[Wizdumb]

I've come up with a rationale which provides evidence in support of God's existence. I challenge you to disprove it.

The rationale is that want is the source of all things, including: needs, accidents, and random occurences. Because want is the source of all things, (what we might call) God must exist or have existed at one time.

Let me give you a few examples of how want is the source of things.

Accident: You go out digging for water, and you strike oil instead. You didn't want to find oil, but if you did not want to find water, you never would have found oil.

Need: If you want to survive, you need water, food, oxygen, etc.

Random Occurence: You want to go for a walk, cause it's a nice day. As you're walking down the street, a bird uses the bathroom on your head. If you did not want to walk down the street, you never would have gotten bird excrement on your head. Likewise, if the bird did not want to survive, it never would have eaten whatever it was that's waste product is now on your head.

A few things you have to understand. There are different kinds of wants. Wants of the mind, and wants of the body. You could also argue there are wants of the soul or emotional wants. When your body wants to eat, you get hungry. If your mind says no, sometimes it overpowers your body. Also, when two wants conflict, like in the case of rape, the more powerful want, or more powerful will, prevails.

If everything comes from want, it means our universe, and life as we know it, comes from want. It also means existence itself comes from want. As we all know, wants require living creatures (rocks do not have wants). Which means, if all things do come from want, (what we might call) God is responsible for us being here and, of course, exists or existed at one time.

So, I challenge you to prove there is even one thing in existence which does not come from want.

[Tormod]

Originally Posted by Wizdumb

So, I challenge you to prove there is even one thing in existence which does not come from want.

The Magellan Galaxy.

[rockytriton]

Originally Posted by Wizdumb

So, I challenge you to prove there is even one thing in existence which does not come from want.

Who wanted God to come into existence? We didn't exist, so it couldn't have been us.

[infamous]

Originally Posted by Wizdumb

I've come up with a rationale which provides evidence in support of God's existence. I challenge you to disprove it.

.

I am also a believer Wizdumb but the scientific method works the other way around. Challenging someone to disprove something is useless when we all are looking for facts to base our beliefs on. The one mistake most believers make is trying to prove their faith to others. Faith needs no proof, if it did, it wouldn't be faith. Like I said, I believe in God, for me this faith is a very personal thing. I can't explain it to others and I certainly can't prove it. Likewise, I can't insist that someone needs to disprove the existence of God to in effect, prove me wrong.

BTW, welcome to Hypography Wizdumb, you'll find many interesting topics to discuss so climb aboard.....................enjoy

[Eclogite]

Originally Posted by Wizdumb

So, I challenge you to prove there is even one thing in existence which does not come from want.

I think the rebuttals given above are sufficient, but you started me thinking in a particular direction.

First: your focus on the power of 'wanting'. This makes a lot of sense and seems to me to be another way of describing the 'drive' of living organisms to feed, to reproduce, to survive, and, in higher organisms to love and to invent and to create works of art and to discover things about the Universe.

Now a problem arises here, because this 'wanting' is an attribute of living things. Yet we often project this onto non-living things. (e.g. the oxygen atom 'wants' to fill its outer shell of electrons). Tormod has pointed out the illogic of this by citing the Magellanic Clouds.

Yet there are points when life arose from non-life, and more especially when consciousness arose from non-consciousness, when 'wanting' becomes a potent and literal part of reality. Perhaps, if we are to ever fully understand how these transitions took place we may need to use a combination of faith and science.

[alxian]

intelligences far more complex than we will have their wants as well

no matter how complex the system simple analogues to 'wants' will be found.

[pgrmdave]

"Wanting" is more a function of evolution. Assume that there are two groups of rabbits, one who 'wants' to survive, by eating, drinking, keeping themselves safe, etc. And another who doesn't 'want' at all. Which one is going to survive and breed? Only the ones who 'want'. Thus, wanting will, by necessity, be bred into all future generations, and not wanting will be eliminated.

[infamous]

Originally Posted by Eclogite

Perhaps, if we are to ever fully understand how these transitions took place we may need to use a combination of faith and science.

This process has always been at work, before facts are known to science there must exist a faith that these evidences are there to be found. This gives birth to the investigation which in turn filters out the truths from the nontruths. Taken to the extreme, science will eventually define the substance of faith.

[C1ay]

Originally Posted by Wizdumb

As we all know, wants require living creatures (rocks do not have wants). Which means, if all things do come from want, (what we might call) God is responsible for us being here and, of course, exists or existed at one time.

So, I challenge you to prove there is even one thing in existence which does not come from want.

Rocks

[Eclogite]

Oh, dear. I have a sinking feeling that this may read like a "Now I'm going to blow my own trumpet" kind of a post. Bear with me,

Originally Posted by infamous

before facts are known to science there must exist a faith that these evidences are there to be found.

Total agreement. I said that a little more expansively (and I thought quite elegantly ) here: http://hypography.com/forums/showpos...&postcount=291

Originally Posted by prgrmdave

Thus, wanting will, by necessity, be bred into all future generations, and not wanting will be eliminated.

This is what I was driving at in my prior post when I talked about the various 'drives' of living things. It seems to me that this 'wanting' is very much about natural selection in action. I am interested in wizdumb's response to that notion.