Does God exist?

[Rob]

personally, i don't believe that there is a god (although if it appears before me and can proove every claim thats ever been made about it, i'm all for believing).

I remember a lecture that i had to sit through in 9th grade, and by then end of two hours, it was concluded that there is no way at the present to conclude the existance (or non existance) of a god. I will have to dig up the lecture notes and handouts for that some time as i'm almost positive it will come up somewhere in ToK.

Edited March 15, 2009 by Rob

[SharkSpider]

I'll just leave this here.

-Image-

Honestly, it's people who do things like this that just make me want to smack myself in the forehead... because they give the rest of us rational agnostics a really bad name. It is true that it has been shown over and over again that no argument exists as to prove without a doubt whether or not god exists. That means that we have no true knowledge as to the ontological status of god or any such concept. By that regard, to make a knowledge claim (such as "god exists" or "god probably doesn't exist") is to perform a fallacy that is absolutely not acceptable in any debate. As such, the only appropriate statement to open any suggestive argument would be a statement concerning the personal beliefs of the person making the argument, and perhaps the reasons for said beliefs. Posting cute pictures like that is simply the attempt to make religion ridiculous, which has become more and more prevalent since fundamentalist Atheists have had to stop using science to try to disprove religious ideas (see: Quantum theory, all of) So yeah, don't let hate for organized religion get in the way of objective reasoning, it's not worth being irrational over something like that, regardless of where you stand.

[Sandwich]

I find it highly improbable on the grounds of there being no evidence as to why there should be a god/is a god etc.

To be honest, it doesn't matter much to me either way. After all, it is impossible to make yourself believe in something-- you either do or you don't.

[nerdy birdy]

Well i basically feel that for one to live, we need the existence of someone supreme to guide us. Moreover a God is needed to help us regulate ous acts and to first clarify the wrong from the right.

I had written an essay a while back. You can read it up.

WHAT_IS_GOD.docx

[Sandwich]

That's not an argument as to why god exists though, it's just stating that you think we need a god for certain things to be possible.

Yet we can regulate our acts and decide right from wrong by ourselves, without a god, if we choose to. That's how everybody without a religion lives. Right and wrong aren't a religious right and wrong.

To return to the Euthyphro question: does god love things because they're good, or are they good because god loves them?

The fact is that they must have a quality in and of themselves, and things can have the properties of right and wrong without something telling us what they are. For instance, if I hit a puppy with a metal pole, you'd know that was wrong, but in religious texts there's not a single one to my knowledge with specific direction on puppies and metal poles. We just know that it's wrong, and nobody needs to tell us. Most people make moral decisions totally separate of religion without realising.

EDIT: I can't get your document to download properly...

Edited March 29, 2009 by sandwich

[Nik Sarantakos]

I don't know, nor does anyone, I like to think of me self as an Agnostic, simply because all assumptions of religion are based on simple theories, and at least science can be backed up by some proofs. Like Einstein said, we, humans, don't know 0.00000000000001% (number of 0s can be infinite) of the universe, so a power like god or something that made the universe would be too much for our mere human brains to understand.

So yeah, just live your life.

[SharkSpider]

To correct a common debating fallacy, the energy in the universe is discrete, and the space of the universe is not, and will never be, infinite. There are a limited number of worlds, and as such we do actually know a definite percentage of the universe.

[HJ:)]

It depends on what you believe. Till now no one proved that God exists nor God doesn't exist.

But personally, I believe that God does exist.

[Panserborne]

And what exactly would a "fundamentalist Atheist" look like, Sharkspider? (Note, this type of scary atheist is extra scary, being capitalised and all). Have you ever met an atheist who said they would never change their views, even if other evidence came into existence? Do these non believers somehow have some dogma they rabidly hold tight to? Or, as seems likely to me, have you just made up some concept in your head with no bearing on reality? I hear about this phenomenon of "fundamentalist" atheism now and then, and it baffles me. I guess people have in mind people who are very vocal in their views, but this is misusing a specific word that has an important meaning.

And you somehow jumped from your bizarre outrage of the poster to lecturing people (I never got who, was it everyone, or the specific poster?) not to "let hate for organized religion get in the way of objective reasoning..." Where did you pull this from? Did Tarz ever even make a statement about his opinion on organized religion? He might consider it a great thing for some people, in some circumstanced, for all any of us know. To encourage people to become atheists is not to "hate" religion. Really, it's intellectually dishonest, arrogant, and plain unjust to jump to these conclusions, when you don't have a clue. You can't just infer these things, unless you have some great knowledge I'm lacking. You're a little too sure of yourself, and a little too dismissive of others, for my liking. It's troubling.

[Panserborne]

Also, isn't it maybe just a little hypocritical, Sharkspider, to inform us all on the nature of the universe (yes, I'm sure you're certain, let's not worry about the breadth and depth of disagreement among Astrophysicists) after saying, just the post before:

"to make a knowledge claim (such as "god exists" or "god probably doesn't exist") is to perform a fallacy that is absolutely not acceptable in any debate. As such, the only appropriate statement to open any suggestive argument would be a statement concerning the personal beliefs of the person making the argument, and perhaps the reasons for said beliefs..."

You don't see anything wrong with your behaviour here? Honestly, it's people who do things like this that just make me want to smack myself in the forehead...

[moneyfaery]

And what exactly would a "fundamentalist Atheist" look like, Sharkspider? (Note, this type of scary atheist is extra scary, being capitalised and all). Have you ever met an atheist who said they would never change their views, even if other evidence came into existence? Do these non believers somehow have some dogma they rabidly hold tight to? Or, as seems likely to me, have you just made up some concept in your head with no bearing on reality? I hear about this phenomenon of "fundamentalist" atheism now and then, and it baffles me. I guess people have in mind people who are very vocal in their views, but this is misusing a specific word that has an important meaning.

Not much scarier than religious extremists... and we have plenty of those around. To be honest though, most people are pretty steadfast in their views, even when it's blatantly obvious that they're wrong. That's why the world is full of hypocrites, including you and me.

[Mr. Shiver]

Permit me to defend Jake (SharkSpider) for a minute here.

By "fundamentalist atheism", I think he's referring to a branch of atheists who no longer adopt their position because of a lack of evidence for the existence of God (upon which the burden of proof still lies, last I checked) but because they take the nonexistence of God to be the de facto truth, thus becoming no less dogmatic than the organized religion to which they vehemently object.

Even though I think he's also a bit dogmatic with his rationalism, all he's really doing is trying to liberate science from the God question, and understandably so. And like it or not you can't really blame him for being logical about it (unless you're a postmodernist or something, because I guess they actually do have a bone to pick with logic).

[SharkSpider]

And what exactly would a "fundamentalist Atheist" look like, Sharkspider? (Note, this type of scary atheist is extra scary, being capitalised and all). Have you ever met an atheist who said they would never change their views, even if other evidence came into existence? Do these non believers somehow have some dogma they rabidly hold tight to? Or, as seems likely to me, have you just made up some concept in your head with no bearing on reality? I hear about this phenomenon of "fundamentalist" atheism now and then, and it baffles me. I guess people have in mind people who are very vocal in their views, but this is misusing a specific word that has an important meaning.

And you somehow jumped from your bizarre outrage of the poster to lecturing people (I never got who, was it everyone, or the specific poster?) not to "let hate for organized religion get in the way of objective reasoning..." Where did you pull this from? Did Tarz ever even make a statement about his opinion on organized religion? He might consider it a great thing for some people, in some circumstanced, for all any of us know. To encourage people to become atheists is not to "hate" religion. Really, it's intellectually dishonest, arrogant, and plain unjust to jump to these conclusions, when you don't have a clue. You can't just infer these things, unless you have some great knowledge I'm lacking. You're a little too sure of yourself, and a little too dismissive of others, for my liking. It's troubling.

Fundamentalist atheists exist in droves. I know many of them myself, and they tend to (at this age) be people who have rebelled against a religious upbringing to the point of wanting science to disprove god, just because they want to see god and everything about it burn. In general, since Atheists claim to be the rational ones, I find that atheists who reject agnosticism based on strange probabilistic arguments are letting confirmation bias get in the way of reasoning. If they say that they don't think a god exist because for them, the possibility doesn't seem relevant, that's fine. If they say "god is just the creation of human weakness" then they're getting closer to the fundamentalist line. I've actually heard that one.

The reason I inferred that from the post was because it was a completely unhelpful attack against religion that symbolises hate for the establishment as a whole, regardless of any form of reasoning. The ads were put up to protest advertisements for churches, and are basically used now as more of a joke among those who have already decided that all religions are wrong. The cute catch-phrase, lack of real argument, and obvious prejudgment are what tipped me off of a more fundamentalist atheism present in that post. I already showed why it was a fallacy, and I simply pointed out that the push to make religion ridiculous is one of the lowest moves in philosophical history, since it relies on common sense and not the sense of reason. I know the history behind those ads, philosophical and societal, which is why I made the claim

Okay, I'm arrogant, dismissive and sure of myself (not saying I am, I tend to think I have a tendency towards, as Shiver said, dogmatic rationalism) Anyways, prove me wrong on any knowledge claim I've made and we'll talk.

Also, isn't it maybe just a little hypocritical, Sharkspider, to inform us all on the nature of the universe (yes, I'm sure you're certain, let's not worry about the breadth and depth of disagreement among Astrophysicists) after saying, just the post before:

"to make a knowledge claim (such as "god exists" or "god probably doesn't exist") is to perform a fallacy that is absolutely not acceptable in any debate. As such, the only appropriate statement to open any suggestive argument would be a statement concerning the personal beliefs of the person making the argument, and perhaps the reasons for said beliefs..."

You don't see anything wrong with your behaviour here? Honestly, it's people who do things like this that just make me want to smack myself in the forehead...

Yeah, I'm going on pure rationalism. Feel free to be illogical and dispute that quote. You have no knowledge concerning the existence of a god. That's as close to an absolute truth as I can get in any debate, and I base my arguments solely on that one premise that I know cannot be proven false. Me "behavior" is simply the logical conclusion of a premise that can't be refuted. I simple extended that to the common practice in debating, which is to not lie to those you're debating against. A false knowledge claim's pretty close to a lie, anyways, especially when I just pointed out exactly why any ontological claims concerning god are automatically assumptions and not knoweldge (though they may be true)

That being said, my claim about astrophysics was simply that the leading models (all of the leading models) rely on a principle of the big bang to an extent, which means that the energy (and thus mass) of the universe is an absolute constant, and therefore the universe cannot be infinite without having an average density of 0, which makes no sense in terms of physics. This is a simple commonality that I don't need to have a super-awesome PHD in astrophysics to point out, man. Sorry to say.

Edited March 31, 2009 by SharkSpider

[Sandwich]

A false knowledge claim's pretty close to a lie, anyways...

You're the first person I've ever seen use 'knowledge claim' outside of theory of knowledge o___o

Congratulations!

I think Richard Dawkins should be awarded #1 example of fundamental atheism, personally. In any case, I don't see why these debates are always going on-- everybody is trying to prove something from nothing, or trying to disprove something from nothing. I've never understood why people don't just get bored and decide that trying to find evidence for (or against) a god is like getting blood from a stone. Most people don't bother arguing that one, they just assume (quite reasonably, in my opinion) that it's impossible and then get on with their lives.

The only possible reason why we ought to keep the possibility of a god open is the fact that we don't know for certain where the universe came from. That's more or less the only unanswered 'why?' question science hasn't yet answered, although I suspect that it too is only a matter of time.

[Panserborne]

OK, first, re "fundamentalist" atheism. I want to take one thing back. I'd agree that there are bound to be some atheists who are close-minded, dogmatic, irrational etc. These aren't fundamentalist atheists. Call them stupid atheists, idiots, whatever you want to. But there's simply no such thing as fundamentalist atheism. This shouldn't be hard to understand. It come from definitions. You can't be a fundamentalist when there are no beliefs to be fundamental about. To repeat, there are no positive claims to belief in atheism. It's simply not possible to be fundamentalist about a lack of belief. And if you claim otherwise, you're twisting a word to mean something other than what it does. And that's bad for anyone trying to understand this topic.

Next, you say "The reason I inferred that from the post was because it was a completely unhelpful attack against religion that symbolises hate for the establishment as a whole, regardless of any form of reasoning." Again, how did you get that? You can't just say things like this without explaining. I saw an ad (and yes I know the controversy and history about the ads) that pretty much sums up my thoughts on my atheism. I don't believe god exists. It's not a big deal in my life. I would have thought the whole idea of the ads was to normalise the idea of atheism, and to make others realise that it's simply not a big deal. Now how on earth you can jump from reading that ad to thinking it represents an attack on, and hatred for, organised religion, is simply beyond me. And you didn't even attempt to elaborate or explain this. (Since when is encouraging people to be atheists a hatred for organised religion? And anyway, I myself am not a big fan of many religious organisations, but "hate" is a word I wouldn't use)

Next, regarding knowledge about the existence of any gods, you start with "Yeah, I'm going on pure rationalism." What does this even mean? I'm pretty sure everyone here is trying to be logical and back their arguments with good reasons. But you're going with a historical philosophical movement that has been irrelevant since Kant helped breach the gap between rationalism and empiricism? So you're going on the foundation that all knowledge can be known on the basis of pure reason, with experience being irrelevant? That's brave, you'd be the first in several centuries to do so.

I'm not sure if I want to say people can have knowledge about the existence of god. The reason is that I don't know what knowledge constitutes, and I doubt you do either. Despite what TOK would try to tell us (in the first lesson, knowledge is "justified true belief". Oh, is that it? That's not so hard!) the issue of deciding what it means to have knowledge is pretty much what makes up the field of epistemology today. So unless you can explain to me the intricacies of externalism and internalism, I'm afraid I'm going to have to reject your assertion that "You have no knowledge concerning the existence of a god. That's as close to an absolute truth as I can get in any debate" See, I'm not sure if I have knowledge about that. Maybe it's something I'll study after school. And, as I said before, I doubt any IB student has much of a grip on epistemology. And that makes statements like yours pretty audacious.

But do prove me wrong!

[deissi]

I'll leave the rest of you comment for SharkSpider, but I do want to comment on this part:

And, as I said before, I doubt any IB student has much of a grip on epistemology. And that makes statements like yours pretty audacious.

I find it quite irrelevant to pull the "how would you know, you're only an IB student" card here. As you may have noticed, this isn't www.PhilosophyPhDsurvival.com, it's www.IBSurvival.com. What point, therefore, is there to insult [sic] someone by accusing his claims of being naïve [sic, again] because he has not specialized in a certain field of Philosophy?

[Panserborne]

No, it was more a "how would we know, we're only IB students?" card. I thought it was reasonable because they don't actually teach us anything much about epistemology in ToK. And I said I would be glad if SharkSpider did know about this, because I sure don't. I don't think it was insulting, or if it was, I didn't mean for it to seem that way.

Edited March 31, 2009 by Panserborne

[Mahuta ♥]

I'm not going to be as 'harsh' as Joel, but that is kind of what i sometimes think, this is getting too philosophical its going out of topic. In fact, I really hate that fact that everything is turned into some philosophical thingie, and if someone doesnt show that 'aspect' in them, they're not really proper IB students.

As I said, this is completely out of topic.

[SharkSpider]

OK, first, re "fundamentalist" atheism. I want to take one thing back. I'd agree that there are bound to be some atheists who are close-minded, dogmatic, irrational etc. These aren't fundamentalist atheists. Call them stupid atheists, idiots, whatever you want to. But there's simply no such thing as fundamentalist atheism. This shouldn't be hard to understand. It come from definitions. You can't be a fundamentalist when there are no beliefs to be fundamental about. To repeat, there are no positive claims to belief in atheism. It's simply not possible to be fundamentalist about a lack of belief. And if you claim otherwise, you're twisting a word to mean something other than what it does. And that's bad for anyone trying to understand this topic.

Fundamentalism is basing belief on a set of principles. Negative or not negative, they're still principles of belief, and not otherwise, and as such fundamentalism can be applied to any set of dogmatic and irrational beliefs, including the more ridiculous atheists. I still don't see why you're needing to argue this, because if you like I can take everything back and redefine what I meant by fundamentalist atheist without issue.

Next, you say "The reason I inferred that from the post was because it was a completely unhelpful attack against religion that symbolises hate for the establishment as a whole, regardless of any form of reasoning." Again, how did you get that? You can't just say things like this without explaining. I saw an ad (and yes I know the controversy and history about the ads) that pretty much sums up my thoughts on my atheism. I don't believe god exists. It's not a big deal in my life. I would have thought the whole idea of the ads was to normalise the idea of atheism, and to make others realise that it's simply not a big deal. Now how on earth you can jump from reading that ad to thinking it represents an attack on, and hatred for, organised religion, is simply beyond me. And you didn't even attempt to elaborate or explain this. (Since when is encouraging people to be atheists a hatred for organised religion? And anyway, I myself am not a big fan of many religious organisations, but "hate" is a word I wouldn't use)

Key point was that although the posters are fine, they are not relevant to any semblance at educated debate, nor do they warrant being posted here without further argument. To take this stance implies a rejection of the idea of philosophy, and an acceptance of the "common sense atheist" argument that I discussed earlier. That's it. Regardless, my choice of diction may have been harsh, but I'll give you a simple explanation if you want one. Namely, I tend to associate extreme confirmation bias and/or rejection of logical principles in order to bring down an idea as a dislike for said idea on an emotional level. It's basic psychology. People exist who dislike religion, and they have no qualms in going around saying that its ridiculous, and making unapplicable allegories, or pithy statements meant to belittle religion. If anything, I've already shown why "there probably isn't a god" is a false and misleading statement.

Next, regarding knowledge about the existence of any gods, you start with "Yeah, I'm going on pure rationalism." What does this even mean? I'm pretty sure everyone here is trying to be logical and back their arguments with good reasons. But you're going with a historical philosophical movement that has been irrelevant since Kant helped breach the gap between rationalism and empiricism? So you're going on the foundation that all knowledge can be known on the basis of pure reason, with experience being irrelevant? That's brave, you'd be the first in several centuries to do so.

I'm afraid I did in fact misuse the word. I simply meant that I was planning on using logic as opposed to what people deem to be common sense. The idea behind a purely rationalist approach is that you prove a principle using a more Kant-style reasoning, and then you quit using empiricism there, instead using only deductive logic, as to necessitate the invalidation of your premise before conclusions can be attacked. The sarcastic comments, however, are appreciated as such, but really, you could try thinking about things before attacking four words that may not completely describe what follows. If I say "I'm about to use logic," then maybe you should focus on what I say afterwards, instead of getting nitpicky about the intent. I should have used the word dogmatic instead of pure. There you go.

I'm not sure if I want to say people can have knowledge about the existence of god. The reason is that I don't know what knowledge constitutes, and I doubt you do either. Despite what TOK would try to tell us (in the first lesson, knowledge is "justified true belief". Oh, is that it? That's not so hard!) the issue of deciding what it means to have knowledge is pretty much what makes up the field of epistemology today. So unless you can explain to me the intricacies of externalism and internalism, I'm afraid I'm going to have to reject your assertion that "You have no knowledge concerning the existence of a god. That's as close to an absolute truth as I can get in any debate" See, I'm not sure if I have knowledge about that. Maybe it's something I'll study after school. And, as I said before, I doubt any IB student has much of a grip on epistemology. And that makes statements like yours pretty audacious.

If you want to go in to that, we have two conclusions from Plato. One, justified true belief is not adequate for a definition of knowledge. Two, things that are not justified, not true, and not believed cannot be knowledge. Ie. we have conditions that must be met, but we do not have the definition of all conditions that must be met. So, by that regard, something that cannot be justified or proven to be true cannot be knowledge. As such, since we cannot prove or disprove the existence of a god (because we technically cannot know anything about the world other than ourselves, if you want to push this that far. I would say that this is true or a more physical level as well, due to lack of physical evidence or even an applicable logic proof. You talked about externalism and internalism, so I obviously don't have to define them to you) then we cannot claim to have such knowledge without saying something that is not true. Until you're able to attack this reasoning, you have no basis on which to say anything that you've said so far.

Call me audacious, if you will, but please attack the statement before the ad hominem attacks start. I'm thick-skinned enough to take it, but I get offended when people lay out the attacks while dodging the actual arguments I'm making. In any case, yes, I'm not infallible, I'm an IB student. So what? If you really have a problem, get a PHD to come reply at me, and I'll take a look at what they write. Regardless, I would appreciate it if you had the decency to take arguments at face value.

Quick edit:

Since you're wondering, I've done alot more philosophical reading than the TOK curriculum, which was something strongly encouraged by a teacher in grade 11 and 12, who has a phd in philosophy. The only appeal to authority I'd make is the fact that he taught us the value of going above the curriculum and doing personal research and thinking.

Edited March 31, 2009 by SharkSpider

[Mahuta ♥]

I still don't see why you see having philosophical side is so important. No one said this is some philosophical debate. I must say, by using all those terms, you're making such a pain for others to answer. I personally can't read on because you go too deep into philosophy i lose everything.

I really think you should reduce your usage of philosophy terms so that everyone can reply, not just those like you.