We live in a time where everyone is searching for a reason to believe in something, there have posters and advertisement stating that “Only Prayer Can Save America”. Well if prayer can save us then there is only one question left to be answered. Who are we praying to? What are we praying for?
God is the almighty, the creator of everything and without him there would be no world and no us. But many people seem to question if He really exist. In the world there are many streams of philosophy that have argued the existence of God, Platonism, naturalism, Aristotelianism, realism, empiricism, and rationalism they have even tried to convince nonbelievers about the defensibility and validity of God. But regardless of the findings it has always been an individual’s choice of what to believe and who to believe in.
There has also been a perception about a greater power that has many searching for proof. The existence of God for some philosophers have fueled a many arguments that to this today still have not been answered.
The two streams I will discuss are Empiricism, and Rationalism. The empiricist is trying to find sense in their primary path to knowledge, while rationalist look for other ways to acquire knowledge for reason on why things are happening, even though they have different beliefs they are still searching for truth and a reason for believing in God or a god.
When I first heard about these two streams I wondered what did these have to do with God anyway. But it hit me, there are people (empiricist) in the world that believe that if you can’t see it, touch it, smell it, or hear it isn’t real the empiricist rely on the five senses to uncover the truth. “Empiricism” is a theory about knowledge that emphasizes the role of exp...
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...hange their minds, we can only follow the path that God has set for us and make the decision that is right for us. Because being a Christian is faith and it demands uncompromising truth. No belief system is above inquiry, and in matters of faith the only belief worth having is a true one (Come Reason Ministries, 1999).
Works Cited
Is There Such A Thing As Rational Faith. (1999). Retrieved from http://www.comereason.org/resources/articles/rationalfaith.pdf
Nash, R. H. (1999). Life’s Ultimate Questions: An introduction to philosophy. Grand Rapids, MI.: Zondervan.
Sunlyk, P. (n.d.). Locke, Hume, Empiricism and the existence of God. Retrieved from http://www.tektonics.org/guest/pslockhume.htm
“Biblical Empiricism” And the Existence of God. (2011). Retrieved from http://www.pleaseconvinceme.com/index/%E2%80%9CBiblical_Empiricism%E2%80%9D_And_The_Existence_of_God
The controversial topic involving the existence of God has been the pinnacle of endless discourse surrounding the concept of religion in the field of philosophy. However, two arguments proclaim themselves to be the “better” way of justifying the existence of God: The Cosmological Argument and the Mystical Argument. While both arguments attempt to enforce strict modus operandi of solidified reasoning, neither prove to be a better way of explaining the existence of God. The downfall of both these arguments rests on commitment of fallacies and lack of sufficient evidence, as a result sabotaging their validity in the field of philosophy and faith.
The question of God’s existence has been debated through the history of man, with every philosopher from Socrates to Immanuel Kant weighing in on the debate. So great has this topic become that numerous proofs have been invented and utilized to prove or disprove God’s existence. Yet no answer still has been reached, leaving me to wonder if any answer at all is possible. So I will try in this paper to see if it is possible to philosophically prove God’s existence.
If God did not exist, he would not be the greatest being imaginable. He is the greatest thing imaginable. Therefore, he does exist. From this argument, God’s existence is viewed. as necessary (Ayer. A. J. 1973).
Rationalism and empiricism were two philosophical schools in the 17th and 18th centuries, that were expressing opposite views on some subjects, including knowledge. While the debate between the rationalist and empiricist schools did not have any relationship to the study of psychology at the time, it has contributed greatly to facilitating the possibility of establishing the discipline of Psychology. This essay will describe the empiricist and rationalist debate, and will relate this debate to the history of psychology.
Rationalism derives from the idea that accepts the supremacy of reason, as opposed to blind faith, and aims at establishing a system of philosophy, values, and ethics that are verifiable by experience, independent of all arbitrary assumptions or authority. The principle doctrine of rationalism holds that the source of knowledge is reason and logic. Thus, rationalism is contrasted with the idea that faith, revelation and religion are also valid sources of knowledge and verification. Rationalists, in this context, prioritize the use of reason and consider reason as being crucial in investigating and understanding the world, and they reject religion on the grounds that it is unreasonable. Rationalism is in contradistinction to fideism;
He further elaborates the topic by speaking on the idea that God is a Necessary being who has no cause but He is the cause of everything and He is the one who sustained this universe. In conclusion of the chapter, Rachels stated that idea of the existence of God will always remain in the contemplations of religious people and arguments used in this chapter needs more convincing evidence to prove the existence of God in this Universe. The chapter commenced by the most thought-provoking argument that “Is it Reasonable to Believe in God?”. The author to explicit this argument gives the result of Gallop polls and the polls conducted by Pew research center, which indicates that the underdeveloped countries are more religious than the developed countries and specifically in United states only 56% of the people consider religion as the most important part of their lives. Furthermore, the author discussed that no one detects the God existence by ordinary means, however, some people can have the sensation that God is somewhere around them no matter if they cannot see, heard or touch Him.
Brannigan, Jack. The Purpose of Life & the General Theory of Ethics. Nebraska, USA: iUniverse, 2005.
Rationalists would claim that knowledge comes from reason or ideas, while empiricists would answer that knowledge is derived from the senses or impressions. The difference between these two philosophical schools of thought, with respect to the distinction between ideas and impressions, can be examined in order to determine how these schools determine the source of knowledge. The distinguishing factor that determines the perspective on the foundation of knowledge is the concept of the divine.
Nash, Ronald H., (1999). Life‘s ultimate questions: an introduction to philosophy, Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530.
Rationalism and empiricism have always been on opposite sides of the philosophic spectrum, Rene Descartes and David Hume are the best representative of each school of thought. Descartes’ rationalism posits that deduction, reason and thus innate ideas are the only way to get to true knowledge. Empiricism on the other hand, posits that by induction, and sense perception, we may find that there are in fact no innate ideas, but that truths must be carefully observed to be true.
- - -. The Wisdom of Life. Trans. T. Bailey Saunders. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books, 1995.
Intellectual thought since Nietzsche has found itself one way or another addressing the death of God. Most of this thinking, however, has taken place from an atheistic starting point and has not considered its own presuppositions. It strives to find consistent outworking from these presuppositions and to eradicate the shadow of God carried over from the Enlightenment tradition because of its grounding in a theistic worldview. However, the outcome and implications of thinking after the death of God has been found hideous and many attempts have been made to transcend the absurdity there.
The concept of God can be a difficult one to grasp especially in today's world - a world in which anyone that believes in God is trying to define exactly what God is. To even attempt to grasp such a concept, one must first recognize his own beliefs in respect to the following questions: Is God our creator? Is God omnipotent (all-powerful) or omniscient (all-knowing) or both? Does God care? Is God with us? Does God interfere with life on earth? These questions should be asked and carefully answered if one should truly wish to identify his specific beliefs in God's existence and persistence.
God can be defined as a being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions (1). There are many people that do not believe in any religion. People who do not believe in a religion have no reason for believing in a God. People who do not believe in a God and argue against the existence of God are proving something that is completely false. There is a God for numerous reasons.
''The best way of approaching philosophy is to ask a few philosophical questions: How was the world created? Is there any will or meaning behind what happens? Is there a life after death? How can we answer these questions? And most important, how ought we to live?'' (Gaarder, Jostein 15)