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George Berkeley And David Hume's Argument For The Existence Of God

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Many philosophers have argued and defined what it means to exist in order to prove or disprove the existence of God. George Berkeley, a Irish philosophers argues for the existence of God. The existence of a great perceiver causing ideas in our minds. On the other hand, David Hume, a Scottish philosopher is a skeptic, he argues to undermine religion, critiquing that religion can have harmful consequences on society. These empiricists argue to establish or dismiss religion because it sets universal notions in which it operates as part of society’s morality.
George Berkeley and David Hume appeals to set up the foundation for morality by addressing religion and questioning the existence of God. Berkeley’s arguments are similar to that of theistic …show more content…

Therefore, Hume’s argument proves to discredit the existence of God. Our simple ideas are formed on the operations of our mind and that the complex idea of God is almost non-existent.
In the Dialogues Philo, who is also a skeptic, challenges the existence of God. Philo argues that our ideas are produced by experience and that we have no experience of divine attributes. Therefore, we have no idea of the nature of God. We can only conclude that he exists because of the universe but we don’t know anything beyond that. Philo also states that you cannot make an analogy between human artifacts and the universe because the resemblance is far fetched. Hume supports Philo’s argument when he makes an analogy to a house in which we can conclude an architect or a designer because we have experienced the effect. But the same analogy cannot be made between the universe and the existence of God because our experience of this effect is concluded from a small experience and is applied to the whole universe. We cannot know God’s nature or his attributes from a finite set of experiences because God himself is …show more content…

The cosmological argument states that the first cause is God and therefore, he created the universe. Philo and Hume argues against this point, stating that, if the universe is analogous to human artifacts then we can infer that the design of the universe is a group project rather than only God himself. Usually, a human creation requires many intelligent creators so therefore, the creator of the universe must consist of various intelligent designers. Additionally, Philo emphasizes that the evidence provided by the universe supports many analogies and not only the analogy from design.
Last argument that Hume critiques is the ontological argument. It states that God is a perfect being. He is ‘that being than which no more perfect being can be conceived’. So he cannot possess anything but perfect properties. Since the property of not existing would be an imperfection, God cannot possess it. Therefore, he must exist. An obvious argument that arises from the ontological argument is, if God is actually a perfect being. By looking at the inferences from the nature of the universe we come to the problem of

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