Christians, what is your VERY BEST arguments for the existence of God?

[Tiberius]

Please correct me if I am wrong, Adrian:

Your position is that free will is merely an illusion, i.e., we do not have free will.

That is correct.

1) that the only reason why you debate or discuss anything with anybody else is because you are compelled to based on your genetics, environment, etc.;

"Compelled" is probably the wrong word here. I wouldn't say "the only reason" either. My position is that the subconscious mind does all the decision making before the conscious mind is even aware of it. The thought process that goes through your conscious mind before making a decision has actually gone through your subconscious beforehand. This has been demonstrated by science to be true (in experiments anyway).

2) you have no reason to believe that anything you say could convince someone that you are "correct" in any position you take because the person you are talking to is compelled to think what they think also (unless of course you are compelled to believe such a thing);

Non-sequitur. Having no free will doesn't mean people are programmed to believe things and think certain things. Your decisions are based on your subconscious mind's reasoning when given certain inputs (from genetics / environment). If I am in a debate, and someone presents a logical argument against a held belief of mine, my subconscious interprets the argument (from the environment it has just come from...the debate), rationalises it against my inner logic, and comes to the conclusion that it is a good argument. My belief subsequently changes.

I used to be a advocate for free will. Even in this forum (if you look back a few months), I argued that free will had to exist, and it wasn't until new data was introduced into my environment (by means of a scientific research paper concluding that free will is unlikely, if not impossible), that I changed my mind. I say "changed my mind" as a common phrase. What actually happened was that my subconscious mind rationalised the arguments, and told my conscious mind what to think.

3) there is no such thing as "correct", "right", "true", "correct application of logic" etc., it is only what a person is compelled to perceive/think;

Non-sequitur again. It doesn't follow that the absence of free will means that truths in the universe suddenly cease to exist. You can demonstrate this easily. For instance, by your argument, if free will exists, then there is no "true". Therefore the statement "free will exists" cannot be true, ergo free will does not exist. You end up with a contradiction.

What I am arguing is that a person's opinions (which have no comparison with what is "true" about the universe) are the result of their genetics and environment (and possibly other factors). They are outputted by the subconscious mind, and are not the result of any conscious reasoning, since this has already happened in the subconscious mind.

Logic is merely the mechanism by which we rationalise things. We all have the same sense of logic, since we are all genetically similar. Our brains function in the same way. People have differing beliefs primarily due to the environment they grow up in, and the way their subconscious mind processes inputs because of this. A devout believer who "sees" God's work in everything has been brought up in such a way that this is their default position, rather than one of actually reasoning out things.

4) in reality, scientists are compelled to think free will doesn't exist regardless of what evidence they look at.

No. You could easily demonstrate that free will existed by disproving the results of the experiments I mentioned. Show that the conscious mind is the first to produce a decision over the subconscious mind, and you will have demonstrated free will.

I guess that would mean there is no real point to any communication and it certainly diminishes (to zero)the weight of any argument put forth here on this forum.

Of course there is a point to communication. We are a social species, we like communicating. I don't think there is free will and I run an atheist forum. I spend a lot of time instant messaging, emailing, and *shock horror* talking to people. I fail to see how the absence of free will means that an argument's weight is diminished to zero. If an argument convinces someone, it shouldn't matter by what means, just that it convinced someone. A convincing argument has a certain weight and value.

One of our top theist debaters (Arcanus) doesn't believe in free will, and he is a Christian. You might be interested in his post: http://atheistforums.org/thread-2044-pos...l#pid37654

I, for one, am glad we don't live like there is no free will. It would make a boring world (or maybe I am just compelled to think this).

Living as if there is no free will is the same as living as if there is. At the end of the day, our decisions are made by "us" at some point. I just don't think they are made by our subconscious. It doesn't mean I believe I'm a robot, or that I have no control, because at some level, what constitutes "me" is in control; it's just not the bit of "me" that does the conscious thinking. It wouldn't make the world a boring place at all. If you are imagining that we'd all be sat at home not bothering to do anything until our subconscious mind "told us to" then you have a very odd view of free will. We'd still do everything the same. We'd get hungry, go to the fridge, get reminded of someone on the way down the stairs, pick up the phone, call them, chat, hang up, etc, etc, etc.

Anything you can do or think with a presuppositional view of "free will" can be done without such a view.