A question concerning the ontological argument

[Peter_Plato]

I’m not quite sure what you mean by your question, but I’ll give it my best. No, obviously the thought of something doesn’t necessarily mean the thing exists outside of the mind. I can think of unicorns, or moons made of cheese, or a flat Earth, and none of these things exist outside the mind.

…

The problem only arises if we try to go purely from the knowledge and definition of the thing itself to reality, without first proving the reality. Since TTWNGCBT doesn’t correspond to anything we experience, and it remains a purely negative definition (what it’s not), there is no reason to suppose that it does exist.
…

The difficulty here is that every proof that we can provide rests upon some premised “thought” in the mind that is assumed to refer to the “thing in itself” as self-evident or by indisputable correspondence. At some point, then, every axiomatic principle that grounds a proof must begin with a mental construct that is assumed to connect to reality.

What you are doing is doubting that the ideas of TTWNGCBT or necessary being are, in fact, axiomatic ideas. In some sense, you have made that determination somewhat arbitrarily because you don’t accept these as self-evident, but with other axioms that you allow are self-evident and which would form the grounds for the “other” proofs you refer to, you do allow these concepts to be accepted as corresponding to reality merely because these appear to you to be self-evident.

In short, it seems that your critique can be applied to any argument because at some point all proofs must rely upon concepts assumed to be true and real even though we can never, at least according to your Kantian perspective, know for certain the “thing in itself.” You are assuming a skeptical position with respect to the idea of necessary being or TTWNGCBT but not so with these other arguments you refer to as proofs.

The bigger question is how can we distinguish between things we know to exist, like horses or trees, and things we know do not, like unicorns or cheesy moons? Our minds can distinguish reality from mere conception or dream states, but how? Even our sense of reality would seem to depend upon the manner in which we conceive it, so it too is dependent upon a conception of reality that would require some other grounds as proof.

I do think there is a way out of this, but it does remain a problem for you because you are applying your criticism somewhat inconsistently.

 

[Ghosty]

I’m not claiming that things can’t be self-evident, nor that we can’t know things “as they are”; I completely disagree with Kant and his skepticism about real knowledge. I’m saying we can’t have proper, immediate knowledge of things that are beyond our mode of existence. Necessary being is utterly beyond us so we know it only by negating what we can know, namely contibgent being. Since every thought we can have is contingent, it is impossible for us to truly know necessity by our own faculties.

We can know that there must be “necessity”, and this is shown by our understanding of contingent things, but we can’t have an idea of necessity that fits its reality. A blind man can know that there must be visible things, but he can’t have a proper knowledge of colors like green and blue. You could ask him to think of the color blue, but supposing he could even attempt to think of color, the thought he had wouldn’t truly be of blue as it is. Blue is real, and can be known “as it is”, but not by the blind man; he knows from others, and perhaps through analogy, “that” it is, but not “what” it is.

Since the blind man’s mind doesn’t work with the proper color blue, we can’t use his ideas about blue to demonstrate its existence. Blue, properly speaking doesn’t exist in his mind. This is not due to blue’s lack of actual existence, but because of the limited nature of the blind man’s faculties. Likewise with us and necessary being; we can reason to its existence by way of our knowledge of contingent things, but we can never have a proper idea of it.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Peter_Plato]

I’m not claiming that things can’t be self-evident, nor that we can’t know things “as they are”; I completely disagree with Kant and his skepticism about real knowledge. I’m saying we can’t have proper, immediate knowledge of things that are beyond our mode of existence. Necessary being is utterly beyond us so we know it only by negating what we can know, namely contibgent being. Since every thought we can have is contingent, it is impossible for us to truly know necessity by our own faculties.

We can know that there must be “necessity”, and this is shown by our understanding of contingent things, but we can’t have an idea of necessity that fits its reality. A blind man can know that there must be visible things, but he can’t have a proper knowledge of colors like green and blue. You could ask him to think of the color blue, but supposing he could even attempt to think of color, the thought he had wouldn’t truly be of blue as it is. Blue is real, and can be known “as it is”, but not by the blind man; he knows from others, and perhaps through analogy, “that” it is, but not “what” it is.

Since the blind man’s mind doesn’t work with the proper color blue, we can’t use his ideas about blue to demonstrate its existence. Blue, properly speaking doesn’t exist in his mind. This is not due to blue’s lack of actual existence, but because of the limited nature of the blind man’s faculties. Likewise with us and necessary being; we can reason to its existence by way of our knowledge of contingent things, but we can never have a proper idea of it.

Peace and God bless!

The fact that necessary being can be reasoned to as a coherent idea means that, like a blind man’s notion of colour, we can know that it is without knowing what it is precisely.

The modal form of the ontological argument does not require that we know what it is, only that it is a coherent possibility. The modal form presents the concept of necessary being. If it is a coherent concept, then necessary cannot entail “only possible,” it must entail necessity, for necessary being entails “must” exist. The only other possibility is for necessary being to be a logically incoherent notion. There is no middle ground.

A necessary being cannot be a possible necessary being. That is an internally inconsistent idea, like a square circle. It is a contradiction of itself. Something cannot be 1) only possible and also 2) necessary. The law of non-contradiction precludes that.

If you admit that a concept of necessary being is possible, by definition you have committed yourself to the admission that such [a] being is necessary. This is not like the blind man and colour because there is nothing in the concept of colour that makes it necessary. A blind man does not offend the law of non-contradiction by admitting that colour could exist without actually knowing that it does. However, to say a necessary being could exist, but not necessarily, is an infringement of logic since it is claiming that a necessary being is only contingently possible. However, if it is only contingent or possible, then it is not necessary, by definition; but if necessary, then it cannot be contingent upon conception, or anything else, by definition.

There are only two possibilities. Necessary being is logically coherent and therefore exists necessarily or the idea of necessary being is incoherent.

 

[Ghosty]

Necessary is not contrary to possible or impossible, it is contrary to contingent. It is no contradiction at all to say that a particular necessary being doesn’t exist in fact, it is only a contradiction to say that an actual necessary being does not actually exist, but then you have to prove the actuality is true.

A necessary being is nothing more than a being that is not contingent on something else for its existence, and it is no contradiction to say that such a being doesn’t necessarily exist. Indeed, I’m not limited to supposing only one succh being, as I can suppose that there are many, or an infinite number. Since it can’t be true that there is an actual infinite set of necessary beings, some of f them certainly don’t actually exist, and therefore it is not certain that a necessary being must exist.

We know that a necessary being exists because contingent things require it, not because it is logically necessary in and of itself.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Linusthe2nd]

I sed: This I do not understand. When you say “Supposing something greater exists in actual reality than TTWNGCBT,” you are conceiving of something greater than TTWNGCBT. So you are really saying “something greater can be thought than that which nothing greater can be thought,” which is a contradiction.

Ghosty replied in part:

So thoughts of things can never require the object of our thought to exist?

I can think of a unicorn or a sphinx but neither has ever existed. I can think of any number of things which have never and will never exist. St. Thomas’ arguments for God’s existence are not of this sort. He is saying an ultimate cause has to exist to account for the existence and activity of the universe. And this is God, the God was trying to reason to but failed.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Necessary is not contrary to possible or impossible, it is contrary to contingent. It is no contradiction at all to say that a particular necessary being doesn’t exist in fact, it is only a contradiction to say that an actual necessary being does not actually exist, but then you have to prove the actuality is true.

A necessary being is nothing more than a being that is not contingent on something else for its existence, and it is no contradiction to say that such a being doesn’t necessarily exist. Indeed, I’m not limited to supposing only one succh being, as I can suppose that there are many, or an infinite number. Since it can’t be true that there is an actual infinite set of necessary beings, some of f them certainly don’t actually exist, and therefore it is not certain that a necessary being must exist.

We know that a necessary being exists because contingent things require it, not because it is logically necessary in and of itself.

Peace and God bless!

I am not clear that necessary is contrary to contingent because it is possible to have a necessary existent or property that is necessarily dependent on another necessary existent and, therefore, still necessary although contingently so. So it could be both contingent on a necessary being, but still be necessary by its necessary connection.
Necessary is the logical contradiction to impossible, but precludes being merely possible in order for necessity to obtain.

 

[Ghosty]

I am not clear that necessary is contrary to contingent because it is possible to have a necessary existent or property that is necessarily dependent on another necessary existent and, therefore, still necessary although contingently so. So it could be both contingent on a necessary being, but still be necessary by its necessary connection.
Necessary is the logical contradiction to impossible, but precludes being merely possible in order for necessity to obtain.

Necessary being, when used in Catholic theology, means non-contingent, i.e. not caused by another, contains within its essence the reason for its own existence. See this definition from the Catholic Encyclopedia. It does not mean a being that necessarily exists, except in the sense that existence is part of its very definition…

Your example of a “contingent necessary being” does not fit with the definitions I’m working with, since any “necessary” being that depends on another “necessary” being is contingent whether or not it must exist. It may be that we’re talking past each other because of this definition difference.

That said, I maintain that there is nothing that forces the mind to accept that a mental conception of a “necessary being” in either sense implies the actual existence of that being. I disagree that “necessary being” is a coherent concept in the human mind, and what we conceive of when we think “necessary being” is in no way a necessary being. Since what we think of, both as general concept and specific thought, is in fact contingent regardless of what we call it, it does not follow that the thought of a necessary being exists actually. As I pointed out above, it is theoretically possible to think of an infinite number of necessary beings, but they do not actually exist and this shows that thinking of necessary beings doesn’t mean they actually exist.

What is a coherent concept in the human mind, to a limited degree, is the removal of a cause from an effect by simply not envisioning it. We can speak of an everlasting footprint without speaking of an everlasting foot, despite the fact that a footprint is absolutely contingent on a foot. From this we build the analogy of necessary being, but that doesn’t mean we have a proper notion of necessary being.

As for demonstrating that a necessary being exists, I believe this is absolutely possible, but I don’t believe it follows from the definition itself. For it to follow from the definition itself we would have to be able to conceive of “necessary existence”, which is utterly beyond our mind as I’ve shown before (every thought of ours is absolutely contingent, and therefore we have no concept of “necessity” as an essential characteristic). If I could truly know necessary being as a coherent concept, then I could know from the definition itself that such a being exists, but as it is I can only know it as a dark analogy by taking away a trait from things I do know, and such a thing is actually less than the complete thing I’m basing my analogy on; in other words, I remove the “cause” from a contingent being and I have a necessary being by analogy, but in fact I have a lesser concept than I had before. All human concepts of “necessary being” follow this model of removing “cause” from a contingent thing, whether forming the general concept or thinking of a specific thing like the footprint above.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Linusthe2nd]

I can think of a unicorn or a sphinx but neither has ever existed. I can think of any number of things which have never and will never exist. St. Thomas’ arguments for God’s existence are not of this sort. He is saying an ultimate cause has to exist to account for the existence and activity of the universe. And this is God, the God was trying to reason to but failed.

Correction. " And this is God, the God Anselm was trying to reason to but failed. "

 

[Ghosty]

Correction. " And this is God, the God Anselm was trying to reason to but failed. "

Right. Aquinas points to the deficiency of creation, which we can know, and even know immediately in some cases. The Ontological Arguments all point to the essence of God, which is impossible for us to know without supernatural faculties.

Aquinas says “this is the world, and it requires God”, while Anselm says “this is God, and He must exist”, but we can’t know God in a manner that allows for this kind of proof; God can know His essence, and does, and this is the Logos.

Peace and God bless!

 

[aragonjohn1]

The difficulty here is that every proof that we can provide rests upon some premised “thought” in the mind that is assumed to refer to the “thing in itself” as self-evident or by indisputable correspondence. At some point, then, every axiomatic principle that grounds a proof must begin with a mental construct that is assumed to connect to reality.

What you are doing is doubting that the ideas of TTWNGCBT or necessary being are, in fact, axiomatic ideas. In some sense, you have made that determination somewhat arbitrarily because you don’t accept these as self-evident, but with other axioms that you allow are self-evident and which would form the grounds for the “other” proofs you refer to, you do allow these concepts to be accepted as corresponding to reality merely because these appear to you to be self-evident.

In short, it seems that your critique can be applied to any argument because at some point all proofs must rely upon concepts assumed to be true and real even though we can never, at least according to your Kantian perspective, know for certain the “thing in itself.” You are assuming a skeptical position with respect to the idea of necessary being or TTWNGCBT but not so with these other arguments you refer to as proofs.

The bigger question is how can we distinguish between things we know to exist, like horses or trees, and things we know do not, like unicorns or cheesy moons? Our minds can distinguish reality from mere conception or dream states, but how? Even our sense of reality would seem to depend upon the manner in which we conceive it, so it too is dependent upon a conception of reality that would require some other grounds as proof.

I do think there is a way out of this, but it does remain a problem for you because you are applying your criticism somewhat inconsistently.

That helped very much
Thank you sir

Kant is still foreign to me however : )

Merry Christmas
God bless

 

[Linusthe2nd]

The difficulty here is that every proof that we can provide rests upon some premised “thought” in the mind that is assumed to refer to the “thing in itself” as self-evident or by indisputable correspondence. At some point, then, every axiomatic principle that grounds a proof must begin with a mental construct that is assumed to connect to reality.

It is true that every " proof " is inferred from a concept in the mind ( which you refer to as a " premised thought " ). But this concept is not " assumed " to refer to reality ( which you refer to as the " thing in itself ). We have a real intellect and we have real sense perceptors - eyes, ears, taste, smell, skin. Through the senses we receive sense data from things existing outside of ourselves.

The intellect collects and collates this data and forms a concept. Then the intellect makes a judgment, " this is a really existing thing." Over a long process of receiving the same precise or very similar data the intellect, in communion with other intellects in its social network, says, " yes, this is a horse, " or " this is my house not yours, " etc.

This is not a " self evident " assumption. It is a conclusion reached by the intellect through an analysis of the sense data it has recieved and pondered over or reasoned about.

From a large number of such exercises and over time ( and who knows how many or over what time span) the intellect forms certain " self-evident " facts which are termed self-evident, " a real world exists outside the myself and I can know it ’ as it really is,. ’ a thing cannot both be and not be at the same time in the same respect, etc. "

These " mental constructs " as you call them are derived from reality. Indeed, it is impossible for us to have any type of knowledge which does not ultimately come through the senses through data derived from reality.

What you are doing is doubting that the ideas of TTWNGCBT or necessary being are, in fact, axiomatic ideas. In some sense, you have made that determination somewhat arbitrarily because you don’t accept these as self-evident, but with other axioms that you allow are self-evident and which would form the grounds for the “other” proofs you refer to, you do allow these concepts to be accepted as corresponding to reality merely because these appear to you to be self-evident.

Indeed, to assume that the TTWNGCBT exists simply because we can have that thought in our mind is completely gratuitous. There is nothing " axiomatic " about it. All true axioms are based judgments about reality as I pointed out above and there are any number of them. But TTWNGCBT is not one of them.

The only " grounds " for such a reality is the process of induction beginning with the limited, contingent beings we find in reality which must have an unlimited, necessary being as the cause of their existence, etc. Once we reach that valid conclusion, we can say, possibly, that this being is TTWNGCBT, since we have proven, through inference that a being very like it must exist outside of our minds and outside the reality we can know with our limited intellects.

In short, it seems that your critique can be applied to any argument because at some point all proofs must rely upon concepts assumed to be true and real even though we can never, at least according to your Kantian perspective, know for certain the “thing in itself.” You are assuming a skeptical position with respect to the idea of necessary being or TTWNGCBT but not so with these other arguments you refer to as proofs.

Wrong. G. is not arguing from a Kantian perspective but from a moderate realist perspective based on St. Thomas and the Scholastics. G’s rejection of Anselm’s argument is justified, and this does not require the rejection of actually reasoned conclusions derived from the first principles of human knowledge and reason based in reality.

The bigger question is how can we distinguish between things we know to exist, like horses or trees, and things we know do not, like unicorns or cheesy moons? Our minds can distinguish reality from mere conception or dream states, but how? Even our sense of reality would seem to depend upon the manner in which we conceive it, so it too is dependent upon a conception of reality that would require some other grounds as proof.

Indeed. I would suggest reading the Summa Theologiae Part 1, Ques 75-89. Or you can pick up a copy of " Mind " by Edward Feser.

G. has been consistent throughout this debate.

 

[Kilbourne]

Greetings all,

Regarding the preceding discussion about the meaning of necessary existence, I think it is helpful to first look at truth and necessity. Here there are three possible positions.

1. All truth is necessary. Nothing could ever have been different from the way it was, is and will be. We can call this the ultra-rationalist position.
2. Some (at least one) truth is necessary. That is, at least some knowledge we have is unconditionally necessary. At least some knowledge is unavoidably true. This is the moderate rationalist position.
3. No truth is necessary. All truth is relative. This is logical positivist position.

Positions 1 and 3 are contraries (polar opposites). Position 2 is contradictory of Positions 1 and 3. To say some truth is necessary contradicts the positions that all truth is necessary and that no truth is necessary.

 

[Kilbourne]

Position 1, ultra-rationalism, espouses pure determinism. It denies that anything could exist with an alternative. It ultimately is refuted because it can be shown that in a world completely determined nothing can change and therefore nothing can happen.

Position 3,logical positivism, espouses pure relativism. It denies that there are absolute or unqualified truths. All truth is contingent on certain circumstances (contingent on an arbitrary definition or certain facts). Relativism, as we know, is self-refuting.

So this leaves Position 2, metaphysics, as the only reasonable position. It recognizes both necessary and contingent truths. It is possible to formulate propositions which are true of all being.

 

[Kilbourne]

So, when we encounter an atheist, we need to establish what kind of critter we are dealing with. He obviously falls within category 3, but here there are two possibilities. With respect to the proposition “God exists,” he could maintain the very idea of God is nonsensical or impossible. The proposition is neither true or false, just nonsense, akin to saying “Round-squares exist.” He could also mean that it is possible that God exists, but there just isn’t any empirical proof or there are facts which contradict the proposition.

With respect to the OA in its second form, Charles Hartshorne argues that, given the definition of God being TTWNGCBT, God’s existence can be proven to be necessary. Thus the argument is not over empirical proof but over the definition. Is it meaningful (logical and coherent) or not to define God in terms of unsurpassable greatness? Hartshorne argues that to deny the possibility of defining God in terms of some attribute or other is to fall into the logical positivist position. Anselm’s unwitting discovery–he didn’t address the meaningfulness of his definition; he just took it for granted–was that God exists necessarily or his existence is impossible.

 

[Ghosty]

Position 1, ultra-rationalism, espouses pure determinism. It denies that anything could exist with an alternative. It ultimately is refuted because it can be shown that in a world completely determined nothing can change and therefore nothing can happen.

I don’t think your last statement stands. Change isn’t opposed to determinism, if the change in question is determined. I think you’re confusing “determined” with “unchanging”, when in fact a change, like a bend in a river, or water becoming mist, is totally compatible with a determined path.

Position 3,logical positivism, espouses pure relativism. It denies that there are absolute or unqualified truths. All truth is contingent on certain circumstances (contingent on an arbitrary definition or certain facts). Relativism, as we know, is self-refuting.

I agree with this. I don’t see how any kind of absolute relativism is reasonable, but then I don’t know if logical positivism necessarily makes the assertion that all truth is relative.

So this leaves Position 2, metaphysics, as the only reasonable position. It recognizes both necessary and contingent truths. It is possible to formulate propositions which are true of all being.

I don’t think it’s the only reasonable position, but it’s the most reasonable because it follows both pure logic and our natural experience. Determinism is reasonable, but it contradicts our natural experience because we do act as if determinism is false. We could be determined to act this way, but it seems less reasonable (not totally unreasonable) to work on the assumption that our senses and rational mind fails us in every-day activity. To borrow a thought from G.K. Chesterton, a determinist still asks “can you please pass the salt” without irony; they might be determined to ask such a thing, but their asking implies non-determination. The most reasonable perspective is that things are not fully determined, but this isn’t a necessary conclusion.

So, when we encounter an atheist, we need to establish what kind of critter we are dealing with. He obviously falls within category 3, but here there are two possibilities. With respect to the proposition “God exists,” he could maintain the very idea of God is nonsensical or impossible. The proposition is neither true or false, just nonsense, akin to saying “Round-squares exist.” He could also mean that it is possible that God exists, but there just isn’t any empirical proof or there are facts which contradict the proposition.

I don’t follow you here. When I was an atheist I was definitely in category #2; one doesn’t have to deny metaphysical reality to maintain that God is unprovable, nor to hold that that God is non-nonsensical. I believed in metaphysical reality, but I didn’t see how God fit into it.

As for Position 3, I think the only way to convince such a person is to show them their own self-contradiction, and appeal to their reason which compels them to accept reality as they experience it, at least to some degree. Once they’ve accepted some measure of absolute reality you can begin to build up to an acceptance of natural facts, and from there to the deficiency of the universe and the necessity of a transcendent being to account for the universe.

With respect to the OA in its second form, Charles Hartshorne argues that, given the definition of God being TTWNGCBT, God’s existence can be proven to be necessary. Thus the argument is not over empirical proof but over the definition. Is it meaningful (logical and coherent) or not to define God in terms of unsurpassable greatness? Hartshorne argues that to deny the possibility of defining God in terms of some attribute or other is to fall into the logical positivist position. Anselm’s unwitting discovery–he didn’t address the meaningfulness of his definition; he just took it for granted–was that God exists necessarily or his existence is impossible.

I’d have to see Hartshorne’s argument, but I don’t see any basis for his assertion. As I’ve argued repeatedly, one can’t go from the definition of “TTWNGCBT” to the actual existence of “TTWNGCBT”. Since there is no necessary thought of “TTWNGCBT”, there can’t be a necessary actual “TTWNGCBT” concluded from it. Since the human mind is limited, our “unsurpassable greatness” in thought falls short of necessary being, just as an unsurpassable human jump falls short of the greatest distance in the universe. Unsurpassable is an inherently relative term from the human perspective; since the human perspective can only gaze on a small fraction of absolute possibility, the greatest limit of that small fraction is “unsurpassable” for our minds, but is certainly surpassed by reality.

I also vehemently disagree with the notion that to deny the definition of God by some attribute is to fall into the logical positivist position. Since every conceivable attribute falls short of what we know must be required for the universe to exist, to say that God must be defined by some attribute is to ultimately say that the universe doesn’t exist.

How pitiful, it seems, for such minds to toy with a “God” that is so small as to have conceivable attributes. They make God smaller than the cosmos, smaller than my skull, smaller than a speck of dust, since all attributes I can conceive of are arrived at through my finite mind.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Kilbourne]

Hi Ghosty,

Hope you had a merry and blessed Christmas.

Originally Posted by Kilbourne
Position 1, ultra-rationalism, espouses pure determinism. It denies that anything could exist with an alternative. It ultimately is refuted because it can be shown that in a world completely determined nothing can change and therefore nothing can happen.

Ghosty replied:

I don’t think your last statement stands. Change isn’t opposed to determinism, if the change in question is determined. I think you’re confusing “determined” with “unchanging”, when in fact a change, like a bend in a river, or water becoming mist, is totally compatible with a determined path.

Think of it this way. If, in Event 1, the causes A,B and C completely determine Event 2, then Event 2 is comprised of only A, B and C. What then has changed? Nothing. If a succeeding event cannot ever be more than the causes of the preceding event, then no change is possible. If no change is possible, then nothing can happen, which is silly. Therefore determinism must be false. Each event must be more than its preceding causes. IOW, each event must be in some way indeterminate.

 

[Ghosty]

Hi Ghosty,

Hope you had a merry and blessed Christmas.

Ghosty replied:

Think of it this way. If, in Event 1, the causes A,B and C completely determine Event 2, then Event 2 is comprised of only A, B and C. What then has changed? Nothing. If a succeeding event cannot ever be more than the causes of the preceding event, then no change is possible. If no change is possible, then nothing can happen, which is silly. Therefore determinism must be false. Each event must be more than its preceding causes. IOW, each event must be in some way indeterminate.

I don’t follow this at all. Succeeding events are never greater than the preceding causes, whether those causes be determined or not. An effect will always, by definition, be the sum of its causes, and this is true with determinism and without it. The real question is whether or not the causes are self-directed and can choose their own effect.

For example, domino A must hit domino B, which must hit domino C, which in turn hits a button which launches a rocket. The path of all of these causes and effects is determined, none of them are self-directed, and all of them are changed in the passing action. The changes themselves are determined, could be going as far back as you please. You can go even further to say that God creates a fully determined universe that moves and changes, with all of the causes and effects set in order to play out over time, with God Himself as the ultimate cause of determinism.

I honestly don’t see how your example demonstrates that determinism contradicts change.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Kilbourne]

Hi Ghosty,

I am not able to explain it any better. Maybe we can start a different thread on causal determinism. For now, all I can add is that universal determinism and complete freedom (no determinism) are polar opposites, and the polar extremes, it seems, usually prove to be false, with the correct metaphysical position lying somewhere in the middle (some freedom is found in all happenings).

I sed:

Position 3,logical positivism, espouses pure relativism. It denies that there are absolute or unqualified truths. All truth is contingent on certain circumstances (contingent on an arbitrary definition or certain facts). Relativism, as we know, is self-refuting.

To which you replied:

I agree with this. I don’t see how any kind of absolute relativism is reasonable, but then I don’t know if logical positivism necessarily makes the assertion that all truth is relative.

LP espouses the verifiability principle that all meaningful propositions are contingent. Only propositions dependent on factual circumstances or arbitrary definitions make sense. If true, all meaningful propositions could have been false, and visa versa.

 

[Ghosty]

Hi Ghosty,

I am not able to explain it any better. Maybe we can start a different thread on causal determinism. For now, all I can add is that universal determinism and complete freedom (no determinism) are polar opposites, and the polar extremes, it seems, usually prove to be false, with the correct metaphysical position lying somewhere in the middle (some freedom is found in all happenings).

We’ll just have to let it go then, I suppose. I see no reason to believe that just because everything is determined that change can’t occur. Things can’t occur differently than determined, but that is not the definition of change by any stretch.

LP espouses the verifiability principle that all meaningful propositions are contingent. Only propositions dependent on factual circumstances or arbitrary definitions make sense. If true, all meaningful propositions could have been false, and visa versa.

Contingent is not the same as relative, and contingency doesn’t cause relativity. A given fact may not have been, but that doesn’t make it relative in the absolute sense, as it still is either really true or really false, and its truth or falsity can be known with certainty by the human mind. I think that, contrary to your assertion, logical positivists would tend to say that facts are not relative. Any philosophical position which asserts that things are either true or false regardless of human perspective, and Logical Positivism most certainly says this about some things, can’t be fully relativist.

Peace and God bless!

 

[Kilbourne]

Happy New Year!

Contingent is not the same as relative, and contingency doesn’t cause relativity. A given fact may not have been, but that doesn’t make it relative in the absolute sense, as it still is either really true or really false, and its truth or falsity can be known with certainty by the human mind. I think that, contrary to your assertion, logical positivists would tend to say that facts are not relative. Any philosophical position which asserts that things are either true or false regardless of human perspective, and Logical Positivism most certainly says this about some things, can’t be fully relativist.

LP is not subjectivism. However, it does hold that no truth is necessary. IOW, the truth or falsity of all propositions depends upon (i.e. is contingent upon or relative to) factual circumstances or definitions.

LP makes the distinction between mere sentences and propositions. Sentences are grammatical expressions, but only meaningful sentences can be propositions. What are meaningful sentences? Only those whose truth or falsity can be demonstrated from facts or consistency with arbitrary rules or definition. So a merely empirical statement like “All swans are white,” is a proposition. So is “All bachelors are unmarried men.” But “Round squares eat grass” is meaningless and can neither be true or false. So is “God is all-knowing” or “God is TTWNGCBT.”