Does God Exist? God as Necessary & Self-Existent
Sunday March 30, 2008
It might seem odd to list "existence" as an attribute of God, but that's not actually the point here. Of course believers think that their god exists - what is at issue is how God exists. According to philosophical theism, God exists in a very special and unique way: God's existence is necessary rather than contingent.
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Hey Austin:
Thanks for digging this deep. It sounds like you are getting at “the metaphysical versus the man-made.”
The *man-made* consists of specific existents such as your example of the computer. The real debate between theists and atheists comes down to *metaphysical* axioms.
Some atheists, including me, state that the primary metaphysical axiom is “Existence exists” (Rand) or nature exists. One can not prove or disprove this axiom. If you state that existence does not exist, you have stated that you, everything around you, and the universe does not exist. Your consciousness (another axiom) allows you to know that existence does exist.
The theists state axiomatically that “God exists” as a supernatural consciousness not with the purpose of understanding existence, but instead creating and controling it. They state this axiom even though human consciousness can not perceive God. “God is unknowable. We must have faith he exists.”
The fundamental issue is “the primacy of existence vs. the primacy of consciousness” (also Rand).
Thanks,
Andy
I’d like to know what their criteria is for determining an existent item. In other words, how do we differentiate those things that do exist from those things that do not exist? What this basically gets to is: What are they defining as “existence”?
Isn’t this a circular argument?
It seems to amount to this.
In order for something to be considered worthy of the name of “god” that thing’s existence would have to be necessary rather than contingent. There must be something whose existence is necessary rather than contingent. Therefore “god” must exist.
If this is not a straw man then it seems obviously wrong. It is more reasonable to think that “existence” itself must be that thing which is necessary for a thing to exist. It is hard to imagine that there could be any more than just one such thing!
If people want to call that “god” they are welcome to. They are also welcome to call it (ala Douglas Adams) “The Great Green Arkleseizure” if they wish. Whatever it may happen to be called, it does not mean that it takes a personal interest in, for instance, the sexual behaviours of tiny creatures in a forgotten galaxy in a remote corner of the universe. Where does THAT idea come from?
“Aseity” comes from Latin, not Greek. Otherwise, a very good article.
This from Russell’s “Why I am not a Christian”.
The First-cause Argument
Perhaps the simplest and easiest to understand is the argument of the First Cause. (It is maintained that everything we see in this world has a cause, and as you go back in the chain of causes further and further you must come to a First Cause, and to that First Cause you give the name of God.) That argument, I suppose, does not carry very much weight nowadays, because, in the first place, cause is not quite what it used to be. The philosophers and the men of science have got going on cause, and it has not anything like the vitality it used to have; but, apart from that, you can see that the argument that there must be a First Cause is one that cannot have any validity. I may say that when I was a young man and was debating these questions very seriously in my mind, I for a long time accepted the argument of the First Cause, until one day, at the age of eighteen, I read John Stuart Mill’s Autobiography, and I there found this sentence: “My father taught me that the question ‘Who made me?’ cannot be answered, since it immediately suggests the further question `Who made god?’” That very simple sentence showed me, as I still think, the fallacy in the argument of the First Cause. If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause. If there can be anything without a cause, it may just as well be the world as God, so that there cannot be any validity in that argument. It is exactly of the same nature as the Hindu’s view, that the world rested upon an elephant and the elephant rested upon a tortoise; and when they said, “How about the tortoise?” the Indian said, “Suppose we change the subject.” The argument is really no better than that. There is no reason why the world could not have come into being without a cause; nor, on the other hand, is there any reason why it should not have always existed. There is no reason to suppose that the world had a beginning at all. The idea that things must have a beginning is really due to the poverty of our imagination. Therefore, perhaps, I need not waste any more time upon the argument about the First Cause.