Any thoughts on Graham Oppy’s critique of Edward Feser’s five proofs of the existence of God?

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EndTimes said:
Since Proof was introduced?

Everything.
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Again, you fail to grasp the meaning of proof in the philosophical understanding.

Faith is not blind and does not preclude philosophical inquiry. A well-ordered Christian philosophy is faith seeking understanding.
 
CTBcin said:
Faith is not blind and does not preclude philosophical inquiry. A well-ordered Christian philosophy is faith seeking understanding.
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Maybe we’re speaking past one another.

And I’ll not be put off the path I’m supporting

Via FAITH - I’ve found the pearl of Great Worth. JESUS!

And I’ve never as yet personally witnessed very much if any
  • of Faith coming via e.g., demands of what some label as being “proof”
    for the reason that FAITH as I’ve encountered is spiritual
    and differs greatly from any modern senses of proof.
That said, yes - via Open and Honest Reason - people can come to solid Evidences

Yet that never auto-leads those who have seen - into FAITH

)

_
 
Khedron said:
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This is the problem with the modern usage of the word metaphysics. Traditionally, and as philosophers understand it, it is the study of the first principles of being and nature. Whether we can say there is cause and effect, whether we can say that by understanding particular samples you can gain any knowledge of other particulars of the same type, what is knowledge, what is “a thing,” and so on. However, you go into a bookstore and under the title metaphysics you’ll find books on wicca and ghosts and poltergeists, which isn’t what is meant by philosophers at all when they speak of metaphysics. Which is why I say from a philosophical perspective, any epistemology makes metaphysical suppositions. Not in the wiccan/paranormal/bookstore manner, but from what philosophers actually mean by it. The epistemology you cited makes all truth claims subject to methods dependent on claims about causality and repeatability. Any justification for why it’s appropriate to use these methods are arguments about the nature of nature and human knowledge (i.e. metaphysics).

As for Aristotle and St. Thomas’ method, they agree that all knowledge comes through the senses and is learned by observation and experience, and that nothing that is known is not first “known” by the senses. However, this doesn’t mean one has to be a nominalist or a materialist, or excluding God.

Even your claims about what knowledge is are based on certain metaphysical suppositions. You perceive a tree in front of you. Is the object of your knowledge (not your perceptual image) that tree or only a mental representation of what you call a tree? It sounds like you default to the latter stance, which is a metaphysical claim not subject to your epistemological methods, and there are certain other commitments and quandaries that can result from that choice.

I’m working on an essay on that very topic right now. If I ever complete it, it would make a good discussion.
 
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Khedron said:
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Wesrock:
This is the problem with the modern usage of the word metaphysics. Traditionally, and as philosophers understand it, it is the study of the first principles of being and nature.
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It is very important to define the basic concepts in a mutually agreeable fashion. The different branches of philosophy are:
  1. metaphysics - the question of “what exists”?
  2. epistemology - the question of “how do we know it”?
  3. ethics - so “how should we behave”?
  4. sometimes people wish to include aesthetics - the problem of “what is beautiful”?
I am not particularly interested in the third or fourth ones, but we can discuss them, if you are so inclined.

When you will be finished with your essay, I will be very interested in reading it. But up until that, I wonder if we can come to agreement upon the branches of philosophy as I enumerated them above.
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In broad strokes, yes. I may claim some wiggle room. Metaphysics for example isn’t so much as what exists as it is the study of the nature of what exists (and for a Thomist would also include justifications for affirming that what exists actually exists independently and isn’t just an illusion).

And epistemology goes very closely with that. There are some co-dependencies between epistemology and metaphysics.

It all kind of builds on each other. From metaphysics and epistemology a philosopher would develop his philosophies of nature and science, and from there a philosophy of ethics and perhaps aesthetics.
 
Delete… Or Ignore … I’ve made a mistake in responding to me.
 
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OK…

To the OP

+Feser’s five proofs?

Thoughts? So few seem to know or care… that it’s apparently not worth many whiles.

Evidences for God’s Existence Exist

PROOFS? No…

God Asks for FAITH which is never based upon any notion of Proof.
 
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