Why it Can’t Be the Case that the Plausibility of God’s Existence is Zero Almost Surely

My critique of Dr. James A. Lindsay's, mathematician and author of God Doesn't; We Do, argument that the plausibility of God’s existence is zero almost surely is below:   

Given our background knowledge about the state of the world, God is the best explanation for motion in the universe; the finely tuned universe and everything in it; the existence of objective morals and duties; and consciousness. If God is the best explanation for these things then God’s existence is very likely. Since God’s existence is very likely, it can’t be the case that the plausibility of God’s existence is zero almost surely. If God is the cause of motion in the universe; the finely tuned universe and everything in it; the existence of objective morals and duties; and consciousness then God can’t possibly be an abstract object as abstract objects have no causal power.

The Argument from First Motion:

1. Some things are changing.

2. Whatever is changing is being changed by something else.

3. The prime mover can be either A) just potential, B) a mix of potential and actual, or C) just actual.

4. The prime mover is pure actuality.

5. Therefore the prime mover is pure actuality.

Experience shows that contingent material objects like people, trees, cars and stars are caused to change by something else. However, this chain of contingent cause and effect can’t go back to infinity because if there is no necessarily existing agent/object that is pure actuality to actualize everything that is a mix of potential and actual then everything in the chain of causality will cease to change and exist. However, since there is change and motion in the universe there must be a prime mover that is pure actuality. Since all material objects in the universe are changing and appear to be contingent it is improbable that the prime mover is a material object. However, God is said to be a necessarily existent, immaterial mind and so is more likely to be the prime mover with pure actuality.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause of its existence.

2. The universe began to exist.

3. Therefore the universe has a cause of its existence.

The Argument from First Motion deals with a potential eternal universe, but current scientific research shows that the universe has existed for ~13.7 billion years and arose out of the big bang and so it not eternal. This means, most likely, that the universe had some sort of cause for its existence. It is very, very, very unlikely that the universe popped into existence uncaused out of nothing as nothingness has no causality. Also, it would be strange that nothingness causes something to pop into existence only once every 13.7 billion years-or-so; after all we don’t observe mountains, planets and people just popping into existence uncaused.

Another naturalistic explanation for the origin of the universe, that the laws of nature caused the universe to come into being, is implausible because laws of nature are abstract objects that can’t, in of themselves  cause anything—abstract objects are causally inert. Another implausible explanation is that subatomic particles and natural laws caused the universe to come into being. This explanation is implausible because everything we can see with our eyes has a cause of its existence, and even microscopic things like the elements didn’t exist prior to the big bang, so necessarily existent subatomic particles would fly in the face of what we know about the universe. Even natural laws seem to be contingent in that they could easily be different than they are. Positing subatomic particles and natural laws as the necessary entities that caused the universe to coming into being is also un-parsimonious as we would need to assume that there are physical objects and abstract objects that need to exist necessarily in order to be the cause of everything else.

On the other hand, positing God as the transcendent being that exists necessarily is more plausible because an un-embodied mind has no parts that need to be formed or created and needs nothing in order to exist. Positing God is also more parsimonious as we need to assume that only one necessary being needs to exist in order to cause everything else to exist.

The Teleological Argument:

1. The fine tuning of the universe is due to either physical necessity, chance or design.

2. It is not due to physical necessity or chance.

3. Therefore, it is due to design.

Observations about the universe show that the cosmological constants are exquisitely fine tuned and that if many of them were only slightly different than they are then the universe would be devoid of stars, planets and life. Oxford physicist Roger Penrose calculates that the odds of the special low entropy condition having arisen by chance alone in the absence of any constraining principles is a least as small as about one part in 10^10(123) in order for the universe to exist. It is very, very, very improbable that the fine tuning that we see in the universe arose by physical necessity or chance. Positing an agent, such as God, who designed the universe in such a way so that life could arise, is much, much, much more plausible than naturalistic alternatives.

The Axiological Argument:

1. If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist.

2. Objective moral values and duties do exist.

3. Therefore, God exists.

Certain propositions such as, “It is wrong to murder innocent people,” “Raping and torturing little children is wrong,” and “It is good to help someone in need,” just seem to be objectively true no matter what a particular culture says. It is extremely difficult for naturalism to account for the existence of objective morals and duties, but they can be accounted for in the nature of God’s being.  

The Argument from Consciousness:

1. Genuinely non-physical mental states exist.

2. There is an explanation for the existence of mental states.

3. Personal explanation is different from natural scientific explanation.

4. The explanation for the existence of mental states is either a personal or natural scientific explanation.

5. The explanation is not a natural scientific one.

6. Therefore the explanation is a personal one.

7. If the explanation is personal, then it is theistic.

8. Therefore the explanation [for the existence of mental states] is theistic.

If matter is all that exists in the universe then we would expect more complex arrangements of matter as time goes by, but consciousness coming out of non-consciousness is extremely unlikely. It is much more plausible to say that the consciousness that we see on earth arose from the conscious mind of God.

As we can see from the arguments I’ve presented, God is the best explanation for motion in the universe; the finely tuned universe and everything in it; the existence of objective morals and duties; and consciousness. Naturalistic explanations for these things range from implausible to extremely implausible. Since God is the best explanation for these things it can’t be the case that God’s existence is zero almost surely. God’s existence is very likely.