I don’t feel qualified to answer. If we’re talking about exists in a mathy sense, then any of those that can be represented mathematically exists. I’m not sure if there are universes where 5=4, and other logically impossible things. I’ve heard arguments to this effect but I don’t remember what they are. Surely you can have things that appear logically impossible, due to hiding some contradiction in the middle of a titanic proof, but actually logically impossible, I don’t know. ‘God’ is vague because ‘omnipresent’ and the like don’t really make sense; similar problems with proper factor of 101.
The last one about Roswell seems obviously true, it’s just not true in most universes we find ourselves on. But I mean, it’s a true statement in a trivial way. ‘We live in a spatially infinite universe and so there exists a copy of you that is the same in every way except with 20 foot long hair’ is also trivially true. But if you only care about worlds in which your hair is 20 feet long, then all of a sudden its truth is not trivial; it’s vitally important.
I was trying to tease out whether your “God is real” is intended in the same sense as “the monster group exists” - neither exists in physical reality, but both exist in at least some minds; in a kind of mental reality. My other questions were intended to ferret out whether your idea of a mental or algorithmic “real” includes only well-defined and consistent ideas, or whether vague, incorrect, and impossible ideas also qualify as “real” in your sense.
Sorry I didn’t make that clear in the original comment—I didn’t mean to seem confrontational. I’m just trying to get a better understanding of your interesting suggestion. This appears to be one situation where more politeness might have helped. :)
As for where I am coming from, I’m one of those philosophical anti-realists mentioned earlier in this thread (and a big fan of van Fraassen). I am far from convinced that electrons are real. So I’m interested in the details when someone says, in effect, that God is just as real as electrons.
I don’t feel qualified to answer. If we’re talking about exists in a mathy sense, then any of those that can be represented mathematically exists. I’m not sure if there are universes where 5=4, and other logically impossible things. I’ve heard arguments to this effect but I don’t remember what they are. Surely you can have things that appear logically impossible, due to hiding some contradiction in the middle of a titanic proof, but actually logically impossible, I don’t know. ‘God’ is vague because ‘omnipresent’ and the like don’t really make sense; similar problems with proper factor of 101.
The last one about Roswell seems obviously true, it’s just not true in most universes we find ourselves on. But I mean, it’s a true statement in a trivial way. ‘We live in a spatially infinite universe and so there exists a copy of you that is the same in every way except with 20 foot long hair’ is also trivially true. But if you only care about worlds in which your hair is 20 feet long, then all of a sudden its truth is not trivial; it’s vitally important.
What implied questions did I miss?
I was trying to tease out whether your “God is real” is intended in the same sense as “the monster group exists” - neither exists in physical reality, but both exist in at least some minds; in a kind of mental reality. My other questions were intended to ferret out whether your idea of a mental or algorithmic “real” includes only well-defined and consistent ideas, or whether vague, incorrect, and impossible ideas also qualify as “real” in your sense.
Sorry I didn’t make that clear in the original comment—I didn’t mean to seem confrontational. I’m just trying to get a better understanding of your interesting suggestion. This appears to be one situation where more politeness might have helped. :)
As for where I am coming from, I’m one of those philosophical anti-realists mentioned earlier in this thread (and a big fan of van Fraassen). I am far from convinced that electrons are real. So I’m interested in the details when someone says, in effect, that God is just as real as electrons.