I’m puzzled a bit by the statement “There is no evidence for the existence for God”.
The statement could be meaningful and true.
Or, it could be meaningful and false.
Or, not meaningful, in which case it is neither true nor false.
What is the meaning of the word “God” in the statement? Can the statement be meaningful if the word God is meaningless?
Let’s say that we agree on a meaning for God. What would be considered evidence for God’s existence?
I think that discussions about the existence of God are futile unless the participants in the discussion agree on the meaning of the word “God”. And, there are many meanings and qualities that are attributed to that word, so it’s not easy to get agreement.
When discussing God with someone, a key question is: What does the word “God” mean to you? The more specific the answer, the more fruitful the discussion can be. Also, “How did you arrive at your meaning of the word ‘God’?”
FWIW, I don’t have a coherent definition to offer.
And, there’s still the question of the nature of evidence …
The hypothetical being of that name as usually spoken of by people. Since there’s no evidence for any other kind of god but that any more than there is for the standard generic “God”.
For God as typically portrayed? Nothing would be good enough since it is contradicted by both logic and the nature of the world. As I said in another discussion, what evidence would be good enough (without contradicting what we already know) to convince you that Earth is hollow, and is actually a vast hamster wheel for a god-hamster living inside it? And that god-hamster is less of a wild claim that "“God”.
Believers would never accept that, since it would restrict their ability to redefine the term on the fly in an argument.
The Christian derived fantasy of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent supernatural being; who is also usually a sadistic egomaniac who demands worships and desires the death and/or torture of most of humanity (while still - somehow - qualifying as benevolent). Which I got as the definition because that’s the one constantly being pushed at me; and since there is no evidence for any sort of “God” at all that’s the definition I go with. Since all versions of God are made up, it just makes sense to argue against the Gods people are actually making up instead of arguing against ones they haven’t bothered to make up yet.
The term “meaningful” is subjective so it can mean whatever you like and it will not effect the validity of the claim of the existence of gods.
The “There is no evidence…” statement is true.
In human societies, the term “god” represents anything supernatural, unaffected by the laws of Nature and the Universe, from F = m*a, to Gravity to subatomic particle forces.
A potentially interesting distinction is whether someone believes that a god can directly affect the life of human beings. But in general, the issue is whether entities exist outside the natural world that we can comprehend.
Any standard repeatable and independently verifiable observation that is the direct result of the existence of a supernatural entity would be good enough as evidence. This could never happen, of course, because nothing can exist outside the parameters of its own existence.
Therefore a belief that supernatural things, gods, spirits, tree fairies, etc, exist are all absurd, irrational and false.
I agree that you would need to define precisely what you mean by “God” as a first step. And what you mean by “evidence” as a second step.
A lot of people I talk to don’t make much distinction between “evidence” and “proof,” but IMO they are worlds apart. I honestly can’t think of any evidence that would prove to me that God exists, but I can see how a person might consider the fact that anything exists as evidence that God exists.
If I’m not mistaken, Aquinas even considered it to be proof.
Since this “god” premise is being put forth not by atheists, but by religionists, it is up to them to define the term so that we have something tangible to examine.
We also need to define “evidence”. “I feel his presence” is a kind of evidence, although it’s not scientific evidence. Perhaps we should say there is no scientific evidence for the existence of God.
But then, as I am wont to say, if there were, how would we know it wasn’t just some extremely advanced alien life form?
Would this make a significant difference? What would be wrong with calling them “gods”? They would have (or least could have) most attributes generally associateds with gods.
What if the aliens have cloaked imaging devices that are able to map all our minds in real time and at the moment of death save a copy to a mega-computer that allows our memories and identity to experience happiness and love for all eternity?
I agree. I think that there is plenty of evidence for the existence of God, but it is poor-quality evidence and it is contradicted by a lot of other evidence. In other words, the evidence for God is not compelling or convincing (for some people), given what we know now about how the world works.
Except that it is atheists who make the general statement about there being no evidence for the existence for God. If theists say that there is plenty of evidence, then it is up to them to first provide a coherent definition of God and provide specific evidence for the existence of that entity, and then an atheist can address each specific point of evidence and demonstrate why there is a better, naturalisitic explanation. Hmmm … now, what is the definition of “better”?
No, not really. What usually happens is that first the Godclaim is made by a religionist, the atheist asks for a clarification of the Godclaim, then points out why the Godclaim doesn’t make any sense.
What kind of evidence are you asking about? The word “evidence” means different things, depending on whether you’re talking to a scientist, a lawyer, a historian, a literary critic…
Do a little searching on Google or Amazon, and you’ll quickly find that there are a lot of people who claim there is indeed evidence for God. It appears to me that one can engage such claims on one of three levels:
(1) You can ignore these people and what they claim is evidence, believing that it’s not worth your time and effort to give them a fair hearing. As I see it, you are well within your rights to do so, but then you lose the right to boldly assert that “There is no evidence for God” (though you might be able to get away with saying “I personally haven’t seen any existence for God”).
(2) You could take a judge-like role and decide whether what these people seek to present is actually “admissible in court” as evidence. If you dismiss it as not meeting the standards for evidence, you could then honestly declare “There is no evidence for God.” But someone else, who thinks some of that evidence is admissible, or who has encountered different offered evidence, may well disagree.
(3) You could take a jury-like role and decide whether the evidence that has been presented is strong enough to “convict.” If you don’t think that those presenting the evidence have made their case, you shouldn’t say “There is no evidence for God,” but rather, “There is not sufficient evidence” or “The evidence is inconclusive” or “The evidence admits of other possible interpretations” or something like that.
Events that cannot be explained by our current secular understanding of physics and psychology.
For example, lots of people believe in faith healing. However, faith healing only seems to occur in situations where spontaneous recovery is possible. Amputees never grow back missing limbs in response to prayers, for example. Which strongly suggests that what people believe is faith healing is really just the normal recovery process coupled with wishful thinking.
True evidence for God would be something that cannot be explained through other means. A violation of the fundamental rules of physics would be a good starting point, particularly if was repeatable and widely observable so we could rule our hallucination or hysteria as the cause. For example, if the stars in several distant galaxies spontaneously rearranged themselves to spell out Bible verses, I’d consider that a significant piece of evidence for the existence of the Christian God, particularly if the galaxies themselves were not in causal contact with each other.
This is still putting the cart before the horse…and still an excellent stall tactic, I have to admit.
First, what are the characteristics of the god in question?
Describe what is to be proven or dis-proven, please.