God formally disproven

[mediamogul]

Its unavoidable in whatever christian definition of the term one accepts whether it be disobedience of god's law/will, breaking the commandments, sin, original sin etc... within that context, to a believing christian "evil"/"sin" exists in some facet otherwise it is useless to talk about Jesus as a sin offering for the world. If one does not accept this bare minimum definition one could not accept the basic requirements of calling oneself a christian. So within the Christian worldview sin neccessarily exists. Which at least makes the question a valid one to pose to a Christian.

The concept of religious sin = evil itself relies on the assumption that the religious terms are valid in order to refute the premise. Its circular in nature. Therefore it is a useless term in a philosophical argument about existence of God.

God doesn't exist because of Evil, which wouldn't exist without assuming God is real when we accept this definition. It cannot be allowed to be used, any more than we can allow the Bible to be evidence of creationism.

For Evil to be a concept for use in a philosophical argument, it needs to have a measurable objective criteria, not a metaphysical one. That is easy to provide with the definition of "needless pain and suffering".

It is not valid to use their definition of evil when posing the question to a Christian. Its smoke and mirrors. Can they deny needless pain and suffering? Its explained only in terms of causation by humankind but not causally linked to a omnibenevolent God, and its this logical fallacy which should be addressed.

I don't disagree. My disagreement with the "problem of evil" argument is that is does not demonstrate gods nonexistence. At best it demonstrates a logical contradiction when one claims god posseses qualities of omipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence. God cannot be all powerful and have something exist against his will. The argument is that sin exists against gods will therefore god is either not omnipotent or not omnibenevolent (which would mean god created sin/evil). It breaks down to pointing out that the christian view of god amounts to a logical fallacy. This obviously says nothing of the other religions which claim something different. I'll say it again I don't like this argument, it doesn't really convince me the way other arguments do. Also, for whatever reason its one that Christians seem to be troubled by especially, which might be because it is not predicated on god not existing.

[NoMoreFaith]

I don't disagree. My disagreement with the "problem of evil" argument is that is does not demonstrate gods nonexistence. At best it demonstrates a logical contradiction when one claims god posseses qualities of omipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence. God cannot be all powerful and have something exist against his will. The argument is that sin exists against gods will therefore god is either not omnipotent or not omnibenevolent.

True, but I think there is a mistaken belief that a single argument can disprove Gods existence given the wide range of attributes given to him.

The only way to do so is counter the individual attributes that make up the whole, the basis for God.

God is not disprovable, but omnipotence, omniscience, omnibenevolence, and omnipresence can be logically criticised.

Using the example that made me laugh from Douglas Gasking, and referenced in the God Delusion as an example of the value laden assumptions of the ontological argument;

1. The creation of the world is the most marvellous achievement imaginable.
   
2. The merit of an achievement is the product of (a) its intrinsic quality, and (b) the ability of its creator.
   
3. The greater the disability (or handicap) of the creator, the more impressive the achievement.
   
4. Therefore if we suppose that the universe is the product of an existent creator we can conceive a greater being—namely, one who created everything while not existing.
   
5. An existing God therefore would not be a being greater than which a greater cannot be conceived because an even more formidable and incredible creator would be a God which did not exist.
   
6. Ergo:
   God does not exist.

As soon as we attribute merits that cannot be clearly defined, or beyond measure, arguments just get silly.

[mediamogul]

I don't disagree. My disagreement with the "problem of evil" argument is that is does not demonstrate gods nonexistence. At best it demonstrates a logical contradiction when one claims god posseses qualities of omipotence, omniscience, and omnibenevolence. God cannot be all powerful and have something exist against his will. The argument is that sin exists against gods will therefore god is either not omnipotent or not omnibenevolent.

True, but I think there is a mistaken belief that a single argument can disprove Gods existence given the wide range of attributes given to him.

The only way to do so is counter the individual attributes that make up the whole, the basis for God.

God is not disprovable, but omnipotence, omniscience, omnibenevolence, and omnipresence can be logically criticised.

Using the example that made me laugh from Douglas Gasking, and referenced in the God Delusion as an example of the value laden assumptions of the ontological argument;

1. The creation of the world is the most marvellous achievement imaginable.
   
2. The merit of an achievement is the product of (a) its intrinsic quality, and (b) the ability of its creator.
   
3. The greater the disability (or handicap) of the creator, the more impressive the achievement.
   
4. Therefore if we suppose that the universe is the product of an existent creator we can conceive a greater being—namely, one who created everything while not existing.
   
5. An existing God therefore would not be a being greater than which a greater cannot be conceived because an even more formidable and incredible creator would be a God which did not exist.
   
6. Ergo:
   God does not exist.

As soon as we attribute merits that cannot be clearly defined, or beyond measure, arguments just get silly.

One of my fellow philosophy students described the ontological argument as one that made you "want to eat your face". It is by far the least convincing argument for the existence of god. Its basically a word game. Hume destroyed it pretty handily in his own time by disrupting the idea of perfection as a central premise. Conceiving of something is not the same as it existing and making existence a neccessary condition of perfection doesn't break this law.

Im working through the God Delusion now. I find the argument that religion is a set of memes that have been selected for against other memes in a meme pool interesting.

[Neo-Scholastic]

True, but I think there is a mistaken belief that a single argument can disprove Gods existence given the wide range of attributes given to him.

I partially agree. A general disproof can not address each and every specific god concept out there. Each would have to be individually disproved on their own merits. No one has time for this.

However orthodox views about the nature of god cannot adequately defend themselves against the 'problem of evil'. Like most of the AF members, I find these defenses less than compelling.

[genkaus]

True, but I think there is a mistaken belief that a single argument can disprove Gods existence given the wide range of attributes given to him.

Actually, I think that if theists settle on a single definition, integral to the nature of god, then it would be ridiculously easy to disprove.

For example, suppose god is said to be "consciousness that caused all existence". Now, the formal disproof of this would be:

1. Consciousness is awareness of something that exists.
2. If consciousness is the cause of all existence, then when nothing existed - consciousness was awareness of nothing.

This contradicts the first premise and therefore the given statement cannot be true. Usually, at this point, the theistic backpeddling starts regarding the nature of existence and consciousness.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Various opinions about how to define mental attributes (consciousness vs. self-awareness, sensation vs. perception, etc.) have been great cause for confusion and misunderstanding. I don't see this being resolved any time soon. Thus the on-going quest for clarity.

[oxymoron]

There are two sorts of existence: logical and physical. Logical arguments can only ever be necessary, not sufficient, conditions for the physical existence of something. By an almost infinite number of magnitudes there are more things that are possible than actually exist. Red and blue zebras - why not? There's nothing logically wrong with that. But the evolution that produced the black-and-white stripes did so to make the animals hard to see in grass, perhaps. Philosophy can only tell us what might be; it takes science to understand what is.

[Statler Waldorf]

Meh. Not all theists say God is omnibenevolent, and the God of the Abrahamic religions most definitely isn't.

According to whom???

[oxymoron]

Meh. Not all theists say God is omnibenevolent, and the God of the Abrahamic religions most definitely isn't.

According to whom???

I've definitely heard William Lane Craig / Plantinga argue this. Craig quoted CS Lewis saying "Aslan is not a tame Lion". Yahweh can be a bit of a bastard if he wants to be. But of course we knew this from the OT, where he is happy to indulge in genocide on a whim.

Their arguments pivot on the fact that god acts in a maximally-benevolent way, not an omni-benevolent one. He might allow a billion to die so that more go to heaven at the rapture. This is flawed for any number of reasons, starting with the Euthyphro Dilemma.

[Statler Waldorf]

@oxymoron

I am on my phone so forgive me if I am kind of brief. You didn't really address my question, stating that Yahweh is not good is a mere assertion . I want to know , according to what standard is He not good ? Your own ?