tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post3622669646793046610..comments2024-03-29T02:29:03.388-07:00Comments on Edward Feser: Carrier on Five ProofsEdward Feserhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13643921537838616224noreply@blogger.comBlogger164125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-14628362816968235292021-12-14T21:33:04.380-08:002021-12-14T21:33:04.380-08:00I appreciate you responding to his inane ramblings...I appreciate you responding to his inane ramblings despite their lack of robustness. Red flags abound: "Follow the evidence", "Aristotle was obsolete", "my refutations here will already be immune to everything he says in his last chapter", "ignores the science". I do still find it baffling that supposedly intelligent PhDs can be this terrible at interdisciplinary surfing.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-27003565997754308692020-03-25T20:26:40.201-07:002020-03-25T20:26:40.201-07:00Dr Feser
Very simply it seems Dr Carrier misdefine...Dr Feser<br />Very simply it seems Dr Carrier misdefines "potential" and "nothing" in terms of the case presented by Plato. From that he has no hope of EVER getting on the right track. <br />Like nearly all atheists who try to refute these basic proofs, they either deliberately or unwittingly base their refutations on the wrong definition of key terms.coolvanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00747420979197529016noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-45180510562778907882019-11-06T09:59:15.794-08:002019-11-06T09:59:15.794-08:00Forgive my autocorrect for changing the word "...Forgive my autocorrect for changing the word "conscious" to "consciousness" a bunch of times.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-10328511118426409472019-09-29T20:54:44.297-07:002019-09-29T20:54:44.297-07:00Your argument that spacetime is contingent is one ...Your argument that spacetime is contingent is one that is already addressed in the article (perhaps you should have read the whole thing). You cannot possibly object to Carrier's model by saying "spacetime is contingent" without accepting the same objection to yours. I think that God, if he existed, would be contingent, because it is absurd to say that we could prove that an actual, real thing (rather than just an abstract entity or logical construction) exists just by making an armchair argument. Yet this is exactly what the claim that God is logically necessary entails. So I can object to your argument in the same way, by saying, "No, God is contingent", unless you have some specific argument for why spacetime has to be contingent and a consciousness God does not. Otherwise, your objection is special pleading.<br /><br />Why does it matter whether an Aristotelian or Thomist would say that God's consciousness is complex? I thought you said that you weren't assuming Aristotelian or Thomist metaphysics. Carrier never claims that you called God complex - he argues that anything that is consciousness must be complex and that therefore God cannot be simple, like you claim he is. I see no flaws in Carrier's argument for this. I find the idea of a simple yet consciousness thing absurd, especially if it is the most simple thing possible. I cannot imagine how consciousness could possibly arise from a simple system or how it, itself could be simple. Our consciousness is very complex, and as Carrier points out, less complex consciousnesses are also less intelligent. Surely God cannot be less intelligent than us.<br /><br />As for your complaints about Carrier calling you sexist, he never does accuse you of saying that God is LITERALLY a man. Sure, maybe he should have been clearer, since it would sound like you said this from reading his article, but that also wasn't the focus of it. And I don't really think it's any less sexist to say that you should pretend God is a man by referring to him in the masculine, or to claim that God is masculine, than to claim that he is literally a man. The typo he made in the page number is obviously not relevant. He doesn't respond to that particular argument because, again, it wasn't the focus of the article. Finally, complaining about "SJWs" isn't an argument. It's just a cringe-inducing remark that makes you look silly.<br /><br />Carrier does engage in a lot of cringeworthy trash talk in his review, but then again, so do you in this response. Calling God a "giant ghost" isn't a strawman- it's just a description you don't like because it makes God sound ridiculous. God is supposed to be a spirit with no body (i.e. a ghost), and he is supposed to be everywhere and therefore have infinite spatial extent (which is pretty giant if you ask me). "Scientism" seems to me to be just another meaningless complaint that religious people like to make without ever explaining how the thing they're complaining about is "scientism" and why that's a bad thing.(2)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-3530240675770343252019-09-29T20:52:57.983-07:002019-09-29T20:52:57.983-07:00I didn't even think Carrier's rebuttal was...I didn't even think Carrier's rebuttal was the greatest, but your response to it is severely lacking. Ironically, although you accuse him of arguing against a straw man, almost everything you say about his rebuttal is a straw man.<br />For example, the paragraph that you take out of context and claim is meant to refute your Aristotelian proof is actually meant to do no such thing. According to the original article, this paragraph is meant to demonstrate that just making up a model in your head (which is what Carrier is doing in that paragraph) doesn't demonstrate that the model is true. It was not meant as a response to arguments from causality, and he never claimed that your argument was an argument from causality. You are only quote-mining his original argument to make it seem as though he said that. <br />Carrier does have terrible wording in this paragraph. For example, he says "The absence of everything but logical contradictions" when what he means to say "the absence of everything that can fail to exist without entailing a contradiction". His bad wording is probably why you found it incoherent. But the paragraph isn't really important to his overall argument. <br /><br />Carrier is correct to accuse you of a false dichotomy. Just because you considered some alternatives doesn't mean you aren't guilty of the fallacy. For example, you protest that you already considered the possibility of a Platonic realm. But, if you concluded that the forms "can exist either in the concrete way in which they exist in individual particular things, or in the abstract way in which they exist in the thoughts of an intellect" from that, then you are still guilty of a false trichotomy. For that inference to be valid, you would have to assume that everything exists either as a particular thing, as a thought, or as a Platonic form. Without justification, this is no better than just assuming that they exist as individuals or thoughts. You cannot come to the conclusion that one of two options has to be correct just by ruling out a few alternatives. You have to provide some argument for why they (or they and the alternatives you ruled out) are the ONLY options.<br /><br />Saying that spacetime is the ultimate reality with the specific properties that Carrier says can be attributed to it is not pantheism. Pantheism would require that spacetime, at the very least, is consciousness because a to be considered a God something must be consciousness. Carrier's entire point is that spacetime is not conscious but fits all of the other properties, so even if he accepts that you have proven that something has those properties, you have not proven that God exists.(1)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-87293611044423401872019-05-08T13:01:07.104-07:002019-05-08T13:01:07.104-07:00I think it has more than Dr. Feser lets on to...I think it has more than Dr. Feser lets on to...Joe Hhttp://google.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-62960191778509664292019-01-30T00:44:35.931-08:002019-01-30T00:44:35.931-08:00Depends on what they mean by "God". Most...Depends on what they mean by "God". Most "atheists" if pressed appeal to something resembling a metaphysical Absolute AKA God.<br /><br />They tend to be panentheists (such as myself, and I'm no atheist) or pantheists (as Carrier attempts by assigning divine attributes to the universe).<br /><br />The difficult part is that the language is tricky. Most Protestants think of God as really a god/demiurge. To them, I'm an "atheist".<br /><br />Classical theists hold a view of God/the source/the One/the metaphysical Absolute/unmoved mover, etc.<br /><br />In this regard, I'm no atheist.<br /><br />Taking the time to deconstruct what is actually being said matters. Aaron Verivehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03643300716176202647noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-28705288015130458262018-08-07T10:26:43.547-07:002018-08-07T10:26:43.547-07:00Or how about this premise: “These forms or pattern...Or how about this premise: “These forms or patterns can exist either in the concrete way in which they exist in individual particular things, or in the abstract way in which they exist in the thoughts of an intellect.”<br />Again, says who? One can easily imagine different ways forms can exist, or we can doubt the Aristotelian ideas of existence of ‘form’ and ‘substance’ all together. For example, as I’ve been saying, perhaps there is a mathematical layer of reality, a platonic realm, where the mathematical patterns that tell the universe how to work exist, but are not inside some object or in some mind, but instead are built into a metaphysical layer of reality that is outside of space and time, but that holds space and time together.<br /><br />Or how about the premise that god is “incorporeal”? Not even Aristotle thought this was some logical necessity since he posits god as being an animal (ζῷον) in Metaphysics 1072b. But apparently Feser thinks his proofs are so logically tight that even Aristotle used them: except his ‘logical necessities’ ended up being different for Aristotle than with the other guys. It’s as if these aren’t really logical necessities at all, but just things theists have made up using rhetorical waves of the hand.<br /><br />“His decision, though in some sense contingent, is not a brute fact either, since it is explained in terms of God's agency.”<br />I already showed above that this leads to a contradiction. If god’s choice is outside of space and time and there is no point where its choice was otherwise, god is stuck making the choice that it did and therefore has no agency. Agency implies a decision that can be made or not made, but if the decision is made forever no matter what, there is no agency to be found.<br /><br />“It seems like it would be better to send you links to other blog posts and articles. Hopefully your next responses will tell me which ones would be best. There's more detail than can be given in the comments section. You also seem to need some background on scholasticism”<br />No and no. Feser supporters keep deferring me to other things, that’s how I ended up here, even after I listen to Feser talk for hours and read his arguments carefully. Why can’t you just defend his claims on their own merits?Brianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04618241910083830113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-77543894636463825442018-08-07T10:26:33.897-07:002018-08-07T10:26:33.897-07:00“I only discussed reasons why our original hypothe...“I only discussed reasons why our original hypothesis should be that the laws of physics are themselves contingent.”<br />And you haven’t shown that at all. Again, the laws of physics could just as easily be brute facts and therefore not contingent and not in need of some unnecessary ‘reason’ or ‘explanation’.<br /><br />“Until you can show either that the arguments for God's necessity fail, or that the laws of physics are necessarily true, the two situations are not commensurate.”<br />That’s where brute facts come in: the laws of physics are brute facts. Demanding explanation or proof of the necessity of brute facts doesn’t make any sense. And the arguments for god’s necessity really do fail since you haven’t been able to show why god is the only candidate for an unactualized actualizer when I could easily conceive of a variety of different candidates. For example, why couldn’t this god be non-omnipotent? Could god just have some abilities and not others? This seems to be what has to be the case, or do you think that could god terminate its own existence? Could god create another god like itself, duplicate itself? Of course not, so omnipotence leads you to contradictions and definitely not logical necessities.<br /><br />“However, as before, God and space-time are not on a par in this respect: space-time is conceived of entirely in mechanistic terms, and our mechanistic notions of causality fail to offer us any way of talking about how space-time could be a cause.”<br />Our mechanistic notions of causality do not fail any more than god does. In J. Richard Gott’s view of existence, eternal inflation has a loop at the beginning where it gives birth to itself: I don’t see how that’s a worse explanation than god. Neither hypothesis gives an ‘explanation’ in the sense that they solve the issue of ‘where did that come from?’. You are just essentially saying that god’s magic created existence, that doesn’t explain anything.<br /><br />“The history of the universe, whatever it is, or the permanent absence of the universe, would all be cases of God's decision, itself timeless and eternal.”<br />This makes no sense since a decision only makes sense in a context of ‘before the decision’ and ‘after the decision’, otherwise there would be no decision to be made. If god’s decision is eternal and timeless, than it was a necessary choice and therefore god is not free but instead makes the decision it has to take. So again, your definitions of god contradict themselves and simply make no sense. This is equivalent of saying god’s magic did it. Basically, an unhelpful god of the gaps that has literally 0 explanatory power. Even if Feser’s god did exist, it would be so meaningless as to render one silent.<br /><br />“ we have reasons for holding that if God exists, He is a necessary being,”<br />No you don’t, you just confidently say you do. I’ve read through Feser’s hundreds of premises where he claims to get to a logical necessity of god: but they were full of false hidden premises and leaps in logic. If his arguments were actually true, you or he would be able to give me a description of the argument in a symbolic logic system like first order logic. But since it’s basically sophistry, he isn’t able to formulate his arguments in any form of symbolic logic.<br /><br />Basically, most of Feser’s premises are just questionable and arbitrary reifications of the world that are not born of necessity at all. Take this premise from Feser: “Everything is either a mind, or a mental content, or a material entity, or an abstract entity.”<br />Who says reality is broken up this way? What does ‘material entity’ even mean when we are talking about say, the Higgs field or a photon? Is a photon the same type of material entity as an electron? What about when the electron or photon is in a superposition of all possible states: is that a ‘physical’ reality? Feser simply has no way of knowing any of this.Brianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04618241910083830113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-78358754241017027072018-08-07T10:24:21.389-07:002018-08-07T10:24:21.389-07:00“Brian, your response has in several places put wo...“Brian, your response has in several places put words into my mouth, and in a few cases suggests that you don't even know what I meant.”<br />The same went for your response. It seems like that’s why these debates occur in the first place: we are dealing with topics where everyday ideas breakdown to an extreme extent.<br /><br />“That in no way sidesteps my observation, because the point is that these structures are what needs to be explained, and the descriptions do absolutely nothing to address that. And so far as I've ever seen, 'these structures' happen to be matter/ its fundamental constituents. My observation stands.”<br />Why do the laws of physics, the structures inherent in reality, need to be “explained” any more than god does? And why do they need to be “explained” at all? ‘Explanation’ works for macroscopic events, but there is no reason to think it is reasonable to ask it of existence itself. When I read Feser’s premises and definitions of god, I don’t feel like they ‘explain’ or show ‘necessity’ for anything at all. I’m still asking myself, ‘but why does god exist at all, and not just pure nothing?” or the infinite regress still shows up since calling something a cause (or unactualized actualizer for rhetorical flourish) that is outside of time doesn’t explain anything and just leaves one puzzled. Just because you ignore the puzzles or confusion doesn’t mean they aren’t there.<br /><br />Also, saying the laws of physics are just ‘matter’ and the ‘fundamental constituents’ of matter shows that you don’t know what scientists and I mean by the laws of physics. The laws of physics would be the structures that govern how matter works the way it does, it isn’t the matter itself. So the laws of physics couldn’t be spacetime bending from the presence of mass, it would be the math-like structure metaphysically imbedded underneath reality that would look more like a mathematical equation than the phenomenon of spacetime curvature that it is dictating.<br /><br />“I used 'prescription' in the broadest sense possible. A priori, it doesn't require an intelligent agent to impose this order onto the world. It just require that something does this. The problem is that you want to treat nebulous structures as doing this without offering any explanation for them.”<br />You are the one who brought up the unhelpful prescription/descriptive thing: I don’t see how it helps at all, even with this ‘broad’ sense. How is the mathematical structure that governs gravity ‘nebulous’? Or anymore nebulous than god? Nevertheless, when scientists and I speak of the laws of physics we clearly mean that they have the principle of their own imposition in themselves, so that the formulas of their actuality and potentiality would already be built within them. You seem to have no problem applying these properties to god, by the way. Also, the laws of physics would be a brute fact, not requiring further explanation. Like I said, every theory posits brute facts: theists just claim that their brute fact ‘explains’ more than the laws of physics being brute facts, when that isn’t the slightest bit true.<br /><br />“Arguments for why God must be a certain way, and be a necessary being, have been given elsewhere.”<br />And this is the exact point I’m raising. How do the arguments for god being a necessary being not equally apply to the laws of physics? This was Carrier’s entire point about spacetime. There is nothing in Feser’s argumentation that makes god the only candidate for an unactualized actualizer. Nevertheless, Feser never proves god is necessary, he merely asserts it.<br /><br />“I only discussed reasons why our original hypothesis should be that the laws of physics are themselves contingent.”<br />And you haven’t shown that at all. Again, the laws of physics could just as easily be brute facts and therefore not contingent and not in need of some unnecessary ‘reason’ or ‘explanation’.Brianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04618241910083830113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-24829142416197957942018-08-07T05:55:45.455-07:002018-08-07T05:55:45.455-07:00Now let's deal with your latter dismissals.
It...Now let's deal with your latter dismissals.<br />It's incorrect to say that because the universe didn't have to be created, or could have been created differently, to conclude that the observation 'there is no moment temporally prior to creation' is irrelevant. The history of the universe, whatever it is, or the permanent absence of the universe, would all be cases of God's decision, itself timeless and eternal. The point of the observation is that 'before' creation, there was no process where God was deciding what to do, or doing anything else that involved a sequence of events. All of God's activities and decisions (and I'm speaking loosely when using the plural) are timeless and eternal under this view. Complaining that it makes no sense to you does us no good here, since you imply in your complaint that you think God is going through some process of deliberation.<br /><br />In all of this, we find that I don't wind up with a brute fact the way you do: we have reasons for holding that if God exists, He is a necessary being, while His decision, though in some sense contingent, is not a brute fact either, since it is explained in terms of God's agency.<br /><br />It seems like it would be better to send you links to other blog posts and articles. Hopefully your next responses will tell me which ones would be best. There's more detail than can be given in the comments section. You also seem to need some background on scholasticism, since you've been pushing farther than I had originally expected when discussing my proposed solutions.Parádoxohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05501803561895808925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-2554839506481264772018-08-07T05:46:45.500-07:002018-08-07T05:46:45.500-07:00Brian, your response has in several places put wor...Brian, your response has in several places put words into my mouth, and in a few cases suggests that you don't even know what I meant. I'll take these out of order.<br /><br />"When I say ‘the laws of physics’ I obviously mean the structures of existence that are being described, not the descriptions themselves which doesn’t seem to be an option you considered."<br />That in no way sidesteps my observation, for the point is that these structures are what needs to be explained, and the descriptions do absolutely nothing to address that. And so far as I've ever seen, 'these structures' happen to be matter/ its fundamental constituents. My observation stands.<br /><br />"It’s not a ‘prescription’ since no one is referring to the human equations and theories and then telling existence to behave like them, instead, the we are referring to[.]"<br />This is where you put words into my mouth. I used 'prescription' in the broadest sense possible. A priori, it doesn't require an intelligent agent to impose this order onto the world. It just require that something does this. The problem is that you want to treat nebulous structures as doing this without offering any explanation for them.<br /><br />"But nevertheless, why do we need to ‘explain’ those things anymore than we need to with the idea of god?"<br />Arguments for why God must be a certain way, and be a necessary being, have been given elsewhere. We aren't dealing with them here, since we already have enough to worry about in this discussion. I only discussed reasons why our original hypothesis should be that the laws of physics are themselves contingent. Until you can show either that the arguments for God's necessity fail, or that the laws of physics are necessarily true, the two situations are not commensurate.<br /><br />"It’s unclear how god can cause anything to happen."<br />What makes Divine causation 'unclear' is two-fold:<br />1. Our experience of the world only gives us imperfect analogues to Divine causation to appeal to;<br />2. Modern conceptions of causation are decidedly inadequate, being 'mechanistic.'<br />However, as before, God and space-time are not on a par in this respect: space-time is conceived of entirely in mechanistic terms, and our mechanistic notions of causality fail to offer us any way of talking about how space-time could be a cause. The problem won't go away unless we drop the mechanistic philosophy that makes atheism plausible to begin with.Parádoxohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05501803561895808925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-11113441431782651402018-08-06T15:17:24.300-07:002018-08-06T15:17:24.300-07:00“As mere descriptions of how material things behav...“As mere descriptions of how material things behave, to say these laws are necessary is to say something about the nature of material things.”<br />When I say ‘the laws of physics’ I obviously mean the structures of existence that are being described, not the descriptions themselves which doesn’t seem to be an option you considered.<br /><br />“But as a prescription, we need to explain what it is that makes material things obey these laws, and these laws specifically, since we can conceive of alternative physical laws, and even of a world where there are no such laws.”<br />It’s not a ‘prescription’ since no one is referring to the human equations and theories and then telling existence to behave like them, instead, the we are referring to the existential structures that they are approximating in the math and theories. The structure inside existence of the law of physics that makes mass bend space is different than Einstein’s equations describing them.<br />But nevertheless, why do we need to ‘explain’ those things anymore than we need to with the idea of god? I could just as easily and arbitrarily demand that you explain what makes god have these properties, and these properties specifically, since we can conceive of alternative properties for god, or even of an existence where there is no such god.<br /><br />“Substantival models could be consistent with a necessary space-time, but it's unclear how space-time can cause anything to happen.”<br />It’s unclear how god can cause anything to happen. The difference is spacetime is testable and empirical and can generate every fundamental particle and field according to string-theory. Nevertheless, I prefer to use the laws of physics over Carrier’s example of spacetime.<br /><br />“I'm sure you don't mean that God just 'woke up' at some time in eternity past, but I don't know what else you might have in mind.”<br />I don’t want to say that, but it is what follows from these sorts of deists claims. If god created the universe, what was it doing/thinking before the creation? And what was it doing before that? And what was it doing before that? Waving the magic wand of saying “it’s outside of time” doesn’t solve the problem since the universe could have been ‘created’ in a different way or not at all, and in a different sequence. Is this even god’s first universe? And did it have to create this universe and in this order?<br /><br />“The second problem seems to assume that change exists in eternity, which isn't so. God's decision to create is only prior to creation in origin and causation, not in time, because there is no 'before creation' in a temporal sense in the first place.”<br />Honestly, saying a decision took place outside of time makes absolutely no sense to me and I don’t see even how it’s conceivable. Maybe you can describe how a decision outside of time works? I don’t see why, in this picture, our universe wasn’t created earlier as opposed to later? Why is the universe this way as opposed to another way? Either way, you hit brute facts: whether it be the laws of physics or god.Brianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04618241910083830113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-3141948213489034292018-08-06T07:33:42.923-07:002018-08-06T07:33:42.923-07:00So you mention the problems of 'waking up to i...So you mention the problems of 'waking up to intelligence' and 'decisions before creation.'<br />The first problem is very murky; I'm sure you don't mean that God just 'woke up' at some time in eternity past, but I don't know what else you might have in mind.<br />The second problem seems to assume that change exists in eternity, which isn't so. God's decision to create is only prior to creation in origin and causation, not in time, because there is no 'before creation' in a temporal sense in the first place.Parádoxohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05501803561895808925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-70539375808994071112018-08-06T07:27:46.015-07:002018-08-06T07:27:46.015-07:00I'm a frequent reader here, so hopefully I can...I'm a frequent reader here, so hopefully I can offer something helpful. Let's start with the first question:<br />I've come across a handful of theories about the nature of the laws of physics, but it seems they can be divided into two basic types:<br />1. Prescriptive (these laws are imposed on matter)<br />2. Descriptive<br />As mere descriptions of how material things behave, to say these laws are necessary is to say something about the nature of material things. But in that case, these laws have no causal power of their own (being only an abstraction from material things in general), and so these laws couldn't possibly count as the first mover.<br />But as a prescription, we need to explain what it is that makes material things obey these laws, and these laws specifically, since we can conceive of alternative physical laws, and even of a world where there are no such laws.<br />Could space-time be the first mover? I've come across two basic theories about it:<br />1. Relational<br />2. SUbstantival<br />But the relational theory makes space-time contingent upon things inside the universe which we already know are contingent, and so space-time cannot itself be necessary.<br />Substantival models could be consistent with a necessary space-time, but it's unclear how space-time can cause anything to happen.Parádoxohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05501803561895808925noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-9684145713808585232018-08-03T23:38:42.638-07:002018-08-03T23:38:42.638-07:00Can anyone explain to me why an unactualized actua...Can anyone explain to me why an unactualized actualizer has to be god and cannot be the laws of physics or 'spacetime' as Carrier argues here? If I can summarize Feser's view: Contingent things like water and cups have something that caused them, but something that could actualize, though without itself being actualized, and also having no potentiality in it to be actualized (in short: an unactualized actualizer), doesn’t have a cause. But why would the concept of god be the only candidate for an ‘unactualized actualizer’, or why would god be a candidate at all? Why can’t the laws of physics be an ‘unactualized actualizer’? And this is precisely what atheists really mean when they ask: “What caused god?”: If the laws of physics aren’t allowed to be unactualized actualizers because theists think that the laws of physics require some further explanation, cause, or ‘something that made them’, why is the concept of god immune from the same requirements? If god can be an unactualized actualizer, so can the laws of physics. Plus, the laws of physics seem to be a far better candidate for an unactualized actualizer since we actually have experiential access to them, and also since something mindless wouldn’t have a ‘waking up to intelligence’ or ‘decisions before creation’ regress.<br />Thanks!Brianhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04618241910083830113noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-76169250396864266402018-04-17T08:09:19.879-07:002018-04-17T08:09:19.879-07:00Dr. Bart Ehrman, a genuine NT scholar, agnostic, a...Dr. Bart Ehrman, a genuine NT scholar, agnostic, and author of "Did Jesus Exist?" has also tangled with and dismissed Carrier.<br /><br />https://ehrmanblog.org/fuller-reply-to-richard-carrier/<br /><br />So, when Carrier will learn to stay on the porch is anyone's guess, but he clearly can't run with the big dogs.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-48781499192074597102018-03-07T21:50:47.900-08:002018-03-07T21:50:47.900-08:00Historians ignore him, mathematicians laugh at his...Historians ignore him, mathematicians laugh at his attempt to use Bayes theorem, and now philosophers get their chance to waste time responding to this guy.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-22506709604920516642018-03-06T15:21:26.914-08:002018-03-06T15:21:26.914-08:00Modern evaluations of whether there are authentica...Modern evaluations of whether there are authentically rational arguments for the existence of God tend to fall short for the simple reason that we fail to maintain the classical distinction between 'reason' and 'intellect'. Wolfgang Smith offers some insights on this point.<br /><br />philos-sophia.org/what-are-proofs-of-godN.W. Flitcrafthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17425314952483315900noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-59946515146457876212018-03-06T14:29:02.293-08:002018-03-06T14:29:02.293-08:00Modern evaluations of whether there are authentica...Modern evaluations of whether there are authentically rational arguments for the existence of God tend to fall short for the simple reason that we fail to maintain the classical distinction between 'reason' and 'intellect'. Wolfgang Smith offers some insights on this point.<br /><br />philos-sophia.org/what-are-proofs-of-godN.W. Flitcrafthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17425314952483315900noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-16772349388412322152018-03-05T17:11:01.951-08:002018-03-05T17:11:01.951-08:00I suppose you mean this howler:
https://arxiv.org...I suppose you mean this howler:<br /><br />https://arxiv.org/pdf/1709.03595.pdf<br /><br />There is still no visible world in this ontology.<br /><br />Rick DeLanohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06675522207482535734noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-35441795355544792222018-03-05T15:23:09.093-08:002018-03-05T15:23:09.093-08:00Christopher. You tried to defy the Carrier. Repent...Christopher. You tried to defy the Carrier. Repent now. You're not allowed to disagree with him.Nickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16175830373964472006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-65514946023849569092018-03-05T14:11:15.071-08:002018-03-05T14:11:15.071-08:00Welp, I tried. I'm user "Chris" tryi...Welp, I tried. I'm user "Chris" trying to talk about the principles of change and was ready to get into act and potency but I don't think I'm permitted to reply further.<br /><br />https://www.richardcarrier.info/archives/13752Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08634115654045133370noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-79446136456947199172018-03-05T04:58:44.100-08:002018-03-05T04:58:44.100-08:00This isn't about Carrier's arguments but h...This isn't about Carrier's arguments but his character. THe point was made that Carrier is dishonest with his listeners. He was dishonest with his wife first. <br /><br />And as for an apology, doesn't work, "Honey. I'm so sorry I cheated on you, but how about we consider making our relationship open and we can sleep with whoever we want? Does that make it better?"<br /><br />That's not what Jen signed up for. Carrier could say he's being true to polyamory, but it would have been better for him to be true to the vows he made to his wife. <br /><br />Feser has answered Carrier's arguments, but it would be a huge mistake to think one's character has no role whatsoever.Nickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16175830373964472006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8954608646904080796.post-51203199579217603722018-03-05T04:55:51.124-08:002018-03-05T04:55:51.124-08:00Carrier is the poster-child of Narcissism.Carrier is the poster-child of Narcissism.Nickhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16175830373964472006noreply@blogger.com