Best philosophical arguments against god

what are the best philosophical arguments against the bible and existence of god.. pls put as many as you can

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Comments ( 33 )
  • ANALRAPIST

    What? I'm tried of all you atheists, I'm not religious and I don't believe in god either but if people see a god in their minds that's their own prerogative. Not all religious folks are pushy about it so stop pushing the whole atheist shit. We get it you're "enlightened by your own intelligence" just like the majority of internet users. Now shove it somewhere else. The concept of God is not supposed to be a physical entity so of course there is no "proof".

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    • charli.m

      It's really awkward agreeing with someone with your username.

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    • User-name

      I agree completely. Some atheists become just as bad as christians when shoving their ideals down your throat. That's why I'll never fully lean their way. How egotistical does one have to be to say with certainty that something they can't prove doesn't exist? Because of logic right? Sure some christians are similar, but not all of them are that level of nutty. Just pretentious.

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      • ANALRAPIST

        "How egotistical does one have to be to say with certainty that something they can't prove doesn't exist?"

        THIS! is the main thing I never understood about atheists, especially when they claim to be logical and scientific. if they knew the least about science they would realise that somethings exist beyond human perception.

        AGNOSTIC FTW

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    • tuple

      I think you meant "tired" of all you atheists. I'm not religious either, and I'm not pushy, and I'm not going to put you down for a two-finger mistake. Some people will, though. Don't be that person!

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      • ANALRAPIST

        What are you even trying to say here? And I'll be whichever "person" I want

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        • Zorak

          Cute.

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    • Ish and ish, man. I mean, sure being religious is ok generally but a lot of people take religion...religiously? Which sets standards for their children that dictate their lives, even, for example, being gay.

      Overall I get your point, I'd say most people don't take it too far but I think we would all be better off without religion.

      (I'm not OP btw)

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  • Grunewald

    I'm sure there are many for and many against. But my question is: does the existence of God even depend on philosophy? He either exists or he doesn't. We cannot 'determine' his non-existence using philosophy any nore than we can determine the non-existence of, say, a spider in the bathtub. It's either there or it isn't. Its being there might be very, very, very implausible. It might be shockingly so. But if the spider is there, it is there, and there's nothing that we or our philosophy can do to make that not so (except wash it down the plughole). And if God is there, it's the same. Philosophy can't determine his existence - it can't even determine what his attributes are - although what's certain is that unlike the spider he is not usually visible to the naked eye for most people at this point in time - and people who know more about the attributes of Christian God will know what I mean by 'usually', 'most people' and 'this point in time'! We cannot determine that a spider has 10 legs by philosophizing it, even though our analogies and theories should be so internally coherent that it would be impossible to imagine how anyone could rationally think any differently. When you have the 8-legged spider in front of you, it's game over.

    Phenomena are what they are, and we can describe them using philosophy, but we can't philosophize them in or out of existence, or invent attributes for them. Our conception of a spider having 10 legs is probably nearer relaity than any conception a person might have about the attributes of a God that doesn't exist. Because if a God with *those* attributes doesn't exist, well, then a God with other attributes might do. If Epicurus' classical idea of God from the famous paradox is impossible, then what about that of, say, Western Christianity? Epicurus' God doesn't have a history of interacting intimately with human beings as the Christian one does, and didn't take on flesh and suffer and die and resurrect to expiate the evil of the world. These differences aren't exhaustive but my point is that the tallies are different between the two kinds of gods - so the Christian God wouldn't necessarily fail Epicurus' test. Any theory you make, even if it's internally airtight, is only as accurate as its parameters. Do even Christians know all the parameters of their God, in theory? Why, absolutely not! But we know at least that a lot of arguments out there set up gods that are not ours - and so it is no surprise about the conclusion that they don't exist.

    If you want a really, really airtight theory of the nonexistence of God, decide which God you want to disprove, and study the holy book associated with him diligently, and speak to members of the communities who believe in him to find out how they experience their God in their own lives, and how they interpret their holy book. Then when you have gathered as much information as you can about who he is and what he does, you can start trying to disprove 'the God of denomination x of religion x'.

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    • factcheck

      This is a good answer until the end. You cannot, ever, try to disprove the existence of something. That's not how it works. This isn't exclusive to whatever god somebody wants to believe in, this is a universal fact of life. Anything, anywhere, ever, can only be proven to exist. Nonexistence cannot be proven.

      Take, for example, the spider in the bathtub. If it's there, you can prove it's there by looking at it. But if it's not, how can you prove that? You could be overlooking it, it could be blending in with a mildew stain, it could be moving around as you're looking in different spots.

      Of course, gods are a bit different, as there is no proof of their existence. It is simply a personal belief.

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      • Hateful1

        Thank you. It's infuriating trying to explain to an atheist, who clings to science as their soul point, how empirical science works. The idea that nothing can exist until it's proven to exist means, simply, nothing can exist. Empirical science proves the validity of a hypothesis through perceived evidence.

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      • Grunewald

        Thanks for the heads up. But I actually do think the Christian God is rather falsifiable as gods go. Forgive me for standing on my soapbox. This has to do with he very 'involved' nature of this God with human beings, and the way it's documented across more than thousand years in history through multiple different civilizations, with the places, times, year and witnesses present and authors often mentioned in those parts of the Bible that are expressly written as historical accounts. Coming from the Greco-Roman world in the case of the New Testament, parts of the Bible are not really that old relatively speaking, and there is a fair amount of other literature from the period with which to corroborate it. In this respect it's empirical enough to be subject to historical scrutiny, in a way that is perhaps harder with the Qur'an, or the Bhagavad Gita, which don't document their narratives in the same way.

        The documentation spreads outside the 'sacred' Christian writing to people of other religions who witnessed or heard of it. I think someone could actually go so far as to try to intellectually prove or disprove the Christian God if they managed to disprove or defend the documentation surrounding his actions among human beings. To a certain extent anyway - I knew a Christian historian very well. When the evidence for both sides is out on the table, at the end of the day it boils down to what you decide is most plausible. What you decide to trust always ultimately comes down to a personal commitment - but I'd like to make the point that it doesn't need to be completely blind.

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    • LFhelp0011

      awesome answer

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  • AngelLoc

    Please check my post --> https://www.isitnormal.com/post/do-you-believe-in-god-science-or-both--254442

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  • NewusernameNorecognition

    First of all there is more than one God. The Christian God is a specific one, but I could say that I believe in God when God is actually a pigeon that can read minds.

    Now I assume you mean the Christian God. The Bible says that he is omnipotent. Omnipotent means that you can do anything. Can you make a rock heavier than you can lift? If you can, then you can't lift that rock, and if you can lift that rock, then you can't make a rock heavier than you can lift. Paradox.

    Now on a different side of things, here is my belief. There could be a God. There is absolutely no explanation of why gravity exists, but it does doesn't it? But there could also be another scientific law that makes it possible for us to be here. Maybe something to do with quantum mechanics. For me, its pretty much, "I mean there's a chance that a God exists, but there is a chance that one doesn't.

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  • Kevinevan

    You both missed the point. OP asked for a "philosophical argument against", not proof. Of course you can't prove a negative. What a waste of words, both of you are so eager to prove your intellect and you immediately show how low it is by not even having basic reading comprehension.

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  • I think a more interesting question would be, "do you think God deserves worship" and to question the type of character God is, fictional or otherwise because we already know that there's no scientific reason to believe in God already.

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  • Kevinevan

    Ok. God the supposed, omnipotent, omnipresent being.

    Now imagine trying to know everything about every living entity on the planet, that ever existed. Then look up at the sky one starry night and try to imagine knowing everything about every little sparkle you see, including what's on them, and everything in between those sparkles, for all eternity infinite or not as we don't know....

    If you can conceptualize that, and remember, it's not just knowing about all of it but being "present" as well, then perhaps God exists.

    I don't even know everything about myself...do you?

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    • LFhelp0011

      Im so glad you ended with " I don't even know everything about myself". So often people interpret the world outside and ask "where is God? What is going on out there?" but I feel we rarely look comprehend the reactions within ourselves. Understand the universe would be great! However, I would not mind starting with understanding what is happening with this body and the thoughts that are instilled with it.

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      • Kevinevan

        Well some believe there is not separation between inward and outward discovery and that the two are hopelessly intertwind.

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  • Perdition

    Philosophical rather than scientific? Then then failure of the all the philosophical arguments offered so far throughout history for the existence God (ontological, teleological, etc.) should suffice.

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    • MissileExpert

      I would beg to differ, sir. A corollary to the Second Law of Thermodynamics basically says given that if there is a God, he is faking his own non-existence. It's a tighter argument because the empirical component is measurable.

      Of course Descartes' Evil Genius could be playing deceptive games. Suffice it to say that observation is more sufficient than conjecture.

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      • Perdition

        The first of these (the 'corollary' - which isn't a corollary at all, by the way) doesn't constitute a sophisticated or successful argument for the existence of a god or gods, let alone for the existence of a specific god of a specific monotheistic religion. It's basically in ad ignorantiam territory.

        The second is not an argument for the existence of a god or gods, let alone for the existence of a specific god of a specific monotheistic religion. It's part of Descartes' epistemological project, taking radical scepticism as a starting point. Descartes doesn't set out a case for the existence of an evil demon tricking him, but merely says you can't ever rule it out.

        Scepticism and entropy are not foundations for solid arguments for the existence of a deity.

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        • Hateful1

          Thank you.

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        • MissileExpert

          Please forgive my lack of rigor in the previous comment. But my intent was to establish a empirical case for Agnosticism. Philosophers are not accustomed to the mathematical treatment of measured phenomenon, and prefer air tight cerebral logic. Anyway, since you are easily a MENSA level user, I offer this in the spirit of provoking thought.

          The premise here is that increasing entropy is a form of randomness itself. It permeates all of nature. Not only that, but it is quantifiable and known. Statistics has Gaussian distributions, et all that describe random outcomes. Should any sample of random data fail to fit these known distributions, it is easily detectable with a Chi Square test. (I use higher level mathematics for my career).

          Many people feel that the evolution of life, extraordinary personal experiences, human endeavors, even the creation of the universe itself is so unlikely that intervention of a Deity must have been involved. To the contrary, if we test the randomness of these outcomes, there has been nothing that has ever happened exceeding expected probability in the long run. For this reason, Chi Square Distributions are known in Scientific and Engineering circles as lie detector tests.

          Did a Deity create the universe and leave? Well, he certainly left, or is an irrelevant disinterested observer. Maybe he never existed in the first place.

          Your go.

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          • Hateful1

            For those who don't know what MissileExpert is saying:

            One: God can't exist because energy in a close system is naturally going to run out, or achieve a state of equilibrium under some extreme circumstances. The Second Law of Thermodynamics deals with the natural flow of energy in one direction.

            Who says a god is a closed system?

            Two: entropy is quantifiable and known. And also completely random.

            This is a total contradiction. If it was random it could not be known.

            Three: Chi Square Distributions. This is hard to simplify but basically it is a complex version of Occam's razor. (yes, I know it's not. But I'm trying to boil it down so everyone can understand it.) It is used to fit variables into a hypothetical model. It is referred to as a hypothetical test, not a lie detector.

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            • MissileExpert

              Yes, thank you. Sort of a hypothetical test that if given that God exists, he must be faking his own non-existence.

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          • Perdition

            Well, if it’s a case for agnosticism you want, we can simply bastardize Descartes. Radical scepticism is a good foundation for agnosticism, given that (etymologically) it refers to ‘not knowing’. We don’t need to make a specifically empirical case for ignorance.

            The OP requested a philosophical argument for the non-existence of God rather than a scientific one, which is why I went down the route of pointing out that the philosophical arguments for the existence of a god are all shaky. You countered with ‘I beg to differ’, and yet you don’t seem to be differing; you’re not arguing a case for the existence of a god, nor providing an example of an argument for the existence of a god that isn’t shaky. Instead you’re moving towards arguing a similar case but from a scientific perspective (which, interesting as it is, isn’t what the OP asked for).

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            • MissileExpert

              Yes, I am a bit of a loose canon. The IIN community seems to favor well argued controversy at a bit of expense to focused consideration. Status quo participants sometimes note that these posts are a bantering version of Sunday public affairs with a dash of Beavis and Butthead providing therapeutic immaturity.

              Please stay on-board. You bring out the best in people.

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