1. Rebuttal:
Argument from Evidence
Argument from Evidence
Summary:
We should determine truth claims based upon evidence, because without evidence as the final standard, anything can be argued. There is not enough evidence for god(s).
Elmer Leon Towns, American professor of theology & pastor, 1932-
“The Bible has a transforming power to change the lives of individuals. This is an empirical argument that other books cannot claim. There are thousands of individuals who have rejected the existence of God, but began reading the Bible for various reasons. As they came in contact with the message of God’s Word, they were brought under conviction and accepted its message concerning Jesus Christ. When they came to know Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, they were converted. These people usually do not come to a place where they intellectually accept the integrity of the Bible. They skipped the academic steps of logical persuasion and when they were converted, their attitude toward the Bible changed. They instantaneously accepted the testimony of the Bible, that God was its divine Author and that it was authoritative for their lives.”
— Elmer L. Towns, Theology for Today, Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2002 p52
“The Bible has a transforming power to change the lives of individuals. This is an empirical argument that other books cannot claim. There are thousands of individuals who have rejected the existence of God, but began reading the Bible for various reasons. As they came in contact with the message of God’s Word, they were brought under conviction and accepted its message concerning Jesus Christ. When they came to know Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, they were converted. These people usually do not come to a place where they intellectually accept the integrity of the Bible. They skipped the academic steps of logical persuasion and when they were converted, their attitude toward the Bible changed. They instantaneously accepted the testimony of the Bible, that God was its divine Author and that it was authoritative for their lives.”
— Elmer L. Towns, Theology for Today, Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2002 p52
Jerome I. Gellman, Israeli professor of philosophy, 1940-
“We have no interest in claiming that belief in God is rational only if based on evidence, let alone only if based on considerations of experience of God. We ourselves have argued elsewhere that belief in God can be proper in the absence of any evidence, being a ‘rock-bottom’ belief, and Alvin Plantinga has argued convincingly that belief in God can be what he calls ‘properly basic’ and as such perfectly rational in the absence of evidential justification.
“So we are not claiming that a believer in God, to be rational, must base her belief on evidence or even think that her belief is somehow rationally defensible on evidential grounds, even if she herself does not quite know how that would go. We recognize that in certain circumstances a believer who just ‘finds herself’ believing in God without any justifying evidence, could be perfectly rational in doing so.
“Nonetheless, the evidential endeavor has great importance. For one thing, there may be many believers for whom belief in God is not rock-bottom or basic, and for whom, in their present cognitive state, belief in God is rational or justified only if based on evidence. Second, we argue that belief in God is strongly rational ‘for everyone’ in light of the evidence. This implies that (on at least some applications of canons of rationality) ‘for everyone’ it is externally rational to believe in God and that ‘for everyone’ it is not externally rational not to believe in God...”
— Jerome I. Gellman, Experience of God and the Rationality of Theistic Belief, Cornell University Press, 1997 p3
“We have no interest in claiming that belief in God is rational only if based on evidence, let alone only if based on considerations of experience of God. We ourselves have argued elsewhere that belief in God can be proper in the absence of any evidence, being a ‘rock-bottom’ belief, and Alvin Plantinga has argued convincingly that belief in God can be what he calls ‘properly basic’ and as such perfectly rational in the absence of evidential justification.
“So we are not claiming that a believer in God, to be rational, must base her belief on evidence or even think that her belief is somehow rationally defensible on evidential grounds, even if she herself does not quite know how that would go. We recognize that in certain circumstances a believer who just ‘finds herself’ believing in God without any justifying evidence, could be perfectly rational in doing so.
“Nonetheless, the evidential endeavor has great importance. For one thing, there may be many believers for whom belief in God is not rock-bottom or basic, and for whom, in their present cognitive state, belief in God is rational or justified only if based on evidence. Second, we argue that belief in God is strongly rational ‘for everyone’ in light of the evidence. This implies that (on at least some applications of canons of rationality) ‘for everyone’ it is externally rational to believe in God and that ‘for everyone’ it is not externally rational not to believe in God...”
— Jerome I. Gellman, Experience of God and the Rationality of Theistic Belief, Cornell University Press, 1997 p3
2. Rebuttal:
Argument from Nonfalsifiablity /
Argument from Burden of Proof /
Russell’s Teapot
Argument from Nonfalsifiablity /
Argument from Burden of Proof /
Russell’s Teapot
Summary:
The proposition that God exists is nonfalsifiable, which means that if it is false, there are no conditions which would show it to be false. Other nonfalsifiable propositions, also presented without evidence, are obviously absurd notions. These include: Russell’s Teapot, invisible pink unicorns, and numerous gods once thought to be real which are no longer worshipped. These analogies are used to create an objective perspective to show that belief in God is just as arbitrary.
Alvin Carl Plantinga, American analytic philosopher
“Clearly we have a great deal of evidence against teapotism. For example, as far as we know, the only way a teapot could have gotten into orbit around the sun would be if some country with sufficiently developed space-shot capabilities had shot this pot into orbit. No country with such capabilities is sufficiently frivolous to waste its resources by trying to send a teapot into orbit. Furthermore, if some country had done so, it would have been all over the news; we would certainly have heard about it. But we haven't. And so on. There is plenty of evidence against teapotism.”
– Alvin Plantinga (quoted by Gary Gutting), “Is Atheism Irrational?”, New York Times, 27 July 2016
“Clearly we have a great deal of evidence against teapotism. For example, as far as we know, the only way a teapot could have gotten into orbit around the sun would be if some country with sufficiently developed space-shot capabilities had shot this pot into orbit. No country with such capabilities is sufficiently frivolous to waste its resources by trying to send a teapot into orbit. Furthermore, if some country had done so, it would have been all over the news; we would certainly have heard about it. But we haven't. And so on. There is plenty of evidence against teapotism.”
– Alvin Plantinga (quoted by Gary Gutting), “Is Atheism Irrational?”, New York Times, 27 July 2016
Brian Garvey, Irish professor of philosophy
“In what way should we understand the claim that there is no evidence for God, or for that matter the claim that there is no evidence for the extra-terrestrial teapot? Since the argument is supposed to be one of analogy, presumably the same notion of evidence is being employed in both cases. But evidence is an extremely slippery concept. We might minimally define it as ‘something that makes us warranted in believing something else’... Further, I presume that when we say there is no evidence for the orbiting teapot, it is empirical evidence we have in mind. So the analogy is meant to be: there is no empirical evidence for either... But empirical evidence is an extremely slippery concept. Those who place it at the centre of their epistemology tend to either give accounts that are too narrow to be realistic, or too underdescribed to do away with the slipperiness... Nonetheless, we can make do for present purposes with fairly rough, partial characterisations. One such might be: if we can see it, hear it, touch it etc., then we have empirical evidence – indeed the best, most direct kind of empirical evidence there is. This of course goes along with the view that the best examples of really existing things we have are precisely those things we can see, hear, touch etc. This view is common to realists and antirealists in the philosophy of science (e.g. Ernan McMullin and Bas Van Fraassen respectively), for their disagreement is about the status of non-observable things. And it need not imply that all we have evidence for is sense-data themselves, for it can and usually does sit perfectly comfortably with a common-sense conception of seeing, whereby we see tables and chairs, dogs and cats. In any event, ruling out the existence of God on the grounds that God is not a sense-datum would fall prey to the strong medicine principle.
“When we say that there is no evidence for a teapot orbiting the sun, the most plausible interpretation is that no-one, as far as we know, has seen, or touched etc., one. But when we say (those of us who do say it) that there is no evidence for the existence of God, is this what we mean? Atheists such as Dawkins clearly think that certain features of the world – in his case the designedness of organisms – used to appear to be good evidence for an ‘intelligent creator’. But now, he thinks, we possess a better explanation, so those features no longer appear to be good evidence...
“Clearly, the empirical evidence that Dawkins’ thought once constituted good grounds for believing in God did not consist in seeing, hearing (etc.) God. So there is a common ground between some theists and some atheists – e.g. Swinburne and Dawkins respectively – namely the hardly controversial claim that it is reasonable to affirm the existence of something on empirical grounds other than that someone has seen, heard, etc. that thing...
“But once we admit that it is acceptable to conclude from evidence other than seeing (etc.) a thing, that that thing exists, then a disanalogy between the God case and the teapot case becomes apparent. For, apart from someone seeing it, what could count as evidence that there was a teapot orbiting the sun?...”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p12-14)
“In both these regards – whether we need to impute causal powers beyond those of objects that just sit there, and whether or not we can say what the object looks like – it is clear that the teapot orbiting the sun lies at one end of the spectrum (or would do, if there was any evidence for such a thing). God, on the other hand, lies at the other end. If there is any evidence for God, it is by means of what God is supposed to have done – which means that that evidence can only be accounted for by God if we impute causal powers to God far above and beyond the ‘power’ to just sit there. And there is nothing that allows us to say what God looks like – if indeed God looks like anything at all. So, when we say that there is no evidence for the teapot, and when we say that there is no evidence for God, we are saying two very different things. In the first case, we are saying that there haven’t been any sightings; in the second we are saying that there is nothing for which God is the best explanation.”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p15-16)
“...There is, I want to argue, a significant difference between denying the existence of a teapot orbiting the sun, and denying the existence of God. When two people disagree over whether or not there is a teapot orbiting the sun, they are disagreeing over whether the world includes that particular item or not. For all that that particular disagreement implies, the two people agree about every other feature of the world: the tea-ist believes in a world that is exactly the same as the one the a-tea-ist believes in, with the single difference that it contains one item that the a-tea-ist’s world doesn’t contain. Since, as I have argued in the previous section, the only thing that could count as evidence for the teapot orbiting the sun is that someone has seen it, it is in one way analogous to a situation where one person says: ‘there’s a postbox at the end of the high street’ and the other person says ‘no there isn’t, go and have a look’, and the first person goes and looks and doesn’t see one. If that person is reasonable, that will be the end of the argument. The two situations are not quite analogous, however, in that no-one has gone and looked to see whether there is a teapot in outer space. But the situations are disanalogous in a second way too, and a way which helps to illuminate why, in the absence of evidence, it is reasonable to conclude that there is no such teapot. That is, that there is nothing manifestly far-fetched in the idea of there being a postbox at the end of the high street. In the absence of seeing one (leaving aside the possibility of more indirect evidence, such as seeing a map of where all the postboxes are at the GPO) one is hardly being unreasonable if one doesn’t come down on one side or the other. And this difference between the postbox and the teapot tells us something about why it is unreasonable to suspend judgement regarding the teapot, even though we have not only failed to see one, but failed to carry out anything remotely approaching an exhaustive search. Because of its manifest far-fetchedness, or what amounts to the same thing, because it’s reasonable in the absence of prior evidence on the specific hypothesis to estimate that it’s highly unlikely, we can say that, when it comes to teapots orbiting the sun, absence of evidence is evidence of absence. The atheist’s argument attempts to gain persuasiveness by ignoring this issue of prior plausibility. It is true that we cannot (at present) conclusively prove that there’s no teapot in outer space in the way that we could conclusively prove that there’s no postbox on the end of the street by going there and looking. But part of the reason why, despite not being able to do this, it is still reasonable to conclude that there isn’t, is that prior to any investigation the hypothesis is manifestly far-fetched. In the postbox case it is not, and thus we can see that absence of evidence, as far as rendering it reasonable to deny something’s existence goes, has different force depending on the case in hand. Unless the existence of God is taken to be also manifestly far-fetched, the argument to the effect that if we don’t suspend judgement regarding the teapot then we shouldn’t suspend it regarding God, doesn’t get off the ground.
“The atheists might not leave it there, however. It is open to them to simply reply: ‘the existence of God is manifestly far-fetched.’ This seems to leave us in a meta-stalemate – that is, a situation in a contest in which it is impossible to decide whether the outcome is a draw or not. The outcome of the argument so far seems to be meta-agnosticism – that is, the suspension of judgement regarding whether or not one should suspend judgement. But the argument does not end there. For the far-fetchedness of the teapot hypothesis is by comparison with an alternative – the alternative that there isn’t one. As I have already pointed out, accepting this alternative is nothing more than denying that a particular entity exists. To be analogous, the atheistic alternative would have also to be merely denying that a particular item exists. However, as I now want to argue, it is not.”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p16-17)
“In what way should we understand the claim that there is no evidence for God, or for that matter the claim that there is no evidence for the extra-terrestrial teapot? Since the argument is supposed to be one of analogy, presumably the same notion of evidence is being employed in both cases. But evidence is an extremely slippery concept. We might minimally define it as ‘something that makes us warranted in believing something else’... Further, I presume that when we say there is no evidence for the orbiting teapot, it is empirical evidence we have in mind. So the analogy is meant to be: there is no empirical evidence for either... But empirical evidence is an extremely slippery concept. Those who place it at the centre of their epistemology tend to either give accounts that are too narrow to be realistic, or too underdescribed to do away with the slipperiness... Nonetheless, we can make do for present purposes with fairly rough, partial characterisations. One such might be: if we can see it, hear it, touch it etc., then we have empirical evidence – indeed the best, most direct kind of empirical evidence there is. This of course goes along with the view that the best examples of really existing things we have are precisely those things we can see, hear, touch etc. This view is common to realists and antirealists in the philosophy of science (e.g. Ernan McMullin and Bas Van Fraassen respectively), for their disagreement is about the status of non-observable things. And it need not imply that all we have evidence for is sense-data themselves, for it can and usually does sit perfectly comfortably with a common-sense conception of seeing, whereby we see tables and chairs, dogs and cats. In any event, ruling out the existence of God on the grounds that God is not a sense-datum would fall prey to the strong medicine principle.
“When we say that there is no evidence for a teapot orbiting the sun, the most plausible interpretation is that no-one, as far as we know, has seen, or touched etc., one. But when we say (those of us who do say it) that there is no evidence for the existence of God, is this what we mean? Atheists such as Dawkins clearly think that certain features of the world – in his case the designedness of organisms – used to appear to be good evidence for an ‘intelligent creator’. But now, he thinks, we possess a better explanation, so those features no longer appear to be good evidence...
“Clearly, the empirical evidence that Dawkins’ thought once constituted good grounds for believing in God did not consist in seeing, hearing (etc.) God. So there is a common ground between some theists and some atheists – e.g. Swinburne and Dawkins respectively – namely the hardly controversial claim that it is reasonable to affirm the existence of something on empirical grounds other than that someone has seen, heard, etc. that thing...
“But once we admit that it is acceptable to conclude from evidence other than seeing (etc.) a thing, that that thing exists, then a disanalogy between the God case and the teapot case becomes apparent. For, apart from someone seeing it, what could count as evidence that there was a teapot orbiting the sun?...”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p12-14)
“In both these regards – whether we need to impute causal powers beyond those of objects that just sit there, and whether or not we can say what the object looks like – it is clear that the teapot orbiting the sun lies at one end of the spectrum (or would do, if there was any evidence for such a thing). God, on the other hand, lies at the other end. If there is any evidence for God, it is by means of what God is supposed to have done – which means that that evidence can only be accounted for by God if we impute causal powers to God far above and beyond the ‘power’ to just sit there. And there is nothing that allows us to say what God looks like – if indeed God looks like anything at all. So, when we say that there is no evidence for the teapot, and when we say that there is no evidence for God, we are saying two very different things. In the first case, we are saying that there haven’t been any sightings; in the second we are saying that there is nothing for which God is the best explanation.”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p15-16)
“...There is, I want to argue, a significant difference between denying the existence of a teapot orbiting the sun, and denying the existence of God. When two people disagree over whether or not there is a teapot orbiting the sun, they are disagreeing over whether the world includes that particular item or not. For all that that particular disagreement implies, the two people agree about every other feature of the world: the tea-ist believes in a world that is exactly the same as the one the a-tea-ist believes in, with the single difference that it contains one item that the a-tea-ist’s world doesn’t contain. Since, as I have argued in the previous section, the only thing that could count as evidence for the teapot orbiting the sun is that someone has seen it, it is in one way analogous to a situation where one person says: ‘there’s a postbox at the end of the high street’ and the other person says ‘no there isn’t, go and have a look’, and the first person goes and looks and doesn’t see one. If that person is reasonable, that will be the end of the argument. The two situations are not quite analogous, however, in that no-one has gone and looked to see whether there is a teapot in outer space. But the situations are disanalogous in a second way too, and a way which helps to illuminate why, in the absence of evidence, it is reasonable to conclude that there is no such teapot. That is, that there is nothing manifestly far-fetched in the idea of there being a postbox at the end of the high street. In the absence of seeing one (leaving aside the possibility of more indirect evidence, such as seeing a map of where all the postboxes are at the GPO) one is hardly being unreasonable if one doesn’t come down on one side or the other. And this difference between the postbox and the teapot tells us something about why it is unreasonable to suspend judgement regarding the teapot, even though we have not only failed to see one, but failed to carry out anything remotely approaching an exhaustive search. Because of its manifest far-fetchedness, or what amounts to the same thing, because it’s reasonable in the absence of prior evidence on the specific hypothesis to estimate that it’s highly unlikely, we can say that, when it comes to teapots orbiting the sun, absence of evidence is evidence of absence. The atheist’s argument attempts to gain persuasiveness by ignoring this issue of prior plausibility. It is true that we cannot (at present) conclusively prove that there’s no teapot in outer space in the way that we could conclusively prove that there’s no postbox on the end of the street by going there and looking. But part of the reason why, despite not being able to do this, it is still reasonable to conclude that there isn’t, is that prior to any investigation the hypothesis is manifestly far-fetched. In the postbox case it is not, and thus we can see that absence of evidence, as far as rendering it reasonable to deny something’s existence goes, has different force depending on the case in hand. Unless the existence of God is taken to be also manifestly far-fetched, the argument to the effect that if we don’t suspend judgement regarding the teapot then we shouldn’t suspend it regarding God, doesn’t get off the ground.
“The atheists might not leave it there, however. It is open to them to simply reply: ‘the existence of God is manifestly far-fetched.’ This seems to leave us in a meta-stalemate – that is, a situation in a contest in which it is impossible to decide whether the outcome is a draw or not. The outcome of the argument so far seems to be meta-agnosticism – that is, the suspension of judgement regarding whether or not one should suspend judgement. But the argument does not end there. For the far-fetchedness of the teapot hypothesis is by comparison with an alternative – the alternative that there isn’t one. As I have already pointed out, accepting this alternative is nothing more than denying that a particular entity exists. To be analogous, the atheistic alternative would have also to be merely denying that a particular item exists. However, as I now want to argue, it is not.”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p16-17)
“Let us look at a picture of the world as the tea-ist sees it (fig. 1), and at a picture of the world as the a-tea-ist sees it (fig. 2).
“As we can see, these worlds are absolutely identical apart from one item. Where tea-istic picture contains a teapot, the a-tea-istic picture contains nothing. To be analogous, there would have to be a situation where, where the theistic picture contains God, the atheistic picture contains nothing. However, the atheist and the theist are not disagreeing over the presence or absence of one particular entity, but over something that is fundamental to the universe as a whole. As already argued in section 2, the teapot is not the explanation for anything. The hypothesis attributes no actions to it than just sitting there. So, as far as the entire rest of the universe goes, it might as well not be there as be there. So leaving the teapot out of our picture of the world does not require us to explain anything in any way other the than [sic] the way we would have explained it anyway. This is not the case with regard to God. For God is invoked as an explanation for (for example) why the universe exists at all, why it is intelligible, why it is governed by laws, why it is governed by the laws it is rather than some other laws, and doubtless many more things. The atheist is thus committed to more than just the denial of something’s existence, he is committed to there being some other explanation for all the things that that thing might be invoked to explain. This does not mean that the atheist is committed to one particular explanation, and neither does it mean that the atheist can’t simply say ‘I don’t know’. But it does mean that the question immediately raises itself, and that the atheist is committed to there being some non-God-involving answer...
“...But in the table, where the theist has God, the atheist has something (even if it’s a ‘something we know not what’) other than God. That something is whatever it is that explains why the Universe has the properties (e.g. the laws) it has. It need not be strictly speaking an entity – and atheists have sometimes suggested that the universe is self-generating. Still, if we go that way, there must be – even if we don’t know what it is – some explanation of how it is that the universe is self-generating, and more specifically how a self-generating universe comes to have the laws that it has. The worldview that excludes the orbiting teapot, however, does not lack an explanation for anything that the worldview that includes the teapot has an explanation for...”
– Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” Ars Disputandi, 10:1, 2010 p9-22 (p17-19)
3. Rebuttal:
Argument from Probability/Improbability
Argument from Probability/Improbability
Summary:
The existence of God is a knowable question; we just need enough data about the universe. For now, the God hypothesis seems improbable based on what we know. Current trends indicate that the more data we uncover about the universe, the lower that probability is likely to become.
C.H. Douglas Clark, British inorganic & structural chemistry professor, 1890-19??
“It seems probable that in spite of widespread unbelief not many people would go so far as to say that there is no God. What part can reason be expected to play in this matter? We think it makes the existence of God more probable than improbable, and so prepares the way for the certainty of faith. Evidently our author [Bertrand Russell] regards reason as on the side of unbelief. The position is that neither of us can irrefutably demonstrate we are right by the use of reason alone. The strength of arguments will have different degrees of cogency for different minds, because apprehension of God is attained only through faith. By ‘apprehension’ we do not mean ‘complete apprehension,’ for if we could completely comprehend God He could not be the God revealed by Christ. We mean the fullest comprehension of which we are capable. We must approach this subject with humility, realizing that we cannot expect to dispose of mystery in discussing Divine Being. If we do this as far as possible with open minds, always remembering the limits of our knowledge, it may be desirable to oppose argument with argument. Reason can help a man to accept belief, but it may also deter him. Our purpose must be to try to show why we think reason more favourable to belief than to unbelief.”
“What does it mean when we say we believe through faith? We think it means that we bring into play a faculty different from reason, which we exert when we appreciate the grandeur of a lovely sunset or feel awe as we contemplate a lofty height with its rocky eminence veiled in mist. If awe deepens into reverence, we begin to feel the need of something to revere, leading to the idea of God and the urge to worship Him as a Being. This may happen to different people in different ways, but the end of the process is invariable. We see something with perfect clarity, and wonder why we had never thought of it before. We know we have come into contact with ultimate Reality. Faith is embodied in a vision of God, a spontaneous enlightenment giving us the certainty of a personal Presence to which we feel we must attach ourselves. We find ourselves en rapport with infinite essence which supersedes all the observations of time and sense, and realize that, although God cannot be perceived with the naked eye, He is known by spiritual insight, and that Jesus Christ, being both God and Man, gave us a concrete and historical expression in our space-time of the inward reality which many find so elusive.”
— C.H. Douglas Clark, Christianity and Bertrand Russell: A Critique of the Essay: ‘Why I Am Not a Christian,’ Lutterworth Press, 1958 p19
“It seems probable that in spite of widespread unbelief not many people would go so far as to say that there is no God. What part can reason be expected to play in this matter? We think it makes the existence of God more probable than improbable, and so prepares the way for the certainty of faith. Evidently our author [Bertrand Russell] regards reason as on the side of unbelief. The position is that neither of us can irrefutably demonstrate we are right by the use of reason alone. The strength of arguments will have different degrees of cogency for different minds, because apprehension of God is attained only through faith. By ‘apprehension’ we do not mean ‘complete apprehension,’ for if we could completely comprehend God He could not be the God revealed by Christ. We mean the fullest comprehension of which we are capable. We must approach this subject with humility, realizing that we cannot expect to dispose of mystery in discussing Divine Being. If we do this as far as possible with open minds, always remembering the limits of our knowledge, it may be desirable to oppose argument with argument. Reason can help a man to accept belief, but it may also deter him. Our purpose must be to try to show why we think reason more favourable to belief than to unbelief.”
“What does it mean when we say we believe through faith? We think it means that we bring into play a faculty different from reason, which we exert when we appreciate the grandeur of a lovely sunset or feel awe as we contemplate a lofty height with its rocky eminence veiled in mist. If awe deepens into reverence, we begin to feel the need of something to revere, leading to the idea of God and the urge to worship Him as a Being. This may happen to different people in different ways, but the end of the process is invariable. We see something with perfect clarity, and wonder why we had never thought of it before. We know we have come into contact with ultimate Reality. Faith is embodied in a vision of God, a spontaneous enlightenment giving us the certainty of a personal Presence to which we feel we must attach ourselves. We find ourselves en rapport with infinite essence which supersedes all the observations of time and sense, and realize that, although God cannot be perceived with the naked eye, He is known by spiritual insight, and that Jesus Christ, being both God and Man, gave us a concrete and historical expression in our space-time of the inward reality which many find so elusive.”
— C.H. Douglas Clark, Christianity and Bertrand Russell: A Critique of the Essay: ‘Why I Am Not a Christian,’ Lutterworth Press, 1958 p19
Robin Le Poidevin, British professor of metaphysics, 1962-
“Theism is not ‘bad science’; it is the very general hypothesis that there exists, in terms of an intelligent being, a true unifying explanation of the world, ourselves, our consciousness, and our capacity for good. The initial probability of the proposition that there exists such an explanation (as opposed to a detailed attempt at one) is not smaller than the initial probability of the proposition that there exists no such explanation.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p117
“Theism is not ‘bad science’; it is the very general hypothesis that there exists, in terms of an intelligent being, a true unifying explanation of the world, ourselves, our consciousness, and our capacity for good. The initial probability of the proposition that there exists such an explanation (as opposed to a detailed attempt at one) is not smaller than the initial probability of the proposition that there exists no such explanation.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p117
4. Rebuttal:
Argument from Simplicity /
Occam’s Razor
Argument from Simplicity /
Occam’s Razor
Summary:
When faced with multiple theories that explain all the given evidence, the theory which explains the evidence with the fewest unknowns or assumptions is probably true. For most or perhaps all questions, the God explanation makes too many assumptions.
Keith Ward, English Anglican priest, philosopher, and theologian, 1938-
“As a matter of fact, the theist would claim that God is a very elegant, economical and fruitful explanation for the existence of the universe. It is economical because it attributes the existence and nature of absolutely everything in the universe to just one being, an ultimate cause which assigns a reason for the existence of everything, including itself. It is elegant because from one key idea – the idea of the most perfect possible being – the whole nature of God and the existence of the universe can be intelligibly explicated.”
— Keith Ward, God, Chance and Necessity, Oneworld, 1996 (quoted by Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, Mariner Books, 2008 p179)
“As a matter of fact, the theist would claim that God is a very elegant, economical and fruitful explanation for the existence of the universe. It is economical because it attributes the existence and nature of absolutely everything in the universe to just one being, an ultimate cause which assigns a reason for the existence of everything, including itself. It is elegant because from one key idea – the idea of the most perfect possible being – the whole nature of God and the existence of the universe can be intelligibly explicated.”
— Keith Ward, God, Chance and Necessity, Oneworld, 1996 (quoted by Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, Mariner Books, 2008 p179)
5. Rebuttal:
Omnipotence Paradoxes
Omnipotence Paradoxes
Summary:
The concept of omnipotence is prone to unresolved paradoxes. For instance, can God create a rock that is too heavy to lift? Reductio ad absurdum: a truly omnipotent being is not possible. Topic does not include the Argument from Free Will.
Joshua Hoffman & Gary Rosenkrantz, American professors of philosophy
“A first resolution of the paradox comes into play when Jane is an essentially omnipotent agent. In that case, the state of affairs of Jane’s being non-omnipotent is impossible. Therefore, Jane cannot bring it about that she is not omnipotent. Since, necessarily, an omnipotent agent can move any stone, no matter how massive, (S2) [that there is a stone of mass m which Jane cannot move] is impossible. But, as we have seen, an omnipotent agent is not required to be able to bring about an impossible state of affairs.
“If, on the other hand, Jane is an accidentally omnipotent agent, both (S1) [that a stone of mass m moves] and (S2) are possible, and it is possible for some omnipotent agent to bring it about that (S1) obtains at one time, and that (S2) obtains at a different time. Thus, there is a second solution to the paradox. In this case, Jane’s being non-omnipotent is a possible state of affairs; thus, we may assume that it is possible for Jane to bring it about that she is non-omnipotent. So, Jane can create and move a stone, s, of mass, m, while omnipotent, and subsequently bring it about that she is not omnipotent and powerless to move s. As a consequence, Jane can bring about both (S1) and (S2), but only if they obtain at different times.”
— Joshua Hoffman & Gary Rosenkrantz, “Omnipotence,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2002
“A first resolution of the paradox comes into play when Jane is an essentially omnipotent agent. In that case, the state of affairs of Jane’s being non-omnipotent is impossible. Therefore, Jane cannot bring it about that she is not omnipotent. Since, necessarily, an omnipotent agent can move any stone, no matter how massive, (S2) [that there is a stone of mass m which Jane cannot move] is impossible. But, as we have seen, an omnipotent agent is not required to be able to bring about an impossible state of affairs.
“If, on the other hand, Jane is an accidentally omnipotent agent, both (S1) [that a stone of mass m moves] and (S2) are possible, and it is possible for some omnipotent agent to bring it about that (S1) obtains at one time, and that (S2) obtains at a different time. Thus, there is a second solution to the paradox. In this case, Jane’s being non-omnipotent is a possible state of affairs; thus, we may assume that it is possible for Jane to bring it about that she is non-omnipotent. So, Jane can create and move a stone, s, of mass, m, while omnipotent, and subsequently bring it about that she is not omnipotent and powerless to move s. As a consequence, Jane can bring about both (S1) and (S2), but only if they obtain at different times.”
— Joshua Hoffman & Gary Rosenkrantz, “Omnipotence,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2002
Paul Davies, PhD, English physicist & professor, 1946-
“In our quest for ultimate answers it is hard not to be drawn, in one way or another, to the infinite. Whether it is an infinite tower of turtles, an infinity of parallel worlds, an infinite set of mathematical propositions, or an infinite Creator, physical existence surely cannot be rooted in anything finite. Western religions have a long tradition of identifying God with the Infinite, whereas Eastern philosophy seeks to eliminate the differences between the One and the Many, and to identify the Void and the Infinite – zero and infinity.
“When the early Christian thinkers such as Plotinus proclaimed that God is infinite, they were primarily concerned to demonstrate that he is not limited in any way. The mathematical concept of infinity was at that time still fairly vague. It was generally believed that infinity is a limit toward which an enumeration may proceed, but which is unachievable in reality. Even Aquinas, who conceded God’s infinite nature, was not prepared to accept that infinity had more than a potential, as opposed to an actual existence. An omnipotent God ‘cannot make an absolutely unlimited thing,’ he maintained.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p229-230
“In our quest for ultimate answers it is hard not to be drawn, in one way or another, to the infinite. Whether it is an infinite tower of turtles, an infinity of parallel worlds, an infinite set of mathematical propositions, or an infinite Creator, physical existence surely cannot be rooted in anything finite. Western religions have a long tradition of identifying God with the Infinite, whereas Eastern philosophy seeks to eliminate the differences between the One and the Many, and to identify the Void and the Infinite – zero and infinity.
“When the early Christian thinkers such as Plotinus proclaimed that God is infinite, they were primarily concerned to demonstrate that he is not limited in any way. The mathematical concept of infinity was at that time still fairly vague. It was generally believed that infinity is a limit toward which an enumeration may proceed, but which is unachievable in reality. Even Aquinas, who conceded God’s infinite nature, was not prepared to accept that infinity had more than a potential, as opposed to an actual existence. An omnipotent God ‘cannot make an absolutely unlimited thing,’ he maintained.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p229-230
6. Rebuttal:
Other Theistic Paradoxes
Other Theistic Paradoxes
Summary:
Some theistic concepts are logically contradictory. This topic does not include paradoxes related to omnipotence.
Paul Davies, PhD, English physicist & professor, 1946-
“As we have seen, Plato confronted the paradox of necessity versus contingency by proposing two gods, one necessary, the other contingent: the Good and the Demiurge. Perhaps the demands of monotheism can be met by arguing that this situation could be legitimately described as really two complementary aspects of a single ‘dipolar’ God. This is the position adopted by proponents of what is known as ‘process theology.’
“Process thought is an attempt to view the world not as a collection of objects, or even as a set of events, but as a process with a definite directionality. The flux of time thus plays a key role in process philosophy, which asserts the primacy of becoming over being. In contrast to the rigid mechanistic view of the universe that arose from the work of Newton and his associates, process philosophy stresses the openness and indeterminism of nature. The future is not implicit in the present: there is a choice of alternatives. Thus nature is attributed a sort of freedom which was absent in the clockwork universe of Laplace. This freedom comes about through the abandonment of reductionism: the world is more than the sum of its parts. We must reject the idea that a physical system, such as a rock or a cloud or a person, is nothing but a collection of atoms, and recognize instead the existence of many different levels of structure. A human being, for example, certainly is a collection of atoms, but there are many higher levels of organization that are missed by this meager description and which are essential for defining what we mean by the world ‘person.’ By viewing complex systems as a hierarchy of organizational levels, the simple ‘bottom-up’ view of causality in terms of elementary particles interacting with other particles must be replaced by a more subtle formulation in which higher levels can act downward upon lower levels too. This serves to introduce elements of teleology, or purposive behavior, in the affairs of the world. Process thinking leads naturally to an organismic or ecological view of the universe, reminiscent of Aristotle’s cosmology. Ian Barbour describes the process vision of reality as the view that the world is a community of interdependent beings rather than a collection of cogs in a machine.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p181-182
“To make this clearer, let me retell a famous parable due to John Wheeler. One day Wheeler was unwittingly subjected to a variant of the game of twenty questions. Only yes-no answers can be given. In the variant version, Wheeler began by asking the usual questions: Is it big? Is it living? etc. At first the answers came quickly, but as the game went on they became slower and more hesitant. Eventually he tried his luck: ‘Is it a cloud?’ The answer came back: ‘Yes!’ Then everyone burst out laughing. The players revealed that to trick Wheeler no word had been chosen in advance. Instead they agreed to answer his questions purely at random, subject only to consistency with previous answers. Nevertheless, an answer was obtained. This obviously contingent answer was not determined in advance, but neither was it arbitrary: its nature was decided in part by the questions Wheeler chose to ask, and in part by pure chance. In the same way, the reality exposed by a quantum measurement is decided in part by the questions the experimenter puts to nature (i.e., whether to ask for a definite position or a definite momentum) and in part by chance (i.e., the uncertain nature of the values obtained for these quantities).
Let us now return to the theological analogue. This mixture of contingency and necessity corresponds to a God who necessarily determines what alternative worlds are available to nature, but who leaves open the freedom of nature to choose from among the alternatives. In process theology the assumption is made that the alternatives are necessarily fixed in order to achieve a valued end result – i.e., they direct or encourage the (otherwise unconstrained) universe to evolve toward something good. Yet within this directed framework there remains openness. The world is therefore neither wholly determined nor arbitrary but, like Wheeler’s cloud, an intimate amalgam of chance and choice.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p184-185
“As we have seen, Plato confronted the paradox of necessity versus contingency by proposing two gods, one necessary, the other contingent: the Good and the Demiurge. Perhaps the demands of monotheism can be met by arguing that this situation could be legitimately described as really two complementary aspects of a single ‘dipolar’ God. This is the position adopted by proponents of what is known as ‘process theology.’
“Process thought is an attempt to view the world not as a collection of objects, or even as a set of events, but as a process with a definite directionality. The flux of time thus plays a key role in process philosophy, which asserts the primacy of becoming over being. In contrast to the rigid mechanistic view of the universe that arose from the work of Newton and his associates, process philosophy stresses the openness and indeterminism of nature. The future is not implicit in the present: there is a choice of alternatives. Thus nature is attributed a sort of freedom which was absent in the clockwork universe of Laplace. This freedom comes about through the abandonment of reductionism: the world is more than the sum of its parts. We must reject the idea that a physical system, such as a rock or a cloud or a person, is nothing but a collection of atoms, and recognize instead the existence of many different levels of structure. A human being, for example, certainly is a collection of atoms, but there are many higher levels of organization that are missed by this meager description and which are essential for defining what we mean by the world ‘person.’ By viewing complex systems as a hierarchy of organizational levels, the simple ‘bottom-up’ view of causality in terms of elementary particles interacting with other particles must be replaced by a more subtle formulation in which higher levels can act downward upon lower levels too. This serves to introduce elements of teleology, or purposive behavior, in the affairs of the world. Process thinking leads naturally to an organismic or ecological view of the universe, reminiscent of Aristotle’s cosmology. Ian Barbour describes the process vision of reality as the view that the world is a community of interdependent beings rather than a collection of cogs in a machine.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p181-182
“To make this clearer, let me retell a famous parable due to John Wheeler. One day Wheeler was unwittingly subjected to a variant of the game of twenty questions. Only yes-no answers can be given. In the variant version, Wheeler began by asking the usual questions: Is it big? Is it living? etc. At first the answers came quickly, but as the game went on they became slower and more hesitant. Eventually he tried his luck: ‘Is it a cloud?’ The answer came back: ‘Yes!’ Then everyone burst out laughing. The players revealed that to trick Wheeler no word had been chosen in advance. Instead they agreed to answer his questions purely at random, subject only to consistency with previous answers. Nevertheless, an answer was obtained. This obviously contingent answer was not determined in advance, but neither was it arbitrary: its nature was decided in part by the questions Wheeler chose to ask, and in part by pure chance. In the same way, the reality exposed by a quantum measurement is decided in part by the questions the experimenter puts to nature (i.e., whether to ask for a definite position or a definite momentum) and in part by chance (i.e., the uncertain nature of the values obtained for these quantities).
Let us now return to the theological analogue. This mixture of contingency and necessity corresponds to a God who necessarily determines what alternative worlds are available to nature, but who leaves open the freedom of nature to choose from among the alternatives. In process theology the assumption is made that the alternatives are necessarily fixed in order to achieve a valued end result – i.e., they direct or encourage the (otherwise unconstrained) universe to evolve toward something good. Yet within this directed framework there remains openness. The world is therefore neither wholly determined nor arbitrary but, like Wheeler’s cloud, an intimate amalgam of chance and choice.”
— Paul Davies, The Mind of God, Touchstone, 1992 p184-185
7. Rebuttal:
Nielsen’s Argument from Linguistic & Logical Incoherence
Nielsen’s Argument from Linguistic & Logical Incoherence
Summary:
In a rational argument, one must have premises which are definable and point to a detectible thing, otherwise the premises cannot be backed by empirical evidence or purely logical assertions. Our language reflects our inability to rationally comprehend god. Because we don’t know what we’re talking about when we use the word “god,” we cannot reason about god.
J.P. Moreland, American philosopher & theologian, 1948-
“...I think that God can be detected in religious experience. I believe that there is a form of perception called numinous perception. People who study these sorts of things are even able to describe laws governing the nature of numinous perception. And I find numinous perception to be very, very similar to sensory perception...
“But let me just say that I believe that God could be defined ostensively in religious experience, in awarenesses of a being who is holy, who is loving, wonderful, kind, and so forth. It is not the case, by the way, that the concept of God is only defined by ostension. I believe that it is possible to give content to the concept of God by inferring God as a theoretical explanation, very much as is done in science, contrary to what Professor Nielsen said.
“Scientists do postulate theoretical entities, and they give theoretical terms meaning as they are embedded in theories and used to explain certain effects...
“[Footnote: A theoretical term, say ‘electron,’ is understood as ‘whatever causes a specified range of phenomena,’ and the phenomena are those for which scientists believe electrons are causally responsible... The term ‘God’ can be similarly defined as that entity with such and such properties deemed necessary to create and design the world, to be a maximally perfect being, to reveal Himself in religious experience, and so on.]
“...The term ‘electron’ gets some of its meaning as such and such an entity to explain such and such an effect. It is interesting to me that two leading philosophers of science–Stanley Jaki who is a Christian and Bas van Fraasen who, I have been told, was not a Christian at the time that he wrote The Scientific Image, though I have heard that he has recently converted to Christianity, but I have not had a chance to check that out and I am not certain that this is true–both of these men believe that scientific realism, that is, the view that you postulate theoretical entities to explain effects in the world, utilizes a method for giving meaning to theoretical terms which is like the way Aquinas and other theists argue from effects to give meaning to the concept of God...
“Consider the property redness, for example. I take redness to be a Platonic entity called a universal. I can see redness even though redness is timeless. But redness, even though timeless and spaceless itself, can be instanced in a ball in my child’s toy box. I can see the timeless, spaceless entity in so far as it is instanced, and I am not merely looking at the token. I am also looking at the type; I am looking at the entity redness itself.
“[Footnote: This insight implies that there are several different senses in which one thing can be in another. A container ’in’ (‘The milk is “in” the glass’) is not the only sense of ’in’ needed to make sense of the world. Thus, if a timeless, spaceless universal like redness can be ‘in’ a spatiotemporal entity like a red ball, then I see no reason why God cannot be ‘in’ a burning bush or in a religious experience without God becoming a spatiotemporal entity, even if the senses of ‘in’ are different in the two cases. If this is so, then God can be ‘present in’ some revelatory event (e.g., a biblical miracle or a religious experience)...]
“What Nielsen has done is to commit what I call the centipede fallacy. If the centipede took long enough to look at his legs and figure out how in the world he walks, he would probably end up stumbling and falling. And philosophers are guilty of the centipede effect all the time. The centipede knows very well that he can walk, even though he can’t give you all the details about how he does so. Most people know very well what ‘God’ means, and they use it to refer, even if they cannot give you a complete theory of reference and meaning to explain this.”
— J.P. Moreland, Does God Exist?, Prometheus Books, 1988 p57-59
“...I think that God can be detected in religious experience. I believe that there is a form of perception called numinous perception. People who study these sorts of things are even able to describe laws governing the nature of numinous perception. And I find numinous perception to be very, very similar to sensory perception...
“But let me just say that I believe that God could be defined ostensively in religious experience, in awarenesses of a being who is holy, who is loving, wonderful, kind, and so forth. It is not the case, by the way, that the concept of God is only defined by ostension. I believe that it is possible to give content to the concept of God by inferring God as a theoretical explanation, very much as is done in science, contrary to what Professor Nielsen said.
“Scientists do postulate theoretical entities, and they give theoretical terms meaning as they are embedded in theories and used to explain certain effects...
“[Footnote: A theoretical term, say ‘electron,’ is understood as ‘whatever causes a specified range of phenomena,’ and the phenomena are those for which scientists believe electrons are causally responsible... The term ‘God’ can be similarly defined as that entity with such and such properties deemed necessary to create and design the world, to be a maximally perfect being, to reveal Himself in religious experience, and so on.]
“...The term ‘electron’ gets some of its meaning as such and such an entity to explain such and such an effect. It is interesting to me that two leading philosophers of science–Stanley Jaki who is a Christian and Bas van Fraasen who, I have been told, was not a Christian at the time that he wrote The Scientific Image, though I have heard that he has recently converted to Christianity, but I have not had a chance to check that out and I am not certain that this is true–both of these men believe that scientific realism, that is, the view that you postulate theoretical entities to explain effects in the world, utilizes a method for giving meaning to theoretical terms which is like the way Aquinas and other theists argue from effects to give meaning to the concept of God...
“Consider the property redness, for example. I take redness to be a Platonic entity called a universal. I can see redness even though redness is timeless. But redness, even though timeless and spaceless itself, can be instanced in a ball in my child’s toy box. I can see the timeless, spaceless entity in so far as it is instanced, and I am not merely looking at the token. I am also looking at the type; I am looking at the entity redness itself.
“[Footnote: This insight implies that there are several different senses in which one thing can be in another. A container ’in’ (‘The milk is “in” the glass’) is not the only sense of ’in’ needed to make sense of the world. Thus, if a timeless, spaceless universal like redness can be ‘in’ a spatiotemporal entity like a red ball, then I see no reason why God cannot be ‘in’ a burning bush or in a religious experience without God becoming a spatiotemporal entity, even if the senses of ‘in’ are different in the two cases. If this is so, then God can be ‘present in’ some revelatory event (e.g., a biblical miracle or a religious experience)...]
“What Nielsen has done is to commit what I call the centipede fallacy. If the centipede took long enough to look at his legs and figure out how in the world he walks, he would probably end up stumbling and falling. And philosophers are guilty of the centipede effect all the time. The centipede knows very well that he can walk, even though he can’t give you all the details about how he does so. Most people know very well what ‘God’ means, and they use it to refer, even if they cannot give you a complete theory of reference and meaning to explain this.”
— J.P. Moreland, Does God Exist?, Prometheus Books, 1988 p57-59
C.S. Lewis, British writer and lay-theologian, 1898-1963
“The position of the question, then, is like this. We want to know whether the universe simply happens to be what it is for no reason or whether there is a power behind it that makes it what it is... If there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe–no more than the architect of a house could actually be a wall or staircase or fireplace in that house. The only way in which we could expect it to show itself would be in a certain way. And that is just what we do find inside ourselves. Surely this ought to arouse our suspicions?”
— C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics, HarperOne, 2017 p30
“You know that in space you can move in three ways–to left or right, backwards or forwards, up or down. Every direction is either one of these three or a compromise between them. They are called the three Dimensions. Now notice this. If you are using only one dimension, you could draw only a straight line. If you are using two, you could draw a figure: say, a square. And a square is made up of four straight lines. Now a step further. If you have three dimensions, you can then build what we call a solid body: say, a cube–a thing like a dice or a lump of sugar. And a cube is made up of six squares.
“Do you see the point? A world of one dimension would be a straight line. In a two-dimensional world, you still get straight lines, but many lines make one figure. In a three-dimensional world, you still get figures but many figures make one solid body. In other words, as you advance to more real and more complicated levels, you do not leave behind you the things you found on the simpler levels: you still have them, but combined in new ways–in ways you could not imagine if you knew only the simpler levels.
“Now the Christian account of God involves just the same principle. The human level is a simple and rather empty level. On the human level one person is one being, and any two persons are two separate beings–just as, in two dimensions (say on a flat sheet of paper) one square is one figure, and any two squares are two separate figures. On the Divine level you still find personalities; but up there you find them combined in new ways which we, who do not live on that level, cannot imagine. In God’s dimension, so to speak, you find a being who is three Persons while remaining one Being, just as a cube is six squares while remaining one cube. Of course we cannot fully conceive a Being like that: just as, if we were so made that we perceived only two dimensions in space we could never properly imagine a cube. But we can get a sort of faint notion of it. And when we do, we are then, for the first time in our lives, getting some positive idea, however faint, of something super-personal–something more than a person. It is something we could never have guessed, and yet, once we have been told, one almost feels one ought to have been able to guess it because it fits in so well with all the things we know already...”
— C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics, HarperOne, 2017 p133-134
“The position of the question, then, is like this. We want to know whether the universe simply happens to be what it is for no reason or whether there is a power behind it that makes it what it is... If there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe–no more than the architect of a house could actually be a wall or staircase or fireplace in that house. The only way in which we could expect it to show itself would be in a certain way. And that is just what we do find inside ourselves. Surely this ought to arouse our suspicions?”
— C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics, HarperOne, 2017 p30
“You know that in space you can move in three ways–to left or right, backwards or forwards, up or down. Every direction is either one of these three or a compromise between them. They are called the three Dimensions. Now notice this. If you are using only one dimension, you could draw only a straight line. If you are using two, you could draw a figure: say, a square. And a square is made up of four straight lines. Now a step further. If you have three dimensions, you can then build what we call a solid body: say, a cube–a thing like a dice or a lump of sugar. And a cube is made up of six squares.
“Do you see the point? A world of one dimension would be a straight line. In a two-dimensional world, you still get straight lines, but many lines make one figure. In a three-dimensional world, you still get figures but many figures make one solid body. In other words, as you advance to more real and more complicated levels, you do not leave behind you the things you found on the simpler levels: you still have them, but combined in new ways–in ways you could not imagine if you knew only the simpler levels.
“Now the Christian account of God involves just the same principle. The human level is a simple and rather empty level. On the human level one person is one being, and any two persons are two separate beings–just as, in two dimensions (say on a flat sheet of paper) one square is one figure, and any two squares are two separate figures. On the Divine level you still find personalities; but up there you find them combined in new ways which we, who do not live on that level, cannot imagine. In God’s dimension, so to speak, you find a being who is three Persons while remaining one Being, just as a cube is six squares while remaining one cube. Of course we cannot fully conceive a Being like that: just as, if we were so made that we perceived only two dimensions in space we could never properly imagine a cube. But we can get a sort of faint notion of it. And when we do, we are then, for the first time in our lives, getting some positive idea, however faint, of something super-personal–something more than a person. It is something we could never have guessed, and yet, once we have been told, one almost feels one ought to have been able to guess it because it fits in so well with all the things we know already...”
— C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), The C.S. Lewis Signature Classics, HarperOne, 2017 p133-134
Jerome I. Gellman, Israeli professor of philosophy, 1940-
“Surely the mere fact that you cannot explain in detail what you mean by a term does not show that the term has no meaning for you or that it is hopelessly vague. The inclination to think otherwise is no doubt a malady that torments some professional philosophers in particular. We can readily understand how this should happen. After all, in their professional lives philosophers often try to define, analyze, explicate, or give an ‘account’ of various concepts which interest them. This task is venerable and to be applauded. But what is admirable turns into professional haughtiness and intellectual caprice when the legitimacy of a concept is judged by whether or not it allows philosophers to do to it what interests them. We have to have some other reason for thinking a term incoherent or hopelessly vague. And until we are given some other reason for thinking our generic concepts about God to be defective, we have every reason to think that they are coherent and are sufficiently clear to have application.”
— Jerome I. Gellman, Experience of God and the Rationality of Theistic Belief, Cornell University Press, 1997 p166
“Surely the mere fact that you cannot explain in detail what you mean by a term does not show that the term has no meaning for you or that it is hopelessly vague. The inclination to think otherwise is no doubt a malady that torments some professional philosophers in particular. We can readily understand how this should happen. After all, in their professional lives philosophers often try to define, analyze, explicate, or give an ‘account’ of various concepts which interest them. This task is venerable and to be applauded. But what is admirable turns into professional haughtiness and intellectual caprice when the legitimacy of a concept is judged by whether or not it allows philosophers to do to it what interests them. We have to have some other reason for thinking a term incoherent or hopelessly vague. And until we are given some other reason for thinking our generic concepts about God to be defective, we have every reason to think that they are coherent and are sufficiently clear to have application.”
— Jerome I. Gellman, Experience of God and the Rationality of Theistic Belief, Cornell University Press, 1997 p166
8. Rebuttal:
Why Just One God?
Why Just One God?
Summary:
If we’re to settle on a Creator, why are we limited to the Western monotheistic God?
William Lane Craig, PhD, ThD, American philosopher & theologian, 1949-
Strobel: “Why does it have to be one Creator? Why couldn’t multiple Creators be involved?”
Craig: “My opinion is that Occam’s razor would shave away any additional creators.”
Strobel: “What’s Ockham’s razor?”
Craig: “It’s a scientific principle that says we should not multiply causes beyond what’s necessary to explain the effect. Since one Creator is sufficient to explain the effect, you would be unwarranted in going beyond the evidence to posit plurality...
“Well, it’s a universally accepted principle of scientific methodology. And besides, the kalam argument can’t prove everything about the Creator. Nothing restricts us from looking at wider considerations. For instance, Jesus of Nazareth proclaimed the truth of monotheism, and he was vindicated by his resurrection from the dead, for which we have convincing historical evidence. Consequently, we have good grounds for believing that what he said was true.”
— William Lane Craig, PhD, ThD (quoted by Lee Strobel), A Case for a Creator, Zondervan, 2004 p115
Strobel: “Why does it have to be one Creator? Why couldn’t multiple Creators be involved?”
Craig: “My opinion is that Occam’s razor would shave away any additional creators.”
Strobel: “What’s Ockham’s razor?”
Craig: “It’s a scientific principle that says we should not multiply causes beyond what’s necessary to explain the effect. Since one Creator is sufficient to explain the effect, you would be unwarranted in going beyond the evidence to posit plurality...
“Well, it’s a universally accepted principle of scientific methodology. And besides, the kalam argument can’t prove everything about the Creator. Nothing restricts us from looking at wider considerations. For instance, Jesus of Nazareth proclaimed the truth of monotheism, and he was vindicated by his resurrection from the dead, for which we have convincing historical evidence. Consequently, we have good grounds for believing that what he said was true.”
— William Lane Craig, PhD, ThD (quoted by Lee Strobel), A Case for a Creator, Zondervan, 2004 p115
Elmer Leon Towns, American professor of theology & pastor, 1932-
“God is one. ‘Here, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD.’ (Deut. 6:4) There can be only one God. To speak of more than only one supreme, absolute, perfect and almighty Being makes about as much sense as talking about a square circle. The meaning of words would become useless and truth would collapse...
“When we talk about the Trinity, we are still talking about one God, but three Persons...
“Polytheism teaches many gods, and it is a denial of the Being of God. Tritheism teaches three gods, and it is not true for the same reason. Dualism teaches two independent divine beings, and that also falls for lack of an axiology. The multiplication of gods is a self-contradiction. There can only be one supreme, absolute, perfect, and almighty being. To say that there are two or more gods, is to say that one means two or more. To do so defies logic, and rationality...
“The Unity of God means He is before all things as their vital, sustaining, and intelligent First Cause. When we recognize such a truth, we accept an intelligent system of the world that explains all the phenomena of universal being. When we accept a First Cause, we explain the unity of God’s plan in the world, that God is One, that He is the prototype and center of the entire universe. Finally, when we accept the First Cause, we accept the unity of God’s design in providence that all things willing or unwilling, active or passive, work in concerted action for the accomplishment of His design.”
— Elmer L. Towns, Theology for Today, Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2002 p107-108
“God is one. ‘Here, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD.’ (Deut. 6:4) There can be only one God. To speak of more than only one supreme, absolute, perfect and almighty Being makes about as much sense as talking about a square circle. The meaning of words would become useless and truth would collapse...
“When we talk about the Trinity, we are still talking about one God, but three Persons...
“Polytheism teaches many gods, and it is a denial of the Being of God. Tritheism teaches three gods, and it is not true for the same reason. Dualism teaches two independent divine beings, and that also falls for lack of an axiology. The multiplication of gods is a self-contradiction. There can only be one supreme, absolute, perfect, and almighty being. To say that there are two or more gods, is to say that one means two or more. To do so defies logic, and rationality...
“The Unity of God means He is before all things as their vital, sustaining, and intelligent First Cause. When we recognize such a truth, we accept an intelligent system of the world that explains all the phenomena of universal being. When we accept a First Cause, we explain the unity of God’s plan in the world, that God is One, that He is the prototype and center of the entire universe. Finally, when we accept the First Cause, we accept the unity of God’s design in providence that all things willing or unwilling, active or passive, work in concerted action for the accomplishment of His design.”
— Elmer L. Towns, Theology for Today, Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, 2002 p107-108
9. Rebuttal:
Argument from Agnosticism
Argument from Agnosticism
Summary:
The answer may be unknowable, or perhaps it is knowable but not through the reasoning and methods that mankind is presently using or capable of.
Robin Le Poidevin, British professor of metaphysics, 1962-
“Even so, if everyone were to agree that theism is either false or meaningless, the practising atheist will probably not mind which, and be content to leave it to philosophers to argue the toss. The point is that theism seems definitely ruled out. In addition, it looks as if there is an argument here to the effect that agnosticism is actually self-defeating. For agnosticism is based on the reflection that what evidence we have
does not unambiguously favour either theism or atheism. But if it turns out that no possible evidence would help us decide, then theism is unverifiable and so, according to the verifiability criterion, meaningless. And if it is meaningless, then it cannot be said that we do not know whether it is true or false. So the grounds for agnosticism threaten to make it redundant.
“However, we shouldn’t feel forced by the criterion of verifiability to dismiss theism as meaningless. First, it seems reasonable to ask whether the criterion applies to itself: is there any way of verifying that the principle is true? If not, then, by its own lights, it seems that it must dismiss itself as meaningless. So let us say we try to verify it by looking at cases of sentences we would be inclined (prior to applying any principle) to think of as meaningful. As long as we stick to ordinary statements like ‘there is an unopened tin of tomatoes in the left-hand cupboard,’ the criterion is safe: statements like that clearly satisfy it. But what if we encounter more controversial statements such as ‘there is a transcendent creator’? Do we say, since the criterion does not apply to it, this statement is not meaningful at all? Or do we say, since this sentence is meaningful, there must be something wrong with the criterion? If we are in the business of testing the criterion, rather than just assuming its truth, the latter response will remain a possibility.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p81-82
“It is a big advantage to atheism that it is widely regarded as the default position. This almost orthodox view goes as follows. Atheism doesn’t require defence. Rather, it is up to theists to convince us that there is a God. Unless they can do so, we can remain comfortable in our disbelief. Only if they produce a really compelling argument in favour are we obliged to stir ourselves and show just where the argument fails. If there’s room for doubt (and there’s always room for doubt over arguments for God) then the rational thing is to be atheist. And this, of course, makes agnosticism completely redundant. For agnosticism concedes – it is integral to the position, indeed – that there is room for doubt where arguments for the existence of God are concerned. Maybe there’s something in some of them – who knows? But if doubt returns us to the default setting, then that takes us to atheism, not agnosticism. This is the presumption of atheism.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p46
“Even so, if everyone were to agree that theism is either false or meaningless, the practising atheist will probably not mind which, and be content to leave it to philosophers to argue the toss. The point is that theism seems definitely ruled out. In addition, it looks as if there is an argument here to the effect that agnosticism is actually self-defeating. For agnosticism is based on the reflection that what evidence we have
does not unambiguously favour either theism or atheism. But if it turns out that no possible evidence would help us decide, then theism is unverifiable and so, according to the verifiability criterion, meaningless. And if it is meaningless, then it cannot be said that we do not know whether it is true or false. So the grounds for agnosticism threaten to make it redundant.
“However, we shouldn’t feel forced by the criterion of verifiability to dismiss theism as meaningless. First, it seems reasonable to ask whether the criterion applies to itself: is there any way of verifying that the principle is true? If not, then, by its own lights, it seems that it must dismiss itself as meaningless. So let us say we try to verify it by looking at cases of sentences we would be inclined (prior to applying any principle) to think of as meaningful. As long as we stick to ordinary statements like ‘there is an unopened tin of tomatoes in the left-hand cupboard,’ the criterion is safe: statements like that clearly satisfy it. But what if we encounter more controversial statements such as ‘there is a transcendent creator’? Do we say, since the criterion does not apply to it, this statement is not meaningful at all? Or do we say, since this sentence is meaningful, there must be something wrong with the criterion? If we are in the business of testing the criterion, rather than just assuming its truth, the latter response will remain a possibility.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p81-82
“It is a big advantage to atheism that it is widely regarded as the default position. This almost orthodox view goes as follows. Atheism doesn’t require defence. Rather, it is up to theists to convince us that there is a God. Unless they can do so, we can remain comfortable in our disbelief. Only if they produce a really compelling argument in favour are we obliged to stir ourselves and show just where the argument fails. If there’s room for doubt (and there’s always room for doubt over arguments for God) then the rational thing is to be atheist. And this, of course, makes agnosticism completely redundant. For agnosticism concedes – it is integral to the position, indeed – that there is room for doubt where arguments for the existence of God are concerned. Maybe there’s something in some of them – who knows? But if doubt returns us to the default setting, then that takes us to atheism, not agnosticism. This is the presumption of atheism.”
— Robin Le Poidevin, Agnosticism: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, 2020 p46
Sir Alfred Jules "Freddie" Ayer (A.J. Ayer), English philosopher & humanist, 1910-1989
“What is not so generally recognized is that there can be no way of proving that the existence of a god, such as the God of Christianity, is even probable. Yet this also is easily shown. For if the existence of such a god were probable, then the proposition that he existed would be an empirical hypothesis. And in that case it would be possible to deduce from it, and other empirical hypotheses, certain experiential propositions which were not deducible from those other hypotheses alone. But in fact this is not possible. It is sometimes claimed, indeed, that the existence of a certain sort of regularity in nature constitutes sufficient evidence for the existence of a god. But if the sentence ‘God exists’ entails no more than that certain types of phenomena occur in certain sequences, then to assert the existence of a god will be simply equivalent to asserting that there is the requisite regularity in nature; and no religious man would admit that this was all he intended to assert in asserting the existence of a god. He would say that in talking about God he was talking about a transcendent being who might be known through certain empirical manifestations, but certainly could not be defined in terms of those manifestations. But in that case the term ‘god’ is a metaphysical term. And if ‘god’ is a metaphysical term, then it cannot even be probable that a god exists. For to say that ‘God exists’ is to make a metaphysical utterance which cannot be either true or false...
“It is important not to confuse this view of religious assertions with the view that is adopted by atheists or agnostics. For it is characteristic of an agnostic to hold that the existence of a god is a possibility in which there is no good reason either to believe or disbelieve; and it is a characteristic of an atheist to hold that it is at least probable that no god exists. And our view that all utterances about the nature of God are nonsensical, so far from being identical with, or even lending support to, either of these familiar contentions, is actually incompatible with them.
“It is important not to confuse this view of religious assertions with the view that is adopted by atheists, or agnostics. For it is characteristic of an agnostic to hold that the existence of a god is a possibility in which there is no good reason either to believe or disbelieve; and it is characteristic of an atheist to hold that it is at least probable that no god exists. And our view that all utterances about the nature of God are nonsensical, so far from being identical with, or even lending any support to, either of these familiar contentions, is actually incompatible with them. For it the assertion that there is a god is nonsensical, then the atheist’s assertion that there is no god is equally nonsensical, since it is only a significant proposition that can be significantly contradicted. As for the agnostic, although he refrains from saying either that there is or that there is not a god, he does not deny that the two sentences ‘There is a transcendent god’ and ‘There is no transcendent god’ express propositions one of which is actually true and the other false. All he says is that we have no means of telling which of them is true, and therefore ought not to commit ourselves to either. But we have seen that the sentences in question do not express propositions at all. And this means that agnosticism also is ruled out.”
— A.J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic, Penguin Books, 1936 p152-153
“What is not so generally recognized is that there can be no way of proving that the existence of a god, such as the God of Christianity, is even probable. Yet this also is easily shown. For if the existence of such a god were probable, then the proposition that he existed would be an empirical hypothesis. And in that case it would be possible to deduce from it, and other empirical hypotheses, certain experiential propositions which were not deducible from those other hypotheses alone. But in fact this is not possible. It is sometimes claimed, indeed, that the existence of a certain sort of regularity in nature constitutes sufficient evidence for the existence of a god. But if the sentence ‘God exists’ entails no more than that certain types of phenomena occur in certain sequences, then to assert the existence of a god will be simply equivalent to asserting that there is the requisite regularity in nature; and no religious man would admit that this was all he intended to assert in asserting the existence of a god. He would say that in talking about God he was talking about a transcendent being who might be known through certain empirical manifestations, but certainly could not be defined in terms of those manifestations. But in that case the term ‘god’ is a metaphysical term. And if ‘god’ is a metaphysical term, then it cannot even be probable that a god exists. For to say that ‘God exists’ is to make a metaphysical utterance which cannot be either true or false...
“It is important not to confuse this view of religious assertions with the view that is adopted by atheists or agnostics. For it is characteristic of an agnostic to hold that the existence of a god is a possibility in which there is no good reason either to believe or disbelieve; and it is a characteristic of an atheist to hold that it is at least probable that no god exists. And our view that all utterances about the nature of God are nonsensical, so far from being identical with, or even lending support to, either of these familiar contentions, is actually incompatible with them.
“It is important not to confuse this view of religious assertions with the view that is adopted by atheists, or agnostics. For it is characteristic of an agnostic to hold that the existence of a god is a possibility in which there is no good reason either to believe or disbelieve; and it is characteristic of an atheist to hold that it is at least probable that no god exists. And our view that all utterances about the nature of God are nonsensical, so far from being identical with, or even lending any support to, either of these familiar contentions, is actually incompatible with them. For it the assertion that there is a god is nonsensical, then the atheist’s assertion that there is no god is equally nonsensical, since it is only a significant proposition that can be significantly contradicted. As for the agnostic, although he refrains from saying either that there is or that there is not a god, he does not deny that the two sentences ‘There is a transcendent god’ and ‘There is no transcendent god’ express propositions one of which is actually true and the other false. All he says is that we have no means of telling which of them is true, and therefore ought not to commit ourselves to either. But we have seen that the sentences in question do not express propositions at all. And this means that agnosticism also is ruled out.”
— A.J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic, Penguin Books, 1936 p152-153