Top 5 Atheist Arguments Against God's Existence
…And Why They Fail
There are many arguments
Atheists use against God’s existence, especially when considering the Christian
faith. I have chosen what I believe to
be the top 5 most compelling arguments for the atheist side. I find these the most difficult to wrestle
with and hardest to answer, and also the ones the average person will use. While there are other arguments concerning specifics
of Christianity, they are not included in this post.
THE UNBIASED PERSPECTIVE
Assuming that God doesn’t
exist as the “default” view is in fact coming from a wrong and biased
perspective. It’s like assuming a person
is guilty and sentencing them to jail without looking at the evidence for and against his innocence. The right perspective is to instead ask:
For what reasons should I believe in God?
For what reasons should I not believe in God?
This is as unbiased as it
gets. Now, considering that we are
trying to best answer these questions, let’s look at the arguments:
1. God cannot be all-powerful – The Omnipotence Paradox
2. Science negates our need for God
3. Belief in God is directly correlated to where you were
born
4. Probability of Christianity being true is minimal
5.
How could a loving God allow suffering and evil to exist?
1. GOD CANNOT BE ALL-POWERFUL – THE OMNIPOTENCE
PARADOX
“Can God make a rock that he cannot
lift?”
-The Omnipotence Paradox
This is a classic
argument against God’s existence known as “The Omnipotence Paradox.” If God is all-powerful, he should be able to
do anything, right? This statement
seemingly traps the theist into a corner he can’t get out of. If God can make this type of rock, then he
cannot lift it and therefore cannot do something. If God can’t make this type of rock, then
there is still something he cannot do.
Either way, there is something God cannot do and therefore cannot be
all-powerful.
However, this is a
complete misunderstanding of the term “all-powerful.” God cannot do what is logically impossible.
Yes, I said it, God cannot do something.
It is logically
impossible to force someone to freely do something. By definition, this statement simply cannot
ever be true. It is also logically
impossible for God to create a spherical triangle. By definition, a triangle cannot be spherical. This does not take away from God’s power in
any way; he is still all-powerful, and therefore is still God.
2. SCIENCE NEGATES OUR NEED FOR GOD
“God was invented to explain
mystery. God is always invented to
explain those things that you do not understand.”
-Richard Feynman, American Physicist
I would of course agree
with the Atheist that the “God of the gaps” mentality should certainly be done
away with. “God of the gaps” means using
gaps in scientific understanding as proof of God’s action and existence. For example, when mankind didn’t understand
what thunderstorms were, we said it was a god getting angry at the world. Now that we understand thunderstorms, we no
longer need to blame it on God.
 |
| Richard Feynman |
And of course I agree
with this claim! However, Science is not
at war with God. I once blogged about
how the Science vs. God phenomenon is untrue, and that both our education
system and American Evangelical Christianity has conditioned us to believe that
Science and God are at war (found here: http://thewaymattseesit.blogspot.com/2014/02/science-vs-god.html).
Science simply explains
“how” things occur, but never “why.”
Science explains to us how gravity works, but no one alive knows what it
is or why it’s there. Science does not contradict faith, but
instead compliments faith.
Imagine a boiling kettle of
water. Why is it boiling? One could argue that the molecules are
heating up and causing the water to boil and eventually turn into steam. One could also argue that the kettle is
boiling because, “I want a cup of tea!”
Both of these arguments explain the boiling kettle. Neither of them contradicts each
other, but actually compliment one another.
Science has helped us to
understand the “how,” but this in no way negates God’s existence. It eliminates the “God of the gaps”
mentality, but that is not in any way what the theist is claiming God to be. Asserting that God does not exist is in fact not a scientific claim at all; in actuality, it is a philosophical claim. Johannes Kepler more accurately described science as "thinking God's thoughts after him."
3. BELIEF IN GOD IS DIRECTLY CORRELATED TO WHERE
YOU WERE BORN
 |
| Richard Dawkins |
-Richard Dawkins, British
Evolutionary Biologist
Richard Dawkins is a huge
proponent of this argument. This asserts
that people only ascribe to their particular faith because of the geological
location of their birth; if you were born in America, you would most likely be
a Christian; if you were born in India, you would most likely be a Hindu; if
you were born in Indonesia, you would most likely be a Muslim.
This argument is concluding that a
belief is false by explaining how the belief originated. This is known as committing the “Genetic
Fallacy.” Even if the assumptions about
the belief were true (Christians only are Christian because of their upbringing;
belief in God only began because of misunderstandings of science; etc.), this
does nothing to show how that belief is false.
Simply explaining the origin of
the belief does not change the truth of that belief.
In what way does this
show that God does not exist? How does
this claim answer the question, “For what reason should I not believe in
God?” Simply put, it does not.
4. PROBABILITY OF CHRISTIANITY BEING TRUE IS
MINIMAL
"Religion is like a pair of shoes...Find one that fits you, but don't make me wear your shoes."
-George Carlin
-George Carlin
However, this argument is
completely fallacious and misleading.
How does one simply assume that there is a 50/50 chance of God’s
existence? From what evidence does this
claim come from? Perhaps it is an
attempt to be unbiased, but it simply is not.
Instead, once again, we ask the questions: For what reason should I
believe in God? For what reasons should
I not believe in God?
We should rephrase this argument: Is Christianity
true? Jesus claimed that he himself was truth (John
14:6). This statement can only be true
or false. By examining both Jesus’
claims and the evidence supporting those claims, we can make a decision about
Christianity. As John Lennox put it, we
want to have “an evidence-based faith.”
I posted a blog post
examining the facts concerning the resurrection of Jesus here:
“Christianity,
if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only
thing it cannot be is moderately important.”
-C.S.
Lewis
5. HOW COULD A LOVING GOD ALLOW SUFFERING AND EVIL
TO EXIST?
“Injustice upon earth renders the
justice of heaven impossible.”
-Robert G. Ingersoll, “The Great
Agnostic”
This is a classic argument is known as The Problem of Evil,
and is perhaps the best one the atheist has to offer against God’s
existence. For what reason should I not
believe in God?
1. An
all-knowing God would know evil exists.
2. An
all-loving God would want to prevent evil from existing.
3. An
all-powerful God could prevent evil from existing.
4. Evil
exists.
5. Therefore
an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving God cannot exist.
However, this argument does not consider another premise: God desires to create significantly free
creatures capable of moral good and moral evil. While this argument is probably the best the
atheist has, it is now outdated. Considering this premise, we see that God’s
existence is not logically incompatible with the existence of evil.
I blogged on this here:
This video does a great job explaining The Problem of Evil:
CONCLUDING REMARKS
 |
| Antony Flew, leading atheist thinker of the 20th century |
I was watching a debate
with Antony Flew, perhaps the most prominent atheist thinker of the 20th
century, and he was adamantly arguing that God couldn’t exist. Immediately after, I watched an interview
with him where he became a theist (more specifically, a Christian theist). He said he simply “followed the evidence
where it led.”
The question we must ask
ourselves is: are we really searching
for truth? Or do we just want to ask
questions, never really wanting an answer?
If we are looking for truth, then we will find it. So, let us instead ask this question:
For what reasons should I
believe in God?
1.
The Cosmological Argument
(Shows God is the best explanation for the cause
of the universe).
2.
The Fine-Tuning Argument
(Shows God is the best explanation for the conditions
for life to exist).
3.
The Moral Argument
(Shows
God is the best explanation for the existence of objective moral values and
duties).
4.
The Historical Facts concerning the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth
(Shows that God is the best explanation for the
resurrection of Jesus).
5.
The Immediate Experience of God
(Shows
that God can be personally known and experienced as a properly basic belief).
I have blogged about
almost all of these arguments, all under the “Let’s Argue” title. While there are many more, these are five
that I find to be very compelling arguments for God’s existence. If we examine the arguments for both sides, we see that we have much better reasons for believing in God's existence.
**This is a great debate
illustrating these five arguments for God’s existence, and also one of the best
cases made by an atheist in all of the debates I’ve seen:
William Lane Craig vs.
Christopher Hitchens:
**This is not an
all-inclusive list of the arguments against God’s existence. Once again, this is the Top 5 that I’ve
compiled based off of my own researching.
I have found these repeatedly brought up in theist vs. atheist debates,
and of all the ones I’ve heard, I find these to be the most compelling.
**This blog post was
inspired from reading:
Top 10 Atheist Arguments
and Why They Fail:
**William Lane Craig vs.
Antony Flew debate:
**Antony Flew discusses becoming a theist:
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