Anselmian Perfect being theology and philosophy argues for the Divine properties from the conception of God being the greatest possible being. In this blog post I will argue for the traditional western conception of God on the basis of Perfect being theology and philosophy.
The formula to determine what properties God has in Anselmian Perfect Being theology is the following propositions:
P1: God is the greatest possible being
P2: God being the greatest possible being entails that he will have every property that is better to have rather than not.
P3: It is better to have x rather than not
C: Hence, God has x
This is an example of how this would work in practice: Reformed Theology wants to say that God is omniscient which means He knows all true propositions even future ones.
Lets apply this to the argument formula provided above:
P3: It is better to have omniscience rather than not
C: Hence, God is omniscient
This seems pretty reasonable considering that we think that it is better to know things rather than being completely ignorant. Thus, it seems more reasonable than not to think a greater being would know every truth rather than not.
From this example we see that the concept of God as the greatest possible being acts as a sort of divine properties generating machine; that is to say: we can apply this formula to warrant many of the properties we would want to predicate of God.
Here are some more Divine Properties that God has in Reformed Theology and in Traditional Western theology:
Divine Properties:
1) Omnipotence: being able to do anything that is logically possible and great (this is a good combination of Anselm's and Aquinas's Definition of omnipotence)
2) Morally Perfect: Being of the highest moral perfection and grounding moral perfection it-self
3) Omnipresent: God being conscience of ever event and point in History, God is not bound to any particular historical event but is boundlessly present at every point in the natural world.
4) Immutability: God's essential, necessary, and intrinsic properties are such that they are not subject to any sort of change.
5) Impassibility: No one can act on God, God only acts on all things. Thus, God in his Divine nature cannot be destroyed, suffer, or be injured.
6) Atemporal: God is timeless. He is not bound by time or bound inside of time.
7) Eternal: God does not begin to exist, but he always exists.
8) Aseity: God is only dependent upon himself.
Reasons for believing 1-8 (the numbers below corresponds with the numbers above)
1) When we think of a great being we tend to think of him being able to a lot of great things rather than being able to either do a) really bad things or b) nothing good at all all.
2) This one is perhaps the most obvious a perfect being is better than a evil being.
3) A God that is everywhere at once is better than a God that is limited to time and space.
4) If God is already the greatest possible being then why would he need to change if he already is the greatest.
5) A God that can be damaged and is not the source of action on everything is not as good as a God who cannot be damaged and acts on everything.
6) A God who is bound by time is not as great as a God who is not constrained by time or atemporal.
7) If God is the greatest possible being then it would be better if he always existed rather than not because this makes him unique from his creation and the it is better for the best to always be existing.
8) Everything outside of God is not as great so it seems that a being that is only dependent upon himself as the greatest possible being would be the greatest possible being.
All one has to show is that there is more reason to believe that 1-8 is greater to have rather than not in order to show that God has these properties. The way we justify that these properties are better to possess rather than not is our intuition. Intuition is basically our mental seeing. We sort of just see that 1+1=2 and we just sort of see that murdering infants for fun is in fact wrong. We cannot give arguments for these sort of things but they are reasonable to believe. This is just like it is reasonable to believe that you see a tree in front of you and that you believe rightly that a tree exists in front of you. You cannot give any argument apart from saying "look and see the tree is in front of me". Likewise, you cannot give a argument for these apart from just using your mental conception to see that one is better to have rather than not.
Conclusion:
The Divine properties 1-8 are properties had by the traditional Western concept of God and since these properties are more reasonable to believe rather than not then we are warranted in believing that a God such as this exists.
Just a few comments, this isn't really a post to refute, just to clarify a few things for me:
ReplyDelete1. "God is omniscient which means He knows all true propositions even future ones"
I'm not sure I understand fully what this means. Does this mean that if I say 'dogs can fly' that God wouldn't know it?
2. Aren't points 6 and 7 the same thing?
3. "2) This one is perhaps the most obvious a perfect being is better than a evil being."
Why is a 'perfect being' automatically 'good'? Can't something be perfectly evil?
4. How do you deal with the Kantian objection that existence isn't a predicate?
Hello,
ReplyDelete1: God only knows all things that correspond to reality, "dogs can fly" does not corresond to reality.
2: No, they are not. Something can always exists in time which would be eternal but not atemporal.
3) You are using Perfect in a equivocal way as to how I am using it. I am using perfect in the sense of not having a single negative quality you are using perfect as performing a action well, in the case you have choose that action one is performing well is evil.
4) My arguments in this post do not argue for God's existence and thus the objection that existence is not a predicate does not apply here. However, I have other posts that argue against Kant on this score and you are free to look at those discussions in the comment section of the classical ontological argument in my Dialogue with the atheist Travis.
God Bless,
NPT
Thanks for the response:
ReplyDelete1. I'm still not clear - so does God know that dogs can't fly or does he know that by implication (ie, he knows dogs walk on the ground)?
2. This supposes that time is eternal, does it not?
3. Am I to understand that you are saying that entities are not *evil*, but that they do *evil acts*? If so, I think I know what you are saying and I could agree with it. If not, can you clarify?
4. That's cool.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteNo problem, anytime.
1)God knows that dogs do not fly and that they walk on the ground. He know every true proposition.
2) No. It just supposes that the concept of eternal and time are distinct with respect to their content. Eternal is never ceasing to exist and temporal has to with a succession of events.
3) No, I am not saying that. What I am saying is that you were using the word perfect in a different sense from how I was using it (equivocation) and I was clarifying in what sense you were using it and what sense I was using it.
God Bless,
NPT
1. What about propositions themselves? I guess this is what I'm asking. I'm not even sure if it really makes sense - so thanks for hanging in there and clarifying.
ReplyDelete2. I think that clears it up a little bit in my mind, thanks.
3. I see - how do you define negative quality? This seems subjective to me, somewhat. Maybe it's the definition of perfection that I'm needing to understand your objection.
Would you be inadvertently proving that even natural law can and does exists the same way we believe 1+1=2? Would you call natural law the same (ontologically) as a properly basic belief, since the identity of this deity (the Western idea of God) and natural law are congenerous? That's stating it quite roughly. I'm not saying that natural law and God are equal in taxonomy, but the way in which we prove them--your method of properly basic beliefs--are similar in ontology, since God is the final cause of natural law.
ReplyDeleteYou stated: "We sort of just see that 1+1=2 and we just sort of see that murdering infants for fun is in fact wrong."
ReplyDeleteThat's where I get the impression of natural law and properly basic beliefs (PBB) are congenerous in methodology.
Oh, your "Reformed Theology Links" widget is spelled incorrectly (FYI).
ReplyDelete"Oh, your "Reformed Theology Links" widget is spelled incorrectly (FYI)."
ReplyDeleteThanks, Julio!
No problem my friend.
ReplyDeleteWould you be inadvertently proving that even natural law can and does exists the same way we believe 1+1=2?
ReplyDeleteResponse: I would say we would prove both of them the same way through intuition which causes us to form basic beliefs about them.
Would you call natural law the same (ontologically) as a properly basic belief, since the identity of this deity (the Western idea of God) and natural law are congenerous?
Response: Natural law is not ontologically the same as a properly basic belief. One is a belief and the other is a moral fact based on a aspect of God's nature.
That's stating it quite roughly. I'm not saying that natural law and God are equal in taxonomy, but the way in which we prove them--your method of properly basic beliefs--are similar in ontology, since God is the final cause of natural law.
Response: I would say that we can prove God through various ways, some ways by definition and others through intuition. So in a sense you could prove God and natural law in similar ways. I would distinguish between intuition and properly basic beliefs like I would distinguish between visual perception and properly basic beliefs.
1. What about propositions themselves? I guess this is what I'm asking. I'm not even sure if it really makes sense - so thanks for hanging in there and clarifying.
ReplyDeleteResponse: God knows propositions themselves.
2. I think that clears it up a little bit in my mind, thanks.
Response: No problem.
3. I see - how do you define negative quality? This seems subjective to me, somewhat. Maybe it's the definition of perfection that I'm needing to understand your objection.
Response: Negative quality is something that is not better to have rather than not. I would say it is objective, intuition that is, objective as you perceiving things in the natural world.
I hope that clarifies things for everyone.
God Bless,
NPT
What do you mean by 'better'? It is better for a man to have more knowledge because it benefits a man. How would an omnipresent being benefit from knowledge?
ReplyDeleteThis is the case in ALL instances of the use of better in this argument.
Pathetic logic. Truly.
Lucid,
ReplyDeleteBetter as I am using it here means that something has factually more goodness intrinsically rather than something else which factually has less intrinsic goodness. Well I do not grant the premise that what makes knowledge good is the consequences it produces. I just think that knowledge is just intrinsically good, just as you think it is just intrinsically good because it benefits a man.
But perhaps even on your own view of what makes knowledge good one could still say that knowledge benefits God because it gives him glory to display his knowledge to creation if he were to create.
Why think my logic is pathetic? What Law of logic am I violating?
God Bless,
NPT