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What evidence do you have that this is true?
Anselm's ontological argument.
The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.
I understand it, but do not see its validity. Why should the cosmos comply with human reason?1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.
Full discussion of the problems with actual infinities is beyond my pay grade and deals with transfinite mathematics and other subjects.
2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity. Reason is supposedly the playing field I meet the atheist on, so I'm sure you can understand my appeal to causality vs. absurdity?
You have still not explained why it needs to be a god. Why not a multiverse equivalent of a toaster oven that pops out a cosmos at some undetermined interval?3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.
Anselm's ontological argument.
The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.
Anselm's ontological argument.
The Zeus argument doesn't work very well because the Christian god is not simply one cause among many, but the cause.
1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.
Full discussion of the problems with actual infinities is beyond my pay grade and deals with transfinite mathematics and other subjects.
2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity. Reason is supposedly the playing field I meet the atheist on, so I'm sure you can understand my appeal to causality vs. absurdity?
3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.
The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.
It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.
An infinite regress of causes cannot actually exist, so therefore there must be a first cause that is itself uncaused.
Anselm's ontological argument.
1. If an actual infinite number of causes existed, we would never be able to reach our present moment in time. So there has to be a first cause.
2. The universe doesn't demand a cause for everything. Rather, human reason demands it. Otherwise we are left with absurdity.
3. not "a" god, but the only God. There can be only one being that causes everything else to come into existence, and this being must be immaterial and non-corporeal.
The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.
The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.
It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.
Really? Then atheists cannot cling to the multiverse explanation, since it exists outside the universe. You are left with no explanation why there is something rather than nothing. It "just is". How anti-intellectual.
This reeks of God-of-the-gaps thinking.
My faith is not dependent on "God-as-explanation", but I find it useful to talk about it nonetheless to demonstrate the appeal of such a belief.
I am a Christian who believes in God because I believe Jesus Christ rose from the dead after being crucified... that is the basis of my faith.
The explanation for why God exists is found in God's nature- God is a necessary being.
It's far more important that God explain the things we do not see, but are nonetheless real- moral intuitions, a sense of the numinous or sublime, and so on. Only a materialist worldview could discredit those things.
And what's your reasoning for believing Jesus rose from the dead?
Discredit? Not likely. Materialist worldviews have explained those in naturalistic terms. The only thing that is discredited is that those things are some kind of mystical ESP powers.
The witness of the saints.
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