happydolphin said:
Existence: The property of an entity to be part of the set of all real things at any point or over the span of any points in the axis of time. Unless an intellignet observer can use its senses to show that an element is not part of the set of all real things according to its given senses, then any and every element can possibly be in the realm of real things. Anything that is not in the realm of real things does not exist in reality. |
Problem is, you also have to define what "real" means. The fundamental problem here, and it was also a problem in a previous thread, is that when people say God exists, they mean a different thing than when they say a physical thing exists. Just simply, God doesn't have pshyical existence. As you guys have discussed, the reason this characteristic is ascribed to God is to escape this causuality problem, primarily that all physical things need a casue. If God is non-physical, God doesn't need a cause and can therefore be ascribed necessity.
Essentially, the arguments (otological and cosmological) for God's existence depend on whether this idea for necessity is reasonable....its pretty easy to predict where someone stands on God's existence if you know which side of the debate they fall on in this issue....and belive me....this debate is still very much alive. : )
