I had a thought – not one that’s going to convince Sye, of course, but anyway, here it is, for discussion:<\/p>\n
Sye’s proof appears to be:<\/p>\n
1. Logic cannot exist without God
2. Logic exists
Conclusion: God exists<\/p>\n
This is a deductively valid argument (necessarily, if the premises are true, so is the conclusion).<\/p>\n
Of course, for a “proof” you need more than validity. So what else? Self-evident premises? Well, if so, then Sye will say: my premises are self-evident (and of course to him they seem to be). So it is a proof!<\/p>\n
Trouble is, what he is really supposed to be doing is proving to us<\/span> that God exists. Now you cannot prove something to an audience in this way if the premises are not self evident to your audience.<\/p>\n Illustration: I can prove I just drew a three-sided figure:<\/p>\n 1. I just drew a triangle Have I “proved” to you my conclusion? Of course not. You still have no idea whether I drew a three sided figure or not. It might be evident to me that the premises are true. But of course the first premise is not evident to you. So the “proof” fails.<\/p>\n The same of course is true of Sye’s “proof” if it’s not self-evident to us that his premise is true. Which it is not.<\/p>\n Now, this is where Sye gets ingenious – he says, in effect, “It IS self evident to you – God HAS given you this knowledge – but you choose to hide it from yourself, being miserable sinners. That means I HAVE proved it to you that God exists.”<\/p>\n This is a key move for Sye, then. He relies on saying that we are somehow deluded.<\/p>\n Of course, someone<\/span> is deluded here about the self-evidence claim. The fact that even most Christians – many of whom I would guess are far more holy and virtuous than Sye – scratch their heads and say “But it isn’t self-evident!” (I include here even those who think the premise is true – they don’t think it’s self-evident<\/span>!) should certainly suggest to Sye that he’s the deluded one.<\/p>\n At the end of the day, all he’s got is an assertion – that we’re all (including the majority of Christians) deluded and that’s why we can’t see he’s got a proof.<\/p>\n That’s the sort of thing nutters always say, of course!<\/p>\n
2. Triangles are three sided figures
Conclusion: I just drew a three-sided figure<\/p>\n