Chapter 11
The essence of the God debate
A lot of seemingly good arguments are wasted in the debate concerning God, yet there is no outcome. I propose a new approach to the issue. What lies at the heart of the God debate is the following earthly experience: nothing comes from nothing, and all life comes from some form of life. That's what we see and touch around us.
If you say God created everything but God never came to exist, God just is, you're saying something came from nothing, but at least you're saying life came from some other form of life. You go against earthly experience on one out of two points. If you say the universe consists of eternal material that never came to be, it just is, you're saying that something came from nothing, and also that life came from non-life. You go against earthly experience on two out of two points.
In addition, the ability to create is among God's attributes, but it's not one of matter's attributes, thus so-called materialists have a compounded problem.
In addition, the ability to create is among God's attributes, but it's not one of matter's attributes, thus so-called materialists have a compounded problem.
It appears that you have to defy ordinary life experince on at least one count. Is that better than defying it on two counts? Borth reason and common sense are based on earthly experience (i.e. sensory data, gleaned primarily through seeing and touching things), and the irony is that perfect reason cannot be achieved in the God debate. You can only choose between being unreasonable on one point or on both.
More on that in the chapter on morality.
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