Maybe I Think Too Much...Rational Theism

I guess I believe in something larger than myself.

Anyone reading the title of this blog might say, “well duh!?”, but this was not always a slam dunk statement. I was raised as a Catholic and the doctrine of that church never really took with me. I studied various religions during my drug-induced search for self awareness when I was in college…the closest I could come to anything that made sense was Buddhism, but I was enjoying the material world way too much at that time to give it up for meditation.

I am, at heart, a very logical person…Rationalist, Objectivist, Scientist. So after my brief exploration of Metaphysics, I fell back on my natural inclination to believe what I saw and leave the rest for some other time. It’s been twenty years and I have finally gotten around to fleshing out what I believe in and have a theology that makes sense to me.

I am a Gnostic.

Funny that I should find a belief system that is as out-of-touch with the mainstream as my politics are.

I am a Libertarian.

I guess I should be happy with my rejection of mainstream theology and politics…given my general lack of respect for the opinions and beliefs of most people. Still, I need to reconcile my religious beliefs with my Rationalist nature, so I am going to use this post to present some scientific/rational arguments for God…If you don’t think too much, stop here…you’ve go the gist of this post and everything that follows is just to satisfy those that are as anal-retentive as I am.

Some Arguments for God:

Thomas Aquinas – Based on the nature of cause and effect, the series of causes that we observe in the world of our experience must necessarily terminate in a First Cause, itself uncaused and unchanging, existing outside of time and space, and sustaining the physical universe in being from moment to moment… sounds a lot like God

William Paley (intelligent design) – Paley, and many others, argue that the complexity and orderliness of the Universe, especially on so vast a scale, exhibits strong signs of purpose. They follow that it is extremely improbable that anything other than an omniscient mind could have been its cause. This argument is only probabilistic, but having spent time in the study of Quantum Physics, I’m a real believer in probability.

G.W. Leibniz the guy who invented Calculus (contingency) – Leibniz argues that the world is contingent…that it could have been different than it is. He also states that the world could have not come into existence at all. It is incoherent to assume that the Universe always existed; it must, therefore have had a beginning, and that this beginning must have been caused by a being unlimited by time and space…sounds a lot like God.

I have only briefly introduced the arguments in this blog, but they are good arguments based on scientific principals and these philosophers and scientists are not alone in promoting them. I have been able to find essays in agreement with these theories, as well as other rational arguments in support of metaphysics by: Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Descartes, Locke, and Newton.

So I finally find myself being comfortable as both a scientist and a spiritualist…just of a slightly different stripe than most of you. That’s OK with me…I’ve always been a little out-of-step with the rest of the parade and I’ve grown to like it.

;-{)} Norm.