1. Philosophical Arguments about God and Religion

2. First things first…answer some questions  What does the word “God” mean to you?  Do you believe in a God?  If so, where does this belief come from? (If not, where does this belief come from?)  What is the purpose of (a) God?  Are God and religion the same thing?  Can the Universe exist with a God? (why/why not)  Is morality/ethics tied to the belief in a God?

3. Make a list… Why do People believe in God?  Religion includes God as part of their belief system.  Parents instill the idea.  Conclude on their own existence of a supreme being.  Life makes sense with God  Explains why humans exist  To keep things in the universe in Harmony and under control.

4. Some Terms to Know…  Theism- the belief in a god or gods.  Atheism- the absence of belief in God, or an active disbelief in God.  Agnosticism- the “indecision concerning God’s existence,” or the view that the existence/non- existence of God can not be proven.  Deism- affirm the existence of God, but deny that God has revealed himself as it is claimed by the monotheistic religions  Evil-the intent to cause harm, “negative moral acts or thoughts that are cruel, unjust, or selfish.”

5. Attributes of God  For many, God is omnipotent, meaning “One having unlimited power or authority.”

6. Attributes of God  For many, God is omnipotent, meaning “One having unlimited power or authority.”  Omniscient, “knowing everything that can be known.”

7. Attributes of God  For many, God is omnipotent, meaning “One having unlimited power or authority.”  Omniscient, “knowing everything that can be known.”  And also, omnipresent, meaning “the state of being everywhere at once.”

8. Attributes of God  For many, God is omnipotent, meaning “One having unlimited power or authority.”  Omniscient, “knowing everything that can be known.”  And also, omnipresent, meaning “the state of being everywhere at once.”

9. Attributes of God  For many, God is omnipotent, meaning “One having unlimited power or authority.”  Omniscient, “knowing everything that can be known.”  And also, omnipresent, meaning “the state of being everywhere at once.”

10. Arguments for Existence…  Ontological argument ontos = reality  Cosmological argument Causation  Teleological argument teleos = complete result  Religious Experience argument

11. The Ontological Argument (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) I have two apples (2) I have two additional apples (3)  I have four apples.

12. The Ontological Argument (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) I have two apples (2) I have two additional apples (3)  I have four apples.

13. The Ontological Argument (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) I have two apples (2) I have two additional apples (3)  I have four apples. No Experience Necessary.

14. The Ontological Argument (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) I have two apples (2) I have two additional apples (3)  I have four apples. A priori Necessary.

15. (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) I have two apples (2) I have two additional apples (3)  I have four apples. A priori Necessary. Bachelor = Unmarried by definition. 2 + 2 = 4 by definition. f

16. (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) X is that which nothing greater can be conceived. (2) Existence in reality is better than existence in the mind. (3) God exists in reality. A priori Necessary. Bachelor = Unmarried by definition.

17. (1) Jim is a bachelor (2)  Jim is unmarried. (1) X is that which nothing greater can be conceived. (2) Existence in reality is better than existence in the mind. (3) X exists in reality. A priori Necessary. Bachelor = Unmarried by definition.

18. The Ontological Argument  St. Anslem  The argument for the existence of God is one that doesn’t depend on premises that are grounded in experience.  Central to Anselm’s argument is a distinction between two ‘kinds of existence’:  1. For a thing to exist in reality is for it to be part of reality, to really exist.  2. For a thing to exist in understanding is for someone to have an idea (concept, thought) of that thing. (like saying you have something ‘on your mind’.)  he knew God’s existence by faith (faith as knowledge)

19. Argument outline  Suppose you could conceive of God’s nonexistence  Then you could think of something greater than God-- something just like God, but existing  God is “a being than which none greater can be conceived.”  But nothing can be conceived as greater than God  So, God’s nonexistence is inconceivable!

20. Another way to think of it...  Anselm in effect defines God as a perfect being  A perfect being must have all perfections– omnipotence, omniscience, omnibenevolence...  Existence is a perfection (or so Anselm seems to say)  Therefore, God must have existence – God must exist  To deny this is self-contradictory  It would be like saying: "Triangles have three sides by definition, but there is a triangle with only two sides"

21. Objections  There are various classic objections to the classic argument  One tries to show that the argument is invalid  – that if we reason the same way in other cases, we get false conclusions  Another tries to show that the argument is based on a confusion about the notion of existence

22. Kant’s Objections to the Ontological Argument  If there is a greatest conceivable being, then he exists. But we cannot conclude from the sheer possibility of such a being that he exists  A concept of God + a concept of his existing may be greater than a concept of God alone; but these are still only concepts, not proofs of God’s existence outside our concepts

23. Huh?  “Suppose that we give a complete description of an object, of its size, its weight, its color, etc. If we then add that the object exists, then in asserting that it exists we add nothing to the concept of the object. The object is the same whether it exists or not; it is the same size, the same weight, the same color, etc. The fact that the object exists, that the concept is exemplified in the world, does not change anything about the concept. To assert that the object exists is to say something about the world, that it contains something that matches that concept; it is not to say anything about the object itself.”

24. Getting to the point…  If Kant believes that existence is not a property of objects, then it is impossible to compare a God that exists to a God that does not!  A God that exists and a God that does not are qualitatively identical!

26. The Cosmological Argument  St Thomas Aquinas  Everything that exists must have a cause. The universe exists, therefore it must have a cause. This “first cause” is God.

27. The Dominoe Effect

28. Argument’s premises 1. the universe exists 2. everything that exists has a cause 3. causes precede their effects 4. the chain of cause & effect cannot go back in time indefinitely (an infinite regress) 5. therefore, there must be a ‘first cause’ that is not itself an effect (ie. it has no prior cause) 6. since everything has a cause, this first cause must be the cause of itself (ie. it must necessarily exist) 7. this self-caused first cause is God 8. therefore, God exists

29. The Uncaused Cause in simple talk means… Everything/everyone is caused by something. Nothing is caused on its own. BUT Something has to start ALL of this. That something is what people understand as ‘God’.

31. Hume’s Criticisms of the Cosmological Argument  Perhaps the universe has always existed, if this can be said of God why not the universe?  Why should we think that everything has a cause or reason for its existence?  Besides, the argument does not prove that God is anything other than a cause of things who might not care at all about his creation

32. Flaws…  it is conceivable that the chain of cause & effect extends back into infinity. By way of contrast, consider the future… do you suppose the future has a specific ending point?  It is based on the assumption that everything has a cause. This then begs the question – if this ‘first cause’ is God, what caused God?  if one accepts the idea of a ‘first cause’ (ie. something that has always existed), it can be argued that the universe may always have existed. The regress could end with the necessary existence of the universe. It need not end with the positing of God as a ‘first cause’.

33. Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)  Does God exist?  Place your bet  Total uncertainty— no data  What should you do?

34. Pascal’s Wager  “Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation that He is.”

35. The argument…  One does not know whether God exists.  Not believing in God is bad for one's eternal soul if God does exist.  Believing in God is of no consequence if God does not exist.  Therefore it is in one's interest to believe in God.

37. The Teleological Argument  Teleological comes from the Greek word ‘telos’ – meaning ‘design’ or ‘purpose ’ 1. the complexity of life on earth and the harmonious organization of living organisms exhibits evidence of intelligent design 2. a design necessitates the presence of a designer --------------------------- ∴ that designer is God

38.  William Paley’s argument from design.  argued that the complexity & efficiency of natural objects (ex. the eye, the brain, etc.) are evidence that they must have been purposefully designed.  How else could they have come to be as they are – perfectly adapted for the purpose they serve?

39.  Paley uses a watch & its maker to draw an analogy.  Just by looking at a watch and all its intricate parts working together in unison, we can tell that it was designed by a watchmaker. So, just by examining the complexity of the eye and how it suits its purpose so well (to see), it must have been designed by some sort of ‘Divine Watchmaker’ (God).

40. Critics: David Hume  it assumes without justification that there is a significant resemblance between objects which occur naturally (ex. the eye) and those which have been designed by humans (ex. a watch). Is there a strong similarity between the two sufficient to make the analogy strong?  Hume argued that we cannot infer from the fact that examples of order in our universe have human causes (ex. the watch) that the universe as a whole has a cause & has been designed, because the universe is unique.  Therefore, because the universe is unique, we cannot rely on analogy to explain it.

41. Also…  If the world/universe was designed, who designed the designer?  the argument of design tells us little about God except God is a design-producing being. The argument doesn’t allow us to draw any conclusions as to God’s nature or character beyond that. The design argument doesn’t prove the existence of only one God, as there may be multiple designers.

42. Darwin  the scientific theory of evolution now provides an explanation of how complex life develops without the need for a ‘designer’.  by a process of survival of the fittest explains how adaptations to environments have occurred, without needing to introduce the notion of God.

44. Religious Experience  The argument from religious experience is the argument from experiences of God to the existence of God. In its strong form, this argument asserts that it is only possible to experience that which exists, and so that the phenomenon of religious experience demonstrates the existence of God. People experience God, therefore there must be a God; case closed. In its weaker form, the argument asserts only that religious experiences constitute evidence for God’s existence.

45. Problems with Religious Experience  involve imagination rather than perception, that the object of the experience is not something that exists objectively in the world but rather is something that exists subjectively in the mind of the person having the experience.  adherents of all religions claim to have had experiences that validate those religions. If any of these appeals to experience is valid, then surely all are. It can‘t be, however, that all of these appeals are valid, because the various religions are mutually inconsistent; they conflict. None of these appeals to experience is valid, therefore.

46. The Problem of Evil: How Can an All-Good, All-Powerful God Exist and There Still Be Evil in the World?

47. What is EVIL? There are 3 types of evil:  Natural evil: catastrophes which happen “accidentally” such as earthquakes and floods.  Moral evil: deliberately caused by humans e.g cruelty, wars, the Holocaust  Demonic evil: unexplained phenomenon on levels beyond our comprehension. Many people think that the existence of evil and suffering in the world shows that there is no God or if God exists, he(she) is unkind.

48. The Problem of Evil  If God exists, He is all good (omnibenevolent), all knowing (omniscient), and all powerful (omnipotent)  If He’s all good, He is willing to prevent evil  If He’s all knowing, He knows how to prevent it  If He’s all powerful, He can prevent it  But evil exists  So, God does not exist  But then you’ve blot out the only thing to compare evil to & evil isn’t evil it’s just chance

49. Why does God allow suffering/evil? FREE WILL was given by God but sometimes people do not use it wisely. Because He gave them freedom they have the opportunity to make wrong choices – and this is when we see evil and suffering!

50. Why does God allow suffering/evil? God did NOT create evil God did NOT create evil God would only create the best of all possible worlds God would only create the best of all possible worlds Evil must be the unavoidable condition for the highest goods (such as freedom) Evil must be the unavoidable condition for the highest goods (such as freedom) The present world must be the best way toward the best world The present world must be the best way toward the best world This (now) is the worst of all possible worlds given the nature of God. This (now) is the worst of all possible worlds given the nature of God. A missing piece: God experienced Evil through the life and death of His Son A missing piece: God experienced Evil through the life and death of His Son

51. "Dawkins Theist-Atheist Scale” (page 50 from Richard Dawkin’s God Delusion)  1.00: Strong theist. 100 percent possibility of God. In the words of C. Jung, 'I do not believe, I know.'  2.00: Very high probability but short of 100 per cent. De facto theist. 'I cannot know for certain, but I strongly believe in God and live my life on the assumption that he is there  3.00: Higher than 50 per cent but not very high. Technically agnostic but leaning towards theism. 'I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God.'  4.00: Exactly 50 per cent. Completely impartial agnostic. 'God's existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable.'  5.00: Lower than 50 per cent but not very low. Technically agnostic but leaning towards atheism. 'I don't know whether God exists but I'm inclined to be skeptical.'  6.00: Very low probability, but short of zero. De facto atheist. 'I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there.'  7:00: Strong atheist. 'I know there is no God, with the same conviction as Jung 'knows' there is one.'