Could God Exist, And Not Exist Too?

Typist said:

Ok then, so how much does a cubic foot of space weigh?

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In physics there are also socalled imaginary numbers. These numbers have the positive and negative value at the same time. Time is such a thing. As to demonstrate that there are things in the universe with a dual nature.

Space or vacuum generally refers to the universe as a whole, so as for example the superposition of a photon will collapse when it interacts with the vacuum.

The Sum of Awe said:

Hmm.

It might be beyond human comprehension, but I don't see it being mathematically possible. X = not x.

But supposedly he isn't limited to logic, so it's pointless to try to rationalize it

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The problem there is that, as I mentioned above, existence isn't a mathematically simple variable. It's a subjective designator. There's no way to objectively define existence, so it can't be reduced to simple math or formal logic.

It's like saying that something can't be both good and not good. Well, yes it can. And everybody knows it.

In fact, the reason we had to invent formal logic and mathematics is because the semantics of natural language aren't so clean and tidy.

My understanding is that deities are always on the eye of the beholder, so sure, they do both exist and fail to.

Vishvavajra said:

In fact, the reason we had to invent formal logic and mathematics is because the semantics of natural language aren't so clean and tidy.

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Yes, the weakness of natural language, formal logic and mathematics are essentially symptoms of the deeper problem, the inherently divisive nature of thought.

Imagine that we all put on pink tinted sunglasses. In this example case, everything we then looked at in all of reality would appear to be pink colored. But the apparent pinkness isn't a property of reality of course, but a property of the tool we are using to observe reality, pink tinted sunglasses.

That's the situation with thought, the information medium we use to observe reality, form theories, come to conclusions etc. Thought is inherently divisive in nature (sometimes called "dualistic"), and so everywhere we look we see apparent division. And so we ask division based questions like "does God exist, yes or no?" That is, we attempt to divide existence from non-existence.

What the space example hopefully illustrates is that we are attempting to impose thought generated divisions upon a reality that is really one thing. Space, the vast majority of reality, contains both existence and non-existence, one thing not two. Space defies our thought generated desire to divide reality in to separate conceptual objects which go in tidy little boxes.

The division distortion we introduce in to our observations of reality is very understandable, because we aren't just using thought as a tool, we ourselves are thought. The notion that "I" am "using thought" is just another division flavored illusion. There aren't two things, "I" and "thought". There is just one thing, thought.

Most of philosophy focuses on the content of thought, this ideology vs. that ideology etc. It's probably wiser to focus on the nature of thought, because if we don't understand that, then we won't see the distortions being introduced in to language and the content of thought.

Ha, ha! This is funny. As I went to submit this post, my Spotify music stopped. So I walked over to the music computer and randomly clicked on a song in the playlist. And then I did a double take, as the name of the song I chose at random was, and I'm not making this up....

"Just A Thought"

Typist said:

All flavors of logic we might discuss are human inventions. And humans are a half insane species with thousands of hair trigger nukes aimed down our own throats, an imminent extinction event we rarely find interesting enough to discuss, a species only recently living in caves, a single species on one little planet in one of billions of galaxies etc. It's folly to assume that any rules invented or discovered by such a species would be binding on all of reality, a realm we can't even define.

We can observe how space violates our rules. We can observe how we typically don't notice that space violates our common sense and rules, even though space is the dominant property of reality at every scale.

We can observe how even most of the leading scientists and religious leaders seem to share our assumption that there are only two possible answers to the "does God exist?" question. We can observe how accumulating decades of expert authority does not automatically cure us of the illusion. We can observe how the "does God exist?" debate goes on fervently for endless centuries, largely blissfully unaware of a possible third answer to this classically dualistic question.

We can observe how that even once we see that even the dominant property of reality can both exist and not exist, we will likely discard this observation so we can get back to the comfortable routine of arguing over whether god exists or not, because we enjoy that game and have memorized all the various arguments on every side.

We can observe how much something that doesn't exist has to teach us.

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While I enjoy the sentiment of this post, this does not change that your space analogy does not in fact violate the law of non contradiction but is rather just an equivocation of the word exist.

The ancient Epicureans insisted that space existed, i.e. that it satisfied all the Parmenidean criteria for existence. It's not a solid thing, but who says only solid material things can be said to exist? Even strict materialists don't go that far.

And weight is a relative phenomenon dependent on gravity, not an inherent quality of anything. Nothing weighs anything absolutely.

Yes!! We Baha'is (and some Muslims) have this view. We view the qualities of "Exists"/"Not-Exists" as qualities of created things. Thus, neither term can apply to the Uncreated God.

In our model of cosmology, God's essence resides in the realm of Háhút, where God's essence resides in an unmanifested state. The names and attributes of God are only manifested in lower realms, meaning essentially God is beyond all attributes, including his own.

We had a discussion on this over in a Baha'i forum recently, on how God technically is neither existent nor non-existent, though admittedly many members of that forum simply gave up stating that the concept was too deep or confusing for them to want to think on.

Typist said:

Ok then, so how much does a cubic foot of space weigh?

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The cubic foot of "space" (which I assume in this theoretical discussion is a pure, empty vacuum (which much of what we view as "space" is not)) has no weight nor mass. But by your definitions it has Height, Width, and Depth. So it has qualities/dimensions, and if a thing has qualities one might say it "exists", correct??

Paul Tillich's thoughts on the subject are relevant here, I believe. He argued that traditional theistic theology, which conceives of God as a being, is hopelessly flawed and a cause of much alienation for modern people. A being—even one much greater and more powerful than us—cannot be the source of being. If, on the other hand, God is understood to represent being itself, then God precedes all dualities, including existence and nonexistence (which isn't the same as non-being, as it is still predicated on being).

Of course, that would mean that traditional conceptions of God would have to be understood as at best metaphorical, not ultimately true. Tillich's view of God is personal in the sense that we are personal manifestations of God's being, but not in the sense that God is a person separate from us, whom we can know or interact with in a conventional subject-object relationship.

I must say I agree with Tillich on pretty much all counts. I've long believed that questions of God's existence or nonexistence were an utter waste of time.

Vishvavajra said:

The problem there is that, as I mentioned above, existence isn't a mathematically simple variable. It's a subjective designator. There's no way to objectively define existence, so it can't be reduced to simple math or formal logic.

It's like saying that something can't be both good and not good. Well, yes it can. And everybody knows it.

In fact, the reason we had to invent formal logic and mathematics is because the semantics of natural language aren't so clean and tidy.

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Interesting take. I never thought of it like that.

Something can be both good and not good because good is a spectrum and not an absolute. I'm open to the possibility that existence could be the same way, but from my POV limited by the flesh I don't see it. The world isn't black and white, but some things are, and I can't help but see existence as one of those things (again open to possibility of being wrong). From all experience so far, I can only imagine existence as a one way thing. where something either exists or it doesn't, because existence is a very defined thing, and good is a spectrum and has various values that overlap. Existence is a property as definitive as on and off, something cannot be ON and at the same time be OFF, only one or the other. Similarly, a specific, individual book cannot have 100 pages and 101 pages simultaneously, which would be possible if something could simultaneously exist and not exist. If the last page both exists and not exists, a book could have 100 an 101 pages at the same time. And my bowl at the moment could have 20 and 21 pieces of cereal in it at the same time

Vishvavajra said:

Paul Tillich's thoughts on the subject are relevant here, I believe. He argued that traditional theistic theology, which conceives of God as a being, is hopelessly flawed and a cause of much alienation for modern people. A being—even one much greater and more powerful than us—cannot be the source of being. If, on the other hand, God is understood to represent being itself, then God precedes all dualities, including existence and nonexistence (which isn't the same as non-being, as it is still predicated on being).

Of course, that would mean that traditional conceptions of God would have to be understood as at best metaphorical, not ultimately true. Tillich's view of God is personal in the sense that we are personal manifestations of God's being, but not in the sense that God is a person separate from us, whom we can know or interact with in a conventional subject-object relationship.

I must say I agree with Tillich on pretty much all counts. I've long believed that questions of God's existence or nonexistence were an utter waste of time.

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I think you know this and have said it elsewhere, but just to reiterate the point: Tillich didn't make this point of view up either, it actually reflects a fairly ancient stream of Christian thought, exemplified probably in the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius. It seems important to me just insofar as, from a Christian perspective, it's not as if one has to abandon the entire tradition to arrive at a less problematic theology. It's been there the whole time.

well named said:

I think you know this and have said it elsewhere, but just to reiterate the point: Tillich didn't make this point of view up either, it actually reflects a fairly ancient stream of Christian thought, exemplified probably in the writings of Pseudo-Dionysius. It seems important to me just insofar as, from a Christian perspective, it's not as if one has to abandon the entire tradition to arrive at a less problematic theology. It's been there the whole time.

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Yes, quite right. In fact, one can argue that the bad theology comes from people being too literal-minded and misunderstanding the original message.

The Orthodox appreciation for apophatic theology is, I think, an example of Tillich's principles in practice, and it was a thing long before he treated it in terms familiar to modern philosophy.

The Sum of Awe said:

Interesting take. I never thought of it like that.

Something can be both good and not good because good is a spectrum and not an absolute. I'm open to the possibility that existence could be the same way, but from my POV limited by the flesh I don't see it. The world isn't black and white, but some things are, and I can't help but see existence as one of those things (again open to possibility of being wrong). From all experience so far, I can only imagine existence as a one way thing. where something either exists or it doesn't, because existence is a very defined thing, and good is a spectrum and has various values that overlap. Existence is a property as definitive as on and off, something cannot be ON and at the same time be OFF, only one or the other. Similarly, a specific, individual book cannot have 100 pages and 101 pages simultaneously, which would be possible if something could simultaneously exist and not exist. If the last page both exists and not exists, a book could have 100 an 101 pages at the same time. And my bowl at the moment could have 20 and 21 pieces of cereal in it at the same time

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If existence is "a very defined thing," then you shouldn't have any trouble defining it for us in a way that will hold up on analysis. I look forward to it, as that would make you the first in history to succeed at that challenge, and all of us would have the honor of saying we were there when it happened.

Vishvavajra said:

If existence is "a very defined thing," then you shouldn't have any trouble defining it for us in a way that will hold up on analysis. I look forward to it, as that would make you the first in history to succeed at that challenge, and all of us would have the honor of saying we were there when it happened.

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What I meant was that existence is a two sided coin, at least from human perspective. There isn't a possible way for a thing that upholds existence to at the same time not uphold existence.

Existence would be presented as 1. Lack of existence would be 0.

X cannot equal 0 and at the same time equal 1.

The Sum of Awe said:

What I meant was that existence is a two sided coin, at least from human perspective. There isn't a possible way for a thing that upholds existence to at the same time not uphold existence.

Existence would be presented as 1. Lack of existence would be 0.

X cannot equal 0 and at the same time equal 1.

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As said, imaginary numbers are both positive and negative at the same time. And time can be decribed using an imaginary number, so that is pretty real.

The Sum of Awe said:

What I meant was that existence is a two sided coin, at least from human perspective. There isn't a possible way for a thing that upholds existence to at the same time not uphold existence.

Existence would be presented as 1. Lack of existence would be 0.

X cannot equal 0 and at the same time equal 1.

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Keeping to the rules of formal logic, this is true. Any axiom must be either True or False. If you make a standard for "Exists" then everything either "Exists" or does "Not-Exist".

The question, though, is what is your standard for "Exists"?? And what is the evidence this standard is correct??

Without a meaningful standard on "Exists", then we may question whether the "Exists"/"Not-Exists" quality is even a thing to begin with.

And then we're completely lost if the thing we're discussing lies outside of formal logic entirely. Everything goes quantum, and X can = 0 at the same time X = 1.

Mohammad Nur Syamsu said:

As said, imaginary numbers are both positive and negative at the same time. And time can be decribed using an imaginary number, so that is pretty real.

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i is technically neither negative nor positive, much like 0. I get your point though, and "neither positive nor negative" is not that dissimilar to "positive and negative at the same time"

Salek Atesh said:

The cubic foot of "space" (which I assume in this theoretical discussion is a pure, empty vacuum (which much of what we view as "space" is not)) has no weight nor mass.

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Yes, space has no weight or mass, and thus can be said to not exist.

Salek Atesh said:

But by your definitions it has Height, Width, and Depth. So it has qualities/dimensions, and if a thing has qualities one might say it "exists", correct??

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Yes, space can be said to have dimension, and thus can be said to exist.

Thus we see that the vast majority of reality can not be placed in to either a neat and tidy box labeled "exists" nor a box labeled "does not exist". Our minds earnestly seek a simple dualistic yes/no type answer, but space ie. most of reality, declines to comply with our demand.

The point of this exercise is less about space, and more about the mind with which we observe space and everything else.

I placed this thread in the Theology section (and not the Science section) in the hopes of inspiring a discussion which might move beyond debating the content of thought (this theology vs. that theology) to an investigation of the nature of thought, that which all theologians and theologies (and anti-theologies) are made of.

This is a movement away from the periphery of theological issues more towards the center, away from what divides theologies and more towards what they all have in common.

Here's an example of that process.

We might observe that, as far as I know, every ideology ever invented has divided in to sub-factions. This seems true of both religious and secular ideologies.

If this sub-division process only happened in some ideologies, we could reason that the division process was a function of those ideologies, ie the content of those particular thoughts.

But if it is true that all ideologies divide in to sub-factions, then it seems we need to look deeper than the content of particular thoughts, to the nature of thought itself, that which all ideologues and ideologies are made of, that which all ideologies have in common.

If it is true that thought is inherently divisive in nature, it then makes perfect sense why every ideology would divide in to sub-factions. After all, they're all made of thought, proposed to be an inherently divisive medium.

I am proposing that all theology and anti-theology arises from a central fact of the human condition. We are attempting to observe a single unified reality through the lens of an inherently divisive medium, like in the space example.

Or to put it more precisely, we the observer are that inherently divisive medium.

Shad said:

This view violates the law of noncontradiction. Something can not exist and not exist as these are mutually exclusive views.

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Something like you cannot paint without a canvas. ;0)

The Sum of Awe said:

What I meant was that existence is a two sided coin, at least from human perspective. There isn't a possible way for a thing that upholds existence to at the same time not uphold existence.

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Salek Atesh said:

Keeping to the rules of formal logic, this is true. Any axiom must be either True or False. If you make a standard for "Exists" then everything either "Exists" or does "Not-Exist".

The question, though, is what is your standard for "Exists"?? And what is the evidence this standard is correct??

Without a meaningful standard on "Exists", then we may question whether the "Exists"/"Not-Exists" quality is even a thing to begin with.

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I think we can understand "existing" but defining it is a problem. In the same way as trying to explain color to a deaf man. This is because reasoning is tied to existence itself, we can't leave existence and observe from that point of view, it's contradicting, if there was observation, it wouldn't be nonexistence. So we must conceptualize "exist" from within existence.

Another reason would be, it's a unique quality itself. There is no opposite, if you think about it, because non-existence (obviously) does not exist. So we're stuck with this word, and it's near impossible to define it, because there is nothing in relation to compare it to.

And then we're completely lost if the thing we're discussing lies outside of formal logic entirely. Everything goes quantum, and X can = 0 at the same time X = 1.

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Indeed, the quantum level is very, very odd. But unless God is quantum, he wouldn't be able to be a "seemingly" chaotic existence, that is a property for only the quantum. Besides, quantum models are very young yet. It was only recently that we could start testing quite a bit of these theories, anda lot have been proven. But consider how much we haven't explored. It seems likely to me that on the quantum scale things are still under causality, but not the same as our causality.