The Babelfish Arguement

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
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The following is an except from "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy"by Douglas Adams.

 Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind bogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen  to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non existance of god.
 The arguement goes something like this. "I refuse to prove that I exist" says God 'For proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."

“But,” says man"The Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn’t it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves that you exists, and so therefore, by your own arguements, you don’t. QED"
“Oh dear,” says God, “I hadn’t thought of that,” and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

Alright. We know that Babel fish do not exist. Look deeper than that. Would it follow, by this thought process, that any evidence presented FOR God was actually evidence AGAINST his existance?

2

Any god that reqires faith is rather un-godlike.

3

If God didn’t care if people believed in him…he wouldn’t send people to hell for failing to do so.

4

Not so much a douche as he expects people to believe in him, but refuses to send them any proof of his existance.

5

You said it yourself…UNREASONABLE…

God is not supposed to be reasonable. You’re supposed to take everything regarding him on faith. I find it douchy, but then again, I don’t believe in god.

6

I’ll fact that.

7

dont you love it when atheists bounce ideas off each other

8

Well though im not a christian, (at least not in the conventional sense) alot of whats been said here is crap. But to defend it would be pointless, as its just 3 atheists in here. Im just pointing out that coming up with arguments based on each others oppinion is not realy any sort of victory

9

Kiss my aegis.

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The anthropomorphic God of most religion requires faith to exist.
If one were to deny this and state, “God doesn’t require anything, such as faith from people. He existed before he made us, and didn’t have to make us at all. he doesn’t need our petty faith.”

How might you respond to someone who said this?

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I would reply with something along the lines of:
there is little/no proof of the existence of this god; thus, it follows that belief in this god does require faith. i guess this god, if you are willing to claim existence, does require faith, unless you are attempting to refute it.
one could say that this god does require “petty” faith; because, until there is irrefutable proof of god’s existence that we pathetic three-dimensional creatures grasp, without any faith, there is no god?
that seemed to come together, nicely. what do you think?

13

I agree, this god does require “petty” faith.
I think God is a silly person. :wink:

14

now now, are you sure you mean “person”? how do you intend “person” to describe an infinite entity?

15

That was kind of the joke. We created God in our image. When you stand back and look at the man-God we created just as a person… he seems a rather ‘silly’ person. I was actually thinking of Michael Paylin in Monte Python’s Holy Grail when he says, “What a strange person!..” “Let’s not go back to Camelot, it is a silly place”

Dawkins - The God Delusion:
“The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction:
jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak;
a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist,
infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic,
capriciously malevolent bully.”

16

I think that the argument rest on confusion. The argument as I understand it go like this

  1. If God exist then his existence cannot be proved by reason
  2. God’s existence can be proved by reason
    Therefore: 3) God don’t exist

Te argument supporting (1) goes like this:

i) If God exist then there is faith about his existence
ii) If there is faith about God’s existence then his existence cannot be proved by reason
Therefore: 1) If God exist then his existence cannot be proved by reason

Both are valid arguments, so any problem with them must be in the truth of the premises.
Lets start with (i). Why to believe such thesis? I see no reason for it. Just consider what faith is. faith is a subjective belief (a belief not supported by any evidence), or something of the sort, but if there is a God that created the universe then he existed before anyone believing in his existence (either beliefs based on proofs/evidence or not based on them). So premise (i) seems wrong, and it seems trivially wrong.

Premise (ii) seems false too, but is more interesting. Suppose I believe that there are aliens just by faith. Other people can believe in aliens by many reasons (for example, because is very unlikely that in such a big universe or ours only in Earth life developed). So there are faith about aliens’ existence, but also there are proofs/evidence about their existence. So there can be both. The same with God. Take San Ambrose for example, he had faith in God’s existence and he developed an argument for his existence as well, to convince others that didn’t have faith.

Finally, the more interesting philosophical thesis, the premise (2). Can it really be proved God existence? There are many arguments for God’s existence, but there are many arguments against those arguments as well. This is a very difficult topic, because the vary different arguments there are, and the vary different philosophical topics involved in them. For example:

a) What is a good proof of something existing?
b) What is existence?
c) What does our concept of God’s implies or contains?
d) Is it possible a proof of something existing a priori?
e) Is there such order in our world that someone have had to design it?
f) Are scientific explanations about our world sufficient to explain our world’s order?

an so on

I propose that the different arguments for God’s existence as well as their philosophical implications and the relevant questions should be taken seriously, and so, one by one in independent post.

17

Another point I forgot to make. In some sense the Babelfish argument seems to be begging the question. For what is the reason for accepting that God’s existence depends on faith? Well, when someone saids that vampires only exist in the imaginations of those who believe in them they usually are trying to say that vampires are not real, they don truly exists, but only in their heads. So the only reason I found in the initial post to believe that God’s existence depends on faith is that God only exists in our heads because is not real, and so he doesn’t truly exists. But the argument is circular then because the premise that God’s existence depends on faith relays on the acceptance of the conclusion, that God doesn’t exist

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It seems that such argument has other defects as well. consider the quoted discussion. Bane makes a fair point. And out there responds in a way I found mistaken. He said two things. First, that someone’s belief in God’ existence that don’t rely in any proof/evidence must rely on faith. That seems true. But he says also that as a conclusion of this God’s existence require faith. That’s a non sequitur. The first reasoning is about the belief in God’s existence. But the conclusion is about God’s existence. But God’s existence is not the same as the belief in God’s existence.

there is other confusion. he says: “until there is irrefutable proof of god’s existence that we pathetic three-dimensional creatures grasp, without any faith, there is no god”. That seems to imply that only exist what we proof to exist, and that is false. For there are many objects that surely exist without we having any proof, for example, the milions of astronomic objects that we haven’t discovered yet. And before we start existing as a species it is reasonable to believe that there were many things existing (the same for any living creature).

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if i understood that this would be construed as a serious discussion about the existence of a higher power, i would have spent more time than the few seconds here and there waiting for other players to finish their turns in civilization 4.
personally, i find it difficult, if not impossible, to take seriously any discussion that contains profanity. in my mind, a place like ilovephilosophy shouldn’t every have foul language; we do pride ourselves on having reason, ideas, and the ability to communicate them, right? all that goes through my head when i hear or read profanity is: “i don’t mind sounding like a witless buffoon; i’m not above using the language of lesser educated neanderthals. in fact, my ideas and arguments are as well thought out as those pre-homo sapiens”

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When I go through the process of using profanity, I think “Hmm. I’m saying a word! You know, those things we use to communicate. Oh, what word am I using? Oh, I’m using the word ‘shit.’ How interesting. What does this word I’m using mean? Hmm. Well, it can mean feces, but in the sense that I’m using it it’s an exclamation point that I add to whatever thing I’m saying for the purpose of furnishing it with my attentive attitude of exclamation. Wow, swell! Why don’t more people ‘curse?’ I suppose it’s because our repressive society creates a mild taboo dealing with a word; this simple, monosyllabic word that floats off of the tongue like an angel.” As a note, this is why I talk at a rate of about two WPM.