The Transcendental Argument for the Existence of God

I'll jump right into it. Con basically makes only one argument in the previous round. Con: "However by incorrectly using the word conceptual he implies that a mind is required for logical absolutes to exist, which i challenge." The definition of concept is: –noun 1. a general notion or idea; conception. 2. an idea of something formed by mentally combining all its characteristics or particulars; a construct. 3. a directly conceived or intuited object of thought. [1] Take careful note of the above definition of the word concept. A notion or idea is necessarily had by a mind; so is an idea formed mentally; so is thought. Note that if logical absolutes are concepts then *by definition* they have to be instantiated by a mind. So, Con seemingly is left in a dilemma. Either agree that logical absolutes are conceptual in nature and therefore agreeing that a mind is required for logical absolutes to exist or deny that logical absolutes are conceptual which them seems absurd. If logical absolutes aren't conceptual, what are they? Them being physical is out of the question so it seems that Con is left with thinking that logical absolutes are abstract objects [2] that just exist "out there", so to speak, in relation to neither physical reality or minds or to anything else really. Indeed, Con seems to think this when he says: "consider a universe without any minds. according to this arguments the Logical Absolutes would not exist here. Clearly this is not so. In this hypothetical universe is a cloud a rock. No, therefore the law of identity still applies even without any mind existing." In this quote he seems to be making that claim. The problem is that this commits him to some kind of Platonism where abstracta (like logical absolutes) just exist and that's that. Why is this a problem? Well, because abstract objects by their very nature don't cause anything. They are causally ineffective. The number 2 doesn't cause anything on Platonism - it just exists. Why is THAT a problem, you ask? Well, because that means we could never know anything. Think about what it means to "know" something that is external to ourselves. It means we enter into some kind of relational or casual relationship - one where information transfers between the object of knowledge and the knower. What this means is that if logical absolutes are external to minds they would be immaterial, abstract objects that can't cause anything. They couldn't cause our knowledge of logical absolutes then. So, if Con's position is true we could *NEVER* know anything about logical absolutes much less imagining them existing in some universe "without any minds". Let me repeat: we'd be entirely ignorant of logical absolutes if we accept Con's line of argumentation. This is obviously false; we do have knowledge of logical absolutes. Therefore, Con's argument about considering a universe without any minds but with logical absolutes "applying" would become incoherent to suppose as we wouldn't even know what logical absolutes are on his position! So, in summation Con's claim that we could imagine a universe without any minds is incoherent if we accept that logical absolutes are conceptual by their very nature - because if they are conceptual they *must* be instantiated by a mind and if we think we are imagining a universe without any minds we are really mistaken. We maybe imagining a universe without any human minds but that does not phase the TAG as the proponent would just say you've aptly just demonstrated why there would need to be an ultimate, transcendent mind to think of these logical absolutes. As Thomas Aquinas was wont to say, "and this everyone understands to be God". [1] http://dictionary.reference.com... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org...