{"id":35496,"date":"2015-06-11T10:56:21","date_gmt":"2015-06-11T14:56:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/?p=35496"},"modified":"2015-06-11T11:22:22","modified_gmt":"2015-06-11T15:22:22","slug":"dialogue-with-the-maverick-philosopher-god-is-a-being-not-being-itself-part-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/dialogue-with-the-maverick-philosopher-god-is-a-being-not-being-itself-part-7\/","title":{"rendered":"Dialogue with the Maverick Philosopher: God is a being, not Being itself \u2013 part 7"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"missed-target\"Here’s where we stand. Bill urges that<\/a> we should say that God’s essence = God’s existence<\/strong> because this (and only this) explains why God necessarily exists (and this not because of any other being).<\/p>\n

Me, I don’t grant that it’s even coherent to suppose that something’s essence just is its existence. So last time<\/a>, I took a shot\u00a0at a different argument for that conclusion… and missed the target<\/strong>! Faithful readers helpfully pointed out that my conclusion wasn’t the right one – I was aiming at the wrong target. Thanks, guys!<\/p>\n

Now, I think there is something I was getting at there. (I’ll explain in a post tomorrow.) But<\/strong> before I get to that, let me raise the topic of modal ontological arguments<\/a><\/strong> for God’s existence. These work, essentially, as follows.<\/p>\n

\"pipeGod exists in no possible world or in\u00a0at least one<\/em> possible world. (Which is to say: either God’s existence is impossible\/contradictory or not.) But there is no contradiction we can find in our idea of God; as best we can tell, this idea is coherent, like the idea of a unicorn and not like the idea of a square circle. So at least one “world” – actual or not. But God is defined as the greatest being there could be. And it is greater to exist necessarily<\/strong> (to exist and be such that one can’t not exist) than to exist contingently. Thus, the idea of the greatest being there could be implies necessary existence, existing in all<\/em> possible worlds. But then, God exists in this<\/em> world, in the actual world. God exists. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Mr. Atheist.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Never mind whether or not this is a successful “proof” of God’s existence. Even if it is not, it is very plausible that<\/strong> being perfect or the greatest being there could be requires necessary existence. Thus,if God exists and is the greatest being there could be, this does imply that<\/strong> God exists necessarily.<\/p>\n

But<\/em> it strikes me that God’s existing and being the greatest being there could be doesn’t explain<\/strong> God’s necessary existence. Rather, the other way around. Part of the explanation why God is the greatest being there could be, is that God has necessary existence rather than contingent existence. Explanation, I think, requires that the explainer not be logically or metaphysically posterior to \u00a0what gets explained. But God’s being the greatest being there could be is posterior to his being necessary, I think. So, that won’t do.<\/p>\n

Next time: my second try to show that if God exists, it is necessary that God exists.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s where we stand. Bill urges that we should say that God’s essence = God’s existence because this (and only this) explains why God necessarily exists (and this not because of any other being). Me, I don’t grant that it’s even coherent to suppose that something’s essence just is its existence. So last time, I… Read More »Dialogue with the Maverick Philosopher: God is a being, not Being itself \u2013 part 7<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[63,54,8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-being","category-debates","category-linkage","category-philosophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35496"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35509,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35496\/revisions\/35509"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinities.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}