DoesGodExist?
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From 1958 to 1962, China experienced a monumental famine that killed at least 45 million people, on the first day of the Battle of the Somme River in World War One, after only twelve hours, 19,420 British soldiers died, from 1346-1350, the Black Death viciously killed 100,000,000 people, Stalin’s “killing by hunger” imposed a cruel death on 1.8 – 12 million Ukrainians, World War Two killed 71 million people - including 6 million Jews. How could God let this happen? A good God certainly would not. So maybe God does not exist, how can one with all the bad in the world?
Clearly, humanity has suffered great tragedy and even continues to today in places like Aleppo. As a result, millions of people are converting to Atheism (the disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God). Religion has always been a sensitive topic, causing thousands of conflicts throughout history. So, what does the very thing we are fighting over even mean, and does it even exist? Depending on who you ask, you will get a different answer. Eastern philosophers typically interpret God as a representation of ultimate reality, while Western philosophy interprets God as a type of being. There are numerous arguments for God’s existence, most notably the cosmological, ontological, and teleological arguments, advocated by Aristotle & Aquinas, St. Anselm & Descartes, and Paley respectively. In essence, the cosmological argument is cause and effect; something earlier causes an effect after, which, in turn, causes another effect – therefore, God exists. The ontological argument is essentially the idea that since you can imagine that God exists he must exist. The teleological argument is described by Paley in Natural Theology: Or, Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity, Collected from the Appearances of Nature. Using his book, Paley explains God’s existence in the terms of his famous watch and watchmaker metaphor – which happens to be the favourite of the writers’ here at Philosopher’s. To restate his theory: when inspecting a watch, you can perceive its various parts and mechanisms that are assembled together for a larger purpose. These parts are combined to create motion that is then regulated and adjusted to perform certain functions and allow us to keep track of time. A watch is an incredibly intricate device and even the slightest variation in shape, size, or order of components would alter the creation of motion, meaning that the watch would not be able to tell time. Paley argues that, due to the complexity of the watch, there must have be a watchmaker that constructed the watch and designed its use; the watch is too complicated to have been created naturally without a creator.
Another interesting argument for the existence of God is the mind-body problem popularized by Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz. To understand this theory, one must first look into how the mind
mind and body interact with the world around us and answer the question: “is reality materialist, dualist, or idealist?” Materialists believe that the universe is comprised of physical substances, while an idealist believes that the universe is made up of ideas. Dualists, believe in both. If you answered ‘idealist’ or ‘materialist’, then the mind-body theory will not answer the God question for you. Essentially, mind-body believers think the force that fluidly allows the mind and body to work together is God. Although it may be extremely difficult to believe in God with all the bad in the world, there is a simple answer for non-believers. As stated by Epicurus, “God is all-powerful. God is perfectly good. Evil exists. If God exists, there would be no evil. Therefore, God does not exist.” God can be either a) all-powerful, or b) not good. God may not be as all-powerful as believers think, if he was, then there would be no evil. Pick if you are going to believe in a) or b) wisely – it could answer many questions for you.