God exists.

All too often, debates about the existence of God further the idea that science and religion are in conflict. I am going to argue in favor of a form of theism consistent with Stephen Jay Gould’s non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA), which describes religion and science as inhabiting different domains of teaching authority that need not and should not overlap.[1] That said, acceptance of NOMA is not necessary for my arguments.Occam’s Razor and RealismOccam’s razor states that if all other things are equal among competing theories, the one with the fewest assumptions ought to be favored. What people sometimes forget is that explanatory power—a theory’s ability to make natural sense of as many facts as possible—is also important, and can even make up for additional assumptions.A good example in philosophy is the debate between realism, which says that reality exists, and solipsism, the idea that it’s impossible to know if it exists. Both theories are unfalsifiable; by definition, no evidence could ever exist to support or refute them because they can accomodate any evidence.It may seem like solipsism is a better theory because it has fewer assumptions, but realism has one huge benefit over solipsism that makes it greatly preferable: explanatory power. Unlike solipsism, it can make sense of the distinction most people experience between dreams and real life, it can explain why the scientific method is so useful, and it can provide a framework from which non-selfish moral theories can be developed.Theism and MoralityJust like realism, I will show that theism’s enormous explanatory power in the realm of ethics makes it highly preferable to other theories. My argument takes this form: 1. Moral theories that are more pragmatic are more likely to be true.2. The existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God and the afterlife enables moral universalism.3. Moral universalism is highly pragmatic.4. God and the afterlife are very likely to exist. I believe the first premise must be considered a moral axiom because it seems to offer the only way to resolve the is-ought problem—connecting factual statements about reality to prescriptive statements about what ought to be. Using pragmatic reasoning (which is necessarily consequentialist), agent-relative theories looking from the moral agent’s point of view are able to find a solution to the problem by focusing entirely on what is pragmatic for them (increasing pleasure, decreasing pain, fulfilling desires; it depends on the theory).[2] However, this always results in highly unintuitive implications if what is pragmatic for some people goes against what is pragmatic for others. For instance, agent-relative hedonism would prescribe a sadistic serial killer to murder as many people as he could if he found pleasure in that. Unfortunately, more intuitive agent-neutral moral theories (where it doesn’t matter whose perspective is taken) cannot pragmatically explain—without begging the question—why an individual should do something for the greater good if it will negatively impact them.In contrast, theism can form the basis for universal moral theories that don’t change depending on human feelings. A theistic system of ethics that takes into consideration the afterlife would prescribe for the serial killer to avoid murdering people (note that I am only talking about heaven, which is the only necessary component to make this argument work; I agree that eternal hell would be evil). Since he will personally gain by avoiding murder, refraining from killing others is something he ought to do out of self-interest.Only by possessing complete omniscience is God able to act as an ideal observer and have perfect moral understanding, and only by being omnipotent can humanity be assured that he will uphold justice in the afterlife. Regardless of which specific system of ethics is followed, theism enables it to be universal instead of dependent on flawed human feelings.Of course, the question of why suffering exists if God has the power to stop it comes up when you consider these three attributes of God, but there’s a very intuitive answer regarding the nature of God’s omnipotence that I’ll look forward to discussing next time.ConclusionWhen it comes to what is “beyond” the universe, uncertainty reigns. Maybe we live in a simulation, a multiverse, or even a hologram on the surface of a black hole. These theories may sound outlandish, but they’re taken pretty seriously by various academics because, like theism, they try to explain aspects of existence. When we realize that religion and science are not in conflict, but are beneficial for different domains of life, we can start to appreciate the usefulness of theism in the “realm of human purposes, meanings, and values,” as Stephen Jay Gould wrote in his famous essay.[1]Sources[1] http://www.blc.arizona.edu...[2] https://plato.stanford.edu...