Arguments for the existence of god

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Overview

Apologetics

As long as there has been two or more people with differing religious views, there has been proselytism. This of course presents a problem, as religion is based on faith rather than evidence, logic or reason, how does one go about convincing other people that their religion is the correct one? After all, if its based on faith and not reason, your faith is by definition really no more a reasonable position than anyone else's. If you don't like what the church is doing, just form your own. You don't need evidence, just faith. ie. make it up as you go along. As a result of this complete lack of evidence on what the true faith apparently is, there are over 1000 denominations of Christianity alone, and no empirical reason to believe any of them.

Over the years, trying to convert people to a particular faith has taken many different forms. Most of them resulting in brute force and threats of violence. "convert or suffer the wrath of god's chosen people" This was fine up until about the end of the dark ages, with the adage that-

unknown source:

"Creationism lost its best argument when the catholic church stopped burning people at the stake"

After the enlightenment, the church started to have serious problems justifying their position. As science expanded our view of the world, God had fewer and fewer places to hide. Coupled with the fact that it was now considered slightly uncouth to simply torture and burn alive those that disagreed with you, the church and its parishioners now had to work very hard to justify their positions of belief, and harder still to convert others. Thus apologetics was born.

In a nutshell, apologetics is the discipline of attempting to justify a theological position through evidence, philosophy, science, metaphysics, and history. However when these apologetics arguments are actually reviewed under scrutiny, we find they rely on:

  • evidence so incredibly poor that even the apologists using it wouldn't accept such evidence as proof of anything in any other argument than for that of their personal god,
  • horrific straw man representations of true scientific theories
  • convoluted metaphysics that ultimately have no real world underpinning
  • and the distortion of historically documented events and evidence to the point of holocaust denial.

There are many conflicting arguments attempting to support the existence of many conflicting gods. They can't all be correct, however they can all be wrong. Indeed, every "argument" presented for God thus far has one or more problems with validity or soundness.

Definitions

It is important when engaging in an argument with a theist, that all the required concepts involved in the argument are clearly defined. Particularly the definition of God. Having clearly defined definitions prevents the theist from moving the goalposts mid-argument, or even more frustratingly getting to the end of the argument and then having the theists say “but that's not my god

Purpose of the argument

It is also important to make sure that the theist is worth arguing with. What is the purpose of the argument?

For instance, if you ask the theist to make their best, most persuasive argument, that supports their belief in God. You may then ask, “This being your best argument for belief, if I can prove this argument is logically flawed, does that mean you will concede that god does not exist?”

If the theist flatly responds with “No, I would still believe in God”, you should ask yourself is it really worth continuing the exchange?

Favourite arguments

Most common theistic arguments

Favourites of professional apologists


v · d Arguments for the existence of god
Anthropic arguments   Anthropic principle · Natural-law argument
Arguments for belief   Pascal's Wager · Argument from faith · Just hit your knees
Christological arguments   Argument from scriptural miracles · Would someone die for a lie? · Liar, Lunatic or Lord
Cosmological arguments   Argument from aesthetic experience · Argument from contingency · Cosmological argument · Fine-tuning argument · Kalam · Leibniz cosmological argument · Principle of sufficient reason · Unmoved mover · Why is there something rather than nothing?
Majority arguments   Argument from admired religious scientists
Moral arguments   Argument from justice · Divine command theory
Ontological argument   Argument from degree · Argument from desire · Origin of the idea of God
Dogmatic arguments   Argument from divine sense · Argument from uniqueness
Teleological arguments   Argument from design · Banana argument · 747 Junkyard argument · Laminin argument · Argument from natural disasters
Testimonial arguments   Argument from observed miracles · Personal experience · Argument from consciousness · Emotional pleas · Efficacy of prayer
Transcendental arguments   God created numbers · Argument from the meaning of life
Scriptural arguments   Scriptural inerrancy · Scriptural scientific foreknowledge · Scriptural codes

Category:Arguments Category:Christian apologists Category:Atheists