Dusty,

I refuted you in post #150. Please answer my arguments there.
Since my argument stands undefeated, you can admit you're wrong.

God bless,
FSC

Last edited by FrenchySkepticalCatholic (12/08/2017 4:44 am)

@FSC
--"I refuted you in post #150. Please answer my arguments there."

"Here are my counter claim, which defeats yours : wept nervous controller deathtrap "
--What controller?  You have not specified.

"mutant burnt extravagant fermentation"
--How is a mutant relevant to Aquinas?  Nor did Aquinas use extravagant fermentation as part of his arguments.

"sparkle bouncy imaginary trial combatant expert pigsticker"
--What does being a pigsticker have to do with an argument from motion or any of the 5 ways?

"harsh chieftain detonator crop messenger legend slave "
--Slavery is irrelevant to arguing for a first mover.

"ginger honeypot crowd ferocious"
--Ginger and ferocious are irrelevant to arguing for a first mover.

"excellent waveform brute liberation business black blueberry"
--What does a black blueberry have to do with any arguments for god?

"void fluent decay grave drowned creation emperor pilot forest"
--A "pilot forest" is a nonsense term.

"snail guillotine hellfire hawk falls propaganda bye entertain."
--A snail fails, or is it the hawk that fails?  Your sentence structure is unintelligible.

In truth, your "sentence" contains no references to any of the 5 ways of Aquinas, assert no principles of physics in a context that would form an argument for a first mover at all.

You make no distinction between a premise and a conclusion in any intelligible way that would constitute and argument for a first mover.

Nonsense gibberish arguments are the easiest to demonstrate as being such.  I have shown that you did not even make an argument for a first mover, nor did you reference my arguments against the necessity of a hierarchical first mover acting in the present moment.  Nor did you reference any arguments of Aquinas.  Therefore, your words are just salad.


 

@grod
SP"You don't present arguments."

"This is, by any objective measure, a complete lie,"
--You have presented no argument demonstrating that the first and second ways are sound.

You have presented no arguments demonstrating my refutations of the first and second ways are unsound.

"which does not surprise me given the source -- not only a scumbag, but someone who wouldn't recognize an argument even if it bit his nose off."
--Arguments typically take the form of stating premises, explaining how they are connected, and stating a conclusion.

ficino accurately summarized some of my arguments in a line by line format.  I have summarized my arguments for you in a set of short paragraphs wherein the premises, reasoning, and conclusions are very clearly laid out.

You have presented no counter arguments.  Maybe presenting two arguments is just too much information for you, so I will again refute the Second Way as an argument for the necessity of a hierarchical first mover acting in the present moment to account for the observation of existential inertia that is manifest and evident to our senses

If a thing does not change in a particular respect then no changer is necessary to account for the observation of no change in that respect.
Existing material does not change its mass/energy merely by virtue of persisting in existence. 
The amount of material of a material object does not change simply by continuing to exist. 
Therefore persistence of the amount of material of an object does not necessitate a changer at all.
Since no changer is necessitated by observed persistence of material, no hierarchical first changer acting in the present moment is necessitated.

In a temporal regress analysis causal events are separated in a time sequence process.
In a hierarchical regress analysis causal events are imagined as connected hierarchically in a particular moment.
A material object can change in mass/energy associated with that object. 
Additional material can move to join with a real material object, or move to separate from a real material object.
All such changes are temporal and accounted for with a temporal regress analysis,
Therefore no hierarchical changer is called for to account for changes in mass/energy of real material objects.

Since no changer is necessary to account for the persistence of mass/energy and no hierarchical changer is necessary to account for changes in mass/energy associated with real material objects, the Second Way fails as an argument for the necessity of a hierarchical first mover acting in the present moment to account for observed persistence of existing material or changes of material of particular real material objects, which is manifest and evident to our senses.


Can you find specific errors in the premises of logic of the above?  Thus far you have not.

Can you show that by finding such flaws that they demonstrate the validity of the Second Way?  Thus far you have not.

@FSC
Your ability to argue is really something.

Can you find the specific errors in this argument?
If a thing does not change in a particular respect then no changer is necessary to account for the observation of no change in that respect.
Existing material does not change its mass/energy merely by virtue of persisting in existence. 
The amount of material of a material object does not change simply by continuing to exist. 
Therefore persistence of the amount of material of an object does not necessitate a changer at all.
Since no changer is necessitated by observed persistence of material, no hierarchical first changer acting in the present moment is necessitated.

In a temporal regress analysis causal events are separated in a time sequence process.
In a hierarchical regress analysis causal events are imagined as connected hierarchically in a particular moment.
A material object can change in mass/energy associated with that object. 
Additional material can move to join with a real material object, or move to separate from a real material object.
All such changes are temporal and accounted for with a temporal regress analysis,
Therefore no hierarchical changer is called for to account for changes in mass/energy of real material objects.

Since no changer is necessary to account for the persistence of mass/energy and no hierarchical changer is necessary to account for changes in mass/energy associated with real material objects, the Second Way fails as an argument for the necessity of a hierarchical first mover acting in the present moment to account for observed persistence of existing material or changes of material of particular real material objects, which is manifest and evident to our senses.


 

@FSC
"Well, since you're asserting the conclusion in the premises, it's basically just as vacuous as the premises themselves"
--I think the term you are looking for is begging the question, and no, I am not.

Premise:
If a thing does not change in a particular respect then no changer is necessary to account for the observation of no change in that respect.

Conclusion:
Therefore persistence of the amount of material of an object does not necessitate a changer at all.

Those are two different statements.  The premise is a general principle related to the nature of change.  Whenever we observe a change a changer is necessarily called for.  This is what Aquinas said:
*It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e. that it should move itself*
Thus, I am simply agreeing with Aquinas in the converse form. 
Since, according to Aquinas a thing cannot move (change) itself, therefore when we observe change there must necessarily exist an associated changer.  It logically follows that if we observe a lack of change then we lack grounds to call for the necessity of a changer.

Even grod understands this, calling it "obvious".

Thus my premise is valid.

My conclusion is quite different.  By argumentation I establish that the valid general premise applies specifically to the persistence of material.

Thus my argument is both valid and sound.

"Show me a thing persisting that you can observe directly, and we'll talk"
--Really?  You do not observe things persisting?  What, is stuff just popping out of and into existence in your observations?  When you park a car in your garage at night don't you fully expect it to still be there in the morning?  What an absurd request.

Every confirmed and well controlled scientific experiment confirms the conservation of mass/energy.  No experiment has measured material simply disappearing from existence.

"What persists without changing, in your view ?"
--The amount of material.  The quantity of mass/energy.

"How come things change ?"
--Newton provided a key insight that has been greatly developed since his day.  To paraphrase, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  In a very rough manner of speaking, everything keeps bouncing off of everything else.  A great variety of ways in which material interacts are described by modern physics.

"How come things persist ?"
--Because persistence is not a change.  When things don't change then things stay the same.  This has the truth of a tautology, and is in fact a tautology by synonym. The Thomist demands an explanation for this tautological truth.

The Thomistic explanation is that an invisible being is continuously changing things in just the right way so as to provide us with the illusion that they are not changing, a truly bizarre worldview that Feser and every Thomist vehemently defends, sometimes not even realizing in those words that is what they are defending.