Can Someone prove to me that God doesn't exist?

Great Debates
301

I respect both the point you made and the eloquent manner in which you made it. However, I didn’t mean to trivialize the faith that one places in epistemology. Respectfully, I disagree with your assessment of the implication regarding faith in axioms. Faith in God is no different, as I see it, from faith in the Induction Axiom. You can never prove either the existence of God nor the truth of Peano’s fifth axiom. You can merely decide upon the perception and validity of your own experience.

In the end, if a person’s faith in God erodes, then he is just as free to toss his assumptions as he is to toss the ones that you, in my opinion unnecessarily, bifurcate. There are, in fact, atheists on this board who formerly were people of faith.

302

With utmost respect, Lib, I beg to differ.

David B. has “faith” (in the sense you posit) in a wide variety of “laws of physics.” I.e., he is aware that if you impart an action of force X, it will be accompanied by an equal and opposite reaction (things such as inertia, friction, etc., being of course taken into account in measuring the action and reaction).

For me, at least, and I believe I speak for Tris in this matter as well, faith in the theological sense is something on the order of “unswerving acceptance of the experience of God’s love, and consequent assurance of the same.” (Semantically poor, I grant, but I trust my meaning is clear.)

“Faith” is something one has in another person – and in particular the Person Whom we understand as our Creator and Redeemer – not in any assertion, whether it be of physics or of theology.

303

The difference, as I see it, is that your faith in God is supposed to be unconditional; that it may not be is a sign of human weakness, not of intellectual honesty.

Let me put it this way: when your faith in God is tested, passing the test means retaining your faith. You can quibble over church doctrine, but belief in the premises of your faith is supposed to be steadfast and active, regardless of reasons for or against holding that faith. The perfectly faithful person would willingly be a martyr–she would give up her life before giving up her faith.

In contrast, the perfect scientist would, when confronted with a proof that Peano’s fifth axiom doesn’t hold in certain cases, immediately accept the proof and modify his own theories accordingly (more likely, the scientist would be presented with a theoretical framework that discounts Peano, and would have no problem conditionally accepting that framework under certain circumstances). That scientists are sometimes wedded to their own theories, holding onto them long after it’s clear they’re mistaken, is also a sign of human weakness, that people aren’t perfectly rational. The perfectly rational person would willingly give up her theories at exactly the moment that the justification for or against her theory tips the other way.

But that’s just it: if a person’s faith erodes. The condition for altering your faith is a loss of faith. A perfectly faithful person has no leeway to challenge or rewrite the foundation of their beliefs.

I don’t think you were trivializing faith in epistemology; I think you were trivializing religious faith insofar as you allowed for the possibility of mechanically altering it. To me, the beauty and nobility (and sometimes, the horror) of faith is its unswerving loyalty.

304

Lib,

Thank you for the reminder that ALL knowledge rests on accepting certain assumptions (postulates) and then following out the consequences. We decide which postulates we’ll accept. I, personally, believe that theism and atheism each rest on accepting or not accepting a basic postulate. The logics that follows from each of them are both cw the world that we experience. There are some differences in implications in each, which lead me to choose to accept one set of assumptions over the other. But I am interested in learning the thoughts of those who choose to accept the other set. Like how do secular humanists deal with moral relativism on an individual level?)

(Some will rigidly hold onto all of Euclid’s postulates because their experience allows them to induce that the universe follows those assumptions; they will never be open to understanding the implications of non-Euclidian geometry, as they spend their time argueing over the concept of accepting a different set of assumptions.)

I’ve been apparently very inarticulate in trying to express the limits of knowledge and Hume’s thoughts on the failure of induction as proof. You are obviously much better read on epistemology than I am. Can you help explain these concepts? And expand upon them for my education? Thank you.

305

I greatly appreciate (and reciprocate) your expression of respect. Unfortunately, I’m not sure whether we disagree! :wink: We’ll know soon enough whether we’re sinking into a cesspool of semantic obfuscation, but meanwhile I think you (and Tris, if applicable) are unnecessarily bluring “commitment” into “faith”. Yes, I have made a commitment of allegiance to God, but that commitment was my decision. The faith I have was His gift. It was given upon the moment that I opened my heart to receive it. Other than the metaphysical plane, I see no difference conceptually between that faith and the faith David has in his physical laws. He has faith in them because he understands them and because he has opened his mind to apprehend them. With God and me, same same, only within the context of reality (as in opening the heart), and not within the context of the physical universe (as in opening the mind).

306

I can accept that. Although I do draw the distinction between trust in a Person and confidence in a description of a mechanical process – which I’m not sure your view distinguishes clearly enough for my tastes – but de gustibus…

However, allow me to point out one fascinating implication:

In short, from our perspective, David’s confidence in the laws of nature is also God’s gift to him. And therefore, in properly using it, he is doing God’s will. Yet another example of Romans 8:28 in action… :slight_smile:

307

I believe that is the popular interpretation of Jesus’s Gethsemane prayer and His lamentation upon the cross, i.e., that He experienced moments of “human-ness” or weakness of faith. I refuse to accept that interpretation since I worship Him. He has (and had) no weakness of any kind.

I am faithful to God because, and simply because, God is faithful to me. In fact, I cannot help my faith. I opened my heart, and it poured in like air into a vacuum. If God abandons me, my faith will go with Him.

So would I! But not because I am blind; rather, because I see!

Were I God (in a more specific sense than I am), I wouldn’t trust a “faith” in me that did not require me to be always truthful and always steadfast. I would expect a believer to turn from me once I betrayed his trust. And, as I have said here before, if God were to betray my trust (e.g., by ordering me to murder an innocent child) I would walk out on Him without either hesitation or regret.

Of course, my experience tells me that God is always trustworthy and is as unlikely to abandon me as anything could possibly be. But He must absolutely and eternally maintain His God-ness, or else I would prefer to fall into the sword than to have Him dwell within me.

I don’t call that faith. I call that the blind leading the blind. There is a difference, in my view, between faith and foolishness.

Horror, indeed. Were God’s chief attribute making war, and not love, I could understand such faith. Fred Phelps is unswervingly loyal in that way. He can have his god. And I’ll just stick with mine.

308

Exactly so. :wink:

309

Don’t think that I’m suggesting, Lib, that a perfectly faithful person is stupid or blind or simpleminded or willfully stubborn about their faith. Your faith in particular seems to be very aware and very sophisticated.

Nonetheless, you didn’t really respond to the difference that I was proposing: that faithful adherence to religious beliefs is not in any way conditional on the justification for those beliefs, while rational adherence to rational beliefs is, ideally, perfectly dependent on the justification for those beliefs.

You say that you opened you heart and God poured faith in. That sounds to me like you didn’t make a reasoned decision to accept God, and that your faith is conditional on the validity of those reasons.

To put it another way, if someone proved to me that God necessarily exists, and I acknowledge his existence in respect of that proof, I can’t really be said to have faith, can I?

If he had no weakness, then how could he be made flesh? My understanding is that Jesus was both God and man, but can he truly to be said to have been man without human weaknesses?

310

In various ways. Most on this board draw morality from values that they have derived from what they consider to be common sense.

Indeed. There was a recent debate over the silly [sym]p[/sym] = 3 thing. When I listed out some of the many ways in which the vessel might have measured out with a diameter to circumference ratio of 3, you would have thought the sky had fallen. My opponent (whom I greatly respect but disagreed with in this instance) had forgotten about drawing circles on saddles and globes, which have ratios other than [sym]p[/sym].

I’m almost embarrassed by that. I’m probably one of the least qualified people here to educate you. I have very little formal education myself (half a semester of college). I just have a high capacity for learning and a voracious appetite for it. I read everything I can get my hands on, and have benefitted from teaching formal logic to computer programmers, and from reading everything I can.

Regarding Hume, the most remarkable thing about him, in my opinion, is the regrettable manner in which he painted himself into a corner, much like Kant. At least when Kant did it, he attempted to correct himself. Hume left himself in this sad state, telling us in essence, “don’t believe anything, including what I’ve said.”

There is nothing complicated about the limits of epistemology. It is like any other tautological beast: its head goes back around into its ass. :wink:

311

I regret (sincerely) that this will likely frustrate you further, but I believe that God despises religion, and all the baggage that goes with it, including unjustified faith, altruism, and political infestation. I don’t consider my faith in God to be “religious” in nature. I believe it to be philosophically and logically sound. I’d be happy to discuss this futher with you, but I fear that you’ll discard me now, as so many have when I’ve gone down this road.

Let me know whether you’d be interested in the pursuit of a more thorough understanding of my position on this. Otherwise, I won’t bore you with it.

I don’t know how you could be said to have faith otherwise. What led me to open my heart was reason (specifically, a ten month investigation into the original Greek Book of John, and a linguistic twist that rocked my world — old-timers here are familiar with the story.) But once that happened, the faith enraptured me like an irresistible whirlwind. So long as I continue to experience God that way in my life, I consider my faith to be firmly foundational.

I don’t understand. Is there something endemically weak about man? Jesus’s status as the Son of Man was, in my opinion, plenipotentiary.

312

Only insofar as humans are morally or behaviorally imperfect creatures, yes, there is something endemically weak about them. If Jesus didn’t share the weaknesses of human flesh, then how do you interpret the Garden of Gethsemene?

As for your faith, I suspect that you’re not following the same conceptual path as I am because your faith is comparitively idiosyncratic (no slam, just an observation): the object of your faith is epistemically evident to you. I don’t think that this is typical of religious belief, though I could be wrong.

313

Oh, I see. But that’s just because of our choices and decisions which, in my opinion, are “weak” whenever they are made for the benefit of the flesh (something that is not real in any meaningful ontological sense) rather than the spirit (which is absolutely real).

Jesus never made these kinds of decisions. His decisions were always made for the benefit of the spirit. (See the thread on Spiritual Suffering.)

I don’t believe that human flesh is “weak”, but merely insignificant, i.e., it is amoral, not immoral. In my opinion, Jesus’s appeal for mercy in Gethsemene was beautiful, endearing, and pleasing to God (to Himself!). Enduring the humiliation of begging for mercy, of washing mens’ feet, of giving Himself up to be beaten, tortured, and ridiculed are among the reasons why I’m so satisfied in worshipping Him, and why I am able to relate to Him as a friend.

Thank you! That is the nicest thing anyone has said to me in quite some time. God go with you.

314

marsupialicious,

Use the search function on this site for Pascal’s Wager. Search the internet for Pascal’s Wager. You can also check out Michael Shermers “How we Believe” (is it How or Why?, it might be why and I’m too lazy to look it up). Then, if you are still interested in debating the Wager, open a new thread - there is almost always a bite on the topic.

In addition to Lib’s point about it not really being belief if it is only done for reward, the other two problems with the wager I’m immediately aware of is that it falls apart when you postulate multiple gods (if you have to believe in Jesus and choose Brahma, you are doomed. But if you choose Jesus and Brahma turns out to be Truth, you are doomed), and that it assumes belief comes with no cost - which is not true.

But this thread is seven pages already (and currently has gotten deep into metaphysics), so open a new thread if you want more…but do yourself a favor and search first.

I was being a wee bit sarcastic. Sorry.

P.S. I ran the search for you. The esteemed SingleDad opened up a thread with this title in March of 2000.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=22693

315

on epistemology
Surely you did not actually mean “tautology” when you described epistemology? By doing so you extend the term to cover every possible human statement about reality. When an adjective becomes universal it looses all descriptive power.

Yes, it is important to understand that no epistemology can be securely validated from a limited consciousness. The knowledge of a finite being can never be absolutely secured. But if we use the word tautology to describe that fact, we have to invent another word for those vacuous arguments which evade contradiction through obfuscatory inclusion.

An epistemology is not a tautology. The statement, “This epistemology is true,” is a tautology.

on faith
The primary difference that I see between the “faith” in material reality and “faith” in metaphysical reality is perhaps best described as inductive confidence. The first “leap of faith” is always the escape from solipsism. Nothing meaningful can be said until that leap is made. Once we accept, at least as a working hypothesis, that other human beings are conscious agents who experience a phenomenological reality, we can compare our phenomenological experience with their reports of phenomenological experience.

I have great confidence that the pencil on my desk is a material object. If I poke myself with it, I experience sharpness, penetration, pain. If I poke someone else, they will report the same group of sensations (though the particular character might change). In my life, I have never met someone who does not experience material objects in a manner directly related to my own experience. Thus my confidence level in material reality is strengthened by unchallenged and incontroverted empirical substantiation. It is not a complete induction; it can never be a complete induction. Thus, my “faith” will always be conditional. My “confidence level” will never be absolute. But uncounted thousands of phenomenological reinfocements, without a single dissent, make my confidence level quite high. As a praxis, this is indistinguishable from absolute belief (until challenged by contradictory data, of course). As an epistemological construct, it bears no relationship to absolute belief.

When people speak to me of their metaphysical beliefs, however, it is clear that they know from the outset that their phenomenological experiences are not unambiguously mirrored in the reported experiences of other humans. The confidence level for metaphysical “faith”, as best I can infer from listening to those who express it, does not decrease when contradictory or dissenting experiences are encountered. Instead, metaphysical “faith” draws its confidence either directly from the individual’s phenomenological experience or selectively from a proper subset of the external reports of experience (or both, of course). As a praxis, this is indistinguishable from absolute belief (until the direct phenomenological experience changes, of course). As an epistmological construct, the “directly supported” metaphysical faith is differentiated from absolute belief only in magnitude. The “supported by shared belief” metaphysical faith is epistemologically distinct from both absolute belief and faith in material reality.

on moral relativism
Atheist morality has been covered in great length and sometime excruciating confusion on these boards. I think some of them may have been cleared away in the “Great thread Purge of 2001”, but the search engine still finds this oldie but goodie.

Pjen, erislover, and I also got into some mildly entertaining fumblings about moral relativism, if you are interested.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=76383

316

SM,

Well, speaking for myself only, my assumption of the God-postulate is NOT contradicted by experience. I understand that some theists believe that it is important to believe in spite of evidence that they shouldn’t. I’ll call this “the Job complex”. But the postulate can be reasonably accepted without such proviso. I merely don’t believe in a God-who-gives-a-hoot as implied reality.

I’ll check out your discussion links. As a former atheist turned agnostic turned (admittedly weak) theist, the issue is important to me. Like I’ve said, my poor human brain feels a lot better accepting that some morality is absolute whether I believe it or not, and I’ve concluded that this statement implies some universal power beyond “the laws of Nature.”

317

Back after one page and giving up.

The previous discussion doesn’t really seem to answer my discomfort. Sure, I was an ethical atheist and had no problem with it. As a Jewish kid, it was even less of a problem. Judiaism really cares less about faith than in following the rules of conduct. If you do the right things you will develop your relationship with God. God is a verb. You know the schtick. The faith over all else bit was never part of my religious education to react against. That I can be hardwired for ethical behavior as a selected evolutionary adaptation is reasonable to me. Since we are also very good cheater detectors, ethical behavior tends to be rewarded in social structures, and genes that promote it get passed down.

But I’m still uncomfortable thinking that morals are not absolutes that transcend that evolutionary selection pressure.

318

I think you misunderstood my point. At least some of the people you meet report phenomenological experiences that contradict your belief. That does not weaken your faith.

Sure, but the sociobiological explanation is not the only possible basis for an atheist morality. It is not even the only one discussed on the first page of that thread.

A lot of people are. It doesn’t bother me, since even if morals are absolutes our moral perception is not. To the practical exercise of guiding human behavior, the presence or absence of an absolute morality is irrelevant. I can have no certainty that my morality is correct whether an absolute standard exists or not.

319

SM,

No, no one I’ve met has had phenum … phemom … experiences that contradict my belief. Since my belief is extremely amorphous, it would be difficult for anyone to do.

320

Yes, that’s right. And yes, that’s what I did mean.

But every epistemological argument is vacuous. I’m not talking about ontology here; I’m talking about the nature of knowledge. And its nature is that it comes from nowhere, goes nowhere, and means nothing. At least, that’s how I see it.

With all respect that is due to a man of your debating skill and intellectual prowess, I disagree. As I see it, every epistemology is a tautology because there is no such thing as immediate knowledge. All knowledge is mediate. Every statement that is made is a redundant statement, including all the statements you and I are making here.

Traditionally, I think that would be “This epistemology is either true or false.”

An astounding observation! I think that is one of the most profound statements I’ve ever seen.

(Yes, I know I said that all statements are empty. But just as the atoms do a great job of presenting a veil of reality, so does language do a great job of emulating meaning.)

And yet, such people exist. Some are even famous, such as Helen Keller and Marshal Stewart Ball.

I don’t know what you mean by “absolute belief”. Do you mean the belief that God holds?

I don’t understand the assignment of “phenomenological experience” to metaphysical faith. Typically, a phenomenological description denies (or at least, evades) an outside influence. Theistic metaphysicism, on the other hand, posits an objectively real God that is indeed independent of our introspections.

I’m not sure what point you’re making here. Before I comment on it, I’d like you to explain how you’ve drawn a distinction that makes a difference.