"Bringing Atheists to God"

[POI]

In a recent exchange, the following quote was made, at the very bottom (viewtopic.php?t=39637&start=410):

"Someone that recently read my argument for God, emailed me and thanked me for bringing him to God."

For Debate:

What is this argument for God, and why is it so convincing?

[Clownboat]

In a recent exchange, the following quote was made, at the very bottom (viewtopic.php?t=39637&start=410):

"Someone that recently read my argument for God, emailed me and thanked me for bringing him to God."

For Debate:

What is this argument for God, and why is it so convincing?

See this rock and this tree! J/K, I couldn't help myself, but I do await the convincing argument.

[Tcg]

[Replying to POI in post #1]

I find no reason to believe this account.


Tcg

[TRANSPONDER]

In a recent exchange, the following quote was made, at the very bottom (viewtopic.php?t=39637&start=410):

"Someone that recently read my argument for God, emailed me and thanked me for bringing him to God."

For Debate:

What is this argument for God, and why is it so convincing?

Yes I would be interested to see such a convincing argument for God. It seems to imply a Jump, maybe from First cause to the Bible, which might fool a few people who have never been told that there might be other options. But it comes down to this - the only atheists to fall for the normal doorstoop spiel are those who don't know the arguments. But it's possible that some of those with booklets and smartphone propaganda videos (I had one shoved in my face with the 'no transitionals' lie) who could convince even the atheist who knew a few arguments. The problem is the Big Lie - say "Do you know that an archaeologist discovered an early copy of Tacitus that confirmed the Jesus story in every detail?' How many people could refute that on the doorstep? And really the 'Sate of Israel' "Prophecy" looks pretty good even after research. And not long ago I had to check Isaiah (as I said I would). It seems to run as retrospective history from the 7th c BC to the 5th from the Assyrian smashing of Israel to the Babylonian smashing of Judea and the capture of Babylon by Cyrus. and I might struggle to prove that it's retrospective history rather than prophecy. How many dumbfounded by Kalam, Indeterminacy and ID arguments would think to say: "That may prove creator, but it doesn't prove which one".

[TRANSPONDER]

In a recent exchange, the following quote was made, at the very bottom (viewtopic.php?t=39637&start=410):

"Someone that recently read my argument for God, emailed me and thanked me for bringing him to God."

For Debate:

What is this argument for God, and why is it so convincing?

Yes I would be interested to see such a convincing argument for God. It seems to imply a Jump, maybe from First cause to the Bible, which might fool a few people who have never been told that there might be other options. But it comes down to this - the only atheists to fall for the normal doorstoop spiel are those who don't know the arguments. But it's possible that some of those with booklets and smartphone propaganda videos (I had one shoved in my face with the 'no transitionals' lie) who could convince even the atheist who knew a few arguments. The problem is the Big Lie - say "Do you know that an archaeologist discovered an early copy of Tacitus that confirmed the Jesus story in every detail?' How many people could refute that on the doorstep? And really the 'Sate of Israel' "Prophecy" looks pretty good even after research. And not long ago I had to check Isaiah (as I said I would). It seems to run as retrospective history from the 7th c BC to the 5th from the Assyrian smashing of Israel to the Babylonian smashing of Judea and the capture of Babylon by Cyrus. and I might struggle to prove that it's retrospective history rather than prophecy. How many dumbfounded by Kalam, Indeterminacy and ID arguments would think to say: "That may prove creator, but it doesn't prove which one".

[POI]

[Replying to POI in post #1]

I find no reason to believe this account.


Tcg

Yea, I find this testimonial a little "Lee Strobel-ish", quite frankly... But I surely cannot wait to hear the possible be-all-end-all argument... I mean, is it one I have not heard before, is it a modification to an existing argument, or is it just the same 'ol existing argument, other?

[AquinasForGod]

[Replying to POI in post #1]

Why not just quote everything I said? Then everyone would have the link to the argument that convinced him of God. Not of Christianity, although that is where he ended up.

I noticed that you seem to think that because an argument convinced X person to believe in God, that the argument ought to be all people to God. Why would you think that? Even among physicists, there are different opinions of the dame data. Sometimes they change their interpretation of the data because of a good argument, but that same argument doesn't convince every physicist to change their interpretation. An example would be the different interpretations of the delayed choice quantum eraser, be it many worlds or Copenhagen, being the two popular ones.

I suppose I could just copy and paste the argument here or you can read it here - https://www.freelymeditate.com/single-p ... ing-at-all

I imagine that only atheists who are open to being wrong would even bother reading a long argument.

This argument will be similar to the one I have used before. To my knowledge, there is no argument exactly like it out of the 100s of arguments for God.




I think you might find this argument convincing, so I am taking the time to write it.

It argues from the best explanation for why anything exists at all.




Why does anything exist? There are two possible explanations that philosophers have come up with. Wait, what only two? Are you sure? Yes. For example, saying that you don’t know is not an explanation for anything, and thus is not a possible explanation for why anything exists.

I am certain that whatever “other” possible explanation you have in mind, It will reduce to one of the two. Philosophers have long known this.

The first explanation: something always exists.

The second explanation: Something came to exist.

The first explanation is the best. I will try to demonstrate why, but first, what is meant by these two explanations?

The first just means that something has always existed, whatever that something might be. There never was nothingness. There is something that is always in existence.

The second explanation means that there was nothingness, and I mean absolutely nothingness, not some darkness, not some void, not some quantum foam, but nothing whatsoever. No space, no time, no concepts, no potentials, no abstracts, etc. Pure nothing. And then for no reason, no cause, without explanation, something came to exist.

Back to the argument. Here is the main reason I think the first explanation is best. If there was nothing, no potential, how could something come to be? If something came to be, wasn’t there the potential for it to exist? If it came to exist without explanation, is this an explanation?

If there was no potential for it to exist, then how did it come to exist?

Then there was never nothingness, for potential is something, even if abstract. And this potential cannot be the cause of its becoming actual anymore than something not existing can cause its own existence.

It would require something else that is actual.

I think I will find common ground with most people, that the first explanation is best. It makes more sense.

I would like to quickly show why some other ideas reduce to one of these two explanations. Someone might point out that an infinite regress is a third example, but it isn’t. That whole infinite regress must itself either always have existed or it came to be, so it reduces to one of these two possible explanations.

Someone might say, another option might be that space-time doesn’t exist in the singularity.

The singularity exists without time, but his is the same as saying it is eternal, thus something always existed. You might wonder why it is the same. Because there are two types of eternity, two ways in which something can always exist.

1. Without time.

2. With infinite time.

If the second is true, this would mean that time is always.

I don’t think it matters for my purposes here. Something is eternal, either without time or with infinite time, and that time doesn’t need to be the same as the time we experience as space-time. If you are skeptical of this, check out the possibility of more than one-time dimension in physics.


Okay, so we have these two possible explanations. Of the two, one is a better explanation, which is that there is something that always exists.

You might wonder, okay? So, what.

We need some common ground or what is the point? That is the problem with most arguments. The premises don’t find common ground with an unbeliever, so the unbeliever easily dismisses the argument. He/she can just disagree with one of the premises, thus why I wish to establish this common ground.

Something always exists. What can we figure out must be true of this eternal thing?

It must be uncaused. After all, it never can come to exist because it always exists. That follows from it always being.

It is also uncaused because it cannot come to be in some new way other than the way it always is. Whatever is always existing must be existing in the way it always exists.

For example, suppose something is always standing still. In that case, it cannot ever be in some other state that contradicts always standing still. That means it could not be moving, for moving is contrary to standing still.

If it is always moving, then it cannot come to stand still, for otherwise, it would be untrue that it was always moving.

So whatever the eternal is, it must always be that, thus it is uncaused.

It must also be self-existent, meaning that it has existential inertia and relies on nothing for its existence. It is not dependent.

Oh, but wait you might say. What if it is eternal like Aristotle’s idea of the universe but that it eternally depends on something else for its existence. Then that something else is the eternal thing that has existential inertia.

That is the eternal thing I am concerned with here. Besides, I have no reason to assume a second eternal thing or this eternal dependency. It would still be true that the more eternal thing without dependency is uncaused and self-existent.

These are things we can deduce must be true of that which is eternal. It is uncaused and self-existent. What else can be figured out about it?

Some things are caused, like things with a half-life, like electrons, photons, and other particles. Please look up the long half-life of electrons and photons if you doubt this. That means they do not have existential inertia. That means they must rely on something outside of their power to exist from one point to the other. But we don’t even have to go there.

They indeed have a half-life. Indeed, they are not eternal. We already determined that spontaneous existence is not the best explanation, thus these particles could not have come to exist spontaneously. That leaves us with one option. They must have come to exist by the eternal.

That would mean the eternal has causal powers, which means we have no reason to be skeptical of cause and effect the way Hume was. Hume would have to appeal to something like spontaneous existence, but we already ruled that out. We found common ground.

So, we have deduced that the eternal must be self-existent, unchanged, uncaused, and the cause of all non-eternal things, such as particles. Many would-be content to stop here. We have thus concluded there is an uncaused cause.

That is all that is necessary to conclude that God exists. But we can take this further. We can deduce more about the eternal. I want to understand it as much as possible.

Because we see that the uncaused eternal thing must be the cause of all non-eternal things, we see there must exist cause and effect relationships, thus we have no reason to be skeptical that a needle can cause a balloon to pop. We have established that there must be a cause and effect relation between the eternal and all non-eternal things, so cause and effect relations are possible.

Because there is cause and effect, we can develop a principle of causality. That opens up the question of what is change exactly? That opens up arguments from Aristotle and Aquinas that change is a potential being actualized. If lends credibility to those arguments.

Anyway, that is outside the scope of this article. What is important here is we do need some principle of causality if something eternal is the best explanation, which it is.

And once we have a principle of causality, it follows there must be a principle of proportionate causality. What is that you ask? It means that whatever is in the effect must in some way be in the cause. The cause cannot give that which it doesn’t have to give.

Here is an example. A bowling ball rolling down the lane cannot be the cause of a sun exploding. First, there is no connection between the two events, which violates the principle of causality. But also it violates the principle of causality because the bowling ball doesn’t have the power to cause a star to explode.

Why is this important? It is important because we know the things the eternal caused to exist. So the eternal must somehow be capable of causing them to exist. Whatever is in the effect must in some way be in the cause.

The eternal caused photons to exist. To be the cause of photons, it had to have photons to give in some way.

There are different ways a cause can have what is in the effect. Ed Feser gives a good example of money. I can physically have a twenty-dollar bill on me. I can give it to you and thus be the physical cause of you receiving $20.

However, I don’t have to have a twenty-dollar bill on me to be the cause of you receiving $20. I could have twenty dollars in the bank. In this case, I have $20 virtually. The point is, if I am the cause of you getting $20, then I must have $20 in some way. I don’t have to have it physically. I could have It virtually, such as in the bank.

I could have it another way. I could be granted the power to print money as I see fit, legal money. I could be the cause of you receiving $20 by printing the money.

But something cannot be the cause of something unless it has it in some way.

So, in what way does the eternal have photons? Photons are massless moving and changing, thus why it has a half-life. We already determined that whatever the eternal is doing it is always doing, unchanged. The eternal cannot itself be a photon because photons have a half-life, they change. They stop existing in the state of being a photon.

But the eternal cannot have photons to give either, because photons cannot themselves be eternal, so they must come to exist. They cannot come to exist independently, so the eternal must be the cause of their existence. The eternal cannot be photons. It cannot possess photons to give them. If it could just possess photons, they would have to be eternal, but they cannot be.

So, in what way can God have photons to give them existence? Just like I don’t have to physically possess a twenty-dollar bill to be the cause of you receiving $20, neither does the eternal need to possess photons physically.

Could he possess them virtually? Not in a bank or anything like that. But he could know photons, of their properties that make them different from himself.

And before electrons or photons come to exist, they must have had the potential to exist. So, the eternal is actualizing their potential to exist. This just means, he causes them to be an actual thing, rather than just being a potential thing. They go from being potential to actually exist as things.

How did they potentially exist, though? Where did they potentially exist? It must be that they virtually existed in the eternal. This is because the eternal is the cause and the photon is the effect. The cause must in some way have what is in the effect to give it. Whatever is in the effect must in some way be in the cause.

The eternal could not have photons physically to give. What about how I can be the cause of you receiving $20 by having the legal power to print money in my example? That is just to say the eternal has the power to cause the photon to exist, but that is exactly what is in question.

But what does work, is how I virtually can have $20 in the bank. But because abstracts cannot exist in a bank, and because there is the eternal and nothing else, then the photons must somehow exist in the eternal. They cannot physically exist in God, so they must virtually exist in him.

How, though? It must be in the form of knowing. The eternal has the information of what makes a photon exist. The potential photon is then the knowledge of its properties, what makes it different from himself and every other potential thing.

That means the eternal has an understanding of all potential things that exist. But remember that we concluded whatever way the eternal is, it is always that way. If it knows all things that exist, then it always does. It doesn’t change.

And because the eternal cannot change, it cannot come to know more than it always has. Whatever it knows it must always know, so if it were possible for it to increase in knowledge, even if the growth rate is incalculably small, given eternity, be that infinite time or no time, it would be infinitely knowledgeable.

It cannot change, and it cannot grow, thus it must always know everything it knows.

Because it is the ultimate cause of all things existing, and the way in which it can be the cause of all things is by having those things virtually, meaning knowledge of them, then the eternal knows all things that were, are and will be.

Also, consider this. He must be the ultimate cause of knowledge itself, but in what way could he have knowledge? It couldn’t have it physically, for physical things come to be. It couldn’t have it virtually either, but why not?

If he had knowledge in him virtually, he has knowledge of knowledge which is just to say he is knowledgeable. So, it is just to say the eternal is the cause of knowledge because he has knowledge to give, which means he is knowledgeable.

And anyway the eternal is, he is always that way, so he has eternal knowledge. Knowledge without time restrictions.

Because the eternal must have knowledge in some way to be the cause of knowledge, and because he is the cause of all things, he must know all things that were, are and will be.

We might call this all-knowing. I agree with Aquinas that all-knowing means to know all logically possible things. It doesn’t mean to know impossible things.

We have established that it must know all things that exist, and because it is always, it must know all things that did exist, do exist, and will exist. In this sense, the eternal is all-knowing.

I do not want to extend beyond what we can deduce must be the case.

So far, we have the eternal is self-existent, unchanging, uncaused, the cause of all things, and all-knowing. Is it just me or is this starting to sound like God? I think I will just call it God from here on.

I think we can deduce more about God. Consciousness exists, and because God is the uncaused cause, he must in some way have consciousness to give. You might say, but God didn’t create me. My parents are the cause of me. That is true. Your parents are “A” cause of you existing. There are other causes, though, of you existing.

For example, your parents are not the cause of your cells dividing as they do in the womb. They are not the cause of DNA existing in the first place. All these things are possible because God is the ultimate cause. God caused all the fundamental things necessary for DNA, life, and everything else.

And these fundamental things work in very specific ways. When we try to figure out why they work the way they work, we come up with ways to explain their movements, changes, interactions, and ways to predict how they will be. We come up with equations and physics, chemistry, etc.

The fundamental things work as if they follow rules, of which God must also be the cause for nothing can come to be spontaneously.

For God to know all things in this way, how they ought to change and cause changes, what rules ought to be in order for everything to work exactly as it works requires something like intelligence. And remember, nothing can be a surprise to God, because God is always the way God is. Unchanged.

That means God is not only causing the fundamental things, but he knows how they will be at all times, which means he always knows how they become stars, trees, humans, consciousness, etc.

That not only makes God something like intelligent but also something like conscious. To be knowing of consciousness is in some way being conscious. Of course, that which is eternal cannot be intelligent or conscious in the same way we are, for we are not eternal.

We would need to define human intelligence differently than we define God's intelligence. Human intelligence is limited. We acquire knowledge and skills and then apply them. God is always knowing what he knows, so doesn’t acquire it. He is always knowing all possible things. God is always causing, or from one eternal moment causes, and thus doesn’t come to apply his knowledge. He is always applying it, so to speak.

God is not conscious in the way we are. We are only aware of here and now. We are only aware of our thoughts and what we experience or remember experiencing. God must be aware of all his knowledge that extends across all time.

Here is another thing to consider. God’s power is such that it causes all things to be. God is the only one that is self-existent and thus has existential inertia. That means that God must be keeping all things in existence, otherwise, they would stop existing.

That means the power of God extends to all things. That is not the say that God has physical extension, for we concluded God is not physical. But God’s power extends to all things. Because God’s power extends to all things, and God knows himself, then he knows himself in relation to all things.

That is another type of awareness. God is aware of his relation to all things in all time, for God extends to all things without time restraints, for God is eternal.

All this also means that God’s power is without limits. All things that ever existed, exist, or will exist is caused by God. God’s power extends to all things in all time, so in this way God is all-powerful. That is not to say God can do anything, but God can do anything logically possible.

God must keep everything in existence, for only the eternal has existential inertia. But, also, this means God is omnipresent. I said his power must extend to all things in all time.

What have we figured out about the eternal? He is self-existent, unchanging, uncaused, cause of all things, all-knowing, self-aware, something like intelligent, and something like conscious, all-powerful, and omnipresent.

I think that is enough to establish him as God. I have deduced so much more about God in this same way, but if I keep going this will turn into a book, and I doubt you want to read a book right now.

[Diagoras]

[Replying to POI in post #1]
Something always exists. What can we figure out must be true of this eternal thing?

It must be uncaused.

Why can't this quality apply to the second explanation: i.e. something came uncaused from nothing?

The argument 'from first cause' is not new. Neither are objections to it.

[AquinasForGod]

[Replying to POI in post #1]
Something always exists. What can we figure out must be true of this eternal thing?

It must be uncaused.

Why can't this quality apply to the second explanation: i.e. something came uncaused from nothing?

The argument 'from first cause' is not new. Neither are objections to it.

It is not an argument from first cause.

It would be true if you can accept spontaneous existence. It would be without a cause or explanation.

[William]

[Replying to AquinasForGod in post #7]

What have we figured out about the eternal? He is self-existent, unchanging, uncaused, cause of all things, all-knowing, self-aware, something like intelligent, and something like conscious, all-powerful, and omnipresent.

I think that is enough to establish him as God. I have deduced so much more about God in this same way, but if I keep going this will turn into a book, and I doubt you want to read a book right now.

Who is this God?

What you describe re the God, cannot - in all honesty, be the God of the Bible.

So who is the God of the Bible in relation to this God you have described?