# Reasons for belief and disbelief in God **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 28, 2006, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964 "2006-01-28T07:02:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Trust](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b38774/32.png) [@Trust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trust)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/61 "2006-01-29T20:46:35Z")
> [@Cliffy](#): > > No you don’t, IMO. Ta-daa! > > See what I did there? I declaimed the truth of my assertion without anything but personal experience and opinion. That’s exactly what you’re doing. So why is it legitimate for you to prove the existence of god by naked appeal to personal prejudice, and it’s illegitimate for me to prove his non-existence by the same method? There is nothing that separates the two approaches. Therefore, merely stating the object you’re trying to prove is not enough to convince someone that your view is corrert. Ergo, we must attempt to divine the truth (that’s a pun) by some other method. In other words, your “evidence” don’t mean shit. > > So once we realize an alternative method must be used, the only method we know of to give us reasonably true models of the world around us is the application of reason to our observations. You seemed to pretend in your OP that this was your goal, but your actions since then have shown us that isn’t so. > > Anyway, as for the rest, whatever **Dio** says is right. > > –Cliffy Sorry Cliffy, but I never stated that others should believe because I did. What I did state, is that there is nothing wrong with my logic as you would so love to have. It is more than obvious that this thread is heading towards personal insults instead of actually showing where my logic is incorrect. ---
**Author:** ![Trust](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b38774/32.png) [@Trust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trust)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/62 "2006-01-29T20:59:36Z")
> [@Apos](#): > > See, it’s just baffling to me how anyone could run around saying things like this without a very obvious question: what makes one person choose one thing and another choose another? For that matter, who the hell is this “we” you are talking about? Am I we different from you we? We obviously make different choices. Perhaps you choose, in the same situations, better than. What accounts for that difference? Please: just TRY to give ANY answer to that which doesn’t throw your whole edifice of free will into total disarray.? What makes one person choose one thing and another choose another? There are two ways to look at this questions. First, you could be asking, what is the mechanism by which someone makes a choice? With all due respect, I hope this is not what you are asking because how the hell could I explain this. It is like saying that God made us have free will, and trying to explain the mechanism by which he did it. Or trying to come up with the mechanism by which the universe came to be. I have no idea how the mechanism worked. We just know that it worked. You surely can’t expect me to pull out of my ass an answer to this? Second, you could be asking what are the reasons for making different choices. There is obviously millions of different answers. Possible answers could be that we are selfish, we are giving, we are smart, we dont consider all the possiblities, we are more concerned with other things, we aren’t happy, we are happy, etc. etc. Me and you are different in our circumstances of coarse. We are different in thousands of possible ways. But what we are not different in is our ability to make any choice we want at anytime we want. If you wanted to believe you could. If you wanted to not believe you could. Likewise with me. > [@Apos](#): > > Again: are you thinking about the implications of your own statements? If God can judge people, then there must logically be something to judge: some underlying character that is determining the nature of the choices made. Which, of course, tosses the whole idea of free will being a barrier to goodness RIGHT out the window. See what I mean about how even asking the question about where choices come from and how they work fataly undermines the whole evasion you are employing? Yes, He can judge our choices. Of coarse these judgments are going to be based on our circumstances, our soul, our heart, our mind, and what we know etc. We have no idea what these are for other people. I can only judge myself and know whether I am being genuine with myself or not. ---
**Author:** ![Trust](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b38774/32.png) [@Trust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trust)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/63 "2006-01-29T21:21:50Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > The problem is it doesn’t matter to me if they do work or not. If God is evil then I want nothing to do with him/her. And there are so many definitions and viewpoints of god that the idea that one particular one is true while the others are all false is unlikely. Who is to say what is true? We don’t know right now. . If God is evil then almost noone would want anything to do with Him. Got it. We just have to agree to disagree because I do not see that big of a difference between peoples viewpoint of God. All the present day religions are not that different. You are talking about the specifics, not simply the overall belief or disbelief in God. > [@Wesley Clark](#): > > Well, that is conjecture. I don’t think I agree with it. For one thing pain is more important than sinning. Another is that there already is alot of sin, and some of the sinners want their victims to suffer and/or could care less. in fact if people really understood the pain they were causing people would be far less evil than they are now. So less pain wouldn’t change anything, it would just make life easier for the world’s victims. . Agree to disagree. You say pain is more important than sinning but I say that the whole reason for pain is because of sinning (and of coarse physical pain is also for survival). Otherwise we have no way of deciphering that it is wrong. > [@Wesley Clark](#): > > One of the major problems I have with pain is that love is a major cause of pain. I’m not talking about heartbreak and romantic love, I’m talking about parents watching their children get sick and die, or friends watching friends suffer from mental illnesses or people feeling depressed because there is evil in the world. The worst/most evil governments on the planet like North Korea or Saddam’s Iraq were renowned for using people’s love for friends and family as weapons to control them. They’d go after a dissident’s family, friends or kids to make the suffering worse. There is no way to comprehend a benevolent god in a world where our love for each other is a major cause of suffering. I have met alot of people who just became numb because they couldn’t deal with the pain their love was causing. . Very good point. I can assure you that if you looked at the reasons for pain in the world as described by Christianity, you would understand that it is still logical. If your stance is that you just do not genuniely believe it, then that is fine. But the only way for that to be fine with me is if you look at all the reasons why there is evil in the world first. Once you get that, then you can make an educated decision on whether God exists or not. You cannot just look in the mirror and say we did not evolve. Likewise, you cannot base your belief on what little you know of Christ. Can we agree on this? > [@Wesley Clark](#): > > Belief is 50% genetic though. . I am gonna need a link and some time to make any sort of conjecture based on this statement. Like you, I am not going to just believe this without any sort of evidence. > [@Wesley Clark](#): > > We aren’t arguing, we are disagreeing. I don’t dislike you and I really respect all the good your religion has done not only for you but all the good your church has done for the world. But you have to understand that I consider myself a good person too and so do many of the people who disagree with your views. Aside from the lack of evidence and the multitude of gods to pick from (both of which make believing hard to do) we can’t contemplate how a benevolent god could be in charge of a world where even an evil criminal is, at the end of the day, a better man than god. Hardened criminals have to desensitize themselves to their victims. If you read up on serial killers or rapists they usually talk about how they manage to view their victims as objects instead of people and how it can take years of more or less brainwashing to reach this level. On a basic level we are mostly unable to hurt those we understand are individual humans just like us, we have to brainwash ourselves into thinking they are objects or ‘just enemies’ or something like that. Even then conscience eats away at alot of people after the deed. Even a serial rapist is a more moral person than god because at least he has to desensitize himself to the evil he is committing by getting drunk and shutting down the rational, moral part of his brain or viewing his victim as an object. If god is all knowing then he already knows what he is doing and is totally in control of his faculties. In my view, the rapist has more of a conscience and more concern for humanity than a creator god. So either god is made up (since there is no evidence and there are too many explanations to know which is true and which isn’t) or god is either amoral, evil or impotent. . Your reasons are all logical. Anyone can relate to them. I can completely relate to them. I simply think that just because there are terrible people in the world who go against God, does not stop God from being real. I also completely realize that unbelieving people can be incredibly great people. I have no problem with this. What works for me might not work for you and when I speak of religion you probably have completely different reactions based on your experience. Since I have had no bad experiences with religion, and only incredibly great ones, I do not have any negative connections with it. The only real thing I do have is these people spouting “Jesus” on tv who obviously do not follow anything close to what the religion calls for. Now take other people with terrible connections with religion and it’s not hard to realize where they come from. What I do have a problem with is that these connections are unrational. They are based on extreme points. Right now, you are under the assumption that belief in God requires going against many things you know. What I am saying is that those things that you know, are not enough to understand Christianity. And once you knew all the things I knew about the religion, you would see that it is all logical. Once you realize that, belief or disbelief in God breaks down into only belief. It does not break down into bad logic. Do you get that? If you still decide that you do not genuinely believe (knowing that nothing is illogical) then that is completely fine. What I do have a problem with is that you think there is something going on that is illogical and there is not. ---
**Author:** ![Trust](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b38774/32.png) [@Trust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trust)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/64 "2006-01-29T21:26:00Z")
Everything breaks down into either genuine belief or disbelief in God. If you can show me otherwise, please attempt to but every single example so far has been based on limited knowledge of Christ or God. Once we can agree on the fact that it all comes down to the fact that you have to believe in God based on no scientific evidence, **but that there is nothing wrong with the logic** , then I will feel like we are all on the same page. ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/65 "2006-01-29T21:30:05Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > I love how you just hammer me with obviously idiotic questions. If you’re not trying to bring down my character, what are you trying to do? I have little information on your character, and am not trying to knock it. I do have a problem with your remarks such as ‘I simply find it amazing that people still believe that a religion that 3 out of 4 people believe in that has lasted for over 2000 years is illogical. I can assure you, there is nothing wrong with the logic. At all.’ You make it sound as if not believing in your religion is amazing and illogical. That’s an aspersion on my character, by the way - as is calling my questions ‘idiotic’. You claim that you have a logical proof of your religious belief, but refuse to answer questions about it. That is not logical - it means you have blind faith, not a logical position. > [@Trust](#): > > Christ had not come along so no, there was no way to believe in Christ. Why didn’t God want these people as worshippers? Does the fact that none of these masses of people believed in God matter to you? > [@Trust](#): > > I am not going to make judgment calls on other peoples religions. Why not? They claim your belief is wrong! Use your impeccable logic to prove **they** are wrong. > [@Trust](#): > > I do not know enough about other religions, but from what I have seen they do not seem that different from Christianity (the modern day religions who do not worship obvious false idols). Err … I was referring to Judaism, which states Jesus is **not** the Son of God. And you think this is not very different from Christianity?! > [@Trust](#): > > I love how you put it, “Your entire Church”. Nice. There is a Christian belief that the world is 6000 years old…what’s your point? No I do not agree. I just love how you group all “believers” into one category. That my friend, is discrimination. Oh dear. You claimed 75% of the World (later changed to 75% of the US) believed in something and that this proved they were right. In fact there are hundreds of different Christian sects, with differing and contradictory beliefs. You cannot claim this proves anything. The meaning of **discrimination** you are attempting to use is 'unfavourable treatment based on prejudice, especially regarding race, age or sex. Perhaps you would like to give examples of how I treat Christians unfavourably. :rolleyes: > [@Trust](#): > > No they are not illogical. That is the entire point of what I am saying. There is nothing wrong with the logic. It will always come down to faith. Now if we looked at the genesis story, we could show that that is illogical to take it as a real life story. But you keep saying right and wrong as if I am God. I try to find the truth as best as I know how. I can feel completely confident in saying that I am incredibly impressed with the person I am today based on how I live my life. Who you are is up to you and I do not try and discount you as a person simply because I do not agree with you. Faith is defined as ‘firm belief especially without logical proof.’ Therefore anything that comes down to faith has **nothing to do** with logical proof. The Genesis story is very worrying to me. Abraham was prepared to kill his son Isaac because God commanded him to. Why is this story in the Bible? What moral lesson does it teach? If you think this story is not real, how do you know any part of the Bible is real? You make some sweeping statements, so you will be challenged on this board (our motto is dedicated to fighting ignorance!). I too 'try to find the truth as best as I know how. I can feel completely confident in saying that I am incredibly impressed with the person I am today based on how I live my life. Who you are is up to you and I do not try and discount you as a person simply because I do not agree with you. ’ The main difference between us is that I do not rely on religious faith, but on logic and evidence. I spent 15 years going to Church, won the religious prize at my School and have discussed various religions over the years. Eventually I asked my Sunday School teacher if there was proof of God. “No”, he replied “It’s a matter of faith.” Well if God exists, he made me a scientist. I believe in gravity, evolution and the scientific method. I don’t believe in religion, homeopathy or prayer. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/66 "2006-01-29T21:39:24Z")
> [@JThunder](#): > > Not at all. Earlier, I mentioned philosopher Alvin Plantinga. In his writings, he emphasizes that a benevolent God may allow pain and suffering during this temporary mortal lifetime, if he has purposes that transcend mere earthly existence. For example, if he desires for people to seek salvation in him, and if suffering has a way of drawing people closer to God, then God might conceivably allow pain and suffering to occur (even those caused by natural evils) so that people will freely seek him – that is, seek him without being forced to do so. > > That was just a cursory treatment of this topic, of course. Plantinga himself discusses this more thoroughly; however, you can find a fairly accessible discussion [here](http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/evil.html), and some more thorough treatments in the various writings of [Dr. William Lane Craig](http://www.leaderu.com/offices/billcraig/). I’m aware of that argument, and find it quite unconvincing. You would have to argue that the pain and suffering in the world is the minimal amount to cause people to be drawn to god. It would also help to show that this has been effective, which seems far from the case. This also leads to the old argument against anesthesia - that suffering is good, especially in childbirth, which is a direct result of Eve’s disobedience. Then it is hard to imagine how the hundred thousand and more killed in the tsunami are closer to god. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/67 "2006-01-29T21:55:49Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > What makes one person choose one thing and another choose another? There are two ways to look at this questions. > > First, you could be asking, what is the mechanism by which someone makes a choice? With all due respect, I hope this is not what you are asking because how the hell could I explain this. Luckily, you don’t have to get into specifics. The mere realization that there has to be some sort of mechanism itself renders the whole idea of “free will” to be nonsense, regardless of the specifics. > [@](#): > > It is like saying that God made us have free will, and trying to explain the mechanism by which he did it. Or trying to come up with the mechanism by which the universe came to be. I have no idea how the mechanism worked. We just know that it worked. You surely can’t expect me to pull out of my ass an answer to this? You are the one who is claiming that free will is inconsistent with always choosing good. If so, you must have some reason to think that, some reason rooted in the understanding of what it means to “choose” something. So you cannot beg off this one without abandoning the concept of free will as barring God from making people who always choose the good. > [@](#): > > Second, you could be asking what are the reasons for making different choices. There is obviously millions of different answers. Possible answers could be that we are selfish, we are giving, we are smart, we dont consider all the possiblities, we are more concerned with other things, we aren’t happy, we are happy, etc. etc. If you can agree that person X is selfish and person Y is less selfish, and that these are the reasons for why one makes a bad choice and one a good choice, then you’ve left yourself with nowhere to go. Why not simply make people such that they are less selfish? > [@](#): > > Me and you are different in our circumstances of coarse. We are different in thousands of possible ways. But what we are not different in is our ability to make any choice we want at anytime we want. If you wanted to believe you could. If you wanted to not believe you could. Likewise with me. Now you’re just trying to contradict what you previously said. We were discussing the reasons WHY someone would make a particular choice. Now you are back to saying that we can make choices. Sure: but the question was HOW? You can’t explain why you would make this choice or that one simply by refferring back to choice again. That’s exactly what we were trying to explain! > [@](#): > > Yes, He can judge our choices. Of coarse these judgments are going to be based on our circumstances, our soul, our heart, our mind, and what we know etc. We have no idea what these are for other people. I can only judge myself and know whether I am being genuine with myself or not. We don’t need to know to know that any legitimate attempt to judge something must rely on a deterministic link from what it chose back to some sort of underlying nature or character. In which case, the illusion of there being a meaningful concept of free will has already broken down. Face it: this evasive argument digs its own grave, hires it’s own pallbearers, and delivers it own flowers. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/68 "2006-01-29T21:56:28Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > Please. You consider yourself to follow facts, yet your words and actions show completely otherwise. Your argument would be like me saying that the universe does not exist because I cannot come up with a feasible way the universe was created. Just because you do not understand how a natural evil can happen does not _rule out_ that God is benevolent. If your agenda is to get rid of unthinking religion, then more power to you. But you really need to stop spreading false information when you really have no idea. Just because you can find a lot of terrible black people, does not mean that all black people are terrible. Likewise with religion my friend. I’m not talking about religion, or believers, but about a benevolent god. How natural evils happen is not the issue, but why god either lets them happen or makes them happen. If you say god is not all powerful, and cannot create a world that does not have earthquakes, fine, no problem. But to show that a god is omnipotent and omnibenevolent, you must show that there is no possible world that will allow belief with less suffering. **JThunder** at least understands the issue. I’m sorry that you so clearly feel threatened by those with good arguments against your belief, but you do not have to be borderline abusive. I’d still like to hear your answer to the problem of natural evil. ---
**Author:** ![aurelian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f4b2a3/32.png) [@aurelian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aurelian)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/69 "2006-01-29T22:40:27Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > I threw together these reasons in a matter of seconds. I am afraid that my list posits believers as shallow and self-centered people just as much as I did for the non-belivers. Yet you chose to only point out your point of view. Why? Because I don’t like to presume I speak for experiences outside of my own? 😉 When I was religious, I was a child, and having been raised in this faith, I didn’t have the capacity to understand as I do today (and hopefully my capacity will continue to grow.) I cannot imagine that my experience, as a sheltered girl raised in a fundamentalist inerrant Christian sect would be terribly representative of ‘faith’ as experienced by most people on this board. So I don’t assume. I would appreciate it if you didn’t, either. ---
**Author:** ![aurelian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f4b2a3/32.png) [@aurelian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aurelian)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2006, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/70 "2006-01-29T23:14:11Z")
> [@aurelian](#): > > Because I don’t like to presume I speak for experiences outside of my own? 😉 > When I was religious, I was a child, and having been raised in this faith, I didn’t have the capacity to understand as I do today (and hopefully my capacity will continue to grow.) I cannot imagine that my experience, as a sheltered girl raised in a fundamentalist inerrant Christian sect would be terribly representative of ‘faith’ as experienced by most people on this board. So I don’t assume. I would appreciate it if you didn’t, either. Read: “took the Bible as inerrant”. Sorry. Since I’m multi-posting, here is my humble take on why I don’t believe in the Christian God. Agustine said that we can understand much more about what God is not than what God is; he is incomprehensible to us. Well, one of the ways of approaching the unknowable is metaphor; it helps us to create simulacra that, while not quite the same, can help us to make basic statements and decisions. Hence the very common metaphor of parent and child, which has already been mentioned in the thread. God is a wise parent, guiding us towards the path that is best for us. Like any parent, then, God must allow us to make mistakes and fall down; like the child learning to ride a two-wheeler must fall down and skin her knees a few times to learn. And as long as we are talking about skinned knees and bumps on the head, the metaphor holds. But, as many others have already mentioned, the pains of this world are exponentially more intense and numerous than these. But no parent, save the criminal or the psychotic, would permit their child the suffering and pain that God permits us to bear, no matter the supposed lesson learned. If your response is to say that I simply cannot understand, that there are larger lessons that I cannot perceive, then I say that my lack of comprehension is still God’s fault: if he made me incapable of understanding his designs, yet made me a rational creature, why would I not question? Why should I be punished for questioning? Which of us, with our children, would punish them for not understanding the greater adult world that surrounds them? I don’t buy the free-will argument; if God is omnipotent and omniscient, he could have made us however he pleased. I am restricted by gravity, but I don’t regard gravity as a restriction to my free will. ---
**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:** [January 30, 2006, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/71 "2006-01-30T01:52:18Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > My viewpoint might be slightly different than Christianity’s viewpoint, but who is to say that _all_ people will not eventually see God? Because hopefully humanity will develop beyond the crutch of religion. With any luck, one day _no one_ will believe in God. > [@Trust](#): > > I consider us all to be evil so God creating only “good” people does not even make sense. With choice none of us are “good”. Another reason I dislike religion; it tends to be fundamentally hostile to humanity. > [@Trust](#): > > I simply find it amazing that people still believe that a religion that 3 out of 4 people believe in that has lasted for over 2000 years is illogical. You mean like the idea that women are inferior lasted thousands of years ? Old is not good, popular is not right. > [@Trust](#): > > I can assure you, there is nothing wrong with the logic. At all. Not everyone agrees with you on that, including me. > [@Trust](#): > > The only justifiable reason for believing or not believing is genuine belief. Er, you _do_ realize that statement makes no sense at all ? Belief can’t justify itself. > [@Trust](#): > > I constantly see people try and rationlize their reasons for not believing. I constantly try and see people rationalize their reasons for believing. You cannot rationalize it. Either you do not believe because you genuinely do not believe (and not enough evidence would be a big factor in this) or you do believe because you genuinely believe (and knowing Love would be a big factor). That statement makes no sense. Also, what makes you think religion/God has anything to do with love ( capitalizing the word doesn’t make it more important ) ? For that matter. what makes you think love is a good thing ? It can be good or bad, depending on circumstances. > [@Trust](#): > > You say that God should show us evidence. If he showed us this tell-all evidence then there would be no purpose to life. Not everyone thinks beliving in God is the purpose of life. Frankly, I find it a rather pathetic purpose. > [@Trust](#): > > The perfect way to get around discrimination is by faith. Now THAT is the purest nonsense. Faith ( religious and otherwise ) has been at the root of discrimination and worse for as long as humans have been around. > [@Trust](#): > > **Der Trihs** , if you would use even a hint of logic in your discussions on religion it would be much easier to have conversations with you. Unfortunately you know that discussions on religion are not as easily proveable as scientific fact so you have no problem spreading slander to further your points. If at any time you would start using logic, I am sure that you can actually get people to understand your viewpoint. However, your completely illogical assumptions discredit your character more than they help prove your point. So please, do us a favor, let go of all this bullshit you hold against religion, and start being rational. I would love to understand where you are coming from but I am afraid your emotions are clouding your judgments. That’s quite the non-rebuttal. Do you have any _actual_ arguments against my opinions ? > [@Trust](#): > > 1. There would be no reason for faith. Faith is what allows life to be what it is. If God just acted in all our affairs, there would be no need for faith. We would simply look at the evidence and know. This erases the entire need for life. What makes you think faith is a good thing ? At best it is a desperation measure, something you do because you have no choice. The kind of blind, evidence free faith you promote is a kind of insanity, I think. > [@Trust](#): > > Now, I would argue that you could not simply create pain at 1/4 the level it is at now. That would directly affect all of our consequences and just lead to more sinning. Do you see what I am saying? All you would be doing is shifting the amount of sinning with the amount of pain. Why in the world would more sin be okay in Gods eyes? How do you know it would create more “sin”, and why should I care ? Why should I care what a jerk like God thinks, assuming he even existed ? > [@Trust](#): > > Once we can agree on the fact that it all comes down to the fact that you have to believe in God based on no scientific evidence, [ib]but that there is nothing wrong with the logic\*\*, then I will feel like we are all on the same page. Problem is, I and others _do_ think there is “something wrong with the logic”. We aren’t on “the same page”, or even close. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/72 "2006-01-30T02:32:11Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I’m aware of that argument, and find it quite unconvincing. You would have to argue that the pain and suffering in the world is the minimal amount to cause people to be drawn to god. Not at all. After all, if someone claims that evil and suffering are incompatible with God’s existence, then the burden of proof rests upon them to demonstrate this claim. I don’t have to prove that only the minimal amount of pain and suffering is allowed. Rather, if someone claims that this pain and suffering proves God’s non-existence, then the burden of proof rests on their shoulders. > [@](#): > > It would also help to show that this has been effective, which seems far from the case. Again, I disagree. As I mentioned earlier, the greatest religious revivals are occuring, not in prosperous nations, but in countries that experience unspeakable hardship and tragedy. > [@](#): > > Then it is hard to imagine how the hundred thousand and more killed in the tsunami are closer to god. Not them, perhaps, but what about their families? Or what about the souls across the world who have been reminded about how fragile and transcient human life can be? Those who have been reminded that, no matter how hard you prepare, your life can be snuffed away at any moment? Again, I’d like to remind you that the burden of proof rests on those who claim that these natural disasters prove God’s non-existence. I don’t have to prove that these tragedies happened for the postulated reason. Rather, as long as this reason is even a possibility, then such natural tragedies are not necessarily incompatible with God’s existence. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/73 "2006-01-30T04:42:58Z")
> [@aurelian](#): > > Read: “took the Bible as inerrant”. Sorry. > > Since I’m multi-posting, here is my humble take on why I don’t believe in the Christian God. > > Agustine said that we can understand much more about what God is not than what God is; he is incomprehensible to us. Well, one of the ways of approaching the unknowable is metaphor; it helps us to create simulacra that, while not quite the same, can help us to make basic statements and decisions. Hence the very common metaphor of parent and child, which has already been mentioned in the thread. God is a wise parent, guiding us towards the path that is best for us. Like any parent, then, God must allow us to make mistakes and fall down; like the child learning to ride a two-wheeler must fall down and skin her knees a few times to learn. And as long as we are talking about skinned knees and bumps on the head, the metaphor holds. But, as many others have already mentioned, the pains of this world are exponentially more intense and numerous than these. > > But no parent, save the criminal or the psychotic, would permit their child the suffering and pain that God permits us to bear, no matter the supposed lesson learned. We discussed this a few months back and it was interesting then as well. The problem I have with this argument is a matter of perspective. If we imagine a God that is timeless and that we are also timless spiritual beings and our physical bodies are a fleeting expression of our true selves then the suffering you speak of can be seen as not that severe. Even in worse case scenario’s how do we compare a lifetime to eternity? When I go through periods of suffering in this life I don’t wallow in them when they are over, I leave them behind. If I have a nightmare and wake up heart pounding, and emotionally distraught, when I realize it was only a fleeting dream it fades quickly until it is gone. In perspective with eternity the suffereing experienced her is a skinned knee. > [@](#): > > If your response is to say that I simply cannot understand, that there are larger lessons that I cannot perceive, then I say that my lack of comprehension is still God’s fault: if he made me incapable of understanding his designs, yet made me a rational creature, why would I not question? Why should I be punished for questioning? Which of us, with our children, would punish them for not understanding the greater adult world that surrounds them? Great point. Of course we are supposed to question and use our ability to reason and comprehend. We’re not asked to accept things blindly because someone with a nifty robe and pointy hat says so. I don’t think we are unable to comprehend. I think that comprehension requires some adjustment on our part. Here on the SDMB I hear the argument that God must know exactly what it takes for each individual to believe so why doesn’t a benevolent being provide that. It has occured to me lately that is exactly what\* is\* being provided. Free will remains and process of our comprehension includes our intellect but also an element of surrender. > [@](#): > > I don’t buy the free-will argument; if God is omnipotent and omniscient, he could have made us however he pleased. I am restricted by gravity, but I don’t regard gravity as a restriction to my free will. I’m not sure I get your point here. In order for there to be choice it was nessecary for there to be at least a percieved duality. What we don’t know is how and why we went from spiritual being to spiritual/physical being. Did God decide that or did did we? Perhaps once there was something to choose and we had free will to choose it , we just did. In a book I’ve been reading it is suggested that rather than God being responsible for creation perhaps creation sprang from us when we decided to believe we were seperate from God. I mean if we’re going to be seperate from God we need to be some place. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/74 "2006-01-30T05:06:10Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > I am gonna need a link and some time to make any sort of conjecture based on this statement. Like you, I am not going to just believe this without any sort of evidence. > > . [http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2003/godonbrainqa.shtml](http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2003/godonbrainqa.shtml) The right temporal lobe is the part that percieves religious experiences and because of that one’s propensity for religion is 50% genetic. Could it be there is a genetic component to religious belief? Religious behaviour is so complex it is very unlikely that there will be a single gene for religious activity, but it does seem as if there is some sort of as yet unidentified genetic component. Several studies of identical twins separated at birth and brought up separately have measured religiosity. Religiosity is defined as the intensity of religious belief. These studies have shown that there appears to be about a 50% component to religiosity. ---
**Author:** ![mrald](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3da27b/32.png) [@mrald](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrald)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/75 "2006-01-30T05:19:56Z")
God exists. There is no scientific reasoning that can prove or disprove him. Free will exists, God wants his children th choose his love and blessing not be forced to. I think everyone think too much about this with their brains, the human brain can’t wrap around eternity and a omnipotent being. But the heart can accept Him ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/76 "2006-01-30T05:30:23Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > [http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2003/godonbrainqa.shtml](http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2003/godonbrainqa.shtml) > > The right temporal lobe is the part that percieves religious experiences and because of that one’s propensity for religion is 50% genetic. > Could it be there is a genetic component to religious belief? > > Religious behaviour is so complex it is very unlikely that there will be a single gene for religious activity, but it does seem as if there is some sort of as yet unidentified genetic component. Several studies of identical twins separated at birth and brought up separately have measured religiosity. Religiosity is defined as the intensity of religious belief. These studies have shown that there appears to be about a 50% component to religiosity. MAybe…but then we have to explain how people go from deep belief to none and vice versa. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/77 "2006-01-30T06:39:25Z")
> [@Trust](#): > > What makes one person choose one thing and another choose another? There are two ways to look at this questions. > > First, you could be asking, what is the mechanism by which someone makes a choice? With all due respect, I hope this is not what you are asking because how the hell could I explain this. It is like saying that God made us have free will, and trying to explain the mechanism by which he did it. Or trying to come up with the mechanism by which the universe came to be. I have no idea how the mechanism worked. We just know that it worked. You surely can’t expect me to pull out of my ass an answer to this? > > Second, you could be asking what are the reasons for making different choices. There is obviously millions of different answers. Possible answers could be that we are selfish, we are giving, we are smart, we dont consider all the possiblities, we are more concerned with other things, we aren’t happy, we are happy, etc. etc. > > Me and you are different in our circumstances of coarse. We are different in thousands of possible ways. But what we are not different in is our ability to make any choice we want at anytime we want. **If you wanted to believe you could. If you wanted to not believe you could.** Likewise with me. Bolding mine. Do you really think that it’s easy to simply decide “I want to believe X,” and convince yourself to believe it, even if the whole fibre of your being strains against that belief? For example, i might decide to take [Pascal’s Wager](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_wager) and to believe in God simply because there is little cost to believing and a possible huge payoff in terms of my eternal salvation. But, having decided that, i would then have to convince myself to believe something that i really don’t believe. It would be a simple act of dogmatism, fixing on a particular conclusion and drumming it into my skull to the exclusion of all alternatives. American philosopher Charles Peirce called this the “method of tenacity” in his description of how we come to believe things. Peirce has a sort of wondering admiration for people who can do this: “They do not waste time in trying to make up their minds what they want, but, fastening like lightning upon whatever alternative comes first, they hold to it to the end, whatever happens, without an instant’s irresolution. This is one of the splendid qualities which generally accompany brilliant, unlasting success. It is impossible not to envy the man who can dismiss reason, although we know how it must turn out at last.” William James would agree with you that it is not necessary to have indisputable scientific evidence in order to come to a belief in the existence of God. In fact, James specifies that this sort of decision requires a different approach than does deciding about merely scientific questions. We have two possibilities here: to believe in God, and not to believe. The decision between these two things is called by James an option. For you to accept a possibility without all the empirical evidence that science provides, then the option you are deciding must be living, forced, and momentous. By living, James means that you must be choosing between two options that seem within the realms of possibility for you. By forced, he means that the choice is one that you can’t simply ignore. And by momentous, he means a choice that unique and significant to you, one that has life-altering consequences. If these criteria are met, James argues that the will to believe is justified, and that we don’t have to meet the same criteria that we would for more prosaic scientific decisions. Furthermore, he argues that our faith need not simply come from an examination of empirical evidence, but can actually precede it and “help to create the fact.” Finding truth in religion can be, according to James, at least partly resultant from our own desire to believe, and he concludes that “we have the right to believe at our own risk any hypothesis that is live enough to tempt our will.” Of course, James was writing at a time when believing in God was a “live” hypothesis for nearly everyone in his audience. Nowdays, as many of the responses in this thread show, there are many people for whom a belief in God does not constitute a live possibility. I’m one of them. James says that a “live hypothesis is one which appeals as a real possibility to him to whom it is proposed.” Well, the existence of God does not appeal to me as a real possibility, and even if we push the issue of empirical scientific proof aside and adopt James’ more religion-friendly mode of determining belief, i can’t bring myself to consider God’s existence as a live hypothesis. I am, in this way, as impervious to logical or empirical suasion as someone who has decided to believe in God unconditionally. Might i suggest, **Trust** , that you have a look at: [Charles Peirce, “The Fixation of Belief” (1877)](http://www.peirce.org/writings/p107.html) [William James, “The Will to Believe” (1896)](http://falcon.jmu.edu/~omearawm/ph101willtobelieve.html) When science really began to challenge religion in America in the late nineteenth century, many people considered exactly the questions you are confronting in this thread, and it might interest you to see how they responded. ---
**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:** [January 30, 2006, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/78 "2006-01-30T09:53:51Z")
> [@JThunder](#): > > Again, I’d like to remind you that the burden of proof rests on those who claim that these natural disasters prove God’s non-existence. I don’t have to prove that these tragedies happened for the postulated reason. Rather, as long as this reason is even a possibility, then such natural tragedies are not necessarily incompatible with God’s existence. It is incompatible with a _benevolent_ God, however. Also, the burden of proof is for believers to demonstrate that a God exists _at all_. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/79 "2006-01-30T12:28:14Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > It is incompatible with a _benevolent_ God, however. Also, the burden of proof is for believers to demonstrate that a God exists _at all_. If I say I believe and you say you don’t, neither of us are compelled to offer proof. It is simply a statement of belief. If one of us presents an arguement concerning why the others belief is invalid { such as this non benevolent arhuement} then evidence is required. I think that’s what **Jthunder** is saying. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2006, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964/80 "2006-01-30T13:03:08Z")
> [@mhendo](#): > > Do you really think that it’s easy to simply decide “I want to believe X,” and convince yourself to believe it, even if the whole fibre of your being strains against that belief? > \ > > Well, the existence of God does not appeal to me as a real possibility, and even if we push the issue of empirical scientific proof aside and adopt James’ more religion-friendly mode of determining belief, i can’t bring myself to consider God’s existence as a live hypothesis. I am, in this way, as impervious to logical or empirical suasion as someone who has decided to believe in God unconditionally. Thanks for this post. I would agree that when we think about it, we can’t simply choose to believe something we don’t. Real belief must be deeper than that. Many people on both sides never really examine those deep beliefs. I do think there may be levels of belief or reasons for our beliefs we haven’t acknowledged that are emotional and subconscious. Looking back at my own experience I can see I embraced certain things because of the group I was a part of and my desire to be in that group. Even though I had unanswered questions I ignored them in order to “belong” I see that in others today. If you think a big part of your emotional well being is invested in believing a certain way then when those beliefs are challenged defenses go up. It’s interesting to note that Jesus talked of this from the believers side when he told the parable of the seeds landing on various types of ground. I think Jesus taught that we must have the courage to see and act on the truth regardless of social and cultural pressures. It ain’t easy. I think it is importent for the individual to be true to themselves regarding what they believe and what they value. That requires a person who has an interest in truly examining those things. I believe the passage, “Use what you have and more will be given” applies to belief in a way that connects our hearts and minds. Love and truth. If I act honestly on what I believe now then it will lead me to the next level of understanding and comprehension. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-for-belief-and-disbelief-in-god/341964.md?page=5)