Burden of Proof in God Debates

[Dre89]

This isn't another thread about whether God exists or not, but is strictly concerned with where the burden of proof lies. My argument is that there is an equal burden of proof on theists and agnostics/atheists, because the arguments that "God is necessary" and "God is not necessary" are equally metaphysically positive claims.

Firstly, I'll make a distinction between theologically positive gpds, and the metaphysically necessary God. Theologically positive gods are gods with specific continent/unecessary traits (eg. Zeus). Now the BoP is NOT on the athiest to refute these, but a BoP is on the atheist to show that such a God is not metaphysically necessary, which in the case of theologically positive Gods, is incredibly easy to do, and therefore usually isn't bothered with in serious debates.

The metaphysically necessary God is the one I'm always talking about. It is self-necessary, eternal, changeless, omnipotent, omniscient, good (depending on whether you're a a deist or not) etc. The reason why this God is called metaphysically necessary is because its proponents argue that the first cause must have had these traits, and no others. It is a metaphysical statement, whereas theologically positive gods are statements of theology.

Of course, the theist has a BoP to prove that the first cause had to necessarily have the traits mentioned above. However, if you're an agnostic/atheist (the distinction doesn't matter in this scenario) then you don't believe God is metaphysicaly necessary. Now this is a statement about metaphysics, which is equally positive to the theistic statement, because you are essentially saying that the first cause can be complex, specific, contingent, can consist of multiple agents simultaneously (eg. space, time, matter etc.), or you reject a first cause altogether, in which case you still make most of the atheistic metaphysical assertions just mentioned.

The difference between agnosticism and atheism, or weak atheism and strong atheism (depending on your understanding of the terminology, as it seems everyone has a different variation) is that strong athiests argue that it is impossible that certain theologically positive gods or the metaphysically necessary God could exist.

 

[Ocean]

interesting thread.

I would argue that the burden of proof lies on anyone who claims there is or is not a god. since the default stance on the subject is apathetic towards either side, and it isn't something that can be shown purely through physical or logical evidence (though some may disagree with this), the burden lies on anyone who makes an actual claim on either side.

in cases where the theist is claiming that there is a god in biblical terms, or of any other religion, then the burden lies solely on the theist.

The difference between agnosticism and atheism, or weak atheism and strong atheism (depending on your understanding of the terminology, as it seems everyone has a different variation) is that strong athiests argue that it is impossible that certain theologically positive gods or the metaphysically necessary God could exist.

 

[Dre89]

The problem is with that diagram is that there are multiple interpretations of the terminology, so I don't bother with it. The good thing about this debate is that it doesn't matter whether someone's an agnostic, or weak or strong atheist, they all hold the same same metaphysical position (that God is not metaphysically necessary), so the terminology war is largely irrelevant.

Also, Ocean, you've kind of simplified the issue so that you can say agnostics or weak atheists have no BoP for their position. That's only true when concerned with a specific type of God, usually a theologically positive God. But whether God is metaphysically necessary is different to whether a specific god exists or not.

 

[ballin4life]

I don't believe there is a teapot orbiting the sun. Do I need to provide proof to back up my lack of belief?

 

[Dre89]

I don't believe there is a teapot orbiting the sun. Do I need to provide proof to back up my lack of belief?

I expected people to miss the point and fall back into this argument.

The orbiting teapot is a positive assertion, so the BoP is on the asserter.

All you need to prove is that the orbiting teapot is not metaphysically necessary, which is easy to do.

Atheism is a positive metaphysical assertion, and any positive assertion earns a BoP.

 

[Lord Chair]

You haul everything into metaphysics and try to summarize an entire debate into a bunch of jargon.

I love being overly complex as well, but the argument that is ''it's difficult to prove something is specifically not there'' is a rather viable one.

 

[1048576]

You: there exists a first cause
Bob: time is circular
Me: you're both off your rocker

why is your position exempt from proof and not Bob's? Clearly the burden of proof must be on one of the two parties, since both claims cannot be simultaneously true. That's why the burden is always on the person making the claim, no matter how weak the claim is.

 

[GwJ]

Dre., you try too hard.

If you're talking about Gnostic Atheists, then yeah, the BoP lies equally among the Theist and that Atheist. The problem is that Gnostic Atheists SHOULDN'T even exists since it's impossible to prove OR disprove.

The vast majority of people are Agnostic Atheists and they have no burden of proof because they assert nothing. They just claim disbelieve due to lack of evidence.

 

[ciaza]

Numbers - Dre. isn't saying theists are exempt from the BoP. In fact the first line he said that it should be equal among both parties since they're both making a claim.
I don't like the idea that certain atheists and agnostics have BoP however Dre.. Mainly the ones that say "I don't know". Basically what Jumpman said.

 

[Dre89]

Gw- You're missing the point. Evidence would be required for a God like Zeus.

The fact an agnostic requires "evidence", which is in reality empirical evidence, suggests that they don't believe a self necessary, eternal, changeless, formless etc. agent is the only possible thing that could be the
first cause. Now that in itself is making a positive metaphysical statement, so they need to defend the idea that the first cause could be otherwise than that.

And to whoever criticised me for clumping everything into metaphysics, this isn't a God debate, this is specifically concerned with metaphysical premises that are invoked when you deem something necessary or not. The concepts of necessity and contingency belong in metaphysics, so I'm totally justified in applying metaphysics, and by the standards of metaphysics this is incredibly basic stuff.

 

[blazedaces]

Dre, I don't want to make any arguments for or against this debate. Plenty of others have done this already.

I just want to say that I personally believe in God despite the lack of evidence, not because of it. Faith is a belief in something without evidence to support it. I chose to believe in god, period. Why do you find the need to prove your beliefs to anyone else? Why is it necessary?

-blazed

 

[GwJ]

Gw- You're missing the point. Evidence would be required for a God like Zeus.

The fact an agnostic requires "evidence", which is in reality empirical evidence, suggests that they don't believe a self necessary, eternal, changeless, formless etc. agent is the only possible thing that could be the
first cause. Now that in itself is making a positive metaphysical statement, so they need to defend the idea that the first cause could be otherwise than that.

And to whoever criticised me for clumping everything into metaphysics, this isn't a God debate, this is specifically concerned with metaphysical premises that are invoked when you deem something necessary or not. The concepts of necessity and contingency belong in metaphysics, so I'm totally justified in applying metaphysics, and by the standards of metaphysics this is incredibly basic stuff.

I remember why I hate responding to you so much. There needs to be as much evidence for a God as there needs to be for Zeus. It doesn't exist at all.

And yes, an agnostic atheist requires evidence. That does NOT put the BoP on the atheist to prove God isn't necessary; that's the theist's job.

"I don't think there's moons around Mercury"
"Sure there are."
"Prove it."
"Well, you tell me why there isn't any moons and then I'll answer."
"I've never seen them or heard about them."
"That's not a good enough reason. You need to tell me why you don't think they're there. They NEED to be there."
"Why's that?"
"Because."

Aside from the fact that that wasn't a reason scenario, I'm getting at one thing: This leads one huge circular argument. The Atheist will ask the Theist for the BoP. The Theist will claim the Atheist has the BoP for reason "x". The Atheist explains that the Theist requires the BoP because of "y". Nonononononono, you still didn't explain "z" you atheist. Et Cetera

 

[1048576]

Numbers - Dre. isn't saying theists are exempt from the BoP. In fact the first line he said that it should be equal among both parties since they're both making a claim.
I don't like the idea that certain atheists and agnostics have BoP however Dre.. Mainly the ones that say "I don't know". Basically what Jumpman said.

And I'm saying the guy who says time isn't circular and there isn't a first cause does not have the burden of proof, since they aren't making a claim, so they don't have to worry about two contradictory ideas being assumed to be true.

Like, if I say "George Washington doesn't exist" and you say "Of course he does" then you have BoP, which should be sufficiently easy to gather. Now if I say "Amorphous, multicolored, poker-playing unicorn doesn't exist" and you say "of course she does" then you still have BoP, only its a bit harder to prove your case this time around.

****: baleted retype short version

Sometimes you have an exhaustive set. For example, saying "this person is not >20 years old" is equivalent to saying "this person is <= 20," so you are making a claim, so you share the burden of proof. However, there are infinite possible universes...

 

[AltF4]

What room for argument is there with a supposed god who is 100% metaphysically necessary? Either you have a 100% rock solid, undeniable proof for his necessity, or you don't.

Burden of proof doesn't apply. Just as it doesn't apply to mathematics. No mathematician talks about how one potential new equation has "burden of proof" over another. It's either proven, or it's not. If it's not proven, then you have nothing to talk about.

If you have no 100% undeniably true proof that this god is necessary... then you can't go around saying it's necessary. Maybe someone in the future could find such a proof, but it does not exist today. You have nothing to talk about.

"Burden of proof" implies that we favor one idea over another, until more evidence comes along. This just isn't how (pure) logic and mathematics work. Burden of proof only applies to the "real world" of empirical evidence. Where things are uncertain and messy, but we have to make assumptions. We favor these assumptions until better evidence comes along. These assumptions are "default positions" (often non-positions) and challenges to them bear the burden of proof.

 

[GwJ]

And I'm saying the guy who says time isn't circular and there isn't a first cause does not have the burden of proof, since they aren't making a claim, so they don't have to worry about two contradictory ideas being assumed to be true.

Like, if I say "George Washington doesn't exist" and you say "Of course he does" then you have BoP, which should be sufficiently easy to gather. Now if I say "Amorphous, multicolored, poker-playing unicorn doesn't exist" and you say "of course she does" then you still have BoP, only its a bit harder to prove your case this time around.

****: baleted retype short version

Sometimes you have an exhaustive set. For example, saying "this person is not >20 years old" is equivalent to saying "this person is <= 20," so you are making a claim, so you share the burden of proof. However, there are infinite possible universes...

Like I said earlier, if you're talking about an agnostic atheist who says "There's not enough evidence for me to believe", then there's no problem; the BoP doesn't lie on the Atheist. However, if it's a Gnostic Atheist that says "There's no God.", then the BoP lies essentially on both of them to prove their side.

However, there's no way to prove God false so that's why this argument makes no sense at all.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

This isn't another thread about whether God exists or not, but is strictly concerned with where the burden of proof lies. My argument is that there is an equal burden of proof on theists and agnostics/atheists, because the arguments that "God is necessary" and "God is not necessary" are equally metaphysically positive claims.

I really wanted to just stop here. Metaphysics is possibly the single most irrelevant field known to man. It has no bearing on reality-that's kind of its entire point. But carry on, carry on.

Of course, the theist has a BoP to prove that the first cause had to necessarily have the traits mentioned above. However, if you're an agnostic/atheist (the distinction doesn't matter in this scenario) then you don't believe God is metaphysicaly necessary. Now this is a statement about metaphysics, which is equally positive to the theistic statement, because you are essentially saying that the first cause can be complex, specific, contingent, can consist of multiple agents simultaneously (eg. space, time, matter etc.), or you reject a first cause altogether, in which case you still make most of the atheistic metaphysical assertions just mentioned.

...What? Hang on, in metaphysics, rejecting a claim is a claim?! Is there no middle ground? You'll have to excuse my ignorance, but wouldn't rejecting the claim that god is metaphysically necessary not constitute a claim?

Furthermore, why is this line of argument restricted to god? Metaphysical arguments go beyond the physical. Why could you not argue like this about the teapot rotating around mars, or at least its metaphysical equivalent?

 

[Battlecow]

Dre is wrong.

 

[1048576]

Like I said earlier, if you're talking about an agnostic atheist who says "There's not enough evidence for me to believe", then there's no problem; the BoP doesn't lie on the Atheist. However, if it's a Gnostic Atheist that says "There's no God.", then the BoP lies essentially on both of them to prove their side.

However, there's no way to prove God false so that's why this argument makes no sense at all.

No. There's no God requires no proof, just like there's no poker-playing unicorns or there's no George Washington. These things are assumed true until proven false, for reasons I've explained twice now.

 

[GwJ]

"there is no god." does require proof, but since it's impossible to prove, people don't try too hard to attempt it. As for the bush or unicorn thing, those are answered with common sense whether or not it actually proves something. I can assert no unicorns exist and say so since there's no evidence for them. I cant prove 100% they don't exist, but i can get close with common sense.

 

[Ocean]

I can assert no unicorns exist and say so since there's no evidence for them.

and you can't do the same with god?

I'm not quite following your logic here.

 

[ballin4life]

I really wanted to just stop here. Metaphysics is possibly the single most irrelevant field known to man. It has no bearing on reality-that's kind of its entire point. But carry on, carry on.

Horribly wrong.

...What? Hang on, in metaphysics, rejecting a claim is a claim?! Is there no middle ground? You'll have to excuse my ignorance, but wouldn't rejecting the claim that god is metaphysically necessary not constitute a claim?

Furthermore, why is this line of argument restricted to god? Metaphysical arguments go beyond the physical. Why could you not argue like this about the teapot rotating around mars, or at least its metaphysical equivalent?

Spot on.


It's not a claim to say "I don't believe X". It is a claim to say "I believe ~X" or "I believe X".

Basically Dre's statement that burden of proof is on atheists applies only if atheists accept his initial argument about metaphysical necessity. Which they don't.

 

[Theftz22]

It seems to me Dre that you are trying to force the atheist into giving a positive claim that god is not necessary when in fact he may simply not claim that god is necessary. I may withhold belief in god's necessity without making an equal claim to know that he is not necessary. I may remain agnostic about the proposition. In such a way the atheist asserts no claim and thus holds only the burden of countering positive arguments for necessity. It seems to me that this is just identical to saying that someone may only be a theist or a positive atheist. That's simply a false dichotomy and changing the proposition from "god exists" to "god is necessary" does not do anything to change that.

Now on the issue of proving a negative that numbers and jumpman bring up, saying god does not exist is a claim about reality that instantiates a burden to prove that claim. However, contra jumpman, it is not impossible to prove that something does not exist. We may either show that it is contradictory or incoherent (impossibility arguments), such that it literally could not exist, we may look for certain facts about reality that should be evident if that thing existed, and if they are not there then that counts as evidence against its existence, or we may look at things that are true, that should not be true if that thing existed (arguments from nonbelief and evil).

 

[GwJ]

and you can't do the same with god?

I'm not quite following your logic here.

It's a little harder to do with God since he's by nature unfalsifiable. That's why there's no possible way to disprove God. All you can do is increase the unlikelyhood that one exists.

 

[Dre89]

I'm going to answer everyone in one go since you all made the same mistake.

You guys are talking about existences, not necessity. Talking about how you don't need to prove the non existence of something is missing the point, so most of you are on the wrong track.

You guys are acting like I'm making an argument for God, or that I'm giving the theist an equal BoP.

If you don't believe God is necessary, then you believe the first cause/ultimate reality can be contingent, un-unified, have a specific form, be multiple agents etc.

The fact you guys think you don't need a BoP for that suggests you think that should be the default positin, but why? That position is not the mere negation or the absence of the belief that the first cause must be formless, self necessary etc. They are equally positive positions.

Blazed- Believe what you want, BoPs are for those who seek to rationally justify their beliefs.

BPC- Science, international law, psychology, and education systems are a few things off the top of my head metaphysics has influenced. There's plenty more than that though.

 

[ciaza]

To clarify Dre., you would classify as anyone who has consciously thought about the concept of God, but is not a theist, as a strong atheist?

The thing is we are talking about necessity. Russell's teapot and God are much more equatable once it is shown that God is not necessary. Once this is shown the BoP shifts completely to the theist.

 

[ballin4life]

I'm going to answer everyone in one go since you all made the same mistake.

You guys are talking about existences, not necessity. Talking about how you don't need to prove the non existence of something is missing the point, so most of you are on the wrong track.

You guys are acting like I'm making an argument for God, or that I'm giving the theist an equal BoP.

If you don't believe God is necessary, then you believe the first cause/ultimate reality can be contingent, un-unified, have a specific form, be multiple agents etc.

The fact you guys think you don't need a BoP for that suggests you think that should be the default positin, but why? That position is not the mere negation or the absence of the belief that the first cause must be formless, self necessary etc. They are equally positive positions.

No no no no no no no. The default position is not a belief that the first cause is contingent etc. It's a lack of belief either way (indeed, it includes a lack of belief about there even being a first cause).

 

[Dre89]

Ciaza- I wouldn't classify them all as strong atheist, because a strong atheist not only finds God's existence metaphysically unecessary, but finds His existence impossible, and make the positive assertion that He does not exist. Standard atheists just find His existence metaphysically unecessary, thus don't assume His existence because there is no further reason to.

And of course, if you can show God is not necessary the BoP rests solely upon the theist. But my point is initially, the atheist has an equal BoP to show that God is not necessary, because the consequences of saying that result in positive metaphysical claims.

Ballin4death- If I tell you that I have parents (in that I was created by a mother and father) and you say you don't know if I parents or not, then that means you believe it is not necessary that I have parents. That you means you consider it possible that-

1. I was caused by something other than parents.
2. I caused myself.
3. I've existed infinitely.

Your refusal to accept the statement that I have parents means that you find these scenarios conceivable. You don't have to prove that my parents don't exist, just that these scenarios are conceivable.

As the atheist, you are pretty much saying these scenarios should be the default position, and require no BoP.

I think what a lot of you are missing is that the non-existence-existence relationship is different from the necessary-contingent relationship. The former has a negative and a positive, one is the negation of the other. The necessary-contingent relationship is not the same, they are equally positive opposites.

 

[GwJ]

We're not saying ANYTHING, all atheism asserts is that we don't have enough evidence to prove God. Anything that God did that we now have to explain for, we can answer either with:

"Well, scientific thingy 'x' explains this."

OR

"Beats me. Maybe we'll find out one day."

We don't have to assert anything like what you're getting at.

 

[ciaza]

We use inductive logic to determine whether or not you have parents, whereas with the first cause we have to be a lot more skeptical though.

I think people are claiming that "atheism" is the default position because that's how we were born. Imagine that somehow the concept of God was never brought about. We would all exist as atheists technically since we lack a belief of God. However what I'm getting from you is that as soon as we are introduced to the concept of God, you have to decide if you assert that there is or is not a God. But as was raised, that's a false dichotomous, and there is middle ground. For atheists who claim that God is not necessary, then sure they would have the BoP of showing their work, but for many implicit atheists they don't have any BoP.

 

[GwJ]

And even so, proving God to be necessary or unnecessary is impossible, so I have no idea at all why we keep trying. It seems the only discussion we get into around here is who has to prove anything.

 

[Dre89]

Gw- Again, you're still indirectly making a positive metaphysical statement, just because you don't realise it doesn't mean you're not doing it.

Your statement about atheism simply being the position that there is a lack of evidence has no point, you're simply stating your conclusion without a premise. You need to show how thinking God is not necessary is NOT believing that the first cause/ultimate reality can be contingent, or you need to show why this should be the default position.

 

[Theftz22]

thinking God is not necessary

Dre you're missing the point here. What we are trying to articulate is that we are not making this claim. If someone claims "god is not necessary", then they have that burden of proof. But if we make no claim about the topic, we may remain agnostic as to whether or not their is a first cause, and whether or not that cause is necessary or contingent. In such a way we have made no claim, and hence no burden of proof is instantiated. If you then want to make the claim that god is necessary, that burden is entirely yours and we must only defeat your arguments if we wish to remain agnostic. What you miss here is that by challenging your arguments we are not accepting the claim that god is contingent or not necessary. We may defeat your arguments without making the claim that god is contingent, we may simply reject your reasons for thinking he is while remaining agnostic on the issue.

Rejecting a case for the affirmative of a claim does not commit you to the truth of the opposite of that claim, basically.

 

[GwJ]

Gw- Again, you're still indirectly making a positive metaphysical statement, just because you don't realise it doesn't mean you're not doing it.

Your statement about atheism simply being the position that there is a lack of evidence has no point, you're simply stating your conclusion without a premise. You need to show how thinking God is not necessary is NOT believing that the first cause/ultimate reality can be contingent, or you need to show why this should be the default position.

Dammit Dre, you must be hard to deal with in real life.

I'm not making a claim about ANYTHING. All I said was I DON'T KNOW.

If I DON'T KNOW requires me to have a burden of proof, then I believe I need to relearn everything in life.

 

[Dre89]

Doggs- That was a pretty good post.

Ok, but then to have no BoP you would have to be limited to refuting that theist's specific for believing God is necessary, you wouldn't even be able to say God is not necessary.

But the point is virtually no one does that. The statements "there is no reason to believe in God" and "God does/could not exist" are metaphysically the same, they're both metaphysically positive too. They both still have the BoP to show that a contingent being could be the first cause.

 

[GwJ]

It still doesn't matter who has the burden of proof. NO PERSON can prove a certain God is necessary.





Like, at all.

 

[ballin4life]

Ballin4death- If I tell you that I have parents (in that I was created by a mother and father) and you say you don't know if I parents or not, then that means you believe it is not necessary that I have parents. That you means you consider it possible that-

1. I was caused by something other than parents.
2. I caused myself.
3. I've existed infinitely.

Your refusal to accept the statement that I have parents means that you find these scenarios conceivable. You don't have to prove that my parents don't exist, just that these scenarios are conceivable.

No, you have to show that they aren't conceivable.

As the atheist, you are pretty much saying these scenarios should be the default position, and require no BoP.

No, the default position is that any of these scenarios are possible.

Doggs- That was a pretty good post.

Ok, but then to have no BoP you would have to be limited to refuting that theist's specific for believing God is necessary, you wouldn't even be able to say God is not necessary.

What we are saying HERE, in this discussion of burden of proof, is that the default position is to have no opinion either way. This does not carry a burden of proof.

Of course, in OTHER ARGUMENTS, one might say that God is not necessary, in which case one would have a burden of proof.

 

[Dre89]

Gw- Stay out of these debates if you think metaphysics is not intelligible. If you don't think it's a worthwhile debate, then stay out of it, it's not as if everyone is going to stop debating and agree with you if you say it's meaningless, all you're doing is slowing the debate down.

If you want to debate whether discussions like this one are intelligible or not, then make a thread about it. Don't derail this one.

Ballin- With the parents situation, the Bop in terms of necessity would be equal on both sides.

True, the default position would be to have no opinion on God's necessity, but I think we disagree on what exactly that entails. To me, that would entail thinking there's a 50% chance God exists, because He would either be metaphysically necessary or not. Now if you truly have no opinion on it, it would be 50/50.

The thing is most people don't believe that should be the default position. Most people (particularly in this thread) are saying it should be not to assume the existence of God unless some positive evidence is provided for Him. Now that isn't 50/50, that's favouring the unecessary side. The fact they're witholding belief on God until there is (empirical) evidence means they're treating it the same as a pink unicorn- something which we require empirical evidence for because we've deemed its existence metaphysically unecessary. This position skips the necessity aspect and jumps staright into the existence aspect.

The reason why we don't believe in the pink unicorn unless there is evidence for it is because we deem it metaphysically unecessray. So all those people who are still equating God to a pink unicorn are forming judgement on what is metaphysically necessary, but not providing reasons for it, and are assuming it to be the default position.

So my original point still stands. Both theism and even the softest forms of atheism require a BoP.

 

[GwJ]

I'll do as you say dre, but I won't be surprised when you never come to a conclusion.

 

[1048576]

The unicorn is completely necessary. How else could there be gravity?

Anyway it seems like everytime you start talking about God people pick you apart until you sit on the position that God is just 'what is' and then you claim that 'what is, is,' which is all well and good and I agree with you, but it's not exactly groundbreaking.

Edit: people keep talking about God or not God, and then claiming that God must be 50%. But there are infinite other alternative explanations for the universe, so there's no reason to assign a 0.000...0001 chance to all of those other explanations, while assigning 50% to God. It's like, suppose I have 3 marbles in an opaque jar, one red, one blue, and one green. If Dre pulls one out, he's saying that there's a 50% chance it's red, because it's either red or it's not red and we can't prove either way (well, before looking).

That's why when you don't have an exhaustive set (infinite differently-colored marbles, george washington/poker-playing unicorn), you have to assume the absence of a claim, because the odds of any claim being true approach zero.

 

[Dre89]

I don't understand the unicorn point. In guessing it's some sort of negative sarcastic remark.

Something is either metaphysically necessary, or it isn't. That's where the 50% comes from.

And your talk of me defining God as "what is" is totally out of place because not once in this thread have I argued for His existence.

The reason why it's important to identify which notion of God I'm talking about is because only one of them (the one I'm talking about) is supposedly metaphysically necessary. It's important to identify that because I concede that for unecessary Gods, the default position should be lack of belief until evidence is presented. That's why it's important to identify which type of God I'm talking about.