On Being an Atheist

Response to “On Being an Atheist”

In the article “On Being an Atheist,” H.J. McCloskey suggests that the theist’s arguments are “proofs” which do not provide definitive evidence for the existence of God, so therefore, they should be abandoned. There are different types of arguments, such as the ontological argument, cosmological argument, teleological argument and moral arguments, which are rationally convincing to everyone that God does exist. These arguments will attempt to show that there is reason enough to believe that there is a God and He does exist. However, these arguments will not show definitive evidence of such. There are also several approaches that provide a solid argument about the existence of God. These approaches are the best explanation approach, the cumulative case approach and the minimalist concept of God. These approaches provide evidence that make a good case that God does exist but does not provide definitive evidence that he does exist. These different types of approaches use concurrence to bring about a very strong case that God does exist. Concurrence is when you take a lot of evidence and put it all together to make a good solid case. When all the evidence from these different approaches is put together, there becomes a good solid argument for the existence of God. One has to be able to make their own decision as to whether or not they believe that God does exist or not. These arguments and approaches will help one to make a decision on this subject (Evans, 1982)

McCloskey claims that the “mere existence of the world constitutes no reason for believing in the existence of such a being (McCloskey, p. 63).” The cosmological argument infers that the existence of God comes from the existence of the cosmos or the universe. There are different versions of the cosmological argument. The temporal version claims that the universe had a beginning. For the universe to have a beginning, the beginning had to have a cause. God...