What doe the Philosopher Fear?

[Laird]

But there is no miracle, just the observation we're here and the logical axiom that Something can't come from Nothing.

You don't think that it's miraculous that there might have been Nothing but instead there is Something? I find that to be the most awesome mystery of existence. Just saying, "Well, there just so happens to be Something, and, you know, that's the end of it" seems to me to utterly belittle the mystery.

Well there's either an infinite regression or some "Out of Time" explanation. Both have issues, though the latter has doesn't make sense to me.

Granted, and fair play. "Out of time" explanations are also problematic. I understand that this is one of Kant's antinomies. However, "eternal" existence, it seems to me, more plausibly is taken to be "existence from outside of time which affects time" than "existence whose past is infinite", given that the latter juts up against the problem of an actual infinity.

I guess that all of that is to say that the former makes more sense to me (even though I'm not entirely comfortable with it).

So you think there are only a finite number of souls/spirits in all of the Real?

Yes. Again, though, I understand that this (infinity versus finitism) is one of Kant's antinomies, so it might point to a deeper resolution.

How does potential become actual without actuality?

I'm not sure why you're asking this, because I'm not proposing that it does. I'm proposing that God is the actual who in turn actualises potential.

And the moment the Void has "potentiality" it seems to me it is an infinite "stuff" what can be used to fill the Real with all the varied spirit worlds.

Hmm. So, you're saying that "potentiality" is "stuff"? That doesn't make sense to me. Only actuality can be "stuff". Potentiality is only... well, the potential for "stuff".

Extant entities have potential, I don't see how there is "potential" just floating by itself?

Huh. For the purposes of argument, I'm not sure it matters either way. That is to say: in the context of our debate (over whether a God who creates souls and their relationship with matter is more plausible than some sort of idealism lacking a true divinity of the intelligently creative sort) does it really matter whether potentiality is "attached" to an entity or rather is free?

I think this just makes "potentiality" a kind of "actuality", since as you say "potentiality" is different from "Nothing".

Hmm. This seems to me to be a sort of semantic distraction. Yes, for potential to be - well, potential - it has to be an "actual" potential. That doesn't mean that there is no meaningful distinction between potentiality and actuality though.

Why would these qualities be necessary? Once you include an instance of fiat power then it seems difficult to claim matter can't produce minds using a different variation of fiat power that doesn't need those qualities.

I'm arguing from conceivability. I don't think it's remotely conceivable that a substance lacking those qualities could create one that has them. I suspect that you don't either, but that you're playing Devil's Advocate.

All observable cases use creativity/free will/intelligence to make "stuff" out of existing "stuff".

Are you sure that that is so? Or is it just your assumption? Why could it not be that our experiences, thoughts, and ideas are truly novel, arising not from preexisting "stuff" but rather "conjured up independently" by our creative, intelligent, freely willing minds?

To me an argument against epiphenomenalism is tied to the impossibility of Something from Nothing or more specifically A can only be the cause of B if there is already something within A that can produce B. If one can have consciousness arise by fiat in matter, then how is it that it can be definite that it is not bound by this same matter?

Remember that even the physicalist Dennet rejects epiphenomanlism while maintaining that the physical with its attendant deterministic "laws" is all there is. Once we give God fiat powers it is all too easy to give fiat powers to the physical.

Hmm? This doesn't make sense to me. I pointed you to Titus's argument, but you simply ignored that argument and went off on another tack. No, the argument is not tied to the impossibility of Something from Nothing: it is tied to the impossibility of matter forming conceptions of a mind which is causally inaccessible to it.

To recapitulate: even if matter had fiat power to create mind, this would not anyway affect my view, since the only logically coherent view of mind-matter duality is interactive dualism. Thus, even if matter created mind (which I hold to be a ridiculous notion), it would anyway end up in the interactive dualism for which I already advocate.