phi final

Anslem of Canterbury

man who thought that God is the greatest possible being

omnipotent

all powerful

omniescent

all knowing

omnibenevolent

wholly good

paradox of omnipotence

they are questions that cannot be answered satisfactorily either in the affirmative or in the negative

Thomas Aquinas

treated the paradox of omnipotence by saying that what you are asking should not have a contradiction within it. An example is God creating a triangle with 4 sides. We shouldn’t say that a 4 sided triangle is something that God cannot create but rather God can create anything and by thing, he means what is possible and can exist

Problems agaist Aquinas theory

His theories suggest that God’s abilities are limited (limited by the law of noncontradiction and limited to the creation of what is possible. However, if God’s powers are limited he is not omnipotent

Can God do the impossible?

Many say God can do the impossible, however, this shows that the impossible can be done. But then that would mean that the impossible is also possible

Problem of divine foreknowledge and human free will

if God knows what is going to happen in the future, it seems that none of our actions can be *free*.

Augustines fix to the problem

Although God knows what will happen, I still choose my own will, so my action will be done freely. Although God has foreknowledge he doesn’t force me to do so.

Is God free?

God always wants to do the right thing and will always choose what is right. But then would ’t that mean that God is bound to do the right thing, which would mean God is not free?

supernatural

all gods (including God) are nonphysical beings that are in some sense over and above the natural world and yet, in many cases, have the ability to affect it.

theism

the view that at least one supernatural god exists

atheism

the view that no gods exist.

Atheist and God

An atheist can accept the theist’s concept of God, however, the atheist believes that there is nothing that satisfies the concept (3 o’s)

Agnosticism

undecided between theism and atheism. in the absence of adequate proof showing either that gods exist or that gods do not exist, we ought to suspend judgment, neither believing nor disbelieving in the existence of God or gods.

cosmological argument/first-cause argument

God must exist because the only way to explain why there is a world at all is with the existence of an eternally powerful Creator. We all must come from something, so then that would mean something must have performed the original act to bring us into the creation. That first cause could not be a part of the world and must have been God

teleological argument/the argument from design

the world and everything in it shows evidence of being the product of intelligent design and creation, much as a car shows evidence of the existence of its designer.

false dichotomy

suggests that there are only two possible explanations for the existence of complex things in the world: chance or intelligent design. Other explanations are possible like *evolution, adaptation*, and *natural selection*.

intelligent design argument

*evolution, adaptation*, and *natural selection* are complex and serve a function, they, too, must be the result of intelligent design. God is complex and serves a function, so, if *everything* that is complex and has a function must have a designer, God must have had an intelligent designer, too. (cycle)

ontological argument

claims that God exists because if he did not exist, he would not be the most perfect being, and if he were not the most perfect being, then he would not be God.

theodicy

a description of divine policy that explains why, from God’s point of view, pain and suffering are necessary for the accomplishment of some greater good.

moral evil

pain and suffering that is caused by humans (murder and recreational torture)

natural evil

pain and suffering that is caused by nature (like harm done by hurricanes and pandemics).

Second criteria

the theodicy must do this in a way that makes the amount of pain and suffering more than compensated for by the good that results.

Third criteria

must show how that good could only be accomplished by that amount of pain and suffering (that is, the good could not have been achieved in some way that involved less pain and suffering).

Succesful theodicy

all moral and natural evil is necessary to achieve some greater good.

modified problem of evil

questions whether God must be wholly good, in other words, it questions whether the concept of God must include the property of omnibenevolence.

the free will defense

Good requires the existence of bad. (One cannot feel compassion unless someone is suffering; Good2 requires that humans have free will the power to choose compassion or hardness of heart; So, to get good, God must also create a world with at least some creatures with free will. However, once God gives those creatures (humans) free will, God leaves open the door that that free will is misused, resulting in bad. God values good so highly that God is willing to put up with bad and the possibility of bad to get it. That is why God chose to create this world, even with its flaws.

second theodicy--ultimate harmony defense.

Because of my limited knowledge, I cannot see how the suffering that occurs in the world fits into the overall scheme of things.

Aristotle

explained truth and falsity as “To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not, is true.” He defines it based on what we say

propositions

Statements that do propose that a certain idea is true or false

Aristotle take on truth

property of a proposition, truth is not appropriately applied to objects or events. So, for him, it is not appropriate to say that *heptapods* are *true* aliens, but it is appropriate to consider whether the proposition “heptapods are aliens” is true.

propositions are objectively true

true independent of the perceptions, biases, feelings, and opinions of thinking beings

subjective truths

A claim is subjectively true when it depends on what a person feels or perceives. Because two people can have different experiences of the same thing, and because beliefs and opinions can differ from person to person, it would seem that the same proposition could be true for one person but false for another.

simultaneously

all moments all at once.

How is a proposition true?

a proposition is true if it matches up with reality or what is in fact the case.

Bertrand Russell

a true belief matches up with what is in fact the case, and a false belief does not.

the correspondence theory of truth.

(1) a proposition or belief and (2) reality or facts. When (1) *corresponds* with (2), we have a true proposition or belief.

Cognitive objectivism

combines the thesis that the world is mind-independent and the correspondence theory of truth.

What does a cognitive objectivist say

what makes a proposition or a belief true is its relationship to a fact about the world.

mind-independent fact

its truth is (relevantly) independent of the existence and thoughts of minds. That is, it would be true even if nobody had thought of it.

Fatalism

the position that true propositions about the future are true now

William James

correspondence theorist is the intellectualist, James concludes that the correspondence theory cannot work because so many of our ideas fail to be exact copies of reality:

pragmatist theory of truth

an idea is *true* when it is practical., does not require “complete verification” that the idea matches up exactly with reality, we only need to show that the belief *works*:

cognitive relativist

truth is *relative*—relative to a person’s beliefs and, in particular, relative to a person’s *conceptual scheme*.

conceptual scheme

the set of concepts and rules that a person uses to shape and organize their thoughts and to process sensory information to form their system of beliefs.

coherence theory of truth

less radical forms of cognitive relativism; a belief is true when it *coheres* with the person’s conceptual scheme.

principle of noncontradiction

claim that *two contradictory statements cannot both be true*

relativism of rationality

there is no way to determine that any given conceptual scheme is better or worse than any other.

perspectivism

there are no objective truths because all we can have are perspectives of the world; yet, a conceptual scheme that allows one to thrive is better than one that doesn’t

postmodernist relativism

the mind-independent world is a myth, and there are no objective standards for determining the truth of any belief or for judging the adequacy of any conceptual scheme, so there are no objective truths

Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche’s version of cognitive relativism has come to be called perspectivism

relativism of logic,

laws of logic are merely social norms and do not reflect laws governing the mind-independent world; no such laws are objective

Protagoras

humans are the ultimate arbiter of what is true and what is false and perhaps, even, of what is rational and what is irrational.

skepticism

the view that we cannot know with certainty whether any proposition is true.

René Descartes

believed he had refuted skepticism; Descartes formulates the argument “I think; therefore, I exist”

theory of representative perceptions.

a perception is genuine if it is caused by and accurately represents the external object(s) that give rise to it.

Descartes’s problem

explains how a perceiver could get evidence that a current perception is caused by and accurately represents an external object.

David Hume

argued that not only can the existence of an external world be doubted, but even the existence of a centralized and continuous self can be doubted.;he argued that memory could not be trusted to provide us with certain information about our previous perceptions.

solipsism of the present moment

most radical form of skepticism. claim that all that can be known with certainty is the moment-by-moment perceptions and thoughts that flit by.