Today we are starting a series that deals with arguments for and against the existence of God. As I have already stated, there is no way to prove that there is no such thing as a supernatural being, since something supernatural would be inherently outside of the scope of our natural tests.
The question of the existence of a god or gods is not one that can be answered unless that being is defined. For the most part I will be focusing on the definition of God found in the monotheistic religions in general and Christianity in particular.
This God is described as:
- Omnipotent (All powerful)
- Omniscient (All knowing)
- Omnipresent (Present everywhere)
- All loving
- Just
- Merciful
- Compassionate
Now that we have a description we can logically test these specifics. It would be safe to say that if God (Yahweh) is none of these things, then he does not exist. Let’s start with a challenge to the justice and mercy of God.
The vast majority of Christians believe in a heaven and a hell with those who are saved going to heaven and those who are lost going to hell. For dualists (nearly all Christians) this is an eternal paradise and an eternal place of torment, while others such as Adventists who reject the concept of an immortal soul hold that those who are lost are resurrected, showed where they went wrong, then destroyed.
There is a disagreement in Christendom between freewill and predestination. Both groups would believe that I am going to hell since I am a former Christian who apostatized to atheism. I know that I am not the only former believer who wanted so badly to be able to continue to believe, but just couldn’t. Since there are the two views of how the saved and the lost are sifted, let’s see if either view is compatible with either a just or merciful view of God as it relates to the goddamn atheists.
Predestination
God arbitrarily chooses who will be saved (the elect) and who will be lost (everybody else). If you are among the elect then God gives you faith, otherwise you don’t have it. I won’t even worry about the question of if my election was withdrawn which caused me to loose my faith, since that is immaterial. According to this view, God chose to damn me. If there is eternal hell fire and I was chosen on a whim to be fuel for the fire, then that is simply sadistic. Even if the end for the lost is a instantaneous snuffing out, then that is quite arbitrary and is neither just nor merciful.
Freewill
God offers salvation to everybody who accepts it. If you choose to accept the gift then you are saved, if you choose to reject it then you are lost, but everybody chooses. According to this view, there should have been a day where I thought to myself, “Jesus, I don’t want your gift of salvation,” but I can assure you that day never happened. I went back and forth several times between varying levels of belief and disbelief, always wanting to believe. Then towards the end I was in a state of disbelief, while I was actively trying to choose to believe. My countless prayers asking God to take away my doubt and give me faith went unanswered. The only choice I made was to act with integrity and accept that I didn’t believe. If I am damned for my integrity and for prayers that went unanswered, then how could that be just or merciful?
If you have a rebuttal for this challenge then I invite you to present it in the comments.
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Hey Dustin,
Haven't talked/communicated with you in a while but I have dropped by this blog on occasion over the last couple months. I didn't know about your blog before this.
Anyways, I was a little confused by your last paragraph. Perhaps my confusion is related to my sleep deprivation. But why does the idea of freewill require one to have a day where one decides one doesn't want the gift of salvation? Most big decisions are, after all, the result of a long, drawn out thought process, right?
Or are you just saying that a decision to reject the "gift of salvation" is not the same as when an individual merely accepts that he or she is not convinced by the arguments that such a gift exists?
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Dustin,
You have brushed near a topic that I have wondered about for a long time. For a god to reward and punish people justly, the rewards and punishments must be the result of a choice made by free will (as you explain in your post). However, natural objects (those governed by the laws of physics) are either deterministic (like a rock dropped from a cliff which has no free will) or random (like some quantum mechanical measurements which has no free will). For people to have free will then, they are not natural. Instead, people must have some supernatural element in them which allows for this free will. Most Christians would probably call this supernatural element a soul. But how does this soul interact with the natural world without us noticing a violation in the laws of physics? It can not. Free will is a violation in the laws of physics. Pretty much what I am saying is, every time you "sin" your brain must be violating the laws of physics or it would be unjust for god to punish you for it. This means that at least one neuron in a "sinners" brain must be violating the laws of physics (which would be an observable event.) Therefor, if humans can ever monitor the neurons in a humans brain during the act of sinning to a high enough resolution that it can be determined that the laws of physics are being followed, then free will can be eliminated as a possible explanation for human behavior, and therefor a just god who punishes people can be eliminated as a possibility.
It may not be possible to eliminate the possibility of any god. But I think it is possible to experimentally eliminate the possibility of a just god who punishes us for our "choices."
Fellow readers, please debate this topic in the comments.
BP
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Jeff – You are right that it is a long drawn out process, one that took years for me. The concept of free will requires the ability to make a contra-causal decision. My desire to believe should have allowed me to believe, but it didn't. How could this be explained by free will?
Causation offers a much better explanation as my "free will" was violated by my own mind.
BP – I have a post that I wrote a while back that I never posted that deals with the issue of determinism. Our brains are electrochemical computers, so you are right that a soul would be required for free will, however even Adventists which reject the concept of a soul still believe in free will.
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Dustin – How do Adventist think that an electrochemical computer can have free will? When a computer gives the result of a computation nobody says "look at what that computer DECIDED to output." Computers, electrochemical or electronic, are deterministic machines and have no free will.
Also, why didn't you post what you wrote about determinism? It sounds interesting.
BP
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BP- It was taking a lot of work to refine. Since I'm on vacation this week I'll try to work on it and get it out soon. I think Adventists would go with it being a gift from God, so basically magic. JWooch and Jeff W, as a Medical Doctor and Medical Student, respectively, would probably be able to explain it better.
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Hi Dustin,
Been a while and I can't claim to have read all your reasoning so I'm probably going to end up pushing you on something you've already addressed, but here goes anyway…
If we are standing face to face and I chose to punch you in the nose have I exercised free will or was I compelled to do so on the basis of the laws of the physical universe? Further, if I was compelled on the basis of the laws of the physical universe and had no choice/free will should I be cu.pable for my behavior? If there is no culpability for behavior is there any reason to be anything other than a blatantly sociopathic hedonist who just dose whatever will please us most in the present?
Even evolution serves me no purpose if there is no free will and if there is no choice in the universe there is ultimately no meaning, whatever is, simply is. Only a being that is omniscient can define and give meaning to an absolute reality. Anything else is nothing more than a personal delusion. As a result, the suggestion that God's justice or mercy must conform to our perception of justice and mercy is invalid as we or even any group of us lack the proper perspective to be able to define either. Further, since we lack the capacity to define anything other than our perceptions i.e. we lack the capacity to define reality, for us to question whether or not God exists on the basis of whether or not we are able to percieve His justice or mercy according to our reasoning is little more than an lesson in futility isn't it?
Just a though or two for you to ponder…
Wm. H.
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William,
Thanks for the comment. As far as the question regarding whether or not free will is required for people to be culpable for their actions, that is covered in a post I've been working on that I will have up on Sunday.
One hole in your argument is that if "only a being that is omniscience can define and give meaning to absolute reality" then you can't define "absolute reality," thus the entire statement is meaningless, and your whole line of argumentation is a lesson in futility.
Your statement regarding out inability to evaluate the justice of the God that is proposed by Christianity would seem to suggest that we also have no grounds to evaluate the justice of a dictator or to hold criminals culpable for their actions. It is further an unsatisfactory position since if we are unable to question the claims made about God then how would anybody be able to freely choose to follow God?
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You're welcome.
You're correct to say that I can't define absolute reality and even my capacity to perceive it is highly limited.
Our ability to evaluate the actions of God or others including criminals in any kind of a realistically meaningful way is entirely dependent on having a value system revealed to us by the omniscient as we are incapable of creating a meaningful standard on our own. The seeing through a mirrow dimly problem we have here suggests that at our best we still don't get a clear picture of reality. As a result we can only opperate on our best understanding of that which is revealed by the omniscient. While that leaves something to be desired in that we don't understand perfectly, chosing to invent our own standards is even more problematic and far more subjective and questionable. At least that's how I see it…
Wm.
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If you can't define or perceive absolute reality then you can't even make a justifiable claim that is exists.
We have made a meaningful standard of our own. Check out my morality posts in the archives for more details, but I'll offer just a few examples here. We have created democracy, equal rights for women, the abolition of slavery, international law against genocide, and a host of other moral advances which are not supported by or go completely against that which you would suggest was revealed by an omniscient being.
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BP- It was taking a lot of work to refine. Since I'm on vacation this week I'll try to work on it and get it out soon. I think Adventists would go with it being a gift from God, so basically magic. JWooch and Jeff W, as a Medical Doctor and Medical Student, respectively, would probably be able to explain it better.
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Dustin,
You have brushed near a topic that I have wondered about for a long time. For a god to reward and punish people justly, the rewards and punishments must be the result of a choice made by free will (as you explain in your post). However, natural objects (those governed by the laws of physics) are either deterministic (like a rock dropped from a cliff which has no free will) or random (like some quantum mechanical measurements which has no free will). For people to have free will then, they are not natural. Instead, people must have some supernatural element in them which allows for this free will. Most Christians would probably call this supernatural element a soul. But how does this soul interact with the natural world without us noticing a violation in the laws of physics? It can not. Free will is a violation in the laws of physics. Pretty much what I am saying is, every time you "sin" your brain must be violating the laws of physics or it would be unjust for god to punish you for it. This means that at least one neuron in a "sinners" brain must be violating the laws of physics (which would be an observable event.) Therefor, if humans can ever monitor the neurons in a humans brain during the act of sinning to a high enough resolution that it can be determined that the laws of physics are being followed, then free will can be eliminated as a possible explanation for human behavior, and therefor a just god who punishes people can be eliminated as a possibility.
It may not be possible to eliminate the possibility of any god. But I think it is possible to experimentally eliminate the possibility of a just god who punishes us for our "choices."
Fellow readers, please debate this topic in the comments.
BP
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BP- It was taking a lot of work to refine. Since I'm on vacation this week I'll try to work on it and get it out soon. I think Adventists would go with it being a gift from God, so basically magic. JWooch and Jeff W, as a Medical Doctor and Medical Student, respectively, would probably be able to explain it better.