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What, in your opinion, is the best or most effective argument FOR the existence of god?

I was so curious as to the opinions of others about this question, that I had to come back on here and ask (I have been gone from here for about a month and a half or so, have been extremely sidetracked and disillusioned; I keep jumping from different activities as my mainstays, so there for a while I was on here for 6 hours a day, then I got burned out and went to reading for several hours a day).

So what is the best or most effective argument for the existence of god? I would have to say that, in my opinion, I think it would have be the teleological argument, or the argument from design. Even with the challenge of having to explain *against* natural mechanisms of self-structuring (like Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking that Victor Stenger talks about in God: The Failed Hypothesis), or all of the flaws, errors, and irregularities in the "creation" itself, and its seeming randomness and majority lack of order. (I always find myself wondering about what we know must exist way out there in space; why create that?) This seems to go hand in hand with the constants argument (I know there must be some other name for it), you know, where they talk about the dials being just so that we're in a Goldilocks zone.

Anyways, what's your take on this?

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Permalink Reply by Jaume on September 29, 2009 at 10:30am

Depends on how you define "god". As a purely philosophical concept, its existence is evident enough ;-)

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Permalink Reply by Langston on September 29, 2009 at 10:57am

Kind of like "Well, there must be some such thing as god(s) or a god, I mean, there's a word for it so it must exist, right? Where would the word have come from if it wasn't real? Geez, GOSH, you're a freakin' idiot". Such peurile reasoning.

Anyways, enough being corny and attempting at humor; let me add a caveat that you should consider this question with your own personal definition of "god" filling in the context. So however you as an individual define it (he, she, it, everything-and-nothing, Absolute Unitary Being, etc.)

Jaume, I get the feeling you're saying god is imaginary. Either that or I'm really ignorant as hell or too oblivious to the obvious.

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Permalink Reply by Jaume on September 29, 2009 at 12:25pm

No reason to be so defensive - I didn't mean to offend. It's obvious enough that the "god" you're assuming in your initial post is what is usually refered to as the "creator god", "prime mover" or "divine watchmaker". And I can't think of a better argument for its existence than the theological one (which nevertheless has flaws of its own).

The reason that prompted my first reply was to point out that, lacking a proper definition of god, you'd better expect people to submit arguments for the existence of any kind of mythological or parodical god. Probably not what you're asking for - although I may be wrong here.

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Permalink Reply by Jaume on September 29, 2009 at 6:47pm

And I can't think of a better argument for its existence than the theological one

Oops! Funny slip of the tongue. Make that teleological, of course.

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Permalink Reply by Langston on September 29, 2009 at 7:08pm

Oh, I hadn't meant to imply you were being offensive, nothing of that sort. I was poking fun at myself, actually. And, well, theists, too, with that silly argument up front. But no, I was saying what I thought you were trying to get across, or that I didn't understand what you were saying because I either couldn't read the obvious or I was just unknowledgeable. I hadn't meant to imply that YOU were saying such things.

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Permalink Reply by AcesLucky on September 29, 2009 at 5:45pm

"So what is the best or most effective argument for the existence of god?" That would be God! The best argument ever would be for god to actually, in this real world, show up! To show up in such a way that his person to everyone would be indisputable as only a god can do. All he'd have to do is make himself known. Simple.

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Permalink Reply by OutlawGirl on September 29, 2009 at 7:25pm

The limitations of human minds and human senses. You can always argue that the reason we don't percieve gods is that we can't percieve gods. There could be a god standing over my shoulder right now and I wouldn't notice.

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Permalink Reply by Vitus on October 11, 2009 at 5:27am

X-rays we can't percieve too. But X-rays can expose photographic films. Untill we haven't photographic film we think about X-rays that it is fiction.
We can't prove x-ray existance without X-ray sensor.
We must deal with gods in the same manner.