God & The Problem of Evil

Let’s apply your argument to things that actually exist:

All armies that exist must be perfect, otherwise a stronger army would defeat a weaker army. Therefore, every army that exists must be absolutely powerful and cannot be defeated by any other army.

^ Make sense?

There are some regions, for instance in South Italy, Spain and Portugal, where Christians believe more in the Mother of God than in God himself.

To those henotheists, that’s the point anyway. So, in reality they are not monotheists, but henotheists, because they always believe, if they are true believers, that their God is more powerful than the God of the others, which means that they acknowledge, recognize, accept the God of the others as the God of the others (!), which would be a contradiction, if they were monotheists.

Where did I “argue for” my (?!) “God”?

Again and again: You have proven nothing. Your statements show your nihilistic attitude towards others’ values and likely and unconsciously also your own values.

Not God is an impossibility, but the "proof that God is an impossibility" is an impossibility. And this impossibility is just the reason why humans or most humans have always believed in gods. It is a success story just because of the impossibility that gods are impossibilities, regardless whether they are perfect or not, regardless wether they are absoute or not. So your kind of God is possible too.

I differentiated ‘perfection’ between the empirical and the non-empirical.
I had argued the idea of God must ultimately be absolute perfection with perfections that are relevant to its essential qualities, e.g. omnipotence, and omni-whatever.

Only God by default ultimately must be absolutely perfect, else it will be dominated by another.

Armies are empirical based.
Being empirical based and conditional, there is no way an army can claim absolute perfection which is totally unconditional.
How can we establish an definition of a perfect army? It is in terms of total number of men, weapons, power of weapons and these keep changing in accordance to conditions, thus cannot be totally unconditional.
Therefore at best every army will claim they can do the best and wish to be superior but they cannot claim absolute perfection in every which way.

I have proven by reason and default, God is an Impossibility.

I understand at present theists are believing in all sort of forms of God based on ignorance. But when they aware of the dilemma they are believing in a lesser powerful God, they will gravitate to an absolutely perfect God which no other gods can dominate it. Point is when they avoid this inevitable domination by others, they MUST end up with an absolutely perfect, which rationally is an impossibility.

I understand believing in a God even if it impossibility has benefits to theists but this is primarily psychological benefits to deal with an existential crisis.

I’ll repeat the following posted in the other thread;

The idea of God arose primarily to deal with the terrible psychological angst suffered by all humans and more so by the majority.
While there is the above main pro and other secondary benefits from theism, it is double-edged and has its terrible negatives of evils when SOME evil prone theists commit terrible evils when inspired by the evil laden words of God in some holy texts.
At present humanity already has alternative non-malignant approaches [from Eastern spiritualities] without evil laden elements in its doctrine to deal with this terrible angst.
Thus if we have foolproof non-theistic alternative why should we settle for theistic approaches that has negative side effects.

It is because of the terrible evils, terror and violence from believing in an impossible God that we must convince theists their beliefs are groundless.

Suppose you meet a theist and he insist on killing you because you are from a different religion and he believe his God [to him is real] has granted him sanction to kill. But if that theist is convinced with argument that the God he think is real is actually false and impossible, then he will have no theistic basis to kill you.
This is the advantage of why the truth ‘God is an impossibility’ is good for humanity because it will prevent all theistic based evils.

You have proven nothing other than your own inability to prove anything.

And you have been given detailed explanation as to why. You have not been able to refute anything said against your feigned proofs.

Why?

What makes omni-[whatever] “essential”? In polytheistic religions, there are many gods who don’t have all (or any) of these traits. And they are not always dominated by the most powerful god of the pantheon. True, Zeus was the most powerful of the Greek gods, and therefore in a sense “dominated” over the others, but clearly the other gods enjoyed a significant degree of freedom–enough so that cults of human beings could worship them as they would any other god. ← This also goes to show that lesser and greater gods can form alliances with each other, just as lesser and greater armies can form alliances. Furthermore, even if the most powerful god was to wipe out all lesser gods into extinction, being the “most” powerful does not have to mean “all” powerful. The one surviving god may still bear certain imperfections.

And in what way is this not so for “unempirical” gods? It’s true that in terms of abstract concepts–like being all knowing–one can imagine a sort of limitless ability–such that for anything that can be known, an omniscient god would know it–but this is partly a consequence of not knowing, and not caring about how one would know, how omniscience is possible (just as you would be free to entertain the idea of an all-powerful army if you didn’t think you had to understand what that would mean in terms of weapons, money, political support, number of soldiers, etc.–an all powerful army would just mean: capable of defeating any other army).

And besides, there’s still a difference between being capable of imagining an all knowing god and the necessity of a god being all knowing. There’s no reason to suppose that just because you can conceive a greater god, that this or that god must be that greater god.

^ Are you bringing Anselm’s argument into the picture?

Because the term ‘perfect’ is used in a variety of sense.
Achieving a perfect score of 100/100 in an objective test is empirically possible. Such an empirical perfection is different from ideal perfection, e.g. perfect circle which is still empirically related.
Perfect in relation to an ultimate God means ‘absolute’ total, unqualified, and the likes. Such an ideal and absolute perfection cannot be real [empirically and rationally].

Note I have produced the range of the meaning of ‘perfect’ in an earlier post. Check the dictionary.

I understand there are a range of gods within polytheism.
Note the point I brought up, i.e. the idea of God is inherent and has naturally evolved from animism to polytheism to monotheism and ultimately to an ontological God, i.e. an absolutely perfect God.
Those who are into polytheism are in a way ignorant and grabbed what that came and by cultural and traditions many are still stuck to it at present.
Given the rational choice, theists will rationally adopt a progressively greater God that will ultimate be an absolutely perfect God. This is why 5.4 billion theists are believing in a monotheistic God and the progress will ultimately be an absolutely perfect God.

I have stated, an absolutely perfect God is the ultimate because when cornered no theist will accept their God to be dominated by another. The theists’ natural progression to avoid one’s God being dominated will lead one to an absolutely perfect God with an optimism that such a God is real. No theists will concede to accept their God has to kiss the ass of another.

Btw, if any theist were to postulate an anthropomorhic God, which is empirically based, I agree such an empirically based God is empirically possible. But such possibility would be extremely negligible. To prove such a God, all one need to to bring the verifiable and justifiable evidence. The limitation of the empirically-based God is there will always be a greater empirical God than the one that is claimed.
So whatever empirical God a theist claim, another will claim another empirical God is greater and this culminate in an infinite regression.

To avoid an infinite regression and kissing the ass of another God, it is only logical that the smarter thinker theists had introduced an absolutely perfect God than which no other God can be greater in perfection.
Yes, I am bringing in St. Anselm’s definition of an ontological God into the picture.
There is no other way for a thinking theist to get out of the above dilemma of infinite regression and having to kiss the ass of another God than to resort to an absolute perfect God.

When a theist claims;
“my God is a Being than which no greater in perfection can exists”
it give no room for another God to dominate it nor command the lesser god to kiss his ass.
Ultimately all educated and thinking theists will end up with an absolutely perfect God [the default definition of what is a God].

But I had argued, an absolutely perfect God is an impossibility to be real, i.e. empirically + rationally real because absolute perfection [as argued] is impossible to be real.

And you still haven’t described what perfection (of any type) looks like.

How could you know?

I introduced the dictionary meaning of perfect and its range of meaning.

In addition I have introduced the following perspective of perfection which you responded as;
viewtopic.php?p=2684613#p2684613

  1. Empirically existing = observable.
  2. Empirically possible = might be observable for all we know.
  3. Empirically impossible = certainly never observable.
  4. Non-empirical and impossible = never observable and logically impossible (contradictory).

In the case of 1. Empirically existing = observable, we have example of a perfect score of 100/100 in an objective test, a so-claimed perfect woman, etc.

In the case of 2. Empirically possible = might be observable for all we know, a perfect circle as observed where measurements conform to quality of a perfect circle.

In the case of 3. Empirically impossible = certainly never observable, an ideal perfect circle which can only exist in numbers and thought but never empirically.

  1. Non-empirical and impossible = never observable and logically impossible (e.g. contradictory or rationally impossible). This is the absolutely perfect God which can never be observable empirically and logically impossible to exists as real empirically and rationally. Such a God is a logical resultant to stop an infinite regression.

I have demonstrated why the idea of God must ultimately be an absolutely perfect God and not any other lesser God to avoid being dominated and having to kiss the ass on another greater or ontological God.

I have already covered the full range/continuum of ‘what is perfect’ from the empirical [qualified] to absolutely perfect [unqualified].
What views of ‘perfect’ can you present and argue against the above?

The dictionary merely says that “perfect” means “without flaw”. That is almost tautological because now we have to ask about what “without flaw” means. Flaw refers to a relative perspective. What is a flaw to one, might be a perfection to another. So you still haven’t actually answered that question in any meaningful way (but then neither do typical dictionaries, sooo … you have to do better than they).

The rest of that post is irrelevant.

Nature’s imperfection caused this perfect beauty…flawed but perfectly beautiful.

[tab]Perfection.jpg[/tab]

The above display your lack of intellectual integrity.

Note this dictionary;
google.com/search?rlz=1C1CH … Dictionary
google.com/search?rlz=1C1CH … bs=perfect

Are you still insisting on this;
JSS: The dictionary merely says that “perfect” means “without flaw”.

I have stated my use of ‘perfect’ in this OP refer to it relevant general meanings, e.g. conforming to all required elements, free from flaw PLUS
2. absolute; complete (used for emphasis).
synonyms: absolute, complete, total, real, out-and-out, thorough, thoroughgoing, downright, utter, sheer, consummate, unmitigated, unqualified, veritable, in every respect, unalloyed;

In addition, see the meaning of ‘absolute’.
google.com/search?rlz=1C1CH … s=absolute

Absolute/absolutely perfect is really nothing more, at least to me, than a highly subjective wonderful, beautiful sense of qualia.

Objectively speaking, something which is absolute perfection is anything which normally functions well, for the most part, without SNAFU. :evilfun:

That’s debatable. It’s true that there are certain measures that not only can we determine empirically but it makes sense to say we got a “perfect” score, and then there are other measures which we can’t determine empirically and we can question whether it makes sense to have a “perfect score” (what does it really mean, for example, for a god to be omnipotent).

Still though, I don’t see why the definition of “perfection” must change in this case. It seems that “being the highest on such-and-such measure possible” works in both cases.

Resorting to dictionary definitions is kind of an amateurish move in philosophy–not necessarily invalid, but amateurish–dictionary definitions don’t determine the meanings of our words, rather they reflect them. We determine the meanings of our words–in conversations, in reading books, in observing the contexts in which they are used–and only afterwards do certain people take those meanings and write dictionaries. Bringing up dictionary definitions is useful if you think a person is misunderstanding the meaning of a word, but I find that most of the time, people just have their own meanings that aren’t necessarily shared by everyone.

You’re talking about the way concepts evolve, not what must be true of the concept. I agree that the concept of ‘god’ evolved along the lines you’ve described, but this is driven by competition and politics between two or more contending religious groups. They’re trying to out-argue or out-justify their competition. But that doesn’t make their arguments so. Imagine that Hellenism was the one true religion. The gods consist of Zeus, Athena, Apollo, Ares, etc. None of them are absolutely perfect in the sense that the Christian God is “omnipotent” but they are the real gods. Do you think different religious groups wouldn’t still try to out-argue and out-justify each other? Wouldn’t they still push their conception of their god towards being the ultimate, most powerful god there is?

So how are we defining an “empirical” God? Here, you seem to be saying if the god is anthropomorphic, then he is empirical. I take this to mean that if he has a physical body (which is what “created in our own image” implies), then he should be empirically observable. However, earlier you seemed to be defining empirical as measurable along some trait (like a test score) for which it is possible to measure the “highest” possible score. If a god has a physical body, he may be empirically observable, but he may still have non-empirical powers, like being all powerful, or all knowing, or all good, etc.

Well, in that case, here’s my definitive case against Anselm’s argument:

The Ontological argument for God’s existence

If you’re only point is that this is the way the concept of god naturally evolves, and is driven by competition and political motives, then I agree. But I don’t think it means that for a god to exist, it must have all these perfect characteristics.

Not sure if you are agree with me or otherwise.

There is a range of perspective to ‘perfection’ e.g. empirical, empirically possible, etc. which are subjective and open to various interpretations. This is why the term ‘absolutely perfect’ is introduced to reinforce this specific perfection as unique, unconditional which do not give any room for it to be outdone in any way. Such an absolutely perfect quality is attributed to God only.

In a way an absolutely perfect God is merely a shared-idea driven by psychology but impossible to exist as real in empirical-rational reality. There is no way it can be rationalized and justified empirically.

The word and concept “perfect” merely means “matching a chosen ideal”.

A “perfect God” is merely a God that matches in characteristic to whatever the valuer believes to be the Ideal, most preferred God, an “Ideal God”, whether that be most powerful, most wise, most beautiful, most dangerous, most irritating, whatever.

The word “perfect” is a RELATIVE term.
So this whole argument has been silly.

As I had stated there are various meanings and perspective to the term ‘perfect’.
In the case of empirical, ‘perfection’ is always relative and qualified to something. Empirical things cannot be absolutely perfect [I have demonstrated this].
In the case of the non-empirical, e.g. God can be assigned qualified perfection but the idea of perfection MUST [I had demonstrated why “MUST”] ultimately be absolute, i.e. unqualified, thus absolutely perfect.
Thus God must ultimately be absolutely and perfectly good, but the fact is evils exist, i.e. contradictory, and thus God is an impossibility.

Even with philosophy, we must start with the general understanding of the term and filter it for philosophical contexts.
Most of the replies, note especially JSS do not take into account [ignorant perhaps] of the other meaning of perfect as absolute, total, unqualified which is relevant to my argument.

One point is the ‘idea’ of God is not a ‘concept’ [Kant’s argument].
To differentiate, a ‘concept’ has an empirical base, e.g. table, apples, beauty, etc.
An ‘idea’ [philosophical sense] is a thought without any empirical qualities, e.g. eternal soul, God and the Whole-Universe. These are transcendental illusions.
Because philosophical ideas are not concepts, they cannot be held to be true as real [empirical-rational] at all.
This is why non-empirical philosophical ideas, e.g. God is impossible to real within an empirical-rational reality.

Zeus, and other Greek gods are not real per se, but if they are claimed to have an empirical base, then it is possible for them to be empirically real, but based on current knowledge the probability of them being real is 0.00…001%.
But as I had pointed out, the evolution of the ideas of God is inevitable leading to 5.4 billion out of 7+ billion people to a monotheistic God toward an absolutely perfect God.

Test scores are merely an example of what is empirical.
When a god is attributed with empirical qualities, such a God logically cannot be all powerful because there is always the possibility of another empirical God which is greater or another empirical God that created that empirical god. So an empirical god would definitely lead to an infinite regression.
To stop this infinite regression, the solution is to introduce the idea [not a concept] of ‘a God than which no greater can be idealized,’ which is proven to be impossible within an empirical-rational reality!

You are merely supporting my point.
I argued the idea of God MUST ultimately be an ontological God, an absolutely perfect God than which no God can be more perfect.
You are arguing such a God is in a way, impossible, which support my argument.

Note mine is, the idea of God naturally evolves and it is driven by desperate existential psychological motives.
This evolution is natural and ultimately the idea of a God must exists as an absolutely perfect God to avoid an infinite regression.
In addition no theist would accept their God be dominated by another and conceding their God will have to kiss the ass of [be owned by] another.

There is no such thing as an objective perfection for the same reason that there is no universal Northward. You are a flat-Earther trying to argue about why it is impossible for the ground to reach the infinitely deep bottom of the universe.

In short, you are “preaching out of school”, not knowing what it is that you are actually speaking about and thus making silly arguments, whether your intended conclusion is correct or not.

At least learn to properly define your significant words.

I agree with the above, but you persistently [despite highlighting to you many times] the other meaning of ‘perfect’ = absolute, unqualified, etc.

Are you even aware of this point I made. Tell me why this other meaning ‘perfect’ = absolute, unqualified, etc. is not relevant?

I have argued it is natural, the belief in the idea of God will gravitate to towards an absolutely perfect God, i.e. absolutely most preferred God, an absolutely unqualified “Ideal God”.

An example of this is St. Anselm’s Ontological God, i.e. God is a Being than which no greater can be conceived.*
Philosophically ‘conceived’ is not the right word, should be ‘idealized’.
I have argued in an absolutely perfect is essential to stop any infinite regression counter thrown in by oppositions.

Did you not read:

There is no “absolute, unqualified perfection”. The term itself is incoherent. It is like say the “universal perfect length”. It simply doesn’t actually make any sense. But uneducated people can easily accept the idea of an actual, objective perfection, even though it is nonsense.

If you want to state and argue that “a perfect God is impossible” and base your arguement on the fact that perfection is relative, THEN you have a case. But it is nonsense to say that the absolute, unqualified (“objective”) perfect God must have these impossible characteristics, because your adjectives are incoherent (they don’t fit together).