Prove it to me that God exists

Hello, my esteemed interlocutor. We thank you for initiating this debate and hope that it will prove fruitful. Now, since this debate is regarding the existence of God, as opposed to a Necessary Being, we should first clarify what kind of God we are referring to. Hence, we shall open with a summary of the Ash’arite doctrine regarding God.

In brief, God is understood as a Necessary Being who possesses Privative Attributes, and Attributes of Volitional Agency.

A Necessary Being is understood as a Being who does not need anything to make it exist, while everything else depends on it to make it exist.

The Privative Attributes are understood as being Pre-Eternality (that God did not begin to exist), Post-Eternality (that God will not cease existing), Transcendence (that God does not resemble contingent beings, and is not composed of matter, energy, time or space), Independence (that God does not have any need) and Oneness (that there is no one else who shares in God’s Being, Attributes or Actions).

The Attributes of Volitional Agency are understood as being Life (that God is Alive, not a machine-like being), Knowledge (that God has Knowledge of all things, without any prior ignorance), Will (that God chooses things based on His Knowledge, without time, such that the willing comes after knowing) and Power (that God realises His choice, in accordance with His Knowledge).

Now, the proof of there being a Necessary Being (NB) is as follows (I have chosen to use an Avicennan style here):

1. There is no doubt that there is existence
2. Existence can either be Necessary - not needing to be made the way it is - or Contingent (C) - needing to be made the way it is
3. C existence can be found in extramental reality
4. If C existence can be found in extramental reality, then it depends on an N existence to make it the way it is
5. Hence, from 1) to 4), N existence can be found in extramental reality to make C existence the way it is 

An example of C existence is the sun shining and wind blowing, as these need explanations to make them the way they are (shining and blowing). 

Analogy: you hear that someone has been spreading a rumour about you, so you ask him, but he says he heard the rumour from person 2. Person 2 says he heard it from person 3 etc. Obviously this rumour has to have a source, someone who made it up without hearing it from someone else. If there was an infinite series of people without someone who initiated the rumour, there would be no rumour for the infinite series of people to spread. The number of people is irrelevant. If there are 5 people, 20 or infinity people, unless there is an initiator for this chain, no rumour exists. Applying this to contingency, unless there is something to make things the way they are and which doesn't need to be made the way it is, nothing would be the way they are.

The proof for the Pre-Eternality of this NB is that if it were not, then it would be emergent and need something to make it exist. 

The proof for the Post-Eternality of this NB is that if it were not, then it would be possible for it to not exist, and would hence be contingent.

The proof for the Transcendence of this NB is that if it were not, then it would resemble contingent beings and hence be contingent.

The proof for the Independence of this NB is evident from the proof for N existence.

The proof for the Life of this NB is evident from the following proofs for Knowledge, Will and Power, since these Attributes cannot be ascribed to a machine-like cause.

The proof for the Knowledge, Will and Power of this NB is that if the C realities were produced by a knowledgeless cause, there would be no C entities and they would not display variegation or design. 

The proof for the Oneness of this NB is that the presence of two wills would disrupt the design and harmony in the universe, and also each NB would have to be different in some way, which means they would be C.

Thus the conception of God defined at the beginning of this statement has been proven. God exists. 

Let us close with two poetic pieces of the Arab poets:

'O wonder! How can He be disobeyed

Or by the thankless have His name denied?

For God in each and every moment made,

And every stillness, traces that us guide.

In everything a sign has e'er been laid

By which His Oneness standeth testified

and

All you grasp with your imagination;

Might, ability and exaltation.

Is lesser than the One Who made creation,

Glorious then is His Origination!

(I.e. His bringing things into existence)

Peace,

Soldier

Thank you for the first rebuttal. I will attempt to respond to everything you have said: 

‘’My opponent basically just presented contingency argument combined with causation and design argument, failed to make his reasoning in premises form, all while making unproved claims such as ""specific design" (if there is any design at all) cant come from non-intelligence".‘’

Indeed, you are absolutely correct in asserting that I used these arguments to prove God, yet I disagree with your assertion that I failed to do so in premise form. The Avicennan contingency argument I presented was made by presenting a number of premises, and the arguments thereafter are made informally, though they are such that a syllogistic formulation is easily extracted. Consider my assertion: ‘The proof for the Pre-Eternality of this NB is that if it were not, then it would be emergent and need something to make it exist.’ This can be formulated as follows:

1. The NB does not need to be made exist
2. Anything that came into being after having not been needs something to make it exist
3. The NB did not come into being after having not been

I avoided syllogistically presenting all the arguments after N existence for the sake of convenience, but, I reiterate, they can easily be converted to a deductive style. However, if you require that I state each argument in syllogistic form, I shall comply.

As for your assertion that I argued specific design cannot emerge from non-intelligence, I did not say that. Perhaps you are referring to my defence of the NB as being a Volitional Agent or a Singular Being. The idea of ‘design’ refers to things having a purpose. This cannot be denied, as the eyes’ purpose is to see and the ear’s purpose is to hear etc. Even if you take an evolutionary perspective, the fact that these organs evolved to better suit their functions shows they have a purpose.

‘’These arguments arent even his own arguments, they are thousand years old arguments which were disproved a billion times by now, and things like B theory of time if true even disprove contingent things existing at all along with causation.’’

I disagree that they have been ‘disproven.’ The arguments’ prevalence in the ‘philosophy of religion’ department indicates that much debate surrounds these arguments, hence both sides continue this battle of words, and the atheists have not had a final say. 

The argument for NB did not involve causation. The meaning of ‘needing to be made the way it is’ refers to the state/characteristics of C entities, such as leaves being green and the sun shining. Even if the universe was eternal, as Avicenna asserted, this does not remove the contingency of the entities within it. To affirm the universe as being an eternal block of spacetime does not refute the argument since we can ask ‘what makes this block the way it is?’ It has properties and is a certain state, hence our question is justified.

Just because something which exists can either be made by something or not made by anything, doesnt prove God. Logic isnt made by anything we know, yet logic is not God. 

A distinction must be drawn between mental necessity and extramental necessity. Logic does not have extramental reality such that we can say it exists in the conventional sense we are talking about. The NB whose existence I have argued for exists in extramental reality.

‘’Likewise, saying that there must be a first cause isnt saying that cause is God or even proving that there is first cause as opposed to infinite regress.’’

I have stated what conception of God I am attempting to prove. If I prove each part of my conception, this means God exists. Can you please highlight the section of my argument you are referring to so I can defend it? This is on account of my ignorance as to whether you are disputing the first argument or the one for the Pre-Eternality of the NB. If you dispute the latter, then I refer you to the analogy I gave in my opening argument. 10 transmitters of a rumour still need someone to invent the rumour. Likewise a hypothetical infinite number of transmitters (notice that I am not making a temporal argument here) would still need somewhere to get the rumour from.

‘’My opponent may be mentioning things like beginning and dependency, but such dont prove God because no deductive logic was used to explain why it has to be God. And for those not familiar with deductive logic, "A because of B" is not deductive logic. Thats just assumption reasoning, and since my opponent didnt prove his claims with observation or with logical laws, they fail.’’ 

I have already responded to all of these. If you wish me to refer to logical laws, here is one to consider: I said in P4 of the contingency argument that ‘If C existence can be found in extramental reality, then it depends on an N existence to make it the way it is’ If you think about it, there are two options: either C existence is made the way it is by something C or not-C (I.e. N) by the law of excluded middle. The former option is false since the very definition of a C entity is one that needs to be made the way it is. It is thus analogous to our assertion ‘Person A received the rumour from Person B who received the rumour from someone else.’ One has not answered the question of where the rumour has come from. 

And God knows best. May He bless and bestow abundant peace on my master Muhammad for ever.

I guess this is my conclusion statement. If anything I say hereon comes across as rude, then I humbly beg your pardon. As an overall statement, I don’t think the esteemed interlocutor really engaged any of my arguments, while ignoring the fact that if I proved all the conceptions of God I had, that would mean that God exists. If X is defined as being A, B and C, and then I prove A, B and C, that means that X is true. 

‘’No, my opponent is merely repeating his arguments while admitting these arguments are subject of debate for decades, and thus aren't even certain or proved.’’

I disagree. I think I furnished more evidence for them. Plus, I don’t think you engaged the arguments specifically, by attacking the premises of each. Hence, I did not have very much to defend. I showed that my arguments have either been presented syllogistically or potentially syllogistically. The way to move forward in the debate would be to show that said premises are unsound.

As for the arguments being the subject of debate, that is certainly true. Yet, that does not mean that they are false. It all relates to whether each individual is convinced by using his rational faculty. Referring to the authority of past philosophers who were not convinced is not a refutation of said proofs. I could say that the fact that geniuses like Ibn Sina, al-Razi, al-Ghazali and Ibn Taymiya believed in God and argued for His existence shows that the proofs are certain, yet that would merely be an appeal to authority. This carries little weight in a discussion such as ours.

The fact that said arguments are still around today could be said to highlight their enduring and timeless truth. I do not say this as a positive statement, but rather as a rebuttal to your assertion. 

‘’The argument of purpose, design, necessary being... None of these establish God, for my opponent did not explain why God is necessary for any of this.’’

I have said that if I proved all the aspects that make up my conception, that conception exists.

‘’These are just ancient arguments, something you can find on google search, so they don't really establish anything and virtually all honest philosophers throughout history agreed they were insufficient.’’

That all honest philosophers asserted the insufficiency of such proofs is dishonest. This is a loaded argument, which suggests that atheist philosophers are somehow more entitled to their position, even though atheism (the rejection of the Divine) is an active claim, and hence requires evidence. As a side point, this relates to atheism, not agnosticism.

The fact that all philosophers did not agree on something does not make it false. Philosophers are humans, and thus make errors in reasoning, hence we have to use our own minds and see what convinces us, in accordance with logic. 

The esteemed interlocutor has also mischaracterised those philosophers who affirmed the Divine Reality as being dishonest. What shall we say, then, of Descartes, who built up a system starting from proving his own existence starting with the cogito? What of Ibn Sina? What of al-Maturidi? Shall we call them dishonest simply because they followed a logic that convinced them of God’s existence? 

‘’My opponent again didn't present anything in deductive form, other than his argument for necessary being which is just contingency argument which fails to prove God any more it proves basic components of universe or a magical bunny which pooped out the universe.’’

This is wrong. I stated in my second response that each argument was informally deductive, and could easily be presented formally, something I demonstrated and I offered to present them as such. I have also shown that the NB is God - according to the conception I gave in my opening - via the other arguments which the esteemed interlocutor has not addressed.

‘’Saying that something made things the way they are, is not saying that something is God.’’

The esteemed interlocutor is absolutely correct. The NB is not automatically God, but I have furnished evidence to show that it is.

‘’Also, saying that logic doesn't exist in reality is very dumb given that all reality bows to it, and my opponent's arguments depend on it. In deductive reasoning, starting premise must be observation or logical law, otherwise what is starting premise proved by?’’

The esteemed interlocutor has strawmanned my argument. I did not say logic does not exist, rather I said it does not exist extramentally. It is an abstract entity that doesn’t have existence the same way NB does. 

‘’Making assumptions to prove God is just yapping. If your first premise is assumption, then your conclusion is assumption too. Coming to debate with arguments which were made 700 years ago thinking that you will "prove God" while those same arguments failed to do exactly that for 700 years since their making... Yeah that doesn't work.’’

I have shown my arguments have premises which the esteemed interlocutor has not addressed. These are based on logic. The esteemed interlocutor also asserts that the arguments failed to prove God’s existence. This is false as many have been convinced by them. This is not appealing to authority, but rather shows that rational minds have been convinced by them.

In conclusion then, I thank the interlocutor for initiating this debate and apologise if I have not been rude in any way. I think my arguments still stand. The esteemed interlocutor has not engaged very much with my premises, hence they have not been shown to be false.

And God knows best.