That's what I've been saying this whole time.
You made my argument for me.
It's not possible to argue for an inconsistent universe. I might as well have just said "It's not possible to argue for adkgjhskdgj."
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Did God make the rules?
- Thread starter Riverwolf
- Start date
That's what I've been saying this whole time.
You made my argument for me.
It's not possible to argue for an inconsistent universe. I might as well have just said "It's not possible to argue for adkgjhskdgj."
PolyHedral
Superabacus Mystic
But an inconsistent universe rejects the axiom that makes an inconsistent universe impossible.
*Counts negations on fingers in confusion before continuing*
But rejecting the axiom that makes it impossible opens the door for it to be a consistent universe instead, in which case those axioms rejected are right back where they belong (in fact they were never able to leave), making the whole excercise of even attempting to doubt them fruitless from the start
PolyHedral
Superabacus Mystic
The problem I think we're running into is that you are right, in that identity is undeniable in a consistent universe. However, since our universe is assumed to be inconsistent, that doesn't apply. The fact that you can logically deduce that the inconsistent universe is actually consistent doesn't actually make a difference, since it is still inconsistent.
(There's probably a clearer way of writing that, but I don't want to resort to propositional calculus.)
(There's probably a clearer way of writing that, but I don't want to resort to propositional calculus.)
Here:
(Emphasis added)
That's identity... so it isn't inconsistent and can't be.
So, it is what it is? That's what you're saying here. You're saying X = X and remains to be what it is ("...it is still inconsistent"), which is X.
You can not escape identity. It's impossible. You can utter the phrase "identity is false" but you immediately self-contradict, as you've been doing this whole time. Treating the premise "inconsistent universe" as though it is meaningful is a mistake, though I was indulging you just for fun.
You can't even get that first premise down without contradicting yourself becuase the moment you say "Premise: inconsistent universe" you're already implying that it's possible for identity to be false and therefore blatantly self-contradicting.
Even so:
No, it wouldn't still be inconsistent if it were consistent. As soon as consistency is the case (which is always) then it is also necessarily the case that ¬inconsistency. So "since it is still inconsistent" is false, because it wouldn't be.
As I said in the other thread you clearly have a very poor idea of Christian theology or metaphysics. God is everything, there is nothing that is not God in an ultimate sense, this is not contrary to traditional Christian theology. So in other words, if we can make such a paradoxical statement, it doesn't work outside him.
As Lord Northbourne put it, God is not real, he is reality, God does not exist, he is existence. There is nothing explicitly contrary to traditional, Semitic monotheism in this conception. So nothing exists if God does not. The law of identity is then a part of Reality or God but causal thinking or reason of course can only take us so far in utterly understanding and defining the divine essence.
Nothingness is pure negation, it is a mere conception, in many ways not even that, beyond all that is or ever good be. One is stretching causal thinking, human language and mental conceptions to their very limits and beyond again but suffice to say your giving to nothingness a sort of positive nature it can never have. Your simply abusing reason, pushing it far beyond its right scope.
As Dr.Seyyed Nasr said, so much modern philosophical debates are simply ill-posed questions. This certainly sums up your argument.
Just_me_Mike
Well-Known Member
I love your new pic.
Listen you did not understand my point, but that is irrelevant. Let me slice this another way for you.
If God is indescribable, not capable of identity, where does your identity sit then? This whole thread has assumed that God is identifiable, but God is infinite. So let's try to examine or identify the infinite.
Infinite, is infinitely unidentifiable, it is beyond identity, because as soon as you identify it you are wrong, and you lose what you identify.
Wrestle with that smarty pants.
BTW, you should be tattoo model!!!!!!!
I disagree that I have a poor understanding of either; but then again most people who have a disagreement with someone implicitely believes that their opponent is prone to mistakes else they wouldn't be disagreeing, right?
This is going to boil down to the question "Why is God everything" and "What cognitive sense does it make for God to be everything." Pantheism is nonsensical to me because if God is everything then God might as well be defined as my socks.
What justification do you have for supposing "God is everything?" Is it just a presuppositional axiom of yours? When I observe things in the universe and study them (which I do, as a cosmology student) I don't see any "God" attribute in them. I observe things like energy, identity, mass, spatial properties, what mathematical paradigms best describe them, and so forth: but nowhere is it apparent where this "God" aspect creeps in unless it's just assumed. Please: what is the justification for asserting that "God is everything?" This goes not only for empirical/physical things but also metaphysical things like mathematics and logic.
We simply can't continue until you justify that assertion, because otherwise I'll just have to be neutrally skeptical since there's no reason for me to believe it. Nor can a theist object to my argument with it if it isn't justified; else I could just respond to any argument I see with my own unjustified semantics to "debunk" it.
The existence of identity as I've described it is wholly justified, but throwing into the mix that identity "is" God needs to be justified badly before it can be asserted with any strength.
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Thanks. Rawr!
I feel as though I did, but of course I can't know that since usually only the person who says "You missed my point" knows for sure. I answered to my best ability to what I thought was your point...
Nothing that exists is incapable of identity. You're sort of mixing up two definitions of "identity." In society we use "identity" to mean our conception of something, but that's not the sort of identity I'm talking about. Inconceivable things still have identity; it just means that they are what they are (whatever they are, even if we don't know what they are... they are what they are).
Just because we might not be able to conceive of God doesn't mean that God isn't God. God is God, regardless of whether we can "grasp" what God is. We can at least grasp (absolutely, too) that God is God if God exists.
I don't know what a bumpfizzit is, for instance, but it's true that a bumpfizzit is a bumpfizzit: it is what it is, regardless of what I think about it (or what I lack the ability to think about it). It still is what it is and isn't what it isn't.
As for tattoo modeling, when I worked at a bar we had a suicide girls show come through and I was asked if I wanted to join. Considering I don't even do Facebook and SG photos can end up on porn sites I gave a big "No thank you."
But many disagreements are due to a lack of understanding. No offense but I'd be very surprised if you had read Origen or the Cappadocian fathers or St.Augustine or Meister Eckhart or even Plotinus.
I'm not suggesting Pantheism in the way moderns usually understand that term. I'm not suggesting God is just the sum of the finite universe. I'm suggesting the Platonic One, which importantly is not contrary to Semitic monotheism but is indeed at least implied by most of the church fathers.
I thought your argument was that the monotheistic concept of God is nonsense in itself, which has been proved wrong, but now your switching to asking for proof for the reality of this premise. That is a different argument. The point is that if God is seen as absolute then he is by definition absolute in himself. It would be silly to then try and use reason, which is based on deducing causes from effects to utterly define and explain what is absolute and therefore not an effect and without a cause. The same would be true if you defined the universe or even the law of identity as in themselves absolute.
This is true, and I haven't read even a single one of the authors/works that you cite. I'm competent in metaphysics though and can roll with the punches, even if it's new material to me. So far though, I haven't seen anything that I'm not familiar with in the ideas themselves we've been discussing.
Nor was I talking about any specific pantheisms, just the general noncognitiveness of defining anything as being everything or a part of everything. (Identity is a notable exception)
No, my argument was that any gods assumed not to be contingent on anything (created all things external to themselves, have control over all things external to themselves) is falsified by the argument. At one point in the OP it even states that theists can go right on rationally believing in a God so long as they admit God didn't create and can't control identity; is contingent on identity.
Incorrect, declaring something to be ontologically necessary is a claim that requires justification. I've justified the claim that identity is necessary; in fact I've justified it infinitely (making it absolute): identity is self-evident and incorrigible; it's properly basic, its negation necessarily shows its truth. It's not possible to doubt the efficacy of identity without self-contradicting.
I've held up my end of the deal: I've given justification for identity's incorrigibility and infinitely so (by way of its incorrigibility).
If you assert that God is ontologically necessary then the onus of proof is on you. The ball's in your court, if you can't uphold that burden then your objection never even gets off the ground since unjustified assertions don't hold water. On that note you shouldn't believe it either if you can't justify it, since unjustified beliefs are irrational...
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I'm not so sure.
But what makes identity separate from anything else? Your argument simply replaces God with the so called law of identity. It doesn't explain that law or how it exists or how it interacts with existence. You have a very naturalistic idea of a law and are simply using some neat so called law of identity, which has a real, if relative meaning as a separate law on the human level, as the transcendental first principle but there is nothing contradictory for the theist to maintain that actually this law is but a part of God, a part of his ineffable, absolute nature.
Your argument is, I thought, that it is nonsensical, not simply unproved that the law of identity is a part of God. All I assert is that the monotheistic(and Platonic and Vedanta.) idea of God is not illogical. As far as I can see this has been done, you don't really have an argument. Your also confused over necessity and limits or constraints. You mistake the first for the last two, again reason can only partly capture the relationship but necessity is not a constraint because it is utterly within God and not without, it is not a limit, if God were limited then this limit must be something as well and then you'd immediately jump to the question of what is common between this and "God" and that commonality, that final cause and absolute reality, would be God and not what we'd previously defined as God or what we found was limiting him.
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There are no discrete systems.
Care to expound on this? You deny heirarchies of necessity/contingency?
Well, again, of course people who disagree with one another will think there must be some flaw with the opponent's reasoning or epistemology; else they wouldn't be on opposite sides of the fence.
I won't question your ability openly if you don't question mine, is that fair? I know you didn't intend offense, and I'm not offended; but it just kind of goes without saying that we both think the other is deficient in some way if we're disagreeing: no need to announce it, right?
I didn't say it was contradictory; I've never asserted "It is false that identity is a part of God." I have asserted, however, that such as an unjustified position (at least so far in this discussion). I've justified the existence and necessity of identity: I've done my part. My definition and justification of identity are consistent. I've done my job, I must be agreed with up to that point unless you find a particular flaw.
If at that point you want to contend that (on top of what I've said) identity is also a part of God then you must justify that assertion as it isn't self-evident or incorrigible; worse it's possible to get an exhaustive understanding of identity without God being dragged into it at all (so you have quite the case to make, at that).
If you can justify it, then now is the time to do it.
If you can't, then you shouldn't be asserting it. You shouldn't even be believing it if you can't justify it unless you're comfortable with being irrational.
The only time I recall mentioning God's nature is when I pointed out that people who assert being malevolent is "against God's nature" supported my point. Where did I say that it was nonsensical or contradictory for identity to be "part of God?"
There are many things that "aren't illogical" but that doesn't make them rational to believe, and certainly doesn't make them rational to assert as an objection to an argument unless it's a rare form of argument where the mere possibility of something refutes the argument.
The mind is naturally abstract, however there are no degrees of reality. No place is more real than any other place. There are no fractional charges.
I do think your deficiency though is a common modern one, due to common modern ways of thinking, so I thought I'd suggest you look at other ways of thinking.
But I think our perspectives are too different, you are obviously an able expounder of the modern "philosophical" perspective whereas I'm a follower, albeit a minor one, of the Ancient(well at least for the great classical wisdom tradition.), Medieval and Eastern idea of philosophy. You're reason or ratiocination and I'm Intellect, in the Platonic sense or the "eye of the heart".
Well I think your perspective is quite limited, relative and human in the way your describing the "law of identity" but I do not disagree in principle.
The point of this argument is not to prove God but to prove that the concept of him Semitic monotheists, and others, use is consistent. That has been done. In no sense have you shown the law of identity to be something necessarily outside God, constraining him.
Because you keep trying to make God utterly dependent on something outside him, hence you think you have a brilliant argument against traditional theist metaphysics, hence this thread.
It seems to me your sort of admitting defeat in a subtle way. You've moved from an argument that was clearly meant to debunk the very idea of God as commonly held by Semitic monotheists and others to simply saying that they haven't proved this idea is really true.
Necessity and contingency have nothing to do with being "more" or "less" real... I'm not sure where you're getting this concept or where you're coming from.
How do you measure an event in a space time continuum? Where does it begin, where does it end? What makes it, eventful. "Necessity and contingency" are arbitrary assessments.
I'm not sure I understand the distinction... it's a little off topic but would you mind expounding a little on that just for entertainment? I don't know what it means for me to be reason and you to be intellect, or what a Platonic "eye of the heart" means.
Something can be consistent but unjustified, though. If my water doesn't flow in the winter it's consistent to say demons are stealing the water -- but certainly not rational without justification. My argument can't be trumped by showing the mere logical possibility of something; the objection must be justified. The objection can't be raised without justification in this scenario, nor can this particular objection you're raising even be believed without justification.
No, as is clearly stated in the opening of the OP my argument is against a specific concept of theism and that if you don't share the premises of the theism being attacked then the argument doesn't apply.
It is true that identity as I've defined it and justified it is efficacious without assuming a God-aspect as you are supposing. My argument follows.
If it's asserted that identity has a God-aspect itself (rather, is an aspect of God) then such a statement desperately requires justification to be argued or believed; especially considering it ostensibly works fine without dragging a God-aspect into it.
So, not to sound like a broken record but I will be frank: this is the third time I've asked. Can you justify the assertion that identity is part of God?
If yes, let's hear it.
If no, you have no business asserting it and particularly believing it (in order to dismiss my argument), if you value being rational.
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