In this post I am going to be arguing that the concept of God is part of the common sense. At the outset I want to make it clear that I am not going to be attempting to make the ontological argument. I do not believe the demonstrable universality of the concept of God in the human psyche necessarily requires the real existence of God (Though I do think it is the best explanation for it). However, I will be arguing that the universal existence of “the God concept” does indicate that that an intuitive knowledge of God is part of the common sense; and, once again, I am going to be using Kant’s criteria of universality and necessity to establish it.
First, universality. I note that the God concept is universal. In all cultures and in every era of human history mankind has had the concept of a God as a part of their intellectual equipment. Early theories of the evolution of religion asserted that the belief an many gods came first and then monotheism. More recent discoveries have turned this notion on its head. We know know that there is a memory of the “sky God,” — a single creating God — in every culture. It now is generally accepted that the concept of a God came first and polytheism later. As a Christian theist I find this very important since it supports to the Christian narrative. But for the purpose of exploring intuitive knowledge I only note the universality of the concept.
It seems empirically verifiable that the concept of God is firmly embedded in the human psyche. Any alien observing us for would report it as one of the distinctive marks of the human race. Even atheists are familiar with the concept though they fight against it.
One of the things I like to ask atheists is, “When or why did you become an atheist?” I’ve met a few that were raised in atheist homes, but most tell me a story of their conversion or they give me some reasons why they have rejected theism. I then go on to point out that this lends support to a favorite theory of mine, that atheism is a learned way of thinking indigenous to cultures touched by the enlightenment tradition. In other words, atheism is clearly a social construct.
Historically speaking, atheism and agnosticism were viewed as aberrations until the middle of the nineteenth century. And when Soviet society tried to use their educational system to stamp out theism they found the God concept kept popping up even among children who had known only atheism. Obviously it is hard to educate away our common sense, though our secular universities do a very good job.
Conversely, the “God concept” is universal and a clear part of the common sense, or our intuitive knowledge. Those who posit a materialist universe must find this odd. In my conversations with atheists they often speak disdainfully of what they refer to as “the god of the gaps” mentality among believers. But isn’t it interesting that throughout human history people in every culture have responded to the gaps exactly the same way, by positing a God (or later, gods)? How do they explain this? Isn’t it surprising to find that widely disparate people groups — separated by time, geography, language and culture — keep coming up the the very same solution when confronted with cosmological and moral questions? Why is that?
Were the God concept not intuitive you would think that we would be able to find a group of people somewhere who came up with a different answer for the gaps in our knowledge, or a tribe that has never even considered the possibility of a God. Indeed, in the nineteenth century some skeptics thought that we might discover such a tribe, but no such tribe has ever been found. How odd, if the materialist are correct, that we have never found a people without the concept of God, especially since such a being is completely outside of our experience in the material universe.
As material beings we have only known mortal beings with material existences like our own. And yet we propose a being unlike ourselves; immortal, invisible — and in the case of the Christians, a completely unexplainable triune God. Why would we choose to fill the gaps by proposing the existence of a spiritual being so separated from our experience and so unlike ourselves?
Now I anticipate some will say that we create God in our own image, that we project our own faces, greatly enlarged, upon the empty canvas of the universe because of our need to explain things. Be careful with that one. This argument actually helps me establish the second element needed to demonstrate the intuitive nature of the God concept; the necessity of God.
But let’s assume that we do have a need — or a desire — to fill in the gaps. Doesn’t this need or desire say something about the way we think? Why do we think we have to fill the gaps in our knowledge, and why is God always the answer we turn to? Kant’s second test, necessity, comes in here. It seems self-obvious to me that if not taught to do otherwise human beings have a compulsion to fill the gaps with God, and the necessity of the God concept can be found in another basic human need; our need for meaning and purpose.
No human society will hold together for very long when people conclude that there is no meaning and purpose for their lives. However, meaning and purpose are not possible in a real sense in a materialistic universe. Human beings don’t seem to do well when they view themselves as cosmic accidents. So if there is no God natural selection has played a dirty trick on us. We have evolved to the place where we require meaning and purpose, but we live in a chance universe that does not allow for the existence of such things. So perhaps theism is the only thing protecting us from hopeless hedonism, nihilism and solipsism (Which to me, are the only reasonable options once a person rejects the God concept).
Let me close by citing a final bit of anecdotal evidence. Helen Keller’s teacher, Annie Sullivan, was a Christian. Some time after she had managed to figure out a way of communicating with Keller she decided she should have some religious training, so she brought in an evangelist so that she could communicate the gospel to her pupil. After hearing about God for the first time, Keller, who had knowledge of the world only through her sense of touch and smell said this, “Thank you for this information. I’ve always known that someone like this must exist, now I know his name.” How did she know?
Mark,
Have you read any of Alvin Plantinga’s work on epistemology?
By: fiester25 on August 3, 2007
at 2:24 pm
The only thing I’ve read of Plantinga is his personal testimony in the book, Philosophers Who Believe. His name has come up in my running debates at differ honestly.
By: markcarlton on August 3, 2007
at 2:53 pm
Plantinga has done a lot of work on epistemology. I think that a lot of what you’re saying here fits really well with his work.
By: fiester25 on August 3, 2007
at 11:44 pm
Over at differhonestly someone said they thought I must have read him. It sounds like I should. Could you recommend a book?
By: markcarlton on August 4, 2007
at 10:06 pm
Warrented Christian Belief is pretty good. It takes quite a bit of work to get through it.
I would suggest starting with some of the articles on his website.
http://www.homestead.com/philofreligion/Papersbyplantinga.html
By: fiester25 on August 6, 2007
at 11:25 pm
Thanks, Fiester, I will be checking out the articles you linked, and when I get time I may even wade through the book.
By: markcarlton on August 7, 2007
at 4:12 pm
Pastor Mark
The 4 philosophical- epistemological articles make interesting reading.
You may also wish to note 2 Scriptural arguments for the existence of God:
1 That knowledge of God is inborn in all humans:
‘ For the truth about God is known to them instinctively.God has put this knowledge in their hearts.’ Romans 1:19.
2 That nature itself is enough evidence of the existence of God:
‘ From the time the world was created,people have seen the earth and sky and all that God has made.They can clearly see the invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature.So they have no excuse whatsoever for not knowing God’. Romans 1:20.
The Bible is the specific Christian revelation of God’s existence,will,plans and purposes.
Tunji
By: tunji on May 10, 2009
at 12:32 pm
Once again, Tunji, an excellent post. Very well said.
By: markcarlton on May 16, 2009
at 6:32 pm
First off, fantastic article. I have been reading material related to this and about this concept now for a while. It has to be one of my favorite topics to discuss with others and I find it fulfilling. I happened to have stumble upon this while looking for the name of a theory about common sense in the belief of God. It states the outcomes for belief in God and no belief and if there is a God or not.
Believe in God and He exists: Eternal life in Heaven
Believe in God and He does not: Rot in the ground
Do not believe in God and He exists: Hell for all time
Do not believe in God and He does not exist: Rot in the ground
The best you can attain with no belief is the worst you can get with faith, so again, its common sense to believe in God, along with all your fantastic observations of we as a people.
So thank you very much and if you happen to know the name of that concept I would be very happy if you could refresh my memory.
By: Ben on June 6, 2009
at 5:43 am
Thanks, Ben. I’m glad you found the site and I appreciate your kind words. The argument you are referring to is a variation of what is known as Pascal’s Wager. It argues that all things considered, faith is a more reasonable choice than unbelief. Atheists have all sorts of “rebutals” to this argument, but I have not found any of them compelling. If you use it, plan on running into things like orbiting tea pots, flying spagetti monsters, etc. Perhaps you already have. Take care and thanks for reading.
By: markcarlton on June 6, 2009
at 4:41 pm
Has it ever occured to you that the “God concept” may have been created as a moral standard that when put into the form of an all seeing higher power that will punish you with eternal hellfire is more intimidating and likely to scare people into believing it? Fear is not Love, why would a loving god want you to fear him?
Also, we are raised to believe in the existence of God so it’s only ingrained from repeatedly being forced into our heads as young, unintelligent children. I mean, if you’re raised to believe that black people are the devil and that belching at the dinner table is exceptable then you’re going to believe that for a long time, possibly forever since this is America.
By: Matt on July 23, 2009
at 5:56 am
Hi Matt. Of course it has occurred to me that the God is a social construct. Let me explain why I reject this explanation. The God concept is universal (i.e. it exists in every culture and in every age) This suggests that it is more than a social construct. Going back to Kant; the universality and necessity of the God concept suggests that it is an innate knowledge. Also, I do not accept that we believe in God (I took the liberty of editing your post and capitalizing God) because it is ingrained and forced into our heads as young, unintelligent children. The Communist experiment with atheism would seem to refute that theory. Even with enforced atheism from the cradle the God concept kept popping up. I would even suggest that you have had trouble getting rid of the concept even though you have consciously rejected it.
Matt, there may very well be a naturalistic explanation for the existence of the God concept. But I do not think the theory that it is a social construct fits the facts. What we believe about God or a particular god might be socially constructed. I think such particulars generally are. But the particulars seem to be nothing more than an attempt to given definition to a preexisting concept.
Finally, I’m troubled by your concept of God. The God I worship is a God who, “takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked,” and who is so concerned that people no be punished with eternal hell-fire that he sent His son into the world to save them from it. As Jesus said, “God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” So I nothing of this god of yours.
In reading your description of God I am remined of the title of a very good book, “Your God is too Small.” Matt, the God of the Bible has many attributes other than love. It is one of these other attributes — His justice — that causes us to fear Him. This was what Thomas Jefferson was speaking of when he said, “Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever.”
Matt, were God as you describe Him — only a God of love — then no one would need to fear Him. But the creator and sustainer of the Universe is also just. The scriptures teach, and it is reasonable to assume, that our sense of justice — a sense of justice that you yourself appeal to in your post — is shared by the God who created us. So let me suggest that our fear of God comes from our own sense justice — and the guilt we feel because we know we fall short of it (I’m sure that even as one who rejects God you feel guilt from time to time). Thanks for your contribution.
By: markcarlton on July 23, 2009
at 3:18 pm
I agree with some of your statements, and please do not think that I am anti-God or anything. I am simply against conformed reiligion because it teaches people what one other person believes and their interpretations, that is why there are about a thousand different versions of the “Bible” and evern more seperate concepts. I am agnostic, therefore I believe in a higher power, just not the common god or religion. I don’t rely on anyone else to tell me what to believe, because, I believe, their opinions are as skewed as any because information mutates the further it travels. I’ve weighed the facts and the pros and cons to religion and it seems that religion is usually something for desperate people to fall back on feel accepted. It feels good for people to believe something that everyone else believes, religion is a fashion statement for most people. It’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it is.
I’m a person who studies sociology and psychology and am interested in religion as a main topic, I’m even taking classes on it in college. I like to debate it and interpret people’s beliefs and expand my basis of knowledge to better make my decision based on a possibly different alternative and what I already believe.
By: Matt on July 29, 2009
at 4:09 am
Matt, I appreciate your post, though I am not sure what you mean by “conformed religion.”
I agree with your observation that there may be a thousand interpretations of the Bible. However, I do not accept your unspoken premises or the conclusions you draw from this phenomenon. I’m sure you know that not all opinions (on any subject) are equal. So why should the same not be true of the various interpretations of scripture?
It all comes down to the hermeneutic one uses. Using the old grammatical interpretation –, which we all generally use when we interpret literature or even oral communication — people will generally come to the same interpretation of a given written or spoken word. This is not to say that there is never confusion or misunderstanding or misinterpretation. For example, you correct judged that I had misunderstood your earlier post, and you gave me additional information so that I would better know where you are coming from. In my international travels and ministry I have seen this normal method of interpretation well work cross culturally. There are certainly many things in a culture that do not communicate well to another culture. However, it is amazing how much does, even deep abstract or philosophical concepts.
I also reject what I think is your assumption, that the thousands of Biblical interpretations means we can not know which, if any of them, are correct. To say this about any other piece of literature (a letter from you parents, for example), would be absurd. So why should we assume that the Bible is any less understandable? After all, the authors of scripture — like the writers of other literature — were attempting to communicate with their readers, not confuse them. Most of the time they wrote in plain prose, sometimes in poetry or some other literary genre. But when we make allowance for poetic, figurative or even apocalyptic language — as we do in our normal reading and talking — we can generally figure out what they were trying to say to their original readers.
While I understand postmodernism, I think that saying the intent of the author can never be discerned from a given text is to cast questions on our ability to communicate verbally with one another at all. If so then we are both wasting our time trying to communicate with each other in this exchange of posts.
I also think there is merit in what you say about religion, generally speaking. But I don’t see Biblical Christianity as a religion in the sense of a man made social construct. The main reason is that Christianity’s truth claims are not based on a body of passed down teaching, but on an historical event (the resurrection) which can be examined using tools such as the legal/historical method to either validate or discredit its claims. In this Christianity is unlike other religious or philosophical systems. Thus, I like the 19th century distinction between man made and revealed religion.
Moving on, let me explain the purpose of this particular series of posts (Christian Epistemology). I began (but did not complete) this series because of my conviction that the gospel confronts the world at an epistemological level and purposes another way of knowing truth which challenges the validity of the world’s epistemology. So I began, not with those things we know because people have taught them to us, but on those things that we know intuitively. Theologians call this “natural revelation,” and philosophers speak of the moral aspect of this intuitive knowledge as “natural law theory.” I am , but what do we know that no one taught us, what J. Budziszewski refers to as, “What we can’t not know.”
Let me spend a few sentences on your observations about religion, and why people turn to to. I agree with much you have said. For example, I appreciated your “fashion statement” observation. Very well said. I may use it myself sometime. It really creates a wonderful word picture that perfectly describes many peoples’ religious faith, including the faith of many peoples’ Christianity.
However, I think you have committed a logical fallacy. You stated what you see as the reasons many people turn to religion. I agree. But this does not prove that their religion is therefore invalid. To say this is to commit the Genetic Fallacy. The GF is a form of the Reductive fallacy. This fallacy is committed when a person claims that something is nothing more than its origins. Freud committed this fallacy in his argument — similar to yours — that religion merely is a crutch. This may be true. But it does not follow that a person’s need for a crutch means that crutches do not exist.
Finally, I appreciate you last paragraph. We share a common interest. I am fascinated with the human animal, and I would not be blogging were I not, like you, interested in other’s beliefs. Also, I am always seeking to expand my basis of knowledge. Thanks again for your contribution to the discussion.
By: markcarlton on July 29, 2009
at 5:24 pm