Can a belief in God be justified on a rational basis?

[Thought Criminal]

Many theists will tell you that their belief in God is based on faith, or on something equally nonrational or irrational, such as a special feeling they have, or their unshakable trust in their parents, or an ineffable experience.

Fine, but none of this carries any weight for me because, as a secular humanist, I have a commitment to believe only what is rationally justified, what a logical analysis of the evidence compels me to believe. It's possible that I might miss out on some truths this way, but I do avoid many, many falsehoods. Of course, I do want to believe whatever's true, so I'm always open to evidence.

Anyhow, this leads me to the obvious question: Can a belief in God be justified on a rational basis? If so, how?

TC

[LittlePig]

But you see, I tend to put my belief in God in the same category as the flower. I have even described it as a matter of taste, as opposed to an objective belief. I have also called it "nonrational," as opposed to "irrational."

I have run into this before. I do not think like a Christian. Few Jews do.

+

Well, of course that's true; but in a situation where no evidence is available--or, in my opinion, possible--as with God's existence, why is it irrational to come down on one side but not the other? I would agree that nonbelief is the "default" position, but if one has a subjective sense that tends toward belief, why is it irrational to regard that as a "tiebreaker"?

=
I like how you describe your belief in God here. And I do think 'nonrational' is a good term to use. Reason would seem to be able to only get us so far in our pursuit of knowledge, and choosing to believe in God is, IMO, a nonrational choice since no evidence gets us there. However, making the claim that many theists do make, that God's existence is evident, is, I think, irrational.

I'm not sure what the nature of your subjective experiences or feelings are that cause your belief scales to tip in favor of God, but I know that I have some of my own that tip me in a different direction. For a long time now I have found the notion of something coming from nothing, *poof* out of 'nowhere,' to be aesthetically pleasing, even exciting. For some reason it feels incredibly 'right.' Maybe it simply provides a final piece to the puzzle that refuses to be solved and thus gives me a feeling of satisfaction. Whatever the reason, I can't shake the feeling of awe and wonder that such a thought gives me. It's almost religious.

But I know that I don't know whether or not there is any truth to such an idea. So I keep that as my own nice little thought, all to my lonesome. If I were to tell people that it is true, that it is evidently true, then I would be running into problems of the irrational kind. Right now I simply take pleasure in some nonrational notions.

[LittlePig]

Well, that's not what I said or meant. (see bolded text)

That's why I asked. Wanted to be sure.

I think the value of believing or not believing in God/s is very debatable. Humans engage in self-deception in pretty much every area of their lives, usually out of self-interest. Fairy tales obviously are good for something. From an economics POV, consumed goods are always consumed at a price and thus possess value.

I have to say that the idea of believing something that's false, or without caring whether it's false, is repulsive to me. For that matter, I would be repulsed by any person who said, "I believe in God, but I really have no idea if it's true and don't care."

TC

I have to say
that accusing something of being false
without having any proof
is repulsive to me.

What makes you think there is no proof? Define the God in question and see if any proof of falsehood can be offered.

[Thought Criminal]

Rationality requires us to be consistent. We can't apply one standard of belief for ourselves, and a higher one for everyone else.

I quite agree.

Looks to me like you want to lower the bar for everyone so that people have an excuse to believe whatever they like.

Well, that's a poor example; that can be verified. Throw a pig up into the air and see if he stays there. I'm thinking of slightly more subtle perceptions. .

Throwing a pig in the air, watching it fall and declaring pigs can't fly is like throwing a person into the water, watching them drown and declaring people can't swim. You'd have to test every pig on Earth first, not to mention the ones on the other side of the universe. Active disproof is difficult at best, impossible at worst. Fortunately, it's rarely necessary

In specific, there is no burden of disproof when no alleged proof has been offered. It is the positive claim of existence that must present prima facie evidence in order to make its case. If it can't, we reject it outright.

I would say, rather, that the purely subjective cannot be evidence that is probative to anyone else. I call my own beliefs "subjective" and I do not attempt to convince others of their truth. I do not, in fact, claim to know that God objectively exists; I have been called an "agnostic theist," and I think that is probably accurate. I do NOT think that my beliefs are irrational because they are unprovable and subjective; they are what they are, my own subjective thoughts, and I make no more claim for them than that.

If it's not evident, it's not evidence. It has to be independently verifiable, else nobody could call your bluff. In fact, you couldn't call your own bluff by letting someone else check your evidence to see if it's what it appears to be.

In short, if it can't convince any other rational person, then if it convinces you, you're not being rational, either. The very fact that a belief is unprovable means you are obligated to reject it.

The fact is, I DON'T laugh at those who say they believe because of something as nebulous as a "feeling," though my own perceptions and experiences are rather more definite than that.

Well, it would be rude to laugh, but it would be dishonest to pretend that they're not mistaken.

I would be more likely to consider the specific content of another's belief as irrational, as in the denial of evolution or a belief in miracles; but I think that a bare belief in God does not connote irrationality in and of itself.

Even a true belief is irrational if held without justification. Someone who takes a fact on faith is still irrational, since the belief is true only by coincidence. Since there is no rational basis for a belief in God, holding it is necessarily an indication of irrationality.

I rather suspect that we define "irrational" differently. I don't define belief in the unproven as irrational, but only belief in that which has been proven false.

This is, to be quite blunt, the heart of your error. You want to cripple rationality by removing the burden of proof from positive claims of existence. This is not acceptable.

Purely subjective experiences certainly ARE evidence to the one who has them, though not, certainly, to anyone else.

If it's only evidence for you, it's not really evidence at all. There's can no more be evidence-for-you than there can true-for-you. Experiences are, ultimately, only evidence that you had some experience. If I pop LSD, I'll have all sorts of experiences, and while they offer evidence about my altered brain chemistry, they are evidence of nothing else.

Must one pretend that they are not there? That seems more intellectually dishonest than taking them into account, which one does not "pretend" to do; one does it.

I'm not saying you should deny that you had the experience, just that you don't confuse it with evidence. If you saw a pink elephant, it would be evidence that you're hallucinating, not evidence of pink elephants.

That is not a subjective belief. That assumes that one knows the thoughts and intent of another with enough certainty to act on that knowledge.

There are no subjective beliefs. All beliefs are about the truth, which is necessarily objective. And I've offered no particular basis for deciding you were about to kill me. It's just something I felt, an intuition.

In point of fact, that kind of subjective feeling ought not be ignored; in real life, it can increase one's awareness and vigilance in a dangerous situation. Take a self-defense class and they'll tell you about it. There is such a thing as "intuition," and sometimes it's quite accurate.

It's one thing to say that, since you had this weird experience, you should keep an eye out. It's another thing to take it at face value and kill someone in "self-defense". The former is suspicion, the latter is belief. You're free to suspect all you like, so long as you withhold belief until your attempt to confirm your suspicions actually succeeds.

Whether such feelings rise to the level of evidence that ought to considered, when speaking of such things as religious belief, would be a decision rightly left up to the individual--especially if he makes no attempt to convince others.

It can never rise to the level of evidence, so any belief is necessarily irrational. Religious beliefs are no different. While the decision is always up to an individual, any decision the make based on feelings is irrational. We don't give them a free pass.

But you see, I tend to put my belief in God in the same category as the flower. I have even described it as a matter of taste, as opposed to an objective belief. I have also called it "nonrational," as opposed to "irrational."

The existence of God is a truth claim, not a matter of taste. This makes it an irrational belief.

I have run into this before. I do not think like a Christian. Few Jews do.

In my experience, all theists fall into one of a small number of categories. You are not exceptional in this regard.

And if one accepts the testimony of a person whom one knows and personally trusts as evidence? If one thinks of a given book as trustworthy on account of its being thought so by many generations of others? As I said, I don't take that route myself, but I think it's a bit much to dismiss such an approach as flatly "irrational." One may certainly disagree with it and think it authority-based and unwise, but to condemn it as being contrary to reason itself seems a bit over the top.

Testimony is not evidence. That's because people can only testify about what they believe, not what's true. This is why we treat fingerprints and DNA more seriously than "Yes, that black man looked like the murderer, then again, don't they all look more or less alike in the dark?"

In religion, people testify constantly, and yet their testimonies are mutually inconsistent and cannot be supported by anything more than their words. This shows how worthless testimony is.

So, yes, treating the Bible as trustworthy because other people have mistakenly held it as such is wildly irrational.

I do not claim that the Bible is intended to teach either scientific or historical facts, and I do not regard the existence of God as either.

And yet the existence of God would be both. You keep trying to hide God in that subjective closet, but it doesn't work.

Do you really question the truth of everything you read and everything you are told? Do you really NEVER accept something that you did not previously know on authority alone?

Don't confuse authority with authoritarianism. With authority, we have good reason to believe that the person would know, and if we doubt them, we can investigate those reasons. With authoritarianism, the very act of doubting is denied to you.

No doubt if it's not something you think unlikely, you do. And that may be our biggest difference; you think that God is unlikely. I don't.

All positive claims of existence are unlikely, as possibilities vastly exceed actualities. Of course, when the claimed item is similar to other things we already know exist, that changes things. A flying pig is improbable because none of the pigs we've thrown has ever flown, but a pig, as such, is quite probable. God is worse than any flying pig, since he's claimed to have INFINITE attributes. Worse, these attributes appear to conflict, so we'd have to buy into further improbabilities just to avoid self-contradiction.

If you don't think God is initially unlikely and therefore in need of huge amounts of evidence, you're not thinking straight.

As it happens, I don't accept authority without questioning it anyway. If I did, I'd still be a Christian. That's rather characteristic of Jews. We are more likely to argue than complacently accept anything.

Ah, but you accept your own unquestioned authority about the existence of God. You have no evidence, yet you believe it anyhow.

Well, of course that's true; but in a situation where no evidence is available--or, in my opinion, possible--as with God's existence, why is it irrational to come down on one side but not the other? I would agree that nonbelief is the "default" position, but if one has a subjective sense that tends toward belief, why is it irrational to regard that as a "tiebreaker"?

Hey, either I'm going to win the lottery or I'm not, so does that mean I have an even chance? It's not a tie to begin with, so there can be no tiebreaker.

But I say I disagree with you on a rational basis, too, and further, I do NOT say that you are wrong, because I don't know that you are.

You can say it's rational, but that doesn't make it so. Moreover, to disagree is to claim I am mistaken. Think this through.

Can you as easily show that a belief in God is false? I have never yet seen an argument that can go beyond "no evidence" or "unproven." That is another matter than a flat Earth, rationally speaking, is it not?

There is no burden of disproof, so put away your tennis racket because we're not going to play burden tennis today. If there is no evidence for God and God's existence is unproven, then that is more than enough to force us to conclude that there is no God.

Again, I regard that as an example of mindreading. More often than not, you are no doubt right; but EVERY time?

I'm right this time; I've shown the specific errors you've made.

What you just said means that everyone must agree with you, or else they are irrational. That's pretty much what I said.

No, it means that we all have to agree with what's rational, else we're being irrational. I"m not special here; I just have a better grasp on rationality than you do.

Oh? You can definitively prove that there is no God? That would be new.

I do not have the burden of proof, so you're wasting your time.

And we don't need to read minds to see if there's a rational basis; we can just ask. That's a bit part of what makes it rational.

I submit that you have not, and cannot, prove that in this instance.

I already have. You made a claim, I asked for its basis, and I was able to determine precisely what made it irrational.

That's no better than flying pigs or a flat Earth. You keep giving examples that can easily be proven or disproven. God is not in that category. If He is, then demonstrate it.

The God claim is designed not to be provable. That's what makes it worthless.

TC

[Jester]

Many theists will tell you that their belief in God is based on faith, or on something equally nonrational or irrational, such as a special feeling they have, or their unshakable trust in their parents, or an ineffable experience.

Fine, but none of this carries any weight for me because, as a secular humanist, I have a commitment to believe only what is rationally justified, what a logical analysis of the evidence compels me to believe. It's possible that I might miss out on some truths this way, but I do avoid many, many falsehoods. Of course, I do want to believe whatever's true, so I'm always open to evidence.

Anyhow, this leads me to the obvious question: Can a belief in God be justified on a rational basis? If so, how?

I’m going to give you a conditional yes. That is, it can be justified as rationally as any spiritual or ethical position. We know remarkably little about the topic of whether or not God exists, but I’d argue that belief in him is every bit as rational as any other position. In fact, it is my position that belief in religion results in fewer contradictions in one's behavior and philosophy than does atheism.

As to the matter of belief rooted in faith, rather than reason, I know how frustrating that is to hear from certain types, and I completely agree that statements such as “I have faith� are completely irrelevant to a debate. I would, however, like to point out a positive side of faith which many non-theists never get to see (mostly due to the fact that the loudest advocates of faith don’t generally seem to have grasped this concept):

Faith is not rational.
This, however, does not mean that a particular religion (or non-religious stance) that one has faith in is not rational. It could be reached through as logical a means as we humans are capable of using. But there’s the issue: humans are not rational. Very little of what we say or do is as rooted in logic as it is in emotional/instinctive impulses. Before we attach some deep religious meaning to this feeling, or go turning our noses up at it as some primitive thing, we ought to stop and realize that this is, first and foremost, a simple fact of being human. As such, faith (a non-rational belief) is a common part of everyday life for all people.

Carl Jung put it this way (please excuse the length of this one):

Do we ever understand what we think? We only understand that thinking which is a mere equation, and from which nothing comes out but what we have put in. That is the working of the intellect. But beyond that there is a thinking in primordial images – in symbols which are older than historical man; which have been ingrained in him from earliest times, and, eternally living, outlasting all generations, still make up the groundwork of the human psyche. It is only possible to live the fullest life when we are in harmony with these symbols; wisdom is a return to them. It is neither a question of belief nor of knowledge, but of the agreement of our thinking with the primordial images of the unconscious. They are the source of all our conscious thoughts, and one of these primordial thoughts is the idea of life after death. Science and these symbols are incommensurables. They are indispensable conditions of the imagination; they are primary data – the materials whose expediency and warrant to exist science cannot deny offhand. It can only treat of them as given facts, much as it can explore a function like that of the thyroid gland, for example. Before the nineteenth century the thyroid was regarded as a meaningless organ, merely because it was not understood. It would be equally short-sighted of us today to call the primordial images senseless.

-Modern Man in Search of a Soul, p.113

Anyone with some knowledge of Jungian psychology will be aware that religious faith is a common way in which people become “in harmony with these symbols�. It seems to be, by far, the most common. This is all to say that irrationality is not necessarily a lack of wisdom, nor is this irrationality necessarily complete. It is quite possible for a person to sense, follow, and practice such things, while remaining more rational than his/her non-religious colleges. In fact, a comparison of the lives of Jung and Freud would be an excellent example of this.

[InTheFlesh]

Well, that's not what I said or meant. (see bolded text)

That's why I asked. Wanted to be sure.

I think the value of believing or not believing in God/s is very debatable. Humans engage in self-deception in pretty much every area of their lives, usually out of self-interest. Fairy tales obviously are good for something. From an economics POV, consumed goods are always consumed at a price and thus possess value.

I have to say that the idea of believing something that's false, or without caring whether it's false, is repulsive to me. For that matter, I would be repulsed by any person who said, "I believe in God, but I really have no idea if it's true and don't care."

TC

I have to say
that accusing something of being false
without having any proof
is repulsive to me.

What makes you think there is no proof? Define the God in question and see if any proof of falsehood can be offered.

Though there are many gods, there's only one true God.
He is the creator of all things.
What proof do you have against him?

[McCulloch]

Though there are many gods, there's only one true God.
He is the creator of all things.

What evidence do you have to make such an assertion?
What do you mean by the word God?
How do you know that there is at least one true God?
How do you know that there is not more than one true God?
If God is the creator of all things and things cannot create themselves, then logically God is not one of the all things that exist, therefore God does not exist.
Do you have any rational justification for your belief in God?

[InTheFlesh]

"If God is the creator of all things and things cannot create themselves, then logically God is not one of the all things that exist, therefore God does not exist."

Is the universe eternal?
Does it have a beginning?
How did it create itself?
Does the universe exist?

[McCulloch]

"If God is the creator of all things and things cannot create themselves, then logically God is not one of the all things that exist, therefore God does not exist."

Is the universe eternal?
Does it have a beginning?
How did it create itself?
Does the universe exist?

What do you mean by eternal? If time itself started at the Big Bang, then yes, the universe is eternal.

However, you did make an assertion.

Though there are many gods, there's only one true God.
He is the creator of all things.

I am waiting for some evidence for that assertion and an explanation of what that assertion means. You cannot answer the requirement for support for your assertion by changing the topic and addressing the deficiencies of some other possible assertion.

You say that there is only one true God. How do you know? What do you mean?

You say that this entity you call God created all things. If God is a thing, then God created God. If things cannot create themselves, then either something else created God, God was never created. Or maybe God is not a thing; God does not exist. If God was not created, then how did God come to exist?

[Taneras]

Though there are many gods, there's only one true God. He is the creator of all things. What proof do you have against him?

A lack of evidence is enough to support a disbelief for an individual, a disbelief that is held until proof of said diety is presented. But most atheists do have reasons that they do not believe in God - they range from outrageous stories to Biblical contradictions to God's conflicting personality traits.

[LittlePig]

Well, that's not what I said or meant. (see bolded text)

That's why I asked. Wanted to be sure.

I think the value of believing or not believing in God/s is very debatable. Humans engage in self-deception in pretty much every area of their lives, usually out of self-interest. Fairy tales obviously are good for something. From an economics POV, consumed goods are always consumed at a price and thus possess value.

I have to say that the idea of believing something that's false, or without caring whether it's false, is repulsive to me. For that matter, I would be repulsed by any person who said, "I believe in God, but I really have no idea if it's true and don't care."

TC

I have to say
that accusing something of being false
without having any proof
is repulsive to me.

What makes you think there is no proof? Define the God in question and see if any proof of falsehood can be offered.

Though there are many gods, there's only one true God.
He is the creator of all things.
What proof do you have against him?

You didn't answer my question, so I don't even know how I would be able to answer yours. I can't begin to disprove an undefined hypothesis. How would you describe this 'creator of all things? other than that it is the creator of all things? Even many atheists believe in something that led to everything else.