Question for the Atheists and Agnostics?

Question

So, talking to theists, all I get is circular logic.

Could you, instead of a theist, prove the existence of God using actual logic and proof?

I'm asking my Atheist and Agnostic friends to "think outside the box" on this one. I just feel with the exception of maybe two Christians on here all the rest of the theists disgust me and I'd rather just ignore them.

Answer 1

Sorry Jimbo - I can't come up with any logical proof that God existed. As hard as I try, it doesn't add up. Maybe Hawkings can give you some proof.

Answer 2

I am not a Christian but this is a logical proof that I studied in Philosophy. This is as close as I could find to solid logic and proof. I found it interesting.

Here is a Paley's famous philosophical proof of design;

Paley's argument proceeds by identifying what he takes to be a reliable indicator of intelligent design:


[S]uppose I found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think … that, for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch as well as for [a] stone [that happened to be lying on the ground]?… For this reason, and for no other; viz., that, if the different parts had been differently shaped from what they are, if a different size from what they are, or placed after any other manner, or in any order than that in which they are placed, either no motion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or none which would have answered the use that is now served by it (Paley, 1).

There are thus two features of a watch that reliably indicate that it is the result of an intelligent design. First, it performs some function that an intelligent agent would regard as valuable; the fact that the watch performs the function of keeping time is something that has value to an intelligent agent. Second, the watch could not perform this function if its parts and mechanisms were differently sized or arranged; the fact that the ability of a watch to keep time depends on the precise shape, size, and arrangement of its parts suggests that the watch has these characteristics because some intelligent agency designed it to these specifications. Taken together, these two characteristics endow the watch with a functional complexity that reliably distinguishes objects that have intelligent designers from objects that do not.

Paley then goes on to argue that the material universe exhibits the same kind of functional complexity as a watch:

Every indicator of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater and more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation. I mean that the contrivances of nature surpass the contrivances of art, in the complexity, subtilty, and curiosity of the mechanism; and still more, if possible, do they go beyond them in number and variety; yet in a multitude of cases, are not less evidently mechanical, not less evidently contrivances, not less evidently accommodated to their end, or suited to their office, than are the most perfect productions of human ingenuity (Paley, 13).

Since the works of nature possess functional complexity, a reliable indicator of intelligent design, we can justifiably conclude that these works were created by an intelligent agent who designed them to instantiate this property.

*Well there you go, I hope you find it interesting*

Answer 3

I don't understand why you would ask an Atheist to prove the existence of God. An Atheist doesn't believe in God so would never try to prove there was one. Agnostics on the other hand, use the Bible as well as text that were discarded by the Jewish and Catholic faiths when they decided what was going to be included in the Bible. Therefore, their proof of the Bible would be the same as that of the Christian other than they have other text relating His life.

Answer 4

It's an interesting concept, but I am afraid that I must take the typical line of thinking; if I could use logic and reasoning to prove the existence of "God" as you call this being, I would no longer be an atheist.

Answer 5

God can never be proved with logics

Logics are lame, personal and they represent only a small percentage of Truth.

Whole Truth cant be proved with half-truths

Even if the whole world denies God's presence, He exists in the core of our being, as our consciousness

So proving god or disproving god with logics both are idiotic deeds

Answer 6

If I could, I wouldn't be an atheist.

Unlike many "atheists" on Y!A's, I actually studied the issue from a religious viewpoint and actively sought evidence to support my beliefs. Only when I exhausted all possibilities outside "magic" did I come to the decision to reject the concept in its entirety.

There is no credible evidence to support God belief.

Answer 7

Deities are an unknown. Currently there is no way to prove or disprove this particular unknown. The christians say the bible proves the deity; however what proof is there that the bible itself is accurate? If you are relying on data that is suspect that is the same as having no data at all.

Answer 8

I am my own God. Other than that, there is no way I can prove the existance of any other god. That's why I'm an atheist.

Answer 9

There are many scientists who think we are close to answering the question...if string theory can ever be tested, we might have it there...

Im agnostic...I know only that the religious conceptions of God are a joke....it appears he probably doesnt exist (the random nature of evolution + the random nature of quantum mechanics)

Answer 10

No, unfortunately, the existence of a deity must be taken as an axiom. Axioms cannot be proven. You either accept the axiom and play the game it creates, or you reject the axiom and play that game instead.

Just like if you want to play with all of Euclid's axiom's, you play euclidean geometry, but if you don't want to play the parallel line axiom, you end up playing the hyperbolic geometry game instead.