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lec_8.txt
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lec_8.txt
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Lecture 8 Notes:
See L7 Slides
Left of at design argument. Contingent Facts. Ontological Arguments.
Leibniz's Cosmological Arguments...
It is a contingent fact that there are contingent things... But maybe we can make a case that it is a necessary fact that there are contingent things.
Design argument: standard form. Insights from science has given a great blow to it. Certain things are useful. How philosophers dealt with certain things. Change size, shape, ..., the purpose of the machinery changes.
About mind.. suppose someone says, our brains are intricate, physio-chemical stuff goes on. So brain is a device performing a function. Bailey: change things here and there, then something wouldn't function. Thus, do we view brain in a purely mechanical manner. Brain science, cognitive neuroscience: provides a mechanistic picture of the human brain.
Design argument - asks you to look around. And gives you some evidence for it. Bailey's discussion: around evidence and how you can accomodate all of that.
: Ontological Argument
Russell - Logician, Philosopher.
God truly exists. Something than which a greater cannot exist, must exist. The argument structure itself. Concepts of great, existence in reality > existence in understanding. God = Great in any sense of comparison. Maximal way of using concept of greatness. The Greatest that one can imagine would be considered as God.
I own a phone but not a palace.
Existence of Palace > Existence of Phone.
: Follow principle of charity throughout. Be fair. On observable and non-observable entities. How can we even compare unobservable entities?
God is great. Great is an umbrella term which captures everything. Make necessary assumptions. Say "Android > Apple".
Why interesting?: Sit in your room, meditate, come up with an existence of God formula. Conceptualizing idea of God. What about religion? All religions show God as the greatest. - Maybe monotheistic Judeo-Christian idea of God. Hindu, Pagan: Gods more as heros. Avatars of God. Jainism: God is not great, idol for people to follow. Nastika and Anastika schools. God as path to liberation: is liberation great?
X: s.t there does not exist anything greater than X. Appeals to one's sense of intuition. Concept of God is intelligible: since we are discussing it right now.
Existence is valuable to us. Therefore if God did not exist, God in existence would be greater... Beliefs and greatness. Reductio, Approaching it in an epistemic fashion.
God in whom everyone believes > God in whom only some people believe. Greatness involves how we perceive what we believe in, whether we accept it's existence, whether it is great.
Aquinas' objection to Anselm: Some people believe God to be a body. So ok, something exists, but what is God. What is meant by it's existence? Aquinas does not really approve of the ontological argument.
Trying to classify the kinds of available objections:
- Linguistic Issues: 'Cube root of 3rd planet from sun': Exists in understanding. Concept? Mental image? What kind of image? Aggregating certain terms perhaps. What is your concept of the triangle? What about justice? - Visual symbols to associate with - But what do you really mean by justice?
Imagine a 1000 sided figure. Difficult to imagine. Much less vivid than an equilateral triangle. Metaphysics; say something about reality just by reality. Concepts may not always be mental images.
Ambiguity: Something than which nothing greater can be thought of. Not an empirical issue - a specific concept or some concept which satisfies this property.
Some concepts possess very properties that characterize them: widely shared, rare, sophisticated, surprising, abstract, non-existence.
- Existence is not a property. X in reality, Y not in reality -> X > Y. Comparisons of relative greatness can be made only among things that already exist.
- Anti-realism: Reductio Ad Absurdum:
Not P is absurd, therefore P
OR
Not P is absurd, therefore NOT(NOT P)
- is it really boolean. Impossible to show God does not exist. Does it mean that God exists? Is consistency a justification. Simple examples to illustrate this distinction.
- Argument, to invalidate the argument given by Anselm. Zero exists but cannot be conceived.
...Ontological argument. Logical form.