The evidence of the existence of God

[FredBloggs]

I would say the evidence of the existence of G-d by theists is strongly based on the initial premise that G-d exists and then finding evidence to support that premise. That evidence is often contained in the holy writings of the particular religion as well as the religion’s traditions, so that the nature of the G-d in question would of course correspond to what the religion states. This is why I always say that the theist’s best argument for the existence of G-d is one’s own faith and one’s inner, spiritual voice that tells them so, not historical evidence, because it is often tainted, and not philosophical evidence, because it generally presupposes G-d’s existence as a starting point.

Ok, then that exposes two different meanings of “evidence.” I use the version of evidence that is independent, consistent, and works for everybody. The sort of evidence that has allowed humankind to build skyscrapers, treat illness and teach us about our environment.

For me that is the only real meaning of “evidence.” I would actually dispute that non-scientific evidence is worthy of the term. “Holy writing” do not constitute evidence in the truest sense of the word.

But horses for courses.

 

[FredBloggs]

I like the argument from morality. In a nutshell, if there is no God, if you and I are only matter whose ultimate fate is cosmic dust, then there is no basis for morality. There is no difference between crushing a rock and killing a person, in the big picture. So if a person is willing to admit morality, a person should admit God exists.

That’s just not true. Yours is a very nihilistic view. There is plenty of basis for morality; indeed, morality sufficient to build and maintain communities existed long before the bible existed, for example. The golden rule was not invented by God, in any of (allegedly) his (alleged) forms.

The morality espoused in the bible (particularly in the OT, but even in the NT) is not something we would be proud of following today. Morality has changed, and continues to change. The NT adopted the humanistic values of “be nice to each other” but most certainly didn’t invent them. The moral zeitgeist continues to evolve to this day. That is established fact, so it’s difficult to tie morality to the existence of God, whom we last heard from 2,000 years ago and haven’t had any moral updates from since. Do you believe we should keep slaves? That women are merely chattel?

Good people who believe in God tend to believe that their morality comes from religion; but correlation does not imply causation. Statistically, people who don’t believe in God are just as moral, if not more so. How do you explain that?

Furthermore, the implied (and often outright stated) outcome of morality coming from God is that if God was somehow proven not to exist, vast numbers of theists would shed their moral bindings and start raping, pillaging and murdering to suit their own ends. Do theists really only do good things because they think God is watching? The notion terrifies me.

I concede that, in a hundred thousand years from now, the universe won’t care whether someone crushed a rock or killed someone in 2019. But that’s hardly the point; we, as a moral society, care.

 

[meltzerboy2]

How about the smaller picture? We need some moral values to live together in relative peace, even in a totally atheistic society. And even with G-d, we don’t completely agree on the nature and extent of certain moral values, according to differences in religious beliefs and differences in interpretation of the same religious belief, as well as personal views.

 

[Dan_Defender]

I concede that, in a hundred thousand years from now, the universe won’t care whether someone crushed a rock or killed someone in 2019.

And that’s exactly it. Without God, life becomes meaningless, it doesn’t matter what one does in this life.

 

[Dan_Defender]

How about the smaller picture? We need some moral values to live together in relative peace,

Yes but you and I believe in a natural moral law, the OP is dealing with atheists.

 

[meltzerboy2]

Oh, but it does matter, even without G-d. Indeed life becomes even more precious if there is no hope of an afterlife and no existence of G-d, in the sense that today is all we have and we had better make use of it wisely. Thus we need to learn to survive and flourish together with others. I can understand the perspective of some atheists.

 

[Dan_Defender]

Well suffice to say that Nietzsche would not agree with you. Anyhow I posted for the benefit of the OP. I’m not interested in arguing with you.

 

[meltzerboy2]

Fair enough.

 

[Wesrock]

Aquinas does beg the question, as was mentioned. That doesn’t mean Aquinas is wrong, and he isn’t, but it is begging the question.

And how exactly do you believe he begged the question, given he quote rigorously and systematically lays out the foundations to the distinctions he makes elsewhere other than just the few short sentences at the start of the Summa, a document written for those already versed in philosophy? You’re just begging the question against all of arguments Thomists put forth.

 

[Nihilo]

Nihilo:

Aquinas does beg the question, as was mentioned. That doesn’t mean Aquinas is wrong, and he isn’t, but it is begging the question.

And how exactly do you believe he begged the question, given he quote rigorously and systematically lays out the foundations to the distinctions he makes elsewhere other than just the few short sentences at the start of the Summa, a document written for those already versed in philosophy? You’re just begging the question against all of arguments Thomists put forth.

It’s the highest compliment that he begs the question. God is God, that is absolutely true, and not coincidentally tautological (begging the question). Every nonfictional thing, when you declare that it’s nonfiction, is begging the question, the conclusion is restatement of the premise, and all that is, is a tautology, and tautology is the foundation of logic, and what else would we expect in a true argument supporting the claim that God is nonfiction, but pure logic?

If God is real, then every argument for His existence is begging the question, and amounts to a definition of Him. Unless we can demonstrate Who He is, then we must be limited to tautologies to discuss or describe Him. It’s why I suggested that the most relevant evidence is the Resurrection of Christ, which is not self-evident to begin with, and requires a non-tautological argument to establish, which by definition leaves it open to personal opinion, which does boil down to a choice about a faith question. Which is all everybody believes about the matter of God’s reality in the first place.

 

[Wesrock]

Aquinas’ arguments are neither begging the question nor tautological. That’s not what begging the question is, and if you think it amounts to a trivial tautology, I’m sorry, you don’t understand the argument.

 

[Nihilo]

Aquinas’ arguments are neither begging the question nor tautological. That’s not what begging the question is, and if you think it amounts to a trivial tautology, I’m sorry, you don’t understand the argument.

Then I’m sorry for you. You don’t understand that the smartest non-believers recognize it as begging the question and tautological. We do not need to disagree with them to retain our faith, if we base our faith in that which Scripture and Tradition declares that we ought: the arrow of the Gospel, the point of which is the Resurrection of Christ. And St. Thomas’s work is not in vain. He logically elaborated God for us. He exists because He must exist. That’s tautological, and true. And, it is frankly mind-bending. I very much understand Aquinas, and adore his mind, and look forward to spending eternity with him.

 

[Wesrock]

Then I’m sorry for you. You don’t understand that the smartest non-believers recognize it as begging the question and tautological. We do not need to disagree with them to retain our faith,

I do not disagree to retain my faith, I disagree because you and they are wrong. That certain effects necessitate an ultimate first cause is not trivial and is not a tautology. Nor do Thomists beg the question. Given how comprehensive and systematic the system and arguments put forth by Thomists, to simply wave a hand and call it begging the question is itself an act of begging the question against their arguments.

Stating a fact is not a tautology (not even talking about the cosmological arguments anymore), which is how you seem to define it. That itself is a nonsensical definition.

A logical tautology is when the conclusion is the same as the premise.

 

[Nihilo]

Nihilo:

Then I’m sorry for you. You don’t understand that the smartest non-believers recognize it as begging the question and tautological. We do not need to disagree with them to retain our faith,

I do not disagree to retain my faith, I disagree because you and they are wrong. That certain effects necessitate an ultimate first cause is not trivial and is not a tautology. Nor do Thomists beg the question. Given how comprehensive and systematic the system and arguments put forth by Thomists, to simply wave a hand and call it begging the question is itself an act of begging the question against their arguments.

It isn’t. That doesn’t even make sense. On its face it’s silly.

Stating a fact is not a tautology (not even talking about the cosmological arguments anymore), which is how you seem to define it. That itself is a nonsensical definition.

A logical tautology is when the conclusion is the same as the premise.

I know. So what is a fact? It is a true proposition, yes? Or something similar? So if you’re stating a fact, then that’s your premise, and when you show logically that your conclusion is directly shown in your premise, then your conclusion is a restatement of your premise, which is a tautology, as you just said, after I already said it previously.

True propositions are all tautological. The only things that are true that are not tautological, are ostensive definitions. “The sun is real” is a tautology, but pointing to the sun is true. When you point to God, what are you pointing at? And how do you prove that you’re not begging the question in calling what you’re pointing at God, when the atheist doesn’t grant you God in the first place?

But what can the atheist say when you point to Christ’s Resurrection? If they ever grant that, then they’ve granted God, and it isn’t begging the question at all. But it does have to be true, which is why arguing that the Gospel is true (apologetics) is so important.

 

[englands123]

To be truthful it’s near on impossible to prove this to a non believer.

I normally say something like this…

Take a quick look towards the Sky and see that no human hand has ever touched such beauty.

Please tell me there is no God in heaven.

When a person runs in to a burning building to save a complete stranger , knowing they will probably die doing so.

Please tell me there is no God.

Our parents gave birth to us. But who gave us a conscience and soul , as it is indeed not from our parents.

Please explain to me there is no God.

Almost everyone who has come close to death door and survived tells of an experience of a bright radiant white light.

Please tell me they are all wrong.

 

[englands123]

Dear Fred my friend if you really and truly believe there is no God.

Please explain to me what is holding you back from doing whatever you like ?

Just a thought of course…

 

[po18guy]

The best evidence for God, as I see it is: they are standing on it! The earth. Take that further: the universe. Expanding from a single point in time and space. Why?
Secondly, beauty. Ask them what beauty is, why they appreciate beauty, and how it fits into the supposedly “soulless” human experience. Is it all just a cruel cosmic joke?

 

[FredBloggs]

And that’s exactly it. Without God, life becomes meaningless, it doesn’t matter what one does in this life.

Not at all, my life isn’t meaningless to me and my loved ones; the lives of, say Noble prize winners is not meaningless to the countless people they’ve helped.

It means there’s no ultimate meaning, but (a) that only matters if you already believe we were created for some purpose; so the reasoning is circular, and (b) it’s hardly an argument for the existence of God anyway.

 

[Kullervo]

I don’t believe the world was created in seven days. I’m not an creationst. I believe in science and I think that science leaves a lot of space for God.

The arguments from st. Thomas Aquinas are not definitiv proof of Catholicism, but they bring you a bit nearer to the conclusion.

There’s no evidence of the resurrection? Than there’s too no evidence for 80% we teach our kids about the ancient history and the middle ages. Most historical sources of this time were written to promote an agenda, they were written a lot of years after the events they are describing by people in different countries in different languages, but when we read them threw the lense of the historical critical method, we still can extract some historical truth out of them. History is not an exact science like physics. You can’t prove the resurrection to the point of certainty equal to the certainty that 5+5 = 10, but you can come to the conclusion that it’s not unreasonable to believe this bold claim. People back then weren’t stupid. Most other religions are rooted in history very far back in the past (like Budhism), which makes them very hard to verify or have very few witnesses for the claims they are making (Islam).
There is even more evidence for the resurrection, than for other historical facts of this period we teach our kids in school. (Look for example for the evidence for the battle in the Teutoburg forest, there isn’t really much, but every historian I have ever heard of “believes” in it.) The only problem with resurrection is that it’s supernatural. That’s the only reason why we don’t teach it as a historical fact. The fact it was supernatural clashes with the very prominent naturalistic view of the world and many people have very strong faith in this philosophy. Naturalism is just that, a philosophy, you can’t prove it. I don’t there is so much more evidence for your philosophy than for my philosophy (religion).

Can you prove naturalism?

 

[FredBloggs]

Dear Fred my friend if you really and truly believe there is no God.

Please explain to me what is holding you back from doing whatever you like ?

Just a thought of course…

The knowledge that it could harm other people who have a human right to remain unharmed.
The knowledge that it could damage other people’s property which they have a right to retain undamaged.

Good solid reasons, which are far more ethical than, “because if I did, God would be mad at me and punish me.”

The idea that some people hold back from doing bad things only because they might be punished is, like I said, terrifying. Let me ask you: if you lost your belief in God, would you go out and kill anyone you didn’t like? Steal from people and stores simply because you wanted certain things?