If you can’t prove God doesn’t exist, why not believe?

I’ve put together a logical proof for the non-existence of god that I think is pretty good, so I’m sharing it around:

To prove or disprove the existence of something, you must first define what that something is. “God” is not simply an intelligent creator of the universe, “God” is purported by Christians (at least) to be so much more.

Proof that “God”, by Christian definition, does not exist.
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Premise 1) “God” desires salvation for Mankind.
Premise 2) “God” wishes to send a directive message crucial to the salvation of Mankind.
Premise 3) “God” is capable of sending counterfeit-proof messages to Mankind.
Premise 4) A precondition for salvation is that Mankind receive and understand “God’s” directive message.
Premise 5) There are many messages in the world that falsely purport to be of “God”.

From P 4 and 5: The salvation of Mankind depends on our ability to differentiate between genuine messages of “God” and phony messages.

To do this in a world full of false messages (P5), it’s necessary for “God” to send a message uniquely attributable to “God” (i.e a message in a form immune to human counterfeit).

The fact that Mankind has not received a coherent directive message uniquely attributable to a non-human source, much less uniquely attributable to “God” is positive evidence that “God”, by definition (P1-4), does not exist.

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The only first message and commandment that we could logically expect a competent and non-mischeivous god to make is: “I will never send a messenger, only believe and follow what I tell you directly”.

In a world full of false prophets who with words and writings claim falsely to speak for “God”, the idea that “God” exists, is capable, but chooses to send commandments through human intermediaries (holy books and prophets) anyway, makes about as much sense as the idea of a treasury department which can print counterfeit-proof money, but chooses to print money that is susceptible to counterfeit anyway; even worse, a treasury that continues to print copies of bills known to have already been counterfeit! If a treasury had the means, we would expect it to exclusively print counterfeit-proof money. To do otherwise would be mischievous and/or stupid.

Essential to the preservation of authority, is the principle that subjects of authority MUST reject commandments not provided in certified form, and as such, a lack of obvious and irrefutable evidence that a directive originates from “God” is actually proof positive evidence that the directive could not possibly originate from “God”.

I totally agree with HP. Unless there is a possibility of harm to other we should all have the freedom of choice what to believe in. Religion, fact or not, can inspire great moments of love and empathy. But also being a person who thoroughly enjoys having one foot in the world of science and the other in the world of the mystical…. I feel empowered by this authors reasoning and find it sheer genius.

Hello, Riley.

I have read your proof for the non-existence of God. You assert that “Mankind has not received a coherent directive message . . . .” This remark reflects a faith commitment on your part, an a priori rejection of the Holy Bible as God’s message to Mankind.

You use logic. Skillfully, I might add. I use it, too. But only the Christian worldview can account for the laws of logic.

My prayer for you, Riley, is that you would thank the God of all creation for the wonderful gifts he has given you, which include a sharp mind.

God Bless.

Michael

David,

Thank you for replying to my message. And happy (belated) Thanksgiving to all on this site. I presuppose that God is omnipotent, just as I presuppose the law of identity (x is x). Omnipotence is an essential aspect of God’s nature.

Who are we, who are finite (and not omnipotent), to question the way an omnipotent God would choose to reveal His purposes and plan to mankind? To what standard does one appeal who challenges the benevolence (the character) of an allegedly non-existent God?

The Scriptures are wonderfully consistent. Despite the overwhelming nature and breadth of the evidence for Christianity, the universe of facts is, to our finite minds, infinite. Therefore, the atheist can fall back on his ability to raise a new “factual” challenge. And this process of debating each fact presented would just continue, ad infinitum. But outside of the Christian worldview, there are no such things as “facts.” They are unintelligible. What preconditions for true facts, reason, laws of logic, and self-consciousness are provided by a worldview that proposes that we and all about us are the product of random (mindless) electrical, chemical, and biological forces?

The proof for the Christian worldview is that it is the only worldview that supplies the preconditions for making sense of the human experience and all of reality — of this very dialogue between us. In other words, the contrary is impossible. We reason, we debate, and more basically, communicate. Which worldview makes sense of this? Only the Christian worldview, which says that God spoke the world into existence and fashioned man in His image, giving him a mind and the capacity to think, reason and communicate.

No other worldview can make sense of these things. Indeed, the atheist borrows capital from the Christian worldview when he demands moral judgments, justice and fairness, when he loves his girlfriend or his wife, when he seeks to protect the weak or infirm among us, when he assumes the uniformity of nature (that the future will be like the past), when he condemns murder and child abuse. An atheist ought not to have a thing called compunction (or conscience) to restrain himself from violating moral laws; moral laws themselves are inexplicable in the atheist worldview. Please understand, I accept that atheists do these things, sometimes better than those who claim to be Christians; however, the atheist worldview cannot make sense of them.

If, as Richard Dawkins says, the universe is pitiless and indifferent chance and matter, and we humans (and everything else) are simply dancing to the music of our DNA, then as Dostoyevsky said, “everything is permissible.”

The Bible says we all deserve eternal condemnation, because we have all inherited a nature of sin as a result of Adam’s disobedience, and none is without sin; yet, in His great mercy and love, God warns us of what awaits us if we continue in our state of rebellion against Him. Indeed, He has reconciled us to Himself in the death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ. By believing in Jesus and asking Him to be our Lord and Savior, we are given life everlasting with God as adopted sons and daughters. Jesus said, “Behold, I make all things new.”

God is a good God. He is speaking to you even through our dialogue. He saved me. He wants to save you. He will not force Himself on you. He is patiently waiting for you to turn to Him.

May God bless you, David.

Michael

David,

Faith is not a leap from the platform of reason; it is the precondition for all reasoning.

You accept the laws of logic, your ability to think and reason, and to make sense of a world that has emerged from randomness, yet your worldview provides no account for your logic and reason, much less a basis for trusting in them.

You accept that there are moral rules to guide you and all of humanity, yet these are abstract, immaterial things. They do not comport with a reality that is purely material.

You approach life as a scientist, which requires you to believe in the uniformity of nature, that tomorrow will be like today. You have no logical basis for doing this. If you were to say, “In the past, the future has always resembled the past,” you would merely be begging the question.

God, by His propositional revelation, has establilshed the foundation upon which we can rationally go about conducting scientific experiments, embracing moral principles, using logic, etc. He has made the world and established its natural laws. He has made us in His image, with minds capable of apprehending (although not perfectly), the world around us. As the Book of Proverbs says: “The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.”

On the other hand, your worldview requires you to take a great leap of faith — to just accept that there are universals, that we are self-conscious, rational beings capable of making sense of reality, that there is any meaning at all in anything that we do, and all this without any explanation for how these things are so.

You have a lot of faith, David. Unlike the faith of the Christian, however, yours is blind.

You are an intelligent person, made in God’s image. My prayer for you is that you would turn to your Creator and give Him the honor, glory and praise that is due Him. “The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.”

Michael

I think a lot of time is wasted by otherwise smart people reacting emotionally to the religious mysticism they were brought up with in their families. You’re not going to improve the world by telling people they are crazy like it’s your full time job. Just skip it and go to the next level and find the answers.

I think what you’re trying to say is that we all should, at some point, “agree to disagree” and get on with the job of acutally “living”. Agreed.

it is like when i was at school and tried desperatelay to prove the existence of the god of shandy. i couldnt prove he existed or did not exist. however, as i want shandy heaven, i keep believing.

These arguements are very good in defending their points of interest or whether not GOd exist or not. I forgot your name but u r right when it comes to having an open mind in order to analyze the stuff u read. Those abilities that were mentioned are a strong case as well, but you have to remember how would u have those ideas if they were provided to you in some instance. People say God doesnt exist, but how is it that our Years are measured in BC and Ad, which stand for Before Christ and After Death. That is very funny to me how we sit here and say He doesnt exist when you base your Years around His son death.

Another thing is not everybody calls on God when they are in desperate times. I call Him whenever i need to talk and He answers maybe not in a way u and i talk but sometimes He uses a dream to stimulate your thinking. I like the arguements that were said because i can look at them and analyze them for myself.

Why is it that if you dont believe God then why try to disprove why God exist. Maybe just Maybe you do believe there is some type of God, but you dont want to admit it. I have read scientific arguements on why he does exist and doesnt exist, and i have came to the conclusion, not based on my own opionion, that God exist because you cant try to disprove something that isnt real.

I enjoy talkin with other religoiuos or non religous groups becuz i dont want to have one view, i listen to arguements say my comments, and bring about a conculsion to it. Either way God+trying to prove He dont exist= God exist whether we like it or not.

How can man explain what happened at the Hudson bay with the plain? How can man explain why there is Good and bad in the world? HOw can man say there is no God if you never took the time and really figure out if there is one? If your going to be opened minded then you have to read different agruements, different theories, watch things on tv to see various views, and finally put the pieces together.

Why is it we try to disprove the GOd of the christians but not the gods of the Greeks or Athenians, or the Egyptians. some of the greatest Kings in this world has submitted at one point to the God of the hebrews. The Romans Caeser at the time respected Jesus and didnt want him to be crucified because He didnt do anything wrong to be killed.

We look at history and at one point in time they believed there is truly a Great God the God who doesnt have to prove Himself to man at all but He cared enough to give up His son.

If you can disprove His son never existed then you win? but Historians and romans show that there was a man named Jesus Christ that walked the Earth at a point of time.

To wrap this up and ill be out your hair. God exist because His son existed on this earth. Therefore if you can disprove His son never walked this Earth, Romans didnt persecute Christians in rome because they served their true GOd then you win

All those who fallow a “god” have been educated from childhood and surely it would be hard for them to see other aspects.
You would asked to have faith in something that only exits in a book, a book which some people blindly think it can’t be false.
IF there is a god then he is making one lousy job on keeping his book straight
for those who haven’t noticed the changes that has been made on the glitches with these holy books, here is a preview … often its asked not to take the words literally, which basically means that those world needs to be taken like a riddle or something …
Genocides that has been done in the name of god
The disgusting tactics that religion applied on scientist that try to understand the universe
and even in today since religion now cants silence the scientists, now it’s trying to enter into scientific way. While science evolves with experiments, observation and proof, religion only asks for faith, the same thing a person would ask from another when trying to pull-up a scam
. Evolution is a fact and proven with evidence, DONT FUCKEN TRY TO INFECT IT WITH GOD “intelligent design”.

Here is the truth … there always will be religion, not because its believe to be true but because it offers something that reality doesn’t… Eternal life, which will come in curtain conditions … and that brings the public control, prevents crimes and all that shit. And when there are desperate people that don’t know about god, they will do whatever it takes to self preservation, most cases leads to crime…

i think we still need to religion because people these days are just too ignorant to live in peace, they need a alternative way of life to keep them away from crime … but after all some religions has some ritualistic way of forgiving once crimes … weekly rituals to identify those don’t fallow their ways and brainwash their children by making them acknowledge their parents religious view. if god would be fair, this wouldn’t have happened .. if god wasn’t so egoistic , people wouldn’t have to conduct rituals for it..

I don’t want to believe something that hasn’t been proved by scientific ways, also those who say that “just because it hasn’t been proved doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist” can fu****f, because the book of god has already been disproved but you are too much brainwashed to notice it.

Technology evolves and scientist will keep finding new ways to brighten our view of universe…
i have been forced to read religious crap all my childhood, and it fucken didn’t made sense … all my cousins and relatives insisted on making me fallow gods way, just because they didn’t wanted me to burn in hell .. But somehow i manage to understand that god doesn’t really exist, I am hoping more people can realize that in the future.

The economic state of the current world is the perfect trap to get people to believe on a higher power.

I told my children the existence of different people that believe in different forms of gods when they came to me asking “why people go to church” or “what is god” and I am proud to say that all my children think that religion is a effective way to control people, and in today’s world, a essential tool to administer laws. They get complains from school because they ask too many questions that ‘some teachers’ are having hard timed coming up with answers .