Law of Identity

[dorkmaster]

An atheist tried to tell me that the law of identity proves that God doesn't exist if He is infinite. I tried to 'see' what he was talking about but to no avail. Has anyone else heard this?

[CeT-To]

I dont understand... what doesn't make sense?

If this is the old "if God is infinite then he doesn't exist because infinites lead to contradictions" - then this is has been refuted before, nothing new.

[spartanII]

An atheist tried to tell me that the law of identity proves that God doesn't exist if He is infinite. I tried to 'see' what he was talking about but to no avail. Has anyone else heard this?

I put the ball in his court. I would say...atheist find me reason growing somewhere. If he says it's natural, you have him in your grasps. tell him that he too is apart of the uniformity of nature, it may appear like he has a choice in things, or is actively thinking, but rather is subject to those natural laws in the past and that's not what we say whenever we talk about things like "reason." Now he can't even justify whether or not he's being logical or whether or not the laws of nature are permitting him to do so.
When in doubt look up Greg Bahnsen. I'd suggest the Bahnsen v Smith debate on youtube.

[Echoside]

An atheist tried to tell me that the law of identity proves that God doesn't exist if He is infinite. I tried to 'see' what he was talking about but to no avail. Has anyone else heard this?

I put the ball in his court. I would say...atheist find me reason growing somewhere. If he says it's natural, you have him in your grasps. tell him that he too is apart of the uniformity of nature, it may appear like he has a choice in things, or is actively thinking, but rather is subject to those natural laws in the past and that's not what we say whenever we talk about things like "reason." Now he can't even justify whether or not he's being logical or whether or not the laws of nature are permitting him to do so.
When in doubt look up Greg Bahnsen. I'd suggest the Bahnsen v Smith debate on youtube.

I don't know, responses like this to me just feel like a cop out.

If the atheist's position is wrong it cannot both be the case that

a) his position is logical

and

b) God doesn't exist

therefore, if god does exist his position must have some kind of answer. Or at least, God as described above (infinite). It would be much more satisfying to hear the actual answer rather than a debate on the nature of the laws of logic.

[spartanII]

An atheist tried to tell me that the law of identity proves that God doesn't exist if He is infinite. I tried to 'see' what he was talking about but to no avail. Has anyone else heard this?

I put the ball in his court. I would say...atheist find me reason growing somewhere. If he says it's natural, you have him in your grasps. tell him that he too is apart of the uniformity of nature, it may appear like he has a choice in things, or is actively thinking, but rather is subject to those natural laws in the past and that's not what we say whenever we talk about things like "reason." Now he can't even justify whether or not he's being logical or whether or not the laws of nature are permitting him to do so.
When in doubt look up Greg Bahnsen. I'd suggest the Bahnsen v Smith debate on youtube.

I don't know, responses like this to me just feel like a cop out.

If the atheist's position is wrong it cannot both be the case that

a) his position is logical

and

b) God doesn't exist

therefore, if god does exist his position must have some kind of answer. Or at least, God as described above (infinite). It would be much more satisfying to hear the actual answer rather than a debate on the nature of the laws of logic.

it's not really a cop out. empiricism/rationality are awesome but can't work together to produce a world view. in their world all there is, is matter in motion, determined by nature. there is no choice. that's an illusion. the burden of proof is now on them to not look stupid.

[Bill McEnaney]

I don't understand the atheist's criticism. The law of identity says that every object is identical with itself. To put that law more formally, for every x, x = x. So infinity = infinity is a tautology. If God exists, then God = God is a tautology, too. In his Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy, where he writes about transfinite numbers, Bertrand Russell argues that some infinitely large numbers are bigger than other infinitely large numbers. But an infinitely large number differs from infinity because infinity is a property an infinitely large number has. Since there are other infinitely large things, an infinitely large number differs from infinity.