That made you sit up and take notice didn’t it? The statement is as silly as the statements made on religious websites and on YouTube videos that they have ‘absolute proof that God exists’ Invariably of course, the arguments put forward by the writers simply aren’t arguments at all in the usual sense of the word or use some combination of circular logic to achieve the aims of the authors.
I doubt that there is an atheist that would make a similar statement in reverse, ie: ‘god does not exist‘ but they are usually more likely to make a statement like ‘I see no evidence whatsoever for the existence of a god or gods’. This is just common sense - just as making a statement like ‘gravity always works’ is also a little ridiculous - just because we have always experienced gravity working doesn’t necessarily mean it will always be so. We may be 99.999 (plus a few thousand 9’s) sure but we don’t say always.
But… for the religious believers out there who must always think in terms of absolute truths or absolute falsehoods (not that there are such things except possibly the ridiculousness of some of their ‘arguments’) - here’s a perfectly logical and iron-clad (to use the writer’s term) argument that ‘proves’ a god cannot exist:
Assumption (1): God exists.
Assumption (1a): God is all-knowing.
Assumption (1b): God is all-powerful.
Assumption (1c): God is perfectly loving.
Assumption (1d): Any being that did not possess all three of the above properties would not be God.
Premise (2): Evil exists.
Premise (3): An all-knowing being would be aware of the existence of evil.
Premise (4): An all-powerful being would be able to eliminate evil.
Premise (5): A perfectly loving being would desire to eliminate evil.
Conclusion (6): Evil does not exist. (from (1),(3),(4),(5))
Contradiction: But evil does exist. (from (2))
Conclusion (7): There is no being that is all-knowing, all-powerful, and perfectly loving. (from (2),(3),(4),(5))
Conclusion (8): God does not exist. (from (7),(1d))
Now, there are certainly many theodicies (an assertion that God has a reason for causing or allowing evil that is compatible with his perfectly loving nature) available for the believers to try to use to refute the argument, but the only one that I can see that comes even close is this one:
“God has a purpose for allowing suffering, but we do not know what that purpose is.”
I cannot do better to answer this than to quote the author of the essay that I have taken my inspiration for this post from: “Though many who use this defense may not realize it, the unknown purpose theodicy effectively amounts to abandoning the claim of God’s goodness. After all, if God allows evil for reasons unknown to us, then what grounds do theists have for judging him to be morally good? Making that determination requires at least some understanding of motive and intent. If we have no idea at all why God does what he does, if the reasons for his actions are incomprehensible to us, then to be consistent we would have to say that we do not know whether he is good or evil. Certainly there is no obvious reason why disasters happen as they do, so how could any theist know that the true reason, whatever it is, is for the better and not for the worse?”
The reality, for me, is that we live precariously on a planet that is continually rocked by completely natural and man-made events that impact upon our lives. Evil people do evil things to others for various reasons including mental problems but often just because they are bad people. Earthquakes, tsunamis and floods occur for perfectly natural reasons. No one is ‘out to get us’ or ‘punish us for our sins’ - they just happen. Because of scientific research over the centuries we know how they occur, but humans just have to have a ‘why’ to go along with the ‘hows’. We refuse to just accept that shit happens sometimes and make the best of it - find methods to reduce the impact of the events when they occur - and then get on with living your lives!
There will never be proof of the god concept either way - the evidence against the existence of any god far outweighs any evidence that there may be one (or more) - but as rational human beings who have evolved into the fantastic (and fantastically flawed) creatures that we are, there are far more important questions to be answered than this one. Free thinkers will eventually outnumber the supernatural believers one day.
Maybe not in our lifetime or that of our children, but one day…
Source: Ideas and quotes taken from Ebon Musings. From an essay entitled : All Possible Worlds - The problem of Evil.
Tags: bible, christianity, churches & cults, faith, god, religion
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Evil is just an unavoidable consequence of free will. If you can’t choose to do evil, you don’t have free will. God , therefore, didn’t “create” evil, he created free will. No one that I know of says God ignores evil. People will be judged on their beliefs, and for their actions, which flow from their beliefs.
Your logic can easily be shown to break down.
The biggest problem for atheists as I see it, is explaining how the universe came into existence by chance with all the right properties to support life, and how life itself came into existence purely by chance. Lots of luck and lots of time is about as weak an argument as you can possibly come up with. Antony Flew finally faced reality and admitted there has to be some brains behind our existence.
Anyone who is honest with themselves has to admit that the laws and characteristics of our universe were chosen for a purpose. Is there some doubt? Sure. Everything has at least some doubt, but a preponderance of evidence points to, at the very least, a deistic god.
With advances in our understanding of the nature of the universe and the nature of life (and the complexity of genome for instance), atheism is on it’s last legs. You just haven’t realized it yet.
My responses to limbo:
1. Your interpretation of evil is just that - your interpretation. Also, I assume that your statement that god didn’t create it, means we have to assume that satan did. If satan can create stuff then we must also assume that he/she/it is also a god… In fact, the logic doesn’t say that god created evil, just that he must be aware of it and presumably would know that it was not a good thing and would have the ability (and desire) to remove it from the world.
If ‘my logic’ (it isn’t my logic, I included the source) can be shown to break down - go ahead, nothing you have stated breaks it down in the slightest.
2. The ‘god of the gaps’ argument doesn’t cut it I’m afraid. Saying that because we can’t yet explain how life came into being - ‘goddit’ - is a pretty lame argument. As far as the reference to Anthony Flew goes - read for yourself here what he believes now - http://secweb.infidels.org/?ki.....038;id=369.
From my reading of this he may be, at most, a deist (someone who believes there is a god that created the universe but then has no interest in us whatsoever) - but then, who cares? For every ‘born again’ atheist there are a thousand theists who abandon their sometimes long-held faiths in the face of reason that they simply cannot ignore.
3. Your statement actually means ‘anyone who wants to justify a belief in a supernatural being must say that there is a creator’ - freethinkers listen to that and say ‘an eye LOOKS like it was created, but just because it looks that way doesn’t mean it was. In a way, evolution ‘created’ the eye - but it was a completely natural process.
4. ‘A preponderance of evidence points to a deistic god?’ Great. Sounds to me like you have your own doubts and are leaning towards a deistic approach - the first step on the road to free thought for many. I encourage you to continue, well done!
5. Finally, advances in mankind’s understanding of the nature of the universe, life - and (what an example to use for the existence of a god!) the genome - are bringing more people to the understanding and acceptance that god belief is an outdated, ridiculous idea that serves no useful purpose and does more harm than good. Dwindling church attendances and the very significant decline in religious belief in Europe and across most of the civilised world (with the notable exception of the US) provides a lie to your last statement. Perhaps you can’t accept or realise that?
But apart from that, thank you for your considered comments. This is just the kind of dialogue that is needed rather than the trolls ‘it sezso in ma book so it MUST BE SO’ stuff that just gets binned. Although I’d like to get some real whacko comments for a planned Nutjobs page!
Hello Admin and Limbo.
This is a very interesting discussion, and I know I’m a bit late but I have picked this part out of the argument against atheism, which seems very ironic considering the statement is not our ‘weak’ excuse but is rather exactly how the universe is:
“The biggest problem for atheists as I see it, is explaining how the universe came into existence by chance with all the right properties to support life, and how life itself came into existence purely by chance. Lots of luck and lots of time is about as weak an argument as you can possibly come up with. ”
It was entirely because of chance, lots of luck and lots of time. The Big Bang seems to be a hazy subject to christians, who probably don’t know much about it, or realize that it was more enormous than is comprehensible. There would’ve been masses of opportunities to get the exact circumstances required to support life after the Big Bang.
To realize just how unique the Earth is, it’s disappointing to watch the ignorance of religion destroy it by war, and competitive and destructive beliefs.
(Referring just to Christianity here) So the belief that the world was created to serve mankind, and that we can and should use all our dwindling resources in a very unsustainable way, because The Lord is coming soon to save us anyway, is very upsetting. I hope everyone can think for themselves one day soon, these myths that people are clinging to are really wearing thin.
So feel free to point out any flaws or inconsistencies, I don’t feel insecure about my atheist beliefs.
-Freedom of thought
1. Universe exists.
2. Universe had a beginning.
3. Whatever caused the Universe to exist is, by definition (see Genesis 1:1), God.
The creation exists, creatures exist, therefore the Creator exists. If we found an outboard motor on Mars, with no visible markings to indicate the manufacturer’s identity, would you presume that it got there by random chance, just a freakish conglomeration of metals and materials that just happened to come together to form a perfectly functional outboard motor? Or would you presume that it was designed and built by (extinct) Martians who used it for transportation on (long gone) water?
If the former, you probably subscribe to the belief that monkeys tapping random keys on typewriters will eventually write the entire works of Shakespeare (logical fallacy: there has not been sufficient time for anything & everything to occur by “accident”; billions of years, yes, but not infinite time).
If the latter, then you could apply the same logic as to why life on Earth began, ie. life was designed and created, and has a purpose. I don’t believe in accidents; we were meant to be here.
The comment is simplistic, but it serves to highlight well the faulty logic that believers try to use to ‘prove’ their delusions are real. I only agree with one point you make - the universe exists. The rest is the same old - and unoriginal - rubbish. The monkeys and typewriters one I have’nt heard for years. Maybe you should try reading other books…
You don’t agree with my 2nd point, that the Universe had a beginning?