Best Argument For or Against God's Existence

[Colter]

You're asking for a list of scientist who don't even consider this a real question. They're still looking for the cause, I gave you a list of the research. Here it is again. What caused the big bang?

As for hating god. How can I hate something I don't even know exists? What I do hate is people who have jumped on the faith band wagon to manipulate others. From mass murder to eating a wafer in church.

Being good doesn't require any of the ritual or belief in a mystical power. And the evidence is a lot of people who did or do believe, were or are evil.

We both have conscious minds that transcend the material as we contrast the super-material values of the good contrasted with relative evil. Faith in it's purest form is a trust in the ultimate Goodness of God. The spirit of worship in man, in all men, is what motivates us to seek for the origins of these nonmaterial values.

We both agree that there are deplorable errors committed in the name of God, that there are genuine charlatans who have attached themselves to religious causes for various reasons, but this does not invalidate the faith of billions of sincere humans who do not act that way.

 

[nonbeliever314]

@Joshua260 Just remember the biggest hole in your argument is that the universe doesn't have a "master clock". "It's all relative".

 

[Joshua260]

This response doesn't even make sense. You are appealing to our causal intuitions, not me. So how am I begging the question?

Let's review:
You said:
"Given that our causal intuitions developed in a universe of physical laws, such as F=ma, we cannot be certain that those intuitions would remain intact in the absence of those laws."

First, we experience cause and effect every day and depend on it in order "to do" science. It is such a common every day experience that it has become axiomatic that effects have causes.

"...the causal premise is rooted in the metaphysical intuition that something cannot come into being from nothing. To suggest that things could just pop into being uncaused out of nothing is to quit doing serious metaphysics and to resort to magic.

Read more: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/causal-premiss-of-the-kalam-argument#ixzz3eCrQIibJ

Well said by William Lane Craig.

So what happens if the physical laws change?
Let's start with a force example (I'm going to ignore units).
F=ma
If an m of 2 fell at an a of 3, the f would be 6.
Therefore, the cause (m of 2 falling at an a of 3) created an effect (f of 6).

Now if the physical Force law changed from F=ma to F=m(.5a), that would not nullify the "law of causality" that effects have causes. Let's try it out:
If an m of 2 fell at an a of 1.5, the f would be 3.
Therefore, the cause (m of 2 falling at an a of 1.5) created an effect (f of 3).

So there's no reason to think that just because the physical laws themselves might change, that the "law of causality" would have to change also.

 

[KCfromNC]

False dichotomy.
Jesus was the manifestation of an immaterial God into a material man.

So Jesus was a totally separate being than god? Good to know. Not particularly non-heretical, but at least it gets around the problem of a being that's both material and not at the the same time.

 

[Joshua260]

What are you extrapolating from?
Various arguments and evidence. We would have to examine each trait separately in order to answer that.

That's not what I claimed.

This is what you said:
"If most cosmologists agree with the premises, and the conclusion follows from the premises, which you claim it does, then that is equivalent to saying that they agree with the conclusion. But that can't be right..."

To review, my proposed KCA argument was:
1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause for it's existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe had a cause for it's existence.

Therefore, you seem to be implying that some scientists disagree with #3, so I'm simply asking you to back up your claim by citing which scientists have claimed that the universe did not have a cause for it's existence. Don't you agree that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence? I suspect that you meant to say that they do not believe in God, which is not the same as disagreeing with #3.

 

[Joshua260]

So Jesus was a totally separate being than god? Good to know. Not particularly non-heretical, but at least it gets around the problem of a being that's both material and not at the the same time.

You apparently do not understand the doctrine of the trinity sufficiently. God is spirit, and has three "centers" of personhood. The second person of trinity of God became flesh in the man of Jesus of Nazareth. I'm not going to respond any more on this as it is off-topic. Go start a thread and we can discuss it.

 

[paul becke]

Hello all,

In your opinion, what's the very best argument for the existence of God? Conversely, what's the top argument against the existence of God? Interested to hear your responses and subsequent reasoning. Thanks!

I would say, either of two somewhat related rationales:

1) The fine-tuning of the universe. It was what finally persuaded Anthony Flew, the Richard Dawkins of his day, though surely somewhat better educated and more intelligent than the latter.

2) The argument from design. The case for this gets stronger by the day, although the notion of its having come together by chance was always beyond farcical, anyway. The designs of the natural world, right down to the single-cell E-Coli virus, make the intelligence and understanding even today's scientists seem like that of little infants, barely able to draw a chalk line on a little blackboard. So much so that they study nature, in order to reverse-engineer its brilliant designs.

 

[nonbeliever314]

Let's review:
You said:
"Given that our causal intuitions developed in a universe of physical laws, such as F=ma, we cannot be certain that those intuitions would remain intact in the absence of those laws."

First, we experience cause and effect every day and depend on it in order "to do" science. It is such a common every day experience that it has become axiomatic that effects have causes.

"...the causal premise is rooted in the metaphysical intuition that something cannot come into being from nothing. To suggest that things could just pop into being uncaused out of nothing is to quit doing serious metaphysics and to resort to magic.

Read more: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/causal-premiss-of-the-kalam-argument#ixzz3eCrQIibJ

Well said by William Lane Craig.

So what happens if the physical laws change?
Let's start with a force example (I'm going to ignore units).
F=ma
If an m of 2 fell at an a of 3, the f would be 6.
Therefore, the cause (m of 2 falling at an a of 3) created an effect (f of 6).

Now if the physical Force law changed from F=ma to F=m(.5a), that would not nullify the "law of causality" that effects have causes. Let's try it out:
If an m of 2 fell at an a of 1.5, the f would be 3.
Therefore, the cause (m of 2 falling at an a of 1.5) created an effect (f of 3).

So there's no reason to think that just because the physical laws themselves might change, that the "law of causality" would have to change also.

Let's try that again with F = dp/dt.

 

[Berean777]

Many people have claimed to have met god, Jesus, or the new messiah, or a different messiah. Do I really need to list them all?

In the 1999 film Joan of Arc, Dustin Hoffman stars and at first we're led to believe he's playing god. At the end he reveals, he's only playing Joan talking to herself. Murders ordered by god. Worse still is god told me to do it defence. Given that kind of power of blind faith, God told me to end the tyranny.

Best advice to anyone who meets god is spit in his face. Because it's better than thinking he told you to press the button. He told Bush to kill 100,000s, land the US in deeper debt and devastate the region.

Unless he was lying, then we have to consider. Maybe others were lying because they wanted the land the people were living on.

Tens of millions of people throughout the last 2000 years have met Jesus when he physically manifested himself onto them. They witnessed their lives were completely changed and for the better. This has happened around the world and to countless people over the ages, who were not even born into Christain families.

These tens of millions of people have the SAME testimony of the man in white appearing onto them and calling them son/daughter. The man in white would say "do you want me to help you son/daughter". All these tens of millions of witnesses saw the same person in white robes, who they confidently testify is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel.

These tens of millions throughout he ages are the living evidence to God's existence and they ALL testify of the same life changing miraculous experience, when the same man in white came into their lives.

Now if unbelievers or mockers are saying there is no proof for God's exitence, the reason for this is that they are not the living evidence to God's existence, therefore they have failed to search for the evidence themselves, and also failed to have an experiential relationship where they can meet Jesus and be touched by God. Their failure to be the living evidence for God's existence is not evidence to say God doesn't exist.

These people who have not seen God face to face have not put the effort to seek God with all their hearts in the same way a scientist would put all his/her heart in their experiments, to seek to prove the same factual repetitive results occurring as part of their experiments. Scientists don't stop at the first attempt or the 1000th attempt, they continue to tweak the conditions of their experiments to proof to themselves that their equations owing to their theories are valid by being repeatable. So the scientist to himself is the living proof to the findings of his own experiments, including the half dozen of scientists who also witnessed and experience what the scientist witnessed and experienced, who then went on to write his/her scientific papers. The scientists therefore is the living evidence to his many efforts put into getting results that proof his/her theories.

Evidence to God's existence is no different to a scientist who works hard in the laboratory to make discoveries themselves and compare the results/testimonies with other scientists. For the existence of God the laboratory is not half a dozen scientists in a few labs, rather those that are living evidence to God's existence encompasses not only the world, but also the last 2000 years and by the tens of millions who have made the SAME repeatable dsicovery to the existence of God. This would be by far more compelling than a scientists who proves his papers to half a dozen of scientists within their finite time for validating the findings of the experiment. Unfortunately the scientist quite commonly would later find out, years down the track to be proven wrong by another theory by another fellow scientist who introduces a variable that the scientist before him overlooked. The question to the existence of God is experimentally proven in the lab which is the world we live in, and by all of humanity, who have not contradicted one another to the discovery of God, but rather reinforced one another to the exitence of God.

As far as the case of an unbeliever is concerned, where does the failure rest. A failure for the absence of God due to an unbeliever being the living proof for himself/herself of God's existence, is proof that the efforts the unbeliever has put in is not up to scratch, or at best a poor none genuine effort. In the same way a failure to obtain results by a scientist is a failure on the part of the scientist. A failure for an unbeliever to proof God's existence themselves where they become the living evidence to God's existence, is therefore a miserable failure on their part and they have the burden of proof on them to disprove God's none exitence. Unbelievers haven't disproven what the tens of millions have experienced, who are the living evidence to God's existence in the laboratory that is the world and the repetitive discoveries made by the faithful across the last 2000 years and counting, to proofing to themselves in validating that God exists and he is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel.

1 Corinthians 3:19-20
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness”; and again, “The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.

You need to find him yourself and any words spoken outside of this tangible, repeatable and verifiable method of discover is futile.

Thank you kindly

 

[nonbeliever314]

Tens of millions of people throughout the last 2000 years have met Jesus when he physically manifested himself onto them. They witnessed their lives were completely changed and for the better. This has happened around the world and to countless people over the ages, who were not even born into Christain families.

These tens of millions of people have the SAME testimony of the man in white appearing onto them and calling them son/daughter. The man in white would say "do you want me to help you son/daughter". All these tens of millions of witnesses saw the same person in white robes, who they confidently testify is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel.

These tens of millions throughout he ages are the living evidence to God's existence and they ALL testify of the same life changing miraculous experience, when the same man in white came into their lives.

Now if unbelievers or mockers are saying there is no proof for God's exitence, the reason for this is that they are not the living evidence to God's existence, therefore they have failed to search for the evidence themselves, and also failed to have an experiential relationship where they can meet Jesus and be touched by God. Their failure to be the living evidence for God's existence is not evidence to say God doesn't exist.

These people who have not seen God face to face have not put the effort to seek God with all their hearts in the same way a scientist would put all his/her heart in their experiments, to seek to prove the same factual repetitive results occurring as part of their experiments. Scientists don't stop at the first attempt or the 1000th attempt, they continue to tweak the conditions of their experiments to proof to themselves that their equations owing to their theories are valid by being repeatable. So the scientist to himself is the living proof to the findings of his own experiments, including the half dozen of scientists who also witnessed and experience what the scientist witnessed and experienced, who then went on to write his/her scientific papers. The scientists therefore is the living evidence to his many efforts put into getting results that proof his/her theories.

Evidence to God's existence is no different to a scientist who works hard in the laboratory to make discoveries themselves and compare the results/testimonies with other scientists. For the existence of God the laboratory is not half a dozen scientists in a few labs, rather those that are living evidence to God's existence encompasses not only the world, but also the last 2000 years and by the tens of millions who have made the SAME repeatable dsicovery to the existence of God. This would be by far more compelling than a scientists who proves his papers to half a dozen of scientists within their finite time for validating the findings of the experiment. Unfortunately the scientist quite commonly would later find out, years down the track to be proven wrong by another theory by another fellow scientist who introduces a variable that the scientist before him overlooked. The question to the existence of God is experimentally proven in the lab which is the world we live in, and by all of humanity, who have not contradicted one another to the discovery of God, but rather reinforced one another to the exitence of God.

As far as the case of an unbeliever is concerned, where does the failure rest. A failure for the absence of God due to an unbeliever being the living proof for himself/herself of God's existence, is proof that the efforts the unbeliever has put in is not up to scratch, or at best a poor none genuine effort. In the same way a failure to obtain results by a scientist is a failure on the part of the scientist. A failure for an unbeliever to proof God's existence themselves where they become the living evidence to God's existence, is therefore a miserable failure on their part and they have the burden of proof on them to disprove God's none exitence. Unbelievers haven't disproven what the tens of millions have experienced, who are the living evidence to God's existence in the laboratory that is the world and the repetitive discoveries made by the faithful across the last 2000 years and counting, to proofing to themselves in validating that God exists and he is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel.

1 Corinthians 3:19-20
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness”; and again, “The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.

You need to find him yourself and any words spoken outside of this tangible, repeatable and verifiable method of discover is futile.

Thank you kindly

Why did God wait roughly 180000 years to introduce his son to mankind?

 

[Berean777]

Why did God wait roughly 180000 years to introduce his son to mankind?

I am not interested in your question. If you are sincerely wanting to know the answer, then first establish a relationship with him. You can't just go onto the street and ask a stranger personal questions, otherwise that stranger will think that you are insane. First you must establish a relationship as a friend with that person to ask him any personal question and even that has to be done with gentleness and awareness on what you can sensibly ask without your conscious rebuking you to why you should ask that question in the first place. You may not ask questions that you may feel that it is none of your business on how that friend buys and sells his wealth.

In this case you are not yet a friend of God but you have the opportunity like many others, not as the world gives you that opportunity, to first introduce yourself to God Christ Jesus as you would to a person you dearly love, maybe a son, daughter, brother, sister, mother, father. Then after he has manifested himself onto you, that is the go ahead for you that he is listening to you and you have become his friend.

Finding God is no different to the way you would establish friends in your life and you don't go about that by questioning their existence do you? this would be insulting as a conscious human being that you are obviously.

You deserve it and to be the living evidence to the existence of God and be the joyful one to share your testimony with others. Humanity are your brothers and sisters and they who have come to know God are the living evidence to God's existence and in some no to distant time you may be numbered as one of the countless millions throughout the centuries to have made friend with God on a personal level beyond what I can say to you. It has to be your discovery and your validation, you need to experience God yourself as much as others can't experience joy and love on your behave you need to seek and you shall find if you seek with all your heart as much, if not more compared to the way you seek worldly things.

Come back and tell us your story I will be interested then, but for now it appears by your testimony that you have nothing in you that interests me.

Goodbye!

 

[nonbeliever314]

I am not interested in your question. If you are sincerely wanting to know the answer, then first establish a relationship with him. You can't just go onto the street and ask a stranger personal questions, otherwise that stranger will think that you are insane. First you must establish a relationship as a friend with that person to ask him any personal question and even that has to be done with gentleness and awareness on what you can sensibly ask without your conscious rebuking you to why you should ask that question in the first place. You may not ask questions that you may feel that it is none of your business on how that friend buys and sells his wealth.

In this case you are not yet a friend of God but you have the opportunity like many others, not as the world gives you that opportunity, to first introduce yourself to God Christ Jesus as you would to a person you dearly love, maybe a son, daughter, brother, sister, mother, father. Then after he has manifested himself onto you, that is the go ahead for you that he is listening to you and you have become his friend.

Finding God is no different to the way you would establish friends in your life and you don't go about that by questioning their existence do you? this would be insulting as a conscious human being that you are obviously.

You deserve it and to be the living evidence to the existence of God and be the joyful one to share your testimony with others. Humanity are your brothers and sisters and they who have come to know God are the living evidence to God's existence and in some no to distant time you may be numbered as one of the countless millions throughout the centuries to have made friend with God on a personal level beyond what I can say to you. It has to be your discovery and your validation, you need to experience God yourself as much as others can't experience joy and love on your behave you need to seek and you shall find if you seek with all your heart as much, if not more compared to the way you seek worldly things.

Come back and tell us your story I will be interested then, but for now it appears by your testimony that you have nothing in you that interests me.

Goodbye!

...Ok......

 

[bhsmte]

One of the few things, I agree with Willy on:

 

[Joshua260]

If spaghetti cannot be both material and immaterial, then neither can God. If God can be both after all, then so can spaghetti.

Jesus does not say that God is material, nor that God is material and immaterial. Rather, Jesus explains that God is spirit (immaterial). He came into this world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. In like manner, the FSM, as explained by Davian and others, is immaterial and manifest himself in his world as a material being. So the true essence of being for both God and the FSM is immaterial.

 

[nonbeliever314]

I've just been converted.. To a Pastafarian. Come join me. http://www.venganza.org

 

[Joshua260]

Kinda oops'd on that one when I said everything. Here's 3. Since you think this universe is the one and only one there is, there are less possibilities in the "everything" category.

1) MUH <- (emoji thumbs up)
2) Eternal Inflation
3) "Clapping" Branes

You think there was nothing "before" this universe, and God created it, so any list I make for the beginning of the universe assuming there was "stuff" around before wouldn't be satisfying for you. So above is my everything list. They're all eternal.

Yes, I do believe that the Christian God created the universe, but I'm all for looking at your suggestions to see how they stack up against as a possible cause the universe.

First, I'd like to review some characteristics that I believe the cause for the universe's existence has:
eternal (as in without beginning or end. In effect, timeless)
immaterial
omnipotent
omniscient
uncaused
space-less
a free-causal agent

We agreed on all of these before except the timeless trait.

So here's my responses:
1) MUH <- (emoji thumbs up)
I really don't know what MUH or emoji means.
Is there a source that describes this MUH? You say he is eternal. Is there some source material where we could see whether he has some of the other traits as those listed above?
2) Eternal Inflation
Do you mean the process of the inflation of space-time with a time component that has no beginning or end? I think that many scientists have concurred that time began, so if that's what you mean, that wouldn't work. Are you sure about this one? If so, can you cite some more characteristics that line up with the list above?
3) "Clapping" Branes
I need some more info on this one also. What other traits line up with the above list. Can you cite sources so we can compare with the list above?

 

[nonbeliever314]

1) MUH <- (emoji thumbs up)
I really don't know what MUH or emoji means.
Is there a source that describes this MUH? You say he is eternal. Is there some source material where we could see whether he has some of the other traits as those listed above?

Mathematical Universe Hypothesis. Everything is a mathematical structure.

Emoji's are just those silly little icons that you can text people on your smartphone. <- (I just realized you can actually put these in a message.....)

2) Eternal Inflation
Do you mean the process of the inflation of space-time with a time component that has no beginning or end? I think that many scientists have concurred that time began, so if that's what you mean, that wouldn't work. Are you sure about this one? If so, can you cite some more characteristics that line up with the list above?

With eternal inflation, when inflation stops in a given region, another universe is created. The inflation happens before the "big bang" part. So when the region stops inflating, that's what we observe as the "beginning". So each universe including this one have a beginning and it doesn't violate any of the things you previously brought up about the universe itself being eternal.

3) "Clapping" Branes
I need some more info on this one also. What other traits line up with the above list. Can you cite sources so we can compare with the list above?

It's a string theory thing. You have a higher dimension space and in that space are 3-4 dimensional (mem)branes and each universe is confined to a brane. I'll need to re-read the details but basically, branes can collide and make a "big bang". This I find less likely than the other 2, but it did predict the variations in the microwave background.

 

[Joshua260]

So you agree that intelligence is not immaterial and does begin to exist?

Please don't put words in my mouth. I never made any claims about intelligence one way or the other. That was someone else who was talking about intelligence. In any case, I certainly do not think it is material because it does not have the same attributes as...well, matter.

So it makes no distinction between ex materia and ex nihilo? Then P1 is not supported by common experience. We have no experience of things "beginning to exist" ex nihilo.

Of course p1 is supported by experience. Does not all experience you ever had demonstrate that everything that begins to exist (or one might say comes into being) has a cause?

When you add in the clause "material" into p1, you are question begging. As in the following:
1. Everything (including the universe) that begins to exist has a (material) cause for it's existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a material cause for it's existence.

The whole point of the KC is to determine what type of cause caused beginning of the universe. But you insert the conclusion that the universe had a material cause up front in p1.

So you are question begging.

"Begging the question, or assuming the answer, is a logical fallacy that occurs when the conclusion of an argument is used as a premise of that same argument; i.e., the premises would not work if the conclusion wasn't already assumed to be true.

[and the site below provides an example]

1. Abortion is unjust murder.
2. Murder is illegal.
3. Therefore abortion should be made illegal, since it is murder. "

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

As I'm sure you know, Hume himself said:
"I never asserted so absurd a proposition as that anything might arise without a cause"
http://www.gotquestions.org/argument-existence-God.html

Then P2 is not supported. As I noted earlier in the conversation, in support of the second premise, you've gestured toward relevant findings in cosmology. However, those findings support only one particular interpretation of the premise; namely, that the expansion of the universe began 13.8 billion years ago. What happened before then, if "before" even makes sense, is presently unknown to us. The universe may have always existed in some form. The findings you draw on do not necessarily imply that the universe - matter and energy - came to be from nothing, which is what you take the second premise to mean.

Here are two physicists who claim that space and time began to exist ex nihilo:
"At this singularity, space and time came into existence; literally nothing existed before the singularity. So if the universe originated at such a singularity, we would truly have a creation ex nihilo."
Frank Tipler and John Barrow from The Anthropic Cosmological Principle.

 

[Joshua260]

Thanks for the suggestions and explaining them a little bit more.

Mathematical Universe Hypothesis. Everything is a mathematical structure.

"The theory can be considered a form of Pythagoreanism or Platonism in that it posits the existence of mathematical entities; a form of mathematical monism in that it denies that anything exists except mathematical objects; and a formal expression of ontic structural realism."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_universe_hypothesis

I'm trying to restrict my response to how it relates to the traits listed before...unless we can over new ones along the way.
The problem I have with this one is that these mathematical entities are not free causal agents. I don't see how they have any causal power at all.

With eternal inflation, when inflation stops in a given region, another universe is created. The inflation happens before the "big bang" part. So when the region stops inflating, that's what we observe as the "beginning". So each universe including this one have a beginning and it doesn't violate any of the things you previously brought up about the universe itself being eternal.

I'm not sure how this relates to the cause for the existence of the universe. All this does is push it back to another step. Also, this is one of the models refuted by Vilenkin in following presentation:

It's a string theory thing. You have a higher dimension space and in that space are 3-4 dimensional (mem)branes and each universe is confined to a brane. I'll need to re-read the details but basically, branes can collide and make a "big bang". This I find less likely than the other 2, but it did predict the variations in the microwave background.

Again, I don't see how these could be free causal agents. If the necessary conditions for the effect existed with the cause, I don't see why the effect should have not always existed. Yet, we see that the universe began to exist a finite time ago.

So far, I "lack a belief" in these suggested causes.

 

[Joshua260]

@Joshua260 Just remember the biggest hole in your argument is that the universe doesn't have a "master clock". "It's all relative".

Incorrect. I thought we covered this already. There is a "cosmic age" of the universe that is independent of a frame of reference.