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

[theVOID]

Got made gays to adopt the excess children

Got?

Even in German it has two t's.

Happy now?

[Minimalist]

I'm old.


I'm never happy.

[Edwardo Piet]

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.

True, infinite space or time can also work. But then that's assuming that that is true.

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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.

You're too right it's not good enough.

[theVOID]

God's existence can't be known. Bomb proof.

Okay, so you don't have knowledge about the existence of God, how about your best reason for believing?

[DeistPaladin]

True, infinite space or time can also work. But then that's assuming that that is true.

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Yes. There was a moment of "Creation", at least for the current universe as we now know it, whatever may have existed before. So our time is limited to 13.7 billion years. Space I'm not sure about.

[theVOID]

God's existence can't be known. Bomb proof.

If gods existence cannot be known(i.e proven) then the only logical conclusion is that he doesn't exist.

Same as unicorns, trolls, Russells teapot and Jesus.

Lacking knowledge about P does not mean you can conclude logically that ~P, it simply means you have no knowledge that P... It doesn't even say anything about whether or not your beleifs are justified, for example; I don't have knowledge that my cellphone will cease to function in about a week but I believe it will because of numerous flaws that I have encountered recently that seem to be very typical indicators of Nokia failures - My belief that my phone will cease to function is justified despite my not knowing.

It's a pity that homophobia is perhaps quite 'normal'.

My guess is that homophobia is a misfiring by-product of cultural ethics.

My guess is that it started when the first straight caveman got ass-raped.

Other than that I insist that you look around and observe the way in which things work a little more.

A little more? I spend a hell of a lot of my precious free time learning how the world works...

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.

The very act of functioning is indicative of a designer now? What about the functioning of the designer?

More astutely from a naturalistic point of view you should look at nature as potential in flux, some energy and algorithm/physical constraint(s) in a feedback loop, something very simple that expands in complexity - It's essentially the complete opposite of what you believe.

I think a really strong case can be made against the existence of God by examining the required t0's of each scenario, one is extremely simple (naturalism) and the other contains a state of affairs in which the being who occupies it has information about all potential states of affairs at all other times right down to the position and momentum of all particles - That's by defintion more complex than the entire universe. You can from there use an argument from best explanation or a bayseian probability and the odds for the existence of god are miniscule.

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.

Efficient? There are hundreds of billions of galaxies each containing hundreds of billions of stars, more empty space than structure, our own planet is largely inhospitable, 99.9% of all species to exist are now exitnct and it's been chugging along like this for 13.7 billions years...

And the conditions being right for a universe are necessary in either model, it can't lend credence to theism any more than naturalism, arguments either way are made on other factors rather than the brute existence of the universe. The conditions being right for a being who knows every detail of this universe before it's existence is even more demanding.

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

You've assumed we were the goal of the universe, can you back up that assertion in any way what-so-ever?

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

Another bare assertion... The probability of my existence is extremely low, so many events had to have occurred in the specific way it did for my conception to take place. Were things different someone else may well have been born, I don't consider my actualized existence to have been cosmically more important than the existence of any other potential being nor was either circumstance 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.

I'm sorry but that's all rather incoherent.

The end of the universe being 'ingrained' (do you mean determined?) is compatible with forms of naturalism and theism. The end of the universe in your ideology should be indetermined correct? After all God gave you free with and supposedly you make acausal decisions and shape the future.

I'm old.


I'm never happy.

You need a cigar and a good hooker.

[fr0d0]

God's existence can't be known. Bomb proof.

Okay, so you don't have knowledge about the existence of God, how about your best reason for believing?

No, I know you can't have knowledge. I am in no doubt about that. There is no logical possibility/ It's a stupid question/ The refutation is perfect.

*takes bait*

My best reason for believing: because it makes most sense to me. Just like someone's reason for not believing makes most sense to them.
What single aspect of my belief makes it most worthwhile/ What argument best supports my belief: that my life is better for it.. and my potential for happiness greater.
What argument external to my belief is the best argument for it: that love is the most powerful force/ that positivity trumps negativity every time.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

God's existence can't be known. Bomb proof.

If gods existence cannot be known(i.e proven) then the only logical conclusion is that he doesn't exist.

Same as unicorns, trolls, Russells teapot and Jesus.

Here we go yet again.

Logical fallacy .Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. IE A thing may not be said to be true because it has not been proved to be false,nor false because it has not been proven to be true.


There is no evidence for the existence of god(s) the soul, mountain trolls,unicorns, dragons or fairies at the bottom of my garden.That allows me to assert " I do not believe in such things due to lack of evidence" It does not allow me to assert "such things do not exist".

That a proposition may be unprovable and unfalsifiable is irrelevant to me.It means only that I may not make truth statements about such propositions.However, in the absence of evidence,I live AS IF such things do not exist.Nor do I waste my time arguing with apologists,although I confess to enjoying sniping and taking the piss.

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My guess is that it started when the first straight caveman got ass-raped.

Indeed.

A liberal is a conservative who has just been arrested.
A conservative is a liberal who has just been mugged (anon)

[theVOID]

My best reason for believing: because it makes most sense to me. Just like someone's reason for not believing makes most sense to them.
What single aspect of my belief makes it most worthwhile/ What argument best supports my belief: that my life is better for it.. and my potential for happiness greater.
What argument external to my belief is the best argument for it: that love is the most powerful force/ that positivity trumps negativity every time.

What is it specifically about theism is it that makes sense to you as opposed to naturalism?

I'm generally for a pragmatically useful belief, so all good to you for finding something that's personally helpful, however I really doubt that you have attained some level of happiness (or increased the potential thereof) that can't be attained by non-theists.

I don't exactly see what you're getting at with love being an argument for God... Firstly, love is a phenomenon that is experienced the same in either worldview, it's only the mechanics of it that changes. Secondly, love does not always trump hate and negativity every time no matter how much you might want it to be that case. I know already that you're set on belief in a posthumous justice to resolve the imablances, is that what you're getting at?

[Edwardo Piet]

If you ask someone why they believe or disbelieve something, once you've asked "why?" enough times in a row the genuine answer is ultimately either "I don't know" or they otherwise end up committing the circular reasoning or begging the question fallacy.

I ultimately don't know why I believe or disbelieve anything. Because any reasons I come up with, once questioned enough times, lead to me not knowing the answer.

Even very basic things. For example: I know that I am self-aware because I consider self-awareness to be identical to self-knowledge, but I ultimately don't know why I'm self aware. If I ask why I'm self-aware I can comprehend that it's because I was born that way and I can comprehend that I was born that way because that's how things have turned out, but ultimately I don't know why things have turned out the way they have, so I ultimately don't know the answer to any "why" question.

I know that 2+2=4 but I ultimately don't know why. I know that numbers have been defined in such a way that 2+2 basically means 4 so the logic of mathematics is ultimately tautological. But I don't know why it is. Why is anything tautological? Why, ultimately, is anything the way it is?