How can theists prove God exists?

[HinduWoman]

I would say that no theists can logically prove the existence of gods.

God is not subject to direct and general perception the way the sun is.
God cannot be inferred --- because inference can only take place when perception has established a concommitance between two objects and what is like God?
If God is unique how can we guess his properties o even his existence?

Then all that is left is WORDS! mouldy old scriptures (the older the better) and believers nattering on about their intuition.
That is basically what theists call 'proof'. :evil:

[David B]

Hi HinduWoman. It's very good to see you again.

There have been various attempts to logically prove the existence of God, but AFAICT they have all failed.

It seems to me that there have also been attempts to bring some empiricism into reasons to believe.

Arguments, for example, that one can infer the existence of God from fulfilled prophesy, from prayers that have come to pass, from design - particularly recently, from the design of certain phenomena that the apologist cannot see how the phenomena could emerge naturalistically, and from personal experience.

These also fail, IMO.

David

[DMB]

I must admit that I don't hang around theologians, but from what I have seen the more rarefied Anglican ones, anyway, dismiss not only the idea of proofs but any consideration of anything as crude as the existence of god. It has become a non-question.

That's one way of sliding out of it. :D

[DMB]

Quite an interesting article here:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16725-religion-may-be-a-product-of-our-evolved-brains.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

Of course, it could be taken either way about EoG.

[HinduWoman]

I don't know why theists think faith is something to be proud of!
Blind belief without evidence just makes them look like idiots.

[Asha'man]

God is not subject to direct and general perception the way the sun is.

There are two different types of gods defined by humans: gods that have a measurable effect on the universe, and gods that have no measurable effect on the universe.

Initially, all gods had measurable effects on the universe. They created fire, lightning, stars & planets, growth and death. But as our ability to examine those effects got better, we found non-god explanations for them. Everywhere we looked, the gods evaporated and were replaced with scientific understanding of natural forces.

Theists who believed in these detectable gods slowly died out, since the detection kept indicating a lack of gods. The only theists who remained were the ones that proposed an 'undetectable' god.

However, once you propose an undetectable god, you find yourself in a contradiction: a god that has no measurable effect on the universe is indistinguishable from a god that simply doesn't exist. In fact, having no measurable effect on the universe is practically defined as not existing. So the only theists that remain are ones that believe in the existence of a non-existent god, but are too clueless to understand the contradiction.

[Copernicus]

We can only directly perceive a fraction of those things whose existence we believe in. For example, I cannot directly interact with individual atoms or molecules, but I can infer their existence from the behavior of things that I can interact with directly.

Gods are not impossible to detect. If they were, then they would be utterly useless to us. According to believers, we can detect them through direct mental contact--revelation or voices in the head. We can infer their existence from reports of miracles from sources of information that we trust (family, friends, social authorities). They are especially evident when they seem to intervene in our lives to cause events that are hard to imagine as just chance or coincidence. So the concrete evidence tends to boil down to an interpretation of "personal experience". Also, despite the existence of a perfectly good "godless" explanation for natural order, the argument from design is an intuitively compelling argument for most people. To someone with strong religious faith, evidence of God's existence is everywhere.

Now, having tried to defend the indefensible, I want to make the point that arguments about evidence for the existence of gods are somewhat beside the point. What really motivates belief in religion is fear of the consequence of loss of belief. Gods are not terribly useful beings when it comes to explaining phenomena in the real world. In fact, they have been proven a hindrance to understanding time and again. But the real motivation was expressed by Pope Benedict in a 2007 encyclical (http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL3016839520071130): "Let us put it very simply: man needs God, otherwise he remains without hope."

What kind of hope does belief in God give people? It gives them hope that everything will turn out all right in the end, that injustices will be corrected and good triumph over evil, that their difficult circumstances--even incurable illnesses--can be altered by divine intervention, that they and their loved ones will not really die, that daily life will be safer because dangerous people fear divine retribution, and so on. Gods are very powerful tools for manipulating reality in ways that science, with all of its demonstrated miraculous effects, cannot hope to match. If you can influence a being with ultimate power over reality, then you gain a measure of that power. Give up that belief, and you are diminished and become immensely weaker than before. It is wishful thinking, but it makes belief based on flimsy evidence all that more compelling.

[DMB]

One can always keep hope alive by buying a lottery ticket. :D

[Copernicus]

Sorry, DMB. Can't do that. The last time we bought a lottery ticket--several years ago--my wife became angry and depressed when we lost. So I've learned not to buy lottery tickets anymore.

[DMB]

Do people become angry and depressed when their god of choice fails to answer prayers? Or do they do the Job thing?

[Asha'man]

Gods are not impossible to detect. If they were, then they would be utterly useless to us.

Nope, as it turns out, gods are impossible to detect, and are also utterly useless.

If thinking that imaginary things exist gives you hope, then being delusional is a good thing. Frankly, I think it's more healthy to perceive reality as it is, without adornment from imaginary non-entities that are indistinguishable from background noise.

[Copernicus]

Nope, as it turns out, gods are impossible to detect, and are also utterly useless.

Evidence is a fulfilled expectation provided by a hypothesis. In that sense, there is plenty of evidence from the perspective of the faithful. It may not be reasonable evidence from our perspective, but we should not expect the faithful to appreciate our perspective. Gods are impossible to detect because they don't exist. That is not the same as claiming that there is no evidence for gods. It all depends on what your standard of evidence is for the god hypothesis.

If thinking that imaginary things exist gives you hope, then being delusional is a good thing. Frankly, I think it's more healthy to perceive reality as it is, without adornment from imaginary non-entities that are indistinguishable from background noise.

I can certainly see the point you are trying to make, but you appear to be arguing that the placebo effect is never helpful. If belief in God cures your cancer, then you have a survival advantage over atheists. The placebo effect does strengthen immune systems. That is, false beliefs can have a good effect. It is just that it is better to rely on empirically validated medicine to fight most things that can kill you. Folk medicine is ubiquitous in primitive cultures precisely because it gives people the kind of hope that helps to fight off the ill effects of disease and injury.

[Ray Moscow]

I would say that no theists can logically prove the existence of gods.

God is not subject to direct and general perception the way the sun is.
God cannot be inferred --- because inference can only take place when perception has established a concommitance between two objects and what is like God?
If God is unique how can we guess his properties o even his existence?

Then all that is left is WORDS! mouldy old scriptures (the older the better) and believers nattering on about their intuition.
That is basically what theists call 'proof'. :evil:

Absolute proof is hard to come by in any subject except mathematics.

However, constructing a hypothesis in which reality is better explained by "god" rather than no "god", and having this hypothesis hold up under testing, would be a good start toward some evidence of "god". So far, even this modest approach has failed completely to find evidence for "god".

[HinduWoman]

Gods are very useful ---

In giving the individual hope that better days are coming
Fantasies of revenge
Maintaining the status quo.
Providing a livelihood for priests

[Moriah Conquering Wind]

Moriah says we should just beat them at their own game and turn atheism into a gnosis-based spiritual path complete with its OWN revelations, scientists for its "priest" caste, deliberate production of altered states of consciousness for its "rituals", and science for its "theology". :D

Us visionary/prophet types will run our visions and their memes and significances by the scientists for their approval that yes, they do constitute a bona fide awareness of scientific truth, albeit apparently arrived at through mystical exercises, meditation, Gestalt, gnosis, etc. rather than by reading books or taking courses.

Revelations of the New Atheism ... coming soon to a blog near you! :)

[Jobar]

As best I can tell, most believers of any sort don't even try to prove the existence of their god. It's assumed, presupposed. Ultimately theology is "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Many here no doubt recall the steel-pated presuppositionalism of theophilus at Internet Infidels. He actually tried to present it as a philosophically worthy proof of God's existence!

[DMB]

According to Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, head of the RCC in England, when speaking on the radio, people who don't believe in god are not fully human.

I'm on the attack. We have to stand up to them. There is something not totally human if you leave out the transcendent and you are not fully human. They have an impoverished understanding to what it is to be human. We are all made by God.

And this twerp is about to retire and be sent by the Government to sit in the House of Lords, the upper house of Parliament, where as an unelected member he will be able to interfere with legislation he doesn't like.

[Moriah Conquering Wind]

Ugh, not the argument about what constitutes "being human" again!

Being human encompasses ALL that human beings have been and can be, from the sublimely unselfish and noble to the insanely debased and perverse, and everything in between. Hell, serial killers love their children too. That sentence alone sums up the paradox of what it means to be human. For more details, see applicable soliloquy from Hamlet.

[tjakey]

Why shouldn't a god(s) be responsible for proving (his? hers? its?) own existence? Why should theists think, or be expected, to prove the god?

It seems to me that the theists need to try and prove their god is a pretty good indication that the god doesn't exist.

But then that's just me. Your mileage may vary.

[DMB]

Why shouldn't a god(s) be responsible for proving (his? hers? its?) own existence? Why should theists think, or be expected, to prove the god?

It seems to me that the theists need to try and prove their god is a pretty good indication that the god doesn't exist.

But then that's just me. Your mileage may vary.

What is worse than this, but an example of a parallel problem, is the mentality that says this person is doing something that god X forbids, so let's punish him/her. E.g. burn heretics at the stake. Stone adultresses. Kill or imprison blasphemers and apostates.

Why can't god X do its own punishments without human help?

[tjakey]

Good point DMB. Without their human servants gods are curiously impotent.

[DMB]

Good point DMB. Without their human servants gods are curiously impotent.

Well they still manage what looks a lot like indiscriminate killing by plagues, volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis...

[tjakey]

Only if you don't know about microbes and plate tectonics...

[DMB]

Further comment on the existence of god:

http://www.jesusandmo.net/2009/03/06/hate/

[tjakey]

Okay, that was pretty funny...

[HinduWoman]

Why are theists so fond of old books is another mystery.

[tjakey]

mmm...that is a mystery. In what other realm is old, out of date, and consistently proven in error, considered a requisite for expertise? Throw in authorship unknown, original manuscripts long lost and contradictory translations, and the whole "holy book" thing is a complete farce.

[Ray Moscow]

mmm...that is a mystery. In what other realm is old, out of date, and consistently proven in error, considered a requisite for expertise? Throw in authorship unknown, original manuscripts long lost and contradictory translations, and the whole "holy book" thing is a complete farce.

The still greater farce is giving people a leading role in public discourse based on their "expertise" with these subjects.

"Parliament welcomes Rev Mohammed Johnson, who is a leading figure in the not-knowing-ones-ass-from-a-hole-in-the-ground tradition, who will lecture us on the vital social issues facing non-knowers today."

[tjakey]

"Parliament welcomes Rev Mohammed Johnson, who is a leading figure in the not-knowing-ones-ass-from-a-hole-in-the-ground tradition, who will lecture us on the vital social issues facing non-knowers today."

Thanks Ray, that was a laugh I needed today.