surroundx wrote:

bmiller wrote:

I have to say that you are making something out of nothing.  Aristotle was referring to the "nothing" of Parmenides.  I don't think you have a proper understanding of that definition.

Nothing is non existence and things that do not exist do not have size.

I'm well aware of what nothing means. I'm not a Lawrence Krauss-type atheist (arguably he knows what it really means, but it serves his "dialectic" to misuse the term).

It is not that things which do not exist have size, it is that the negation of things can vary in size.

From the fact that there is not anything between two cubes, it does not follow that they are adjoined.

Please give more details for this:
"It is not that things which do not exist have size, it is that the negation of things can vary in size."

What do you consider the difference between "things which do not exist" and "the negation of things"?

I'm interested in your reasoning.

But then it seems the argument is actually about ontology in the first place.
Theists maintain that God is essential for things to exist.  Atheists maintain that God is not essential for things to exist.  The arguments contradict each other so Fred could not rationally hold that both are true.  Parsimony would only tighten up each argument to be more concise. 

surroundx wrote:

It does not follow from the fact that space is nothing, that therefore it is a meaningless concept. After all one sense of "space" is the negation of material objects. So for example, take your two objects to be 30cm cubes separated by 30cm. That means a third cube of the same size could theoretically be inserted between them to produce 90cm of continuous horizontal extension.

When you use the word "nothing" in a conversation with people on a Classical Theism forum they have in mind the lack of any substance or attribute whatsoever. Space can contain an object.  Literal nothing cannot. 

The example you give is almost exactly the same argument used by Aristotle against the atomists to show how "the void" (what separated atoms) could not be nothing, since if there were nothing between 2 objects all objects would be continuous.  If there was literally nothing between 2 30cm cubes, no object could fit between them.

Space is either actually containing an object, or it can potentially contain an object.  So space can be changed from one actual state to a potential state in the future. 

Timocrates wrote:

The best you can do is assert this at a brute fact, which is a matter of personal belief or opinion and not science. 

I think this is the bottom line.  Either something else accounts for keeping a simple material body in existence, it keeps itself in existence, or it's continued existence is a  brute fact?    

A brute fact is just the avoidance of an explanation.  And I'd like to see an explain of how inanimate objects are responsible for causing their continued existence without implicitly invoking brute facts.

ficino wrote:

So far I contend that Aquinas does not argue for DDC and does not seek to refute EI in the Five Ways. He does this elsewhere, in my view.

So St Thomas cannot be accused of begging the question against EI in the Five Ways if he discusses the reasons for DDC elsewhere, right?  

ficino wrote:

So arguments for the existence of God cannot justifiably appeal to premises that contain DDC. God's existence must be proved first, before one goes further to argue that no substance can remain in existence unless God operates to sustain/conserve it in existence at every moment.

But St Thomas's project in the Five Ways is to briefly show that the existence of God can be proven by reason alone.  If he considered the Five Ways all there needed to be said, he wouldn't have continued to write volumes of excruciating details to explain the reasoning.  Similarly, one might as well argue that he does not give an exhaustive explanation of causality in the Five Ways, which seems to be fundamental to at least the first 3.

He explains the order and intent of his presentation here.
http://dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles1.htm#9

He starts by demonstrating that the existence of God can be proven by reason alone.  He goes into the bloody details later.  So the topic of God's relation to creatures is explored in the second section starting here: http://dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles2.htm

With detailed arguments for DDC here: http://dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles2.htm#15

ficino wrote:

I don't see reason to grant that assumption: 1) simple bodies/elements in an A-T conception under certain conditions change their location without needing the UM to move them along at every point along their transit; 2) ensouled beings make decisions without needing the UM to move those decisions.

What assumption?  You may not agree with the argument, but it certainly is not merely an assumption.

Regarding your 1: I disa