New proof of the existence of God

[inocente]

1. It is not acceptable to suppose that the totality of all things is absurd and vain;
2. But the visible world is absurd and vain; as is obvious to virtually all people, both Christians and non-believers.
3. Therefore, there must be something more than this visible world, and this is called “God”.

For some it is acceptable to suppose that the totality has no meaning, and yet still find meaning in their own corner. We may not agree with this letter and the following poem, but it would be difficult to prove it isn’t acceptable: books.google.es/books?id=zDwx8nViavoC&pg=PA225#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

[Qoeleth]

Here’s another new proof or rather an old proof that has been inspired by me reading a new book to me, but an old book by GK Chesterton.

1. Man is not merely an animal. Man is an artist. He is the only animal that creates. Even in our most ancient evidence of early cave man we can see that he was an artist as he drew pictures of deer and other animals. But, what we never see is a deer drawing a picture of a man.
2. Man is not merely a product of his environment. There is no other animal who is like man. He stands alone, a one off. Nothing else comes close. The more you examine man as an animal the more you realize he is not like one. And thus his environment could never fully explain how he came to be.
3. Man is partly other or supernatural when compared to the animals. Man has an intellect and a will, which is something that is not seen in his environment and thus can not come from it, but from some higher level or reality above it.
4. Therefore, man is like a god or created in God’s image.

That is a very convincing proof. For example, there is no possible benefit to humans (from an evolutionary point of view), to be able to write paint like Delacroix, to write like Baudelaire, or to compose like Chopin. These artists (and others) exhibited something ‘God-like’. This certainly proves the existence of something beyond mere visible nature.

This proof is somewhat related to the argument I proposed, since the capacity for a human being to say, “This world is not enough to satisfy my soul”, point to clearly to the existence and operation of something more than this world, something more than nature.

 

[Qoeleth]

If prehistoric homo sapiens killed off or interbred with other species, so that other species with our characteristics bit the dust, we only appear to be unique.

Yes, but that characteristic which make human most ‘in the image of God’- creativity, sensitivity, idealism- actually seem contrary to the necessities of survival.

If we consider the most creative, intelligent, sensitive, perceptive and idealistic people- most died poor, with few (or no) children, in the Middle Ages often entered religious life, in the 19th Century they went mad, etc. Beethoven, Chopin, Verlaine, Baudelaire, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Scriabin- generally genius types seems to do very poorly in the struggle to survive and to propagate.

So, human genius does not seem to be attributable to Darwinistic natural selection, since it seems to be a liability (if not catastrophe) from the perspective.

 

[Qoeleth]

For some it is acceptable to suppose that the totality has no meaning, and yet still find meaning in their own corner. We may not agree with this letter and the following poem, but it would be difficult to prove it isn’t acceptable: books.google.es/books?id=zDwx8nViavoC&pg=PA225#v=onepage&q&f=false

Sorry- the link took me to the book, but not to the particular letter. Could you let me know the page number, please, then I can locate it on Google books?

Many thanks.

 

[inocente]

Sorry- the link took me to the book, but not to the particular letter. Could you let me know the page number, please, then I can locate it on Google books?

Many thanks.

Sorry about that, pages 225 and 226.

 

[inocente]

Yes, but that characteristic which make human most ‘in the image of God’- creativity, sensitivity, idealism- actually seem contrary to the necessities of survival.

If we consider the most creative, intelligent, sensitive, perceptive and idealistic people- most died poor, with few (or no) children, in the Middle Ages often religious life, went mad, etc. Beethoven, Chopin, Verlaine, Baudelaire, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Scriabin, Elvis- all geniuses seems to do very poorly in the struggle to survive and to propagate.

It would be more likely, from a Darwinistic point of view, that human genius would constitute a liability, and would have died out.

First time I’ve seen Nietzsche and Elvis in the same sentence!

Not sure genius is well-enough defined to make a list of geniuses without selection bias, or on the role of nurture as opposed to nature. But your theory implies that genius could not be a common trait, and so will only occur rarely, which tallies with the evidence.

 

[Qoeleth]

First time I’ve seen Nietzsche and Elvis in the same sentence!

Not sure genius is well-enough defined to make a list of geniuses without selection bias, or on the role of nurture as opposed to nature. But your theory implies that genius could not be a common trait, and so will only occur rarely, which tallies with the evidence.

I should have edited out Elvis. Although he was a genius, and had only one ‘official’ child, it seems he actually did much better in the struggle to propagate, after all…

 

[thistle]

So…you disagree with Aquinas.

We don’t need proof whatever Aquinas said. He was not right about everything. He did not believe in the Immaculate Conception.

By the way the Church does not say we need proof of God. We have grace and faith.

 

[fisherman_carl]

If prehistoric homo sapiens killed off or interbred with other species, so that other species with our characteristics bit the dust, we only appear to be unique.

There is a distinct lack of evidence for your theory. The only thing we really know about early man is that he was an artist. There is no evidence of art being a gradual process. We don’t see monkeys drawing badly and then humans drawing better. We see no monkeys drawing at all. The Evolution theory of man is not something that is verifiable by observation. Even if one could explain the evolution of animals man stands so much alone from the animals that if he were merely a product of his environment it would be the miracle of miracles.

We can see that birds build nests, but what we don’t see is birds building nests in the Gothic style. If we saw a bird building a nest in a Gothic style we would think something wholly unnatural was at work. And if we saw a bird talk like a man we would think it the result of a poltergiest or something supernatural. Yet, when we look at a man and his ability to do these things we think it is natural, when it is really just as miraculous.

 

[e_c]

This one? w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2006/september/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20060912_university-regensburg.html

It doesn’t appear that Ratzinger is making the argument you’re attributing to him.

I don’t think it’s in the Regensburg address.

 

[e_c]

“The Preacher, the Son of David, king of Jerusalem”, is obviously Solomon.
You will find that the traditional commentaries on the work, by both the Greek and Latin fathers, all agree that Solomon was the author.

It was said by the Greek and Latin Fathers because they were unfamiliar with Hebrew.

The language of Ecclesiastes is so radically different from the Hebrew of Solomon’s age, it would be like claiming Shakespeare wrote Harry Potter.

Actually, there are places where Paul clearly states that it is his opinion being voiced and not “the Lord’s.” Similarly, in this passage, “the Preacher” clearly states, as Paul would distinguish between his words and the Lord’s…

And yet the that part of the text remains inspired. It is his inspired opinion, unbeknownst to the hagiographer himself. Prophecy does not require that the prophet knows he is prophesying. See Caiaphas, for instance, saying Jesus would die for the people…

 

[e_c]

Actually, there are places where Paul clearly states that it is his opinion being voiced and not “the Lord’s.” Similarly, in this passage, “the Preacher” clearly states, as Paul would distinguish between his words and the Lord’s…

And yet the that part of the text remains inspired. It is his inspired opinion, unbeknownst to the hagiographer himself. Prophecy does not require that the prophet knows he is prophesying. See Caiaphas, for instance, saying Jesus would die for the people…

 

[Peter_Plato]

And yet the that part of the text remains inspired. It is his inspired opinion, unbeknownst to the hagiographer himself. Prophecy does not require that the prophet knows he is prophesying. See Caiaphas, for instance, saying Jesus would die for the people…

Except that the words of the Preacher are actually self-refuting.

If taken literally, and “all is vanity” that would mean his claim that all is vanity is also a vain claim. Ergo even his claim is devoid of meaning and significance and cannot be a substantive one.

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher,
vanity of vanities! All is vanity.

So if his claim is an inspired one, then precisely what does it mean?

It must mean that his capacity to judge all (qualified as all merely human attempts to impose meaning upon reality) to be vanity, must itself have come from a non-vain and not merely human source.

In other words, he can only claim that all is vanity if he is coming from a perspective that can properly judge what is and what is not vanity. Otherwise, his claim is also merely a vain one.

Ergo, the “all” that he refers to is not all in an unqualified sense, but all in the sense of all merely human attempts to impose meaning and value upon reality.

The Preacher, then, is implicitly claiming to be seeing things from a non-vain (divine or inspired) perspective which can property judge the human perspective to be vain.

It is similar, I think, to Socrates’ claim to know nothing. How could he possibly know THAT without having a direct intuition of what it means to know anything (or everything) at all and seeing directly as a result that what he does know is nothing in comparison to what it means to actually know.

Paradoxically, I think this is something like the argument that Qoeleth proposed in the opening post. We can’t know things are meaningless without having some direct insight into what is truly meaningful.

As CS Lewis pointed out, fish don’t know they are swimming in water precisely because they are so totally immersed in it. They have no perspective from which to see themselves swimming in water. Unless we have a perspective that transcends the merely human we cannot know that the merely human that we are immersed in is pure vanity.

If that insight into the human condition is significantly true, then it cannot be merely a human derived insight, it would have to come from a transcendent source. Otherwise, we could not know for certain that it is true, just as fish could not know for certain that they are swimming in water without getting out of the water, transcending it, and looking at themselves swimming in it from an outside perspective.

 

[Peter_Plato]

It was said by the Greek and Latin Fathers because they were unfamiliar with Hebrew.

The language of Ecclesiastes is so radically different from the Hebrew of Solomon’s age, it would be like claiming Shakespeare wrote Harry Potter.

No, more like Shakespeare being translated into modern English.

 

[e_c]

No, more like Shakespeare being translated into modern English.

I don’t understand how that works better - I mean to say that the Hebrew of Ecclesiastes is to Modern English as the Hebrew of Solomon’s age is to Middle English. They are “as different as chalk and cheese” as I remember one commentator putting it.

Anyway, of course one has to understand what the author is trying to say - and it seems it can be taken for granted that “all is vanity” is something subtle and qualified.

AND, there is the fact that the whole text is parenthetical. It is essentially one long quotation, ending with the last paragraph. Seems important.

But Paul is more problematic.

 

[goout]

I don’t think it’s in the Regensburg address.

Actually it is, although it may be somewhere else as well.

At Regensburg Benedict points to the “logos” or “reason” of God. God is reason-able. God reveals himself such that he is comprehensible to the degree of our competence.
This address is in the context of Islam’s view of God as capricious and unreasonable and utterly beyond comprehension.

 

[e_c]

Actually it is, although it may be somewhere else as well.

At Regensburg Benedict points to the “logos” or “reason” of God. God is reason-able. God reveals himself such that he is comprehensible to the degree of our competence.
This address is in the context of Islam’s view of God as capricious and unreasonable and utterly beyond comprehension.

Ah yes. I wonder what JapKap is on to then.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Actually it is, although it may be somewhere else as well.

At Regensburg Benedict points to the “logos” or “reason” of God. God is reason-able. God reveals himself such that he is comprehensible to the degree of our competence.
This address is in the context of Islam’s view of God as capricious and unreasonable and utterly beyond comprehension.

I agree with your interpretation of Ratzinger. This is not the same as e_c’s original characterization, which was:

Anyway, it’s just not a good argument. The opposite works better, as Cdl. Ratzinger suggested - the world is intelligible, we can know it, that means there is an inner logic and therefore an intelligence which stands behind it - echoing the 5th proof of St. Thomas.

Indeed, it is exactly the reverse. E_C’s claim was that we can know God exists and is logical because the world is intelligible. Ratzinger is claiming that we can know the world is intelligible because God exists and is logical.

We could sew these two claims together into one tight circle, but the two claims are not the same.

 

[goout]

I agree with your interpretation of Ratzinger. This is not the same as e_c’s original characterization, which was:
Indeed, it is exactly the reverse. E_C’s claim was that we can know God exists and is logical because the world is intelligible. Ratzinger is claiming that we can know the world is intelligible because God exists and is logical.

We could sew these two claims together into one tight circle, but the two claims are not the same.

It’s all the same ball o wax.
This is why the Church observes that faith and reason mutually inform one another. One is void of meaning without the other.

In any case, even absent an explicit faith in God, you cannot avoid the intelligibility of the universe and the implications of that.
The universe is discoverable, and at the same time never fully discovered. And the universe is -not you-. So you participate in revelation whether you want to admit it or not. Something other than you is revealed to you.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Don’t sweat the difference between
A implies B
and
B implies A

I could ignore the difference, but then I wouldn’t belong in a philosophy forum.