Can reason lead us to God?

[Anonymous No.12198354]

The metaphysical arguments for God explain reality better than anything atheists have come up with. So why is the West increasingly atheist/areligious? Were people conned into not taking these arguments seriously?

[Anonymous No.12198376]

>>12198354
>The metaphysical arguments for God explain reality better than anything atheists have come up with
lol what arguments. You realize metaphysics died in the 20th century, right?

>Were people conned into not taking these arguments seriously?
oh the iron, Lee

[Anonymous No.12198379]

>>12198354
No, they don't. Theology and apologists start with the conclusion and build their systems around that. It's is the antithesis of reason. Attempting to prove God via reason is a mistake.

[Anonymous No.12198386]

Reason can lead us to designing escape proof blueprints for death camps and efficiency formula for forced labor.

Which is to say that reason is a handy thing indeed but by no means the only aspect of intellect. In fact you might say modernity is what happens when you assume intellect is the same thing as reason.

There are things beyond the rational which perceive and declare truth.

Scandalous, I know.

[Anonymous No.12198389]

>>12198354
Belief in God is a personal thing. The people who make a big stink about the lack of belief and cite changes in culture or social life are out to control others just like any other worldly ideologue.

I believe in God and live what I consider a Christian life, but I don't need to vote Republican, attend weekly social clubs, or flex my moral probity in casual conversations to do so.

The worlds problems would be all fixed up if more people just believed in God and did obeyed the everything the man on the stage and screen says.

Not so.

[Anonymous No.12198403]

>>12198376
Metaphysics is not dead. In fact, it is undergoing a revival or sorts. So why do you say this?

[Anonymous No.12198410]

I am suspicious of rational arguments which claim to prove super rational matters.

[Anonymous No.12198412]

>>12198379
No they don't. They start with fundamental axioms and assumptions. You can see this in their formalized arguments.

[Anonymous No.12198427]

>>12198403
Metaphysics is entirely dead. The whole idea of metaphysics is that you have to posit something higher than Physics in order to explain reality. This has been proven erroneous by modern physics. Reality can be and is being explained entirely by the natural sciences. No more super-natural stuff is relevant anymore, sorry.

[Anonymous No.12198428]

>>12198354
What is Aristotles proof? I'm curious. Always figured him for a Gnostic.

[Anonymous No.12198436]

>>12198354

Because the very first sentence that you wrote is clearly false.

[Anonymous No.12198448]

>>12198436

Explain fine-tuning without God, and then compare it to an explanation with God.

[Anonymous No.12198454]

>>12198427
>reality can be and is being explained entirely by the natural sciences

I cannot believe I read this.

[Anonymous No.12198455]

>>12198376
>>12198427
holy shit the state of this board

[Anonymous No.12198465]

>>12198427

[Anonymous No.12198469]

>>12198454
>>12198455
>>12198465
Great arguments all.

Nice to see you don't have a clue about what you're talking about and get so easily upset when you get called out on it.

Give one of these "metaphysical arguments" for god and I'll explain why it's shit.

[Anonymous No.12198480]

>>12198469
1. Change is a real feature of the world.
2. But change is the actualization of a potential.
3. So, the actualization of potential is a real feature of the world.
4. No potential can be actualized unless something already actual actualizes it (the
principle of causality).
5. So, any change is caused by something already actual.
6. The occurrence of any change C presupposes some thing or substance S which
changes.
7. The existence of S at any given moment itself presupposes the concurrent
actualization of S’s potential for existence.
8. So, any substance S has at any moment some actualizer A of its existence.
9. A’s own existence at the moment it actualizes S itself presupposes either (a) the concurrent actualization of its own potential for existence or (b) A’s being
purely actual.
10. If A’s existence at the moment it actualizes S presupposes the concurrent
actualization of its own potential for existence, then there exists a regress of
concurrent actualizers that is either infinite or terminates in a purely actual
actualizer.
11. But such a regress of concurrent actualizers would constitute a hierarchical causal
series, and such a series cannot regress infinitely.
12. So, either A itself is a purely actual actualizer or there is a purely actual actualizer
which terminates the regress that begins with the actualization of A.
13. So, the occurrence of C and thus the existence of S at any given moment
presupposes the existence of a purely actual actualizer.
14. So, there is a purely actual actualizer.
15. In order for there to be more than one purely actual actualizer, there would have
to be some differentiating feature that one such actualizer has that the others
lack.

[Anonymous No.12198484]

>>12198480
16. But there could be such a differentiating feature only if a purely actual actualizer
had some unactualized potential, which, being purely actual, it does not have.
17. So, there can be no such differentiating feature, and thus no way for there to be
more than one purely actual actualizer.
18. So, there is only one purely actual actualizer.
19. In order for this purely actual actualizer to be capable of change, it would have to
have potentials capable of actualization.
20. But being purely actual, it lacks any such potentials.
21. So, it is immutable or incapable of change.
22. If this purely actual actualizer existed in time, then it would be capable of change,
which it is not.
23. So, this purely actual actualizer is eternal, existing outside of time.
24. If the purely actual actualizer were material, then it would be changeable and exist
in time, which it does not.
25. So, the purely actual actualizer is immaterial.
26. If the purely actual actualizer were corporeal, then it would be material, which it
is not.
27. So, the purely actual actualizer is incorporeal.
28. If the purely actual actualizer were imperfect in any way, it would have some
unactualized potential, which, being purely actual, it does not have.
29. So, the purely actual actualizer is perfect.
30. For something to be less than fully good is for it to have a privation—that is, to
fail to actualize some feature proper to it.
31. A purely actual actualizer, being purely actual, can have no such privation.
32. So, the purely actual actualizer is fully good.
33. To have power entails being able to actualize potentials.

[Anonymous No.12198487]

>>12198484
34. Any potential that is actualized is either actualized by the purely actual actualizer
or by a series of actualizers which terminates in the purely actual actualizer.
35. So, all power derives from the purely actual actualizer.
36. But to be that from which all power derives is to be omnipotent.
37. So, the purely actual actualizer is omnipotent.
38. Whatever is in an effect is in its cause in some way, whether formally, virtually,
or eminently (the principle of proportionate causality).
39. The purely actual actualizer is the cause of all things.
40. So, the forms or patterns manifest in all the things it causes must in some way be
in the purely actual actualizer.
41. These forms or patterns can exist either in the concrete way in which they exist in
individual particular things, or in the abstract way in which they exist in the
thoughts of an intellect.
42. They cannot exist in the purely actual actualizer in the same way they exist in
individual particular things.
43. So, they must exist in the purely actual actualizer in the abstract way in which
they exist in the thoughts of an intellect.
44. So, the purely actual actualizer has intellect or intelligence.
45. Since it is the forms or patterns of all things that are in the thoughts of this
intellect, there is nothing that is outside the range of those thoughts.
46. For there to be nothing outside the range of something’s thoughts is for that thing
to be ominiscient.
47. So, the purely actual actualizer is omniscient.
48. So, there exists a purely actual cause of the existence of things, which is one,
immutable, eternal, immaterial, incorporeal, perfect, fully good, omnipotent,
intelligent, and omniscient.
49. But for there to be such a cause of things is just what it is for God to exist.
50. So, God exists.

[Anonymous No.12198488]

>>12198480
This is the Aristotelian argument Feser gives.

[Anonymous No.12198504]

>>12198480
>1. Change is a real feature of the world.
>2. But change is the actualization of a potential.
>3. So, the actualization of potential is a real feature of the world.
Implodes within the first 3 steps. Amazing.

You really are totally and abjectly oblivious to what the current understand of reality is, aren't you?

This might help you along.https://newtoniangravity.quora.com/Defining-the-Concepts-of-Energy No one considers the dichotomy of actual/potential. This is what happens when the only books you read are thousands of years old and written by people who couldn't even invent penicillin.

[Anonymous No.12198505]

>>12198480
>>12198484
>>12198487

[Anonymous No.12198507]

>>12198505
Not an argument.

[Anonymous No.12198514]

>>12198507
Neither was your retarded "proof"

[Anonymous No.12198558]

>>12198504
You are truly the dumbest and most philosophically illiterate person I have met on this board. May God have mercy on your soul.
Let's see what Werner Heisenberg has to say about Aristotelian potentiality and physics.

>Regarding the “statistical expectation” quantum theory associates with the behavior of an atom, Heisenberg says:


>One might perhaps call it an objective tendency or possibility, a “potentia” in the sense of Aristotelian philosophy. In fact, I believe that the language actually used by physicists when they speak about atomic events produces in their minds similar notions as the concept “potentia.” So the physicists have gradually become accustomed to considering the electronic orbits, etc., not as reality but rather as a kind of “potentia.”(pp. 154-5 in the 2007 Harper Perennial Modern Classics edition)


>And again:


>The probability wave of Bohr, Kramers, Slater… was a quantitative version of the old concept of “potentia” in Aristotelian philosophy. It introduced something standing in the middle between the idea of an event and the actual event, a strange kind of physical reality just in the middle between possibility and reality.(p. 15)


>And yet again:


>The probability function combines objective and subjective elements. It contains statements about possibilities or better tendencies (“potentia” in Aristotelian philosophy), and these statements are completely objective, they do not depend on any observer; and it contains statements about our knowledge of the system, which of course are subjective in so far as they may be different for different observers.(p. 27)


>Discussing, more generally, the relationship between matter and energy in modern physics, Heisenberg says:


>If we compare this situation with the Aristotelian concepts of matter and form, we can say that the matter of Aristotle, which is mere “potentia,” should be compared to our concept of energy, which gets into “actuality” by means of the form, when the elementary particle is created.(p. 134)

[Anonymous No.12198589]

>>12198504
This is your brain on STEM.

[Anonymous No.12198724]

>>12198354
>THE CHANCES OF THE UNIVERSE JUST COMING TOGETHER ARE SO LOW ITS LIKE IF A BUNCH OF PIECES OF AN AIRPLANE WERE IN A JUNKYARD THEN A TORNADO SWEPT THROUGH AND ALL THE PIECES JUST LANDED TOGETHER IN THE EXACT SHAPE OF AN AIRPLANE CHECKMATE ATHEISTS

[Anonymous No.12198747]

>>12198724
Fine-tuning is a subject of serious philosophical inquiry that has been written about quite a lot in the last 10 years. Why is there something rather than nothing? You've managed to say nothing, that's certain.

[Anonymous No.12198750]

>>12198514
I mean it clearly was, but I'm 99 percent sure you're trolling,

[Anonymous No.12198759]

>>12198747
Oh, you were being serious about the fine-tuning thing..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9O5wXsgqrc

[Anonymous No.12198767]

>>12198747
I think you meant to post in this thread >>12198721
Pseud.

[Anonymous No.12198785]

So what if you could somehow prove there is a h7gher being? That doesn't mean it's the Christian God or really any other god described by humans at all. In conclusion: Abracucks BTFO.

[Anonymous No.12198793]

Belief based upon pure faith is much stronger, more self-rewarding than belief based upon reason.
>>12198761

[Anonymous No.12198798]

>>12198412

The problem with classical apologetics is assuming axioms are more certain that God, which makes for easy pickings. That's why a transcendental argument for the existence of God is the only coherent proof.

[Anonymous No.12198808]

>arguing the existence of God without defining God at all
Are you all retarded or am I being trolled?

[Anonymous No.12198836]

>>12198759
I don't come here to watch videos. If you want to give an argument then give one.

[Anonymous No.12198842]

>>12198793

The dichotomy of reason and faith is the disease of the Western philosophical tradition. Your options are being a pietist cuck who relies solely on faith or an autist who is either Catholic or Calvinist and has only "proofs" and tomes of Ex Cathedra.

[Anonymous No.12198849]

>>12198354

think of it like this
If something bad happens to you are you going to listen to any "arguments" about how that bad thing is actually a good thing?

[Anonymous No.12198852]

>>12198836

herp-te-terp Aquinas can arbitrarily cite others to support his thing but DON'T YOU DARE do the exact same thing

[Anonymous No.12198854]

>>12198836
>can't watch an 8 minute video
>"If you want to give an argument then give one."
The video contains the (multiple) arguments, you mouthbreather. Way to tip your hand of having absolutely zero arguments.

[Anonymous No.12198857]

>>12198842
Reason begins with axioms, which are just dressed-up declarations of faith.

[Anonymous No.12198864]

>>12198852
He can cite him, I just can't watch a video right now.

[Anonymous No.12198896]

>>12198857

I think both of us are in agreement on that point. To divorce the two is a mistake.

The problem with the Western tradition and classical apologetics is the forming of an axiom without reference to God prior to positing His existence. To make God less certain than the law of noncontradiction calls into question the veracity of His existence. A transcendental proof would simply refer the totality of the structure (something similar but not equivalent to Plato's forms) of the universe to His Logos, which would qualify as the precondition of all existence.

[Anonymous No.12198935]

>>12198854
Then give some of them. Also, ask yourself how often you would spend eight minutes reading a long typed out response on this site. Pawning me off to a YouTube video is just lazy.

[Anonymous No.12198952]

>>12198935
Anon doesnt want to spend 8 minutes typing something up.

[Anonymous No.12199147]

>>12198427
Who let this IRA motherfucker on my board.

[Anonymous No.12199203]

>>12198427
explain causality without stepping into metaphysics, mr big brain