Can any thing be infinite

[Audie]

Squible is quite right, chinadoll. He and I are talking about philosophical principles, which are completely unrelated (at least at this juncture) to questions of exegesis and historiography. A person's stance on the extent of the flood--or for that matter on any biblical principle--really has nothing to do with whether or not that same person is or can be a good philosopher or scientist or accountant or any other profession. To take but one silly example, did you know that the inventor of the first magnetic resonance scanning machine--the thing that does MRIs . . . a pretty important invention!--was a young earth creationist? (His name was Raymond Vahan Damadian, if you are curious.) He believed the earth is 6000 years old, believed Noah's flood was global, etc. Did his beliefs on such matters in any way affect his ability to do science properly? Of course not. And so it is in matters of philosophy.

As a matter of fact, I think that if you were to do the work that you were recommended when you first arrived here by me and Byblos, and now implicitly by Squible, you would find that you would have no argument whatsoever against them. All that you would have to do would be to understand the terms. That sounds easy. It isn't, sadly. But such is the case with any science. But once you know the terms, things are incredibly self-evident, such that you would clearly see that to deny the existence of God is literally on the same level as to insist that triangles have four sides, that one and one make three, that a married man is a bachelor, or that something that has absolutely no kind of existence is capable of doing anything at all.

Thanks jac, this deserves a better response than I can give it now.

[Jac3510]

Jac,

I must say once I started on the journey on scholasticism and I wrapped my mind around hiacrhcial ordering in particular I lifted my hand in front of my eyes and went woohoah!

Right now I am sitting on my back landing, we have a lot of trees and just watching the wind rustle through the leaves and with the view I hold to now it simply blows me away. I just cannot see the world like I use to. If I ever had an anthropomorphic view of God prior I can confidently say it no longer is the case now.

Interestingly I have found that on many points I intuitively held to without realising it. Mind you I wasn't able to articulate it as well prior.

I encourage anyone to investigate classical theism / scholasticism. It's sad to see what happened in history with this position but it is also great to see it having a resurgence too.. It's certainly long overdue.

Just thought I would share that..

Cheers.

And thanks for sharing.

It is amazing when it suddenly clicks just what God is (or, perhaps, when it clicks what God is not . . .). I've often thought about Sagan's garage dragon at this point. Far from being clever, it really does show how they haven't grappled with the most fundamental idea about God as He has been described in classical theism for over two thousand years. And so related is the silly "one god further" objection. All of them see God as one being next to many.

It's hard to blame them, though, when so many Christians--and evangelicals in particular--hold the same essential view of God. That God is just one being among many, albeit and incredibly powerful being. So I suppose atheists come by their skepticism honestly. They're hardly stupid people, and they've applied critical enough reasoning processes to realize that such conceptions of "god" are either entirely superfluous or else downright self-contradictory. But that's one of the reasons I'm as interested in the subject as I am. I'm young enough to be idealistic enough to think that maybe I can play some small role in the revitalization of classical theism among evangelicals. Then maybe we can all have the same type of experiences on a regular basis that you describe here!

[Squible]

Jac,

I agree with you for the most part...

Over the years I have had a number of good discussions which were charitable intellectual and challenging. I have found great respect with them. However I have had bad experiences too, some highly critical of theists to the point of ridicule and the belief that atheism only has the mantle of reason. To be honest we theists can be accused of such things too, I boil it down to the nature of mankind.

What I have concluded so far in general (on the intellectual front) is that the metaphysical presuppositions are what's clearly different. This forms a scaffolding if you will. What I have also found is only a handful want to admit this and discuss on these grounds.

Interestingly and recently I have found Cs Lewis' pilgrims regress rather enlightening on another front as well, in that he uses an allegory where a jail and jailer represent the spirit of the age and how one can be trapped within that. The jailer is essentially telling you what to think. Basically it's saying how many can't escape their own thinking especially where society (or let's say secularisation) has or is trying to impress upon you. Education systems come to mind here .. I actually can relate to that allegory quite deeply. It took a deep interest in philosophy to be able to understand that and escape it as such. Sadly I see this allegory played out with so many people on many topics. With that I am now endeavouring to remember this allegory especially when talking with others.

Cheers

[Squible]

Audie,

On further thought. I am wondering if I took your question the wrong way?

I think it is extraordinarily difficult to get context especially when you don't know the other person all that well and even more so in text where inflection can make a huge difference

Cheers

[Proinsias]

As a matter of fact, I think that if you were to do the work that you were recommended when you first arrived here by me and Byblos, and now implicitly by Squible, you would find that you would have no argument whatsoever against them. All that you would have to do would be to understand the terms. That sounds easy. It isn't, sadly. But such is the case with any science. But once you know the terms, things are incredibly self-evident, such that you would clearly see that to deny the existence of God is literally on the same level as to insist that triangles have four sides, that one and one make three, that a married man is a bachelor, or that something that has absolutely no kind of existence is capable of doing anything at all.

This thead has coincided with a request from the in-laws for Christmas present suggestions, preferbaly on Amazon, I've asked for two of Feser's books that I could find on Amazon UK: The introduction to Aquinas & Philosophy of Mind. So hopefully I'll have a better handle on things over the coming months.

I'm curious about the building blocks for that sort of worldview but from my minimal exploration of the topic it seems to me just another way of looking at things. I'm struggling to get over the Buddha's idea of it not really being an important question. I enjoy this stuff as much as I enjoy sharpening steel, it's all chasing the infinite, but I'm yet to be convinced that it matters. Like any hobby you get out what you put in.

[Squible]

Another book I would recommend is scholastic metaphysics a contemporary introduction by Edward Feser, I believe it compliments his other books especially Aquinas and would provide a solid foundation. After that you may find also find Oderberg quite interesting as well but his work gets deeper into neo-Aristotelian metaphysics.

As to it mattering it depends on each individual.

Philosophy of mind is very interesting and personally I beleive this definitely matters. If certain materialist conceptions in this field have their way it could have profound implications. For example it can flow on to the freewill debate.

Ravi Zacharias has some great books with regard to imaginary conversations between Christ and various important people like Buddha. He thoroughly researches and uses the imaginary conversation as a mechanism to convey key points well. In The Lotus and The Cross he spent significant time understanding Buddhist thought. These books are actually quite revealing. In fact Ravi has quite a number of books which are rather interesting.

[Audie]

Audie,

On further thought. I am wondering if I took your question the wrong way?

I think it is extraordinarily difficult to get context especially when you don't know the other person all that well and even more so in text where inflection can make a huge difference

Cheers

Thanks squib, I dont know that I necessarily make it easy for someone to know me.
And yes, the whole context for how I think is not going to be at all like yours.

Sorry I dont really have time for this, I've bitten off more than I can chew. I rank you among some very worthwhile people here whose ideas I'd like to know better.

M

[Proinsias]

Another book I would recommend is scholastic metaphysics a contemporary introduction by Edward Feser, I believe it compliments his other books especially Aquinas and would provide a solid foundation. After that you may find also find Oderberg quite interesting as well but his work gets deeper into neo-Aristotelian metaphysics.

As to it mattering it depends on each individual.

Philosophy of mind is very interesting and personally I beleive this definitely matters. If certain materialist conceptions in this field have their way it could have profound implications. For example it can flow on to the freewill debate.

Ravi Zacharias has some great books with regard to imaginary conversations between Christ and various important people like Buddha. He thoroughly researches and uses the imaginary conversation as a mechanism to convey key points well. In The Lotus and The Cross he spent significant time understanding Buddhist thought. These books are actually quite revealing. In fact Ravi has quite a number of books which are rather interesting.

I was looking at Scholastic Metaphysics but it's a little expensive, I'll see how I get on with the intro to Aquinas first of all. I'm not a fan of Ravi. I read Jesus among other Gods & Jesus Talks with Krishna a few years ago and found them pretty poor, little more than building up quick caricatures of other religions to have Jesus swiftly knock them down.

[Squible]

Another book I would recommend is scholastic metaphysics a contemporary introduction by Edward Feser, I believe it compliments his other books especially Aquinas and would provide a solid foundation. After that you may find also find Oderberg quite interesting as well but his work gets deeper into neo-Aristotelian metaphysics.

As to it mattering it depends on each individual.

Philosophy of mind is very interesting and personally I beleive this definitely matters. If certain materialist conceptions in this field have their way it could have profound implications. For example it can flow on to the freewill debate.

Ravi Zacharias has some great books with regard to imaginary conversations between Christ and various important people like Buddha. He thoroughly researches and uses the imaginary conversation as a mechanism to convey key points well. In The Lotus and The Cross he spent significant time understanding Buddhist thought. These books are actually quite revealing. In fact Ravi has quite a number of books which are rather interesting.

I was looking at Scholastic Metaphysics but it's a little expensive, I'll see how I get on with the intro to Aquinas first of all. I'm not a fan of Ravi. I read Jesus among other Gods & Jesus Talks with Krishna a few years ago and found them pretty poor, little more than building up quick caricatures of other religions to have Jesus swiftly knock them down.

I think to be fair Ravi is attempting to address a broad audience. However, I can understand where you are coming from.

[Squible]

Audie,

On further thought. I am wondering if I took your question the wrong way?

I think it is extraordinarily difficult to get context especially when you don't know the other person all that well and even more so in text where inflection can make a huge difference

Cheers

Thanks squib, I dont know that I necessarily make it easy for someone to know me.
And yes, the whole context for how I think is not going to be at all like yours.

Sorry I dont really have time for this, I've bitten off more than I can chew. I rank you among some very worthwhile people here whose ideas I'd like to know better.

M

No worries!