise.

Premise 1: This is true for most if not all monotheistic religions, but what about polytheism?

A fair point, but this was written in response to the ontological argument for God, and I've only seen that used for monotheistic religions.

Premise 2: This is true only for some theistic religions.

true, but again, all the religions I have seen use the ontological argument have claimed that God created the universe.

Premise 3: This one is quite subjective. Most of us have the instinct to value sacrifice and carrying a burden as positive traits but I wouldn't be too sure about the universality of this claim.

As I've said earlier in this thread... If a person drives a car, that's an accomplishment. If a person drives a car with the handicap of having no limbs, that is a greater accomplishment, despite the fact that the end result is the same (that the car has been driven down the road). The increased greatness comes from the fact that the person with no limbs has had to overcome a challenge that the other person did not.

Premise 4: True but simply as a logical consequence of premise 3. One might argue that the handicap has to be great but not too great to the point of limiting premise 2.

Ah, but those who invoke the ontological argument for God usually claim that God has no limits!

 

[Tiberius]

OMG.

What? I'm using an argument that is designed to invalidate the Ontological argument. It's impossible to show that my ontological argument that God doesn't exist is flawed without also demonstrating that the ontological argument that he DOES exist is also flawed. So, this is meant for those people who believe the ontological argument is valid. Any flaws they point out in this argument also exist in theirs.

 

[Secret Chief]

Well here's a summary...

Ontological Arguments (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

 

[Scolopendra]

A fair point, but this was written in response to the ontological argument for God, and I've only seen that used for monotheistic religions.



true, but again, all the religions I have seen use the ontological argument have claimed that God created the universe.



As I've said earlier in this thread... If a person drives a car, that's an accomplishment. If a person drives a car with the handicap of having no limbs, that is a greater accomplishment, despite the fact that the end result is the same (that the car has been driven down the road). The increased greatness comes from the fact that the person with no limbs has had to overcome a challenge that the other person did not.



Ah, but those who invoke the ontological argument for God usually claim that God has no limits!

Driving a car with no limbs sounds more like suicide to me

 

[Brickjectivity]

That's what 'real' means, existing in the world external to the self

Reality consisting of time and matter is still being researched. Saying God creates (verb) the universe is placing God into the universe, so it is a peculiar definition of God for a straw argument.

not purely conceptual or imaginary. A real god would have to have objective existence.

A god might, but God would not. This is called transcendence by theologians. Its alluded to in the NT for instance when an author says God is spirit or that God is in heaven. I'm not inventing it. People can insist it means God isn't real, but that's begging the question of the OP. Making God a part of this universe is a straw argument against God, because it denies God's transcendence. The strategy of the OP argument is to ignore transcendence by insisting God must be the agent creating the universe. When I object they then insist incorrectly that Christians must agree, but Christians have a transcendent God not an objective God, morality being of superior import to physical reality. They are trying to disprove the existence of a god. It is not the same thing.

 

[Tiberius]

Driving a car with no limbs sounds more like suicide to me

But if someone can actually do it, then you'd be pretty impressed, right?

 

[blü 2]

Reality consisting of time and matter is still being researched. Saying God creates (verb) the universe is placing God into the universe, so it is a peculiar definition of God for a straw argument.

It's not a straw argument if you think about it. God, after all, never appears, never says, never does, and the same is true of all the other gods worshiped on planet Earth now and throughout the past.

So it's fair to say that the only way God is / gods are known to exist is as a concept / thing imagined in an individual brain, no? If God were real, you could show [him] not just to me but to the world, no?

 

[rational experiences]

Father and mother both proved to me no man is God.

One God O rock the entity is the one.

Finished as rock law of space.

God the rock entity created its own heavens.

No man is God.

Now an ape isn't. God. It has sex it's ape DNA produces an ape baby. Exact.

So if you say I believe in a type of pre existence where a human came from.

First it's not another humans thesis.

As you aren't any God. You're just a human.

And if it is true you wont ever know nor see it.

So we use words as humans words that state why I don't know. The human telling.

 

[PureX]

Premise 1: God is the greatest possible being.

Premise 2: God accomplished the creation of the universe.

Premise 3: To accomplish something while suffering a handicap is greater than accomplishing that thing with no handicap.

Conclusion: A God who created the universe while being handicapped is greater than a God who created the universe without being handicapped.

Premise 4: The greatest possible handicap is non-existence.

Conclusion: The greatest possible God necessarily does not exist.

Premise 1. is a both baseless and subjective.
Premise 3. is therefor of no consequence and premise 4. is of no relevance.

 

[Tiberius]

Premise 1. is a both baseless and subjective.
Premise 3. is therefor of no consequence and premise 4. is of no relevance.

The same is true of the ontological argument FOR God, and that's precisely what this was intended to show (see post 45).

 

[Sheldon]

Non-existence is not a handicap. Nice try, though.

It would be the greatest handicap to achieving anything.

 

[firedragon]

It's impossible to show that my ontological argument that God doesn't exist is flawed without also demonstrating that the ontological argument that he DOES exist is also flawed.

Hmm. Okay. Let me show you a flaw in your argument that does not exist in any of the so called "ontological arguments" in history.

Your premise 3 contradicts you'r premise 1. This is an easier fallacy to understand than your major fallacies in argumentation.

P1 says God is the greatest being. P3 says a God with a handicap is greater which means "handicapped God is greater" that means "God is not the greatest". It's an immediate internal contradiction in your syllogism. The fallacy is not only a conclusion that denies your own premise, but also the premises are contradictory. This is not a valid argument. And I have never come across such fallacies in any of the ontological arguments done by any philosopher in history.

 

[Sheldon]

A handicap is something that only applies to things that already exist.

handicap
noun

1. a circumstance that makes progress or success difficult.

I'm not sure it does you know. Not existing would make progress and success pretty difficult.

For example, women often have a handicap in golf because they can't hit a golf ball as hard as a man. Women exist. Something that doesn't exist can't have a handicap.

Progress or success in your example, would clearly be more difficult for a non existent golfer, thus non existence seems to represent a handicap.

I also suspect that @Tiberius wasn't being entirely literal in the title, but rather parodying the ontological argument for a deity, by illustrating its flawed nature.

 

[PureX]

The same is true of the ontological argument FOR God, and that's precisely what this was intended to show (see post 45).

"God" needs no supporting argument, as it is a self-evident concept. The problems come from the fact that we have no idea what "God" is: how to existentially define that concept, and no means of finding out. All we can do is speculate, act on those speculations, and see what results. But in the end, all that tells us is the functional value of our speculations. It doesn't tell us anything about "God".

 

[Tiberius]

Hmm. Okay. Let me show you a flaw in your argument that does not exist in any of the so called "ontological arguments" in history.

Your premise 3 contradicts you'r premise 1. This is an easier fallacy to understand than your major fallacies in argumentation.

P1 says God is the greatest being. P3 says a God with a handicap is greater which means "handicapped God is greater" that means "God is not the greatest". It's an immediate internal contradiction in your syllogism. The fallacy is not only a conclusion that denies your own premise, but also the premises are contradictory. This is not a valid argument. And I have never come across such fallacies in any of the ontological arguments done by any philosopher in history.

Premise 3 indicates that the God described in Premise 1 must have some handicap in order to still fit the definition given in Premise 1. That's how I get the conclusion.

 

[Tiberius]

"God" needs no supporting argument, as it is a self-evident concept. The problems come from the fact that we have no idea what "God" is: how to existentially define that concept, and no means of finding out. All we can do is speculate, act on those speculations, and see what results. But in the end, all that tells us is the functional value of our speculations. It doesn't tell us anything about "God".

Any positive claim needs a supporting argument. To claim that God doesn't is special pleading.

 

[firedragon]

Premise 3 indicates that the God described in Premise 1 must have some handicap in order to still fit the definition given in Premise 1. That's how I get the conclusion.

That's a contradiction. Not only your conclusion, your premises are contradictory. They are formally invalid in argumentation.

If you think a philosopher's ontological argument is as fallacious as this, there is nothing much to say but that you have not even read up on any of the ontological arguments.