# Is There a God? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [November 4, 2011, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832 "2011-11-04T09:58:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/41 "2011-11-05T04:24:40Z")
> [@gamerunknown](#): > > Is There a God? No. Now, get over it, and go out and enjoy your lives. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/42 "2011-11-05T04:44:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Oh, and by the way: Atheists are under no obligation to give you reasons why there isn’t a god. Theists bear the burden of proof to demonstrate that there is one. I can accept that an agnostic is under no burden of proof, but shouldn’t someone claiming affirmatively that there is no God be held to the same burden of proof as someone who is claiming affirmatively that there is? ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/43 "2011-11-05T04:55:19Z")
Cecil’s attempt at an answer to this question is pathetic. Even if you accept that it may not be turtles all the way down and that whatever is at the bottom could be given a title, giving that thing the title “god” is a fudge. A deliberate attempt to mislead. Simply, there is not a religion on earth that uses the word “god” to mean nothing more than a name for what happens when the turtles run out. The attributes of “gods” that are fundamental to the religions that espouse them have no significant commonality with the one attribute of the entity that Cecil describes. It’s like saying you have come up with evidence that there is a magnificent stone building because you have found a pebble and chosen to call it a cathedral. ---
**Author:** ![Consensus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3be4f8/32.png) [@Consensus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Consensus)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/44 "2011-11-05T05:20:44Z")
I don’t know of any god that is not part of a religion(of some sort). So why try to answer a factual question based on faith? ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/45 "2011-11-05T06:00:16Z")
> [@Rickymouse](#): > > I believe in god, the creater of everything we see. I don’t really know what he/she/it is, but I feel there is structure to things in this reality and it isn’t random. Everybody needs to believe in something. Belief makes you whole. Without any beliefs you lack true consciousness. Help me, I’m unconscious and I can’t get up:rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/46 "2011-11-05T06:02:02Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I can accept that an agnostic is under no burden of proof, but shouldn’t someone claiming affirmatively that there is no God be held to the same burden of proof as someone who is claiming affirmatively that there is? Before I answer that, do you claim affirmatively that Leprechauns don’t exist, or do you just operate on the assumption that they don’t? ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/47 "2011-11-05T06:03:10Z")
Well that about wraps it up for atheism. I’m convinced: there is a G-d and He is something like a First Cause, not necessarily temporally. I’m turning in my agnostic card and converting to 200% theism. Not all causes are [proximate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proximate_and_ultimate_causation). Some are ultimate. The ultimate cause of the world is G-d. Atheists believe that all causes are proximate and that the set of ultimate causes of the world don’t exist. I find this implausible, except of course as a matter of faith, which I respect though disagree with in this context. > [@gamerununknown](#): > > While the cosmological argument is a good start, it’s been given a savaging from Kant and Russell (here for example). I didn’t locate the savaging, though I’m willing to entertain that hypothesis. Might you be more specific? ETA: > [@Princhester](#): > > Even if you accept that it may not be turtles all the way down and that whatever is at the bottom could be given a title, giving that thing the title “god” is a fudge. A deliberate attempt to mislead. > > Simply, there is not a religion on earth that uses the word “god” to mean nothing more than a name for what happens when the turtles run out. …_until now_. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/48 "2011-11-05T08:30:26Z")
I like Cecil’s reply. To me it highlights what kind of lame excuses for “proof of God” the best of the crop consists of. Cecil: > [@](#): > > From this we deduce that, from the standpoint of one of the world’s great religions, an impersonal, abstract, and frankly mechanistic God is nonetheless God. > [@](#): > > However, should the existence of some such First Cause be demonstrated, one might, on the logic of Thomas Aquinas, be entitled to call it God. It might not be blunt enough for adherents to such proofs to be offended, but I wasn’t expecting Cecil to speak up on the issue at all. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/49 "2011-11-05T08:30:48Z")
Even if you accept Aquinas’ reasoning, it doesn’t prove that God exists. It just proves that God existed at some point. Once the First Cause (chronologically or not) initiated the First Effect, there’s no reason to assume the system cannot keep itself moving without further divine action. ---
**Author:** ![oogabooga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/c68b51/32.png) [@oogabooga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oogabooga)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/50 "2011-11-05T09:28:49Z")
“Placating the ignorant since 2011”? Others have already lamented on the load of ‘horseshit’ (as one of them put it so well) this article was. I see no need to go over why again, but really? Stick to the motto, or maybe change it? I will add a profound quote that one of my more brilliant highschool teachers said one day out of the blue, and that I still remember decades later: “Religion is a mental crutch.” Meaning; the world is a shitty place, and if you need to pretend there is a god or three to deal with it, no shame on you. Humans, being the psychotic apes they are, have immense trouble understanding concepts like ‘nothingness’, ‘infinity’, or even ‘…it just is’. But being able to ask those questions is what also made us the current rulers of this planet. It’s a double-edged sword. It does become dangerous when those who need the crutch, forget that it’s a crutch. But that doesn’t seem to be a problem in this thread, to your (our?) credit. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/51 "2011-11-05T13:57:32Z")
> [@](#): > > I didn’t locate the savaging, though I’m willing to entertain that hypothesis. Might you be more specific? [QUOTE=Bertrand Russell] The difficulty of this argument is that I don’t admit the idea of a necessary being and I don’t admit that there is any particular meaning in calling other beings “contingent.” These phrases don’t for me have a significance except within a logic that I reject. [/quote] > [@](#): > > I can accept that an agnostic is under no burden of proof, but shouldn’t someone claiming affirmatively that there is no God be held to the same burden of proof as someone who is claiming affirmatively that there is? Dawkins points out that very few atheists make the Russell’s teapot fallacy of claiming they can know something doesn’t exist. One can point out the inherent fallacies of a proposition (omnipotence contradicts itself, omniscience contradicts free will, ineffability contradicts the notion of a personal God), but, at least under Popper’s theory of disprovability, one cannot prove a negative. Just as very few Christians are Gnostic Christians at the moment (though they may be at a “1” on his scale). Instead, most just operate using parsimony: only accepting the minimum the evidence accounts for and operating under the assumption that anything else is superfluous (but not rejecting evidence and in some cases actively seeking it). Which reminds me, Pascal’s wager could have been brought up. As for whether Cecil has come down with the Flew: it could be a case of [Terror Management](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_management_theory). ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/52 "2011-11-05T15:49:53Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > If you can’t prove the existence of Yahweh while excluding the existence of Odin, you don’t have proof of anything. Actually, the teleological argument does rule out Odin, Zeus, and the like. It does allow Ahura Mazda, though. ---
**Author:** ![BeavisReturn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5f9b8f/32.png) [@BeavisReturn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeavisReturn)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/53 "2011-11-05T17:42:14Z")
If there is no God, there is no justice. The only justice there is in the universe is that which can be doled out by humans or other intelligent beings (if there are any), which is paltry at best. Everyone – without exception – has exactly the same fate. You, me, Jesus Christ, Adolf Hitler, Mother Teresa, Charles Manson, Marilyn Manson – everybody ultimately ends up just as dead as everyone else. It doesn’t matter what you believe, it doesn’t matter how you live your life. And for anyone proclaiming to put your “faith” into Science, we are told by Science that even the universe will eventually end. So honestly, what are you hoping to accomplish that can realistically survive not only your own demise but the death of the universe itself? If there truly is no God, we are all simply biding our time, waiting to die. And all the time you’re spending on these message boards trying to convince everyone else that you’re right will fade into nothingness. Get out and enjoy your life – you don’t have much time left. ---
**Author:** ![SiXSwordS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/49beb7/32.png) [@SiXSwordS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SiXSwordS)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/54 "2011-11-05T18:38:02Z")
> [@BeavisReturn](#): > > If there is no God, there is no justice. … > If there truly is no God, we are all simply biding our time, waiting to die. First, I think bringing the idea of justice into the mix only muddies the water. Unca Cece probably would have fared just as well writing an article answering the question: “Is there any justice?” And I really think you are missing the point of life and justice if you believe they are valueless or non-existent without some human concept to innervate them. The sense that life is just a long wait for death is a symptom of major depression. As such, I would argue, it is a pathological way of looking at life. Regardless of what skewed defense one has for holding such a belief, it is a result of distorted thinking. You might argue that that is proof of the existence of god, but you’re just falling into that same trap of presuming what you set out to prove. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/55 "2011-11-05T20:45:29Z")
> [@](#): > > If there is no God, there is no justice. While I find the idea of eternal orgiastic bliss quite attractive (and not everyone shares that opinion - Hitchens doesn’t for example), I’m quite repelled by the idea that justice is more important than happiness. If everyone could be happy for all eternity, why prevent them from being so? The idea that justice is more important than mercy has been the principle behind every genocide and instigatory war. > [@](#): > > And all the time you’re spending on these message boards trying to convince everyone else that you’re right will fade into nothingness. I quite like pursuing truth. I’m an optimist: I think seeking truth and increasing standards of living will be better for humans than not, even if polls show that people think they are less happy in developed nations (which may simply show a fundamental flaw with retrospective data rather than an actual phenomenon). In any scenario, if any one particular religion is true (and most hold as a fundamental doctrine that they are the one true religion, or else the meme wouldn’t be likely to survive), it is mutually exclusive with the tenets of any other religions practised by millions of people, so the majority of the world is wrong about at least a few things (that is, if they believe in the doctrine of the religion they profess). How is it possible to be an optimist and not hold particularly strongly onto a belief in a Just Creator? Well, I think that human society has advanced in some respects in developed societies. I don’t think it would be possible to institute feudalism, sexism or racism as official policies in the democratic countries in the West any more (perhaps in spite of doctrinal passages used to defend the latter two concepts). I think more people are enamoured to the idea of increasing rights for homosexuals and respect for the environment than, say, 50 years ago. There are things to celebrate and even when we’re gone, we can be glad that they \*actually happened \* (I actually got this idea from superman, where he had a sort of existential crisis after having a sort of amalgamation episode where he travelled through the Silver Age, Golden Age and Red Scare - it’s been comforting to me when I’ve been depressed). Perhaps we can celebrate our own contributions to increasing memes that brought pleasure to people. Of course, this doesn’t give us a right to be complacent: having only one life to lead should jolt us into action over the 30000 children that starve to death every day rather than thinking “Oh, I’ll pray for them and their families. I’m sure they’re in heaven now”. I also cede that religion can motivate people to do that very effectively. I don’t think of atheism as post-modernist or solipsistic and rejecting concepts such as “good” and “evil” - I personally think people starving to death is a great evil. I hope atheists are motivated to help others. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/56 "2011-11-05T21:47:26Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **sh1bu1** : > Before I answer that, do you claim affirmatively that Leprechauns don’t exist, or do you just operate on the assumption that they don’t? I make no claim as to the existence or nonexistence of leprechauns. Nor do I operate on any assumption regarding their existence or nonexistence, since the existence or nonexistence of leprechauns has no bearing on any aspect of my behavior. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/57 "2011-11-05T22:32:55Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I make no claim as to the existence or nonexistence of leprechauns. Nor do I operate on any assumption regarding their existence or nonexistence, since the existence or nonexistence of leprechauns has no bearing on any aspect of my behavior. I read it in a book, that leprechauns will steal a year of your life if you don’t wear holy-leprechaun socks. Do you wear them, you know, just in case? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/58 "2011-11-05T22:51:11Z")
> [@BeavisReturn](#): > > If there is no God, there is no justice. And what makes you think that adding a god to the mix creates justice? Assuming that there was a god, what makes you think it would be just? The universe is much more consistent with an uncaring or evil god. > [@BeavisReturn](#): > > Everyone – without exception – has exactly the same fate. > You, me, Jesus Christ, Adolf Hitler, Mother Teresa, Charles Manson, Marilyn Manson – everybody ultimately ends up just as dead as everyone else. > It doesn’t matter what you believe, it doesn’t matter how you live your life. Of course it matters how we live; regardless of our eventual death we experience quite a lot on the way there. > [@BeavisReturn](#): > > If there truly is no God, we are all simply biding our time, waiting to die. And if there is a god, we are all its puppets & slaves, and have no hope. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2011, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/59 "2011-11-05T23:14:17Z")
> [@](#): > > I read it in a book, that leprechauns will steal a year of your life if you don’t wear holy-leprechaun socks. Well, now, that’s an empirically-testable proposition, so belief need not enter into it. If scientific studies can show that people who wear a certain sort of socks live, on average, a year longer than those who don’t, then yes, I would wear that sort of sock, independently of whether or not the reason for the lifespan difference is leprechauns stealing years. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832/60 "2011-11-06T00:21:53Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > Cecil’s attempt at an answer to this question is pathetic. Even if you accept that it may not be turtles all the way down and that whatever is at the bottom could be given a title, giving that thing the title “god” is a fudge. A deliberate attempt to mislead. Picking at nits: I’d call it sleight of hand rather than misleading: Cecil included caveats. He noted for example that he was presenting a sketch, not an airtight argument. See also **naita** , post 48. > [@](#): > > Simply, there is not a religion on earth that uses the word “god” to mean nothing more than a name for what happens when the turtles run out. Cecil noted that it was the definition of Saint Aquinas, a banner-level character in the Catholic pantheon. Furthermore, the argument has some of the flavor of Spinoza’s conception of the same. I think you overstate your argument (though it’s fine for a message board.) This conception of God is not _wholly_ alien to practicing theists. It’s just that it might be reasonable to ask them how they establish some of the other characteristics of the Being that they worship. Also, to clarify the turtles can go all the way down: in that case “Turtles all the way down” _is_ G-d. But I think you understand that: your metaphor is fine. > [@naita](#): > > I like Cecil’s reply. To me it highlights what kind of lame excuses for “proof of God” the best of the crop consists of. What I wasn’t aware of is that First Cause can be conceptual and atemporal. It can be a straight application of the ultimate/proximate distinction sometimes used in biology. > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Even if you accept Aquinas’ reasoning, it doesn’t prove that God exists. It just proves that God existed at some point. Once the First Cause (chronologically or not) initiated the First Effect, there’s no reason to assume the system cannot keep itself moving without further divine action. Well if the First Cause is atemporal, then G-d still exists. But it could also be chronological, which would imply that He may no longer be with us. But to say G-d never existed is nonsensical. And if we consider First Conceptual Cause alone, then G-d definitely exists. > [@gamerunknown](#): > > > [@Bertrand Russell](#): > > > > The difficulty of this argument is that I don’t admit the idea of a necessary being and I don’t admit that there is any particular meaning in calling other beings “contingent.” These phrases don’t for me have a significance except within a logic that I reject. Thanks for the quote. Russell was replying to somebody who took a more effusive view of G-d, so it’s a little tricky to sort out. That said, “Contingent” maps directly to “Proximate cause”, while “Necessary Being” maps to “Ultimate Cause”, though the last 2 don’t line up perfectly. I think it fair to say that there is necessarily an ultimate cause for the world. That cause may be one final turtle at the bottom of the pile, turtles going all the way down infinitely or indefinitely, or even turtles nibbling at each others’ tails in a grand circle. But to say that there simply is no non-proximate cause for the world is nonsensical. That said, Russell was a bright man, and I trust that he would have an answer to all of that. I’m not saying the cosmological argument is unanswerable: I’m saying that I can’t currently think of a good response to it outside of **Princhester** ’s line of argument involving empirically observed religions. Partially refuted above. > [@Der Trihs](#): > > The universe is much more consistent with an uncaring or evil god. You are familiar with the Problem of Evil. There is a mirror-like Problem of Good. It’s hard to sustain either hypothesis: though to be fair your argument is couched in probabilistic terms. And uncaring doesn’t seem wholly implausible, especially given the universally human propensity to whine. [I’ll probably bow out of this PoE/PoG fork though, at least in this thread.] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-god/601832.md?page=4)