### 6. Objections and replies

Pro-theist might become worried here. Surely God’s perfection and goodness (if God were to exist) will figure prominently in their arguments for pro-theism. But, it is often maintained, one implication of perfection is existence. Thus, pro-theists cannot use God’s perfection in an argument for pro-theism. The deck has been stacked against them. However, this would be too hasty, since there are two claims in this short argument: first, that God (if such there be) is perfect, and second that perfection implies existence. We must keep one of these claims out of the present debate, and perhaps it is better to screen out the second, rather than the first. On this suggestion, the claim that ‘perfection implies existence’ is N (screened out) in the (partial) state of affairs. However, the claim ‘God is perfect’ would be true in the in the (partial) state of affairs. Thus, pro-theists may use God’s perfection in their arguments. One might object that my account looks remarkably similar to Kahane’s, which I rejected. Recall Kahane’s preferred strategy: the atheist maintaining that the existence of an omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipotent being is incoherent should consider a possible world in which there is a very knowledgeable, very benevolent, very powerful being. His suggestion is to water down the theist’s claims. This is not what I propose. Rather, I suggest that some subset of the propositions leading to the claim that God’s existence is incoherent be screened out. To use my Escher analogy, my suggestion is to cover up part of the aqueduct, while Kahane’s is to consider a different aqueduct altogether. Some philosophers of religion might object to my approach on grounds that they cannot conceive of God failing to exist: it is a psychological impossibility. Similarly, some philosophers and theologians will claim that they simply cannot screen out certain propositions that entail God’s existence. Some might make the stronger claim that when a subject’s cognitive faculties are properly functioning, that subject must believe that God exists. Since these philosophers cannot screen out the appropriate beliefs, the objection concludes, my account does not allow these philosophers to engage in the axiological question For the sake of argument, assume that the objector is right in thinking that a properly functioning cognitive system produces belief that God exists. Notice that my account does not require that the theist disbelieve that God exists, or that the atheist believe that God exist, when considering what they take to be counterpossibles. Nor does it require that either suspend judgment on the existential question of God’s existence. All my solution requires is that theists screen out their belief that God exists when they consider Godless worlds and that atheists screen out their belief that God does not exist when they consider Godly worlds. The belief, though screened out, is “free to continue exerting whatever influence it would have on ongoing processes” (Leslie 1987, p. 417). I admit that my approach will be of no help to theists who deny that they can even imagine God not existing, or atheists who claim that they cannot imagine God existing. If a theist claims not only that godless states of affairs are impossible, but that it is impossible to even imagine them, then this theist is committed to quietism. The axiological question will require comparing the value of godly and godless states of affairs, and this requires at least imagination. These theists might be able to speak of the effect God has on this world, but they will be unable to compare those goods or ills to any other world. Admittedly, some impossibilities are such that I cannot conceive of them, and quietism about them may be fitting. I cannot imagine of a round square copula on Berkeley College, but I am not troubled by this. First, remember that counterpossibles with ‘there is a round square copula on Berkeley College’ as an antecedent need not always be true. On my account, they can