Definition of God

[Guest]

don't mean to clip the first sentence and run, but not a lot of time right now. Just to be clear, I'm giving all people who say they believe in God the benefit of the doubt, but a theistic God probably at its most essential point requires that there is no other logical or physical possibility. If I'm wrong about that, then there is a stronger definition of God out there and some might say, per the ontological argument, a God such that no other explanation is possible is a greater God than a God such that it could have been otherwise.

I think that's enough to let me know what you mean.

I have to admit that I find logical necessity a slippery concept. I keep wanting to say that it could just be a fact that God is necessary. I know that this is missing the point of necessary existence but it's a point I find easy to miss.

To me theism means believing in an ultimate being, for a worthwhile value of "ultimate". Given what existence actually is (whatever it actually is), it's a fact that without God nothing at all would exist. But does this have to mean that God is logically necessary, in the sense that no other explanation for any part of reality could even be self-consistent? Maybe I'm just dim on this point, but I simply don't see it.

Anselm's ontological argument is a fun little exercise but I've always felt that Kant killed it. You can't define things into existing, or I'd fill my wallet with the greatest conceivable dollars. I think the problems are with the concept of logical necessity, not with the concept of God.

If you want to identify theism with belief in a logically necessary God, then okay; I can try to cook up some other term for the kind of thing I believe. I don't really think would be a fair or reasonable terminology, though. I think it would be like defining physics to be the concepts of Newton. Logical necessity and the ontological argument are medieval theology. They were cutting-edge ideas in their day, but we've come a ways since, at least in logic if not in theology.

[_Res Ipsa]

This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this question asked as if it were some kind of silver bullet gotcha against atheists. I think it’s silly. I do not have a belief in the existence of God, as that term is generally understood.

[_Res Ipsa]

don't mean to clip the first sentence and run, but not a lot of time right now. Just to be clear, I'm giving all people who say they believe in God the benefit of the doubt, but a theistic God probably at its most essential point requires that there is no other logical or physical possibility. If I'm wrong about that, then there is a stronger definition of God out there and some might say, per the ontological argument, a God such that no other explanation is possible is a greater God than a God such that it could have been otherwise.

I think that's enough to let me know what you mean.

I have to admit that I find logical necessity a slippery concept. I keep wanting to say that it could just be a fact that God is necessary. I know that this is missing the point of necessary existence but it's a point I find easy to miss.

To me theism means believing in an ultimate being, for a worthwhile value of "ultimate". Given what existence actually is (whatever it actually is), it's a fact that without God nothing at all would exist. But does this have to mean that God is logically necessary, in the sense that no other explanation for any part of reality could even be self-consistent? Maybe I'm just dim on this point, but I simply don't see it.

Anselm's ontological argument is a fun little exercise but I've always felt that Kant killed it. You can't define things into existing, or I'd fill my wallet with the greatest conceivable dollars. I think the problems are with the concept of logical necessity, not with the concept of God.

If you want to identify theism with belief in a logically necessary God, then okay; I can try to cook up some other term for the kind of thing I believe. I don't really think would be a fair or reasonable terminology, though. I think it would be like defining physics to be the concepts of Newton. Logical necessity and the ontological argument are medieval theology. They were cutting-edge ideas in their day, but we've come a ways since, at least in logic if not in theology.

I think we can avoid your qualms about logical necessity by talking about necessary and sufficient conditions. If I understand you correctly, you are saying that God can be a sufficient, but not a necessary, condition for what we observe around us today. If that’s accurate, what are the attributes of such a God and what good reason do we have for concluding that it exists?

[_Jersey Girl]

That's easy. The God that I assert exists is Antonio Guterres, the current Secretary General of the United Nations. I think every nation in the United Nations would concede Guterres exists, so I think it's safe to conclude that God exists.

What is this supposed to be? Some tricky little trap to ensnare our atheist friends here?

You're right, it's easy.

Might you consider responding to the plethora of other replies you got here? Or was your OP supposed to be the joke of the day?

If so, it fell flat.

[_Maksutov]

Ha.

[_EAllusion]

I take the view that atheism is a rejection of belief in gods where gods refers to deities as described in common religious belief and theology.

[_EAllusion]

One class of argument for atheism attempts to argue that God is an inherently incoherent concept and therefore cannot be believed. For example, they might attemp to show that the traits of classical theism are mutually contradictory.

While I don’t think these arguments work on all forms of god-belief, it does illustrate how silly an argument that takes the form of “unless you can define the god you don’t think exists, then atheism is illegitimate” is.

[_Maksutov]

Atheists get to define God?

[_Chap]

One class of argument for atheism attempts to argue that God is an inherently incoherent concept and therefore cannot be believed.

I don't know about this 'inherently incoherent concept' stuff. That would seem to suggest that there is a single referent denoted by 'God', and we have found that referent to be 'inherently incoherent'. On that:

1. When ten people use the term "God', it seems to me that they are likely to be gesturing vaguely in ten different directions by that utterance.

2. The idea of there being an identifiable referent that is 'inherently incoherent' seems to me to make no sense.

[_RockSlider]

The simple answer has been given by IHAQ,

It's all the same God's you believe don't exist, plus one.