It's what I do. — Banno

So? Where's your solution?

I suppose we might specify a possible world such that the folk therein believe their world is not the actual world.

A world of mad fools? — Banno

:chin:

Might be either. You haven't yet specified. — Banno

You had to come up with the solution.

Actually I explicitly said that the folk in each possible world think their world is the actual world.

But yes, there is only one actual world, within the structure of modal logic. — Banno

I don't buy that. How can modal logic (about possibilities and necessities) ever even claim there is only one actual world.

If you think that, you've missed the point. — Banno

I believe you're barking up the wrong tree here.

Let's try another route.

1. World X is possible & World X is not actual (you would agree)

2. World X is impossible & World X is not actual (obvious)

I give you world Z which is not actual. That is to say,

3. World Z is not actual.

Question for you: Is world Z impossible or is world Z possible?

How would you be able to tell?

Suppose a world Y is not actual. Why? There has to be a reason why that is.
— TheMadFool
There is a possible world in which my cat is ginger.

In the actual world, he is black.

Now the reason, if you need one, that the possible world in which my cat is ginger is not the actual world is that my cat is black. — Banno

Let me get this straight.

1. Your cat (in the actual world) is black

Therefore,

2. The possible world in which your cat is ginger is not the actual world.

The word "the" is key. Of course any possible world which differs from this (the) actual world is not this world. However that doesn't prove that those possible worlds are not actual. You're assuming that this (the) world is the only actual world.

Nuh. "Actual" is an indexical. Like left and right. The folk in each possible world think they are in the actual world.

Add that "Necessarily" is just "In all possible worlds", and hopefully you will see why your proposition is ill-formed. — Banno

The word "actual" as an indexical is not, I think, important. My argument has little to do with modal realism although we come to the same conclusion.

Update

World X is not actual.

Why?

Reason R

Argument A1:

1. R

Therefore,

2. World X is not actual

However, given argument A1,

3. Necessary that world X is not actual.

4. If world X is not actual then necessary that world X is not actual. [from 2, 3]

Argument A2:

5. If necessary that world X is not actual then world X is impossible.

Argument A3:

6. If world X is not actual then world X is impossible [4, 5 HS]

Ergo,

7. If world X is possible then world X is actual [6 Contra]

QED.

This: =>, is not the same as this <=>. Implies does not mean means.
And you still have the problem of validity, truth/falsity, soundness. And even this not a complete specification.

George is at home or George is at the store.
George is not at home.
George is at the store.

Valid, true, sound. But oops, George isn't at the store! Logic, caveat emptor. Or at least understand its limits and boundaries. — tim wood

I have no idea what you're trying to say here.

My argument is rather simple.

Suppose X is not an actual world.

There has to be an reason why it's not actual (the principle of sufficient reason).

What does having a reason for X is not actual mean?

It simply means that we have an argument that proves X is not actual. If there's a proof for X is not actual, it implies X is necessarily not actual.

In other words,

1. If X is not actual then X is necessarily not actual.

2. If X is necessarily not actual then X is not possible.

Ergo,

3. If X is not actual then X is not possible (1, 2 HS)

Ergo,

4. If X is possible then X is actual (3 Contra)

QED

Free will, but also cause and repercussion.

God gave Adam and Eve free will:
You are free to eat from any tree in the garden
but also told:
You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die

Using same rhetoric we can conclude:
They disobeyed but didn't die, doesn't that make God a liar?

Because he said:
you must not touch it, or you will die — SpaceDweller

I suppose I can say at this point that I finally got it.

Free will was bestowed upon humanity (Adam & Eve too) so that we could be good or bad (sans free will morality is meaningless).

When God, all-good as defined, warned Adam & Eve not to partake of the forbidden fruit, it was to be understood that doing so was evil.

The two, Adam & Eve, despite God's express instructions not to, ate, heartily I assume, the forbidden fruit, succumbing to Satan's vile machination. Adam and Eve then were, became, truly bad (they had, of their own accord, freely, committed an evil deed). Hence God had to penalize the two.

Having said that, Adam and Eve, before having taken the disastrous step that doomed them, were innocent - they didn't know what morality was. Why did God then punish the hapless couple? That God is all-good wouldn't have made any sense to them and so they wouldn't have known eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil was bad.

The only logical explanation is God was ticked off by Adam's & Eve's disobedience. This suggests to me that evil inheres in disobedience. To be good is to be obedient. Why? I can't quite put my finger on it at the moment.

Another, far better, way to make sense of God's actions is with the help of the legal principle ignorantia juris non excusat (ignorance of the law excuses not). True Adam & Eve were innocent and didn't know right from wrong but they did commit evil (as explained above). Hence God did what an moral authority would do - punish!

We don't know if consciousness if physical or nonphysical.

A p-zombie is a hypothesized being physically identical to a human but bereft of consciousness.

So, yes a p-zombie begs the question; after all it's defined in such a way that assumes consciousness nonphysical.

However, it can still be used in an argument like so:

1. If consciousness is nonphysical then p-zombies are possible

Ergo,

2. If p-zombies are impossible then consciousness is physical.

If we have free will, God shouldn't have penalized Adam & Eve. Disobedience is part and parcel of unrestricted volition.

Also this is what you're saying.

1. If X is an actual world then X is a possible world.
2. If X is a possible world then X is an actual world.

I can also say:

1. If is apple then it is a fruit
2. If is fruit then it is an apple

Possible world has a greater scope that contains all actual worlds
Therefore you can't say that a possible world is an actual world because possible worlds do not completely contain actual worlds in its set- there are some worlds that are just potential. Otherwise it would be not be a set of potential worlds but actual worlds. — ninjachewit

Read my reply to tim wood

I'll repeat myself at the risk of boring you but it's quite exciting to say the least.

If a possible world X is not actual, there's got to be a reason why. That reason, in an argument, proves X is not actual. In an argument, the conclusion (here X is not actual) is necessarily true.

Therefore,

1. X is not actual implies X is necessarily not actual.

2. X is necessarily not actual implies X is not possible.

3. X is not actual implies X is not possible (1, 2 HS)

Ergo,

4. X is possible implies X is actual (3 Contra)

QED

"Is not," "can't be": not interchangeable, not substitutable one for the other. Yours, then QE~D. — tim wood

Suppose a world Y is not actual. Why? There has to be a reason why that is. That reason becomes an argument the conclusion of which is Y is not actual. A conclusion is necessarily true i.e. Y is not actual implies Y is necessarily not actual. If Y is necessarily not actual then Y is not possible. Therefore, Y is not actual implies Y is not possible. That means Y is possible entails Y is actual. QED.

To All

First things first, what we agree on.

1. If X is an actual world then X is a possible world.

Now, the sticking point,

2. If X is a possible world then X is an actual world.

Statement 2, all of you say is false.

Consider now the following statement (contrapositive of 2)

3. If X is not an actual world then X is not a possible world (contrapositive of 2)

Invoking the principle of sufficient reason, if X is not an actual world, it follows that there are reasons why X is not an actual world. These reasons show why X can't be an actual world. In other words, there's an argument that proves X is not a possible world.

That is to say, it's true that,

3. If X is not an actual world then X is not a possible world.

Undoing what we did, we get

4. If X is a possible world then X is an actual world (contrapositive of 3). This statement is true.

QED.

But we're not talking about points in space are we? — khaled

Of course, it's an analogy. You got it, right?

There is a gap" is not a logical statement. — khaled

How can you say that? What's not logical about it?

Why do you say that it's "...not two way"? If there's a gap between point A and point B, it doesn't matter whether I'm at point A or B, there's a gap.

@Banno, @Bartricks, @180 Proof, @I like sushi@DecheleSchilder, @khaled, @jorndoe@Jack Cummins, @tim wood

Possible

1. If X is possible then not necessary that X is actual.

Ergo,

2. There's a gap between possible and actual.

Actual

3. If X is actual then necessary that X is possible.

Ergo,

4. There's no gap between possible and actual

5. There's a gap between possible and actual & There's no gap between possible and actual. [Contradiction!]

instead of "an actual world", I'd use "the actual world", but maybe that's just me?

1. X is a possible world ∧ X is not the actual world = X is a possible world but not our's

Say, one where Napoleon drowned by suicide. At least that seems possible.

2. X is a possible world ∧ X is the actual world = X is our world

Or, instead of "an actual world", we could use "a real world", i.e. not fictional or merely imagined, despite being unknown to us.

1. X is a possible world ∧ X is not real = a possible world but imaginary/fictional

2. X is a possible world ∧ X is real = our world or another real world (unknown to us)

(Technically, there's a presumption that our world is a self-consistent whole, but that doesn't seem controversial; either way, the possible world semantics, I think, is intended to allow reasoning that includes our world, the actual world.)

If that makes any sense... — jorndoe

:ok:

I'm mainly interested in what follows from the claim that a possible world need not be actual.

Suppose X is a possible world and that's all we know.

Then the following is true:

1. X is possible & X is not actual.

I'm working with my intuition here so bear with me.

I conclude from 1 that there's something not actual about possible. In other words, there's a gap between the possible and the actual.

How come then that when the poles are reversed, there's a connectionn the gap I mentioned above is bridged, as in if X is actual then X is possible

Summary:

1. If X is possible then X is actual (False i.e. there's a gap between possible and actual)

2. If X is actual then X is possible (True? What happened to the gap mentioned above?)

To all

Suppose X is a possible world and is not actual.

Ergo, the following statement is true.

1. X is possible & X is not actual

If so, the statement

2. X is possible & X is actual

has to be false because X is not actual (X is actual is false)

But then look at 2. It says something odd: X is possible and actual is false.

What's bothering me is the claim that the following statement is true:

1. X is a possible world & X is not an actual world.

If 1 is true then the following statement should be false:

2. X is a possible world & X is an actual world.

and even this should be false:

3. X is an impossible world & X is not an actual world.

Update

To all the above posters:

If a world x is possible but world x is not actual is acceptable then there's something not possible about an actual world.

1. World x is possible & World x is not actual (true according to all the posters above)

Ergo,

World x is actual can't be consistent with world x is possible. After all, world x is actual is the negation of world x is not actual.

A way out:

All possible worlds are actual worlds.

“Possible” means can exist in a possible world. Not actually exists in some world. — khaled

I disagree.

If I say an argument is invalid it means there's a world in which all the premises are true and the conclusion is false. — TheMadFool

Not in this world necessarily though so who cares? — khaled

How do you know?

Yes, that's an argument that Dummo would be impressed by. Whereas I think it's stupid. — Bartricks

Why is it stupid?

What's a possible world?

May I talk with the same right about toity worlds? Have you read Toity Worlds by Professor Boule Sheet?

There's a toity world in which there is a centaur. And there's a toity world in which there is a true contradiction. Might that centaur come and get me from the toity world in which it is living? Should I be afraid? Will it bring the true contradiction with it? — Bartricks

It appears that the idea of possibility is more nuanced than I thought.

A possible world: A world that can be real. There's nothing about a possible world that makes it impossible. So a centaur world is a possible world - nothing about centaurs is impossible.

Two different senses of possible:

1. Possible 1: It's possible there'll be light rain tomorrow. Not true that it has to rain tomorrow.

2. Possible 2: It's possible that God exists. God has to exist in one possible world. Hey!, we've just proved that God exists.

:chin:

Are there no novels of life as an animal...a bat?

Do you know what the paper is called, and who wrote it? — Wayfarer

I have a poor memory but here's what I managed to get ahold of :point:

David Chalmers first formulated the problem in his paper Facing up to the problem of consciousness (1995). — Wikipedia

Dummo thinks that if it is possible for there to be true contradictions, then there are some. Do you agree? — Bartricks

Yes! To say something is possible means that that something is in at least one possible world.

Death is the ultimate mystery for humans. I think it's possible that when we die our consciousness enters another body and we can call this reincarnation or the ressurection of the body (if we get the same body back). The thing for me is that it seems we are bodies and brains so we seem to die on our death beds for good but Buddhism offers the possibility that consciousness is substance less such that it can go somewhere else when the body dies. You're right though that this is all completely speculative and it's something we can't figure out. It's nice however to have a belief in an afterlife — Gregory

Possible, yes but do keep in mind, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. The English were wise folks.

TheMadFool said it is relevant to know whether God can go or do wrong, since that specific God has property of being omnibenevolent, I think is therefore irrelevant to argue over something that is already known, there is no assumption or personal position here.

So why don't we just focus on the knowledge of good and evil? — SpaceDweller

God is supposed to have endued us with free will. That's the solution to the problem of evil. He also (the Fall of Man) has a zero tolerance policy towards disobedience. Either God is evil or God should be ok with disobedience.

As you implied, the Garden of Eden myth seems to be intended as a warning against "evil" Science, which trusts its sensory extensions and rational conclusions more than the absolute Word of God : "apple bad, trust me". That's also why the Bible repeatedly indicates that physical Flesh (including taste & touch) is corrupted, and only the non-physical Spirit is pure & good, and a direct link to God --- so, trust, and don't bother to verify.. — Gnomon

Very Gnostic in spirit. I read about Gnosticism yesterday on Wikipedia and this - matter & flesh as evil, the spirit & soul as good - figures in its teachings. Gnosticism was declared heresy by the church and stamped out therefore.

Of course, in the Garden, those child-like humans had direct sensory experience with God, who walked in the garden, making sounds that frightened the babes-in-the-woods. Today, we are bereft of that intimate contact, and the original words of God, are now -- reportedly -- recorded in man-made books, after passing through the fallible minds of many generations of sinful fleshly humans. Therefore, it follows that the self-reliance of Science may be the product of a Satanic plot. Hence, your label "malus scientia" seems to be appropriate. Unless, human reason is the only remaining reliable Word (Logos) of the Creator — Gnomon

And then some say religion has no bone to pick with science.

There aren't any true contradictions. — Bartricks

I wouldn't be so sure. :grin:

Nirvana is, at its simplest, liberation from moral causation. After one has freed oneself from karma (good & bad) there is, in a sense, no debt to repay nor any reward to receive, things that lead to rebirth in samsara. Where does a Buddha go? The question is left unanswered. Better silence than give a wrong answer. Like my 88 year old father told me once, on an unrelated issue, "go and find out."

He isn't 'beyond time'. See OP. — Bartricks

Oh! Well, if He's within time, then of course, being all-powerful, He can generate contradictions!

My question would be, what else can generate contradictions? There are no true contradictions in the world as we know it. So, where's the proof that God exists? Show us a true contradiction.

I don't know what you are talking about. — Bartricks

:lol:

I think God can create true contradictions — Bartricks

No, He can't if He is beyond time. The logical AND (&) operator becomes meaningless. Therefore, p & ~p is also undefined.

for a contradiction to be true, then it is true. — Bartricks

Let's start with a statement.

G = God exists.

If I deny God exists then ~G = God does not exist.

If God is beyond time and since time plays a crucial role in contradictions, God is able to defy the law of noncontradiction.

This means that it's possible that God exists AND God doesn't exist is true.

However, if time doesn't apply to God, the "AND" operator loses meaning. If I say "I am in Paris AND I'm happy" what I want to convey is the conjuncts ("I am in Paris", "I am happy") are to be understood as happening at the same time.

For a contradiction, the AND operator, its meaning as outlined above, is critical. Without the AND operator, the concept of a contradiction is meaningless. That means God can't do contradictions. Right?

I take it you've read McTaggart? — Bartricks

McTaggart "proves" time is not real by showing it leads to a contradiction. If time isn't real then there can be no contradictions.

Thus, the idea of God existing outside of time is a perfectly coherent one. — Bartricks

1. Then he can't be described as immortal whatever that implies.

2. God's omnipotence is related to His beyond-time nature. Contradictions don't apply to him, a contradiction being defined as a compound statement that something is and is not in the same sense and at the same time. Nice! :up:

I'm not just telling you, I am demonstrating it:
All theorems of propositional calculus are necessary theorems of modal logic.
The Law of Noncontradiction is a theorem of propositional calculus.
Therefore the Law of noncontradiction is a necessary theorem of modal logic.
If the Law of Noncontradiction is a necessary theorem, then it is not contingent.
The law of noncontradiction is not contingent.
So, where does this argument go wrong? Want me to do it for you? — Banno

:up:

But that is an assertion, not an argument. — Wayfarer

What about the so-called "hard" problem proves that nonphysicalism is true.

Sapere aude!