H. J. McCloskey published an article in February 1968 entitled, “On Being an Atheist.” God’s existence is one that has been questioned and debated for many years. McCloskey’s article is an argument that attempts to show that an atheistic view is more comfortable than a theistic view in an effort to prove that God does not exist. McCloskey argued against the theistic arguments: the cosmological argument, teleological argument, and argument from design. Therefore, this paper is in response to McCloskey’s arguments with a theistic view, in support of God’s existence. McCloskey (1968) suggests that the arguments given are why theists believe in God but states that these arguments do not support a belief in God (p. 65). We cannot “prove” with absolute certainty that God exists. God, and His sovereignty are far greater than what our minds could ever comprehend. The thought that God is the best explanation for life and our being is important in maintaining the belief that God does exist. Just because there is no “absolute proof,” does not mean that God does not exist.
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51). According to Evans & Manis (2009), the conclusion of the cosmological argument is limited (p. 77). The cosmological argument basically lays the groundwork for beginning a deeper study of God and how the universe originated. This shows that there is evidence to substantiate God’s existence and suggests that McCloskey’s idea to discount this theory is false because there is a source of the universe and everything within. However, Naturalists, for example would object to this argument. Naturalists believe that there is no reason that an object exists and are unable to provide explanations in support of why these objects are in existence. However, the cause of the universe is necessary because the answer behind it all is God’s
I have to admit that Zimmerman’s talk was hard at times for me to comprehend. I would love feedback if I understood his divine argument wrong, because I have had a few discussions about it with my peers and many took away different views from his final argument for a divine being, and in this paper I will explain how I understood his final argument. To come upon the divine being of God, he had to eliminate all the other contingent and necessary options believed by other philosophers and scientists through reasoning. He explained how it wasn’t possible for their to be no answer for the cosmos, nor were any of the contingent explanations of science, philosophy, or an infinite past made any sense.
Hume (textbook, p. 305) develops, in detail, what is presumably the most grounded contention against the presence of God in a valid deductive argument. He states, “Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then is he impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then is he malevolent.
Web. 16 Dec. 2015. This article seeks to argue and find evidence that there is a God. Through the use of social science and research, this article focuses on establishing the validity and reliability of evidence in social research and concludes that the case study approach is valid for providing empirical scientific evidence for the existence of God.
Everything around us is built of our faith in our senses, and our faith in other people. Without faith we are surrounded by the fear of the known, every neighbour could be planning our death, our senses could be simulated by some machine; and without faith in God, for many people can be the difference between bearing the evil of the world and slipping into the world of oblivion and chaos. Yet is this faith in God rational or not? Mackie thinks not, in his essay “Evil and Omnipotence” he uses the problem of evil in the world to expose the irrationality of God. He shows how, the contradicts of an Omni God makes the belief in such a being irrational.
The existence of God has been presented by a multitude of philosophers. However, this has led to profound criticism and arguments of God’s inexistence. The strongest argument in contradiction to God’s existence is the Problem of Evil, presented by J.L Mackie. In this paper, I aim to describe the problem of evil, analyse the objection of the Paradox of Omnipotence and provide rebuttals to this objection. Thus, highlighting my support for Mackie’s Problem of evil.
The Cosmological Argument is an a priori argument, seeking to establish the existence of a self-existent being through the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR), in order to then attempt to prove that that self-existent being is the “theist God” (48). In the Cosmological Argument, philosophers argued that the world’s foundation is based on the implicit relationship we have with the world and one another. Their arguments can be epitomized below: (a) Every being (that exists or ever did exist) is either a dependent being or a self-existent being. (b) Not every being can be a dependent being.
The cosmological argument looks to the world to prove God’s existence rather than pure definitions. The proponent of the cosmological argument was St. Thomas Aquinas, a theologian in the eleventh century CE (Solomon). He proposed that everything that exists must have a cause, and that the cause was God (Aquinas). Aquinas’ first point was based off of motion, that nothing can be both the mover and moved. An item sitting in place has the potential to be moving, but cannot move unless something that is already moving imparts motion to it
The Big Bang Theory is the theory on how the universe came to exsitance. Scientists believe that 13.7 billion years ago that an explosive expansion occurred causing the universe to begin (May & Howell). Paley’s Design Argument goes against this well known theory, which
This paper will discuss the problem of evil. In the first part, I will discuss Walter Sinnott-Armstrong’s atheist stance and William Lane Craig’s theist stance on the problem of evil. In the final part of this paper, I will argue that Walter Sinnott-Armstrong’s argument is stronger. The Problem of Evil
The question that is asked time and time again is whether or not god exists. It is evident that people hold different beliefs. It is evident that through some of the beliefs of J.L. Mackie that it could be argued that God does not actually exist. I find this argument to be more agreeable. In Mackie’s Evil and Omnipotence, he argues many points to support why it should be believed that god does not exist.
As a result of my life experience, nature helped me to become a Christian and look more into evidence that points towards a Creator through the universe. The Cosmological and Teleological arguments provide evidence of a Creator. The Cosmological argument is that everything that is created has a cause, for example, an egg comes from a chicken. But there has to be a first cause that was uncaused. More accurately, “ Whatever begins to exist, has a cause of its existence.
The cosmological argument says that everything has a cause. The chain of causes cannot reach back indefinitely and at some point there must be a first cause. The First Cause we may call God. This is not a strong argument because this says that God was the first cause in a long chain of causes, but what caused God? This argument says that everything must have a cause, but in the end says that God has no cause.
If god doesn’t cause my existence, then I am caused by myself, my parents or a lesser cause. There is no infinite regression, so I my existence isn’t caused by my parents or lesser cause, Therefore, God is the cause of my existence (AD 51). As well I am not God, If I created
In this argument we already assumed that there may be possibility that God exist and finally we reached where we started. So this argument does not give us the exact information about existence of God. There are many objections on this argument but still it is a powerful argument. In my opinion, this argument is not much satisfactory. It describes that existence is greater than imagination.
St. Anselm and Descartes are known for presenting the first ontological arguments on the existence of God. The word ontological is a compound word derived from ‘ont’ which means exists or being and ‘–ology’ which means the study of. Even though Anselm and Descartes’ arguments differ slightly, they both stem from the same reasoning. Unlike the other two arguments on God’s existence (teleological and cosmological), the ontological argument does not seek to use any empirical evidence but rather concentrates on pure reason. The rationale behind this school of thought