HKB
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Often appears with: the nature and attributes of God · logic, method, and demonstration · fate, destiny, and necessity · doubt, skepticism, and certainty · words without meaning · unthinking things · the problem of evil and theodicy · socrates sits · reason and the intellect · providence and divine governance · perception and the senses · past events
Usually: argument (6) · skepticism (4) · detachment (3) · sudden reversal of fortune (1) · censure (1) · exhortation (1)
“But as for me, holding as I do that God did the best that was possible, or that he could not have done better than he has done, deeming also that to pass any other judgement upon his work in its entirety would be to wrong his goodness or his wisdom, I must say that to make something which surpasses in goodness the best itself, that indeed would imply contradiction.” Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Freiherr von, Theodicy · insight
“This is what Augustine means when he says (Contra Faust. xxix, 5): "Whosoever says, If God is almighty, let Him make what is done as if it were not done, does not see that this is to say: If God is almighty let Him effect that what is true, by the very fact that it is true, be false":” Thomas, Aquinas, Saint, Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) · precept
“Now THE SET RULES OR ESTABLISHED METHODS WHEREIN THE MIND WE DEPEND ON EXCITES IN US THE IDEAS OF SENSE, ARE CALLED THE LAWS OF NATURE; and these we learn by experience.” George Berkeley, A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowle · insight
Continuing the critique, Engels says Duehring’s attempt to “count” an infinite past leads to contradiction, insists infinity requires a fixed starting point for calculation, and rejects treating mathematical infinity as a universal law.
at pleasure in the series, a point taken at pleasure in the line. Hence as far as the line or series is concerned it is immaterial where we put it. But as for the contradiction of the "counted endless progression" we shall be in a position to examine it more closely as soon as Herr Duehring has taught us the trick of reckoning it. If he has accomplished the feat of counting from minus infinity to zero, we shall be g…
He explains that “absolutely possible” excludes contradictions, so God cannot do self-contradictory things—not due to weakness, but because they lack the nature of possibility.
not incompatible with the subject, as that Socrates sits; and absolutely impossible when the predicate is altogether incompatible with the subject, as, for instance, that a man is a donkey. It must, however, be remembered that since every agent produces an effect like itself, to each active power there corresponds a thing possible as its proper object according to the nature of that act on which its active power is …
In disputing whether God can make the past not to have been, Thomas says such a denial implies contradiction, so it lies outside God’s omnipotence.
cannot make a thing that is corrupt not to have been corrupted." Therefore, for the same reason, He cannot effect that anything else which is past should not have been. *I answer that,* As was said above (Q. 7, A. 2), there does not fall under the scope of God's omnipotence anything that implies a contradiction. Now that the past should not have been implies a contradiction. For as it implies a contradiction to say …
Berkeley says the case needs no extra proof: one must only test whether one can conceive extension or any idea existing without being perceived, and he asserts that doing so is a contradiction.
a substance; but it has been shown that there is no corporeal or material substance: it remains therefore that the CAUSE OF IDEAS is an incorporeal active substance or Spirit. 27. NO IDEA OF SPIRIT.--A spirit is one simple, undivided, active being--as it perceives ideas it is called the UNDERSTANDING, and as it produces or otherwise operates about them it is called the WILL. Hence there can be no idea formed of a so…
Berkeley insists that “absolute existence” of sensible objects outside the mind is meaningless or contradictory, and he urges readers to check their own thoughts to see the emptiness of the claim.
of quick apprehensions, I hope it may be pardoned, since all men do not equally apprehend things of this nature, and I am willing to be understood by every one. FIRST, then, it will be objected that by the foregoing principles ALL THAT IS REAL AND SUBSTANTIAL IN NATURE IS BANISHED OUT OF THE WORLD, and instead thereof a chimerical scheme of ideas takes place. All things that exist, exist only in the mind, that is, t…
Leibniz rejects the claim that making the best universe limits God’s power, insisting that a universe better than the best would contradict, like drawing a shorter-than-straight line.
that must be paid to good in general. Thus one must understand that God loves virtue supremely and hates vice supremely, and that nevertheless some vice is to be permitted. 223. M. Arnauld and M. Bayle appear to maintain that this method of explaining things and of establishing a best among all the plans for the universe, one such as may not be surpassed by any other, sets a limit to God's power. 'Have you considere…