The following is a portion of a comment response to a Christian commenter (commenting on this post) who suggested that there is no real contradiction between the methods of science and those of faith, and that there was necessarily too much inherent subjectivity and unsubstantiated assumptions for the scientifically minded to appropriately assess god claims.
Here are some basic steps to follow when assessing the existence of any god.
- Determine which god is being posited.
- Determine whether the god being posited is logically coherent.
- Does the god posited claim to be loving and “slow to anger”, then become so impatiently wrathful upon the very first offense of humans that he damns then to eternal torture?
- Does the god posited claim that a 3-day death of his “son” pays the price of eternal torture for the offender?
- Does the god posited make the personal acceptance of his son a requirement for salvation, then let much of the world die without knowledge of this fact?
- Does the god posited claim to offer an absolute morality, then suddenly decide that slavery, polygamy, genocide and men taking women as booty of war to be suddenly immoral after years of complicity in these actions?
- Does the god posited claim to be omnipotent, then find himself impotent against chariot of iron?
- Does the god in question claim the bible to be inerrant, then have one of the “inspired” writers take another writer completely out of context?
(Matthew 2:15 -> Hosea 11;1) - Does the god posited suggest that believing MORE upon LESS evidence is “blessed”?
If the answer is yes to even one of the questions above, the god posited is as illogical as a square triangle, and deserves no further consideration.
- Determine whether the god being posited can be distinguished from an imaginary god.
- Does the god posited make any promises that can be tested?
- Can the god posited affect the material causal chain in a way that can be tested? Continue reading
