Will someone please comment on refuting this argument? I'm trying to find a knock-out punch to this Christian argument and can't seem to find one I really like. Thanks to everyone.

Could you link me to the argument so I do not have to search for it?

one thing i notice about arguments about god existing, when cameras were invented, the number of miracles god performed suffered.

I can't locate a website that exactly specifies the details of what this argument entails. In a nutshell, just from my own reading (not any actually reading from the book itself because I'm not going t waste 20 bucks on bullshit), it states that belief in god is rational and justifiable just as belief that other people have minds/other people's minds exist. I know this sounds like crap on the surface but I'm wanting to dismantle it at the core. I don't think this explicitly argues for god but I can't seem to get my hands around this. I'm sure it's been disputed before but I just can't find anything on the Internet that knocks it out to my satisfaction.

The entire premise of god existing because people have minds is what I found as well.

Smells like bullshit to me, and easily dismissed if I could view the actual argument.

I believe the argument is that since we accept the existence of other minds without proof, it is also rational to accept the existence of a god without proof.

The argument as I see it is not meant to prove the existence of 'God', but to provide a rational reason to believe in 'God'.

The argument fails on many obvious levels.

While I guess it can't be proven with absolute certainty that other minds exist, (please let's not sink into a discussion on solipsism), the evidence for other minds existing is pretty massive. Even before modern advances in neuroscience.

The evidence for the existence of 'God' is none existent in comparison.

And even if the argument was valid and sound, it still does not get you to Yahweh or Jeshua.

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

(November 1, 2013 at 8:19 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I believe the argument is that since we accept the existence of other minds without proof, it is also rational to accept the existence of a god without proof.

I guess I am lost on the "not knowing whether other minds exists" part, which is ludicrous.

Am I missing something?

If another mind did not exist, I have to conclude that I am mad and imagining everyone around me.

(November 1, 2013 at 8:21 pm)Maelstrom Wrote:

(November 1, 2013 at 8:19 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: I believe the argument is that since we accept the existence of other minds without proof, it is also rational to accept the existence of a god without proof.

I guess I am lost on the "not knowing whether other minds exists" part, which is ludicrous.

Am I missing something?

Yes.

Problem of other minds

(November 1, 2013 at 8:21 pm)Maelstrom Wrote: I guess I am lost on the "not knowing whether other minds exists" part, which is ludicrous.

Am I missing something?

If another mind did not exist, I have to conclude that I am mad and imagining everyone around me.

Solipsism is the philosophical idea that only one's own mind is sure to exist. As an epistemological position, solipsism holds that knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure. The external world and other minds cannot be known, and might not exist outside the mind. As a metaphysical position, solipsism goes further to the conclusion that the world and other minds do not exist.

In other words, the only thing that I can prove is that my own mind exists. It's the old 'brain in a vat" scenario. I can't prove that I could be a brain in a vat and that all of what I detect as a reality outside of my mind, including other minds, can not be proven to exist.

So, in the same way that I can't prove that other minds exist, but that it is rational for me to believe they do, it is also rational to believe that 'God' exists.

At least that's the way I read his argument.

Such a dumb argument.