Way of the Mind

A: Nothing can exist without a cause. The universe exists; what caused it? I say it was God!

B: OK, who caused God, then?

A: Nothing. God wasn’t caused or created; he always existed.

B: Then why can’t the universe have always existed?

A: That’s impossible, nothing can exist without a cause…

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

This is one of the most common examples of a fallacy called special pleading, that is, introducing an exception to a rule without justifying or proving that exception. Believers postulate God’s existance due to the fact that, according to them, everything needs a cause, or a creator, or a designer. Then what caused, created or designed God in the first place? Ah, that’s an exception. God always was. Why? Just because! And so on.

Unfortunately, arguing with someone who makes a claim like this and doesn’t see a problem with it is typically useless. We’re talking about a person who already “has” the answers, and will ignore any facts or logic contradicting them. You can’t argue with someone who sees no relation between truth and reality.

Fortunately, many believers aren’t like this, and would not use the argument above as proof of their god’s existence. Unfortunately, then we run into another problem: the more a believer is sophisticated and educated, the more he gets away from the absurd, Ray Comfort-like “proofs of God” (a banana?!? seriously…), and the closer he gets to admitting that he has no proofs or evidence at all, just faith… and if he still sees no problem with it, if he sees faith (complete disregard for facts and reality) as a virtue, then, again, there’s nothing that can be done for that believer.