I'm not a professional metaphysician, but on van Inwagen's position, which I think aligns with Quine (van Inwagen is a theist, Quine wasn't), by definition an abstract object doesn't exist anywhere. It's just something over which the properties being quantified don't include location, whether in a mind or anywhere else. Although van Inwagen is I think a conservative Episcopalian, he doesn't say that abstract objects are "in" God's mind, because he holds they aren't "anywhere." They are also not temporally located, so they're eternal in the sense of not in time. But they exist, because it's senseless to have objects that don't exist. Even when spatio-temporal entities were just coalescing after the Big Bang, 19 was the only prime between 18 and 20 (in base ten).

But I haven't read all van Inwagen's stuff, by any means, so he may say in what I haven't read that abstract objects are "in" at least one mind. What I remember from the colloquium though was that he denied this. He held that the reason they don't threaten God's aseity, contra Craig, is that they have no causal powers. 19 is an example he uses elsewhere; in the colloquium, his example of an abstract object was "sentence form." When you say, "this sentence form is faulty," you commit yourself to "there exists an x, such that x is a sentence form and x is faulty." Craig and Welty wanted to have multiple senses of "exists," which I believe is a mistake.

Where do abstract objects such as 19 exist without a mind? 19 presumes being, logic, ontology, the mind, the PNC, sense perceptions, intellect, syllogism, set theory, and a physical substrate. If 19 is an abstract perceived relationship of the mind to the physical reality as such does it not have causal powers in the mind that conceives it if it represents the true relationship of beings?

Interesting post F, thanks.

Something is screwy with Disqus. I just upvoted yours. I can't imagine why the upvote feature won't work for you, unless Zuckerberg's arm is longer than the lever that doesn't actualize a hierarchical series of causes from outer space.

Upvote here. Zuckerberg still hates me. But thanks for the link.

https://www.firstthings.com/article/2020/04/keep-it-simple

It's a review of Wm. Lane Craig's book on God's aseity and the challenge of Platonism. I attended a panel last year where Craig and Peter van Inwagen and Greg Welty discussed divine aseity and abstract objects. I thought van Inwagen was the most persuasive. Feser in his review takes a different tack from van Inwagen, closer I think to Welty's in the panel.

I don't endorse all of Feser's criticisms of Craig because I don't think Feser's concern with the location of abstract objects - i.e. they must exist "in" a mind - is necessary. So far I think it makes the most sense to affirm that there exists one prime number between 18 and 20 but that this "between" is not a spatial location, and 19 didn't need to exist "in" a mind before it first came to be identified as a prime. It just is an abstract object that lacks spatio-temporal location and causal powers.

I might some day change my view about the existence of abstract objects so defined, but so far I see no reason to.

Oh well, no need for anyone to reply to my musings - but fans of Feser may enjoy Feser's take-down of Craig.

The other is "God is morality" which I've already dismissed elsewhere here on the site.

> explain to me how this thread is not about the natural right to liberty and life.

The explanation is that I began the thread, and my topic was separation of religion and government.

Maybe you don't understand what American Independence day is for, read the Declaration of Independence and then explain to me how this thread is not about the natural right to liberty and life.

> when the subject is the natural right to life and liberty.

which it wasn't in this thread. Please read more carefully.