Proving the Existence of God

[prodigalson2011]

I didn’t realize my question would be so very difficult to answer.

Incidentally, I know what that word means, I too can google . Nothing has the power to overcome a law of nature, which is why they are called omnipotent. However, that is incidental and off-topic.

That is not the meaning of omnipotent. Further, if you believe in God, as you apparently do, then you most likely believe that God has the power to overcome a law of nature. In fact, you probably believe that God created the laws of nature. Ergo, the laws of nature are not omnipotent. Moreover, omnipotence entails the ability to do or create or change anything. The laws of nature clearly do not possess such power.

Fine, but again that’s not what I was asking about.

It was a point you made in support of your overall objection, and I believe it’s mistaken, so I addressed it.

I’ve found that some Thomists play a game which is unique to them. For example, they will say God has one property when viewed from one angle, and a completely incompatible property when viewed from another. When asked how this can be, they wave their arms in the air and say it’s all very sophisticated and it can only be understood by people who can see the Emperor’s new clothes, and aren’t the clothes magnificent.

I am hoping you are not one of those Thomists.

I certainly don’t think I am.

I’ll try this one last time in the forlorn hope that someone is capable of giving a straight answer (meaning information, only information, and nothing but information) to my question: The immutable god as described in post #45 and the linked article is a blind force with no possibility of it making any choices. It cannot then have any personality, and we may as well worship the law of gravity. So where does God’s intellect come in this, and how is it compatible?

I’ll try one more time to give you an answer. The God described in post 45 is NOT a blind force. He is aware, he loves and wills. However, for Him, these things do not occur, as they do for us, in succession. Unlike human beings, God is not only aware of one thing at a time. He knows everything at once, He loves everything at once, and He wills all He wills simultaneously. He is therefore both personal and immutable.

Does that answer your question?

Shirley this is not such a difficult question that it had to be asked so many times with so little result?

No, it’s not. And stop calling me Shirley.

 

[belorg]

Return to the book analogy again. The “universe” that is contained within the narrative of the story begins with the first word as an aspect of the first event. The story as a narrative could be said to begin here. However, that beginning does not preclude that the story as an idea began to take conception in the writer’s mind in various forms on a timeline completely independent of the timeline of the story.

If the author “writes himself into the story” as God does with creation, it is not true that the author “began” to exist when he entered the story.

I don’t claim he began to exist when he entered the story.
For the rest, what you are saying is that from one POV (from withing the book) the book begins, but not from another POV. That’s my point.

The story is not such an exhaustive account of the author that it fully encapsulates the reality of the author inside of it. The same can be said with creation. God did not “begin” to exist at t0, he simply exists eternally, independent of time.

The univrese did not begin to exist at t0 either, not from an eternal POV that is.

The analogy breaks down because any human author does indeed exist in A-Theory time, the same paradigm of time that exists within any story, whereas God, as eternal, does not.

I am not convinced that human authors exist in A-Theory time.

Now, it would be true to say that both God and the universe could be said to simply exist, although the universe does in a causally contingent sense, whereas God not so much.

Now that is what I have been saying all along, Peter.

However, to say that the universe “has a beginning” does not imply that that beginning is not a real beginning of the story. Just as saying it “has an ending” does not necessarily imply that the ending of the story inside of a book means the book itself vapourizes when the reader gets to the end, or that the book “pops” into existence when a reader begins to read it.

Again, the beginning of the universe is the beginning OF THE UNIVERSE, just as the beginning of a story is the beginning OF THE STORY. In both cases, the BEGINNING is a meaningful aspect of the story and of the universe, but simply a different sense of what the word beginning implies. The beginning of a story need not mark its origin as a story although it would mark its beginning as a narrative.

No problem with that.

It seems to me that if the story were a story about the author writing the story, then there might be a tautology involved since the origin of the story would be the beginning of narrative. In that case they would be one and the same thing - kind of, but even then not REALLY.

Not really?

I don’t think that is what we have in the case of the universe, anyhow, because we do not have any insight into “how” God undertook the creation, only “that” he did. So the beginning of the universe (in the sense of the beginning of the continuing narrative or saga) does not undertake to tell us at all HOW God goes about the act of creating from eternity. Since THAT act (the HOW of creation) is eternal and not temporal we have no reason to assume there was a time BEFORE the universe in the same sense that we mean yesterday came BEFORE today, precisely because the HOW is, presumably, not a temporal nor a contingent act.

What do you mean, “not a contingent act”. Is creation a necessary act in your opinion?

This is true, but does not imply what you seem to think it does.

What do I think it implies?

 

[Peter_Plato]

What do you mean, “not a contingent act”. Is creation a necessary act in your opinion?

Even if the universe simply “exists” eternally, that does not mean it exists necessarily. It is possible to always exist, but still exist contingently as a free act of a necessary being. The necessity is in the cause, not the effect, even if the effect, factually speaking, does always exist.

Necessary means logically necessary, which entails that the existent cannot NOT exist.

The universe would not be necessary merely because God eternally keeps it in existence. It isn’t, by that fact, made logically necessary.

 

[inocente]

:newidea: Why don’t you actually read what I said. From my post #61 :

" Thomas demonstrates the following qualities of the Unmoved Mover ( the First Cause ) : the Unmoved Mover is not a body, has no potency, is the first existent, is the most excellent of beings ( things which exist ), is an intelligent being ( because he is the First Cause of intelligent beings and because he created all that exists and that can only be done by an intelligent being), is pure act, having no composition of any kind, is a living being, having life in the fullest extent possible, is pure existence ( I am Who am. ), is One and simple ( all attributed to him by way of operations or qualities or acts are one with his existence and not separate from his essence but identified with it, is pure Intelligence, he is pure existence, he is pure form, he is pure Will, etc ), he is absolutely Perfect in evey way that can be imagined,

( all the perfections we observe in creatures and creation exist primordially in God, without detriment to his simpleness or oneness or his pure actuality )., he is Good without qualification and infinitely so, his Goodness is his existence, is Limiteless in every way, he operates in all creation and most intimately and by his substance, his power, and by his presence, is unchangeable in any way, is Eternal, is One and there is no other like him, he is the First cause of all that is or ever was or ever will be.

You may get all this from Part 1 of the Summa Theologiae, etc.

And this Being all call God. He is the God of Christianity of Islam, of Judaism. From the beginning of philosophy neither Catholics, nor Judaism, nor Islam considered proving the existence of God to be harmful or detracted from what God Revealed of Himself in the Scriptures. Of course the Scriptures reveal to us the full nature of God, that is without argument. But the greatest minds of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism did not view philosophy as a detriment to Revelation. "

So the whole world can see that I answered you. Of course you don’t have to accept my answer, that is your la re’ponse habituelle. But I did give you the best answer possible.
I’m sorry I can’t draw you a picture.

After I said that you didn’t answer my question, you just repeated not answering it all over again.

My question was about how the philosophical argument made in post #45 allows for God to have a personality.

From what I can make out, it doesn’t. When arguing that God never changes we must ignore that God has a personality, but when arguing that God has a personality we must ignore that God never changes. Pick ‘n’ mix reasoning.

 

[inocente]

I’ll try one more time to give you an answer. The God described in post 45 is NOT a blind force. He is aware, he loves and wills. However, for Him, these things do not occur, as they do for us, in succession. Unlike human beings, God is not only aware of one thing at a time. He knows everything at once, He loves everything at once, and He wills all He wills simultaneously. He is therefore both personal and immutable.

Does that answer your question?

Ah, now that’s an answer, thanks.

That might describe the Father, although the theology is disputed.

But how can it apply to the Son and the Spirit, or are we supposed to ignore them?

 

[Linusthe2nd]

After I said that you didn’t answer my question, you just repeated not answering it all over again.

My question was about how the philosophical argument made in post #45 allows for God to have a personality.

From what I can make out, it doesn’t. When arguing that God never changes we must ignore that God has a personality, but when arguing that God has a personality we must ignore that God never changes. Pick ‘n’ mix reasoning.

Well gee willikers, why didn’t you say so in the first place. I’ll have to cheat a little. Thomas doesn’t get into the Personhood of God until much later in the S.T. and by then he is already talking about the God of Revelation. I can talk about that but you can read pretty much the same stuff in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

However, on the philosophical level, he established that the First Cause is Simple, One, Pure Act, having an Intelligent and Will, etc. ( as I discussed in prior posts. ). You are a being with an intellect and a will, you are a person, you have a personality ( And How! ). The same with the First Cause. He is a Being with an Intellect and a Will. That makes Him a Person, a Being with a Personality, as Thomas defines or understands these terms.

Linus2nd

 

[belorg]

Even if the universe simply “exists” eternally, that does not mean it exists necessarily. It is possible to always exist, but still exist contingently as a free act of a necessary being. The necessity is in the cause, not the effect, even if the effect, factually speaking, does always exist.

Necessary means logically necessary, which entails that the existent cannot NOT exist.

The universe would not be necessary merely because God eternally keeps it in existence. It isn’t, by that fact, made logically necessary.

If the act was not contingent, does that mean it was a necessary act?
And if it was a necssary act, then why isn’t the universe necessary too?

 

[Linusthe2nd]

After I said that you didn’t answer my question, you just repeated not answering it all over again.

My question was about how the philosophical argument made in post #45 allows for God to have a personality.

From what I can make out, it doesn’t. When arguing that God never changes we must ignore that God has a personality, but when arguing that God has a personality we must ignore that God never changes. Pick ‘n’ mix reasoning.

I should have added that moving and changing has nothing to do with having a personality, per se. Even a totally comatose invalid has a personality. So it is not contadictory to say that " God does not change, " ( Something God tells us Himself ) and that He has a personality or is a Person, by the Thomistic definition.

Bye, the cows are getting restless ( ugh, life is an endless cycle of chores ).

Linus2nd.

 

[inocente]

Well gee willikers, why didn’t you say so in the first place. I’ll have to cheat a little. Thomas doesn’t get into the Personhood of God until much later in the S.T. and by then he is already talking about the God of Revelation. I can talk about that but you can read pretty much the same stuff in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

However, on the philosophical level, he established that the First Cause is Simple, One, Pure Act, having an Intelligent and Will, etc. ( as I discussed in prior posts. ). You are a being with an intellect and a will, you are a person, you have a personality ( And How! ). The same with the First Cause. He is a Being with an Intellect and a Will. That makes Him a Person, a Being with a Personality, as Thomas defines or understands these terms.

Linus2nd

Yes but that still doesn’t answer my question, it just says there are other arguments and we must never try to put them together.

However, prodigalson did answer my question, post #81, and a terrifically good answer it was too, that God wills all simultaneously, and that’s how come He never changes.

Except that it appears to not maketh any sense (which is hardly unusual when it comes to the Scholastics ). While the Father might be unchanging, it strains credibility that the Son and the Spirit are. If God knows exactly where His Spirit will blow (John 3) for every millisecond for eternity, He would have to be incredibly complicated, for how else would He know all the course corrections?

Bye, the cows are getting restless ( ugh, life is an endless cycle of chores ).

I don’t know who you’re referring to there, but you’re obviously upset to call them such names.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Yes but that still doesn’t answer my question, it just says there are other arguments and we must never try to put them together.

However, prodigalson did answer my question, post #81, and a terrifically good answer it was too, that God wills all simultaneously, and that’s how come He never changes.

You might be interested in this article on by Eternity, Awareness and ActionEleonore Stump and Norman Kretzmann that addresses the simultaneity of eternity and how that is compatible with eternity having “duration” in the sense of enduring or being “forever.” I started it last night but haven’t finished yet.

 

[prodigalson2011]

Ah, now that’s an answer, thanks.

That might describe the Father, although the theology is disputed.

But how can it apply to the Son and the Spirit, or are we supposed to ignore them?

While the Father might be unchanging, it strains credibility that the Son and the Spirit are. If God knows exactly where His Spirit will blow (John 3) for every millisecond for eternity, He would have to be incredibly complicated, for how else would He know all the course corrections?

This objection appears nonsensical to me. The Son is the Word, or knowledge, of God. The Holy Spirit is the self-love that flows between the Father and his knowledge of Himself (the Son.) And it is, in fact, in this way that we are made in the “imago Dei.” We, too, have an intellectual soul that allows us to know and love ourselves (as well as God and others, of course.) The difference being that in God, being perfect, each of these processions is also perfect and therefore a complete person (rather than mere likeness.) Yet, just as our intellects and our love are not separate from our selves, neither are the persons of the Trinity separate entities. So the question then becomes: why would you think that the Son (who is, in fact, the very knowledge of God) and the Holy Spirit (who is the love produced by that knowledge) would not know all that God knows?

Furthermore, why do you assume God would have to be complex to be omniscient?

 

[inocente]

You might be interested in this article on Eternity, Awareness and Action by Eleonore Stump and Norman Kretzmann that addresses the simultaneity of eternity and how that is compatible with eternity having “duration” in the sense of enduring or being “forever.” I started it last night but haven’t finished yet.

Thanks. I speed read it, and may go back later to read it properly, but it seemed rather confused. Although it did add another problem. I already have the issues of how an unchanging God can be simple, and how in any sense the Son and Spirit could be called unchanging. The article adds the problem of how an unchanging deity could be said to interact in any meaningful way with us.

A solution is perhaps that there’s a difference between Thomas and what we might call decadent Thomists . So if Thomas recognizes that nothing about God can be fully grasped by us, that all we can really know is what God chooses to reveal to us, then he necessarily treats his “proofs” with a pinch of salt. While if yon decadent Thomists think he proves these things beyond doubt, they are barking up the wrong canoe.

 

[inocente]

This objection appears nonsensical to me. The Son is the Word, or knowledge, of God. The Holy Spirit is the self-love that flows between the Father and his knowledge of Himself (the Son.) And it is, in fact, in this way that we are made in the “imago Dei.” We, too, have an intellectual soul that allows us to know and love ourselves (as well as God and others, of course.) The difference being that in God, being perfect, each of these processions is also perfect and therefore a complete person (rather than mere likeness.) Yet, just as our intellects and our love are not separate from our selves, neither are the persons of the Trinity separate entities. So the question then becomes: why would you think that the Son (who is, in fact, the very knowledge of God) and the Holy Spirit (who is the love produced by that knowledge) would not know all that God knows?

Furthermore, why do you assume God would have to be complex to be omniscient?

Twas not my point. My issue is we can say we can relate to God, and He is unchanging, is omniscient, is simple. No problem as long as we keep those statements separate. But put them together and there are contradictions.

So to know everything, God must be a great library (not simple) or must be able to look when and where (not unchanging) or must be all (but that’s pantheism) or so on.

Jesus learns in the Temple, he grows up. He is not unchanging or omniscient or simple. And it’s the very fact that he’s none of those things which help us relate to Christ.

“The wind blows where it will”, i.e. the Spirit interacts with us. If all our thoughts are known then there’s no interaction, the Spirit may as well be a book.

So my point is that “proofs” of these attributes only function when kept isolated, when put together they generate lots of anomalies. Which is fine for those who say God is ultimately unknowable, but means that attempts to prove the existence and attributes of God must always ultimately fail.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Thanks. I speed read it, and may go back later to read it properly, but it seemed rather confused. Although it did add another problem. I already have the issues of how an unchanging God can be simple, and how in any sense the Son and Spirit could be called unchanging. The article adds the problem of how an unchanging deity could be said to interact in any meaningful way with us.

Interesting comment, since my understanding of the article was that it did not ADD this “problem,” but was written to address this point precisely, i.e., How can the eternal interact with the temporal? It was on that very point that criticisms were raised and refuted.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

After I said that you didn’t answer my question, you just repeated not answering it all over again.

?

My question was about how the philosophical argument made in post #45 allows for God to have a personality.

I guess I don’t understand the source of your difficulty.

From what I can make out, it doesn’t. When arguing that God never changes we must ignore that God has a personality, but when arguing that God has a personality we must ignore that God never changes. Pick ‘n’ mix reasoning.

Why would either case be so? Certainly you don’t deny that the Son of God was a Person with a Personality. He was True God and True man ( It’s in the Bible ). So if the Son is a person and has a personality, then God the Father is also a Person with a Personality. And since the Holy Spirit is also God, the Holy Spirit is also a Person with a Personality. I think you are hung up on the manifestation of personhood and personality in us as human beings. Well, God is an absolely Perfect Person, a Perfect Living Personality. Whereas we are limited in our personhood and in personality. God is the Perfect exemplary of our personhood and personality. That is why He can be an Unchanging Person with and Unchanging and Perfect Personality.

Linus2nd

 

[inocente]

?

I guess I don’t understand the source of your difficulty.

Why would either case be so? Certainly you don’t deny that the Son of God was a Person with a Personality. He was True God and True man ( It’s in the Bible ). So if the Son is a person and has a personality, then God the Father is also a Person with a Personality. And since the Holy Spirit is also God, the Holy Spirit is also a Person with a Personality. I think you are hung up on the manifestation of personhood and personality in us as human beings. Well, God is an absolely Perfect Person, a Perfect Living Personality. Whereas we are limited in our personhood and in personality. God is the Perfect exemplary of our personhood and personality. That is why He can be an Unchanging Person with and Unchanging and Perfect Personality.

You’re still talking about your broad theological beliefs, while my issue is with the logic of one specific philosophical argument, and nothing else but the logic of one specific philosophical argument.

The issue is how any kind of interactive personality (a living God) can by inferred, deduced, or is in any sense consistent with a complete absence of change, but no worries, I’ve already concluded that Thomists have trained themselves never to ask such questions, as that’s the only way to see the Emperor’s new clothes.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

You’re still talking about your broad theological beliefs, while my issue is with the logic of one specific philosophical argument, and nothing else but the logic of one specific philosophical argument.

The issue is how any kind of interactive personality (a living God) can by inferred, deduced, or is in any sense consistent with a complete absence of change, but no worries, I’ve already concluded that Thomists have trained themselves never to ask such questions, as that’s the only way to see the Emperor’s new clothes.

As I said if you are dealing at the philosophical level, you can infer that the First Cause is Intelligent and has a Will and that He loves the creatures He created. That fits Thomas’ definition of a Being that is a Person, and, being a Person, that means He has a Personality. That seems logical to me. Where am I wrong?

And if He is Unchanging and Unchangeable, is a Person, and has a Personality, He fits the minimal definition of Who God is. But for a complete understanding of Who this Being is one has to accept Revelation. Now I can see how someone committed, ideologically, to Sola Scriptura can reject this reasoning. If that is your position, there isn’t much point in this discussion, because you will never accept my position, no matter what, and I will never accept yours. I don’t mind that, but you should have made that known right up front.

Linus2nd

Linus2nd

 

[Peter_Plato]

Thomists have trained themselves never to ask or be sidetracked by “such,” i.e., meaningless, questions. They have the presence and discipline of mind not to regurgitate ad tedium superficial or ill-conceived “questions” trotted out by individuals who appeal to the Emperor’s new clothes as a “catch-all” argument against any “truth” that opposes their own.

 

[empther]

innocente’s post 93 ( at least six errors in logic hear :bigyikes: )

Twas not my point. My issue is we can say we can relate to God, and He is unchanging, is omniscient, is simple. No problem as long as we keep those statements separate. But put them together and there are contradictions.

So to know everything, God must be a great library (not simple) *** just as we know the many parts of a car by the one idea “car”, so God knows all things at once as one Idea, the Word. This was discussed by Aquinas 700 years ago, and by myself on this forum nearly as long ago. ]*** or must be able to look when and where (not unchanging) *** but God is omniscient and knows everything already. This has been discussed on this forum many times. ]*** or must be all (but that’s pantheism)*** a leap in logic, it does not follow from what you’ve said. ]*** or so on.

Jesus learns in the Temple, *** the human nature of Jesus was a finite created thing and had to learn practical things, but his personhood was divine, not human. This has been discussed many times on these forums. ] *** he grows up. He is not unchanging or omniscient or simple.*** his human nature isn’t but his divine nature is. ]*** And it’s the very fact that he’s none of those things which help us relate to Christ.

“The wind blows where it will”, i.e. the Spirit interacts with us. If all our thoughts are known then there’s no interaction,*** a leap in logic. When the members of a choir sing, they interact but they also know what each other is doing and will do. ] *** the Spirit may as well be a book.

 

[Bahman]

You’re still talking about your broad theological beliefs, while my issue is with the logic of one specific philosophical argument, and nothing else but the logic of one specific philosophical argument.

The issue is how any kind of interactive personality (a living God) can by inferred, deduced, or is in any sense consistent with a complete absence of change, but no worries, I’ve already concluded that Thomists have trained themselves never to ask such questions, as that’s the only way to see the Emperor’s new clothes.

What personalty has to do with changeless mind? God in their view is changeless because it has omniscience. How God could change its personality when it knows the fate of each being before creation? God in this picture however knows about emergence of evil and itself alone is responsible for evil creation. The main question is whether God is able to create a creation without evil? The answer apparently is no, when free will is involved in creation. What is free will?, we don’t know. How about God?, God does know free will, how possibly God could not know what free will is in the same time creating beings with free will? So God is cognitively open to free will, so God knows the reason why we act accordingly based on our free will on a situation. Now if you rewind the movie backward, you will find that God should know the source of evil in First Cause. In simple word:

1. God has omniscience
2. God is cognitively open to free will
3. God knows the action we perform as a result of situation we were/are/will be embedded into
4. God knew the source evil in first hand, namely first cause
5. God created evil