tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post7946751048118191958..comments2024-02-29T19:21:32.831-05:00Comments on Possible Worlds: Kant's Criticism of the Ontological ArgumentRandy Everisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06870605678781409126noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-74758138981106368812013-05-06T10:09:52.428-04:002013-05-06T10:09:52.428-04:00Very helpful, Martin. I very much appreciate the c...Very helpful, Martin. I very much appreciate the comment (and the passage reads as very familiar to me, which means I've probably read Plantinga on this before!). Still, I don't think Kant's criticism of existence as a predicate is convincing.Randy Everisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06870605678781409126noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-35358062697601947392013-05-04T09:51:41.811-04:002013-05-04T09:51:41.811-04:00As far as I understand, Kant was criticizing Desca...As far as I understand, Kant was criticizing Descartes' and Leibniz's formulation of the argument, NOT Anselm's. They do use existence as a property. But Anselm does not. One formulation of his argument includes the three premises:<br /><br />1. The Greatest Conceivable Being exists as a concept but not as reality (premise for reductio)<br />2. Existence as both a concept and in reality is greater than existence as a concept alone<br />3. It is conceivable that the GCB exists as both a concept and in reality<br /><br />Note at no point does he use existence as a property. Plantinga says:<br /><br />"If this is what [Kant] means, he's certainly right. But is it relevant to the ontological argument? Couldn't Anselm thank Kant for this interesting point and proceed merrily on his way? Where did he try to define God into being by adding existence to a list of properties that defined some concept?...If this were Anselm's procedure -- if he had simply added existence to a concept that has application contingently if at all -- then indeed his argument would be subject to the Kantian criticism. But he didn't, and it isn't."Martinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06038086497147379685noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-57185345878907074282013-04-29T17:48:25.053-04:002013-04-29T17:48:25.053-04:00Makes perfect sense. Thanks a bunch Randy :)
Fran...Makes perfect sense. Thanks a bunch Randy :)<br /><br />FrankAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-65779937051542546462013-04-29T17:29:02.932-04:002013-04-29T17:29:02.932-04:00Hello Frank, as I understand it, Frege is trying t...Hello Frank, as I understand it, Frege is trying to be precise, so that we can avoid committing ourselves to whatever it is of which we speak. That's why he would say "Martians do not exist" seems incoherent (that is, it would be like saying "There exist Martians, but the existing Martians do not exist"). I think it's important to understand that Frege's considerations more resemble philosophy of language than they do ontological properties. But surely even here, an actually-existing Martian adds to a concept, and thus distinguishes it. One criticism I would have of this kind of discussion is, according to what is written above, there would be no difference in properties between two identical Xs, X1 and X2, where X1 is fictional and X2 is not. But surely that is false, for we can say of X2, "X2 exists," whereas we cannot say that of X1.<br /><br />One last, brief comment. It may help to distinguish between types of existence, as Anselm does. This way, we can say, "Martians do not exist" and not thereby commit ourselves to existing non-existent Martians. When we mean "exist" for "Martians," we mean so conceptually. When we use "exist" for the negation, we mean that in the actually-existing sense. This distinction renders an incoherence charge as moot, for we just aren't using "exist" univocally. Randy Everisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06870605678781409126noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-6277873756865333552013-04-26T18:04:50.184-04:002013-04-26T18:04:50.184-04:00Heyllo Randy J
Perhaps you’d be so kind as to co...Heyllo Randy J <br /><br />Perhaps you’d be so kind as to comment on a criticism that’s been leveled against the notion that existence is a property. <br /><br /> “…it is necessary first to briefly summarize a notion of existence first introduced into modern logic by Gottlob Frege. Take a sentence like “cats exist.” At first glance this seems to predicate existence of a certain kind of object, namely cats. But Frege argued that this appearance is misleading. Existence, he claimed. Is not a predicate f objects (that is to say, a first level predicate),but rather a predicate of concepts ()that is to say, a second level predicate). In this case, it is being predicated of the concept ‘being a cat’. Hence, to reveal the logical structure of the sentence in question, we’d have to rewrite as saying something like “There is at least on x such that x is a cat.” This does not tell us that a certain object has the property of existence; rather it tells us that there is at least one thing falling under a certain concept. Thus, the sentence in question does not tell us something about individual cats, but rather about the concept of being a cat. <br /><br /> A standard argument for the view that this Fregean notion of existence is the only legitimate notion is that if existence were a first level predicate of objects, then (it is claimed) negative existential statements like “Martians do not exist” would be self contradictory, which they obviously are not. For if we think of this statement as saying tat Martians do not have the property pf existence, this would seem to entail that there are (I.e. there exist) certain creatures, namely Martians, who lack existence. Since that is absurd, the statement “Martians do not exist” cannot be interpreted as denying a property or attribute of existence to some object or objects. It should rather be interpreted in light of Frege’s doctrine of existence as saying something like “It is not the case that there is at least one x such that x is a Martian.” That is to say, it says o the concept ‘being a Martian’ that there is nothing to which it applies.”<br /><br />I apologize if this is off topic. Hope all is well with you. <br /><br />God bless, FrankAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-14762287808635120852013-04-26T13:24:37.604-04:002013-04-26T13:24:37.604-04:00Hello Frank! As I understand Aquinas, and divine s...Hello Frank! As I understand Aquinas, and divine simplicity, there just would be no difference between God's essence and existence, so that they are one and the same (at least as far as entailments are concerned, anyway). But I agree with the metaphor; existence is surely adding to the description of the object.Randy Everisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06870605678781409126noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1433428682510068517.post-40911794770601686682013-04-26T02:00:17.122-04:002013-04-26T02:00:17.122-04:00Randy, wouldn't Aquinas' distinction betwe...Randy, wouldn't Aquinas' distinction between essence and existence support the notion that existence is a property?<br /><br />If we were to say that in addition to being a bird that burns to ashes, out of which another arises, a Phoenix also exists, surely that'd being adding to the description.<br /><br />-Frank<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com