From: Brian Holtz [brian@holtz.org] Sent: Thursday, July 18, 2002 11:36 PM To: Alt.Atheism.Moderated Subject: Re: Science & atheism are cultures. "Jesse Nowells" wrote: > Since you insist that the actuality & possibility are equivalent in > world-objects, (because you can't "discern" the difference on > *undiscernible* world-objects), your definition must be arbitrary. What definition? I don't stipulate any definition of 'existence' for other worlds. I merely note that people who naively try to apply the intra-world definition of 'existence' to other worlds are confused, in that they cannot distinguish that notion from mere possible existence of said worlds. > What is the purpose of defining them so [..]? As I told Mr. Holbach, I have no strong preference between the choices of a) leaving 'existence' undefined for other worlds, and b) recognizing that existence is for other worlds indistinguishable from -- and thus synonymous with -- possibility. The two choices involve identical ontological commitments, and are different only lexicographically. -- brian@holtz.org http://humanknowledge.net