I shall argue that one of Robert Maydole’s premises in his Modal Perfection Argument is false. The premise is as follows.
(M) Perfections entail only perfections.[1]
For any properties J and K, if J is a perfection and J entails K, then K is a perfection.[2] Consider Maydole’s argument for (M):
“Suppose X is a perfection and X entails Y. Then it is better to have X than not, and having Y is a necessary condition for having X. But it is always better to have that which is a necessary condition for whatever it is better to have than not; for the absence of the necessary condition means the absence of the conditioned, and per assumption it is better to have the conditioned. Therefore, it is better to have Y than not. So Y is a perfection.”[3]
This argument has some prima facie plausibility. But what does Maydole mean by perfection here? This argument seems to presuppose the following:
(D) A property P is a perfection just in case P is better to have than lack.[4]
But it turns out that (M) and (D) are incompatible. The property of being omnipotent contingently (non-essentially) is a property that is better to have than lack and, therefore, by (D), a perfection. Suppose a being B has omnipotence in a possible world W and lacks it in W*; in W* B has as many of the same properties as it has in W as is possible given that it is not omnipotent in W*. Then, in W, B has omnipotence contingently. It would be odd to suppose that B’s having omnipotence is not a property that is better to have than lack, for, in W, B is obviously greater than it is in W*. B’s having omnipotence in W adds to its greatness, and so is better to have than lack. The property of being omnipotent contingently entails the property possibly lacks omnipotence. Given (M) and (D), it follows that possibly lacks omnipotence is a perfection. But clearly this is not true. It is neither the case that this property is a perfection or that it is a property better to have than lack. Thus, (D) is true only if (M) is false and (M) is true only if (D) is false. So (D) and (M) cannot both be true.
[1] See Maydole, Robert. “The Modal Perfection Argument for the Existence of a Supreme Being.” Philo 6, no. 2 (2003).
[2] A property P entails a property Q just in case it is necessarily the case that, for all x, x has P only if x has Q.
[3] Maydole (2003). Pg. 302.
[4] Maydole defines perfection as follows: “a perfection is understood as a property that is better to have than lack.” See Ibid. Pg. 299.
The Analytic Philosopher 