Proof God Exists

[DiscoDan]

i) If God does not exist, then it is not the case that if I pray, my prayers will be answered.

ii) I do not pray.

iii) Thus, God exists.

[Greg]

I don't get your logic... could you clarify?

[DarkSociologist]

DiscoDan,

Your proof is flawed due to a few reasons.

1) You assume that the answering of prayers is caused by God an no other. There are people here who believe that by simply believing in something (such as praying) will cause it to become reality. Based on the proof given, it is still possible that prayers are answered by something other than God.

In order to substantiate your proof, you also need to prove that prayers are only answered by God and no other.

2) Your second statment has no bearing on the first statement. What does you not praying have to do with prayers being/not being answered? The active action of praying is being tested, not the passive action of not praying.

This, of course, does not mean that I do not believe in God.

[DiscoDan]

To formalize, let:
G = "God exists",
P = "I pray", and
A = "my prayers are answered".

Then, by the premise, we have:
~G --> ~(P --> A) (premise)
~G --> ~(~P \/ A) (def'n of -->)
~G --> (P /\ ~S) (distributing the ~)
~P (given)
~(P /\ ~S) (since ~P)
~(~G) (I forget the name of this property. modus tollens maybe?)
G

Thus, God exists.

[DarkSociologist]

G --> (P --> A) is not logically equivalent to ~G --> ~(P --> A)

For example:

"If I am sleepy, then I will sleep"

S = "I am Sleepy"
W = "Will Sleep"

S --> W

But let's throw in "If I am bored, then I will sleep"

B = "I am bored"

B --> W

Since both B and S imply W, you cannot say ~S --> ~W because you're really saying

(~S)(B) ^ (~S)(~B) --> ~W, which is not true.

This is why you first need to prove that prayers are only answered by God

[Truefire]

I have a rock that repels bears.
1) if the rock does not repel bears, then if I don't have the rock, I won't be attacked by bears.
2)I don't have the rock
3)therefore, the rock repels bears?

[skinnyninja]

Nicely put with the rocks and bears.

This reminds me of one of the old arguments, I think it went something like:

Existence is a perfection (of sorts)
Existence exists
therefore God is perfect!

Or something like that. I had to learn it in philosophy class a million years ago and I managed to wrap my brain around it for a moment, I think. But there are flaws in it too, if I remember right.

I have since forgotten it. Anyone else remember what I'm talking about? Sorry I'm so crazy!

[Chris_1977]

Actually, both Discodan and Darksociologist are wrong. If we accept Discodans two premises, G indeed follows, but as Darksociologist points out, his reasoning is wrong.

~G --> ~(P --> A)

is equivalent to

(P->A) -> G

in classical logic (which I don't believe in, BTW). From ~P it follows that P->A. Combining this with (P->A) -> G, we have G.

[Truefire]

Originally Posted by skinnyninja

Nicely put with the rocks and bears.

This reminds me of one of the old arguments, I think it went something like:

Existence is a perfection (of sorts)
Existence exists
therefore God is perfect!

Or something like that. I had to learn it in philosophy class a million years ago and I managed to wrap my brain around it for a moment, I think. But there are flaws in it too, if I remember right.

I have since forgotten it. Anyone else remember what I'm talking about? Sorry I'm so crazy!

I not sure, but I remember something from a philosophy class that went like this.

assume God is perfect, in the highest sense of the word, pure and utter perfection. Omniscient, all powerful, all pervading, the ultimate. etc.

Human thought is bound by experience and previous thought. Try it, try to come up with a completely original thought that cannot be broken down into something that you have previously learned. Its impossible. It can't be done, original thought doesn't exist in a pure form, instead everything we think about is based on things that are already in our mind. Therefore anything that we can imagine, must be based on previously existing principles. The very fact that we can conceive of a perfect being means that a perfect being must exist. Therefore god must exist.

or something along those lines... There are holes I know, this is an incomplete translation at best. When my teacher taught it is felt nearly irrefutable. (even if I wasn't convinced )

[Mark Lapierre]

Originally Posted by Truefire

assume God is perfect, in the highest sense of the word, pure and utter perfection. Omniscient, all powerful, all pervading, the ultimate. etc.

Human thought is bound by experience and previous thought. Try it, try to come up with a completely original thought that cannot be broken down into something that you have previously learned. Its impossible. It can't be done, original thought doesn't exist in a pure form, instead everything we think about is based on things that are already in our mind. Therefore anything that we can imagine, must be based on previously existing principles. The very fact that we can conceive of a perfect being means that a perfect being must exist. Therefore god must exist.

or something along those lines... There are holes I know, this is an incomplete translation at best. When my teacher taught it is felt nearly irrefutable. (even if I wasn't convinced )

Holes, such as that the concept of a perfect being is still an amalgamation of other, smaller concepts. I.e., perfection, omniscience, all powerful, all pervading, being.

I choose to pray to the Flying Spaghetti Monster. By the same reasoning it must exist.

[One]

The real question is "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" It's been an open problem in the field for centuries.

[Mark Lapierre]

42. It all makes sense now! That was the right question!

[Wanderer]

The perfect God argument has got a formal name, I cant remember it at the moment.. Ontological Argument.

Guanilo, put forward a critique that goes like this...

I imagine a perfect island
It has monkey butlers, a rope swing, unlimited coconuts and it exists.

Obviously the problem with the ontological argument and the island argument is you cannot just add existence to a list of requirements for a perfect island, wikipedia is a good source of info on the subject.

Also it uses language to prove God, and this is dodgey in the extreme because applying our language to God in the first place is hard.

Wikipedia info Ontological argument - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I prefer the design argument - the chance of the Earth existing in the correct conditions for us and other animals to live is (1/2)^6000000
or 6 million coins all landing heads up, is it really possible that that chance happened?

[Mark Lapierre]

Originally Posted by Wanderer

I prefer the design argument - the chance of the Earth existing in the correct conditions for us and other animals to live is (1/2)^6000000
or 6 million coins all landing heads up, is it really possible that that chance happened?

I think it is possible, but since this is a thread about God, not the creation of the Earth, I'll leave it at that.

[Truefire]

Assuming time is infinite...then it had to happen sometime right?

[Billy]

Originally Posted by skinnyninja

Nicely put with the rocks and bears.

This reminds me of one of the old arguments, I think it went something like:

Existence is a perfection (of sorts)
Existence exists
therefore God is perfect!

Or something like that. I had to learn it in philosophy class a million years ago and I managed to wrap my brain around it for a moment, I think. But there are flaws in it too, if I remember right.

I have since forgotten it. Anyone else remember what I'm talking about? Sorry I'm so crazy!

What if existence is deeply flawed? Then existence exists, God is existence and god is imperfection.

[Mark Lapierre]

It seems a strange argument. I'd like to hear how existence could be either perfect or imperfect. As far as I understand, existence defines a state of being. Something is, or it isn't, there's no grey area, no greater or lesser state, and therefore no perfection or imperfection.

[ethereal]

I think all that's needed is:

I exist.
I cannot create my own existence.
Therefore, God exists.

[skinnyninja]

I prefer the design argument - the chance of the Earth existing in the correct conditions for us and other animals to live is (1/2)^6000000
or 6 million coins all landing heads up, is it really possible that that chance happened?

If the universe is infinite in time and space, then the probability of this happening isn't just good, it is certain.

[Mark Lapierre]

Originally Posted by ethereal

I think all that's needed is:

I exist.
I cannot create my own existence.
Therefore, God exists.

Who/what created God?

If your inability to create your own existence implies the existence of God, then God's existence must imply the existence of something greater than God. We're talking proof, not faith or personal belief, so this argument fails.

Mmmm, I like turtles.

[toolbaree]

Yes He does! Read on! With all respect to those who said no, this article and the link at the end explain the existance of God which I have no doubt about. I urge you to read this in full so please click on the link at the end of this page to keep reading about this interesting topic. Thanks for bringing this up.

Allah has sent down miracles, revelations and messengers to give clear proofs He exists and more important, what we should do once we come to this realization.

Allah has sent prophets and messengers with many proofs throughout the ages for people to be able to clearly see with their own eyes and to be able to use their own senses the miracles and proofs pointing to the fact, Allah does in fact, exist.

Miracles of prophets and messengers of Allah have come to people through the ages. Moses, peace be upon him, showed many miracles to pharoah and to the children of Israel. Plagues, locusts, water turning to blood, his stick becoming a snake, the voice in the burning bush and the parting of the Red Sea were are clear miracles for the people of Moses time.

Again, Allah sent Jesus, the son of Mary, peace be upon him, with clear miracles for the people of his time. Speaking from the cradle while still a new born infant, creating birds from clay, curing the sick, giving sight to the blind and even bringing a dead man back to life, were all clear signs to the people to know Jesus, peace be upon him, was a messenger of Allah as was Moses before him.

Muhammad, peace be upon him, was the last and final messenger of Allah, and he was sent to all of mankind. Allah sent him with a number of miracles, not the least of which was the Quran. The predictions and propheies of Muhammad, peace be upon him, have come true even in this century and the Quran has been used to convince even scientists of the existence of Allah.
[Please visit "Science Proves Allah": Watch video of famous scientists admit Quran is from Allah and even accept Islam]

The Quran is the best of proofs for the existence of Allah and today over one and half billion people memorize and rectie from the exact text, in the exact same language it was revealed in; Arabic. More than 10 million Muslims have completely memorized the entire Quran from cover to cover, and can recite it from memory without looking at it.

No one sees or hears Allah, not even the prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him. Nor are we able to use our senses to make some kind of contact with Him. However, we are encouraged in Islam to use our senses and our common sense to recognize all of this universe could not possibly come into existence on its own. Something had to design it all and then put it into motion. This is beyond our ability to do, yet it is something we can understand.

We know from the teachings of Muhammad, peace be upon him, the proofs for the existence of God (Allah) are most obvious to us in our everyday surroundings. Anyone with understanding would quickly acknowledge His existence provided they are not so stubborn as to ignore the obvious evidencers in front right in front of us.

We don't have to see an artist to recognize a painting, correct? So, if we see paintings without seeing artists painting them, in the same way, we can believe Allah created everything without having to see Him (or touch, or hear, etc.).

Read more and get closer to your true God here.

[escapee]

Now i have to adopt SR/LOA model (after reading the posts here ) so i can become a god of my own SR world . More power to me . I'm clearly inspired by Alaskan_Librarian

[Truefire]

ooooooh! I love dogma! Wicked movie too...

[Gabriel]

The Riddle of Epicurus

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence come the evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

[Lychee]

Originally Posted by Gabriel

The Riddle of Epicurus

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence come the evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

lol This riddle has flaws

[greatmind]

In my views the most solid proof of existence of God is consciousness. I am still amazed that from where consciousness emanates. You see a living body and the very next moment something happens and the same body becomes lump of matter and nothing else. It is only this consciousness which separates inanimate matter from animate matter.
We are conscious beings and definitely there must be a supreme consciousness from where all creation emanates, from where all consciousness emanates.

[arpee]

Originally Posted by DiscoDan

i) If God does not exist, then it is not the case that if I pray, my prayers will be answered.

ii) I do not pray.

iii) Thus, God exists.

i) is a false premise. You can pray and still have your prayers answered even if god doesn't exist, and you can pray and NOT have your prayers answered and god can still exist, so this is a false premise that god answers prayers all the time, or that god is responsible for all prayers...

Originally Posted by ethereal

I think all that's needed is:

I exist.
I cannot create my own existence.
Therefore, God exists.

Your logic is flawed. This would make more sense:

I exist.
I cannot create my own existence.
Therefore, someone else created my existence for me.

You can trace this back from your parents to your ancestors, you can trace it back to evolution and abiogenesis. Problem solved without a god.

I'm not saying that a god doesn't exist. I'm just saying that we already know where it all came from without filling in a god in the gaps...

Originally Posted by Lychee

lol This riddle has flaws

Where exactly are these flaws?

Originally Posted by greatmind

In my views the most solid proof of existence of God is consciousness. I am still amazed that from where consciousness emanates. You see a living body and the very next moment something happens and the same body becomes lump of matter and nothing else. It is only this consciousness which separates inanimate matter from animate matter.
We are conscious beings and definitely there must be a supreme consciousness from where all creation emanates, from where all consciousness emanates.

You might as well say that the wind is proof that god exist...

Because the wind exist there is obviously a supreme wind where all winds emerges from...

Um, no...

[desertrat]

I believe in a God I see as a creative life force of the cosmos. The only thing I can prove are my own thoughts and feelings. This is a 4 year old thread thanks for bring it back from old thread heaven great mind . desert rat

[sk8joyful]

Originally Posted by DarkSociologist

you first need to prove that
prayers are only answered by God

Many so called 'prayer-answers' have nothing to do with God.

Iow, answers came from other sources: satan's minions, or more often
(erroneous) beliefs & actions, screwing-up children.
But
God for sure exists, for IN-God we have our being...

[sk8joyful]

erm, it copied itself, lol