Boethius's Arguments for the existence of God

[StAugustine]

As in a dream, the desire to awaken reveals that we ought to be awake and can awaken, so in reality, the desire for knowledge of reality proves that it can be known. The known distinction between the dream and waking proves we can be awake- likewise the known distinction between subjective and objective reality demonstrates our capacity to know reality at all. The very fear of illusion is proof of reality.

 

[STT]

The universe is not perfect therefore it could be god rather than God who created this.

 

[Gorgias]

That’s an interesting question. If I should attempt to draw a triangle, but due to my extreme ineptitude I actually draw a circle, is it a circle, or is it an imperfect triangle? Or is it both, depending upon one’s perspective? And wouldn’t that make it subjective?

Interesting!

I think that we would have to allow a viewer to describe it as s/he wishes. (That wouldn’t, however, make it that thing – it would just be an observer’s description.)

From the point of the person constructing it, I would say it’s an imperfect triangle. (But, to be fair, it would be an imperfect circle, too, I would say!)

But as it pertains to the OP, you can’t invoke the existence of a designer in an argument whose purported goal is to prove the existence of that very designer.

This wouldn’t be the part of the argument that posits the existence of the designer. But, hey… nice try.

So for the sake of the presented argument, whether or not something is imperfect is totally subjective.

No. One could legitimately look at something, attempt to understand the intent of the person who constructed it, and label it accordingly. (The observer, of course, could be mistaken. Nevertheless, he would be attempting a valid description.)

I would agree that there’s the concept of a perfect triangle, but I would also point out that the known laws governing our reality make the creation of such a perfect triangle impossible. Uncertainty means that you can never draw a perfectly straight line, or a perfectly round circle. The concept of a perfect circle, and the actual existence of a perfect circle are two different things.

See! And here you made fun of Boethius! You just explained his argument, as something that you agree with!

 

[StAugustine]

What do you know of imperfection? You can only compare it to a known idea of perfection. But if you admit this you admit of a reality which you can use as a basis of comparison.

But if all is experience, you should have no knowledge of this, for where would the notion of perfection originate?

 

[ServusDei1]

Yes, it’s a bit long, I suggest you read from the beginning until your questions are answered. If you have any questions, post in the forum. I’ve noticed most, “refutations” of Thomistic arguments are really misunderstandings of Aristotelian thought. Aquinas goes into why the universe or anything contingent cannot be god, etc.

 

[ServusDei1]

Or if you’d like your questions answered now, I suggest you post another discussion. I’ll try to help you where I can.

 

[STT]

What do you know of imperfection? You can only compare it to a known idea of perfection. But if you admit this you admit of a reality which you can use as a basis of comparison.

But if all is experience, you should have no knowledge of this, for where would the notion of perfection originate?

I understand what you are trying to say. Do you understand what I am trying to say? If yes, then there is a tension between what you said and what I said.

 

[StAugustine]

If no person has ever experienced perfection, then where does the notion of perfection come from? Infinite good predicated of a thing without privation?

Where does the notion of infinite come from? No one has experienced it, and being material and subject to death, no one will. How then can we abstract it?

 

[StAugustine]

False, and demonstrably so. You seek after truth, therefore you admit to ignorance, and in so doing seek to move from an imperfect to a more perfected state.

 

[StAugustine]

Exactly. Perfection is the completion of being. But you know this.

Therefore consider- that which is imperfect is incomplete, as you yourself admit. But you seek to complete your understanding of truth, it is therefore imperfect, and you seek to perfect it.

Now, if you are already perfect, meaning entirely, because perfection is wholeness, as you say, why do you seek to improve on perfection? Why do you seek after truth?

If you are whole, why does your intellect betray you by questing for wholeness via truth? Such behavior is in fact symptomatic of weakness, therefore a lack of wholeness, and therefore imperfection.

It’s inescapable.

 

[Gorgias]

Do you see the flaw yet?

Yes. You’re mischaracterizing his argument.

The only way to have imperfections is to ASSUME the existence of a perfect version that the imperfect instantiation is a flawed copy of.

Not quite. Boethius is dealing with the problem that he and his contemporaries were trying to wrap their heads around: ‘universals’ and ‘particulars.’ (Boethius eventually was able to explain the Aristotelian solution with a harmonization of realist (“universals have real existence”) and conceptualist (“universals exist in the mind”) perspectives, but he himself probably was closer to a sort of neo-Platonist perspective.

So, in the context of the quote that @IWantGod provides (BTW, @IWantGod, are you lifting text from boethius101.org? Are you the author at that site?), Boethius says, “here I conceive it proper to inquire, first, whether any excellence, such as thou hast lately defined, can exist in the nature of things, lest we be deceived by an empty fiction of thought to which no true reality answers.” In other words, he’s asking “do universals exist as ‘substance’ (i.e., ‘form’)?” Without asserting that they exist in reality, as things unto themselves, he asserts that universals do exist.

So, before you get all worked up, I think it’s important for you to ask, “what is the ‘existence’ that Boethius is positing here?”. Before you toss his solution out the window, it would help to understand what he’s trying to ask, and how he’s trying to answer it.

So you have to ASSUME the existence of the perfect version in order to prove the existence of the perfect version.

No, I think you’re seeing a circular argument where there is none. His argument is that we would not recognize imperfection if there weren’t perfection that we compare it to. So, it’s not “assume God exists; therefore God exists”. Rather, it’s “does God exist? Yes – the recognition of imperfection leads us to conclude that there must be ‘perfection’. We call that perfection – which we posit rationally – by the name ‘God’.”

If there is no perfect version, then there are no imperfections, and if there are no imperfections, then there is no perfect version. Voila!!! I disproved the existence of God.

You remind me of the passage from Adams’ “Hitchhiker” novel, in which God proves His own non-existence by asserting His existence. At least Adams realized the joke he was making.

(P.S., your argument fails to state the crux of the argument. Let me fix it for you:

If there is no perfect version, then there are no imperfections, and if there are no imperfections, then there is no perfect version. But, there are imperfections. Therefore, the perfection – i.e., God – exists. Voila!!!

Glad I could help you work through your proof. )

 

[StAugustine]

Life itself is a betrayal of that. Life grows from immature, to mature, to overripening to decay.

If you are complete as you are, then others are as well. Which means you have no moral basis to object to others inconveniencing you.

When your family lies dead in front of you due to the antics of a psychotic gunman who smiles at you and says- “It’s the journey that matters” and then puts a gun in his mouth…

This is simply his way of expressing his own inherent perfection. Right? So why do you demand justice in such circumstances?

See, it cannot really be lived, because we inherently know better- and that intuitive vision of the truth is what being human is about, at least in part.

 

[IWantGod]

So, in the context of the quote that @IWantGod provides (BTW, @IWantGod, are you lifting text from boethius101.org?

I have quoted from that site, it’s not my work.

 

[StAugustine]

So the failure to adhere to the law of the state is what? A moral failing? Or simply a different degree of perfection?

But perfection is penultimate and can not admit of degrees.

Is Charles Manson perfect in some sense?

 

[HarryStotle]

So, first you claim…

Maybe if I put it another way you’d see the flaw. If there is no perfect version, then there are no imperfections, and if there are no imperfections, then there is no perfect version.

Your argument is that merely saying something is “imperfect” is to assume some idea of “perfection.”

So, by denying there is any perfection at all, you deny that imperfection is a meaningful concept.

Then here you go positing what perfection means.

Perfection lies in being what one is meant to be.

That would seem to undermine your whole argument that the idea of perfection is meaningless and is mere presumption, since you go on to propose what perfection (something that, according to you, really doesn’t actually exist in the first place) is.

How, precisely, do we know that something was “meant to be” unless we know, a priori, what it was that was meant to to be?

How do you know you are being what you were “meant to be” without doing a whole lotta presuming yourself? Much more presuming than the person who assumes, formally, that imperfection implies perfection.

You do the same thing except that, for you, you presume to know what perfection is even though you don’t allow that anything less than perfection exists.

What exactly is it that is “meant to be,” except just what happens to be?

You don’t try to explain away imperfection, you just assume it away.

 

[Gorgias]

There’s the crux of our disagreement. You see imperfections, and I don’t believe that this is demonstrably true. If there is no perfect version, ( and the argument can’t simply assume that there is ) then there’s no standard against which to measure perfection, except your own subjective concept of perfection. And obviously my concept of perfection, and yours, are different.

Ahh, but we can say that we see differences, no? And, to one extent or another, a difference implies a qualitative variance, wouldn’t you say? And, if a qualitative variance, then one could be said to be qualitatively better than the other, no? And, if one is qualitatively better, then it is more perfect, while the other is less perfect. And therefore, we perceive an imperfection.

To prove the existence of imperfections, you need to first prove the existence of a standard against which to measure those imperfections. It’s a circular argument.

I think the standard is manifest. If Rachael Ray cooks dinner for you and I cook dinner for you, I think you’d be able to say which one was better and which is worse. If an MLB pitcher threw a fastball and you threw a fastball, I think I’d be able to say which is better and which is worse. To imply – let alone assert – that there’s no obvious standard… is facetious, don’t you think?

 

[Gorgias]

Without a standard by which to measure them, perfect and imperfect are meaningless terms.

I disagree. Implicitly, we have a standard. Your very use of “Pope Francis” and “Charles Manson” means that you see this as a reasonable example… and therefore, there is a standard which you recognize! Now, that standard may not be rigorously defined, but it exists, and your example demonstrates that you not only recognize it but assent to it.

In the example of Rachael Ray and the chicken, the standard is purely subjective.

Fair enough reaction on your part. But still… “difference”, and therefore, “imperfection.” (And besides, the “difference” might be that my spaghetti is crunchy and my sauce acrid, and hers is not – which would not be a subjective measure!)

But there is no objective standard by which to measure better and worse.

Bah… as one blogger says, “B as in B, S as in S”…!!!

There are plenty of objective standards! I can measure the speed of a fastball, or how close it comes to the strike zone. And you admit as much in your response! “The very name defines the standard” – and yet, you claim there’s no standard! C’mon, @oldnskeptical… there’s a difference between ‘agnostic’ and 'not willing to admit that you really do, in fact, possess knowledge '!!!

You can compare whatever you want, but any of them could be deemed imperfect if you use the other one as the standard.

Yes, there may be a variety of scales on which to compare entities: height, weight, number of people they’ve murdered, their speed in the 40-yard-dash… but each of them point to a perfection that is met (or unmet) to a particular degree! (And, these perfections are not, of necessity, ‘subjective’!

 

[Gorgias]

It amazes me that you can’t grasp this.

I can grasp what you’re saying: I just reject it.

The fact that I use Pope Francis and Charles Manson as an example doesn’t mean that I recognize that there’s a standard, it simply means that I recognize that there’s a difference.

… and that means that you recognize there’s a qualitative difference. And with that recognition, you have just grounded my argument. It amazes me that you can’t grasp this.

Use the Pope as the standard, and Manson is imperfect. Use Manson as the standard and the Pope is imperfect.

That’s fine. But, these would be two distinct standards – and both might be reasonable standards! There isn’t the suggestion that there’s only one objective standard – and your attempt to force this into the argument isn’t reasonable. All we’re asserting is that standards exist.

Gorgias kind of distracted me.

Reasonable counter-arguments tend to do that, you know.

I know that it seems as though I’ve contradicted myself.

Seems?

 

[ServusDei1]

Is it possible the two of you are falling for semantic argument?

 

[ServusDei1]

I mean, here he claims what if what i find to be perfect is imperfect, etc. He might as well say, my decinition of red is different from yours, therefore your argument is invalid. Perhaps we should define perfect.