It is quite common for theists, when asked to provide some evidence for their belief in God, to reply, "why, the fact that we are here, that the universe exists, is more than enough evidence!".

I don’t know if most theists have really thought about what they mean when they say that. Think about it: when they say that the universe’s existence is evidence for a god, the implication is that, without a god, there could be no universe.

But now I ask the obvious, but not often asked question: why does the universe require a god to exist? The answer, I believe, is that you don’t know any other way, can’t conceive of any other possibility. You don’t understand how the universe could exist, except by divine creation. But isn’t that just the God of the Gaps fallacy, all over again? You don’t know, so it must have been God? Much like diseases were thought to be caused by demons before we knew about germs?

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