well "perfect deceiver" must be included too right? So he's perfectly communicating his perfect deceptions to his perfectly flawed creations, so we have to rely in our perfectly imperfect senses of logic and reason to try and figure out what the hell is going on! Seems like a perfect cluster-fuck to me...
How about "perfectly beneficent", "perfectly patient" and "incapable of making a mistake", and then look at the Old Testament Yahweh? Along with your "perfect communicator", that makes for a pretty imperfect being.
The idea of "perfection" also fails when you look at reality. There is nothing in real life for which one can't imagine something better, or some way to improve upon it. This also runs into the question of who determines whether or not something is perfect. Something you consider perfectly suitable for yourself may not be what someone else considers perfect for them. It's rather easy to imagine something superior to the Biblegod, and easy to see how different people have vastly different ideas about what kind of God perfectly suits their wants and needs.
The Ontological Argument is neither logical, nor an argument. "Imagine a perfect being." That's pretty vague. It's like describing how happy you were on your happiest day. How the hell can you define "perfect" with respect to a being? A hundred people imagining the perfect being would be imagining 100 different things. "Existing is better than not existing." That might FEEL true, but feeling true and being true are completely different things. That's not logic. That's just pushing words around.
Angus Adolphus I did that and I came to the conclusion it was probably a theistic argument. Not necessarily though. p1: All theistic arguments have one or more logical fallacies in their premises. p2: Honest philosophers are usually aware of logical fallacies and they try to avoid them. p3: The argument is shit. Conclusion: It's probably a theistic argument and/or philosopher. An honest philosopher might miss a logical fallacy, but a theist never argues without logical fallacies, so an argument with logical fallacies is more likely to have come from a theist. Also, theists are not intellectually honest when it comes to theism, ever. As soon as they are intellectually honest, they're atheists and no longer theists.
Ontology isn't about getting to the core of the issues, it's about the nature of reality. What do you think the nature of existence is, and why do you believe that? Matt's definition of ontology is weird. Physicalism is the least parsimonious and least empirically likely ontology to be true. Philosophical idealism is the most likely ontology to be true, according to science (two-slit experiment and backwards causality), and to philosophy. Materialism has been disproven, but that doesn't mean "God" has been proven.
I don' feel like I am even in your league. So many concepts it is offputting. It's like name dropping with words (concept dropping). Actually say what it is you believe
“God cannot exist because of Eric The God-Eating Magic Penguin. Since Eric is God-Eating by definition, he has no choice but to eat God. So, if God exists, He automatically ceases to exist as a result of being eaten. Unless one can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, God doesn’t exist. Even if you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, that same proof will also be applicable to God. There are only two possibilities: either you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist or you can not. In both cases it logically follows that God doesn’t exist.”
Inability to disprove something is not evidence of somethings existence...And the ability to prove something is not evidence of something else not existing... I disagree with your comment... In both cases it does not logically follow that god doesnt exist....Im Atheist, but I simply can not assert that god does not exist...I can not assert that anything does not exist...Theres no "logical" way around that..... You cant end up saying a line like "in both cases it logically follows", when you started off by using a hypothetical instance of something you didnt believe in BEFORE you made your "logical argument".... You CANT prove that Eric does not exist, so you are "logically" prevented from making any points that rely on "even if you can prove eric doesnt exist"... Its a logical fallacy...you are using a presuppositionalist argument.....along with a bunch of other fallacies.... In the end, you actually allowd the shifting of the burden of proof over to you....And now you are in the same boat as the theist... Im Atheist, but I cant claim that god does not exist...I simply have no clue whether god exists or not....and I have no clue if magical penguin god-eaters exist or not...maybe they do, maybe they dont... Asserting that something does not exist is always illogical...
I define my reality and henceforth you don't exist. You call this illogical, I can this rational. May I suggest that now stand up and liberate your panties from your recesses.
FishBayVI420H20: "Asserting that something does not exist is always illogical..." Married bachelors don't exist. Square circles don't exist. One certain *can* logically deduce nonexistence. It just requires the concepts under discussion to actually be defined. The God that Abrahamists believe in is generally defined as omniscient, omnipotent, and all-loving. Given the world we observe, not such being exists. If some being lacks any of those 3 traits, why call it God?
1. Imagine all theists owe me money. 2. It is possible that they all owe me money. 3. Therefor all theists must give me money or they prove god doesn't exist.
@JTN Seriously? are you so dense you don't get the point? Like is this an R/woosh moment? You are basing an entire argument on your IMAGINATION!!!!! Do You Not understand that?
Regardless of language or symbolic representation of the argument, the largest flaw is in the idea that something we can just imagine must possibly exist. As Matt and others have pointed out that we cannot simply "define" something into acutal existence. The factor which lends an air of reasonableness to the Ontological arguments is that reasonable people allow for possibilities. People may well say, yes, maybe in some world, something, anything, conceptually is possible. I think the best way to short circuit this argument is to pair the statement, - "It is possible that there is a being which has maximal greatness (in some world)" with the statement, - "It is also possible that there is NOT a being which has maximal greatness (in any world)." That both of those statements may be true indicates that mere conceptual possibility, does not itself make actual existence necessary.
My biggest problem with these monologic arguments is that they seem to make a logical leap between premises. I don't even care about the issue of whether existence is better or not. How do these people think they got from "it's possible" to "it's necessary?" They just incrementally add words into the premises until edging their way to necessary, but they never demonstrate it. It's possible that a perfect circle could exist Uniqueness is a property of perfection The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle Therefore every circle is a perfect circle You can do this with anything. To me it seems to be little more than rhetorical masturbation. In the ontological argument, they're just conflating "maximum POSSIBLE power" with "maximum power that is possible in this reality". The smartest guy in the world isn't infinitely smart, but he's still the smartest possible. It's just wordplay. The claim is, INFINITE intelligence (or power) and that's where the burden rests. I see no need to entertain any argument that cannot demonstrate its own first premise, no matter how flawed the rest of it may be.
[The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle] What? How did you deduce that? You said uniqueness is a property of perfection. No, it's not. Uniqueness is a property of quantity. [To me it seems to be little more than rhetorical masturbation.] You need to study more philosophy to train yourself in understanding rational abstract thought. You can't argue against a philosopher by telling him _"I don't know man, it feels to me you're just talking"._ Having an education might help.
Are you saying that the argument I included in my post was not very logical? That I simply asserted connections that were not demonstrated, and so I was basically just making stuff up? Would you perhaps say that this makes MY argument a good example of ACTUAL rhetorical masturbation?
Would you agree that it could accurately be described as rhetorical masturbation, being that it was, to your perspective seemingly just self-indulgent word salad?
TheFounderUtopia I don't care what label you want to put on it. The problem is you have no validity aka what you're saying makes no coherent sense. [Uniqueness is a property of perfection The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle] Those two things do not add up. It's a non sequitur.
I've always been baffled by the idea of greatness/perfection outside of context. Is God supposed to be perfectly square, the most round, both?!? Is it also the perfect rapist, serial killer? the most blue, the most red? can He be perfectly stupid? How about Lucky? Does that even make sense as a property for an omniscient being?
@@Darksaga28 no, I think this is reductio ad absurdum, and is actually being used as proof that the ontological argument sucks. "the most blue, the most red?" is an obvious contradiction, yes, but that means the ontological argument, not John, is generating a contradiction by posing a perfect or "maximally great" being, as posed by John, "outside of context". A maximally great being... compared to what?
If I were to imagine the most perfect being that being would be the best at doing any task. They would be the fastest runner for example and will have won every race because a fastest runner that has won every race would be greater and more perfect than one that hasn't. Since we know for a fact that every race hasn't been won by one perfect runner then this ultimate perfect being cannot exist. Therefore by this argument God does not exist.
How can you not have a perfect circle it doesnt have to be made it can be a barrier taking no space it doesnt make sence it's like the rock argument can God make a rock to bit to lift why would you define God as something like us of course it's possible if God can manifest in different ways
+phileas007 To answer this, I will channel my alter ego - Reverend Billy Bob Fatheful of the Furst Amurkin, Bald Eagle, Apple Pie Church of Christ. Here we go... Whut y'all dusn't unnerstand is that if'n tha Bible was better at konveyin' its messige, it woodint be perfickt no more! GOd dun give us free will, an that meens that we gots ta have FAITH! Ya cain't maek no free choyce if'n ya knows the answer ahed a time! God got's ta hide hisself, and kommunikate in suttle ways - jest enuff so's ya kin figger out that he's reelly thair if'n ya wants ta! Man... that always gives me a headache.
+Pat Doyle Bravo. But why then bother with a book at all? If the book comes too close to taking our free will and anyway is only there so volunteers can be inspired to interprete it correctly and talk others into believing through their talents.... why not leave out the step of writing down a half assed attempt and simply going directly to inspiring his human speakers? And why if there is a god that if you beg really hard will show you in your heart the true meaning of his book... do they end up with dozens of translations that contradict each other and with thousands of denominations that fight to the blood about anything from how one single word has to be read to the core of all these religions, the rules of how to gain salvation and eternal blessings?
+Pat Doyle Bravo. But why then bother with a book at all? If the book comes too close to taking our free will and anyway is only there so volunteers can be inspired to interprete it correctly and talk others into believing through their talents.... why not leave out the step of writing down a half assed attempt and simply going directly to inspiring his human speakers? And why if there is a god that if you beg really hard will show you in your heart the true meaning of his book... do they end up with dozens of translations that contradict each other and with thousands of denominations that fight to the blood about anything from how one single word has to be read to the core of all these religions, the rules of how to gain salvation and eternal blessings?
*It dun be like a mistery novel. God dun give us clues thru his buuk. :-)* You kid, but I've actually encountered this ridiculous argument. It is laughable because once the message is delivered, it doesn't matter how clear or opaque it was beforehand. Any supposed free will impact possessing the knowledge has is not mitigated by making it harder to acquire. All that does is ensure fewer people learn the lesson, which is antithetical to the purpose of writing the book in the first place. Some Christian arguments have at least a veneer of persuasion, but this is not one of them. :)
It is a conceptual truth (or, so to speak, true by definition) that a TH-cam channel run by God is a channel than which none greater can be imagined. God and his channel exist as an idea in the mind. Something that exists as an idea in the mind and in reality is, other things being equal, greater than something that exists only as an idea in the mind. Thus, if God's TH-cam channel exists only as an idea in the mind, then we can imagine something that is greater than God's TH-cam channel. But we cannot imagine a channel that is greater than God's TH-cam channel (for it is a contradiction to suppose that we can imagine something greater than the greatest possible thing that can be imagined.) _Therefore, God has a TH-cam channel._ Furthermore, with 54M subs, Pewdiepie is the greatest channel on TH-cam. _Therefore, Pewdiepie is God._
[Furthermore, with 54M subs, Pewdiepie is the greatest channel on TH-cam.] Well I can imagine a TH-cam channel with 55 million subs. So your ontological argument for PDP fails. Next.
All philosophical arguments for god suffer from one great flaw. They all make unfounded presumptions. There is no evidence to support the presumptions so the conclusion is also unsupported.
+smokert5555 And the best of them, in my opinion, the Kalaam, only points to a cause which could be anything from a quantum fluctuation to Yahweh. And even THAT one is fatally flawed by unsupported premises. But all the rest of which I am aware suffer from a worse flaw - begging the question. The conclusion is in the premises.
You forget that they usually add a second stage to Kalaam where suddenly any cause has to become a god of their own preferential attributes, That has always been a giant Non sequitur and always killed the argument. Except for Presuppositionalists who find nothing weird about this "problem"...
Pat Doyle You forget. The Kalam cosmological argument states the universe began. Science shows that the universe only began to expand and before that expansion we don't know what happened, it may be an eternal cycle. Therefore the Kalam is making a baseless assertion that the universe began.
As far as I can tell, all arguments for the existence of "God" are nothing more than pushing words around. They bear little resemblance to ACTUAL logic that can produce ACTUAL conclusions from ACTUAL premises.
I have never understood why the ontological argument isn't more often attacked by the assumption that "perfection" or "greatness" is totally ordered (i.e., satisfies the trichotomy that for any A and B, either A < B, A = B, or A > B). Or at least that it is a semi-latice: for any A and B there is a C such that A
@@canwelook Except that's not really the argument. Yes. There are massive undemonstrated leaps, but there is, indeed, a core of reasonable logic that can be reasonably refuted.
@@canwelook The argument is (fatally, I would say) broken. But, the way you put it is still a strawmen. The value in exploring these arguments is to: 1) understand precisely what is wrong with them, in a technical sense, and 2) to approach them with enough rigor that apologists cannot justifiably that we have not honestly considered them.
Around 23:00 - I'm not sure that the ease with which an argument is understandable is evidence against it's conclusion. Wouldn't that be like saying "General Relativity describes a nature of space-time in a fundamental way. But General Relativity is hard to understand. That strikes me as odd" Why should it be odd that a fundamental truth is hard to understand?
While I don't disagree, I would contend that there is something more fundamental that needs proving before that assertion can even be discussed: "Existence is a property."
+Amigo21189 I contend that existence actually would be a predicate, because in contrast to what Imannuel Kant thought, the property of existence is actually what distinguishes real, tangible, concrete objects in the real world from mere imaginary objects that are only the subject of one mind.
+Amigo21189 I would say that existence is definitely a property of things that exist. The question is whether existence is greater than a lack of existence. But I get your point to an extent - things that do not exist have no properties, so one could say that existence is a sine quo non of anything we want to seriously discuss - if a thing has ANY properties - it exists.
Pat Doyle Could existence possibly be a predicate in the sense of it being either purely subjective (imaginary) or intersubjective (concrete)? After all, we only actually know the world through empirical observation, and even that requires an assumption of regularity in physical law.
The problem, and the psychology here is why this is such a tempting argument to use, is that I can distinguish wholly fictional things from each other by properties, or wholly ideal things. A perfect circle is distinct from a perfect square. A unicorn has one horn while a wyvern has no horns but has wings. We as humans do not need to put existence onto something to ascribe properties to it. So, at the very least, existence as a property has to be differentiated from all other properties. All other properties are purely a priori: I can define a moogabooga as a five-legged leaping mammal that breathes fire. But I can't define a moogabooga as existing because "to exist", as a term, means in practice "to demonstrably exist in our reality", which is why you have to go check.
Some of these topics are interesting. I'm reminded of an SNL skit about a garage band where the members imagined themselves having a hit song that brought them fame, wealth, and adoring fans. They found this idea so compelling that they had already designed an album cover and made a music video -- without having even one song. Most people will laugh at this idea. They feel intuitively that a potential, even a very great potential, has less utility than an actuality. In other words, an imagined hit song, even the biggest imagined hit song of all time still has less utility than a song that was actually composed, performed, and recorded. Also, most people can readily decompose the concept of potentiality into several broad categories such as conceivable, theoretical, technological, and practical. 1.) A floating tabletop can be conceived, but, based on what we know now, it isn't theoretically possible. 2.) A human mission to Mars is theoretically possible but, based on what we know now, it isn't technologically possible. 3.) Reciprocating steam engines are technologically possible, but, based on what we know now, they are not practical. Practicality can be further broken down into things such as cost, talent, and opportunity. A reciprocating steam engine would cost more to build and operate than a diesel engine. I could buy a big hunk of marble which could potentially be carved into a great work of art but that would require the talent of a stone carver. Anyone could visit the Eifel Tower but they would have to actually be in Paris to have that opportunity. So, while it might be comforting to think of a god as perfect, it can be readily stated that a real but imperfect god has greater utility than a perfect but only potential god. Then we could consider maximality itself. Let's say God is the maximally conceivable agent. Presumably this would be maximal to humans or perhaps maximal to the most intelligent human. But then one would have to ask if this God then, being of greater intellect could likewise conceive of an agent greater than itself. This then would lead to an infinite sequence of each maximal God conceiving of an even more maximal God. Such an infinite sequence would not seem to be much of an explanation. This fact swallows up both Anselm's and Descarte's arguments as conceivability within a mind. You could try to get around this problem by defining God as the maximally conceivable agent. However, this too seems to have problems. If God is the maximally conceivable agent then no such God could conceive of an agent greater than itself. However, for a human to propose such an argument requires a concept of an agent greater than itself. Therefore, such a human would have a relatively less limited ability of conception than God. In other words, a human could imagine an agent greater than itself but God could not. And, a God that is more limited than a human would be a contradiction. Therefore God could not exist.
My problem is that you have to accept the premise as true. Really? If I reject the premise, which has not been proved, then the entire argument falls apart. It is just that simple. Reject the premise, which is just a hypothetical, and there is no argument.
Mr. Dillahunty, PLEASE keep doing what you do, and as I see that you expand in many different ways, keep doing that too! Doesn't say much in a realistic sense, I know, but know that I appreciate your existence. Thanks!
Version at 3:06 Imagine the greatest possible cheeseburger. If this cheeseburger doesn't actually exist, then you can imagine a cheeseburger that is greater than that cheeseburger because it has all the properties of the greatest possible cheeseburger and also exists. Therefore, the greatest possible cheeseburger must exist. Why don't you like me enough to bring me that cheeseburger? Version at 14:18 The greatest cheeseburger that can exist has a perfect texture, flavor, and calorie count. A perfect cheeseburger can only be perfect if it exists in every possible world. It is possible that a cheeseburger has maximal greatness. Therefore, it is necessarily true that a cheeseburger of maximal greatness exists. Therefore the perfect cheeseburger exists. Why don't you like me enough to bring me this cheeseburger either?
1. Would you pay me for either these cheeseburgers? (And delivery, tax and gratuity) 2. Would this payment be c.o.d. Or deferred to another day? 3. What would your emotional state be, while paying for this cheeseburger? ie 1 you would 3 gladly 2 pay me tuesday
@@brucebaker810 The transcendent love of the Divine Cheeseburger is such that only I speak for the TRUE cheeseburger. If you give me money, I can tell you the will of the Divine Cheeseburger. If you don't love the Divine Cheeseburger you will be thrown in the deep fryer for eternity. (Both of my comments are reductio ad absurdum to demonstrate why the logic falls apart if applied to anything you don't already have an extreme bias towards.)
I would gladly pay you Tuesday...for a BSolution today. Both of mine are absurd reflections on a possible Christian sect. Of the Yes And school. Yes Jesus AND golden plates. Yes and we can drink poison. Mine is Yes And Popeye. This sect, as many, relies for its Thingy of Defining Weirdness, on just one or two bible passages. This one something about I am that I am. Plus some "confirmation" verses about olive oil. This is an offshoot...but some figure "be Wimpy" might be the meta message of the NT.
I always loved the Ontological Argument. There is an interesting angle one can come from: if the greatest possible thing must exist, then by the same toke, must not the meekest possible thing not exist? This would then lead to nothing existing at all, since if the meekest (or smallest) possible thing can't exist, then the second meekest will be the meekest, and stop existing too. and so on. Until nothing is left. This might not be the most airtight of arguments, but its fun and it shows some of the silliness about defining things into existence.
+Cryogenic Vortex Yes - it works for anything. I have a concept of the greatest possible turd. It would be infinitely smelly, solid enough to not be diarrhea, but not so solid as to cause constipation, and have just enough corn kernels to make it visually interesting. If it is possible for this turd to exist in one possible toilet, it must exist in ALL possible toilets! GO check - would you? :-)
If existence is not a predicate, then the argument is unsound because the premise “a thing that exists is greater than a thing that doesn’t exist” is false. If we accept that existence is a predicate, then it is impossible to conceive of any thing that actually doesn’t exist (even though you think you can).
Yes I can imagine that too so it must be real! Christians must've been soooo embarrassed about the ridiculousness of faith to have thought the ontological argument helped their case.
Your argument at roughly 16:00 where you discuss the assumption of possibility is where I am constantly getting hung up on this argument. People want to claim something is possible, but they do not want to provide evidence (besides circular reasoning) that such a thing is PLAUSIBLE.
It seems to me that it's an equivocation between a very sloppy meaning of the word "possible" and what it actually means. To me, "X is possible" means that there is some known mechanism by which X could become a reality. But this argument seems to want "possible" to also mean things that "could be possible given certain not necessarily actual circumstances". Since we don't know everything, there are a lot of things that could be possible, but that doesn't mean we get to say that they are in fact possible, only that we can't say they're definitely impossible.
In context of OA, possible simply means logically consistent aka. non-self-contradictory. Which has to be demonstrated and shouldn't be accepted as true by default. If it were then all hypotheses should be accepted as true until proven otherwise, which is absurd.
KohuGaly and, imo the MOA fails that in premise 1, since omnipotence is not self consistent. even if the term is downgraded to "the ability to do anything logically possible" the set of all logically possible things does _not_ include the ability to do all logically possible things, as some things are logically possible on their own but mutually exclusive together. Some people say the Kalam is the greatest example of "fractal wrongness" in all apologetics, but for me it is the MOA
"set of all logically possible things does not include the ability to do all logically possible things, as some things are logically possible on their own but mutually exclusive together." ability to do all LPTs is not the same thing as ability to do every LPT. It is the same intuitive difference like between laving licence to drive any car and all cars - you obviously can't drive them all at once. However, I generally do agree with the "fractal wrongness" of this argument, because of how mutually exclusively do the supposed attributes of greatness interact with each other. My hypothesis is that maximal greatness of any necessary being tends towards zero. Every new paradox (omnipotence paradox being the most notorious example) seems to shrink the maximal greatness considerably, compared to intuitive naive expectation. Off course, I have no definitive proof that zero is the final value, but I definitely have more evidence than MOA proponents have...
KohuGaly i see your point, but my thing is that the ability to do all logically possible things is impossible because as soon as one uses this ability for, say one builds that proverbial pile of rocks he cannot lift, the lifting if that pile is no longer an ability that person has, or else logical possibility goes out the window and we are left with paradoxes. So i guess what i mean is the set of all logically possible things includes both lifting any mass and putting together a mass you are unable to lift(from the omnipotence paradox) but it is logically impossible to do both, not even at the same time, but in principle. If you have the ability to do one, by definition as an analytical truth, you lack the ability to do the other. As i see it, anyways.
+munstrumridcully you fail to recognize the "potence" in omnipotence. You have to not only analyse singular actions, but also composite actions (chains of singular actions). The logically possible omnipotence includes only self-consistent chains (ie. making unliftable rock and then lifting it is invalid composite action). That does not necessarily mean the chains need to be consistent with each other, because in any given reality only one of the chains can be realized (which one specifically is a matter of "choise"/"predermination").
Doesn’t this argument mean that “if you can imagine it then it exists”? For example, imagine a perfect unicorn. Now imagine a unicorn that actually exists, which is more perfect than a unicorn who doesn’t exist. Therefore, a perfect unicorn exists.
my issue and I've mentioned to you in other videos is the whole concept that good is the greatest thing, but good/evil are value judgements not intrinsic values, so why would the greatest being just automaticly be the greatest good being
My problem with the ontological argument is the word "exist". Dreams, and thoughts exist. Do they have ontological status? No. Exist is not synonymous with BE. Unicorns COULD exist, but they do not, and therefor they have no BEING. (the additional problem is that "unicorn" is a merely a description of a mythological creature, made up from the imagination, like centaurs, minotaurs, sphinxes, elves, dwarfs, wizards, etc) God COULD exist, but that doesn't mean it has BEING. Harry Potter, Huckleberry Finn, Gulliver all exist... but not of them have any BEING.
"possible" is another troublesome word. It is "possible" that I exist in more than one body, or physical form. I can conceive of my "mind" or self identity being something separate from my body, and therefor not limited to my body. The fact is, the mind or self does not have any sense of BEING, even though it does exist as a concept. Therefor, the conflation of existence and being is not the subject of "possibilities".
So would this also be possible? 1. Imagine the most absolute state of nothing you can.2. Because you do exist, this cannot be the most absolute state of nothing.3. A more absolute state of nothing would be one where nothing else existed. 4. In some possible world, absolute nothing must exist5. Because it is absolute, the absolute nothing must exist in all worlds6. Therefore nothing exists.
"Nothing exists" in this context is used as the "lack of existence of all things", as there being no "thing", a complete and utter lack of anything. It would only be a contradiction if "nothing" in "nothing exists" was not a negation, but its customary to be understood as "no thing exists", which is completely ok, since it does not say that "X exists" where X is nothing, but it says that no X exists. All X-es are denied to exist, not denial affirmed to exist. The confusion comes from the form of the statement, not from its intended meaning.
+Hypatia That is a good clarification that then leads to what constitutes a "thing". I note that the common Christian definition of god these days sounds a lot like nothing to me - spaceless, timeless, and immaterial. They seem to be asserting the existence of a "thing" that shares none of the properties normally associated with things, and to make things even more fun, they claim that this nothing thing, created everything from nothing!
Great Video, I love the change of scenery! It seems to me that this argument just says that "god" is the most perfect being that exists. But there are (at least) two ways to interpret this statement. The most succinct way to interpret it is as follows: The most perfect being that exists is defined as "god". So, if the most perfect being in the universe is my next-door neighbor Larry, then he is defined as god. All this "argument" does is create a specific definition for god. Given that definition, we can try to find what fits that definition (In this case, Larry). We cannot apply our own definition of god to the results of this argument. I can define anything any way I want. Imagine if I were to define "The Beatles" as the best all-female music group of all time. Clearly, something doesn't add up. When you think of The Beatles, you think of the all-male music group. Given my definition, you must either change your belief about the sex of the members of the band or you must acknowledge that my definition is different from yours. By my definition, "The Beatles" would be the Spice Girls. Given my definition, this would be a true statement. But you cannot then insert your own definition of "The Beatles" and be justified in your belief that the actual band "The Beatles" Is the same band as "The Spice Girls". You cannot mix definitions.
I once asked this question in a Christian chat room: "If God is a necessary being, then why is he also a contingent being on the rules of logic? Wouldn't that make God contingent just like me?" The answer: I got kicked out of the chat........
I'd like to ask a question, to see if I understand this. Imagine the maximally perfect unicorn. A unicorn that did not exist would be less than perfect. Therefore a perfect unicorn actually exists. So, the problem, if I get it, is that we assume existing is a trait or property of perfection?
at some level, yes. But it goed further: 'existing' as a property of anything (perfect or not), is already a problem. None-existing chairs aren not chairs, and don't have four legs. Something can only have properties (or perfections) IF it exists. Some versions (like Plantinga's) try to avoid this... but i think at one point or another, they all make this mistake. He just hides it better under a thick layer of 'modal logic'.
Although I agree with the wholesome sense of the refutals, I dont think you have hit the core of ontological argument yet (at least the modal form). The jump from 3-4-5 is a valid move (you think there's a problem here). The one and only shaky premise is premise 3. The wordings of this form weren't clear, I understand the one presented by WLC better. Understand what is being done here. Premise 3 is like a wolf disguised. 1 and 2 are nothing but definitions of maximal greatness. Part A is defining maximal excellence - omniscient omnipotent, omnibenevolent (and existent of course). Part B is deifning maximal greatness - (read WLC's version - if being is maximally excellent in one possible world implies he is maximally excellent in all possible worlds, he is maximally great). NOw to uncover the disguise in premise 3, all you have to do is replace the words maximal greatness with its actual definition: Premise 3': It is possible that there is a being that is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent and existent such that if the being has these properties possibly, it has these properties necessarily. The next move to premise 4 is perfectly valid after this. But see what a complex little thing premise 3 has become when expressed as premise 3'. The whole play here is to disguise the actual burden of premise 3 to reduce it to possibility of just the classical definition of a God but for the argument to work you would need to prove the possibility of this added property of necessity to consider in the mix in the premise. Or in other words, they try to hide the burden of proof of the following statement: It is possible that x exists where x is such that if its possible it exists, it is necessary it exists. You are right in saying that assigning existence as a property is problematic. But even with that, the modal form has a bigger problem. You have been trying to attack the classical definition and ask for the proof for possibility of existence of classical God. But in all honesty, you are missing the point here. You should be asking for another level of burden of proof of possibility on premise 3 :)
Does it even matter? There still is the incredible daring but completely unfounded jump from "there is a necessary being with these attributes, that MUST exist for these reasons" to "therefore the bible is right and my bellief is justified". Even if you can ontologically (or with any other of the classical apologetic arguments) prove that there are a million omnipotent, omniscient etc. beings around that were needed to create all of the multiverse and have enough spare time to take one wednesday off after being finished.... that still does not give you the businesscard "me Jahweh" to check up the connection between the argument and their religion... You have just shown that theoretically gods MUST exist. Fine. Now find them and ask them for more about themselves... The bible is still no proof but only the statement of your claim...
It does matter. If someone is using ontological argument as proof/argument for Jahweh, then they are wrong and we dont need to analyse this. But most of the ones using this argument do not use it for Jahweh or Allah, even though their belief might be for Jahweh or Allah. Also, you could have potential believers in an Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnibenevolent, necessary God who isnt Jahweh, or Allah. And if they use the ontological argument, we would have to show where they are going wrong.. :)
Meh, perhaps that move is valid in modal logic, but "possible" and "possible worlds" in modal logic don't resemble anything that any regular person would discuss colloquially, so it's a dishonest move on Plantinga's part to pretend that this somehow conjures his selected entity into ACTUAL existence. *And if they use the ontological argument, we would have to show where they are going wrong.. :)* While that task may be somewhat worthwhile, it's not necessary at all. it's up to the claimant to demonstrate the soundness of their premises and validity of their argument.
Excellent de-construction of the ontological argument Matt. I'd add one thing: what is meant by a "perfect being"? Perfect in what context? For example, the Great White shark is, arguably, the perfect marine predator (although Orca sometimes kill them) but it is rubbish in an arborial environment. The only thing that all "beings" have in common on which they could be compared for 'perfection', free of contextual constraints, is..., well, *being* - that is to say existence. However, existence is binary: something either exists or it does not. That means all things that exist are 'perfect' on the characteristic of 'being' (and no being can be 'more perfect' than another at existing). That is an 'A therefore B' argument: exist therefore perfect at existing (and is consistent with the ontological argument). However, you cannot reverse that and argue that 'B therefore A', that is all perfect things must exist. That's what the ontological argument tries to sneak in, and it is an error in the formal logic of the argument. It can readily be disproved by means of examples: a perfect unicorn, a perfect leprechaun, a perfect Hobbit, etc. must exist because otherwise they wouldn't be perfect. Clearly nonsense, caused by taking a reasonable A therefore B argument and erroneously reversing it. Which, I suspect, any religious apologist would recognise and admit for unicorns, leprechauns, Hobbits etc., and for other gods than their own. That, of course, makes it yet another example of what all religious apologetics seem to boil down to: special pleading.
I actually hate it when atheists go down routes like this with believers. This is exactly where the believers want you to go! You should always keep arguments with believers in the simplest possible terms as that is what they really struggle with.
nitehawk86, I agree. The difference is that in the case of Perfect Circle, we can go to Jerome, Arizona and meet Maynard, he's the proof of APCs existence. :)
It really is aggravating when they hold this bullshit and Plantinga up as seriously intellectual faces of apologetics and philosophy. It to me at best appears massively disingenuous. And to be frank I find it incredible a so called very educated philosopher can proffer such utter cobblers to folk to consider seriously, with a straight face. That this is seemingly the best they can do to try to baldly assert a supernatural entity is a reality is astonishing. And that a supposedly obvious god entity/deity would need such a contrived, dishonest, convoluted and obfuscatory hodgepodge of nonsense mind boggling. Yet this doesn't appear to matter in the slightest.
Pretty much all of Catholic philosophy also revolves around this laughable notion that merely establishing a valid argument for _literally anything_ makes the conclusion rational to accept as true.
TheZooCrew Alright, I'll bite. Please show a relevant source of Catholic philosophy that claims that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true." And please try harder than Anselm. Even Anselm believed his argument to be sound, not merely valid.
Sorry, but I don't give a fucking fuck that Anselm "believed" his argument to be sound. Demonstration is what is required, and this has been understood since Democritus. Anselm just defined a god with "existence" as a property. What a joke. Edward Feser is a leading Catholic philosopher. He specializes in using 10,000 words when 2 will do, but the point is that he's all about Thomas Aquinas, who also didn't present sound premises in his arguments. He made all the same mistakes Aristotle did in advancing "pure reason" both in the absence of and in the face of empiricism. Alvin Plantinga is the same way with his modal logic ontological argument. I'm also just taking Catholic apologists at their word. I'm glowering at that "relevant source" quip, as it seems to have a built-in dismissal mechanism.
TheZooCrew "I don't give a flying fuck that Anselm "believed" his argument to be sound." How can Catholic philosophy revolve around the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true" if none of its key figures *accepts* the notion? "Anselm just defined a god with "existence" as a property." Wrong. "Edward Feser...is all about Thomas Aquinas, who also didn't present sound premises in his arguments." Irrelevant to your claim about Catholic philosophy. "He made all the same mistakes Aristotle did in advancing "pure reason" both in the absence of and in the face of empiricism." Demonstrably and laughably wrong. "Alvin Plantiga..." is not Catholic, what's your point? "I'm glowering at that "relevant source" quip, as it seems to have a built-in dismissal mechanism." It certainly has no "show a source" mechanism, as you have yet to provide one. Saying that Feser and Aquinas are wrong, even if true, does nothing to establish your claim that Catholic philosophy relies on the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true". Appealing to a non-Catholic philosopher doesn't establish it either. There's an entire Wikipedia category of Catholic philosophers. It should be painfully straightforward to find *one* whose thought centers on the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true".
My thoughts on the ontological argument, it's a verbal shell game without anything under the shells and we are expected to take their word for it that something is under the shells.
I have yet to come across a coherent definition for Gawd. They have either internal contradictions, unresolvable paradoxes or are simply mathematically impossible. Has anyone put forward a cogent definition that can be examined?
If one were to believe the Ontological Argument, then you could use the same method to define ANYTHING into existence, and it doesn't even need to be perfect. For example, you could imagine a talking chicken who MUST exist. Imagine such a chicken, and since this chicken has the property of MUST EXISTING, it therefore MUST exist. You could bypass the perfection factor entirely, and define anything into existence as long as we imbue it with that property of existence, even though it only exists in our imagination.
So it's almost like they think a ... negative logical contradiction equates to a positive conclusion? I've never put much thought into it because it's so obviously flawed from the beginning, but I just don't understand the leap from thinking something exists to it exists.
because when you zoom in far enough you'll get little edges. A rough analogy would be to draw a circle in photoshop or GIMP from far away it looks great, but as you zoom into the edge you'll notice the pixels. And its going to be similar in reality here because you'd start seeing the individual atoms which would cause tiny little bumps and such across it. Hence not perfect.
My problem with these alleged arguments for the existence of God is that none of them constitute evidence for her existence: they are just thought experiments. Further, merely conceding that something is possible says nothing about its likelihood, and Step 4 of the argument plays a rhetorical trick to circumvent this.
Great work, as usual Matt, and not to be nitpicky, but at 21:24, I think you mispoke slightly when you said that "If you accept the premises, you should accept the conclusion." Well, no, not if the logic connecting the premises to the conclusion doesn't stand up.
Listening to a discussion of the Ontological Argument really brings home for me Wittgenstein's point about many of philosophy's most misguided tangents and unresolved issues having to do with a misuse of language
I do not understand this argument, perfection is only definable if a set of non contradicting criteria can be found which is clearly limiting and therefore is imperfect because it cannot be all encompassing. The religious that I've talked to cannot define perfection because there is always conflicting requirements and therefore conflicting perfections. For example you cannot design a perfect airplane because it has numerous conflicting requirements. Optimization of one means the failure of another. Perfection can such as a circle can exist depending the type of geometry conceivably because it does not have to be physically drawn. The maximal being argument seems nonsense also since you can make up anything but that does mean it exists.
I don't get how "Imagine something that, given some properties, has to exist for those properties to be satisfied" can EVER become "therefore it exists". A hypothetical is a hypothetical. It requiring existence to fit hypothetical conditions doesn't change anything to the fact that the conditions are hypothetical. If I imagine a unicorn in my wardrobe and I define it as requiring existence, existence is only required to fit that description, it's not required for any other purpose whatsoever. It certainly doesn't make the unicorn real. It only has impact on the hypothetical, not on objective reality. To claim otherwise is just nonsensical.
I think it is impossible to define perfection. What is perfection supposed to be? There must be some absolute truth, independent of all the different truths everyone of us finds in life, aggregates for themselves out of the constant stream of experiences and the restrictions we have in the perception of reality. But is there any truthful definition of perfection? The argument seems to revolve around the imagination of perfection, but how can I imagine something more perfect than perfect? Perfect itself is a superlative already. I think I haven't understood the argument yet. Wikipedia says about Anselm "He suggested that, if the greatest possible being exists in the mind, it must also exist in reality." Why? I don't see why something imagined should necessarily exist in reality. If I imagine a unicorn it does still not exist in reality. It goes on with "If it only exists in the mind, then an even greater being must be possible - one which exists both in the mind and in reality." Why? Is it greater because it would exist in both fantasy and reality? If it only exists in the mind, it only exists in the mind. I don't see the cogency of this conclusion. Either I am too stupid to understand this argument or just too intelligent.
Thank you so much for this amazing video! A bit off-topic, but I wanted to ask: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (air carpet target dish off jeans toilet sweet piano spoil fruit essay). How should I go about transferring them to Binance?
I want to focus on the definition of beings in the ontological argument. Because the existence of maximal element is not a certainty. For example, there is no maximal/greatest integer in the set of real numbers. So if by being it means any being a person can imagine, then it is an infinite list. As you can imagine a being with n hands, where n is an arbitrary integer, you can imagine an infinite number of beings. So in that case the existence of a maximal element/being is not certain. Also isn't arguing for a omnipotent, omniscient and wholly good being, a contradiction because of the problem of evil?
The ontological argument looks like a play on semantics. Like a one liner joke without a funny punchline (or without one at all). Just like a being that doesn't exist can conceivably be greater than one that does, with that logic, is it possible to imagine a being of maximum evil, or any other characteristic (like laziness or incompetence)? If so, do we have a problem like which infinite is greater?
1. It's possible that a maximal greater being exists. 2. If you agree, then you should believe that God exists. 3. If you don't, well, we'll just try to come with some other argument. (Best summary ever)
line width 0 .. cant u get that by puttin a circle ontop of fx a bigger circle? erm... a round thing.. that's got filling... so the perimiter of the inner circle, onto whatever that circle is on (the bigger circle fx) becomes the linew0 circle..? I dunno.. like.. would that fit ze need?
circleA line width 1 and radius 1 .. draw circleB line width 1 and radius 2 .. draw circleC as circleA circumference perimeter thingthing... smoothness still like.. a .. problem.. maybe.. I dunno
a line width of zero is impossible, because if a line has a width of zero, it does not exist in anything but a conceptual sense. We can think about it, but it doesn't really take up space. (Unless you do some very specific infinite things with it. space filling curves are....strange.) For your example, the construction would be cutting out from one circle another circle with the same center and radius as the first. In mathematics, you CAN have an arbitrarily small difference in radius between the two circles, but it must be >0. Go look at limits in a precalc course. In reality, 0 line width can't exist because at very small scales the very concept of discrete objects disappears entirely.
My issue, aside from the to-me exceedingly obvious problem that imagining things and making them exist are notoriously uncorrelated (and the equivocation about "possible" reality is nonsensical), is that the perfect circle example is far too nice to the theist. The perfect circle is sensibly defined: it is perfect in a specific sense. But God as argued is "perfect" in vague senses that combine multiple subjective and objective axes, many of which practically or definitionally conflict. So even if I could grant that a perfect circle could possibly be made in reality somehow, a perfect circle is at least a coherent notion. Trying to pretend that an incoherent notion exists by definition because it's so incoherent is some pretty amazing doublespeak.
I like the first argument that existence is not a predicate/property. Existence is something`s reality/being - the being of a being, not merely something`s property or accidental trait. X can have properties both as an imaginary or abstract object (a mathematical object, or a fantasy being) or as a real object, but existence is a prior condition of an object, dealing with its actuality, reality, its actual being in the world. Existence is something a thing "does", whether its "is-ing", not what a thing is like. You can dissect a thing down to its subatomic particles, no such property as "existence" will be found. A ball can be round, red, full, bouncy, but whether if its real or not, whether it occurs in space-time is something more and separate, than to just add: red, full, bouncy, existing...
A very interesting and solidly entertaining book that I always think about when considering this argument is The Number of the Beast by Robert Heinlein.
trying to observe the Matter from another angle. Is It even Logical to think of perfection? what the hell is perfection? sure we can imagine the concept of perfection, but when we describe It and separate It from imperfection, I Think we get to an area of arbitrary definitions. one may say something is perfect, but the question is: what defines something as perfect? what do everything considered perfect have in commun? what Unites ALL those concepts? isn't the mere definition off something as "perfect"... arbitrary? actually, I think there's no perfection or imperfection as something objective. It's allways a creation of the mind, an arbitrary limit. That limit Is often atributed to Nature, as it's order is considered perfect because It Works. but does anything that is not work? what can possibly be that doesn't work in some form or fashion? Everything in the universe is part of a structure of some sort. If that's true, everything Works ALL the time, because It exists And the structure in wich It is exists. If so, perfection is an arbitrary selection. If we concieve as perfect an Idea, the problem of definition still stands. what makes It perfect? what perfect things have in comum that is not simply arbitrary? And about the Idea that It is rational to agree to the conclusion If You agree with the premisse, it's not allways the case! the conclusion may be absurd and not derive directly from the premisse. there's no Reason to believe something as rational Just because It comes from the right place. It also Matters where It goes! If the conclusion is not derived directly from the premisses, It might be jumping into a conclusion, And I believe it's the case with This ontological argument
Even our attempts to conceive of "perfection" are hopelessly flawed due to observer bias. What possible justification can there be to assume that any concept of perfect we can imagine remotely approaches what actual perfection would be?
@@fgc_rewind nope. I'm simply saying that even attempting to make assumptions or assertions about "perfection" or from that the "greatest conceivable being" is an exercise in futility. It's also rather ridiculous to assume that any "being" could even approach the imagined concepts of any gods, much less the highly illogical multi omni character from certain mythological narratives.
What if for each god there is another god which is more perfect/positive/whatever then the previous one? Like for each number there is a greater number...
Great job Matt. I'm loving this series. This reminds me of how analytic statements are in the end circular and don't necessarily tell you anything about the world (a circle is round). Also Santa is perfect and he doesn't exist, so there.
The greatest concept we can come up with is the Universe, since it envelops all space and time, and gets bigger every time we think of it because it's expanding.
My favorite objection to the Ontological Argument is to point out that existence is not a property; it's the precondition for properties to apply to a thing. If someone uses a god's defined "greatness" or "perfection" to deduce that these properties imply an existent god in order to apply to that god, it's no less absurd for me to define a purple dragon and deduce that it's property of being purple implies an existent dragon in order for that "purpleness" to apply to something. After all; if you say that you're imagining a non-existent purple dragon, then it isn't the purple dragon because if it doesn't exist, it isn't purple. In order to actually imagine a purple dragon, you must imagine it as existing. Therefore purple dragons necessarily exist in all possible worlds, because a nonexistent purple dragon is as absurd a concept as a non-purple/purple dragon. *drops mic
If you draw a circle with a compass, you end up with a perfect circle in which the pencil line is completely smooth, as smooth as any straight line drawn against a ruler.
Paul Robinson "As smooth as any straight line drawn against a ruler". First...that's not 'perfect'. Second, it's a line segment and not a line. Third, lines and segments have no width = so you can't draw them...and you can't draw a perfect circle, even with a compass.
Matt, circles I've drawn with a compass looked perfect to me, anyway! Well, you can draw a perfect circle using a template created using machine created holes.
Personally, I think whether one can actually imagine a "perfect" being is entirely irrelevant, even if you couldn't make an argument that "perfection" and "greatness" are subjective. The most important argument for me is that _imagining a being does not make it real_ , no matter how much better that would make it.
Imagine the perfect argument for the existence of a thing. Now imagine that the thing the argument is arguing for doesn't exist. Wouldn't the argument be more perfect if the thing it was arguing for existed? Therefore the perfect argument for the existence of a unicorn must exist.
Interesting but no mention of Aristotle the unmoved mover or transcendental mathematics ? Or maybe Kant ? Vedic Sankhya philosophy ? Maybe a being that contains all of creation within him yet remains aloof from his creation is an interesting definition ?
Matt Dillahunty thanks for the reply my understanding is some of the Principal questions of ontology include “What can be said to exist?" "What is a thing?" "Into what categories, if any, can we sort existing things?" "What are the meanings of being?" "What are the various modes of being of entities?" All of the different points I mentioned above have addressed these questions in different ways through the years
To me, where every form of the ontological argument fails is that existing is always a greater property than non-existence... which always confuses me and seems like a baseless assertion, or at best a subjective and therefore useless one in context.
If you hadn't said "I am saying 'possible' far too much", I don't think I would have even noticed. Now I want to turn it into a drinking game for this video.
no it wouldn't. Non-existent things still have properties and thus can have flaws. In fact they can have any arbitrary properties. For example if you say "all children in this room are bald" and there are no children in the room, the statement is true by default. Because "all x" is a shorthand for "x_1 and x_2 and x_3 and ...". And "true" is a neutral element in respect to "and" operation. It is intuitively true - characters in stories do not really exist, yet they can have flaws.
It depends on how exactly you define those terms, but the contradiction arises from knowledge of the future. Either the being knows the future (including its own choices) and is powerless to change it, or it has the power to change the future and thus it didn't know the future.
I think there may be a hidden fallacy (or error or something) within the very construction of the argument. If a thing which truly exists is "superior" to a thing which only conceptually exists, where do we draw the line of "conceptual perfection" being "superior" to "actual existence"? Is a "non-perfect being" that really exists "superior" to a "perfect being that is purely conceptual"? I would say that actual existence trumps any kind of "perfect thing that is purely conceptual" which would make me or you or anybody more "superior" or "maximally great" or "perfect" that some thing that is merely conceptual, no matter who perfect that conceptual thing is.
why can't we conceive of perfection? you state on the one hand that we can't (5:01) and on the other hand you state that perfection in reality is impossible; these are two different things, and neither is obviously the case. the argument for the latter (9:00ish-10:00ish) falls short. its perfectly logically possible that a perfect circle obtain in physical reality; the litmus test for coherence is logical possibility, not physical possibility. besides, the theist is going to argue that reality includes metaphysical reality. i take it that the bit here is an attempt is to show that the ontological argument fails to even get off the ground. i'm with you on the end result, namely that the argument fails, but i think it fails in flight or upon landing, not on the runway.
I think perfect circles or perfectly straight lines are good examples. These are "perfect entities" that we imagine, and they help us talk about things, construct things, or compare things. So by this reasoning, we can say that the "perfect God" that theists propose *is fine* as an archetype; he needn't also exist to use this archetype in the way that we use circles and lines to make calculated decisions.
This idea that the most perfect thing you can imagine must somehow necessarily exist seems like such utter nonsense I'm baffled that serious thinkers bother to address it.
When I try to conceive of a most perfect being I'd definitely include "perfect communicator" and that's just one more thing I don't see evidence for.
well "perfect deceiver" must be included too right? So he's perfectly communicating his perfect deceptions to his perfectly flawed creations, so we have to rely in our perfectly imperfect senses of logic and reason to try and figure out what the hell is going on!
Seems like a perfect cluster-fuck to me...
How about "perfectly beneficent", "perfectly patient" and "incapable of making a mistake", and then look at the Old Testament Yahweh? Along with your "perfect communicator", that makes for a pretty imperfect being.
The idea of "perfection" also fails when you look at reality. There is nothing in real life for which one can't imagine something better, or some way to improve upon it. This also runs into the question of who determines whether or not something is perfect. Something you consider perfectly suitable for yourself may not be what someone else considers perfect for them. It's rather easy to imagine something superior to the Biblegod, and easy to see how different people have vastly different ideas about what kind of God perfectly suits their wants and needs.
Wow..it seems like Matt is desperate to escape fine tuning lol
According to the bible He just doesn't communicate with the wicked. Check yourself buddy
I see the problem here Matt: you didn't turn around. Turn around around and look at the trees Matt.
*Look at the trees Matt!*
waspbloke Oh my word you're right, look at the trees! We now have evidence of....trees. Fucking amazing
waspbloke I'm convinced!
LOL
EP3mentalist Did you look at the clouds though?
Brilliant. Obviously you have experience in talking to theists.
1: God exists
2: goobly gobly hokum dokum talk
3: Then god exists
The Ontological Argument is neither logical, nor an argument.
"Imagine a perfect being."
That's pretty vague. It's like describing how happy you were on your happiest day. How the hell can you define "perfect" with respect to a being? A hundred people imagining the perfect being would be imagining 100 different things.
"Existing is better than not existing."
That might FEEL true, but feeling true and being true are completely different things.
That's not logic. That's just pushing words around.
LMFAO! im stealing this, brilliant one
1.Imagine the most absolute worthless philosophical argument......
xD
Angus Adolphus I did that and I came to the conclusion it was probably a theistic argument. Not necessarily though.
p1: All theistic arguments have one or more logical fallacies in their premises.
p2: Honest philosophers are usually aware of logical fallacies and they try to avoid them.
p3: The argument is shit.
Conclusion: It's probably a theistic argument and/or philosopher. An honest philosopher might miss a logical fallacy, but a theist never argues without logical fallacies, so an argument with logical fallacies is more likely to have come from a theist.
Also, theists are not intellectually honest when it comes to theism, ever. As soon as they are intellectually honest, they're atheists and no longer theists.
I really like this and agree.
Ontology isn't about getting to the core of the issues, it's about the nature of reality. What do you think the nature of existence is, and why do you believe that? Matt's definition of ontology is weird. Physicalism is the least parsimonious and least empirically likely ontology to be true. Philosophical idealism is the most likely ontology to be true, according to science (two-slit experiment and backwards causality), and to philosophy. Materialism has been disproven, but that doesn't mean "God" has been proven.
I don' feel like I am even in your league. So many concepts it is offputting. It's like name dropping with words (concept dropping). Actually say what it is you believe
“God cannot exist because of Eric The God-Eating Magic Penguin. Since Eric is God-Eating by definition, he has no choice but to eat God. So, if God exists, He automatically ceases to exist as a result of being eaten. Unless one can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, God doesn’t exist. Even if you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist, that same proof will also be applicable to God. There are only two possibilities: either you can prove that Eric doesn’t exist or you can not. In both cases it logically follows that God doesn’t exist.”
Inability to disprove something is not evidence of somethings existence...And the ability to prove something is not evidence of something else not existing...
I disagree with your comment... In both cases it does not logically follow that god doesnt exist....Im Atheist, but I simply can not assert that god does not exist...I can not assert that anything does not exist...Theres no "logical" way around that.....
You cant end up saying a line like "in both cases it logically follows", when you started off by using a hypothetical instance of something you didnt believe in BEFORE you made your "logical argument"....
You CANT prove that Eric does not exist, so you are "logically" prevented from making any points that rely on "even if you can prove eric doesnt exist"...
Its a logical fallacy...you are using a presuppositionalist argument.....along with a bunch of other fallacies....
In the end, you actually allowd the shifting of the burden of proof over to you....And now you are in the same boat as the theist...
Im Atheist, but I cant claim that god does not exist...I simply have no clue whether god exists or not....and I have no clue if magical penguin god-eaters exist or not...maybe they do, maybe they dont...
Asserting that something does not exist is always illogical...
I define my reality and henceforth you don't exist. You call this illogical, I can this rational. May I suggest that now stand up and liberate your panties from your recesses.
I was just trying to have a conversation with someone who seemed intelligent...Sorry to bother you...
All hail the almighty Eric the God-Eater, the true lord of the Universe!
FishBayVI420H20: "Asserting that something does not exist is always illogical..."
Married bachelors don't exist. Square circles don't exist. One certain *can* logically deduce nonexistence. It just requires the concepts under discussion to actually be defined.
The God that Abrahamists believe in is generally defined as omniscient, omnipotent, and all-loving. Given the world we observe, not such being exists. If some being lacks any of those 3 traits, why call it God?
1. Imagine all theists owe me money.
2. It is possible that they all owe me money.
3. Therefor all theists must give me money or they prove god doesn't exist.
Snuffy Wuffykiss you clearly didnt understand the argument
@JTN Sorry your argument for a god fails... I guess you just didn't imagine hard enough...
@JTN pk. Well you can just imagine a maximally powerful response here... I am sure that will suit your level of skepticism...
@JTN Sorry your brain is not capable of understanding my maximally great answer...
@JTN Seriously? are you so dense you don't get the point?
Like is this an R/woosh moment?
You are basing an entire argument on your IMAGINATION!!!!!
Do You Not understand that?
In the thumbnail it looks like Matt is playing a tiny flute.
Thumbed up for being the least pretentious here.
I skimmed the comments just to see if anyone else thought the same thing.
In my head I imagine the flute thing from Charlie and the Chocolate factory, right before the umpa lumpas show up :P
saw that as well xD
A perfect flute.
Regardless of language or symbolic representation of the argument, the largest flaw is in the idea that something we can just imagine must possibly exist. As Matt and others have pointed out that we cannot simply "define" something into acutal existence.
The factor which lends an air of reasonableness to the Ontological arguments is that reasonable people allow for possibilities. People may well say, yes, maybe in some world, something, anything, conceptually is possible.
I think the best way to short circuit this argument is to pair the statement,
- "It is possible that there is a being which has maximal greatness (in some world)"
with the statement,
- "It is also possible that there is NOT a being which has maximal greatness (in any world)."
That both of those statements may be true indicates that mere conceptual possibility, does not itself make actual existence necessary.
My biggest problem with these monologic arguments is that they seem to make a logical leap between premises. I don't even care about the issue of whether existence is better or not. How do these people think they got from "it's possible" to "it's necessary?" They just incrementally add words into the premises until edging their way to necessary, but they never demonstrate it.
It's possible that a perfect circle could exist
Uniqueness is a property of perfection
The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle
Therefore every circle is a perfect circle
You can do this with anything. To me it seems to be little more than rhetorical masturbation. In the ontological argument, they're just conflating "maximum POSSIBLE power" with "maximum power that is possible in this reality". The smartest guy in the world isn't infinitely smart, but he's still the smartest possible. It's just wordplay.
The claim is, INFINITE intelligence (or power) and that's where the burden rests. I see no need to entertain any argument that cannot demonstrate its own first premise, no matter how flawed the rest of it may be.
[The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle]
What? How did you deduce that?
You said uniqueness is a property of perfection. No, it's not. Uniqueness is a property of quantity.
[To me it seems to be little more than rhetorical masturbation.]
You need to study more philosophy to train yourself in understanding rational abstract thought. You can't argue against a philosopher by telling him _"I don't know man, it feels to me you're just talking"._ Having an education might help.
Are you saying that the argument I included in my post was not very logical? That I simply asserted connections that were not demonstrated, and so I was basically just making stuff up? Would you perhaps say that this makes MY argument a good example of ACTUAL rhetorical masturbation?
Your argument is massively flawed, yes. It requires intelligence to make a good argument, just as it takes intelligence to understand a good argument.
Would you agree that it could accurately be described as rhetorical masturbation, being that it was, to your perspective seemingly just self-indulgent word salad?
TheFounderUtopia
I don't care what label you want to put on it. The problem is you have no validity aka what you're saying makes no coherent sense.
[Uniqueness is a property of perfection
The most perfect circle must therefore be the ONLY circle]
Those two things do not add up. It's a non sequitur.
I've always been baffled by the idea of greatness/perfection outside of context. Is God supposed to be perfectly square, the most round, both?!? Is it also the perfect rapist, serial killer? the most blue, the most red? can He be perfectly stupid? How about Lucky? Does that even make sense as a property for an omniscient being?
John Ughrin lol, do you know something called contradiction? Study some philosophy, stop making a fool of yourself in public.
@@Darksaga28 no, I think this is reductio ad absurdum, and is actually being used as proof that the ontological argument sucks. "the most blue, the most red?" is an obvious contradiction, yes, but that means the ontological argument, not John, is generating a contradiction by posing a perfect or "maximally great" being, as posed by John, "outside of context". A maximally great being... compared to what?
If I were to imagine the most perfect being that being would be the best at doing any task. They would be the fastest runner for example and will have won every race because a fastest runner that has won every race would be greater and more perfect than one that hasn't. Since we know for a fact that every race hasn't been won by one perfect runner then this ultimate perfect being cannot exist. Therefore by this argument God does not exist.
@@alihaggis78 no men, theres not such a thing like almost perfect, or is perfect or isnt.
How can you not have a perfect circle it doesnt have to be made it can be a barrier taking no space it doesnt make sence it's like the rock argument can God make a rock to bit to lift why would you define God as something like us of course it's possible if God can manifest in different ways
So the most perfect being cannot write a book that wouldn't be easily improved by any random 10-year-old.
Go on, I'm listening.......
+phileas007
To answer this, I will channel my alter ego - Reverend Billy Bob Fatheful of the Furst Amurkin, Bald Eagle, Apple Pie Church of Christ. Here we go...
Whut y'all dusn't unnerstand is that if'n tha Bible was better at konveyin' its messige, it woodint be perfickt no more! GOd dun give us free will, an that meens that we gots ta have FAITH! Ya cain't maek no free choyce if'n ya knows the answer ahed a time! God got's ta hide hisself, and kommunikate in suttle ways - jest enuff so's ya kin figger out that he's reelly thair if'n ya wants ta!
Man... that always gives me a headache.
+Pat Doyle
Bravo.
But why then bother with a book at all? If the book comes too close to taking our free will and anyway is only there so volunteers can be inspired to interprete it correctly and talk others into believing through their talents.... why not leave out the step of writing down a half assed attempt and simply going directly to inspiring his human speakers?
And why if there is a god that if you beg really hard will show you in your heart the true meaning of his book... do they end up with dozens of translations that contradict each other and with thousands of denominations that fight to the blood about anything from how one single word has to be read to the core of all these religions, the rules of how to gain salvation and eternal blessings?
+Pat Doyle
Bravo.
But why then bother with a book at all? If the book comes too close to taking our free will and anyway is only there so volunteers can be inspired to interprete it correctly and talk others into believing through their talents.... why not leave out the step of writing down a half assed attempt and simply going directly to inspiring his human speakers?
And why if there is a god that if you beg really hard will show you in your heart the true meaning of his book... do they end up with dozens of translations that contradict each other and with thousands of denominations that fight to the blood about anything from how one single word has to be read to the core of all these religions, the rules of how to gain salvation and eternal blessings?
It dun be like a mistery novel. God dun give us clues thru his buuk. :-)
*It dun be like a mistery novel. God dun give us clues thru his buuk. :-)*
You kid, but I've actually encountered this ridiculous argument. It is laughable because once the message is delivered, it doesn't matter how clear or opaque it was beforehand. Any supposed free will impact possessing the knowledge has is not mitigated by making it harder to acquire. All that does is ensure fewer people learn the lesson, which is antithetical to the purpose of writing the book in the first place.
Some Christian arguments have at least a veneer of persuasion, but this is not one of them. :)
It is a conceptual truth (or, so to speak, true by definition) that a TH-cam channel run by God is a channel than which none greater can be imagined.
God and his channel exist as an idea in the mind.
Something that exists as an idea in the mind and in reality is, other things being equal, greater than something that exists only as an idea in the mind.
Thus, if God's TH-cam channel exists only as an idea in the mind, then we can imagine something that is greater than God's TH-cam channel.
But we cannot imagine a channel that is greater than God's TH-cam channel (for it is a contradiction to suppose that we can imagine something greater than the greatest possible thing that can be imagined.)
_Therefore, God has a TH-cam channel._
Furthermore, with 54M subs, Pewdiepie is the greatest channel on TH-cam.
_Therefore, Pewdiepie is God._
Or, ya know, maybe you can't define things into existence with word games. Rather, you have to offer evidence.
LMFAO good one XD
You are just an "Angry Atheist", PewDiePie is the way, the truth and the life.
Blessed peace upon Him.
St Anselm is whirling dervishly in his grave.
[Furthermore, with 54M subs, Pewdiepie is the greatest channel on TH-cam.]
Well I can imagine a TH-cam channel with 55 million subs.
So your ontological argument for PDP fails.
Next.
All philosophical arguments for god suffer from one great flaw. They all make unfounded presumptions. There is no evidence to support the presumptions so the conclusion is also unsupported.
+smokert5555
And the best of them, in my opinion, the Kalaam, only points to a cause which could be anything from a quantum fluctuation to Yahweh. And even THAT one is fatally flawed by unsupported premises. But all the rest of which I am aware suffer from a worse flaw - begging the question. The conclusion is in the premises.
You forget that they usually add a second stage to Kalaam where suddenly any cause has to become a god of their own preferential attributes, That has always been a giant Non sequitur and always killed the argument. Except for Presuppositionalists who find nothing weird about this "problem"...
Pat Doyle You forget. The Kalam cosmological argument states the universe began. Science shows that the universe only began to expand and before that expansion we don't know what happened, it may be an eternal cycle. Therefore the Kalam is making a baseless assertion that the universe began.
+Nacasius
If you read my post you will see that I did not forget. You are correct - but you merely expanded upon what I said.
As far as I can tell, all arguments for the existence of "God" are nothing more than pushing words around.
They bear little resemblance to ACTUAL logic that can produce ACTUAL conclusions from ACTUAL premises.
I have never understood why the ontological argument isn't more often attacked by the assumption that "perfection" or "greatness" is totally ordered (i.e., satisfies the trichotomy that for any A and B, either A < B, A = B, or A > B). Or at least that it is a semi-latice: for any A and B there is a C such that A
Wait wait wait.
The argument is *literally* "I can imagine it so it has to be real"?
What the fuck?
Yep.
And Matt wastes 26 minutes talking when he could have we just said this?
@@canwelook Except that's not really the argument.
Yes. There are massive undemonstrated leaps, but there is, indeed, a core of reasonable logic that can be reasonably refuted.
@@martinmckee5333 the entire foundation of the argument is 'I can imagine it therefore it is real'.
Why waste words?
@@canwelook The argument is (fatally, I would say) broken. But, the way you put it is still a strawmen. The value in exploring these arguments is to: 1) understand precisely what is wrong with them, in a technical sense, and 2) to approach them with enough rigor that apologists cannot justifiably that we have not honestly considered them.
Around 23:00 - I'm not sure that the ease with which an argument is understandable is evidence against it's conclusion.
Wouldn't that be like saying "General Relativity describes a nature of space-time in a fundamental way. But General Relativity is hard to understand. That strikes me as odd"
Why should it be odd that a fundamental truth is hard to understand?
I couldn't even tell how the conclusion even followed the premises.
The OA pretty much boils down to
"existence is a property of greatness".
Fantastic - prove it.
While I don't disagree, I would contend that there is something more fundamental that needs proving before that assertion can even be discussed: "Existence is a property."
+Amigo21189
I contend that existence actually would be a predicate, because in contrast to what Imannuel Kant thought, the property of existence is actually what distinguishes real, tangible, concrete objects in the real world from mere imaginary objects that are only the subject of one mind.
+Amigo21189
I would say that existence is definitely a property of things that exist. The question is whether existence is greater than a lack of existence.
But I get your point to an extent - things that do not exist have no properties, so one could say that existence is a sine quo non of anything we want to seriously discuss - if a thing has ANY properties - it exists.
Pat Doyle
Could existence possibly be a predicate in the sense of it being either purely subjective (imaginary) or intersubjective (concrete)? After all, we only actually know the world through empirical observation, and even that requires an assumption of regularity in physical law.
The problem, and the psychology here is why this is such a tempting argument to use, is that I can distinguish wholly fictional things from each other by properties, or wholly ideal things. A perfect circle is distinct from a perfect square. A unicorn has one horn while a wyvern has no horns but has wings. We as humans do not need to put existence onto something to ascribe properties to it.
So, at the very least, existence as a property has to be differentiated from all other properties. All other properties are purely a priori: I can define a moogabooga as a five-legged leaping mammal that breathes fire. But I can't define a moogabooga as existing because "to exist", as a term, means in practice "to demonstrably exist in our reality", which is why you have to go check.
Some of these topics are interesting.
I'm reminded of an SNL skit about a garage band where the members imagined themselves having a hit song that brought them fame, wealth, and adoring fans. They found this idea so compelling that they had already designed an album cover and made a music video -- without having even one song. Most people will laugh at this idea. They feel intuitively that a potential, even a very great potential, has less utility than an actuality. In other words, an imagined hit song, even the biggest imagined hit song of all time still has less utility than a song that was actually composed, performed, and recorded.
Also, most people can readily decompose the concept of potentiality into several broad categories such as conceivable, theoretical, technological, and practical.
1.) A floating tabletop can be conceived, but, based on what we know now, it isn't theoretically possible.
2.) A human mission to Mars is theoretically possible but, based on what we know now, it isn't technologically possible.
3.) Reciprocating steam engines are technologically possible, but, based on what we know now, they are not practical.
Practicality can be further broken down into things such as cost, talent, and opportunity. A reciprocating steam engine would cost more to build and operate than a diesel engine. I could buy a big hunk of marble which could potentially be carved into a great work of art but that would require the talent of a stone carver. Anyone could visit the Eifel Tower but they would have to actually be in Paris to have that opportunity.
So, while it might be comforting to think of a god as perfect, it can be readily stated that a real but imperfect god has greater utility than a perfect but only potential god.
Then we could consider maximality itself. Let's say God is the maximally conceivable agent. Presumably this would be maximal to humans or perhaps maximal to the most intelligent human. But then one would have to ask if this God then, being of greater intellect could likewise conceive of an agent greater than itself. This then would lead to an infinite sequence of each maximal God conceiving of an even more maximal God. Such an infinite sequence would not seem to be much of an explanation. This fact swallows up both Anselm's and Descarte's arguments as conceivability within a mind.
You could try to get around this problem by defining God as the maximally conceivable agent. However, this too seems to have problems. If God is the maximally conceivable agent then no such God could conceive of an agent greater than itself. However, for a human to propose such an argument requires a concept of an agent greater than itself. Therefore, such a human would have a relatively less limited ability of conception than God. In other words, a human could imagine an agent greater than itself but God could not. And, a God that is more limited than a human would be a contradiction. Therefore God could not exist.
Matt, thank you for this series of explaining each argument in its own segment.
My problem is that you have to accept the premise as true. Really? If I reject the premise, which has not been proved, then the entire argument falls apart. It is just that simple. Reject the premise, which is just a hypothetical, and there is no argument.
Exactly!
Mr. Dillahunty, PLEASE keep doing what you do, and as I see that you expand in many different ways, keep doing that too! Doesn't say much in a realistic sense, I know, but know that I appreciate your existence. Thanks!
Version at 3:06
Imagine the greatest possible cheeseburger. If this cheeseburger doesn't actually exist, then you can imagine a cheeseburger that is greater than that cheeseburger because it has all the properties of the greatest possible cheeseburger and also exists. Therefore, the greatest possible cheeseburger must exist. Why don't you like me enough to bring me that cheeseburger?
Version at 14:18
The greatest cheeseburger that can exist has a perfect texture, flavor, and calorie count. A perfect cheeseburger can only be perfect if it exists in every possible world. It is possible that a cheeseburger has maximal greatness. Therefore, it is necessarily true that a cheeseburger of maximal greatness exists. Therefore the perfect cheeseburger exists. Why don't you like me enough to bring me this cheeseburger either?
Now, I want a cheeseberder.. :(
1. Would you pay me for either these cheeseburgers? (And delivery, tax and gratuity)
2. Would this payment be c.o.d. Or deferred to another day?
3. What would your emotional state be, while paying for this cheeseburger?
ie
1 you would
3 gladly
2 pay me tuesday
@@brucebaker810 The transcendent love of the Divine Cheeseburger is such that only I speak for the TRUE cheeseburger. If you give me money, I can tell you the will of the Divine Cheeseburger. If you don't love the Divine Cheeseburger you will be thrown in the deep fryer for eternity.
(Both of my comments are reductio ad absurdum to demonstrate why the logic falls apart if applied to anything you don't already have an extreme bias towards.)
I would gladly pay you Tuesday...for a BSolution today.
Both of mine are absurd reflections on a possible Christian sect. Of the Yes And school. Yes Jesus AND golden plates. Yes and we can drink poison.
Mine is Yes And Popeye. This sect, as many, relies for its Thingy of Defining Weirdness, on just one or two bible passages. This one something about I am that I am. Plus some "confirmation" verses about olive oil.
This is an offshoot...but some figure "be Wimpy" might be the meta message of the NT.
Man, I could go for a cheeseburger right now..
I always loved the Ontological Argument. There is an interesting angle one can come from: if the greatest possible thing must exist, then by the same toke, must not the meekest possible thing not exist?
This would then lead to nothing existing at all, since if the meekest (or smallest) possible thing can't exist, then the second meekest will be the meekest, and stop existing too. and so on. Until nothing is left.
This might not be the most airtight of arguments, but its fun and it shows some of the silliness about defining things into existence.
Imagine Harry Potter.
Since you can imagine Harry Potter he must exist.
Great arguement :)
Pleasingly, we have more evidence that Hogwarts exists than a god/s.
The books about Harry Potter describe some places that are real, so obviously it must all be true.
Bad example. Harry Potter is the boy who lived.
+Cryogenic Vortex
Yes - it works for anything. I have a concept of the greatest possible turd. It would be infinitely smelly, solid enough to not be diarrhea, but not so solid as to cause constipation, and have just enough corn kernels to make it visually interesting. If it is possible for this turd to exist in one possible toilet, it must exist in ALL possible toilets! GO check - would you? :-)
Hankyism
If existence is not a predicate, then the argument is unsound because the premise “a thing that exists is greater than a thing that doesn’t exist” is false. If we accept that existence is a predicate, then it is impossible to conceive of any thing that actually doesn’t exist (even though you think you can).
“But wouldn’t a God who could find a flaw in the ontological argument be greater still?” - XKCD
Yes I can imagine that too so it must be real!
Christians must've been soooo embarrassed about the ridiculousness of faith to have thought the ontological argument helped their case.
Your argument at roughly 16:00 where you discuss the assumption of possibility is where I am constantly getting hung up on this argument. People want to claim something is possible, but they do not want to provide evidence (besides circular reasoning) that such a thing is PLAUSIBLE.
It seems to me that it's an equivocation between a very sloppy meaning of the word "possible" and what it actually means. To me, "X is possible" means that there is some known mechanism by which X could become a reality. But this argument seems to want "possible" to also mean things that "could be possible given certain not necessarily actual circumstances". Since we don't know everything, there are a lot of things that could be possible, but that doesn't mean we get to say that they are in fact possible, only that we can't say they're definitely impossible.
In context of OA, possible simply means logically consistent aka. non-self-contradictory. Which has to be demonstrated and shouldn't be accepted as true by default. If it were then all hypotheses should be accepted as true until proven otherwise, which is absurd.
KohuGaly and, imo the MOA fails that in premise 1, since omnipotence is not self consistent. even if the term is downgraded to "the ability to do anything logically possible" the set of all logically possible things does _not_ include the ability to do all logically possible things, as some things are logically possible on their own but mutually exclusive together. Some people say the Kalam is the greatest example of "fractal wrongness" in all apologetics, but for me it is the MOA
"set of all logically possible things does not include the ability to do all logically possible things, as some things are logically possible on their own but mutually exclusive together."
ability to do all LPTs is not the same thing as ability to do every LPT. It is the same intuitive difference like between laving licence to drive any car and all cars - you obviously can't drive them all at once. However, I generally do agree with the "fractal wrongness" of this argument, because of how mutually exclusively do the supposed attributes of greatness interact with each other.
My hypothesis is that maximal greatness of any necessary being tends towards zero. Every new paradox (omnipotence paradox being the most notorious example) seems to shrink the maximal greatness considerably, compared to intuitive naive expectation. Off course, I have no definitive proof that zero is the final value, but I definitely have more evidence than MOA proponents have...
KohuGaly i see your point, but my thing is that the ability to do all logically possible things is impossible because as soon as one uses this ability for, say one builds that proverbial pile of rocks he cannot lift, the lifting if that pile is no longer an ability that person has, or else logical possibility goes out the window and we are left with paradoxes. So i guess what i mean is the set of all logically possible things includes both lifting any mass and putting together a mass you are unable to lift(from the omnipotence paradox) but it is logically impossible to do both, not even at the same time, but in principle. If you have the ability to do one, by definition as an analytical truth, you lack the ability to do the other. As i see it, anyways.
+munstrumridcully you fail to recognize the "potence" in omnipotence. You have to not only analyse singular actions, but also composite actions (chains of singular actions). The logically possible omnipotence includes only self-consistent chains (ie. making unliftable rock and then lifting it is invalid composite action). That does not necessarily mean the chains need to be consistent with each other, because in any given reality only one of the chains can be realized (which one specifically is a matter of "choise"/"predermination").
Doesn’t this argument mean that “if you can imagine it then it exists”? For example, imagine a perfect unicorn. Now imagine a unicorn that actually exists, which is more perfect than a unicorn who doesn’t exist. Therefore, a perfect unicorn exists.
Non existence doesn’t exist only existence❤️
my issue and I've mentioned to you in other videos is the whole concept that good is the greatest thing, but good/evil are value judgements not intrinsic values, so why would the greatest being just automaticly be the greatest good being
The typical apologist answer is "because I said so." Looking at the man behind the curtain is expressly forbidden in religion.
My problem with the ontological argument is the word "exist".
Dreams, and thoughts exist. Do they have ontological status? No.
Exist is not synonymous with BE.
Unicorns COULD exist, but they do not, and therefor they have no BEING. (the additional problem is that "unicorn" is a merely a description of a mythological creature, made up from the imagination, like centaurs, minotaurs, sphinxes, elves, dwarfs, wizards, etc)
God COULD exist, but that doesn't mean it has BEING.
Harry Potter, Huckleberry Finn, Gulliver all exist... but not of them have any BEING.
"possible" is another troublesome word.
It is "possible" that I exist in more than one body, or physical form. I can conceive of my "mind" or self identity being something separate from my body, and therefor not limited to my body.
The fact is, the mind or self does not have any sense of BEING, even though it does exist as a concept. Therefor, the conflation of existence and being is not the subject of "possibilities".
So would this also be possible?
1. Imagine the most absolute state of nothing you can.2. Because you do exist, this cannot be the most absolute state of nothing.3. A more absolute state of nothing would be one where nothing else existed.
4. In some possible world, absolute nothing must exist5. Because it is absolute, the absolute nothing must exist in all worlds6. Therefore nothing exists.
Hmm not really. It kinda muddles the two arguments and you seem require a non-thing to be a thing.
Roj H to say that "nothing exists" is a contradiction. Existence implies something. Something cannot be nothing.
"Nothing exists" in this context is used as the "lack of existence of all things", as there being no "thing", a complete and utter lack of anything. It would only be a contradiction if "nothing" in "nothing exists" was not a negation, but its customary to be understood as "no thing exists", which is completely ok, since it does not say that "X exists" where X is nothing, but it says that no X exists. All X-es are denied to exist, not denial affirmed to exist. The confusion comes from the form of the statement, not from its intended meaning.
Thanks, that's a helpful clarification.
+Hypatia
That is a good clarification that then leads to what constitutes a "thing". I note that the common Christian definition of god these days sounds a lot like nothing to me - spaceless, timeless, and immaterial. They seem to be asserting the existence of a "thing" that shares none of the properties normally associated with things, and to make things even more fun, they claim that this nothing thing, created everything from nothing!
Matt, philosophy bores me to tears,... except when you explain it. Thanks!
Yes. He has sparked my interest in phylosophy many years ago.
@@colaboytje Hope u take more of a interest in philosophy rather than phylosophy.
@@dragan3659 Sometimes people make an error.
colaboytje It was just a joke
Great Video, I love the change of scenery!
It seems to me that this argument just says that "god" is the most perfect being that exists.
But there are (at least) two ways to interpret this statement. The most succinct way to interpret it is as follows: The most perfect being that exists is defined as "god". So, if the most perfect being in the universe is my next-door neighbor Larry, then he is defined as god.
All this "argument" does is create a specific definition for god. Given that definition, we can try to find what fits that definition (In this case, Larry). We cannot apply our own definition of god to the results of this argument.
I can define anything any way I want. Imagine if I were to define "The Beatles" as the best all-female music group of all time. Clearly, something doesn't add up. When you think of The Beatles, you think of the all-male music group. Given my definition, you must either change your belief about the sex of the members of the band or you must acknowledge that my definition is different from yours. By my definition, "The Beatles" would be the Spice Girls. Given my definition, this would be a true statement. But you cannot then insert your own definition of "The Beatles" and be justified in your belief that the actual band "The Beatles" Is the same band as "The Spice Girls". You cannot mix definitions.
Wow... this was fantastic Matt thanks for this!
I once asked this question in a Christian chat room: "If God is a necessary being, then why is he also a contingent being on the rules of logic? Wouldn't that make God contingent just like me?" The answer: I got kicked out of the chat........
How is god a contingent being?
@@Matthewsmusic1000 Is god subject to the rules of logic?
@@snarky77005 the problem of conceiving logic as an external strenght is pathetic, God is subject to logic in the sense that logic is all there is.
I'd like to ask a question, to see if I understand this.
Imagine the maximally perfect unicorn. A unicorn that did not exist would be less than perfect. Therefore a perfect unicorn actually exists. So, the problem, if I get it, is that we assume existing is a trait or property of perfection?
at some level, yes.
But it goed further: 'existing' as a property of anything (perfect or not), is already a problem.
None-existing chairs aren not chairs, and don't have four legs. Something can only have properties (or perfections) IF it exists.
Some versions (like Plantinga's) try to avoid this... but i think at one point or another, they all make this mistake. He just hides it better under a thick layer of 'modal logic'.
@@PGBurgess
What a crock of shit. (Them, not you.)
Although I agree with the wholesome sense of the refutals, I dont think you have hit the core of ontological argument yet (at least the modal form). The jump from 3-4-5 is a valid move (you think there's a problem here). The one and only shaky premise is premise 3. The wordings of this form weren't clear, I understand the one presented by WLC better. Understand what is being done here. Premise 3 is like a wolf disguised. 1 and 2 are nothing but definitions of maximal greatness. Part A is defining maximal excellence - omniscient omnipotent, omnibenevolent (and existent of course). Part B is deifning maximal greatness - (read WLC's version - if being is maximally excellent in one possible world implies he is maximally excellent in all possible worlds, he is maximally great). NOw to uncover the disguise in premise 3, all you have to do is replace the words maximal greatness with its actual definition:
Premise 3': It is possible that there is a being that is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent and existent such that if the being has these properties possibly, it has these properties necessarily.
The next move to premise 4 is perfectly valid after this. But see what a complex little thing premise 3 has become when expressed as premise 3'. The whole play here is to disguise the actual burden of premise 3 to reduce it to possibility of just the classical definition of a God but for the argument to work you would need to prove the possibility of this added property of necessity to consider in the mix in the premise.
Or in other words, they try to hide the burden of proof of the following statement:
It is possible that x exists where x is such that if its possible it exists, it is necessary it exists.
You are right in saying that assigning existence as a property is problematic. But even with that, the modal form has a bigger problem. You have been trying to attack the classical definition and ask for the proof for possibility of existence of classical God. But in all honesty, you are missing the point here. You should be asking for another level of burden of proof of possibility on premise 3 :)
Is that a Meinongian conception of property and existence?
Not sure. My point was that its irrelevant to the refutation required here.
Does it even matter? There still is the incredible daring but completely unfounded jump from "there is a necessary being with these attributes, that MUST exist for these reasons" to "therefore the bible is right and my bellief is justified".
Even if you can ontologically (or with any other of the classical apologetic arguments) prove that there are a million omnipotent, omniscient etc. beings around that were needed to create all of the multiverse and have enough spare time to take one wednesday off after being finished.... that still does not give you the businesscard "me Jahweh" to check up the connection between the argument and their religion... You have just shown that theoretically gods MUST exist.
Fine. Now find them and ask them for more about themselves... The bible is still no proof but only the statement of your claim...
It does matter. If someone is using ontological argument as proof/argument for Jahweh, then they are wrong and we dont need to analyse this. But most of the ones using this argument do not use it for Jahweh or Allah, even though their belief might be for Jahweh or Allah. Also, you could have potential believers in an Omnipotent, Omniscient, Omnibenevolent, necessary God who isnt Jahweh, or Allah. And if they use the ontological argument, we would have to show where they are going wrong.. :)
Meh, perhaps that move is valid in modal logic, but "possible" and "possible worlds" in modal logic don't resemble anything that any regular person would discuss colloquially, so it's a dishonest move on Plantinga's part to pretend that this somehow conjures his selected entity into ACTUAL existence.
*And if they use the ontological argument, we would have to show where they are going wrong.. :)*
While that task may be somewhat worthwhile, it's not necessary at all. it's up to the claimant to demonstrate the soundness of their premises and validity of their argument.
Excellent de-construction of the ontological argument Matt. I'd add one thing: what is meant by a "perfect being"? Perfect in what context? For example, the Great White shark is, arguably, the perfect marine predator (although Orca sometimes kill them) but it is rubbish in an arborial environment.
The only thing that all "beings" have in common on which they could be compared for 'perfection', free of contextual constraints, is..., well, *being* - that is to say existence. However, existence is binary: something either exists or it does not. That means all things that exist are 'perfect' on the characteristic of 'being' (and no being can be 'more perfect' than another at existing). That is an 'A therefore B' argument: exist therefore perfect at existing (and is consistent with the ontological argument).
However, you cannot reverse that and argue that 'B therefore A', that is all perfect things must exist. That's what the ontological argument tries to sneak in, and it is an error in the formal logic of the argument. It can readily be disproved by means of examples: a perfect unicorn, a perfect leprechaun, a perfect Hobbit, etc. must exist because otherwise they wouldn't be perfect. Clearly nonsense, caused by taking a reasonable A therefore B argument and erroneously reversing it.
Which, I suspect, any religious apologist would recognise and admit for unicorns, leprechauns, Hobbits etc., and for other gods than their own. That, of course, makes it yet another example of what all religious apologetics seem to boil down to: special pleading.
I actually hate it when atheists go down routes like this with believers. This is exactly where the believers want you to go! You should always keep arguments with believers in the simplest possible terms as that is what they really struggle with.
Damvid: Being intellectually honest requires responding to people.
Of course, but that doesn't mean allowing yourself to be dragged along every tangent and rabbit hole they so choose.
What an excellent video series!
I have a concept of A Perfect Circle... but Tool is greater. :)
nitehawk86, I agree. The difference is that in the case of Perfect Circle, we can go to Jerome, Arizona and meet Maynard, he's the proof of APCs existence. :)
"Imagine the biggest tool possible... "
Reminds me of platos perfect spheres or whatever. The perfect circle that doesn’t exist in reality only as a concept
Oh shit you mentioned Platonic solids perfect
Its an unsound argument but rational to believe it ? ok Alvin and the theist monks.
It really is aggravating when they hold this bullshit and Plantinga up as seriously intellectual faces of apologetics and philosophy. It to me at best appears massively disingenuous. And to be frank I find it incredible a so called very educated philosopher can proffer such utter cobblers to folk to consider seriously, with a straight face.
That this is seemingly the best they can do to try to baldly assert a supernatural entity is a reality is astonishing. And that a supposedly obvious god entity/deity would need such a contrived, dishonest, convoluted and obfuscatory hodgepodge of nonsense mind boggling.
Yet this doesn't appear to matter in the slightest.
Pretty much all of Catholic philosophy also revolves around this laughable notion that merely establishing a valid argument for _literally anything_ makes the conclusion rational to accept as true.
TheZooCrew Alright, I'll bite. Please show a relevant source of Catholic philosophy that claims that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true." And please try harder than Anselm. Even Anselm believed his argument to be sound, not merely valid.
Sorry, but I don't give a fucking fuck that Anselm "believed" his argument to be sound. Demonstration is what is required, and this has been understood since Democritus. Anselm just defined a god with "existence" as a property. What a joke.
Edward Feser is a leading Catholic philosopher. He specializes in using 10,000 words when 2 will do, but the point is that he's all about Thomas Aquinas, who also didn't present sound premises in his arguments. He made all the same mistakes Aristotle did in advancing "pure reason" both in the absence of and in the face of empiricism. Alvin Plantinga is the same way with his modal logic ontological argument.
I'm also just taking Catholic apologists at their word. I'm glowering at that "relevant source" quip, as it seems to have a built-in dismissal mechanism.
TheZooCrew "I don't give a flying fuck that Anselm "believed" his argument to be sound."
How can Catholic philosophy revolve around the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true" if none of its key figures *accepts* the notion?
"Anselm just defined a god with "existence" as a property." Wrong.
"Edward Feser...is all about Thomas Aquinas, who also didn't present sound premises in his arguments." Irrelevant to your claim about Catholic philosophy.
"He made all the same mistakes Aristotle did in advancing "pure reason" both in the absence of and in the face of empiricism." Demonstrably and laughably wrong.
"Alvin Plantiga..." is not Catholic, what's your point?
"I'm glowering at that "relevant source" quip, as it seems to have a built-in dismissal mechanism."
It certainly has no "show a source" mechanism, as you have yet to provide one. Saying that Feser and Aquinas are wrong, even if true, does nothing to establish your claim that Catholic philosophy relies on the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true". Appealing to a non-Catholic philosopher doesn't establish it either.
There's an entire Wikipedia category of Catholic philosophers. It should be painfully straightforward to find *one* whose thought centers on the notion that "merely establishing a valid argument...makes the conclusion rational to accept as true".
My thoughts on the ontological argument, it's a verbal shell game without anything under the shells and we are expected to take their word for it that something is under the shells.
You cannot define something into existence.
I have yet to come across a coherent definition for Gawd. They have either internal contradictions, unresolvable paradoxes or are simply mathematically impossible. Has anyone put forward a cogent definition that can be examined?
Recently, I don't think so. We kind of "murdered" all of those ones with science.
If one were to believe the Ontological Argument, then you could use the same method to define ANYTHING into existence, and it doesn't even need to be perfect. For example, you could imagine a talking chicken who MUST exist. Imagine such a chicken, and since this chicken has the property of MUST EXISTING, it therefore MUST exist. You could bypass the perfection factor entirely, and define anything into existence as long as we imbue it with that property of existence, even though it only exists in our imagination.
So it's almost like they think a ... negative logical contradiction equates to a positive conclusion? I've never put much thought into it because it's so obviously flawed from the beginning, but I just don't understand the leap from thinking something exists to it exists.
Pls help, I don't understand why a perfect circle would need a line width of 0
because when you zoom in far enough you'll get little edges.
A rough analogy would be to draw a circle in photoshop or GIMP from far away it looks great, but as you zoom into the edge you'll notice the pixels. And its going to be similar in reality here because you'd start seeing the individual atoms which would cause tiny little bumps and such across it. Hence not perfect.
@@shanewilson7994 thanks
My problem with these alleged arguments for the existence of God is that none of them constitute evidence for her existence: they are just thought experiments. Further, merely conceding that something is possible says nothing about its likelihood, and Step 4 of the argument plays a rhetorical trick to circumvent this.
Great work, as usual Matt, and not to be nitpicky, but at 21:24, I think you mispoke slightly when you said that "If you accept the premises, you should accept the conclusion." Well, no, not if the logic connecting the premises to the conclusion doesn't stand up.
Listening to a discussion of the Ontological Argument really brings home for me Wittgenstein's point about many of philosophy's most misguided tangents and unresolved issues having to do with a misuse of language
I do not understand this argument, perfection is only definable if a set of non contradicting criteria can be found which is clearly limiting and therefore is imperfect because it cannot be all encompassing. The religious that I've talked to cannot define perfection because there is always conflicting requirements and therefore conflicting perfections. For example you cannot design a perfect airplane because it has numerous conflicting requirements. Optimization of one means the failure of another. Perfection can such as a circle can exist depending the type of geometry conceivably because it does not have to be physically drawn. The maximal being argument seems nonsense also since you can make up anything but that does mean it exists.
I don't get how "Imagine something that, given some properties, has to exist for those properties to be satisfied" can EVER become "therefore it exists". A hypothetical is a hypothetical. It requiring existence to fit hypothetical conditions doesn't change anything to the fact that the conditions are hypothetical. If I imagine a unicorn in my wardrobe and I define it as requiring existence, existence is only required to fit that description, it's not required for any other purpose whatsoever. It certainly doesn't make the unicorn real. It only has impact on the hypothetical, not on objective reality. To claim otherwise is just nonsensical.
We have examples of existence but no examples of non-existance. How can we compare and contrast nothing and something at all?
I think it is impossible to define perfection. What is perfection supposed to be? There must be some absolute truth, independent of all the different truths everyone of us finds in life, aggregates for themselves out of the constant stream of experiences and the restrictions we have in the perception of reality. But is there any truthful definition of perfection? The argument seems to revolve around the imagination of perfection, but how can I imagine something more perfect than perfect? Perfect itself is a superlative already. I think I haven't understood the argument yet. Wikipedia says about Anselm
"He suggested that, if the greatest possible being exists in the mind, it must also exist in reality."
Why? I don't see why something imagined should necessarily exist in reality. If I imagine a unicorn it does still not exist in reality. It goes on with
"If it only exists in the mind, then an even greater being must be possible - one which exists both in the mind and in reality."
Why? Is it greater because it would exist in both fantasy and reality? If it only exists in the mind, it only exists in the mind. I don't see the cogency of this conclusion.
Either I am too stupid to understand this argument or just too intelligent.
Could you please give a citation to that paper with the non-existent greatest being? Thanks.
thank you matt for all u do for the Atheists around the world. by educating more and more people
Thank you so much for this amazing video! A bit off-topic, but I wanted to ask: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (air carpet target dish off jeans toilet sweet piano spoil fruit essay). How should I go about transferring them to Binance?
I just about follow the argument (I think) but I just don't get how it has persisted for so long. The leaps in logic astound me.
I want to focus on the definition of beings in the ontological argument. Because the existence of maximal element is not a certainty. For example, there is no maximal/greatest integer in the set of real numbers. So if by being it means any being a person can imagine, then it is an infinite list. As you can imagine a being with n hands, where n is an arbitrary integer, you can imagine an infinite number of beings. So in that case the existence of a maximal element/being is not certain.
Also isn't arguing for a omnipotent, omniscient and wholly good being, a contradiction because of the problem of evil?
The ontological argument looks like a play on semantics. Like a one liner joke without a funny punchline (or without one at all).
Just like a being that doesn't exist can conceivably be greater than one that does, with that logic, is it possible to imagine a being of maximum evil, or any other characteristic (like laziness or incompetence)? If so, do we have a problem like which infinite is greater?
1. It's possible that a maximal greater being exists.
2. If you agree, then you should believe that God exists.
3. If you don't, well, we'll just try to come with some other argument.
(Best summary ever)
Great video Matt. Keep trucking through the fallacies.
line width 0 .. cant u get that by puttin a circle ontop of fx a bigger circle?
erm... a round thing.. that's got filling... so the perimiter of the inner circle, onto whatever that circle is on (the bigger circle fx)
becomes the linew0 circle..?
I dunno.. like.. would that fit ze need?
circleA line width 1 and radius 1 .. draw
circleB line width 1 and radius 2 .. draw
circleC as circleA circumference perimeter thingthing...
smoothness still like.. a .. problem.. maybe.. I dunno
a line width of zero is impossible, because if a line has a width of zero, it does not exist in anything but a conceptual sense. We can think about it, but it doesn't really take up space. (Unless you do some very specific infinite things with it. space filling curves are....strange.)
For your example, the construction would be cutting out from one circle another circle with the same center and radius as the first. In mathematics, you CAN have an arbitrarily small difference in radius between the two circles, but it must be >0. Go look at limits in a precalc course.
In reality, 0 line width can't exist because at very small scales the very concept of discrete objects disappears entirely.
I just like to say "yes it WOULD exist if it was perfect, but that doesn't necessitate it's existence."
Just when I thought these videos couldn't get any better, you quote Bret Hart, my favorite wrestler.
My issue, aside from the to-me exceedingly obvious problem that imagining things and making them exist are notoriously uncorrelated (and the equivocation about "possible" reality is nonsensical), is that the perfect circle example is far too nice to the theist. The perfect circle is sensibly defined: it is perfect in a specific sense. But God as argued is "perfect" in vague senses that combine multiple subjective and objective axes, many of which practically or definitionally conflict. So even if I could grant that a perfect circle could possibly be made in reality somehow, a perfect circle is at least a coherent notion. Trying to pretend that an incoherent notion exists by definition because it's so incoherent is some pretty amazing doublespeak.
I like the first argument that existence is not a predicate/property.
Existence is something`s reality/being - the being of a being, not merely something`s property or accidental trait. X can have properties both as an imaginary or abstract object (a mathematical object, or a fantasy being) or as a real object, but existence is a prior condition of an object, dealing with its actuality, reality, its actual being in the world. Existence is something a thing "does", whether its "is-ing", not what a thing is like. You can dissect a thing down to its subatomic particles, no such property as "existence" will be found. A ball can be round, red, full, bouncy, but whether if its real or not, whether it occurs in space-time is something more and separate, than to just add: red, full, bouncy, existing...
Dear Anselm,
No ontological argument is an island entire unto itself.
Your bro, Bro Gaunilo.
matt, can noam Chomsky and steven pinker in the study of language throw a wrench in your argument?
A very interesting and solidly entertaining book that I always think about when considering this argument is The Number of the Beast by Robert Heinlein.
What about perfection in maths? For example, is zero "perfect"?
trying to observe the Matter from another angle. Is It even Logical to think of perfection? what the hell is perfection? sure we can imagine the concept of perfection, but when we describe It and separate It from imperfection, I Think we get to an area of arbitrary definitions. one may say something is perfect, but the question is: what defines something as perfect? what do everything considered perfect have in commun? what Unites ALL those concepts? isn't the mere definition off something as "perfect"... arbitrary? actually, I think there's no perfection or imperfection as something objective. It's allways a creation of the mind, an arbitrary limit. That limit Is often atributed to Nature, as it's order is considered perfect because It Works. but does anything that is not work? what can possibly be that doesn't work in some form or fashion? Everything in the universe is part of a structure of some sort. If that's true, everything Works ALL the time, because It exists And the structure in wich It is exists. If so, perfection is an arbitrary selection. If we concieve as perfect an Idea, the problem of definition still stands. what makes It perfect? what perfect things have in comum that is not simply arbitrary?
And about the Idea that It is rational to agree to the conclusion If You agree with the premisse, it's not allways the case! the conclusion may be absurd and not derive directly from the premisse. there's no Reason to believe something as rational Just because It comes from the right place. It also Matters where It goes! If the conclusion is not derived directly from the premisses, It might be jumping into a conclusion, And I believe it's the case with This ontological argument
Even our attempts to conceive of "perfection" are hopelessly flawed due to observer bias. What possible justification can there be to assume that any concept of perfect we can imagine remotely approaches what actual perfection would be?
@@fgc_rewind nope. I'm simply saying that even attempting to make assumptions or assertions about "perfection" or from that the "greatest conceivable being" is an exercise in futility.
It's also rather ridiculous to assume that any "being" could even approach the imagined concepts of any gods, much less the highly illogical multi omni character from certain mythological narratives.
The greatest possible being is Will Smith. Therefore, Will Smith is God.
What if for each god there is another god which is more perfect/positive/whatever then the previous one? Like for each number there is a greater number...
I think you need to look up 'the ontological argument' to answer that question.
Great job Matt. I'm loving this series. This reminds me of how analytic statements are in the end circular and don't necessarily tell you anything about the world (a circle is round). Also Santa is perfect and he doesn't exist, so there.
The greatest concept we can come up with is the Universe, since it envelops all space and time, and gets bigger every time we think of it because it's expanding.
My favorite objection to the Ontological Argument is to point out that existence is not a property; it's the precondition for properties to apply to a thing.
If someone uses a god's defined "greatness" or "perfection" to deduce that these properties imply an existent god in order to apply to that god, it's no less absurd for me to define a purple dragon and deduce that it's property of being purple implies an existent dragon in order for that "purpleness" to apply to something.
After all; if you say that you're imagining a non-existent purple dragon, then it isn't the purple dragon because if it doesn't exist, it isn't purple. In order to actually imagine a purple dragon, you must imagine it as existing. Therefore purple dragons necessarily exist in all possible worlds, because a nonexistent purple dragon is as absurd a concept as a non-purple/purple dragon.
*drops mic
If you draw a circle with a compass, you end up with a perfect circle in which the pencil line is completely smooth, as smooth as any straight line drawn against a ruler.
Paul Robinson "As smooth as any straight line drawn against a ruler". First...that's not 'perfect'. Second, it's a line segment and not a line. Third, lines and segments have no width = so you can't draw them...and you can't draw a perfect circle, even with a compass.
Matt, circles I've drawn with a compass looked perfect to me, anyway! Well, you can draw a perfect circle using a template created using machine created holes.
Personally, I think whether one can actually imagine a "perfect" being is entirely irrelevant, even if you couldn't make an argument that "perfection" and "greatness" are subjective.
The most important argument for me is that _imagining a being does not make it real_ , no matter how much better that would make it.
Imagine the perfect argument for the existence of a thing. Now imagine that the thing the argument is arguing for doesn't exist. Wouldn't the argument be more perfect if the thing it was arguing for existed? Therefore the perfect argument for the existence of a unicorn must exist.
So… who’s the best there is, was, and ever will be?
Brett Hart?
Or Mr. Perfect?
Is it not the same concept?
Would a maximally great being also exhibit maximal fairness ?
Interesting but no mention of Aristotle the unmoved mover or transcendental mathematics ? Or maybe Kant ? Vedic Sankhya philosophy ? Maybe a being that contains all of creation within him yet remains aloof from his creation is an interesting definition ?
None of those things are ontological
Matt Dillahunty thanks for the reply my understanding is some of the Principal questions of ontology include
“What can be said to exist?"
"What is a thing?"
"Into what categories, if any, can we sort existing things?"
"What are the meanings of being?"
"What are the various modes of being of entities?" All of the different points I mentioned above have addressed these questions in different ways through the years
What if one person's conception of the greatest possible being contradicts another person's conception of the greatest possible being?
That is another problem with it, that maximally great is subjective.
To me, where every form of the ontological argument fails is that existing is always a greater property than non-existence... which always confuses me and seems like a baseless assertion, or at best a subjective and therefore useless one in context.
So you like pizza? Wouldn't it be greater if the tastiest pizza existed? According to you, a pizza lover, that's just a subjective assertion.
If you hadn't said "I am saying 'possible' far too much", I don't think I would have even noticed. Now I want to turn it into a drinking game for this video.
Would it be a valid argument thatvit is greater for a thing to not exist than exist as if something does not exist it can have no flaws?
no it wouldn't. Non-existent things still have properties and thus can have flaws. In fact they can have any arbitrary properties. For example if you say "all children in this room are bald" and there are no children in the room, the statement is true by default. Because "all x" is a shorthand for "x_1 and x_2 and x_3 and ...". And "true" is a neutral element in respect to "and" operation.
It is intuitively true - characters in stories do not really exist, yet they can have flaws.
KohuGaly Disagree
Hey Matt, would a contradiction arise if a being were to be omnipotent and omniscient?
xPLODER only when you add in omni benevolent
It depends on how exactly you define those terms, but the contradiction arises from knowledge of the future. Either the being knows the future (including its own choices) and is powerless to change it, or it has the power to change the future and thus it didn't know the future.
Thank you, Matt. Just thank you.
I think there may be a hidden fallacy (or error or something) within the very construction of the argument.
If a thing which truly exists is "superior" to a thing which only conceptually exists, where do we draw the line of "conceptual perfection" being "superior" to "actual existence"?
Is a "non-perfect being" that really exists "superior" to a "perfect being that is purely conceptual"?
I would say that actual existence trumps any kind of "perfect thing that is purely conceptual" which would make me or you or anybody more "superior" or "maximally great" or "perfect" that some thing that is merely conceptual, no matter who perfect that conceptual thing is.
Where was this recorded at? Looks like Rockwoods area in Missouri.
why can't we conceive of perfection? you state on the one hand that we can't (5:01) and on the other hand you state that perfection in reality is impossible; these are two different things, and neither is obviously the case. the argument for the latter (9:00ish-10:00ish) falls short. its perfectly logically possible that a perfect circle obtain in physical reality; the litmus test for coherence is logical possibility, not physical possibility. besides, the theist is going to argue that reality includes metaphysical reality. i take it that the bit here is an attempt is to show that the ontological argument fails to even get off the ground. i'm with you on the end result, namely that the argument fails, but i think it fails in flight or upon landing, not on the runway.
Can one just shoot down this argument but pointing out that it relies on a counterfactual conditional from there start.
I think perfect circles or perfectly straight lines are good examples. These are "perfect entities" that we imagine, and they help us talk about things, construct things, or compare things. So by this reasoning, we can say that the "perfect God" that theists propose *is fine* as an archetype; he needn't also exist to use this archetype in the way that we use circles and lines to make calculated decisions.
This idea that the most perfect thing you can imagine must somehow necessarily exist seems like such utter nonsense I'm baffled that serious thinkers bother to address it.