On the Existence of the Man in the Sky
He is what He is...or is He?
I recently have been engaged in a back-and-forth with some of the bloggers on Elect Exiles. One of the bloggers, Drew, put forward some ideas for proving the existence of god. I am addressing these here because they seem to be common arguments put forward by the religious.
In reference to Richard Dawkins, Drew criticized the notion of equating belief in the tooth fairy with belief in god, saying: “There is ample evidence that the tooth fairy does not exist. We know the truth–parents sneak in, take the tooth…” However, this does not prove that the tooth fairy does not exist. It proves that parents like to trick their children (or something similar), but it has not proven that a tooth fairy does not exist somewhere in the world.
It is extremely difficult to prove a negative. However, the point that I have heard Dawkins and Hitchens and the like make is that there is no evidence for the existence of a tooth fairy or a Loch Ness monster, and the vast majority of people don’t believe in those things. However, there is no evidence for the existence of god, and yet billions of people don’t let that stand in their way. If one is willing to accept the existence of one evidence-less thing, why not all the other evidence-less things?
Drew’s response would be that, in fact, there is evidence for god. And what, pray tell, is that evidence? I quote:
There is the empirical world around us that we can see, touch, taste etc. Where did all this complexity of life arise from? Even if you attribute it to the big bang, you are still not answering the question of where all this empirical matter came from to begin with. Further, we still have no legitimate or even scientifically reasonable theory for where life came from. For the sake of argument, let’s say life did evolve out of single-celled organisms–but where did the organisms come from? Bottom line is that we don’t know, no one does.
Nor do we know where we got our sense of right and wrong. Our capacity to love, our inherent sense of justice etc. These are huge questions that Christianity (or perhaps more pointedly, the Bible) gives answers to.
Here we have some typical claims made by religious people. Three things are dealt with—(1) the existence and complexity of life, (2) the existence of the universe and everything in it, and (3) human morality.
Regarding the existence or origin of the universe, no, we do not have all the answers, but we have infinitely more than we did 500 years ago, and even more than we did 1000 years ago. With a track record like this, why would we not simply inductively expect (1) that someday we will be able to answer many such questions that today seem impossible to answer to many people (just as today we are able to easily answer questions about the moon, sun, stars, weather, etc that our ancestors could never have possibly answered), and (2) that such questions are, in fact, answerable through science and reason, just as questions that were unanswerable ages ago are easily answerable today by a schoolchild? (This is a primer, but there are more arguments for trusting in science and reason for explaining the origins of the universe.)
More to the point, Drew poses a lot of questions like “where did all this complexity of life arise from.” How does posing questions provide evidence that god exists? The fact that we do not know x, y or z does not, by any stretch of the imagination, prove that an immaterial and transcendent sentient being created the universe. Take the following example: in the year 1000 AD, an average person might have said “what are the stars in the night sky? We do not know. No one on this earth can ever know the answer to that question. We can speculate, debate, imagine, etc, but we can never know the real answer. Therefore god exists.” Huh? What does our lack of knowing something have to do with the existence of anything, except our lack of knowing?
The second thing Drew deals with is the existence and complexity of life: “we still have no legitimate or even scientifically reasonable theory for where life came from.” This is completely wrong. Again, we do not know for sure but the main working hypothesis or assumption in science is that the original, extremely simple living cell arose out of chemical reactions somewhere in the primordial goop. And yes, some experimentation has been done to indicate that this is a likely explanation. It is some very fascinating stuff, if you do some research on it.
I note that he says “For the sake of argument, let’s say life did evolve out of single-celled organisms.” Drew makes it sound as if there is some uncertainty or debate. There is not. Evolution is an established fact.
Finally, he says “Nor do we know where we got our sense of right and wrong. Our capacity to love, our inherent sense of justice etc.” Once again, this is exactly wrong. In fact, science has given a significant amount of theoretical and experimental evidence that our morality stems from our evolutionary past. It is not very difficult for a layman to imagine this one: individuals who developed the tendency to care for each other and look after each other and establish a sense of justice and fairness lived in groups and communities that had a straightforward survival advantage over those that lived in groups and communities populated by inherently selfish, backstabbing and mistrustful individuals. Pretty simple. And again, the science is piling up every day that this is true.
In short, nothing Drew has written demonstrates to any degree that god exists. Or that two gods exist, or that a million gods exist, or that zero gods exist, to be sure. Now, let me be clear – believing in god is not irrational or stupid or silly, as many of the new atheists seem to think. There is just no real evidence for it, and therefore it is a matter of personal, subjective preference.
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I didn’t intend to come across as saying that the things I mentioned are proof of God’s existence. I would agree with you that we cannot prove God’s existence and I am glad to hear you admit that neither can we disprove God’s existence.
Thanks for your reply. I guess I came across differently than you seem to have received it. I guess that is my fault. Again, we don’t have a clue about where life came from–that is a HUGE question in my mind. One that the Bible answers (I know that irritates you but the Bible does answer that question for me). Saying that morality arose out of a need to survive is not scientifically provable either–I am obviously not as scientifically knowledgeable as you are but those folks aren’t around to ask why they believe its wrong to kill your neighbor, so saying that it was a survival mechanism doesn’t answer the question for me.
Again, thanks for your reply. I found it interesting.
Thanks for the clarification–glad to hear we agree on something.
But I don’t see why, if science is helping us to answer the question of where life came from, why any nonscientific explanation is necessary. It is absolutely a huge question, and one that we either have answered or are very close to answering.
“Saying that morality arose out of a need to survive is not scientifically provable either.” I would sincerely urge you to consider looking into the findings from biology and anthropology and, indeed, history on this matter. There are plenty of nonscientific articles accessible to the average person.
Again, theoretically, experimentally, and historically, it seems very straightforward to say that those communities that developed a binding sense of justice and a belief that killing your neighbor is fundamentally wrong had an advantage over those who believed that killing your neighbor is fundamentally right, or is morally neutral.
That is, since they restrained the passions of their members, these societies had more peace, more stability, and, indeed, more people, than their competitors. Therefore those societies lasted longer, could better protect themselves against outside threats, expanded, and passed their beliefs and values on to subsequent generations.