The Existence of God
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The existence of God has long been a topic of debate. It is the ultimate topic of discussion, as everyone seems to have an opinion on it. I will look at the traditional arguments for the existence of God, the ones that have stood the test of time, and find out how convincing the arguments really are by looking at each one in turn, analysing the logic behind each argument, and finally looking at its criticisms and the responses to the criticisms.
The first argument for the existence of God I will look at is the cosmological argument, more commonly known as the “First Cause” argument. It is attributed to Saint Thomas Aquinas, a 13th century philosopher. The basic premise is that for the Universe to exist, something must have caused it to exist in the beginning. The conclusion to this premise, argues Saint Thomas, is that God created the Universe, as he is the only thing eternal. The unstated premises in this argument are that an eternal entity is required to create the universe, and that God is the only thing eternal. The history of time in the universe is often likened to a stack of dominoes falling on one another and causing a chain reaction down the line of dominoes. They did not start falling by themselves, as something must have triggered the very first one. In the First Cause argument, it is God that created the Universe and hence was the first cause. This argument even allows for the Big Bang theory, stating that God caused the Big Bang. This is a popular argument because it allows religion and science to co-exist in one theory. In fact, the Big Bang theory helps the First Cause argument because it shows that the Universe did in fact begin at a point in time, meaning that there must have been a first cause.
Bertrand Russell, a philosopher and Humanist, criticised the First Cause argument. He stated that if it was possible for God to exist without having being made, it was just as possible for the Universe to exist without a creator. According to Russell, there is no reason why it needs a cause to come into existence. Similarly, there is no reason why it couldnt have existed eternally: Aquinas uses the fallacy of moral dilemma to offer us no other selection of choices. This is not a formal fallacy, as you can see below, but an informal fallacy originating in premise #3. There is also question over the other 2 premises:
There is a first cause of the Universe
The first cause must be eternal
God is the only eternal being
The first cause is God
It has also not been proven that something that comes into being needs a cause, as nothing that we know of has ever come into existence, merely changed from one state into another, therefore the Universe does not need a first cause. Following the First Cause argument, Russell also asked the question: if God made the Universe, who made God?
Anybody responding to these criticisms will say that God does not need a creator because he caused everything else and is eternal. Aquinas described God as “the necessary being” and “the immovable mover”. According to him, God is the only thing that has no beginning or end. His argument is entirely dependent on his own belief in his premises.
Another popular argument for the existence of God is the teleological argument, more commonly known as the Design argument. It was famously put forward by William Paley, who stated that a rock or pebble was not necessarily designed, but appeared randomly by chance as a result of the laws of nature. A watch, however, could not appear by random chance as it has been designed in such a way that it uses the best possible materials arranged in the most efficient manner in order to serve its purpose and is therefore designed. The human eye, just one organic example of a system in the human body which is many times more complex than a watch, must therefore have also been designed as it appears to be perfect for its purpose and couldnt have possibly been created out of random chance. Paleys argument also puts emphasis on the natural beauty and apparent order of the world. The designer, argues Paley, must therefore be God.
This argument is criticised by David Hume, an 18th century Scottish philosopher, who believes that since a human eye is organic and so changes and develops, whereas a watch is mechanical, it doesnt need a designer. He believed that you cannot compare a machine to an organic system such as our world or our bodies. Hume also argued that as well as order and beauty, there is also ugliness and disorder in the world, so the world is not perfect. Would an omnipotent designer really create an imperfect world? According to Hume, we are just lucky that the world does less harm than good. He then went on to state that due to the presence of suffering and evil, it questions the fact that God is omnipotent, and hence the existence of God altogether. He concludes from this that the world is not a good example of proof of the existence of God.
This argument suffers from the fallacy of composition, in which just because one item in our world needs a designer, it facilitates the need for a designer for everything in the eyes of Paley.
A watch needs a designer
A watch is part of our world
Our world therefore needs a designer
This is actually a formal fallacy, as the watch is a subset of our world. This could also be seen as “affirming the consequent”.
Another criticism of the Design argument comes from Charles Darwin. He most famously proposed the idea of evolution by natural selection. This theory shows that organic creatures will adapt to their surroundings based on the combination