Mere Christianity: logical reasoning

by Rex B13 25 Replies latest jw friends

  • D wiltshire
    D wiltshire

    Seeker,

    To me the fact that any living thing can know anything at all is one of the things that make me beleive their is a God.
    Mind you that is not the only thing.

    If someone lived a trillion X longer than you, and had a billion X more reasoning ability would he come to the same conclusions as you?
  • SixofNine
    SixofNine
    Men have differed as to whether you should have one wife or four. But they have always agreed that you must not simply have any woman you liked

    Sorry, just wanted to quote that again to point out how incredibly stupid it is.

  • ashitaka
    ashitaka

    Rex, I've read Mere Christianity, and think it is full of common sense. I really enjoy it.

    ashi

  • Seeker
    Seeker
    Seeker,

    To me the fact that any living thing can know anything at all is one of the things that make me beleive their is a God.

    I don't understand that at all. Knowledge = God exists? Can you elaborate, please?

  • D wiltshire
    D wiltshire

    Seeker,
    I will try but it's not easy.
    Conscious life, life that knows anything, to know something makes you an entity.
    Hows that?

    If someone lived a trillion X longer than you, and had a billion X more reasoning ability would he come to the same conclusions as you?
  • hillary_step
    hillary_step

    Seeker,

    I think that David may have been alluding to the similar conclusion emoted by Rene Descartes, 'I think therefore I am'. At least that is how I understood his statement.

    Then, examining closely what I was, and seeing that I could imagine that I had no body and that there was no world or place where I was, I could not imagine that I did not exist at all. On the contrary, precisely because I doubted the existence of other things it followed quite obviously and certainly that I did exist. If, on the other hand, I had only ceased to think while everything else that I had imagined remained true, I would have had no reason to believe that I existed; therefore I realized that I was a substance whose essence, or nature, is nothing but thought, and which, in order to exist, needs no place to exist nor any other material thing. So this self, that is to say the soul, through which I am what I am, is entirely separate from the body, and is even more easily known than the latter, so that even if I did not have a body, my soul would continue to be all that it is.Descartes, 'Discourse On Method'.
    His argument was that reasoned consciousness itself is a conclusive certainty of the existence of man and using the same 'method', that the formulation of inertial law a certainty of God.

    HS

  • D wiltshire
    D wiltshire

    HS,

    Thanks, I'm not that book smart.
    And yes that's kinda what I mean. It's hard to explain as clear I should.

    If someone lived a trillion X longer than you, and had a billion X more reasoning ability would he come to the same conclusions as you?
  • SixofNine
    SixofNine

    D wiltshire, don't feel bad. Descartes explained it clear as mud. I think what he was trying to say is that "I have a good imagination, and sometimes I pinch myself."

    "I think therefore I am"-- ppfpffffllloooot!~ Like anyone seriously doubts the existence of Rex.

  • hillary_step
    hillary_step

    lol - Actually Six, when you read 'Method' you can understand his reasoning, especially against a C16th backdrop, but he was in fact centuries ahead of his time in his philosophical thinking.

    Let me explain:

    I Rex therefore I am.....no that's not it.

    I think therefore I Rex....no, that's not it either.

    I think that Rex am.....nope

    I think therefore I Descartes....Ahh! There we have it.

    Just teasing Rex, read in context C.S.Lewis has some valuable viewpoints on some challenging issues. -- HS

  • Seeker
    Seeker
    Seeker,
    I will try but it's not easy.
    Conscious life, life that knows anything, to know something makes you an entity.
    Hows that?

    Thank you for elaborating. OK, I'll grant you that consciousness implies existence. Because I am aware of my surroundings, I exist, I am an entity.

    But how does that prove God's existence?

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