INDISPUTABLE Rational Proof That God Exists (Or Existed)

[SkepticThinker]

The concept of eternal time is logicall absurd. The concept of God existing before time is logically sound.

How's that?

 

[1robin]

Ahh, the old "atheists don't believe in god because they don't want to be accountable to anyone" garbage.

I'm not even sure why I dignified such a terrible argument with a response, except to expose it for what it is. Garbage.

That was an evidenced based claim and whether mantra or not is a fact. Does garbage need to be called garbage? However non-garbage that is so inconvenient that only it's false label as garbage would require labeling garbage. I also stated it was in every case I know of and there are plenty non-voluntary or realized. No, I do not think atheists are sitting around thinking "I sure do hate accountability" so God is out. I think it (and know it is in many cases (at least a hundred without exception) is a result of blindness that the Bible calls a spiritual darkness. Which is why Paul claimed he had new eyes to see and new ears to hear. From my own experience it is like being in a delusion that is undetectable until removed.

 

[SkepticThinker]

Energy of all types known also obeys thermodynamics. The means thing in all of the universe are on average slowing down, burning out, getting cold, etc.. Yet when the universe is examined things are in a very young would up state. The only things that gets you out of this is oscillating universes which besides having no evidence only kicks the can down the road because oscillations are not perfectly efficient.

.

Not quite.

Consider again, Victor Stenger:

"Another prediction of the creator hypothesis also fails to be confirmed by the data. If the universe were created, then it should have possessed some degree of order at the creation––the design that was inserted at that point by the Grand Designer. This expectation of order is usually expressed in terms of the second law of thermodynamics, which states that the total entropy or disorder of a closed system must remain constant or increase with time. It would seem to follow that if the universe today is a closed system, it could not always have been so. At some point in the past, order must have been imparted from the outside.

Prior to 1929, this was a strong argument for a creation. However, in that year astronomer Edwin Hubble reported that the galaxies are moving away from one another at speeds approximately proportional to their distance, indicating that the universe is expanding. This formed the earliest evidence for the big bang. For example, an expanding universe can have started in total chaos and still form localized order consistent with the second law.

The simplest way to see this is with a (literally) homey example. Suppose that whenever you clean your house, you empty the collected rubbish by tossing it out the window into your yard. Eventually the yard would be filled with rubbish. However, you can continue doing this with a simple expedient. Just keep buying up the land around your house and you will always have more room to toss the rubbish. You are able to maintain localized order––in your house––at the expense of increased disorder in the rest of the universe.

Similarly, parts of the universe can become more orderly as the rubbish, or entropy, produced during the ordering process (think of it as disorder being removed from the system being ordered) is tossed out into the larger, ever-expanding surrounding space. The total entropy of the universe increases as the universe expands, as required by the second law. However, the maximum possible entropy increases even faster leaving increasingly more room for order to form. The reason for this is that the maximum entropy of a sphere of a certain radius (we are thinking of the universe as a sphere) is that of a black hole of that radius. The expanding universe is not a black hole and so has less than maximum entropy. Thus, while becoming more disorderly on the whole as time goes by, our expanding universe is not maximally disordered. But, once it was.

Suppose we extrapolate the expansion back 13.7 billion years to the earliest definable moment when the universe was confined to the smallest possible region of space that can be operationally defined, a Planck sphere that has a radius equal to the Planck length, 1.6 x 10-35 meter. As expected from the second law, the universe at that time had lower entropy than it has now. However, that entropy was also as high as it possibly could have been for an object that small, because a sphere of Planck dimensions is equivalent to a black hole.

This may require further elaboration. We seem to be saying that the entropy of the universe was maximal when the universe began, yet it has been increasing ever since. Indeed, that’s exactly what we are saying. When the universe began, its entropy was the highest it could be for an object of that size, because the universe was equivalent to a black hole from which no information can be extracted.
Currently, the entropy is higher, but not maximal, that is, not as high as it could be for an object of the universe’s current size. The universe is no longer a black hole.
When, at the beginning of the big bang, the entropy was maximal, the disorder was complete and no structure was present. So, the universe began with no structure, but has structure today because its entropy is no longer maximal.

In short, according to our best current cosmological understanding, our universe began with no structure or organization, designed or otherwise. It was a state of chaos.

We are thus forced to conclude that the order we now observe could not have been the result of any initial design built into the universe at the so-called creation. The universe preserves no record of what went on before the big bang. The creator, if he existed, left no imprint. "

Chapter in The Improbability of God, eds

 

[1robin]

How's that?

An infinite number of past seconds can't possibly be traversed. What ever created time must be independent of it.

 

[SkepticThinker]

You can find massive amounts of people on both sides. The argument is still relevant and debated today. A link to an opposing opinion is not an argument. If you wish pick an aspect of the contention and post it. The claim is so dang simple it is almost bullet proof. Normally only semantic based opposition even exists. Give me you best one.

His premises are based on unfounded assumptions.

That was easy.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

An infinite number of past seconds can't possibly be traversed. What ever created time must be independent of it.

If God can exist without a cause, why can't time, space, or the entire universe itself? Why do any of those things HAVE TO have a source if God doesn't?

 

[1robin]

If God can exist without a cause, why can't time, space, or the entire universe itself? Why do any of those things HAVE TO have a source if God doesn't?

The theory is very very simple and also a classic of philosophy that goes back to Greece and is still debated today.

1. Time, space, and matter can't be infinite because infinites can't be traversed.
2. They must have had a beginning.
3. Anything that began to exist must have a cause (no known exceptions even in the quantum are known).
4. Time space and matter must have a cause.
5. God did not begin to exist.
6. God is outside and independent of time so there exists no need to traverse anything.
7. God needs no cause and is eternal.

You can refuse to believe it but no effectual argument exists against the logic, though some very desperate and bad ones do. Not one known fact contradicts a single claim I made.

 

[1robin]

His premises are based on unfounded assumptions.

That was easy.

Baseless assertions usually are. Apparently that is why your side so frequently uses them. There is not even a necessity for the slightest evidence in that case. Yes it is quite easy and also quite impotent. You keep this up and you will get my favorite poem at least once in response and I know you can't stand that. You showed up too late for me anyway I am leaving and it appears won't miss much. BTW I asked for the best, was this actually it?

 

[SkepticThinker]

That was an evidenced based claim and whether mantra or not is a fact.

And what evidence would that be??

Does garbage need to be called garbage?

Yes!!

However non-garbage that is so inconvenient that only it's false label as garbage would require labeling garbage. I also stated it was in every case I know of and there are plenty non-voluntary or realized. No, I do not think atheists are sitting around thinking "I sure do hate accountability" so God is out. I think it (and know it is in many cases (at least a hundred without exception) is a result of blindness that the Bible calls a spiritual darkness. Which is why Paul claimed he had new eyes to see and new ears to hear. From my own experience it is like being in a delusion that is undetectable until removed.

Oh, have you performed a study on the subject? What are these cases you speak of?

"Spiritual darkness" is just different terminology for "atheists don't believe because they don't want to be accountable to god," and it's still nonsense, imo. I don't believe because I don't see any evidence that convinces me that I should believe. It's the exact same reason you don't believe in unicorns.

I am accountable to every other person on the planet. I know it. And I try to act like it.

 

[Enai de a lukal]

No, I do not think atheists are sitting around thinking "I sure do hate accountability" so God is out. I think it (and know it is in many cases (at least a hundred without exception) is a result of blindness that the Bible calls a spiritual darkness. Which is why Paul claimed he had new eyes to see and new ears to hear. From my own experience it is like being in a delusion that is undetectable until removed.

Of course, this is a ridiculous description- and you likely know that; its purpose is entirely rhetorical.

As a matter of psychological fact, most people who are atheists are atheists for the same sorts of reasons that people who are theists are theists- they were raised that way, or they have decided that that is the most likely position. And calling this determination "blindness" or "delusion" is simple partisan pettiness- it clearly isn't blindness, since after thousands of years, the debate over whether God exists rages on, and so far no one has been able to produce conclusive evidence or proof that God exists. Not only that, but the absolute poverty of evidence for the existence of God is so stark that many theists have even conceded that belief in God is purely a matter of faith.

When atheism is a matter of conscious decision (rather than upbringing), it is typically the result of critical thinking- seeing through the absolutely flimsy justifications that are offered for belief in God- clearly, this is not a matter of blindness, but an unwillingness to believe in things unseen or unheard.

 

[SkepticThinker]

The theory is very very simple and also a classic of philosophy that goes back to Greece and is still debated today.

1. Time, space, and matter can't be infinite because infinites can't be traversed.
2. They must have had a beginning.
3. Anything that began to exist must have a cause (no known exceptions even in the quantum are known).
4. Time space and matter must have a cause.
5. God did not begin to exist.
6. God is outside and independent of time so there exists no need to traverse anything.
7. God needs no cause and is eternal.

You can refuse to believe it but no effectual argument exists against the logic, though some very desperate and bad ones do. Not one known fact contradicts a single claim I made.

I beg to differ.

Just on #3 alone, consider again, Victor Stenger:

"In fact, physical events at the atomic and subatomic level are observed to have no evident cause. For example, when an atom in an excited energy level drops to a lower level and emits a photon, a particle of light, we find no cause of that event. Similarly, no cause is evident in the decay of a radioactive nucleus."

-God: The Failed Hypothesis, Victor Stenger

 

[SkepticThinker]

Baseless assertions usually are. Apparently that is why your side so frequently uses them. There is not even a necessity for the slightest evidence in that case. Yes it is quite easy and also quite impotent. You keep this up and you will get my favorite poem at least once in response and I know you can't stand that. You showed up too late for me anyway I am leaving and it appears won't miss much. BTW I asked for the best, was this actually it?

Yes, it is.

He takes all of his premises to be self-evident, which of course, they are not. Kinda makes the argument useless.

 

[Meow Mix]

The theory is very very simple and also a classic of philosophy that goes back to Greece and is still debated today.

1. Time, space, and matter can't be infinite because infinites can't be traversed.
2. They must have had a beginning.
3. Anything that began to exist must have a cause (no known exceptions even in the quantum are known).
4. Time space and matter must have a cause.
5. God did not begin to exist.
6. God is outside and independent of time so there exists no need to traverse anything.
7. God needs no cause and is eternal.

You can refuse to believe it but no effectual argument exists against the logic, though some very desperate and bad ones do. Not one known fact contradicts a single claim I made.

(1) is incorrect. This is falling into the same trap Zeno did with his paradoxes. There is no reason why there couldn't have been an infinite past or an infinite future, for instance -- the counter-argument usually looks something like "but you'd never get to NOW because you'd have to cross infinity to get here!"

But this is poor reasoning: this is thinking of time like a line with a point of origin on the infinite left (if left is "past"). Yet this is not the correct way to treat infinite time. Infinity is not an amount; yet that is the mistake this very common erroneous line of thinking makes.

Any point on an infinite timeline will be followed by another point; and there's no reason why this point wouldn't be that following point. The argument that "infinities can't be traversed" is a very common, very old -- but erroneous misunderstanding of how infinities work.

Aside from that, there is no guarantee that a necessary ontological thing would be a *being* (a God): in fact, there's not too many reasons to suppose a necessary thing WOULD be a being. So even using the necessary foundation argument doesn't help theism at all because the theist is simply assuming that the necessary foundation is God; yet fail to demonstrate why it would have to be a deity rather than a non-deity.

---
Edit: Sorry for the redundancy, I'm at work and was dealing with multiple interruptions to my train of thought

 

[Agnostic75]

He will not lie.......

Better stated, he will not lie, and he does not have the capacity to lie, partly because the Bible says that he cannot lie, and partly because William Lane Craig says that God is the greatest conceivable being. Craig obviously believes that God does not have the capacity to lie.

.......AND (not because) lying is not a logical possibility for him (the same as square circles).

Lying is not a logical possibility for God, as Craig, and many millions of other Christians would tell you.

Square circles is not a logical possibility.

Omnibenevolence by definition requires consistency, as does Craig's "greatest conceivable being" argument.

Therefore that is not an argument that he has no freewill.

Yes it is.

I just remembered that capacity and possibility are also independent. Even if I could not lift a rock, lie, or anything other action you could name that does not mean I could not will it.

But God is not even able to want to lie since his omnibenevolent nature consistently prevents him from wanting to oppose his own nature.

Freedom to choose has nothing to do with the capacity to carry it out.

The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines the word "choose" as "to select freely and after consideration." That does not apply to God since choice implies options. Since God must tell the truth, he has no other options. Since God has always known everything, there has never been anything for him to consider since he has always known which option is best.

Even if God can't actually lie does not mean that he could not will to do so. That is not a statement of facts about God but is a statement about the facts of freewill. You can't use an argument about ability to dictate a claim about will.

God is not even able to want to lie since his omnibenevolent nature consistently prevents him from wanting to oppose his own nature, and since William Lane Craig says that God is the greatest conceivable being.

If for the sake of argument God can want to lie, but is not able to lie, you still would not have a rational basis for loving him since he has no choice except to keep his promise to give Christians eternal life.

As you probably know, distinguished scholar, college professor, and author J. P. Moreland is a close associate of William Lane Craig, and that they have co-authored at least one book together. Moreland has very impressive academic credentials. In a Youtube video at
Is God Perfect J. P. Moreland - YouTube, he discusses the perfection of God. He says that God is the greatest possible being, and cannot improve. That certainly implies that God is not able to lie, and is not even able to want to lie.

An article at Reading The Summa: Question 4 - God's Perfection says:

"Aquinas argues.......that since God is the first efficient cause of created things, and since causes contain their effects, therefore God must contain the perfections of all created things in the highest manner possible."

Aquinas' "in the highest manner possible" is similar to Craig's "greatest conceivable being," and Moreland's "greatest possible being." Such a being could not possibly ever want to lie, let alone ever tell a lie. J. P. Moreland said it the best when he said that God cannot improve.

 

[Agnostic75]

I believe [God] lying will fall under logical impossibilities like square circles.

You just refuted your previous comments, which were:

He may be perfectly evil. He may be perfectly ambiguous. He may be able to change the nature of truth itself.

William Lane Craig, Ravi Zacharias, and J. P. Moreland would certainly disagree with that.

 

[Thief]

If God has no choice except to be good, what is wrong with that?

Wasn't pointing to the nature of God as much as His adherence to His creation.

Have you read the preamble of Job?

If God cannot set aside His own standard.....adheres to 'as it is'.....only.....

The grace and mercy are not in the scheme of things as we approach.

No one is good but the Father.....so I've heard.

Make presentation as described in Job....without expectation of objection?
I think not.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

The theory is very very simple and also a classic of philosophy that goes back to Greece and is still debated today.

1. Time, space, and matter can't be infinite because infinites can't be traversed.
2. They must have had a beginning.
3. Anything that began to exist must have a cause (no known exceptions even in the quantum are known).
4. Time space and matter must have a cause.
5. God did not begin to exist.
6. God is outside and independent of time so there exists no need to traverse anything.
7. God needs no cause and is eternal.

You can refuse to believe it but no effectual argument exists against the logic, though some very desperate and bad ones do. Not one known fact contradicts a single claim I made.

That whole argument is a baseless assumption of linear time, which infinite time certainly wouldn't be...

 

[Agnostic75]

Wasn't pointing to the nature of God as much as His adherence to His creation.

If God cannot set aside His own standard.......

Are you saying that God is able to tell lies? The Bible says that God cannot lie. If God cannot lie, how can he have free will regarding his character?

You have a very strange way of communicating. I do not understand much of what you say.

 

[I.S.L.A.M617]

Are you saying that God is able to tell lies? The Bible says that God cannot lie. If God cannot lie, how can he have free will regarding his character?

You have a very strange way of communicating. I do not understand much of what you say.

God can too lie... He told us he exists

 

[Thief]

Are you saying that God is able to tell lies? The Bible says that God cannot lie. If God cannot lie, how can he have free will regarding his character?

You have a very strange way of communicating. I do not understand much of what you say.

Try consideration that you are told what you might be able to deal with.

As the Carpenter said to His own.....
'I have told you the truth.....why do you not believe me?'