Exam 4: Plato the Beginning of Everything

In his arguments for the existence of God, why does Descartes claim that existence is a perfection?

Explain Aquinas's fourth proof for the existence of God. Do you agree with Aquinas?

According to the reading, "As being is to becoming, so is truth to ..."

Masham claims that ________ "is the proper disease our age, and has proceeded from diverse causes; but be the remoter or original ones what they will, it could never have prevailed as it has done, had not parents very generally contributed thereto, either by negligence of their children's instruction; or instructing them very ill in respect of religion."

What does the speaker mean when he says, "for we must remember that I who am the speaker, and you who are the judges, are only mortal men, and we ought to accept the tale which is probable and enquire no further"?

According to Mackie, it is sometimes suggested that "Evil is due to human free will." Mackie criticizes this position: "God was not, then, faced with a choice between making innocent automata and making beings who, in acting freely, would sometimes go wrong: there was open to him the obviously better possibility of making beings who would act freely but always go right. Clearly, his failure to avail himself of this possibility is inconsistent with his being both ___________ and ___________."

Anselm says, "Hence, there is no doubt that there exists a being, than which nothing greater can be conceived, and it exists both in the understanding and in reality."

Explain Mackie's criticism of the following position: "Evil is necessary as a means to good."

For Masham, "________ being here understood as that faculty in us which discovers, by the intervention of intermediate ideas, what connection those in the proposition have one with another whether certain, probable, or none at all, according to which we ought to regulate our assent."

Paley says that even if "we had never seen a watch made; that we had never known an artist capable of making one; that we were altogether incapable of executing such a piece of workmanship ourselves, or of understanding in what manner it was performed," nevertheless, we would still conclude that it must have had a maker.

Based on Conway's discussion, explain the difference between "eternal" and "infinite time."

Leibniz claims that "It is the knowledge of necessary and eternal truths that distinguishes us from the mere animals and gives us Reason and the sciences, raising us to the knowledge of ourselves and of God."

Parsons says, "Let's call all of the evils that really exist (in the past, present, or future) ..."

Berkeley says, "Hence, it is evident that _______ is known as certainly and immediately as any other mind or spirit whatsoever distinct from ourselves."

According to Lammenranta, "The Descartes Triangle is often understood as a form of formal or logical circularity, in which the conclusion appears as one of the premises."

Lammenranta claims that "Descartes attempts to validate reason in terms of reason itself."

What argument does Pascal provide when he says, "But we know neither the existence nor the nature of God, because he has neither dimension nor limits"?

Conway says, "Likewise, in God there can exist no passion, which to speak properly comes from his creatures: For every passion is something ..."

Leibniz says, "It is also through the knowledge of necessary truths, and through their abstract expression, that we rise to ________________, which make us think of what is called I, and observe that this or that is within us."

Kierkegaard says, "For if God does not exist it would of course be impossible for free will to exist."