Gary, List: Indeed, that is my overall argument in a nutshell. Peirce basically reiterates the "candle on top" quotation in his Logic Notebook entry of 1908 Aug 28 that I have been citing repeatedly--God as *Ens necessarium* is the "rational explanation" for "the co-reality of the three universes" that "logic requires."
On the point that is still a little hazy, the nominal definition of God as *Ens necessarium* entails that if God is *possibly *real, then God is *necessarily *real, and therefore *actually *real. In other words, if God is real in *any *possible world, then God is real in *every *possible world, including the *actual *world. Since this is a conditional proposition, the truth of the consequent is not established unless the truth of the antecedent is established. Leibniz (and Gödel) tried to do this on ontological and *a priori* grounds, but ultimately he (and Peirce) settled instead on a cosmological and *a posteriori* approach--if God were *not *possibly real, then *nothing *would be possibly real; but something obviously *is *possibly real, since our entire universe is *actually *real; therefore (by *modus tollens*), God is possibly real. Here is Leibniz's own summary of this, where "Being-from-itself" is another name for *Ens necessarium*. GWL: [The ontological argument] appears to have some solidity, and those who will have it that from notions, ideas, definitions, or possible essences alone one can never infer actual existence fall back into ... denying the possibility of the Being-from-itself. But note well, this oblique approach itself serves to make known that they are wrong, and ultimately fills the hole in the demonstration. For if the *Being-from-itself* is impossible, all the beings-by-another are too, for they are, ultimately, only by the *Being-from-itself*; thus nothing would be able to exist. This reasoning leads us to another important modal proposition, equal to the previous one, which together with it completes the demonstration. It can be expressed thus: *if the necessary Being is not, there is no possible Being*. (1701) Regards, Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt On Tue, Oct 29, 2024 at 4:38 PM Gary Richmond <[email protected]> wrote: > Jon, List,you > > Jon, when you first mentioned that you were studying Anselm's ontological > argument, I wondered if you weren't going to plunge us into some long, > intricate foray into Medieval scholasticism. You have, of course, done > nothing of the sort. > > Regarding today's post you wrote: "I recognize that some of this is > repetitive from my previous posts, but I hope that it is helpful by showing > how some of the different pieces fit together." > > It is indeed extremely helpful and, well, for me the frosting on the cake > of your persuasive Peircean argument for *Ens Necessarium*. OK, so there > is a candle on top of the frosting on your argumentative cake being this > quotation: > > CSP: To explain anything is to show it to be a necessary consequence. To > say that the total real is a consequence of utter nothing without substance > or appearance is absurd. The only alternative is to suppose a necessary > something whose mode of being transcends reality. > > > At the risk of simply rephrasing what you wrote, I'd like to try to > summarize your argumentation to see if I have finally fully understood it. > If I have, I hope my summary too will be helpful in List members fully > grasping your argumentation. > > For me, it ultimately proved very helpful that you developed your > argumentation through the ontological arguments of Anselm and Leibniz, > Anselm proposing that if God can be conceived as "that than which nothing > greater can be thought" then God’s existence is *logically possible*. > However, this logical possibility alone does not establish that God's being > is metaphysically possible (let alone necessary). > > So Leibniz reasons that God’s reality needs to be shown as *metaphysically > possible*, and if this can be demonstrated, then God’s reality would > follow as necessary by modal necessity (I'm a little hazy on that point, so > that a bit of clarification would be helpful). Purely logical arguments > being insufficient to confirm metaphysical necessity, Liebniz ultimately > invokes the PSR to argue *cosmologically* for God’s necessity. > > Peirce goes even further in arguing that the totality of existence by mere > chance or brute fact is absurd. The only alternative is a p*rinciple > governing all phenomena, *one whose mode of being transcends even the > three categories and three Universes of phenomena, and this is, of course, > *Ens > Necessarium*. So, God, as *Ens Necessarium*, is shown to be not only > logically conceivable but metaphysically necessary. And if God’s being is > metaphysically necessary it is as well necessarily *real*, for it alone > can explain the "co-realit\y" and interdependence of all three universes > without the (irrational) acceptance of unexplained facts (I think I should > have included more quotations above). > > Please let me know if this 'gets it' in a nutshell, so to speak. > > Finally, as you wrote: > > JAS: God's mode of being is utterly unique, the three universes encompass > "all the phenomena there are," but God is *not *a phenomenon; rather, God > is "the Principle of all Phenomena ... the author and creator of all that > could ever be observed of Ideas, Occurrences, or *Logoi*" (R 339:[295r]). > > QED > > Thanks, > > Gary R >
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