Arguments for the existence of God (5) AQA A Level Religious Studies

Paley's Design Argument 

KEY VOCAB: 

• Inductive: when arguments are based on probability 

• Empirical: when an argument is based on the experience of senses 

THE ARGUMENT 

• If you stumbled on a stone, you wouldn’t ask how it got there, it is simple not complicated 

• If you stumbled on a watch, it would be reasonable to ask how it got there 

• A watch is complex and couldn’t have happened by chance, it has an intelligent designer 

• The universe is complex like the watch, it didn’t occur by chance it must have had a designer 

• The universe is more complex than a watch so has a greater designer this is God 

DAVID HUMES CRITISMS 

• Mechanistic: the universe is not a machine; it isn't reasonable to compare it to one 

• Chance: eventually due to the age of the audience order would eventually emerge 

• Anthropomorphic: humans don't know how the universe began; we are applying human thoughts to something that isn't human 

• Problem of evil: moral and natural evil is a sign of flawed design  

EVALUATION 

STATMENT AS A PROOF 

VALUE TO FAITH 

• Rational and empirically based 

• Consistent with Bible 

• “Belief that and belief in” his argument is BT, and his description is BI 

Anselm's Ontological Argument 

PROSLOGIUM 2 

• God is that “nothing greater can be conceived” 

• “The fool stays in his heart there is no God”- even a fool understands God 

• There is a difference between existing in the mind and in reality 

• If God only existed in the mind, a greater being could have been conceived 

• So, God cannot exit in only the mind, he exists in reality  

GAUNILOS LOST ISLAND VS ANSLEMS 

PROSLIGUM 3 (his responses) 

• A necessary being is ones whose nonexistence is contradictory 

• A contingent being is something that may or may not exist 

• It is greater to be a necessary being than a contingent one 

• If God is contingent something is better  

• So, God must be necessity  

• AN island isn't God 

 KANTS CRITISMIS 

Existence is not a predicate: 

• A real predicate gives information about a subject, Anslem's argument doesn't do this 

Something cannot be defined into existence: 

• Just because God could exist doesn't mean he does  

Aquinas Cosmological Argument 

WHAT IS IT 

• Because everything in the world  is contingent there must have been a time where nothing existed. This is impossible due to the amount t of contingent beings there are, so... there must be a necessary being 

• Everything that is necessary must be either caused or uncaused, infinite regress is the idea that there is an unending series of caused necessary beings. This is ridiculous so... there must be an uncaused necessary being 

• ‘I should say that the universe is just there, and that’s all’ -A debate on the existence of God, Bertrand Russell  

• ‘Plurality should not be posited without necessity.’ -William of Ockham 

CRISTISIMS 

• Fallacy of composition (Russel): just because what we see in the world is caused doesn't mean the universe was 

• Hume and Russell reject the necessary being: statements about existence are synthetic rather than analytic 

• Human suggested the universe may be a necessary existent being Ockham's Razor- it’s the simplistic explanation 

• The universe is brute fact 

• Hume argued that infinite regress could happen 

• Hume said nothing can be said about the nature of God