A Vicious Regress V: Intelligences

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A Vicious Regress V: Intelligences

The second video is long, but very informative.

The first video is shorter.  Latter-day Saint theology, in his scholarly and informed opinion holds that intelligences and matter are alone eternal.

However, nearer to the end of the first video, Dr. White states (paraphrased) that some Mormon apologists postulate that an infinite number of gods, exist. Based on the implication earlier in the video of the law of eternal progression, this law does connect to a concept of infinite gods.

I am not expert on The Church of Jesus-Christ Latter-day Saints, but having studied the nature of God within my United Kingdom MPhil/PhD studies (1999-2010 and prior in British Columbia) with theodicy, the problem of evil, free will and determinism, I do have some significant expertise in regard to the nature of God, philosophically and theologically.

In my opinion, an infinite number of gods, would reasonably require an infinity to eternally progress. How could there be an eternal progression of gods in a finite amount of time (Not necessarily solar time, but the point stands)?

Therefore, for those Latter-day Saints apologists that hold to the existence of an infinite number of gods, it is more reasonable that this an aspect of the infinite and eternal, as opposed to the finite.

But, if this occurred in an infinite timeless state, in my view this would rule out any concept of progression; these infinite gods would simply be infinite gods. There is no progression from point a to point b.

There is the problem of more than one infinite entity. Reasonably, only one infinite, limitless being could exist.

Further

This would fall into the category of vicious regress. Contrasted with a reasonable view of the Trinitarian God which as infinite and eternal 'Is'. There is no progression and no regress or progress.

Cited from my archives

LDS Temple April 2010

Vicious Regress October 2006

Matthew J. Slick notes that the Latter-day Saints' idea of Gods, which originated with Joseph Smith, teaches an infinite regression of causes. Slick (2006: 1). Each God came into existence from a previous God, and this has gone on in an infinite past. Slick (2006: 1). There cannot be an infinite regression of Gods because this would require an infinite amount of time which would not allow us to arrive at the present.

In contrast the idea of the Christian Trinity is that God has always existed and existed prior to time and therefore God has not lived for an infinite amount of time. God created time, but existed in a timeless state prior to the creation of time, space and matter.

In the Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Simon Blackburn discusses ‘infinite regress’ and mentions that this occurs in a vicious way whenever a problem tries to solve itself and yet remains with the same problem it had previously. Blackburn (1996: 324). A vicious regress is an infinite regress that does not solve its own problem, while a benign regress is an infinite regress that does not fail to solve its own problem. Blackburn (1996: 324). Blackburn writes that there is frequently room for debate on what is a vicious regress or benign regress. Blackburn (1996: 324).

In The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, William Tolhurst writes that a vicious regress is in some way unacceptable as it would include an infinite series of items dependent on prior items. A vicious regress may be impossible to hold to philosophically, or it may be inconsistent. Tolhurst (1996: 835). 

BLACKBURN, S. (1996) ‘Regress’, in Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

SLICK, MATTHEW J. (2006) 'A logical proof that Mormonism is false', Meridian, Idaho, Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry, http://www.carm.org/lds/infinity.htm

SMITH, JOSEPH (1844)(2006) ‘Sermon by the Prophet-The Christian Godhead-Plurality of Gods’, History of the Church, Vol. 6, p. 473-479. http://www.utlm.org TOLHURST,

TOLHURST, WILLIAM (1996) 'Vicious Regress', in Robert Audi, (ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.