Austin Dacey and William Lane Craig talking about proving God does or doesn't exist.
If you are familiar with this blog, you will know I think we can prove beyond reasonable doubt that there is no God just by appeal to empirical evidence (and I also think it is possible to prove there is no God by conceptual means). See The God of Eth.
Incidentally, I think maybe Dacey at the beginning misses out a third kind of proof that X does not exist. He mentions:
(i) conceptual proofs
(ii) proofs based on looking for a thing and failing to find it (note this seems to require X be observable, which God supposedly isn't)
But there is also this method:
(iii) show that if there were an X, there would not be Y (Y being observable). Y is observed to exist. Therefore X does not exist.
Note that (ii) takes absence of evidence to be (under certain circumstances) evidence of absence, whereas (iii) does not. My God of Eth "proof" is of the third kind.
P.S. Perhaps (ii) should also include: if there is an X, there would be Y (observable). Y is not observed. Therefore X does not exist. This does not require God be observable (as Dacey's formulation seems to require). But it is not as effective as (iii), as one might insist that our failure to observe Y does not show Y does not exist (again, we are still treating absence of evidence as evidence of absence). However, if Y were something that would be observable everywhere if God existed, such as "an absence of gratuitous evil", then the observation that there is no absence of gratuitous evil round here would directly entail there's no God. (iii) thus becomes a variant of (ii) after all.
If you are familiar with this blog, you will know I think we can prove beyond reasonable doubt that there is no God just by appeal to empirical evidence (and I also think it is possible to prove there is no God by conceptual means). See The God of Eth.
Incidentally, I think maybe Dacey at the beginning misses out a third kind of proof that X does not exist. He mentions:
(i) conceptual proofs
(ii) proofs based on looking for a thing and failing to find it (note this seems to require X be observable, which God supposedly isn't)
But there is also this method:
(iii) show that if there were an X, there would not be Y (Y being observable). Y is observed to exist. Therefore X does not exist.
Note that (ii) takes absence of evidence to be (under certain circumstances) evidence of absence, whereas (iii) does not. My God of Eth "proof" is of the third kind.
P.S. Perhaps (ii) should also include: if there is an X, there would be Y (observable). Y is not observed. Therefore X does not exist. This does not require God be observable (as Dacey's formulation seems to require). But it is not as effective as (iii), as one might insist that our failure to observe Y does not show Y does not exist (again, we are still treating absence of evidence as evidence of absence). However, if Y were something that would be observable everywhere if God existed, such as "an absence of gratuitous evil", then the observation that there is no absence of gratuitous evil round here would directly entail there's no God. (iii) thus becomes a variant of (ii) after all.
Comments
Just suppose this is true. Our entire universe exists inside inside another universe, created by beings of that other universe. They've chosen the initial conditions of our universe, and its natural laws, based on what's most likely to lead to sentient self-aware life forms. But once our universe starts, they're powerless to intervene. Are they gods?
But in any case he above discussion takes for granted the God in question is the Judeo-Christian God.
FWIW I tend to agree but a professional opinion would be interesting.
In case (ii) can we not take the evidence of absence to be quite strong under specific restrictions . e.g I cannot look for evidence of God everywhere but I could say be fairly definite He wasn't in a particular region of space and time?
I think Karen Armstrong covers this best in her book The History of God, where she points out that some of the 'prophets' or writers projected onto God the same character dispositions that they themselves possessed, or reflected the issues that they were dealing with in their own lives. This is not a central theme in her book, by the way; she just gives a couple of examples. Though I have to admit it's a number of years since I read it, and I no longer have a copy.
But I don't believe this addresses the question of a metaphysical entity for want of a better term. There are many religions where God is not a 'Creator' but people still believe in a metaphysical realm, which we would call Heaven. I'm thinking of the Chinese concept of Tao for example, which seems to me to represent a perfect world not unlike Plato's. It's just that in the West, because of our Christian heritage, we give this world a persona, and call it God.
Regards, Paul.
1. Nothing is demonstrable, unless the contrary is a contradiction.
2. Whatever we conceive as existent, we can also conceive as non existent.
3. Deductive arguments for the existence of God attempt to demonstrate the existence of God.
4. There is no contradiction in denying that God exists. This follows from 2.
5. Therefore, deductive arguments for the existence of God fail as demonstrations because if they were sound, they would necessarily follow and could not be denied without contradiction.
6. God’s existence is not necessary, this follows from 2, we can conceive God as not existing and 5, deductive arguments for the existence of God can be denied without contradiction.
7. Ontological arguments argue that if God exists, then God necessarily exists.
8. If God doesn’t necessarily exist, then God doesn’t exist. Contra positive of 7.
9. God doesn’t exist. This follows from 6 and 8.
http://philosophicalneuron.blogspot.com/2009/05/silly-argument-against-existence-of.html
Anyway, this won't cause anyone to stop believing I'm sure. :)
But in the end, isn't that what ii really states. Think about it, when we say, "We observe X," aren't we really saying, "we perceive the effects of X." I don't actually "see" a tree, I perceive the visible light reflected off the tree. With a neutrino, I can neither see it nor can I see visible light reflected off of it. What I can observe is an electromagnetic radiation being detected on an instrument after it has interacted with another particle.
Therefore I think that, "if there is an X, there would be Y (observable)," is just a scientifically more precise statement of ii.
As for Georges' aliens or deistic gods who created the conditions for the Big Bang and then never interacted with the natural universe again, I use the probability analysis (as Stephen put it, beyond a reasonable doubt). The human brain can create a virtually innumerable group of entities and phenomena which can not be empirically tested.
Out of all of the ones it has invented to date, how many have been demonstrated?
Based on all probabilities, it is then reasonable to conclude that any hypothesis, that has no concrete evidence to support it and no way to falsify it, is in fact false (guess I really can't blame a unicorn for stealing socks out of my dryer).
This alleged god doesn't seem to affect anything.
So why does the existence of this god matter?
So why does the existence of this god matter? I guess that if one can reasonably deny that it's possible for God to exist, it makes the case for belief being rational a lost cause. I guess then believers would become fideists anyway....
Of course, there's the intellectual challange that these arguments present. For some, it's fun to figure out if they work or not.