god and logic

logical problems in proofs of god

even if we accept the proofs of god's existence and concede that they are not fallacious, what they prove is the existence of some obscure force or power or powers, and these do not necessarily resemble the god of christianity or islam or judaism.  for example, thomas aquinas was so sure that he had found a proof for the christian god by supposedly proving that the universe needed an "unmoved mover."  aquinas borrowed this proof from aristotle, but aristotle had found over 40 different unmoved movers!  why did thomas make the leap of illogic that there must be only one unmoved mover?  and that this unmoved mover is actually god and not another entity?

but all this is old news.  let's move on to something new.  having conceded, just for the moment, that yes, one can prove god's existence, we shall now try to build a logical proof that is valid in structure.  there are problems with this, however.

an example of a classic syllogism from a logic book (copi and cohen): all men are mortal / socrates is a man / therefore socrates is mortal.  this valid syllogism can be converted into another valid syllogism: all men are immortal / socrates is a man / therefore socrates is immortal.  this second syllogism is valid, but is it true?  the first syllogism is called valid and true.  the second syllogism is valid but false.

now we can construct all sorts of proofs of god's existence, and even if they are valid, if a question arrises about the truth of one of the premises, then the whole syllogism and the conclusion are suspect.

furthermore, even if the syllogism itself is valid, there may be an unwarranted illogical leap somewhere within the premises that would make that particular premise itself untrue.  if the rooster crows, then the sun will rise / the rooster crows / therefore, the sun will rise.  this is valid in structure.  but the first premise is false -- it is not true that the sun will rise because of the rooster.  so the whole syllogism must be scrapped.  it is valid -- its structure is correct, but it is false.

if mary gave birth to jesus, then god exists / mary gave birth to jesus / god exists.  but is the connection between mary giving birth and god's existence a warranted one?  or is it a fallacious non-sequitur similar to the relationship between the sunrise and the rooster's crowing?  it can be argued that it is clearly a true proposition, since we know from scripture that mary would not have gotten pregnant without god, so it is true that "if mary gave birth to jesus, then god exists."  but the source of the information here is scripture, and when a witness is mistaken on several occasions, it warrants suspicion that the witness may be mistaken again on this particular occasion.  the evangelists do not agree on several details, so at least some of them are mistaken or are not telling the story exactly as it happened.  so is it still necessarily true that if mary gave birth to jesus, god exists?  more to the point, if the evangelists are telling the truth, then god exists.  but maybe the evangelists have failed to tell the truth?

some proofs could be just as false -- though valid in structure. god is love / love exists / therefore god exists.  but this is an equivocation.  the "love" that exists in this world is surely not the same kind of love that christians believe their god to be, else they are insulting the divinity of their own god.  these are "made to order" syllogisms where the premises are constructed in order to create a predetermined conclusion.  here's another: if there is justice, then god exists / there is justice / god exists.  huh?  what's is the logical connection between justice and god?  one can still suspect that this may be a non-sequitur like the sunrise and the rooster crow.

god logically absent

then there are proofs were god does not even appear in the premises of the proof!  clearly, if god does not appear in the premises, then logic would dictate that god should not appear in the conclusion.  this means that making a proof about the existence of an "all-powerful being" or an "all-perfect being" or an "uncreated creator" or an "unmoved mover" or whatnot should, from the biblical perspective, fail.  proving that there is an "all-powerful being" is not the same thing as proving that there is "god."

these kinds of proofs can be amusing.  do the believers not know their god?  do they not read their own scriptures?

for example, the god of abraham, isaac, and jacob is not a member of a species or of a genus.  proving that there exists an all-powerful being is not the same as proving that god exists.  when a proof concludes the existence of some being which have all the attributes or characteristics of god, and when the proof claims that it has therefore proven the existence of god (already illogical if it was done without using god in the premises), this proof must be rejected by the believers themselves!  for god is not one of a genus of beings with a set of specific attributes or characteristics.  what such proofs arrive at are theoretical beings or forces -- these are not god.

logical problems with definitions

the most complicated part about proving god's existence, and of disproving god's existence, too, is the vagueness of what "existence" really means when it is applied to god.  if asked, "does god exist?" or if making a proof with a sentence using "god" and "exist" together, we would first have to understand what one really means by the word "exist."

at the level of scripture or religion, god exists in one sense:  by definition.  at this level, asking "does god have existence?" could be like asking "does a unicorn have one horn?"  by definition, the answer to both questions is "yes," but just as unicorns do not really exist, it is possible that god does not really exist.  yet there can be a whole series of syllogisms constructed about unicorns, and one can distinguish between true and false statements about unicorns ("unicorns look like horses" is true, "unicorns are fish" is false).  similarly, there are a whole set of sentences one can make about god.  but it is possible that the existence of god is only as much as the existence of unicorns.  being able to construct logical sentences about a thing is not proof of actual existence of that thing.

now compare this to asking "did st. john the beloved write the gospel?"  the answer, at the level of scripture and religion, at least for those who accept the gospel of st. john, is "yes."  but if the question is whether st. john actually wrote the gospel, we would have to check in the historical records if there really was a john, and this john was actually the "beloved," and he was actually present in the times and places he was claimed to have been present.  things would get complicated when we find that the author of the book of revelations who claimed to be st. john may not really have been the same john but a disciple of st. john.  now the question is whether john actually existed, and this question cannot easily be answered and cannot be answered briefly.  there was a john, but he did not do everything ascribed to him.  meanwhile, there is a conception of a "john" who wrote everything people say he, did but this entity is only a literary one.  meanwhile the john who existed in reality is not exactly the john of tradition and legend.  so in some sense there was one john, in another sense john is a literary entity composed of several authors. 

in the case of god, it is infinitely more complicated than the case of john.  at least we can check historical records for john, and at least there was a man named john.  but we can't easily check birth and death records to find god, and we wouldn't even know what name to look for (i am who am?).  yes, there was a john, but he didn't do everything that people say he did.  is it safe to say that there is a god, but he didn't do everything that scripture says he did?  such a statement would find many enemies. 

the question of whether god has existence or not is a question that cannot be answered because it is a question that we can't even understand.  god does not exist in the same way that you or i exist or that worms or injustice exist.  so there seems to be different modes of being, as the scholastic philosophers would agree.  but in which of the several modes of being do we place god?  so god does not exist like a material being.  is god a mathematical idea?  simply a form?  simply an ideal? 

so it seems that we have to say that god has a mode of existence unique to god.  since this mode of existence is like nothing else, then it makes as much sense to say that god exists as it is to say that god does not exist, since the word "exist" clearly no longer suffices. 

the mystics would agree.  the concept of god is beyond existence (and in that case, beyond logic, too).  so god does not exist?  we don't seem to know what we even mean by god.

this is the fun part of debating the existence of god.  terms that are applied to god do not mean what they mean.  any concept of god is not exactly what it is.  for example, to say that god is this or god is that requires a clarification that the speaker does not really mean what he is saying in an ordinary sense, but in a unique and transcendental sense that is special and specific only to god.  now what is this exactly?  and how can we logically grasp this?  and finally, god is simply a "mystery."

if we don't know what we are talking about, we can't seem to either prove or disprove it.  and perhaps that is where theists should feel a sense of triumph.  they can easily defend their god against the questions of atheists and agnostics by simply pointing out that this or that term doesn't really mean what it means.  the theist always has an escape route in any debate because his or her position is beyond attack.  it is quite beyond logical understanding