Attention Theists! Present your best argument for the existence of God!

[Edwardo Piet]

Nope, the odds are exactly 1.

For the universe to have existed? Explain.

[downbeatplumb]

It's probably best to cease arguing with Dotard about this whole thing right now, as he's made it quite clear he's only looking to pick a fight about a hot button issue because he gets his jollies or something. It'll sidetrack this topic more to indulge this.

As for my best arguments for God? Well, I first agree with fr0do that God cannot be known. Not within our conventional, concrete standard of knowing at least.

Other than that I insist that you look around and observe the way in which things work a little more. It's funny because you atheists like to talk about how the world works quite a lot and use that somehow as counter-evidence for why God can't or doesn't exist. Coincidence, science, materialism or what-have-you...but you don't seem to talk about the fact that it all works. By that I mean that this world, this universe, works in an efficient and timely way as to be in complete working order. All the conditions were right for a universe to be born and exist.

Not only that, all the conditions, the infintesimally small factors, were in place from the very beginning moment leading up to this one for a planet such as ours to spawn life. And then for that life to become us...the odds are literally beyond impossible. So then it becomes a question of, 'to what end?' And so going beyond that, it becomes a question of whether or not the 'end' to which the universe leads is ingrained within it from the very beginning...as in, all moments leading up to the universe's 'end' were there from the 'beginning.'

Full circle.

But the universe is vast and, as far as we know, this is the only planet with life on it.
Seems a very unsatistactory and inefficient means of going about it if life was the goal.

[Edwardo Piet]

Life is full of evolutionary mistakes. Anything we see as 'success' or 'mistakes' is our own interpretation though.

[Ashendant]

the odds are literally beyond impossible.

Nope, the odds are exactly 1.

Nope the odds are

Some computations of the Drake equation, given different assumptions:

Current estimates (see below):

R* = 7/year, fp = 0.5, ne = 2, fl = 0.33, fi = 0.01, fc = 0.01, and L = 10,000 years
N = 7 × 0.5 × 2 × 0.33 × 0.01 × 0.01 × 10,000 = 2.31 (so two communicative civilizations exist in our galaxy at any given time, on average, plus two hundred more that are not trying to communicate).

But a pessimist might equally well believe that suitable planets are rare, life seldom becomes intelligent, and intelligent civilizations do not last very long:

R* = 10/year, fp = 0.5, ne = 0.01, fl = 0.13, fi = 0.001, fc = 0.01, and L = 1000 years
N = 10 × 0.5 × 0.01 × 0.13 × 0.001 × 0.01 × 1000 = 0.000065 (we are almost surely alone in our galaxy).

Alternatively, making some more optimistic assumptions, assuming that planets are common, life always arises when planets are favorable, 10% of civilizations become willing and able to communicate, and then spread through their local star systems for 100,000 years (a very short period in geologic time):

R* = 20/year, fp = 0.5, ne = 2, fl = 1, fi = 0.1, fc = 0.1, and L = 100,000 years
N = 20 × 0.5 × 2 × 1 × 0.1 × 0.1 × 100,000 = 20,000 (there's quite a few civilizations, although the closest one would still be about 1500 light years away).

The odds are 2 that are trying to communicate and 200 that are not, that is if you're not pessimistic or optimistic,

EDIT:that's per 100.000 years in our galaxy alone

[Jaysyn]

Nope, the odds are exactly 1.

For the universe to have existed? Explain.

No, for us to have existed.

And then for that life to become us...the odds are literally beyond impossible.

[OnlyNatural]

you don't seem to talk about the fact that it all works. By that I mean that this world, this universe, works in an efficient and timely way as to be in complete working order. All the conditions were right for a universe to be born and exist.

Not only that, all the conditions, the infintesimally small factors, were in place from the very beginning moment leading up to this one for a planet such as ours to spawn life. And then for that life to become us...the odds are literally beyond impossible. So then it becomes a question of, 'to what end?'

Yes, it works. Yes, the conditions were right for things to exist and evolve. But that doesn't mean any of this was predetermined by an all-knowing mind in the sky. Evolution has no ultimate goal. Things could have turned out a lot differently. If that asteroid had missed Earth 65 million years ago, we probably wouldn't be here today.

[Faith No More]

... all the conditions, the infintesimally small factors, were in place from the very beginning moment leading up to this one for a planet such as ours to spawn life. And then for that life to become us...the odds are literally beyond impossible. So then it becomes a question of, 'to what end?' And so going beyond that, it becomes a question of whether or not the 'end' to which the universe leads is ingrained within it from the very beginning...as in, all moments leading up to the universe's 'end' were there from the 'beginning.'

The odds of life developing as it exists is astronomical but the odds that some sort of life would develop over trillions of years in such a vast space are nearly 1 to 1. Your argument stems from the idea that humans are special and their design was guided by the hand of God. Using the odds of our existence as proof of God assumes that if the universe were to reset itself everything would evolve exactly the way it is now. The fact is that once life started, something had to evolve.

[Edwardo Piet]

No, for us to have existed.

I take it you are a determinist then?

[DeistPaladin]

Nothing...I repeat NOTHING. 100% nothing can exist without a cause. Not the universe. Not earth. Not humans. O wait, except god...he can. And therefore god exists.

Perhaps God came to be in the proto-universe and gave order to the rest?

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No, for us to have existed.

I take it you are a determinist then?

I don't think one needs to be a determinist. It's possible to use the Law of Infinite Probability here. Over infinite space and/or time, anything that can happen, however unlikely, will. Therefore, even if the odds are a quadrillion to one, it still would happen once in a quadrillion times and, over infinite time and/or space, would happen.

[Rayaan]

Here's another proof:

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Well, I'll post something more substantial later because I know that this was not good enough.