Is Necessary Existence a Great-Making Property?

[Jason Dulle]

During Craig’s Cambridge debate Aref Ahmed responded to the ontological argument by asking why “necessary existence” should be thought of as a great making-property.  Ahmed asked if a piece of Mozart’s music would be any greater if it existed necessarily rather than contingently.  It would seem not, which leads one to believe that necessary existence is not a great-making property.  And yet, it still seems to be the case that some entity that must exist is greater than an entity that only just-so-happens to exist.  These two intuitions compete against one another.  How would you sort between these two intuitions?

[FNB - Former non-believer]

I am not sure it is possible for music to necessarily exist. The music on paper is just a representation of the actual music itself which is an audible phenomenon. What would it be for music to exist necessarily? Though I would suggest that if you want more discussion on this, you post it in the "choose your own topic" area at the bottom where 90% of the people on this forum spend their time.

[Jason Dulle]

It is not possible for music to exist necessarily, and I would venture to say that Aref knows that.  He was simply trying to illustrate that the greatness of the music does not increase simply because it is necessary.  And if its necessary existence cannot make the music any greater than if it has contingent existence, then necessary existence is not a great making property, and the ontological argument fails.

I actually posted this topic under the ontological argument as well.  If I don't get much response there either, I will post it under the general tab.

[FNB - Former non-believer]

jasondulle wrote: It is not possible for music to exist necessarily, and I would venture to say that Aref knows that.  He was simply trying to illustrate that the greatness of the music does not increase simply because it is necessary.  And if its necessary existence cannot make the music any greater than if it has contingent existence, then necessary existence is not a great making property, and the ontological argument fails.

I actually posted this topic under the ontological argument as well.  If I don't get much response there either, I will post it under the general tab.

If you cannot apply necessary existence to music--if it is impossible for music to necessarily exist--then it seems to me no evidence that it is not a great making property if applied to music, as it cannot even be applied to music.

Likewise, the number 7 cannot have the property of being in pain, but that doesn't mean pain isn't an undesirable property or anything else. And even if it were possible somehow for music to necessarily exist, it seems to me that it would make the music have some sort of greatness. Even if one couldn't hear the necessary existence of music, there would seem to me to be something really special about the fact that this music had existed necessarily (perhaps by a necessity of its own nature).

[Great Pumpkin]

emailestthoume wrote:

It is not possible for music to exist necessarily, and I would venture to say that Aref knows that.  He was simply trying to illustrate that the greatness of the music does not increase simply because it is necessary.  And if its necessary existence cannot make the music any greater than if it has contingent existence, then necessary existence is not a great making property, and the ontological argument fails.

I actually posted this topic under the ontological argument as well.  If I don't get much response there either, I will post it under the general tab.

If you cannot apply necessary existence to music--if it is impossible for music to necessarily exist--then it seems to me no evidence that it is not a great making property if applied to music, as it cannot even be applied to music.

Likewise, the number 7 cannot have the property of being in pain, but that doesn't mean pain isn't an undesirable property or anything else. And even if it were possible somehow for music to necessarily exist, it seems to me that it would make the music have some sort of greatness. Even if one couldn't hear the necessary existence of music, there would seem to me to be something really special about the fact that this music had existed necessarily (perhaps by a necessity of its own nature).

If the Universe existed necessarily, would it be greater?

Under materialism, the universe (or the conditions to randomly create one) appear to be Necessary.  That would make it Great.  And, even greater than God since it did it unwittingly whereas God had to think about it, and even then, had to kill a bunch of people because his Creation messed up his Creation....  Just sayin'