Is "Why is there something rather than nothing?" a legitimate question?

[Leonhard]

Pity you never learned to read.

[Jedidiah]

?

That was aimed at Tassman.

[Jedidiah]

That was aimed at Tassman.

[Tassman]

That's not an assumption, its a conclusion.

I think we can know that God exists, and many of His properties, with all the certainty that's needed. You may think the conclusion is faulty, but it would disengenous to say that arguments aren't being advanced for it. At most you can say that those arguments don't work, but you can't pretend none exists.

That was aimed at Tassman.

Cryptic as usual; what "was aimed at Tassman"? Specify!

[robrecht]

As for “knowing” certain properties of God there are many Christians who disagree with you that such defined properties can exist, e.g. TWeb members such as robrecht and others adopt ‘apophatic theology’ as the only possible approach to God – i.e. the belief that God can be known to humans only in terms of what He is not.

This is not an accurate description. I certainly do not deny the existence of various properties of God that people try to define; rather I merely question the adequacy of the definitions to fully comprehend the reality. I certainly do not consider apophatic theology to be the only possible approach to God. It is only one part of a dialectic, or intellectual method, whereas God is, in my humble opinion, best known, through respectful love and service of othes, especially the poor.

[Tassman]

This is not an accurate description. I certainly do not deny the existence of various properties of God that people try to define; rather I merely question the adequacy of the definitions to fully comprehend the reality. I certainly do not consider apophatic theology to be the only possible approach to God. It is only one part of a dialectic, or intellectual method, whereas God is, in my humble opinion, best known, through respectful love and service of othes, especially the poor.

Perhaps I overstated your position. I was responding directly to Leonhard’s comment in #68: “we can know that God exists, and many of His properties, with all the certainty that's needed”. I referred to the ‘apophatic’ position, which you favour, as a counter to such universal certainty among some theists.

[Leonhard]

Nonsense! The existence of a deity is in itself an assumption.

I'm not sure I follow your train of logic here.

Tassman: "Theists assume that God exists!"
Theist: "No, we don't, we can show that He exists. *proceeds to list arguments*"
Tassman: "Nonsense! The existence of a deity is in itself an assumption."

Okay Tassman, where did I "assume" that God existed?

The only possible arguments for such an entity exiting are metaphysical arguments, which given that the premises for such arguments can’t be shown to be true then neither can the conclusions be shown to be true.

Which premises can't be shown to be true? That's a very interesting claim, but I need to know more specifically what claims you're talking about.

[robrecht]

Apophatic theology is not about relativizing certainty, but rather acknowledging our human limitations to know or describe the divine adequately. The intellectual way of negation can sound very similar to language of doubt, more properly of denial, but, generally speaking, I think apophatic theology is to be engaged by those who have more or stronger faith rather than by those who fear it. From a spiritual perspective, it is certainly true that the via negativa or a dark night of the soul may sometimes be accompanied by profound doubt, but this also frequently produces a more profound certitude of love. But that is more a matter of personal spirituality, which has indeed sometimes been called 'mystical theology' in the tradition. Generally speaking, apophatic theology is more a matter of fundamental theological method. Some of this may all sound like gobblety gook to you, or cognitive dissonance confirming belief, but ultimately everything is known by its fruits.

[Tassman]

Apophatic theology is not about relativizing certainty, but rather acknowledging our human limitations to know or describe the divine adequately.

The intellectual way of negation can sound very similar to language of doubt, more properly of denial, but, generally speaking, I think apophatic theology is to be engaged by those who have more or stronger faith rather than by those who fear it. From a spiritual perspective, it is certainly true that the via negativa or a dark night of the soul may sometimes be accompanied by profound doubt, but this also frequently produces a more profound certitude of love. But that is more a matter of personal spirituality, which has indeed sometimes been called 'mystical theology' in the tradition. Generally speaking, apophatic theology is more a matter of fundamental theological method. Some of this may all sound like gobblety gook to you, or cognitive dissonance confirming belief, but ultimately everything is known by its fruits.

[Kelp(p)]

For whatever reason the person is a theist in the first place? Perhaps they buy one of the philosophical arguments for the existence of God or they believe that there is good historical evidence for the Resurrection of Christ. Apophatic theology can come later as a way of thinking about the God that you've decided exists for other reasons.

[robrecht]

But why does one assume that the “divine” exists in the first place, especially when Apophatic theology is unwilling to ascribe definite properties to such a concept?

Thank you for such a detailed answer and I understand the difficulty in categorizing the properties of an ineffable entity but again, why does one assume that a “divine”, “ineffable” entity such as God exists in the first place?

That's a very good question. For me, it seems to be a kind of intuition, fed primarily by the example of love and service of others in the church, especially the experience of social ministry with the poor, and profound experiences in prayer, especially in the celebration of the Eucharist, that leave me with a subjective certitude that seems to run very deep. Again, I don't think that apophatic theology is unwilling to ascribe properties to God, but it is not content with overly conceptual definitions that do not seem capable of capturing the depth of experience and certainly cannot capture the divine reality itself, of which our experience is just a taste or poor reflection.

[Tassman]

I'm not sure I follow your train of logic here.

Tassman: "Theists assume that God exists!"
Theist: "No, we don't, we can show that He exists. *proceeds to list arguments*"
Tassman: "Nonsense! The existence of a deity is in itself an assumption."

Okay Tassman, where did I "assume" that God existed?

Which premises can't be shown to be true? That's a very interesting claim, but I need to know more specifically what claims you're talking about.

[Leonhard]

Why is it a strawman, do you acknowledge that theists in general don't assume that God exists?

And it followed the posts you wrote yourself. First you stated it was an assumption, then I mentioned arguments (saying you were being unfair), then you more or less repeated the argument.

Examples please.

Humanity has now devised a more effective means for acquiring factual knowledge than philosophy, namely scientific methodology. So why, when there's so much data and emerging science in areas like neurobiology, sociobiology, human psychology, emergence, evolution and standard biology, physics, etc. that actually can and will provide real answers, would one care about the speculative, unverified guesswork of philosophy?

You do realise that you're engaging in a philosophical argument here, arguing for the position of scientism?

[Tassman]

Why is it a strawman, do you acknowledge that theists in general don't assume that God exists?

And it followed the posts you wrote yourself. First you stated it was an assumption, then I mentioned arguments (saying you were being unfair), then you more or less repeated the argument.

Examples please.

"without proof or demonstration", i.e. cannot be shown to be true? If an argument has a premise which can be empirically tested and potentially verified then it is by definition science, not metaphysics.

You do realise that you're engaging in a philosophical argument here, arguing for the position of scientism?

[Tassman]

That's a very good question. For me, it seems to be a kind of intuition, fed primarily by the example of love and service of others in the church, especially the experience of social ministry with the poor, and profound experiences in prayer, especially in the celebration of the Eucharist, that leave me with a subjective certitude that seems to run very deep. Again, I don't think that apophatic theology is unwilling to ascribe properties to God, but it is not content with overly conceptual definitions that do not seem capable of capturing the depth of experience and certainly cannot capture the divine reality itself, of which our experience is just a taste or poor reflection.