A couple of weeks ago I attended the local multicultural festival and after consuming my first ever plate of Tanzanian food was walking through the crowd with a friend. As we walked past a stall we heard someone call out ‘there is no god’ and my friend responded ‘yes there is’! We promptly turned around and the debate began.
The common argument (at least in my experience) is that it is much easier to believe there is no god, than to believe there is. It is usually put on the person of faith, in this case the Christian, to prove that God does exist. The atheist isn’t required to prove that god doesn’t exist.
I’ve heard it contended that it takes just as much faith to believe there is no god, than to believe that there is. So why is the burden of proof placed on the Christian? What evidence can be provided to support the argument that there is no god?
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The argument that there is no God doesn’t need evidence. The argument that there *is* a God, does.
It’s simple – if I claim that there’s a purple, undetectable space alien on my shoulder, and it was up to you to *disprove* it, you couldn’t. It’d be impossible.
Hence, the claim “There is a God” is the claim you need to support; not the other way around. Christianity is asserting something, and non-Christianity isn’t.
Regardless of your stance on the issue, the burden of proof lies on the Christian; if it didn’t then it’s tacit admission that Allah, Vishnu, Zeus, etc. are as real as the Christian God.
I agree with Bob, in a way. But at the multicultural festival it was the other person who was asserting that there is no God. He made the claim, he should offer evidence in support of his claim. It doesn’t hold that his assertion is correct until a passer-by contends and proves otherwise.
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