God Exists

It's unfortunate that Con only responded to my Round 2 argument, seeing as this is my last round. In any case, I'll do my best to respond to what was written. Con's response to my rebuttal #1 from Round 2 is to simply say it cannot be a non-sequitur because it is not an inference. But it most certainly is. Let's look again at what Con wrote: "(2) Necessarily, one is at a time in a position to participate in meaningful conscious relationship with God only if at that time one believes that God exists" While I realize that Con intends (2) as a premise within a larger deduction, the individual sentence contains an internal premise/conclusion relationship which is what I'm attacking. Allow me to rearrange it a bit: "if at that time one believes that God exists..." (premise)[then] "one is in a position to participate in a meaningful conscious relationship with God..." (inference) It does not follow that belief in god must lead to a meaningful, conscious relationship with Him. This is traditionally called Deism - the belief in a God without accepting a specific revelation or model of interaction with Him. Therefore, it's a non sequitur. Con's response to my rebuttal #3 is very important. Con protests that words must actually mean something, and that reason is destroyed if the meaning if words can be transcendent. Con sums it up perfectly - "then what is it we are talking about?" I agree. However, this is not the point I'm making.... I am not arguing that descriptions of God are transcendent and therefore meaningless. Con has submitted an opinion for what perfectly loving behavior would look like ("something close to what Schellenberg proposed"), and accuses God, if he exists, of violating that opinion, thereby suggesting a perfectly loving God does not exist. My objection, very simply, is that human understanding is confined within a flawed paradigm. Therefore, it would be impossible for us to accurately identify divine behavior as "imperfect" because we have no ability to conceive what perfection actually is. It does not mean the idea of perfection is meaningless, but rather that we must admit it would be impossible for us to accuse a perfect being, if he exists, of being imperfect. Does this mean God is beyond reason? No. It's simply an admission that there are some things we don't fully understand. Con's argument is not an appeal to reason, it's an appeal to arrogance: "God doesn't behave the way that we think he should. Therefore, god probably doesn't exist." This is not an argument. It's a complaint. 4) Con offers a strange response to my rebuttal #4. Con says "if those numbers [of people who believe in God] were a lot higher" then it would be evidence against their premise (4). Well, those numbers are pretty high..... most estimates conclude around 85% of the world's population believes in God [1]. Yes, statistics can be skewed and this is a hard topic to measure, but even with a significant margin of error that number is still very large. It's hard to imagine how much higher the number would have to be before being accepted as evidence by Con. Con says it should not be the case that both sides can be reasonable. But it is. You can find examples of this everywhere. For example, two intelligent, reasonable economists can look at the same market data and reach different conclusions about the economy's strength. Two doctors can draw different conclusions from the same chart. My opponent seems to be saying this is a contest between unreasonable belief and reasonable non-belief. I argue they can both be reasonable, under our definition of reason, but that belief in god offers more reasonable explanations for our observed reality. In response to rebuttal #5, Con says that God could thunder "down from the skies" and make "most reasonable people" believe. First, it's important to identify the subtle but significant goalpost shifting here. Con as gone from claiming that "all reasonable people would believe" to simply "most" of them. Second, who can say that God never has appeared to people? While I am not advocating any particular religion, many histories (both scriptural and secular) have recorded instances where a god did allegedly appear or speak. Con provides no reason to reject these records, which would be unfalsifiable anyway. Finally, this argument suggests that a "perfectly loving" god would force everyone to believe through divine intervention. I submit, simply, that forcing people to love you does not seem very loving..... For #6, Con says that two agents must be aware of each other to have a meaningful relation. I agree - but that is irrelevant to this debate. Con's definition of God in Round 1 is "The omnipotent, omniscient, loving creator of our universe." There is nothing about "meaningful relations" to be found. You certainly can love someone without them knowing about you. A mother can love her comatose son. In fact, this is precisely how many religions describe our relationship with God - as being "dead" or "blind" until a moment of conversion. I'm not trying to quibble with semantics, but it does not follow that "loving" must equate to "meaningful relationship." Con says it makes little sense to say Jill and John are in a meaningful relation if John does not know Jill. But that's not what was originally said. Con said "Jill loves John" and that can certainly be accomplished without John's knowledge. Con finishes their responses with a simplified deduction: P1) If God exists, God is loving.P2) God is not loving.C1) Therefore, God does not exist. If this is the core of Con's argument, then it does not work. P2 must affirm the existence of God in order to deny it, which is circular logic. Consider the argument in different terms: P1) If fire exists, fire is hot.P2) fire is not hot.C1) Therefore, fire does not exist. How can we declare "fire is not hot" if we say that fire does not exist? It's a meaningless statement. In order to say "fire is not hot," we must assume there is an entity, fire, that we can measure to gauge its temperature. But the moment we do that, we affirm its existence, meaning our conclusion is incorrect. There could be numerous reasons why we felt no heat from the fire - perhaps our nerves are damaged, or we're too far away, or the flame is behind glass. The same applies to God - it is not reasonable to conclude his non-existence based on a perceived lack of love. Physical Minds:Responding to my rebuttal, Con says that what is most likely is most reasonable. But that's not necessarily true. Probability is a part of reason, but it is not the whole. We make improbable, yet completely reasonable decisions every day - it's improbable that I will crash my car on the way to the grocery store, yet I put my seat belt on. It is improbable someone will try to rob my home, yet I still lock my door. Why are these actions considered reasonable? Because reason is more than pure probability. It also involves risk vs. reward, cost vs. benefit. This is why I think Pascal's Wager is a strong argument in this case. Even if T is less probable, it is infinitely more reasonable when also considering risk vs. reward. But is T significantly less probable? Perhaps, but Con doesn't really know. To quote my opponent: "T could still be high...." or, "it might be just zero." This is not reason, it's just a range of possible options. To counter Pascal's Wager, Con says that God would not allow people into heaven who believed out of self-interest. This is a contradictory claim. Claiming that a loving deity interested in personal relationship would kick believers out based on their motives is contrary to Con's own definition of loving quoted from Schellenberg, which says that a perfectly loving god would always ensure meaningful contact with herself. Indeed, unconditional love is blind to motive - it is unconditional. But, let's assume there is some contingency on practicing the right religion. This does not help Con's argument at all. It reduces the chances of the believer being correct, yes, but the non-believer's chances remain exactly the same: zero. Pluralism or Exclusivism is irrelevant; when we're simply talking belief vs. unbelief, belief is still more reasonable. To conclude, we must remember that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. While the BoP is shared, my opponent is advancing a claim that runs contrary to the almost universal experience of human culture since the beginning of recorded history. That is, by all measures, an extraordinary claim. Con has offered some theories and alternate possibilities, but a possibility is neither evidence nor extraordinary. Thanks to Con for a fun debate, I enjoyed it. As per the rules, I will waive the last round.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org...