Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

The Problem With Most Theological Doctrines and the Theological Argument for Mental Reality

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In most theologies, it is said that God created the material world. It is also said that God is (1) omnipresent, (2) omnipotent, and (3) omniscient; that God knows the future and the past. It is also said that God is an unchanging, eternal, immaterial being and the root of all existence.

Unless God is itself subject to linear time, the idea that God “created” anything is absurd. The idea of “creating” something necessarily implies that there was a time before that thing was created. From the “perspective” (I’ll explain the scare quotes below) of being everywhere and everywhen in one’s “now,” nothing is ever created. It always exists, has always existence, and will always exist, from God’s perspective, because all those things would exist to God as “now.”

“Matter” cannot exist if God is an immaterial being because God “is” everything from a theological perspective. There is no place or state “outside of God” or “unlike God,” because there is nowhere else to exist, and nothing else to comprise anything that is said to exist. If God is fundamentally immaterial being, then everything is fundamentally immaterial. Matter cannot exist in that situation.

All spiritual or religious doctrines extend from the perspective of assigning “not-God” characteristics and perspective to God. IOW, they are characterizations of God and the assigning of attributes to God that inimical to the logical ramifications of the attributes assigned to God by those same metaphysical perspectives.

The idea that God “chose” to create this specific world and limit the experiential capacity of all sentient beings to, basically, a single architecture out of infinite possibilities is absurd because God cannot have a “perspective.” “Perspective” requires a point of view. God cannot have a point of view.

Furthermore, God cannot “make a decision.” A decision requires context, organized sequential experiences, and a perspective – none of which God can logically experience, at least not from the state of “being God”

Even if we ignore all that, let’s say God instantaneously examines all possible experiential architectures “before” he “chooses” one – let’s say the Christian architecture – to limit sentient beings to. The problem with this is that a Godly “examination” of all possible experiential pathways would necessarily mean instantly knowing all possible experiences in every possible architecture – IOW, experiencing every possible life of every possible person in every possible architecture. That’s what omnipresence and omniscience would necessarily entail.

But God exists in a complete state of omniscient, eternal “now-ness, always experiencing all of those other possibilities as those beings in those other possible reality architectures. That’s what eternal omniscience and omnipresence necessarily means. God cannot then decide to “unexist” those other individual experiences in other architectures – they eternally exist as beings experiencing other architectures. Other realities. In the only place and as the only thing any such reality can ever exist – in the mind of God.

If the “perspective” of God is “all possible perspectives at the same time all the time,” then God (from the “God perspective) doesn’t have a perspective. If the nature of your being is “always fully experiencing all possible experiences all the time from every possible perspective,” no experiential decisions can be made; they are all fully being made eternally. There are no “others” to make experiential parameters for; all possible decisions from every individual perspective always fully exist eternally AS those individual beings in the mind of God – the only way anything ever exists as “real.”

Every possible experience, every possible experiential pathway in every possible experiential architecture always and eternally exists as real as any other. As individual consciousnesses, we can only be observational aspects of God, “exploring” an ocean of fully real possibilities, only limited by what is possible in the mind of God.

IOW, no four-sided triangles or 1+1=3 experiences or the like. But that’s the only kind of limitation to what is available to experience. As observational aspects of God, everything is ultimately “within” us. All possibilities. All other aspects conscious aspects of God – other people with individual perspectives, are in this sense “within” us.

Comments
Jerry: Only in your head. Not in the real world. In the real world there will be a maximum. It will be a very big number but after that there will be no more entities that represent something in the real world. Consequently no larger number. And what would that maximum be then? No what you will have are six oranges and two other things which are no longer oranges. In actuality in the real world you will have 8 entities or two groups of four entities, not all the same. Okay. So, can you buy a quart of ice cream? A quart being a quarter of a gallon? How about a pint of milk? Again, a pint being a fraction of a gallon. Do the only fractions that count the ones that have names?JVL
November 1, 2020
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Querius: JVL will always be able to find points on a number line that are less than a Planck length apart. This falsifies his position. And what position is that exactly? I don't think my mathematical stance is controversial so . . . . .JVL
November 1, 2020
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JVL If you think you can list all the points on a line I can always find one you missed.
A line is like a necklace of pearls. Please tell me what pearl I've missed. :)
That’s because a line in mathematics has no thickness.
Now you have the opportunity to tell us if exist one thing from this universe that have no thickness.
Other opinions are available.
:) Truth have available only one "opinion". This it's a masquerade because motion of Achilles is the same / not influenced ( let's say 10 m /s )no matter into how many halves is cut that distance on a paper. :) There is no logical connection between a runner and bystander mathematician who have a paper and a pen and cut halves of halves of halves and for that reason (of cutting distances in halves) runner will never finish that race. :) Zeno(still at halfway of his dying breath) today in hospital reading messages on uncommondescent thinking :"-Man, mathematicians who push my paradoxes today are always at a half distance to become real mathematicians but another half... prevent them."Sandy
November 1, 2020
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If you give me a finite list of numbers I can always find another one. And another one. And another one after that. I can keep finding more numbers. So there cannot be a finite number of numbers.
Only in your head. Not in the real world. In the real world there will be a maximum. It will be a very big number but after that there will be no more entities that represent something in the real world. Consequently no larger number.
If I have 7 oranges and I want to split them evenly between two people they each get 3.5 oranges; a perfectly acceptable and physically achievable answer.
No what you will have are six oranges and two other things which are no longer oranges. In actuality in the real world you will have 8 entities or two groups of four entities, not all the same. Somebody wrote a song once called "It's so easy." When something is based on evidence and logic, it's so easy to refute the nonsense that comes up especially from those who do not seem to live in the real world but only in their heads. I can imagine naturalistic evolution happening in someone's mind. It's just no one can point to a real world example that isn't trivial. I have a question. Does naturalistic evolution only exist in people's minds? Is that why it is so hard to provide evidence against it since the evidence is from the real world and not useful against people's imagination. I wonder if this a fundamental difference between believers in ID and anti-ID. The latter live mainly in their imaginations and not in the real world. Something to explore!jerry
November 1, 2020
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Sandy @426, JVL will always be able to find points on a number line that are less than a Planck length apart. This falsifies his position. Reality and mathematics do seem to join at probabilities such as wavefunctions. And their manifestations in our physical world enable such effects as fusion in our sun by means of quantum tunneling. -QQuerius
November 1, 2020
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Viola Lee @412, It seems to me that Sandy and you are talking past each other (as in the non-existent intersection of skew lines in 3D). As you well know, some non-Euclidean geometries define only lines—points are undefined. You seem to acknowledge Sandy's objections in 413 and 421, although I'd add that my point wasp is slightly annoyed at being hemmed in with quotes. ;-) -QQuerius
November 1, 2020
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Jerry: The number of numbers will always be finite. If you give me a finite list of numbers I can always find another one. And another one. And another one after that. I can keep finding more numbers. So there cannot be a finite number of numbers. Sandy: Actually is very strange that maths accept such a big lie that a line can contain an infinite number of points. If you think you can list all the points on a line I can always find one you missed. Maths very strangely fail to measure thinness of a line but has infinite zoom in measuring the lenght of a line. What in the world… That's because a line in mathematics has no thickness. Sandy: From my point of view Zeno paradoxes (&co.) are just dumb maths not boundaries of maths where mathematicians try to aquire new knowledge about maths. Other opinions are available. Jerry: If I have 7 of somethings 1/2 is not anything that exist in reality. If I have 7 oranges and I want to split them evenly between two people they each get 3.5 oranges; a perfectly acceptable and physically achievable answer.JVL
November 1, 2020
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Sandy @408, . . . not to mention the limit to infinite points imposed by the Planck length. -QQuerius
November 1, 2020
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Jerry @405,
Any so called line connecting any disjoint positions is nothing but a series of discontinuous specks of some material (including pixels on a computer screen). Our mind tricks us into thinking they are connected but everyone reading this knows they are not connected and the specks are finite.
With that in mind, take a look at the first couple of illustrated pages in this amazing little book: https://www.amazon.com/Prof-McSquareds-Calculus-Primer-Intergalactic/dp/0486789705/ -QQuerius
November 1, 2020
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Kairosfocus @404 ,
in addition to physical models and axiomatised logic models, there are embedded structures and quantities bound up in the logic of being of any possible world.
Do you have in mind probabilities or tensors? Or are you thinking of more fundamental interactions as in cause and effect? -QQuerius
November 1, 2020
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ViolaLee But mental constructs are real, just not in the same way that a rock is physically real.
Unlike a real rock , a real mental constructs could be false.Sandy
November 1, 2020
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To think otherwise is to dismiss the entirety of my mental experience as “not real.”
Never said that. Is Obi Wan real? He certainly exists in our heads and we can have long discussions on him but does anyone believe he is a real person in our world. One has to differentiate between what exist only in our heads and what exists in the real world. This all started with discussions of various types of infinity. And I said infinity does not exist in the real world but only in our heads. I was just pointing out the obvious but no one wants to accept this. They want their imaginary worlds to exist even if it is only a dream. This in no way says that imagined worlds are not useful for the real world just as novels which are not real help us to understand and explain the real world. And we all have had some wild dreams. Few would argue they represent reality but they are mental experiences. I predict that soon someone soon will focus on the filtering process that our senses do between real world phenomenon and our minds interpretation of these perceptions. And the discussion will go off on another tangent.jerry
November 1, 2020
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Jerry, I agree that numbers and word "each refers to something in the real world. But each itself is a mental construct." But you seem to be using "real world" to mean "physical, material world. But mental constructs are real, just not in the same way that a rock is physically real. To think otherwise is to dismiss the entirety of my mental experience as "not real."Viola Lee
November 1, 2020
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Does the number 1/2 not have any meaning in the “real” world?
Not really. Half of some entity is a completely different thing. If I have 8 of something 1/2 is 4 just a different positive integer. If I have 7 of somethings 1/2 is not anything that exist in reality. Remember these are extremely useful concepts but not based in anything real. I can have half an apple but know that it is different from an apple.jerry
November 1, 2020
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It seems to me that all numbers are mental constructs, even the positive integers.
Yes in a sense. But look at it as similar to a word. Do words have real existence? A number refers to a real thing, a grouping of entities. All the sets of these real things such as apples that have a one to one correspondence represent a specific number. So does the number exist? Does a word exist? Each refers to something in the real world (though not all words). But each itself is a mental construct. It just that a positive integer can point to something in the real world just as a word usually does.jerry
November 1, 2020
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Positive integers are just "in our head" also. That is, all math is made of abstract concepts and symbolic notations that we can apply to the real world in various degrees. Break a stick in half and you have a fraction. Draw a right triangle with sides of one unit each, and you have an irrational number as the hypotenuse. Have two people walk away from each other from a starting point and you have negative numbers. And so on. Pure math can be very powerful in describing the real world, but abstract concepts are a different kind of thing than physical objects. Yes, I can't "point to" an abstract concept because that is something my mind is aware of, but I can use and manipulate symbols that represent those concepts. So I agree with ET that math concepts are real and exist in our universe, just in a different way than physical objects do.Viola Lee
November 1, 2020
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It seems to me that all numbers are mental constructs, even the positive integers. Does the number 1/2 not have any meaning in the "real" world?daveS
November 1, 2020
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you didn’t say that “doing mathematics” isn’t real, but rather that some of the entities involved such as points and irrational numbers aren’t real.
The only numbers that have meaning in the real world are positive integers and this is best understandable by using some mental constructs only in our heads. All the rest of the numbers while extremely useful, are just mental constructs. I wrote a paper in a college philosophy course on what is a number and used basic set theory to illustrate it. Similarly none of the geometric figures used in basic geometry have any exact real world existence just approximations. Like a line which is just a series of small dots that are irregular when examined up close by magnification. By the way I was introduced to geometry in sophomore year in high school and was so taken back by the logic that I finished our textbook by mid October.jerry
November 1, 2020
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They exist in mathematics and mathematics exists in our universe
So do elephants that are weightless, frictionless ice and Obi Wan Kenobi. Mathematics is logic applied to certain concepts. Most of these concepts are only in our heads and just approximate a real world entity. So is logic real? Yes in a sense but I cannot point to a real world entity and say there it is.jerry
November 1, 2020
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Viola Lee Clearly, there is a difference between math as a body of abstract concepts, such as a point or a line, and our applying those concepts in real-world applications. Most of the discussion in this thread, including the problem about the “wasp” or about the continuity of points representing real numbers on the number line, are about pure math, not real-world applications.
If it's not about real-world , why do you use real-world objects? I tell you why ,because external world triggered those internal human intuitions to discover maths laws and bewildering truth that this universe and math are married together. Of course our body of maths knowledge has boundaries and those boundaries are pushed by pure math but we must not confound math boundaries with dumb math. From my point of view Zeno paradoxes (&co.) are just dumb maths not boundaries of maths where mathematicians try to aquire new knowledge about maths.
DaveS I believe our minds, thoughts, and mental constructions are part of reality. Even if mathematics is just our mind’s way of dealing with the larger world, it’s still real.
There are maths idealizers and maths haters , both possitions are just wrong because maths it's like ore not like gold bullion,maths has a lot of waste ,but in the same time has pure gold. We don't have to praise ore(because contain gold) ,we praise only what is gold from ore.Sandy
November 1, 2020
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Jerry, PS to #415: I probably misstated your position in that you didn't say that "doing mathematics" isn't real, but rather that some of the entities involved such as points and irrational numbers aren't real.daveS
November 1, 2020
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Jerry,
Of course it is idle speculation. It all exists in your head. Not in reality.
I believe our minds, thoughts, and mental constructions are part of reality. Even if mathematics is just our mind's way of dealing with the larger world, it's still real. Can you place 8 queens on a chessboard so no queen is attacking another? Yes, and we can determine this using our minds only. How do we reliably arrive at the correct answer in problems such as this if what we are doing is not "real"?daveS
November 1, 2020
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Jerry:
But points don’t exist in our universe.
They exist in mathematics and mathematics exists in our universeET
November 1, 2020
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Clearly, there is a difference between math as a body of abstract concepts, such as a point or a line, and our applying those concepts in real-world applications. Most of the discussion in this thread, including the problem about the "wasp" or about the continuity of points representing real numbers on the number line, are about pure math, not real-world applications.Viola Lee
November 1, 2020
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Sandy, here is the very first thing taught in a high school geometry course from Undefined Terms, MathBitsNotebook.com In geometry, formal definitions are formed using other defined words or terms. There are, however, three words in geometry that are not formally defined. These words are point, line and plane, and are referred to as the "three undefined terms of geometry". The descriptions, stated below, refer to these words in relation to geometry. POINT • a point indicates a location (or position) in space. • a point has no dimension (actual size). • a point has no length, no width, and no height (thickness). While we represent a point with a dot, the dot can be very tiny or very large. Remember, a point has no size. LINE (straight line) • a line has no thickness. • a line's length extends in one dimension. • a line goes on forever in both directions. • a line has infinite length, zero width, and zero height. • a line is assumed to be straight. PLANE • a plane has two dimensions. • a plane forms a flat surface extending indefinitely in all directions. • a plane has infinite length, infinite width and zero height (thickness).Viola Lee
November 1, 2020
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Points do not have a physical measurement.
But points don’t exist in our universe. Specks maybe. Entities smaller than specks exist but not points.jerry
November 1, 2020
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It’s not just idle speculation.
Of course it is idle speculation. It all exists in your head. Not in reality. And I know a fair amount about mathematics though I forgot most of it. When I took the GRE exam on math for graduate school. I got 72 of 75 correct. I left three blank. The three questions I left blank were all on statistics because as an arrogant a**hole I thought statistics was beneath me and never bothered to study it. I had no idea what a standard deviation was. Later I learned how stupid I was and actually taught a class in statistics once. And I support the movement to teach statistics instead of calculus in high school. Of course teaching both would be good but statistics is more useful for the average person.jerry
November 1, 2020
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Sandy, It is a fact that any line can contain infinite points. Points do not have a physical measurement.ET
November 1, 2020
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Kairosfocus ET, a good question, to which on continuum framework the answer is c, continuum magnitude. One can draw a Line” in a second or less, and of course the continuum brings in the Zeno effects and convergent transfinite series completed in finite time as successive partial sums converge, KF
JVL ET: How many points are there between two points 6 inches apart? As many as you want.
Actually is very strange that maths accept such a big lie that a line can contain an infinite number of points. This lie can be easily debunked by measuring his thinness ( for example 0.01 inches)and knowing that has 6 inches.Result 6÷0.01=600 points. ;) Maths very strangely fail to measure thinness of a line but has infinite zoom in measuring the lenght of a line. What in the world... :)Sandy
November 1, 2020
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"Most" being the operative word.Viola Lee
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