Critique of the ideas for the Existence of God - 1100 Words

Critique of the ideas for the Existence of God For thousands of years the idea of God have been questioned and proposed by philosophers, scientists and scholars alike. Many have argued for and against its existence and it’s still a subject of heated debates in the present day. Since God is a notion about an entity that was never seen or heard from by anyone, it has been a strenuous struggle to substantiate his existence. Yet, great philosophers have always found a way to validate the idea of God through their own way of reasoning. The philosophical discussions about God’s existence began with pre-modern philosophers such as Plato, Saint Augustine, and it was further examined by modern philosophers such as Descartes etc. In this essay I†¦show more content†¦However much they may lack form, and however great may be their propensity not to exist, nonetheless some form remains in them so that they do exist in some way..† so this should be enough of a proof that â€Å"all good things come from God, since everything that exists – whether that which has understanding, life, and existence or that which has only life and existence, or that which has existence alone – is from God.† (Williams, 1993, p.53) In other words all finite things owe their existence to God and these things in turn must be good, since they are creatures of God. To demonstrate the goodness of God and its’ creatures, Augustine stretches the idea of lack of the good. Evil, he believes, is the privation of the good. Thus, evil is created by the absence of the good and by the absence of God. The conclusion is all-good and powerful God exists. Another major philosopher Rene Descartes who attempted to prove God’s existence wrote a book titled Meditations, which was composed of six essays, each of which tried to answer different philosophical questions about self-existence, human nature, distinction between body and mind and about existence of God, etc. The idea of God was so important to Descartes that he devoted an entire essay to the discussion and substantiating of God’s existence. In Meditations, similarly to Augustine, Descartes begins his evaluation of God by first proving his own existence, because how can he prove God exists if heShow MoreRelatedRene Descartes Ontological Argument957 Words   |  4 Pagesmetaphysical arguments of existence of man to his proofs for the existence of God are still discussed and debated today. 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