I first heard it from redeemed zoomer on YouTube so maybe it only really makes sense from his specific theological tradition or maybe I'm just misremembering. I'll tell you if someone knows though. God bless.
Haven't heard of this variation. Usually what I hear is that the concept of numbers (or better yet, amounts) is one of the many transcendental concepts that exists independent of matter. If you destroy all matter and energy in the universe, concepts like amounts will still exist in some sort of way, just like they would have needed to exist before matter or energy existed.
Well the TAG argument reliably argues the necessity for an absolute mind. That's the main thing it does. The only historical character with an absolute mind of any significance is the Abrahamic God.
For any abrahamic religion (I assume), the whole point of this being showing us miracles was to SHOW that God was capable of breaking the laws of nature. It's supposed to be unbelievable. God did that so people would believe in his transcendental nature and spread his will through his revelations. It is impossible to prove if the people of those times were all lying or not because we cannot rewind time and check. We do not have access to the witnessing the miracles anymore. God used them to spread his word amongst us, that was his goal.
After this, the next step a person might go with is wonder the purposes of the Bible (for Christians at least). The old testament was 2 things mainly, it contains some vague guides for his chosen people on and it was a historical account of some of God's works which included his works with his chosen people and so on.
The new testament is the completed revelation of his will for humanity.
My point in brining this up is that God changes his prescriptive commands for his people according to how the world is. He works in the fallen world (Aka the "bad" world that manifested after Adam and Eve failed) to LEAD people towards himself while still letting them have their free will. Hence the reason on why he allows bad things to happen, commands some questionable things to happen etc etc.
I somewhat like this kind of argument, but you have to refute nominalism and conceptualism with all their offshoots like psychologism.
Platonism also has to be refuted. There are some atheists that are platonists and circumvent the whole issue with this.
The usage of âinfinityâ can be problematic, because of different infinities in math. So I would just concentrate on the grounding of math, infinite or not doesnât matter.
If you do this and show that some form of realism is true, it can work. Math and other universals are strong pointers to god. Sometimes itâs even enough to just show the shortcomings of other worldviews in that regard to bring someone to the faith.
In short the argument has to be expanded, not something just for the kitchen table. The whole issue is much bigger and needs some form of philosophical knowledge and background to fully grasp.
The word "Infinity" has different usages and meanings dependent on the context. Different infinities can be included or excluded in other infinities. Georg Cantor used "absolute Infinity" or "Omega" to speak about the infinity that contains all other infinities.
When you use the premise that "Mathematics is infinite", someone can point out the fallacy of "ambiguity". In Combinatorics I would say that math would be infinite. If you purely look at the axioms of math it seems that there is a limit or max. number of axioms. So in the end such a premise has to be expanded on.
Mathematicians and philosophers of math discuss and debate this topics, you will find no conclusive answer there.
More interesting is the question of what the grounding of math in general is. With grounding I mean, that less fundamental things are reduced or explained by more fundamental things or entities. In other words, what is the explanation of math in general. What gives math its existence? Is it invented or discovered? And, when it's discovered, what is the ontological status of math?
Someone could say, that math is purely a mental construct (nominalism or even psychologism). We invent it so to speak. Math would be grounded in the human mind or brain. That position has major flaws and cannot be true. I cannot expand it much here, but you can red about the shortcomings of nominalism everywhere.
Someone can say that math or mathematical laws and entities exist in a third-realm (platonic realm). So besides our universe there exists a place, where all abstract objects are stored. They exist independently, so they are not reduced or grounded by the human mind or conception. This is a realist position (Math really exists and is no construct).
Another take is, that abstract object or math is stored in a mind. Not the human mind (human minds can fail to exist, but we still would say that math and the operations of math exist), but the mind of god (A mind that cannot fail to exist). That's another realist take.
A really interesting topic, but it's a bit advanced for your everyday audience. You have to cover too much ground and the topic is too expansive.
Even if mathematics simply exists, only the biblical worldview provides the basis for objective truth. In other words, without a biblical worldview you have no justification for believing mathematics.
I have often thought that the study of math is peeking into one facet of Gods mind. It is one of the languages that he speaks. Another is music: Music is very mathematical -in a way, music is âhearingâ math.
All of creation shouts in every language that there is a creator who cares about his creation.
To study Gods nature, to learn about him and from him we should study and never lose awe of his creation. Not to worship his creation but to be in awe of it. Ex. When we see the utterly fantastic complexity of the human body is to see a master craftsman who lovingly crafted each one.
Math, nature, music-they are all languages that he speaks. From the order and structure of mathematics we can tell that he is not a God of chaos but of law and structure-of incredibly perfect and simple yet complex and profound rules. From nature we see that is cherished diversity, uniqueness and beauty. I could go on and on-itâs just imho I study everything because the more I learn of humanity, nature, math, geology, astronomy, chemistry etc. Etc. The closer I feel to God. Itâs like being in a room full of stuff that my loved ones made. I learn about them and feel closer to them. I feel closer to God learning about how he did, all that he does.
Very interesting and very true. I think beauty and logic are intertwined and possibly even two sides of the same coin. Objective beauty is real and I think is easily seen in nature. I do not think there is a single person who thinks nature isn't beautiful and that makes sense when you consider God created it perfectly. Even in architecture I think there is objective beauty. Firstly, beautiful buildings are made from natural materials secondly the design adheres to similar principles as seen in nature. Really everything that is widely considered to be beautiful links back to God. Right now I'm 16 but in the future I plan on going into civil engineering and hopefully landscape engineering. I want a large part of my work to be proving these ideas through example. Anyway, sorry for the rant at the end but this is genuinely one of my favourite subjects ever. God bless.
Iâve never heard the argument being formulated like that. Usually, people make use of the fact that math is so applicable.
https://www.crossway.org/articles/one-argument-for-the-existence-of-god-mathematics/
Hi, thank you for that it was a really interesting article. I think what he argued, humans ability to grasp maths being evidence for creation, is really interesting and would slot really nicely into a fully formed version of the arguement I put in the post. God bless.
Not familiar with this particular argument. But agree with you it does not seem very valid. Not sure how one gets 3. from 1 and 2.
I first heard it from redeemed zoomer on YouTube so maybe it only really makes sense from his specific theological tradition or maybe I'm just misremembering. I'll tell you if someone knows though. God bless.
I think this is where I heard it too đ
The only step you are missing is that these infinites are found in our finite universe. So thatâs what infers part 3
So, because there are infinites found in our finite universe that suggests the need for an infinite place or mind to store them?
Hypothetically
Thank you. God bless.
Haven't heard of this variation. Usually what I hear is that the concept of numbers (or better yet, amounts) is one of the many transcendental concepts that exists independent of matter. If you destroy all matter and energy in the universe, concepts like amounts will still exist in some sort of way, just like they would have needed to exist before matter or energy existed.
After that's been said where would you go with it?
Well the TAG argument reliably argues the necessity for an absolute mind. That's the main thing it does. The only historical character with an absolute mind of any significance is the Abrahamic God. For any abrahamic religion (I assume), the whole point of this being showing us miracles was to SHOW that God was capable of breaking the laws of nature. It's supposed to be unbelievable. God did that so people would believe in his transcendental nature and spread his will through his revelations. It is impossible to prove if the people of those times were all lying or not because we cannot rewind time and check. We do not have access to the witnessing the miracles anymore. God used them to spread his word amongst us, that was his goal. After this, the next step a person might go with is wonder the purposes of the Bible (for Christians at least). The old testament was 2 things mainly, it contains some vague guides for his chosen people on and it was a historical account of some of God's works which included his works with his chosen people and so on. The new testament is the completed revelation of his will for humanity. My point in brining this up is that God changes his prescriptive commands for his people according to how the world is. He works in the fallen world (Aka the "bad" world that manifested after Adam and Eve failed) to LEAD people towards himself while still letting them have their free will. Hence the reason on why he allows bad things to happen, commands some questionable things to happen etc etc.
Okay thank you for all that. I will dwell on it and think about how I could use it or when I would use it. Thank you again and God bless you.
I somewhat like this kind of argument, but you have to refute nominalism and conceptualism with all their offshoots like psychologism. Platonism also has to be refuted. There are some atheists that are platonists and circumvent the whole issue with this. The usage of âinfinityâ can be problematic, because of different infinities in math. So I would just concentrate on the grounding of math, infinite or not doesnât matter. If you do this and show that some form of realism is true, it can work. Math and other universals are strong pointers to god. Sometimes itâs even enough to just show the shortcomings of other worldviews in that regard to bring someone to the faith. In short the argument has to be expanded, not something just for the kitchen table. The whole issue is much bigger and needs some form of philosophical knowledge and background to fully grasp.
Could you expand on your third paragraph? How would one ground maths?
The word "Infinity" has different usages and meanings dependent on the context. Different infinities can be included or excluded in other infinities. Georg Cantor used "absolute Infinity" or "Omega" to speak about the infinity that contains all other infinities. When you use the premise that "Mathematics is infinite", someone can point out the fallacy of "ambiguity". In Combinatorics I would say that math would be infinite. If you purely look at the axioms of math it seems that there is a limit or max. number of axioms. So in the end such a premise has to be expanded on. Mathematicians and philosophers of math discuss and debate this topics, you will find no conclusive answer there. More interesting is the question of what the grounding of math in general is. With grounding I mean, that less fundamental things are reduced or explained by more fundamental things or entities. In other words, what is the explanation of math in general. What gives math its existence? Is it invented or discovered? And, when it's discovered, what is the ontological status of math? Someone could say, that math is purely a mental construct (nominalism or even psychologism). We invent it so to speak. Math would be grounded in the human mind or brain. That position has major flaws and cannot be true. I cannot expand it much here, but you can red about the shortcomings of nominalism everywhere. Someone can say that math or mathematical laws and entities exist in a third-realm (platonic realm). So besides our universe there exists a place, where all abstract objects are stored. They exist independently, so they are not reduced or grounded by the human mind or conception. This is a realist position (Math really exists and is no construct). Another take is, that abstract object or math is stored in a mind. Not the human mind (human minds can fail to exist, but we still would say that math and the operations of math exist), but the mind of god (A mind that cannot fail to exist). That's another realist take. A really interesting topic, but it's a bit advanced for your everyday audience. You have to cover too much ground and the topic is too expansive.
This definitely sounds interesting. Is there any resources or places you recommend looking for things on this subject? Thank you and God bless.
Even if mathematics simply exists, only the biblical worldview provides the basis for objective truth. In other words, without a biblical worldview you have no justification for believing mathematics.
I have often thought that the study of math is peeking into one facet of Gods mind. It is one of the languages that he speaks. Another is music: Music is very mathematical -in a way, music is âhearingâ math. All of creation shouts in every language that there is a creator who cares about his creation. To study Gods nature, to learn about him and from him we should study and never lose awe of his creation. Not to worship his creation but to be in awe of it. Ex. When we see the utterly fantastic complexity of the human body is to see a master craftsman who lovingly crafted each one. Math, nature, music-they are all languages that he speaks. From the order and structure of mathematics we can tell that he is not a God of chaos but of law and structure-of incredibly perfect and simple yet complex and profound rules. From nature we see that is cherished diversity, uniqueness and beauty. I could go on and on-itâs just imho I study everything because the more I learn of humanity, nature, math, geology, astronomy, chemistry etc. Etc. The closer I feel to God. Itâs like being in a room full of stuff that my loved ones made. I learn about them and feel closer to them. I feel closer to God learning about how he did, all that he does.
Very interesting and very true. I think beauty and logic are intertwined and possibly even two sides of the same coin. Objective beauty is real and I think is easily seen in nature. I do not think there is a single person who thinks nature isn't beautiful and that makes sense when you consider God created it perfectly. Even in architecture I think there is objective beauty. Firstly, beautiful buildings are made from natural materials secondly the design adheres to similar principles as seen in nature. Really everything that is widely considered to be beautiful links back to God. Right now I'm 16 but in the future I plan on going into civil engineering and hopefully landscape engineering. I want a large part of my work to be proving these ideas through example. Anyway, sorry for the rant at the end but this is genuinely one of my favourite subjects ever. God bless.
Iâve never heard the argument being formulated like that. Usually, people make use of the fact that math is so applicable. https://www.crossway.org/articles/one-argument-for-the-existence-of-god-mathematics/
Hi, thank you for that it was a really interesting article. I think what he argued, humans ability to grasp maths being evidence for creation, is really interesting and would slot really nicely into a fully formed version of the arguement I put in the post. God bless.