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    The Principle of the Best is a consequence of the Princip... — Carmelics
    Home/Divine Attributes
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    The Principle of the Best is a consequence of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, not a rival to it.

    Divine AttributesNatural Theology
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    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.The sufficient reason for every choice is that the chooser perceives the choice to be best.
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    • 2.God chooses the actual world.
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    • 3.God perceives something to be what is best just in case it is the best.
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
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    • 1.The PSR requires only that every fact have *some* explanation, not that explanations must terminate in a best-choice calculation.
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    • 2.Leibniz's own modal framework allows that God could have sufficient reason to create even without a unique best world, as Rescher's 'optimific' reading shows.
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    • 3.If PSR entails the Principle of the Best, then in worlds without a unique optimum, PSR itself becomes vacuously unsatisfiable, making it a rival constraint rather than a consequence.
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    Reason against 2 of 2
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    • 1.Spinoza argued that God acts from the necessity of divine nature alone, providing sufficient reasons without any teleological ranking of possible worlds.
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    • 2.If a necessitarian PSR fully satisfies the demand for sufficient reasons without invoking 'best,' then the Principle of the Best is a substantive *addition* to PSR, not its logical consequence.
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    Topics

    Divine AttributesNatural Theology

    Connections

    2 topics

    Free Will & Foreknowledge1 linkedModality & Possibility1 linked

    Related

    God chooses the actual world.God perceives something to be what is best just in case it is the best.If PSR entails the Principle of the Best, then in worlds without a unique optimu...If a necessitarian PSR fully satisfies the demand for sufficient reasons without...
    +5 moreShow less
    Leibniz's own modal framework allows that God could have sufficient reason to cr...Spinoza argued that God acts from the necessity of divine nature alone, providin...The PSR requires only that every fact have *some* explanation, not that explanat...

    Similar

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    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: sufficient-reason
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    Another metaphysical characterization of a sufficient reason connects with the Principle of the Best, which says that for any proposition p, p is true just in case p holds in the best possible world (G VI.448/DM 22; Mon. 46, 53, 54/G VI, 614–616). Is the Principle of the Best a supplement to the PSR or a rival to the PSR? It is, in fact, a consequence of the PSR in conjunction with three additional assumptions: (1) the sufficient reason for every choice is that the chooser perceives it to the be
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

    The Principle of Sufficient Reason holds that every truth has a sufficient reaso...
    The sufficient reason for every choice is that the chooser perceives the choice ...
    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (1 for, 2 against)
    Edits
    1 edit