A Response to Mr. George H Smith - Part II
As Smith's book unfolds, he moves on to certain irrational beliefs held by the Christian (Judeo-Christian) concerning the nature of God. THe first is the challenge of the "Unlimited Attribute," which we find in pronouncements such as "God is infinite." That is, God lasts forever, God's mercy is unending, God's love is eternal, etc. Here he raises a challenge that is very Eastern in its predeliction, and the objection goes something like this: how can you define an infinite being? If you can define an infinte being totally (that is that the definition is fully comprehensive) then this God is not infinite. We are left with a contradiction.
There is more to this objection than meets the eye - it is a worthwhile objection. However, this objection is true of anything noble or transcendant, such as love for a fellow human being. I can quote the definition of love from the dictionary, but we all know and experience love as something more than mere words on a page. Still that definition is meaningful. Similarly, any definition of God that theists give will not be total (because you cannot totally define an infinite being by definition) but that does not mean that any definition or description cannot be significant and meaningful. Smith presupposes that by defining God that we are defining Him in His entirety - I agree that the theists cannot do this, but we can still define God in such a way that is meaningful, significant, and correct as to what the definition speaks about. For example, I can define water without calling it H2O and someone will still know what I am talking about.
Smith then moves on to what he calls the problem of the Limited Attributes. This is a problem he believes that theists face when describing God's character. For instance, we say that "God is alive," but Smith claims we can only understand that in the human sense of alive which also means that, therefore, God must be alive in the same sense as natural organisms and can die. Or that "God is wise, loving, etc." with these characteristics, because we can only understand them in a human and fallible way, which means that God is also fallible in his love although we claim that he isn't - Smith's point is that Theists is once again contradictory. But I see this problem as being easily solved if we remember the first attribute of God - infinity. Now I have never experienced anything infinite, but I understand intellectually that anything which is infinite will never cease to exist. In the case of God's attributes, this also means that those attributes will never cease; God will never be unloving, or unwise, etc. even though human beings are often unloving or unwise. In the case of infinity, just because I have never experienced it does not mean that I have no idea what it is. I have never experienced an electron in any tangible way either, but no one really doubts that they exist. And there is a meaning and significance to the word electron when I use it even though I have never directly experienced one. We also talk about wood having "memory" in that, if it has warped under certain circumstances, it may yet return to its original shape - but wood does not actually possess the faculty of memory that you or I do. Still we can speak of it as if it did, and the meaning is made clearer to us that wood has such-and-such a property that is analagous to our memory. We talk about proteins "knowing" how to combine themselves to create amino acids, but proteins do not have actual knowledge in the same sense that you and I do. Therefore, I contend that we can attribute characteristics that are at least like human characteristics to non-human things, and have those attributes be meaningful.
There is more to this objection than meets the eye - it is a worthwhile objection. However, this objection is true of anything noble or transcendant, such as love for a fellow human being. I can quote the definition of love from the dictionary, but we all know and experience love as something more than mere words on a page. Still that definition is meaningful. Similarly, any definition of God that theists give will not be total (because you cannot totally define an infinite being by definition) but that does not mean that any definition or description cannot be significant and meaningful. Smith presupposes that by defining God that we are defining Him in His entirety - I agree that the theists cannot do this, but we can still define God in such a way that is meaningful, significant, and correct as to what the definition speaks about. For example, I can define water without calling it H2O and someone will still know what I am talking about.
Smith then moves on to what he calls the problem of the Limited Attributes. This is a problem he believes that theists face when describing God's character. For instance, we say that "God is alive," but Smith claims we can only understand that in the human sense of alive which also means that, therefore, God must be alive in the same sense as natural organisms and can die. Or that "God is wise, loving, etc." with these characteristics, because we can only understand them in a human and fallible way, which means that God is also fallible in his love although we claim that he isn't - Smith's point is that Theists is once again contradictory. But I see this problem as being easily solved if we remember the first attribute of God - infinity. Now I have never experienced anything infinite, but I understand intellectually that anything which is infinite will never cease to exist. In the case of God's attributes, this also means that those attributes will never cease; God will never be unloving, or unwise, etc. even though human beings are often unloving or unwise. In the case of infinity, just because I have never experienced it does not mean that I have no idea what it is. I have never experienced an electron in any tangible way either, but no one really doubts that they exist. And there is a meaning and significance to the word electron when I use it even though I have never directly experienced one. We also talk about wood having "memory" in that, if it has warped under certain circumstances, it may yet return to its original shape - but wood does not actually possess the faculty of memory that you or I do. Still we can speak of it as if it did, and the meaning is made clearer to us that wood has such-and-such a property that is analagous to our memory. We talk about proteins "knowing" how to combine themselves to create amino acids, but proteins do not have actual knowledge in the same sense that you and I do. Therefore, I contend that we can attribute characteristics that are at least like human characteristics to non-human things, and have those attributes be meaningful.
posted by Brian at 12:46 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home