(IR)Rationalization

I've been thinking of a good enough topic to start off philosophyxiation. Today when i read another blog i stumbled upon, it struck me. I'm a diehard cynic when it comes to things that are associated with "consensus". Consensus knowledge strikes me as a very irrational definition of knowledge, if knowledge can be irrational at all! So in keeping with the cynical tradition the first topic will be God. A large percentage of people think Philo is all about God and religion. When I go to bookstores the Philo section is filled with religious books. Imagine passing off faith for knowledge; It's preposterous.

Defining God-

The term God here refers to the supernatural creator and perhaps overseer of the universe/universes (for proponents of the Multiverse theory). God needn't represent, a being; The concept simply represents a higher power.

How to Prove God Exists...

I] The Cosmological Argument

Thomas Aquinas' Argument for 'A First Sustaining Cause':

1 A contingent being exists.

2 There is a cause for the existence of the contingent being

3 Said cause lies outside the contingent being

4 The cause can take the form of other contingent beings or a non-contingent being

5 But contingent beings alone cannot provide an adequate causal account of the existence of all contingent beings

6 This necesitates the existence of a contingent being, ie, God.

II] The Ontological Argument

(ontological arguments are a priori, ie, they stem from largely non-empirical sources)

This argument comes in numerous versions but in essence it says something like:

A supremely perfect being who lacks existence, wouldn't really be supremely perfect. Since, the idea of God is "perfect", God has to exist (Descartes' 5th Meditation). 

III] The Teleological Argument

Popularly known as the argument from design. This argument represents God as the intelligent designer who has designed the universe we inhabit. The basic argument is that the degree of complexity we see in the universe could not have been arrived at coincidentally. There is a purpose and creator behind all that we see around us and that creator is what the idea of "God" represents. (Coincidentally, the multiverse theory that came up earlier is something of a "scientific solution" to the intelligent design question...)

The three arguments mentioned above are the three mainstream arguments for the existence of God. Of course the world we inhabit is rarely simple, and these arguments are a few of many that exist and even these arguments themselves have varied versions and interpretations. 

All the arguments seen above have flaws that would be obvious to most. These flaws would probably be the subject of another post. For now, I'd like to meander to the end of tis post by defining the epistemological stances on the issue of the existence of God. (Just in case- epistemology=the study of the nature and construction of knowledge. Its one of the 5 major divisions of philosophy and clearly my favourite:) )

>Theism- The belief that God exists and that the existence of God can be proven

>Atheism- The denial of the existence of God along with the belief that the non-existence of God can be proven.

>Agnosticism- A neutral stance. Agnostics believe that a concrete epistemological proof for the existence or non-existence of God is not possible. Although as Richard Dawkins rightly pointed out in "The God Delusion", it isn't really possible to stand right on the very thin line. We agnostics are either theist-agnostics or atheist-agnostics. 

With all the socially cultivated paradigms that are all around, this topic always makes for the most colourful discussions... Not always a good thing if, like me, you've found black to be your one colour...