To quote Victor J. Stenger from his book God And The Folly Of Faith: “Why would a perfect God need to step in after he created a universe in which everything is already divinely predetermined?” If for nothing else, I think this alone demonstrates that he doesn’t exist. Some may argue that this may show him to be a deist God who created the universe then got out of its way. But I think it shows his nonexistence. Comments?
My problem with that line of thinking is that I can’t see a way to tell a difference between:
- An absent god
- An indifferent god
- A non-existent god
They all behave exactly the same way. So I don’t see the point of Deism other than to preserve some semblance of a god-figure for the Deist’s personal preference that they’d like there to BE one, while frankly admitting at least that there’s no actual evidence for such a thing in lived experience.
As to God not needing to intervene in a scenario where everything is “divinely predetermined” … well not all theists would make that argument. Those who believe that free will must be preserved for example will say that individuals have the choice to “reject” God and are “free” to do so. If everything is a foregone conclusion then there can be no one freely choosing to believe in and obey / follow God.
Also the argument presupposes a particular definition of a capital-G God, probably the Abrahamic one, and I think quite often in between the ears of people reading a statement like Stenger’s, they probably substitute their specific version of that God as well.
My personal preference is to take a higher-level view: God as generally proposed has certain characteristics – omni-this and -that – but one characteristic that nearly all theists will agree on is that their god, who/whatever it is, is invisible and exists outside of and beyond and non-dependent on the natural world. That places the deity conveniently beyond observation or even intersubjective experience, and allows believers to claim whatever they want about it with impunity.
So I am less interesting in “showing” that god doesn’t exist than in not seeing any good reason to buy the idea, and challenging people who think it’s believable.
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One non-existent thing looks much like another.
A deity would out of necessity have to reveal itself unequivocally, before anyone could consider a choice is necessary. A bit like Pascal’s wager, I can’t negate risk I have no evidence exists, and no definitive information on how to negate this claimed risk.
The horse goes in front of the cart, or it won’t work properly.
This of course is the problem with omniscience, were any being to be truly omniscient no one, even that being would have any real autonomy, roundly contradicting it being omnipotent, oh I know, magic magic magic…
mysterious see.
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Hi! Why ask such a question in the first place.
If you’re referring to Stenger’s question … it’s a fair question given the Christian god’s stated characteristics, IMO. You can’t posit an all-knowing, all-powerful god and then say he has to / wants to intervene in his creation after the fact. If humans experience suffering and need, then it is either god’s will or god did not anticipate it. In any event, even if you argue that god planned for suffering yet wants us to petition him to address it, the fact that he never does so in a way distinguishable from random happenstance, means he’s still falling down on the (alleged) job.
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