but which God?
My god.. definitely not yours...
all hail Thor
Formalizing a Proof of God by Leibniz
21–24 of 24 posts
Re: Formalizing a Proof of God by Leibniz
#22It is fun to see these historical arguments formalized like this, but they should remember to mention how flawed these arguments have proven to be over time.
P3 has the same flaw as Zeno's paradoxes, where there is a false assumption that the sum of infinite things must itself be infinite. If this were true, calculus class would be much easier, as all of those infinite sums would have the same answer. Since we know that the sum of an infinity achieved by infinite division of a finite is a finite itself, we are unable to tell whether it would take infinite or finite power to move these infinite things.
P1 fails to account for the possibility of multiple gods or gods other than the one this proof is presumably about. No evidence is provided for the claims of incorporeality or infinite power, either, without which the proof could well be proving that something more powerful than god exists, but not necessarily that god does.
The entire proof, flaws aside, only endeavors to prove that something god-like once existed, but not that it still exists or has any relation to what people historically have called god.
Re: Formalizing a Proof of God by Leibniz
#23It's a nice exercise but doesn't this ultimately proof that using these formalized proofs is flawed? That this system can be made to 'proof' anything, as long as the premises are logical by themself? Or am I reading too much in the mathematical term 'proof'? Because it sounds more like 'verifiable reasoning' to me.
You already hit the important part with "as long as the premises are logical". Since the premises here are flawed, the proof falls apart. It isn't a flaw in formalized proofs. Getting flawless premises is the challenge for trying to use this for philosophical proof - the concepts are typically not as well defined as, say, what you see in geometry class.
Re: Formalizing a Proof of God by Leibniz
#24A "quick" "summary" by Feser is: 1. The Principle of sufficient reason (PSR) holds that there is an explanation for the existence of anything that does exist and for its having the attributes it has. 2. If PSR were not true, then things and events without evident explanation or intelligibility would be extremely common. 3. But this is the opposite of what common sense and science alike find to be the case. 4. If PSR…
This is just one more bad variation of the "prime mover" argument. Your step 24 is where a whole bunch of woo is injected. > Because there must be a root cause, this root cause must be jesusy The logic is in "not even wrong" territory. Why does being "purely actual, absolutely simple or noncomposite" imply "fully good"? Because you've abandoned reason and are just making up definitions. Define "good", please and than…
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