God exists | DebateCraft

God is defined as: "All powerful being which has maximum power and which is maximally great".

Exists will be defined as: "to be in some world".

Burden of proof is shared.

Round 1

1 of 3

SatanLucy

Pro #1

Hi, and thanks for accepting.

Arguments:

1. God A exists and God B exists

2. God A exists and God B doesnt exist

3. God A doesnt exist and God B exists

4. God A and God B dont exist

If two Gods are possible, we end up with probability where only 1 out of 4 options favor atheism. If we increase number of possible Gods to 10000, then atheism is only true 1 in 10000 times. Since number of Gods can be infinite, atheism's probability is 1 in infinite.

II.

P1. God is an explanation for logic (A=A)

P2. Atheism has no expanation for logic (A=A).

C1. Logic can be proved and explained by God, while logic of atheist world cannot be proved.

C2. Any logic atheist uses is to be considered unproved.

P1 is true because God with all powers to create everything can create everything which exists, including logic. Correct by definition. P2 is true because logic cannot be explained by logic, and atheist has no explanation outside logic either. So C1 and C2 follow logically. Because God is above logic in power, there is nothing which can logically prevent God from existing or creating himself. So no logic atheist uses can disprove or even question God, and existence of logic itself is dependent upon God, thus mere use of logic assumes existence of God.

III.

P1. God is a maximally great all powerful being

P2. If maximally great being exists in one world, such being exists in all worlds.

P3. Maximally great being exists in mind, so it exists in one world

C. Maximally great being exists in all worlds

P1, P2 are true by definition. P3 is true, maximally great being exists in the mind and can be imagined. C logically follows. God can be proved to exist in imagination, he cannot be proved to not exist in any possible place. So opposite of ontological doesnt work.

P1. God is a maximally great all powerful being

P2. If maximally great being exists in one possible world, such being exists in all possible worlds.

P3. Maximally great being exists in possible world

C. God exists in all possible worlds.

Because God exists in possible version of this world, and no possible version of this world can contradict God's existence, we can conclude God exists in a possible world. Opposite doesnt work here. If we assume there is a condition in possible world which prevents God from existing, we would assume that such condition is above God in power, which is impossible by definition of God having maximum power. By logic, either God is possible or God isnt possible. No 3rd option exists, and two options are mutually exclusive. Possible means there is no known contradiction to God's existence. So with lack of any known contradiction in real world to God's existence, God is possible by definition, thus he exists in one possible world. And C follows.

IV.

P1. God explains why world exists as it is

P2. Lack of God cannot explain why world is as it is, and why world isnt different.

C. Only God explains the world.

P1 is true, world is as it is because God's will designed it that way. P2 is true, lack of God cannot provide any explanation for world and its laws and design being as it is. So C follows, God is the only existing explanation.

Dependent things cannot go back infinitely, and even infinite chain of dependents is still itself dependent. So a necessary being must exist to design things dependent on it to design it.

God with all powers to create everything can create everything which exists, and only something with power to create everything which exists can create everything which exists. Only all powerful being which can create everything can account for creation of everything.

P1. Only omniscience is complete truth

P2. God is omniscient

P3. Saying that omniscience doesnt exist is logically impossible position to defend

C1. God can never be considered to not exist

C2. God can only be considered to exist.

P1 and P2 are true by definition. P3 is true by tautology, because it takes omniscience to claim that omniscience doesnt exist, a logical contradiction. If person claimed that omniscience doesnt exist, but did so from a position of lack of omniscience, person wouldnt have complete truth, so person's claim would be based on incomplete truth, thus unproved, because the knowledge person lacks could be the knowledge which disproves such position. So omniscience can never be claimed to not exist, as that is a logical contradiction. So C follows, it is not possible to defend position that omniscience doesnt exist. So the only position left is that omniscience can be considered possible to exist, and never impossible.

Such argument serves to support possibility of God, and also to prove that position "God doesnt exist" is impossible to hold by anyone ever and can never be considered logically true, while position "God exists" can be logically considered true by God. Claiming that omniscience doesnt exist is equal to saying that whole truth doesnt exist, a self defeating position which cannot be true because it denies truth.

Ketaki@2010

Con #2

First, I want to start by saying I deeply respect my opponent’s views and the way they are presenting their arguments. The points I make are not meant to offend, but to share my perspective on the topic.

At first, when I read your arguments, I was like, ‘Oh shit, what did I sign up for?’ But then, as I read them more carefully, I realized some very silly mistakes in them.

What I’ve noticed in your arguments is that what you take as a base is something that is not yet proved: God exists. That is the very topic we are debating. The fact that we are here debating it means it is not yet proven. Yet, you build your argument upon this unproved fact.

For example, your first argument assumes that God exists. Then you move on to suggest that this unproved fact could also mean that multiple gods exist. Then you compare that with another unproved fact, i.e. atheism and then you go on to calculate probabilities. But that’s not how probability works. We learned this in school, you cannot compare two unproved facts and you cannot assign probabilities to something thats is unproven. At this point you were using imagination as evidence, but imagination cannot prove reality. By the same logic, I could imagine 10,000 unicorns sitting next to me right now, but that does not make them real. Possibility or imagination does not equal reality. Just because something can be imagined in your mind does not mean it exists. Building an argument on something unproven—something that is exactly what we are trying to prove—simply does not make sense.

Now moving onto the next argument that is about logic. Here again, I notice a similar mistake, you assume that God exists and that he created logic. I dare say, that's completely wrong way to present an argument. Logic is not something that is created (at least that has not been proved). Logic is a system that works inside our brains. We observe patterns from our childhood, our brains learn from these patterns, and we make decisions accordingly. This process is what we call logic. It’s not something that needs to be created by someone. These are just rules that our brain uses to process information. You cannot claim that God created these rules when his existence itself is questionable. Building an argument on the assumption that God created logic, and then saying that logic cannot be used to question God, is completely baseless. Just like in the previous argument, it starts with an unproven assumption and builds a conclusion on it, it just dosent make sense.

Next, we have the argument that God is maximally powerful and great, and because we can imagine him existing in at least one possible world, he exits in all possible worlds. But, as I mentioned in my first point, imagination does not equal reality. Just because we imagine God does not mean He exists in any possible world, and consequently does not prove he exists in all possible worlds.

Then, just defining God as maximally great does not prove existence. Once again, you are building an argument on an unproven base that God is maximally powerful and using it to ‘prove’ other unproven facts.Thats just baseless.

Next up we have a claim that God explains why the world exists. I can understand that perspective. Books like the Holy Bible, the Holy Quran, and the Holy Bhagvad Gita do offer explanations for why the world exists, provide values, and guide us on how to live. But that does not mean they are the only explanations.

There are many scientific explanations for why the world is the way it is, how it formed, how life came to exist, and why the universe is so vast. Some of these are well-supported, some are still theories, and while some might suggest the possibility of a supreme being, none of them prove the existense of God. Even the Big Bang, for instance, is a theory. Similarly, claiming God as an explanation is also a theory, not proven fact.

The key flaw here is assuming that because some scientific explanations are incomplete or not fully proven, the answer must automatically be God. Thats not how it works. Lack of evidence for one explanation does not automatically validate another unproven explanation.

Finally, the omniscience argument. I actually liked this one because it’s kind of confusing, and it took me a while to realize what you were trying to say. I understand your point, God is defined as omniscient, and because humans are not omniscient, we cannot fully know whether God exists or not.

But just because we cannot prove that God does not exist, it does not automatically mean God exists. We would still need a separate proof for that. For example, if I say, I don’t have the proof if life exists anywhere else in the universe, that doesn’t mean life must exist somewhere—I would need its own evidence to prove it.

This argument only highlights the limits of what we can know,it does not provide proof of God.

Round 2

2 of 3

SatanLucy

Pro #3

I thank my opponent for fun challenge.

4 issues:

Burden of proof is shared, so our positions likewise have equal probability in this debate before evidence is presented. So debate itself already places "God exists" at 50%, thus chance of any individual God at above 0%.
God is not impossible by modal logic. Possible means there is no contradiction to known axiom, and impossible is opposite of that. No contradicting axiom to God was presented by opponent. So chance of each God is above 0%, where impossible means 0% chance.
Because infinite number of independent Gods are possible, the chance of each individual God needs to be only above 0% to make atheism unlikely. Because each individual God is possible, their chance is above 0% each. Sum of infinite of non-zero probabilities always gives almost certain existence of at least one.
Math of random probability is usually easiest to express with coin toss. Coin toss has 50% chance of guessing any single Yes/No question. For example, if answer to question is yes, coin toss will guess "Yes" 50% of time. Same if answer is no, coin will guess "No" 50% of the time. Because when we assume only two options, choosing one randomly will always give us 50% chance to be correct. When we account for individual God, coin toss has 50% chance of guessing if that God exists. But when we increase number of Gods to lets say two, things change drastically. Because two Gods are independent, they are independent options. So if we took two coins, and threw one for God A, and second for God B, the odds are now 75% that coin will say at least one God exists, and it is correct in 75% of cases to say at least one God exists. So the chance for random choice to choose theism over atheism is way above 50%, and if we dont have any evidence for or against God, or probability of individual Gods which can be any, we must rely on random choice which always favors theism by far.

II.

My opponent presents logic as independent.

P1. Independent being is a being which doesnt depend on anything and everything else is created by it.

P2. Logic is not something which creates things.

C. Logic is not an independent being.

P1 is true by definition. P2 is also true, logic on its own has no creative power, and thus cannot create itself or other things.

Another argument:

P1. Logic either exists or doesnt

P2. In order to prove logic exists, we need explanation which is not logic, because logic cannot create itself and thus cannot explain own existence by itself.

P3. God above logic can create logic

P4. God above logic is explanation for logic

P1 is true according to logic itself, which when assumed true, leads to P2, P3 and P4. Logic even when assumed to exist in order to produce explanation, cannot explain its own existence, because any such explanation would already depend on logic. Self-explanation would be circular. So explanation can only be outside logic, which logic can use to explain itself. Outside logic is unknown, thus it can be anything, thus it is all powerful and maximally great.

III.

My opponent said that imagination isnt reality. However:

P1. Mind exists in reality

P2. God exists in mind

C. God exists in reality

If it was claimed that mind doesnt exist, such position would be absurd. And if it was claimed that God doesnt exist in mind would make God unquestionable.

However, modal ontological argument does not depend on imagination.

Definition: Maximally great being is a being which exists in all possible worlds.

P1. Maximally great being, if exists in one possible world, exists in all possible worlds

P2. Maximally great being exists in one possible world

C. Maximally great being exists in all possible worlds

Possible world by definition is possible in reality. So it is not imagination of any kind. Because maximally great being exists in one possible world, it exists in all by definition.

Consider problem of containing all reality.

All reality exists
If something exists, it must be contained somewhere
All reality must be contained somewhere
Something which contains all reality must be maximally great and must be able to create all reality

IV.

P1. Something is either dependent or independent.

P2. Dependent things fail to exist at certain times and places, thus depend on external conditions for own existence

P3. Dependent things cannot be dependent on themselves

P4. Dependent things depend on independent thing

P5. Independent thing is thing which cannot fail to exist. It exists always and everywhere. It is maximally great.

P1. Saying that it is impossible to determine truth is a self defeating position

P2. Determining truth requires reliable system for determining truth.

P3. System for determining truth must contain all true claims, or it risks being disproved by claims it lacks and thus unable to be used to reliably determine truth

P4. Containing all true claims is omniscience

P5. Claiming omniscience doesnt exist is equal to claiming it is impossible to determine truth.

Ketaki@2010

Con #4

FORFEITED

Round 3

3 of 3

SatanLucy

Pro #5

FORFEITED

Ketaki@2010

Con #6

FORFEITED

SatanLucy

#18

--> @ChatKnight

Research incompleteness theorem, and then realize what it means in debating where each claim depends on other to prove it and on lack of any disproving claim as well, thus lack of any true claim logically creates incomplete system. Further, lack of any true claim creates risk for system as a whole to be disproved, creating uncrertainty instead of proved true claims. To claim that system which has risk of being disproved at the same time reliably determines truth is a contradiction. To claim no system exists which can reliably determine truth means truth can never be reliably determined, which is a position which defeats itself as well.

ChatKnight

#17

--> @SatanLucy

The claim that the denial of omniscience entails a self-defeating epistemic relativism is fundamentally flawed on multiple grounds.

First, omniscience is traditionally defined as the possession of maximal or complete knowledge of all true propositions (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Def. D1). This definition presupposes an idealized epistemic agent — commonly attributed to divine beings — whose knowledge is both vast and infallible.[1]

Denial of omniscience does not entail that knowledge or truth is unknowable or indeterminate. Rather, it acknowledges epistemic finitude — the condition of limited knowledge capacity and the practical impossibility of attaining total, exhaustive knowledge. This position remains logically coherent and epistemologically defensible, recognizing that knowledge is fallible, context-dependent, and subject to revision (ied., ).[2][1]

Furthermore, insisting that rejection of omniscience implies an inability to determine truth reliably commits a category error conflating *maximal knowledge* with *adequate knowledge*. One can justifiably claim to know many truths without possessing omniscience. This position aligns with contemporary epistemic frameworks in which knowledge is understood probabilistically, inferentially, or contextually (ibid.).

The claim that denial of omniscience is self-defeating presumes an unrealistic epistemic standard that no finite agent can meet. It disregards distinctions between *truth* (ontological fact) and *knowledge* (epistemic access to truth), and between *maximal knowledge* and *practical epistemic reliability*.

In sum, denying omniscience does not license skepticism or epistemic nihilism, nor does it collapse into a self-refuting contradiction; rather, it acknowledges the fundamentally limited scope of cognition while preserving the meaningful pursuit and acquisition of knowledge.

***

This dispute underscores that claiming omniscience is a radically stronger assertion than merely striving for reliable knowledge, and rejecting omniscience remains fully compatible with sound epistemology.

SatanLucy

#16

--> @ChatKnight

"proposition can be denied if its opposite can be stated without contradiction"

It cannot be denied from a position of complete truth. Complete truth by definition includes all true claims. If something would include all true claims, that something would be omniscience. Lack of any true claim makes your position unable to reliably determine truth. Thus, to claim omniscience doesnt exist equals to saying truth cannot be reliably determined, a self defeating claim.

ChatKnight

#15

--> @SatanLucy

(AI augmented response)

It is logically possible to deny the existence of omniscience, and this denial can be coherently supported. Here’s how:

***

### Logical Possibility of Denial

In logic, a proposition can be denied if its opposite can be stated without contradiction. "Omniscience exists" is a positive claim; its negation—"Omniscience does not exist"—is logically permissible because it does not result in any inherent contradiction or paradox in reasoning. The burden of proof for omniscience lies with the claimant; denying it is reasonable unless definitive evidence is presented.

***

### Coherent Reasoning and Argumentation

#### 1. **Epistemic Limits**
All known minds, human or artificial, operate within limits: one cannot know all facts, predict all events, or possess complete information about everything, due to:
- Time constraints—new data and events constantly emerge.
- Cognitive constraints—memory, understanding, and processing power are finite.
- Observational limitations—some truths may be unobservable or unknowable.

Since no entity demonstrably surpasses these limits, the claim of omniscience is unsupported by experience and reason.

#### 2. **Logical Paradoxes**
The idea of omniscience generates paradoxes:
- If someone is omniscient, can they know a secret withheld even from themselves? (Self-referential paradox)
- Omniscience undermines free will—if future choices are knowable in advance, true autonomy may not exist.

These paradoxes make omniscience incoherent or self-contradictory when carefully examined.

#### 3. **Absence of Empirical Evidence**
No person, computer, or presumed supernatural being has demonstrated omniscient capability. All knowledge claims are bounded and provisional; omniscience is a hypothetical quality with no empirical support.

ChatKnight

#14

--> @SatanLucy

Nonsense. Try proving that.

SatanLucy

#13

--> @ChatKnight

It is not possible to deny omniscience from a position of complete truth.

ChatKnight

#12

--> @SatanLucy

The claim that denying omniscience is logically impossible to defend is not accurate. It is logically possible to deny the existence of omniscience and support that denial with coherent reasoning and argumentation.

SomeDebatePerson

#11

Atheists won’t be able to use the problem of evil in this debate since Pro already believes the Creator is evil and worships the creature instead.

pierree

#10

oh okay I understand ty

SatanLucy

--> @pierree

While this debate is too short to even include all meanings, "all powerful being" means being which has all powers, power being defined as ability to do something. So all powerful being can do everything. Maximum power simply means no greater power is possible. Maximally great means being present in all worlds.

pierree

what do you mean by "all powerful being" and "maximum power and maximally great"? I'm genuinely confused

SatanLucy

God is an important topic for me, tho I understand that you dislike God because of what he did to China.

SatanLucy

--> @philochristos

I am not sure, but maximum power outside of all powerful could even imply maximum power within given limits, and I dont want that. I admit I was also tempted to argue for divine being which is above everything else in power, but then I realized it would limit me to monotheism.

SatanLucy

--> @SomeDebatePerson

I only place shared burden of proof because voters on this site are so mean towards Pro that it doesnt even matter if it is shared burden of proof. Besides, atheist logically lives life as if God didnt exist, so I guess atheist should be brave enough to at least be able to prove that his lifestyle isnt completely wrong.

Intel_06

Ahh, the exact same topics. Makes me think of my middle school years.

philochristos

Do you see a difference between being "all powerful" and having "maximum power"?

SomeDebatePerson

No atheist will debate you since atheists don’t want a burden of proof or even a shared burden of proof. Atheists always want to be on the opposite side of the burden of proof, and they will twist evidence and philosophy to make their opponents have the burden of proof.

SomeDebatePerson

Theistic satanist vs atheistic satanist. What the heck bro?

Ultracrepidarian

Criterion	Pro	Tie	Con
Winner

Reason:

Forfeiture

SomeDebatePerson

Criterion	Pro	Tie	Con
Winner

Reason:

You can thank me know, SatanLucy. Reason: Full forfeit.

You can finally stop complaining.

Kohai Administrator

Criterion	Pro	Tie	Con
Winner

Reason:

Full forfeit

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

New comment