---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
But the "necessary" existence is another "therefore..." that doesn't follow from the previous statement. The best way to kill the argument I think is to decide on moral interventionism. Seems reasonable to me that god would have a strong moral sense, stronger than mine even, and that he wouldn't like to see people suffer. If I see two yobs attacking an old lady I will intervene. Therefore (proper one this time) our perfect god who is bound to exist will not be able to help himself if he sees suffering. As he clearly does not intervene in his creation in this way we can conclude on of two things: That this logic is flawed and he doesn't exist or that he doesn't care, in which case he isn't the perfect being the logic claims he must be. Oh, this idea of God is a very limited one. Even if I did believe in God (which I happen to) God is not nearly so simplistic in either his/her/its methods and also I don't feel that most of us are given the depth of insight necessary to understand or conceive of how and why life is like it is. This last is proven if you simply look at how everyone flounders around trying to make sense of it all! So, we know one thing for sure, people can't really explain to the satisfaction of all or even comprehend for themselves the reasons for the complexity of their lives. This leads to all sorts of theories on the existence of God and being the limited creatures we are we try and place human traits and characteristics in a God or no God of our choice and making. There is an incomprehensible aspect to God and rightly so. Just because we can't justify or understand how God is operating hardly negates his/her/its existence. I don't know how or why the weather does what it does but that doesn't mean weather doesn't exist or that weather doesn't follow laws of physics and nature. I don't think anything is random. One thing leads to the next - energy shifts, changes form, moves stuff, creates other stuff and all the while the complexity and dynamic of it all is beyond anyone to comprehend and understand the nuances of it all. Similarly with this creator. But the creator is not necessarily some Being and I find it improbable we would recognize the creator as a person-like entity - either physically or in the characteristics he/she/it embodies. Not that the creator couldn't appear to us as such, I think it can and has - many times. There is of course a third option and it seems to me that it's as correct as my first one: Theology is a bunch of true believers sitting around trying to think up long winded arguments to defend something that patently doesn't exist in the way that all the old scriptures claim it does. It clearly takes a lot of work to wind your way to the conclusion you have decided upon. It's an odd way to go about things and this is why science has proved such a vastly superior explanatory system, there's no way a scientist would let the first assumption (or axiom) go past without it being tested against the evidence. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <s3raphita@...> wrote: Re "I don't get the final "therefore..." I can conceive of fabulous things but nature is under no obligation to create them.": Because only "that than which no greater can be conceived" has *necessary* existence. Everything else has accidental existence (you, for example). The "necessary existence" is God's unique selling point. An atheist is claiming that it's possible that God doesn't exist. Therefore, said atheist is claiming God doesn't necessarily exist. Therefore, said atheist is claiming God doesn't exist necessarily. But "necessary existence" is part of our definition of God so said atheist is caught in a logical contradiction. Ouch!
