The Existence of God
This is just an idea I had inspired by the somewhat limited arguments of Anselm and Aquinas, which seem to contradict each other slightly; if God is the being that than which nothing greater can be conceived, the implication is the God must be infinitely great, so infinity does exist. Therefore, it seems that Aquinas would be wrong in denying the possibility of an infinite regress. However, I personally agree that there cannot be an infinite regress, and so I looked towards refining Anselm's definition of God-
my argument goes as so:
"Everything that exists in the Universe had the ability to be imagined before its existence (a baby can be imagined before its birth). Therefore, for things to have come into existence it must have been possible beforehand to have imagined that thing. There cannot be an infinite regress of existence, so the thing which created the Universe or the first to have existed within it must first be unimaginable and secondly have intelligence great enough to imagine everything in the Universe without empirical evidence on which to base its conceptions. This is what we call God"
My new definition of God is a being with the ability to imagine everything in the Universe, independent of empirical evidence. Additionally, this is the only predicate that we can truly know about God.
I would really like some feedback/criticism of this argument, so feel free to disagree :-)
my argument goes as so:
"Everything that exists in the Universe had the ability to be imagined before its existence (a baby can be imagined before its birth). Therefore, for things to have come into existence it must have been possible beforehand to have imagined that thing. There cannot be an infinite regress of existence, so the thing which created the Universe or the first to have existed within it must first be unimaginable and secondly have intelligence great enough to imagine everything in the Universe without empirical evidence on which to base its conceptions. This is what we call God"
My new definition of God is a being with the ability to imagine everything in the Universe, independent of empirical evidence. Additionally, this is the only predicate that we can truly know about God.
I would really like some feedback/criticism of this argument, so feel free to disagree :-)
Comments (25)
I can't see how our ability to imagine things that we already know about, like babies, could be an argument for God's existence. What would be way more compelling would be to make an argument for God's existence based on pure creativity in-itself.
My idea was that if we can say that the ability to be imagined is a predicate of all things, the only way to end an infinite regress would be to have an unimaginable thing which still exists, which fits into many people's idea of God. By the same logic, if one were to use inherent creativity, God would have to lack any creativity in himself, which would make it impossible to have created the Universe. In order to create something with purpose- as we can see is the case of all things in the Universe- one must first imagine its purpose. It would make sense therefore to say that God could imagine the purpose of all things, yet himself remain unimaginable- then God could create the Universe, but create nothing as sophisticated as himself, explaining why our Universe is limited by the laws of nature, limited by God's imagination.
I deny your premise!
Something could be infinite, God. Infinite regress however is the process to reach infinity which is impossible. These are different.
Infinite regress is a process of reaching to infinity by finite step which is impossible since infinity+anything finite=infinity.
I would argue that infinity works on the same principles as an infinite regress. Just as something must have caused the last cause, something greater than the greatest conceivable thing can always be conceived.
Rather than God being the greatest conceivable being, it makes more sense to think of God as the only unconceivable being.
For what reason? By its very definition, existence must have a beginning and an end
No, it does not. The chain of causes reaches back in time to the Big Bang. Now if cosmologists are right in thinking that there WAS something before the Big Bang, be it another universe, or parts of a larger multiuniverse, or whatever, then it is conceivable that the temporal chain of cause-effect has no beginning. Interesting that Edward Feser, whose Five Proofs of the Existence of God has been the topic of several threads here, accepts that the causal chain can go back infinitely in time. His arguments are quite different.
I agree with the other comments, viz., that the above quoted statement is false. There is nothing that precludes the possibility of an infinite regress of existence. It's certainly not contradictory, for example, to say that there could be an infinite number of finite beings extending into the past. There could also be an infinite number of causal links into the past. In terms of modal logic, this is true metaphysically and logically, i.e., it's certainly metaphysically and logically possible. It may not be the case that these things are true, but surely the possibility exists.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought Aquinas didn't say an infinite regress was impossible? I thought he actually specifically said that it could not be shown through philosophical argument that the universe came into being due to God's creative act, and that this was a faith-based claim.
Yes, Feser's arguments are not focused on the temporal cosmological arguments but are focused on hierarchical arguments.
You are not wrong. He wanted to claim that Aristotle, who did not believe the universe was created, was rational and, in fact, represented the best that reason could provide. We "know" that the world was created, not because it is the rational position, but because of revelation, as recorded in Scripture.
I don't agree with this. To say "that than which nothing greater can be conceived", is to limit conception, and this is to deny infinity. So that stated premise is a premise which limits conception, denying infinity. It says that infinity cannot be conceived.
But right now all we know is how to model our universe abstractly in a very basic way. Just because everything in our universe has a cause, I don't think that necessarily means that the universe itself needs a cause. Just to explain "cause" you'd need a concept of time. Time is connected to space. So to say the universe itself needed a cause would maybe imply that time (and therefore space) exists outside of the universe's space which gets really confusing. Maybe our universe is eternal. Or maybe there is another dimension of space that is eternal and that is what our universe came from. This is interesting speculation.
I think we should be careful and not assume the laws of our universe apply outside of our universe. We can speculate, but acknowledging our ignorance seems wise to me. It's obvious that there are forces that are outside our knowledge, and they may not be conceivable to humans for a long time, if ever. I prefer to not label it as god because the word carries a lot of baggage. I'd rather just say that I have no idea what's going on.
You didn't get my point. Infinite regress is the process of reaching to infinity.
If God is "unconceivable" or "inconceivable", that seems to be good reason for saying there is no God.
Is there any difference between the universe existing, and a universe in which a few humans think there is a god in the existing universe?
the bible says something along the lines of .... "and he created man in his own image " .....
so god has arms , legs , wears shoes ...definitely shaves ...and I hope he brushes his teeth .
or perhaps .... man created god in HIS image to enhance his ego even more .... which one sounds more realistic knowing what we know of this species we call humans .
with that said , once you believe this deity is just an exaggerated version of us with supernatural powers , everything you conceive is biased by the simple fact that you believe his (again ...his ??? a guy ... interesting , coincidence that this is a male dominated planet .... hmmm ..must be coincidence ) rituals and ways to go about things is like us .... uses imagination to create .... thought or imagination is a phantom form created by the mind , imagination has no existence outside a human mind.
if you want to experience a bit closer of an answer to what , who is god .... start by questioning who YOU are ....beyond your name and life experiences ....
there are concepts of the universe , such as infinity and eternity that seems almost supernatural and while we may speculate about this or that ... all they are is speculations ....
but I will leave you with a powerful pointer to the reality that is life .....
there is one thing that is eternal in nature and regardless of any condition of the universe it will never cease to exist ...... the present moment , it has always been , it always is and it will always be Now ...
question your existence solely in the present moment and you may find the answers you seek , don't be surprised when your questions no longer need answers .
https://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/theogloss/imago-body.html
https://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/theogloss/imago-body.html
I appreciate the full explanation , and while it does attempt to describe some relationship between our state of being and his image .... why exactly are we the only chosen ones ? does that sound like one love of all ? .... it sounds like mankind needs to be special and god of course conformed this for us to make it true.
we also take after "him" with "rational structure" .... rational structure implies having a brain right ?? because rationalizing something doesn't get done with the soul ... more like the brain ... so god has a brain .....
the passage you quote certainly seems more eloquent and closer to the truth in the beginning , but in my opinion it starts to contradict itself ...... a book written by men will always have men's opinions and judgments on them ......
i am ok with disagreeing
I was just pointing out what the Imago Dei represents within the tradition of Christianity, in contrast to your caricature of it.
That's anthropomorphic.
(...but even the use of a name like "God", or the notion of "creation" is anthropomorphic too.)
I suggest that even your definition is more than can be meaningfully or reliably said.
Anyway, the words "a being" are usually used to refer to a physical living thing in a physical world.
All this conceptual reasoned logical and quasi-logical argument is out-of-place in an attempt to apply it outside the realm of the describable and explainable.
Curiously, it always turns out that most (all?) of the people discussing God in these discussions are Atheists.
Maybe the bottom-line in these discussions is that no one here would say that you should believe what you don't know of or perceive reason to believe. Think of all that argument that would be avoided.
Michael Ossipoff